Train Your BrainBuild a Framework for Clear Thinking pot

Table of ContentsChapter 1: Your Neurons at Work Chapter 2: Framing Your Thoughts Chapter 3: Putting Your Brain to Work Chapter 4: Tools for Clear Thinking Chapter 5: Food for Thought Ch

Train Your BrainBuild a Framework for Clear Thinking Take Full Advantage of Your Brain’s Exceptional Powers

By Dr William W Dodd

Copyright 2012 William DoddSmashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Your Neurons at Work

Chapter 2: Framing Your Thoughts

Chapter 3: Putting Your Brain to Work

Chapter 4: Tools for Clear Thinking

Chapter 5: Food for Thought

Chapter 6: The Conscious Mind

Chapter 7: A Model of the Mind

Chapter 8: Solving Problems

Chapter 9: Getting it Right

Chapter 10: Managing Your Resources

Chapter 11: Clear Thinking and You

About the Author

Clear thinking involves learning more, remembering more, making better decisions, finding more satisfactory solutions to a variety of problems, and improving relations with others

The most important concept in Train Your Brain is that thinking skills can be

developed and enhanced through directed effort and practice You can train your brain to think better, just as you can train your muscles to perform specific tasks, such as playing a saxophone or swimming the backstroke

A clear thinker systematically collects data, analyzes information, and makes

considered decisions A clear thinker also communicates effectively and strives to work effectively with others

Thinking clearly on a regular basis is an achievable objective It does not require a revolutionary approach Every attempt at clear thinking leads to increased knowledge and improved skills Each success lays the foundation for more success in the future

As you learn more and start to think more clearly, additional learning becomes easier With more knowledge, clear thinking becomes a habit rather than a challenge

Over time, the cumulative effect of increased knowledge and clear thinking will lead

to systematic improvements in your own health, wealth, satisfaction, and happiness

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Chapter 1: Your Neurons at Work

1.1 Basic Anatomy of Your Brain

1.2 Your Body’s Communication Systems

1.3 Your Senses

Thinking is a wondrously complicated biological process

The basic anatomy of your brain and input from your senses operate together to determine how your mind perceives the universe, and how you think

1.1 Basic Anatomy of Your Brain

Your brain is where all your thinking takes place So learning a little about the

structure and operation of your brain is an appropriate beginning for a book on

training your brain to think clearly

The brain is a complex organic system for processing information fed to it by your senses The structures of the brain contain several billion neurons with a total weight

of about 1.4 kilograms (3 pounds) Those neurons require about twenty percent of the blood flow from your heart to keep them supplied with oxygen and nourishment The brain floats in a cerebrospinal fluid that helps to support its spongy structure and protect it from mechanical shocks

Based on knowledge derived from anatomy, evolutionary theories, and functional characteristics, the brain can be regarded as a composite of three basic

substructures According to Paul MacLean (Laboratory of Brain Evolution and

Behaviour of the National Institute of Mental Health), as the human brain evolved primitive structures were successively surrounded by more advanced neural

structures The hindbrain, located at the base of the brain, is its most primitive part and is associated with autonomic functions The midbrain complex lies above the hindbrain, is more sophisticated, and is associated with our emotions and the

formation of memories The left and right hemispheres of the forebrain form a cap over the midbrain The forebrain is the most highly evolved component of the brain and is associated with awareness and thinking (See Figure #1 for a sketch of the basic brain structures.) It is MacLean’s contention that,

“We are obliged to look at ourselves and the world through the eyes of three quite different mentalities.” [The human brain] “amounts to three interconnected

biological computers [each with] its own sense of time and space, its own memory, [muscle] motor control, and other functions”.

Carl Sagan adds,

“Each [of these three] brain[s] corresponds to a separate major evolutionary step The three brains are distinguished neuro-anatomically and functionally, and contain strikingly different distributions of the neurochemicals dopamine and

cholinesterase.”

Figure #1: A sketch of the basic structures of the brain

We also know that the brain has conscious and subconscious modes While you are reading this sentence part of your brain keeps your heart beating, part keeps your eyes moving across the page, and another part wonders what is for supper tonight Your brain also has a sleep mode that can create dreams, and it has an unconscious mode to which it can retreat when your brain is injured Your rational thoughts can

be disrupted by emotional concerns, and your emotional concerns can be overridden

by your basic needs to breathe, drink, and eat It is no wonder that it is sometimes a challenge to think clearly

With several levels of functioning, each with conscious and subconscious modes, it is a great advantage to be able to shift mental gears at-will to meet daily demands

1.1.1 Learning about the Brain

There are a number of sources of information about the structure and operation of

the brain.

Brain injuries

Whenever someone experiences a damaging head wound and survives, there is an opportunity to compare any resulting disability with the damaged region of the brain Historically, the advent of high-speed bullets in the 19th century led to many non-fatal head wounds Survivors had characteristic impairments when specific parts of the brain were injured

Animal experiments

While there are recognized ethical constraints that limit neural experiments on

humans, there are as yet few constraints limiting experiments on animals And since there are many parallels between the structures of human and animal brains, much has been learned from animal studies about how our brains function Continued

experiments on animals reflect our basic ignorance of subtle biological processes

Brain surgery

The techniques and procedures for performing successful operations on human brains evolved rapidly during the 20th century There are no pain sensors in the brain itself and patients are normally restrained but awake during brain surgery Surgeons can then talk to patients during an operation to confirm that incisions are having the intended effect

During operations to treat patients with severe epilepsy, Wilder Penfield discovered that stimulating specific regions of the brain produced physical sensations During the early 1950’s, he demonstrated that the sense of touch for each part of the body’s surface is represented on the parietal lobe (see section 1.1.4), and that adjacent parts of the body are represented on adjacent parts of the brain Penfield also found that the more important and sensitive body regions have proportionally greater parts

of the brain assigned to them He discovered, as well, that stimulation of other

regions could elicit particular memories in a patient

In the 1960’s, a new operation was designed to ease the symptoms of severe epilepsy

In this operation the main connection (corpus callosum) between the left and right cerebral hemispheres of the forebrain is severed to prevent future epileptic seizures from spreading across the whole brain While the operation limited the damage of epileptic seizures, it also led to characteristic deficiencies Roger Sperry won the Nobel Prize in 1981 for his studies of the subsequent behavioural characteristics of these patients

Brain scans

Non-invasive scanning techniques allow the human brain to be studied in action A variety of scanning techniques have been developed since 1920, when the German physiologist, Hans Berger, first used electroencephalography to study the human brain Newer techniques can detect activity in smaller regions of the brain over

shorter time periods

Here are brief descriptions of some of the common scanning techniques:

1 EEG – Electroencephalography – measures the electrical activity of the brain as detected by electrodes on the surface of the head

2 MEG – Magnetoencephalography – similar to EEG but it measures magnetic signals

3 MRI – Magnetic Resonance Imaging – uses strong magnetic fields and radio

waves to analyze soft tissue It can be used on any part of the body, including the brain

4 CT – Computerized Tomography (or CAT – Computerized Axial Tomography) – converts the information from a MRI into a three dimensional image

5 fMRI – functional MRI – a newer version of MRI that is much faster (and much more expensive)

6 PET – Positron Emission Topography – requires the injection of a radioactive substance into a patient’s bloodstream The patient is given a specific mental task to perform and the most active areas of the brain then absorb the most radioactive material

7 NIRS – Near-Infra-Red Spectroscopy – can be used to assess brain function by detecting changes in blood hemoglobin concentrations that are associated with neural activity

1.1.2 The Hindbrain

The hindbrain is considered the most primitive component of the brain It is located

at the top of the spinal cord, just inside the base of the skull Its main components are the medulla, the pons, and the cerebellum

The medulla is located just at the top of the spinal cord at the lower end of the

hindbrain The medulla controls many autonomic functions including respiration, circulation, and digestion At the top of the medulla, just under the midbrain, is a small region called the reticular activating system The reticular activating system is believed to harbour our centre of arousal and motivation This system acts as a

primary filter on all incoming neural signals Signals are forwarded to other parts of the brain only if the input is deemed significant The reticular activating system is also involved in maintaining consciousness and regulating sleep

