What you think the world (or a 'thing') "is", is not. What you think the
world "is" is the configuration of your brain's reaction circuitry, the
synaptic logic which directs your brain's reactions to its experiences. The
configuration of your brain's experiential-reaction circuitry (ERC) is
something over which you have potential control -- i.e. it has the capability
of "designing" its own configuration. As a "human being", your primary tool
for configuring your ERC logic is your language. And the first step to
conciously, deliberately, and intelligently engineering your own ERC logic, or
"intelligence", is to know what you are refering to when you say (and/or
"think") what the world "is".
Christopher L. Turner 10-03-98
-----------------------------------------------------
>From a previous post:
Subject: Humans as "reaction machines":
We react to our new sensory experiences based on our past experiences. This
is the principle of 'learning', the survival strategy of neurologically
'mapping' our environment, at which we humans excell as a species.
We react to our words. We react to a thing or a person, etc., as we react to
the word(s) we call that thing or person. Our language is the tool we humans
have developed (or perhaps blindly 'evolved' would be more accurate) for
programming our reactions to our experiences. We tend to fail to recognize,
however, that the words we use to describe a thing, and the thing itself, are
not the same thing. We tend to fail to recognize this because, culturally, we
do not express this distinction in our usage of our language. (Reference g-s
reasons why our language cannot say 'all' about anything, etc.)
This is why we must extend the scientific method to our lives in
general. We must not be blinded by, or slaves to, our words and our reactions
to them. (Etc.)
Chris Turner 9-15-98