Is this weird or what?
Here’s something I just read from a quote of Richard feynman – The value of science, that’s just plain weird!
“It means the atoms that are in the brain are being replaced: the ones that were there before have gone away.
So what is this mind of ours: what are these atoms with consciousness? Last week's potatoes! They now can remember what was going on in my mind a year ago—a mind which has long ago been replaced. To note that the thing I call my individuality is only a pattern or dance, that is what it means when one discovers how long it takes for the atoms of the brain to be replaced by other atoms. The atoms come into my brain, dance a dance, and then go out—there are always new atoms, but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday.”
So what is this mind of ours: what are these atoms with consciousness? Last week's potatoes! They now can remember what was going on in my mind a year ago—a mind which has long ago been replaced. To note that the thing I call my individuality is only a pattern or dance, that is what it means when one discovers how long it takes for the atoms of the brain to be replaced by other atoms. The atoms come into my brain, dance a dance, and then go out—there are always new atoms, but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday.”
Atoms in your brain are being replaced by other atoms. We know that at a larger scale, cells - [larger groupings of atoms], are being replaced continuously in the body. Some even say that every 7 years, you own a totally new body. Amazing!
At the level of atoms, we know that they come together and share atomic space and electrons. So that connected atoms might consist almost entirely of electrons of just one atom bouncing around, keeping both of them going. weird.
So particles[electrons] move in and out of each other. This must mean that any atom’s constituency is in a constant state of flux. So that an atom is made up of individual particles that come and go from all over the place. They pop in this atom and then take a little holiday to another one. Weird.
The upshot of this is that our brain and body, that chair, that car, that hamburger, is not a fixed thing. Every last atomic particle of it goes in and out, and other particles from elsewhere, take their place. A swirling bubbling, burping, flowing soup, rather than a stolid solid rock of a thing, which is all we ever see. Weird.
You are at this very moment, a completely different set of matter than you were a microscopic fraction of a second ago, yet you have stayed the same person. Even weirder!
Paul...weirded out!
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