Pain is a complex feeling, with many dimensions and sensations. Usually we are required to describe it verbally, even though pain is not a verbal sensation
Pain. Abdominal pain, headache, pain that brings life like labor pain, pain from rubbing, burning or stinging, or just heartache for something unfortunate that happened... It is very difficult to define pain. Although it is clear that pain is universal, you never know whether the level of pain that one person describes as "unbearable" is the same as the pain threshold of another person, who is willing to endure the same amount of pain and a little more.
But we have a need for pain, measuring it and knowing about it. Both for the purposes of healing the pain, and also to use the important message that pain transmits to us - something is not right and needs to be treated. There is a use of pain, which only emphasizes the fact that we must measure and tell about the pain to those who take care of us, whether it is a doctor, a psychologist, or a concerned parent of a small child. Even just sharing our pain can help. So sharing the pain is a sought-after commodity, and certainly accurate and clear sharing can help more.
But how do we tell another person about our pain?
Pain is a complex feeling, with many dimensions and sensations. Usually we are required to describe it verbally, even though pain is not a verbal feeling - there is emotional pain and deep sorrow from the bride, there are burning sensations in the skin or internal irritation, there is a fleeting and quick pain, which passes by the time we have enough to describe it (and suddenly reappears). Sometimes it's also difficult to talk about pain - because it's hard to talk about it, because of a language barrier, or because we were taught to "pursue our lips and suffer". We would be happy if we had an objective measurement for pain - beyond the deficient verbal description.
In the article published this month, a review was conducted on modern imaging techniques that may help to understand the level of pain that another person experiences, in an objective and non-verbal way. This - by measuring the brain processes that people experience while feeling the pain.
The researcher describes two areas that usually respond to pain, when subjects experience it inside a magnetic imaging device. The first is the thalamus - an area in the center of the brain which centers sensory input from the entire body, both information flowing from the spinal cord and from other areas, such as the limbic system which is associated with emotions. The second brain area is very extensive, the frontal cortex - where sensory information, attention and attention are concentrated, and generally operate when we think in a complex way.
When you lie in the imaging device and go through different degrees of painful injury, the level of activity in these areas will teach us about the intensity of the pain that person experiences, also on a personal level - how much it hurts for that person. Measuring brain activity during prolonged or chronic pain will help to understand what the pain means and its intensity for each person. In addition - we will also be able to measure the connection between the areas, that is, to stand for the complexity that occurs when the information about the pain is transmitted, and what actually happens behind the scenes.
Learning about pain and wondering about our jar - maybe we found another way to "tell" and share with others. And the mere knowledge that they will share in our pain, sometimes also, makes it easier.
The article and link to it:
Tracey, I. (2011) Can neuroimaging studies identify pain endophenotypes in humans? Nature Reviews Neurology, 7
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Pain is definitely something subjective according to what the late Prof. Leibovitz wrote that the human brain sends a command to the nerve and tells it that there is pain, the most unbearable pain if it can be expressed like this is a toothache even then the brain sends a command to the nerve telling it to activate the means of relief or healing or the system The immune system of the body, so pain is subjective, meaning that no one can feel your pain, even if they understand, for example, a person who has lost a father or mother and is in mourning, unfortunately, every person in this country and on earth knows what the loss of a father, mother, son or daughter is, but no one is can feel the same pain as the person who is in sadness or grief and the same goes for physical and non-mental pain common sense claims that mental pain is sometimes infinitely more unbearable than physical pain and for physical pain you can take painkillers or medicines that will ease the pain regarding mental pain I am satisfied
Machel,
Doesn't a gas molecule have a temperature? If the heat of the gas is the average of the kinetic energies of all the molecules, does the unit also have kinetic energy?
right point,
The sense of color and the rule of recognition are an infinite collection of representations.
And the others are right - consciousness, as far as I understand it, is a physical state,
But what physical condition? Science does not know how to deal with it, not to measure, not to quantify in any other way, not to describe in any way, and in fact today researchers have no access to cognition.
Consciousness is a consequence of thermoelectric processes, but the pulses and transmitters are not the state of consciousness.
In a previous debate I argued that consciousness is an abstract state, and I was ridiculed. In the meantime I found an article by a physics professor who also talks about abstract things in consciousness.
http://odyssey.org.il/209313.
