Speaker 3: 00:04

TIMELESS. The human experience through a quantum lens. Hello and welcome back to Timeless with me Isabel Soden. And Clive Hyland . Episode three. We are talking about neuroscience.

Speaker 1: 00:31

Is that is?

Speaker 3: 00:34

That's my work done for the day.

Speaker 1: 00:41

Yeah, so the context was very much how do we um how do we bring the most recent information to the table in our conversations about exploring human nature and the nature of the universe, which are inseparable. But today we're going to focus on neuroscience on what has it told us, particularly in the last 20-30 years, about the way that the brain works. And for me, I use a model which is, I think, a very helpful starting place for people because the brain is an incredibly comp complex organ that we have, you know, more complex than anything else we're aware of in the in the universe, consisting of a hundred billion neurons that can connect, you know, between 10,000 to 100,000 times each. So for you. Yeah, and in intelligence is is driven really by connectivity. You know, it's the the more connections they've got, the more forms of intelligence and you know, modes of intelligence that you can work with.

Speaker 3: 01:42

So you mean neural connections?

Speaker 1: 01:44

Yeah, in this particular place. So you know, the neuro the way that these neurons can connect up with each other. Um so that yeah explaining an organ like that is obviously quite a job. So to start with a model that represents that in a reliable way is a nice place to start. And so the model that I talk about with brain systems is uh about instincts, emotions, and two forms of thought, rational thought and reflective thought. And it's a nice way of untangling so much of what we try to understand in a day-to-day, you know, living of life sense, where we mix all those things up. You know, we're not really terribly aware of was that an instinctive reaction or emotional reaction or you know, rational or reflective. Okay, yeah. So the starting point is to say, okay, let's let's like work out what is really going on here, what are the dynamics that drive our responses? Because focusing on behavior, the stuff above the surface of the iceberg, right, that's just the outcome of all the other stuff that goes on.

Speaker 3: 02:51

Okay, yeah.

Speaker 1: 02:52

And just to you know, put a bit of science around this, you know, we can be quite precise about the timings. So it's not an opinion as to what operates quick, more quickly than the rest, it's more about yeah, being quite precise about the speed at which these parts of the brain light up, you know, in in scanning conditions when we feed certain stimuli into the brain. So we can pinpoint the sequence of activity. And instincts are undoubtedly the fastest, okay, which is natural. It's going back to our evolutionary status of reptilians, you know. The first job was one of survival, where you had to work out, you know, were you in danger or not, and what you had to do to react if you saw that danger, or indeed if you sensed an opportunity, like the opportunity for a kill, which is still a part of the survival mechanism.

Speaker 2: 03:40

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 03:41

So, and then came along emotions, which are slower but still incredibly fast. And we talk about emotions, whereas instance register about 70 milliseconds in the brain, emotions register at around about 80 milliseconds, so that's thousandths of a second in the brain. But it's important to have that as a bedrock of our understanding, because when we recognize that they're the oldest parts of the brain and they operate most quickly, then for instance, it is a nonsense to believe we've got any sort of ultimate control over our emotions, they operate much more quickly. Okay. Now, there's lots of other things about emotions, but we can't we can't cover everything everything. But then at the human level, so whilst emotions really, you know, um are part of our mammalian development, you know, and the development of social groups and bonds and relationships, you know, collaboration and all that stuff. At the human level, then what really kicked on with our evolution was the ability to think. And the essence of thinking is actually to slow down, slow down the processing speed of the brain. And that's so counterintuitive for people because people automatically assume that thoughts are the quickest, but they're not. Okay, and there's a reason for that, and the reason in evolutionary term was that by slowing down the processing of that information in the brain, we could collect more information and therefore introduce options, which means choice. See, there is no choice about our instincts or our emotions, they just happen. It's driven by sensory intelligence where we sense in our environment and we react. And obviously, as mammals and reptiles, we would have to do that.

