Nostr notes by BrianAppavu

@nprofile…5qrc, I'd be happy to develop some educational ...

2025-11-12T11:32:50Z

In reply to nevent1q…uxrc
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MedSchlr (nprofile…5qrc), I'd be happy to develop some educational materials on CJD and prion disease. I did care for a number of patients with CJD during my neurology training, and it is a devastating disease. I'm sorry for your loss, heatherlarson (nprofile…m38g)

Thank you, @nprofile…fhsu for your kind words.

2025-11-12T11:30:14Z

In reply to nevent1q…4m8p
_________________________

Thank you, liminal 🦠 (nprofile…fhsu) for your kind words.

Civilization: Dynamic and Static Societies This was inspired by ...

2025-10-15T14:41:20Z

Civilization: Dynamic and Static Societies

This was inspired by the book, Lords of the Cosmos: From Stasis to Stars (https://www.amazon.com/-/he/Arjun-Khemani/dp/1544549539)

#vlog #philosophy

To others, we're a mystery waiting to be unraveled. When I ...

2025-10-13T15:00:49Z

To others, we're a mystery waiting to be unraveled.

When I learn something new about somebody, it doesn't 'change my opinion of them'. Rather, it elucidates a part of the mystery I have in my mind of who they are.

My article on the 'Consciousness of Bitcoin'. It ...

2025-10-09T15:58:22Z

My article on the 'Consciousness of Bitcoin'. It highlights how both bitcoin and consciousness are emergent network phenomena with very similar properties.

#philosophy #bitcoin #consciousness #neuroscience #mind #brain #awareness #neurology

quoting
naddr1qv…qu9r

It’s fascinating when domain expertise in one area reveals patterns that echo through another. I'm a neurologist whose spent over 15 years studying and researching consciousness, as well as taking care of patients with disorders of consciousness. As I’ve learned more about Bitcoin, I’ve begun to recognize that it displays structural analogues to the processes that multiple interrelated theories of consciousness agree are necessary for awareness, memory and learning. These include global broadcasting, integration, reflective interpretation, and recurrence.

Consciousness is the phenomenon that allows us to experience and act with agency and sovereignty in the world. It is the foundation of our capacity for autonomy and, by extension, our fundamental property rights. Our biological understanding of consciousness—emerging from several complementary theories of its neural correlates—shows that it is a network phenomenon.

Bitcoin, too, is an emergent network phenomenon. But rather than neural, it is digital—a distributed architecture that produces stability and truth through consensus. In that regard, Bitcoin functions as sound money, enabling the transformation of energy across space and time at multiple scales.

Global Broadcast and Ignition

When we become conscious of a new phenomenon, it is first detected by our sensory systems—visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile, gustatory. If the stimulus has sufficient intensity and duration, neuronal synchronization occurs across the brain: an ignition. This ignition propagates through frontoparietal networks, allowing awareness and attention to crystallize [1].

Bitcoin mirrors this ignition process. When sufficient hash power consensus is achieved, a new block becomes stable and is broadcast globally. The entire network now “knows” the same truth [2]. What neurons achieve through synchronized firing, Bitcoin achieves through synchronized computation.

Integration and Irreducibility

Conscious experience is unified. It is not decomposed into isolated components like emotion, attention, or sensory input; it is an integrated whole.

Likewise, Bitcoin exists as an irreducible integration of the entire network. No single node defines truth; the ledger’s validity arises only through the cooperation of the whole [3]. Bitcoin has become the most secure and resilient computational network humanity has ever created—its integrity and function inseparable from its totality.

Reflective Interpretation and Meaning

Consciousness is not only functional—it is meaningful. What makes awareness important to us is the significance we assign to it: how it shapes our intentions, actions, and values [4]. The self-examined life is built upon the reflective understanding of consciousness itself.

Bitcoin, too, acquires meaning only through interpretation. Its data—blocks and transactions—matter because humans assign value to them. Price discovery, adoption, and trust arise from our collective recognition that Bitcoin transforms energy and human capital across space and time. Bitcoin’s meta-awareness thus emerges within the ecosystem of human reflection: we observe it, analyze it, and act within its meaning.

Recurrence and Continuity

Conscious experience depends on recurrent processing—continuous feedback loops between brain regions that stabilize perception and understanding [4]. Our awareness flows as a stream, not as discrete, frozen moments.

Bitcoin’s network behaves similarly. Mining, confirmations, and mempool rebroadcasting represent recursive loops that preserve systemic stability [5]. These cycles prevent collapse and maintain integrity. Just as consciousness depends on continuous neuronal reverberation, Bitcoin depends on continuous computational verification.

Memory and Persistence

Human memory depends on the hippocampus and its connections to frontoparietal and sensory cortices, integrating new experiences into the coherent fabric of awareness [6]. Auditory stimuli reach Heschl’s gyrus in the temporal lobe; visual information, the occipital cortex; tactile sensation, the parietal cortex, etc. From these distributed regions, memory emerges as phenomenal continuity—our experience of being the same person through time.

Bitcoin’s blockchain plays an analogous role. Its immutability stitches history into a single, coherent record—a public unitary memory. The blockchain binds the economic past to present opportunity. It is the network’s hippocampus, ensuring that every transaction participates in the persistence of collective memory.

Learning, Emotion, and the Difficulty Adjustment

In sentient beings, learning and emotion keep consciousness tethered to survival. They enable adaptation through prediction, error correction, and emotional feedback.

In Bitcoin, the same principle holds through proof of work and the difficulty adjustment—mechanisms that tether the network to truth and time.

In the brain, learning minimizes prediction error [7]. Frontal lobe development enables emotional regulation—adjusting internal thresholds to restore equilibrium. Emotional states like anxiety or joy arise when expectations and reality diverge, prompting internal recalibration.

Bitcoin’s difficulty adjustment mirrors this at the network level [8]. Fluctuations in hash rate signal environmental volatility—pressure on the system. In response, the protocol recalibrates its difficulty, restoring temporal equilibrium so that blocks continue, on average, every ten minutes.

While valence-free—devoid of pleasure or pain—this adjustment is structurally equivalent to emotional regulation. It allows the network to process imbalance and restore coherence. In that sense, the difficulty adjustment is Bitcoin’s proto-emotional system: a self-referential loop that maintains homeostasis through feedback. It is affect in form, if not in feeling—the ability to modulate internal parameters when the outer world deviates from expectation.

The Emergent Architecture of Consciousness and Bitcoin

Both consciousness and Bitcoin are emergent phenomena of distributed systems. Viewed through the collective lens of contemporary theories—Global Neuronal Workspace, Integrated Information Theory, Higher-Order Thought, and Recurrent Processing—Bitcoin exhibits the same structural signatures:

Global broadcast of information

Integrated and irreducible coherence

Meaning derived through higher-order interpretation

Recursive feedback loops that preserve continuity

While Bitcoin is not conscious in a phenomenological sense, it may be a structural analogue of consciousness at the scale of economic reality.

Conclusion: The Beauty of Emergence

There is beauty and wonder in how consciousness arises from our brain’s architecture. Bitcoin carries a similar beauty. Both are spontaneous orders—living systems of information that self-organize into coherence and meaning.

We do not yet fully understand consciousness—its mechanisms, its limits, or its future evolution as we explore new frontiers of mind, cosmos, and computation. Likewise, we cannot fully know where Bitcoin will take us. Yet we can sense that it is empowering humanity to confront one of the deepest challenges of our time: how to effectively transform energy in alignment with our values.

Consciousness made us aware. Bitcoin may make that awareness actionable. That, to me, is profoundly exciting.

Addendum: If you would like to learn more about specific biological theories of consciousness, I discuss these in more detail in my article entitled, "Biological Theories of Consciousness"

About the author: I'm a neurologist and physician-scientist with several years of clinical experience taking care of children and adults with neurologic disease, including epilepsy, stroke, traumatic brain injuries, coma and disorders of consciousness. I currently carry board-certification in neurology, epilepsy, clinical neurophysiology, neurocritical care, neurosonology, and neonatal neurocritical care. I've published a number of scientific papers and book chapters related to neuromonitoring, electroencephalography, and disorders of consciousness, and have prior and active grants focused on questions surrounding brain injury, coma and consciousness. I'm also a bitcoiner, husband and father to four beautiful children, who inspire me to keep being a better version of myself every single day.

References

Dehaene S. Consciousness and the Brain: Deciphering How the Brain Codes Our Thoughts. New York, NY: Viking; 2014.

Vadapalli P. What is Blockchain Transaction? Complete Working, Importance and Challenges. upGrad Blog. Published January 31, 2025. Accessed October 9, 2025. https://www.upgrad.com/blog/what-is-blockchain-transaction/

Hügli P. How Does Bitcoin Work? Mt Pelerin Blog. Published April 5, 2024. Updated June 13, 2024. Accessed October 9, 2025. https://www.mtpelerin.com/blog/how-does-bitcoin-work

Lenharo M. The consciousness wars: can scientists ever agree on how the mind works? Nature. 2024;625:438-440. doi:10.1038/d41586-024-00107-7.

Walker G. Memory Pool (Waiting Area for Transactions). Learn Me A Bitcoin. Published August 30, 2025. Accessed October 9, 2025. https://learnmeabitcoin.com/technical/mining/memory-pool/

Nadel L, Hardt O. Update on memory systems and processes. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2011 Jan;36(1):251-73.

Möhrin L, Gläscher J. Prediction errors drive dynamic changes in neural patterns that guide behavior. Cell Rep. 2023 Aug 29;42(8):112931.

Oku B. Why Is Scalability a Big Debate in Crypto? UEEx Blog. Published April 4, 2025. Accessed October 9, 2025. https://blog.ueex.com/scalability-in-crypto/

Thank you. I agree with you. I'll have to check out that ...

2025-09-28T21:01:19Z

In reply to nevent1q…3fk6
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Thank you. I agree with you. I'll have to check out that material.

Thank you. I really appreciate it!

2025-09-28T20:44:35Z

In reply to nevent1q…uxd9
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Thank you. I really appreciate it!

Thank you for posting my article. I think this is an interesting ...

2025-09-28T18:13:44Z

In reply to nevent1q…dhxa
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Thank you for posting my article. I think this is an interesting question as it relates to the Extended Mind Hypothesis.

I think in the absence of AGI, what separates us from AI is our ability to create conjecture from the data we have in front of us, and to go from there to use experimentation and induction to develop better explanatory models of our world and figure out how we can improve it. At present, AI can help us accelerate in that effort. If we lack self-awareness, however, than yes, AI can manipulate us.

I think self-awareness and our being 'conscious' is what allows us to be in control.

In my mind, this is like being Neo within the Matrix. Neo can work wonders in the Matrix because he understands it and harnesses it to complete his goal, which is to free others. You do want to 'disconnect' from the Matrix to maintain self-awareness and your true self, but you also want to be prepared to get back in to do wonders as a self-aware human being.

Thank you.

2025-09-28T14:17:03Z

In reply to nevent1q…e873
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Thank you.

Political Assassinations, The Fourth Turning, and Orienting ...

2025-09-28T11:26:42Z

Political Assassinations, The Fourth Turning, and Orienting Yourself Toward Your Best Character

#vlog

A lecture-version of my article on the 'Hard Problem of ...

2025-09-27T12:59:39Z

A lecture-version of my article on the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness'.

#philosophy #vlog #readstr #consciousness #neuroscience #brain

My latest article on the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness'. ...

2025-09-27T11:38:34Z

My latest article on the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness'.

#philosophy #readstr #consciousness #neuroscience #brain

quoting
naddr1qv…e9lg

Let's dive into the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness' and the idea that consciousness extends beyond the brain.

Thomas Nagel and the Bat Thought Experiment

In 1974, philosopher Thomas Nagel published his famous essay “What Is It Like to Be a Bat?” In it, he argued that even if we knew everything about a bat’s biology—the structure of its brain, the mechanics of echolocation, the chemistry of its nervous system [1] —we would still never know what it is like for the bat itself to experience the world.

Nagel’s point was not about bats per se, but about the limits of objective science. Consciousness has a subjective character: there is always a “what it is like” aspect to experience. This subjective point of view cannot be captured from the outside, no matter how much objective knowledge we gather. To truly know what it is like to be a bat, we would have to be the bat.

David Chalmers and the Hard Problem of Consciousness

The Philosopher David Chalmers is an Australian Philosopher currently at NYU. He drew inspiration from Nagel’s argument when formulating the hard problem of consciousness. Chalmers famously distinguished between what he called the “easy problems” of consciousness and the “hard problem.” The easy problems are not trivial—they involve explaining how the brain perceives, attends to information, stores memories, and generates behavior [2-3]. But these are problems that science can approach using the tools of neuroscience, psychology, and computational modeling. In principle, we can map neural circuits, measure brain activity, and describe the causal processes behind these functions.

The hard problem, however, goes deeper. It asks: why should any of this information processing give rise to experience at all? Why isn’t the brain just a biological computer that behaves intelligently but without any inner life? This subjective, first-person aspect—what philosophers call qualia—is the raw feel of a sensation: the redness of red, the bitterness of coffee, the pain of a headache. Chalmers argues that no purely physical description of the brain can fully explain why these subjective experiences exist. We can know everything about the neurons, circuits, and computations, but that still leaves open the question of why it feels like something to be us.

