Mittwoch, 4. Juni 2014

the switch of consciousness


the switch of consciousness, 2014


i took the photo “the switch of consciousness” in the halls of the old secondary school (progymnasium, called progr) in berne as a part of a private project i’ve been pursuing for the past four years.

switch of consciousness

i’m referring to blog 6 on the topic of creativity, blog 9 about neurochemical connections and blog 10 on the topic of memory and conscious and subconscious storage.

brain research is trying to solve one of the last big mysteries: consciousness. but neither consciousness from a philosophical point of view nor a certain part in the brain for consciousness exist, just like there is no place for the soul in our body.

consciousness is a state of deliberate experience that i can tell people about.

background consciousness is based on my emotional experiences and shows me that this body is my body and that i have my own identity. i can also differentiate between reality and my thoughts and intentions. in short: i know that it is (only) me who thinks, feels, experiences or even decides and acts.

actual consciousness means that i, on the one hand, notice occurrences in the environment or in my body through my senses and, on the other hand, experience emotions and needs, i.e. hunger. this also includes purely mental activities such as thinking and remembering.

most of the daily happenings, however, don’t require consciousness as our brain can process many things that don’t even reach our consciousness. this is called implicit perception – implicit learning.

the explicit operation mode of consciousness is required when it comes to learning new things – this is even fostered by consciousness! learning new things is achieved by creating neuronal lanes and groups (nerve cells are created and organized in new groups). the working memory (=cortex) plays a key role in this process. after the “roads” (lanes) have been developed, strengthened and automated, the activity of the working memory is being reduced. with automatization, actual consciousness turns into nothing but a limiting factor – everything is done unconsciously – we can even do it in our sleep.

since sensations reach us faster than we can process them, we need a working memory to buffer data. this is done with the help of the neurotransmitter dopamine which i introduced to you when talking about creativity in blog 6.

this information is stored in the cortex for a short amount of time until it has been analyzed, classified and compared to previous experiences

dopamine therefore ensures a slow, cognitive processing of information in the cortex. 

the stress hormone noradrenaline is released in the locus coeruleus (blue core) in times of stress and prevents the effect of dopamine. this causes the working memory to turn itself off in favor of parts of the brain that are not part of the cortex. noradrenaline thus fosters fast, analog processing of information that is not accessible by our consciousness.

stress and the release of noradrenaline thus lead to a shift in the brain from a conscious, slow mode to a fast and subconscious one. noradrenaline is incidentally a chemical precursor of dopamine – both are of importance for the development of psychological illnesses

the stress hormone noradrenaline in the blue core plays an important role for shifting between consciousness and subconsciousness. (noradrenaline is also produced in the adrenal glands, where it leads to bodily stress reactions in combination with adrenaline).

unconsciously working brain structures, located deeply in the brain and particularly in the limbic system, come into effect in this way. switching off the working memory complicates or precludes the learning process and with that our receptiveness and also creativity. stress kills the ability to think as well as creativity

among many other structures, the amygdala (almond core – memory for fear and feelings), the mesolimbic pathway with the nucleus accumbens (luck and reward system) and the hippocampus (sea horse – the declarative, episodical long-term memory) are part of the limbic system.

it is thus not astonishing that our stress plagued society is severely suffering from psychological and physical diseases, as though it seems that we turn off our conscious control through our behavior and are thereby making way for automated and morbid brain processes.

i will continue talking about findings from stress and trauma research in future blog posts. this will allow insights into how we are experiencing the world, how we are guided and what possibilities we have to steer our boat ourselves. according to findings in brain research and quantum physics, the extent of these possibilities is, however, far from certain.

sources: gerhard roth, klaus grawe