Machel
You are right in that I was wrong in the facts I wrote in the first part of my response, and I apologize to you, apparently my memory also goes wrong sometimes and apparently I remembered facts that are not exactly correct 🙂
Regarding the question itself, you may not have understood the question correctly, so I will elaborate:
You wrote: "No animal (and man in general) does not secrete cells as color"
I wasn't talking about an animal excreting cells as a color.
In other words, what I meant to say is:
That the cells that create the color component in the molecules are cells, we will define them in this case as cells that are permanent or fundamental, but these cells cause -every animal that has the ability to absorb light of a certain wavelength- to behave differently because of a different perception of the wavelengths of the nature around them! ?
Moti:
you are rambling
Do you even know what dimension you are talking about another dimension?
Tell me:
Do you think the gas has pressure? After all, a gas molecule has no pressure, but the pressure is an accumulated expression of the total momentum of the molecules.
Does a gas have a temperature?
A gas molecule has no temperature, but a gas does, and this is the statistical expression of the average kinetic energy of the molecules.
There are machines that can operate in different ways as a result of different pressures and different temperatures and this without having any access to the level of the molecules and this while the molecules determine their mode of operation.
So how about your sensations being cumulative expressions of neuronal excitation states?
Do you really want to ignore the fact that applying a current to a certain point in the human brain causes him to report that he wants to raise his hand?
What is the meaning of this fact if not the simple claim that the electrical stimulation of that area of the brain is the desire to raise the hand?
ghosts:
Although the description of the facts in your response is incorrect:
What is the mood of a squid anyway? It is common to think that its color changes are simply a camouflage mechanism.
Dogs are not color blind: http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/366/are-cats-and-dogs-really-color-blind-how-do-they-know
No animal (and man in general) does not secrete cells as color. The vision process does not create new cells.
But the final conclusion - that the perception of color is different in different animals is still true and it is a fact that there are animals (mainly insects) that are able to see ultraviolet light that humans cannot see at all.
A protein encoded in a certain configuration causes jellyfish to glow green.
Jellyfish don't have eyes, and apparently they can't see colors either.
A squid (or an octopus?) has the ability to change its body color and signal to other squids about its moods.
Dogs are said to be color blind.
What does all this say about the human ability to differentiate between the color red for example and the color green?
Does specific coding of a specific protein cause the creation of specific cells that the person interprets as color,
And other animals - based on the exact same proteins - 'perceive' the phenomenon (which man calls color) in a different way than man does?
Basically everyone is wrong, everyone still doesn't know and don't understand the existence of the feeling as a thing in itself.
And only know how it is caused, how to activate it, or how to measure it
That would be like saying the earth is flat.
The feeling is another dimension.
Avner:
Color is a bit more complex.
It exists in the real world but it is more complex than a wavelength.
In a previous response I wrote that it was a combination of wavelengths, but it is worth emphasizing - especially in light of what was said in the link he brought without - that it is an even more complex thing.
I recommend you to enter the above website.
with no:
However, I have several comments regarding the pretense of answering questions.
One is that it doesn't really explain what the feeling is. He presents an approach that describes common denominators of sensations, but in my opinion - does not deal with the subjective question of qualia.
Personally, I would attack the matter a little differently - especially in light of the difference he points to (and rightly so) between what our body reacts to without "determining" it and things we feel. I won't go into it here because I don't have a definitive answer either - despite the particular change. I'll probably point the direction anyway after the next section.
The second thing is that he ignores the existence of sensations that are absent from the matter of the immediate interaction he describes between the body and the world.
It is important, for example, about the feeling of sorrow.
After all, it is clear that such a feeling exists and it is also clear that it does not have the qualities that he attributes to feelings.
As far as I'm concerned - the problem he attacks (not the one he pretends to attack but the one he really attacks) gets a better answer if you look at the matter from an evolutionary point of view.
Physical sensations that we actually feel are sensations that being aware of allows us to act more successfully.
The meaning of feelings that under different conditions - in combination with other feelings - will allow us to choose wisely from a variety of ways of action - that is - it is not about feelings that connect to things that we have no possibility of influencing or feelings that always make us act in the same way.
