BIOCENTRISM Page 5

  the seat of consciousness escapes from its jumpy, nervous, verbal

  isolation cell and takes residence in some other section of the the-

  ater, where the lights shine more brightly and where things feel more

  direct, more real.

  On what street is this theater found? Where are the sensations of

  life?

  We can start with everything visual that is currently being per-

  ceived all around us—this book you are holding, for example. Lan-

  guage and custom say that it all lies outside us in the external world.

  Yet we’ve already seen that nothing can be perceived that is not

  already interacting with our consciousness, which is why biocen-

  tric axiom number one is that nature or the so-called external world

  must be correlative with consciousness. One doesn’t exist with-

  out the other. What this means is that when we do not look at the

  Moon the Moon effectively vanishes—which, subjectively, is obvious

  enough. If we still think of the Moon and believe that it’s out there orbiting the Earth, or accept that other people are probably watching it, all such thoughts are still mental constructs. The bottom-line

  issue here is if no consciousness existed at all, in what sense would

  the Moon persist, and in what form?

  So what is it that we see when we observe nature? The answer

  in terms of image-location and neural mechanics is actually more

  straightforward than almost any other aspect of biocentrism.

  Because the images of the trees, grass, the book you’re holding, and

  everything else that’s perceived is real and not imaginary, it must

  be physically happening in some location. Human physiology texts

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  answer this without ambiguity. Although the eye and retina gather

  photons that deliver their payloads of bits of the electromagnetic

  force, these are channeled through heavy-duty cables straight back

  until the actual perception of images themselves physically occurs in the back of the brain, augmented by other nearby locations, in special sections that are as vast and labyrinthine as the hallways of the Milky

  Way, and contain as many neurons as there are stars in the galaxy.

  This, according to human physiology texts, is where the actual col-

  ors, shapes, and movement “happen.” This is where they are per-

  ceived or cognized.

  If you consciously try to access that luminous, energy-filled,

  visual part of the brain, you might at first be frustrated; you might

  tap the back of your skull and feel a particularly vacuous sense of

  nothingness. But that’s because it was an unnecessary exercise: you’re

  already accessing the visual portion of the brain with every glance

  you take. Look now, at anything. Custom has told us that what we

  see is “out there,” outside ourselves, and such a viewpoint is fine and

  necessary in terms of language and utility, as in “Please pass the but-

  ter that’s over there.” But make no mistake: the visual image of that

  butter, that is, the butter itself, actually exists only inside your brain.

  That is its location. It is the only place visual images are perceived

  and cognized.

  Some may imagine that there are two worlds, one “out there”

  and a separate one being cognized inside the skull. But the “two

  worlds” model is a myth. Nothing is perceived except the percep-

  tions themselves, and nothing exists outside of consciousness. Only

  one visual reality is extant, and there it is. Right there.

  The “outside world” is, therefore, located within the brain or

  mind. Of course, this is so astounding for many people, even if it

  is obvious to those who study the brain, that it becomes possible to

  over-think the issue and come up with attempted refutations. “Yeah,

  but what about someone born blind?” “And what about touch; if

  things aren’t out there, how can we feel them?”

  None of that changes the reality: touch, too, occurs only within

  consciousness or the mind. Every aspect of that butter, its existence

  w H e r e i s T H e U N i v e r s e ?

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  on every level, is not outside of one’s being. The real mind-twister

  to all this, and the reason some are loath to accept what should be

  patently obvious, is that its implications destroy the entire house-of-

  cards worldview that we have embraced all our lives. If that is con-

  sciousness, or mind, right in front of us, then consciousness extends

  indefinitely to all that is cognized—calling into question the nature

  and reality of something we will devote an entire chapter to—space.

  If that before us is consciousness, it can change the area of scientific focus from the nature of a cold, inert, external universe to issues

  such as how your consciousness relates to mine and to that of the

  animals. But we’ll put aside, for the moment, questions of the unity

  of consciousness. Let it suffice to say that any overarching unity of

  consciousness is not just difficult or impossible to prove but is fun-

  damentally incompatible with dualistic languages—which adds an

  additional burden of making it difficult to grasp with logic alone.

