The human mind

[DBT]

Again there is no research needed or formal argument needed to explain the obvious.

If a rock falls I need no research to prove it falls. No argument needed.

If you are expressing the idea that research has value you must have the autonomy to not only decide what has value but also the autonomy to cause your hands to type out the words you chose.

Ah, yes, gotcha, no research or evidence needed for faith....which confirms your position as a man of faith. Someone who rejects evidence and reason in favour of subjective experience and faith based belief.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Please stop the noise and address the OP.

Here it is again:

We tend to see our conscious mind, i.e. the part of our mind that's capable of proper reasoning, i.e. thinking using a formal language, as properly "us". This is the "I" in Descartes' Cogito, I think, therefore I am. We also see it as the part that's really intelligent compared to our more brutish, instinctive, "intuitive", and essentially apparently non-conscious mind. Many people think of this as a two-system set-up. The second system, the conscious part of our mind, is assumed as having evolved at some point in our more recent history well after the first system was already in place, system which is seen therefore as much closer in terms of evolution to that of our closest animal relatives. Basically, we tend to think that all the intelligent ideas we have when awake are produced by the second system, typically through a sort of "verbal", or formal, thinking. The first system is usually understood as providing us with emotions, sensations, perceptions etc. and also intuitions.

What do you think of this view?

Do you have any alternative view?
EB

EB

 

[untermensche]

Again there is no research needed or formal argument needed to explain the obvious.

If a rock falls I need no research to prove it falls. No argument needed.

If you are expressing the idea that research has value you must have the autonomy to not only decide what has value but also the autonomy to cause your hands to type out the words you chose.

Ah, yes, gotcha, no research or evidence needed for faith....which confirms your position as a man of faith. Someone who rejects evidence and reason in favour of subjective experience and faith based belief.

You have not addressed my points in the least.

You have merely waved your arms a little like a fool and completely ignored the points made.

 

[untermensche]

That is pouting not discourse.

You mistake my facial wetness which was caused by Crocodile tears which should remind rather you of a main course.

More pouting.

How can you accept some ideas and reject other ideas if you do not have the autonomy to do it?

Answer that. That is all you have to address.

Simple.

 

[4321lynx]

Please stop the noise and address the OP.

Here it is again:

We tend to see our conscious mind, i.e. the part of our mind that's capable of proper reasoning, i.e. thinking using a formal language, as properly "us". This is the "I" in Descartes' Cogito, I think, therefore I am. We also see it as the part that's really intelligent compared to our more brutish, instinctive, "intuitive", and essentially apparently non-conscious mind. Many people think of this as a two-system set-up. The second system, the conscious part of our mind, is assumed as having evolved at some point in our more recent history well after the first system was already in place, system which is seen therefore as much closer in terms of evolution to that of our closest animal relatives. Basically, we tend to think that all the intelligent ideas we have when awake are produced by the second system, typically through a sort of "verbal", or formal, thinking. The first system is usually understood as providing us with emotions, sensations, perceptions etc. and also intuitions.

What do you think of this view?

Do you have any alternative view?
EB

EB

They are getting ready for the New Year with the Same Old... Same Old...

I like your thinking about this, provided you admit to (i.e. allow of) varying roles of influence of the first system on the second, and of the second on the first, varying from time to time in quantity and quality of importance in a dynamic equilibrium (or non-equilibrium) in a polyphasic system.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Please stop the noise and address the OP.

Here it is again:

We tend to see our conscious mind, i.e. the part of our mind that's capable of proper reasoning, i.e. thinking using a formal language, as properly "us". This is the "I" in Descartes' Cogito, I think, therefore I am. We also see it as the part that's really intelligent compared to our more brutish, instinctive, "intuitive", and essentially apparently non-conscious mind. Many people think of this as a two-system set-up. The second system, the conscious part of our mind, is assumed as having evolved at some point in our more recent history well after the first system was already in place, system which is seen therefore as much closer in terms of evolution to that of our closest animal relatives. Basically, we tend to think that all the intelligent ideas we have when awake are produced by the second system, typically through a sort of "verbal", or formal, thinking. The first system is usually understood as providing us with emotions, sensations, perceptions etc. and also intuitions.

What do you think of this view?

Do you have any alternative view?
EB

EB

They are getting ready for the New Year with the Same Old... Same Old...