The cerebellum is located at the back of the hindbrain, behind the medulla It is about the size of a small apple and is divided into left and right hemispheres Its compact structure contains about fifty percent of the brain’s neurons in only ten percent of the brain’s volume About 200 million input neurons from the spinal cord pass through the cerebellum The cerebellum also controls subconscious movements

to maintain posture, balance, and co-ordination

The pons is a swelling around the medulla just in front of the cerebellum It connects the two halves of the cerebellum and manages the switching of signals from one side

of the body to the opposite side of the brain It plays a major role in relaying sensory information from the cerebellum to the forebrain

Figure #2: Basic structures of the hindbrain 1.1.3 The Midbrain Complex

To simplify the discussions, the term ‘midbrain complex’ has been coined to include the midbrain along with the thalamus and the limbic system

The midbrain is cylinder shaped, about 2 centimetres (cm) in height and 2 cm in diameter It sits on top of the hindbrain in the middle of the head; approximately level with the bridge of your nose The midbrain is associated with the pathways for voluntary muscle control, visual system reflexes, and hearing

The thalamus consists of two plum sized lobes just above the midbrain These right lobes provide a system for relaying neural signals between the midbrain and the hemispheres of the forebrain, and act as the brain’s main filter of sensory input The thalamus is also associated with regulating sleep, wakefulness, consciousness, and mental arousal

left-The limbic system is an important series of left-right nerve pathways located around the midbrain and under the forebrain The limbic system is involved in emotional responses such as fear and aggression, mood in general, appetite, and emotional responses to food The limbic system is also involved in the processing and storage of short-term memory From an evolutionary point of view, the limbic system is an old structure that can also be found in fish, amphibians, and reptiles – as well as

mammals The limbic system is highly connected with the frontal lobes (see section 1.1.4) and may be the source of emotional satisfaction that can be derived from clear thinking There is no universal agreement on exactly which organs should be listed as part of the limbic system, but its main components are the hypothalamus, the

hippocampus, and the amygdala

The hypothalamus consists of two small left-right structures, each about the size of a bean The two parts of the hypothalamus reside under the two parts of the thalamus The primary function of the hypothalamus is to maintain the body’s status quo It regulates blood pressure, temperature, fluid levels, electrolyte balance, body weight, and appetite Your hypothalamus sends you a signal to let you know when you are hungry, thirsty, tired, mad, or sad The hypothalamus is also connected to the

pituitary gland, the master regulator of the body’s endocrine (hormone) system

Your hypothalamus works much like the thermostat on a furnace, maintaining key body parameters at appropriate levels In the short run you may gain or lose a few pounds, but the setting for body weight established in your hypothalamus will

eventually bring your body weight back to its former setting Similar corrective

measures initiated in your hypothalamus maintain your body temperature and blood pressure

Figure #3: Basic structures of the midbrain complex

The amygdala has a left-right structure with almond shaped components residing just below the hypothalamus The amygdala is involved with the emotions of aggression, fear, and pleasure Persons with a large amygdala tend to be more aggressive

Anxiety, autism, depression, narcolepsy, phobias, and schizophrenia are often linked

to a malfunctioning amygdala

The hippocampus has a left-right structure in the shape of elongated beans curving towards the back of the brain from the amygdala The hippocampus plays an essential role in our ability to create new memories of daily events and also influences our ability to access old memories Research also suggests that the hippocampus plays a role in our ability to form mental maps of our surroundings and to perform spatial tasks

The nucleus accumbens is sometimes considered part of the basal ganglia of the

forebrain and sometimes as part of the limbic system It has sensitive dopamine

receptors that respond to intense stimuli, novel stimuli, and pheromones The nucleus accumbens has been called the pleasure centre of the brain

Many of the structures in the midbrain are connected by an extended loop called the fornix.

1.1.4 The Forebrain

The forebrain (also known as the cerebrum) is the dominant part of the brain that you see in most pictures of the brain The forebrain is the most evolved portion of the brain and is usually regarded as the seat of conscious thought It has two basic

components, the large cerebral hemispheres, and a set of specialized nerve clusters called the basal ganglia

The left-right structures of the cerebral hemispheres look like the two halves of a giant walnut, and are situated at the top of the brain The wrinkled surface of the cerebrum is also known as the cerebral cortex, or the neural cortex The word

‘cortex’ simply means outer layer The cortex has many folds that increase its surface area by a factor of three and consists of about ten billion neurons arranged in six thin layers This grey matter is supported by a thicker layer of myelinated axons (white matter) The two cerebral hemispheres are connected by a thick band of cells called the corpus callosum The cerebral hemispheres are essential to thought, memory, and personality They receive, store, and interpret information from all over the body, and initiate voluntary actions

The cerebral hemispheres are each divided by larger folds into four distinct lobes See Figure #4 By the time impulses from neurons in your body reach this portion of your brain, they have switched sides Lobes on the right side control processes on the left side of the body, and visa versa

As the name implies, the frontal lobes are located at the front of the brain, just behind your forehead Your most advanced thinking and decision-making occur in the frontal lobes Your personality and intelligence are thought to reside here The motor cortex in each frontal lobe controls all your voluntary muscular activity The right motor cortex lies in a band from the top of your head down towards your right

temple The portion near the top controls the movement of your lower left body and the portion near your right temple controls the muscles on the left side of your face The frontal lobes also contain Broca’s area devoted to generating speech, and other regions related to understanding, learning, thinking, and planning

The parietal lobes lie just behind the frontal lobes and extend towards the back of your head The parietal lobes contain the somatosensory cortex, a region that

receives sensory input from all parts of your body A map of the surface of your body can be traced out on the somatosensory cortex

Figure #4: Basic structures of the forebrain

The occipital lobes are located at the very back of the head and are devoted to vision If you happen to get hit in the back of the head you sometimes ‘see stars’ because the occipital lobes have been jarred and spurious neural signals are

generated

The temporal lobes are located at the side of the head, just inside the ears

Appropriately, the temporal lobes contain the auditory cortex that is responsible for the ears and hearing The temporal lobes also contain Wernicke’s area; a region devoted to understanding speech

The basal ganglia are small and specialized clusters of cells involved with the control

of movement They are found inside the white matter beneath the cerebral cortex.This introduction to the anatomy of the brain has touched on the major structures at work in your brain There are also several large spaces in the brain, called ventricles,

that are filled with cerebral fluid The cerebral fluid circulates through the ventricles transporting hormones, removing waste, and helping to support the structure of the brain.

A summary of the basic structures of the brain and their main functions is provided in Table #1

Table #1: A summary of basic brain components

The fundamental concept to remember is that your brain is a highly complex structure deserving of your best efforts to use it effectively

1.1.5 The Left Brain and the Right Brain

Most structures on the right side of the brain are duplicated by similar structures on the left, and most components are designed to control functions on the opposite side

of the body A massive neural link, the corpus callosum, connects the left and right sides of the brain This connection provides a natural backup in which most neural control mechanisms are duplicated in the right and left sides of the brain If one side

of the brain is damaged, there is still a good chance that an individual can survive using the backup functionality in the other half of the brain

There are minor differences between the right and left sides of your brain In a

typical right-handed person, the left cerebral cortex controls language analysis and speech production, and tends to process information one item at a time in a

sequential manner In the same right-handed person, the right cerebral cortex tends

to process information holistically to gain an overall impression

Most humans display a distinct preference for using the right hand, both for fine

motor activities such as writing, and for power activities such as swinging a bat or club in sports In fact the whole right side of a right-handed person tends to be

dominant over the left People tend to have a dominant eye, a dominant ear, a

dominant arm, and a dominant leg – all on the same side Since body parts are

controlled by the opposite side of the brain, in these people the left cerebral cortex tends to dominate

This arrangement, with each half of the brain managing the opposite side of the body,

is common across the animal kingdom When combined with the concept of a

dominant side, the neural crossover may provide a distinct survival advantage If a creature were involved in a life and death struggle it would tend to turn its strongest side towards the most immediate enemy With the crossover brain structure, this posture automatically moves the dominant half-brain away from the enemy The dominant half-brain is thus better protected and can continue to direct moves for attack and defence even if the leading half-brain is damaged

About 86% of the population is right-handed, and these people process language in the left cerebral cortex The remaining 14% can be divided into three groups:

1 About 2% are pure left-handers and process language in the right cerebral cortex Their brains are left-right mirror images of right-handed people

2 About 4% process language in both sides of the brain These people tend to be ambidextrous and can write or play sports equally well with either hand

3 About 8% have a mixed dominance These people tend to perform some tasks with their right hand and some with their left hand, and process language on the same side as their dominant hand Those with mixed dominance often have difficulty distinguishing right from left, but sometimes find it easier to view a situation holistically rather than seeing it as composed of individual

components

The tooth-brush test for handedness

If you brush all your teeth with your right hand, your dominant side is probably on the right

If you brush all your teeth with your left hand, your dominant side is probably on the left

If you can brush all your teeth with either your right or your left hand, you may be ambidextrous

If you brush some of your teeth with your right hand, and the rest with your left, then you may have a mixed dominance

In human society, your handedness can sometimes be an advantage, and sometimes a disadvantage Most devices and structures are designed for the right-handed majority – everyday items such as door handles, stair rails, and scissors are right-handed The left-to-right flow for reading and writing favour right-handers Left-handed baseball pitchers are in demand because the majority of batters are right-handed and find it more difficult to hit pitches delivered from a pitcher’s left hand.

