Ideas are glamorous

Our aim in founding the state was not the disproportional happiness of any one class, but the greatest happiness of the whole; we thought that in a state ordered with a view to the good of the whole, we should be most likely to find justice?

As may be discerned from the above quotation, ideas are far more glamorous compared to the actual execution. That's why so many great ideas remain just that - an idea.

A creative mind explores and explodes with innovative ideas. Any notion or thought can be considered as an idea. Ideas are the result of thinking; a definitely formulated thought; an opinion.

The present popular use of the word idea makes it signify any product of mental apprehension or activity, considered as an object of knowledge or thought. An idea is mental as opposed to anything substantial or physical.

Thus, almost any mental product: a belief, conception, design, opinion, etc., may be called an idea.

The mind is where ideas originate. It is said that an idle mind is a devil's playground. I doubt that this is so. The mind is never idle. We may think that it is idle, but in fact it is active all the time even though we may not be conscious of the fact.

The concept of mind is understood in many different ways by many different traditions. Most agree that minds are constituted by conscious experience and intelligent thought. Common attributes of mind include perception, reason, imagination, memory, emotion, attention, free-will and a capacity for communication.

A rich set of unconscious processes are also included in many modern characterizations of mind.

Theories of mind and its function are numerous. Earliest recorded speculations are from the likes of Zoroaster, the Buddha, Plato, Aristotle, and other ancient Greek, Indian and, later, Islamic and medieval European philosophers. Pre-modern understandings of the mind saw it as an aspect of the soul, in the sense of being both divine and immortal, linking human thinking with the un-changing ordering principle of the cosmos itself.

Which attributes make up the mind is much debated. Some psychologists argue that only the "higher" intellectual functions constitute mind, particularly reason and memory.

In this view the emotions "love, hate, fear, joy" | are more primitive or subjective in nature and should be seen as different from the mind as such.

Others argue that various rational and emotional states cannot be so separated, that they are of the same nature and origin, and should therefore be considered all part of what we call the mind.

In popular usage, mind is frequently synonymous with thought: the private conversation with ourselves that we carry on "inside our heads." Thus we "make up our minds," "change our minds" or are "of two minds" about something. One of the key attributes of the mind in this sense is that it is a private sphere to which no one but the owner has access. No one else can "know our mind." They can only interpret what we consciously or unconsciously communicate.

Broadly speaking, mental faculties are the various functions of the mind, or things the mind can "do". Thought is a mental activity which allows human beings to make sense of things in the world, and to represent and interpret them in ways that are significant, or which accord with their needs, attachments, goals, commitments, plans, ends, desires, etc.

Thinking involves the symbolic or semantic mediation of ideas or data, as when we form concepts, engage in problem solving, reasoning and making decisions.

Words that refer to similar concepts and processes include deliberation, cognition, ideation, discourse and imagination.

Thinking is also deeply connected with our capacity to make and use tools; to understand cause and effect; to recognise patterns of significance; to comprehend and disclose unique contexts of experience or activity; and to respond to the world in a meaningful way.

With the mind having such powerful influence over our life, the still unanswered question is: where is the mind located? If the mind is a physical phenomenon of some kind, it has to be located somewhere.

There are two possible options: either the mind is internal to the body or the mind is external to it. More generally, either the mind depends only on events and properties taking place inside the subject's body or it depends also on factors external to it. Eastern traditions such as Buddhism do not hold to the dualistic mind/body model but do assert that the mind and body are separate entities. Buddhism in particular does not hold to the notion of a soul. Some forms of Buddhism assert that a very subtle level of mind leaves the body at the time of death and goes to a new life. Buddha explained that although mind lacks form, it can nevertheless be related to form.

Thus, our mind is related to our body and is "located" at different places throughout the body. This is to be understood in the context of how the five sense consciousnesses and the mental consciousness are generated.

There are many different types of mind "sense awareness, mental awareness, gross minds, subtle minds, and very subtle minds" and they are all formless (lacking shape, colour, sound, smell, taste or tactile properties) and they all function to cognize or know.

There is no such thing as a mind without an object known by that mind. Even though none of these minds is form, they can be related to form.

Humans are corporeal beings and, as such, they are subject to examination and description by the natural sciences. Since mental processes are intimately related to bodily processes, the descriptions that the natural sciences furnish of human beings play an important role in the philosophy of mind. There are many scientific disciplines that study processes related to the mental. The list of such sciences includes: biology, computer science, cognitive science, cybernetics, linguistics, medicine, pharmacology, and psychology.

However, as with the majority of the people, these are subjects beyond the scope of our daily requirements of life.

Since we discern, discriminate, distinguish and recognize the relationship between mind and brain; it would suffice to say: what we discern we see apart from all other objects; what we discriminate we judge apart; what we distinguish we mark apart, or recognize by some special mark or manifest difference. But, more commonly, we simply refuse to think about it because we have no idea about it. In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issue?.

So said Sir Francis Bacon; an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, author and pioneer of the scientific method who lived from the latter half of the 16th century to the first quarter of the 17th century.

See you this day next week. Until then, keep thinking, keep laughing. Life is mostly about these two activities.

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