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     At the outset we would like to clarify that the use of the term ‘response system’ in relation to the mind must not be viewed as a harkening back to the ‘stimulus-response’ theory of mental behavior, which treated the mind as a black box (which could not and need not be illuminated), and was only concerned with its behavioral manifestations like emotions, thoughts, and other mental functions. The mental response system that we will be exploring in this piece of writing is in fact an elaborate and multi-layered complex of mental mechanics, which can be objectively inquired into and explained. 

 

The formation and functioning of the human mind as a response system made up of specialized mental modules 

 

A journey back to the origins of living things will reveal that it was the inception of two very important processes which defined and distinguished a living thing from the rest of non-living Nature.  The first one was the emergence of an internal imbalance between its various components which made it inherently unstable and insufficient as a form. The second one was the capability of sensitivity (a kind of sensory perception) for its form and its insufficiency, which in the next step became an internal response of preference (its flipside being aversion for disintegration) for preserving the form as an integrated structure leading on to an external response for that preference. It is these two fundamental processes which became the basis for the proactive and dynamic interaction of a living thing with its environment. Because the living thing now had to continuously and dynamically interact with and respond to its environment in order to redress its internal imbalance and preserve its form. It is on the basis of these internal responses of preference and aversion leading to the generation of external responses (of execution) that gradually through trial and error, a scale of likes and dislikes developed in living forms for the execution of external responses. Thus the basic response system of all living forms is based on the digits of like and dislike, just as you have 0s and 1s in the case of computers. If a living thing is confronted with an object then without identifying that object it cannot respond and that identification is not in terms of quantities or figures, (post-verbal abstraction categories of identification) etc., but in terms of the basic scale of like and dislike (and their grades) in accordance with which it identifies and then responds to that thing. If the object is beneficial for that form then it will access the stored library of its likes and dislikes and respond to it positively i.e. by moving towards it, or consuming it, etc. And if it is harmful according to its existing scale of likes and dislikes then it will identify it as a ‘dislike’ and consequently respond by moving away from it. 

   

It is in the above backdrop that the proactive capability of living things based on the like/ dislike response process had to become more efficient if the living thing wanted to succeed in preserving its form. But the criteria and requirements of that efficiency were derived from the changing nature and extent of the internal imbalances and contradictions vis-à-vis the outside world (from which it had to continuously take) and the correspondingly developing like/dislike scale. These dictated what the proactive capability needed for becoming more efficient and capable. Broadly speaking, it needed ancillary capabilities such as perception (of external objects, things and processes/events, in our case) and then different kinds of perception and then a processing capability and along with it an executory system to implement the layers of responses. That is how gradually a proper mental response system made up of all these sub-systems (with their own layers and dimensions) was evolved to coordinate and carry out the many-sided interactions of a living thing with its environment. Two things can be discerned from the above explanation. One, the emergence of a ‘response’ capability in early life forms was one of the core processes responsible for the inception, and evolution of proper mental processes in the more developed living things as they moved up the ladder of evolution. Two, the emotional response process (made of layers of accumulated emotional responses based on likes and dislikes) was the foundation on which the subsequent storeys of an elaborate mental response system made up of sub-systems (specific mental programmes, functions and processes of perception, cognition, problem solving, Will, etc.), were built during the evolution of increasingly complex life forms. Hence it was these emotional and mental response systems which enabled living things to generate different levels and layers of responses indispensable for their meaningful interaction with the environment from the standpoint of their survival and further evolution as specific forms in Nature.  In human beings, especially after language, we find these emotional and mental response systems becoming very elaborate and complex. With the growing quantity and quality of human interaction with the outside world an exponential growth in mental capabilities took place. These new mental capabilities gradually became more structured functions which then evolved into specific programmes for repeatable, predictable and stable functioning. On the basis of these programmes then specialized mental systems and their sub-systems were evolved.

