Do you know the difference between your knowledge, your intelligence and your wisdom? Would you be interested in how your brain employs them? Do you realize that you ARE your memories and the way you process them? If interested, you might find this pearl enlightening.
We are our MEMORIES and how they are Processed:
A memory is defined as: “the mental faculty of retaining and recalling past experiences”—they are our library of experiential memories. We are the amalgamation of our skill/muscle, sensory, emotional and rational memories and the specific way our brain and body processes them.
Sensory memories connect us to the world outside of our bodies—without them we wouldn’t have any memories. Emotional memories help us physically survive. Rational memories help us to socially survive. Skill memories help us to survive physically and socially. Muscle memory helps us to physically survive by doing our routine tasks (walk, eat, etc.) better than we can if we thought about them. Our every thought, our every reaction is triggered by our memories, which are controlled by the PFC (Pre-Frontal Cortex). Our PFC uses our memories to make decisions about how to react—some of those decisions are appropriate and some aren’t.
Sensory memories trigger basic (anger, fear, joy and sorrow) emotional memories that take control of the PFC so that we are not distracted from physically surviving. The triggered emotional memory wipes the PFC clear of whatever it was doing and then uses the rational memories also triggered by those sensory memories to make a decision on how to react. This emotional memory’s control of the PFC is quelled by rational memories that determine why that emotion was triggered, which only occurs after we stop rationalizing about why we had a right to have that emotional outburst. Sensory memories also trigger our rational emotions (frustration, guilt, surprise, etc.), which the PFC uses to decide on how to react, or not as the case may be.
Bottom line on memory: In every thought and deed, we are the expression of our memories; nothing more and nothing less. Everybody has their own unique set of memories—not right or wrong, not good or bad, but sometimes inappropriate. Life is what it is and blaming others by rationalizing only makes things worse—rationalizing does not make us right or wrong or good or bad, just annoying to be around. And the sooner we realize this the sooner we can start on the path to a wiser way of thinking and living with positive knowledge memories.
What is KNOWLEDGE?
Knowledge is defined as: “the memories and skills acquired by humans through real-life experiences”. In other words, knowledge is the summation of ALL of our memories, some of which are based on truth/fact and some of which are based on fiction/lies. We store this knowledge as memories all over our body, but mostly in our brains.
Our left and right sensory cortices store our sensory memories. Our left and right temporal cortices store our skill memories (language, math and music) aided by our muscle memory. Our right amygdala stores our anger and joy memories and our left amygdala stores our fear and sorrow memories. Our right frontal cortex stores our interactive-thinking director and socializer experiential memories and our left frontal cortex stores our detailed-thinking analyzer and relator experiential memories. Our PFC makes decisions using the rational experiential memories and programming (attributes) of a rational style. These attributes are the style’s: orientation, purpose, pace, motivations and attitudes. Depending on the situation, the PFC also makes decisions to not react; for example, when we have a self-serving negative thought that is best not acted upon.
Rational knowledge memories can be truth/factual (positive +) or lies/fallacies (negative –) or both (+, –) and fall into the following categories:
Fact/truth memory (+): “Knowledge that has an objectively real demonstrable existence and reoccurrence”—for example, the forces of nature.
Lie memory (–): A false statement deliberately presented as being true—example, conspiracy theories.
Half-Truth memory (+, –): “A statement, especially one intended to deceive, that omits the negative facts necessary for a full accounting of it”—example, a salesman’s memories that extol the virtues of a product, but omits what’s wrong with it.
Opinion memory (+, –): “A confident belief/conclusion not totally supported by factual knowledge”—example, our beliefs that have not yet determined to be a fact or the truth.
Pseudo-Truth memory (+, –): “A false, deceptive statement that combines a lie with a fact to give the lie credibility”—example, believing that the sun is hot (a fact) because it is a solid thermo-nuclear ball (a lie since the sun is hollow like a tennis ball and the reason why stars eventually collapse).
Emotional and Sensory knowledge memories can be factual (positive +) or lies (negative –) or both (+, –):
Emotional memory (+, –): “An anger, fear, joy or sorrow memory that produces an emotional reaction that is based on facts or lies”—fact (+) example, we should avoid venomous snakes because they are deadly—lie (–) example, we should avoid all snakes because they are deadly.
Sensory memory (+, –): “a memory that can be a fact or a lie”—fact (+) example, where there’s fire there’s smoke—lie (–) example, where there’s smoke there’s fire.
