RasterEyes Productions

Self-Awareness

This isn't one of those things I can straight out answer. It confuses me, but I'll try to explain what I'm asking myself and what I know about it:

"Why am I a human? Why am I who I am, and not someone else?" There are many brains out there, yet I am perceiving reality through this one. ...Why?

It's a tough question. Obviously, if you were an animal of some sort, it's a question you would never ask. So part of it is that- It might surprise you that you're human as opposed to any other creature, because as a human you can make that realization about yourself and question it. As a human, we can also ask, "Why am I this particular human? But consider if you were able to switch your perception to a different one- Whoever took your body would now be asking the same question you just asked, and you would share the same concerns as the person who's brain you entered. This is all hypothetical, but if everyone looked through a different set of eyes every... 12 seconds, nobody would have the capability of realizing it, because memory is still part of the physical world, and spirit doesn't share this quality. So whatever force, or spirit, transfers between minds every 12 seconds is the same as all the other spirits. If not, we would observe it.

But that still doesn't explain anything. The spirit was hypothetical, it doesn't exist.

The brain is the only element that applies in this scenario, you are a product of it. When a brain develops, it must think, and consequently becomes another object capable of defining itself as a "Me".

But beyond that, when I contemplate this subject i just get stuck. I come up with an answer that isn't an answer at the same time. We are all the same, in that each brain can be in the same conundrum. They wonder why they are who they are just as you do. So lets assume that consciousness is not created, it is divided, and each of those divisions can experience something else, but only the thing it experiences. Our brains cant simply divide, we have to start from basics and work our way up using DNA. But if you were created through mitosis, you would consider your mom the same person as you, relatively. But the way in which we reproduce ourselves results in entirely new memories, and perspective of time (in that we look back and notice we're further down the chain than our parents). But otherwise, we're the same people as our parents, so you could in theory say that you and your parents were once one, not divided.

But this has to be the most confusing subject I've ever encountered. It hurts my brain to think about it.

Posted by Insomniac at November 19, 2005 01:00 AM