The Mind
That neither our thoughts, nor passions, nor ideas formed by the imagination, exist without the mind, is what everybody will allow. ~ Irish philosopher George Berkeley
The mind is an intangible organ for perception and other symbolic processing. The mind’s functioning may be materially grounded in whatever biological system processes sensory input into ecological comprehension. For humans, the physiological system for intelligence is the brain and associated nervous system.
Physical concepts are free creations of the mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world. ~ Albert Einstein
Mentation is inherent in every life form, from viruses and cells on up. Every organism has a mind, even if it lacks an identifiable organ analogous to the brain.
As to the connection between mind and vital force, mind is the language of the vital force. This vital force and the consciousness appear simultaneously and always exist together. When there is no vital force, there is also no mind. ~ Nisargadatta Maharaj
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Mind and consciousness are not things but processes. ~ Austrian American physicist and system theorist Fritjof Capra & Italian chemist Pier Luigi Luisi
The mind has 2 functional realms. The useful part is willmind: mentation under volition, for problem-solving. The other – nattermind – is a not only a nuisance, it is the generator of pignorance.
The human condition: lost in thought. ~ German guru Eckhart Tolle
Nattermind is the woodpecker on the lumber of mentation: the voice of distraction, doubt, and distress; a deceiver by its nagging worries and schemes. The mind demands a sense of security, or it works itself into a frenzy of worry to resolve its fear. More mundanely, nattermind craves stimulation. It loves to be tickled by puzzles of every province. Nattermind insists upon needless worry about events which are not transpiring, upon which it spins countless scenarios to resolve.
The priceless galaxy of misinformation called the mind. ~ American writer and artist Djuna Barnes