In 'Self Comes to Mind' I pay a lot of attention to simple creatures without brains or minds, because those 'cartooned abstractions of who we are' operate on precisely the same principles that we do.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Humans like to think of themselves as unusual. We've got big brains that make it possible for us to think, and we think that we have free will and that our behavior can't be described by some mechanistic set of theorems or ideas. But even in terms of much of our behavior, we really aren't very different from other animals.
We get so intellectual that we forget that we're physical creatures.
Very simple ideas lie within the reach only of complex minds.
Birds and animals probably think without knowing that they think; that is, they have not self-consciousness. Only man seems to be endowed with this faculty; he alone develops disinterested intelligence, intelligence that is not primarily concerned with his own safety and well-being but that looks abroad upon things.
We need a self because the complexity of the chemical processes that make up our individual humanities exceeds the processing power of our brains.
I tend to think in images and feelings rather than non-abstract concepts.
The human mind evolved always in the company of the human body, and of the animal body before it was human. The intricate connections of mind and body must exceed our imagination, as from our point of view we are peculiarly prevented from observing them.
Simple ideas lie within the reach only of complex minds.
People often ask how I got interested in the brain; my rhetorical answer is: 'How can anyone NOT be interested in it?' Everything you call 'human nature' and consciousness arises from it.
The intelligence of the lower forms of animal life, like a great deal of human intelligence, does not involve a self.