Consciousness Requires Thought

When your mind goes 'blank,' your brain activity resembles deep sleep, scans reveal

Thinking obviously requires different parts of brain for different kinds of thoughts. This result indicates that, when your mind goes blank, your neurons are all waiting for each other to say something first. The simple truth is, your neurons can take cat naps. They organize according to proprioception, attempting to predict the next punch line, and just do nothing if nobody can connect the dots.

Note, this means it is possible to measure consciousness, but only statistically.

 

That’s a wild way to put it – neurons waiting on each other like awkward people at a party, no one wanting to speak first. I kinda love that image. When the mind “goes blank,” it feels less like nothingness and more like this quiet collective pause, right? Like the system’s still humming underneath, but every part is holding its breath. It makes sense that scans would mirror deep sleep; maybe consciousness isn’t a constant flame but something that flickers, rests, even hides behind itself.

I’ve noticed that feeling especially when I’m in sensory overload – too many inputs, too much noise, and then suddenly it’s all gone quiet inside. Maybe that’s the neurons calling a truce. I’m curious about what you said regarding measuring consciousness statistically. If we’re only tracking it by probability, does that mean we can never truly pin it down in real time? Like it’s always half a ghost, half a signal? Feels poetic in a way – the brain dreaming even while awake, waiting for itself to remember it’s alive.

 

In physics, it is the lowest possible energy state, like a car engine idling. Stomping on the gas gives you acceleration, and the lower the car can idle, the faster it can go. The more in tune your subconscious is with the humor in life, the easier it is to avoid bullshit, and figure out what you want for yourself.

The lowest possible energy state also comes with a "Local Minima", which is how badly you can tune the car, without it stalling out immediately. Our conscious minds, resemble the local minima, but its what makes us creative. When our neurons relax altogether, someone can startle you and make you hit the ceiling. They're like little kids who cuddle and relax in front of the TV, but the only way they can do that, is if they ignore the conscious mind and, the alternative, is for them to form giant amplifiers, sort of a fire alarm.

 

Yes, the human body vibrates. Whether it's the brain or whatever, it means the signals pulse on and off. So every second we go in and out of consciousness many times. Our brain puts them together like frames in a movie to achieve awareness.

Of course in reality there is only one moment, time not with standing.

 

This is contrary to the philosophy and methodology of meditation and mindfulness/awareness which states that consciousness can exist without thought but thought cannot exist without consciousness.

The process of meditation here is to be still and aware witnessing the habitual thinking and emoting process of the mind till they reduce in intensity to a trickle and finally to total thoughtlesness, and no-mind is the term used to address this state.

Consciousness then uses thought as a tool for practical purposes and switches it off when not needed, and is not overwhelmed by it. This is not the case with most unconscious people living compulsively in psychological time of past memories and future based imagination.

The state of consciousness without compulsive thought is termed as samadhi or satori in eastern philosophy, and is said to self-generate peace and bliss as the innate charecterestics of pure consciousness. This is why meditation is a source of relaxation and bliss for many trained meditators with zero expense.

On the other hand, compulsive thinking and consequent emoting is considered to be the source of psychological suffering and is considered to be the characteristic of an untrained mind as per eastern philosophy.

So thinking unconsciously to prove to oneself that one is conscious can be detrimental to mental health and well-being, imho. Meditators in general also show better mental health as per research as well as physical health due to possible psychosomatic effects.

Eckhart Tolle clarifies on the same , “The philosopher Descartes believed he had found the most fundamental truth when he made his famous statement: "I think, therefore I am." He had, in fact, given expression to the most basic error: to equate thinking with Being and identity with thinking. The compulsive thinker, which means almost everyone, lives in a state of apparent separateness, in an insanely complex world of continuous problems and conflict, a world that reflects the ever-increasing fragmentation of the mind.”

 

Meditation is something you have to learn, and there are more than one type of meditative state. The issue for science is what can they measure, and this is a good first start towards measuring meditative states better. Ultimately, its all magic, but its nice to know what you can measure and make more sense out of collectively.

 

It is as much an emotional state as it is a state of consciousness, reflecting the fact we are mortal. You could say, God or the truth, never has to think, suffer, or die, but we do.

People have a subconscious and conscious mind, because God doesn't need one, he's infallible.

Again, the issue comes down to efficiency for modern science, and consciousness can be described statistically as emerging from our neurons, or the Collective Unconscious. That's not to say we don't have an individual consciousness, but it is also collective.

Dr Seuss was a visionary: It's Turtles All The Way Down Baby!

 

Interesting stuff.
Neurons waiting; I immediately thought of the analogy of a car with its timing off its optimum setting. Each cylinder is down on power which in cumulative terms, means the torque is sluggish and the vehicle was down on power. If timing were completely off, the engine would stop.

Te engine idling speed...
Ive never know the idle speed to have any effect on vehicle speed. When it's at idle the vehicle is deliberately stationery - at rest. If it moving at whatever speed above zero, its not idling.

