From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:15:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <00f001bed2d8$9bd2b980$99170a3f@pavilion> <932533330.456928@server.australia.net.au> <7n9mts$gaf$1@kopp.stud.ntnu.no> <379c5bba.443619@newscache.ntnu.no> <7nrb34$rsl@dfw-ixnews5.ix.netcom.com> Subject: Re: Unusual amnesia case puzzles doctors until they find brain cyst Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 06:01:36 -0400 Lines: 87 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: <#CUYHKn2#GA.76@cpmsnbbsa05> Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa05 i stand on what i posted, but will clarify below. F. Frank LeFever wrote in message <7nrb34$rsl@dfw-ixnews5.ix.netcom.com>... >In "Ken Collins" >writes: >> >>the 'spatial' correlation, re. hippocampal function, had been proposed >by >>others before i developed the 'supersystem configuration' stuff. >> >>it's just that the 'spatial' functionality =derives= in the >'supersystem >>configuration' stuff... despite the fact that folks can design >experiments >>that are 'spatially' vigilant, there exists no explicitly-'spatial' >stuff at >>any 'level' lower than the nervous system as a =whole=. >> > >- - - - -(snip) - - - - - - - - - > >Uhhhh..what?? "experiments that are 'spatially' vigilant" ??? 1. experiments that're designed to yield information with respect to spatially-'mapped' hypotheses. >What, in your language does "experiment" mean? 2. "experiment". >What, in your language, does "vigilant" mean? 3. see 1. > >I am interested in studies of "vigilance", but usually (ALWAYS?) these >uuse humans or some other living organisms as subjects. But maybe >"vigilance" means something else in your language. no, it's just that some folks can Think, and i take my lead from their school. > >Maybe it is just a typo? you meant to write "experimenters" who are >vigilant? No, surely not. Surely you were not writing of folks who >DESIGN EXPERIMENTERS! Or am I assuming too much. Maybe you are into >Artificial Intelligence? Maybe (parts of) this passage makes (nominal) >sense in the context of designing ROBOTS with "sensory" interfaces with >the environment and (programmed) vigilance. > >If I can't even understand this, what chance do I have with REAL secret >language, such as "superficial configuration stuff" or whatever. > >Ummm... Yes, spatial coding cells are not spatial any more than color >coding cells are colored, and all that, but NOTHING spatial except the >whole nervous system? No spatial perception or spatially-oriented >behavior in (e.g.) Christopher Reeves? Or do you mean something like >"the whole supra-brainstem nervous system" ?? It all must be whole or >no "spatial" behavior? Any hole in the whole results in loss of all >"spatial" function? Aphasic patients can't even POINT in the direction >of the thing they want but cannot name?? it's all in AoK, and the refs cited in AoK, Frank. how can anything 'spatial' happen, internally, that does not derive in the spatial Geometry that's established at the body-environment interface? ...at the extreme physical extent of the nervous system? and, since it's established out-there, how do you suppose it gets in-there if the spatial Geometry isn't rigorously-preserved enroute? yes, there're some 'fancy' twists and turns in the neural Topology, but the one spatial Geometry is rigorously-preserved throughout its entire extent, regardless. in cases where this fails, such as the columnar-distribution deficiencies that've been correlated with 'dyslexia', there's always detectable correlated information-processing 'deficits'. Think, or not, but your trying to beat me over the head with mere words is not going to accomplish anything. K. P. Collins >[...] From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:15:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" Subject: the 'stock market' Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 05:43:34 -0400 Lines: 36 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.easynews.com!easynews!news.good.net!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa05 first things first, tonight... to folks who trade in the 'stock market': please take a breather away from the edge of 'panic' until the 'dust settles'. do not try to interpret anything that will transpire as 'indicating' what it is that you 'should' do. what you should do is the same as it always is... invest in companies that make strong efforts to be absolutely forthright while producing Honorable products, and supporting their customers' needs and hopes. as i did, in another online 'place', about 18 months ago, i advise you, again, to resolve to act with determined steadiness... don't jump on anything, don't bail out of anything... 'just' be patient. it's summertime. take a vacation. Love your Children and your Wives/Husbands. take 'a breather'. 'smell the roses.' ...think about what you'll do =after= the 'dust has settled'. for now, just 'lay-back'. i ask those who are in positions to do so to grant any extensions that are necessary to investors that've gotten themselves into trouble. there'll be another day to earn a buck. for now, the thing to do is to put on thoughtful care with an eye to the long-term. K. P. Collins From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:15:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <00f001bed2d8$9bd2b980$99170a3f@pavilion> <932533330.456928@server.australia.net.au> Subject: RETRACTION Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 06:14:03 -0400 Lines: 80 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa05 missed setting this straight... tonight, i verified that the information reported by the _New York Times_, and the _Dallas Morning News_, that was discussed in this thread was False. fornix lesions, including temporary instances, do not produce 'memory' deficits. i ask folks at both the _New York Times_, and the _Dallas Morning News_ to discover the source of this Error, and to publish corrections, and any other necessary clarifying information. K. P. Collins (ken) [P. S. what's below is False... the correct stuff was posted, earlier, in a reply to the msg i posted below.] Ken Collins wrote in message ... >as is explained in AoK, Ap5, the hippocampi guide convergence upon >'supersystem configurations' with respect to the topologically-distributed >ratio of excitation to inhibition [TD E/I] that is occuring within the brain >[within the nervous system]. > >the fornix is a bundle of nerve fibers that carries TD E/I-relevant >information between low-level mechanisms, and and which, importantly, >'inverts' the topology of such, so that it can be appropriately interfaced >with intermediate-'level' 'supersystem configuration' dynamics. > >the cyst's pressing against the fornix, interrupted this communication which >is fundamentally necessary for the formation of formerly-non-existent >intermediate-'level' 'supersystem configurations'. > >the cyst's disruption left the individual's brain incapable of forming new, >intermediate-'level' 'supersystem configurations'. > >absent this capacity, the functionality of the remaining low- and >high-'level' 'supersystem configuration' mechanisms [brain stem, cerebellum, >basal ganglia, prefrontal cortex, along with incomplete hypothalamic >functionality], functioned 'normally'... leaving the individual to >'experience' what was left of his information-processing dynamics... kind of >like a wharehouse during a trucker's strike... one can walk around in it, >and see what's already there, but one will find nothing new 'on the >shelves'. > >when the cyst was drained, the individual's information-processing dynamics >returned to 'normal'. > >the case is a good example of how information gathered by Medical >practicioners has entered into the complete 'picture' of brain [nervous >system] function that exists. [for a more-integrated discussion, see AoK.] > >cheers, ken collins > >John wrote in message <932533330.456928@server.australia.net.au>... >> >>"Ron Blue" wrote in message <00f001bed2d8$9bd2b980$99170a3f@pavilion>... >>> >>> >>> http://www.dallasnews.com/science/0719sci2amnesia.htm >> >> >>I don't know why the finding the brain cyst solved the puzzle of this case. >>Okay, in memory area, but that's not explaining anything. >> >>Can anyone help me with this??? >> >> >>John >>Remove XXXX in reply address >> >> > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!amsterdam1-snf1!news.gtei.net!diablo.theplanet.net!join.news.pipex.net!pipex!warm.news.pipex.net!pipex!gecm.com!usenet From: X Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 13:36:09 +0100 Organization: .blah Lines: 17 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: stnp2501.stanmre.gecm.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en]C-CCK-MCD GECMSTANv2 (WinNT; I) Kooter wrote: > > of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases > to > > be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. > > Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social > requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism > lacking free will'? Definition of terms again: what is free will? Well, "will" translates loosely to a combination of intent and desire. You imply here that it means "free action". d. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!vic.nntp.telstra.net!not-for-mail From: "John" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Why can’t this man feel whether or not he’s standing up? Lines: 16 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Organization: Geko Internet Message-ID: <933336997.825948@server.australia.net.au> Cache-Post-Path: server.australia.net.au!unknown@203.25.204.24 Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 22:18:22 +1000 NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.25.206.2 X-Complaints-To: abuse@telstra.net X-Trace: vic.nntp.telstra.net 933336994 203.25.206.2 (Fri, 30 Jul 1999 22:16:34 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 22:16:34 EST http://www.apa.org/monitor/jun98/touch.html "Through trial and error over three years, Waterman, who lives in Hampshire, England, taught himself how to move again by consciously controlling and visually monitoring every action. To this day, if the lights go out unannounced, he crumples to the floor, unable to budge until they come back on. It’s almost impossible for most people to imagine his condition, he admits." I just saw a TV program on this case, it's quite a story and very revealing. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!lsanca1-snf1!news.gtei.net!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!newsfeed.mathworks.com!nntp.abs.net!uunet!pao.uu.net!sea.uu.net!newsfeed1.sea.pnap.net!newsfeed.pnap.net!news.seanet.com!not-for-mail From: realistic@seanet.com (Richard F Hall) Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.debate,alt.philosophy,talk.philosophy.humanism,sci.philosophy.meta,sci.cognitive,sci.lang,talk.philosophy.misc,alt.brain,alt.human-brain,comp.ai.philosophy,alt.fan.rawilson,bionet.neuroscience,alt.memetics,alt.consciousness,alt.neo-tech Subject: Re: THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIO-RELIGION Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 11:35:23 GMT Lines: 27 Message-ID: <37a18c48.4970730@news.seanet.com> References: <379E587B.6A9D@columbia-center.org> <37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com> <#o0v#xb2#GA.187@cpmsnbbsa02> NNTP-Posting-Host: cy15.dialup.seanet.com X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 On Thu, 29 Jul 1999 08:18:32 -0400, "Ken Collins" wrote: >the problem is that, since there's, verifiably, only one 'map' of Truth >within physical reality... the one-way flow of energy from order to disorder >that is what's described by 2nd Thermo (wdb2t), their can be no >'either-or-s'... at each 'place' on the wdb2t map, there's 'just' wdb2t. >sure, the flow of energy from order to disorder can be 'controlled', >locally, but that only augments the flow of energy from order to disorder, >elsewhere... wdb2t remains the =one= thing. > >this means that there can exist only one thing that can be the object of >Faith... anything else, 'merely', 'fakes' it... detectably. > >K. P. Collins Mr. Collins: I have never read a statement of faith similar to yours. Truely unique. The important thing is that it's faith in something that you can rely on when everything else has failed you. Is it true that the continued existence of "living things" seems to be contrary to the wdb2t? rich http://www.seanet.com/~realistic/idealism realistic idealism searching for strong faith. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.idt.