Thinking, wondering, daydreaming, nightdreaming, doubting, declaring... it's our special human power of cognition. It is in there churning away, and although we can develop techniques to cultivate it just so (pruning out the bad thoughts, pacifying the anger, assuring the fears, and fueling the positives) it still keeps firing off. I watched a lecture on Nebraska's awesome public access station about the brain last night, and though my understanding of it was limited, I did take a few facts away... apparently our brains consume like, a ton of energy. These things are like big SUV's of the body, guzzling up 70% of our blood sugar just to lollygag about in revery. Our thoughts make us hungry! Feed me feed me they say, I am a factory of cognition and I want not to be slowed. If oxygen fails to be sent to the brain for even just a minute or two, extreme damage can be done... A woman who had suffered an arterial blockage in the back of her brain lost the capacity to walk, and once the brain was repaired "physically" she had to relearn the skill like a little baby all over again, because the brain lost its nutrients briefly, and therefore started pruning itself away. Brains freak me out.
I also watched a documentary about the "science of babies"... really just about how their brains work. Apparently, other mammals come out of the womb ready to walk within hours... all preprogrammed for life and raring to go. Human fetuses emerge less developed, though, as they still need about a year of development to begin to attempt walking. This is because 1. we are bi-pedal, so walking is just that much harder due to the balancing of our giant heads over our tiny feet, though it's that much smarter as it is more energy efficient than quadrapedalism. 2. If our brains were developed enough to handle the difficult walking gig, they would be too big to fit through the pelvic bones. So it is actually quite important that babies are born exactly when they are-- a fetus outside the womb, a helpless animal relying completely on the care of its mother and father for life and security. Too soon, though, and what results is the precarious touch and go health of a preemie. Buffalo give birth on the wild plains all alone. Humans need other humans to complete this delivery in any effective way. Other interesting fact: at three months, a baby can distinguish between the faces of different humans as well as different monkeys... they can tell that one human and one monkey are different from the other human and other monkey. Surprisingly, at six months, a baby can no longer distinguish between different types of monkeys, only different types of humans. That is because, through experience, the brain learns that the different faces of humans are much more important to recognize than those of monkeys, and so due to the brian's pruning power, selected by experience, the ability to distinguish monkey one from monkey two is lost. At least we can still recognize when a monkey is a monkey. That knowledge remains relevant. Though experience shapes what information the brain will pay attention to, it is not just "experience" that takes a brain from helpless baby to capable adult. Evidence shows that the brain is in a sense pre-programmed or wired with all sorts of information.
Like Math! So some scientists did an experiement... babies pay more attention to things they do not understand, and babies lose interest when bored with old information... so given that knowledge a baby was shown a "puppet show" where one puppet came on the stage. then a second came on the stage. A board was put up blocking the stage, and when the board came down, only one puppet remained. The baby was staring in riveting confusion... indicating an innate ability to understand the laws of addition and subtraction. This was counterbalanced by the fact that when a. both puppets were remaining on the stage post-board, and b. when the baby saw one puppet leaving the stage and acknowledged the subtraction of puppets, the baby's interest was minimal, and it's eye contact shifted away from the stage. Cool.
