Chapter 14 autonomy

Manipulating a typewriter with your fingertips is like riding a bicycle or walking on a path, and it's best not to think about it at all.As soon as you think about it, your fingertips falter and hit the wrong key.To do things that can be done well as long as you are skilled, you must relax the muscles and nervous system related to each movement, let them do their own thing, and don't get involved in it yourself.This doesn't mean a loss of power, because it's up to you to decide whether to do it or not, and you can intervene at any time to improve your skills.If you want to ride your bike backwards, or if you want to walk in an inventive jog, with light hops every fourth step, and whistling as you run, you can do that.If you pay attention to every detail, keep every muscle tensed, let your whole body fall freely with every step, but control yourself at the last moment and put your other foot out in time to stop the fall, you will eventually be tired. Get down and shake into a ball with exhaustion.

We are blessed with the freedom to choose and change in the process of learning this unconscious coordination.If we were born with all these skills, as automatic as ants, we would lose diversity.The world wouldn't be as interesting if we all walked or jumped the same way and never fell off our bikes.If we were genetically programmed to play the piano well, we might never learn to understand music. The rules are different for those complex, coordinated, ingenious operations that we perform inside the body.We don't need to learn anything.Our smooth muscle cells are born with a full set of instructions, do not need our help at all, but work along the way according to their own plan, regulating the caliber of blood vessels, moving food through the intestines, opening or closing pipes according to the requirements of the entire system; Secretory cells make their products in secret; the heart contracts; They communicate with each other by touching each other; organelles send messages to other organelles.All of this is going on non-stop, and we're not whispering anything to them.The entire arrangement is an ecosystem in which the operation of each part is governed by the state and activity of all other parts.Things usually run smoothly, and it's a surefire mechanism.

But now, the autonomy of this long-considered inviolable interior territory has been contested.Experimental psychologists have recently discovered that the internal organs can be trained to do all sorts of things as easily as a boy learns to ride a bicycle by using the instrumental technique of conditioning.If a thing is done according to the method required by the person and followed by the signal, the appropriate stimulus will be given immediately to strengthen the action just done, so this thing forms a conditioned reflex.By stimulating "pleasure centers" in their brains, mice were taught to see signals to speed up or slow their heartbeats, or to alter blood pressure and EEG waveforms.

The same technology has been applied to humans, with different stimuli, and the results have been astonishing.You can, it is claimed, make your kidneys change the rate at which urine is made, raise or lower blood pressure, change your heart rate, and map your brain waves differently. There is already talk of a breakthrough in the prevention and treatment of human disease.According to proponents, the technology, when perfected and expanded, must lead to new therapeutic possibilities.If, as has been reported, a mouse could control the blood vessels in one ear to dilate more than the other, what a rich experience in self-control and self-manipulation might lie before man ?There are already cryptic ads in literary magazines urging people to buy electronic headphones that train and tune their brainwaves to their tastes.

I don't believe this. Not to belittle it.I know that this technique is extremely important.People should be elated by the hope that they can call the shots, call the shots, and control their cellular activity like a toy train.Knowing that the viscera can be controlled, it is natural to think that we have neglected them all these years, and that, by judicious use of human intellect, these primitive structures can be trained to behave in whatever standard we want to set them. My trouble, to be honest, was a lack of self-confidence.If someone told me tomorrow that I would be in direct contact with my liver and could direct it now, it would kill me.Well, tell me that one of the 747 jets I used to fly in second class over 40,000 feet above Denver is now mine and I can play with it as I like; then I'd at least have hope of skydiving Run for my life, if I can find a parachute and figure out how to open the door soon.But if I'm in charge of the liver, then me and my liver are doomed.Because, to be honest, I am not as smart as my liver. In addition, my constitution determines that I am not able to make decisions about my liver.Hopefully I won't be forced to, never.I don't have a clue what to do.

I feel the same way about the rest of my body.Whatever they do, they'll be luckier without my intervention.In theory, it might be tempting to take over your brain, but I can't imagine doing it in real life.I'd lose touch, mess things up, turn on the wrong cells at the wrong times, throw things around.I doubt if I will ever be able to generate my thoughts by then.My cells are born, or differentiated, and they know how to do this together.If I thrust in to organize them, they would resent, perhaps terrify, perhaps swarm like bees into my ventricle. But as I said, it is a temptation after all.I've never been really satisfied with how my brain works, and perhaps it's a pleasure to try to take charge of it myself, just once.Given the chance, there are a few things I'd like to change: some memories would slip away without a record; Those strings of thoughts went round and round in it and never got a clue.I have always suspected that there are some cells in there that have been fooling around and wasting most of the time, but I would like to see them concentrate and work steadily.At the same time, if I'm in charge, they will obey me with a little respect.

However, on the balance of pros and cons, I think it is better not to get involved in this kind of business.Once you start, there is no end to your responsibilities.I'd rather give all my automatic functions a lot of autonomy, give them as much autonomy as they want, and then leave everything alone and hope for the best.Think about it, you have to worry about how to manage white blood cells, keep track of them, listen for signals, and drive them here and there whenever there is a situation.At first you have a glimmer of pride in ownership, and then it wears you down and debilitates you, and there's not much time left to do anything else.

So what to do?You can't just put this technology aside and get away with it.If there's one thing we've learned in this century, it's that all new technology, whether good or bad, must be applied sooner or later.It is in our nature to do this.One cannot expect to make conditioning an exception to this technique.We're driven to put it to good use, to wrestle with our inner environment, to meddle.It drains us of so much energy that we end up further disconnected from the outside world and deprived of the main source of joy in life. As for the way out, I have a suggestion.If we have the ability to control automatic functions, regulate brain waves, and direct cells, why isn't it possible to use the exact same technology in the exact opposite direction?Why can't we not get involved or take over affairs, but learn to completely separate, separate, dismantle from affairs, and learn to float freely?If you're going to try it, you just have to be careful not to remove the safety rope too.

Of course, people have been trying to do this sort of thing for a long time, but with different techniques and with different luck.If you think about it, Zen archery seems to be like this.After studying with a master for several months, when you learn to release the arrow, you don't let it go by yourself, you have to let your fingers release the arrow, and let them make decisions on their own, gently, just like the opening of a flower.After learning this, no matter where the arrow hits, you will be sure to hit it.You can jump to the side to see the scene.