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!198.82.160.249!solaris.cc.vt.edu!news.vt.edu!news.seanet.com!not-for-mail From: realistic@seanet.com (Richard F Hall) Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.debate,talk.philosophy.humanism,sci.philosophy.meta,sci.cognitive,sci.lang,talk.philosophy.misc,alt.brain,alt.human-brain,comp.ai.philosophy,alt.fan.rawilson,bionet.neuroscience,alt.memetics,alt.consciousness,alt.neo-tech Subject: Re: THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIO-RELIGION Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 11:23:50 GMT Lines: 61 Message-ID: <37a187dc.3837974@news.seanet.com> References: <379E587B.6A9D@columbia-center.org> <37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: cy15.dialup.seanet.com X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 On Thu, 29 Jul 1999 11:10:47 -0400, Christopher P McDill wrote: Dear McDill: First thanks for your response. > I feel I should give a nutshell critique of your manifesto here. >You are clearly trying to promote an idea based on some kind of epiphany >that you've had, but you've not done enough homework to justify turning a >hypothesis into a "philosophy." > Firstly, your definition of religious thinking suffers the same >flaws that Sigmund Freud made in his work THE FUTURE OF AN ILLUSION. In >this work, Freud pulled a definition of religion out of thin air based on >his own western-protestant prejudices, further flavored by semantic >relations found in his native German language ("this is synonymous with >that"). Do you recognize the summary I presented as having it's origin in Freud? I have been working on the ideas for some time but was originally supplied the concepts from some mentors. If they are not original, I would like to know. > There has been a huge amount of research in the fields of >Sociology, Anthropology, Psychology, and Comparative Religion (and a >consequent huge body of scholarly work) seeking to arrive at a definition >or characterization of "religion" that can apply universally to all >cultures. It's tougher than most people might think. >"Faith" and "humility" are not universal, for example. If there is a religion that does not contain faith and humility, it escapes my knowledge. As a matter of fact, I think these are qualities of all human beings, even though some deny them. > If you care to get a start on a more all-encompassing definition >of religion, start with Emile Durckheim's work, then look at Weber & >Mauss, Malinowski, Bataille, and Foucault. Forget Jung, Campbell, Freud, >and Frazer. Too cluttered with myth and archetype. The areas of sociology, anthropology, evolution of religious literature and philosophy, addressed by these cited authors are more general than I am interested. But I certainly will continue to wade through the tons of stuff by and about these writers. Much of it has nothing to do with religion. Could you be more specifc? > You further complicate your approach by attaching >biological/functional attributes to religion, little or no hard-science >citation. Please give a more convincing, empirical argument. This is not just a furthur complication, it is the thrust of my post. Also, I must mention that there is no "hard-science" citation. Most people don't even consider this subject to be a aspect of biodetermination. That's why I'm posting it. >Science is no place for semantic games. Science starts with semantics continues to evidence, inserts reason and sometimes creates games. One can't get away from it, Chris. > Good luck. thanks for the authors, I had no idea, your response is deeply appreciated. rich http://www.seanet.com/~realistic/idealism From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!firehose.mindspring.com!not-for-mail From: "Kooter" Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 07:23:54 -0400 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 24 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: cf.cd.b8.ca X-Server-Date: 30 Jul 1999 11:21:52 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2014.211 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 Ken Collins wrote in message news:ekcFnfG1#GA.153@cpmsnbbsa05... > of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases to > be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism lacking free will'? I don't see a connection between intelligence and free will. Slaves did what their owners wanted but at the same time some were considered very intelligent. Motivation is the thing that drives us towards a goal. Whether the motivation is caused by hunger or a subroutine in a program is irrelevant. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <378875c5.3370669@news.uni-oldenburg.de> <37990aae.182107833@news.mindspring.com> <7nd3lg$o5a@dfw-ixnews4.ix.netcom.com> <7ngk0i$j3e@dfw-ixnews14.ix.netcom.com> <7nokep$cvf@dfw-ixnews6.ix.netcom.com> <#q3p8yX2#GA.276@cpmsnbbsa05> <933239328.268780@server.australia.net.au> <933297360.577273@server.australia.net.au> Subject: Re: book about the brain and its functions Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 07:15:58 -0400 Lines: 11 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: <#ataszn2#GA.447@cpmsnbbsa02> Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa02 John wrote in message <933297360.577273@server.australia.net.au>... >[...] >I depise intellectual dishonesty [...] me too... K. P. Collins [ken] From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 09:29:56 -0400 Lines: 31 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: <#HLIk#o2#GA.446@cpmsnbbsa02> Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.direct.ca!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa02 sorry... no more 'freebies', at least not on this topic. K. P. Collins Kooter wrote in message <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net>... > >Ken Collins wrote in message >news:ekcFnfG1#GA.153@cpmsnbbsa05... > > > >> of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases >to >> be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. > >Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social >requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism >lacking free will'? > >I don't see a connection between intelligence and free will. Slaves did >what their owners wanted but at the same time some were considered very >intelligent. > >Motivation is the thing that drives us towards a goal. Whether the >motivation is caused by hunger or a subroutine in a program is irrelevant. > > > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:16:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <933220114.857406@server.australia.net.au> <14240.49886.228609.735602@lrz.de> Subject: Re: Mirror helps beat paralysis Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 06:50:09 -0400 Lines: 73 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: <#TZwPln2#GA.276@cpmsnbbsa05> Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa05 having, this night, reread H. M., i'll contribute as follows... the only thing that i came across that might be giving folks 'trouble' are the 1. animal-test paradigm results with H. M. and 2. the temporal pole - dorsomedial thalamus hypothesis. in 1., when tests were redesigned in light of results, with animal subjects, showing 'learning' after removal of the hippocampi, H. M. also showed signs of having 'learned', although he experienced no feeling of 'familiarity' with the stuff of the test paradigm. this's =all= discussed in AoK. NDT describes multiple 'supersystem configuration mechanisms'. as is discussed in AoK, Ap5, the hippocampus is just one of these. removal of the hippocampi leave the functioning of the remaining supersystem configuration mechanisms, although modified, still functional, and TD E/I-minimization occurs under their control... just as is explained in AoK. when H. M. showed signs of having 'learned', it was the TD E/I-minimization attributable to the remaining supersystem configuration mechanisms that resulted in the neural activation 'state' convergence underpinning the by-produced the behaviroal manifestations of 'learning'. the main contributions to this TD E/I-minimization are from the cerebellum, which 'just' strips away any extraneous TD E/I that it can, and the prefrontal cortex mechanism of volition (AoK, Ap7), which is a long-term, inherently-'quiet', 'plodding' TD E/I-minimization mechanism. i didn't like the temporal pole hypothesis 20 years ago, and i still don't because it attributes too-much functionality to dorsomedial thalamus, which has its hands full with all the work it receives from prefrontal cortex. H. M.'s flat affect, and the stuff of 'curiosity' ('spontaneous seeking' in the face of novelty, and his lack of diminution of novelty, and his inability to finely-tune the internal configuration of his brain, so as to robustly 'finitize' his neural activation 'state', are, as is discussed in AoK, Ap5, all due to the absence of the functionality 'normal' hippocampi. there's much more, but what i'd have to say would be overly-critical of refs. i'd have to cite. so just take what's above, and read in your own good refs, separating the wheat from the chaff, with respect to it (which is how AoK was engineered to be used, anyway... for the same reason... i =hate= 'criticizing folks). if there's anything in AoK, or anything of the ramifications of NDT, that anyone wants discussed explicitly (except the stuff of Ap6, which i reserve for in-person presentations, mostly, because it's just too hard to convey via 'words'), please ask. cheers, K. P. Collins (ken) Eugene Leitl wrote in message <14240.49886.228609.735602@lrz.de>... >John writes: > > > PS: All these posts for refs will soon end, I must return to the world to > > make my way and should be buried for the remainder of the year; coming out > > to play here and there. Hope the effort has not been in vain and benefited > > some. Now if anyone else has some spare time on their hands and would like > > to take up the baton circa 3 days time ... . > >That's a most excellent suggestion. I'm already running a news service >for ~130 people, perhaps I can bounce occasional neurosci thing or >two. > >But it would be of course even better if several other people would >contribute. >--- From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.good.net!newsfeed.enteract.com!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!ix.netcom.com!news From: "Phil Roberts, Jr." Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 10:17:21 -0400 Organization: Netcom Lines: 184 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> NNTP-Posting-Host: gra-mi9-10.ix.netcom.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-NETCOM-Date: Fri Jul 30 9:16:19 AM CDT 1999 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en X wrote: > > Kooter wrote: > > > > of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases > > to > > > be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. > > > > Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social > > requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism > > lacking free will'? > > Definition of terms again: what is free will? Well, "will" translates loosely > to a combination of intent and desire. You imply here that it means "free > action". > How about LESS DETERMINED in the sense that we are a species which is beginning to show signs of having some SERIOUS RESERVATIONS about blindly and obediently caring out a number of nature's emotional mandates: Lower Emotion or On What Its Like To Be A Bat or On Giving Homuncular Functionalists What They Say They Want Presumably, mother nature has gone to a lot of trouble to evolve our capacity for reflective thought precisely because it makes it possible for us to have a fairly good idea of what will be in our overall best interest. But if this is so, why then are there motivational states, such as fear, anger, and sexual arousal, which continually urge us to engage in episodes of strategic stupidity on those innumerable occasions when, at some later point in time, we end up having to ask ourselves, "Now why did I do that?" I mean, if prudence is such hot stuff from an evolutionary standpoint, why isn't mother making it easier for us to exercise it more prudently? The answer, I believe, is precisely what you might expect. The reason the lower emotions seem so out of context with our more reflective concerns is precisely because they are remnants of a pre-reflective survivalist heritage -- vestigial remains of ancient stimulus response mechanisms which, prior to the advent of prudential insight, were chiefly responsible for perpetuating ourselves and our genetic blueprints. And their lack of continuity with our more reflective concerns is because, at some point in our dark and distant past, survival was not the result of any overall intention or "will" to survive, but simply the non-intentional cumulative effect of a number of independent intentions or "wills" to exhibit stereotyped responses to certain immediate stimuli, but which were probably undertaken with little if any understanding of the overall objective they were designed to achieve. But isn't this exactly what you would expect? After all, the real mind blower in Darwin's hypothesis has always been the realization that it isn't necessary to postulate the presence of a conscious intention in the mind of a supreme being or what have you in order to account for the existence of phenomenally complex living organisms. And if you don't have to postulate a conscious intention at the level of abstraction that Darwin was working at, then you certainly don't have to postulate it at the level of the individual organism. Simply put, that which best persists persists and, as a simple law of mechanics, that applies irrespective of whether or not anything is intending to do so. In other words, the reason the lower emotions so often urge us to engage in random acts of stupidity is because, in a manner of speaking, they don't quite know what they are doing. Their strategic incoherence is due to the fact that the id is not so much an evil monster as a bunch of bungling idiots (Larry, Curly and Moe come to mind) and in which case Freud's mistake was not in positing homunculi (the id, ego and superego), as Ryle has contended, as in not positing enough of them. The Evolution of Prudence If, as I have suggested, Darwin and the incoherence of the lower emotions constitute evidence and argumentation against the likelihood of a conscious intention to survive in our pre-reflective ancestors, just where did the one we have come from anyway? Simple. As with moral concerns, prudence is not something we are endowed with by nature, at least not directly. Instead, it has to be drummed into us by our parents and others who have preceded us into consciousness (e.g., cooling it with the candy). As such, its obviously not so much the product of physical evolution as the product of cultural evolution. Or, more interestingly for present concerns, it can be construed as the product of the evolution of rationality itself facilitated, no doubt, by a combination of nature's constant tinkering with the neural architecture and the eventual ability to transfer what, in the beginning, at least, were probably simple conditioned cognitions (memes, a la Dawkins) from one generation to the next. What is most interesting here, if indeed we are talking about the evolution of rationality and its bearing on the determinism issue, is that it entails, not merely the transfer of knowledge, but of values as well. For example, there would be little point in coming to possess the knowledge of the long term detriments of eating too much candy if you weren't also able to eventually adopt the practice of overriding the internal mini- program directing you to eat it which, one might speculate, could be accomplished in one of two ways: 1. By simply following the rules handed down to you, based on their having been related to you in terms of one of the mini- programs of the old survival system (you'll get a spanking), and in which case there has been a transfer of benefits if not a transfer of values and insights. The moral analogue of this might be obeying the ten commandments so you don't end up with an eternal spanking. 