I was just telling someone about the time I took a girl to a porn movie for a first date. “Yeah, umm, she has since moved out of the state.” 🙂
I’ll be there around 7, shooting pool. If you’re bored, you should come too!
Is there a more recursive exercise than thinking about the nature of consciousness?
My emotions have been swinging about pretty dramatically lately, which has started me thinking about emotions in general. All of this cogitation has resulted in a new mental model (the model is mental, and the thing being modeled is mental – and the modeler…) about consciousness that I’m trying on for size.
It’s easy to see emotions as cause and effect. Some external event happens. In response to the event, you experience an emotional reaction. As a result of that emotional reaction, your brain directs the release of a cocktail of hormones. Those hormones produce a physical reaction, like a racing heart beat, dilated pupils. At least, that’s how I used to think things work. And in some cases, that’s pretty valid; for instance, that seems to be the flow of events in a traditional fight-or-flight event/adrenal response.
But for less dramatic, obvious events, I’m trying out a new model.
New theory: Human consciousness is largely an exercise of pattern recognition, and a subsequent rationalization of what was observed.
As an example, think about a common experience with dreams that we’ve all had. You’re dreaming about being chased through your office by some creature. As you’re running through the hallways, the fire alarm starts blaring. You’re running and panting and the alarm is getting louder, and you’re more frantic, and the alarm is ringing and… you wake up. And the fire alarm noise is your alarm clock waking you up. What just happened wasn’t coincidence. It wasn’t dumb luck that your dream included an alarm just before your alarm clock went off. Of course not. What happened was that the alarm clock went off, and your brain did its little pattern matching routine, trying to find some logical explanation for the sound that fit the stream of consciousness you were in at the moment. Hence, the alarm in your dream, which lasted for several seconds before you woke up and came fully awake.
So let me bring this back to emotions. And, I’m going to introduce a further twist. What if the “external event” that kicks everything off isn’t all that external?
What if the initial action is the production of hormones? Maybe it was something you ate, maybe it’s a cyclical event, who knows why. But some bit of equilibrium gets upset and your body and brain get an unexpected rinse of hormones. The brain produces an emotional response to the hormones. “Hmm, this particular cocktail is frustration and annoyance.” And then your brain, just as it did in the dream example, looks for some rationalization that conveniently fits your current stream of consciousness. “Frustration and annoyance. Hmm, what could I find to be frustrated and annoyed about? Hey, the light is on in the hallway… and in the kitchen. Dammit, why can’t she learn to turn the lights out when she leaves the room? We’ve talked about this before, why can’t she learn to do such a simple thing? Grrr…”
And because the frustration is being caused by the hormones (and not the other way around, as formerly assumed), it explains why you can address the thing that is making you upset, and then minutes later get worked up all over again by a completely different issue. The issue itself isn’t the prime cause; it is just the rationalization constructed by the brain. Until you’ve flushed the hormones, your consciousness will simply find something else to explain this emotional turmoil.
Pretty messed up, huh? And it’s really hard to see, in the heat of the moment. It’s the nature of an emotional response; when you’re in the midst of it, it just seems so bloody important! It’s all you can think about, you’re worked up and angry/sad/frustrated/scared/anxious/whatever and it’s all the fault of [fill in the blank], and if you could just fix that problem it would all go away! Why can’t people understand? And then some loved one helpfully suggests, “How long has it been since you’ve been to the gym? Maybe you need to go blow off some steam.” and you get outraged. “What? Don’t you trivialize this! Going to the gym isn’t going to make her smarter about turning off the lights! That isn’t going to fix anything! You’re so patronizing, it makes me want to punch someone! When you get all smug and condescending… you just don’t understand me! You never really have. Why I oughta…”
Eventually the hormones bleed off in their own sweet time. Or maybe you end up going to the gym anyway (grumble, gripe, moan) and get that heart rate elevated and flush out the hormones. Or some other gland starts squirting (heh. It sounds dirty when I say it like that.) and your brain drops the previous issue and picks up the new one to start gnawing on.
This model resonates for me. It explains the capricious nature of emotional response; how something can seem so terribly important, so overwhelming at one time, and then later seem like such a tempest in a teacup. And it reduces the function of consciousness down to a very simple pattern. Analyze incoming stimulus, produce an explanation. Analyze incoming stimulus, produce an explanation. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Which is related to my other post, consciousness is a myth. But I’ll save that for a later time.
She said to me, “I thought you’d join me in the shower. Instead, I find you washing my dishes. I’m not sure which is sexier.”
This sign, from a corporate bathroom to be named at a later date, amuses me.
Note: Using your camera in a public restroom is a dangerous activity, and should be attempted only with the utmost caution. Mainly, I just like using the word “utmost”.
Doing all your Christmas shopping online is old news; people have been doing that for a while now. But this year, I’ve come up on a new twist.