I know it's a bit vague and it's not a coincidence - I haven't had time to think about it in the necessary depth yet.
To the point - there is such a concept in nature called red, it is the wavelength reflected by blood, and our brain is built to decipher this color according to emotional context, in defensive mode it will interpret this color as a warning as part of an evolutionary mechanism of self-defense and dealing with injuries; In aggressive mode you will interpret this color as invitations to attack and injure a victim; And it is possible to continue what happens in other mods (sexual attraction, etc.). Green is associated with fresh food. Blue with water. and so'.
with no:
It took me a while to respond because I wanted to read the material.
So I read.
Nice link!
point:
This is really a strange question.
Our knowledge is organized in levels and most people do not deal with more than one level at all.
An expert in quantum theory does not know how to build a radio even though the radio is all quantum. He also does not necessarily master chemistry even though chemistry is all quantum.
The level of biology is "higher" than the level of chemistry and lower than the level of consciousness.
It is all about different levels of knowledge organization.
point:
And what mental components are there in an image on a computer?
If mentality is part of nature why doesn't it appear in the standard model? Why don't you study a course in mentality for advanced physics?
Point (28):
You make the creator!
You attribute to me a claim that I never claimed that nature is mental when I claimed exactly the opposite.
My argument is that the mentality is natural - that is - it is part of nature.
Guy, don't get confused between the model itself which is a product of thinking and of course it is all a representation.
A representation of what? We don't know what. We call it reality. But this is only a representation. We do not know what reality itself is, and we cannot know.
This representation (the theory) called a standard model does not contain mental components.
In the concept of a particle there are no mental components (such as color, impulse, desire, experience). A particle is a concept that describes a representation of a phenomenon. Nothing more. Not a representation of reality. We have no idea about reality.
point:
"The standard model explains nature. And in the standard model, a natural process known as "representation" does not appear.
If we look at the definition of what a model is in science, we will see that this is not the case:
http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%93%D7%9C_(%D7%9E%D7%93%D7%A2)
The first sentence states that representation is an essential part of understanding natural processes:
"In science, a model is a theoretical representation of a complex system"
"Particle" is a representation, "force" is a representation.
There is nothing in an image on a computer that is more or less real than a particle
Well, Michael, this is exactly what is amazing in science (=representation of phenomena through mathematical representations), it is not trivial. That is, it was possible to think that it was not possible to "understand the world". And the wonder is that it is possible.
But it is a long way from this wonder to the claim that nature itself is mental.
point:
I don't have the strength to argue with your nihilistic approach that repeats itself time and time again.
It is a fact that not only are there representations, but it is possible to build machines (which operate under the laws of nature) and understand these representations.
By the way - there are also representations that were built in nature not by human hands: for example, the DNA structure represents the various protein structures and other activities that occur in the cell.
For some reason you insist on calling only a tiny part of nature by the name "nature".
point (24)
You wrote: "There are no representations in nature. In nature there are particles and forces."
I get the impression that you lack a basic understanding of some topics.
After all, 'particles and forces' are a representation of everything in nature. That is, everything in nature consists of particles and forces that act on those particles. Even these letters are made up of pixels that are basically made up of particles.
And this is the representation that man gave to the experiences he had.
point (14)
If I understood you correctly, then my answer to you is:
The very fact that the value of pain is measured (that is, strong pain or weak pain, etc.), indicates that pain is an experience that can be measured in a scientific process.
Hence, with the help of the subject who experienced the pain, the value of the pain can be measured.
The fact that the soul is not scientifically proven (at least not yet) does not mean that pain cannot be measured (even if it is the subject's feelings).
In nature there are no representations. In nature there are particles and forces. The standard model explains nature. And in the standard model, a natural process known as "representation" does not appear.
Representation is a mental/mental/experiential concept. Therefore, the claim that the color red is a representation does not add anything to the contradiction.
The disc has no image, the disc has particles in certain situations. There is no image on the computer screen. There is no computer screen at all, there is a collection of atoms that emit/transmit photons.
All these image/color/computer screen concepts are mental representations of mental perceptions. And they themselves are part of the contradiction. And surely the contradiction cannot be resolved through them.
point:
Why are there no representations in nature? After all, Machal pointed out exactly where in nature there are representations - in the minds of living beings.
