I was going to answer the question I posed at the end of my last post this week, but decided to deviate due to an interesting epiphany I had this week. It isn’t anything I would consider to be a monumental discovery, so much as an interesting realization. That I am not a single, unified entity, but really just a collection of smaller entities (that in turn are simply collections of even smaller entities, and so on).
Recently, I had a massage. Not the relaxing sort of massage most people will expect, but a therapeutic massage. If you’ve had one of these before, then you will know that it tends to be painful during the massage, as the therapist pokes and prods your individual muscle fibers and other bits. While the massage was proceeding, I realized precisely how much this therapist was focusing in on very specific parts of my body. I could feel the therapist feeling around a little in an area of my back, then once finding what she was looking for, pressing hard and literally manipulating the bit she had found. It felt to me like she was moving my muscle fibers to the sides and around in order to get them into better position. Perhaps in some cases, she was also simply massaging those fibers to loosen them up. Either way, I realized at that moment that she was objectifying me.
I don’t use the term objectifying in this case to suggest anything negative. Only to convey the fact that she was looking at me not necessarily as a person, but as a collection of parts. Specifically, my back was not the back of a person, so much as it was a large flat surface made up of skin and muscle and bone (and other things). She was focusing on finding a very particular muscle in order to manipulate it. While this muscle is technically a part of me, it was at that time not important that it was. That is, the muscle was simply an object to manipulate for a purpose. In this case, to improve my situation and make me feel better (eventually).
After the massage, I did feel much better. I was sore, but the pain I had in my neck and back was relieved. I felt like I was not so tight. I felt better. But I couldn’t dismiss this realization that I was objectified during the procedure. My body was simply a collection of bits and pieces.
I further recalled a bit of history about computer animation that related to all this. In particular, the difficulty with computer animation in making human beings look realistic. This issue has also been observed and experienced by various artists trying to capture the human form, especially painters. The problem that many now realize is that the skin is not opaque or solid. When light hits our skin, it is not all reflected away; some of the light penetrates our skin and then is reflected by the stuff underneath, like our blood, bones, and muscles. This is what gives us the particular hues that we have. Flesh colour is inconsistent, just as the bits and pieces beneath the surface of our skin are constantly moving around and changing. If you know what blushing is, this is a great example, where more blood flows to an area making it appear more red.
In the case of computer animation, in order to make a human look more realistic, the model of the human has to be more complete, with actual bones and muscles grafted beneath a skin’s surface. The skin, in the computer, is not entirely opaque, and whatever is beneath can be seen through. This also means that as the camera view changes, what is seen isn’t the same either, as different bits and pieces reflect light differently at different angles. Once again, the human body is not really a solid, opaque object, but a collection of smaller pieces.
I have often thought my consciousness is of a similar nature. That is, my consciousness is not some solid, uniform entity, but a collection of smaller entities as well. The best example I have to describe this is of the nature of fire. Think of a little flame on a candle. It is simple and seems pretty uniform. Then consider a roaring fire in a fireplace, or perhaps a bonfire on a beach. The fire is the same as that of the candle, only much larger and more exciting. The larger fire seems to be made up of smaller parts, perhaps like millions of small candle flames, all smooshed together. But they are so tightly packed, they appear uniform. The fire, at least in appearance, is a single entity, which moves and crackles and heats up the room. Of course I know that it can be separated into smaller parts; I can take a small piece of wood, place the tip into the larger fire, and then ignite the tip and pull it away. Is that a new fire? Or did I take a small bit of the existing fire and take it with me?
I wonder if consciousness is of this same sort of nature. Made up of tiny little bits of consciousness, generated by the cells of our body perhaps. Like the midi-chlorians that were made up in Episode 1 of the Star Wars franchise, perhaps consciousness is small bits that collect to make up a larger sentience. If this is true, then all the parts of my body may, in some way, contribute to the whole of my mind. Perhaps the nervous cells, especially those found in my brain, contribute larger bits of consciousness than the other parts, like my muscle cells. This could suggest that the link between my body and my mind is much tigher than René Descartes suggested in his meditations. Again, this is not new; there are many people who have questioned Descartes suggestion of mind/body dualism.
Ultimately, where this all leads me is to the realization that I am not a single, solid, uniform, opaque entity. I am bits and pieces of lots of other smaller entities, which seem to be also made up of even smaller entities, and so on. I am not one single thing, but a collection of things. If my mind and my body are simply a collection, where some bits can be added and others removed, without disturbing (significantly) the whole that makes me who and what I am, then perhaps I am not as static or unchanging as I might like to believe. Like the world around me, I may simply be a transient, flowing object, seen as a single entity only by convention and convenience.
It is interesting to think about, and it is always possible that it is the truth (as much a truth might exist). But I must be careful not to confuse the situation for the one that I find myself bound to. I am a part of this human world presently, with strange rules and customs that I am expected to maintain. Like brushing my teeth, or going to work, or cleaning dishes. I may be a collection of parts, but I also, at the same time, am a single unified entity, at least as is observed by society and those humans who exist around me. I have to maintain and recognize myself as a single entity most of the time. Or as one of my professors in university suggested, when I was having a bit of a crisis of identity, if I am not me, then who should he assign my grades to?