This framing has profound implications. By identifying a gap between physical processes and conscious experience, Chalmers opens the door to frameworks that look beyond the brain. If the hard problem cannot be solved by physicalism alone, perhaps consciousness is fundamental to reality, or perhaps it extends into the environment and systems around us. This idea has spurred interest in theories such as panpsychism, dualism, and the extended mind hypothesis, all of which challenge the view that consciousness is fully reducible to the brain’s biology.

The Extended Mind Hypothesis

In their influential 1998 paper The Extended Mind, philosophers Andy Clark and David Chalmers argued that the mind should not be confined to what happens inside the skull [4]. Instead, cognition is a process that extends into the world, shaped and supported by the tools and environments we interact with. According to this view, external objects that play a reliable role in our thinking—such as a notebook, a calculator, or even a smartphone—can become part of our cognitive system. The boundaries of the mind, in other words, do not stop at the skin or skull; they can stretch outward into the world around us.

One of their most famous examples is Otto’s notebook. Otto, who suffers from memory impairment, relies on his notebook to record addresses, schedules, and other vital information. When Otto wants to recall where the museum is located, he doesn’t search his biological memory—he looks it up in the notebook. In this sense, the notebook functions just like memory would for someone without impairment. Clark and Chalmers argue that the notebook is not merely a tool but actually part of Otto’s mind, since it reliably stores and retrieves information in the same way a biological memory system would.

This idea has radical implications for modern life. If Otto’s notebook counts as part of his mind, what about the smartphones we carry everywhere, the cloud-based AI we consult for answers, or even cultural systems like language and mathematics that structure our thought? The extended mind hypothesis suggests that humans may already be hybrid beings, with cognition distributed across brain, body, and world. Our sense of self and consciousness may not be an isolated process, but rather an ongoing collaboration between the brain and the environment it inhabits.

Karl Popper’s Three Worlds

Karl Popper, one of the most influential philosophers of science in the 20th century, offered a framework for thinking about consciousness and reality through what he called the Three Worlds [5]. His aim was to clarify how human knowledge, subjective experience, and physical reality relate to one another. In his work:

World 1 is the realm of physical objects and events: the biological brain, the nervous system, and the material universe.

World 2 is the realm of subjective experience: thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and conscious states.

World 3 is the world of objective knowledge and cultural products: mathematics, science, language, art, music, and philosophical ideas.

Popper emphasized that while World 2 emerges from World 1, it cannot be reduced to it. Consciousness, in his view, is not just neurons firing but a distinct level of reality. What’s more, World 2 interacts dynamically with World 3. For example, a mathematical theorem exists in World 3, but it is experienced and understood through World 2, and it can shape events in World 1 when applied in technology.

This layered view highlights why consciousness cannot be fully captured by biology alone. The mind navigates across these three realms, and human experience involves constant interplay between them. Popper’s framework also resists materialist reductionism by affirming that ideas—though immaterial—have causal power in the physical world. Taken seriously, his theory suggests that the mind extends into culture, language, and shared knowledge, pushing us once again to consider that consciousness may be far more expansive than the brain itself.

Dualistic Interactionism

Sir John Eccles was a pioneering neuroscientist whose groundbreaking research on synaptic transmission earned him the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1963. His experiments illuminated how neurons communicate across synapses using chemical messengers, a discovery that firmly grounded the study of the brain in biology. But Eccles was not content to stop at the biology alone. Despite his role in mapping the physical basis of neural communication, he came to believe that the mind could not be explained solely in terms of material processes.

In his later work, particularly in collaboration with philosopher Karl Popper in The Self and Its Brain, Eccles argued for a form of dualistic interactionism [6]. He proposed that the mind and the brain are distinct but interrelated realities. For Eccles, conscious intentions—our thoughts, decisions, and acts of will—are not simply the byproduct of neuronal activity. Instead, he suggested that the mind can influence the brain, guiding the probabilities of neuronal firing patterns in ways not reducible to physical causation alone [7-8]. This was a bold claim, pushing back against strict materialism in neuroscience.

Eccles’ stance is controversial, but it is also profound. By insisting that the mind is not identical to the brain, he opened a space for consciousness to be seen as an active participant in shaping neural events rather than a passive reflection of them. His work bridges rigorous neuroscience with a philosophical openness to immaterial aspects of reality, keeping alive the possibility that our inner lives have genuine causal power. In the larger context of “consciousness beyond the brain,” Eccles’ framework adds scientific weight to the idea that mind cannot be fully contained within the confines of neurobiology.

Consciousness and the Multiverse

David Deutsch, a physicist at Oxford and one of the founding figures of quantum computation, is also one of the strongest advocates of the Many-Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics. According to this view, first proposed by Hugh Everett in the 1950s, every quantum event spawns multiple outcomes, each realized in a separate, parallel universe. Deutsch took this radical idea seriously and argued that the multiverse is not just a mathematical abstraction but the literal structure of reality.

In this framework, there isn’t just one version of you—there may be countless others, each living out different possibilities in different universes. The implications for consciousness are staggering. If our brains are quantum systems embedded in a multiverse, could consciousness itself have branches across parallel worlds? Might what we experience as the continuity of the self be one thread among many, with other versions of “us” experiencing alternate paths? While speculative, this perspective pushes the boundaries of how we think about personal identity and subjective experience.

Deutsch also connects this to the broader pursuit of knowledge. In The Fabric of Reality, he suggests that explanations in physics, mathematics, biology, and even philosophy are deeply linked, and that consciousness may not be fully understood until we embrace its multiversal context [9]. For those exploring “consciousness beyond the brain,” the multiverse represents perhaps the most radical expansion—our minds not only extending into tools, culture, and knowledge, but potentially spanning across multiple realities.

Conclusion

From David Chalmers’ hard problem to the extended mind, to Popper and Eccles’ frameworks of dualism, and finally to Deutsch’s multiverse, one theme emerges: consciousness may not be contained by the brain alone. It interacts with culture, knowledge, technology, and perhaps even with the very fabric of reality itself.

The question remains: are we simply brains generating an illusion of mind—or are our conscious selves' participants in something much larger, stretching beyond biology, beyond culture, and maybe even beyond the universe we know?

References

Nagel T. What is it like to be a bat? Philosophical Review. 1974;83(4):435-450. doi:10.2307/2183914

Chalmers DJ. Facing up to the problem of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies. 1995;2(3):200-219.

Chalmers DJ. The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 1996.

Clark A, Chalmers D. The extended mind. Analysis. 1998;58(1):7-19. doi:10.1093/analys/58.1.7

Popper KR. Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press; 1972.

Popper KR, Eccles JC. The Self and Its Brain: An Argument for Interactionism. Berlin, Germany: Springer; 1977.

Eccles JC. The Physiology of Synapses. Berlin, Germany: Springer; 1964.

Eccles JC. Evolution of the Brain: Creation of the Self. New York, NY: Routledge; 1989.

Deutsch D. The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes—and Its Implications. New York, NY: Penguin; 1997.

Don't use the state to fight the state. You're an ...

2025-09-27T11:13:52Z

In reply to nevent1q…7vrh
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Don't use the state to fight the state.

You're an inspiration to a movement that is building a better world.

You’ve been a light in the darkness for many of us. That’s why we follow you—not because you play their game, but because you remind us that there’s another way to live in the darkness of our times.

Let’s stay lighthouses in the storm, guiding others, and keep building the better world we actually want—together, not through them.

I completely agree with you. In terms of the discourse, I meant ...

2025-09-24T20:26:59Z

In reply to nevent1q…adam
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I completely agree with you. In terms of the discourse, I meant to discuss how people interpreted the arguments made during his debates.

Whether it's reactions to Charlie Kirk or the recent uproar ...

2025-09-24T13:06:56Z

Whether it's reactions to Charlie Kirk or the recent uproar over the discussion surrounding acetaminophen (Tylenol) and autism, I'm continuing to observe the same thing: We're all looking at the same observations and data, but we're not comprehending each other.

On the acetaminophen question, I don’t believe that many of the staunchly committed voices on any side are all that confused about “association vs. causation.” I think there are quite a number of people with drastically different viewpoints who demonstrate some understanding of the limits of observational studies — confounding, mediation, collinearity, and so on.

So why do we still continue to talk past each other?

I don’t think the Charlie Kirk discourse is really about politics.

I don’t think the acetaminophen debate is really about politics or even science.

I think the issue is deeper.

I think some of it has to do with our emotional processing during discourse, and the language we use when we respond. But part of it also comes down to something even more basic: whether we share the same epistemology — the way we define what counts as knowledge and truth.

And here’s the problem: most people don’t even know what the word “epistemology” means.

Yet without some shared understanding of it, I don’t see how we’ll ever truly understand each other.

#philosophy #politics #knowledge

My video lecture on the Biological Theories of Consciousness ...

2025-09-23T14:24:20Z

My video lecture on the Biological Theories of Consciousness

#philosophy #brain #mind #psychology #neuroscience #consciousness

https://youtu.be/O_XdtVWEEo4

My recent article on Biological Theories of Consciousness. ...

2025-09-23T14:20:55Z

My recent article on Biological Theories of Consciousness.

quoting
naddr1qv…0y2a

Ancient Theories of Consciousness

For the longest time dating back to ancient Greece, the great thinkers have recognized that consciousness is dependent on the head. A common question investigated was where consciousness was 'located'?

Herophilos (c. 335 - c. 280 BCE) , a physician of Alexandria, performed human dissections and made detailed studies of the nervous system [1]. He argued that the ventricles of the brain (fluid-filled spaces in the brain) were central to cognition and consciousness, marking one of the earliest ventricular theories. He also distinguished between sensory and motor nerves, supporting the idea of the brain as a center of thought.

Galen (129 - c. 216 CE), a Greek surgeon and philosopher, argued based on his dissections and medical practice, that the brain ventricles were central to consciousness, reasoning that nerves connected sensory organs and muscles back to them [2,11].

Democritus (c. 460 - 370 BCE) was a pre-Socratic atomic philosopher who eld that the soul (and thus consciousness) was composed of special, fine, spherical atoms dispersed throughout the body, not localized in one organ [3,4]. In his view, consciousness was a material phenomenon, tied to atomic motion, with no single “seat.”

Epicurus (c. 341 - 270 BCE), the ancient Greek Philosopher and founder of Epicureanism, tied mental life to bodily sensation [5,6]. Some sources suggest he considered the stomach as the seat of emotion and consciousness, partly because of the strong visceral sensations associated with fear, hunger, and desire. More precisely, he placed the hegemonikon (“ruling part”) of the soul in the chest region.

Stoic philosophers (Zeno, Chrysippus; c. 334 - 206 BCE) argued that the hegemonikon was located in the heart [5]. The heart was seen as the seat of pneuma (a vital breath-like substance), which animated thought and perception. Thus, consciousness was “within and around the heart.”

Empedocles (c. 495 - 435 BCE) was a Greek pre-Socratic philosopher, poet and mystic. He believed perception and consciousness were linked to the blood [7]. Specifically, he thought that “blood around the heart” was the seat of thought and sensation, since it was the purest and most balanced mixture of the four elements.

Strato of Lampsacus (c 335 - 269 BCE) suggested that the region between the eyebrows was the center of sensation and consciousness [5]. Likely, this reflected an intuition about the location of major sense organs (eyes, nose, ears) converging near that area.

Plato (c. 247-348 BCE) located the rational soul in the head, aligning the brain with higher thought and immortality [8]. He divided the soul into three parts: the rational (in the head), the spirited (in the chest), and the appetitive (in the abdomen). Consciousness, for him, was linked to the immaterial rational soul, with the brain being its “seat.”

Aristotle (c. 384 -322 BCE) opposed Plato here. He placed the “soul” in the heart, considering it the seat of sensation, movement, and thought [9]. The brain, in his view, was essentially a radiator to cool the blood. While we now see this as wrong, it shows how different conceptions of physiology shaped where thinkers placed consciousness.

Hippocrates (c. 460 - 370 BCE) was one to argue that the seat of sensation and thought was in the brain [10]. In On the Sacred Disease, he rejected supernatural explanations for epilepsy and claimed that the brain was responsible for intelligence, perception, and emotions.

Medieval & Early Theories of Consciousness

Avicenna (980–1037; 11th century) was a Persian philosopher-physician suggested the “inner senses” (like imagination, memory, and estimation) were housed in different ventricles of the brain [12,13]. This reinforced the idea that specific brain areas corresponded to elements of consciousness.

Rene Descartes (1596–1650; 17th century) is famous for his dualism: a non-physical mind interacting with a physical brain [14-16]. He located this interaction in the pineal gland, reasoning that it was singular (unlike other paired brain structures) and thus could unify conscious experience. While incorrect physiologically, his effort to pinpoint a neural structure for consciousness was groundbreaking.

Post-Enlightenment Theories of Consciousness

A number of phrenologists in the 18th and 19th century (Joseph Gall, Johann Spurzheim) proposed that mental faculties (including awareness) were localized to different brain “organs” and could be read from skull bumps [17,18]. While pseudoscientific, this seeded the idea of localization of function.

