A History of Me

piero scaruffi

Origins

• I was born billions of years ago...

The Computer Age

• A digital world • We fear machines• Each generation has been afraid of the new

tools available to their offspring• We fear the way machines will change daily

life

The Computer Age

• We are a tool-making species. • And tools have always shaped the mind. • We are not the only tool-making species, and

we are not the only species whose "cognitive life" is shaped by tools.

• Even a spider, that has built a spider-web, will have a "mental" life that revolves around the spider-web.

The Computer Age

• Each new tool, whether it's fire or television, has shaped the mind of the humans who used it.

• Tools have "created" the mind as it is now. • That includes our "artistic" expressions

Mind

• Where does the mind come from? • Why do we think?

The Origin of Thinking

• Darwinian paradigm:– It must have evolved from something

primordial and it must have evolved because it had a useful function for survival.

– The most primordial mind one can think of is a mind that has very basic emotions, possibly only pain and pleasure.

The Origins of Thinking

• The evolution of emotions– Emotions evolved, as much as any other organ. – Emotions had an evolutionary value, as they

helped bodies survive– It is unlikely that humans are the only species with

emotions…– ...but it is likely that humans are the species in

which emotions evolved in the most spectacular way.

The Origins of Thinking

• The evolution of tools– Tools relieved us from many daily chores. – Our emotions had been invented to help cope with those

chores, but tools made them less and less necessary– Our mind was nonetheless still producing emotions, just

like the immune system is producing antibodies all the time

– Those emotions flowing through our mind eventually got organized, and yielded thought.

The Origins of Thinking

• The evolution of thought– Thought eventually yielded a continuous flow

of emotions and a concept of the self: consciousness was born.

– Consciousness was born because our mind had nothing to do most of the day, and that happened because we invented tools

The Origins of Thinking

• The evolution of thought– Co-evolution of tools and emotions– At the same time there was evolution of the

body– And several scientists would add evolution of

language and evolution of memes– They all evolved together (co-evolved). – It was evolution on several parallel tracks.

The Origins of Culture

• As tools became more and more sophisticated, we also started using them for thinking. For example, language. For example, writing. For example, music. For example, painting, cinema and comics.

The Take-over of the Mind

• We started identifying with our mind. • We are no longer bodies with some organs

that helped the body survive (including a mind) but minds that have a body

• If we transplant Helen’s brain to Jim, is Jim getting Helen’s brain or Helen getting Jim’s body?

The Mystery of the Mind

• So we started wondering where our mind comes from, not just where our body comes from.

• Little by little we have been able to rediscover our past, and understand how our mind was created, how "I" was created.

The Mystery of the Mind

• Unpleasant discoveries– The more we realize that we are mere accidents of

evolution. – We are not what we think we are: we do not think,

we are thought– We only see and hear and ultimately think what

makes sense in our ecological niche.– We are driven by the environment in what we do

and what we think

The Mystery of the Mind

• Unpleasant discoveries– Our mind is recreated all the time, whether we want it or

not. – The amount of control over our mental life is extremely

low– The brain works all the time, and most of the time we

don’t know what it is doing– Most of the cells of the body (including neurons) and

most of the connections between the neurons change in one year

Creativity

• Creativity is something we do because we have to do it.

• Our mind is continuously reshaped by the tools we invent, and continuously explores them.

• We are always creative or we are never creative: there is no difference between the two processes.

Creativity

• Our mind has no choice but to create meaning all the time out of the flow of emotions using the tools it has invented.

• We are both the creators and the products of our technology.

BibliographyDamasio Antonio: DESCARTES' ERROR (1995)Donald Merlin: ORIGINS OF THE MODERN MIND (1991)Edelman Gerald: NEURAL DARWINISM (1987)Gibson James Jerome: THE SENSES CONSIDERED AS PERCEPTUAL

SYSTEMS (1966)Jaynes Julian: THE ORIGIN OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN THE BREAKDOWN OF

THE BICAMERAL MIND (1977)Kauffman Stuart: THE ORIGINS OF ORDER (1993)Macphail Euan: THE EVOLUTION OF CONSCIOUSNESS (1998)Maturana Humberto: AUTOPOIESIS AND COGNITION (1980)Neisser Ulric: COGNITION AND REALITY (1975)Ornstein Robert: EVOLUTION OF CONSCIOUSNESS (1991)

BibliographyPenrose Roger: THE EMPEROR'S NEW MIND (1989)Pinker Steven: HOW THE MIND WORKS (1997)Searle John: THE REDISCOVERY OF THE MIND (1992)Stapp Henry: MIND, MATTER AND QUANTUM MECHANICS

(1993)Unger Peter: IDENTITY, CONSCIOUSNESS AND VALUE (1991)

Bibliography