2. By yourself becoming endowed with the insights which have led to the practice including: a. Some appreciation for the rationale of the practice, perhaps based on past experience and your resultant ability to empathize with your future self and the position he will be in (rotten teeth) if you don't override the old survival system's mini-program. This would result in an increase in the value attached to those mere representations of distant concerns. The moral analogue for this would be loving others more than the natural ideal (not at all) based on the ability to empathize with the mere represented concerns of others. b. Some appreciation of the fact that one "ought" to be prudent, based in part on the insight that rational creatures operate from a more global perspective which is, for some abstruse reason, superior (the ego) to that of creatures whose thought and behavior is totally determined by the mini-programs of the old survival system (the id). However, coming up with an explanation for the origin of this insight is a little tougher and would result in straying a little further afield than I care to at this juncture. The moral analogue would be some appreciation for the fact that one "ought" to love others more than the natural ideal (not at all) based in part on the insight that rational creatures operate from a more global perspective which is, for some abstruse reason, superior (the super ego) to that of creatures totally determined by the prudence program (the ego, i.e., self-concern). c. Finally, it seems to me that before you could override any of the mini-programs of the old survival system you would need one final ingredient. You would need to devalue the necessity of completing the mini-program, that is to say, re- evaluate its necessity relative to other values (e.g., represented future concerns) rather than in the absolute manner of a determined entity. But, before you can do that, it seems likely that you would have to be able to "see" the mini-program from "outside the system", that is to say, from a more objective viewpoint, perhaps as a component in a larger more valued program. Only then might you invoke the option to no longer be determined by it if and when it was, as we say, prudent. And since we are often prudent, or at least some of us are, that must be precisely what has happened in homo sapiens. -- Implied References -- 1. What Is It Like To Be A Bat, Thomas Nagel 2. On Giving Libertarians What They Say They Want, D. C. Dennett -- Phil Roberts, Jr. The Mechanics of Genetic Indeterminism http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/dada/90/ Feelings of Worthlessness from the Perspective of So-Called Cognitive Science http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!nyc-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!easynet-tele!easynet.net!newspeer1.nac.net!netnews.com!howland.erols.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: "Phil Roberts, Jr." Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 10:12:07 -0400 Organization: Netcom Lines: 164 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <37A1B2B7.FAEE4E34@ix.netcom.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: gra-mi9-10.ix.netcom.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-NETCOM-Date: Fri Jul 30 9:11:06 AM CDT 1999 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en Kooter wrote: > > > Motivation is the thing that drives us towards a goal. Whether the > motivation is caused by hunger or a subroutine in a program is irrelevant. You have a point here so long as the goal can be seen to be relevant to perpetuating our DNA. However, I would argue, based on a number of decades of observing the only psyche I have immediate access to, that the dominant motivational vector in man is not PHYSICAL well-being, but rather an incessant and at times almost frantic pursuit of his own self-worth/self- significance. And, if so, then I believe that this might be VERY RELEVANT to the issue of whether we are indetermined or not, as I explain below: A Divergent Theory of Emotional Instability (Sketch) Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement, purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression, suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?' Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed is also the one in which individuals have the greatest difficulty in maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth, often going to extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel Knievel, celibate monks, self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.). Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psychocentric stability (i.e., maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth). Synopsis: In much the manner reasoning allows for the subordination of lower emotional concerns and values (pain, fear, anger, sex, etc.) to more global concerns (concern for the self as a whole), so too, these more global concerns and values can themselves become reevaluated and subordinated to other more global, more objective considerations. And if this is so, and assuming that emotional disorder emanates from a deficiency in self-worth resulting from precisely this sort of experiencially based reevaluation, then it can reasonably be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from one's rational faculties functioning a tad too well. Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective, emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought, devaluing experience, etc. Implications: So-called "free will" and the incessant activity presumed to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite we all have for self-significating experience which, in turn, is simply nature's way of attempting to counter the objectifying influences of our rational faculties. This also implies that the engine in the first "free-thinking" artifact is probably going to be a diesel. "Another simile would be an atomic pile of less than critical size: an injected idea is to correspond to a neutron entering the pile from without. Each such neutron will cause a certain disturbance which eventually dies away. If, however, the size of the pile is sufficiently increased, the disturbance caused by such an incoming neutron will very likely go on and on increasing until the whole pile is destroyed. Is there a corresponding phenomenon for minds?" (A. M. Turing). Additional Implications: Since the explanation I have proposed amounts to the contention that the most rational species (presumably) is beginning to exhibit signs of transcending the formalism of nature's fixed objective (accomplished in man via intentional self-concern, i.e., the prudence program) it can reasonably be construed as providing evidence and argumentation in support of Lucas (1961) and Penrose (1989, 1994). Not only does this imply that the aforementioned artifact probably won't be a computer, but it would also explain why a question such as "Can Human Irrationality Be Experimentally Demonstrated?" (Cohen, 1981) has led to controversy, in that it presupposes the possibility of a discrete (formalizable) answer to a question which can only be addressed in comparative (non-formalizable) terms (e.g. X is more rational than Y, the norm, etc.). Along these same lines, the theory can also be construed as an endorsement or metajustification for comparative approaches in epistemology (explanationism, plausiblism, etc.) "The short answer [to Lucas/Godel and more recently, Penrose] is that, although it is established that there are limitations to the powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without any sort of proof, that no such limitations apply to human intellect " (A. M. Turing). "So even if mathematicians are superb cognizers of mathematical truth, and even if there is no algorithm, practical or otherwise, for cognizing mathematical truth, it does not follow that the power of mathematicians to cognize mathematical truth is not entirely explicable in terms of their brain's executing an algorithm. Not an algorhithm for intuiting mathematical truth -- we can suppose that Penrose [via Godel] has proved that there could be no such thing. What would the algorithm be for, then? Most plausibly it would be an algorithm -- one of very many -- for trying to stay alive ... " (D. C. Dennett). Oops! Sorry! Wrong again, old bean. "My ruling passion is the love of literary fame" (David Hume). "I have often felt as though I had inherited all the defiance and all the passions with which our ancestors defended their Temple and could gladly sacrifice my life for one great moment in history" (Sigmund Freud). "He, too [Ludwig Wittgenstein], suffered from depressions and for long periods considered killing himself because he considered his life worthless, but the stubbornness inherited from his father may have helped him to survive" (Hans Sluga). "The inquest [Alan Turing's] established that it was suicide. The evidence was perfunctory, not for any irregular reason, but because it was so transparently clear a case" (Andrew Hodges) REFERENCES 1. Cohen, L. Jonathan, Can Human Irrationality be Experimentally Demonstrated?, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1981, 4, 317-370. 2. Lucas, J. R., Minds, Machines and Godel, Philosophy, Vol XXXVI (1961). Reprinted in Anderson's, Minds and Machines, and engagingly explored in Hofstadter's Pulitzer prize winner, Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid. 3. Penrose, Roger, The Emperor's New Mind, 1989; Shadows of the Mind, 1994. -- Phil Roberts, Jr. The Mechanics of Genetic Indeterminism http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/dada/90/ Feelings of Worthlessness from the Perspective of So-Called Cognitive Science http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.good.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!newspeer.clara.net!news.clara.net!remarQ-uK!remarQ.com!supernews.com!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!server1.netnews.ja.net!pegasus.csx.cam.ac.uk!hgmp.mrc.ac.uk!biosci From: stefan.wermter@sunderland.ac.uk (Stefan Wermter) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Call EmerNet: Neural Computation and Neuroscience Date: 30 Jul 1999 15:48:57 +0100 Organization: MRC Human Genome Mapping Project Resource Centre Message-ID: <37A1B808.DF1FE718@sunderland.ac.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: mercury.hgmp.mrc.ac.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: niobium.hgmp.mrc.ac.uk 933346138 17588 193.62.192.80 (30 Jul 1999 14:48:58 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@hgmp.mrc.ac.uk NNTP-Posting-Date: 30 Jul 1999 14:48:58 GMT X-Received: from mserv1.dl.ac.uk (root@mserv1.dl.ac.uk [148.79.160.65]) by hgmp.mrc.ac.uk (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA26163 for ; Fri, 30 Jul 1999 15:47:25 +0100 (BST) X-Received: from isis.sunderland.ac.uk (isis.sunderland.ac.uk [157.228.12.13]) by mserv1.dl.ac.uk with SMTP id PAA28826 (8.8.8/5.4[ref postmaster@dl.ac.uk] for dl.ac.uk from stefan.wermter@sunderland.ac.uk); Fri, 30 Jul 1999 15:47:40 +0100 (BST) X-Precedence: first-class X-Received: from skuld.sunderland.ac.uk (sunderland.ac.uk) [157.228.106.130] by isis.sunderland.ac.uk with esmtp (Exim 1.82 #2) id 11ADpT-0000bJ-00; Fri, 30 Jul 1999 15:40:11 +0100 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.51 [en] (X11; I; SunOS 5.6 sun4u) X-Accept-Language: de X-To: "'neuron-request'" , "comp-neuro@bbb.caltech.edu" , "hybrid-list@cs.ua.edu" Lines: 167 EmerNet: International Workshop on Emergent Neural Computational Architectures Based on Neuroscience. Call for Papers Date: Saturday 11th September 1999. Location: Appleton Tower at the University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom. This EPSCR supported workshop will be held directly after ICANN 99. To see the call in a more structured way you can also go to http://www.his.sunderland.ac.uk/emernet/icann99w.html Description and Motivation ------------------ Existing computing approaches lack the flexibility and reliability performed by biological information processing systems. While much is known about the processing of biological systems, little use has been made of this in computation. If there is to be progress in building computational machines that have the capabilities of natural computing systems, collaboration among those researching biological information processing and computer science is critical. The EmerNet project aims to bring these two areas together, which should enable computer scientists to comprehend how the brain processes information, as well as generating new techniques for considering computation. The focus of the EmerNet Network is to comprehend more from neuroscience and to exploit this in computing to build computational neural architectures. Areas of Interest for Workshop -------------------- Areas of interest include issues of neuroscience and neural network, such as: 1.Synchronisation: How does the brain synchronise its processing? How does the brain schedule its processing? 2.Processing speed: How does the brain compute with relatively slow computing elements but still achieve rapid and real time performance? 3.Robustness: How does human memory manage to continue to operate despite failure of its components? 4.Modular construction: What can we learn from the brain for building modular more powerful artificial neural network architectures to solve larger tasks? 