When our bodies are not plastic or responsive or expressive in relation to
our thoughts and feelings, the conversation between inner and outer
becomes stilted or non-existent. Learning to carry on this conversation
fluently is essential not only for art, but also for science. If we
cannot make our own bodies the image and outer revelation of our thoughts,
and if we cannot discover in thought the inner, expressive content of our
outer, bodily gestures, then how can we expect the gestures of external
nature to light up within us as understanding? Our bodies, after all, are
surely that part of the physical world with which we are most intimate!
What is the relation between the neural activity of our brains and the
thoughts and feelings we experience in consciousness? There are two
separate questions, often confused: is neural activity necessary
for our normal conscious experience? and is neural activity
sufficient for that experience? Elsas finds evidence for the
necessity, but not the sufficiency.