The left brain relator style stores people-oriented details such as a person’s: name, occupation, age, physical attributes, family members and their names, accomplishments, etc., along with our positive (loving) and negative (sad) experiential memories involving. The left brain analyzer style stores detailed task-oriented (thing) memories that include the location, date and time, people involved, decisions made/avoided, danger or risk pain or loss involved, etc., along with experiential memories of our successes and failures.
The R-brain director and socializer style memories contain knowledge in the form of interactively linked experiential memories, unlike the individual memories involved in L-brain detail-thinking. R-brain people use their interactive thinking to make immediate decisions. Socializer memories differentiate between positive and negative connections and how to deal with them. Director memories differentiate between possible solutions with one seemingly the most appropriate one to act on—those memories are based on facts and productive choices or on fiction and flawed, hasty decisions. Conversely, L-brain people prefer to defer any decision until enough factual knowledge memories are obtained, which seems like forever to R-brain directors and socializers.
Bottom line on Knowledge: Knowledge is the sum total of all of our memories, which are based on either truth (+ facts) or fiction (– lies) or a combination of facts and lies. We use this factual and flawed knowledge to make intelligence decisions on how to best survive.
What is INTELLIGENCE?
Intelligence is defined as: “the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge” to better survive. We acquire that knowledge from experiences that we store as experiential memories. We apply that knowledge using a style’s knowledge memories and its wired-in programming (attributes) to make decisions on how to react (or not). The knowledge memories we store, whether true or false, is used intelligently as long as it helps us to survive; even if that survival intelligence makes us lead a negative, self-serving existence instead of a positive others-serving existence.
Emotional Intelligence: is the use of emotional experiential memories to automatically react to physically survive and then regain rational control of our PFC to make decisions about how to appropriately react. We are inappropriate when we rationalize about why we had a right to that emotional outburst and we are appropriate when we quell the emotion and use factual memories to react.
Rational Intelligence: gives us the choice to either appropriately or inappropriately react . We appropriately react when we use the most appropriate style and its positive (+) knowledge memories. We inappropriately react when we use the wrong rational style and/or its negative (–) knowledge memories. Directors and analyzers inappropriately react when the try to get things done instead of just listened to others concerns. Socializers and relators inappropriately react when they socialize instead of getting a task done that they are responsible for. Appropriateness has nothing to do with morality, which is black or white, good or bad, right or wrong type thinking based on judgmental opinions. We exhibit positive rational intelligence (+) when our decisions are others-serving and based on factual knowledge. We exhibit negative rational intelligence (–) when our decisions are self-serving, especially when they are based on lies. And yes, we can survive quite well employing negative, self-serving intelligence if we don’t care how much it harms others.
We can be very Intelligent, but not very Knowledgeable nor Wise:
Our knowledge-intelligence-wisdom symbiosis can make us quite intelligent even though our knowledge doesn’t have many factual experiential memories. For example, POTUS-45 has been called an idiot, a moron, etc., by knowledgeable, successful appointees who walked out on him in disgust. He has also been called very intelligent by those who know and support him. The fact is that he is intelligent because he uses the knowledge he has and to survive very well. Unfortunately, his knowledge is riddled with lies and the false opinions of others, which doesn’t seem to matter much to him as long as he survives. This is because he is a strong R-brain, weak L-brain person who doesn’t read much and only listens to and stores knowledge memories of other’s opinions that fit his needs, learning nothing new. He is usually stressed out, making him only use his strong director style, which forces him to think: “only my needs matter”, “only my opinions matter” and “only my decisions matter”. He has very little wisdom since his knowledge and intelligence is based on lies and false opinions. He does though, use that false knowledge intelligently and seems to survive well.
We can be Knowledgeable and even Wise, but not very Intelligent:
For example, I have an acquaintance that is the most knowledgeable, factual person I have ever met. He is a college professor of philosophy with numerous Doctorate and Master’s Degrees. He has read nearly 10,000 books on a myriad of social and scientific subjects and seems to retain their truth. His problem is that he is an extremely strong L-brain analyzer and extremely weak R-brain socializer and director, giving him many detailed knowledge memories but few interactive knowledge memories. This lack of R-brain interactive memories lowers his ability to be decisive and derive something new from his vast knowledge. For example, he can echo the knowledge of many scholars on a subject, but finds it difficult to interrelate their knowledge and draw new conclusions (his decisions). He is wise since his knowledge is true, right and lasting and appropriately applied to his survival.
