Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2015-01-09 Thread John Mikes
Evgenyij, we know sss little 'bout our natural existence (and in my
agnosticism I hope for so much we don't even imagine...) that I come up
with the question: what should be called human brain? the tissue in the
lab or more? if you add all the brainfunctions (explainable today, or
not) you may end up with a 'monster' unfathomable for our ongoing (naiv?)
natural sciences. Do the gut-microbes THINK for us? and so on...

B O D Y 

Best regards
John Mikes

On Thu, Dec 25, 2014 at 4:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote:

 In paper

 Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the
 cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see
 http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)

 the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside
 the brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.

 The suggestion of the medieval physician Avicenna that the brain
 ‘cupboard’ is bare, – i.e. the brain is a perceptual, not storage, organ –
 is consistent with a mysterious ‘universe as holograph’ model.

 Charles Darwin spent much time setting out various combinations of 26
 units in linear order on paper. Yet, that each cell of an organism might
 contain similar digital information, now known as DNA, was beyond his
 conceptual horizon. Likewise, many today compute using remote information
 storage yet are unlikely to countenance the possibility that their own
 brains might functioning similarly.

 Best wishes,

 Evgenii

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-27 Thread Evgenii Rudnyi
I should say that I am not an expert in this issue, however I have found 
the paper entertaining. The history of Samuel Butler is quite 
interesting. Butler in 19th century held that heredity and brain memory 
both involved the storage of information and that the two forms of 
storage were the same. Now there are even more papers along this line, 
see for example the abstract


DNA methylation and memory formation
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/abs/nn.2666.html

Memory formation and storage require long-lasting changes in 
memory-related neuronal circuits. Recent evidence indicates that DNA 
methylation may serve as a contributing mechanism in memory formation 
and storage.


Although the meaning of the term long term memory might not be exactly 
the same.


Evgeii


Am 26.12.2014 um 22:06 schrieb meekerdb:

On 12/26/2014 11:56 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

Am 26.12.2014 um 19:55 schrieb meekerdb:



But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an
abuse of terminology, making a metaphor into a factual
description. DNA provides memory only in that sometimes parts
of it get to reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but
their memory is just get copied to not. There's nothing
Lamarckian about it, much less extra-corporeal survival of
memories.  Memories are necessarily things that are remembered.
I don't remember any previous life and I doubt that you do
either.


From the paper:

In the twenty-first century the Hebbian network hypothesis came
under attack and attention returned to storage of specific items of
mental information as DNA (Dietrich and Been, 2001; Arshavsky,
2006a).

Dietrich, A., Been, W., 2001. Memory and DNA. J. Theor. Biol. 208,
 145-149.

Arshavsky, Y. I., 2006a. ‘The seven sins’ of the Hebbian synapse:
can the hypothesis of synaptic plasticity explain long-term memory?
Prog. Neurobiol. 80, 99-113.


Evgenii



I can't get the first paper.  The second is nonsense.  Arshavsky
claims that long-term memory can't be based on network structure
because it's not stable - but he doesn't provide any empirical
evidence that it's not stable enough.  He ignores the fact that very
little information is actually retained in long-term memory (do you
remember what you had for lunch on this day last month?) and
concentrates on the small amount that is.  He ignores the studies
finding that recalling memories tends to change them.  And he does
nothing to support his DNA theory except to say DNA is more stable.
It would be trivial to look at some brain cells and see whether they
have identical DNA or not - which would blow away his theory.

Brent



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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-27 Thread LizR
I haven't managed to read the entire paper yet, but it seems to be along
similar lines to the idea that the brain receives consciousness from
somewhere else, like in the story by Barrington Bayley (I forget the title)
in which the universe is criss-crossed with beams of consciousness that
cause life to emerge and get filtered through the structures that appear as
a result. One amusing point in the story (which is opnly about 5 pages
long) is that the beams have no origin - they come from an infinite
distance, and occasionally get redirected by beings who arise as a result
of their influence.