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Consequently, the mental operating system of contemporary man has today become a highly advanced specialization of mental capabilities, functions and then their programmes and systems (both emotional and mental). It has acquired new dimensions and super-structural layers, and innumerable and new interconnections and interactions amongst specialized mental processes and also with biological processes and the dynamic external environment. Broadly speaking all the areas of our concern today lie in the domain of our emotional response systems and all the areas of our attention fall into the ambit of our mental response systems. Of course both these systems are in continuous interaction and they overlap, reinforce and channelize each other. There is a complex feedback loop between them. It is the accumulated functioning of our emotional and mental responses that becomes our internal experience, which actually holds the steering wheel of our decision making, Will and doing processes. So what we do is primarily controlled by our emotional and mental responses and not our intellectual understanding. The latter is able to get access to the Will and doing processes but that is occasional and not a sustained process. That is why most of the time we are not able to actualize our intellectual understanding. Our Will and doing (channelized by our emotional and mental response systems) operate autonomously and the intellectual understanding is most of the time unable to do anything about it. And in fact most of the time our intelligence and intellectual understanding operates in aid of the decisions we make unintelligently on the basis of our emotional and mental response systems and their control of our decision making and doing. 

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It is to study and explore this highly advanced mental operating system of man that we find extensive and unending debate and discourse, working hypotheses, empirical studies in disciplines like Cognitive Science, AI, Brain and Mind Sciences, Psychology, Philosophy, Consciousness Studies and even Social Sciences. All these explore the various emotional and mental systems and processes and the human personality; their evolution, structural constituents, architecture, and functioning. We find Computational and modular models of the mind and then theories like Global Workspace and Cartesian Theatre and their critiques proposing alternate models. And then there are those focusing on brain mind or body mind problem. Before science got interested in focusing on the conscious self and unconscious functioning of the mind, these were the domain of religious and mystical thought and Philosophy and Psychology. But today mainstream science, alongside philosophy and psychology, is focusing on these aspects of the mind but one finds them faltering sometimes and falling back on various practices and concepts in the mystical traditions, for example meditation, etc. So when sophisticated intellectual inquiry into the human mind guided by laboratory and empirical tools finds itself in a blind alley in these areas then it decides to stop using reason and begins to rehash earlier pre-scientific intuition or sometimes dogma based concepts and models and incorporate them to come up with some elegant new theories. 

 

The mainstream trend of inquiry into the mind, however, remains micro specialization, where specific mental functions and processes like cognition, memory, learning and sometimes more intangible higher functions are taken up by scientists, and they keep delving deeper into them and discovering unmanageable micro aspects and facts about the working of these processes. The results and findings of this trend are most of the time not tangible to lay people and also do not add up to provide man with a clear picture of his mind. So most of them are of no practical use but just theoretical adornments to be kept on shelves. Mental and connected physiological disorders is the primary area which uses inputs (empirically tangible facts) from all these debates and knowledge. Modification of normal overt or identifiable mental behaviors and attitudes, etc., is another area which utilizes the knowledge emerging out of this entire gamut of disciplines focusing on the brain and mind processes.  

 

The above main trends of scientific inquiry into the mind, apart from providing us with growing theoretical and practical knowledge for enabling cosmetic changes in our minds, are also manifestations of how sophisticated, difficult and many-sided the problem of trying to inquire into and understand the mental operating system of today’s man has become.  At present the reigning theories and models in Cognitive science, AI and other brain and mind sciences and even philosophy and psychology which zero in on exploring and explaining the complexity, organization and functioning of the human mind are largely computational and modular accounts. With the fringes trying to move beyond these accounts because of those mental processes and states which cannot be explained within the framework of computational theories alone, for example, subjective experience itself, or what they call ‘qualia’ (e.g. feeling of seeing red) or the creative and holistic character of human thinking in general. We find many types of modular models (as part of computational theories) of the mind and then extensive and highly technical debates for and against these models. 