Speaker 2: 05:23

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 05:24

But as human beings, we have this further layer of intelligence which is called thoughts. And that has enabled us through evolution to develop very complex responses to sensory intelligence that comes up through the body.

Speaker 3: 05:37

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 05:40

You don't have to put your hand up, it's a podcast.

Speaker 3: 05:42

It doesn't really work. Free will. Yeah. Is that a it's you know, the the rational reflective, is that a sort of departure into free will that that humans have beyond animals and reptiles, or is that a bigger philosophical question that is not one for neuroscience?

Speaker 1: 06:03

Oh no, no, there's a there is a neuroscience view on that. Totally, okay. So the neuroscience view is that uh free view, uh sort of free will could be a bit of an illusion, yeah. Um, but there is nevertheless a huge uh evolutionary debt to having our own sense of agency. So that was so what that means is we perceive that there's free will, and that's vital because if we don't think we can control anything, we're not going to do anything about things. We're just robots, right? So that limits our response, our evolutionary ability to sustain and survive. So it's very important that we believe that we have free will because we believe that we can then do something about our circumstances.

Speaker 3: 06:43

But the point of importance is that we think we have it, and whether we do or not, is by the by.

Speaker 1: 06:49

Well, it's not by the by, but we'll talk about it more when we get into consciousness. Okay, great. Okay, so we'll talk more about that. But undoubtedly it has served a very important evolutionary role for us.

Speaker 2: 06:59

Okay.

Speaker 1: 06:59

Okay. But back to the thinking. So, what I wanted to do then was split it into rational and reflective thinking. Okay. And for this like simple context that we're dealing with now, rational thinking is all about getting things done, but much more complicated things. As I said, you know, we're we we can be hijacked by our instincts and emotions, right? But this is about thought processes where we introduce choice and the complexity of our choice, you know, is but is significantly beyond any other animals, all right, as far as thought processing is concerned. But the the brain itself is predictive, so we are always anticipating what's happening next, and we build strategies for dealing with that, right? But things don't always go to plan. So we need another part of the brain that sort of oversees the whole process and is the change part of the brain. And that's the bit that looks at the bigger picture so that when something goes wrong, we can step back, take the bigger picture, which takes longer then, because we need more information.

Speaker 2: 07:59

Okay.

Speaker 1: 08:00

So whilst rational thinking comes in at about four um 250 milliseconds, this what we call reflective thinking comes in at 420 milliseconds. Okay.

Speaker 3: 08:11

And the quickest bit is 70 minutes.

Speaker 1: 08:15

70, yeah. So so if we play that out, right? So things like imagination would sit very much in the reflective space. And if I I think if if you take a little while to think about that, it makes sense because we're collecting more information from more sources to put it together. But like instinctive reactions are incredibly quick because originally as reptiles, we needed to make up, we couldn't take half a second that could cost us our lives. We have to get on with things, you know, make our minds up quickly. If a bus is veering off towards the pavement that you're walking on, it's not a good time for thinking about, you know, it as a driver had a good day. You know, it's much more about what have I got to do to get out of here? Yeah, to protect myself. But further relatability, I think, comes to things like, you know, one of my bug bays that we touched on before is I I dislike the level of polarization that exists in society between, you know, different sorts of beliefs, between religion and science and spiritual spirituality and something else, so on and on and on it goes. Okay. One of the reasons for that is the instinctive brain. So whilst it's there to protect us, the very first thing it will do is look out for, you know, are you my tribe or somebody else's tribe? Okay. So it's that first thought which says, should I be afraid of you or am I okay with you?

Speaker 2: 09:34

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 09:35

All right. Now, at that level, and we still make those decisions, we still have an absolute tendency to decide is somebody in the safe basket or in the threat basket. Yeah. And that then has a huge impact on the information that we look for thereafter to determine how we deal with the response. Because once the instinctive brain is engaged, it's like a crocodile, it charges through, it explodes in and it changes the oxygenated blood supply in the brain, which means that the diet's already cast and what we're going to be looking for in making sense of the situation. The reason I say that's relatable is because it explains why we are often hung up with who's right and who's wrong. Because we start making that decision within the first 70 milliseconds of our brain's reaction.

