Introduction

About OTRHOG

Part One
    The Fungus Among Us
    Symbiosis
    Bio-computer
    Mushroom Detectives
    Urine of Drunkenness
    Sacrifice for Science
    Split Brain
    Trauma the Teacher
    The Savior Syndrome

Part Two
    The Written Word

Part Three
    Naked in the Desert

The Functions of the Left and Right Hemispheres of the Brain

It is important to understand the way our mind works in order to use it properly. Just by knowing the basic duality of the brain allows us to take the first step. We must face the fact that our ego-self is only part of our "intelligence" and not the "smartest" at some tasks.

For most of us, our ego resides in the left hemisphere of the brain, which controls the right side of the body and the right hand. This side of the brain uses a linear way of thinking. This linear way of processing information can be very valuable, but it isn't the only way to think. This way of thinking tends to divide everything into just two categories, black and white, good and evil, with no in between.

The right side of the brain is the home of our intuition and functions a little differently. This side processes information by entering it into a spatial mode where each "bit" is in a relationship with all of the other "bits" similar information. This way of perceiving allows one to appreciate the whole as a complex interrelationship between all of its parts.

Now, there are some scientist types that say this split brain stuff is just a bunch of nonsense with no scientific basis. Well, it just so happens that to be a scientist almost requires a dominant left-brain way of thinking. The cornerstone concepts of science are digital, sequential and in a straight line. For example, the very idea that it is possible to remove things from their environment and have them behave naturally in the laboratory is counter to the way the right hemisphere deals with information. If you will notice, that is the way "science" probes for the secrets of nature. They see no use for this split brain jive, because it shows them to be handicapped human beings with only half a grasp on reality. Of course, there are relative exceptions. Not all scientists fit this very broad generalization. If you listen to what those scholars with anything like a balanced relationship between their hemispheres say, they are the ones preaching the concepts of a holistic, living, reactive and threatened Bio-sphere.

Across the board, from science and politics, down to the administration of local government, the policy makers are chosen for their left-brain bias or "single mindedness" which translates as mentally handicapped. All of these areas are ruled by dominant males with their bloodstreams overflowing with the drugs of combat. They fight their daily "battles" with their peers and make decisions based on today's glory and strut their success while leaving the common people to pay the price, today and for many half-lives to come.

Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain

If you would learn something about this whole split brain thing, it would behoove you to check out someone who has found some practical application for this information. Betty Edwards is just such a person. In her book, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, she leads the student through exercises designed to loosen up the right hemisphere and get the left one to shut up for awhile. This is the switch that the artist makes in order to create. She guarantees that anyone who goes through her lessons can "learn to draw". It works.

Betty Edwards was teaching Art in Long Beach, California, when she began to study split brain theory as it pertained to her craft. She noticed that she had trouble during demonstration drawing, trying to concentrate on drawing and explaining what she was doing to the class. It was difficult for her to function in both modes at the same time. From this clue she developed ways of learning to control these functions. With practice, you can not only learn to shift from hemisphere to hemisphere at will, but use both sides at once.

We all have experience with this phenomenon, but few of us have ever stopped to think about it. Remember the baseball games when every one would chatter, "Hey, batter, hey, batter batter."? Sure, we were trying to distract the batter and make him miss the ball. It just so happens that the spatial mode is the one you need to be in to hit the baseball. Talking and listening are in the other hemisphere of the brain. If you can get the batter to pay attention to your chatter, he'll never hit the ball. Talking on the golfer's back swing is the very same thing.

They say that we only use about 10% of our available brain power and everyone just chuckles. As soon as you find the controls, and begin to use them, you begin to find that there is more "brain" available to you than you ever thought possible. It takes time. It is like having a limb in a cast for a couple of months; when it comes out, it is practically useless. It takes time to exercise it and build up the muscles, nerves and tendons so that they can function normally. It is the same with the brain. When those long closed channels begin to operate again, they require some exercises, like Betty's. Thinking is a learned process and our schools and other educational institutions have done everything possible to keep thinking to a minimum.

It is obvious that two separate ways of processing incoming data would have the advantage of increasing the information available on which to base wise decisions. The process should give another dimension to the individual's perception, not found when either way of processing data is used exclusively.

A description of the different functions of the left-brain, masculine mode, and the right-brain, feminine style of thinking, goes something like this:

Language leads the list as the example of the dominate form of communication, favoring the skills of the left brain. Non-verbal communication is virtually ignored by our society. The tendency of the left-brain to label broad generalizations with some symbol that represents the total is a fast way of handling information. Unfortunately, that symbol may not accurately represent everything within that block of information. The abstract and rational are considered positive ways of thinking by our culture and the feminine counterparts, analogic, concrete and non-rational are not really considered to be "thinking" at all but more on the order of emotions. The people who can balance all of these elements have the best possibility of making wise choices. In our culture, 90% left brain and 10% right is considered equilibrium. You could break them down into the "Math" and "English" departments on the one side and the "Art" and "Music" on the other. The point is, the people who have failed to develop the intuitive side of their nature are working under a severe handicap in the real World. They just don't "see" the value of half of the things the rest of us find important. It is convenient for the Left-brain to keep track of progress by using numbers or some other form of abstract scoring system. They prefer to judge the worth of projects by their dollar and cents value, while failing to even look at aesthetic or environmental considerations.