* * * 1.2 Your Body’s Communication Systems

The body has two major communication systems: the electro-chemical nervous

system, and the bio-chemical endocrine system These systems gather information about your body and your environment, process that information, and then initiate action that will increase your chances for survival Ultimately, all of your actions are intended to increase your chances for survival

1.2.1 Neurons – Building Blocks of the Nervous System

The nervous system consists of billions of specialized cells called neurons About one third of your neurons are organized into a complex communication network to carry information from your sense organs to your brain and from your brain back to your muscles The rest of your neurons form the structures in your brain

A neuron is a specialized and elongated cell that transmits an electro-chemical signal from one end to the other A neuron receives signals through delicate branching structures called dendrites located near the cell nucleus A nerve cell has one longer extension, an axon And at the far end of the axon, there are more branches A single neuron can receive signals though many of its dendrites and can transmit signals to many other neurons through its axon branches If a strong nerve impulse arrives at a dendrite, or a weaker signal arrives at a number of dendrites, then an electro-

chemical signal is generated that propagates along the axon and then off to the dendrites of one or more nearby neurons

There is a tiny but important gap, called a synapse, between the dendrites and axons

of neighbouring neurons A nerve impulse can only jump this gap with the assistance

of specialized chemicals called neurotransmitters Neurotransmitters are created and released at a synapse as a nerve impulse approaches the end of an axon If enough neurotransmitter has been generated before the nerve impulse arrives, then the impulse can cross the synapse and continue down the dendrite of the next nerve An impulse has a greater chance of being transmitted if the signal in a single axon is stronger, or if an impulse has been duplicated and is travelling along several

neighbouring neurons at the same time A synapse can also act as a filter by blocking weaker signals After an impulse reaches the end of an axon, neurotransmitters are quickly broken down so they will not interfere with the next set of nerve impulses

Neurons outside of the brain are bundled to form nerve fibres that look like white cords or wires Signals typically travel from dendrites and down the axon of a nerve fibre at speeds up to one hundred metres per second, depending on the overall

structure of the nerve bundle Although neurons are carefully protected and

nourished by support cells, they are unable to undergo cell division or to repair any significant damage Any neural damage tends to be permanent

Figure #5: The basic structure of a neuron

1.2.2 The Central Nervous System

Your nervous system has two main components: the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system The central nervous system, in turn, has two main

components: the brain and the spinal cord The spinal cord is the trunk line for

transmitting neural signals back and forth between your body and your brain The central nervous system is protected by the skull and the spine, and by three

membranes of fibrous tissues – the meninges Damage to the spinal cord is very

serious and can lead to permanent disability or death

1.2.3 The Peripheral Nervous System

The peripheral nervous system is a network of sensory neurons that branch out from the spinal cord to reach every nook and cranny of your body One set of sensory neurons transmits signals towards the central nervous system and then on to your brain, and another set of motor neurons transmits signals in the opposite direction to activate both the voluntary and involuntary action of muscles

The peripheral system has a right-left symmetry with forty-three pairs of major nerve

fibres Ten of these pairs emerge from the underside of your skull to serve your head, and the other thirty-three pairs emerge at different points along your spine to serve the rest of your body.

The peripheral nervous system can be further divided into the somatic nervous system and the autonomic nervous system

The somatic nerves serve activities that are under your conscious control They

collect information from sensory organs and transmit signals to muscles to initiate voluntary movement

The autonomic nervous system controls short-term actions and systems that function without conscious control Some autonomic neurons (sympathetic) are dedicated to stimulating organs and muscle action, and other autonomic neurons (parasympathetic) are dedicated to inhibiting the action of muscles and organs The autonomic system can transmit signals to alter the size of your pupils in response to light, change your rate of breathing, alter your heart rate, stimulate muscular contractions in your

stomach and intestines, and cause the hairs on your skin to stand on end

The autonomic system can also transmit signals to generate a co-ordinated set of activities such as a response to perceived danger The danger response includes an increase in respiration and heart rate, the dilatation of air passages, the diversion of blood from the skin and internal organs to muscles, and the release of extra sugar from the liver into the bloodstream

1.2.4 The Endocrine System

The endocrine glands secrete hormones into the blood stream to maintain chemical balances in the body, to help prepare your body for emergency situations, and to control longer term processes such as sexual maturation and body growth Specific hormones may start, stop, or inhibit a process and often participate in chemical

feedback loops to help maintain normal body conditions

The pituitary is the master endocrine gland It is the size of a pea and is located just under the thalamus, surrounded by bone at the bottom of the skull The thalamus provides the connection between the brain and the pituitary gland

The front portion of the pituitary produces growth hormone and other hormones that influence the thyroid glands, the adrenal glands, the gonads, and the mammary

glands The back portion of the pituitary produces a hormone that controls the body’s water balance and oxytocin Oxytocin is involved in initiating the birth process and the production of breast milk

The other main endocrine glands are the:

1 Adrenal glands (above each kidney) – produce adrenaline that controls the body’s ‘fight or flight’ response

2 Thyroid gland (front of the neck) – produces thyroxine that controls the body’s

* * * 1.3 Your Senses

Your sense organs provide your brain with all of the information it possesses about your external environment Your sense organs are remarkable detectors, but they do have physical limitations Your sense organs also filter environmental information as it

is detected The resulting information from your senses is further filtered as it flows through diverse parts of your brain Then your brain gets to work, using the

information that it has gathered, and constructs a model of reality in your mind When you listen to an orchestra play, your conscious mind hears music – not a set of vibrations at different frequencies and intensities When you look out the window, you see a tree – not a set of colour intensities across your retina

We normally think of five sets of specialized organs (tongue, nose, skin, ears, and eyes) as providing all the information about the environment and the state of our body, to our brains The orientation systems in our joints and our ears should be

counted as an additional sense

In this section, the emphasis is on the flow of information from sensory organs to your brain

1.3.1 Your Tongue

Your tongue is sensitive to warmth and cold, but it specializes in detecting the taste

of liquids The tongue is coated with about 10 000 taste buds Each bud consists of a little pit lined with a cluster of sensory cells and the sensory cells are in contact with peripheral nerves The taste buds at the tip of the tongue are most sensitive to

sweetness A little further back, the taste buds are most sensitive to saltiness Behind those are taste buds sensitive to sourness, and at the back are taste buds sensitive to bitterness Another set of taste buds is responsive to umami, a savoury taste All other taste sensations can be described in terms of these basic tastes

Under constant stimulation, the taste buds lose some sensitivity A second chocolate

is not as sweet as the first

Taste sensations do not always provide an accurate indication of what you are eating because there are chemicals that can alter the sensitivity of your taste buds For example, when monosodium glutamate is mixed with food, all four types of taste receptors are stimulated An Indian plant called Gymnema sylvestre contains

gymnemic acid, which reduces the sensitivity of the tongue to sweetness A fruit from West Africa, Synsepalum dulcificum, has the effect of making sour substances taste sweet

1.3.2 Your Nose

Your sense of smell is located in two small patches of specialized cells located high up

in each nasal passage, just under the brain case The olfactory mucosa each contain about 10 million sensory cells These sensory cells conduct odour signals directly to the side of the brain above them This arrangement reflects the early evolutionary development of the sense of smell (The other senses conduct most signals from one side of the body to the opposite side of the brain.)