The mind is like a computer.
When the computer saves an image - this image is a representation of information received from the physical world - there is a correlation between the information stored in the computer and that in the world. This does not contradict the fact that the computer itself exists only in the physical world
I am not contradicting myself.
In nature there is representation.
Not only in the brain but also outside it.
For example, the word "dog" represents a dog, even though it is made up of completely different physical things from the things a dog is made up of.
You are contradicting yourself a bit. On the one hand you say that the color red exists. And on the other hand, you talk about "representation".
In nature there are no representations.
In nature there is only what is. Everything else is not.
You will find in the standard model in physics something about a light red color or an orange color.
point:
There is no contradiction here.
The brain is a physical entity and what happens in it is subject to the laws of physics.
The brain experiences a bright red color and therefore this experience does exist in the physical world.
In the physical universe there is what we call the color red only in our absence it is not visible at all and therefore does not appear red either (that is - the sensation of the red color does not exist in our absence but what causes us to feel this sensation - combinations of light wave frequencies - does exist - even in our absence).
The sensation of the color red - like the other sensations - is a mental representation of what is happening in the world outside the brain, but - like the brain - this mental representation also exists in the physical world. Not in the world outside the brain but yes in the part of the (physical) world inside it.
Michael, I mainly referred to the things you wrote. And regarding the lack of understanding in the public I did not mean you but others.
The contradictions are contradictions and I will clarify a little:
Sayings that
1) I experience a bright red color
2) In the physical universe there is no red color (in physics books you will not find bright red color particles)
3) The physical universe is a closed system. Everything that exists and everything that can be created from these physical processes are only physical processes.
4) "The experience is brain activity" = "The bright red color is (or is the result of) electrical physical activity in the brain"
Statement 4 contains a contradiction according to the definitions/assumptions 1,2,3 and therefore either statement 4 is nonsense because it contains a contradiction, or the definitions/assumptions 1,2,3 are incorrect.
What you call "contradictions" are not contradictions at all but your unwillingness to treat the facts as they are.
The truth is that you didn't even read some of the things like what I said about the "neural matching" which is true even if your other mistakes weren't mistakes.
point:
And I am amazed at your lack of understanding of such obvious things.
I have already written my reasons.
If anyone made it this far down here. Hello 🙂
I think that what can be found out with the brain scans in the case of pain.
It's degrees of difficulty that the body experiences at that moment.
Since there is pain that is "tolerable" it is possible to scan a person and find out that he will live without immediate treatment.
I assume that there is an area of the brain that lights up when pain is at the "unbearable" stage
And the mind/mind/person cannot concentrate on anything else, and in this case it can be identified and treated...
It will be possible to define general areas in the brain that are related to pain, and to determine grades for diagnosis in the future...
Maybe…. 🙂
A small addition -
I recommend reviewing O'Regan's approach to the subject of the location of feelings.
http://nivea.psycho.univ-paris5.fr/
I am amazed anew every time such a debate arises about the lack of understanding that exists in the public regarding these simple and obvious matters.
Michael, the video clip is definitely interesting (for example, you can learn from the video clip how ignorant Yaron London is with the country in matters of religion, science and philosophy) but this video does not affect my claims. Dear Professor, you don't know something that you don't know or something that I don't know in the simple and obvious area for any child who has learned to think about how to identify whether what is said is true or false.
It is clear to every child that if something is true it must not contain an internal contradiction. This is the basis of thinking and it rejects any qualitative scientific consideration however it may be. If something contains an internal contradiction, then it is not true and it does not matter how beautiful the content of the thing sounds.
No one is afraid to say something. I would happily like to identify a brain process with a certain experience, but I am not lying to myself just because of considerations of correlation. The logical contradiction that such a statement contains is stronger than the everyday sense of scientific correctness in this statement.
List of facts. The contradictions are self-evident.
1) In the universe there are particles and forces that are scattered in the cosmic space (gravitational force, electric force, weak force, strong force).
2) In our life there are no particles, no attractive forces, no electric forces, there is also no location of the self in the sense in which a particle is located. (Has anyone ever experienced an electron?)