On the subject of DNA being memory, it's a form of memory of what worked in
the past, but not very like the sort we appear to use in our brains - that
is, it's a pattern that represents successful past reproducers, but is more
or less fixed in any given organism (as far as I know, ignoring
retroviruses etc). The similarity between DNA and brain type memory seems
roughly the similarity between genes and memes. I can't see any reason to
assume they would use the same molecular mechanism.

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-27 Thread Bruno Marchal


On 26 Dec 2014, at 19:55, meekerdb wrote:


On 12/25/2014 11:45 PM, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List wrote:



From: everything-list@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com 
] On Behalf Of Kim Jones

Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2014 7:46 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal





On 26 Dec 2014, at 1:43 pm, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote:

On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:
In paper

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is  
the cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164.  
(see http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)


the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is  
outside the brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the  
brain then they should survive destruction of the brain.  But as I  
understand Bruno's idea one's soul survives destruction of the  
brain as in reincarnation, but memories don't.


Brent

Don't forget this is about long-term memory. How long is long-term?  
I would say beyond the life of the individual. Seen like that,  
there has to be some kind of library or lookup table which in no  
way correlates to anything to do with human brain size, the authors  
conclude. Certain of these very-long-term memories do get encoded  
somehow to survive destruction of the brain, as in Jung's 'racial  
memory' or collective unconscious' - the original engrams or  
patterns of recognition (archetypes) some of them terrifyingly  
inexplicable and probably arising in dreams and recorded as  
revelations. Folklore is the racial memory of homo sapiens. We  
still churn it out. What we cannot remember exactly we plaster over  
with something else anyway, because HS are natural-born story  
tellers who cannot pass up a good story. If the shoe fits, we tend  
to wear it. It's literally in our DNA these authors conclude. This  
suggests to me that the notion of Junk DNA is perhaps itself junk  
as the very purpose of DNA is to record ie encode experience at  
something for the purpose of passing it on. DNA cannot fail at that  
purpose. Whenever scientists declare something Junk or Dark  
this just means we are clueless over this so it's time to find  
the macro-molecular link that allows this almost-Lamarckian effect  
of racial memory to come about.


The term “junk DNA”, itself has been junked a while ago, when it  
was discovered that a portion of this DNA acts like a kind of OS  
that switches encoding sections on and off. It  is a  
mistake I believe to look at DNA as a static repository of  
hereditary information alone. It is this of course, but it turns  
out to be more complex, dynamic and layered than the simple static  
model. A lot of the so called “junk DNA” (but not all of it by any  
means) seems to be involved in this dynamic process. Especially,  
during the process of embryogenesis, DNA expression is undergoing  
dynamic highly sequenced and seemingly (somehow) choreographed  
changes (through methylation and other means).
Other parts of this junk DNA, seem to be parasitical in nature;  
e.g. the selfish DNA hypothesis, and this also seems very likely –  
IMO. If such DNA “parasite entities” exist,  perhaps  
using viruses as vehicles during their “life-cycle” in order to  
ride with them on into a hosts DNA and insert themselves into a new  
happy home, passing copies down for as long as the lineage  
continues. Perhaps a parasite is “junk” for the host, but from the  
parasites perspective I am sure the view is different… so even here  
in this case is it really junk.

-Chris



But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an abuse  
of terminology, making a metaphor into a factual description.  DNA  
provides memory only in that sometimes parts of it get to  
reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but their memory is  
just get copied to not.  There's nothing Lamarckian about it, much  
less extra-corporeal survival of memories.  Memories are necessarily  
things that are remembered.  I don't remember any previous life and  
I doubt that you do either.