Speaker 3: 10:23

So how our our perception of other people sits in that reptilian instinctive part.

Speaker 1: 10:30

That's the starting point, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 10:31

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:32

And of course, our challenge then is like recognizing that's going on. So why is it we're more inclined to believe some people more than others? Okay. What's happening at that very instinctive level, which creates connection and trust or not? And sometimes that's going to be right. So I'm not saying ignore it, okay, because it's basically built on our experience. But sometimes it'll be wrong. And when we find ourselves in situations where we've not handled something as well as we could have, and we've been honest with ourselves about that, then it's very useful to go back and think, well, where at what level was I wrong? Was my thinking wrong about it? Was I emotionally wrong? Or was I just instinctively put myself in the worst possible position to start with? Does that make sense?

Speaker 3: 11:14

Yeah, it does. It does. So it's really the interplay between the the yeah, yeah, exactly that.

Speaker 1: 11:20

Because we analyze behavior, and I and I understand why, because it's just classic with our preoccupation with the material world, right? We have to focus on what we see. Yeah, I get that. But behavior itself is a response to all the other stuff that happened first. And when we were talking about the physics community, matter itself is a response to everything else that happened first at the energetic level.

Speaker 3: 11:44

Yes. So this is yeah, but so this is the same pattern of perception, we're doing it again.

Speaker 1: 11:51

It is, yeah, yeah. It's a and and again, not knocking ourselves, we haven't been stupid, it's just what we knew. Right? But now we should know the things are not working. Yeah, so where's our next level of intelligence going to come from? Well, and part of it is from just looking into ourselves, you know, because we've been so preoccupied with our external worlds that we've done very little to transform our internal worlds. We've tried, but you know, we haven't got very far so as yet.

Speaker 3: 12:18

But the scientific tools, you know, advanced enough for us to be able to get a scientific glimpse into our internal world.

Speaker 1: 12:28

Yeah, they're they're insights. So they don't they won't spell out solutions to us because it's too early, I think, in our understanding of the brain, and certainly our understanding of the universe. But to me, at least it says don't put all your eggs in the one basket of rational science. Yeah. Yeah, because we know that is only at best half a story. So, what about the rest of the story? Where are we gonna look for the rest of that story? And that's you know what we're talking about, whether it is from a physics or from a neuroscience perspective, you're opening up our minds to the other stuff. That you know, there are insights available now, and we should be tuning into that, and we should be stop trying to stop all this racing round in terms of the preoccupation with the material world and give ourselves space to open up our internal world.

Speaker 3: 13:20

So, neuroscience in terms of the brain, is that where our neuroscientific exploration will end?

