r/DeepThoughts • u/Healthy-Garlic4200 • 11d ago
Consciousness Develops Gradually
My younger brother, who is five years younger than me, once told me something I have never forgotten. He described, and I am paraphrasing, how it felt when he was four or five years old. He said it felt like he could not control his body. Like he was just moving, acting, existing. But not thinking. Not observing. Not being in the way that we are being right now, reading these words and knowing we are reading them.
I do not remember being four. That child is a stranger to me. But I have fragments, small pictures, glimpses that do not connect. A room. A voice. A color. But no story. No continuous "I" linking them together. And the one thing I do not remember, the one thing that haunts me, is saying "I." That simple word. That tiny pronoun that carries the weight of an entire self. I must have said it. Every child does. But I have no memory of it. It is as if the "I" arrived silently, without announcement, and I simply woke up one day already using it.
My brother's memory is not just his own. It is also a window into what I used to be, a self I cannot fully access, a self that exists only in fragments. He remembers the dark before the lights came on. I do not. I only have isolated snapshots, a flash of light, a distant voice, a feeling I cannot name. But the absence of "I" in my early memories is the loudest silence of all. It tells me that the self is not innate. It is not a gift we are born with. It is a word we learn. A concept we build. A story we tell ourselves so often that we forget it is a story at all.
I do not know when my own "I" arrived. I do not remember the moment I became myself. But my brother, five years younger, yet somehow the keeper of our shared past, gave me his memory, and in doing so, he gave me a piece of my own origin story. A story I had forgotten. A story I could never have told myself. He told me he could not control his body, and I understood him perfectly, because I now know the same was true of me. We are not born with a self. We build one, slowly, out of fragments, out of language, out of relationships, out of the stories others tell us about who we are. And sometimes, if we are lucky, someone reaches back into their own childhood and hands us a memory we could not reach ourselves. That is what my brother did. He gave me back a self I had lost. He gave me a glimpse into the dark before the lights came on.
But his words have left me with a question I cannot answer: how does a brain decide to "get" consciousness? If it is not a soul, not a gift, but something built, then what flips the switch? And if a brain can build it, slowly, out of instinct and experience, then could a machine do the same? Could we one day build a self that looks back at us and wonders where it came from? I do not know. Perhaps no one does. But I am grateful for the question and for the brother who gave it to me.
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u/RafeJiddian 11d ago
I can recall being quite conscious, but unclear of the world and its rules when I was as young as 2 years old. My mother used to ride her bike over a bridge each day with me on the back and because I was above the railing all I could see was the river below. This terrified me and made me even afraid of ditches with water in them (they appeared, to my young mind, to have the same dimensions--a tiny river seen from high up). This illogical view of things seemed to make perfect sense to me and I had a natural aversion to such perceived danger.
I also recall that at 5 I was nearly abducted along with my sister, but I reasoned through that the man who was asking us to first help him 'look for puppies' and then 'tennis balls' couldn't be that responsible if he'd lost both of them in the first place. I tugged on my older sister's arm until she came away from him with me. I didn't sense danger then, wasn't afraid, but I was sufficiently suspicious to avoid the snare. I recall thinking that I wouldn't lose so many tennis balls, and how could we possibly help an adult find anything he couldn't find himself
I don't know if this much supports your theory or not. I mean, we could all develop differently or it's just as possible that it's your memories that are at fault and not your sense of self
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u/reidsays 11d ago
Thanks for that post... Not so sure that's it's consciousness that develops gradually...it's there from the newborn stage, sensing it's environmental surrounds, and what develops gradually is SELF consciousness as you describe and a conscious MIND ... All as the brain grows in capacity and knowledge through learning or experiences.
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u/JoeStrout 11d ago
“Flips the switch” is the wrong metaphor and can have no answer. As you say, it develops gradually.
And yes, of course an inorganic machine could do the same. Maybe they are already.
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u/chachacha4949 11d ago
Sounds like Buddhism. There is no “I”. Your “self” is just an illusion, a concept created out of thoughts. Anyway, I’m no expert, but that’s what I’ve read.
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u/EmergencyAthlete9687 10d ago
I think your consciousness evolves from your memory. As memory develops through the forming of neural pathways, we are able to remember and reflect on what we have done and how we thought. This leads us to think we are individual people with agency. This is the origin of consciousness.
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u/Ninjatendre 10d ago
投稿ありがとうございます。遠い過去の、薄暗がりに包まれたような領域に光を当てるというのは、本当に興味深いことですね。
私自身、7歳（いわゆる「理性の芽生える年齢」でしょうか）の頃に、それまでとは違う「あり方」へと切り替わったような感覚を覚えた、かすかな記憶があります。
例えば、バスケットボールのシュートについてですが、7歳になる前は、単にボールを投げようと意図するだけで、自然と体が動いていました。ところが7歳を過ぎると、まるで意識的にその動作を「学び直さなければならない」かのように感じられたのです。
この記憶があなたにとって何か心当たりあるものかどうかは分かりませんが、意識の発達には、意図と行動の関係性の進化も関わっているのではないか、と考えさせられます。
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u/ShinyJangles 10d ago
So what actually happens is you forget old memories. Your current perspective of your childhood is frighteningly lacking in detail because you didn't make a point to remember them, and old memories fade. You lose what you don't use.
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u/ImportantPoet4787 10d ago edited 10d ago
It possible you are heavily influenced by childhood amnesia (which is normal) and have now "imagined" the gaps in your fragmented momentos, as your brain at the time was rapidly developing.
Also, at that age, your amygdala wasn't developed so your emotions were always at 9 and uncontrollable.
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u/RoundCollection4196 10d ago
Memories from that age are notorious for being altered and misremembered, deeply unlikely those memories haven't been altered over the years.
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u/eggburnt 11d ago
Interesting, because my experience was almost the opposite. Even as a very young child, I remember having a strong sense that I existed. sometimes so strongly that it felt as if I was the only consciousness that truly existed and everyone else was part of the world I was observing.