The classic Rubik’s Cube has a zillion different states. And yet some people can solve it in seconds by just seeing it for a moment.
How can you solve anything while seeing?
Close your eyes.
And the solution will be covered in darkness.
But so will the problem…
Do you see now?
Brain activity has an unmistakable signature: the firing of neurons, as brain cells relay information to one another through the triggered release of chemical neurotransmitters, which are received by the long, branching dendrites of neighbouring cells.
This microscopic ritual is distinctive, but it doesn’t belong only to neurons. Scientists have now found bursts of neuron-like activity in certain skin cells. (1)
Our brain thinks.
Our skin thinks.
Is there anything that does not think?
Interactions all around.
Can we dare to stay alone?
In the face of existence.
Can we not stay silent?
In the face of ignorance.
Can we dare to say I don’t know?
In the face of death.
Do we dare to deny life?
Be honest. See what I see.
A cosmos full of cowards.
Thinking…
Therefore, doing anything but being…
The left and right side of the brain are involved in different tasks. This functional lateralization and associated brain asymmetry are well documented in humans, but little is known about brain asymmetry in our closest living relatives, the great apes. Using endocasts (imprints of the brain on cranial bones), scientists now challenge the long-held notion that the human pattern of brain asymmetry is unique. They found the same asymmetry pattern in chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. However, humans were the most variable in this pattern. This suggests that lateralized, uniquely human cognitive abilities, such as language, evolved by adapting a presumably ancestral asymmetry pattern. (1)
The universe is symmetrical. Or so we think it should be. But why think something like that in the first place? Is it that symmetry is beautiful and we are naturally inclined towards admiring beautiful? Could it be that symmetry of also an inherent part of our nature and, this, we tend to adhere to theories which include it?
Our brain is asymmetrical. Or so we think because we see differences in our two hemispheres in our brain. But why think that in the first place? Differences are there, this is certainly. But what makes us look at those differences? What if by seeing things from another perspective? What if that other perspective shows as that symmetry is preserved at another level?
Which belief is going to prevail?
Think.
What do you want to see?
Do you feel safe within a symmetrical universe? Would you feel more creative in an asymmetrical one? What it everything is symmetrical because everything is not? What if everything is asymmetrical because there is no other cosmos where symmetry exists?
Think.
There is no symmetry in anything.
Until you see asymmetry.
And decide to create a mirror…
Drawing an object and naming it engages the brain in similar ways, according to research recently published in JNeurosci. The finding demonstrates the importance of the visual processing system for producing drawings of an object.
In a study by Fan et al., healthy adults performed two tasks while the researchers recorded brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging: they identified pieces of furniture in pictures and produced drawings of those pieces of furniture. The researchers used machine learning to discover similar patterns of brain activity across both tasks within the occipital cortex, an area of the brain important for visual processing. This means people recruit the same neural representation of an object whether they are drawing it or seeing it. (1)
We think what we see.
We speak what we think.
Draw a line.
Contain the cosmos on a paper.
And you will remain speechless.
Do you see?
We think what we speak.
We see what we think…
But who drew the first line? Who thought of that first thought? Who spoke the first words?
In the midst of silence, can you listen to yourself?
Stop looking.
In the void of everything, can you see anything?
Children may learn new words better when they learn them in the context of other words they are just learning – according to research from the University of East Anglia.
Eighty two children took part in the study. In two experiments the team taught them some new words for things they couldn’t name – such as honey-dippers and strainers. Dr Samuelson said: “We practiced these new words until they knew the honey-dipper was called a ‘zeb’ and the strainer was a ‘yok’. We then showed them a new thing – a bird toy – in the context of either the objects they knew well (a ball and a car) or things they had only just learned to name (the ‘zeb’ honey-dipper and ‘yok’ strainer).
“When we asked them to get the ‘blick’, they were good at linking this new word to the bird-toy when it was presented with the familiar things, and with the just learned things.”
But, after a five minute colouring break, the children were not so good at remembering what a ‘blick’ was when they had learned it in the context of objects they already knew. (and did better when they had initially leaned the word in the context of the less well-known things — the ‘zeb’ honey dipper and the ‘yok’ strainer). “We had expected that a stronger knowledge of familiar words would be better for learning new words, but we found the opposite was true” claim the researchers.
“It seems counterintuitive, but it is perhaps because the less well-known items don’t compete with the new words as much. If they learn new words in the context of playing with well-known items such as a ball, book or car, they don’t process the new word as much.” (1)
Remembering things. Learning new things. Forgetting others.
The best way to learn is to unlearn.
The best way to remember new things is to forget the old ones.
New things will then become old.
And soon, they will too be forgotten in the quest for knowledge.
Babies we will be once more.
To view the cosmos as it is.
At the moment we are old and die…
And for the first time we will see.
That this is not the first time we see…