Speaker 1: 13:29

Absolutely not. So glad you said that. Yeah, it would have been very quiet, wouldn't it? It's not good material, is it, for a podcast? Silence silence. Um, no, no, but so I mean, where that leads is to the whole concept of body intelligence, you know. So, um below that, energetic intelligence. But let's stick with easy stuff first. So, you know, um He says easy stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Maybe that was a joke? No, maybe not. Um keep trying. Yeah, okay, keep keep plugging away. So yeah, so when we're dealing with body intelligence, we still we know that there's a complex, you know, somatic sensory system that runs through the body. Every every cell in the body is an intelligence system, okay, and that sounds weird, but it is because it has to sense what's going on in the bloodstream, for instance, you know, whether there are toxins in the bloodstream or whether there are nutrients, because it has to react differently to those. So it's not like intelligence only sits in certain parts of the body. Intelligence does not just sit in the brain, it sits right across our whole existence, right? And not only material, beyond that. But let's stick with the material for now. So we have a very sophisticated body intelligence system which consists of primarily the senses that we're all aware of, you know, sight and sound and all that stuff, um, and equally the emotional um uh sensory experience that is embodied within us. You know, we feel our emotions in the body, don't we? We don't feel our thoughts in the body, but we've we feel our emotions there. So, and broadly the way that it's work is the brain, you cannot operate independently of the body, and that's one of the challenges for AI. Another debate another day. But in essence, the brain relies on the information coming from the body about its environment and then works out how to respond. Okay, so there are different tiers in the brain where there's a part of the brain called the insula, which is where this some other sensory intelligence is received in the brain, and then we have intelligence sort of coming down from the thinking layers, which interprets that intelligence and works out how we respond. But if you took away that intelligence, we wouldn't be humans, yeah, you know, because it's the foundational information that we work with and then work out how we respond. So that is throws up some very interesting challenges. So number one is we need to be much more in touch with our bodies, okay, and in particular the intelligence that our body is offering us that we just don't listen into enough. Yeah, and of course, that can take us into a meditative state or a spiritual state, so it's a point of possible convergence. Yeah. So listening to our bodies, but also then there's this whole principle about when people talk about mind, usually people's assumption, the mind operates around the brain. I would argue the mind operates around the whole brain and body.

Speaker 3: 16:27

Right.

Speaker 1: 16:27

So the brain and body are the biological machinery of our mind, but our mind is not necessarily the same thing. But that's something we're gonna leave hanging until we get into consciousness. I'm not gonna tell you now. Yeah, no, we just need a bit more information to get the most out of that debate, you know. But that's the essence of it is even with our current today's understanding of mind, then we are wrong to exclude the body.

Speaker 2: 16:58

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 16:58

You know, we are we are biology and we're energy. And we need to understand how those domains meet and work together.

Speaker 3: 17:06

Yeah. But I mean, yeah, I mean, as as we know working together, we have a constant discourse about how to bring not how to bring the whole being into a room, into a space of learning, not just the the brain. You know, the the attitude that this this you know the body is something that transports the brain from place to place and you know, necessarily needs fed and watering every now and then and and let out for a run, but actually the whole system as one and how we can how we can treat that because I feel uh I feel really strongly personally that um our well-being suffers when we make that um disassociation between mind and body.

Speaker 1: 17:52

Well, yeah, I mean the way I like to think of it is like that there are you know the intelligence system in the in the whole unit called a uh human being, you know, is hugely impacted by the brain, the heart and the gut. So the heart and the gut are big players. And certainly when we get into um experiences like confidence, the difference between confidence and not being confident. But we are confident when the brain, the heart, and the gut are synchronized, when they're aligned and believe in the same things, right? And we are uh when we're out of balance, we are at least suboptimized or possibly in into some state of ill health or or anxiety. You know, so synchronization around what's going on in the body and aligning it with what's going on in the brain is a key part of maintaining homeostasis, which is a which is a basically a place of biological balance where things are as they're meant to be. You know, anxiety is a state where we pulled out of balance, excitement is a state where we're pulled out of balance, you know, which is why excitement is is temporary, but it's a motivator, of course. But it's like we always need to keep dropping back to this default position where everything, the engine's just ticking over, you know, and that is absolutely a brain and body type synchronization activity, and yet we rarely understand that. And you know, a classic example would be um where we're in denial about you know needing help, for instance, um, or you know, we are so habitual about the way that we have to appear positive, we almost convince ourselves that we are positive. You can fool the thinking parts of the brain, but you cannot fool the body. The heart has to deal with the reality of the hormones that are being released, you know, in the body. So there's an honesty about the body that is well worth protecting and trying to gaze into on occasions because that's what that's where our human reality is, not what we always tell ourselves in the brain. And when we can get those things synchronized and we're actually telling ourselves what's really happening, we're in a state of well-being.