The nose specializes in detecting airborne chemicals, which we interpret as odours It

is the electron configuration of a chemical that stimulates a receptor Chemicals with similar molecular shapes tend to elicit the same odour response It takes about 5 molecules of a chemical to excite a single receptor, and about 40 receptors must be excited to reach the threshold of detection When these conditions are met, a nerve impulse is sent off to your brain As the intensity of a smell increases (there are more

of the associated chemicals in the air you are breathing) the response also tends to increase, up to a maximum level After continual exposure to an odour, the response tends to decline When you first enter a cow barn the smell of animals tends to be quite intense After a few minutes the smell becomes much less noticeable

Smells inform us about our chemical environment Smells provide clues about what materials are safe to eat, what is safe to keep near us, and what items may be

poisonous or contain harmful bacteria Combined with taste, the sense of smell

enhances the pleasure of eating In the wild, predators use smell to hunt their prey, and prey animals use smell to avoid predators

Smell also plays an important role in mate selection The female gypsy moth, when it

is ready to mate, emits a scent that can attract a male moth from miles away All mammals, including humans, emit similar chemicals called pheromones to indicate their sexual status While pheromones can have a significant effect on our selection of mates, the process occurs at a subconscious level We sometimes use perfumes and colognes in an effort to enhance the effect of pheromones In the days before

ovulation, women are about a hundred times more sensitive to musk odour than men Other pheromones can transmit a subconscious alarm, ‘danger is near’ that we

sometimes interpret as the ‘smell of fear’

Research has been conducted to determine if there are olfactory sensors that respond only to specific chemicals, but the results are inconclusive However, it has been

shown that combinations of a few basic odours can stimulate our interpretation of most other odours

Table #2: A list of primary odours

The olfactory sensors seem to be particularly sensitive to these odours Combinations

of these seven basic odours can simulate most other odour responses

1.3.3 Your Sense of Touch

The skin is your body’s largest organ The layers of your skin provide a flexible shield against physical injury, infection, and ultraviolet radiation The skin acts as a

container to prevent the loss of vital fluids It also has insulating properties that help

to regulate your body temperature Your skin is covered with a network of nerve endings that are sensitive to touch, pressure, temperature, and pain

Your sense of touch is most sensitive on your hands, feet, and face; and less sensitive

on your legs, arms, and trunk Pressure is felt when it causes the skin to deform, but there is no sensation when pressure is applied evenly and there is no deformation Scuba divers seldom experience a sense of pressure in depths less than 30 metres because the water pushes evenly on all skin surfaces Continued touch or pressure tends to be ignored after a few minutes When our clothes are comfortable, we tend not to notice them wrapped around our bodies shortly after dressing To detect light touches, hairs on the skin act as tiny levers so that an object weighing just a fraction

of a gram can twist a hair in its follicle, cause a local deformation of the skin, and signal a touch sensation

The skin has a typical temperature of 33 degrees Celsius and is able to detect changes

as small as a hundredth of a degree The skin’s sensitivity to hot or cold varies over the surface of the body and also depends on the body’s recent heat history On a very hot day, a cloth dipped in warm water can feel delightfully cool The skin adapts to a reasonable range of temperatures within a few minutes If you dive into a cold lake,

or climb into a hot bath, the thermal sensation soon decreases

A sensation of pain is generated if the pressure or temperature sensors on the skin are over stimulated Pain is a warning to the brain that action needs to be taken to avoid harm or damage In the disease of leprosy, the nerve endings of the extremities are damaged so that pain receptors no longer work Without pain receptors, those

suffering from leprosy receive no warning pain when fingers and toes are damaged The result is that the extremities are gradually destroyed, not directly by the disease but by excessive wear that is not moderated by pain Some types of skin pain, such as burns, tend to persist over time with no adaptation Other types of skin pain, such as that inflicted by the stab of a needle, tend to decrease rapidly with time

1.3.4 Your Auditory System

Your ears convert vibrations in the air into nerve impulses in three stages Your outer ear funnels sound waves to your eardrum and the waves cause that delicate layer of skin to vibrate Then tiny bone structures in your middle ear amplify the mechanical vibrations of the eardrum and pass the amplified motion to your inner ear The

cochlea is the main structure in the inner ear It is a coil about 3 cm long, filled with fluid and lined with nerve endings Vibrations from the bones in your middle ear cause the fluid in the cochlea to vibrate and that motion generates auditory nerve impulses About forty percent of the nerve impulses from an ear on one side of your head go the same side of the brain, and sixty percent are transferred to the opposite side of the brain

With both ears operating you are able to determine the approximate direction of a source of sound And, if you are familiar with a source of sound, you can also make a reasonable estimate of the distance to the source

Human ears are sensitive to a wide range of vibrations, from a low hum at 20 Hertz (cycles per second) to a high squeak at 20 000 Hertz Your ears can also detect a wide range of intensities, from a pin dropping on the floor, to a jet engine Your ears can also detect more than one frequency at a time; when two notes are played on a piano you can detect both notes This ability lets you interpret speech and enjoy music

Your ability to interpret speech also depends on the social context of a conversation, since you do not always hear every word that is spoken In an experiment to test the ability of subjects to perceive spoken language, portions of the words in a

conversation were blanked out at random As long as a conversation had a known context, subjects were still able to understand about 85% of the words spoken, even when 50% of the sounds were deleted

For a right-handed person, the right ear (feeding most of its impulses to the left hemisphere) dominates in perceiving speech and language The left ear (feeding most

of its impulses to the right hemisphere) dominates in perceiving non-verbal sounds.Your ability to detect high frequencies declines with age, at the rate of about 150 Hertz per year after age 40

1.3.5 Your Visual System

Your visual system is the most sophisticated and complicated of your senses Vision supplies information about the status of your environment, what it contains, and what

is moving within it Vision supplies you with information about shape, size, distance, brightness, and colour

The seemingly simple task of interpreting shape requires information about vertical lines, horizontal lines, diagonal lines, edges, and shading Your sense of colour is restricted to light with wavelengths between red (700 nm ) and violet (400 nm) Your eyes are positioned in the front of the skull and slightly separated to provide

stereoscopic vision Each eye provides a slightly different view of an object These different views provide information about the distance and shape of an object Both eyes survey the field of view directly ahead of you, while objects to each side can be detected peripherally by just one eye It takes about 0.1 seconds for your brain to process a field of view and then get ready to for the next field of view A series of still pictures flashed on a screen at twice that rate is interpreted by your brain as continuous action

Your eyes convert incoming photons (fundamental bits of light energy) into nerve impulses Each eye has a number of substructures that contribute to your ability to see:

1 The upper and lower eyelids regularly sweep the surface of your eye and can close rapidly to protect its surface

2 The cornea is a clear protective layer and acts as a preliminary lens

3 The aqueous humour is the fluid-filled cavity between the cornea and the lens

4 The iris is a coloured disk in front of the lens It has an opening that can vary in diameter from 0.5 to 9.0 mm to control the intensity of light that reaches the retina

5 The lens is a flexible structure that is normally thick and curved for viewing objects up close It can be stretched by ocular muscles to a thinner and less curved shape for viewing objects in the distance With age the lens loses some

of its elasticity and can no longer return to its highly curved status That is when you have to start using reading glasses

6 The vitreous humour is the liquid-filled region in the centre of the eye The vitreous humour has to exert enough pressure to maintain the shape of the eye, but too much pressure (glaucoma) can damage the retina

7 The retina is the lining at the back of your eye that is coated with

light-detecting sensors, called rods and cones There are about 120 million rods spread over most of the retina to provide a basic black and white view of the universe In addition there are about 7 million cones concentrated in the

region directly behind the lens to provide a high-resolution image, in living colour, of the region directly in front of each eye The rods are more sensitive

to faint light than the cones, so faint scenes are typically perceived in black and white

The muscles that move your eyes also play a key role in your vision system Every twentieth of a second your eyes make rapid and abrupt jumps through about 15

degrees, as if they are in a constant search mode This jumping motion, called a saccade, occurs when the background remains stationary and you are concentrating

on an object in the foreground, as when you are reading The eye muscles can also execute smooth pursuit movements to follow an object as it moves across your field

of view These two types of movements help to keep an object of interest focused on the more sensitive cones at the centre of the retina

The neural connections associated with the visual system are the most complicated of any of our senses Behind the eyes, there is a partial switch-over in the optic nerves (called the chiasm) so that all the information from the left half of the field of view, from both eyes, is directed to the right occipital lobe at the back of your brain

Similarly, information from the right field of view, from both eyes, is channelled to the left occipital lobe The analysis of visual information is quite complicated So far neurologists have been able to trace twenty-eight different sub-channels in the brain for analyzing visual information

