Being and Brain

We are living in the age of the scientific investigation into the human brain. Numerous theories and ideas have arisen regarding how it is that human brain function equates to our "consciousness" as human beings.

In this short introduction we look at the picture of the brain and the human experience of being, from a position that entirely accepts the fundamental scientific evidence from modern brain science. This is the evidence that what we experience as our self, together with what we experience as the material world we inhabit, is all a construct of brain function.

Complete acceptance of this scientific evidence, as distinct from the limited hypothesis that we experience an "internal, predictive, neural model" of an "external" material world, a world that in itself is not a construct of brain function, leads to a radically different way of understanding the world itself, that is alternate to the currently mainstream view.

The scientific evidence suggests a radical change of understanding is called for, in a way no less than was the case in the emergence of the facts of quantum physics, in the first part of the 20th century. Now, a century later, full acceptance of the fundamental scientific facts regarding the brain, promises the potential for science to once again challenge global preconceptions about the very nature of our constitution and situation, as human beings.

We can, however, only realise this potential if we are prepared to accept the challenges to our cherished personal notions about who we are, that are presented by the science.