Speaker 2: 20:03

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 20:03

In a real place and and and and belief, you know, gravitas and all those things because we're using all of us. We are a complete individual, whereas anxiety and all the negative stuff separates us internally, and our systems don't coordinate, they don't synchronize, and we you know, you can at worst in the brain you can go into psychosis, you know, and different voices speaking in the head. It's stress is a form of separation, whereas you know, well-being is all about synchronicity and bringing things together. That was a good boom, money.

Speaker 3: 20:36

Yeah, can you hear me? I'm powering.

Speaker 1: 20:42

Who needs words? Yeah, yeah. Just just just throw a f a few noises in my way, right?

Speaker 3: 20:47

But just gentle effects. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, I love that.

Speaker: 20:55

So now where to go now, do you?

Speaker 3: 20:56

Well, I mean, I have a little note here on neurodiversity. Um, yeah. Yeah. And I I there is no seamless segue, just more purring.

Speaker 1: 21:07

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's it's yeah, well, I mean, let's let's take one step back first of all. And you know, uh our understanding of the human brain has been hugely um uh enhanced by when the brain doesn't work as it's supposed to. Okay, and that's a that can be at a real biological level, or you know, things like split brain surgery and things like that, where you have to save a person's life or experience really through you know separating parts of the brain, because for instance, the level of seizures that they're having is the only way to control it. Okay, so um, and what we have found is that the brain is incredibly powerful and clever at at recovering things it loses, right? So it's got this great regenerative ability to bounce back, and if it loses something, it'll find another way of getting the information, okay? But you know, without two. Much depth on that. So basically, where that takes us is the point that we can we can bounce back and recover. Yeah. So whence it starts with things like spit brain surgery in the neurodiverse space, it's now very noticeable that there are a lot of people that are battling with either diagnosed or self-diagnosed conditions of a neurodiversity and anxiety disorders. Now, my own view of that, that can't be backed up with the science yet, but there are pointers there, is that that's symptomatic of sensory overload in our brains. You know, the level of information that we are now trying to deal with in terms of external change in our environments is like no other species has ever experienced, including humanity itself, earlier stages of. And our brains can't cope with that. And my suspicion is that our brains are getting bent out of shape in in order to try and cope with this. And we have natural mechanisms in the brain that allow us, for instance, to moderate emotions, you know, key interfaces in the brain, yeah, yeah, to do with the temporal lobe and parietal lobe and things like that. But basically, they are there to help us, you know, moderate life and just be continue to be able to make sense of what's going on.

Speaker 2: 23:19

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 23:19

But when that's constantly flooded by information around change, and change requires more energy in the brain, you know, rather than using the current networks. And when it's exacerbated by things like especially youngsters with developing brains and social media, where they're bombarded, you know, whether it's a person in an organizational context being context being bombarded by too much information, or the child is being bombarded with the wrong sort of information. The reality is that our brain's ability to cope with that is getting stretched.

Speaker 2: 23:51

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 23:52

You know, I know there's something like probably one or four in people that diagnose is being around, you know, around neurodiverse or anxiety conditions. Yeah. So, and it's only gonna get worse, you know, it's because that is the direction that we've pointed to ourselves. Now, understanding how the brain has reacted to that again is a very useful insight and is telling us that things shouldn't be this way, you know, and our view of normal is going to change and has to change because of the environments we've created. What I really dislike about uh our treatment of neurodiverse conditions is again this polarization, as though there is like you know, there's a group of so-called normal people and a group of uh different people. So basically, it's like typical, untypical, and a big gap in the middle. It's nothing like that. Yeah, the truth is there's a spectrum, and we're all a bit untypical. Yeah, you know, we've all got the odd bit of obsessive behavior or experience anxiety or mood swings, all the classic things, you know, social engagement issues, all the things that are suffered on a bigger level, on a higher level for neurodiverse people, but are nevertheless now a part of a fairly typical human condition. Yeah, it's not that we're totally different, it's just we're at different points on the scale. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 25:19

But it speaks again to, you know, going back all the way to that kind of Newton versus Einstein, that you know, it is this, it's it's a continuum, it's a wave, it's a spectrum, and yet we want to go binary, you're in this classification or this one. Absolutely. It's very material. And it it it does. I mean, and then you're diagnosed or not diagnosed, and that yeah, yeah, classification, identification, and and and and we've got to reset the rules because you know, at the moment new dire neurodiversity and uh uh well, in particular that has a stigma around it, you know, and which is totally unreasonable.

