Do Something… With Your Mind

Planning your trip home. Imagining what you’ll do if there’s traffic. Remembering the lyrics to Bohemian Rhapsody to pass the time—how do those things count as “doing things with your mind?” When you’re imagining traffic, are you doing something when you think about, or is it something that just pops into your head? Maybe you’re just musing about traffic, or but maybe you’re imagining what you’ll do about it, like planning your route home—you can’t do that by just letting your mind wander.

That’s a natural thought to have—but could it be an illusion? We like to think that we’re the driver of the bus, in control of everything that goes on in our heads. But what if the reality is that 99% of what’s happening in there is on autopilot, totally inaccessible to the conscious mind? What if all we’re actually doing is starting the ignition?

Of course, if you just started the ignition and took your hands off the wheel, you might veer around all over the place. Pretty soon you’d start thinking about (to take some random examples) the blister on your foot, what you’re going to have for dinner, and your mother-in-law. We’re constantly monitoring the stream of consciousness, keeping ourselves on track. It does feel like we really are driving the bus—or at least we’ve got one hand on the wheel.

JL:    Have you never been in an airplane? Those things spend most of the journey on autopilot. And they do a pretty good job. Why not think our brains are like that?

BV:    You’re confusing brains and planes, Josh. Airplanes aren’t designed to be constantly monitoring their surroundings for threats and opportunities. But brains are. We’re hardwired to notice the ice cream in the store and the dog mess on the sidewalk. That’s why, when it comes to the brain, you can’t just “set it and forget it.”

JL:    OK, but all you’ve shown so far is that we have to keep the brain on track. That doesn’t sound like much of an active role. Give me an example of a full-fledged mental ACTION—something you’re really doing with your mind. Not just a process you set in motion and inspect periodically, like a soufflé.

BV:     OK, how about learning a musical instrument? If you’re already an expert, you’re acting more or less on autopilot. But when you’re starting out, you’ve got a ton of really effortful work to do. You have to focus on every little finger movement.

JL:    Sounds like you’re restricting mental action to cases we don’t care very much about, like blundering about on the keyboard when you’re five. Do you really want to rule out the cases that are closest to our heart, like Glenn Gould playing The Goldberg Variations and knocking them out of the park?

BV:    I’m not ruling those out at all! In fact, Glenn Gould is 100% in charge. Even if his playing is almost all automatic, it’s fully intentional; it’s fully under his control; and he is responsible for it. If he misses a note, there’s no one else to blame. And the same is true for a host of MENTAL actions.

JL:    Like what?

BV:    Like lots of things! Coming up with a good crossword clue. Solving a mystery. Cooking up arguments to refute an… OBSTINATE COLLEAGUE.

JL:    And you’ve done a really good job of that. You’ve convinced me that there are way more bona fide mental actions than I’d realized.

BV:    And maybe our guest will move you even closer to the light! It’s our Stanford colleague Antonia Peacocke. She’s going to join us in a bit.

Image by John Hain from Pixabay