 

The mainstream ones spearheaded by the Fodorian account talk of genetically specified ‘domain specific’ mental modules associated with specific areas of the brain and within them there are differing accents. Some focus more on their specific functional role and identity in the overall mental operating system rather than structural specifics. For instance, ‘mental modules’ that Steven Pinker invents do not necessarily map on to specific brain areas. While others suggest that the functional identity of these modules is dependent on their structure and position in the mental system. Then there are differing views on whether the entire mind is modular or just some lower order mental processes. Some propose modules for conceptual processes like ‘practical reasoning’, or other higher order mental functions and processes, etc. While Fodorian and neo-Fodorian views clearly state that modules are non-conceptual and consequently we cannot have modules for holistic human reasoning, ‘belief-fixation’, discerning meaning, and other similar mental functions. In addition, we also have myriad concepts and details continuously emerging about the general characteristics and functioning of these modules including the conditions and constraints of interactions between them. This includes concepts of encapsulation, innate or genetic specification or channeling, fast processing, domain specificity and unique processing algorithms, distinct neural grounding, etc.,  

 

Residing on top of these computational/modular accounts is the area of consciousness and the conscious and unified experience of self and external world, which is viewed as the core area in all theories pertaining to the mind. Here we have all kinds of scientific and philosophical theories focusing on the substance, evolution, function and role of consciousness and its integral connection with the brain and body. Theories like Global Workspace and architecture, explain consciousness as using some central workspace in the brain where it integrates and coordinates the functioning of specialized mental modules and their networks without ‘knowing’ the location of the resources in the brain or their relevance to the problem. Our consciousness only broadcasts the information at a parallel level to all the specialized modules or ‘micro processors’ and it is through competition between them that the final decision or response is reached.  The counter theoretical frameworks view this centralized role of consciousness as the ‘illusion of self and conscious will’. In addition, the inquiry into consciousness has also revealed how it is just the tip of the iceberg, which consists of non-conscious or unconscious processes. How our unconscious or semi-conscious processes influence and control our different mental functions and determine our thinking and doing is today becoming an important part of the discourse and thinking about the mind. 

 

The above mentioned multi-level discourse and explanation is still far from providing any definite answers about the organization/architecture, complexity and functioning of the human mind. There are still many confusions, contradictions, potpourri of old and new concepts, assumptions, facts, notions, paradigms, which prevent us from getting a clearer, tangible and working grasp of our minds today. Given this situation, we would just like to briefly state our position in this area. For us ‘modules’ are nothing more than certain capability areas (not clearly demarcated and rigidly defined as an Electronics module would be) of the brain and mind which become specialized in some specific functions. We conceive of mental modules as specialized response systems and their sub-systems, which perceive, process (evaluate) and then respond to distinct stimuli (in all their shades) on the basis of their specifically evolved multi-layered programmes based on genetic software (specific mental genes) containing the core paradigms/algorithms of a living thing’s interaction with the outside world. The development of these modular response systems (emotional and mental) in post-brain living things was a product of a dynamic and on-going interaction between the mental genetic software, the brain processes, mental processes and the external environment. 

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In earlier species the response system was very elementary and not a proper and developed modular process, as there were no sub-systems or layers. To give an example, the emotional capability and executing capability were not separate processes; the executing capability was a part of the emotional process. And that in turn determined or controlled the functioning of processes like perception. For instance, where does the animal choose to look? What does it want to hear? What does it want to turn away from or ignore? What is it that it focuses on, and sometimes more intensely? Since there was very little processing required so the processing capability was also not an elaborate system with its own sub-layers. In advanced animals the response systems became more elaborate and began to acquire a more modular character. With the inception of human beings and especially the post-language and then post-civilization man the response systems became highly developed modular processes. Broadly speaking there are three main stages in terms of which the human modular response systems operate to generate a response to a stimulus; perception, processing and execution (what we can refer to as a Will in the human response systems). The modular response systems (emotional and mental as mentioned earlier) and their sub-systems or modules based on their specific programmes operate at all these stages. 

