Neurostoicism seeks to create a language and practice that allows us to bear and forbear anything. To merge our Will with Natures will, and continually refocus our actions on what we control according to our values and be happy with what we have. Marcus Aurelius advanced the Stoical concept of the view from above and the contemplation of the transience of all matter. Thus, his contribution was to the use of perspective. The view from above is seeing things at the level of the entire universe. The contemplation of transience is the recognition that all is changing and temporary. Therefore, in our practice of Neurostoicism, perspective and perception are major tools in approaching the perfection of mind. Perspective helps develop wisdom, and perception helps us to endure and renounce.
Let us explore the idea of perception further. It is clear from the second stanza of the poem “The Blind Men and the Elephant” by John Godfrey Saxe, that each blind man upon encountering an elephant, seizes upon his first sensory impressions, and they then infer from that information the whole nature of the elephant. Epictetus teaches us to analyze first impressions so that we are rightly using all the “appearances” that existence presents for our advantage. The men from Indostan limit their own understanding, and by arguing the accuracy of their points of view, they limit the understanding of the group. Just as the individuals in the poem are limited, each of us operates with perceptual limitations and biases (Worley, D., Worley, D., Soldner, L., 2008). The stubborn insistence of each individual that he has a monopoly on the “truth” results in unethical communication because it limits the understanding of others.
According to the book Communication Counts, selectivity is when “your perceptions create your expectations, and your expectations confirm your perceptions (Worley et al., 2008, p. 47).” The thinking of each man in the poem gets filtered through his limited experience of the elephant, and all later ideas about the elephant are dictated by the one part of the elephant that they felt with their own hands. The men’s thinking is limited by their expectations based on the very first impressions. The Indostanese each take a slice of the reality of the elephant, and falsely extrapolate it to the whole elephant. All meaning about the elephant is narrowed down to each man’s first tactile sensation of the animal. It is clear in this fable that none of the subjects understand what the elephant is in its entirety, because they each have a particular narrow focus of stimuli that blocks out their possible perception and thus knowledge of the entire elephant. Alas, everyone allows himself to get trapped in the limitation of his own sensations, without utilizing the tactile experience of the others around him to gain insight into the whole. Likewise, we take our limited slice of experience and extrapolate it to the world. We should always strive to approach the truth, but due to the limitations of human understanding, this can only be an approximation. Moreover, we must direct our perceptions to give us the greatest power to endure and renounce every event, because this can be seen as a deeper truth. To do this is a Neurostoical practice.
Every one of us is blind in some sense like the men in the poem. The ancient Stoics recognized that we do not have control over our instinctual reactions, but we do control how we think about things that happen, and our actions. We all experience the perceptual limitations of our sociological milieu or sensory deficiencies. Cognitive orientation, according to Communication Counts, “refers to how you process information and is directly tied to perception (Worley et al., 2008, p. 48).” The exclusion of pertinent data is influenced by the culture we grow up in, the language we speak, and the perception and prejudices of family and friends around us. If we do not accept the “group think” of our group, we are then ostracized and pushed out of the group. We may believe the group think, not believe it, or pretend to believe.
Ostracism is usually painful enough to keep most people “within the lines,” even if the lines define either an incomplete or false reality. One example of the limits of language is seen in the Piraha tribe of the Brazilian jungle. This group has no word to communicate any specific number and can only state relative quantities such as “a few” or “additional” (Trafton, 2008). How might growing up in such a culture restrict the mathematical thinking of an individual? How do you talk about something that you do not even have a word for expressing. It is very enlightening to analyze a given culture by the words they have or do not have, and the number of words for the same thing denoting the importance of a concept to that culture.