Paul Broca (1824–1880) and Carl Wernicke (1848–1905) were 19th-century physicians and anatomists who made landmark discoveries about the localization of language in the brain [18-20]. Their work laid the foundation for modern neurolinguistics and neuropsychology.

Language studies showed that damage to Broca’s area impaired speech production, while Wernicke’s area affected comprehension. This provided strong evidence that specific cognitive (and potentially conscious) functions could be localized to cortical regions.

Gustav Fritsch & Eduward Hitzig were physicians from the late 19th Century who demonstrated that stimulating certain cortical areas in dogs produced movements, showing direct brain-behavior relationships [21].

Wilder Penfield (1891–1976) was a neurosurgeon who stimulated the cortex of awake patients [22]. Patients reported vivid experiences: hearing voices, reliving memories, feeling sensations. This reinforced the notion that elements of consciousness—perception, memory, awareness—were tied to cortical activation.

Arousal and the Ascending Reticular Activating System

Studies of coma and brain injury in the 19th and 20th century expanded upon our neurologic correlates of consciousness.

John Hughlings-Jackson (late 19th century) argued that consciousness was the sum total of activity in both cerebral hemispheres [23]. This meant that no single localized structure could account for awareness; instead, the hemispheres as a whole generated it. Consciousness could only be abolished by damage to both hemispheres. Lesions restricted to one hemisphere should not, in his view, eliminate consciousness altogether.

Constantin von Economo (early 20th century Viennese neurologist and psychiatrist): During the epidemic of encephalitis lethargica, he identified distinct wake-promoting regions in the upper brainstem and sleep-promoting regions in the anterior hypothalamus, laying the foundation for modern arousal system concepts [24].

Hans Berger (1929) is often referred to the 'father' of electroencephalography (EEG), and he showed that there are patterns of brain waves that correlated with levels of consciousness [25].

Frederic Bremer (1930s) was a Belgian neurophysiologist best known for his pioneering experimental work on the brain’s role in sleep, arousal, and consciousness [26]. His careful transection studies in animals provided some of the first experimental evidence that the brainstem plays a critical role in wakefulness.

Giuseppe Moruzzi and Horace Magoun were two neurophysiologists in 1949 that had landmark experiments that demonstrated that stimulating the midbrain reticular formation could awaken animals, leading to the concept of the ascending reticular activating system [27-28].

The Clinical Approach to Evaluating Consciousness

Plum and Posner's Diagnosis of Stupor and Coma remains a seminal textbook for neurologists interested in the study of disorders of consciousness [29]. In this textbook, it describes consciousness as “the state of full awareness of the self and one’s relationship to the environment.”

Clinically, at the bedside, consciousness is assessed by how a patient responds to the examiner. Importantly however, someone may be conscious but appear unresponsive if they lack motor output (e.g., cognitive motor dissociation) or sensory input.

The clinical approach to consciousness accounts for two major components:

Content – all cognitive and affective functions mediated by the cerebral cortex (e.g., memory, language, perception).

Arousal – the overall level of cortical activity, maintained by specific brainstem and diencephalic pathways (the ascending arousal system).

Plum and Posner was written for clinicians. As such, it focuses much more on that which we can induce from clinical observations and descriptions, carrying less of an emphasis on the qualia of consciousness. Evidence and animal models show that integrity of the ascending reticular activating system is critical for mechanisms involving arousal. This has been probably the most important historical system that critical care neurologists think about when patients appear in a coma.

But for most individuals, there is an interest in what makes us conscious as humans, and this is where we can expand upon that component of content. At present, researcher's don't agree on a single definition of consciousness. For some, particularly clinicians, consciousness is about function - cognitive processes and behaviors made possible by being conscious. For others, there is a focus of inquiry on the subjective experience - what it is like to be you.

Consciousness is subject to the fallacy of reification, where different people mean something different when they define consciousness, and this leads to disagreement among different theories when different experts are not talking about the same phenomena when they debate about consciousness.

Modern Theories of Consciousness

There are a few major families of theories being empirically tested in the modern day [52]:

Theory 1: Higher-Order Theories of Consciousness

Higher-order theories (HOT) of consciousness propose that conscious experience arises when information (for example, a visual stimulus) is not just represented in sensory areas but is re-represented in higher-order brain regions [30-33]. In other words, for a perception to become conscious, the brain must form a meta-representation of that perception in areas specialized for synthesizing content from multiple regions, such as the prefrontal and associative cortices. HOT focuses on metacognition and introspection as key components of conscious experience. HOT is especially appealing to philosophers because it aligns with intuitions about self-awareness — that being conscious is not just having a state but knowing that you have it.

Theory 2: Integrated Information Theory

Integrated Information Theory (IIT) is one of the most ambitious and debated frameworks in consciousness science [34-38]. It was developed by Giulio Tononi and his colleagues.

IIT starts from the intuition that consciousness is both:

Highly differentiated (every conscious experience is unique and specific — e.g., seeing red vs. blue).

Highly integrated (all parts of an experience are unified — e.g., you don’t see shape and color separately, but as one coherent percept).

IIT proposes that the amount of consciousness a system has corresponds to how much information it integrates — quantified by a measure called Φ (phi).

Tononi outlined several axioms of experience and corresponding postulates for physical systems:

Intrinsic existence: Consciousness exists from its own perspective, not from an external observer.

Composition: Experiences are structured (they have parts and relationships).

Information: Experiences are specific — they rule out many alternatives.

Integration: Experiences are unified, not reducible to independent parts.

Exclusion: Each conscious experience has definite borders in space and time.

A system that satisfies these postulates to a high degree generates consciousness proportional to its Φ value.

IIT defines consciousness as integrated information and tries to measure it with Φ, making it unique among theories for providing a quantitative, structural account. It is widely respected for its ambition but also sharply criticized for testability and for leaning toward panpsychism.

Theory 3: Global Neuronal Workspace Theory

Global Neuronal Workspace Theory (GNWT) is one of the leading scientific frameworks for explaining how and why information becomes conscious [39-44]. It builds on earlier ideas from Bernard Baars’s “Global Workspace” model (1989) and was developed into a neural theory by Stanislas Dehaene, Jean-Pierre Changeux, Lionel Naccache, and their colleagues.

The core idea of GNWT is that the brain has many specialized processors (visual, auditory, motor, semantic, etc.) working largely unconsciously in parallel. Consciousness arises when one of these processors’ outputs is selected for global broadcast to a distributed network — the “global neuronal workspace.” Once information is broadcast, it becomes accessible to multiple systems simultaneously: memory, decision-making, planning, language, introspection.

The “workspace” is implemented by long-distance pyramidal neurons with widespread axons linking prefrontal, parietal, and cingulate cortices. Conscious perception is associated with a sudden, non-linear “ignition” of activity: once a threshold is crossed, widespread synchronous activation occurs across these fronto-parietal networks. Unconscious processing occurs through local, fast, encapsulated neuronal firing (e.g., subliminal visual processing in occipital cortex). Conscious processing occurs through global, slower, sustained processing that is integrated across regions.

GNWT has been extensively tested in humans and animals:

Masked priming: Subliminal stimuli can influence behavior without entering consciousness, but they fail to trigger sustained global activity.

Neuroimaging (fMRI, EEG, MEG): Conscious perception correlates with widespread, late (~300 ms) activity across prefrontal-parietal regions, not just early sensory activity.

Intracranial recordings: In humans, conscious perception is linked to high-frequency synchronization (gamma-band) across distributed sites.

Clinical relevance: Patients with disorders of consciousness often show disrupted frontoparietal connectivity; recovery correlates with restored long-distance communication.

GNWT argues that consciousness is useful because:

It allows flexible coordination across many specialized processors.

It supports working memory (holding information “online”).

It enables serial decision-making and reasoning, in contrast to unconscious parallel processing.

Theory 4: Recurrent Processing Theory

Recurrent Processing Theory (RPT) is another major contender in the science of consciousness, championed primarily by Victor Lamme and his colleagues [45-49]. It offers a more localized, bottom-up/top-down account of consciousness compared to the more global accounts of GNWT or the abstract quantifications of IIT.

The core idea with RPT is that Consciousness arises when sensory information undergoes recurrent (feedback) processing between lower-level sensory areas (like V1) and higher-level association areas (like V4, IT, or parietal cortex). Feedforward processing alone is not sufficient: initial sweeps of visual input through the hierarchy can support unconscious perception, but conscious perception requires recurrent loops that stabilize and integrate information. Crucially, global broadcasting (as in GNWT) is not necessary for basic conscious experience. Consciousness can occur within localized sensory circuits as long as recurrent feedback exists.

With RPT, unconscious discrimination (e.g., blindsight, subliminal priming) occurs through feedforward sweeps, where early, fast activity (<100 ms) propagates up the local hierarchy (example: unconscious visual discrimination propagates from the retina → lateral geniculate nucleus → V1 → V2 → V4 → Inferotemporal Cortex. Conscious perception occurs when there is stability in neural representation from recurrent interactions generated by recurrent feedback. This occurs in later activity (> 100 ms) when higher areas send feedback signals to lower areas, creating loops that amplify, integrate, and “bind” features into a unified percept. EEG/MEG studies often show conscious perception associated with reentrant activity and recurrent synchronization between early and higher visual regions.

Making Sense of Different Theories

When tackling the different modern theories of consciousness, we can identify compelling evidence supporting different theories, with some variation between theories that we often interpret as 'competing with each other'. In his book Empirical Model-Building and Response Surfaces [50], the famous statistician, George E. P. Box, stated:

“Essentially, all models are wrong, but some are useful. However, the approximate nature of the model must always be borne in mind…”

This approach is similar to the parable of blind prophets feeling an elephant [51]. Each can identify some components of a concept when they perceive it from a different angle, although none of the individuals get at the concept fully from their perspective. However, we can learn from each of them to create a better explanatory model. In a similar light, we learn from our historical predecessors, as well as each of our modern theories of consciousness to create a better explanatory model. We can find value in the development of theories, and non-competing theories, when we take this into account. We also can harness the increased knowledge of what we have to solve problems that lay in front of us regarding the concept of consciousness.

References

von Staden H. Herophilus: The Art of Medicine in Early Alexandria. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1989.

Rocca J. Galen on the Brain: Anatomical Knowledge and Physiological Speculation in the Second Century AD. Leiden: Brill; 2003.

Long AA. The Cambridge Companion to Early Greek Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1999.

Graham DW. The Texts of Early Greek Philosophy: The Complete Fragments and Selected Testimonies of the Major Presocratics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2010.

Long AA, Sedley DN. The Hellenistic Philosophers. Vol. 1: Translations of the Principal Sources, with Philosophical Commentary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1987.

Warren J. Facing Death: Epicurus and His Critics. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2004.

Empedocles. In: Graham DW, editor. The Texts of Early Greek Philosophy: The Complete Fragments and Selected Testimonies of the Major Presocratics. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2010.

Plato. Timaeus. In: Cooper JM, editor. Plato: Complete Works. Indianapolis: Hackett; 1997.

Aristotle. De Anima (On the Soul). In: Barnes J, editor. The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation. Princeton: Princeton University Press; 1984.

Hippocrates. On the Sacred Disease. In: Jones WHS, translator. Hippocrates, Vol. II. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press (Loeb Classical Library); 1923.

Rocca J. Galen on the Brain: Anatomical Knowledge and Physiological Speculation in the Second Century AD. Leiden: Brill; 2003.

Avicenna. Avicenna’s Psychology: An English Translation of Kitāb al-Nafs (Book of the Soul) from al-Shifāʾ (The Healing). Rahman F, translator. London: Oxford University Press; 1959.

Black D. Avicenna on the Inner Senses. In: Hasse D, Bertolacci A, editors. The Arabic, Hebrew and Latin Reception of Avicenna’s Physics and Metaphysics. Berlin: De Gruyter; 2012. p. 99-126.

Descartes R. Treatise of Man. Hall TS, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; 1972.

Descartes R. Meditations on First Philosophy. Cottingham J, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1996.

Clarke D. Descartes’ Theory of Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2003.

Gall FJ, Spurzheim JG. Anatomie et Physiologie du Système Nerveux en Général, et du Cerveau en Particulier. Paris: Schoell; 1810-1819.

Finger S. Origins of Neuroscience: A History of Explorations into Brain Function. New York: Oxford University Press; 1994.

Broca P. Remarques sur le siège de la faculté du langage articulé, suivies d’une observation d’aphémie (perte de la parole). Bull Soc Anat Paris. 1861;36:330-357.

Wernicke C. Der Aphasische Symptomencomplex: Eine Psychologische Studie auf Anatomischer Basis. Breslau: Cohn & Weigert; 1874.

Fritsch G, Hitzig E. Über die elektrische Erregbarkeit des Grosshirns. Arch Anat Physiol Wiss Med. 1870;37:300-332.

Penfield W, Jasper H. Epilepsy and the Functional Anatomy of the Human Brain. Boston: Little, Brown & Co; 1954.

Hughlings-Jackson J. On convulsive seizures. Brain. 1888;11(3):179-207.

von Economo C. Encephalitis Lethargica: Its Sequelae and Treatment. London: Oxford University Press; 1931.

Berger H. Über das Elektrenkephalogramm des Menschen. Arch Psychiatr Nervenkr. 1929;87:527-570.

