Singularity
Jan 26 2015


In grade school science
we crowded around a cow's brain,

shoving, inching

sidling in.

Ooh'd and aah'd

at the water-logged lump

glistening red.

A respectful gaze,

as ancient hunters honour their prey

leave no waste.

A noble animal, sacrificed
for the sake of instruction,
which I would never have thought
eating roast beef, on Sunday.

Gratitude

to a slaughter-house animal

I'd always taken for granted
as plastic-wrapped meat.

I recall how special this felt,
the sense of reverence
at so deep a mystery, revealed.
That an object so small
could contain such power,
an immense animal
in a few pounds of flesh.
But mostly, how fragile it was
and therefore us;
squishily quivering
in a kitchen bowl,
like jello
that never fully set.

Now, my questions are deeper
my awe more profound.

And I feel all the more
how fragile we are.

Each of us
in possession of the most complicated thing
in the known universe,
sloshing skin-deep
beneath its brittle bone.
Carotids, like fire-hose
the skull's sharpened edge.

I imagine how mind
arises from matter,
consciousness
from a clump of cells.

How all reality
is virtual,
reconstructed
in neurochemistry
in 3 lbs of meat.
The world as seen
from a darkened cavern
enclosed in the head.

How trillions of cells
must be errorless,
prune, reconnect
remember, forget
understand, and affect,
but with no sense of themselves
or how it all works.

Not just improbable birth
through countless matings, accidents

random chance,

but the ghost in the machine
as unique
as we are.

Gazing at our small grey brains
is like observing ourselves
in a hall of mirrors.
Seeing only the surface

of unfathomable depth.
And even then,
nothing but virtual
tricks of light.



I set out want to write something about the brain. Which started off well enough -- by which I mean small -- but kind of got out of hand!

We take delight in mystery. We seek out moments of transcendence and wonder. We see magic in easily explicable things. Yet we need look no further than what we carry around every day in own heads: the most complicated, mysterious, magical, and awe-inspiring object in the entire universe! 7 billion of them, and counting; all right here, on this minuscule speck of a planet. While our telescopes are all pointing out and our microscopes in, as if amazing things can only be exotic, remote, impossible. The dullest and least interesting human being ever born is still in possession of the most sophisticated and complex object anywhere, ever.

(The word "awesome" would be perfect here. Or at least in its traditional sense of "inspiring awe". Unfortunately, like much of language, it's been debased by over-use and word inflation. So now, a good cup of coffee is "awesome, man". And writers like me are left with fewer superlatives and thinner language from which to choose.)

There are a few great mysteries that may never be solved.

What happens after we die?

Is there a purpose to life? Or is all of biology simply an accident in an inorganic cosmos, driven -- for as long as it lasts -- by the meaningless imperative of survival and reproduction? In man's relentless search for explanation, this is the fundamental "why" behind all the "why's" repeatedly asked. (Although I guess only an atheist would wonder about this. Believers have their explanation ready-made; and for them, faith, as proof, is good enough.)

What is the nature of consciousness? Is it a meaningless epiphenomenon of the brain as it carries out its vegetative functions? Or are intelligence and self-awareness not only instrumental, but inevitable? Are mind and brain indivisible? Or is there a soul, a duality between the two? At what point does the singularity of self-awareness occur: is there a critical mass of cells, a key revelation, a paradigm shift from cognition to feeling? (In other words, is it only a matter of time before robots become sentient?!!) Which, in turn, leads to questions of free will and moral agency.

All of which is ridiculously complicated to address in the sparse language of poetry!

And little of which I try to address here. But I do touch on the duality of mind and brain, the slipperiness of perception, the mystery of consciousness, and the wonder of "self". And how this brilliant organ can produce great works of art, can peer into the depths of atoms, while having no inkling of itself. As I said, tough subjects for poetry. ...Although if you've read this far, perhaps I haven't totally failed.

I called it Singularity because this is one way to think of the dawning of consciousness, of self-awareness. It alludes to the ultimate mystery of brain giving rise to mind, as well as our unique individuality. And thus to the nature of self; which may seem obvious, but is really a spectacular mystery (and as frustrating as a Möbius strip!) That is, "why am I me, and not someone else?"

(I'm not sure if that brain was, in fact, red. You'd think grey, as in grey matter. But I strongly recall a kind of washed-out pink colour. Let me know, if you do. Let's see how good memory and perception are, 50 years on.)