1.3.6 Your Sense of Orientation

There are two components to our sense of orientation: kinaesthetic sensors and

vestibular organs

Kinaesthetic sensors provide information about your body’s spatial position, and the movement of your joints and muscles Special sensors in the mobile joints of the skeleton provide information on the motion of single joints, and the relative motion

of sets of related joints The shoulder is most sensitive to detecting small motions The wrist is next most sensitive, then the knuckle of the index finger The ankle is the joint least sensitive to detecting small motions The brain receives information from these sensors and uses it to determine the direction and the movement of your limbs

in space

For controlled motion, you also need information on the position and orientation of your whole body in space In all mammals, vestibular organs located in the inner ears provide information on position and orientation A vestibular organ is a tiny sac filled with fluid It is lined with cilia (fine sensory hairs), and contains small crystals of calcium carbonate Both gravity and acceleration in a straight line can force the crystals into the cilia, causing them to bend and send neural impulses to the

cerebellum and the medulla The vestibular organ also includes two fluid-filled loops

at approximate right angles to each other If your head moves in a circular motion, fluid in these loops flows and the cilia are bent, sending more neural impulses to the brain that correspond to the rotation of your head

Visual input provides a backup check on the orientation and motion of your body

The vestibular system can provide signals to help you interpret how your body is moving during most everyday activities Even the repeated action of jogging presents

no difficulty However, large repeated motions, or motions in which the visual and vestibular systems provide conflicting information, can lead to motion sickness Over

time, most individuals eventually become habituated to an over stimulated vestibular system If you spend enough time at sea, your seasickness will gradually disappear.

Our sense organs are highly specialized organs for collecting information about our environment However, they are not mechanical machines that make absolute

measurements, and they tire under constant stimulation Organic sensors are best at monitoring changing conditions within their normal range of operation

Raw input from your senses is filtered so that irrelevant data is disregarded The remaining input is interpreted and constantly analyzed for danger factors, for

emotional factors, and for practical information related to your current situation This filtering and interpretative activity occurs in your sub-conscious mind before the results are passed on to your conscious mind for consideration

Your senses provide you with a continuous update on the state of your immediate physical environment

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Chapter 2: Framing Your Thoughts

2.1 Human Thinking

2.2 The Nature of the Physical Universe

2.3 Approaches to Clear Thinking

The model of the universe that you create in your brain is based on a summary of your sensory inputs and physical experiences Your past experiences, your social setting, and your knowledge of the world around you all have a profound impact on what you think and the conclusions that you reach

2.1 Human Thinking

When you think, you are activating neural networks in your brain and searching

through all the information that you have been able to gather since you were born You tend to consider yourself as a freethinking being, but your brain works with

evolutionary structures, cultural frameworks, and personal traits that set limits on your thought processes

You inherited a brain that is anatomically similar to other human brains Some of your particular behaviour patterns were also inherited from your parents along with the colour of your hair and the size of your feet Some of your learned behaviour patterns have been shaped by the community in which you live

Still, much of your mental universe is unique to yourself Your life’s experiences are your own The neural networks that develop during your childhood are your own Your individual memories were shaped in your mind by events in your life

Your mind creates a mental model of reality based on the information your mind is currently receiving from your senses and the past information you have gathered from your life’s experiences When you reach out to pick up a coffee mug you are

integrating information about colour, shape, texture, and function for the mug, as well as past experience in handling hollow objects filled with hot liquids You have also made a prediction regarding the satisfaction of drinking the coffee in the mug

2.1.1 Basic Sources of Thought

Our thoughts are stimulated either by external or internal sources Sometimes we have total control over the source of our thoughts; sometimes thoughts are forced upon us

a newborn baby learns to separate spoken sounds into words and sentences that can

be converted into ideas With practice, wine connoisseurs can develop their abilities

to detect minor differences in the taste and aroma (or bouquet) of different wines With practice, radiologists can learn to read subtle variations on x-ray plates to help them detect and diagnose a variety of medical conditions

You can also learn to block superfluous sensory input while you concentrate on a chosen task A soldier can ignore the pain of a wound during the heat of a battle A NASCAR driver can ignore an itch during a hectic pit stop With practice you can ignore background noise while falling asleep With practice you can ignore the forest and find the tree with the hawk sitting on a branch

It is a source of irritation if you cannot ignore dull and repetitive input, or if you cannot distinguish between significant and irrelevant information Every child has to master the task of separating printed letters from background designs before he/she can learn to read

Anatomical pathways

Some of our basic thought processes are built into specific neural networks For

example, our ability to recognize faces is located in a specific region of the brain If that region is damaged, you may no longer be able to recognize people you know by their facial features The hippocampus, in the midbrain complex, plays a vital role in the formation of new memories If your hippocampus is damaged, then your ability to create new memories is correspondingly damaged

Some neural pathways can be adapted to compensate for damage, especially in young children Every stroke victim experiences the loss of some neural pathways and

corresponding impairment With the support of physiotherapy, other neurons in a neighbouring region can often be adapted to restore most functional loss caused by a stroke

This adaptability of the brain is not always welcome Patients, who have had a limb amputated, often experience sensations from a phantom limb When a limb is

amputated, the neural circuitry that controlled that limb is still in place It is thought that nearby neural circuits in the brain start to utilize these abandoned circuits, and

in so doing create signals that are detected as coming from the missing limb Patients can suffer from pain in a phantom limb long after the limb has been removed

Your limbic system is the source of most of your emotions It is also structured to receive and act on significant information with a minimal time delay You may react emotionally before your forebrain has had a chance to review and consider that same information

Once you have reached an emotional conclusion, it is often difficult to re-evaluate that same information on a rational basis MRI scans indicate that once you are

emotionally attached to an idea, you exhibit a strong bias when interpreting any new information For example once you have a strong political affiliation any subsequent

political critiques tend to be evaluated in your limbic system as positive or negative according to your established views Your forebrain and reasoned analysis is often bypassed by emotional reactions.

For clear thinking, you need the ability to outmanoeuvre your limbic system on

important issues The essential ingredient is time A basic strategy is to develop the habit of wondering about implications or associations before making that crucial first judgement That way you can provide time for your forebrain to get involved before taking action or making major decisions The old adage, ‘Count to ten before you act’, is an essential ingredient in clear thinking If you want to be guided by your forebrain, the most powerful part of your brain, then you have to be able to delay and override your limbic system

Personal characteristics

Every person builds a unique personality based on their inherited physical

characteristics, their inherited mental circuits, and the experiences they have had during their lives Your personal goals, motivation, attitudes, self-image, and self-confidence also become key components of your personality Your personality affects the information that you gather from the environment, and how you perceive that information Your personality acts as a master filter for all of your thought processes

2.1.2 The Nature of Humankind

Historical evidence provides significant clues about how humans make use of their neural systems to think, create, build, and destroy

From the archaeological records of civilizations over the past 5000 years we can observe many basic characteristics of humans, some admirable, some not We

apparently like to build – homes, villages, towns, cities, fortresses, monuments, palaces, and temples We like to decorate and embellish – our homes, our

implements, our public buildings, and ourselves We like to invent and create – new tools, new weapons, and new farming techniques We fear and revere the

supernatural – we sacrifice plants, animals, and people to appease the gods, we pray

to the gods for forgiveness and for favours, we bow to priests who may communicate directly with the gods on our behalf We like status and power – we are almost always ready to fight to maintain our social status, we are ready to fight to protect our families, we are ready to fight to take advantage of weakness in a neighbouring tribe

or town

The general characteristics of humans, as revealed by history, still dominate much of human activity today We need to consider these innate tendencies as we strive to improve our own thought processes These tendencies seem to be embedded in our societies, and our societies establish frameworks that shape much of our thinking as individuals

2.1.3 The Impact of Your Social Environmental

At birth, your cerebellum is already able to keep you alive, breathing and eating, and

basic instincts are operational Your limbic system provides you with basic emotional drives However, much of your midbrain and forebrain are waiting to be sculpted by experience.

