Dark Matter

What in the world goes on inside our heads?  Oh sure, there’s the stuff we control.  We can add two plus three and reliably reach five.  We can find our way home again after we’ve been to the store, although finding where we parked our car isn’t always so reliable.

But I mean the seemingly random thoughts that arise, almost like dreaming while awake. A minute ago, I was in the kitchen, and I began singing “Inka Dinka Doo”, phrasing it the way I remember Jimmy Durante did.  Okay, remembering Durante’s performance, in connection with this song is easy to fathom.  But why on earth did I begin singing it? I would guess that I have not heard the song in years and years. I don’t recall having anything cross my consciousness lately having anything to do with that song, with Durante, with big noses.  What neurons firing brought this memory forward into consciousness?

 

 

 

Perhaps our minds are like the universe.  Much of the universe is now thought to consist of dark matter. Matter that we cannot perceive, but merely infer.  Perhaps our minds are conscious in just a small way, and most of it is unconscious.  Entirely outside of our control, outside, perhaps, even of our understanding.

Inka, dinka, doo.