5.Learning in context: How can we build learning algorithms which consider context? How can we design incremental learning algorithms and dynamic architectures? Workshop Details ------------ The workshop will be held on Saturday 11 Sept 1999, the day following the ICANN 99 conference, at the Appleton Tower which is located at the University of Edinburgh's central campus. This day-long workshop will be made up of 10-12 talks with two being invited talks and the remainder contributed by participants. Those wishing to contribute talks are required to send a four-page abstract via email for consideration to Professor Wermter and Mark Elshaw. Registration for the EmerNet workshop is free. Those registering for the ICANN conference should register for this workshop on the same form. Others should contact Mark Elshaw or Professor Stefan Wermter to arrange registration for the workshop. It is intended that scientists from the UK who will present papers can have their railway traveling costs for the workshop fully reimbursed. *******Deadline for papers is 15th August (for planning purposes it would be good if you could indicate your interest to present or participate immediately) Invited Speakers ----------- Prof. Mike Denham University of Plymouth Prof. John Taylor King's College London Publication ------- If there is sufficient interest it is planned that extended versions of the submissions will be published in a special issue of a journal or book. Committee ------- Prof. Stefan Wermter University of Sunderland Prof. Jim.Austin University of York Prof. David Willshaw University of Edinburgh Contacts ------ Prof. Stefan Wermter University of Sunderland Centre of Informatics SCET St. Peters Way Sunderland SR6 0DD United Kingdom Phone: +44 191 515 3279 Fax: +44 191 515 2781 Email: Stefan.Wermter@sunderland.ac.uk (please cc all msg to Mark Elshaw) Mark Elshaw (For Workshop Organisation) University of Sunderland Centre for Informatics SCET St. Peters Way Sunderland SR6 0DD United Kingdom Phone: +44 191 515 3682 Fax: +44 191 515 2781 Email: mark.elshaw@sunderland.ac.uk For more information on the EmerNet network see http://www.his.sunderland.ac.uk/emernet/ *************************************** Professor Stefan Wermter Research Chair in Intelligent Systems University of Sunderland Centre of Informatics, SCET St Peters Way Sunderland SR6 0DD United Kingdom phone: +44 191 515 3279 fax: +44 191 515 2781 email: stefan.wermter@sunderland.ac.uk http://www.his.sunderland.ac.uk/ **************************************** --- From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <933220114.857406@server.australia.net.au> <14240.49886.228609.735602@lrz.de> <#TZwPln2#GA.276@cpmsnbbsa05> Subject: Re: Mirror helps beat paralysis Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 09:55:54 -0400 Lines: 22 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.direct.ca!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa02 Ken Collins wrote in message <#TZwPln2#GA.276@cpmsnbbsa05>... >[...] >when H. M. showed signs of having 'learned', it was the TD E/I-minimization >attributable to the remaining supersystem configuration mechanisms that >resulted in the neural activation 'state' convergence underpinning the >by-produced the behaviroal manifestations of 'learning'. > >the main contributions to this TD E/I-minimization are from the cerebellum, >which 'just' strips away any extraneous TD E/I that it can, and the >prefrontal cortex mechanism of volition (AoK, Ap7), which is a long-term, >inherently-'quiet', 'plodding' TD E/I-minimization mechanism. whoops! left out the important contributions of the basal ganglia-substantia nigra. (see AoK, Ap5) K. P. Collins >[...] From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <379E587B.6A9D@columbia-center.org> <37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com> <#o0v#xb2#GA.187@cpmsnbbsa02> <37a18c48.4970730@news.seanet.com> Subject: Re: THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIO-RELIGION Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 09:49:09 -0400 Lines: 35 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: <#o5RSJp2#GA.190@cpmsnbbsa02> Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.debate,alt.philosophy,talk.philosophy.humanism,sci.philosophy.meta,sci.cognitive,sci.lang,talk.philosophy.misc,alt.brain,alt.human-brain,comp.ai.philosophy,alt.fan.rawilson,bionet.neuroscience,alt.memetics,alt.consciousness,alt.neo-tech Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!denver-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!coop.net!pulsar.dimensional.com!dimensional.com!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!newshub.northeast.verio.net!news-out.cwix.com!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa02 Richard F Hall wrote in message <37a18c48.4970730@news.seanet.com>... >On Thu, 29 Jul 1999 08:18:32 -0400, "Ken Collins" > wrote: > >>the problem is that, since there's, verifiably, only one 'map' of Truth >>within physical reality... the one-way flow of energy from order to disorder >>that is what's described by 2nd Thermo (wdb2t), their can be no >>'either-or-s'... at each 'place' on the wdb2t map, there's 'just' wdb2t. >>sure, the flow of energy from order to disorder can be 'controlled', >>locally, but that only augments the flow of energy from order to disorder, >>elsewhere... wdb2t remains the =one= thing. >> >>this means that there can exist only one thing that can be the object of >>Faith... anything else, 'merely', 'fakes' it... detectably. >> >>K. P. Collins >Mr. Collins: >I have never read a statement of faith similar to yours. >Truely unique. >The important thing is that it's faith in something that you can rely >on when everything else has failed you. >Is it true that the continued existence of "living things" seems to be >contrary to the wdb2t? No. Life climbs the gradient that is wdb2t, always consuming more energy than it gathers. but, still, it climbs. ken collins From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:17:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: "Phil Roberts, Jr." Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 10:06:16 -0400 Organization: Netcom Lines: 174 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <37A1B158.ED2FF501@ix.netcom.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: gra-mi9-10.ix.netcom.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-NETCOM-Date: Fri Jul 30 9:05:14 AM CDT 1999 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en Kooter wrote: > > Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social > requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism > lacking free will'? Probably not, but I believe there is evidence at least that we are LESS DETERMINED than other organisms. And, interestingly enough, if so, it also seems likely that the manner in which nature has introduced this indeterminism into the universe is itself determined by a mechanism of sorts. > > I don't see a connection between intelligence and free will. I do: The Mechanics of Genetic Indeterminism: Why We Turned Out Like Captain Kirk Instead of Mr. Spock "Can the cultural evolution of cultural values gain a direction and momentum of its own and completely replace genetic evolution? I think not. The genes hold culture on a leash. The leash is very long, but inevitably values will be constrained in accordance with their effects on the human gene pool" (E. O. Wilson, 1978, p. 167). (Abstract) Diagrams A and B (below) represent someone's understanding, with Diagram A representing an understanding which is relatively correct and complete and Diagram B representing an understanding which is less correct (slanted line) and less complete (missing line). Diagram C is comprised of a number of A-like configurations which have been conjoined to one another with asterisks which represent associations. The configuration in the middle of the diagram, labeled with an 'X', represents an individual's relatively correct and complete understanding of her own interests (and taken to include those of immediate kin). The conjoined surrounding configurations represent this same individual's relatively correct and complete understanding of the interests of others. As such, Diagram C can be construed as a rough representation of the cognitive profile we find in ourselves in that, where human beings are concerned, it appears nature has been selecting for organisms that are relatively cognitively objective (i.e., smart). By representing value in terms of the darkness of lines, it is also possible to employ Diagram C to represent our species' predicted valuative profile. This could be accomplished simply by making the X configuration as dark as possible and the other configurations as light as possible. That's because, at least according to most sociobiologists, we should expect animate organisms to place paramount importance on their own interests and, with the exception of immediate kin, none whatsoever on the interests of others (Hamilton, Dawkins, Campbell, etc.) | | | | | - z - * - z - * - z - * - z - * - z - | | | | | | - X - * * * * * | | | | | | - z - * - y - * - y - * - y - * - z - Diagram A | | | | | * * * * * | | | | | - z - * - y - * - X - * - y - * - z - | | | | | / * * * * * - X - | | | | | - z - * - y - * - y - * - y - * - z - | | | | | Diagram B * * * * * | | | | | - z - * - z - * - z - * - z - * - z - | | | | | Diagram C While other species conform quite nicely, the valuative profile in man has been a source of consternation, in that we are considerably more other-interested than expected (Albert Schweitzer, self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.). This could be represented in Diagram C by making the lines in the peripheral configurations a bit darker, but still quite light. Although egregiously underappreciated by natural scientists, most of whom are still mesmerized by "an extrinsic philosophy of science which is [fourty] years out of date" (Manicas and Secord), our species is also afflicted with a disturbing volatility in self-worth. Not infrequently, this volatility manifests itself in a life threatening deficiency in self-interest (apathy, recklessness, suicide, etc.) represented by making configuration X a bit lighter, but still quite dark. Since the proposed adjustments to Diagram C would result in configurations which are more equal in darkness compared to the configurations in the predicted profile, it suggests that other-interestedness and emotional instability are just different manifestations of an "unwanted" (maladaptive from a "gene's" perspective) increase in valuative objectivity. And, since I am supposing that this "red shift" toward valuative objectivity is indeed "unwanted" (e.g., no group selection), I have postulated A LEAKAGE BETWEEN THE COGNITIVE AND VALUATIVE COMPONENTS OF OUR STRATEGIC PROFILE to account for it, i.e., a leakage of value from regions of high concentration to regions of low concentration via the conduits of the associative junctures. This amounts to the supposition that the explosive increase in cognitive objectivity (knowledge) emanating from the snowball effect of cultural evolution (language, printing, scientific method, etc.) has begun to have an objectifying influence on our values. Combined with the fact that these influenced values become culturally transmitted and the influence further amplified over time, the cumulative effect has become SUFFICIENT TO OVERWHELM NATURE'S INCESSANT CULLING OF THE VALUATIVELY UNFIT (other-interested and emotionally unstable members of the species) causing the species to become LESS DETERMINED by natural selection. Or, if you prefer, the reason we turned out like Captain Kirk instead of Mr. Spock or more like Mother Teresa than Joseph Stalin has been more a matter of psychodynamic necessity than of survivalistic expediency. In the remainder of the paper I elaborate on the mechanism presumed responsible for the leakage (the moralization mechanism), suggest some disturbing implications (e.g., homo sapiens are becoming too rational) and, by incorporating representations for Hume's three types of association, conclude by employing Diagram C to represent several predictions of the theory. ---------- References ---------- 1.E. O. Wilson, On Human Nature, 1978. 2.W. D. Hamilton, The Genetic Evolution of Social Behavior, Journal of Theoretical Biology, 7, 1964. 3.Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 1976. 4.Donald Campbell, On the Conflicts Between Biological and Social Evolution and Between Psychology and Moral Tradition, American Psychologist, Dec. 1975. 5.Peter Manicas and Paul F. Secord, Implications of the New Philosophy of Science: A Topology for Psychology, presented at the seventh annual meeting of the 'Society for Philosophy and Psychology' at the University of Chicago, 1981. Available at: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476/N_T_abs.htm 6.David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, 1739. -- Phil Roberts, Jr. The Mechanics of Genetic Indeterminism http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/dada/90/ Feelings of Worthlessness from the Perspective of So-Called Cognitive Science http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!panix!news.panix.com!not-for-mail From: gcf@panix.com (G*rd*n) Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: 30 Jul 1999 10:50:51 -0400 Organization: }"{ }"{ }"{ }"{ Lines: 33 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: panix2.nfs100.access.net X-Trace: news.panix.com 933346251 7040 166.84.0.227 (30 Jul 1999 14:50:51 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@panix.