A newborn has about 10 billion brain cells and this number remains essentially

constant through adulthood, but the number of supportive glia cells increases until about age 20 The number of axon-dendrite connections increases continuously with life’s experiences

Your social environment continually shapes and refines your thought processes

The circumstances of your birth

The United Nations currently recognizes 192 different countries with average annual incomes ranging from $500 US to over $30 000 US, and with average life expectancies ranging from 35 years to over 80 years The world population is estimated to be about 6.5 billion people and at any given time there are approximately 200 million people

on the move as refugees If you are born in a nation with a large debt, few natural resources, and a bankrupt social system, then you will have difficulty reaching your potential as a clear thinker

If individuals could choose the circumstances of their birth, then the most direct path

to clear thinking would include caring, educated, and wealthy parents living in a prosperous society

The historical context of your birth is another important factor in your opportunities

to be a clear thinker In the developed world, the last few decades have been the best time to be alive in the history of human kind While the focus of the news media

is often on negative events, in a relative sense, peace and prosperity have reigned during the past fifty years In the western world the general population has been better fed, better educated, is more secure, has had access to better medical care, and has had more leisure time and less physically demanding jobs than at any other time in history

Physical comforts and stress

We think more clearly when we are healthy, comfortable, well rested, and free from excessive stress Under severe and lasting stress your mental efficiency can suffer dramatically Under stress you tend to lose concentration, have difficulty assessing new information, and your short-term memory starts to fail Under excessive stress your ability to think clearly can be seriously impaired

One strategy for reducing stress is to remove yourself from the stressful situation Often stressful situations are of your own making Step back and re-evaluate your objectives Are the potential rewards from your current activities worth the wear-and-tear on your psyche?

Another strategy for reducing stress is to anticipate challenging situations and prepare

to deal with them ahead of time Astronauts spend years practicing the procedures

that they will have to carry out after they are launched into in orbit They spend almost as much time again preparing for possible emergencies Preparation and

practice provide the tools and procedures needed to deal with potentially stressful situations

responsibilities within your family Your family instils early lessons about loyalty, mutual support, the roles of men and women, and the essential economics of family life

In many societies, families with common grandparents and great grandparents

consider themselves a clan, and clan members are expected to work together to foster common social, territorial, and economic interests

Members of a tribe typically claim a more distant but common ancestor Tribal

members form a society with common culture, customs, traditions, and economic interests A tribal member is expected to adhere to tribal customs and to show

preference for tribal members in any dealings involving external groups The founding tribes of Athens, Rome, and Israel; and the tribes of Native Americans and the

Bedouins of Arabia are examples of well-known tribes

Religion

Religions have their own traditions and rituals They often have special sites for

worship and leaders with inspired knowledge Religions impose a mental framework for dealing with fears, hopes, learning, and your goals in life Religious traditions often require ritual acts and standard approaches for dealing with everyday events Rules must be followed to avoid displeasing the gods Polytheistic religions tend to be more accepting of other religions but offer a fragmented philosophy Monotheistic religions tend to be less flexible but offer a more coherent philosophy

Environmental changes

Mental challenges arise when the environment changes – a new device is invented, travellers bring new ideas from the external world, the social and economic

foundations are destroyed in war, or the population is decimated by a natural disaster

or swollen by immigration If you are forced to adapt to changing conditions, the process is less traumatic if you have developed a flexible approach to your social environment

Mental challenges also arise when an individual is able to perceive a better way to do something How can the new approach be developed and integrated into a static

Suppression of selected groups

Throughout human history social environments have often discriminated against, and suppressed, selected subgroups in the population War captives, lower classes, the poor, women, children, people of different origin, and people with a different

religion were typical targets Such discrimination and suppression may have been highly organized and deliberate, or haphazard in nature Regardless, the effect on clear thinking is always negative Members of a suppressed group have fewer

opportunities to receive care and nurturing, and fewer resources for education and intellectual development

Modes of expression

Your social environment also determines the modes of expression that are available for your use A culture with a complex language, a tradition of artistic and political expression, and a habit of self-expression fosters creative and philosophical thinking

A culture can also deliberately limit your modes of expression Early Puritans and Calvinists were discouraged from dancing and singing Renaissance scholars were required to carry out their deliberations in Latin Muslims are discouraged from

drawing the form of any living creature

Since we use words to structure most of our conscious thoughts, the richness and subtleties of the language we are using are important factors in determining our clarity of thought It has been proposed by the German philosopher von Humbolt and the American linguist E S Benjamin, that all higher levels of thinking are dependent

on language, and that speakers of different languages actually experience the world differently

Dr Philip Dale (Language Development – Structure and Function, 1972) provides a

simple but illustrative example In the English language, the visible spectrum is

typically described by six colours – red, green, orange, yellow, blue, and purple In Shona (a language spoken in Zimbabwe and southern Mozambique), the same

spectrum is described by just four colours, and in Bassa (a language spoken in Nigeria) only two words for colour are used It is apparent that your ability to describe and think about colour depends on the language you are using

While we assume that we are looking at the world objectively, in reality we are

looking at the world with a brain that has been shaped by the social world into which

we were born It is difficult to locate an objective reality when the very structure of your brain, all your observations, and all your thoughts have all been modified by, and filtered through, the elements of a specific culture

2.1.4 Reality Anchors in Your Mental Universe

The term reality anchor is used here to describe the most basic knowledge that you can use as a foundation for understanding and interpreting all other knowledge The

analogy is with the anchors that can be used to hold a ship in place during a storm If your reality anchors in your mental universe are well deployed then you can have more confidence in your ability to think clearly and make sound decisions.

Mental anchors are not absolute, but provide the most reasonable and practical

foundation for your thought processes Your mental anchors should never be taken for granted They should be checked periodically to see if they have served you well.What basic knowledge and concepts can you use as anchors? Which anchors can you count on in tough times and use with confidence to build more elaborate mental concepts? The search for this knowledge and these concepts has been pursued by philosophers for thousands of years Whole libraries can be filled with detailed

religious and philosophical discussions related to mental anchors There may not be any ultimate or final conclusions to such discussions, but the following paragraphs provide some pragmatic guidelines for establishing your own mental anchors

Anchor #1: You exist

How do you know that you are not just dreaming? You might be heavily sedated and locked in an insane asylum somewhere Or you might be a simulated character in some bizarre alien computer game To philosophers, this is the ‘problem of

existence’ Parmenides of Elea (c500 BCE) claimed that simply to think of a concept gave that concept some semblance of existence René Descartes (1596 – 1650), a French philosopher and mathematician, began his analysis of existence with the phrase, “I think, therefore I am.” Philosophers have not yet devised any absolute solution to the problem of existence, but you can develop a sense of your own basic mental state and use it as a mental anchor Have confidence that you exist as an individual entity

Anchor #2: You can think

You have the ability to consider, think, and act as an individual This is a key idea and the whole focus of this book For although you possess these abilities, you may not always use them effectively If ‘You can think’ is to be one of your mental anchors, then you need to spend significant effort to train your brain and utilize your mind in

an objective and analytic fashion

To think clearly you need to be rested and nourished Your brain needs a good supply

of blood and oxygen You need to ensure that your brain is not suffering from a

physical injury or a psychiatric illness, and is free from drugs that might impair your thought processes

Anchor #3: You can remember

You can remember past events, and your memories are a guide to understanding present and future events In your childhood you learned to walk, and talk, and a variety of other useful skills that you still remember You can recognize people, places, and situations In fact, you have an amazing ability to remember a

tremendous amount of material related to your life’s experiences

However, as a mental anchor your memories have to be used with some caution Our memories are not the equivalent of video recordings of events Instead, memories are your interpretative summaries of the information gathered by your senses It is

possible to train your memory to record more specific information related to events For example, police officers are trained to observe and elicit specific details of what has happened at a crime scene, doctors are trained to observe specific physical

characteristics of their patients, and scientists are trained to make precise

observations and record the results

You can support your mental memories by making external records of information – writing notes, taking photographs, and recording videos You can run reliability tests

on your memory by comparing your recollections with those of others you trust, or by comparing your memories with official records

Anchor #4: You can test reality

You are always free to take information that you have encountered and compare that information with reality (See section 2.2 for more on reality anchors.) Reality is not

always easy to define, but if someone says, ‘Take two doses of this magic potion and

you will be able to fly’, a quick reality check should tell you that something is wrong.

When other people describe events the way you would have described them, then you have reason to believe that your interpretation of the events matches reality Of course you could all be wrong Often the challenge is to separate observable reality from belief Is a typhoid epidemic the result of God’s wrath, or polluted drinking water?

