Self Comes to Mind

culture and open the way into new means of homeostasis at the level of societies and culture. In an extraordinary leap, homeostasis acquires an extension into the sociocultural space. Justice systems, economic and political organizations, the arts, medicine, and technology are examples of the new devices of regulation.
    The dramatic reduction of violence along with the increase in tolerance that has become so apparent in recent centuries would not have occurred without sociocultural homeostasis. Neither would the gradual transition from coercive power to the power of persuasion that hallmarks advanced social and political systems, their failures notwithstanding. The investigation of sociocultural homeostasis can be informed by psychology and neuroscience, but the native space of its phenomena is cultural. It is reasonable to describe those who study the rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court, the deliberations of the U.S. Congress, or the workings of financial institutions as engaging, indirectly, in studying the vagaries of sociocultural homeostasis.
    Both basic homeostasis (which is nonconsciously guided) and sociocultural homeostasis (which is created and guided by reflective conscious minds) operate as curators of biological value. Basic and sociocultural varieties of homeostasis are separated by billions of years of evolution, and yet they promote the same goal—the survival of living organisms—albeit in different ecological niches. That goal is broadened, in the case of sociocultural homeostasis, to encompass the deliberate seeking of well-being. It goes without saying that the way in which human brains manage life requires both varieties of homeostasis in continuous interaction. But while the basic variety of homeostasis is an established inheritance, provided by everyone’s genome, the sociocultural variety is a somewhat fragile work in progress, responsible for much of human drama, folly, and hope. The interaction between these two kinds of homeostasis is not confined to each individual. There is growing evidence that, over multiple generations, cultural developments lead to changes in the genome.
VIII
     
    Viewing the conscious mind in the optic of evolution from simple life-forms toward complex and hypercomplex organisms such as ours helps naturalize the mind and shows it to be the result of stepwise progressions of complexity within the biological idiom.
    We can look at human consciousness and at the functions it made possible (language, expanded memory, reasoning, creativity, the whole edifice of culture) as the curators of value inside our modern, very minded, very social beings. And we can imagine a long umbilical cord that links the barely weaned, perennially dependent conscious mind to the depths of very elementary and very un- conscious regulators of the value principle.
    The history of consciousness cannot be told in the conventional way. Consciousness came into being because of biological value, as a contributor to more effective value management. But consciousness did not invent biological value or the process of valuation. Eventually, in human minds, consciousness revealed biological value and allowed the development of new ways and means of managing it.
Life and the Conscious Mind
     
    Is it reasonable to devote a book to the question of how brains make conscious minds? It is sensible to ask if understanding the brain work behind mind and self has any practical significance besides satisfying our curiosity about human nature. Does it make any difference in daily life? For many reasons, large and small, I think it does. Brain science and its explanations are not about to provide for all people the satisfaction that so many obtain from experiencing the arts or cultivating spiritual beliefs. But there certainly are other compensations.
    Understanding the circumstances in which conscious minds emerged in the history of life, and specifically how they developed in human history, allows us to judge perhaps more wisely than before the quality of the knowledge and advice those conscious minds provide. Is the knowledge reliable? Is the advice sound? Do we gain from understanding the mechanisms behind the minds that give us counsel?
    Elucidating the neural mechanisms behind conscious minds reveals that our selves are not always sound and that they are not in control of every decision. But the facts also authorize us to reject the false impression that our ability to deliberate consciously is a myth.