"Under 'left handed', the dictionary lists as synonyms 'clumsy', 'awkward', 'insincere', 'malicious'. Synonyms for 'right handed', however, are 'correct', 'indispensable', and 'reliable'. Now, it's important to remember that these terms were all made up, when languages began, by some person's left hemisphere--the left brain calling the right bad names! And the right brain--labeled, pinpointed, and buttonholed--was without a language of its own to defend itself."
1 Edwards

It should also be of interest to those dedicated to equal status for women to notice that this system is highly biased against fair play for women. For feminists to try to "out male the males" is going to do nothing but make the situation worse. Too much "male-ness" is the root of the problem, anyway. What all of us need to do, regardless of gender, is to work to balance our decision making equipment by exercising it. Once we begin to find equilibrium in our individual personalities, then we can work on the imbalances in our culture.

R-complex

As if that weren't enough for us to handle, there is a third part of the brain which seems to have as much to say in our behavior as either of the "thinking" two. This is known as the R-complex or "reptile" brain.2 Long This is the powerhouse of survival energy that can be unleashed in an emergency. This is the "Hulk" that resides in all of us. Known in the Orient as the Kundalini, this drive is what the athlete must learn to release at just the right moment in order to excel. This is the "past president" of the organism and has the final word in all life and death matters. There isn't any "thinking" going on here, just gut reaction. This is also the seat of habit. Such behavior patterns as mating, social hierarchies, obedience to precedent and ritual, are rooted here along with opiate receptor sites and other areas sensitive to chemicals like hormones and such. This section of the brain is tuned for action rather than contemplation.

This part of the brain is located at the base of the skull and is attached to the spinal cord. It is called the reptile brain because it resembles that primitive brain in function and displays the same selfish bias that we expect from "cold blooded" creatures.

Two Fools, a Mute and a Brute

Sandwiched between the "thinking" partners, left and right, and the "brute" in the bottom chamber, we have the mammal addition to the board of directors. Family and social organization are programed into this area. The brain is constructed in layers. From the end of the spinal cord the successively more "modern" pieces of the brain have been added on to the existing equipment. Consequently, the decisions made by the lofty sections of the brain must pass through the "chain of command" before they can reach implementation, and the reptile has the last word. Many times the R-complex pays more attention to messages from the glands than it does to the orders from the "higher" brain. This system can leave us in a bind if we don't understand how it works. The R-complex is very good at getting us by in tough situations like badass neighborhoods and war zones. The aggressive behavior demanded by these conditions imprints in the reptile brain and is labeled: SUCCESSFUL BEHAVIOR. In times of stress the individual may resort to this "proven" pattern of action without giving it a thought. The "thinking" part of the brain gets the job of trying to rationalize the behavior of the "snake". Some use their available brain for little else but making excuses. Our courts and jails are overflowing with people who suffer from this problem. Our prisons do nothing, but encourage the use of the R-complex to deal with everyday life.

So, our human brains are made up of four basic seats of authority, of which the ego is only one. As long as that ego operates under the delusion that it is running the whole show, there's going to be trouble. The ego can either lose itself in rationalization or it can so subdue the rest of the board, that it becomes a virtual dictator of an unstable state, subject to periodic revolution. We are truly multidimensional beings even if we could be considered a closed system, which, of course, we are not.

This inner board room is constantly being bombarded by a steady stream of information from the environment in the form of allomones, pheromones, viruses, enzymes and other compounds, not to mention the steady flow of sight and sound stimuli. It is no wonder that some people "lose it" to an overwhelming feeling of chaos and confusion.

The human psyche is a highly complex interaction of fundamental units that each has its own way of processing information and its own limits of authority to act. I do not mean to over simplify this system or to "explain" all of it in my own crude terms, but I am trying to show the relationship of the various parts of our nervous system in a way that relates to the subject at hand.

The domination of the "male" side of the brain is apparent in every part of our daily life from the preferred use of the right hand to the exercise of "dominion" over the Earth. It shows itself in the short range, digital, masculine way of thinking that dominates our decision making process. The tendency of civilized humans to dominate, conquer, exploit and destroy shows us the location of the flaw in conceptual model. This is the "warrior ethic" that has been our way of doing things for some time. The cultures that we now call "primitive" put considerably more effort into seeking balance with their environment through the "female" aspects of Nature.

Our culture worships one god who is male, supremely powerful and thought to be off in the distance somewhere, whereas the primitives pay homage to the god of the Earth who is female, supremely understanding and contained in all things. It all boils down to which side of the brain handles our religion. In our culture the seat of authority in our bio-control system is a military junta, with the Ego and the Reptilian portions of the brain calling the shots.

The difficulty in spotting the flaw in our thinking is that we can only look at the problem with that same flawed thinking. The evidence cannot be found at the thinking end of the situation, but at the action end--the results. Let's take the way we think about insects and our crops as an example. Bugs eat crops. To keep from losing our food supply to them we kill them with chemical poisons. On the surface this seems to solve the problem, but in a few generations the bugs have developed resistance to the poison and are back doing their thing. Meanwhile, the poison wipes out the natural predators that would normally control the insects as well as many of the insects necessary for pollination of the crops. Herbicides are used to kill weeds, but destroy the habitat for beneficial insects and food sources for some hungry ones. The local ecosystem is thrown completely out of balance.

Because Nature is a self correcting organism, She develops strains that are resistant to the poison. Plants and insects maintain a balance with each other by using "chemical agents". They have been doing it for a long time and are very good at it. Our attempt to dominate the little buggers with chemicals has failed. This is because the "right-handed" way of thinking is limited to looking at the problem in a local, straight line, digital, masculine mode.

The alternate way of looking at the situation is to see the crop and insects, both beneficial and non-beneficial, as an interlocking system of checks and balances that works to maintain equilibrium and optimum overall growth through the culling of the weak and keeping all partners strong. This is the same relationship that exists between a moose herd and its wolves or domestic animals and their breeders. In this way of looking at the problem we see that the way to beat the bugs is to keep the whole ecosystem healthy through proper nutrition and gardening techniques and the insect problems can easily be handled with less damaging strategies.