Sometimes the search for reality is deliberately obscured For example, in a television game show called ‘The Family Feud’, the audience was polled before the on-air show began to determine their views on a variety of topics Then the challenge of the contestants was not to provide information based on reality, but to determine the audience’s perception of reality Many people make claims that are difficult to verify

or disprove, except by referring to what is practical and reasonable The more

informed you are, the better able you are to make reality checks, and the more

valuable this mental anchor becomes

Anchor #5: You can search for cause-and-effect

Cause-and-effect is a philosophical approach to understanding why things happen the way they do This approach requires a fundamental assumption that there is a reason,

or an explanation, for the occurrence of an event A cause-and-effect philosophy provides a powerful motive to organize your observations and to search for root

causes so that you can begin to control the events that affect your life

Questions such as: ‘If I do this, what will happen?’, ‘What makes the wind blow?’, and ‘Why is the sky blue?’ reflect the struggle, even at an early age, of virtually

everyone to determine why the world works the way it does

Unfortunately, cause-and-effect is not always easy to determine There is a

continuing debate among economists regarding the economic impact of raising or lowering taxes The development of quantum mechanics was inspired by the struggle

to establish cause-and-effect relationships at the atomic and nuclear levels

Cause-and-effect can also be difficult to establish in everyday events Some people seem to be luckier than others Is there a reason for that luck, or is it just chance? Sports personalities often follow odd routines that supposedly bring them good luck: they might wear their lucky socks, or pat a doorway five times to increase their

chances of winning a competition If it is possible that mere belief in a effect connection can alter an athlete’s attitudes and motivations, then wearing a lucky hat could actually make a win more likely

cause-and-Cause-and-effect is particularly difficult to establish when there are a number of cofactors involved For example, the successful baking of bread depends on the type

of flour, the type and quantity of yeast, the amount of liquid, rising times, and baking time – so it can be difficult to determine why your bread does not taste the way it should

Anchor #6: You can search for truth

Your determination to seek the truth is another valuable mental anchor in your quest for clear thinking The emphasis here is on evaluating the correctness of

communications directed to you by others

Storytellers and actors earn their livings by convincing an audience that they are portraying an alternate reality Tone of voice, facial expressions, and physical

gestures are used to convey emotions The literal meaning of words may constitute as little as ten percent of the information received by an audience

Even the supposed factual content of a communication requires careful evaluation A communication can be accurate or it can be exaggerated, distorted, erroneous, or completely fabricated Conveying disinformation is a standard technique of

espionage, politics, and marketing Some people can lie convincingly, complete with appropriate body language and emotional expressions

Perhaps the most fruitful and dependable approach for detecting truth is to establish

an informal tally for the truth-value of communications from a given source If, over time, the communications from a given source tend to match reality, then you can have higher confidence in the truth of future communications from that same source The more you already know about a topic, the harder it is for anyone to mislead or misinform you

* * * 2.2 The Nature of the Physical Universe

Establishing an informed and consistent view of reality is a vital step in laying a

foundation for clear thinking If you absorb a wealth of knowledge about the physical universe, integrate that knowledge into a coherent database, and interpret that

information with a consistent philosophy, then your ability to think clearly can only be enhanced

The physical universe consists of all we can detect directly with our senses, and all we can detect indirectly with instruments that extend our senses The French

mathematician and philosopher, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), described all of physical space as consisting of two infinities; the realm of the stars above him, and the realm

of the things that he could not see, the realm of the very small A complete

description of reality should also include the realm of everyday events, as well as Pascal’s realms of the very small and the very large

2.2.1 The Realm of Everyday Events

The realm of everyday events includes everything that can be detected by our

unaided senses It consists of objects with dimensions between 1 millimetre (mm) and

10 000 kilometres (km), and time scales from a tenth of a second to 100 years A leg

on a fruit fly is about 1 mm long The Earth is about 12 800 km in diameter, rotates on its axis once every 24 hours, and revolves about the Sun every 365.25 days A human being is about 2 metres tall, and can live for about 100 years In 100 years, a heart beating once a second beats about 3.2 billion times

We can look out a window and see trees, grass, buildings, and automobiles Some of

us can see cities, farms, plains, forests, mountains, lakes, or oceans We can go

outside and touch the ground; we can taste water, and eat the food We can watch the Sun rise in the east and set in the west We can experience the passing of the seasons These are all aspects of the realm of everyday events

We do not inhabit the entire everyday zone We live in only a thin layer on the

surface of the Earth, within the biosphere If you used a marker pen to draw the largest circle you could on a large sheet of paper to represent the Earth, then the thickness of that line would encompass the entire biosphere, including the tallest mountains and the deepest trenches in the oceans Humans actually live in only a small portion of the biosphere Three quarters of the Earth’s surface is covered with water, and much of the dry land is desert, rocks, or frozen ice

2.2.2 The Realm of the Very Large

The realm of the very large spans the universe beyond the Earth It includes objects from the size of the Earth to the size of the whole universe (several billion light-

years) ; and time scales from 100 years to the age of the universe (about 13.7 billion years)

Our solar system is centred on the Sun with eight planets in orbit around it: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune Most of the planets have

one or more moons There are also a number of dwarf planets, thousands of asteroids, and thousands of comets The Sun has a diameter of about 1.4 million km and

contains over 99% of the mass of the entire solar system Most of the rest of the solar system lies within a disc about 12 light-hours in thickness

Beyond the solar system is a myriad of other stars Some are 10 times more massive and many times brighter than the Sun; most are about the same size, or smaller and fainter than the Sun While a few hundred of the brightest stars visible in the sky have been named, most are just given a number in one of the many star catalogues All of the stars in the sky appear much fainter than the Sun because they are so far away The nearest star to the Sun is Proxima, with a distance of 4.2 light-years Most stars have nearby companions, or occur in clusters with hundreds of members The nearest

100 billion stars are grouped together and orbit around a central black hole to form the Milky Way galaxy The Milky Way is disc shaped and about 300 000 light-years in diameter The Sun is about 25 000 light-years from the centre of the disc, on the inner edge of the Orion arm

Beyond the Milky Way, there are billions of other galaxies The nearest galaxy

comparable to the Milky Way is the Andromeda galaxy, with a distance of about 2.9 million light-years Even though the Andromeda galaxy contains billions of stars, it is

so far away that it appears as just a faint smudge in the night sky Even galaxies tend

to occur in clusters The Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxies dominate the Local Group, which consists of 30 galaxies The Virgo cluster contains the Local Group and about 2000 other large galaxies It has a diameter of about 60 million light-years The largest telescopes on Earth, or in space, have yet to detect an end to the distribution

through evolutionary stages as the stars within them consume primordial hydrogen and radiate energy into the surrounding universe The galaxies in a cluster move about each other, and a few galaxies have been observed in collision with each other

A number of investigations have estimated the age of the universe at 13.7 billion years, so the radius of the knowable universe is just the distance that light could travel in that time, or 13.7 billion light-years

2.2.3 The Realm of the Very Small

The realm of the very small consists of objects smaller than 1 mm, and with

interaction times less than a tenth of a second This is the realm of cells, bacteria, viruses, atoms, and subatomic particles Bacteria can reproduce in a matter of

minutes Atomic events occur in less than a billionth of a second Nuclear events are a

million times faster than that From an atom’s point of view, humans are colossal giants and human activity takes place at a glacial pace.

It is a fundamental theorem in biology that every living body is composed of individual living cells Every human consists of billions of cells organized into tissues and organs

We are also inhabited by a host of mostly friendly bacteria that aid digestion and help

to protect our outer layers Every cell lives its own existence, occasionally responding

to external stimuli, but most of the time working with its complex internal structures and chemical processes

We are surrounded by solids, liquids, and gases – all consisting of atoms It is

surprising that everything in the universe is composed of just 102 different types of atoms In a very real sense our universe is like a giant LEGO set By selecting the right atoms and combining them in the right way any crystal or chemical can be formed, and from those – you, a tree, an automobile, a mountain or a star can be constructed

In practice, while chemists are experts at manipulating chemicals and engineers are experts at manipulating materials, it is unlikely that we will ever fabricate everyday objects atom-by-atom It would take about a thousand-billion-billion atoms of

hydrogen and oxygen to create a tiny drop of water

Every atom contains a central nucleus made up of smaller particles called neutrons and protons The nucleus is surrounded by a group of electrons, and the number of electrons matches the number of protons You get different atoms by changing the number of protons and electrons Particle physicists have also determined that

protons and neutrons are in turn made out of particles called quarks

While the cosmos is not actually divided into three realms according to time and distance scales, thinking in terms of these realms may help you to appreciate the narrow confines of your existence within the vast dimensions of the universe

Constructing a comprehensive world view that can accommodate most events across each of these scales is a major intellectual hurdle If you are able to construct such a world view, then it is much easier to deal mentally with the amazing variety of

objects and happenings that comprise the known universe

One immediate implication of a comprehensive world view is the realization that humans do not represent the ultimate beings, and the Earth is not the centre of the universe We are more like fleas adrift on a raft on a boundless sea But we are

special fleas because we can learn, comprehend, and create

2.2.4 Reality Anchors in the Physical Universe

How do you know that any of the three physical zones are real? For that matter, how

do you know anything is real? How can you decide between two opposing views of reality?