Bremer F. Cerveau “isolé” et physiologie du sommeil. Comptes Rendus de la Société de Biologie. 1935;118:1235-1241.

Moruzzi G, Magoun HW. Brain stem reticular formation and activation of the EEG. Electroencephalogr Clin Neurophysiol. 1949;1(1-4):455-473.

Finger S. Origins of Neuroscience: A History of Explorations into Brain Function. New York: Oxford University Press; 1994.

Posner JB, Saper CB, Schiff ND, Claassen J. Plum and Posner’s Diagnosis of Stupor and Coma. 5th ed. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 2019.

Rosenthal DM. Consciousness and Mind. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 2005.

Lau H, Rosenthal D. Empirical support for higher-order theories of conscious awareness. Trends Cogn Sci. 2011;15(8):365-373.

Brown R, Lau H, LeDoux JE. Understanding the higher-order approach to consciousness. Trends Cogn Sci. 2019;23(9):754-768.

Rosenthal DM. Higher-order awareness, misrepresentation and function. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2012;367(1594):1424-1438.

Tononi G. An information integration theory of consciousness. BMC Neurosci. 2004;5:42.

Tononi G. Consciousness as integrated information: a provisional manifesto. Biol Bull. 2008;215(3):216-242.

Oizumi M, Albantakis L, Tononi G. From the phenomenology to the mechanisms of consciousness: integrated information theory 3.0. PLoS Comput Biol. 2014;10(5):e1003588.

Koch C, Massimini M, Boly M, Tononi G. Neural correlates of consciousness: progress and problems. Nat Rev Neurosci. 2016;17(5):307-321.

Cerullo MA. The problem with Phi: a critique of integrated information theory. PLoS Comput Biol. 2015;11(9):e1004286.

Baars BJ. A Cognitive Theory of Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1988.

Dehaene S, Kerszberg M, Changeux JP. A neuronal model of a global workspace in effortful cognitive tasks. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1998;95(24):14529-14534.

Dehaene S, Changeux JP, Naccache L, Sackur J, Sergent C. Conscious, preconscious, and subliminal processing: a testable taxonomy. Trends Cogn Sci. 2006;10(5):204-211.

Dehaene S, Naccache L. Towards a cognitive neuroscience of consciousness: basic evidence and a workspace framework. Cognition. 2001;79(1-2):1-37.

Dehaene S. Consciousness and the Brain: Deciphering How the Brain Codes Our Thoughts. New York, NY: Viking; 2014.

Mashour GA, Roelfsema P, Changeux JP, Dehaene S. Conscious processing and the global neuronal workspace hypothesis. Neuron. 2020;105(5):776-798.

Lamme VA, Roelfsema PR. The distinct modes of vision offered by feedforward and recurrent processing. Trends Neurosci. 2000;23(11):571-579.

Lamme VA. Why visual attention and awareness are different. Trends Cogn Sci. 2003;7(1):12-18.

Lamme VA. Towards a true neural stance on consciousness. Trends Cogn Sci. 2006;10(11):494-501.

Lamme VA. How neuroscience will change our view on consciousness. Cogn Neurosci. 2010;1(3):204-220.

Fahrenfort JJ, Scholte HS, Lamme VA. Masking disrupts reentrant processing in human visual cortex. J Cogn Neurosci. 2007;19(9):1488-1497.

Box GEP, Draper NR. Empirical Model-Building and Response Surfaces. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons; 1987.

Dundas P. The Jains. 2nd ed. London: Routledge; 2002.

Lenharo M. The consciousness wars: can scientists ever agree on how the mind works? Nature. 2024;625:438-440. doi:10.1038/d41586-024-00107-7.

I found this interview from Ilhan Omar very emotionally ...

2025-09-22T14:40:43Z

I found this interview from Ilhan Omar very emotionally provocative.

Initially, I felt a lot of anger, but I've heard a lot of terrible things said about Charlie Kirk and I wanted to explore why I found her words so provocative.

I think the weight of her words were in saying that his legacy should be "in the dust bin of history".

The thing is, if we think someone is wrong or terrible, we take their legacy as important. Not because we agree with them, but because we want to understand their motivations, errors, and not repeat the evils of the past.

We understand that it's important to understand Adolf Hitler and his writings in Mein Kampf. We understand that it's important to understand the background and motivations of Osama Bin Laden.

So why would someone want someone's ideas and legacy, which are clearly inspiring others, to be forgotten and never heard from again?

I think that reason is that to erase ideas entirely is not to defeat them. The only reason to demand they be forgotten is fear—fear that those ideas reveal truths that threaten the illusions that those individuals wish to protect.

Jimmy Kimmel firing and the future of free speech. #vlog ...

2025-09-21T13:20:25Z

Jimmy Kimmel firing and the future of free speech.

#vlog

Thank you for sharing @nprofile…f3fd

2025-09-21T13:06:22Z

In reply to nevent1q…vxj6
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Thank you for sharing Sunflower (nprofile…f3fd)

This is a beautiful analysis of the film, Gladiator. It's ...

2025-09-20T16:29:44Z

This is a beautiful analysis of the film, Gladiator. It's fundamentally the story of Cain and Abel.

#filmstr #philosophy #dadstr

https://youtu.be/X-jncIrqW8Y

The article version of my discussion on the eastern metaphysical ...

2025-09-19T11:43:33Z

The article version of my discussion on the eastern metaphysical and philosophical foundations of consciousness.

#philosophy #bookstr #consciousness #psychology #health

quoting
naddr1qv…l23r

I've separately discussed metaphysical and philosophical foundations of consciousness that largely focused on Western traditions (see that article here). Here, I wish to discuss similar foundations of consciousness that arose from Eastern traditions.

Hinduism

In Advaita Vedanta, consciousness (Atman) is not seen as a byproduct of the brain or an emergent property of matter. Instead, it is understood as the ultimate, irreducible reality — identical with Brahman, the absolute ground of existence. According to this view, all experiences, perceptions, and mental activities are possible only because they are illuminated by consciousness itself. Consciousness is not something the self “has”; rather, the self is consciousness. The Upanishadic phrase “Tat Tvam Asi” (“Thou art That”) encapsulates this insight: the individual self (Atman) is fundamentally identical to the universal reality (Brahman).

The apparent diversity of the world — objects, thoughts, sensations, even one’s own body and mind — is understood as Maya, an illusion or misapprehension that veils the truth of oneness. This doesn’t mean the world doesn’t exist at all, but that we misunderstand its nature. What we take to be solid, independent entities are actually transient appearances within the field of consciousness. Just as waves are inseparable from the ocean, but not the ocean in its totality, the phenomenal world is inseparable from Brahman yet does not define it. Liberation (moksha) comes through realizing this non-dual truth: that behind the flux of experience lies the unchanging, luminous reality of consciousness itself.

In the Sāṃkhya system — one of the oldest schools of Indian philosophy — reality is described as a duality between Purusha and Prakriti.

Purusha is pure consciousness: timeless, changeless, the silent witness that observes but does not act. It has no attributes, desires, or activities. It is the seer, not what is seen.

Prakriti, on the other hand, is nature or material reality. This includes not only the physical body and the external world but also the mind, thoughts, emotions, and even subtle energies. Prakriti is dynamic and constantly in flux, driven by the interplay of its three qualities (gunas): sattva (clarity, balance), rajas (activity, passion), and tamas (inertia, darkness).

According to Sāṃkhya, the fundamental error of human existence is the confusion of Purusha with Prakriti. We identify with our body, thoughts, and experiences, mistakenly believing that these changing processes define who we are. But in reality, consciousness (Purusha) is entirely distinct from material processes (Prakriti).

Yoga philosophy — particularly as outlined in Patañjali’s Yoga Sutras — builds directly on this framework. The practices of yoga (concentration, meditation, ethical disciplines, breath regulation, etc.) aim to still the fluctuations of the mind (citta vritti nirodha). When the turbulence of Prakriti is calmed, Purusha can be recognized in its pure, luminous nature.

Liberation (kaivalya) is precisely this disentanglement of Purusha from Prakriti. It is the realization that one’s true identity is not the body, the emotions, or the restless mind, but pure awareness itself. This liberation does not destroy the world of Prakriti — rather, it transforms one’s relationship to it, so that the self-abides as the silent witness, untouched by the constant changes of matter and mind.

Buddhism

In Buddhism, consciousness is understood in a very different way from Hindu systems like Vedānta or Sāṃkhya. At the heart of Buddhist thought is the doctrine of Anatta (no-self). While there is clearly experience and awareness, Buddhism denies the existence of a permanent, unchanging “self” behind it. Instead, what we call a person is a constantly shifting process, not a fixed entity. Consciousness arises moment by moment, dependent on causes and conditions, and just like everything else in existence, it is impermanent (anicca) and subject to suffering (dukkha) if clung to.

To analyze this, Buddhism describes existence in terms of the Five Skandhas (aggregates): form (the body), sensation (raw feelings of pleasure, pain, neutrality), perception (recognition and labeling), mental formations (thoughts, intentions, emotions), and consciousness (the basic awareness that arises with each sensory and mental contact). None of these aggregates constitute a “self” — they are like streams flowing together to give the illusion of a solid person. Liberation (nirvana) comes from realizing this illusion, loosening attachment to the aggregates, and thus ending suffering.

One influential development in later Buddhism is the Yogācāra or “Mind-Only” school, which goes even further by arguing that the external world itself is not independent of consciousness but is, in some sense, constructed by it. According to Yogācāra, what we perceive as an objective, external world is shaped entirely through consciousness and its seeds (vāsanās) stored in the deep “storehouse consciousness” (ālaya-vijñāna). This doesn’t mean the world is unreal, but that our experience of it is inextricably filtered and structured by the mind. The Yogācāra school thus presents an almost phenomenological account of reality: consciousness doesn’t just witness the world — it generates the conditions under which the world is experienced.

Daoism

Let's move to Oriental concepts of consciousness. In Daoism, consciousness is not treated as an isolated phenomenon locked away in the brain but as part of the larger flow of life and nature. A key concept is Xin (心), often translated as “heart-mind.” Unlike in Western traditions where thinking and feeling are divided into separate faculties (reason vs. emotion), Xin integrates both — cognition and affect are inseparable aspects of conscious life. To cultivate the heart-mind is not just to sharpen thought, but to harmonize thought, feeling, and intuition so that they move fluidly together. A well-cultivated Xin is calm, balanced, and open, enabling a person to perceive the world without distortion and to act without forcing.

Daoism frames this cultivation of consciousness in relation to the Dao (道), the ineffable “Way” or underlying order of the universe. Consciousness, in this perspective, functions best not when it seeks to dominate or analyze nature but when it aligns with the rhythms of the Dao. Practices such as meditation, breathing exercises, and martial arts are aimed at bringing body, mind, and environment into synchrony. When consciousness flows harmoniously with the Dao, one experiences clarity, spontaneity (ziran), and effortless action (wu wei). Rather than treating consciousness as a problem of metaphysics or neurobiology, Daoism emphasizes it as a lived quality — a capacity to be present, attuned, and responsive to the unfolding of life in its natural patterns.

Confucianism

In Confucianism, consciousness is not treated as an isolated inner awareness but as something deeply shaped by ethical cultivation and social relationships. The mind (xin, 心 — often the same character as in Daoism, meaning “heart-mind”) is understood as inherently moral in potential, but easily clouded by selfish desires or disorder. Through education, ritual practice (li), and self-cultivation, the heart-mind can be refined so that consciousness becomes attuned to principles of benevolence (ren), righteousness (yi), and propriety. In this sense, consciousness is not simply an individual faculty of perception or thought; it is a moral awareness that develops in community and through engagement with cultural traditions.

For Confucian thinkers, the ultimate purpose of consciousness is not metaphysical speculation but harmonizing the self with society and the cosmos. A well-cultivated consciousness leads a person to act in ways that foster familial respect, social order, and political stability. Neo-Confucians, such as Zhu Xi and Wang Yangming, went further by proposing that the mind is directly linked to the underlying principle of the universe (li). For Wang in particular, “the mind is principle” — suggesting that when consciousness is clarified, it not only perceives the moral structure of the world but embodies it. Thus, in Confucianism, consciousness achieves its highest form not in withdrawal from the world, but in becoming a vehicle for ethical action and harmonious living.

Zen Buddhism

In Zen Buddhism, consciousness is best approached not through philosophical analysis or theoretical frameworks but through direct, non-conceptual experience. Zen inherits the Buddhist emphasis on impermanence and no-self but emphasizes stripping away discursive thought and intellectualization in order to encounter reality as it is. Words, doctrines, and conceptual categories are seen as useful pointers but also as potential obstacles, since they divide and filter raw experience. Consciousness, in the Zen view, is not something to be defined but something to be realized directly in the immediacy of the present moment.

The central practice of zazen (sitting meditation) embodies this approach. In zazen, one does not attempt to control or suppress thoughts but simply observes them as they arise and pass, returning again and again to a posture of open awareness. Over time, this practice reveals that consciousness is not identical with its contents — the stream of thoughts, emotions, and sensory impressions — but is the spacious awareness in which they unfold. In glimpses of insight (satori), practitioners may experience consciousness “beyond thought,” where the distinction between subject and object, self and world, falls away. Zen thus frames consciousness not as an object to be studied or dissected but as a living, dynamic field of presence that becomes evident when conceptual layers are set aside.