3) In the universe (universe = the physical universe known to us from modern physics) there is no red color and no green color, no smell and no sound
4) In our experience there are all experiences. Examples of experiences: red color, pain, sound, smell, choice, imagination, etc.).
The contradiction is clear.
To ghost: A minimal definition of psyche includes the conscious experiences. And of course this has not been scientifically proven. Because it is a subject that experiences. And that's exactly what I'm saying. And you insist on identifying a pain experience that has not been scientifically proven, with measurements of brain processes that have been scientifically proven.
Oren: The position we have with regard to the organs, and with regard to visual perception it exists at any given moment, no phantoms are needed to make this clear. Read my example again.
Machel
I definitely agree with you. In general, you can say that 'everything is in the head'.
And what you wrote in the last few lines definitely justifies the claim that the feeling of pain is in the brain.
In addition, it can be said that the brain utilizes the cells (in the brain) that are no longer in use (but were once used)
In order to perform tasks that were not intended for them in the first place. And that's just because the mind is flexible, and can be 'played' with to create new things. Like a new insight, or a new activity (activity of an organ that was not activated by the same cells).
Likewise, free choice is also a result of brain activity.
And it is a result that the body 'understands' in retrospect - and not at the same moment - when the decision is made. That is, the free choice also precedes the 'conscious action' of the body.
incidentally:
It is interesting to note that the loss of information about the location of body parts is probably the phenomenon that, in extreme cases, translates into what is known as an out-of-body experience (in which the information about the location of the "I" in relation to the whole body is mistaken).
Two books that discuss different aspects of this matter are:
Why we see what isn't there
As well as:
The God impulse
Ghosts:
In your last comment you jumped a little above the navel.
The subject of phantom pains (actually - ghost pains in Hebrew) has been studied in depth by Professor Ramachandran and a large part of his book "Phantoms in the Brain" (in English - Phantoms in the brain) is devoted to the subject.
According to these studies - phantom pain has several causes.
One of the interesting reasons - which also relates to Punkut's puzzlement - is that of the learned connection between the state of the body's organs and the inputs that the brain receives from its various senses.
As everyone who has ever tried the relaxation methods of yoga knows - it is very easy to get into a situation where you do not know where and in what position the hands (or other body parts) are.
This is due to the fact that our sense of position derives from both muscle reports and visual reports. In relaxation as above - these also disappear.
In another discussion, experiments on the feeling of the position of the hand were mentioned:
https://www.hayadan.org.il/yet-another-word-on-altruism-1311103/#comment-280308
I gave the explanation for the results of these experiments in the response later in the same discussion - here:
https://www.hayadan.org.il/yet-another-word-on-altruism-1311103/#comment-280411
I guess you see the connection to the topic.
In light of these findings - Ramachandran was able to cure many cases of phantom pain by using techniques that are amazing in their beauty and simplicity.
For example - he was once approached by an amputee who claimed that he constantly felt that the fingers of his amputated hand were clenched into a fist with great force and stuck in the flesh of the palm.
Since he had no hand - he had no way to open the fist and reduce the pain.
Ramachandran built a box for him into which he could put his healthy hand and the stump of his amputated hand.
Inside the box was a mirror where the patient saw the reflection of his healthy hand on the side where the stump was.
So he told him to contract his healthy hand into a fist and then try to open both fists.
After several days in which the man used the aforementioned facility, his problem was solved.
Another mechanism of ghostly sensations mentioned in Ramachandran's book is related to the mapping of body parts onto the cerebral cortex: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cortical_homunculus
Each organ is mapped onto the brain because as you and I know (and I hope others will learn too) sensations are in the brain.
Many times, when an organ is severed - its nerves stop transmitting information to the brain.
What happens then is that a certain section of the brain is no longer utilized and this situation leads to an interesting phenomenon:
Adjacent areas (that have so far been associated with other organs) expand into the unused area and as a result it happens, for example, that touching a person's face makes them feel as if they are touching the fingers of their missing hand.
All the above phenomena, as you can see, are not subject to free choice at all.
point:
Arguing with you, Ghost is right throughout everything I've been able to read from your comments.
The truth is that even what Oren wrote is - without intending to - proof of the truth of the ghost's words (after all, when the hand is gone and it still hurts - it is a sign that the pain is not in the hand but in the brain!).
