Today we'll be dissecting, so to speak, the structure of the human psyche, A.k.a. the
mind.
But first, it should be clear to everyone that the term brain and mind are very dissimilar.
Mind and brain are used interchangeably in our daily interactions.
However, in terms of studies & research, it is of the utmost importance to differentiate
the former from the latter.
The brain is constructed of physical matter.
I.E. blood vessels, nerves and layers intertwined, shielded by a skull.
When we say brain, we speak of what is physiological, organic.
On the other hand, the mind corresponds to what is psychic(I.E Psychology).
Picture the mind as an intangible veil of eletrical impulses generated by the brain.
It is a seperate entity, even from the soul.
As we go through the book, I'll be using the term psyche as referance to the mind, seeying
that psyche and mind relatively mean the same thing.
With this basic overview at hand, we could now proceed to the main premise of this book.
(the structure of the psyche).
Oftentimes, people wish they could die instead of getting constantly tormented by that annoying
chatter box lurking inside their heads.
But, if we look closely, objectively, you'll realize that your psyche, doesn't want to
shut up, because that stream of nonsense serves a great purpose.
A constant assessing, judging & classifying of people & things into certain categories.
I think, It does so to help you better grasp this chaotic world by converting what is unknown
& uncertain into something further intelligible.
Look around your room and distinguish one object that you do not yet know its name or
nature.
Undoubtedly none.
Whether you like it or not, the psyche's fate is to function daily, consciously or subconsciously
to break down what's going on around you.
The psyche's spontaneous reactivity to the external is not meant to make you miserable.
It is merely a natural tendency to search & explore the unknown.
The psyche does not interpret reality as it is but always in relation to us.
Everything you perceive from the outside world passes through your sensory devices.
Processed by the brain, the mind then weaves it with your memories, thoughts and feelings,
hence project a quote on quote subjective reality.
Imagine You and I contemplating the ocean at the moment.
The scenery might elicit joyfulness in you, whereas it might trigger sadness for me.
You see, the reality, the image was the same but our concept of it differed, seeying that
the view evoked dissimilar memories for both of us.
We experience not the external as a whole as much as a mere distorted subjective conception
of it.
In other words, the psyche's not a reflection of reality in actuality, but of man's position
projected onto the world.
Consciousness is more or less the same in every individual.
Every person, however, streams the world from his personal angle.
Hearing this concept, you might have grasped it one way, whereas another person on the
other side of the world, who's watching the same video, might've grasped it a totally
different way.
Consciousness operates in an inward motion.
It seems to pour the world into us through our sensory-devices.
Sense-perception signals that something pertains infront of us.
But its job is limited only to generating a field of awareness.
it cannot describe the nature or name of the things perceived.
The mechanism that tells us what things are elaborately is called apperception.
Sense-perception is classified more as physiological, connected to the brain.
Apperception on the other hand is sorted as a psychic process.
And unlike sense-perception whose function is quite obvious, Apperception has a more
intricate structure, in that its workings involve a harmonuous cooperation between other
sub-processeses.
To name a few, recognition, evaluation, the intuitive processes, the instinctual processes,
etc.
Now we're going to comment on each one of these apperceptive sub-processes individually.
Imagine, you're hiking a great mountain.
On your way upward, there were numerous plants of various peculiarities.
Suddently, you hear strange noises.
You look up and spot a bird hovering in the skies.
Your sense-perception has captured it.
But, how is it that you've recognized & named this object as a bird and not as a flying
car, a tree or a shampoo?
This is where the process of recognition comes into play, and it functions as follows:
Everytime you direct attention towards an object, your mind quickly dives into your
memory searching for old memory-images that may help you recognize the novel stimulus.
You didn't think of the bird as a tree because you already have past stored information justifying
what a bird should look like.
In contrast, a three-year old baby, who sees a bird for the first time, will surely be
able to see, to become aware of the flying bird(as an object) but he won't be able to
recognize it as a bird or animal because it's a new experience for him.
He will probably assume that it's just another kind of humans flying up in the air, owing
to the fact that his life up until this point revolved only around living indoors with people,
unexposed to outdoor objects.
Hence recognition (of new objects) is a psychic process.
It happens only when you do have at least a faint memory-image identical to the new
image perceived, or any other memory fragment containing some information that could help
you identify the object.
Here's an easier example:
Let's say you're a guitar player & a friend of yours is a pianist.
Let's assume also, that you have never seen a piano in your entire life.
You have zero memory-image of it, nor do you have the word piano in your vocabulary yet.
One day, your friend invites you in to see it.
He knows what a piano is but you, the first thing that came to mind is a load of questions
concerning this new object.
As he played a few notes on it, you might've been able to guess correct that it's just
another musical instrument like your guitar since it produces similar melodies, however,
the name of the object will remain a mystery until your friend names it for you.
Now, after aqcuiring this experience, the next time you see a piano, you'll be able
to name it as such, and recognize its purpose.
If, we suppose that you haven't gone through that first experience, the object(aka piano)
will remain unintelligeable until someone explains it to you.
The fact of the matter is, you cannot recognize the nature or name of new oncoming objects
unless you do have already a pre-established memory-image of them or until someone else
explains to you what that thing is, aka, through second hand experience.
Recognition can also be referenced as thinking.
A mental process that helps distinguish the nature of novel stimulus based on what the
person has seen before.
As a side note, next time you're onto reading a book, notice how your mind understands new
ideas.
