In Metamagical Themas (an anagram of his Scientific American column, "Mathematical Games"), cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter wrote about the sphex wasp, an insect that performs exactly the same sequence of actions in exactly the same way every time, as if reading instructions from a punched card. If the sphex's ritual is interrupted at any point, it starts over from the beginning.
I think we do have certain patterns of thought and behavior stored in a sort of neural ROM, if you will. I doubt it's binary data, but rather more like a neural net that has been trained through repetition to yield a predictable outcome.
Jung wrote about a psychic ordering principle that keeps the personality somewhat rational and sane. Predictable outcomes are necessary for sanity, yes? The ordering principle seems to be linked to the manifestation of universal archetypes in various local guises. Could the archetypes actually be a bunch of little hardwired programs, many of them subconscious, which nevertheless guide our behavior?
I think we do have certain patterns of thought and behavior stored in a sort of neural ROM, if you will. I doubt it's binary data, but rather more like a neural net that has been trained through repetition to yield a predictable outcome.
Jung wrote about a psychic ordering principle that keeps the personality somewhat rational and sane. Predictable outcomes are necessary for sanity, yes? The ordering principle seems to be linked to the manifestation of universal archetypes in various local guises. Could the archetypes actually be a bunch of little hardwired programs, many of them subconscious, which nevertheless guide our behavior?