Ironically, it is a well-known medical fact that in blind people tactile sense is sharpened relative to the sighted person. However, all the individuals in the poem are in fact limited by their sensory systems because of their analysis. What might we make of experiencing vision in the infrared range of light or echolocation hearing as some other animals experience? This might be possible soon. We are all advantaged by stretching our ability to perceive material outside of our preferred channels. We are also advantaged by understanding our own preferences and utilizing that self-knowledge to either direct meaning through those channels, or better yet, to expand our fluency in other sensory systems by “engaging in activities that do not necessarily match your cognitive orientations (Worley et al., 2008, pgs. 49-50).” But our cognitive orientations must be in the practice of Neurostoicism. In contrast, the blind men in the poem choose to remain within the confines of their own opinions. Neurostoicism seeks to create a culture where we combine the tools of neuroscience and Stoicism to enhance life. Imagine a world where we live like this every day!
We are responsible for the extent to which our communication enhances life, and for the propagation of empowering thoughts and beliefs. First, it is immoral for each man in the poem to communicate his initial impression as the definitive truth to all the others. Significant choice is “having sufficient information about a situation to make a good decision (Worley et al., 2008, p. 32).” The subjects of the poem deny each other significant choice by their actions. It would have been far more ethical for each to describe his observations, and work to correlate all available information from the other subjects in order to reach the most complete conclusions. Second, the communication of the Indostanese was unethical in that each stubbornly maintained the “truth” of his perception without listening and objectively evaluating all observations. Therefore, the men did not demonstrate tolerance of the opinions of the others in the poem. According to Communication Counts, tolerance is “respect for one another and the belief that every human being has value (Worley et al., 2008, p. 32).” Instead, everyone takes a position to the exclusion of the others. This limits their perceptual field and brings them each to a different false perception. All the blind men are convinced that they are right, and the others are all wrong. This is often seen in religions that are initially based in life affirming ideas that are developed into dogmas that are used to oppressed others. Any ideology is useful to extent to which it is life enhancing. We must seek to understand, then to be understood. We must avoid projecting our own biographies on others in communication.
The challenges with perception include selectivity, cognitive orientation, prior knowledge, and ethical considerations (Worley et a1., 2008). What everyone in the poem initially kinesthetically feels, dictates what he later thinks because of his flawed methods of perception. We human beings are not omnipotent, and therefore we will always experience a certain limitation in our perception. Right brain, left brain, and each sense provide some useful data as far as they go, but we need the composite of all of them to gain effective perception. We need to use all our six senses and even expanded senses such as intuition, imagination, or hypotheses formation, to move beyond our common limited perception to understand the “whole elephant,” or the whole universe for that matter. Ethical pursuit of knowledge must break through the barrier of “I'm right/you are wrong” paradigms. Marcus Aurelius had a useful formula for this. First, ask yourself if the other person has a point that is true. This requires considerable individual elasticity because human beings tend to get psychologically “invested” in their own conclusions, and view outside opinions as a threat. If you evaluate that they do have a point, then use what is true. If they do not, then try to make better whatever harm their thinking is causing. And if you cannot help the situation-well then tell yourself to forget it. It does not help for you to worry about it. Human progress thus requires breaking out of individual perceptual limitations and expanding the accuracy of our observations with effective perception, peer review, and efficient group collaboration.
The view from above helps to develop wisdom because it allows us to step outside of any stressful situation and get cognitive distance. If you are considering a challenging circumstance, and you imagine the perspective of the entire universe like a sphere in your hand, it does two things. First, it increases our power to resist negative emotions. Second, it gives you insights into possible solutions or views that could help. If we use this as a meditation, it has the possibility to be life transformative. Get as spectacular with this practice as you can. Imagine you are Carl Sagan narrating a tour of the cosmos. Plus, if you have a remote view, it allows you to take effective action without negative reactions. It is like a highly competent, experienced person who has faced the same situation countless times. They know how to act without any feelings of panic or surprise. Neurostoicism seeks to create a language and practice that allows us to bear and forbear anything. To merge our Will with Natures will, and continually refocus our actions on what we control according to our values and be happy with what we have.
References
Trafton, A. (2008). Language Without Numbers: Amazonian Tribe Has No Word To Express ‘One,’ Other Numbers. Science Daily, 7, 1. Retrieved July 15, 2008, from sciencedaily.com Website: http:/www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080714111940.htm
Worley, D., Worley, D., Soldner, L. (2008). Communication Counts. Boston: Pearson.