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 30 Jul 1999 14:50:51 GMT X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97) "Phil Roberts, Jr." : | How about LESS DETERMINED in the sense that we are a species which is beginning | to show signs of having some SERIOUS RESERVATIONS about blindly and obediently | caring out a number of nature's emotional mandates.... Indeterminacy exists at the lowest levels of the physis. Even if it were not for QM, as Feynman showed, classical mechanics also produces indeterminacy. Probably, the organization of living beings is a way of evolving larger determinable systems in spite of this fundamental instability. The organization of animal bodies, for example, is highly homeostatic. In the larger animals, especially in primates, we begin to see the evolution of societies which impose order and conformity on their members. And in the case of human beings, a large brain, originally evolved for some purpose like better swinging from branches or rock-throwing, now fills with rhetoric which commands obedience to simple principles and fits the individual ever more snugly in with his social context. Finally, humans evolve the mass media and the Internet, where they increasingly hear about and conform to a rhetoric of non-conformity and submit to the dictates of "freedom." The direction of evolution is clearly towards obedience, not away from it. Too bad. -- }"{ G*rd*n }"{ gcf@panix.com }"{ { http://www.etaoin.com | latest new material 4/15 <-adv't From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!firehose.mindspring.com!not-for-mail From: "Kooter" Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 12:50:43 -0400 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 35 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7nskrl$1qa$1@nntp8.atl.mindspring.net> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: cf.cd.bb.2d X-Server-Date: 30 Jul 1999 16:45:41 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2014.211 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 Gawd, you talk a lot. Phil Roberts, Jr. wrote in message news:37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com... > > > X wrote: > > > > Kooter wrote: > > > > > > of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases > > > to > > > > be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. > > > > > > Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social > > > requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism > > > lacking free will'? > > > > Definition of terms again: what is free will? Well, "will" translates loosely > > to a combination of intent and desire. You imply here that it means "free > > action". > > > > How about LESS DETERMINED in the sense that we are a species which is beginning > to show signs of having some SERIOUS RESERVATIONS about blindly and obediently From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!firehose.mindspring.com!not-for-mail From: "Kooter" Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 12:45:36 -0400 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 24 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7nski2$vqq$1@nntp8.atl.mindspring.net> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <378b326f.0@news.victoria.tc.ca> <37903382.1566230@news.demon.co.uk> <7n1aq6$qfo$1@newssvr03-int.news.prodigy.com> <379874e8.3481585@news.demon.co.uk> <7n5tmj$8o3@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> <932625090.90571@server.australia.net.au> <7n6g0h$prg$1@its.hooked.net> <379dd387.4822153@news.demon.co.uk> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> NNTP-Posting-Host: cf.cd.bb.2d X-Server-Date: 30 Jul 1999 16:40:34 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2014.211 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 X wrote in message news:37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X... > Kooter wrote: > > > > of course, 'AI' 'motivation' can be tailored, but in doing so, it ceases > > to > > > be 'AI' and is just another mechanism lacking Free Will. > > > > Humans don't have 'free will'. We are severly constrained by social > > requirements. Does that mean that we are also 'just another mechanism > > lacking free will'? > > Definition of terms again: what is free will? Well, "will" translates loosely > to a combination of intent and desire. You imply here that it means "free > action". Wrong. I implied that _free_ will is the _free_dom to implement your desires. The word 'free' is a modifier on the word 'will'. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!cam-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!ctp.com!usenet From: "Douglas Potts" Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.debate,alt.philosophy,talk.philosophy.humanism,sci.philosophy.meta,sci.cognitive,sci.lang,talk.philosophy.misc,alt.brain,alt.human-brain,comp.ai.philosophy,alt.fan.rawilson,bionet.neuroscience,alt.memetics,alt.consciousness,alt.neo-tech Subject: Re: THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIO-RELIGION Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 13:17:31 -0500 Organization: Cambridge Technology Partners, Inc. Lines: 84 Message-ID: <7nsqan$72t$1@concorde.ctp.com> References: <379E587B.6A9D@columbia-center.org> <37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 149.44.125.74 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 I would disagree with your definition of Faith. Faith is an on-going belief. You don't have faith in a god, you believe in a god...you have faith IN that god. If you have faith in a god, you believe certain things. You may believe that living a "good" life might place you in a "heaven" like place after your death. You HAVE faith that this god in which you believe will think you lived this good life and thus place you in the "heaven" like place after your death. You believe in an event, you have faith that your beliefs are correct. Richard F Hall wrote in message news:37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com... > BIODETERMINATION AND RELIGION > > The premise of this introductory essay is stimulate discussion of the > biological components of "religion". Religion composed of human > characteristics which evolved biologically as a part of human needs. > It is further proposed, here, that to deny these needs may be > unhealthy and unwholesome. > > Everyone has some degree of each of these components in their make-up > which we may loosely call their "religion". This is true even though > they may deny "religion". > > First, let's try to identify the essence of "religion" in it's > components: > > 1) Faith. Definitions: (a). A Faith is anything believed. In this > definition, the words "faith" and "belief" can be interchanged. For > instance, if you "believe" that "Reason" is all that is necessary, > then one has "faith" in "Reason". (b). A Faith is a religious tenet > or doctrine such as "Catholicism". (c). In both a and b, a person > has "faith" in those things which are "beyond their knowledge". In > most cases, beyond evidence. > > For instance, there is: faith in a God, faith that there is no God, > faith in angels, faith that all is one, faith that reality is a "blind > mechanism", faith in humanity, faith in oneself, faith in the > existence of a soul, in no soul, and faith in nothing (despair and > chaos), etc. More than anyone else, the physicist recognizes the > limits of knowledge. Often an individual's strength of character is > only as strong as in what they choose to have faith. > > 2) Humility is recognizing a modest estimate of one's own importance > in proportion to that in what one keeps faith. All religions stress > some sort of humility. Humility strengthens a group through its > members. > > 3) Identification is to recognize and equate one's self to a : > family, group, community, country, world, the ecosphere. The family, > congregation, and world community are considerations of every > religion. The history of mankind shows strength of identification > with larger groups to be one measure of the evolution of society. > > 4) Dedication is to devote one's time and energy to a special use (we > can't do everything). We can focus our lives. People with dedication > in their lives experience generally better health. > > 5) Truths are essential concepts that relate to human life in a > special way. Truths also include a history of the development of a > belief system, whether it be personal or in literature. What are the > "truths" of your "religion". > > 6) Ritual is regularly followed procedures including: prayer, > holidays, and other activities which affirm all other aspects of the > belief system are factors which identify and stabilize one's > existence. Even the scientist can find solace in the ritual of one's > experiments. > > Religion has been a unifying force, as well as, an evolutionary force > in the greatest developments of human kind. > > To be human is to be "religious". The discovery that a religion or > philosophy can direct biological evolution through associated > sexual-mate selection is on the edge of the 21st century. > > rich > http://www.seanet.com/~realistic/idealism > Realistic Idealism > reconciliation of science and religion in 10 generations or > more. > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.corridex.com!newshub.northeast.verio.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: nedludd@ix.netcom.com(Ned Ludd) Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: 30 Jul 1999 15:25:03 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 43 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7nsg4f$dn4@dfw-ixnews17.ix.netcom.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: mil-wi15-35.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Fri Jul 30 10:25:03 AM CDT 1999 In <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com> gcf@panix.com (G*rd*n) writes: "Phil Roberts, Jr." : | How about LESS DETERMINED in the sense that we are a | species which is beginning to show signs of having some | SERIOUS RESERVATIONS about blindly and obediently caring | out a number of nature's emotional mandates.... Gordon: > Indeterminacy exists at the lowest levels of the physis. > Even if it were not for QM, as Feynman showed, classical > mechanics also produces indeterminacy. > Probably, the organization of living beings is a way of > evolving larger determinable systems in spite of this > fundamental instability. The organization of animal > bodies, for example, is highly homeostatic. In the larger > animals, especially in primates, we begin to see the > evolution of societies which impose order and conformity > on their members. And in the case of human beings, a large > brain, originally evolved for some purpose like better > swinging from branches or rock-throwing, now fills with > rhetoric which commands obedience to simple principles and > fits the individual ever more snugly in with his social > context. > Finally, humans evolve the mass media and the Internet, > where they increasingly hear about and conform to a > rhetoric of non-conformity and submit to the dictates of > "freedom." The direction of evolution is clearly towards > obedience, not away from it. > Too bad. > Postmodernist heal thyself! Perhaps a dose of Nietzsche is needed here. All things recur. Civilizations overextend, dark ages return. A serious restructuring of the species will await the development of something like telepathy. Telephone and television inch us toward it, but do not break the wall of individualism. Ned From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:18:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.esat.net!HEAnet!web3.tcd.ie!macpsy84.psychology.tcd.ie!user From: smomara@mail.tcd.ie (Shane O'Mara) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience,alt.brain,sci.med.psychobiology,sci.cognitive Subject: Conference on Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction: Theoretical and Experimental Perspectives Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 17:21:56 +0100 Organization: Trinity College, Dublin 2 Lines: 72 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: macpsy84.psychology.tcd.ie Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, March 30 and 31, 2000 The Nature of Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction: Theoretical and Experimental Perspectives A conference held in association with a Special Issue of Hippocampus. A central theme in theories of hippocampal function in memory and amnesia is the translation of temporary hippocampal information storage into a more permanent cortical store. Connections between hippocampus and cortex are hypothesized to undergo use-dependent changes in synaptic strength, enabling long-term consolidation of memory. Most theoretical and experimental work on the biological processes thought to underlie long-term memory has concentrated on the 'early' stages of hippocampal formation processing, rather than on the interaction between the hippocampal formation and cortex. This conference is specifically designed to redress this imbalance. Conference Sessions include: Theoretical Perspectives; Lessons from Neuroanatomy and Neurochemistry; Synaptic Transmission; Behavioural and Imaging Analyses. Call for Poster Presentations: Poster presentations are welcome; poster abstracts will be collated into a conference booklet. Invited speakers include: John Aggleton, School of Psychology, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK David G. Amaral, Center for Neuroscience, University of California, Davis, CA, USA Neil Burgess, Inst. of Cognitive Neuroscience University College, London, UK Gyorgi Buzsaki, Center for Neuroscience, Rutgers, State University of New Jersey, NJ, USA Raymond P. Kesner, Dept of Psychology, University of Utah, Utah, USA Serge Laroche, Neurobiologie de l'Apprentissage et de la Memoire, Uni Paris Sud, France Marina A. Lynch, Dept of Physiology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland Eleanor A. Maguire, Wellcome Dept of Cognitive Neurology, Inst of Neurology, London , UK Robert L. Muller, Dept of Physiology, SUNY Health Sciences Centre, Brooklyn, NY, USA Lynn Nadel, Dept of Psychology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA Shane M. O'Mara, Dept of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland Randall C. O'Reilly, Dept of Psychology, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA Bruno Poucet, Lab Neurosciences Cognitives-CNRS, Marseille, France Ian H. Robertson, Dept of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland Edmund T. Rolls, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK Anne-Marie Thierry, Collège de France, Paris, France Menno P. Witter, Dept of Anatomy, Vrije University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Supported by the Wellcome Trust; the Provostís Fund of Trinity College; the Department of Psychology, Trinity College. Registration (including conference banquet): Students and PostDoctoral Researchers £125 IEP; Senior Researchers (£175) (excluding conference banquet £100 IEP and £150 IEP, respectively). For further information, including registration materials, please check the conference website: http://www.tcd.ie/Psychology/HippCortConf/ Or write/email/Fax: Dr Shane M. O'Mara, Academic Organizer, Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction Conference, Department of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland; Email: hippconf@tcd.ie; Fax: +353-1-671 2006 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:19:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!nntp.primenet.com!nntp.gctr.net!enews.sgi.com!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.uwa.edu.au!not-for-mail From: Aphex Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.debate,talk.philosophy.humanism,sci.philosophy.meta,alt.human-brain,comp.ai.philosophy,alt.fan.rawilson,bionet.neuroscience,alt.memetics,alt.consciousness Subject: Re: THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIO-RELIGION Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 06:04:05 +0800 Organization: pandora's box corperation Lines: 7 Message-ID: <37A22155.3BC8D400@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> References: <379E587B.6A9D@columbia-center.org> <37a0396a.1978255@news.seanet.com> Reply-To: discord@cygnus.uwa.edu.au NNTP-Posting-Host: dial01-226-std.dy.uwa.cygnus.net.au Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.07 [en] (Win95; I) > Science is no place for semantic games. Science is the BEST place for semantic games. |aphex| "Ninja, the tea party's over." From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:19:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: Subject: Re: Conference on Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction: Theoretical and Experimental Perspectives Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 18:48:41 -0400 Lines: 81 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience,alt.brain,sci.med.psychobiology,sci.cognitive Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!howland.erols.