Adventures of a Wetware Hacker

For some, studying the mind and all its glory brings them to heights unparalleled. The altitude at which you fly when you overlook the intelligence and very reality of man is otherwise unattainable. To fathom intelligence, and indeed, to reproduce it, has been the goal of our species since its inception. We have succeeded in the blind recreation of intelligence with every generation, but we still fail to explain how -- or why -- the intelligence itself exists. There is only one way to get to the top of this, the highest mountain on which we can stand. These theories, these glimpses of consciousness, have ensnared the greatest minds ever to walk the earth. They are incredible, wonderful, and inspiring. Pondering the concepts involved certainly does lead to the greatest highs the mind can experience. But what if you're afraid of heights?

How do people continually deal with the existential vertigo inherent to studying the mind? Are preconceptions that successful in their salvation? How can people stand on the edge for hours, days, weeks at a time, looking into the abyss, hoping that -- for a moment -- the abyss will, indeed, stare back. For me, the most frightening and overwhelming moments are those spent staring into the nebulous concepts of consciousness, the ever unreachable comprehension of comprehension itself. The incredible distance between myself and this Invisible Hand, this Theory of Mind, is at once unavoidable and insurmountable. This is a battle that must be fought, although it will most certainly be lost. Perhaps it will be my downfall, but I maintain that it is a battle worth losing...

posted by Parijata Mackey @ 12:25 AM