Understanding Levels of Cognition: An Exploration of Ancient Hebrew Cosmology and Communication

1. Prof. M. M. NinanMarthoma Church of San Francisco Bay Area

2. Introduction to Prof. M. M. NinanMarthoma Church of San Francisco Bay Area

3. Why is the horse not laughing? Levels of cognitions Because the horse does not understandwhat they are saying.

4. Levels of cognitions Here is another dilemma . The letter he received contains the above writing. He cannot make sense to it. Why? Because he does not know the language in which it is written.

5. The key is that it is written in Korean and if he knew it, it meant “I love you.” To understand that he needs to know the what those symbols mean. Levels of cognitions

6. Every culture understood these facts. In the ancient Hebrew culture the cosmos was classified as four dimensions with sentient beings in every dimensions sometimes spanning several dimensions at a time. These dimensions are the four worlds: Asiyyah (Action) - the material universe in which we live. This is the world of sensations Yezirah (Formation) - the abode of the "lower angels," men's souls and the Garden of Eden. This is the world of mind, thought and patterns. The mental realm. The first heaven Beriah (Creation) - considered "Heaven" proper, it is the first separation from the Divine, and "location" of the Throne of God and archangels. This is the spiritual realm – the second heaven Azilut (Emanation) - the eternal unchanging Divine world. This is the divine realm – the third heaven It is a convenient way of thinking. These can be represented as a tree as is usually done in Hebrew mystic tradition. A traditional pictorial representation is given in the next page. We can think that Man is living in a four level mansion. We usually live on the ground floor and seldom ascend to the higher floors.

7. We live in four floors The Hebrew Cosmology

8. The Jain Universe 1 2 3 4

9. We live in four floors We know this dimension through our five senses The Hebrew Cosmology

10. smell taste sight hearing touch We have developed the sciences of our world using these sense impulses – Physics, Chemistry, biology etc. We know this dimension through our five senses

11. Since man lives in a multidimensional world, we have other senses of perceptions which are not just material. We learn through them also. All learning comes through communication within the various realms of existence.

12. Semiotics "All instruction is either about things or about signs; but things are learned by means of signs,“ (On Christian Doctrine, I:2). A sign, is “something that shows itself to the senses and something other than itself to the mind” (Signum est quod se ipsum sensui et praeter se aliquid animo ostendit) (Augustine De dial. 1975, 86) Augustine of Hippas (354-430 A.D.),

13. Semiotics Without Signs Nothing is conceivable Sless, 1986 Symbol communicates meaning purely through arbitrary conventions. This is the way natural language carries meaning

14. Eye sees things because light of different frequencies and different intensities reach the retina through a lens and then the brain makes sense out of it as some form of image. Similar argument follows for every sense perceptions of ours. What the brain receive through the senses are some form of impulse which are simply signs connected with what is perceived. Hence every thought that you have is the product of a sign and is in itself a sign. “every thought is a sign” Without Signs Nothing is conceivable Sless, 1986

15. These signs are associated with object perceived by the mind. The next time when the brain sees a sign it immediately associates through memory to the previous experience to the object itself. The reverse process takes place when we perceive a sign and this leads us to make coherent connected thinking. Object, Concept and its sign form a triangular relation. They are all distinct, yet related.

16. Reality perceived understood encoded ...'reality' is always encoded, or rather the only way we can perceive and make sense of reality is by the codes of our culture. There may be an objective, empiricist reality out there, but there is no universal, objective way of perceiving and making sense of it. What passes for reality in any culture is the product of the culture's codes, so 'reality' is always already encoded, it is never 'raw'. Fiske (1987 )

17. Incarnation The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us God encoded for us in our language Incarnation was nothing but the encoding of the divine into human realm so that we may be able to understand what is otherwise not directly knowable. God is in our realm and beyond and above all our dimensions. We can make some sense out of it only when God can be understood by us in our world. This is what incarnation did. “The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us”

18. Communication among the living

19. Communication,is not merely a characteristic of humans, or of living organisms. . Successful survival in any environment depends upon an organism's ability to acquire information from its environment through its senses. Fish can sense light, chemicals, vibrations and electricity.

20. Communication, …. of living organisms. There is no leader, no overall control; instead the flock's movements are determined by the moment-by-moment decisions of individual birds. How do they communicate?

21. Communication, is present at the deepest levels of our material universe.

22. How do chameleons change color and how do they know what color to change to? How do they manage to get the camouflage colors?

24. Communication within the body

25. Neurons are specialized cells that convey sensory information into the brain, carry out the operations involved in thought and feeling and action, and transmit commands out into the body to control muscles and organs. The most prominent part of the neuron is the cell body or soma. The nucleus is the largest organelle inside the cell body and contains the cell’s chromosomes. Dendrites are extensions that branch out from the cell body to receive information from other neurons. The axon extends like a tail from the cell body and carries information to other locations. Communication within the body Because of the nerve cells that surround the body like a net, messages from the brain reach the most remote areas of the body with great speed.

26. Communication within the body In the brain of one individual|one quadrillion (1,000,000,000,000,000) communications can occur simultaneously

27. In the brain of one individual|one quadrillion (1,000,000,000,000,000) communications can occur simultaneously Human body is a marvellous communication system using signals.We describe them in terms of neurons and electric potential variations through the nerves.

28. A gene is the basic unit of heredity in a living organism. All living things depend on genes. Genes hold the information to build and maintain their cells and pass genetic traits to offspring. Genes are stranger forms of encoded transmission of properties, characters, traits etc in many dimensions from one generation to the other. It is like a documentation through out ages from the beginning of creation.

30. DNA transmits inherited experiencein coded form. It is decoded in organism’s physique, Character and behavior

32. Decoding of the coding of DNA codon-to-amino acid paradigm The genetic code is the set of rules by which information encoded in genetic material (DNA or RNA sequences) is translated into proteins (amino acid sequences) by living cells. The code defines a mapping between tri-nucleotide sequences, called codons, and amino acids Here is the three-letter code employed to encode the 20 standard amino acids used by living cells to encode proteins where informations are stored.

33. Decoding of DNA proteins The human genome is the full complement of genetic material in a human cell; it contains instructions for making all the protein molecules for all the different kinds of cells of the human body – neurons in the brain, red blood cells, bone tissue, liver cells, etc. In decoding DNA, researchers determine the "sequence" or exact order of the individual chemical building blocks, or bases, that make up the DNA.

34. Human DNA contains 3 billion base pairs The total length of DNA in 1 human equals 70 round trips from the Earth to the Sun

35. Meiosis is necessary for growth and transmission This is the study of inheritance, the passing of traits from on generation to the next. Genes are the units of hereditary, found at specific loci on each chromosome. Genes are made up of DNA, and DNA replication in meiosis passes on the genes to offspring.

36. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms and some viruses. The main role of DNA molecules is the long-term storage of information.

37. Genetic Communications Multiplication within the body: Transfering faith from one generation to the other DNA comes with its own decoder

38. You are the decoded reality of your DNA in all dimensions. The information goes back to Adam and Eve or even to the creation

39. Meiosis is necessary for growth Meiosis produces genetic recombination, because each daughter cell is given half of the genetic material as the original dividing cell.

40. Sacraments are the DNA codes In the transmission Of Faith From one generation to the other.

41. ommunication hannels

43. The whole universe is a communicating system Universe Tribes, flocks Organism Organ Systems from strings to the cosmos Organs Cells Macromolecules Molecules Atoms, ions Quarks Strings

44. The whole universe is a communicating system Including dimensions that are non-material

45. We are all talking to each other in codes in all four worlds

46. Our brains mathematically construct "concrete" reality by interpreting frequencies from another dimension, a realm of meaningful, patterned primary reality that transcends time and space.

48. The God gene hypothesis proposes that human beings inherit a set of genes that predisposes them to believe in a higher power. The idea has been postulated by geneticist Dean Hamer, the director of the Gene Structure and Regulation Unit at the U.S. National Cancer Institute. • The God gene hypothesis is based on a combination of • behavioral genetic, • neurobiological and • psychological studies.

49. The Vesicular Monoamine Transporter 2 or VMAT2 is an integral membrane protein that acts to transport monoamines—particularly neurotransmitters such as dopamine, norepinephrine, serotonin, and histamine—from cellular cytosol into synaptic vesicles. In humans, the VMAT2 protein is encoded by the VMAT2 gene. A single change in a single base of the gene seems to be directly related not to the belief in God, but to the increased probability that that individual will identify as spiritual.

50. There is a statistically significant correlation between religious behavior and the isoform of VMAT2? "It's a pump. A teeny-tiny pump responsible for packaging a neurotransmitter for export during brain activity. The neurotransmitter is released at the synaptic knob at the tip of an axon into the synaptic cleft. It diffuses across to the opposite membrane (the postsynaptic membrane), where it triggers the propagation of a nerve impulse in the next neuron.