It might depend what we mean by long term memory. When an spider is  
born it certainly comes with some amount of memory, at least  
procedural memories like the way to build a web, or to recognize a  
mate or a prey, etc. There is nothing irrational in thinking that we  
too have such prewired skills, and most plausibly also some more  
declarative form of knowledge, that is some forms of memories. This  
would not contradict Darwin Evolution (and does not need anything like  
a Lamarckian theory). Our brain is not much wired in advance, compared  
to some other animals, but it is still wired in a large part. We might  
not remember a past life, but we do remember the result of billions  
years of evolution. This might be illustrated with the genetics of  
phobia

Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-27 Thread meekerdb

On 12/27/2014 12:05 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:
I should say that I am not an expert in this issue, however I have found the paper 
entertaining. The history of Samuel Butler is quite interesting. Butler in 19th century 
held that heredity and brain memory both involved the storage of information and that 
the two forms of storage were the same. Now there are even more papers along this line, 
see for example the abstract


DNA methylation and memory formation
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/abs/nn.2666.html

Memory formation and storage require long-lasting changes in memory-related neuronal 
circuits. Recent evidence indicates that DNA methylation may serve as a contributing 
mechanism in memory formation and storage.


Notice how vague may serve as a contributing mechanism is.  He starts the paper by 
claiming that memory must be at the molecular level because it lasts a lifetime, BUT the 
only molecule that is persistent over that span is DNA.  So he's skipped right over the 
possibility of structural persistence of neural networks.  He might as well have concluded 
that memory is in bones, because the last a lifetime.  But then when he tries to imagine 
a way of coding information in DNA the only possibility if methylation. Unfortunately for 
his theory he finds methylation is dynamic (which he would have called unstable except 
that would make his hypothesis obviously wrong).  The whole paper is speculation to 
support and conclusion that was assumed at the beginning.


Brent



Although the meaning of the term long term memory might not be exactly the 
same.

Evgeii


Am 26.12.2014 um 22:06 schrieb meekerdb:

On 12/26/2014 11:56 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

Am 26.12.2014 um 19:55 schrieb meekerdb:



But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an
abuse of terminology, making a metaphor into a factual
description. DNA provides memory only in that sometimes parts
of it get to reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but
their memory is just get copied to not. There's nothing
Lamarckian about it, much less extra-corporeal survival of
memories.  Memories are necessarily things that are remembered.
I don't remember any previous life and I doubt that you do
either.


From the paper:

In the twenty-first century the Hebbian network hypothesis came
under attack and attention returned to storage of specific items of
mental information as DNA (Dietrich and Been, 2001; Arshavsky,
2006a).

Dietrich, A., Been, W., 2001. Memory and DNA. J. Theor. Biol. 208,
 145-149.

Arshavsky, Y. I., 2006a. ‘The seven sins’ of the Hebbian synapse:
can the hypothesis of synaptic plasticity explain long-term memory?
Prog. Neurobiol. 80, 99-113.


Evgenii



I can't get the first paper.  The second is nonsense.  Arshavsky
claims that long-term memory can't be based on network structure
because it's not stable - but he doesn't provide any empirical
evidence that it's not stable enough.  He ignores the fact that very
little information is actually retained in long-term memory (do you
remember what you had for lunch on this day last month?) and
concentrates on the small amount that is.  He ignores the studies
finding that recalling memories tends to change them.  And he does
nothing to support his DNA theory except to say DNA is more stable.
It would be trivial to look at some brain cells and see whether they
have identical DNA or not - which would blow away his theory.

Brent





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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-27 Thread Evgenii Rudnyi

Am 27.12.2014 um 22:33 schrieb meekerdb:

On 12/27/2014 12:05 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

I should say that I am not an expert in this issue, however I have
 found the paper entertaining. The history of Samuel Butler is
quite interesting. Butler in 19th century held that heredity and
brain memory both involved the storage of information and that the
two forms of storage were the same. Now there are even more papers
along this line, see for example the abstract

DNA methylation and memory formation
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/abs/nn.2666.html

Memory formation and storage require long-lasting changes in
memory-related neuronal circuits. Recent evidence indicates that
DNA methylation may serve as a contributing mechanism in memory
formation and storage.


Notice how vague may serve as a contributing mechanism is.  He
starts the paper by claiming that memory must be at the molecular
level because it lasts a lifetime, BUT the only molecule that is
persistent over that span is DNA.  So he's skipped right over the
possibility of structural persistence of neural networks.  He might
as well have concluded that memory is in bones, because the last a
lifetime.  But then when he tries to imagine a way of coding
information in DNA the only possibility if methylation. Unfortunately
for his theory he finds methylation is dynamic (which he would have
called unstable except that would make his hypothesis obviously
wrong).  The whole paper is speculation to support and conclusion
that was assumed at the beginning.