  Why? Language was created to work exclusively through sym-

  bolism and to divide nature into parts and actions. The word water

  is not actual water, and the word it corresponds to nothing at all in the phrase “It is raining.” Even if well acquainted with the limitations

  and vagaries of language, we must be especially on guard against

  dismissing biocentrism (or any way of cognizing the universe as a

  whole) too quickly if it doesn’t at first glance seem compatible with

  customary verbal constructions; we will discuss this at much greater

  length in a later chapter. The challenge here, alas, is to peer not just

  behind habitual ways of thinking, but to go beyond some of the tools

  of the thinking process itself, to grasp the universe in a way that is

  at the same time simpler and more demanding than that to which

  we are accustomed. Absolutely everything in the symbolic realm,

  for example, has come into existence at one point in time, and will

  eventually die—even mountains. Yet consciousness, like aspects of

  quantum theory involving entangled particles, may exist outside of

  time altogether.

  Finally, some revert to the “control” aspect to assert the funda-

  mental separation of ourselves and an external, objective reality. But

  control is a widely misunderstood concept. Although we commonly

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  believe that clouds form, planets spin, and our own livers manufac-

  ture their hundreds of enzymes “all by themselves,” we nonetheless

  have been accustomed to hold that our minds possess a peculiarly

  unique self-controlling feature that creates a bottom-line distinction

  between self and external world. In reality, recent experiments show

  conclusively that the brain’s electrochemical connections, its neural

  impulses traveling at 240 miles per hour, cause decisions to be made

  faster than we are even aware of them. In other words, the brain and

  mind, too, operate all by itself, without any need for external med-

  dling by our thoughts
, which also incidentally occur by themselves.

  So control, too, is largely an illusion. As Einstein put it, “We can will

  ourselves to act, but we cannot will ourselves to will.”

  The most cited experiment in this field was conducted a quarter-

  century ago. Researcher Benjamin Libet asked subjects to choose a

  random moment to perform a hand motion while hooked up to an

  electroencephalograph (EEG) monitor in which the so-called “readi-

  ness potential” of the brain was being monitored. Naturally, electri-

  cal signals always precede actual physical actions, but Libet wanted

  to know whether they also preceded a subject’s subjective feeling of intention to act. In short, is there some subjective “self” who consciously decides things, thereby setting in motion the brain’s elec-

  trical activities that ultimately lead to the action? Or is it the other

  way ’round? Subjects were therefore asked to note the position of a

  clock’s second hand when they first felt the initial intention to move

  their hand.

  Libet’s findings were consistent, and perhaps not surprising:

  unconscious, unfelt, brain electrical activity occurred a full half second before there was any conscious sense of decision-making by

  the subject. More recent experiments by Libet, announced in 2008,

  analyzing separate, higher-order brain functions, have allowed his

  research team to predict up to ten seconds in advance which hand a

  subject is about to decide to raise. Ten seconds is nearly an eternity

  when it comes to cognitive decisions, and yet a person’s eventual

  decision could be seen on brain scans that long before the subject

  was even remotely aware of having made any decision. This and

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  other experiments prove that the brain makes its own decisions

  on a subconscious level, and people only later feel that “they” have

  performed a conscious decision. It means that we go through life

  thinking that, unlike the blessedly autonomous operations of the

  heart and kidneys, a lever-pulling “me” is in charge of the brain’s

  workings. Libet concluded that the sense of personal free will arises

  solely from a habitual retrospective perspective of the ongoing flow

  of brain events.

  What, then, do we make of all this? First, that we are truly free to

  enjoy the unfolding of life, including our own lives, unencumbered

  by the acquired, often guilt-ridden sense of control, and the obses-

  sive need to avoid messing up. We can relax, because we’ll automati-

  cally perform anyway.

  Second, and more to the point of this book and chapter, modern

  knowledge of the brain shows that what appears “out there” is actu-

  ally occurring within our own minds, with visual and tactile expe-

  riences located not in some external disconnected location that we

  have grown accustomed to regarding as being distant from ourselves.

  Looking around, we see only our own mind or, perhaps, it’s better

  put that there is no true disconnect between external and internal.

  Instead, we can label all cognition as an amalgam of our experiential

  selves and whatever energy field may pervade the cosmos. To avoid

  such awkward phrasing, we’ll allude to it by simply calling it aware-

  ness or consciousness. With this in mind (no pun intended), we’ll see how any “theory of everything” must incorporate this biocentrism—

  or else be a train on a track to nowhere.

  To sum up:

  First Principle of Biocentrism: What we perceive as reality is a

  process that involves our consciousness.

  Second Principle of Biocentrism: Our external and inter-

  nal perceptions are inextricably intertwined. They are different

  sides of the same coin and cannot be separated.

  6

  BuBBles In tIme

  Time’s existence cannot be found between the tick and the tock

  of a clock. It is the language of life and, as such, is most power-

  fully felt in the context of human experience.

  My father had just pushed her aside. Then he struck Bubbles

  again.

