This is article #13 being published in the blog series and I thought of capturing a few topics of possible interest in the same article. I sincerely hope the article will generate many constructive and enlightening responses which may serve to benefit most people.
The human brain sitting at the top of our bodies and located between our shoulders is estimated to contain between 86 and 100 billion neurons, with an almost equal number of glia cells and several hundreds of synapses, perhaps as many as 1000, connected to each neuron. In total, we are looking at between 75 and 100 trillion electrical and chemical connections firing in our heads. This is simply amazing or mind-boggling to say the least. There are many websites and other sources that describe and provide specific information about the human brain structure, its operation and phenomenal thinking capacity, so I will not elaborate more on this aspect. However, I’m sure we will all agree that our bodily computer is an astonishing machine that has helped Homo sapiens to evolve at an astonishing pace to this day.
Yet, the Homo sapiens species is relatively new when compared and measured in relation to other animal species that have evolved over many millions of years on this planet. And we still have a lot of potential for growth both scientifically and of course sociologically-wise. Obviously, our species will need many thousands of years, if not several hundred thousand years before we will evolve to a level of maturity where we all work together in harmony, synergy at its best, for the benefit and respect of everyone along with sustainable peace. Obviously, we are a long way off as a relatively young species to achieve this desired maturity level.
One of the many phenomenal wonders that our brain connections has which is not too often mentioned is our thinking outside-the-box ability or, what I describe as related and even non-related contextual thinking processes. Let me explain myself with a specific example that we can relate to. In the previous fiction-based article I described my imaginary thoughts concerning some very advanced aliens from a far distant planetary system surrounding a star located 2,015 light-years from our sun and who came to our rescue to provide help to our species and evolve progressively. The evolutionary process would be more like leapfrogging into the future and bring about lasting stability, cooperation and sustainable peace throughout our planet. Of course, this article was just the opener and I have conceptualized a series of evolutionary articles that would describe the process these aliens would need to implement at an accelerated pace in our evolutionary process to bring about long lasting peace in our small planet, and even colonization throughout our own solar system. Btw, the support from our new alien friends would not be one-sided affair but also would provide tangible benefits for them as well, a win-win arrangement for everyone.
An appropriate question to ask would be what brought about the creation of the last fiction article? Well, in my mind there is far too much violence, wars, conflicts, vengeance, greed, jealousy, terrorism and this trend seems to be increasing steadily throughout on our small planet. Yet, we remain unable to solve our own problems no matter what efforts we attempt to apply. On an individual basis we seek help from family members, friends and professionals to resolve our own personal problems when we are unable to on our own. So, by applying this thinking process to bring about counselling for mankind as a whole, I imagined that the help that mankind needs to cure itself at this time and re-align us back in the proper evolutionary direction may come from advanced and caring aliens.
In light of what I described up to now, would even a super computer have been able to conceptualize and produce an article like the last fictional one that was posted? I seriously doubt it because there was no pattern or trend between planetary violence and conflicts of every kind and my article with aliens coming to the rescue with help to resolve our issues. Computers, so far, are not designed to perform abstract thinking like humans can perform with relative ease. Our species’ reasoning and cognitive abilities, along with astronomical brain connections which spark our ideas, thoughts, imagination and creative processes mixed with our emotions, feelings and sentiments make for a powerful inspiring and motivating cocktail. Most of the time our cocktails are quite effective and are certainly motivating and worthwhile, but occasionally the results turn ugly for ourselves and others, as we have all become very familiar with of over time.
Computers are essentially designed to perform pre-programmed processes at a much, much faster pace than humans can otherwise perform manually. Besides, computers cannot perform what-if and out-of-the-box conceptual thinking processes through self-analysis and resolution processes on their own. Computers greatly assist mankind with predesigned applications/programs to resolve repetitive and very involved algorithmic processes that would otherwise require mankind a phenomenal number of manual calculations that would consume a huge amount of time and possibly be prone to human types of manual and transcription errors etc. Will we ever see the day that computers with artificial intelligence will undertake, overtake or even parallel some of the human cognitive and conceptual thinking processes that we complete spontaneously? Perhaps, however I do not foresee this expanded aspect of our super computers being capable of such cognitive tasks, menial and fairly simplistic for us, for the foreseeable future, or for many thousands or even tens of thousands of years in the future.
In the last few thousand years there have been a countless number of great western and eastern philosophers that have served as forward thinkers for our social, scientific, technological, artistic and economic development. Without these great thinkers our evolutionary process would probably have been somewhat stagnant or significantly retarded. We sometimes refer to philosophers as prominent people that have walked the surface of the Earth a long time ago. Is there any further need for philosophers in today’s society? I believe that more than ever we do have an increasing need for enlightened philosophers to exercise wisdom and develop concepts and orientation for our species’ sustained future growth with harmony and manifest the goodwill and respect for everyone, along with the desired care and protection of the animal kingdom friends since we remain the higher form of cognitive living beings on this planet, at least at the present time.
In concluding this article, I truly believe that mankind is presently at a crossroad which involves scientific, technological, economic, ideological, cultural and social orientation, and our species is in a pressing need for assistance to restore proper balance and stability in our values and orientation for the future.