I had to check this one on Qwant, just to make sure. Yes, they won't get any new anything for Christmas.

I like your thinking about this

Sorry, not mine. I'm just airing this view as a decoy. Re-read how I phrase it exactly and you'll see.

Still, I do see it as the default view. I will admit to have been having this view myself for a very long time.

Now I think it doesn't match with what we think we know about evolution in particular. Evolving the second system would be a stretch of the imagination. So my post was to give an opportunity for people to articulate some alternative view more in line with evolution. Fat chance with the menagerie here.

, provided you admit to (i.e. allow of) varying roles of influence of the first system on the second, and of the second on the first, varying from time to time in quantity and quality of importance in a dynamic equilibrium (or non-equilibrium) in a polyphasic system.

That's not quite my view. I don't think any two-system setup could have been evolved within the short span of time of the primate branch. Maybe someone else has an expert opinion on this. Instead, I think of our cortex as one system running a two-level software, so to speak. One level is producing what we are conscious of as our intuitions, our memories, all our percepts, sensations, impressions, emotions. Then the system also developed at some point in our recent history the ability to run a programme of formal thinking. Our abstract thinking is entirely produced by processes that are essentially unconscious. This ability would have been there from the start. It would be intrinsic to the way part of our brain works. The actual development of it would have been prompted by our social life and perhaps something else.The immediate advantage for the individual would have been access to abstract thinking, much more nibble to take circumstances into account and adapt behaviour. The much more considerable advantage, though, would have been for the community. Abstract thinking, joined with language, gives the opportunity for the individual to share his thoughts. The individual remains the source of original thinking, new ideas, but language and shared abstract thinking allow the community to turn into a large and more powerful "brain". This would have been very effective to help the first communities to have developed abstract thinking and language to grow and beat the opposition, or perhaps just absorb them. At the beginning was the word. This also explain why we want to share our views, why we argue and try to convince, and how new ideas are seized and developed by society. Individuals remain the main source of original thinking, witness Copernicus, Descartes, Einstein and Trump (ah-ah). But these people would be nothing without the community to provide the elevated ground to start from and the comfort to spend time thinking these original ideas. Standing on the shoulders of giants, as Newton explained, showing he didn't quite get it.

So there is a dynamic equilibrium but it's that of one system running different programmes, not that of two systems. We're effectively the formal thinking programme, getting inputs from the non-formal programmes, like memory, perceptions, etc. We're a formal thinking programme run by the brain. And the beauty of it is that our brain gets new releases of the programme all the time, just by being connected to the web of the community, taking advantage of the flow of new ideas and of new thinking paradigms. This is a collaborative effort. This is Christmas. Enjoy.
EB

 

[4321lynx]

They are getting ready for the New Year with the Same Old... Same Old...

I had to check this one on Qwant, just to make sure. Yes, they won't get any new anything for Christmas.

I like your thinking about this

Sorry, not mine. I'm just airing this view as a decoy. Re-read how I phrase it exactly and you'll see.

Still, I do see it as the default view. I will admit to have been having this view myself for a very long time.

Now I think it doesn't match with what we think we know about evolution in particular. Evolving the second system would be a stretch of the imagination. So my post was to give an opportunity for people to articulate some alternative view more in line with evolution. Fat chance with the menagerie here.

, provided you admit to (i.e. allow of) varying roles of influence of the first system on the second, and of the second on the first, varying from time to time in quantity and quality of importance in a dynamic equilibrium (or non-equilibrium) in a polyphasic system.

That's not quite my view. I don't think any two-system setup could have been evolved within the short span of time of the primate branch. Maybe someone else has an expert opinion on this. Instead, I think of our cortex as one system running a two-level software, so to speak. One level is producing what we are conscious of as our intuitions, our memories, all our percepts, sensations, impressions, emotions. Then the system also developed at some point in our recent history the ability to run a programme of formal thinking. Our abstract thinking is entirely produced by processes that are essentially unconscious. This ability would have been there from the start. It would be intrinsic to the way part of our brain works. The actual development of it would have been prompted by our social life and perhaps something else.The immediate advantage for the individual would have been access to abstract thinking, much more nibble to take circumstances into account and adapt behaviour. The much more considerable advantage, though, would have been for the community. Abstract thinking, joined with language, gives the opportunity for the individual to share his thoughts. The individual remains the source of original thinking, new ideas, but language and shared abstract thinking allow the community to turn into a large and more powerful "brain". This would have been very effective to help the first communities to have developed abstract thinking and language to grow and beat the opposition, or perhaps just absorb them. At the beginning was the word. This also explain why we want to share our views, why we argue and try to convince, and how new ideas are seized and developed by society. Individuals remain the main source of original thinking, witness Copernicus, Descartes, Einstein and Trump (ah-ah). But these people would be nothing without the community to provide the elevated ground to start from and the comfort to spend time thinking these original ideas. Standing on the shoulders of giants, as Newton explained, showing he didn't quite get it.