  My father was an old-school Italian with archaic ideas about

  child-rearing, so it is difficult now for me to write a record of this

  episode from so long ago. The indignity Bubbles suffered that day

  (not an isolated event) was so shameful that, four decades later, I still

  remember it as clearly as if it were yesterday.

  The affection I shared with Beverly—“Bubbles”—was a strong

  one, for being my older sister, she had always felt that it was her job

  to protect me. It touches me painfully even now to look back into

  the days of my childhood.

  I can remember the morning of what was as cold a New England

  day as you would ever want to feel at your toes’ ends. I was standing

  at the school bus stop at my usual time, with my little mittens and

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  lunchbox, when one of the older neighborhood boys pushed me to

  the ground. What exactly happened I can’t recall. I don’t profess to

  have been wholly innocent. But there I was on the sidewalk—help-

  less, looking up. “Let me go,” I sobbed. “Let me up.”

  I was still on the ground—and very cold and hurt—when, lift-

  ing my eyes, I saw Bubbles running up the street. When she reached

  the bus stop, she gave this older boy a look that I could see created

  instant fear for his own safety. I feel indebted to her for that alone.

  “You touch my little brother ever again,” she said, “and I’ll punch

  your face in.”

  I had always been a favorite of hers, I suppose; in fact, the earli-

  est remembrance I have of my childhood was with her, in her play-

  doctor’s office. “You’re a little unwell,” she said, handing me a cup of

  sand. “It’s medicine. Drink this and you’ll feel better.” This I did, and

  as I started to drink it, Bubbles cried out “No!” and then gave a gasp,

  as if she were swallowing it herself. (Afterward, it occurred to me

  that it was only make-believe, and that I ought not have done this,

  but at the time it all seemed quite real.)

  It is difficult for me to believe that it was me, and not her, who

  went on to become the doctor. She was very bright and tried so hard

  to do her very, very best—an “A” student, I recollect. All the teach-

  ers loved her. But that was not enough. By the tenth grade, she had

  dropped out of school, and had entered on a course of destruction

  with drugs. I can only understand that this happened because of

  the poor conditions at home. The ill that was done to her had little

  remission and occurred in a cyclic, almost mindless manner. She

  was beaten, ran away, and was punished again.

  How well I recall Bubbles hiding under the porch, wondering

  what she was going to do next. I remember the terror that hung

  about the place; I shiver at my father’s voice upstairs, penetrating

  through the walls; I can see the tears running down her face. I some-

  times wonder, when I think about it, that nobody intervened on her

  behalf. Not the school, not the police, not even the court-appointed

/>   social worker could do anything about it, apparently.

  b U b b L e s i N T i m e

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  Sometime later, Bubbles moved out of the house—although I am

  conscious of some confusion in my mind about the exact events—I

  learned that she was pregnant. I only recollect that through some

  loose-fitting dress, I felt the baby moving in her body; when all the

  relatives refused to go to her wedding, I told her: “It’s okay! It’s okay!”

  and held her hand.

  The birth of “Little Bubbles” was a happy occasion, an oasis in

  this life in the desert. There were many faces that I knew among

  those who visited her in the hospital room. There was my mother,

  my sister, and even my father looking on. Bubbles was so kind-

  hearted and had such a pleasant manner that I should not have been

  surprised at seeing them all there. How happy she was, and when I

  sat down by her side on the bed, she asked me—her little brother—

  if I would be the godfather to her child.

  All this, though, was a short event, and stands like a wildflower

  along an asphalt road. I wondered on that occasion what cost she

  might pay for this happiness; I saw it materialize at a later date when

  her problems reappeared, when her lithium treatments failed. Little

  by little, her mind began to deteriorate. Her speech made less and

  less sense, and her actions took on a more bizarre quality. I had seen

  enough of medicine then to have gained the capacity to stand beside

  myself, aloof from the consequences of disease, but it was a matter of

  some emotion to me, even then, to see her child taken away. I have

  a deep remembrance of her in the hospital, utterly without hope,

  restrained and sedated with drugs. As I went away from the hospital

  that day, I mingled my memories of her with tears.

  Bubbles knew of no place anywhere so comforting as the house

  of our childhood during the rare times of peace, no place half so

  shady as its green apple trees. They had been planted there more

  than fifty years ago by my friend Barbara’s dad. On one occasion,

  long after my parents had sold the house, the new owners saw Bub-

  bles sitting on the sidewalk with her elbows on her knees. The bed-

  room windows were all open to let in the blossom-scented breeze.

  Wild roses still dangled from the old trellis on the side of the house.