I Think Therefore I Am...Not

I think therefore I am...not

“I think therefore I am” said René Descartes in his “Discourse on the Method” (Descartes 1637). A fairly self evident statement that says because I think I exist. By our very act of thinking we provide evidence of our existence. But Jill Bolte Taylor, in her video presentation on TED.com, adds to that idea with the notion that via purely right brain thought “I think therefore I am not”.

Neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor gives a detailed and sometimes moving description of the morning that she suffered a stroke in the left hemisphere of her brain. During the course of the talk she first explains to us that our left brain is a serial device, working through things logically, one step at a time. That the left brain concerns itself with the past, and the future. The left brain also sees ourselves as unique individuals, placed into a 3d space where we interact with the rest of the world as a distinct entity, separate and apart from other objects. But our right brain, she goes on to explain, is much more abstract and tends to see ourselves as just bundles and collections of energy, easily at one with the energy of the rest of the world, not unique and independent, but part of a much larger whole. At one point during her presentation she describes leaning against the wall of her home and watching with wonder as her arm begins to intermingle with the wall (Taylor 2008).

Her statements are supported by left/right brain lateralization studies (the differences in how our left and right brains function and how each processes information and stimuli (Meyers 2009)), that show that each half of our brain performs certain tasks better than does its next door neighbor. The left brain excels at math and science...

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...sciousness available through the right brain as described by Jill Bolte Taylor.

References

Descartes, René (1910). The Harvard Classics Five-Foot Shelf of Books – French and English

Philosophers Charles W. Eliot LL D (Ed.). Discourse on the Method (pp 28) New York, NY, P F Collier & Son (original work published 1637)

Meyers, David (2009). Psychology in Everyday Life New York, NY, Worth Publishers

Morris, Rich (2005-2007). Left Brain, Right Brain, Whole Brain. Retrieved from

http://www.singsurf.org/rightbrain.php

Taylor, Jill Bolte (Presenter). (filmed 2008, Feb., posted 2008, Mar.). TED Talks. Jill Bolte Taylor's Stroke of Insight. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html

Charles Milam

Psych 2301-015

February 17, 2010