"The Mindfulness of Man", p. 424
Interpretations and Forecasts 1922-1972 (1973)
Context: The relation between psyche and soma, mind and brain, are peculiarly intimate; but, as in marriage, the partners are not inseparable: indeed their divorce was one of the conditions for the mind's independent history and its cumulative achievements.
But the human mind possesses a special advantage over the brain: for once it has created impressive symbols and has stored significant memories, it can transfer its characteristic activities to materials like to stone and paper that outlast the original brain's brief life-span. When the organism dies, the brain dies, too, with all its lifetime accumulations. But the mind reproduces itself by transmitting its symbols to other intermediaries, human and mechanical, than the particular brain that first assembled them.
“Odd that the brain could function on its own, without acquainting him with its purposes, its reasons. But the brain was an organ, like the spleen, heart, kidneys. And they went about their private activities. So why not the brain?”
The Man Who Japed (1956)
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Philip K. Dick 278
American author 1928–1982Related quotes
Source: The Professor at the Breakfast Table (1859), Ch. VI.
"Before Ethics and Morality" (1972)
Context: The brain is highly immature at birth and is dependent upon sensory stimulation for normal growth, development, and function. Sensory stimulation is like a a nutrient—without it the brain does not develop or function normally.
Foreword, p. ix to "Following the Synagogue Service" by Jeffrey Cohen, Gnesia Publications, 1997, .
“No brain is stronger than its weakest think.”
Thomas L. Masson, Laughs (1926), p. 167.
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary
“Call him not old whose visionary brain
Holds o’er the post its undivided reign”
"The Old Player" (1861), in Songs in Many Keys (1862).
Context: Call him not old whose visionary brain
Holds o’er the post its undivided reign,
For him in vain the envious seasons roll,
Who bears eternal summer in this soul.