The Biology of General Anesthesia from Paramecium to Primate
It is a fascinating article, but at R1200 he really tossed me for a loop. Such a loop and smackeroo, I gotta get it out of my system before going on. And there was so much I like about the actual science I was digging, it’s a shame, (we’ll get back to it),
but at R1200 is such a great example of that Abrahamic Mindset in action, which more than anything is about an attitude, so subtle and inbred, but also a betrayal, exposer of shallow thinking. That is from the perspective of Earth Centrism and a deep appreciation for both deep time and the evolutionary pageant that brought us into being.
It’s written:
“Like anesthesia, sleep is a state that at first glance should
arguably have been selected against
because it also incurs identically profound risks and opportunity costs.
Alan Rechtschaffen, a pioneer in sleep neurobiology, wryly stated that‘**‘if sleep doesn’t serve some vital function, **
> > it is the biggest mistake evolution ever made’’ [21].”
Why not just stick to what’s being observed and measured?
Instead a gratuitous, dare I paternalistic, bold judgement. Has evolution made the grade, succeeded or failed when she invented sleep? It’s as though Evolution needs to justify itself.
It goes back to the simplistic procreation balance sheet attitude,
Which itself reveals a disregard for most of what’s happening during evolution,
within nature’s (biosphere’s) dealing with life, one day at a time, day after days that added together created the Evolution that we need to do a better job of understanding.
The survival of the fittest tally sheet is a God Eye, an after the fact view, point, but living happens in the now. That’s not worth disregarding.
Think about that attitude.
I think that sort of distracting hyperbole is nothing more than an echo of millennia worth of religious indoctrination and argumentation. The paternalistic attitude towards everything whether invited or not.
Want to discuss Evolution?
How about Evolution is about creatures figuring out how to deal with the very immediate challenging task of surviving the next moment and figuring out how to live through the seasons.
“Evolution” is simply the tally sheet, life itself is the creative force.
We shouldn’t lose sight of that, and make out Evolution to be the creative force.
The end result is passing along genes, but that’s the “God’s Eye.”
But, for the creatures themselves, there’s more than “procreation” dictating their day to days, and to ignore that by laser focusing a simplistic formula that =’s procreation. It’s foolish and totally misses what’s happening in the bigger natural world around us. The thing that will survive and recover.
We sleep because any complex thermodynamic system stressed nonstop, without maintenance will self destruct. It’s like physics and not a choice. Evolution was doing the best it could with what it had.
No master plan, no chess, just plain dealing with the situation in front of it, a gazillion times over, at every level of the scale, doing the best it could with what it had, and learning via success & survival while leaving the rest behind. All of it happening moment to moment.
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And now I’ve run out of time.
The Biology of General Anesthesia from Paramecium to Primate
Cool article, I don’t dismiss any of it, but since you have a hard time figuring out my attitude and that Abrahamic Attitude (might be better than ‘mindset’ )
I’ve a life time of reading & hearing those kinds of self-centered ignorant judgement calls where there’s zero justification for it beyond the great ego. It’s always bugs me.
Write, thanks for those links, interesting read, just wish I had more time for it. later