So there is a dynamic equilibrium but it's that of one system running different programmes, not that of two systems. We're effectively the formal thinking programme, getting inputs from the non-formal programmes, like memory, perceptions, etc. We're a formal thinking programme run by the brain. And the beauty of it is that our brain gets new releases of the programme all the time, just by being connected to the web of the community, taking advantage of the flow of new ideas and of new thinking paradigms. This is a collaborative effort. This is Christmas. Enjoy.
EB

I think there are/were no hard and fast borders but a more or less continuous spectrum from zero thoughts in an ancient and present "amoeba" or other unicellular organism, to Copernicus, Descartes, Einstein. But that the majority of humans are at the stage where they instinctively, reflexly, "believe" in Trump and his trumperies, and the equivalent "ideals", in every country in the world with nationalist, tribal, racist people in it, that is every single country and province, race, tribe, or family group on planet Earth, to a greater or lesser extent.
And the same goes for the "two" brain functions from the purely automatic eg heartbeat, respiration, urine production, feces elimination, to the philosophical, -- spectrums (?spectra) not hard and fast divisions. The divisions were created by brains/minds of men studying the phenomena. The reality was created by chance and inheritance and evolution with all the processes involved in these.

Yes, it's Xmas, but also just past the winter solstice, the days are getting longer and the nights shorter, so take care, it's getting easier to be caught with your pants down and furious husbands are unpredictable. So I wish you a happy new year, and take care, you and all of us here, we were never plentiful and now there is almost only me and thee left, and I'm not too sure about thee...

 

[Speakpigeon]

I think there are/were no hard and fast borders but a more or less continuous spectrum from zero thoughts in an ancient and present "amoeba" or other unicellular organism, to Copernicus, Descartes, Einstein. But that the majority of humans are at the stage where they instinctively, reflexly, "believe" in Trump and his trumperies, and the equivalent "ideals", in every country in the world with nationalist, tribal, racist people in it, that is every single country and province, race, tribe, or family group on planet Earth, to a greater or lesser extent.
And the same goes for the "two" brain functions from the purely automatic eg heartbeat, respiration, urine production, feces elimination, to the philosophical, -- spectrums (?spectra) not hard and fast divisions. The divisions were created by brains/minds of men studying the phenomena. The reality was created by chance and inheritance and evolution with all the processes involved in these.

Yes, it's Xmas, but also just past the winter solstice, the days are getting longer and the nights shorter, so take care, it's getting easier to be caught with your pants down and furious husbands are unpredictable. So I wish you a happy new year, and take care, you and all of us here, we were never plentiful and now there is almost only me and thee left, and I'm not too sure about thee...

But there is a hard wall between the conscious mind and the unconscious mind. All I can do to try and understand how logic works is by paying attention to logical intuitions provided by my logical sense using processes that remain hidden from me. My brain do things I don't understand. All I am aware of are the ideas, impressions etc. that somehow become conscious. How these things are produced is hidden from me. I'm one bit of my brain in one room and the rest is in another room, locked and no access. So, I would say that there is definitely a hard border. It's nothing invented. It's empirical. I would expect this border to appear during our lifetime, when we're very young, but that doesn't explain anything much.

