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akerle's picture

politics of the brain

Submitted by akerle on Wed, 09/10/2008 - 6:59pm.

I have been thinking about the idea of the 'mind' being a part of the brain. In reality, the brain is the final frontier in terms of medicine and biology. We know so little about it and it is a very complex and subtle machine. The problem, I think, comes from searching for the 'ghost' in the machine. For that reason, I believe that dealing with mental illness is very difficult. For many, there is some kind of disconnect between the brain and the 'soul'. In fact, the idea of the brain having any CONTROL over the 'soul' makes the whole study of mental health very political indeed. Some believe that scientists reduce the human experience to a set of electronic currents and chemicals. All this disagreement about the idea of soul,self,mind and body as being seperate entities makes the study of mental health a fractured and incongruous practice. To which part do we owe the most loyalty and which part needs to be cured? 

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