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Two parallel neural ectoderm progenitors contribute to the developing brain

137 points · 80 comments · Jimmc414

  1. carefree-bob · · focus · HN ↗
    There was a book in the 1970s called "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" by Julian Jaynes, where he argued that ancient civilizations -- and he used examples from Homer -- lacked the current modern sense of self-consciousness. If you look at their behavior, they interact with some external divine voice that drives their actions, whereas if you read modern literature you see people being driven by an inner voice which they associate with themselves.

    This shift from the &quot;bicameral mentality&quot; of the external voice to the modern mentality of the inner voice was hypothesized by Jaynes to be rooted in some biological changes in the brain. At the time there was split brain research that showed these two parts of the brain function independently almost as two different minds in the same skull. See this 2007 survey: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.researchgate.net&#x2F;publication&#x2F;6323702_The_bicameral_mind30_years_on_A_critical_reappraisal_of_Julian_Jaynes&#x27;_hypothesis" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.researchgate.net&#x2F;publication&#x2F;6323702_The_bicamer...

    1. drdaeman · · focus · HN ↗
      It’s an interesting book for sure, but I had (minor, but still) issues even with the introductory premises. Just a few notes I made from the very first chapter:

      - Jaynes used the term “reminiscence” in a way very different from Ballard and claimed no animal is capable of reminiscence. That was a very odd claim overall.

      - Then he claimed that if we ever create a language that can express everything, metaphors won’t be possible. Which is, I think, almost obviously false, because many metaphors are constructed artistically, despite having exact terms.

      - And he talks about spatialization as a primitive aspect of consciousness, but he seems to talk about relations&#x2F;connectedness at best.

      And so on - I misplaced my notes somewhere and only recovered a few random bits. Still, interesting reading, fun (albeit really questionable) core idea, but those papercuts were kinda off-putting for me.

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