According to the German philosopher, George Hegel (1770 – 1831), the gradual

evolution of the history of ideas leads to the perception of reality The American

philosopher, John Dewey (1859 – 1952), claimed that truth and reality were based on distillations of the rules for action that had proved to be successful.

A more pragmatic approach is that you should be able to detect reality, directly or indirectly, through your senses On a fundamental level you can touch reality, smell

it, and taste it More precisely, you can measure the properties of reality and you can measure how those properties vary over time

The use of ‘reality anchors’, analogous to mental anchors, provides a very practical means for establishing your model of reality A reality anchor is a particular concept

in which you have a high degree of confidence A set of such anchors can help you to maintain a dependable interpretation of reality and provide a framework for

reasonable interpolations and extrapolations

Reality anchors in the everyday realm

The simplest and most reliable anchors are based on direct experience Your kitchen table is real You can touch it You can pile stuff on it You can measure it You can leave the room, come back ten minutes later, and there it is again – the same table The kitchen table may be one of your first and best anchors in reality You can expand your realm of reality, and experience your entire home in a similar fashion

Outside of your home, you can also experience your neighbourhood as a firsthand reality However, a number of practical difficulties soon become apparent Your neighbours may not be supportive of your efforts to experience their kitchen tables And very soon there would be too many tables, buildings, roads, blades of grass, trees, and fields for you to experience firsthand in a reasonable amount of time Even

if you spent your whole life at it you would never get more than a few kilometres from home

There are at least two standard procedures for extending a system of reality anchors:

1 The first is to construct a mental model of an aspect of reality that you can use

in lieu of firsthand experience (See section 5.3 for a more complete discussion

of models.) After visiting a few buildings you begin to acquire knowledge of their typical properties such as room size, ceiling height, stairs, doors,

windows, desks, chairs, and appliances Soon you can predict, with a

reasonable degree of accuracy, the basic structure of the inside of a building after a brief view of its exterior and its surroundings Similarly, you can soon predict the basic nature of the soil in a whole field just by holding a handful of dirt (sand, loam, pebbles) and glancing at the plants growing in the field

2 The second way to extend your reality anchors is to rely on the experience of others Travellers can tell you what they experienced in the next town down the road They might tell you directly, or you might be able to review recorded versions of their observations

How can you decide if travellers’ accounts are true and accurate? Continuing the analogy, you can apply one or more of the following criteria:

1 The accounts are reasonable extensions of your own experience in your own neighbourhood.

2 You know some of the travellers personally and trust their ability to observe and report accurately

3 Some of the travellers are recognized by your neighbours as experienced and truthful observers and reporters

4 A number of travellers, unknown to each other and coming from different directions, all report similar observations

5 The traveller explains how to visit the same places he did, so if you wanted to devote the time and energy to do so you could travel down the road to observe the next town for yourself

Not all reality anchors are equivalent An anchor that has met several of the above tests is probably more secure than one that has not If you spend considerable time and effort in expanding your range of anchors and securing them well, then you will probably have a better grip on reality than someone who just checks the kitchen table every now and then

Reality anchors in the realm of the very large

Around the world, thousands of astronomers spend their professional lives collecting and analyzing astronomical data obtained with sophisticated telescopes and satellites All such information gathered during the past three centuries has been used to build a systematic, and consistent model of the cosmos With ever larger and more complex astronomical instruments new discoveries and clarifications are still being made on a regular basis

How could you as an individual verify the claims about the properties of this realm? You could use a clock and a protractor to make systematic observations of the

positions and apparent motions of the Sun, Moon, and stars This data could then be used to verify at least a portion of those claims You could check your position on Earth with a Global-Positioning-System device and verify that all the orbital theories and instrumentation work as advertised You could read magazines, journals, and texts on astronomy You could join an association of amateur astronomers With a few thousand dollars-worth of equipment, and the determination to develop the skills to use that equipment properly, you could observe the moons of Jupiter, the rings of Saturn, comets, multiple star systems, globular clusters, nebulae, and galaxies You could study astronomy at a university; you could become a professional astronomer With accurate and systematic observations spanning months, years, and decades; you could determine the orbits of our planets about the Sun; you could determine the orbits, sizes, and masses of binary stars; you could determine the periods of stars that oscillate in brightness With more sophisticated equipment and mathematical

analyzes you could measure the velocities of stars and galaxies, and determine their distances

None of this information is secret If you are willing to spend the time and effort, you could make all the observations and deductions yourself If you discovered something

substantially new or different, the attention of thousands of amateur and professional astronomers would be diverted to explore your claims And if your discovery were confirmed, existing knowledge would be adjusted and updated to include it.

Reality anchors in the realm of the very small

The realm of the very small is studied by microbiologists, material scientists,

biochemists, organic and physical chemists, quantum physicists, and electronic

engineers In the past few centuries they have developed sophisticated instruments to explore the properties of microscopic materials With this knowledge they have

developed new materials, new medicines, and the whole field of electronics The Internet, e-mails, cell phones, digital TV, iPods, penicillin, and digital cameras all exist because scientists have developed and successfully applied theories of the very small

How could you verify descriptions and claims about the properties of the realm of the very small? An inexpensive microscope and some basic skills in sample preparation would provide the means for you to observe amoebae, paramecia, plant cells, and animal cells The structures of crystals such as table salt, ice, and diamonds are reflections of the properties of their constituent atoms Any working device using transistors supplies a verification of the quantum properties of material at the very small level Turn on your television set, or your computer, and you have evidence that engineers can manipulate the flow of electrons to transfer energy and

information You could also read technical journals and texts; you could study

appropriate courses at university You could ask experts in the field: a microbiologist could provide details of living organisms as small as the structures within cells, a chemist could provide details of atomic structure, a particle physicist could provide descriptions of subatomic particles

An expanded world view helps you to appreciate that the universe is an integrated system of physical events Every day, humanity is applying its talent, tenacity, and curiosity to expand our knowledge of the universe

* * * 2.3 Approaches to Clear Thinking

This last section of the chapter presents a few practical approaches to clear thinking

In practice we tend to develop a variety of mental models to cope with particular situations, as we encounter them The challenge is then to review the characteristics

of those models and try to modify them so that they are consistent with each other I can remember as a child struggling with the concepts that anything lighter than

water, such as wood, will float and anything heavier than water, such as steel, will sink – and yet battleships and ocean liners are made of steel and seem to float very well These mental models of flotation were inconsistent with each other and inspired

a lot of pondering and quests for more information A version of Archimedes’ principle was required to bring these two models of reality into agreement

Note that inconsistent behaviour involves using one set of guiding principles in one situation, and a conflicting set of principles in a different situation, without you

necessarily being aware of any contradiction

Here are a few examples of inconsistent mental models:

1 While the ancient Romans created disciplined and well-equipped armies, they often relied on augury to determine a good day for battle Their training and weapons were based on logic and proven battle tactics, but examining a

sheep’s liver for favourable signs before going to battle was completely

3 Someone who uses a computer to prepare an essay on the ‘evils of technology’ may not be thinking in a consistent manner

4 The concept of an all-powerful and loving god appears to be inconsistent with the abundant suffering of innocents that such a god could easily prevent

Working with a consistent mental model is analogous to working with a universal system of measures and weights, such as the metric system A common set of weights and measures facilitates trade and technical communications between countries Tools manufactured in one country can be used to repair a machine manufactured in another A consistent world view facilitates communication among various mental models Solutions to problems in one realm can be adapted for use in other realms

A consistent world view also helps you to understand the past, predict the future, and deal with various individuals and groups of people

2.3.2 Be Open-Minded

Another valuable approach to clear thinking is to make systematic efforts to remain open-minded It is difficult to think clearly about an issue if you have already made

up your mind what you are going to do regarding that issue

When you are making an effort to be open-minded you tend to: