Thinking in Āsana - Movement and Philosophy in Viniyoga, Iyengar Yoga, and Ashtanga Yoga - Matylda Ciołkosz
1. Introduction: The Legacy of Descartes and the Mind-machine
Thinking in Āsana - Movement and Philosophy in Viniyoga, Iyengar Yoga, and Ashtanga Yoga - Matylda Ciołkosz
Matylda Ciołkosz [+]
Jagiellonian University, Kraków
Description
The history of modern thought produced a model of the mind as a thinking machine, and of cognition as the process the mind-machine performs. The mind is a system of interconnected virtual halls superimposed onto the neural structure of the brain. These halls take in information coming in from different sources. They also contain some information at the outset, and this default information can be supplemented and modified based on further learning. Cognition involves transforming the incoming information to produce statements of belief. Although the thinker may not always be aware of it, it is a thinking process, a rational endeavour based on the analysis of inner copies of the external world.