I would agree that the idea is vague. Yet, scientists discuss it and 
this is not the only paper in this direction, Google Scholar shows that 
this theme is quite popular nowadays.


The main point here is that what these scientists claim is close to 
Butler's ideas. An interesting twist in thinking especially if to 
observe it from historical perspective.


Evgenii

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread Bruno Marchal


On 26 Dec 2014, at 03:43, meekerdb wrote:


On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

In paper

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is  
the cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164.  
(see http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)


the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is  
outside the brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the  
brain then they should survive destruction of the brain.


But not of the *generalized brain, which in this case might be in the  
hologram.




But as I understand Bruno's idea one's soul survives destruction  
of the brain as in reincarnation, but memories don't.


In the computationalist thought experience, we suppose that the  
generalized brain is the biological brain, and we survive with our  
memories unchanged. Then, for death, I said that there is an inflation  
of type of survival possible, some with partial or total amnesia, and  
others with the complete memory of lifetime staying preserved. Of  
course we cannot evaluate the probabilities without extracting the  
(quantum) measure from the material hypostases. (There has been recent  
progresses, but this is really a program of research for the centuries  
to come).


I might add that with salvia, I understand better that our deep  
identity is indeed not in our memories, but in our universality, so  
that you can already understand you are immortal, simply because you  
realize that you are already Peano Arithmetic (say). In that case we  
are all the same person, just put in different context. This can have  
positive ethical consequences as you can develop more empathy toward  
others.


Bruno






Brent

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http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread Jason Resch
If the memories aren't in the brain, then what physical causes enable a
positive or negative recognition of the photo of a person's face? It seems
to me that this would require some extra-physical interaction beyond all
known physical laws. If this excess storage area could be tapped, could we
build computers of infinite memory and storage capacity by storing these
bits into the ether and overcome the information/volume limits of quantum
mechanics and the holographic principle?

Jason

On Thu, Dec 25, 2014 at 3:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote:

 In paper

 Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the
 cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see
 http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)

 the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside
 the brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.

 The suggestion of the medieval physician Avicenna that the brain
 ‘cupboard’ is bare, – i.e. the brain is a perceptual, not storage, organ –
 is consistent with a mysterious ‘universe as holograph’ model.

 Charles Darwin spent much time setting out various combinations of 26
 units in linear order on paper. Yet, that each cell of an organism might
 contain similar digital information, now known as DNA, was beyond his
 conceptual horizon. Likewise, many today compute using remote information
 storage yet are unlikely to countenance the possibility that their own
 brains might functioning similarly.

 Best wishes,

 Evgenii

 --
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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread meekerdb

On 12/25/2014 11:45 PM, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List wrote:


*From:*everything-list@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] *On 
Behalf Of *Kim Jones

*Sent:* Thursday, December 25, 2014 7:46 PM
*To:* everything-list@googlegroups.com
*Subject:* Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal


On 26 Dec 2014, at 1:43 pm, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net 
mailto:meeke...@verizon.net wrote:


On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

In paper

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
cupboard
bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see
http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm
http://post.queensu.ca/%7Eforsdyke/mind01.htm)

the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside 
the
brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the brain 
then they
should survive destruction of the brain.  But as I understand Bruno's idea 
one's
soul survives destruction of the brain as in reincarnation, but memories 
don't.

