Glad to see the body being included in Modern stoicism- and being included in your practice!… certainly the body is not completely in our control but it is still a great gift …Thanks for this inspiring essay Brittany
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed it! I think it can be tricky to incorporate physical practices in a virtue-oriented way, but it's definitely worth the effort!
I finished reading Donald Robertson’s Philosophy of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy recently, and I think this reinforces what I read there a lot! Cognitions and behaviors go together and can influence one another. Changing our beliefs can improve our happiness/behavior, but behavioral modifications (yoga, exercise, etc.) can also positively impact our beliefs/happiness.
Really thought provoking essay which I enjoyed reading. I think your suggested model of brain is correct but there are perhaps other aspects involved as well. I think it is still useful to talk about fish amphibian,reptilian, mamal and hominid brains. Not so much as they describe particular structures but their size and complexity and the resulting behaviour differences. I think that complexity also involves so differences in structures not just in size or richness of networks for example speech centres. But you are right in saying it is messy and integrated. A good example is music which when we listen to it lights up the whole brain not just one particular centre. I think some behaviours particularly habits have also specific structures involved although these are also connected to other extensive pathways. A good example is eating habits and disorders are related to a specific reward pathway in the midbrain which seems to become dysfunctional causing anorexia and this may have a genetic component. It is of interest that speakers of mandarin use 4 parts of brain in speech compared to 3 for English. Rewiring to learn mandarin is hard however likely to be good for brain. I think brain plasticity is real and regular stoic practices probably rewire parts of the brain including habit centres. So I think the integrated model is the useful one and the reason I developed my stoic prayer! Hopefully my brain will become rewired!
Thank you, Tim, I'm glad you liked the essay. I agree, it's enormously complicated and I don't pretend to know that much about neuroscience...I just enjoy reading books by people who do! But I definitely agree with you about neuroplasticity and our capacity to rewire our habits. I think even if we don't know the exact neural mechanisms that allow this, we can still see it in action in our lives. And the ancient Stoics were ahead of their time in suggesting that people can continue to develop throughout their lives, so yes, there must be something in the Stoic practices that helps to rewire us.
Well said, Brittany, thank you. Without having read the Feldman Barrett, I would think one of the theories she's taking aim at might be the 'massively modular' theories of the brain/mind, which in turn have influenced many of the less plausible evo-psych positions. When I was researching a paper on what the Stoics' 'according to nature' meant, I discovered such statements as: ‘The brain is a computer designed by natural selection to extract information from the environment’ (Tooby and Cosmides, 2005). This kind of 'techno' metaphor, I think, however popular, is an obstacle to understanding.
Thanks, Judy! Yes, there are so many theories swirling around neuroscience, and to me our current understanding seems quite provisional; it will probably take lots more detours before we ultimately arrive at any real understanding of the brain. Fortunately, Stoicism as a philosophy doesn't *depend* on this type of scientific advance, but I always find it interesting when it's in alignment.
Thanks for an excellent essay! Very well thought out and articulated.
Glad to see the body being included in Modern stoicism- and being included in your practice!… certainly the body is not completely in our control but it is still a great gift …Thanks for this inspiring essay Brittany
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed it! I think it can be tricky to incorporate physical practices in a virtue-oriented way, but it's definitely worth the effort!
I finished reading Donald Robertson’s Philosophy of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy recently, and I think this reinforces what I read there a lot! Cognitions and behaviors go together and can influence one another. Changing our beliefs can improve our happiness/behavior, but behavioral modifications (yoga, exercise, etc.) can also positively impact our beliefs/happiness.
Brittany
Really thought provoking essay which I enjoyed reading. I think your suggested model of brain is correct but there are perhaps other aspects involved as well. I think it is still useful to talk about fish amphibian,reptilian, mamal and hominid brains. Not so much as they describe particular structures but their size and complexity and the resulting behaviour differences. I think that complexity also involves so differences in structures not just in size or richness of networks for example speech centres. But you are right in saying it is messy and integrated. A good example is music which when we listen to it lights up the whole brain not just one particular centre. I think some behaviours particularly habits have also specific structures involved although these are also connected to other extensive pathways. A good example is eating habits and disorders are related to a specific reward pathway in the midbrain which seems to become dysfunctional causing anorexia and this may have a genetic component. It is of interest that speakers of mandarin use 4 parts of brain in speech compared to 3 for English. Rewiring to learn mandarin is hard however likely to be good for brain. I think brain plasticity is real and regular stoic practices probably rewire parts of the brain including habit centres. So I think the integrated model is the useful one and the reason I developed my stoic prayer! Hopefully my brain will become rewired!
Thank you, Tim, I'm glad you liked the essay. I agree, it's enormously complicated and I don't pretend to know that much about neuroscience...I just enjoy reading books by people who do! But I definitely agree with you about neuroplasticity and our capacity to rewire our habits. I think even if we don't know the exact neural mechanisms that allow this, we can still see it in action in our lives. And the ancient Stoics were ahead of their time in suggesting that people can continue to develop throughout their lives, so yes, there must be something in the Stoic practices that helps to rewire us.
Well said, Brittany, thank you. Without having read the Feldman Barrett, I would think one of the theories she's taking aim at might be the 'massively modular' theories of the brain/mind, which in turn have influenced many of the less plausible evo-psych positions. When I was researching a paper on what the Stoics' 'according to nature' meant, I discovered such statements as: ‘The brain is a computer designed by natural selection to extract information from the environment’ (Tooby and Cosmides, 2005). This kind of 'techno' metaphor, I think, however popular, is an obstacle to understanding.
Thanks, Judy! Yes, there are so many theories swirling around neuroscience, and to me our current understanding seems quite provisional; it will probably take lots more detours before we ultimately arrive at any real understanding of the brain. Fortunately, Stoicism as a philosophy doesn't *depend* on this type of scientific advance, but I always find it interesting when it's in alignment.