Bottom line on Intelligence: Intelligence is the use of knowledge to make decisions on how to best survive. This survival intelligence can be positive (+), based on facts that help others or it can be negative (–) based on lies that harm others.
What is WISDOM?
Wisdom lies in our factual experiential memories, “which are true, right and lasting while having the good sense to employ them”—but being wise on a few subjects does not make us “universally wise”, just wise on that subject. We all have anything from a low to a high degree of wisdom on any subject that we store memories about. The more factual memories we have on a subject the wiser we are on that subject and the more fallacious memories we have the less wise we are on that subject. Thus, our objective should be to weaken our fallacious memories on a subject, leaving only the factual memories. The more factual memories we store on a subject the wiser we are on that subject—and the more subjects we have factual knowledge on the wiser we are in general.
The difficult part is delineating between facts and falsities, which we have discussed in the first six parts of this mindfulness series. Thus, speaking in terms of positive and negative knowledge and intelligence on a subject; we are positively wise when it is based on factual knowledge memories and negatively wise when it based on fallacious (lies) knowledge memories. But the definition of wise only allows for facts/truths and never lies/falsehoods. Therefore, there are no negatively wise people, only positively wise people who have many more positive knowledge memories than negative knowledge memories on many subjects.
Where the facts are rarely found: For millennia, we have obtained our facts, opinions and lies from others through their gossip, speeches, books, etc., but more recently from “social media”. Unfortunately greedy social media executives are more interested in profits based on lies than providing factual knowledge. The fact is, lies, half-truths, pseudo-truths and fallacious opinions abound in social media with few actual facts. Social media can be used for propagating facts and positiveness—unfortunately, that doesn’t increase profits so it gets squelched. Therefore, don’t look to social media to get your facts to enhance your wisdom—Wikipedia isn’t that much of a factual knowledge source either. Try reading books or articles from reputable, experienced people and watch reputable news media if you can find any. Just use your common sense; some lies and opinions are obvious, but most half-truths and pseudo-truths are not—learn to discriminate between all of them, separating the lies from the facts and then repress the lie memories and rely on the fact memories to gain wisdom on a subject.
How our Emotional Memories affect our wisdom:
Our wisdom is derived from factual rational decisions based on factual rational experiential memories. Our basic emotions/reactions of anger, fear, joy and sorrow only contain enough intelligence to momentarily physically survive and do not allow for factual rational choice. We cannot gain wisdom from our basic emotional memories unless we block those negative rational memories and stop rationalizing. Our rational emotions (all of the other emotions) are triggered by rational thought, which allows us to discriminate between fact and fiction if we want to. Thus we can gain wisdom by controlling our rational emotions and create more factual experiential memories to react with in the future.
What is your WISDOM POTENTIAL?
We all have the potential to be wise; it all depends on how arduously we work at it. We can know all of the knowable facts and be wise on just a few subjects or on many subjects. This is why universities exist to spread out our wisdom, although all levels of schooling can provide factual knowledge that increases our wisdom if we seek it. Our wisdom depends on our factual knowledge—our lies, half-truth/pseudo-truth and opinions thwart our wisdom. To be wise on any subject we must ferret out the facts through discussions (with open-minded people), reading scholarly books and articles and listening to reputable media.
Factual experiential memories are the part of our overall knowledge that enhances our wisdom, while false experiential memories are the part of our overall knowledge that stifles our wisdom. Fortunately, as shown in the first six parts of this mindfulness series, false memories can be overridden by factual memories derived by “stepping outside of ourselves” to ignore our own false knowledge, collect the factual knowledge of others and store them as new factual experiential memories—your WISDOM POTENTIAL is based on this!
Bottom line on Wisdom: Wisdom is based in our factual experiential memories, “which are true, right and lasting while having the good sense to employ them”. We cannot be wise about everything; we can only be wise on the subjects that we store sufficient factual knowledge memories about. Unlike intelligence, which is based on facts and/or lies to help us survive, wisdom is only based on factual knowledge.
Bottom line on Knowledge, Intelligence and Wisdom:
We are knowledgeable on a subject when we store factual and fallacious experiential memories about it.
We are intelligent on a subject when we employ our + & – knowledge about it to survive.
We are wise on a subject when we have many more factual knowledge memories than fallacious memories on that subject—and the more subjects we become wiser on, the wiser a person we become.
I hope that this knowledge-intelligence-wisdom symbiosis pearl has helped you to better understand what knowledge, intelligence and wisdom are and how they can help you proceed on a more truthful, more fulfilling life’s path.
