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The structure of human psyche in the light of an evolutionary approach
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THE STRUCTURE OF HUMAN PSYCHE IN THE LIGHT OF AN EVOLUTIONARY APPROACH
Evolution of active knowledge of the psyche. Of course, the entire period of their evolution is a period of their continuous improvement. However, for any subject, there is always a limit to perfection. And no matter how perfect the reception system, the somatic and vegetative systems of the psyche, but the sphere of life activity management in the environment always and necessarily demanded and requires systems that are fundamentally new in their functions, and therefore in their content.
P. I 42
The need to improve the forms of control of the psyche of internal and external vital activity by the body is caused by the harsh conditions of natural selection. However, the old organs of mental activity necessarily have a limit to their perfection. Therefore, only the emergence and development of fundamentally new organs of mental activity provides more successful resistance to harsh environmental conditions. (1. 3. 5. ) I 42
For example, no matter how we improve the cart, at best we will get a car, but not an airplane. So it is in the psyche. What has worked well and reliably over millions of years of evolution is still working successfully today. It has already reached the limit of its perfection. Even if nature went to the excessive complication of the " ancient" apparatus of the psyche, for the sake of the implementation of more and more complex forms of adaptive activity in the environment, it would only reduce the reliability of these apparatuses. Therefore, where the psychic organs reached the limit of their perfection, there nature left them without further changes. And she solved the problem of improving adaptive activity by creating fundamentally new organs.
As a result, today the human psyche looks like a puff pie:
In the beginning, more complex vegetative and somatic systems were layered on the reception system by evolution.
Further, the subconscious system was layered on them.
Further, the intellect system was layered on the subconscious.
The main thing is that the reception system is the most primitive. She stayed that way. But the vegetative and somatic systems are already much more complicated. The next subconscious system is even more complex, although it has a ganglionic structure. The intelligence system arose much later. The reasons for its occurrence were fundamentally new " engineering solutions" of nature in the form of huge fields of associative neurons that make up the cerebral cortex.
Four stages of the evolution of the nervous system. Consider the Nervous System Tree. By the way, in cybernetics a peculiar structure is called a " tree", the scheme of which is very reminiscent of the shape of a tree (trunk, branches, leaves). For example, an inference tree is the structure of the algorithm for that inference.
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The roots of the Nervous System Tree are the receptive nervous system. This is the physical carrier of the receptive system of the psyche, or the Sensing Soul. The Sensing Soul is the “eyes and ears” of all other systems of the psyche. This part of the soul arose very first, for none of the other systems of the psyche can do anything without its data. All other parts of the soul historically arose much later. How much later? For about a billion years.
From the standpoint of the evolution of the psyche, this is its very first layer.
The trunk of the Nervous System Tree has two parts. The lower part is the spinal cord, nerve nodes and individual nerves that are the physical carriers of the somatic system of the psyche. It is the latter that controls all the elementary muscle movements. She perfectly " understands" the scheme of the body, including the real state of each muscle and each joint at any given time.
The upper part is the apparatus of the brain stem and individual nerve nodes, which are the physical carriers of the autonomic system of the psyche. This is an ancient invention of nature, for the vegetative system of the psyche controls the vital activity of internal organs. Even an insect cannot live without this system.
From the standpoint of the evolution of the psyche, this is its second layer. The physiological carriers of these mental systems do not overlap each other, since the vegetative and somatic systems of the psyche have the same historical age. Actually, therefore, the physiological carriers of these mental systems have approximately the same ganglionic (consisting of small nerve nodes) structure.
The branches of the Nervous System Tree are the limbic system (formations of the quadruple and subcortical nodes). The subconscious is located here. The subconscious mind controls the adaptive activity of the organism in the environment. The subconscious is the " mind" of the frog, so its historical age corresponds to the historical age of the frog. From the standpoint of the evolution of the psyche, this is its third layer.
The top of the Nervous System Tree is the cerebral cortex. This is the latest nervous formation that is the carrier of the intellect. Intellectual activity is inherent not only in humans, but also in all higher vertebrates.
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