So as you may have read, I want to have children. As it feels like that biological clock is going off trying to be like "the oven is preheated!", I also feel other biological urges, such as the one to make a nest. I feel that a human nest is different from other mammals. There is the physical home-nest component... Finding shelter, a constant supply of food/resources, being safe, protected, but also well decorated and making it smell nice... there is also a cognitive nest making which I don't suppose other animals experience to this extent. In order to consciously teach, it feels like one needs an understanding of what one will teach. Perhaps there are biological mechanisms that ensure that the essentials of what must be taught are taught... when a baby cries, it is our instinct to pick it up and hold it. Babies need this nurturing and touch, so alas, one need not consciously think "i believe i should now hold the baby to satisfy it's need for touch"... we just do it. We can now through science try to understand why we do things, but if they are effective we have already been doing them without knowing why or even that we do... We mimic faces with babies without realizing it... and in turn this teaches babies to recognize facial cues relaying important information. When someone makes a face, we don't think "because her nostrils are slightly flared and her lips are turned down by 5 degrees and her eyelids are pulled back and the lines on her chin are deepening it must mean she is experiencing anger"... we just think, "dude she's angry". There is so much information that we don't know we know yet. But along with these "innate" skills we teach our offspring, there is a whole set of concious ones, too. Like, "how will we raise our kids"... will they go to time out if they disobey? will they get spanked? Will they be required to eat five bites of veggies to guarantee dessert? will we allow them sugar? Will we try to make them into ballerinas? Will we make them be vegans? Will we teach them a certain religion? Which questions one asks depends on which subjects are the most valuable to you. And the answer to them depends really on the desires and discoveries within yourself. Some parents choose to actively teach their children about all world religions and encourage the child to "choose" or follow the one that most speaks to them personally. Doing so is just as much a decision about "what will I teach my child" as one who un-conciously teaches their child about Islam without ever making a choice against anything else to do so. I'm not sure what I'm getting at except that the idea of relaying love and information and skills to offspring conjures up a desire in me to actively understand what I value. It feels like a biological nesting of the mind, this urge to understand what I believe, value, desire, and strive for, so as to "always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and reverence." I want to be ready with a response I have confidence in when a child asks me what happens to dead people, for example. In fact, I actually think it may be my own inner child asking all these questions, which occurs with or without offspring. The hope that is in me, what will I say about it? To what account will I say it is from? Those are the questions I feel urged to investigate in order to answer them with integrity and sincerity.
The same place that above verse came from also said "Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation-- if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good."
I find that so interesting, particularly the last little tidbit... "if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good." It's so real. So so so so many people have tasted that "the Lord" is bad. A way to exploit others, a way to dominate and supress women, a way to judge and condemn anybody that makes one uncomfortable, a wrathful, angry diety, an imposer of plagues, floods, disease, a son-killer, a buzz-killer, an opiate of the masses. To me, the author known as "peter" seems to be hinting at the fact that this good Lord ain't so sweet to everyone. I like it because it means he isn't saying to everyone who passes this scripture "you better do this and do that and not this and not that"... why should they? why would they? Why would someone listen to the commands of a person declaring themself a disciple of the Lord... this same Lord that seems to inspire wars? Peter makes his audience clear with that statement, and with it the whole lot makes more sense. If one has tasted that the Lord is good and sweet, one would naturally want more of the "pure spiritual milk" which causes one to "grow into" salvation. Salvation here to me means less "going to a place called heaven when you die" and more "going to a place called heaven and/or kingdom of God here and now in this life"... a place without malice, a place of personal sincerity, a place without envy in one's heart... all those destructive forces that can make life the description of a hell. So one rids oneself of that, and seeks pure spiritual milk as an alternative, and from this good things grow. Make yourself like a baby and feel the basic yearning for love and nurturing.
If one hasn't tasted that the Lord is good, then one will most likely have malice and perhaps slander against this Lord. But if one has not come to this conclusion, if one feels that perhaps "the Lord" is good, then there is no longer a place for these feelings, because a greater good has restored them. In a way, I feel these things such as malice, envy, insincerity, and slander have an important place in the world. They can be guides pointing to some deep wound that needs caring for. If i'm constantly malice-ing, then im probably angry, butif i just condemn myself for my anger, I will only grow more angry with myself. But if I can listen to it, allow it to be, accept it as a reality, and ask it where it is coming from, then I can find its source and make things right, hopefully. That is why I think Peter says to ride oneself of these things if one has tasted that the Lord is good. Perhaps following these negative emotions to the source may show someone why they tasted that the Lord is not good, and could lead to a reconciliation with that entity "lord". But for those who find the Lord tasting good, and thereby seek pure spiritual milk which thereby grows into salvation, the salvation acts to heal the wound pouring out with malice and envy and such, hence, no longer needed?
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