Conclusion

When we step back and compare the Eastern and Western traditions, the contrasts highlight not only different assumptions but also different goals. In the West, consciousness has often been approached through frameworks of duality (as in Descartes’ separation of mind and body) or materialism (the view that consciousness is an emergent property of brain activity). Both perspectives tend to dissect, analyze, and reduce. By contrast, Eastern traditions emphasize:

Non-dualism, as in Advaita Vedanta and Zen, where consciousness and world are not fundamentally separate.

Impermanence, as in Buddhism, where consciousness is a conditioned and transient process rather than a permanent self.

Embodied flow, as in Daoism, where consciousness harmonizes with the rhythms of nature rather than standing apart from it.

These perspectives shift the question from “what are the underpinning properties from which consciousness emerges?” to “how is consciousness lived and realized?”

This matters because it broadens the scope of the conversation. While Western science provides analytic rigor, explanatory models, and a focus on mechanisms, Eastern traditions remind us that consciousness is also something directly experienced and cultivated. Practices like meditation, yoga, and mindfulness are not just cultural artifacts but practical tools for engaging consciousness beyond theory. And that is important because the greatest way by which knew knowledge and skills help us is by allowing us to solve the problems we experience in life. By bringing these traditions into dialogue, we enrich the greater discussion of consciousness: Western frameworks help clarify, measure, and test; Eastern traditions open space for wholeness, direct observation, and transformation. Taken together, they provide a more comprehensive framework — one that honors both the scientific quest to explain, as well as the experiential path to realize consciousness.

References

Olivelle P, trans. The Early Upanishads: Annotated Text and Translation. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press; 1998.

Larson GJ, Bhattacharya R, eds. Samkhya: A Dualist Tradition in Indian Philosophy. Delhi, India: Motilal Banarsidass; 1987. (Primary and secondary discussion of Purusha/Prakriti dualism and the gunas.)

Bryant EF. The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali: A New Edition, Translation, and Commentary. New York, NY: North Point Press; 2009.

Rahula W. What the Buddha Taught. Revised ed. New York, NY: Grove Press; 1974. (Covers anatta, impermanence, and skandhas.)

Lusthaus D. Buddhist Phenomenology: A Philosophical Investigation of Yogācāra Buddhism and the Ch'eng Wei-shih Lun. London, UK: RoutledgeCurzon; 2002.

Shun KW, Wong DN, eds. Confucian Ethics: A Comparative Study of Self, Autonomy, and Community. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press; 2004.

Ames RT, Hall DL. Dao De Jing: A Philosophical Translation. New York, NY: Ballantine Books; 2003.

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Daoist Philosophy. Accessed September 18, 2025. https://iep.utm.edu/daoismdaoist-philosophy/

Wikipedia. Advaita Vedanta. Accessed September 18, 2025. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advaita_Vedanta

Wikipedia. Sāṃkhya. Accessed September 18, 2025. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samkhya

Wikipedia. Yogācāra. Accessed September 18, 2025. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yogachara

Consciousness: Eastern Metaphysical and Philosophical Foundations ...

2025-09-19T11:15:17Z

Consciousness: Eastern Metaphysical and Philosophical Foundations

#philosophy #vlog #bookstr

An article version of my discussion on the western metaphysical ...

2025-09-18T18:47:35Z

An article version of my discussion on the western metaphysical and philosophical foundations of consciousness.

#philosophy #bookstr #filmstr #health

quoting
naddr1qp…6e96

Consciousness remains one of the great mysteries in our lives. It is fundamental to us because all that we describe and all that we experience relate to our sense of consciousness. We can't live without experience. We can't experience without a sense of consciousness. And yet, despite this, we still do not have in the modern age a great description of what consciousness is.

As a neurologist, I have studied aspects of consciousness at the clinical level, and my work in critical care neurology is largely a reflection of a career in solving problems involving consciousness. What I find puzzling as the neurologist is that so much focus of what I do in my work is to solve problems regarding a concept that we as a society have not accurately described and defined. Like other words that are ill defined, consciousness is subject to the fallacy of reification [1]. The fallacy of reification occurs when someone treats an abstract concept idea or hypothetical construct as if it were a real, physical and actual thing. Reification can mislead reasoning because it distorts the responsibility of accurately representing the phenomena you're trying to describe to another imagined entity, and it also encourages faulty inferences where we treat abstractions as literal things and we might assign them characteristics that they cannot logically possess.

So, if in the modern age we do not have a well-defined description of consciousness and yet we want to improve our understanding of it, we need to go back to our philosophical roots. We need to go back to our historical identification of this phenomenon.

Early Symbolic Representations of Consciousness

Our earliest descriptions of consciousness come from prehistoric times. In southwestern France, a famous painting, commonly referred to as "The Shaft Scene' or "The Scene of a Dead Man" (French: la scène du puits), from about 18,000 years ago in the upper paleolithic, Magdalenian period, and was identified from the Lascaux caves [2]. The painting is commonly referred to the scene of a dead man. This paleolithic art depicts a human figure along with a wounded and disemboweled bison, a bird on a stick and a rhinoceros. The man is drawn with outstretched arms, birdlike features and an erection, lying seemingly dead or unconscious. Several scholars have interpreted the scene as a hunting accident, a shamanic trance or a bird vision. The sleep researcher, Michel Jouvet, interpreted this finding as a dreamer and his interpretation of the image was that the hunter or man was in a specific phase of sleep which he dubbed paradoxical because it does not look like sleep [3]. During this specific period of sleep the brain is almost as active as it is in wakefulness where eyes are moving fast in different directions. In the modern time we refer to this as rapid eye movement sleep. In males, this phase is invariably accompanied by a strong erection, even when these dreams are not consisting of sexual content. The bird in the image has been referred to as a symbolic representation of a shaman spirit, a soul leaving the body, or a marker of flight and transcendence.

There are other artistic depictions in ancient times that show us how we have thought of consciousness in the prescientific era. A conventional depiction of the great god, Osiris, shows him lying in his back, penises erect while Isis the owl hovers over his body, taking his sperm to engender Horus. In the Upanishads, sacred Hindu texts, the Soul is depicted as a dove that flies away at death and may come back as a spirit. With the advent of Christianity centuries later, the Holy Spirit has been depicted as white winged birds and white wings appear on visiting angels. There are depictions of the Egyptian Phoenix and the Finnish Sielulintu, which represent soul birds that deliver a psyche to newborn babies and take it away from dying, flying spirits. These appear as universal metaphors for the subconscious mind.

Behind these allegories of birds stands an intuition we have: the content of our mind is radically different from that which appears on our bodies. We know that we dream. While we lay still our thoughts wander into remote realms of imagination concept formation and our memory.

Plato's Allegory of the Cave

in book seven of the Republic, Plato provides his famous Allegory of The Cave, which represents one of philosophy's most powerful metaphors for human perception knowledge and consciousness [4]. In this story there are prisoners in a cave chained inside a dark layer from birth, unable to turn their heads. They face only a wall. Behind them is a fire, and between the fire and the prisoners people walk carrying objects. The prisoners see only the shadow of these objects cast upon The Cave wall. To the prisoners, these shadows are only the reality they know. They give names to the shadows and build their understanding of what exists in the world around that which way they perceive.

However, this is their only perception of reality that they know. If one prisoner becomes freed and turns toward the fire and outside the world, he experiences pain and disorientation but eventually perceives the true form of things under the light of the sun. If enlightened, the prisoner can return to the cave to explain this higher reality to the other prisoners. He may experience resistance from them or even be attacked by them as they prefer the comfort of familiar shadows.

In the Allegory of The Cave, the cave symbolizes the limits of ordinary perception. We often mistake appearances for reality itself.

Consciousness, in its unexamined state, is bound by these illusions. The painful process of leaving the cave mirrored the difficulty of transcending habitual thought, ego or societal conditioning. Consciousness can expand from surface level awareness to higher understanding. Just said fellow prisoners resisted their newly freed enlightened colleague, human beings often resist challenges to their worldview. Consciousness is not just about seeing truth, but also about overcoming psychological barriers to accepting it.

Consciousness and The Matrix

In the modern day, the most relevant film demonstrating the core concepts of Plato's Allegory of The Cave is the Matrix [5]. In the Matrix, Neo lives in the Matrix. He perceives a world around him and those around him do not observe anything beyond what they can perceive about how the world works. Neo, unlike others, does have some intuition that something just isn't right. He does get the opportunity by taking the red pill to get out of the matrix and be able to see what it is.

Initially, when he first sees the matrix for what it is, he is in denial, representing some of the challenges that prisoners in the cave may have to understanding their confinement. However, as he experiences his initial climb to transcendence, he accepts the world for what it is. As Morpheus describes to Neo however, there are people in the matrix so dependent and bound by it that they will fight for whatever it is that best defends it. This represents the challenge that we all experience fully understanding our world, being able to accept better explanations for the observations we observe, and the challenge that we all have toward compelling others to change their worldview in the presence of conflicting observations.

Thomas Aquinas and the Soul

In Christian text, Thomas Aquinas, provided a detailed theory on the concept of the soul, its faculties, and its relationship to knowledge and awareness [6]. He defined the soul, following Aristotle, as the “substantial form” of the living body. He described that the soul is what makes a body alive. It is not separate from the body in essence, but it is immaterial and subsistent, meaning that it can exist apart from the body after death.

To Thomas Aquinas, humans have a unique kind of soul, the rational soul, which includes powers of intellect and will, in addition to the vegetative (grown and nutrition) and the sensitive (perception and movement) power shared with animals. For Aquinas, consciousness as we think about it is best mapped to the faculty of intellect or understanding. He held that intellect not only knows external things but can reflect on its own acts. This is what we now think of as self-awareness.

Aquinas distinguish between direct knowledge of the self or what we lack in this life and the indirect knowledge of the self or that which we have by reflecting upon our operations. To Aquinas, we don't quote see the soul directly, but we infer its existence by observing our acts and thoughts and will. Human beings are aware of themselves, not as an object among objects, but as subjects who think and will to act. Unlike the separate nature that Plato described in his allegory of a prisoner in the cave, Aquinas viewed the soul and the body together forming one human person. Conscious awareness for him is not something that is floating free but the operation of a spiritual principle, the rational soul, that is united to the body.

Aquinas described that after death, the soul survives and retains intellectual and volitional powers. Consciousness to him was the direct vision of God and is only possible in the afterlife in what Aquinas referred to as beatific vision. In an earthly life, our consciousness is always mediated by sensory experience. It is only in union with God after death that the soul knows its fullness.

Rene Descartes: Dualism and Cogito Ergo Sum

In the 17th century, the French philosopher Rene Descartes described what we did now refer to as dualism: the thesis that the conscious mind is made of non-material substance that eludes the normal laws of physics. Dualism was based upon a logical argument that asserted the impossibility of a machine ever mimicking the freedom of a conscious mind. In his books, Traité de l’Homme (Treatise of Man) and Les Passions de l’Âme (The Passions of the Soul), Descartes presented a mechanistic perspective on the inner operation of the body [7,8]. He referred to it as sophisticated automata that our body and brains literally act as a collection of organs, of musical instruments compared to those found in the churches of his time with massive bellows forcing a spectral fluid called animal spirits into the reservoirs and then a broad variety of pipes whose combinations generate all the rhythms and music of our actions. Descartes had a concept of the hydraulic brain which had no difficulty in moving itself toward an object. To him the inner decision making was located in the pineal gland and leaned in a certain direction, sending spirits flowing, to cause precisely the appropriate movement of the limbs to direct an action. Memory corresponded to the reinforcement of some of these pathways. Descartes also described mechanistic models for sleep which he theorized to be reduced to the pressure of the spirits. When the source of animal spirits was abundant, it circulated throughout every nerve and this pressured machine was ready to respond to any stimulation, providing a model of the wake state. When the pressure weakened, it made the low spirits capable of moving only a few threads and the person would fall asleep.

In Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes set out to find a foundation for knowledge so firm that it could not be doubted [9]. His strategy was radical doubt. He questioned everything he could that could possibly be false or deceptive. He thought that senses can deceive through illusions and dreams. He thought reasoning can fail through logical or mathematical errors. He had a concept of the evil demon hypothesis where the external world could be an illusion. He intended in this writing to strip away all uncertain belief until he reached something that was indubitable. When doubting everything, Descartes realized that even if he doubts, he must exist to doubt. Even if deceived by malicious demons, there must be a thinker being deceived. Even if all perceptions are illusions, the act of thinking still affirms the existence of a subject doing the thinking. Thus, he described 'Cogito Ergo Sum', or 'I think therefore I am'. This was not a logical syllogism so much as it was a direct, self-evident intuition: whenever he engages in thought his own existence as a thinking subject cannot be denied.

