Am I my brain?

Interesting fact

Every 7 years you are a new body, every single cell has been replaced, except your neurons. Makes you wonder where your memories come from.

People say no you are not your brain you are mind body and spirit, well it is possible that we are just our brains/body, the ego creates ideals like souls, spirits,afterlives ect. but in the end, they don't know that at all they just like to believe that is true.

It is certainly possible when we die consciousness ends, maybe that is the unique part of being alive is that you are conscious.

reply to post by rudeboyrave


Dr. Robert White has already performed head transplants in apes. The apes are paralyzed but the heart beats and supplies oxygen to the brain. So the tehnology to answer your question is out there.

But you have already answered your own question, by asking it.

reply to post by rudeboyrave


Id say you are your brain. If you got a heart or lung or liver transplant youd still be you. But if you got a brain transplant your body would end up being who ever you got the brain from.

how can any other person possibly tell you who you are. the answer you seek is only within you. you may see reflections of yourself projected in others but ultimately the purpose of life is to determine it by your own standards.

dont be fooled into thinking anybody on here myself included has the right answer. But uh huh! if thats true then my previous statement becomes null and void. Short answer is nobody knows a god dam thing. So your asking the wrong people. The only possibly truthful answer if there even is such a thing is that we dont know.

sorry double post

Originally posted by sprocket2cog
reply to post by rudeboyrave

 

I had a melt down a few years ago think big questions like this, and others .. like does the universe have a soul or consciousness?
are we all just one mind in different bodies talking to ourselves or is there many separate minds here..

Wow...I had the same "melt down". I still think about being just one mind and everyone in our lives are just our "Imagination" when our brain gets "Lonely". For instance when I am in my room and my sister and her husband are "Eerily Quiet", and I go into the next room to them and ask if they want a cuppa, I will be beforehand thinking "Maybe we are all just part of each others thoughts".

I have been diagnosed with SAD and Depression...but before I was diagnosied, I had no sense of what was happening to me. Why was I so dissociative and quiet? Why am I reclusive? Are demons controlling/possessing me and what is occuring to me? Why do I lack interest in people and everything I used to enjoy?

I had know idea what was going on with me. Then one night my sister sent me a text message asking if her husband had "been up with me"? I instantly thought that WE were the same person and that I had multiple personalities and she was "Checking that I wasn't having an episode". Complete insanity is an understatement.

Anyway, I even went down stairs to my brother in law to "Test" that I was really him and him me by aggressively insisting that if I made one of his roll ups without his permission...then there wouldn't be arguments or contention because "We are in fact the same person". Funny thing is he suffers from Schizophrenia himself But he must have "understood" me cause I got the roll up without any hassle.

Looking back I feel a little guilty about that but we've laughed it off together!

True story. No I don't do drugs.

Synopsis: The body is not the self. The body is the vehicle. We are it's drivers.
Observation: In the dream state we become separated from the body and travel in space/time and completely different outcomes of events.
Explanation: According to what we call reality, dream is a perfect candidate to be an alternate reality. Reality is what we observe through our senses. Today reality is defined as that 'that actually exists, observable or not observable.' Existence is although a relative concept. If you can walk on a surface in your dream, it certainly seems to exist.
Argument: If we are only flesh and blood, tell me this: If your memories are stored in different cells or parts of the brain, what kind of cell is it, that visits these memory cells, knows where to look, and what to look for? How can this entity have all the knowledge in itself and figure out the location of memories, and the content of the memories to compare it's search with? Or if it's several cells that collect memories from several other cells, what organizes them all to work together and what compares the memory to look for with the one found? What kind of cell initiates a thought in the brain? Or does in all just pop together by chance?
Conclusion: The body in itself cannot be the total of our existence.

The brain is set up like everyone elses. Our DNA separates us from one another including our parents. The brain interprets the DNA and controls the body. Now whether what we experience in life is imprinted in our DNA via the brain I can only guess. It has been sugested.

reply to post by rudeboyrave


.... close your eyes and imagine an apple.. with who's eyes did you see it...? now close your eyes and imagine an apple pie... with who's nose did you smell it...? .. are you your brain..? well yes.. you are everything contained in your skin....Your Brain is to your body what your mind is to your soul.. now if your not sure if you have a soul or not.. that's another discussion.... Your body is a machine a ghost can operate... so the real question is.. my mind/ brain can control my body... but am I in control of my mind.......

Perhaps you are your soul, or maybe you are the tangible, soon to be not so mysterious brain. Perhaps you are neither, perhaps you exist only as a line of code somewhere in the memory banks of the universe, and while your visible formation can wither away, your code remains, waiting to roll the dice yet again, or run the algorithm. Perhaps you are only a dream, and so is everyone else. Perhaps you are not you, and you are all things. Maybe, you are a combination of all or some of these things, maybe you are none. Nobody really knows for sure, what do you feel you are in your heart? That is where you will find your answer, because if you can't convince your heart, you haven't convinced much of anything.