It's true people are getting thinner on the ground but I hope you can appreciate that many of us have been around for years and years. And I'm confident people are appreciative of that despite the rude words coming fast. I guess we all understand how horrible it is outside of here! We're safe from Trump here, I hope.
EB

 

[4321lynx]

But I say there is no hard border, and such as there is, even great and impossible for you and I to scale, is passable to an extent for some humans eg pearl divers who can train their brain (all two or more parts of it) and body to let them stay under water for inordinate times. And many other examples exist. And a malfunctioning thyroid gland will cause malfunctions of the conscious brain as well as other malfunctions, and some people seem unable to function nowadays without consciously causing malfunctions of their brains with drugs, for varying lengths of time etc etc etc

It can be argued that such borders as exist, help in our survival, if you were aware of every step of your decision making you would become easy prey for a less complicated animal. Eventually with a little bit of luck and advances in biochemistry and molecular and quantum physics and chemistry and in physiology, all may be made clear. But don't hold your breath unless you are some Supermanpearldiver, it ain't going to happen soon.

 

[untermensche]

There is no border because there are not two minds.

There are brain functions and products that the mind is not experiencing but they are not another mind.

There is only one mind and it is the center that experiences all things. If it is experienced it is experienced by the mind.

Things like emotions and impulses and instincts are primitive reflexes, not a mind, and a mind with enough practice can and must override and ignore these primitive reflexes.

 

[WAB]

There is only one mind and it is the center that experiences all things.

this^. With a nod to Yung, Guatama, Jesus, Spinoza, etc...

 

[Speakpigeon]

There is only one mind and it is the center that experiences all things.

this^. With a nod to Yung, Guatama, Jesus, Spinoza, etc...

Yung, Guatama, Jesus, Spinoza, untermensche etc...

But if there is only one mind then all these people can only have the same one mind.

And so think the same thing, which would explain why they should say the same thing.

Show

Ah, it sucks.

EB

 

[untermensche]

There is only one mind and it is the center that experiences all things.

this^. With a nod to Yung, Guatama, Jesus, Spinoza, etc...

It is just a simple observation.

There is one experiencer, one mind, and it is what experiences all things.

And saying there is only one mind is meant as each individual only has one mind.

But every individual mind is different because it is the product of an individual brain and individual experiences, the most important of those being all the experiences that led to development in the womb.

 

[fromderinside]

Below are revisions I made to your statement

We I tend to see our conscious mind, i.e. the part of our mind that's capable of proper reasoning, i.e. thinking using a formal language, as properly "us". This is the "I" in Descartes' Cogito, I think, therefore I am. We I also see it as the part that's really intelligent compared to our more brutish, instinctive, "intuitive", and essentially apparently non-conscious mind. Many people I think of this as a two-system set-up. The second system, the conscious part of our mind, is assumed as having evolved at some point in our mankind's more recent history well after the first system was already in place, system which is seen therefore as much closer in terms of evolution to that of our closest animal relatives. Basically, we ​ I tend to think that all the intelligent ideas we have had when awake are produced by the second system, typically through a sort of "verbal", or formal, thinking. The first system is usually understood as providing us with emotions, sensations, perceptions etc. and also intuitions.

What do you think of this view?

Do you have any alternative view?
EB

Yes. You will see it in the changes I made to your presentation.

 

[Speakpigeon]

We tend to see our conscious mind, i.e. the part of our mind that's capable of proper reasoning, i.e. thinking using a formal language, as properly "us". This is the "I" in Descartes' Cogito, I think, therefore I am. We also see it as the part that's really intelligent compared to our more brutish, instinctive, "intuitive", and essentially apparently non-conscious mind. Many people think of this as a two-system set-up. The second system, the conscious part of our mind, is assumed as having evolved at some point in our more recent history well after the first system was already in place, system which is seen therefore as much closer in terms of evolution to that of our closest animal relatives. Basically, we tend to think that all the intelligent ideas we have when awake are produced by the second system, typically through a sort of "verbal", or formal, thinking. The first system is usually understood as providing us with emotions, sensations, perceptions etc. and also intuitions.

What do you think of this view?

Do you have any alternative view?
EB

EDIT
As it is, this is not in fact my view. I am presenting here what I think is our default perspective on our own mind. I think it's our default perspective because this is what I came to understand most people naively believe, including myself, including most people here. This is also what comes out of the literature generally. In effect, talk of our conscious mind v. our unconscious mind says it all. The evidence that it is our default perspective is overwhelming.

That doesn't preclude us from coming up with more interesting theories about our mind. So, may be you have one. That was the purpose of this thread.

