Three different families bought the same type of a TV. These identical TVs were sold in one and the same store and produced at the same enterprise… But the first family constantly watch the news broadcasts, the second family prefers various TV series, and the third one is a fond of sports programs. There is nothing to be surprised about. Why? Because in every family there is a primary User of the device purchased (a TV set in this case) and exactly this person determines its usage policy. As a rule, this TV was bought to satisfy the wishes of this particular User…
The same situation is with all other devices…
In fact, the term “device” always denotes some object (device, mechanism, construction, installation …) human beings have created for their own needs to perform strictly defined functions (personal computer, mobile phone, TV, radio, refrigerator, air conditioner, cookstove, car…)
For example, a personal computer (PC). Computers are called “personal” just because they are used by certain “persons”, i.e. “Users”. As a rule, each personal computer has one user. Each user is free to use his personal computer in his own discretion: to play computer games, to develop any innovative facilities, to constantly surf the social networks, etc.
What is an obvious conclusion we can arrive at after the results of this thought experiment?
Using a lot of identical devices, will never help different people to create the same information, since it is called “personal information” for a reason, that is, Users (“persons”) create it as well as possess it. And each user produces his own “personal information”, using the certain devices he prefers.
The same situation is with people…
Despite the similar functionality of the human bodies as well as the possibility to duplicate (clone, copy) their genetically identical material bodies, they all have and will always possess different memory, different consciousness, different character, different knowledge, different experience… Why is it so? One of the possible variants is that various people just have various Users.
The material body just provides “own” User with the opportunity to cognize “our” World and perform certain actions in it. It is he (“our” User) who feels anxious, thinks, dwells on something, enjoys… And each reader can guess what is the name of “his” User — it’s your Personality.
There are good reasons why such terms as a person that denotes the integrity of a human being (from the Latin persona) and a personality denoting social and psychological aspects of a human being (from the Latin personalitas) have the same deep root persona.
Every Human being constantly processes information during his cognitive activity. Once this information is systematized (generalized), it acquires a new status — now it’s knowledge (“life experience”) of this particular Human being.
That’s why people reflect (“see”, feel) the outside World, and each of them does it in his/her own way (from his/her own “point of view”, “with his/her own eyes”).
Every person admits the existence of only those things he underwent by himself, then thought through, turned over in his mind, thought out, passed through, felt out, created, etc., that is, he cognized and realized something without any assistance.
If a human being did cognize and did realize “something”, then this “something” definitely exists for him!
If a human being didn’t cognize and didn’t realize “something”, then this “something” doesn’t exist for him at all!
All systematized and generalized feelings of a person are his consciousness (memory). There can be nothing more! This is the World of a human being he “lives” in.
P.S. If we imagine a meeting of two people, whose consciousnesses contain completely different information, they will not be able to communicate with each other, since they will have nothing to talk about, because these interlocutors live in “different Worlds” (they perceive the World “with different eyes”).
At the very beginning, this experiment reminded me of a 40-years-old student joke on pseudoscientific methodology, in which cockroaches were mentioned. It goes like this:
“A researcher suggests a hypothesis: the hearing organs of cockroaches are located on their tarsi.” To test the hypothesis, we knock on the table where the unfortunate insect is sitting, and see that the cockroach is running away. “Then, the naturalist tears off the cockroach’s tarsi, knocks on the table and notes that the insect is not moving. Thus, the hypothesis is proved and turns into a working theory. “
But given the current trends in technology, if we move away from this research on cockroaches, this experiment looks a little different from my point of view:
There are two identical TV sets in a room on two different tables. Both TVs are connected to the 220V electrical power network. But only one of the TVs is connected to the television antenna, i.e. the first TV shows a television program, while the second one does not, only white noise. Let’s conduct a simple experiment – let’s turn off the antenna system from the first TV and connect it to the second TV. Make sure that the first TV stopped showing TV programs, and the second TV started showing TV programs. We make a very simple conclusion – the experimenter managed not only to “transplant” the TV program from one TV set to another, but also to prove that all the TV programs are located in the antenna system! What a simple and understandable experiment, but how far it is from the reality…
“UCLA biologists report they have transferred a memory from one marine snail to another, creating an artificial memory, by injecting RNA from one to another. This research could lead to new ways to lessen the trauma of painful memories with RNA and to restore lost memories.
“I think in the not-too-distant future, we could potentially use RNA to ameliorate the effects of Alzheimer’s disease or post-traumatic stress disorder,” said David Glanzman, senior author of the study and a UCLA professor of integrative biology and physiology and of neurobiology. The team’s research is published May 14 in eNeuro, the online journal of the Society for Neuroscience.
RNA, or ribonucleic acid, has been widely known as a cellular messenger that makes proteins and carries out DNA’s instructions to other parts of the cell. It is now understood to have other important functions besides protein coding, including regulation of a variety of cellular processes involved in development and disease.
The researchers gave mild electric shocks to the tails of a species of marine snail called Aplysia. The snails received five tail shocks, one every 20 minutes, and then five more 24 hours later. The shocks enhance the snail’s defensive withdrawal reflex, a response it displays for protection from potential harm. When the researchers subsequently tapped the snails, they found those that had been given the shocks displayed a defensive contraction that lasted an average of 50 seconds, a simple type of learning known as “sensitization.” Those that had not been given the shocks contracted for only about one second.
The life scientists extracted RNA from the nervous systems of marine snails that received the tail shocks the day after the second series of shocks, and also from marine snails that did not receive any shocks. Then the RNA from the first (sensitized) group was injected into seven marine snails that had not received any shocks, and the RNA from the second group was injected into a control group of seven other snails that also had not received any shocks.
Remarkably, the scientists found that the seven that received the from snails that were given the shocks behaved as if they themselves had received the tail shocks: They displayed a defensive contraction that lasted an average of about 40 seconds.
“It’s as though we transferred the memory,” said Glanzman, who is also a member of UCLA’s Brain Research Institute.
As expected, the control group of snails did not display the lengthy contraction.
Next, the researchers added RNA to Petri dishes containing neurons extracted from different snails that did not receive shocks. Some dishes had RNA from marine snails that had been given electric tail shocks, and some dishes contained RNA from snails that had not been given shocks. Some of the dishes contained sensory neurons, and others contained motor neurons, which in the snail are responsible for the reflex.
When a marine snail is given electric tail shocks, its sensory neurons become more excitable. Interestingly, the researchers discovered, adding RNA from the snails that had been given shocks also produced increased excitability in sensory neurons in a Petri dish; it did not do so in motor neurons. Adding RNA from a marine snail that was not given the tail shocks did not produce this increased excitability in sensory neurons.
In the field of neuroscience, it has long been thought that memories are stored in synapses. (Each neuron has several thousand synapses.) Glanzman holds a different view, believing that memories are stored in the nucleus of neurons.
“If memories were stored at synapses, there is no way our experiment would have worked,” said Glanzman, who added that the marine snail is an excellent model for studying the brain and memory.
Scientists know more about the cell biology of this simple form of learning in this animal than any other form of learning in any other organism, Glanzman said. The cellular and molecular processes seem to be very similar between the marine snail and humans, even though the snail has about 20,000 neurons in its central nervous system and humans are thought to have about 100 billion.
In the future, Glanzman said, it is possible that RNA can be used to awaken and restore memories that have gone dormant in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. He and his colleagues published research in the journal eLife in 2014 indicating that lost memories can be restored.
There are many kinds of RNA, and in future research, Glanzman wants to identify the types of RNA that can be used to transfer memories.”
