The Happiness Hypothesis - the Divided Self summary by Richi

The Divided Self:

A surgeon named Joe Bogen had an idea on how to prevent massive epileptic seizures from occurring. Seizures originate in one part of the brain. A corpus callosum is a group of nerves responsible for the two halves of the brain to communicate and work together. If the seizure spreads to it, then the individual will lose consciousness and fall to the ground with muscle spasms. Joe Bogen knew removing this part would stop this from happening. His surgery worked and seizure intensity was greatly reduced. However, with the corpus callosum removed, there was no connection between the brain. This caused a weird phenomenon which is called alien hand syndrome, where the left hand would sometimes act on its own. The right hemisphere of the brain is not good at paying attention to details or good at translating things it sees into words, so the left side would mostly do something called confabulation. This process makes up reasons and explanations for what the right hemisphere has chosen. It is so good at doing it, that the individual doesn’t realize that they performed the behavior. Confabulation goes beyond people with split brains. This shows the drastic way in how your mind gives reasonable explanations for some people’s behavior but doesn’t know the cause for your behavior in the first place, as well as showing the importance of both sides of your brain.

              Humans are unique since they’re the only organism to have developed a complex language. Controlled thinking is also unique to humans because it requires analyzing pros and cons or using past failures and success to help achieve your own goals, which all require words. On the other hand, there are automatic processes, which are found in most complex organisms. Most of these automatic processes are unnoticed. For example, you don’t usually think of walking, yet you still do, without having to rely on yourself remembering to do so. Breathing, blinking, stretching, even walking around others, and not running into people is mostly automatic. Controlled processes are also limited, as you can only think about one process at a time, where you can do multiple processes automatically. The introduction of language to humans has impacted our evolution and was used as a powerful tool, and those who could speak, were more likely to survive, thus passing those traits to their offspring. Language gave humans partial freedom from stimulus control. Stimulus control is the system where goals are more focused on the present, which is a primitive trait that most animals use to suit their environment. The controlled system allowed humans to make long-term decisions, and language implied conversations between other people who can discuss what’s the best decisions and the formation of plans. We all have instinct, emotion, reactions, that make up most of our automatic system. Our minds can think on their own, but that can contradict our controlled thought. Sometimes they don’t work together, leaving us divided.

              Our minds are loosely divided in many ways. We contradict our thoughts and try to make up reasons for our choices and preferences. We are divided as an individual, but we are ourselves. We have our skills and strengths. Our weaknesses and struggles. With this knowledge, we learn better about ourselves and we can eventually find a purpose and meaning in our lives.