Where Do Thoughts Come From?

“Know what is in front of your face and what is hidden will be revealed to you”

---Jesus, Gospel of Thomas, Saying 5.

1. One of the most powerful insights Jesus shared is the promise to his followers that when they start to look for themselves, the hidden will be revealed. In this essay, I posed the question to readers: Where do my thoughts come from?

2. It is obvious that everyone has thoughts. But from whence do they arise? The very act of posing this question and then deeply examining this question is the first step to Enlightenment. 

3. The answer from the brain researchers: Thoughts are a function of the electrical current in the brain. Parts of the brain are activated and then these impulses are translated in thoughts. How does this happen? This is part of what consciousness researchers call the “hard question” to which they have no answer. Apparently, thoughts just somehow arise—either sourced from the brain or outside the brain.  See: The Hard Problem of Consciousness - Serious Science.

4. Our psychologist friends will explain that thoughts are part of the associative function of the brain. So one sees a group of children riding on a merry-go-round and then he is reminded of himself doing so many years previously. While this sort of explanation passes for erudition, it really explains nothing. This kind of pseudo-explanation uses a concept, then defines the concept, then gives various examples of the concept, and then connects the given concept to other concepts and Abracadabra! we know where thoughts come from. In fact, this is a description of what appears to be a chain of causation which is illusionary. For one thing, each time you revisit the child’s merry-go-round, you will have different associations. If there were a true cause-and-effect relationship, then one would expect the same output for the same input, which does not happen. The careful reader will also note that the entire explanation relies on us knowing what causes the “associative function” to occur; instead, by a magic wave of hand, the reader is supposed to accept that this is well understood when, in fact, the psychologist has not explain how this function works but assumes it in explaining another.

5. Thoughts arise from the higher brain controlling the lower brain. This sums up consciousness researcher Daniel Dennett elaborate explanation of how the brain works. See_Dan Dennett: The illusion of consciousness | TED Talk | TED.com.   One immediately sees an infinite regress problem here: Where did the higher mind obtain the impulse in order for the lower brain to have the thoughts? At some point we will have to go outside the system or in this case outside the brain to offer a cogent explanation. 

6. Thoughts arise from outside the brain. Logically, this is the only place they could arise—which would be obvious if one followed Jesus’ advice to “look what is in front of your face.” The hidden in this case: God. Everything must be sourced by God or Consciousness or nothing could manifest. Everything is vibrating at the speed of light so that your brain is fooled into thinking things are solid when they are just atoms arranged together to make up an illusionary solid. Here we leave the domain of physics and enter metaphysics. See: The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels ... - Amazon.com. 

7. One important corollary to the insight that thoughts arise from outside the brain: Your thoughts are not your own! This is what enlightened masters have been saying for millennia: From Solomon to Jesus to the Buddha to the Zen Masters of today: Thoughts arise without a thinker.

8. The moment the truth seeker sees that thoughts which arise are not his own something amazing happens: They stop! Thoughts are an obvious secondary function from some impulse which have been translated into sub-vocalization. While they usually will be repetitive—like a child’s merry-go-round—you can get off the amusement park ride by seeing you are riding a horse that is being controlled by something outside you.

9. All meditative practices are designed to center the brain on the radiant present. With each breath one disassociates from his thoughts and witnesses them. When this happens one sees one’s thoughts and what one is are two different things. This is the first step to Enlightenment. 

10. May each reader of this blog see what is in front of his face so that the hidden is revealed!