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The processing within each system/modules, the interactivity, exchange, coordination amongst them, their influencing each other and the coming together or integration of their respective outputs is a complex many-step process and there is no central process located in the brain where all the inputs come together to generate a unified response, etc. Of course there is a composite and integrated response to a stimulus but that is an accumulated (not linear or serial) product of a series of evaluations and integrations (producing certain conclusions) that take place within the main response systems, which in turn depend on the evaluations within their layers. And then we need to keep in mind that not all the sub-systems get involved in this complex process but only the relevant (to the stimulus) ones. Another important factor is that this process of integration and the coming up of a crystallized conclusion, which then gets implemented, also depends on the actual dynamic of interactivity between the dominant (like the emotional complex) and relevant response systems. That is, to what extent they are able to influence, coalesce, cooperate or override each other, and then their coming together in the ‘execution’ (or Will) process where the final weighing or evaluation and then implementation takes place. The purpose of all this explanation is to inform the reader that the modular organization and functioning of the human mind is quite an elaborate and sophisticated process. It can neither be explained in terms of merely the brain processes because all this dynamic and complexity can’t be reduced to the brain and nor merely at a linguistic and abstract mental level without referring to any distinct energy process apart from the known energy constituents and processes. In our view mental modules are not some abstract linguistic category as considered by some researchers, philosophers and scientists. They are an energy process and in our view their energy constituents would be some pre-big bang massless magnetic energy forms which are not yet detectable by our laboratory tools.

     

To sum up, all these modular response systems and their sub-systems work together as an integrated Internal Response System of the mind for the individual as a whole. This is the picture of the modular mind that we have discovered during our quest of acquiring a useable understanding of the human mind so that we can restructure it. Giving an account of the similarities it shares with the existing computational and modular accounts or differences is a separate detailed exercise, which will be taken up in some future pieces of writing.  

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The modular response system as human personality 

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With this we come to a distinct feature of the human (especially contemporary) modular response system which needs to be pointed out and explained. Because it is this feature in terms of which we know and view ourselves and other human beings. In the highly developed and complex modular response system of post-civilization man we find the addition of another layer which is absent in pre-human and even early human species. The repeated functioning of our various mental modules as individual response systems and as a whole and their products in terms of our ideas, feelings, thoughts, motivations, etc., becomes our internal experience (emotional and mental) as an individual. And when we become aware of our experience and other mental products then there arises a layer of a unified experience, which is in fact a meta-layer of response—our integrated self or ‘I’. Our personality or sense of our own selves is nothing more than an accumulated outcome or aggregate product of the on-going functioning of all our response systems. A pertinent detail needs to be mentioned at this point. In terms of micro mental dynamics our sense of personality arises when we start associating our Will response system (which is a simple execution process in less complex and earlier living forms) with ourselves. In the human response systems, it is the Will where it all comes together. The Will represents the whole of one’s response capability for all its layers. It is in the Will as an elaborate response system that the final weighing and crystallization of conclusions from all the other response systems takes place. And then those crystallized conclusions are sent to the doing part of the Will for actual implementation. So it occupies a critical and leading role in the gamut of all our mental processes and response systems. And our personality becomes what our Will response system is. This idea is not new. The connection between our acts and core character has been proposed by many thinkers and philosophers.       