I’m going to buy people gifts based on the spam I’m receiving this week! Based on today’s batch of spam, I’m going to be giving a lot of fake Rolex watches, V1agra, and some cream that promises to make you thicker and longer. Some loved ones will be receiving some penny stocks, while others will get a new rate on their mortgage!
Last night, I saw Mike Doughty at Mississippi Studios.
Before I saw something about the show, let me talk about the venue.
There’s a doorfront on Mississippi Ave for the place, but that’s not where you enter. Instead, you go in through Mississippi Station (a bar/pub next door), pass through the restaurant, out the back doors to the outside patio, keep going, then bear left into… what looks like someone’s backyard. Up the stairs to the house, and go on in. Sure enough, the place is a converted home that sits fewer than 100 people. (Okay, I confess to being anal enough that I counted. 79 seats.) In such a small space, it seems silly to talk about a balcony, but there is a section of seating towards the back that is elevated just barely above the heads of the people ahead, and I found a pair of seats on the front row of that platform. I’ve seen Doughty in clubs of over 1000, and in this show, it was like he was hanging out in the living room with me. This place just become my favorite Portland venue. If there’s someone I’m even mildly interested seeing that is playing at MS, I’m so there.
As for the show itself: I’ve seen Mike play smaller two man shows, and larger shows where he has a full band behind him. I prefer the smaller gigs, hands down. I just prefer the simpler, sparser sound when it’s just Doughty and his guitar, maybe with one side man. Given that, last night’s show made me really happy. He had one other musician with him, a fellow named Scrap Livingston playing cello and resonator guitar. (I had to do some digging on Google and Wikipedia to find the name of this. I hope I got it right. It looks like a standard guitar, except for the large, round metal platter on the body of the guitar, which gives it a sound a bit like a banjo.)
Mike and Scrap performed a great mix of audience favorites and some new songs from his forthcoming album, “Golden Delicious”. Off-hand, I recall them playing 27 Jennifers, White Lexus, Busting Up a Starbucks, Grey Ghost, Janine, Looking at the World from the Bottom of a Well, Madeline and Nine, Rising Sign, Sunken-Eyed Girl, Thank You Lord For Sending Me The F Train, Tremendous Brunettes, True Dreams Of Wichita, Unsingable Name. In between songs, mike and Scrap drew questions from the Question Jar, answering queries from the audience. We learned what the “Unsingable Name” was, which albums changed MD’s life, his perspective on his past drug use, his recent experience on morning drive-time radio shows, his thoughts about our fair city, and much more.
All in all, it was a hell of a show, maybe the best I’ve seen in Portland (and I’ve seen some real winners)! A big, enthusiastic “Hell yeah!”
Last Saturday the lovely pre-doc and I went to the grand opening of Batty’s Hippodrome, a new venue in Portland for circus arts. I saw the late show, which featured Seattle’s Pure Cirkus.
The Hippodrome is buried in the dark
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends–
It gives a lovely light!
Life has been moving pretty damn fast lately, too fast for me to be documenting it all in LJ. There have been a lot of nights that ended at 1 am only to begin a new day at 5. There is a fabulous new relationship to explore. There is the pleasure in constantly finding something new and delightful in the existing relationship. I’ve seen some amazing shows in Portlandia. Oh yeah, and work, and tutoring. *whew*
I’ve done one little road trip to Bend already this week, and will make another trip (To the coast? Not sure yet.) before it’s all over. In between, I’ll try to rest up a bit, before my candle ends meet in the middle.
The Red-headed Amazon invited me to see Ben Harper at the Keller Auditorium last night, along with a batch of her friends. I only kinda knew the music of BH, had never seen a show at the Keller, and had met her friends just once or twice before.
Harper was great! His music is a blend of modern blues, reggae and pop, backed by an amazing bass player, drums, keyboards, two guitars and bongos. Think Jack Johnson, with a lot more soul and energy. He sort of reminds me of a modern Bill Withers (and he actually covered a BW song last night). At one point in the show, the band dropped to a bare whisper and Harper stepped to the apron of the stage and sang several verses to the house with no mic, no amplification at all, just a raw, naked voice to a crowd of a couple of thousand people. I was overwhelmed by how powerful that moment was.
The only cheesiness of the show was how over the top some of Harper’s stage patter was. At one point, he congratulated the audience on their bravery in embracing such a creative and unique blend of music. Yeah, I’ve never felt so brave as when I attended a music concert. 🙂
The Keller is a big house, a traditional proscenium theater. It’s very wide, not terribly deep, and has two generous balconies. Our seats were about half way down, on the main floor, on the far left side. We had a pretty good view, and were able to stand on the wings when we wanted to stretch, fidget or bounce to the music. The crowd was incredibly receptive, applauding enthusiastically, standing for a bunch of the high-energy songs, and sitting quietly for the slower tunes.
And the RHA’s friends are a cool bunch that I’m enjoying getting to know better. Sitting in the car after the show, with four people piled into the back seat was more giggly, silly fun than I’ve had in a while. Good people, good times. 🙂