Brent

Don't forget this is about long-term memory. How long is long-term? I would say beyond 
the life of the individual. Seen like that, there has to be some kind of library or 
lookup table which in no way correlates to anything to do with human brain size, the 
authors conclude. Certain of these very-long-term memories do get encoded somehow to 
survive destruction of the brain, as in Jung's 'racial memory' or collective 
unconscious' - the original engrams or patterns of recognition (archetypes) some of them 
terrifyingly inexplicable and probably arising in dreams and recorded as revelations. 
Folklore is the racial memory of homo sapiens. We still churn it out. What we cannot 
remember exactly we plaster over with something else anyway, because HS are natural-born 
story tellers who cannot pass up a good story. If the shoe fits, we tend to wear it. 
It's literally in our DNA these authors conclude. This suggests to me that the notion of 
Junk DNA is perhaps itself junk as the very purpose of DNA is to record ie encode 
experience at something for the purpose of passing it on. DNA cannot fail at that 
purpose. Whenever scientists declare something Junk or Dark this just means we are 
clueless over this so it's time to find the macro-molecular link that allows this 
almost-Lamarckian effect of racial memory to come about.


The term “junk DNA”, itself has been junked a while ago, when it was discovered that a 
portion of this DNA acts like a kind of OS that switches encoding sections on and off. 
It is a mistake I believe to look at DNA as a static repository of hereditary 
information alone. It is this of course, but it turns out to be more complex, dynamic 
and layered than the simple static model. A lot of the so called “junk DNA” (but not all 
of it by any means) seems to be involved in this dynamic process. Especially, during the 
process of embryogenesis, DNA expression is undergoing dynamic highly sequenced and 
seemingly (somehow) choreographed changes (through methylation and other means).


Other parts of this junk DNA, seem to be parasitical in nature; e.g. the selfish DNA 
hypothesis, and this also seems very likely – IMO. If such DNA “parasite entities” 
exist, perhaps using viruses as vehicles during their “life-cycle” in order to ride with 
them on into a hosts DNA and insert themselves into a new happy home, passing copies 
down for as long as the lineage continues. Perhaps a parasite is “junk” for the host, 
but from the parasites perspective I am sure the view is different… so even here in this 
case is it really junk.


-Chris




But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an abuse of terminology, making 
a metaphor into a factual description.  DNA provides memory only in that sometimes parts 
of it get to reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but their memory is just get 
copied to not.  There's nothing Lamarckian about it, much less extra-corporeal survival of 
memories.  Memories are necessarily things that are remembered.  I don't remember any 
previous life and I doubt that you do either.


Brent

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread Evgenii Rudnyi

Am 26.12.2014 um 19:55 schrieb meekerdb:



But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an abuse
of terminology, making a metaphor into a factual description.  DNA
provides memory only in that sometimes parts of it get to
reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but their memory is
just get copied to not. There's nothing Lamarckian about it, much
less extra-corporeal survival of memories.  Memories are necessarily
things that are remembered.  I don't remember any previous life and I
doubt that you do either.


From the paper:

In the twenty-first century the Hebbian network hypothesis came under 
attack and attention returned to storage of specific items of mental 
information as DNA (Dietrich and Been, 2001; Arshavsky, 2006a).


Dietrich, A., Been, W., 2001. Memory and DNA. J. Theor. Biol. 208, 145-149.

Arshavsky, Y. I., 2006a. ‘The seven sins’ of the Hebbian synapse: can 
the hypothesis of synaptic plasticity explain long-term memory? Prog. 
Neurobiol. 80, 99-113.



Evgenii

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread meekerdb

On 12/26/2014 11:56 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

Am 26.12.2014 um 19:55 schrieb meekerdb:



But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an abuse
of terminology, making a metaphor into a factual description. DNA
provides memory only in that sometimes parts of it get to
reproduce.  Genes are more persistent units, but their memory is
just get copied to not. There's nothing Lamarckian about it, much
less extra-corporeal survival of memories.  Memories are necessarily
things that are remembered.  I don't remember any previous life and I
doubt that you do either.


From the paper:

In the twenty-first century the Hebbian network hypothesis came under attack and 
attention returned to storage of specific items of mental information as DNA (Dietrich 
and Been, 2001; Arshavsky, 2006a).


Dietrich, A., Been, W., 2001. Memory and DNA. J. Theor. Biol. 208, 145-149.

Arshavsky, Y. I., 2006a. ‘The seven sins’ of the Hebbian synapse: can the hypothesis of 
synaptic plasticity explain long-term memory? Prog. Neurobiol. 80, 99-113.