 

The point we want to stress about our personality is that it is not a deliberately architected product of intelligence. It is a response layer that arises during the course of the evolution of our mental processes, as specialized response systems. Our experience of this layer and our verbalization of it is what gives it a separate and unique existence. Our individuality in terms of our specific mental operating system is a logical reality in Nature and our awareness of it is also valid and legitimate. But when we have a unified experience of the superstructures built on the basic fact of our individuality and verbalize it then we create this superficial and superfluous layer of ‘I’ and make it the cornerstone of our existence. We are aware of it because of the specific state and character of human consciousness but we have not consciously or intelligently created it. Consequently our awareness of our personality is actually an awareness of its superstructural part, and not its fundamental part. The superstructure of our personality has acquired so many layers and dimensions and has become so complex and elaborate that we have lost touch with its fundamental part and its design criteria coming from our mental genes. Both our sensitivities and intellect are not yet able to carry out a sustained inquiry into the logic, making and mechanics of this part. And how its unintelligent and reflexive character covertly influences and colors even the operation of our intelligence and intellect. In addition, due to the innumerable variety of the mental superstructure we get enamored and entangled in the specific characters and journeys of personalities, which breeds a kind of arrogance and illusion of being unique and different. It is this arrogance which then starts dominating and dictating the interaction between personalities and the interaction of personalities with other processes and phenomena in Nature, both tangible and intangible. 

 

The real crisis of the contemporary human mind and personality 

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The problem is that our personalities have today become an inadequate and defective operating system. They have not been designed and constructed on the basis of objective facts but inputs from our unintelligently made emotional and mental response systems, whose basic design criteria and paradigms are a product of the concrete history of the origins and evolution of these systems, as objective processes in Nature. The consequences of the defects and insufficiency of our personalities to cope with the complexity of our internal and external lives are clearly manifest in the growing disintegration and conflicts that we witness within ourselves and in the world that our defective personalities have created and are continuing to create. So we need to take a step back and look at ourselves, our personalities, not only as producers of exponential material and intellectual progress and development but also as producers of an unprecedented scale of rapidly increasing disintegration, anarchy, conflicts, contradictions, unhappiness and disharmony.  

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The contemporary human mind is actually a hybrid mind made up of three main layers. The programmed modular emotional and mental response systems (including their layer of human personality), which are actually the superstructure constructed on the primary capability of sensitivity about the form as a whole concretized through the emotional process of like/dislike. Then the nonverbal intelligence which we share with developed animals and currently it exists in the form of developed sensitivities but is yet to acquire the form of a more intelligent and systematized process. The latest layer is of verbal intelligence which is the contemporary sophisticated human intellect. The roots of the crisis that we confront today within our minds lie in the capability of intelligence that emerged in living things, as a response to the insufficiency of the basic emotional process to cope with the growing and many-sided interaction with the external environment. The problem is that this capability, initially nonverbal, is actually not a response process in the sense of becoming operative only on the basis of a programme. In fact, whenever a new situation arises which requires a novel solution then the capability of problem solving or intelligence operates beyond the programme and the pre-existing referent solutions. With the emergence of verbal intelligence in human beings that original capability of intelligence to go beyond the parameters of the programme gets a new leash of life. So much so that it gradually becomes a continuous and a more systematized process and eventually produces the human intellect whose products are the world that we have made for ourselves today. 

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The issue is that in the case of the animal mind the nonverbal intelligence despite operating sometimes beyond the programme remained firmly integrated with the emotional and mental response systems of the animal and operated harmoniously within their framework. It did not develop and become an autonomous system which would begin to continuously operate beyond the confines of the programme/software. Thus that basic integration between the response systems and intelligence of an animal remained intact. The intelligence capability continued to peacefully serve the agenda of the response system. So the animal hybrid mental systems continued to operate efficiently and in a stable manner. In the human mind this stable relationship got disturbed. Especially after language when his intelligence started becoming a proper system with infinite potential of growth. Finally, in the period of civilization when it became the intellect then that original equation within the mind breaks down. That basic harmony and stability between the mental processes is lost. And we find a critical contradiction emerging between the layers of the hybrid (made up of the above mentioned three mental layers) mental operating system of an individual. It is a two-fold contradiction. In one fold, contradiction has arisen within the emotional and mental response systems; between their primary layer of sensitivity for the form as a whole and the secondary or superstructural layers of emotional and mental processes, which were meant to concretize the primary layer. The latter have acquired the form of an elaborate and item-based agenda for primarily preserving the status quo within the mind. Our primary sensitivity layer is about holistically sensing and experiencing in relation to all our dimensions- physical, emotional, mental and spiritual- and not just any one dimension. But our superstructural layers, which constitute our subjective agenda and its moment to moment functioning, are only concerned with the attention demanding dominant dimension at any given instance or period of time. So their processing and assessing is item and event based, largely for short-term purposes and mainly for preserving the status quo or our given state of individual and social existence. Since both these layers have differing objectives and functioning within us hence they logically come in contradiction with each other. We are not aware or conscious of this contradiction but it manifests itself at times in terms of its consequences and results which can and do come into our awareness. And to which we assign all kinds of linear and superficial causes other than this core contradiction.  

