Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Aug 2006
- Posts
- 3,779
- Location
- Wales
That Cotard thing is interesting.
You also could say that someone suffering from it demonstrates (thinly) how the evolutionary process gives rise to intelligence or instinct. I mean, if you're suffering from a delusion which means you don't feel the need to eat, then you're eventually going to die (of course, regardless of whether you've had offspring, that's not necessarily an evolutionary cul-de-sac because that applies to whole species I believe). Luckier people have the experience of reality whereby they feel an instinctual need to eat, and this governs their actions, they eat they survive. Arguably, both minds are delusional, it just so happens that one delusion is more helpful to aiding survival than the other one. I think in this way we give more credence than we should to the idea of intelligence or instinct as being something that is beyond the biological mechanisms which houses it - it's not, in a way it's a delusion propogated onto us by our brains/bodies, it's a way of processing and experiencing reality which happens to aid survival (or not, as the case might be). I'm sure the reality experienced by a cotard sufferer is as truthful to them as the reality experienced by anyone.
It raises the interesting question of whether we have evolved to have a relatively deceptional view of reality, across the board. Knowing the whole nasty truth is often pretty unhelpful motivator for getting out of bed in the morning, what else are we shielding from ourselves? If we are programmed to see helpful patterns and symmetries throughout the universe, then it could be a possibility that we're processing this information we receive from the world around us in a very limited way which might appeal to our senses, convictions and intuition but may not exactly be the truth of matters. I mean, we've already discovered the space-time has 4 dimensional curvature. We've encountered limits, I'm sure of it, and arrived at understandings but processed them in ways that our senses can sometimes barely handle.
Sounds like an advertisment for a shroom party. I guess it is an interesting proposition that what we view as solid physical evidence could well be skewed by our perception given that we are such fragile, but adaptive creatures.
You also could say that someone suffering from it demonstrates (thinly) how the evolutionary process gives rise to intelligence or instinct. I mean, if you're suffering from a delusion which means you don't feel the need to eat, then you're eventually going to die (of course, regardless of whether you've had offspring, that's not necessarily an evolutionary cul-de-sac because that applies to whole species I believe). Luckier people have the experience of reality whereby they feel an instinctual need to eat, and this governs their actions, they eat they survive. Arguably, both minds are delusional, it just so happens that one delusion is more helpful to aiding survival than the other one. I think in this way we give more credence than we should to the idea of intelligence or instinct as being something that is beyond the biological mechanisms which houses it - it's not, in a way it's a delusion propogated onto us by our brains/bodies, it's a way of processing and experiencing reality which happens to aid survival (or not, as the case might be). I'm sure the reality experienced by a cotard sufferer is as truthful to them as the reality experienced by anyone.
It raises the interesting question of whether we have evolved to have a relatively deceptional view of reality, across the board. Knowing the whole nasty truth is often pretty unhelpful motivator for getting out of bed in the morning, what else are we shielding from ourselves? If we are programmed to see helpful patterns and symmetries throughout the universe, then it could be a possibility that we're processing this information we receive from the world around us in a very limited way which might appeal to our senses, convictions and intuition but may not exactly be the truth of matters. I mean, we've already discovered the space-time has 4 dimensional curvature. We've encountered limits, I'm sure of it, and arrived at understandings but processed them in ways that our senses can sometimes barely handle.
Sounds like an advertisment for a shroom party. I guess it is an interesting proposition that what we view as solid physical evidence could well be skewed by our perception given that we are such fragile, but adaptive creatures.
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