TBI

 

 Much has transpired since the last blog of Aircooled Underground.  Apathy, Facebook, two works in progress, Son's wedding, grandson fun, family reunion, travel, illness, happiness, endless home repairs, canning, family illness, computer crashes, being out of range of cell and internet connections (a blessing!) and assorted moments of reading, thinking (habitual) and conversation. Oh, I forgot the most important, just plain forgetful!

With that said I will refer to the wonderful picture above. The PBY is on of my all time favorite aircraft and one I would have loved to have flown. 

This picture symbolized a wonderful opportunity for getting a few folks together and making up our own story of what the circumstances were of this situation and what may have happened later to the crew.  No holds barred! 

One can make a story of tragedy, comedy, hope, revelation, and so on. A picture, like this, is worth a thousand words. The question must be asked, "What thousand words?"  

What we can say for relative certainty is what can be described. Once we breach what is observably there then we cease reality and enter the smoky road of conjecture, extrapolation, inference, assumption, guessing, intentionality and a myriad other possible projections of the mind. In a word we leave what we can see and enter into the unreality of Fantasy.

Our mind is rapt with this ability to move  from the world of what is observed to that which is not observed except internally. It is called thinking. We use the inner illumination of thinking to create images in our mind. These may be of the past, of the present, and the future. Imagination; the process of us imaging in our mind based on our experience to re enact the past, deal with the present or make something of the future. A prediction.  

We can be stimulated by what we see or feel but what we draw on is a product of our physical, visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile experience. We can merely have an image of what might happen and have a physical response to it. Like being in the dentist office, for example.

If our experience is engineered, what then?  If you rely on image generation that is not your own, experiences that are not your own, how does that effect what you think, your thought?

Our brain, our instrument of thought is amazing but it is an odd binary affair. There is the unconscious;  the concrete brain. The primordial  brain that responds to all situations in an immediate and physical.way.  There is a firewall to this part of us. Then our tool, our thinking brain with the ability to grasp abstractions with the dexterity of an opposable thumb. The beauty of it being we can make predictions in the present based on memory and more importantly using language we can extend the prediction component  in concert with others.  It is what has kept us alive for eons and has also created an opportunity for the unscrupulous to exploit us. A tool we might call a two edged sword.

The problem.  The concrete mind sees through the same eyes as our thinking abstracting brain.  

We go to a scary movie. The abstract brain says it is not real, explains their is nothing to fear.  The scary scene appears, Out heart races, palms perspire, we jump, we cringe, avoid our eyes, gasp and so on, (unless you are a psychopath).  Our concrete minds sees it as real and has sent the alert to our autonomic system which acts.

There was a saying many years ago; "You are what you eat". Though dreadfully simplistic, there is a great deal of truth in that since we digest or if you will, transmute food into our physicality.( Too much carrot juice and you will become a shade of orange.)  

 In terms of what we experience much the same can be said. Those experiences we "digest" or transmute  becomes memory. That memory, however contrived, influences our ability to make good predictions or choices.

What you feed your mind is as important as what you feed your body.

 If we read the label on food we buy to see what ingredients are in the product we do it to protect ourselves. Why don't we do that with what we watch, what we read, what we hear?

A recent vote wither to indicate if a product is from GMO or not  is a message screaming out.  The nature of a food source is important to health which is often an automatic function of the FDA, that it was made a voting issue is a message in itself.  Important information can come from what is not said or how things that are said, written or displayed in media are implied. Like a pond, the surface of something is a fraction of what lays beneath.

The unspoken messages in advertisement, in posture, in tone, in color, in context, in all facets of life is critical.  Consciously you may not think so or be bothered to be aware. 

But I guarantee you, your unconscious mind does not miss a single thing and it sees it all as real. .If you didn't know that before, you know it now. The question is....