 

In the second fold, a contradiction has emerged between the programmed emotional and mental response systems (including Personality) and the intellect. The functioning and agendas of both processes are at odds with each other, hence the covert and overt contradiction between them. In the current scenario of human existence on both the individual and social planes, the highly elaborate and complex superstructure of our emotional and mental response systems and personality has gotten disconnected from its core sensitivity criterion, and only repetitively operating and promoting the unconsciously (in interaction with the environment) formed agenda of the genetic mental templates. It is in the mental genes that the templates for our personality models, motivations, temperament, etc., reside. These templates concretize and become layers of programmes as the individual interacts with the environment during the various stages of his/her lifespan, and then in different periods of human history, especially in the phase of civilization, wherein, the human programmes pertaining to his emotional and intelligence processes become highly elaborate and complex. During interaction with a complex social environment and due to growing mental capabilities these mental templates and programmes also keep getting modified, albeit at an unconscious level. 

 

Today what we find is that despite a developed intelligence and intellect an individual basically lives out the agenda of his mental genetic programmes and templates. The core direction is provided by them. And his intelligence and even intellect are primarily used to serve and promote this agenda (expressed in the highly elaborate response systems), which has also become quite complex. The intellect manages to operate beyond the confines of these programmed emotional and mental response systems but they continue to pollute its working and products and covertly hijack and use it for their core genetic agenda. We find quite a number of examples in human history in which the products of our intellectual processes have been used to promote the adversarial agendas of our genetic mental processes. Nuclear and biological weapons are one such example. A more subtle and internal example would be of a cutting edge Scientist whose intellectual processes are working at the optimum level in the field of say Particle Physics and he is coming up with extremely important insights and knowledge in his field. Among the numerous motivations which drive him in his work a dominant motivation could be of getting the Nobel prize for his work or to come up with those novel insights or knowledge which none of his colleagues are able to. So there his desire or wish based genetic emotional process, whose fundamental character is adversarial or vis-a-vis other individuals, takes over and might also affect his intellectual work. He might give in to the tendency of coming quickly to conclusions in his work and not going through all the steps that intellectual labor requires. This tendency at the intellectual level is a translation of the urge for instant gratification in his genetic emotional processes. Now this is one simple example but in reality this process of intervention would be happening at various levels within an individual and in relation to numerous things, situations, interactions within him and outside of him, and would be in terms of numerous shades, colors and layers.   

 

The above illustration of the deep rooted domination and control that our programmed response systems or genetic mental processes exercise within our minds clearly tells us that they are basically proceeding unchecked and churning out new and innumerable forms of misery and pain (at all levels and dimensions), which are gradually making the human form unstable from within. This means that they are actually threatening the survival and stable functioning of the human form, and consequently no longer operating in line with the core criterion and purpose of their formation and development, which was to ensure survival of the individual unit. Where survival today not only includes ‘physical’ survival but going towards growing and intelligent pleasure on the mental plane arising from greater harmony and stability of the overall form, and moving away from unintelligent pain resulting from disharmony, conflicts and contradictions.  