Evgenii



I can't get the first paper.  The second is nonsense.  Arshavsky claims that long-term 
memory can't be based on network structure because it's not stable - but he doesn't 
provide any empirical evidence that it's not stable enough.  He ignores the fact that very 
little information is actually retained in long-term memory (do you remember what you had 
for lunch on this day last month?) and concentrates on the small amount that is.  He 
ignores the studies finding that recalling memories tends to change them.  And he does 
nothing to support his DNA theory except to say DNA is more stable.  It would be trivial 
to look at some brain cells and see whether they have identical DNA or not - which would 
blow away his theory.


Brent

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RE: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-26 Thread 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List
 

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of meekerdb
Sent: Friday, December 26, 2014 10:56 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

 

On 12/25/2014 11:45 PM, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List wrote:

 

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Kim Jones
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2014 7:46 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

 

 

 


On 26 Dec 2014, at 1:43 pm, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote:

On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

In paper 

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm 
http://post.queensu.ca/%7Eforsdyke/mind01.htm ) 

the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the 
brain. I guess that Bruno should like it. 


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the brain then 
they should survive destruction of the brain.  But as I understand Bruno's idea 
one's soul survives destruction of the brain as in reincarnation, but 
memories don't.

Brent 

 

Don't forget this is about long-term memory. How long is long-term? I would say 
beyond the life of the individual. Seen like that, there has to be some kind of 
library or lookup table which in no way correlates to anything to do with human 
brain size, the authors conclude. Certain of these very-long-term memories do 
get encoded somehow to survive destruction of the brain, as in Jung's 'racial 
memory' or collective unconscious' - the original engrams or patterns of 
recognition (archetypes) some of them terrifyingly inexplicable and probably 
arising in dreams and recorded as revelations. Folklore is the racial memory of 
homo sapiens. We still churn it out. What we cannot remember exactly we plaster 
over with something else anyway, because HS are natural-born story tellers who 
cannot pass up a good story. If the shoe fits, we tend to wear it. It's 
literally in our DNA these authors conclude. This suggests to me that the 
notion of Junk DNA is perhaps itself junk as the very purpose of DNA is to 
record ie encode experience at something for the purpose of passing it on. DNA 
cannot fail at that purpose. Whenever scientists declare something Junk or 
Dark this just means we are clueless over this so it's time to find the 
macro-molecular link that allows this almost-Lamarckian effect of racial memory 
to come about. 

 

The term “junk DNA”, itself has been junked a while ago, when it was discovered 
that a portion of this DNA acts like a kind of OS that switches encoding 
sections on and off. It is a mistake I believe to look at DNA as a static 
repository of hereditary information alone. It is this of course, but it turns 
out to be more complex, dynamic and layered than the simple static model. A lot 
of the so called “junk DNA” (but not all of it by any means) seems to be 
involved in this dynamic process. Especially, during the process of 
embryogenesis, DNA expression is undergoing dynamic highly sequenced and 
seemingly (somehow) choreographed changes (through methylation and other means).

Other parts of this junk DNA, seem to be parasitical in nature; e.g. the 
selfish DNA hypothesis, and this also seems very likely – IMO. If such DNA 
“parasite entities” exist, perhaps using viruses as vehicles during their 
“life-cycle” in order to ride with them on into a hosts DNA and insert 
themselves into a new happy home, passing copies down for as long as the 
lineage continues. Perhaps a parasite is “junk” for the host, but from the 
parasites perspective I am sure the view is different… so even here in this 
case is it really junk.

-Chris

 


But to say that DNA provides long term memory seems like an abuse of 
terminology, making a metaphor into a factual description.  DNA provides 
memory only in that sometimes parts of it get to reproduce.  Genes are more 
persistent units, but their memory is just get copied to not.  There's 
nothing Lamarckian about it, much less extra-corporeal survival of memories.  
Memories are necessarily things that are remembered.  I don't remember any 
previous life and I doubt that you do either.

