The Passing of Knowledge

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  • MalReynolds
    CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
    • Sep 2003
    • 6571

    #1

    The Passing of Knowledge

    We all have brains, even if we don't seem to use them all the time. We all have bodies that live and breathe, even if we're lazy bums. We all watch TV, or read books or swim and run. We all learn.

    But, that's the thing. We all learn. We all absorb knowledge into our bloodstream, our system and our brains. Bear with me, it's about to get a little odd.

    All concious thought occurs in the brain and all knowledge is stored in the brain. The law of the convervation of mass states that matter cannot be created or destroyed... So everything in our brain that makes us us, our knowledge and our personalities are stored herein, the brain.

    When we die, the knowledge does not just exit the brain in a fluid motion out the ear, it remains in the brain until the brain biodegrades. Then the knowledge we have is passed into the dirt, along with the rest of the nutrients that our bodies provide... The nutrients make the soil rich in protiens and other vital elemants to ensure the survival of life outside of our own...

    But our thoughts, personality and knowledge with our brain seep into the dirt as well. All around where you are buried, there are remnants of you, not just inside the coffin. In the dirt around you.

    Soon, a worm comes along and eats the dirt around your coffin. It is rich with protiens and you. Your thoughts. The worm takes the food in, absorbs the protiens, and absorbs your thoughts, although not conciously.

    The worm breaches the ground and is picked up by a bird. The bird eats the worm, and digests the information that you have left behind. It flys, and graces the land with it's natural fertilizer. The grass grows with your knowledge.

    A cow eats the grass, and absorbs your thoughts. The cow is then led into a slaughterhouse, where it is killed and made into all kinds of beef products. Some of which are sent to a pregnant mother who is eating for two. She eats the cow, digests this food, and then passes some nutrients and free thought onto her child.

    This child now has some of the knowledge you did.

    I think this affects us today, but I will get into it more depending on the reaction to this initial post. I've considered this a lot, and it also... Explains things, like people with similar personalities, people with... Other problems, etc etc.

    Just think about it.

    You, the originator of knowlege, die. You decompose. A worm eats your dirt. It gets eaten by bird, bird shits your knowledge. A cow eats your knowledge, and it is passed on to a mother and her unborn child.

    Just don't knock this yet.

    Mal
    "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

    "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


    My new novel:

    Maledictions: The Offering.

    Now in Paperback!
  • emptiness
    FFR Player
    • Feb 2005
    • 453

    #2
    RE: The Passing of Knowledge

    interesting theory....isn't it energy not matter....or maybe two laws are the same
    Back in 5 mins

    Comment

    • Afrobean
      Admiral in the Red Army
      • Dec 2003
      • 13262

      #3
      RE: The Passing of Knowledge

      That's a fine theory, except that I know knowlege and memories to not be actual matter. It's just information stored in your brain. You might as well suggest that if one ingests a hard drive then they will at least subconciously know of the previous contents of said drive. It's just not possible.

      Also:
      interesting theory....isn't it energy not matter....or maybe two laws are the same
      Both matter and energy cannot be desroyed or created, but they can change forms. For example, ice can melt (matter change) and kinetic energy can be transferred to thermal energy(energy change).

      Comment

      • emptiness
        FFR Player
        • Feb 2005
        • 453

        #4
        RE: The Passing of Knowledge

        k just wondering...
        Back in 5 mins

        Comment

        • dancingmaniac3
          FFR Player
          • Nov 2003
          • 1873

          #5
          RE: The Passing of Knowledge

          Thats a very fine theory indeed....Although i have to say my favorite part was "bird shits your knowledge.." haha that made me laugh. Anyway..

          Im gonna have to agree with Bean...your knowledge and information is just stored into your brain...it isn't in any form to where some random object can "eat it" or shit it or whatever and learn what you have learned. If that were so, natural cloning wouldn't be as difficult as it is. Also i think that when your brain 'biodegrades' all of your thoughts and known knowledge is destroyed as well. Yet that brings you to the point of "matter is not created or destroyed." If your knowledge and known information CAN be destroyed, then it indeed is not matter... This is a really interesting theory you have Mal...Maybe you should bring it up with a scientist. Kudos to you.

          Comment

          • MalReynolds
            CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
            • Sep 2003
            • 6571

            #6
            RE: The Passing of Knowledge

            Hmm... If knowledge is just stored in the brain, then what about self-discovery? Conclusions that we come to on our own and then the application of said conclusions? It seems like more than just stored data in a gray CPU, simply because we think and are capable of such things. Thinking of the brain as some kind of utilitarian unit that is only there to store information.

            Mal

            PS: I've never ingested a hard-drive. I don't think that's digestion friendly.
            "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

            "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


            My new novel:

            Maledictions: The Offering.

            Now in Paperback!

            Comment

            • deposition
              FFR Player
              • Feb 2004
              • 1115

              #7
              RE: The Passing of Knowledge

              Is this a joke?

              I know you don't think by eating someone's brain you gain their knowledge...

              Comment

              • MalReynolds
                CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
                • Sep 2003
                • 6571

                #8
                RE: The Passing of Knowledge

                Well, not exactly. You need to read the first post again. It's the nutrients in the soil that eventually make their way to a fetus. I mean, eating brains is just crazy. They don't make you smarter, but they could predict capacity for knowledge and certain aspects of personality.

                Mal
                "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

                "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


                My new novel:

                Maledictions: The Offering.

                Now in Paperback!

                Comment

                • dancingmaniac3
                  FFR Player
                  • Nov 2003
                  • 1873

                  #9
                  RE: The Passing of Knowledge

                  I hate to say it Mal, but you stumped me. I seriously don't know, and you have a great theory...I agree with you in certain aspects, but i also highly disagree. The whole food chain of knowledge thing you have going on seems a little unrealistic, but you never know. You obviously ate alot of meat from the cow that ate the grass that the bird shit on cause you have an intelligent mind.

                  Comment

                  • MalReynolds
                    CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
                    • Sep 2003
                    • 6571

                    #10
                    RE: The Passing of Knowledge

                    Well, here, it gets a tic complicated... Genetics have a rather large hand in the shaping of the body and mind, although these protiens surely add to it as well.

                    So, several worms eat the earth that is rich in your knowledge. But the worm keeps some, the bird keeps some, the cow keeps some, and the mother doesn't get the maximum of you out of the dirt. She gets the maximum of someone else. There's 30% you, and 70% Andy Kaufman. Or, if you're still the dominant part, you're just the dominant part by a smidge. 10% you, 9,8,7,6,5,5,4,3,2% other people or some such. That would mean you're the dominant personality, but the capacity for knowledge from your protiens would be smaller, thus creating a less intelligent form of you, I suppose.

                    I dunno, that part might be a tad complicated. But, if there are equal shares of certain personalities and knowledge retainers, who is to say that it doesn't create a chemical imbalance that makes the recipient mentally unstable due to the equal shares of mind and personality?

                    Once again, just thinking out loud.

                    Mal
                    "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

                    "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


                    My new novel:

                    Maledictions: The Offering.

                    Now in Paperback!

                    Comment

                    • NightSonnett
                      FFR Veteran
                      • Aug 2003
                      • 334

                      #11
                      I can see where you're coming from. I don't believe I've ever thought about this, but I've thought of things like it. For example, our bodies leave remnants, as you say, in the soil around us. Could this possibly be an explanation for ghosts? Or spirits that are witnessed? I know that ghosts are a completely different topic, but it relates a bit to what you brought up.

                      I'm not sure if I want to believe that our thoughts are matter, but it's something to ponder upon.

                      People have changed a lot in the past thousands of years...Perhaps you're right.
                      My computer hates me.

                      /gquit

                      Comment

                      • MalReynolds
                        CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
                        • Sep 2003
                        • 6571

                        #12
                        The idea of ghosts is just the spiritual remnants of a person, no what is flesh and broken down.

                        Mal
                        "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

                        "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


                        My new novel:

                        Maledictions: The Offering.

                        Now in Paperback!

                        Comment

                        • Afrobean
                          Admiral in the Red Army
                          • Dec 2003
                          • 13262

                          #13
                          Originally posted by MalReynolds
                          The idea of ghosts is just the spiritual remnants of a person, no what is flesh and broken down.

                          Mal
                          I think they were saying that maybe the spirit resides in the decaying flesh. That's the only way I could imagine if spirits exist. There wouldn't be one definite spirit from a person, but each person would have a spirit energy to them that would encompass all of their being.

                          Comment

                          • MalReynolds
                            CHOCK FULL O' NUTRIENTS
                            • Sep 2003
                            • 6571

                            #14
                            I always thought of the spirit of a person in a metaphysical manner, something that could not be traced, but something that could impact... Although, I do like the new way of looking at it.

                            Mal
                            "A new take on the epic fantasy genre... Darkly comic, relatable characters... twisted storyline."

                            "Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor


                            My new novel:

                            Maledictions: The Offering.

                            Now in Paperback!

                            Comment

                            • Austaph
                              FFR Player
                              • Jul 2005
                              • 75

                              #15
                              Mal, you definitely have a creative mind, but I think you're overlooking one simple fact: when we digest proteins, we destroy them. Many of the unstable fatty acids in the brain oxidize as our brain rots, anyway. The most profound thing that could happen from eating a brain would be the ingestion of consciousness-altering neurochemicals. Even then, what our stomach's acids don't destroy can't cross the blood-brain-barrier. If altering a genetic predisposition were as easy as you suggest, species would flux at such a fast rate that we could never keep up with the taxonomy. Afrobean also has a good point about knowledge being an immaterial substance. The neuroscientist Joseph Le Doux put it best when he said "You are your synapses." Knowledge itself is pretty unsteady ground to tread on. Since the time of Socrates (c. 500 BCE) - one of his most famous quotes being "I neither know nor think I know" - philosophy has yet to actually account for the existence of knowledge (Re: Heraclitus and Parmenides). If you're into metaphysics, you might want to check out Immanuel Kant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant). He was basically the be-all-to-end-all of metaphysicians; an archetype, if you will. Philosophy graduates actually brag about having read his works - even without understanding them - as he has written some of the very most difficult of philosophical treatise. He was an absolutely brilliant man.
                              Believe nothing, question everything.

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