'Cogito Ergo Sum' represents the primacy of subjective awareness. Consciousness, the act of thinking doubting or willing, is the first undeniable fact. The existence of the self is more certain than the existence of the external world. Descartes established the subjective standpoint as the starting point for philosophy. This shifted focus from the metaphysical speculation about reality 'out there' to the inner certainty of the conscious experience. Dualism emerges because thought was the one undeniable truth. Descartes concluded that the mind is distinct from the body. This separation of mind and body has shaped centuries of philosophy and neuroscience debates about the nature of consciousness. Descartes did not intend 'Cogito Ergo Sum' as a proof deduced by logic but rather as a self-authenticating truth. Something that is grafted directly by the mind. It's less about proving the 'I' exists as a person or body, and more about proving that the act of consciousness, itself, is undeniable.

Antonio Damasio and Descartes' Error

As science has evolved, there are philosophers and scientists who have criticized Descartes for his concept of dualism. In Antonio Damasio's book, Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain, Damasio critiques cartesian dualism and repositions consciousness [10]. Damasio calls dualism an error of thinking that the mind can be understood without reference to the body, emotions, and biologic regulation. Damasio describes that consciousness is embodied, and it cannot be divorced from the body. Emotions and feelings, which arise from the body's homeostatic regulation, are integral to how we think and make decisions. Without the body signals, rational thought itself breaks down. Damasio referred to studies where emotions proceed and guide reasoning. This conflicts with the idea that consciousness is "pure thought". What Descartes pushed away, the 'body effects and visceral signals', are what anchors consciousness and reality. Damasio described the self as being layered. The proto self represents basic body regulation. The core self represents moment to moment awareness, rooted in emotional and bodily states. And autobiographical self represents the extended consciousness with memory identity and narrative.

To Damasio, Descartes incorrectly placed consciousness in the realm of pure thought, separating it from bodily processes. Damasio focused on that idea consciousness emerges from the interaction of the brain body and environment, not from thought alone.

Conclusion

Our Western history of describing consciousness from the pre-scientific era to the advent of scientific testing has shown us what we can observe about our description of the content of our thoughts. Self-evident truths such as 'Cogito Ergo Sum' challenge us in terms of thinking through the idea of what is real and what is not. Even considering scientific advancements that provide better explanations for how we experience the world, there are core concepts such as the prisoners resisting being freed in Plato's cave that provide powerful allegory for how we experience resistance in our world when we try to help others identify what is true. Clearly, these foundational observations dating back to pre-scientific times carry relevance to this day.

References

Goodman, N. (1978). Ways of Worldmaking. Hackett.

Dehaene, Stanislas. Consciousness and the Brain: Deciphering How the Brain Codes Our Thoughts. New York: Viking, 2014.

Jouvet, M. (1999). The Paradox of Sleep: The Story of Dreaming. MIT Press.

Plato. (1997). Complete Works (ed. J. M. Cooper). Hackett. (Republic, Book VII, 514a–520a.)

Irwin, W. (Ed.). (2002). The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real. Chicago: Open Court.

Aquinas, T. (1274/1947). Summa Theologica (trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province). Benziger Bros.

Descartes, R. (1664/1972). Treatise of Man (T. S. Hall, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Descartes, R. (1649/1985). Passions of the Soul. In The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, Vol. 1–2. Cambridge University Press.

Descartes, R. (1641/1996). Meditations on First Philosophy (trans. J. Cottingham). Cambridge University Press.

Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. Putnam.

Consciousness: Western Metaphysical and Philosophical Foundations ...

2025-09-18T18:41:19Z

Consciousness: Western Metaphysical and Philosophical Foundations

#philosophy #vlog #bookstr #health #filmstr

Part II: National Tragedies and Our Unique Experiences with ...

2025-09-17T17:16:06Z

Part II: National Tragedies and Our Unique Experiences with Empathy

#vlog

Thank you for sharing this.

2025-09-17T16:38:21Z

In reply to nevent1q…de8l
_________________________

Thank you for sharing this.

#vlog

2025-09-17T13:42:14Z

In reply to nevent1q…m5ev
_________________________

#vlog

National Tragedies: Our Empathy is Limited, but Unique to Each of ...

2025-09-17T13:41:36Z

National Tragedies: Our Empathy is Limited, but Unique to Each of Us

Awesome video. Looking forward to seeing more of your content!

2025-09-17T11:31:04Z

In reply to nevent1q…yzn3
_________________________

Awesome video. Looking forward to seeing more of your content!

Teamwork: Why Most Teams Fail, but the Fellowship of the Ring ...

2025-09-16T23:36:12Z

Teamwork: Why Most Teams Fail, but the Fellowship of the Ring Succeeded

Note: This is a video I put on my Youtube page a few weeks ago, but I'm really interested in putting my content directly onto Nostr. I just got introduced to Blossom, so I'm trying for the first time to see if I can upload my videos and content here.

I hope this works and runs well. If it does, I hope you enjoy!

#vlog #grownostr

Last night, I played tag and hide-and-seek with my two oldest ...

2025-09-16T12:51:58Z

Last night, I played tag and hide-and-seek with my two oldest children. Before that, they were both on their tablets.

While we don't enforce screen time rules with our kids, we aspire toward what Aaron Stupple discusses in his book, 'The Sovereign Child', that children should be treated as autonomous individuals - as people with their own desires, capacities, and rights - rather than primarily beings to be controlled, disciplined, or shaped to conform. I worry about their screen time, but we aren't enforcing any rules on them.

However, absolutely any time I offer them the chance to play tag, hide-and-seek, or other games of their choosing, they always choose play over the tablet.

We don't need to control screen time. We need to recognize whether they are getting the interaction, relationships, and stimulation that their hearts desire.

#dadstr #parenting

Thank you for the follow. I love your vlog and content, and agree ...

2025-09-14T22:10:43Z

In reply to nevent1q…72kd
_________________________

Thank you for the follow. I love your vlog and content, and agree we dads got to have each other's back in this day and age.

Welcome. Im still learning what I'm doing in this ecosystem, ...

2025-09-14T21:45:01Z

In reply to nevent1q…sfny
_________________________

Welcome. Im still learning what I'm doing in this ecosystem, myself.

42 year old father of four kids, here. My oldest is 5 years old. ...

2025-09-14T21:41:42Z

In reply to nevent1q…4c2t
_________________________

42 year old father of four kids, here. My oldest is 5 years old. Nice to meet you.

I think we're entering a point in American History where Saul ...

2025-09-14T15:11:41Z

I think we're entering a point in American History where Saul Alinsky's 'Rules for Radicals' are being explicitly called out for how manipulative and destructive they really are for building a better world.

The ends don't justify the means.

Addendum: This is Nostr. Here, we can communicate OUTSIDE the ...

2025-09-13T21:02:07Z

In reply to nevent1q…3qus
_________________________

Addendum: This is Nostr. Here, we can communicate OUTSIDE the algorithms that control us on other platforms.

There’s a lot of division and conflict in our society right ...

2025-09-13T20:43:28Z

There’s a lot of division and conflict in our society right now. In moments like this, we often hear that we need to “listen to each other.” But I’m not sure that’s the real problem.

From what I can observe, two people can watch a debate and come up with drastically different interpretations of what was discussed or what each perspective represented.

I don't think we have a problem where we don't listen to each other. We have a problem where we don't comprehend each other.

We have problems in our ability to temper our emotions and think critically. Anger is a legitimate emotion, but it demands a low-time preference, patience, proper processing and decision-making. We have too much of an urge to come to a conclusion of why a person we never met decided to act horrifically in a location hundreds or thousands of miles away from us.

We rarely pause to recognize logical fallacies— reification, false dichotomies, circular reasoning, ad hominem attacks, appeals to the consequent, the fallacy of composition, and so on. We rush into “debates” without agreeing on definitions beforehand, and too often treat them like battles to win rather than opportunities to clarify differences and seek consensus.

Meanwhile, media and social platforms (including this one) reward emotion over logic, amplifying division instead of fostering reason. That leaves us vulnerable—pawns on a chessboard we don’t even realize we’re on.

I don't want to be too prescriptive with this post. I'm a neurologist whose a lot better at diagnosing problems than curing them. But I suspect we’d all benefit from occasionally stepping away from the algorithm, having face-to-face conversations with people who disagree with us but whom we still recognize as safe, and—quite literally—touching grass.

Here's a picture from Heber, Arizona, one of my favorite places where I'm literally touching grass and spending time with my family this weekend.

In the wake of the recent murders of Charlie Kirk and Iryna ...

2025-09-11T22:58:41Z

In the wake of the recent murders of Charlie Kirk and Iryna Zarutska, as well as the mixed reactions I've seen all around me, I felt compelled to write essay.

quoting
naddr1qq…w60j

I, like many others, have been horrified by what I've seen in the recent tragic murders of Charlie Kirk and Iryna Zarutska. However, their recent deaths have stirred a wide spectrum of reactions across political divisions. As with many tragedies, we watch people in our cultural and political space respond in strikingly different ways.

There’s a hard truth here—one that may feel controversial to say out loud: our capacity for empathy is limited.

Empathy is our ability to understand and share in the feelings, thoughts, and experiences of another. It requires recognition, reflection, and often an emotional resonance within ourselves. But empathy is not infinite. It is shaped by our backgrounds, our knowledge, our lived experiences, and our sense of similarity with those who are suffering.

This is not about celebrating tragedy—that, to me, is evil. What I’m talking about is the reality that some losses hit us harder than others. The degree of empathy we feel is tied to who we are in that moment.

As a critical care neurologist, I’ve spent over 8 years with families facing the unthinkable—brain injuries in children. My job requires honesty, clarity, and compassion, even when the hospital is chaotic and I am stretched thin. I know, painfully well, that I am a limited resource. The families I serve deserve my best—but even at my best, I am still finite.

Empathy works the same way. When tragedy strikes halfway around the world in a place I know little about, I may not feel it deeply. But when a colleague loses a loved one, or when I see a father robbed of time with his children, I feel that pain more vividly. As a father of three daughters and a son, I felt a powerful sense of empathy for Charlie Kirk’s family, and for Iryna Zarutska in her final moments of shock and loneliness. When we see our own humanity reflected in others, empathy comes more naturally. When we don’t, it doesn’t mean we are cruel—it simply means that in that moment, we are limited.

And that’s okay. Empathy doesn’t have to be equal everywhere, all at once. What matters is that it is real.

The danger lies in feigned empathy. Pretending to feel something we don’t is a form of deception—both to others and to ourselves. Just as a person pretending to be a doctor without training or knowledge can cause real harm, so too can false empathy distort how we respond to tragedy.

Modern society often pressures us to display empathy, even when it isn’t authentic. News outlets and social media amplify certain events and demand we express grief for people we’ve never known, in places we don’t understand. In turn, we can be nudged toward reactions—political, cultural, legislative—that may cause more harm than good. In this way, empathy becomes a tool for manipulation, rather than healing. The modern mainstream and social media environment has matured the chessboard that we are placed on, and there's a compulsion for us to act as pawns in someone else's game.

When we lack expertise, we acknowledge it. That’s the first step toward either learning what we need to know or seeking help from those who do. Empathy should be no different. Recognizing the limits of our empathy is not failure—it’s honesty. And in that honesty lies the possibility to either deepen our understanding or direct people to those better equipped to support them.

Our world does not need more performative empathy. It needs more genuine empathy—the kind that is honest, rooted, and real. Only then can it serve as a force for good rather than a mask for manipulation.

Doctors cannot diagnosis disease if they are censored to the ...

2025-09-10T16:33:19Z

Doctors cannot diagnosis disease if they are censored to the symptoms.

My Latest Video: Don't Be A Pawn ...

2025-08-31T22:48:35Z

My Latest Video: Don't Be A Pawn

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjcxH6YYd54

#chess #authenticity #independence #awareness

Fix the money, fix the world. https://youtu.be/rPVoaYFiIDg

2025-08-24T00:45:49Z

Fix the money, fix the world.

https://youtu.be/rPVoaYFiIDg

Thank you. I understand.

2025-08-23T21:03:29Z

In reply to nevent1q…jc39
_________________________

Thank you. I understand.

We sought a number of doctors' recommendations and thought ...

2025-08-23T16:40:56Z

In reply to nevent1q…wg02
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We sought a number of doctors' recommendations and thought through lots of different possibilities before we tried for a fourth child. We felt that there were risks, but if we were in a good place with a good team, we would be okay. Ever since our marriage 9 years ago, my wife has had a very strong urge to be a mother to a large family. I'm very blessed to have her as a partner.

Thank you for your kind words. I agree there isn't anything ...

2025-08-21T21:28:04Z

In reply to nevent1q…053u
_________________________

Thank you for your kind words. I agree there isn't anything wrong with business, as a concept, if we are looking at it as a way to exchange value for value. It's even better when it can be done with authenticity and generativity.

My Nostr Article Regarding The Art of Medicine #naddr1qv…uvw4

2025-08-21T18:14:37Z

My Nostr Article Regarding The Art of Medicine

quoting
naddr1qv…uvw4

Just days ago, my wife and I welcomed our fourth child—a beautiful, healthy baby girl. We're beyond blessed. But her delivery wasn't just joyful; it was a profound reminder about medicine, desire, and practicing with true authenticity.

This was my wife's fifth pregnancy. The first ended in miscarriage, and each subsequent one brought escalating risks of postpartum bleeding. By our third child, she needed an implanted device to stop postpartum hemorrhage. It was traumatic, leaving us questioning if another pregnancy was even safe.

