MIND: AN EMERGENT PROPERTY

A major problem in understanding how the nervous system works deals with the coversion of the physical – nerve structures and impulses – to the psychophysical – sensations and feelings. Somewhere in the nervous system this transition occur to account for characteristics that make us human. One possible mechanism for this elusive even is the concept of emergent properties – The appearance of a property that does not inrtere to, and is not predictable from, the components or modules of a system. The suggestion is made that late Phylogenetic cortical areas constitute the critical components to allow emergence of tituse properties that are uniquely human.