Obviously, many people here tend instead to deliver what I would call the materialist dogma rather than their private perspective on their own mind, a kind of totalitarian revisionism whereby the subject volunteers to censor any private perspective to align himself with whatever he perceives as the authority. This is really sad. People like this can be spotted very easily because they invariably take a dogmatic attitude towards other people attempting to have a genuine debate on various issues. They also tend to shy away from any rational presentation of their view, opting instead for a simple repeat of the dogma, again and again and again.

It is unfortunately testimony to human nature that people who think of themselves as the inheritors of people like Galileo, Newton and Einstein, should instead choose to behave essentially like the minions of the Popes at the time of Copernicus and Galileo. This also explains why fascism, Nazism and the Stalinist regime could work.

I came to realise that the successes of science have only been made possible by a few bright individuals, people like indeed Galileo, Newton and Einstein, and I would argue most of all by Copernicus, because even though he had been educated in the dogma perpetuated by the Church, he went ahead with publishing his own original idea, that he came up with through rational thinking alone, i.e. facts and logic, an idea which was literally a revolutionary idea in that it started what came indeed to be called the Copernican Revolution, the importance of which to science, not surprisingly, tends to be overlooked by the dogmatic materialists the world over. Obviously, science, particularly modern science, is, and increasingly so, reliant on big cohorts of scientist workers. These people are absolutely necessary to modern science, at least for now, just like workers are necessary to any industry relying on manual labour. These people don't have the time nor probably the inclination to think much about anything, not even about what they do and not even about science. Their views tend to be stereotypical and in the intense ideological confrontation between different economic interests, they tend to align themselves with dogmatic materialism, in effect much like the population in Germany has largely aligned itself with the Nazis, by economic and narrow-minded opportunism. Well, that's our world, with a large dose of sad irony to it and no surprise.

All my life, starting when I was still a kid, I was close to the scientific ideal. I realise now I was only close to the scientific ideal but not to the dogmatic cohortes that I mistook for a long time for the genuine article. I first realised there was a glitch when I read a book around 1980 about the brain by Pierre Changeux, a French neuroscientist. He just dismissed in his book the notion of consciousness as something like an illusion. That was idiotic then as it is now and it helped me realise how stupid well-educated, intelligent and expert people can be. Just sad.

Oh, well, that was a serious derail, isn't it? Well, maybe not.
EB

 

[4321lynx]

There is only one mind and it is the center that experiences all things.

this^. With a nod to Yung, Guatama, Jesus, Spinoza, etc...

It is just a simple observation.

There is one experiencer, one mind, and it is what experiences all things.

And saying there is only one mind is meant as each individual only has one mind.

But every individual mind is different because it is the product of an individual brain and individual experiences, the most important of those being all the experiences that led to development in the womb.

What experiences that led to development in the womb? (Do you mean "influenced" and not "led"?) Hormonal experiences? Other chemical experiences including alcohol/other drug intake/inhalation by mother, including tobbaco smoke and "good", "harmless", drugs like caffeine or cannabis? Cow's milk instead of human colostrum/milk in immediate post -uterine period and later weeks/months? Are you including birth trauma here? External electromagnetic trauma/interference including radioactivity? Ultrasound interference? And the development of what? The brain? The mind? The entire foetus?

Get your thinking cap on please; give your mind something to do.

Please do not answer any of these questions with any inanities like "no harm has been demonstrated/proven" by any one or more of these. That nothing has yet been shown to be harmful, does not prove any of these are not harmful, especially when acting in combination.
As an example: lack of some experiences, such as lack of passage through the mother's birth canal owing to Cesarean Section, has already been shown to have deleterious effects on the bacterial flora and immune system of the newborn baby, a result unexpected only a few years ago

 

[untermensche]

What experiences that led to development in the womb? Hormonal experiences? Other chemical experiences including alcohol/other drug intake/inhalation by mother, including tobbaco smoke and "good", "harmless", drugs like caffeine or cannabis? Cow's milk instead of human colostrum/milk on immediate post -uterine period? Are you including birth trauma here? External electromagnetic trauma/interference including radioactivity? Ultrasound interference? And the development of what? The brain? The mind? The entire foetus?

There is the migratory experience of the neurons where millions of neurons move around to form the nervous system. This is dictated by spatial realities. Once a neuron is in place another cannot be in the same place and the way the neuron is situated in space is a chance contingency, not directed by any gene.