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa02 sounds like a great focus... HURRAH. K. P. Collins (ken) Shane O'Mara wrote in message ... >Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, March 30 and 31, 2000 > >The Nature of Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction: Theoretical and >Experimental Perspectives > >A conference held in association with a Special Issue of Hippocampus. > >A central theme in theories of hippocampal function in memory and amnesia >is the translation of temporary hippocampal information storage into a >more permanent cortical store. Connections between hippocampus and cortex >are hypothesized to undergo use-dependent changes in synaptic strength, >enabling long-term consolidation of memory. Most theoretical and >experimental work on the biological processes thought to underlie >long-term memory has concentrated on the 'early' stages of hippocampal >formation processing, rather than on the interaction between the >hippocampal formation and cortex. This conference is specifically designed >to redress this imbalance. > >Conference Sessions include: Theoretical Perspectives; Lessons from >Neuroanatomy and >Neurochemistry; Synaptic Transmission; Behavioural and Imaging Analyses. > >Call for Poster Presentations: Poster presentations are welcome; poster >abstracts will be collated >into a conference booklet. > >Invited speakers include: > >John Aggleton, School of Psychology, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK >David G. Amaral, Center for Neuroscience, University of California, Davis, >CA, USA >Neil Burgess, Inst. of Cognitive Neuroscience University College, London, UK >Gyorgi Buzsaki, Center for Neuroscience, Rutgers, State University of New >Jersey, NJ, USA >Raymond P. Kesner, Dept of Psychology, University of Utah, Utah, USA >Serge Laroche, Neurobiologie de l'Apprentissage et de la Memoire, Uni >Paris Sud, France >Marina A. Lynch, Dept of Physiology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland >Eleanor A. Maguire, Wellcome Dept of Cognitive Neurology, Inst of >Neurology, London , UK >Robert L. Muller, Dept of Physiology, SUNY Health Sciences Centre, >Brooklyn, NY, USA >Lynn Nadel, Dept of Psychology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA >Shane M. O'Mara, Dept of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland >Randall C. O'Reilly, Dept of Psychology, University of Colorado, Boulder, >CO, USA >Bruno Poucet, Lab Neurosciences Cognitives-CNRS, Marseille, France >Ian H. Robertson, Dept of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland >Edmund T. Rolls, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, >Oxford, UK >Anne-Marie Thierry, Collège de France, Paris, France >Menno P. Witter, Dept of Anatomy, Vrije University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands > >Supported by the Wellcome Trust; the Provostís Fund of Trinity College; >the Department of >Psychology, Trinity College. > >Registration (including conference banquet): Students and PostDoctoral >Researchers £125 IEP; >Senior Researchers (£175) (excluding conference banquet £100 IEP and £150 >IEP, respectively). > >For further information, including registration materials, please check >the conference website: >http://www.tcd.ie/Psychology/HippCortConf/ > >Or write/email/Fax: >Dr Shane M. O'Mara, Academic Organizer, Hippocampal-Cortical Interaction >Conference, >Department of Psychology, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland; Email: >hippconf@tcd.ie; Fax: >+353-1-671 2006 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:19:00 1999 Path: biosci!pravda.ucr.edu!ihnp4.ucsd.edu!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!howland.erols.net!panix!news.panix.com!not-for-mail From: gcf@panix.com (G*rd*n) Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Date: 1 Aug 1999 12:45:00 -0400 Organization: }"{ }"{ }"{ }"{ Lines: 17 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <7o1tic$5oa$1@panix2.panix.com> References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com> <7o0sbk$ide$1@news.NERO.NET> NNTP-Posting-Host: panix2.nfs100.access.net X-Trace: news.panix.com 933525900 18334 166.84.0.227 (1 Aug 1999 16:45:00 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@panix.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 1 Aug 1999 16:45:00 GMT X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97) G*rd*n: | >Finally, humans evolve the mass media and the Internet, | >where they increasingly hear about and conform to a | >rhetoric of non-conformity and submit to the dictates of | >"freedom." The direction of evolution is clearly towards | >obedience, not away from it. | > | >Too bad. "Alec Maki" : | Why is that too bad? Just my reactionary prejudice. -- }"{ G*rd*n }"{ gcf@panix.com }"{ { http://www.etaoin.com | latest new material 4/15 <-adv't From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:21:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!diablo.theplanet.net!newsfeed.esat.net!HEAnet!web3.tcd.ie!macpsy84.psychology.tcd.ie!user From: smomara@mail.tcd.ie (Shane O'Mara) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: test Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 14:29:39 +0100 Organization: Trinity College, Dublin 2 Lines: 1 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: macpsy84.psychology.tcd.ie From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:22:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!howland.erols.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: further Re: Brain region used in face recognition is active in new object recognition Date: 31 Jul 1999 05:50:48 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 56 Message-ID: <7nu2ro$pk4@dfw-ixnews4.ix.netcom.com> References: <933043949.381386@server.australia.net.au> <#uNhc8#1#GA.308@cpmsnbbsa03> <7nke90$edk$1@hecate.umd.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 12:50:48 AM CDT 1999 In other words, it means everything and nothing. F. LeFever In "Ken Collins" writes: > >Hi, Didier. > >Didier A. Depireux wrote in message <7nke90$edk$1@hecate.umd.edu>... > >>[...] > >>Without going through AoK (the reprint pile on my desk is already big >>enough as it is), would you mind stating what TD stands for? E/I is >>usually (in hearing, anyway) an abbreviation for Excitatory/Inhibitory. >> >> Didier > >there's a lot in-it, but it's short-hand for "the sum of the >Topologigally-Distributed relative ratios of Excitation to Inhibition"... >the "TD" includes all of Neuroanatomy's twists and turns, which all exist >for the sole purpose of aligning all of the neural architecture so that >'decisions' can be made, within it, through the simple minimization of =one= >'thing'... > >TD E/I. > >neural activation 'states' are 'finitized' [rendered maximally-finite] when >excitation is minimized and inhibition is maximized. our nervous systems do >everything that they do by 'seeking' this one 'goal'. > >[there's more to it. for instance, there's neural architecture that's >inherently TD E/I(up)-generating... but all such seemingly-discordant >instances are just more of the tightly-integrated global neural architecture >that 'seeks' to do only one thing: minimize TD E/I.] > >ken collins > >>[...] > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:22:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: I'll be... Date: 31 Jul 1999 05:53:48 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 21 Message-ID: <7nu31c$rks@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> References: <#CEfWzD2#GA.271@cpmsnbbsa03> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 12:53:48 AM CDT 1999 Was somebody waiting to hear this? Are your goings and comings that important? (well, maybe your SECOND COMING...) "Elvis has left the building." F. LeFever In <#CEfWzD2#GA.271@cpmsnbbsa03> "Ken Collins" writes: > >...offline for some extended hours... had to take my Father to an early Dr's >appointment. only way i could "get-up" was not go to bed :-) > >ken collins > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:22:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: Brain region used in face recognition is active in new object recognition Date: 31 Jul 1999 05:22:50 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 37 Message-ID: <7nu17a$a38@dfw-ixnews7.ix.netcom.com> References: <933043949.381386@server.australia.net.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 12:22:50 AM CDT 1999 Hmmm..how does one recognize a NEW object? One might confabulate and claim recognition of a new objectt (especially if one has frontal lesions), but wouldn't valid recognition be of an OLD object??? On the oter hand, it was in Australia, in fact (Cairns) that I presented a paper by Dr. Elena Kumkova and myself which reported use of a visual memory test based on "new" objects (i.e. NOBODY had seen them before), which had been devised so as to discourage the kind of analysis and verbal description the "nonsense shapes" used in SOME (most?) visual memory tests, and encourage seeing them "as a whole" or "as an object", the way one USUALLY sees a face. Some of our (behavioral) data did support the idea that they were treated the same way faces were, so it is satisfying to see (if that is what this study shows) that functional neuroimaging data might also,, in the case of some "new objects". Of course, before we tested recognition we showed them to our subjects, so they could tell them from REALLY new ones which we did NOT let them see before testing. (That is, they recognized the OLD objects and could discriminate them from the REALLY new objects). F. Frank LeFever, Ph.D. New York Neuropsychology Group In <933043949.381386@server.australia.net.au> "John" writes: > > > > > >http://www.brown.edu/Administration/News_Bureau/1998-99/98-154.html > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:22:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: LTP and learning Date: 31 Jul 1999 05:42:17 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 84 Message-ID: <7nu2bp$11j@dfw-ixnews19.ix.netcom.com> References: <933043969.298961@server.australia.net.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 12:42:17 AM CDT 1999 Apparently, Ken has as much trouble reading English as the rest of us have reading his language, whatever it is. A quick look at John's brief quote is sufficient to show that Ken missed the point entirely. Nobody "induced and [sic] 'LTP'-like condition" in THIS experiment. This was a study of mice who are LACKING in the ability to develop LTP. Starting from ignorance and confusion, using terms which perhaps even HE doesn't understand, courageously following the disorderd twists and turns of his own thought, it's no wonder that he produces such a marvelous specimen as what follows that innocent revelation of his mis-reading. F. LeFever In "Ken Collins" writes: > >the press release didn't provide sufficient info, but simply inducing and >'LTP'-like condition indiscriminantly with respect to the >topologically-distributed nature of 'normal' nervous system function, does >not eliminate all of the trophic consequences inherent in the >non-interfered-with resultant activation 'state', and if there's enough >information remaining in the resultant activation 'state' to allow the TD >E/I-minimization mechanisms to achieve convergence upon a supersystem >configuration, the nervous system ('brain') does exactly that, and an >'appropriate' behavioral response is 'addressed' via the TD E/I-minimization >with respect to what's left, 'after' the experimental stuff is 'applied'. > >within the tightly-integrated neural topology, the forced, >indiscriminant-of-the-TD, 'LTP'-like condition, in fact, constitutes a >relatively-random activation sub-'state'... a TD E/I(up) sub-'state'... and >any remaining (non-interfered-with) TD E/I-minimization mechanisms just >'whittle' (AoK, Ap5) it away, as they 'normally' do with with other >superfluous (relatively-random) activation. > >it's been a major shortcoming of most experiments in Neuroscience that the >tight mapping of the neural topology has been largely ignored... if an >experimental design is not engineered in a way that keeps the Topology of >the experimental part commensurate with the innate neural Topology, then, to >the degree of such, the experiment yields False results. > >K. P. Collins > >John wrote in message <933043969.298961@server.australia.net.au>... >> >>"There still remains, however, one unresolved and very controversial issue: >>To what extent does long-term potentiation participate in learning and >>memory acquisition? Contrary to their expectations, the scientists from >>Heidelberg could not demonstrate abnormal learning behaviour in the mutant >>mice. Rather, the mice lacking LTP were, like normal mice, capable of >>accurately finding a submerged, invisible platform in a pool of murky water >>("water maze") and to swim there immediately when placed in the water." >> >> >> >> >> >>http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/mpg-dal060299.html >> >> > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:22:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news.indiana.edu!NewsNG.Chicago.Qual.Net!205.212.123.11!news.bright.net!not-for-mail From: Randy Timmerman Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: A strange feeling. I need to know what it is. Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 02:17:36 -0400 Organization: bright.net Ohio Lines: 28 Message-ID: <37A14380.8888D0BF@bright.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: shel-ras1-4-cs-5.dial.bright.