Consciousness Continued – Tuesday 23rd July 2021

Consciousness Continued – Tuesday 23rd July 2021

When writing on this and other subjects to do with the brain and disability, my insights aren’t based on theory they are drawn from my own experiences growing up with a variant form of Rett Syndrome and having a child with the same disability.

I do not expect anyone to take what I say as gospel – for myself – it’s fact based, so I actually *know* I’m correct. And it would be a stretch for my conciousness to be working differently than my fellow human beings. But each to their own of course.

From my diary: Just to add an interesting insight, I’ll mention Prosopagnosia. This condition is the inability to recognise faces. In a crowd you won’t recognise your family and could get lost. Every day you never recognise another person’s face. This is a facet in a memory system that hasn’t connected. As a child you wouldn’t know that others do recognise faces, not until your milestones begin to make it obvious and family could get assistance. So you’re not conscious of this problem till you know about it etc.
So if, for example, all priority memory systems failed, you would/could be conscious but you wouldn’t know you were conscious. Because your memory systems are recording – fast – in real time, and that’s what you’re interacting with. Hope that makes sense. This is a very large subject, and this is just a teeny insight into conciousness.

Just back to Prosopagnosia, you of course have other senses besides sight, so it is to be hoped these and their corresponding memory systems are intact and can come to your assistance, ie., recognising your mother’s voice, the sound of her footsteps, her scent…as a blind person must.
Fiona MacLeod (C)