Not sure who you are responding to. I was commenting on Kim’s use of the term 
“junk DNA” and how some of what had been thought of as being “junk” was later 
discovered to play a role in determining what DNA actually got encoded… and 
that some of these DNA regions also appear to be “parasitic” (e.g. the selfish 
gene hypothesis).

I could see some instinct-behavioral patterns being encoded in the DNA, but 
memories I do not see how this would occur. Recording a memory would have to 
have some measurable effect on the underlying substrate (e.g. the DNA) in which 
it was being recorded. I see

Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread Evgenii Rudnyi

In paper

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)


the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside 
the brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.


The suggestion of the medieval physician Avicenna that the brain 
‘cupboard’ is bare, – i.e. the brain is a perceptual, not storage, organ 
– is consistent with a mysterious ‘universe as holograph’ model.


Charles Darwin spent much time setting out various combinations of 26 
units in linear order on paper. Yet, that each cell of an organism might 
contain similar digital information, now known as DNA, was beyond his 
conceptual horizon. Likewise, many today compute using remote 
information storage yet are unlikely to countenance the possibility that 
their own brains might functioning similarly.


Best wishes,

Evgenii

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread Kim Jones


Haven't read it yet but just wanted to say that I have never had trouble wih 
his idea

 On 25 Dec 2014, at 8:17 pm, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote:
 
 In paper
 
 Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
 cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
 http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)
 
 the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the 
 brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.
 
 The suggestion of the medieval physician Avicenna that the brain ‘cupboard’ 
 is bare, – i.e. the brain is a perceptual, not storage, organ – is consistent 
 with a mysterious ‘universe as holograph’ model.
 
 Charles Darwin spent much time setting out various combinations of 26 units 
 in linear order on paper. Yet, that each cell of an organism might contain 
 similar digital information, now known as DNA, was beyond his conceptual 
 horizon. Likewise, many today compute using remote information storage yet 
 are unlikely to countenance the possibility that their own brains might 
 functioning similarly.
 
 Best wishes,
 
 Evgenii
 
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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread Kim Jones


Good one. Haven't read it yet but just wanted to say that I have never had 
trouble with this idea - clearly Platonic in nature but beyond that, possibly 
the most clearly intuitive and ancient notion known to Man. Bruno's idea still 
strikes me as the best formulation of it, but most are yet to embrace the full 
implications of comp.

Kim

 On 25 Dec 2014, at 8:17 pm, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote:
 
 In paper
 
 Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
 cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
 http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)
 
 the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the 
 brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.
 
 The suggestion of the medieval physician Avicenna that the brain ‘cupboard’ 
 is bare, – i.e. the brain is a perceptual, not storage, organ – is consistent 
 with a mysterious ‘universe as holograph’ model.
 
 Charles Darwin spent much time setting out various combinations of 26 units 
 in linear order on paper. Yet, that each cell of an organism might contain 
 similar digital information, now known as DNA, was beyond his conceptual 
 horizon. Likewise, many today compute using remote information storage yet 
 are unlikely to countenance the possibility that their own brains might 
 functioning similarly.
 
 Best wishes,
 
 Evgenii
 
 -- 
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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread meekerdb

On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

In paper

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the cupboard bare? 
Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm)


the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the brain. I 
guess that Bruno should like it. 


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the brain then they should 
survive destruction of the brain.  But as I understand Bruno's idea one's soul survives 
destruction of the brain as in reincarnation, but memories don't.


Brent

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Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread Kim Jones


 

 On 26 Dec 2014, at 1:43 pm, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote:
 
 On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:
 In paper 
 
 Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
 cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
 http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm) 
 
 the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the 
 brain. I guess that Bruno should like it.
 
 That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the brain 
 then they should survive destruction of the brain.  But as I understand 
 Bruno's idea one's soul survives destruction of the brain as in 
 reincarnation, but memories don't.
 
