Where does a thought start?

If there is no "higher self" or "soul" or "spirit" then it should be easy to determine, scientifically, where a human thought comes from shouldn't it?

Just wondering if anyone has any concrete scientific evidence of where a thought actually comes from...

...or is this something somewhat equivalent to the creation/evolution discussion that's happening.

Cheers

JS

I was thinking about thought yesterday (thoughts about thoughts? Weird). I'm not sure where a thought occurs. I don't even know how to describe a thought really. I can have a thought, with my mind still feeling blank. The logical answer would be that it is some sort of brain impulse, but I'm not sure if even a doctor can answer this one.

a thought starts from a suggestion, an outside stimulus, something we see or hear

Since every person has two, not one, two brains, the thought of one could stimulate a thought in the other.

If you doubt what I said, Google it up--look for the little brain in the stomache.

[edit on 17-8-2005 by Astronomer68]

Astronomer, I googled it and all I could find was info about it on weird little sites I have never heard of before. Can you find a credible site like CNN that has it? (I couldnt). If scientists discovered a second brain, I would have thought this would be much larger news.

I saw a programme by Lord Robert Winston (the fertility expert) on measuring the brain before a thought becomes consciously felt.

Can't remember the name of the research group, but there is a good paper on similar work here.

Originally posted by Yarcofin
Astronomer, I googled it and all I could find was info about it on weird little sites I have never heard of before. Can you find a credible site like CNN that has it? (I couldnt). If scientists discovered a second brain, I would have thought this would be much larger news.

Surprised the hell out of me when I first ran into it. Try simply putting "second brain" (without the quotes) into Google and you'll find several articles about it.

"thoughts" are neorological responses to "stimuli". The Cerebral Cortex of the brain is responsible for analyzing various stimuli that the body receives, be it internal or external. An example of an internal stimuli would be hunger (As someone mentioned before). The body begins to chemically respond to changes from within which will trigger an impulse to the brain that generally has a rehearsed response. For example, when your energy reserves are running low, the body will "tell" brain that you are hungry. AT that point, it is the brain's job to inform you consciously that you need to eat. That in turn illicits a response in the form of "Cognition", where you conscioulsy acknowledge that you are hungry and then logically solve the problem by thinking that you should eat. External stimuli are not much different.

In Summary, the brain is nothing more than a logic processor. Yes, a very complex computer that has the ability to work with billions of variables simultaneously and deduct an appropriate, logical response based upon our leanred experiences.

Physiologically speaking, thoughts are derived from the cerebral cortex as various gaglion bundle begins to fire axons to dendrites through a chemical called Acetyl Choline (ACH). This is why drugs and alcohol, sleep deprivation etc. have the ability to affect our "thoughts." As the chemical make-up or concentration of the ACH in our synapses changes, the outcome of thought processes will also change.

Of course, this is an EXTREMELY simplified explanation.

i think it all stems from the realization of polarity. but im sick at the moment and dont feel like adding much more. just an idea

Well google turned up a few interesting articels on the "little Brain"

If you want a credible web site here are a few
MSU Little Brain

Here is another
U.S. News & World Report

Hope that helps out a little, I fact i didn't evan know about this. and i have major stomach problem

Zintac

Zero Plus Zero Equals Zero

0 + 0 = 0

0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0=0

0 + 0(to the infinitum) = 0


You are 1 Self Aware being.
You are 1 Consciousness.
You are 1 source of intelligence.

Each cell of your body is ZERO self aware?
Each cell of your body is ZERO self consciousness?
Each cell of your body is ZREO intelligence?

Science says we are only 1 being.

Science says our cells are not conscious, not self-aware, not intelligent.

Therefore:

Zero + Zero + Zero(for each cell of your body) = 1

0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0 ........ = 1

Originally posted by kozmo
"thoughts" are neorological responses to "stimuli".

Does a stimuli always precede a thought? I can lay in my bed at night and start thinking about a tv show i saw earlier, no stimuli required right?

Originally posted by Esoteric Teacher
Zero + Zero + Zero(for each cell of your body) = 1

I believe most scientists will agree with you on that one. I remember hearing a professor say that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, but I don't recall which course it was so I can't find the book that dealt with this subject.

Originally posted by kozmo
"thoughts" are neorological responses to "stimuli".

Of course, this is an EXTREMELY simplified explanation.

Originally posted by Symer
Does a stimuli always precede a thought?
...

to me the message by Kosmo sounded only like
response to a stimuli, which in my eyes is not a thought,
but merely a reaction or response to a pain/need/function

i feel a thought is a consciousness thing, Symer,
and that consciousness issue is a headwarper for sociologists
and philosophers alike.
you might want to scan over this link; deoxy.org...

after all, we are neither robots nor cockroaches

~L~

I think consciousness is defined as an entity that can learn from it's environment, and have an affect upon it's environment. We know cells do both. So, therefore I belive a thought must begin within a cell. The elctricity passing from a brain cell to another, but thought must take place outside the brain, right?

For, we are comprised of cells.

Our nerve cells are small long narrow cylinders of water with variable insulation along the walls ... a "thought" would be some sort of signal propagating through part of our cortex that activates the intelligent part of our thinking process rather than the automated part (such as breathing).

This activation feeds back on itself and forms some sort of circuital loop which causes us to consider or ponder this thought deeply.

The origination of the thought could be an external or an internal stimulus. Either we get triggered by anything that hits our sensory input nodes, or else a prior thought or change in body function triggers this thought. For example, we might be dreaming, and wake up suddenly, with some sort of thought running through our brain that was not due to an external stimulus.

Well, I don't know where regular thoughts come from, but I do know that if you hold in a fart long enough, it travels up the spinal column, enters the cerebellum, and thats where Sh*tty ideas come from.

Where does a thought start?


For most people, usually inside the heads of other people.

Maybe everywhere and nowhere at the same time?

The idea reminds me of the "Free Lunch" Time travel paradox:

There is another paradox, called the "free lunch" paradox, that occurs: if you go back to Bach's century and tell him how great he is in our century and show him all the great compositions he is famous for, and Bach then reproduces these compositions note for note, then Bach's music exists without any "artistic" effort being put in to them (a "free lunch", so to speak).

Then again, maybe not. Just a thought.

wow.

this thread got hijacked 3 posts in...very sad....enough with the stomach brains already jeesh.....


the jelly in our skulls is quite an amazing organ. chemicals interact, and thoughts explode out of nothing...

www.thebrain.mcgill.ca...
At the origin of every thought or action, there are the nerve impulses that travel through the body’s neurons. These impulses are nothing more than the movement of electrically charged inorganic molecules through the neural membrane.

But this movement of electrical charges would never allow us to be self-aware if their coordination were not determined by the properties of the channels in the neural membrane. These channels are actually large proteins embedded in this membrane, and their properties are determined by the human genome, itself the result of evolution.

Where does a thought start? Why, when you are thinking to yourself, must you internally voice your thoughts? Are you telling yourself your thoughts?

I tried an experiment once in which as soon as I would think about something I would try to recognize it and then move on to the next thought. I mean, why sit there and think to yourself "like, it would be cool if I had like a million dollars like blah blah blah...." Why narrate it to yourself? You should already know what you are going to say to yourself. They are, after all, your thoughts.

I guess I am trying to say I don't know. I will think about it.