As far as our understanding is concerned - and this understanding is shared, more or less - by all brain researchers - what is called soul is nothing but brain activity.
There is a lot of evidence for this and one of the most beautiful of them is the one mentioned by Professor Sompoliansky here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d35nFvb1Wh4&feature=channel_page
It turns out - according to the experiment he describes - that even the holy of holies of the "soul" - its desire - is brain activity.
In general - those who are afraid of explicit statements, speak of "neural correlate" - this is the translation I chose for the foreign term Neural correlate described here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_correlate
It is a neural configuration that is closely coordinated with this or that "mental" experience - that is - a neural behavior in the absence of which the experience does not exist and in its existence the experience also exists.
Even those who are afraid to say that there is no mystical soul must still agree with the above experimental findings.
In principle - there is no problem in discovering brain areas whose activity is in full correlation with the sensation of pain and whose activity level is in correlation with the intensity of the pain. This can also be tested in an experiment (where the measurement of nerve activity is compared with the reports of the owners of those nerves)
So what does it give?
One of the things such a finding will clearly provide is a way to find out how much pain a person feels.
By the way - sight is also a "mental" experience and to the best of my memory there have already been experiments in which they found out what a cat sees by measuring neural activity in its brain.
Pine
very true. "The nervous system still signals pain, irritation or deformity."
The brain continues to send an electrical signal to that place that needs repair.
Maybe, the question is, why? Why does the brain continue to send an electrical signal to that area that cannot be repaired even though the body is aware of it?
The answer, in my opinion, is that the brain does not distinguish between the question 'is there/is there no possibility of repair'.
I think the brain continues to send a signal to the same area, but the answer to the correction depends solely on its 'free choice'
It's up to the person whether to continue repairing the damaged area or not.
It seems to me that a point means what is best illustrated by the phenomenon of phantom pains. Even though the organ is not there (if from amputation or if from birth) and there is actually nothing to "fix" as you say, the nervous system still signals pain, irritation or deformity.
point
What does it have to do with the soul? The existence of the soul has not yet been scientifically proven.
In any case, it is possible to feel pain in the hand when the brain sends a signal to that area of the hand that is injured.
Besides, I think that it is indeed possible to measure the value of the pain. (I can testify for myself that when I realize that there is pain in the place where I was hurt - then the level of pain decreases because of the 'understanding' that that area was hurt)
When the hand hurts, you feel the pain in the hand itself. And it's a strange and wonderful part when you understand it. Think about it for a while and then you'll realize that it's really a miracle. How is it possible to feel pain in the hand when the mind is in the brain at all.
What happens is that the feeling of pain has a location attached to it. In general, the whole subjective thing is strange. And of course it is not a process that is measured.
point
Without disrespecting you, I think you wrote nonsense:
"How is it possible that the hand hurts when there is no brain in the hand at all"
Why would there be a brain in the hand??
It is enough for the brain to send an electrical signal to some nerve or neuron to 'signal' to it that there is a vulnerable link that needs repair somewhere in the system it controls (the body).
By the way, there is a difference between a feeling of pain and a feeling of sorrow or something similar.
Pain is a special signal from the brain to the body.
Sorrow or grief or a feeling of disappointment and the like are qualities that, in my opinion, are concentrated only in the mind and not in the body.
Ghost..?
What you wrote you wrote. It seems to me that you yourself have noticed the problems that arise when you think about the subject. And so you added something in brackets...
An example of the problem between what happens and the experience is that, on the one hand, they claim that the soul is in the brain, but on the other hand, everyone will say that the "hand" is the one that hurts him. So how is it possible that the hand hurts when there is no brain in the hand at all.
point
You are wrong.
Pain is indeed a 'brain process'.
According to what I learn from this 'pain': that when the body is damaged somewhere, then the brain sends signals to that damaged place so that the owner of the body feels the need to repair the defect (and as the intensity of the damage, so does the intensity of the feeling of pain).
Kinda agree with 1
The author confuses pain with brain processes. It is neither appropriate nor nice in a scientific journal to make such a serious error.
Pain is a subjective experience. And the measurements measure something else altogether, something not subjective. So there is no connection between what had to be proven and what was proven in this article.