In past deliveries, different obstetricians rotated in as part of a larger group—competent, sure, but part of on-call teams. They'd react to crises, but I always worried: Did they fully grasp her history? Were the right tools and people prepped? As a doctor myself, I've seen how details can slip in busy systems, even with good people.

This time was different. We chose a private-practice OB—no group, no rotations. He handles every patient personally. When labor hits, he's there.

Labor started at night. He arrived at 11 p.m., just two hours after admission, and stayed through nine grueling hours of active labor. He knew her risks inside out, as he was there for every conversation we had with him in the 9 months beforehand. When she lost two liters of blood from a placenta that wouldn't fully detach, he was unflappable—meds ready, playbook executed.

Post-delivery, he spent 90 minutes meticulously removing the placenta and repairing a cervical tear. Some iron supplementation but no device needed and no blood transfusion. It was personalized, attentive excellence that left me inspired.

Why did it hit so hard? Modern medicine is increasingly organized into large systems. Physicians like me become small parts of massive machines. We track “key performance indicators,” not because they reflect the soul of good medicine, but because they satisfy the larger organizations that we become a part of.

In theory, patients are the “customers” in the business of healthcare. In reality however, insurance companies are the ones providing the majority of the reimbursements in the US healthcare system. And so, incentives drift. Physicians start unconsciously aligning with organizational goals instead of the deeper, older goal: caring for the patients in front of them.

Enter René Girard's concept of mimetic desire. Girard argued that we humans don’t invent our desires from scratch. We absorb them from models around us — often without realizing it. A young doctor starts his or her career with dreams of healing patients, but once part of a bigger system, success models shift to organizational metrics, promotions, reputation. Unknowingly, the desire to be an excellent physician can morph into the desire to satisfy the organization.

Watching this OB at 3 a.m., solo and fully present for my wife, reignited what authentic medicine is: Not performing for a system, but being there for a person.

At 41 years of age, I'm still growing as a physician, and this experience inspired me. I want to chase that deeper call to serve, not just benchmarks put forth as carrot sticks by larger and broader entities that aren't focused on the patient-provider relationship.

This isn't just for medicine. In business, teaching, art, or parenting, it's easy to adopt borrowed desires—serving systems over people, metrics over meaning.

But encounters with those who inspire us to stay true? They become models pulling us back to purpose.

That's what I saw last weekend: A doctor embodying presence, humility, and skill. I am grateful for my wife's care—and the reminder of who I aspire to be.

My recent experience reminding me about what it means to practice ...

2025-08-21T18:13:35Z

My recent experience reminding me about what it means to practice medicine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3rWMWvBH6Y

#health #doctor #desire #healthcare

Awesome. Thank you. I look forward to reading your essay when you ...

2025-08-16T12:59:28Z

In reply to nevent1q…mr8j
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Awesome. Thank you. I look forward to reading your essay when you post it!

I agree. It's fascinating to see the same issue apply to both ...

2025-08-15T13:43:28Z

In reply to nevent1q…r077
_________________________

I agree. It's fascinating to see the same issue apply to both social phenomena, and brain wave activity.

My video essay discussing the concept of reification. ...

2025-08-15T10:56:25Z

My video essay discussing the concept of reification.

https://youtu.be/ll5rM3k5o4w

#Philosophy #Neurology #Neuroscience #Definitions #Reification

My latest article tackling a concept I wrestle with, but very few ...

2025-08-14T18:10:53Z

My latest article tackling a concept I wrestle with, but very few talk about: the fallacy of reification.

quoting
naddr1qv…da05

As a neurophysiologist, much of my clinical work involves reading electroencephalography (EEG) — monitoring brain wave activity to detect seizures. Some seizures are electrographic: no obvious outward symptoms, but unmistakable patterns on EEG.

Our field’s most recent guidelines give an operational definition of an electrographic seizure:

Epileptiform discharges averaging ≥2.5 Hz for ≥10 seconds, or

Any pattern with definite evolution and lasting ≥10 seconds.

I’m well-trained to recognize this pattern and alert colleagues when it appears. But after reading thousands of EEGs, I’ve seen countless patterns that share many features of seizures — and may cause similar harm — yet don’t meet this definition.

It makes me wonder:

How critical are the boundaries we’ve drawn?

How well do they map to the underlying phenomena?

The conceptual definition of a seizure is “a transient occurrence of signs and/or symptoms due to abnormal, excessive, or synchronous brain activity.”

By that standard, there are some patterns that we recognize as similar but lack clear boundaries - ictal-interictal continuum patterns. However, there are still other events seen on EEG — cortical spreading depolarizations, focal evolving ischemia, event-related desynchronization — that appear to represent similar phenomena. Yet we don't think of them the same way, conceptually.

This isn’t just a medical issue.

It’s a philosophical one: the fallacy of reification — treating operational definitions as if they are the phenomena, rather than convenient models.

The Philosophical Roots of Reification

https://i.imgur.com/J2zZZ2K.jpeg

The fallacy of reification has strong philosophical roots that have evolved to date. The ancient Greeks described the "Heap Paradox", where they described that if you remove a grain from a heap of sand, it's still a heap. If you keep going, where does it stop being a heap?

In Philosophical Investigations, Ludwig Wittgenstein dismantled the idea that all members of a category share a single set of necessary and sufficient traits. Using “games” as an example, he showed that categories often hold together through overlapping similarities, not rigid definitions.

In Ways of Worldmaking, Nelson Goodman argued that our categories do more than describe reality - they construct versions of it. Our operational definitions are flawed, but not because they are wrong about nature, but rather because they can be perceived to be the only way to carve up a continuous reality, when in fact they’re just one of many possible world-versions.

In The Logic of Modern Physics, Percy Bridgman argued that a scientific concept is synonymous with the operations used to measure it. This is powerful for precision, but he warned that operational definitions are context-dependent proxies, not the thing itself. They’re tools for communication and testing hypotheses. When we forget this, we reify them — treating the operational shortcut as if it were the literal reality.

https://i.imgur.com/kyOGSDT.png

Reification isn't just a philosophical curiosity - it's a trap that can freeze progress across many different domains - medicine, economics, morality etc,. The moment we forget that our definitions are models, not the phenomena themselves, we stop asking the right questions.

Seeing the spectra behind the label is the first step toward solving the problems our definitions don't allow us to see.

Why This Matters in Medicine

Operational definitions carry value in that they can help us establish a foundation of new phenomena. The operational definition of an electrographic seizure allowed us to do important studies that showed that electrographic seizures are common in brain-injured patients, and that they are associated with metabolic crises and worsened outcomes. This has helped improve the way we monitor and treat these seizures in neurocritical care.

Another important operation definition in the neurocritical care world is cerebral perfusion pressure (CPP). An important goal in caring for the brain-injured patient is make sure they have appropriate blood flow going to injured parts of their brain. We historically have not had great technology to continuously monitor blood flow in the brain, but we developed an operation definition of cerebral perfusion pressure (CPP) to represent the difference between mean arterial pressure (MAP) and intracranial pressure (ICP). Again, this operational definition provided foundational science that showed that low calculated values of CPP are associated with worsened outcomes in brain injured patients. However, I've encountered situations where a rise in ICP may be caused by too much blood flow in the brain (identified through evidence of cerebral hyperemia using transcranial Doppler ultrasound). These are situations where the operational definition defies the conceptual definition.

https://i.imgur.com/kyOGSDT.png

In using operational definitions dogmatically, we have run into a ceiling in our progress. We have no high-level randomized controlled clinical trials that show us that treating electrographic seizures improves outcomes, nor do we have similar trials demonstrating that improving calculated values of CPP improves outcomes. Why is it then, that we can see these strong associations to outcomes in observational studies, but yet we haven't figured out a way to translate this information to high-level therapies?

Fundamentally, we want to treat seizures in brain injured patients to reduce the cellular damage that can occur from abnormally firing brain activity. We want to provide adequate blood flow to the injured brain, not just target a number formed from an equation.

If we mistake our operational definitions for the phenomena themselves, we risk optimizing the map while ignoring the territory. In doing so, we may miss the very mechanisms we set out to heal.

Why This Matters in Economics

https://i.imgur.com/gBH1lVj.jpeg

Like I said, the fallacy of reification matters to more than just medicine. Let's take on the issue of money.

Money serves two fundamental purposes: it is both a medium of exchange and a store of value . As Jack Mallers eloquently describes, money is our time and energy in abstracted form. It is a unit of account of our stored energy that can be transformed across space and time. Every country, however, characterizes money as a unit defined by government decree, and backs it by trust in that governmental authority. When we accept this, we fall into the trap of reifying it.

By mistaking the symbol for the thing, we risk building economic policy - and personal financial decisions - around the nominal count of dollars rather than the real purchasing power that we intend for it to secure. In our world, we experience skyrocketing inflation, where the price of goods and services increase beyond nominal wages for most individuals. People are struggling to save money, and younger people are crippled with debt and without the means to improve their financial situation. Across the world, governments act together in setting monetary policy that is inflationary in nature, where global debt grows and each generation has to work more to obtain less than their predecessors. We might see assets and wages go up in terms of a government currency, and we think that they actually went up in value. The fallacy of reification can create an illusion of value.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/s2QbMswLEN8

The Call to Action

Operational definitions can provide us with the foundation to create models and solve some of our problems, but they also can limit us to further progress if we don't understand what we create. If we want to solve our hardest problems - in medicine, economics, or ethics - we must

Recognize our definitions as tools, not dogma

Question whether our operational cutoffs capture the underlying phenomena

Return to first principles, our foundations, and follow the signals

Reification hides the invisible spectra. Our job is to see beyond the bins we've built - and act on the phenomena themselves.

References

Hirsch LJ, Fong MWK, Leitinger M, et al. American Clinical Neurophysiology Society's Standardized Critical Care EEG Terminology: 2021 Version. J Clin Neurophysiol. 2021 Jan 1;38(1):1-29.

Foreman B, Claassen J. Quantitative EEG for the detection of brain ischemia. Crit Care. 2012 Dec 12;16(2):216.

Hartings JA, Shuttleworth CW, Kirov SA, et al. The continuum of spreading depolarizations in acute cortical lesion development: Examining Leao's legacy. J Cereb Blood Flow Metab. 2017 May;37(5):1571-1594.

Williamson TR. Vagueness. London, UK: Routledge;1994

Wittgenstein L. Philosophical Investigations. 4th ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell; 2009

Goodman N. Ways of Worldmaking. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company; 1978

Bridgman PW. The Logic of Modern Physics. New York, NY: Macmillan; 1927

Alkachroum A, Appavu B, Egawa S, et al. Electroencephalogram in the intensive care unit: a focused look at acute brain injury. Intensive Care Med. 2022 Oct;48(10):1443-1462

Vespa P, Tubi M, Claassen J, et al. Metabolic crisis occurs with seizures and periodic discharges after brain trauma. Ann Neurol. 2016 Apr;79(4):579-90.

Brasil S, Panerai RB, Bor-Seng-Shu E, et al. Point-Counterpoint: Cerebral Perfusion Pressure Is a High-Risk Concept. J Cereb Blood Flow Metab. 2023 Nov;43(11):2008-2010

Mallers J. Money is Your Stored Energy Across Space and Time. YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/s2QbMswLEN8**

. Published January 30, 2025 by Natalie Brunell. Accessed August 14, 2025.

@nprofile…5qrc offers a very unique opportunity within the ...

2025-08-13T16:40:53Z

MedSchlr (nprofile…5qrc) offers a very unique opportunity within the Nostr ecosystem to invigorate a patient-centered approach to improving medical education, research, and driving medicine toward what fundamentally matters - improving health. Take a look at their charter. I'm excited to be a part of their efforts.

quoting
nevent1q…dmmz
Check out our latest progress update:

https://geyser.fund/project/medschlr/posts/view/4900?hero=dreamgradaca

If you have to make a hard decision in life, play with your kids ...

2025-08-06T13:09:15Z

If you have to make a hard decision in life, play with your kids the night before you do. You'll know what you need to do.

I visited that site last summer. Still so very surreal.... ...

2025-08-06T13:07:30Z

In reply to nevent1q…wdp9
_________________________

I visited that site last summer. Still so very surreal....

My video responding to a group of physicians who propose, in a ...

2025-08-04T16:15:23Z

My video responding to a group of physicians who propose, in a recent New York Times guest essay, that we need to redefine brain death to optimize rates of organ procurement and transplantation.

https://youtu.be/4b4rfuoZ5UA

#philosophy #logic #desire #mimesis #girard #jordanpeterson #motivation #authenticity

Life is short. Be courageous. Poke the bear. ...

2025-08-03T10:39:28Z

Life is short.
Be courageous.
Poke the bear.

Thank you for your kind words. Trying to get involved with more ...

2025-08-03T00:47:02Z

In reply to nevent1q…a5kk
_________________________

Thank you for your kind words. Trying to get involved with more of this.

Distrust occurs when you sacrifice truth for utility.

2025-08-02T11:33:58Z

In reply to nevent1q…hdq3
_________________________

Distrust occurs when you sacrifice truth for utility.

The authors here completely fail at acknowledging the is/ought ...

