Don't Believe the Pilot.

In the South Korean F1 race today the BBC coverage had David Coultard reporting from the Maclaren factory ‘Mission Control’ here in the UK as well as Martin Brundle on the grid at the track. Martin, keen to keep viewers abreast of the very latest developments, relayed as it unfolded that there would be a ten minute delay. David in the UK said, “we knew that two minutes ago”, which was strange seeing as Martin was present in real life and David was half way round the world on a satellite link; a perfect illustration of a recent finding that somewhere unbeknown to you your brain makes decisions around a second before ‘you’ make them. In fact some things are being put into place up to seven seconds before you’re consciously aware of them. So like Martin your conscious awareness is the last to know what’s actually going on. Of course it is you making the decisions but not the part of you you’re conscious of. Ever burnt yourself? Isn’t your finger out of there before you’ve even thought about it? The evolutionary parts of your brain governing your body and your emotions do all the preliminary work before the results get passed on to your conscious frontal cortex. And when, a bit later, the frontal cortex gets the messages it makes the best sense it can of them. Having played little part in forming them it rationalises them after the event. Talk about the cart before the horse. Yes ‘you’ are just a post justification of yourself. But then we all to some extent perceive people who’re drowning in after-the-event rationalisations. They actually believe their conscious mind is the pilot, unaware it’s the cabin staff in control of the aircraft. This creates a tricky situation. The pilot does after all have all the knobs and dials, the stick and the vital view out of the front window, where as the crew are in the galley stuffing a microwave with breakfasts. This seems absurd. But wait. Consider a three-week flight to the moon. What use would perfect navigation and a finely executed landing be if the passengers had all already died of hunger? Or rioted because their supply of duty free spirit was unavailable? So on a trip of three score years and ten there’s a lot more to be aware of than to think about. Leave it to the pilot and he’ll get you there but without spirit and sustenance and a big smile from the stewardess it’s likely to be a fruitless journey.