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jesus brand spirituality: the irony
So the blogger from the UK who offered first impressions of the book–must have been a galley copy–referred to in my post yesterday writes back and says I’ve misrepresented his post. Naturally, I re-read the post. And yes, he’s got a point.
It’s the lizard brain at work once again. Mine, that is. This limbic system placed atop the lizard brain that’s looking at the world through the lens of threat, dodge and dart. You conflate criticisms–hearing a current mild one on top of a previous harsh one from another source–and your brain plays tricks on you.
It’s like one of those visual tricks. Do you see a goblet or two women looking at each other? Now you see the goblet, now you don’t. Is the blog post unfair? Or just first impressions tossed out with full acknowledgment that they may or may not be accurate? Goblet or outline of two heads? Something in the brain of the beholder determines which it is–or rather which it seems to be.
How many conversations have we had like this? The person speaking thinks she’s projecting one thing, but the person listening perceives another. So I go back to the UK blog post and read it differently: the goblet becomes the outline of two women looking at each other.
Then my frontal lobe has to kick into gear, and arbitrate between the two perceptions. And make a ruling: the first perception was off, the second more reliable. I read somewhere–Carl Sagin, I think–that humans have more pain in childbirth than do other species because the frontal lobe of the human brain is so large. Thank your mother for the pain she endured bringing you with your frontal lobe into the world, so you didn’t have to simply rely on your lizard brain.
It’s amazing we make our way through the world as well as we do with this sensing equipment we’ve been saddled with.
April 19th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
Hi - have just been reading the banter between you, Ally Simpson and your daughters. Certainly brings things to life. I’ve got a mountain of books to read already — now here’s another one I’ve got to add to it. Drat!
“Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body.” That’s me done for tonight then…
April 20th, 2008 at 11:24 am
Phil,
I suppose it’s not the done thing, being “defended” by one’s daughters in the blogosphere. But in this case, all’s well that ends well.
I was an associate editor for a christian magazine several years ago, and about died reading too much christian stuff–magazines mainly. I fasted for about 20 years from any Christian magazines. Given your occupation you might need to do the same with Christian books.
After reading mine, of course.
ken
April 23rd, 2008 at 11:25 am
Ken, your blog entry reminded me of that great Star Trek episode where Kirk fights the Lizard Man (episode titled “Arena”). Actually, it wasn’t technically a lizard man, but a reptilian race of humanoids named “The Gom.” (I only know that last part because I Googled it. Otherwise I would be a COMPLETE nerd.)
Anyway, the lizard guy throws rocks at Kirk… hurting him pretty bad. But Kirk has to use his frontal lobes to figure out a way to beat lizard man, and makes a crude gun out of stuff lying around. (Just like our frontal lobes need to overcome the reptilian brain, eh?)
That episode also illustrates your points about the reptilian mind: “threat, dodge and dart.” Although I must say, the lizard man was quite slow, and didn’t do much dodging and darting–mostly just determined plodding.