Magical Relationship Between our Physical Body and Mind - Part 1

Abstract: This article brings you scientific facts on the relationship between body-mind, mind-memory, and the past-present-future time frames. The article emphasizes how the human brain helps in initiating the thought process by interacting with the different brain regions. Even though science is yet unable to unravel the mystery behind this complex human thought process, this article tries to bring scientific findings and speculations together to draw a meaningful picture.    

Mind in Body or Body in Mind (A Scientific Viewpoint) ?

There have been a lot of debates about this topic since the 17th century [1]. Is it the mind that is inside our physical body or the other way around? The first must be convincing to you, which is rather a general belief. The latter is somewhat unconvincing but was brought up to the public by therapists, spiritual masters, and yogis. Therapists often base their viewpoint around our psychological and physiological relationships. They identify our human body's condition as a result of a complex psychological process that adjusts chemical and neurological compounds in the body. On the other hand, yogis and enlightened beings consider our physical bodies are direct manifestations of our human mind, which may sound bizarre. Before diving deeper into this context, it is better to ask whether our mind exists?

Many religious and spiritual teachings outline that the mind does not exist, but it is perceived to exist by a complex mechanism between our memory, sensory perception, and imagination. What we grasp from our five senses only starts to make sense to us with the help of our memory. This process is called sensory perception, in which the sense organs coordinate with the brain to identify their inputs to process something useful. Certain memory regions in the brain perform this identification process and associate these sensory inputs with prior experience. The following figure shows the parts of the brain involved in this process; therefore, in the physical point of view, these parts altogether can be considered as “the memory”.

Fig. 1. Memory regions in human brain : Where our memories stored in our brain ? [2]

Thoughts, Memory and Past: Where do they come from ?

In the simplest way, human memory can be divided into two main categories: Short-term and long-term memories. Short-term memory can be as short as a few seconds. More specifically, it involves day-to-day life activities, emotional and cognitive responses. The prefrontal cortex section is responsible for holding short-term memory. The other parts of the memory, as shown in the figure, are responsible for maintaining long-term memories.

The hippocampus, located in the brain's temporal lobe, is where episodic memories are formed, indexed, or stored for later access. Episodic memories are what most people think of as memory and include information about recent or past events and experiences, such as where you parked your car this morning or the dinner you had with a friend last month. On the other hand, the neocortex is involved in higher functions such as sensory perception, generation of motor commands, spatial reasoning, and language. Over time, information from certain memories that are temporarily stored in the hippocampus can be transferred to the neocortex as general knowledge – things like knowing that coffee provides a pick-me-up (energy boost). Scientists think this transfer from the hippocampus to the neocortex happens as we sleep. Even though all the brain parts in the figure contribute to this complex cognitive process, three major parts play the biggest role in organizing this. The hippocampus brings episodic memories, the neocortex provides the sensory perception, and the prefrontal cortex orchestrates the thought process with the above memories. Too much science to grasp? I hope not ! 😬😬😬

How come all this scientific information and findings are relevant to our original topic? Well, we are still looking for the answer to our question, "Does our mind exist ?". The previous passage gives us a scientific insight into our human memory. The memory is at one end of our thought process. And this thought process itself is what we refer to as “mind”. How does the mind originate from the memory out of nowhere? Although the science of brain cell communication is well-understood, the complexity of thought processes is not well-defined. But the closest explanation based on recent research and speculations is as follows: “The human brain is composed of about 100 billion nerve cells (neurons) interconnected by trillions of connections called synapses. On average, each connection transmits about one signal per second. These electrical signals are created by the brain chemicals known as neurotransmitters. When neurons release these chemicals, the electrical signals propagate like a wave to thousands of adjacent neurons, which leads to thought formation” [3][4]. The graphical representation of this process is shown below:

Fig. 2. Eye Consciousness: How the detection of the external objects through eye, generate neurotransmitters (chemical signals) to the brain in order to form thoughts.

