Scientists locate the Conscious

There you have it, scientists claim to have located the conscious in the brain, but there is a twist coming, and it's a big one. In the article, John Walsh sardonically explains:

The lateral frontal pole, in short, is like a spouse who is quick to inform you that you've blundered and bungled it when it would have been so easy to get it right. It's the kindly-but-firm voice of authority that tells you to go to your room and mull over what you've done, so you'll be sure not to do it again in future...

Intellectual ability consists of short-term memory, reasoning and verbal agility. Although these interact with one another they are handled by three distinct nerve 'circuits' in the brain Hang on. This isn't some minor breakthrough of cognitive neuroscience. This is about good and bad, right and wrong. This is about the brain's connection to morality. This means that the Oxford scientists, without apparently realising what they've done, have located the conscience.

So what was that twist I was talking about?

But wait, what's this final detail I read about the lateral frontal pole? Humans have two of them! One above and behind each eyebrow! But why would we need two consciences? Unless (my hands are shaking just writing this) they're the Good Conscience and the Bad Conscience, the angel and devil traditionally thought to reside on human shoulders, to tell us either a) it's absolutely fine to steal that money/pinch that bottom/kick that beggar; or b) it's absolutely wrong even to think about any of them.

Do we have two consciousness? It would explain a lot about the 'war inside'. The writer relates to the devil and god-- and the band Brand New would probably agree. I actually love this-- a conscious for both the left and right brain. Another article purports that conscious is another form of matter altogether:

Tegmark’s approach is to think of consciousness as a state of matter, like a solid, a liquid or a gas. “I conjecture that consciousness can be understood as yet another state of matter. Just as there are many types of liquids, there are many types of consciousness,” he says.

He goes on to show how the particular properties of consciousness might arise from the physical laws that govern our universe. And he explains how these properties allow physicists to reason about the conditions under which consciousness arises and how we might exploit it to better understand why the world around us appears as it does.

Science is getting occultist. I want to write more about this this evening, but one more thing. Check out this cool video on Avatar the Last Airbender PBSideachannel posted. It only goes til about midway into the running time. It's a good watch.