While this migration and positioning is taking place about half the neurons die. This is the dying experience. And the dying off takes place due to spatial and environmental factors, not because of genes. The neurons that end up in functional positions do not die off.

Then once the arrangement of the neurons has taken place there are all the developmental "experiences" you mention. The health and nutrition of the mother. The stress level of the mother. The chemicals the mother ingests.

Countless experiences in the womb taking place that have an effect on the development of the nervous system.

So many factors that it is feasible that every brain begins with the same basic plan and all differences are due to migratory and environmental factors during development.

Please do not answer any of these questions with any inanities like "no harm has been demonstrated/proven" by any one or more of these.

In pharmacy school one of my professors specialized on the effects of alcohol on the brain.

There is great harm done by ingesting even a little alcohol during pregnancy.

I know nothing about caffeine or marijuana in terms of fetal brain development. I would think both would have some effect. It all depends on what crosses the placenta.

Marijuana has been under researched because of the insanity of classifying it as Schedule I.

 

[DBT]

If the conscious mind is seen to be capable of reasoning, it is the brain that generating a conscious mind that is capable of reasoning. Therefore it is not so much that the conscious mind is capable of reasoning, but that the brain generating the conscious mind is capable of reasoning both consciously and unconsciously.

 

[4321lynx]

What experiences that led to development in the womb? Hormonal experiences? Other chemical experiences including alcohol/other drug intake/inhalation by mother, including tobbaco smoke and "good", "harmless", drugs like caffeine or cannabis? Cow's milk instead of human colostrum/milk on immediate post -uterine period? Are you including birth trauma here? External electromagnetic trauma/interference including radioactivity? Ultrasound interference? And the development of what? The brain? The mind? The entire foetus?

There is the migratory experience of the neurons where millions of neurons move around to form the nervous system. This is dictated by spatial realities. Once a neuron is in place another cannot be in the same place and the way the neuron is situated in space is a chance contingency, not directed by any gene.

While this migration and positioning is taking place about half the neurons die. This is the dying experience. And the dying off takes place due to spatial and environmental factors, not because of genes. The neurons that end up in functional positions do not die off.

Then once the arrangement of the neurons has taken place there are all the developmental "experiences" you mention. The health and nutrition of the mother. The stress level of the mother. The chemicals the mother ingests.

Countless experiences in the womb taking place that have an effect on the development of the nervous system.

So many factors that it is feasible that every brain begins with the same basic plan and all differences are due to migratory and environmental factors during development.

Please do not answer any of these questions with any inanities like "no harm has been demonstrated/proven" by any one or more of these.

In pharmacy school one of my professors specialized on the effects of alcohol on the brain.

There is great harm done by ingesting even a little alcohol during pregnancy.

I know nothing about caffeine or marijuana in terms of fetal brain development. I would think both would have some effect. It all depends on what crosses the placenta.

Marijuana has been under researched because of the insanity of classifying it as Schedule I.

And you say that all this activity is by chance with no gene involvement in the creation or direction of the cells and chemicals concerned? Either your teachers were ignorant or you misunderstood them.

see for example

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867400808983

or read the whole of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axon_guidance#Genetic_association

Starting at

Mechanisms
Growing axons have a highly motile structure at the growing tip called the growth cone, which "sniffs out" the extracellular activities in the environment for signals that instruct the axon which direction to grow. These signals, called guidance cues, can be fixed in place or diffusible; they can attract or repel axons. Growth cones contain receptors that recognize these guidance cues and interpret the signal into a chemotropic response.

and going on to

Axon guidance is genetically associated with other characteristics or features. For example, enrichment analyses of different signaling pathways led to the discovery of a genetic association with intracranial volume

and read

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Development_of_the_nervous_system_in_humans#Neurotrophic_factors

What told you it was all due to"chance"? What chance? God? An "autonomous" universal mind? You better ease up on whatever you are smoking.

What in the mammalian brain or elsewhere in that mammal is created de novo without genes being ultimately concerned in its existence?

 

[untermensche]

That's a misunderstanding of the point I was making.

Of course there must be general overall genetic plans for the construction of a brain.

But there are not specific genetic plans controlling each individual neuron.

Every brain is unique on the microscopic level.