I See, A Tree

This question may well have been covered in The Mechanism Of Mind, however don’t have a copy any more and was looking for an answer.

Yesterday I went for a walk, sat by the river, looked across the river and saw a tree (this is a true story by the way, not a metaphor!) So I saw a tree and when I say I saw a tree I mean it in the everyday sense – I saw a thing with a trunk branches, not very many leaves etc etc .

1) Where did I see this tree ? Was it as Wikipedia seems to suggest caught by the retina and then converted into neuronal signals and then ‘seen’ in some part of my brain ?

2) At the same time – or roughly after – a seemingly different process started – I started having thoughts about trees – ‘Another month it’ll be covered in leaves” etc etc

3) What are the connections between these two processes.? The ‘seeing’ and the ‘thinking’ In terms of location do they inhabit different parts of the brain ? And if so what is the connection ? And in terms of the original signal is ‘thinking’ abstracted out of the visual signal after arrival - or is the original signal split into two different forms on arrival?

The reason I ask is from a value point of view. PO Appreciation is the highest form of value. If so I’d rather spend a few minutes appreciating a tree in the moment than being triggered into running down the same thought patterns . Are triggers automatic ? Obviously I could have deliberately interrupted the patterns but there is a time and a place and at that time and place I just wanted to appreciate a tree ! (the fact that it led to this train of thoughts is bye the bye!)

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Comment by Sinclair McLay on March 25, 2011 at 12:40: Cheers Kim – you have the gift (or well honed skill) of clarity! In an earlier post you talked about ‘perfect thinking’ – perhaps the better the thinker the less the thinking ? Dr De Bono once gave his definition of thinking was ‘thinking for a purpose.’ Sounds good to me. But what do we call the rest of the mental activity – background noise? Interminable chatter? To escape from that would be a form of freedom I suppose…

I did read Happiness Purpose many years ago and it helped me through a very difficult time in my life. I was lost in a maelstrom of belief systems – well just lost I suppose ! – and the books navigational aids – respect, dignity, humour and enjoyment – seemed not only eminently reasonable (obvious?) but were very beneficial. I wrote to Dr De Bono thanking him for the book and he wrote back saying he was delighted I had benefited from it and then he suggested I never get involved with the advertising industry. I don’t know why !– he didn’t know me and I never mentioned the subject in my letter - but I never did.

From memory is that not the book that mentions contemplation ? Which is close to what you were referring to ie living in the moment. Maybe some balance between the contemplative and the active? I do enjoy a bit of quiet depth but I also love the cut and thrust of speculation, inventiveness and conceptual flourishes (?!)

Speaking of which a wild hypothesis came to me when I was ruminating on the relationship between patterns in the visual lobe and the frontal lobe.

Apparently light has a wave component and a particle component – the so-called wave/particle duality…OK I may be about to make a fool of myself here but…

What if we call one a waveform and take the liberty of calling the other a bitstream. In an informational model they could be bundled together as a bitwave. OK now for the jump I have no right to make…What if the bitstream part of the bitwave is directly associated and goes directly to that part of the brain that is only found in the higher mammals which has an ability to crunch, process, decipher and receive bits of information ?

This has implications – especially as regards the tree! – but thought best to test it out before going any further…

Comment by Phil Bachmann on March 25, 2011 at 9:24: Hello Sinclair,

I don't know anything about lobes - I don't think Mechanism of Mind mentions them.

I think what de Bono was trying to do was present a number of models that demonstrate how the brain works - not provide a doctor's dissection of a human organ.

He then says well if the brain works like this then it makes perfect sense to introduce random words to stimulate creativity etc.

Comment by Sinclair McLay on March 25, 2011 at 8:48: Hi Phil thanks for your reply! Done a bit more research and think I can put the question a bit more clearly. First a bit of context – it is March here and the trees and relatively bare – but in a month or so shall be leafier.

OK from what I now understand when I looked at the tree I saw or visualized it in my occipital lobe.

Now first of all this took attention – ie I had deliberately directed my attention to the tree – and then ‘seen’ it in my occipital lobe.

Then I started to have thoughts about the tree – ie ‘it’s a bit bare now but in a month it will be leafier’

Presumably these thoughts were in my frontal lobe ?

So the question was about the relationship between the two and the nature of the signals and triggering.

Hope this makes more sense !

Comment by Phil Bachmann on March 25, 2011 at 1:38: Having read your post a bit better I'd like to adjust my answer to 2).

I thought you looked at the tree and said to yourself "soon the leaves will fall" but instead you said "..in another month it will be covered in leaves."

Now in the absense of further stimulation the brain is going to move along established paths. So when you think of the number one, your brain will tire of this and move onto something that you associate with one, say "two". This makes it easy for us to memorise songs.

It may have been that you looked at the tree and the natural progression in your mind was to move from a bare tree to one with leaves on it.

Comment by Phil Bachmann on March 24, 2011 at 20:48: Yes Sinclair it's in the Mechanism of Mind.

1) Not quite. The retina get stimulated which then stimulates part of your brain which then runs into (imagine rain running into a dry river bed) the concept of tree which is connected in your mind to the sound "tree". Your brain moves from one to the other because the active neurons get tired.

2) When another part of the brain has been recently excited it is kinda warmed up and ready to go. You may have been thinking of "Ahh where has my youth gone" then you see the tree and the because both areas of the brain are excited they then fire up a part of the brain that they are both connected to ie. "the tree will age". This then leads to "the tree will lose its leaves". Remember that active neurons are always tiring and so your brain keeps moving from one idea to the next.

3) 'thinking' is abstracted out of the visual signal.

Re: Are the triggers automatic: Yes - but you can always look at the tree with different pre-warmed-up-area in your mind so that you will get different automatic triggers.

- Looking at the tree while focussed on the random word "sunshine."

- Looking at the tree and thinking how a tree could be made "useful".

etc.

nb. I have written this reply authoritatively but really it's just my understanding of de Bono's book "Mechanism of Mind."