When we read, detect an object through our eyes, the photons associated with the patterns of the shape of the object hit the retina, and their energy triggers an electrical signal in the light-detecting cells at the front end of the optic nerve. That electrical signal propagates like a wave along the long threads called axons that are part of the connections between neurons. When the signal reaches the end of an axon, it causes the release of chemical neurotransmitters into the synapse, a chemical junction between the axon tip and target neurons. A target neuron responds with its own electrical signal, which, in turn, spreads to other neurons. Within a few hundred milliseconds, the signal has spread to billions of neurons in several dozen interconnected areas of our brain. The three major parts of the memory (prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, and neocortex) help to perceive the detected object properly. For instance, when we see a cat, the mental picture of the cat (😸) is generated by the process starting from the optical nerves, a series of neurotransmitters, and the neural network in the brain. The identification of the cat is performed by accessing the “past” data in the memory region. This is performed by the recognition memory region called perirhinal cortex (not shown in Fig. 1). For this purpose, the neocortex and perirhinal cortex regions work together. Without previous (past) experience or memory (of a cat), the brain cannot identify the object. Therefore without the “past”, what the brain perceives is merely a meaningless mental image. Read more about the recognition memory here. 

In a nutshell, memory represents the "Past" as certain information stored in our brain areas. When the consciousness or thought process is initiated, this process continuously accesses the experiences, incidents, and emotions from our memories. Therefore, what we refer to as the Past is merely an illustration and a sequencing of our memory chunks with the help of neuro-transmitters and neurons. Then, is the Past illusory? Well, what is perceived as past is necessary to think, to imagine and necessary for our cognitive abilities. Yet we should not suffer because of our memories! The whole thinking process takes place in the "Present" moment, or "Here and Now". 

Thoughts, Imagination and Future: Does the future exist ?

As we learnt, memory helps us to perform sensory perception, object recognition, and thought formation. This is a continuous engagement between our “past” memory and the “present” brain activity. Let me take you to the next level of this discussion: What would become of our thought process without imagination? The imagination is the greatest potential humankind possess. Without it, we would not have evolved, civilized, and come this far to become who we are now. From this point, we still imagine our next level of evolution. Where would we end up? Exploring or conquering other planets? Human settlements on Mars? But what if it is the spiritual enlightenment of all human beings?

In the previous example, the identification of a cat involves sensory perception and the recognition memory. Does our thought process around this incident stop here? What if it is a beautiful, cute-fluffy cat you would love? Or rather, it reminds you of a pet you lost recently? This is where the imagination comes into play. After perception initiates the thought process, it is naturally followed by the imagination. When the perception goes bottom-up, from the periphery to the central nervous system, imagination uses the top-down approach, traveling from the higher associative cortices to the lower visual areas in the brain. [5][6] Similar to perception, the neural network fires a series of neurotransmitters (Fig. 2) to establish the imagination in the brain. The relevant brain regions for this operation include the prefrontal cortex, neocortex, temporal cortex, inferior parietal cortex, and hippocampus. This network is typically referred to as the time travel network, which leads to thinking, i.e. "I want that cat ! I want to cuddle that fluffy !! Ohh man, it looks exactly like my Bella !!!".

Fig. 3. The identification of the object and imagination both happen with respect to the present moment.

In a nutshell, the future only exists in our imagination or desires. On the other hand, imagination is only possible with a preceding event which is essentially a thought, perception, or a memory. As illustrated in Fig. 2 and Fig. 3, this “time travel” network is a result of complex neurological and brain activities that happens in the present moment. 

Conclusions ?

After reading through this article, it is not difficult to understand that past and future time frames actually exist in our mental images. Neurotransmitters, the brain neural network, and the memory play a significant role in initiating this process. A series of such mental images turn into a thought process. In daily life, we need this thinking process to be productive, to be creative, and to execute certain tasks. This repetitive process itself is called “Mind”. But how can this precious instrument lead us to suffer? When these mental images get increasingly identified with external objects, desires, and our memories, we get caught up in our own thoughts and lose the track of reality. Our ego-self is the culprit behind this, which let your mind to be the master of your life. So what is reality? The reality is nothing but the continuous awareness of our present moment and disturbing thoughts and emotions! Once the awareness becomes our master, the mind can be its slave!!!

An Exercise

Try to observe your thoughts in alertness. Try to identify the past and future time frames created by your own thought process. You may witness that these time frames just exist at the present moment: here and now. This witnessing quality is what we refer to as awareness. If the awareness is your master, the rest is momentary transitions. 

However there is also a situation which transcends this present-moment awareness. See who would you become in that! Do not forget to comment your answer.......