To try a possibility for clarifying this problem we take the most general model that we could have about the brain as a material device (Fig. 22) within the philosophical conception of this book. For such a model there is no need for a one-to-one correspondence between the psychological level and the underlayer of the nervous system, since the mental field can also play some role into this. To what extend a portion of the brain can control, and finally know, an other, i.e. to what extend a part of what is represented in Fig. 22 can introspect and know an other, remains to be proved. The problem of brain knowing the brain is fundamental in neurobiology. However, lets remember the results of automaton theory and of algorithms theory showing that an automaton (algorithm) can not describe and know an other, but of a lower class, and the we shall question the possibility of a human brain being able to know an other human brain. However, the human brain is not studied by an other human brain, but by a collectivity of human brains, and that changes the general conditions of the problem, leaving open our possibility of knowing the human brain. To-date we do not know how certain is the possibility of controlling the functioning of a certain part of the substance-brain by the psychological level via a mental field. And regarding the mental field we should notice that if it is supposed to be of informatter nature, then the coupling of the latter with the brain should be done at the level at which the informatter, as a profound matter, can be easily accessible, i.e. starting with the quantic level towards more profound states. Hence the connection with informatter should be searched from the molecular level of the structures constituting the brain.

Fig. 22

Certain experimental data could come towardsthe aforementioned ideas. Thus H. H. Kornbuter⁸³ observes that the conscious will triggers a negative potential in the upper part of the brain, on both sides, about 0.8 sec. before a massive brain activity is developed. The interaction between consciousness and brain seems to require a certain time until the cortex is electrically ready for its action, e.g. for obtaining a voluntary action. The experiment does not exclude the possibility of this voluntary initial electric discharge taking place in a limited area of the brain, i.e. retaining to a restricted zone the connection between psychologic and physiologic.
The mathematical study of EEG waves performed by factorial analysis on electronic computers, showed new aspectsregarding brain behavior. Gray Walter et al.⁸⁴ observed certain variations of the EEG waves under an intellectual stimulus, when an information or an action is anticipated by the brain. This variation, called CNV (contingent negative variation) or anticipation waves, were extracted from the noise of neural activity byspecial algorithms. These waves reflect a preparation ofthe brain for coming tasks. E. Roy John et al.⁸⁵, also mathematically processed the EEG waves and showed certain shapes reflecting the brain behavior under a stimulus and interpreted the meaning of it.

Other techniques consist of following neuronic trajectories by implantation of microelectrodes or other techniques. James Old from California Institute of Technology⁸⁶ examined the response of a mouse brain to a sound signal via a number of microelectrodes. A new signal diffuses in the whole brain. In 1-2 milisec. the signal goes from one neuron to the other, in about 100-200 milisec. the mouse reacts. The phenomenon of signal diffusion is describedby James Old as follows⁸⁷: at the initial moment No. 1 there is something at the receptor; at moment No. 2, one millisecond later, there is something larger; at moment No. 3, even larger. At moments No.4, 5 and 6, it covers almost the whole brain. Even if not all the neurons are implied, fragments of the signal can be found almost everywhere. Then it starts converging towards an effector and it ceases to exist.
When the signal is repeated, i.e. the brain is subject to a learning process, the brain signals are channelled with priority onto certain paths, although they continue to be diffused in the whole brain. Learning modifies the way in which signals are channelled into the brain. The presence of electric impulses into the brain produces a "combinatorial explosion" thus making difficult the exact comparison of the brain with an electronic computer; or such a computer representing the brain should be understood and modelled differently than the present day computers. The brain has a high flexibility, certain functions can be taken over by new regions if the typical regions are damaged. However, one should not understand that the combinatorial explosion would negate or destroy the information-machine patterns. On the contrary, these are carried by the combinatorial explosion into the whole brain, thus making even more difficult the understanding of how this device works. The brain works in a more complex manner than the computer and according to Jack D. Cowan⁸⁸ (Biophysics Professor at Chicago University), the difference is so great that the methods used in the study of computers and of artificial intelligence are insufficient for understanding the brain-machine. To understand the brain one needs new avenues of attack, new concepts, new mathematicalmodels. In his opinion⁸⁹ one can determine how a dozen or a hundred neurons interact, but it is a large jump from here to tens of thousands, or millions, or billions. For him, the only mode known to make this jump is through mathematics.

Cowan wants to use the mathematical modelling to understand the integrative activity of the brain, especially by determining the configurations specified in the neuronic networks.
Other new techniques for the physical study of the brain were developed lately. Louis E. Sokoloff from the US National Institute of Mental Health⁹⁰ uses a chemical substance (2-deoxiglucose) that passes from the bloodstream to feed especially the activated neurons. This technique developed in 1975 bears the name of Sokoloff. Containing radioactive carbon, this substance allows to trace the trajectories of the activated neurons.

Biology and Psychology in Relation with Awareness 65