Kathryn: …I agree that typing is learned through experience, most of us took some sort of typing/computer class in school.
I'm not convinced that we learn that our hearts need to beat though. Perhaps breathing… because we don't begin to breathe until after we are born. But isn't the heart the first thing to develop? And if it is, and the heart develops before the brain, then how can we register the knowledge from our experience that the heart needs to beat? We have this experience before the brain even exists to KNOW such a fact.
Garr: But our mothers teach us how our hearts beat...via the umbilical cord.
Kathryn: That's not what I meant. I meant more along the lines of how can we LEARN if we do not yet have a BRAIN in which to analyze our experiences and learn the lesson.
Or are you saying that we magically learn from an experience which is not our own?
Garr: I'm saying that the heart starts beating because the umbilical cord sends blood to the fetus. Just like CPR pumps blood through the heart like a jump-start, the mother sends pulses to the fetus via the umbilical cord to essentially bring life into it. This is a learning experience whether or not you like to think of it as one. To make reference to your point about not learning without a brain: why would one need a brain while inside the mother?...The mother is the brains of the operation while she carries the child; once outside of the womb, the baby must fend for itself. The miracle of life is all too beautiful!
Kathryn: I still don't agree with you, but for the purpose of this discussion, I'll let it go.
Chris: After following this discussion I don't agree with you either. I have heard the other side of the argument and believe that it is correct, but it raises other issues that we would rather not discuss here, ethical dilemmas.
Garr: Neither of you believe in an umbilical cord?
Medical journals will tell you that the cord develops in the embryonic stage of life, before the fetus. Medical journals will also tell you that the umbilical cord has one vein and two arteries; the vein carries oxygenated blood from the mother to the child, and the two arteries carry deoxygenated blood from the fetus back to the mother. Thus, the point regarding the brain's construction coming after the construction of the heart is a nil point because it is the mother who regulates her child's blood all along.
Chris: It is shown true that our hearts develop before our brains. Thus how can it be experience that we learn of the beat of our hearts? The heart is beating when the brain develops, so how can we learn the beating of the heart through experience? Can we? Maybe after the brain develops it could be experience...but then what causes the heart to beat before experience comes into the picture?
Kathryn: I do not believe the umbilical cord is the issue here...
True, the mother regulates her child's blood flow. The mother. Not the child. So how is this equivalent to the child learning a lesson about how to make his heart beat? It's not. The mother's body has the experience of a beating heart. The mother's body controls this for her child. The child, when he develops a mind and can become aware of his beating heart, an awareness which is necessary in order to call this "experience", his heart is already beating.
Garr: Are you saying that since the baby is not conscious of his heart beating, he does not experience it? If this is the case, I will accept your definition of "experience".
Chris: I am seeing that the point is that because the baby doesn't have a brain how can he learn that his heart beats and how it beats through experience? He learns of its existence and how it beats after it has developed basic brain functions after developing a brain. So to start it is not experience.
Garr: You say the heart beating is not an experience...interesting...
Kathryn: It is an experience, but the baby does not have a brain. HE is not the one directly gaining the experience, he is not thinking, even subconsciously, "oh, it would be good if my heart beats," he is only benefiting from the experience, through a lovely set of circumstances known as the miracle of life.
Garr: So we do learn to beat our hearts before our brains develop?
Kathryn: Our hearts are beating before our brains develop, yes. I've said that before.
Garr: Well then can we justly say that human perseverance of existence is due to a string of experiences given from mother to child, from mother to child, ad infinitum? Life is rhythmic? Do all the hearts of the earth beat to some sort of samba? Tango? Jazz? Rock and Roll? Or is the beat incomprehensible?