Speaker 1: 25:58

It's unfair on the people concerned, you know, and I know from working up closely with them that they have a really tough time. But the truth is that yeah, underneath the surface here, you've got some very talented people. So, for instance, people with ADHD are often incredibly creative people because their minds bounce around, they don't fit into the rules of predictable, you know, factory management styles, if you know what I mean. They don't they don't behave themselves in a classic way. But if you can tap into that talent, they're incredibly creative people, and likewise the apparent obsessive behavior of somebody with autism can be fantastic if you're looking for for like rigor in research, you know, where one person's obsession is another person's passion. And if they passion, the key point is do they enjoy it? And a lot of them, you know, autistic people enjoy that, you know, getting stuck into something and really following it through. You know, so instead of it seeing it's something that's unusual and we can't handle it, therefore it's bad, it's like, oh, this is actually how our brains are trying their best to adapt to the conditions we created. And we should be looking at this for the opportunities, not just the barriers. So you see the the whole link is our whole concept of what we are and who we are needs to evolve, and it needs to evolve quickly, like urgently.

Speaker 3: 27:16

Yeah. I um there's a um statistic that I love. Uh I I do think I know, I never remember the numbers in statistics. Well, that's a challenge. But I think I have this one down that in a day we consume as much information as someone did in a lifetime 500 years ago. And when you think about like the newest part of our brain is what, 200,000 years old. Yeah. I don't know why I'm suddenly quoting everyone numbers having admitted to not being great with them. But you know, to give you an example, in the state, you know, uh the evolution of ourselves and and and the the incredibly rapid shift in our environment, there's gonna be a discord, and as you're describing, I think that's a fascinating um uh take on neurodivergency. And uh, you know, so our sense of self needs a rethink, a reshape.

Speaker 1: 28:21

No, there's an interesting concept, self, isn't it? So uh what's neuroscience view on a self? Um don't don't worry if I take on this conversation, just keep asking myself questions now and answering them. So basically, the neuroscience view of self is is tangible, but it is no permanent structure in the brain that we could call the self. All cells regenerate, you know, typically within a couple of years or so in the brain, right across the body, I think in seven years. So there's no biological presence of something we can call a self. Right now, what you do with that information can go in different directions, but it certainly starts to throw uh a very different perspective on what the self might be. Certainly, if people, as I think I originally had was like, you know, you arrive with a some some sort of self, and that self navigates its way through life as best it can.

Speaker 3: 29:18

When you say you are right, you mean you are born, you're right on earth.

Speaker 1: 29:21

Yeah, right. There's some sort of genetic structure wherever it is, you know, or spiritual structure that, and then you navigate your way through life. But but my view is different now, and now I think it's very much something that emerges. You know, there is no doubt that we are unique. Every one of us is absolutely unique, okay. But whether we have a self at the beginning that navigates life is now highly debatable from the neuroscience perspective. We see it as an emergent, still like streaming process where we are collecting, downloading intelligence, and adding to that intelligence as we go through life. Now it's important as I've touched on before, that we maintain a sense of self, because if we have no sense of agency, then we think we can't do anything about it.

Speaker 3: 30:08

Yes, we touched on that.

Speaker 1: 30:09

And from an evolutionary point of view, that's a weak place to be, right? Because you're just a robot.