The human brain sitting at the top of our bodies and located between our shoulders is estimated to contain between 86 and 100 billion neurons, with an almost equal number of glia cells and several hundreds of synapses, perhaps as many as 1000, connected to each neuron. In total, we are looking at between 75 and 100 trillion electrical and chemical connections firing in our heads. This is simply amazing or mind-boggling to say the least. There are many websites and other sources that describe and provide specific information about the human brain structure, its operation and phenomenal thinking capacity, so I will not elaborate more on this aspect. However, I’m sure we will all agree that our bodily computer is an astonishing machine that has helped Homo sapiens to evolve at an astonishing pace to this day.
Yet, the Homo sapiens species is relatively new when compared and measured in relation to other animal species that have evolved over many millions of years on this planet. And we still have a lot of potential for growth both scientifically and of course sociologically-wise. Obviously, our species will need many thousands of years, if not several hundred thousand years before we will evolve to a level of maturity where we all work together in harmony, synergy at its best, for the benefit and respect of everyone along with sustainable peace. Obviously, we are a long way off as a relatively young species to achieve this desired maturity level.
One of the many phenomenal wonders that our brain connections has which is not too often mentioned is our thinking outside-the-box ability or, what I describe as related and even non-related contextual thinking processes. Let me explain myself with a specific example that we can relate to. In the previous fiction-based article I described my imaginary thoughts concerning some very advanced aliens from a far distant planetary system surrounding a star located 2,015 light-years from our sun and who came to our rescue to provide help to our species and evolve progressively. The evolutionary process would be more like leapfrogging into the future and bring about lasting stability, cooperation and sustainable peace throughout our planet. Of course, this article was just the opener and I have conceptualized a series of evolutionary articles that would describe the process these aliens would need to implement at an accelerated pace in our evolutionary process to bring about long lasting peace in our small planet, and even colonization throughout our own solar system. Btw, the support from our new alien friends would not be one-sided affair but also would provide tangible benefits for them as well, a win-win arrangement for everyone.
An appropriate question to ask would be what brought about the creation of the last fiction article? Well, in my mind there is far too much violence, wars, conflicts, vengeance, greed, jealousy, terrorism and this trend seems to be increasing steadily throughout on our small planet. Yet, we remain unable to solve our own problems no matter what efforts we attempt to apply. On an individual basis we seek help from family members, friends and professionals to resolve our own personal problems when we are unable to on our own. So, by applying this thinking process to bring about counselling for mankind as a whole, I imagined that the help that mankind needs to cure itself at this time and re-align us back in the proper evolutionary direction may come from advanced and caring aliens.
In light of what I described up to now, would even a super computer have been able to conceptualize and produce an article like the last fictional one that was posted? I seriously doubt it because there was no pattern or trend between planetary violence and conflicts of every kind and my article with aliens coming to the rescue with help to resolve our issues. Computers, so far, are not designed to perform abstract thinking like humans can perform with relative ease. Our species’ reasoning and cognitive abilities, along with astronomical brain connections which spark our ideas, thoughts, imagination and creative processes mixed with our emotions, feelings and sentiments make for a powerful inspiring and motivating cocktail. Most of the time our cocktails are quite effective and are certainly motivating and worthwhile, but occasionally the results turn ugly for ourselves and others, as we have all become very familiar with of over time.
Computers are essentially designed to perform pre-programmed processes at a much, much faster pace than humans can otherwise perform manually. Besides, computers cannot perform what-if and out-of-the-box conceptual thinking processes through self-analysis and resolution processes on their own. Computers greatly assist mankind with predesigned applications/programs to resolve repetitive and very involved algorithmic processes that would otherwise require mankind a phenomenal number of manual calculations that would consume a huge amount of time and possibly be prone to human types of manual and transcription errors etc. Will we ever see the day that computers with artificial intelligence will undertake, overtake or even parallel some of the human cognitive and conceptual thinking processes that we complete spontaneously? Perhaps, however I do not foresee this expanded aspect of our super computers being capable of such cognitive tasks, menial and fairly simplistic for us, for the foreseeable future, or for many thousands or even tens of thousands of years in the future.
In the last few thousand years there have been a countless number of great western and eastern philosophers that have served as forward thinkers for our social, scientific, technological, artistic and economic development. Without these great thinkers our evolutionary process would probably have been somewhat stagnant or significantly retarded. We sometimes refer to philosophers as prominent people that have walked the surface of the Earth a long time ago. Is there any further need for philosophers in today’s society? I believe that more than ever we do have an increasing need for enlightened philosophers to exercise wisdom and develop concepts and orientation for our species’ sustained future growth with harmony and manifest the goodwill and respect for everyone, along with the desired care and protection of the animal kingdom friends since we remain the higher form of cognitive living beings on this planet, at least at the present time.
In concluding this article, I truly believe that mankind is presently at a crossroad which involves scientific, technological, economic, ideological, cultural and social orientation, and our species is in a pressing need for assistance to restore proper balance and stability in our values and orientation for the future.