What we bring in through the "primitive" brain our sight, hearing, touch,
etc directly effects the develop of higher brain functions and the higher
brain functions interpret the information from the lower brain.  It's a
feedback/feedforward design.  In OT we have what are arousal states and that
the best learning takes place in a quiet alert state.  Our arousal states
come partially from the reticulating activating system(pardon spelling this
morning) which is a brain stem function.
Neuroanatomy is much more fun in the real world than in class.

It sounds like great reading and I'm going to add the book to the need to
read list.  Right now I'm reading a book about Bipolar disorder in children
between classes and finishing up homework assignments.

email address: [log in to unmask]


-----Original Message-----
From: St. John's University Cerebral Palsy List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Bobby G. Greer, Ph.
D.
Sent: Thursday, September 06, 2001 4:04 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Book Review


Kyle,

    Thanks for responding, you're the only on to do so. I will feebly
attempt
to elaborate or confuse.

    Our emotions and our primiyive "sense of self" first grow out of somatic
images.
Connecting consequences(emotions) with stimuli originate in body sensations
and reasoning grows from making decisions as the result of emotional
consequences.
The most important point here, as per Damasio is that the older conventional
view of neural development is that the higher cortex evolved from the more
primitive subcortical areas and thos evolved from the brain stem and
medulla,
etc. His contends
that many people conceive of these higher cortical processes(reasoning) are
"divorced" from the lower, primitive structures. When,  in fact, this
circuitry(of these primitive areas) is very much interwoven into cognitive
decision making in the highest cortical functions. And the most fundamental
sense of self lies in the somatic landscape of the body.

Hope that el
In a message dated 9/6/01 5:13:05 PM, [log in to unmask] writes:

<< Bobby, could you flesh out point 3?  I can see the rationale behind the
others, but I'm not sure what he is "getting at" here?  All thought, logic
and emotion are dependant on somatic state?  Can this be over-ridden by
"will"? >>