 

Coming back to the second contradiction, mentioned above, our existing response systems are using programmes/software of yesterday to process the facts of today. The information (facts and knowledge about ourselves and our lives, including the reality created by our minds) that our intellect is providing us is coming in continuous conflict with the core unintelligently made and adversarial operative paradigms and motivations, etc. of our response systems, whose standpoint and center is the individual biological form. Our intellect is discovering more and more truths and trying to take us closer to reality, while our response systems and their existing idea, habit, emotional and even intelligence patterns want to persist with their existing mode of functioning, which is actually taking us away from reality and towards new forms of disintegration. Man has been historically experiencing this contradiction during the period of civilization and it is this contradiction that he has been expressing in different ways and from time to time. It has been broadly referred to as the conflict between emotions and reason/intellect, and more recently reflexive mind and deliberative or reasoning mind. 

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In our opinion the above contradictions are the root cause of the manifest (and also underlying) disintegration, anarchy and conflicts that we observe and also experience at all levels and dimensions of human life today. They are not in our awareness in a crystallized form but their manifestations are in our experience. It is another thing that despite our experience of these contradictions we are too busy with the moment to moment living out of our basic emotional and mental agenda that we do not have the time to identify and then address them. So we prefer to entangle ourselves in current affairs and live out our lives in terms of them. And any long-term intellectual vision we have is eventually connected to this operative framework of current affairs.    

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The logical solution to these contradictions and their consequences, reaching acute proportions today, is that man needs to move towards developing an autonomous intelligence (an organic composite of our verbal and nonverbal intelligence) and intellect, which will enable him to move towards the making of a new conscious mental operating system, with a new architecture, design and an intelligent and harmonious integration between the three main minds which constitute it.

 

Notes

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i.  Stages and layers of mental functions, processes and programmes structured and operating both discretely and in an integrated manner and having their origins in the genetic process.

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ii. We find specialization in the mental functions of developed animals also but in us this process became quite advanced and complex. 

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iii. Fodor, 1983.

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iv. Rose, 2006, p. 101.

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v. Milkowski, 2008.

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vi. Fodor, 1983.

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vii. Carruthers, 2006.

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viii. Stewart, 2007, pp. 58-92.  

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ix. Broadly speaking, brain process modules control the autonomic and reflex systems of the body while mental modules are specialists in various mental functions and products. 

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x. To give an example, the perceptual module will have distinct layers of programmes pertaining to all the five senses.  

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xi. Interestingly just as in computers we find that specific programmes are the means through which the software (as the basic framework) concretizes or functions similarly mental programmes are the concrete functional layers of the mental genes software. And when acute problems or a crisis arise in the functioning of these mental programmes vis-à-vis the environment then that is communicated to the mental software via the brain processes and consequently the mental software and its paradigms of interactivity also get modified. Which in turn either modifies the existing mental processes or produces new mental processes.

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xii. The fundamental part of human personality consists of motivational elements, basic positions and paradigms. This part is the design criteria coming from the dynamic between our mental genes, brain and external environment and has been made at an un-inquiring and reflexive level. Whatever reasoning and inquiry that we have done at a deliberate and conscious level has gone into the superstructure. The superstructure consists of devising systems for the pursuit of our fundamental motivations, paradigms and positions.

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xiii. Although some of its products/solutions when they get stored in memory eventually become kind of referents or protocols/paradigms activated in similar situations which become a part of the response systems.

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xiv. With preference for the form’s holistic and integrated stability, survival, and growth, and aversion for instability and disintegration, as its core theme or criterion.

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xv. There are layers in point of time ranging from short- term, medium-term to those which we share with other living forms even bacteria. Then we have layers in terms of the reach of these programmes. Some have a very limited reach, others have a constant reach, for example those which require constant mental attention or some pertaining to our preferred emotional motivations and actions, which also operate repetitively.    

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xvi. Marcus, 2009, pp. 51-52 

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