It’s no secret that humans like to tell stories and the most satisfying stories have a beginning, middle, and end — all narrated in a way which gives rise to the illusion that one thing caused another. But a temporal unfolding of events is not causal. Storytellers choose which events to include in the unfolding, [...]
Tags:causal thinking·narrative structure·Reid Hastie·storytelling
Hallucinations are a universal feature of human experience. This doesn’t mean that everyone has hallucinated, but everyone is capable of hallucinating. If hallucinations can be managed, the effects range from enlightening to fun. If hallucinations are uncontrolled, the effects range from psychosis to terror. In most cases, expectations are the key to management [...]
Tags:absorption·charismatics·Christian·confabulation·delusions·evangelicals·hallucinations·perceptual bias·perceputal deficits·reality monitoring·shamans·Tanya Luhrmann·trance·visions
Thinking is a strange thing. So strange, in fact, that most people think that whatever is doing the thinking must have a life of its own. This idea, commonsense dualism, has been around a long time and is the default position for most people regardless of culture. It’s a hard habit or intuition to break, [...]
Tags:commonsense dualism·Descartes·Franz Joseph Gall·monism·neuroscience·phrenology·soul beliefs·strict materialism
In 1976, the polymathic Princeton psychologist Julian Jaynes published The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. It is one of those rare books which is mostly wrong but is filled with so many penetrating and provocative insights that it still deserves to be read. It’s a big idea book that aroused [...]
Tags:auditory hallucination·bicameral mind·consciousness·introspection·Julian Jaynes·lateralization of function·left-right brain·racism·split brain
Some weeks ago Farhad Manjoo penned a techno-robotic piece arguing that independent bookstores are superfluous and should just die. It was one of the coldest things I’ve read in years but it wasn’t surprising. Manjoo’s pleasures in life seem to be efficiency, pricing, and technology. His idea of literary fun is to preview books on [...]
Tags:Amazon·Error and Eccentricity·Farhad Manjoo·independent bookstores·Jerry Coyne·Joseph Jastrow·Ludwig Wittgenstein·William James·Wish and Wisdom
There can be little doubt that fluctuations in consciousness are a major contributing factor to beliefs in the supernatural. Although there are other aspects of mind that are also contributing factors (such as agency detection, theory of mind, causal sequencing, and pattern imposition), one thing that surely would have mystified or perplexed early modern humans [...]
Tags:Aborigines·altered states of consciousness·ASC·Bushmen·dreams·Dreamtime·hallucinations·Iroquois·Jesuit Relations·Plains Indians·psychotropics·San·trance·trance dance·visions
When fully modern humans left Africa, their journey is often described as the “colonization” or “peopling” of the world. Characterizing things this way can give rise to the mistaken impression that the journey out of Africa was unprecedented and unique. This of course ignores the fact that human ancestors pulsed out of Africa multiple times [...]
Tags:Aborigines·adaptive radiation·colonization·complex cognition·Iain Davidson·Jane Balme·language·migration·out of Africa·peopling of Australia·peopling of world·southern arc route·symbolism
While working on the Göbekli Tepe Series, a reader suggested some possible intersections with the work of Julian Jaynes. At her suggestion I’m reading The Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976) and some of Jaynes’ other writings, including his 1970 essay on “The Problem of Animate Motion in the Seventeenth [...]
Tags:agency attribution·agency detection·animation·animism·Edward Tylor·Fabricus ab Aquapendente·folk physics·HADD·Julian Jaynes·motion·movement
Thanks to the hard work and serendipity of Dr. Michael Gazzaniga, who was recently profiled in the New York Times, we know that our left brain homunculus is a storyteller. Our homunculi confabulate like crazy. Nevermind that the person in our head lacks basic information or essential plot elements: s/he will fashion a narrative or [...]
Tags:agency·confabulation·credulity·illusory intentions·intentionality·manipulation·Margaret Lynn·Michael Gazzaniga·mind control·storytelling·suggestion
Americans are notoriously religious, which means that most believe in supernatural agents and forces. While most of these supernaturals are of the Christian variety, there seems to be a spillover effect. Belief in Christian supernaturals apparently doesn’t preclude belief in less orthodox kinds of supernaturals:
Source:LiveScience
This isn’t surprising. Socially constructed and doctrinal lines separate “religion” [...]
Tags:deities·demons·ghosts·gods·magic·paranormal·spirits·supernatural