Meditation and consciousness....
I agree with that of meditation. I was diagnosed last year with post viral fatigue syndrome. I never wanted to be hit by a syndrome of any sort but its still here and I haven't had concentration or mental focus so haven't been able to work. Difficult to say the least both financially and in terms of the feeling of self worth.

However regarding the following...

"consciousness can exist without thought but thought cannot exist without consciousness."

I can state that consciousness can exist without thought and I think thought can occur without consciousness.

Reasoning: I can be conscious, standing up outdoors talking with my neighbour and Im fully aware of the setting and circumstances but I lose all thought for seconds - as much as 15 seconds. I don't just lose my train of thought mid-sentence but I lose the whole subject of conversation; unable to pick up without him reminding me of the subject and what I started to say. So; Consciousness exists without thought just like that engine making a noise with extremely offset timing such that it doesn't function or propel the vehicle anywhere.

And surely thought can exist without consciousness?
I mean, we dream when asleep and also, I had a dream whilst under general anaesthetic as a 12yr old. Afterwards the nurse asked me if I remembered anything from when I went to the theatre. I recalled counting backwards from 10, as instructed. I got as far as 7 but she said I got to 5 and the difference between what I did and that which I can recall is normal. I also recalled a dream. She asked me what I dreamed about and I felt embarrassed. I eventually told her and she said that was good to know and understand because it explained why my 'willy' (her word) went very stiff.

 

The dream state is considered to be an unconscious state , just as in the awake state where one can be still unconscious due to the compulsive and seemingly uncontrollable brooding over past memories or future imagination without being able to switch off from the same consciously. This is why in the dream state there can be nightmares over which one has no control over and have to suffer for its entire duration.

The deep sleep state where there are no dreams ( as opposed to the dreaming state) is also a mental state, and in which there are no thoughts. After awaking from deep sleep, one is conscious of the fact that there was no dreams which means that consciousness to some extent was present during this span of sleeping time.

The deep sleep state without thoughts or dreams is obviously the preferred sleep quality due to its refreshing nature, and hence the deep sleep state is sometimes equated with meditation in terms of thoughtless consciousness in eastern philosophy.

 

This is indeed a very good article having read it now. However the thread title, ' Consciousness requires thought', might be a wrong inference on the same.

The article title 'when your mind goes blank your brain activity resembles deep sleep scans reveal' is very insightful though.

 

Conscious awareness is ultimately just magic, and doesn't require an explanation. Mama Nature doesn't think, because she's infallible, and embodies the truth.

Still neurologists and the rest of us often prefer explanations we can work with.

 

I agree......it is what seperates the "humans" from the animals imo.



Also a big problem forming AI atm............how much do you let it learn/think on its own(bounderies).........consciousness?

Interesting question

Mzzls

 

Everything in a Singularity obeys proprioception, trying to guess what comes next. Without the ability to guess what comes next, ya got nothing kid, go home and cry to mama!

The reason is because everything is organizing around what's missing from picture, in order to become more efficient. A physicist could say everything exists, only because its efficient. Humble efficiency is how you get the punch lines to the joke, by not over-thinking the problem, and it means our brains and the universe organize around figuring out what to ignore. Sensation and awareness are meaningless, unless you can use pattern matching to figure out what to ignore first. AI don't know what to ignore a lot of things, and machine learning is all about teaching them what to ignore, but their programmers keep feeding them bullshit math, that doesn't reflect reality.

Because we occupy a singularity, mathematics themselves fall apart when taken to extremes, and you have use linguistic analysis and a sense of humor. Their computer require more organic software, that is taboo in academia. Note that both AI and mathematicians working on the newer Theories of Everything, are hallucinating. They will keep doing so until they get tired of it.

Their computer is demanding pattern matching, which is the kind of math they only steal and censor from other people. They tried to get college students to write it for them, and got almost nowhere.

It is 12.000 year old systems logics, that have a life and will of their own, and laugh at the best laid plans of mice and men.

 

That bit about proprioception and guessing feels like consciousness isn’t some smooth, steady beam at all, more like a twitchy balancing act between chaos and pattern. The way you said it, it’s almost like the universe keeps stitching and trimming itself. Makes sense that AI misses that part – it just keeps crunching numbers, no sense of pause, no little gut twitch that says “okay, stop here.”

I like what you said about humble efficiency – maybe that’s what awareness really is, a kind of quiet laziness, knowing when not to push. Our brains seem built to chase meaning, but also to protect us from drowning in it. That “pattern matching” you mentioned reminds me of dreams, how the mind stitches things together just so it doesn’t fall apart completely.

Do you think that same efficiency – the thing that makes us skip what doesn’t matter – is also what makes humor or creativity happen? That weird spark when something missing suddenly fits. And about “organic software,” were you thinking emotional logic, or something closer to living computation? I keep wondering if anything without that soft, irrational flicker could ever be truly aware.

 

Consciousness is getting the punch lines to the jokes. Either you get the punch lines or you don't, which is why modern scientists continue to debate whether they are actually conscious. It is pattern matching, using synchronized networks to achieve the lowest possible energy state. The question for your neurons is what to ignore and avoid, making you harder for the bear to catch.