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: cletus.bright.net 933315644 23311 205.212.148.85 (30 Jul 1999 06:20:44 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@bright.net NNTP-Posting-Date: 30 Jul 1999 06:20:44 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) I have been getting what I call charges for many years now. I have asked many people about them, but I am no closer to figuring out what they are. There is really no way to discribe it, the closest way to describe it would be the feeling that you get with a cold chill but instead of the cold chill it feels like a surge of energy rushing through my body. I almost want to describe it as static electricity, but that is no where near what it feels like. Sometimes they are trigured by a strong emotion, other times they start up for no apparent reason. They can come and go in the matter of a split second or last up to several minutes. Sometimes they are located in a particular part of my body, othertimes they are throughout my entire body. The only time that I have ever heard of anyone else ever having anything like this was a lady on tv who was a healing hand while she decribed the feeling that she gets when she heals. However, she said that she only got it in her arms, I get it everywhere. I know that this sounds strange, but all that I really want to know is what causes it. Has anyone ever heard of someone else that has this. Or does anyone have any idea what it could be. Does anyone know of any type of medical condition that may cause this. I would greatly appreciate any information that anyone could give me. Thank you for your time. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!feeder.kornet.net!news-stock.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: FURTHER CLARIFICATION... Date: 31 Jul 1999 07:09:06 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 126 Message-ID: <7nu7ei$448@dfw-ixnews19.ix.netcom.com> References: <00f001bed2d8$9bd2b980$99170a3f@pavilion> <932533330.456928@server.australia.net.au> <7n9mts$gaf$1@kopp.stud.ntnu.no> <379c5bba.443619@newscache.ntnu.no> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 2:09:06 AM CDT 1999 Ummmm.. Did I miss something? Is he still going on about how he popped-off about that cyst on the fornix, belatedly wished he had thought or read a little more before he made a fool of himself, and then blamed it on the NY Times, saying they printed something that misled him, indeed printed it JUST to mislead him? Or is this something new? What's this? Amid all the usual drivel a potentially testable predictioon? That Ken will be in NY, to speak his piece before some kind of audience? By INVITATION? God forbid he'd drop his coyness (or give up his alibi in case this event neve occurs) and actually TELL us who invited him, where he is going to speak, and when! He coyly suggests, "IF you should HEAR of this presentation (in NY City) you come early and get a seat"!!!! (emphasis added) Whenever I am invited to speak, it is publically announced, and I make no secret of the date, time, place, sponsoring organization, and title of my talk... F. LeFever In "Ken Collins" writes: > >>[...] > >>>...but, lo! Science has been Murdered by these Jackasses... and i =do= >care >>>with respect to such. > >STILL DO... > >i just wanted to wait until the noon-"time" 'stock market' reports came in. >the web sites to which the 'aevasive' one directed me, seemed "two" >contrived... and, what, with Dr. Frank bashin' me left and right... "workin' >me into a 'frenzy', real good", it was clear that i couldn't expect any >co-operation... and i didn't. > >but what really gave it away was the too-slick 'presentation' by the folks >at Harvard [henceforth, "Shame U"], and the fact that a number of >"institutions" involved had been on "the receiving end" of a lot of my >BEGGING, for years and years. > >...but, of course, everything that was out there was nothing that i couldn't >throw together over the course of a long weekend... so i just couldn't lend >it any credance. > >but i did want to "play along" until today's noon-"time" "stock market" >report, so i did. > >it's a Sorrowfilled thing... the energy, gone forever to Waste, that went >into the hoax, expended in a sincere, critical, hearing-out of the in-person >thing that i've been begging for for so long, would've been all that was >necessary. > >but folks chose to Murder Science, instead. > >if anyone's interested, i have received an offer to give such a >presentation. i've offered to accept any published Neuroscience articles as >tests of the theory. i've suggested that the title, and stack addresses of >such articles be given to me beforehand, so that i can work the stuff of the >challenge papers into the presentation... > >...so, if anyone wants to see what last night on bionet.neuroscience [small >"n"]could've been, i suggest that, if you hear of this presentation (in New >York city), you come early and get a seat. > >you know, it's 20 years since the decussation stuff has been worked out, and >available... it remains the most-significant "event" that's ever occurred >during the entire history of Science... if anyone thinks i expect anything >of anyone, or any institution, who will not allow the decussation stuff to >be published, i suggest you pop some of those drugs in which you put your >"faith", and schedule some "time" with a local psychiatrist... > >...Science wasn't Murdered "yeaterday"... it was Murdered 20 years ago, and >you Jackasses have been Murdering it, over and over again, everyday, ever >since... > >...good grief... NPR actually got so full of itself that it "celebrated" by >playing "Hail Britania" before the noon-"time" news. > >it's all so Sorrow-filled... wasn't "Yugoslavia" enough to get anybody's >attention? > >i knew something was going-down days in advance... a >voice-filled-with-'genius' told me so. > >You folks are Savages. > >K. P. COLLINS >109 Grape Street, Apr R >Chicopee, MA 01013 > >(413) 592-5516 > >>[...] > > From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Message-ID: <37A2CC52.68E@armory.com> Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 03:13:38 -0700 From: Steve X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04Gold (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience,sci.cognitive To: John Subject: Re: Falling in love drives you mad References: <933301102.220579@server.australia.net.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.239.195.121 X-Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.239.195.121 X-Trace: 31 Jul 1999 03:09:28 -0700, 209.239.195.121 Lines: 26 X-Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.63.224.240 Path: biosci!CS.Arizona.EDU!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.easynews.com!easynews!news-west.eli.net!news1.jps.net!209.239.195.121 John wrote: > > http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_407000/407125.stm > > "University of California psychiatrist Hagop Akiskal, one of the research > team, suggested this obsessive behaviour may be linked to evolution. > > Without intense emotion, he said no-one in their "right" mind would fall in > love and have children. > > But the study found the first flush of love does not last as emotions settle > down. > > When the researchers tested the students a year later, they found their > serotonin levels had returned to normal and their obsession with their > partners had died down." --------------------------- This suggests people would never breed or stay married after a year. Hmmm, well, so much for Akiskal then! ;-) I suppose the ongoing drive to have sex whatever you feel about your partner has little to do with it then? ;-> -Steve -- -Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com:/pub/user/rstevew -Electronics Site!! 1000 Files/50 Dirs!! http://www.armory.com/~rstevew Europe Naples Italy: http://ftp.unina.it/pub/electronics/ftp.armory.com From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!18.181.0.26!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: Allan Adler Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: brains of retarded persons Date: 31 Jul 1999 04:21:23 -0400 Organization: MIT Lines: 17 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: zohar.ai.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 I've read and heard some accounts of the use of certain scans of human brains. I think they monitory the amount of oxygen used by each part of the brain using MRI, but I'm not really sure. Using this technique, they have been able to determine which parts of the brain "light up" when certain tasks are performed. They have also determined differences in the ways the brains of people suffering from depression work. What I would like to know is whether these techniques have been applied to the brains of retarded persons, particularly those whose retardation was induced by brain damage suffered at birth. I would be interested in reading the relevant literature. Allan Adler ara@altdorf.ai.mit.edu From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!news.servint.com!netnews.com!howland.erols.net!ix.netcom.com!news From: flefever@ix.netcom.com(F. Frank LeFever) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: Blindsight and Rage Date: 31 Jul 1999 06:47:24 GMT Organization: Netcom Lines: 116 Message-ID: <7nu65s$6tb@dfw-ixnews21.ix.netcom.com> References: <19990726011413.06007.00001792@ng-fm1.aol.com> <7nkg7t$8qo$1@news1.xs4all.nl> NNTP-Posting-Host: nyc-ny65-13.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 1:47:24 AM CDT 1999 Whooa, whoa, whoa! Too much confusion for one posting! One confusion on top of another, but two wrongs don't make a right! Where to begin? In the middle, I guess. I'll interpolate comments. In <7nkg7t$8qo$1@news1.xs4all.nl> "Mervyn van Kuyen" writes: > >JoRoss wrote: >>1 - Blindsight. I read a paragraph about this, and it looks like an >interesting >>hook for a story I'm working on. But I don't know: what causes it (stroke, >>brain lesion--if there is such a thing--head trauma, etc.), if it can occur >in >>the complete visual field (I read about it on one side only), and how >people >>who have it deal with it. If I understand blindsight (probably not), it >seems >>that your subconscious (or unconscious) can see, but you cannot consciously >>"see" what you're seeing--you are, effectively, blind. True, false? I don't >>know if a low-level, speculative discussion is appropriate on this >newsgroup >>(please e-mail if not), but I'd love to know more. > > >The left hemispere of the cortex deals with the right visual field, >the right hemispere deals with both left and right. COMMENT: the right hemisphere deals with the left visual field in exactly the same way that the left hemisphere deals with the right visual field, i.e. as being the cortical projection areas for left and right visual fields, respectively. What you may be thinking of (perhaps misunderstanding whatt you have read) is that the right hemisphere seems to be important for "attention" in both left and right visual fields, left and right somatosensory perception, etc. There damage to >the left hemispere has no blinding effect, language could be impaired. COMMENT: strictly speaking, it would have to be a pretty large or very precisely placed lesion in EITHER hemisphere to have a "blinding" effect--and the "blinding" would be only in one visual field. For example, one of my patients who (relevant to the question of face perception, discussed under a different heading) had prosopagnosia on the basis of PERHAPS a unilateral lesion, was "blind in the upper part of her left visual field, i.e. a field cut in the "left upper quadrant". >When the right hemisphere is damaged (through a stroke), then the patient >neglects his right half of the world and body. He/she might eat only the >left side of the plate or put make-up on the left side only. CCOMMENT: I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you really do know what you meant to say here, but suffer from left/right confusion or just get mixed up when you try to use words. The unilateral neglect due to a right hemisphere lesion (usually in the parietal lobe; "vision" is really not affected att all) is, of course, the exact OPPOSITE of what you have written here. (Yes, I'm sure. I've presented several papers on my own research in unilateral neglect.) GENERAL COMMENT: a wise person knows what he knows and knows what he does not know. That is, he knows where his knowledge ends and his speculations begin. To avoid misleading others, who are admittedly ignorant and are seeking information, one should state up-front what it is you know for sure, what it is you THINK you know (becauuse you read it or heard it somewhere), and what is just a sheer "guess". This proper display of intellectual honesty and humility (which I have found to be standard practice in the very best neuroscientists of our day) has the further advantage of protecting you from sometimes very harsh criticism and contempt. HISTORICAL NOTE: "Blindsight" is the phenomenon of people with cortical blindness (i.e. large lesions in just exactly the right spot, the visual cortex causing a complete loss of conscious awareness of any visual stimuli) being able to point to objects they are blindly "looking" at (i.e. directing their eyes towards) more reliably than one could expect if they were just pointing randomly. Larry Weizkrantz (have I mis-spelled his name? dosn't look right to me) was one of the first (THE first?) to study this systematically. I had the privilege of hearing his first-hand report, very early in this exploration, when Hans-Lukas Teuber invited him to speak to our class (I studied with him c. 1960-1961). Teuber had a grading policy which is relevant to the advice I gave you. He said that, eventually, many of us would be teaching, i.e. be in a position where people trusted us to tell them things which were true. Therefore, in an effort to develop habits of intellectual honesty and humility in us, he would give us one point for each correct answer on one of his exams, zero if we left the item blank or said "I don't know", but MINUS one point if we wrote something which was not correct. ANOTHER PERSONAL HISTORICAL NOTE: Last November, Elizabeth Warrington came from London to speak at the NY Academy of Sciences (at my invitation). I've known her, casually, for many years, but it wasn't ujtil I ws going over her bibliography (to prepare to introduce her) that I realized that she had collaborated with Weiskrantz in some of those very early blindsight studies! F. Frank LeFever, Ph.D. New York Neuropsychology Group From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Path: biosci!CS.Arizona.EDU!