 Brent 

Don't forget this is about long-term memory. How long is long-term? I would say 
beyond the life of the individual. Seen like that, there has to be some kind of 
library or lookup table which in no way correlates to anything to do with human 
brain size, the authors conclude. Certain of these very-long-term memories do 
get encoded somehow to survive destruction of the brain, as in Jung's 'racial 
memory' or collective unconscious' - the original engrams or patterns of 
recognition (archetypes) some of them terrifyingly inexplicable and probably 
arising in dreams and recorded as revelations. Folklore is the racial memory of 
homo sapiens. We still churn it out. What we cannot remember exactly we plaster 
over with something else anyway, because HS are natural-born story tellers who 
cannot pass up a good story. If the shoe fits, we tend to wear it. It's 
literally in our DNA these authors conclude. This suggests to me that the 
notion of Junk DNA is perhaps itself junk as the very purpose of DNA is to 
record ie encode experience at something for the purpose of passing it on. DNA 
cannot fail at that purpose. Whenever scientists declare something Junk or 
Dark this just means we are clueless over this so it's time to find the 
macro-molecular link that allows this almost-Lamarckian effect of racial memory 
to come about. 

Kim

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RE: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

2014-12-25 Thread 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List
 

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Kim Jones
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2014 7:46 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Long term memory is extra-corporeal

 

 

 


On 26 Dec 2014, at 1:43 pm, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote:

On 12/25/2014 1:17 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

In paper 

Forsdyke, D.R. (2009). Samuel Butler and human long term memory: is the 
cupboard bare? Journal of Theoretical Biology 258(1), 156-164. (see 
http://post.queensu.ca/~forsdyke/mind01.htm 
http://post.queensu.ca/%7Eforsdyke/mind01.htm ) 

the author considers a possibility that the long term memory is outside the 
brain. I guess that Bruno should like it. 


That seems backwards for Bruno's idea.  If memories are outside the brain then 
they should survive destruction of the brain.  But as I understand Bruno's idea 
one's soul survives destruction of the brain as in reincarnation, but 
memories don't.

Brent 

 

Don't forget this is about long-term memory. How long is long-term? I would say 
beyond the life of the individual. Seen like that, there has to be some kind of 
library or lookup table which in no way correlates to anything to do with human 
brain size, the authors conclude. Certain of these very-long-term memories do 
get encoded somehow to survive destruction of the brain, as in Jung's 'racial 
memory' or collective unconscious' - the original engrams or patterns of 
recognition (archetypes) some of them terrifyingly inexplicable and probably 
arising in dreams and recorded as revelations. Folklore is the racial memory of 
homo sapiens. We still churn it out. What we cannot remember exactly we plaster 
over with something else anyway, because HS are natural-born story tellers who 
cannot pass up a good story. If the shoe fits, we tend to wear it. It's 
literally in our DNA these authors conclude. This suggests to me that the 
notion of Junk DNA is perhaps itself junk as the very purpose of DNA is to 
record ie encode experience at something for the purpose of passing it on. DNA 
cannot fail at that purpose. Whenever scientists declare something Junk or 
Dark this just means we are clueless over this so it's time to find the 
macro-molecular link that allows this almost-Lamarckian effect of racial memory 
to come about. 

 

The term “junk DNA”, itself has been junked a while ago, when it was discovered 
that a portion of this DNA acts like a kind of OS that switches encoding 
sections on and off. It is a mistake I believe to look at DNA as a static 
repository of hereditary information alone. It is this of course, but it turns 
out to be more complex, dynamic and layered than the simple static model. A lot 
of the so called “junk DNA” (but not all of it by any means) seems to be 
involved in this dynamic process. Especially, during the process of 
embryogenesis, DNA expression is undergoing dynamic highly sequenced and 
seemingly (somehow) choreographed changes (through methylation and other means).

Other parts of this junk DNA, seem to be parasitical in nature; e.g. the 
selfish DNA hypothesis, and this also seems very likely – IMO. If such DNA 
“parasite entities” exist, perhaps using viruses as vehicles during their 
“life-cycle” in order to ride with them on into a hosts DNA and insert 
themselves into a new happy home, passing copies down for as long as the 
lineage continues. Perhaps a parasite is “junk” for the host, but from the 
parasites perspective I am sure the view is different… so even here in this 
case is it really junk.

-Chris

 

Kim

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