Originally posted by Fractured.Facade
But to enlighten you as to what you really are would be too overwhelming and hard to believe.

Take it on faith, or the lack thereof, when you die, you'll know for sure.

edit on 4-6-2011 by Fractured.Facade because: (no reason given)

I hope this is a joke because if it isn't than that is the most ignorant thing i have ever heard. Your true nature cannot be overwhelming to you, thats stupid. God did not create you and then made you afraid of your true nature.

Stop preaching to people because you are deluding them with your own delusions.

The search for self has been the prominent question in our reality, the buddha discovered it and many other people after him, if you want to know who you are you need to meditate and keep going on the path you are walking now, all will be well.

You are the sum of all of your parts and your brain processes that.

All sensory input, coupled with instinct, memory and other things creates the illusion of consciousness.

A wise elder told me (Indigenous Australian) when I was discussing about my spirit, she looked at me with a tiny smile on her face, placed her hand up (which is when I stopped talking), and said:

"You are a spirit with a body", and then let me continue.

The conversation lead into the whole concept of Mind, Body, and Spirit, I will use words below that may be easier to understand

She ended up explaining that the Brain is a "device" that integrates the non-physical with the physical.

"Look at it like a car, you drive it do you not? The car is the body, you are its driver", were her words....

She stated that the brain has components of a 'feedback system', like a 'bio-feedback'. Sensory input translates the brain to physical sensations - the results are the interpretation by the mind (non physical), into physical. The mind projects relating to senses.

I asked her if it was like a game of tennis? She said "somewhat".

IE, The Tennis Court is the body, the "net" is the brain, one side is the non physical, the other side is the physical - yet all are needed for the game.

Haven't spoken to her in a while.. hrmm

reply to post by rudeboyrave



Well, this depends on what you believe. Some believe you are your mind, and others believe you are your brain. The difference between the two is that one is physical and the other is nonphysical. So your brain itself is physical, being as how it is of tangible materials and it works on a chemical level. Your mind, however, is non-physical, as it is most closely related to your soul/conscious/subconscious. This is what Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and others all tried to figure out and debated it strongly.

I personally believe in the latter; that I am my own entity of energy inside of this body and that this body is my tool to experience a human life for no more than 120 years (per God's terms and limitations). I believe that when I die, this body dies, and I go on as myself as the energy that currently drives this reticle.

reply to post by Chipkin9


mine was even stranger...
i contemplated being the "one" and that the whole universe was a construct of my mind..
i was at the shops after it happened and i saw a guy getting food off the bottom shelf with his back to me.
i said i think he is me ... i belived it 100%
when he turned around he had a t shirt with a band name on it..
the band was" you am I".
now that was a real eye oener to say the least....
who knows ,one day i might even tell you the story of the yellow rope...
peace

I always like to imagine Our Body being a computer ,our Brain is the processor but What would a Processor be Without The Actual OPERATING SYSTEM.

Our Spirit/Higher Self or Soul choose your name should you wish is the Operating system....If you think at your body =Hardware Your Soul or that spark that is in each one of us ..that is not material that=Operating System

Yes all our existence is in our DNA =Drivers ......so on and so forth is a very easy way to perceive things the way they are if you could associate them with something you understand a little bit better.

We are Biological Machines Extremely Complex....with an even more complex Operating System

reply to post by Astyanax

Yes, having a friend who knows about some subject automatically qualifies you as an expert in it yourself.

No... Talking with someone who is himself an expert helps me better understand Jungs thought/intentions.

reply to post by Astyanax


Hence the idea "dimension". Youre trying to define "life" by only one category of existence - the physical. When they are nothing alike.

Do you have any clue how incredibly irrational - even philosophically speaking - your reasoning is?

There is no reason to make the assumption that consciousness - which is something completely other from the physical, is merely a result from the physical. Proof? Well, Dreaming, for one. Theres also the NDE phenomenon. Theres also the occult - and if you had experience with this you would know beyond a doubt that there does exist an abstract/metaphysical realm that precedes this dimension of reality......So, just as a 'force', allegorically called an angel (and in Hebrew, "Malak", angel, also means 'messenger' ie; an angel is an EMANATION from the creator transmitting a particular principle, or energy, that brings about a particular phenomena) is above and before the phenomena it produces, likewise the 'soul' or consciousness, precedes the body it is born into.

reply to post by lisa2012


Thats not the best analogy because either way the computer, its operating system, hard drive etc all exists within the physical. Without a computer, there is no operating system, unlike in the case of the soul; without the body, still exists.

reply to post by The Matrix Traveller


Geomtery is only used as an explination, not a source. Siting these complex shapes, and sizes as the source, or identification of the soul is incorrect.