Michael Shermer: The pattern behind self-deception
There's nothing new here -- at least for rational, non-mad humans. It's nice to hear someone (more qualified than I?) reaffirming exactly what I think, though.
The best bit -- the bit that shows how close we are to knowing what chemically makes us tick -- is the bit about dopamine levels in the brain. More dopamine = hyperactive imagination, see patterns everywhere and in everything; not enough dopamine = dull, sluggish, unable to make potentially life-saving associations.
That a single neurotransmitter can play such a vital role in our lives is scary. My point of view is that humans are basically pattern matching machines. We do carry out extemporaneous acts -- we do sometimes act without actually thinking of the consequences -- but ultimately, living life is a matter of matching objects, ideas, thoughts and people against archetypes held in cranial memory.
I don't think people realise that without accurate, rational pattern-matching abilities, we basically fail as human beings. Fail to associate a road sign with 'stop' -- you're dead. Fail to associate a pointed gun with 'stop talking' -- you're dead.
You can take the pattern-matching thing even further. Consider laboratory scientists -- specialist humans designed to spot very specific patterns, often at the expense of having weaker pattern-matching in other areas. The same goes for any specialist: they all spot patterns, or make best guesses based on known patterns -- a bomb defusal expert (circuits, wiring, smell, sight); a video gamer (peripheral vision, color processing); a lawyer (similar cases, concepts, human traits).
I need to learn more about how dopamine affects our rationality; it's an interesting vein of thought, that's for sure.