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!newsfeed.icl.net!colt.net!iol.ie!news.indigo.ie!gerryq Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.meta,bionet.neuroscience,comp.society.futures,alt.postmodern From: gerryq@indigo.ie (Gerry Quinn) Subject: Re: First letter of Oz to the NG Distribution: inet References: <378ACC53.94E6E2BD@mediaone.net> <7ns1sg$9je$1@nntp5.atl.mindspring.net> <37A19C39.8559C43B@X.X> <37A1B3F1.AA20EF3E@ix.netcom.com> <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com> X-Newsreader: News Xpress 2.01 Message-ID: Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 07:20:35 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 194.125.168.45 X-Complaints-To: news@indigo.ie X-Trace: news.indigo.ie 933405651 194.125.168.45 (Sat, 31 Jul 1999 08:20:51 BST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 08:20:51 BST Organization: Indigo Lines: 55 In article <7nse4b$fq9$1@panix2.panix.com>, gcf@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote: >"Phil Roberts, Jr." : >| How about LESS DETERMINED in the sense that we are a species which is > beginning >| to show signs of having some SERIOUS RESERVATIONS about blindly and > obediently >| caring out a number of nature's emotional mandates.... > >Indeterminacy exists at the lowest levels of the physis. >Even if it were not for QM, as Feynman showed, classical >mechanics also produces indeterminacy. > It's not quite so simple. What most people mean by indeterminacy depends on a viewpoint in which causes temporally precede effects. This is true of macroscopic irreversible systems (like you and me) but not always of electrons. So indeterminacy in this context really means the inability of the macroscopic systems to predict the microscopic in detail. ObSciences: thermodynamics, quantum theory, information theory. >Probably, the organization of living beings is a way of >evolving larger determinable systems in spite of this >fundamental instability. The organization of animal Indeterminacy is not instability. >bodies, for example, is highly homeostatic. In the larger >animals, especially in primates, we begin to see the >evolution of societies which impose order and conformity >on their members. And in the case of human beings, a large >brain, originally evolved for some purpose like better >swinging from branches or rock-throwing, now fills with >rhetoric which commands obedience to simple principles and >fits the individual ever more snugly in with his social >context. > >Finally, humans evolve the mass media and the Internet, >where they increasingly hear about and conform to a >rhetoric of non-conformity and submit to the dictates of >"freedom." The direction of evolution is clearly towards >obedience, not away from it. > >Too bad. > Here we are as the microscopic electron, to the macroscopic eye of the historian. We may not be 'free', but we will preserve our indeterminacy. - Gerry Quinn From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:23:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!server1.netnews.ja.net!hgmp.mrc.ac.uk!biosci From: eugene.leitl@lrz.uni-muenchen.de (Eugene Leitl) Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: further Re: Brain region used in face recognition is active in new object recognition Date: 31 Jul 1999 07:16:21 +0100 Organization: MRC Human Genome Mapping Project Resource Centre Lines: 14 Message-ID: <14242.37889.758685.283805@lrz.de> References: <7nu2ro$pk4@dfw-ixnews4.ix.netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: mercury.hgmp.mrc.ac.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: niobium.hgmp.mrc.ac.uk 933401782 6387 193.62.192.80 (31 Jul 1999 06:16:22 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@hgmp.mrc.ac.uk NNTP-Posting-Date: 31 Jul 1999 06:16:22 GMT X-Received: from grebe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (grebe.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.100]) by hgmp.mrc.ac.uk (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id HAA02463 for ; Sat, 31 Jul 1999 07:16:17 +0100 (BST) X-Received: from lrz.de (1Cust124.tnt1.rancho-cucamonga.ca.da.uu.net [208.251.225.124]) by grebe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA17125; Fri, 30 Jul 1999 23:16:15 -0700 (PDT) X-Received: (from eugene.leitl@localhost) by lrz.de (8.8.8/8.8.8) id XAA07299; Fri, 30 Jul 1999 23:13:22 -0700 X-To: flefever@ix.netcom.com (F. Frank LeFever) X-Cc: neur-sci@hgmp.mrc.ac.uk X-In-Reply-To: <7nu2ro$pk4@dfw-ixnews4.ix.netcom.com> X-Mailer: VM 6.71 under 21.1 (patch 4) "Arches" XEmacs Lucid F. Frank LeFever writes: > > > > In other words, it means everything and nothing. > I wish you would stop commenting on Ken's inanities, because a number of people are filtering him, and by you replying to him we're again forced to deal with stuff we thought we've filtered already. You do have often valuable stuff to say, it would be a real pity putting you into a killfile just because of ken c. --- From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!news.servint.com!netnews.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!rain.fr!wanadoo.fr!not-for-mail From: "Greg_c" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: looking for links Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 10:29:04 +0200 Organization: Wanadoo, l'internet avec France Telecom Lines: 18 Message-ID: <7nuc5s$9ks$1@wanadoo.fr> NNTP-Posting-Host: brennes1-1-186.abo.wanadoo.fr X-Trace: wanadoo.fr 933409788 9884 193.250.16.186 (31 Jul 1999 08:29:48 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@wanadoo.fr NNTP-Posting-Date: 31 Jul 1999 08:29:48 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Hello, I'm looking for links to web pages dealing with studies on artificial intelligence. human brain <---> computers. Any ideas are very welcome ! :-) ---------------------------------------------- Actions Réseaux Numériques greg@x-arn.org http://www.x-arn.org Action Reseaux Numériques 13 rue Beauvais / 56100 Lorient (fermé le Lundi) +33 (0)2.97.64.58.18 From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!vic.nntp.telstra.net!not-for-mail From: "John" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Presupplementary Motor Area Activation during Sequence Learning Reflects Visuo-Motor Association Lines: 8 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Organization: Geko Internet Message-ID: <933430839.761743@server.australia.net.au> Cache-Post-Path: server.australia.net.au!unknown@203.25.204.33 Date: Sun, 1 Aug 1999 00:20:03 +1000 NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.25.206.2 X-Complaints-To: abuse@telstra.net X-Trace: vic.nntp.telstra.net 933430837 203.25.206.2 (Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:37 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:37 EST http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/19/10/RC1 "The pre-SMA activation remained unchanged during learning of visuo-motor associations but decreased during learning of sequences, suggesting that the pre-SMA is related to visuo-motor association rather than sequence" From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.stanford.edu!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!vic.nntp.telstra.net!not-for-mail From: "John" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Scientists uncover molecular changes underlying amphetamine and antidepressant action Lines: 10 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Organization: Geko Internet Message-ID: <933430838.203982@server.australia.net.au> Cache-Post-Path: server.australia.net.au!unknown@203.25.204.33 Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 23:56:56 +1000 NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.25.206.2 X-Complaints-To: abuse@telstra.net X-Trace: vic.nntp.telstra.net 933430835 203.25.206.2 (Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:35 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:35 EST http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/vumc-sum072899.html "But the problem is, you could have a situation where other signals pull the transporter off the cell surface right when it needs to be there to clear away serotonin," Blakely said. "In this case, the signals coming into the neuron would have more priority than the neurotransmitter itself." From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.direct.ca!netnews.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail From: c_thomas_wild@my-deja.com Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Re: Unexplained memory disorder Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 15:10:58 GMT Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Lines: 27 Message-ID: <7nv3lt$acr$1@nnrp1.deja.com> References: <379eabb4.4008927@news.freeserve.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: 216.119.24.108 X-Article-Creation-Date: Sat Jul 31 15:10:58 1999 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows 95) X-Http-Proxy: 1.1 x26.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 216.119.24.108 X-MyDeja-Info: XMYDJUIDc_thomas_wild In article <379eabb4.4008927@news.freeserve.net>, liams@cwcom.net (Liam) wrote: > Hi, > would you please have a look at > www.liams.cwc.net/umist.htm > I am 34 and have severe memory problem, > but have no-one is any nearer finding the cause or possible cure. > If you have any ideas, will you please send me an E-mail, > as I'm getting nowhere with this. > Thanks in adavance > Liam > liams@cwcom.net > Saw one of your posts to Usenet. A question: Do you react in any way to coffee/caffeine at all? Positively? Neutral? Even negatively? I am an adult with mild ADHD (Inattentive Type Predominantly) and discovered with the help of my doctor that an FDA approved medicine, a special caffeine compound, slightly improved my memory for as long as the medicine lasted (which was usually only for a few hours). It came as a surprise that a medicine could even in a small way effect memory and with the help of my doctor I learned that caffeine changes neurotransmitter levels in the body (including dopamine which is associated with human motor movement and memory). Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!vic.nntp.telstra.net!not-for-mail From: "John" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Decision Making Deficiencies Lines: 7 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Organization: Geko Internet Message-ID: <933430826.234952@server.australia.net.au> Cache-Post-Path: server.australia.net.au!unknown@203.25.204.33 Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 23:52:37 +1000 NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.25.206.2 X-Complaints-To: abuse@telstra.net X-Trace: vic.nntp.telstra.net 933430834 203.25.206.2 (Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:34 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:34 EST http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/uiowa-usf072799.html "Researchers found that lesions of the amygdala disrupt emotional conditioning, whereas lesions to the ventromedial prefrontal (VMF) cortex cause an individual to have difficulty with conflict situations" From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:24:00 1999 Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!amsterdam1-snf1!news.gtei.net!diablo.theplanet.net!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!vic.nntp.telstra.net!not-for-mail From: "John" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: THIRD Vision System Proposed Lines: 12 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Organization: Geko Internet Message-ID: <933430840.633822@server.australia.net.au> Cache-Post-Path: server.australia.net.au!unknown@203.25.204.33 Date: Sun, 1 Aug 1999 00:24:02 +1000 NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.25.206.2 X-Complaints-To: abuse@telstra.net X-Trace: vic.nntp.telstra.net 933430838 203.25.206.2 (Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:38 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 01 Aug 1999 00:20:38 EST http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/usc-tlo070299.html "New Research Reveals Secrets of 'Third Order' Pure Color Motion Detection Sytem Used by Brain " You're on your own. 1 ... 2 .... 3 .... From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 16:25:00 1999 Path: biosci!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!news.servint.com!netnews.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!ix.netcom.com!news From: "BlaDe" Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Subject: Gene Mixing Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 13:43:40 -0400 Organization: Netcom Lines: 6 Message-ID: <7nvcsd$rev@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: eat-nj1-09.ix.netcom.com X-NETCOM-Date: Sat Jul 31 12:47:57 PM CDT 1999 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 Why cant you mix a dogs eggs and a cats sperm to get a wierd type of animal? Same things with humans. Does the sperm die immediatley when hitting the egg? Something must be happening. From owner-neuroscience@net.bio.net Sun Aug 01 17:16:00 1999 From: "Ken Collins" References: <7nvcsd$rev@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> Subject: Re: Gene Mixing Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 14:08:36 -0400 Lines: 25 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Newsgroups: bionet.neuroscience Path: biosci!fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov!fcrdcnews.NCIFCRF.GOV!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cam-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news1.carrier1.net!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!howland.erols.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!207.46.180.32!cpmsnbbsa04!cpmsnbbsa05 breeders do something like this with horses and donkeys... mules are produced, but they are sterile... unable to reproduce. i've not read in this area, but it seems logical that it's because there's just too much genetic difference in the sperm and egg DNA to facilitate the all the necessary energy transformations that yield a complete organism (one that can reproduce, and everything else). BTW, 'speciation' (the branching off of new species) does happen in a way exactly analogous to your original example... but the DNA of the two progenitors involved has to be much more similar than is that of dog and cat. ken collins BlaDe wrote in message <7nvcsd$rev@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com>... >Why cant you mix a dogs eggs and a cats spe