It processes a new insight, then scans memory-images for relevant clues, facts, past experiences
that may help you grasp this new piece of information.
In case where you couldn't comprehend it, you're left intruiged, troubled or frustrated
as the insight remains an unfathomable mystery.
This is why the more experiences & knowledge you gain, the further you can link things
together & the better able you are at decoding the world.
Having touched a rough surface (of wood for example), here the word "rough" conveys the
feeling-tone the stimulus carries that was then sensed by me.
And thus prompted me to mentally judge & classify the material into a certain category (i.e.
among things that are rough)
Evaluation is the process of feeling.
After recognizing the object, the psyche evaluates its feeling-tone, and then shocks the body
to conceive emotions based on that assessment.
I'd guess that this process could be triggered after recognition, or function simultaneously
parallel to it.
Recognition scans the nature & name of the item, evaluation helps you feel the item.
Some people might question, "why do I need evaluation if I have recognized the thing
already?"
I personally think, evaluation is a mechanism by wich the mind is able to further identify
novel stimulus.
We understand people and things better especially when we feel emotionally connected to them.
Intuition is usually conceived as something somewhat esoteric.
But, in our day to day interactions, all of us inadvertantly verbalize at times what we
feel intuitively.
Allow me to clarify with a basic example: - At the sight of an unidentified flying object,
three people conveyed the following statements
The first one said "guys, I guess I saw a spaceship!"
The second said "I have a feeling that there's a rocket coming towards us"
And the last one "calm down, I Think it's just a bird"
These three statements convey an intuitive guessing of what the object might be.
The first person said he saw something.
He refered to his intuition as sense-perception, aka, the act of seeying.
The second however, engulfed by strong emotion, illustrated his intuitive guess as
a process of feeling.
And the third as rational thinking.
The problem here is not in whether or not they have made a guess, it's in the words
they used to verbalize their intuitive guess.
The intuitive process is not intertwined with sense-perception, and furthermore has nothing
to do with thinking nor with feeling.
Thinking is quite often slow, it takes time to ponder.
Conversely, Intuitive guesses, as I shall call them, are evoked instantaneously & spontaneously
at the sight of a novel occurence.
Intuition is some sort of clairvoyant mental ability that helps us guess or count the possible
outcomes of an event.
The reason why we confuse intuition with thinking & feeling is owing to the insufficient development
of our languages as Carl jung cited.
In addition, I would personally guess(intuitively guess), we confuse intuition with other mental
functions merely out of lazyness, or perhaps because the processes of intuitive guessing,
thinking, and feeling occur quite often simultaneously, leaving no time for us to differentiate between
each of them.
Volitional processes correspond to voluntary actions, emerging from free-will.
Volition is contrasted with instinctual reflexes that happen involuntarily, wich we're going
to see in a second.
This mechanism encompasses not only the ability to think up intentions within the psychic
realm, but also a second function that thrusts you to voluntarily act upon your willing to
crystallize it into the physical world.
When you deliberately intend to do something, and then willfully act upon that decision,
that is a display of volition or free will.
The opposite are actions originating from your instincts, like the fight or flight response
for instance.
Instead of you voluntarily choosing a course of action, the instinctual physiological response(a.k.a.
fight or flight) decides on your behalf and forces your body to react in a defined direction.
Imagine you're visiting in a graveyard.
And suddenly, you spot a creepy ghost walking by.
In such high pressure situations, Your survival instinct kicks in without delay and constrains
you to act thoughtlessly, either by screaming for help, sprinting, or getting paralyzed
altogether and fainting.
Instincts are primitive behavioral reactions innate in each and everyone of us.
Some of them of are inborn compulsive drives, like sexual drives for example.
Arguably, Although our instincts could be harnessed to some extent, for the most part,
when activated, they send signals to the brain that we cannot easily ignore.
And these electrical impulses are so strong that they oftentimes overwhelm the thinking
mind.
The author denoted that it's difficult to count a definite number of the instincts.
Neither do we have a distinct definition of them at the moment.
But, the only thing that's ascertained is that the instincts fall among physiological
functions.I.E. generated from the body & not the psyche.
But, nonethless they are connected to it in some ways as we will see in further videos.
So keep mind, volitional processes are psychological, instincts are more so physiological.
There exists two types of apperceptive processes.
Directed and undirected.
Both are contents of consciousness.
Directed conscious processes are named as such for they are rational, and can be consciously
diverted by attention.
like thinking & volition.
You could, most of the time, direct and freely chose your thoughts.
On the other hand, undirected conscious processes are irrational, and are unconfined by attention,
like dreams and fantasies for instance.
Conscious choices are the product of rational reasoning.
Dreams are the polar opposite, in that they're often arbitrary, uncontrolable, disorganized
visions.
Some people may exclaim: "aren't dreams considered unconscious?!"
To a fair extent, the answer is yes and no.
For the sake of conciseness, I can't further elaborate on this point as it will prompt
us a very long digression.
But, I will in the next video.
For now, a superficial definition should be sufficient.
The author considers dreams among conscious processes.
Here's why
He depicted dreams indeed as manifestation of unconscious psychic activity yet emerging
to the surface of consciousness.
And whatever passes into the realm of consciousness is hence considered one of its contents.
So, their origin is unconscious but their display is conscious.
As promised in the next one, we'll dive deeper into the nature & purpose of dreams & especially
the unconscious psyche.
Thanks for watching and see you real soon.