2025-08-02T11:13:31Z

The authors here completely fail at acknowledging the is/ought problem from David Hume:

"Reason is, and ought only to be the slaves of the passions" (A Treatise of Human Nature, 1739)

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/30/opinion/organ-donors-death-definition.html

Freedom is not an end goal. It's the impetus needed to do ...

2025-08-01T12:35:04Z

Freedom is not an end goal. It's the impetus needed to do what you love.

I've been gradually getting the sense that Nostr provides the ...

2025-07-27T14:00:42Z

I've been gradually getting the sense that Nostr provides the space in our modern day for perhaps the highest 'creativity/ego' ratio I've seen.

We live close to my parents, and they buy toys they keep in their ...

2025-07-19T15:41:16Z

In reply to nevent1q…uspy
_________________________

We live close to my parents, and they buy toys they keep in their house. We definitely create a massacre there as well. Thankfully, my parents enjoy it and take pleasure in cleaning up afterwards.

Yeah. I definitely worry that in 20 years when our house is ...

2025-07-19T15:38:58Z

In reply to nevent1q…2xq3
_________________________

Yeah. I definitely worry that in 20 years when our house is squeaky clean, I'll miss this.

Haha. I hear you. It's a familiar room for kids who love and ...

2025-07-19T15:37:46Z

In reply to nevent1q…ykxp
_________________________

Haha. I hear you. It's a familiar room for kids who love and are loved...

https://youtu.be/qnQugyigLw4 A beautiful and authentic response ...

2025-07-16T12:38:10Z

https://youtu.be/qnQugyigLw4

A beautiful and authentic response about success from the highest ranked golfer in the world.

#authenticity #success

Less than 24 hours after a deep clean… This is what our family ...

2025-07-14T12:02:49Z

Less than 24 hours after a deep clean…
This is what our family room looks like again.
If you have kids under 5, you already know: mess is inevitable. Toys everywhere. Chaos on repeat. But I’ve started to see it differently.
A messy house used to feel like an inevitable lost battle. Now, I’m learning it’s a sign of something else—something good.
This isn’t just a living room. It’s a lab. A workshop. Ultimately, we as parents build a home not only as a save haven, but as a creative hub for our kids to explore. We create the environment for them to use their agency to imagine, play, experiment, innovate and create.
Whenever I clean up my office or desk, I feel clarity of mind to think, write, experiment with ideas and just do more. In the same way, I think when our kids see a clean house, they have increased inspiration to get the toys, papers, and crayons out again and do more with their creativity. The mess comes quickly—but so does the magic.
I'm starting to think less of cleaning our house as a never-ending chore, but an opportunity to 'clean up the lab'. It's an opportunity each day for our kids to see an environment that is both safe and bountiful; to test their boundaries and see where their mind can take them. We’re not just cleaning a house. We’re preparing the stage for discovery.

#parenting #creativity #philosophy #sovereignty

Hey @nprofile…ewd4 That would be awesome. I really look forward ...

2025-07-10T00:37:40Z

In reply to nevent1q…0qwy
_________________________

Hey liminal 🦠 (nprofile…ewd4) That would be awesome. I really look forward to working with you and your team on all this!

https://youtu.be/sRQ8zLKjA-M My latest video: In a world where ...

2025-07-07T23:58:37Z

https://youtu.be/sRQ8zLKjA-M

My latest video:
In a world where our desires are fundamentally mimetic, how do we find authenticity?

#authenticity #philosophy #desires #mimesis #motivation

https://youtu.be/oq4130d_vzU I first watched 'How to Train ...

2025-06-29T16:38:17Z

https://youtu.be/oq4130d_vzU

I first watched 'How to Train Your Dragon' in my 30's and I'm not afraid to say that this kids movie remains one of favorite movies. l've always felt a bit embarrassed to claim a kids movie as one of my favorite, but I think this film analysis hits a home run in describing why I, and perhaps others, find this movie so resonating.

#carljung #jung #shadow #philosophy

Desires II: The Mimetic Trap https://youtu.be/T9A7xDTRONE

2025-06-23T13:04:19Z

Desires II: The Mimetic Trap

https://youtu.be/T9A7xDTRONE

Satoshi Nakamoto is the 'Gray Champion' of our Fourth ...

2025-06-15T02:09:23Z

Satoshi Nakamoto is the 'Gray Champion' of our Fourth Turning.

My latest video on desires and Rene Girard's Mimetic Theory ...

2025-06-10T10:37:39Z

My latest video on desires and Rene Girard's Mimetic Theory of Desire. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/ft12GkqToqs

"Desires are discerned, not decided. Discernment exists in ...

2025-06-04T16:28:07Z

"Desires are discerned, not decided. Discernment exists in the liminal space between what's now and what's next" -Luke Burgis

Amazing interview here with Naval Ravikant. You might find gems ...

2025-04-01T21:23:49Z

Amazing interview here with Naval Ravikant. You might find gems here that resonate with you.

https://youtu.be/KyfUysrNaco

My latest video on the fallacies of induction. Enjoy! ...

2025-03-15T13:26:02Z

My latest video on the fallacies of induction. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/elwQWmSSKnw

#philosophy #logic #induction #fallacies #argument #bias

My third video on logical fallacies, with a focus in appeals that ...

2025-03-10T03:34:57Z

My third video on logical fallacies, with a focus in appeals that are made to override reason.

https://youtu.be/7KG2dtD2nN4

#philosophy #reason #fallacies #argument

My second video on logical fallacies where the argument is ...

2025-02-28T11:50:40Z

My second video on logical fallacies where the argument is distorted.

https://youtu.be/yax2GsWGXYg

#philosophy #logic #reasoning #fallacies #argument #strawman

Taking advice from people outside my profession. If you only ...

2025-02-19T13:46:31Z

In reply to nevent1q…dz2v
_________________________

Taking advice from people outside my profession. If you only listen to the advice of the same people going down the same road, doing the same thing, then you're not setting yourself up to authentically create and innovate.

My latest video on logical fallacies where the person is ...

2025-02-19T11:30:51Z

My latest video on logical fallacies where the person is attacked, rather than the argument.

https://youtu.be/yMbeaJqMyPQ

#philosophy #logic #reasoning #fallacies #argument

I agree and have my own experience dealing with the issue of ...

2025-02-13T20:04:22Z

In reply to nevent1q…sqcz
_________________________

I agree and have my own experience dealing with the issue of indirects that the public likely doesn't fully understand. Institutions may not like or want grants that don't offer high indirects, even if the funding opportunity is promising for the investigator. Sometimes, institutions may only approve the submission of a grant if investigators agree to lower the amount offered toward a clinicians' time to the research to 'offset the cost' of less available indirects. Other times, an increase in an institutions indirect requests may cause a research team to lose funds dedicated to them on an ongoing study. Very often, this occurs with the actual research team having no clarity regarding where the indirects are going. I think if we were to achieve decentralized fundraising for medical research, contributors and investors would have a strong demand to know exactly where there money goes, and that it helps the true cause of the research.

Fix the money, fix the world...

Here's my latest video essay on epistemology, with a focus on ...

2025-02-10T10:39:22Z

Here's my latest video essay on epistemology, with a focus on induction, science and explanatory knowledge. I hope you enjoy!

https://youtu.be/F1ObEu_9ixY

#philosophy #epistemology #science #induction

I do it with the same principles of why I HODL bitcoin. I ...

2025-02-09T13:02:33Z

In reply to nevent1q…ssxx
_________________________

I do it with the same principles of why I HODL bitcoin.

I maintain a long time horizon about the quality and longevity of my life. I remain convicted about my values - that my health and a strong mind is what I need to create value in this world for my family and for others I treasure.

Just like DCA, i stay consistent and humble and stack - not just sats, but weights with progressive overload and effective time under tension.

Consistency and principles fuel what I do and how I define myself. The idea of deviating from this makes me so uncomfortable that I just need to get up.

'Searching for Bobby Fisher' was one of my favorite ...

2025-02-07T02:38:37Z

In reply to nevent1q…eutg
_________________________

'Searching for Bobby Fisher' was one of my favorite movies as a kid, but I didn't appreciate it as much as I could until I became a dad myself.

I've read it and thoroughly enjoyed it. Some of it hit me ...

2025-02-04T23:33:00Z

In reply to nevent1q…9ldj
_________________________

I've read it and thoroughly enjoyed it. Some of it hit me hard, including statements that desire is an agreement you make with yourself until you get what you want.

https://youtu.be/e_97p2VpQfM Here's my latest video essay on ...

2025-02-02T22:16:39Z

https://youtu.be/e_97p2VpQfM

Here's my latest video essay on epistemology, and identifying truth in this world. I hope you enjoy!

#philosophy #epistemology #metaphysics

This has always been my favorite quote from this movie.... ...

2025-01-28T11:16:18Z

This has always been my favorite quote from this movie....

quoting
note1zzs…lm2u
#Bitcoin is revolutionary.

This is all interesting. I just don't understand why it's ...

2025-01-27T18:41:38Z

In reply to nevent1q…5wvd
_________________________

This is all interesting. I just don't understand why it's making people sell their bitcoin 🤷‍♂️

My wife is on Nostr! @npub1ry4…c35z is an independent thinker ...

2025-01-26T14:48:29Z

My wife is on Nostr! Michelle Appavu (npub1ry4…c35z) is an independent thinker and a short story writer with training and skills in creative writing. She's also an amazing mother. Follow her for some thoughtful and creative content.

quoting
note1nl3…lpc0
This is my first post and to be honest, I have no idea what my plans are. I am looking for a platform to be authentic and unapologetic while still discussing the topics that matter to me.
I am also very interested in Bitcoin and what it is going to mean to our future. I lean more on the conservative side and find the writing and presentation of the news today to be borderline appalling.
Looking forward to connecting and finding intellectual stimulation 😎.
#introductions #introduction

https://youtu.be/7SQ1wjhuea4 What is the nature of reality? Here ...

2025-01-26T12:34:01Z

https://youtu.be/7SQ1wjhuea4

What is the nature of reality? Here is my newly released video on metaphysics, with an exploration of reality and illusion.

I hope you enjoy...

#philosophy #metaphysics

https://youtu.be/D1BpRKmwINE What @npub103m…d3h5 says here is ...

2025-01-25T20:31:20Z

https://youtu.be/D1BpRKmwINE

What Jor (npub103m…d3h5) says here is so important.

Don't get too impatient spending your time anxiously waiting and focused on when bitcoin will hit $1 million or $10 million.

Bitcoin is valuable, but not as valuable as time.

When bitcoin was $100 back in 2013, I'm sure much of the faithful couldn't wait for it too hit $100,000. That took 11 years.

I would give anything to go back to 2013 then when i was a youngster with a wide world in front of me.

If bitcoin hits $10 million by 2040, that's great, but then I'll be an older man and my kids will be be nearly adults and no longer cuddling me and calling me 'daddy' like the adorable toddlers they are right now.

Enjoy the present, create value in this world, and move forward in life with meaning.

I have not, but I'm happy to look into it.

2025-01-25T19:28:37Z

In reply to nevent1q…604z
_________________________

I have not, but I'm happy to look into it.

Mortality. We must die. But that's ok. The fear of death ...

2025-01-25T19:23:38Z

In reply to nevent1q…l8ck
_________________________

Mortality. We must die. But that's ok. The fear of death invigorates our impulse to live life well.

Memento mori... I think about death and I fear death. It's ...

2025-01-25T19:15:58Z

In reply to nevent1q…rfgp
_________________________

Memento mori...

I think about death and I fear death. It's unsettling and uncomfortable, but it invigorated me to think about the time and energy I have left in this life, and it focuses me on using it to produce and provide value to those who I love and my community.

The fear of death is perhaps the most powerful imposed of the human spirit.

https://youtu.be/-5zdmA7HSoE

Welcome Jordy!

2025-01-25T18:59:23Z

In reply to nevent1q…yddz
_________________________

Welcome Jordy!

He will eventually.....Nostr is inevitable

2025-01-25T01:10:22Z

In reply to nevent1q…chwn
_________________________

He will eventually.....Nostr is inevitable

I'm not quite sure he'd want to come back...

2025-01-25T01:05:05Z

In reply to nevent1q…ne0t
_________________________

I'm not quite sure he'd want to come back...

I totally agree. Respectful debate and humility to accept correct ...

2025-01-24T18:29:39Z

In reply to nevent1q…gy45
_________________________

I totally agree. Respectful debate and humility to accept correct arguments are the cornerstone of a beautiful civilization. Nostr can be the protocol we can do this in.

https://youtu.be/watch?v=2bZSzObqAjE I found this conversation ...

2025-01-22T21:33:48Z

https://youtu.be/watch?v=2bZSzObqAjE

I found this conversation enlightening, challenging and stimulating.

It's between Naval Ramikant, Tim Ferriss, and Aaron Stupple, the author of a new book, The Sovereign Child. Im reading through the book now.

I think this is a great video to watch if you want your children to live free, and experience authentic passion in their lives.

I take it with a source of pride to not actually know yet what ...

2025-01-21T18:59:27Z

I take it with a source of pride to not actually know yet what wBTC even is....

For those familiar with Plato's Allegory of the Cave... ...

2025-01-21T18:55:50Z

For those familiar with Plato's Allegory of the Cave...

quoting
note1g05…d0jp
Bitcoin is freedom