The Brain, Consciousness & Illusion of Truth

Abstract

...How do we know that something is true or false? How does the brain discern the truth? What kind of mechanism allows the brain to interpret the information received in the shape of electrical and chemical impulses to which it is constantly exposed? Is it the case that our brains are endowed with appropriate algorithmic rules for discriminating between truth and untruth, alongside certain rules for handling, say, optical information? Is it the case that the brain produces illusions of truth like it does illusions of vision? My answer is in the positive, and this is what I shall be seeking to show in this essay.

An essay in style, The Brain, Consciousness and Illusion of Truth is a valuable addition to the literature on the mind/body problem and an engrossing account of the human brain with its services and disservices to the self. Karol Ondrias is one of the 'disturbing' authors who will not stop at taboos. Problems he addresses here are of our postmodern era, when people, still tightly controlled by their ancestral genetic code and ethnocentric cultural stereotypes, are acquiring an awareness of this and trying to review the authenticated behavioral patterns and preconceived ideas still shaping their lives. The notion of the distorted and manipulated reception of the world cuts through the whole of the essay.

...The human race, the author argues, cannot afford any longer remain content with the illusory certainties provided by the 'selfish' genes and by parochial cultures (however dear to the cockles of our heart the latter might be). But isn't it just another illusion - to try and free the self from the comfortable bondage of biological and cultural forces? The essay will take you to the further and farther reaches of human nature and this may be part of the answer.

About the Author

Karol Ondrias (1952), Senior Research Fellow and already a known publicist in Slovakia, works for the Institute of Molecular Physiology and Genetics of the Slovak Academy of Sciences headquartered in Bratislava, Slovakia. His most recent books are We the Twenty-first Century Mo(dern)slaves Swear and Some Banalities, Facts and Unanswered Questions. He is also the author and editor of scores of works in the field of biophysics. Karol Ondrias is married with one son and he currently lives in Bratislava.