On Learning A New Thing
There's no absolute ad hoc learning: all learning has to be based on something that already exists in the brain; we can't learn anything, we can't even understand anything, at all if not for the neural structures that already exist somewhere in the head, according to the scientist George Lakoff.
At birth, we have 100 billion neurons in the brain as an infant. Each of these neurons has about 1000 to 10,000 connections to other neural sites. In total, that's between 100 Trillion and a Quadrillion connections.
In the wombs we, as a fetus, do thumb-sucking. We start to move our arms and legs. Our motor system neurons must form circuits and work in the right way to allow such movements. The more frequently the fetus moves the stronger the relevant circuits would become. This is called "Neural Recruitment," I'm told.
You can acquire a new circuitry from the pre-existing connections: you have so many neurons and connections such that you have networks that are ready to be used (by simply strengthening at the synapses through frequent use) for many things; lasting connections acquired by being in the right places to be regularly used and strengthened. This is aptly called "Neural Darwinism".
Any new learning, whatever it may be, will be about making changes relative to what you already have. In terms of choosing music as a career, for example, a five-year-old child, who grew up on music since the time of being a mere fetus, will have an advantage over another child, who'd never listened to music at all till five. One child will have relatively little work to do compared to the other child.
As the adage goes, train up a child in the ways he should go.
Neural Rewiring: The Good Samaritan
In the parable of the good Samaritan, Jews and Samaritans despised each other. A certain traveler was robbed and beaten half-dead on the road. In this circumstance, the Jewish institutional leaders, who chanced upon the unfortunate traveler, ended up walking away without helping the person in distress. A good Samaritan however came and helped the unfortunate soul in more ways than one. Hospitals and charitable organizations have come to be named after the Good Samaritan.
Loving the enemy is, however, generally speaking, hard to do. Because we are hardwired to do the opposite.
Hyperlink Text Of Reality
Love can overcome all wrongs. It can enable us to do the impossible and empathize with the "enemy". It can transform us into a new physical being (thanks to neuroplasticity).
Empathy itself is at the heart of rationality and democracy — something I wrote about in a previous post if I remember it correctly. Without love and empathy in our hearts, our rationality and democracy will die.
We could close our eyes and then see that with our mind: our human mind dictates what we see — something I wrote about in yet another previous post. It all comes back to tie in nicely. Like a hyperlink text.
TLDR: (According to Moussa Ibrahim, Gaddafi’s Ex-Spokesperson) if we have the truth, if we see the reality, then we'd have two powers, the explanatory power and that of prophecy (as though you have in your hands a hyperlink text on the ultimate reality).
Previous Posts
Twinkling Along With Joseph
John Boyd's OODA And You
Grand Story + Story + Facts = Meaning (Advanced Writing Course Materials)
I Missed The Gorilla... Did You See It?
Whoever That Said "Fear + Manipulation + Domination = Witchcraft" Is A Superlative Genius
Tom Robinson's Predicament
Time Once Lost: She Once Was An Angel...
Amazing, The Original Myth Explains The Second Myth
When Words Failed...
When Conmen Marry...
Heraclitus: You Can't Step Into The Same River Twice, Can You?
Mimetic Theory: Is This The Best Way To Understand The World?
Absolutism Vs. Relativism, Which Side Are You On?
I am with you on this. Love is such a powerful force. It can cause a person to do the most difficult thing.
With love all things are possible!
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I ended up editing this post multiple times, rectifying logical gaps I'd made here and there. Now, after the edit, I hope it's a lot easier to read. :)
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