Speaker 3: 30:14

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 30:14

So you need to believe in a self. So belief itself then becomes an evolutionary function, right? So now we're starting to get a bit deep, right? So basically, I'm not saying there's the evidence shows there isn't a self, but I'm saying we can't take it for granted. And that's when we start to get in the debate about okay, so is there anything that pre-exists? Does it go through life and does it return at the end of life, which takes us into spirituality? But for now, we're talking neuroscience, and we are saying our whole concept of self needs to be re-examined.

Speaker 2: 30:50

Whoa.

Speaker 1: 30:52

See, I said we didn't need words. We just need noises. I use my mammalian brain to interpret that noise, although I'm still a bit confused. Because my thinking brain's getting in the way.

Speaker 3: 31:09

Um yes. So ever-changing cellular cluster, so the idea of any continual sense of self is uh impossible in that structure. There was something you talked about.

Speaker 1: 31:23

I don't say it's impossible, I'm saying it's up for question.

Speaker 3: 31:26

It's up for question.

Speaker 1: 31:29

Remember, I talked about separation in an earlier conversation, and I was saying that there's this illusion that we're separate.

Speaker 2: 31:35

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 31:36

Well, of course, we've been taught, most of us I think, is like you have to have a strong view of yourself, you have to have a real identity, so you put yourself out there, you're noticed, and you get on in life. Yeah. Now there's, as I said, an evolutionary benefit from that, undoubtedly. And identity is about, you know, have feeling you've got value in your community, etc. But is there a downside as well, which is again, it breeds this whole idea of we're separate. And in the quantum world, we are not separate. You know, we are all whatever we end up doing affects us all, and that's so hard to get our life and our heads around. You know, but that's the reality in invert commas of the quantum world. Nothing is disconnected.

Speaker 3: 32:21

I got the tingle again.

Speaker 1: 32:22

Yeah, I'm so glad you found it back. Um well, I hope there's a few more tingles going on out there. It isn't just you and me having this conversation, you know. But I can't sense them on the microphone.

Speaker 3: 32:40

Okay, so the self.

Speaker 1: 32:43

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 32:44

As a possibly less than constructive construct.

Speaker 1: 32:50

That's an interesting choice of words.

Speaker 3: 32:51

Yeah, it wasn't a question. So I think I can better with the sound. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:57

Stick with the noises for when you're in that mood. Yeah. Um, yeah, no, I I do believe it or not, I do believe no, we I do actually know what you're getting at, which is a bit worrying. Um but yeah, it's it's it's just something open ourselves up, examine our current patterns of thought. You know, this doesn't mean letting go of the things that we believe in deeply, but why should we be afraid of looking to those things? Surely a belief that we're afraid to challenge is of no good to us. If you can't stand up to some rigor and some analysis, is it really uh a belief that that serves us? Yeah, yeah. So, you know, this as I've said before, this hang up of being right or wrong, you know, it's just perspectives. The more we looked at this stuff, everything is about perspective, and how do we share those perspectives to come up with something better than we've got now?

Speaker 3: 33:50

Yeah, Clive, I think you need an ice bucket now, don't you? Um, so that's three. That's episode three on neuroscience. And as we dance around this notion of self, I think it might be time to introduce our theme for episode four.

Speaker 1: 34:11

Yep.

Speaker 3: 34:11

Consciousness.

Speaker 1: 34:12

So you regained your rational brain there. You you you got you got through the emotional stuff, and it came back to you, didn't it? It just needed a bit more time.

Speaker 2: 34:20

It did!

Speaker 1: 34:21

Yeah, it did. So, yeah, so consciousness is where we you know we've sort of been doing it, but we take more time to bring it all together now because the role of consciousness is of intense interest to physicists in terms of the observation of the universe, which we talked about in that session. Um, it's also of great interest to psychologists, obviously, you know, and it's also very relevant from almost an evolutionary biology point of view, understanding how we've developed different levels of consciousness. So that's what we'll talk about next time, again with a view of trying to open up people's understanding of who we are.

Speaker 3: 35:02

Amazing, Clive. Thank you so much. And everyone, um, yes, thank you for listening, and we will see you for episode four of Timeless.