The Operating System of The Brain

The Operating System of The Brain (Buddhi)

Veera Raghavaiah Kancharla

Abstract

Animals with brains evolved to have thirst for information to actively interact with the information abundant nature for survival. Pleasure is the state of the brain when knowing new or decayed (forgotten) information. The state of being thirsty due to analytical thinking or lack of information availability is sadness. Physical pain and some strong interrupting senses also distract the brain from knowing any information and thus cause sadness. Animal brains obtain baseline pleasure in the form of general bliss (happiness) in the absence of interruptions and distractions. Animals evolved to have happiness so that they do not hook on less dense information, which is abundant in the vicinity of the animals. Additionally, happiness is not as rich in information density as many information elements coming through the sense organs. This makes animals interact with nature actively for information-rich sources and thus increases the chances of survival.

 

Keywords: Pleasure, Sadness, Information, Memorization, Emotions, Happiness, Pain, Meditation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Operating System of The Brain (Buddhi)

There are several studies on the brain mechanisms of pleasure and sadness (mental pain) in animals with brains including humans. However, none of these studies can satisfactorily and unrefutably explain the logical mechanisms of desire, pleasure and sadness (mental pain) in the brain. For example, the existing literature cannot explain the exact brain mechanism behind pleasure from a joke, pleasure from winning a challenge, pleasure from music, etc. The existing literature predominantly explains the evolutionary reasons behind pleasure or sadness in all different scenarios in the lives of animals including humans.

There has been research work to map the regions of the brain that get excited or behave differently from the rest of the brain regions during pleasure; as observed via different functional imaging technologies such as positron emission tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) during pleasure and by using artificial stimulants such as electrical and chemical stimulants. These regions are referred to as reward centers and are part of the limbic system of the brain. Moreover, reward centers are common and get excited similarly for all types of pleasures such as music, food, sex, winning challenges, etc. (Berridge and Kringelbach 2015; Blood and Zatorre 2001; Spanagel and Weiss 1999). Dopamine has been found to be an important agent in the process of desire, pleasure and learning. The mechanism by which the reward centers identify the reward worthiness of the data or information reaching the brain has never been explained. For example, the brain is known to enjoy music. It is not explained why the reward centers do not like the sounds that are not music, such as ambient sounds; and why a certain piece of music is liked more than other music by a typical person. Although dopamine is active during desire, pleasure and learning; it is regulated by reward centers and is a result of reward center activation and not a primary cause of pleasure.

This paper proposes, elucidates and strongly validates a new conceptual theoretical framework (theorizes nonempirically) on the exact mechanism of pleasure (joy) and sadness (mental pain) with abundant illustrations. This paper clarifies that the mechanism of obtaining pleasure is the same (unifies) from all kinds of pleasure sources. All the illustration scenarios are universally well-known common life experiences, additionally backed by the existing scholarly literature on psychology and neuroscience in some cases. The easily interpretable mechanism of pleasure based on common life experiences could not be decoded so far, because any person cannot observe and analyze (think) a pleasure and have a pleasure simultaneously. Decoding the mechanism of pleasure for the first time required almost thinking while having the pleasure. This paper also includes a detailed comparison and review of the relevant existing literature.

The main points of the concept/theory are as follows. Animals with brains have thirst for information (information is what the brain can interpret and memorize from the data reaching the brain). Pleasure is the state of the brain when knowing new or decayed (forgotten) information (This is a completely new understanding, unlike the old misunderstanding that pleasure and memorization are different processes). Pleasure is quenching the memorization thirst or pleasure is memorization (It is not a metaphor that pleasure is memorization. This paper indeed validates that pleasure and memorization are the same, which we thought of as different things so far). The data from pleasure sources such as a music reaching the brain itself does not create pleasure. Only the new or decayed information from the pleasure sources gives pleasure. Reward worthiness is determined by the information quantity and density. The information that causes emotions is stored as either short-term memory or long-term explicit memory. Animals know about the information availability in the environment from the meta-information (which is also information but is usually less dense (low Shannon entropy) and thus less enjoyable). Example of a meta-information element: “Sweets in a shop at XYZ location taste good. We already know that new information is found in different places. The link information of one of the different known paths to a shop with tasty sweets is given here.). The taste of the sweet is the information that gives pleasure and is referred by the meta-information. The state of being thirsty (not knowing information) due to analytical thinking or lack of information availability is sadness (mental pain). Sadness (opposite of happiness) and mental pain (opposite of pleasure) are the same since both represent the same state of the brain (not knowing information). Therefore, these names are used synonymously in this paper. Physical pain and some strong interrupting senses (such as a very strong smell of a fish or a strong bitter taste) also distract the brain from knowing any information and thus cause sadness. There are already some evidences indicating that the brain centers that become active during sadness because of physical pain or mental pain are the same. In other words, the brain processes sadness because of a physical pain or other reasons similarly (DeWall et al. 2010; Eisenberger, Lieberman, and Williams 2003; Eisenberger 2008; Kross et al. 2011).

The process in the brain driving the living in the animals with brains primarily through the desire for pleasures/information can be called the operating system of the brain. In summary, the operating system of the brain (called buddhi in all major languages of India, including Sanskrit) operates to gather information. The processes in the consciousness are already well segregated as two main components called manas (mind) and buddhi and are used in all major languages in India. The definitions section and other sections clarify this segregation in more detail.

This paper predominantly focuses and theorizes on the mechanism of obtaining pleasure or sadness (mental pain) at the atomic level (at the level of primary constituents of emotions). For example, although people do not like to memorize phone numbers, they typically memorize a few important phone numbers due to the other benefits from memorizing those important phone numbers. This paper explains separately and at the atomic level, ‘why people do not like to memorize phone numbers’ and the different ‘pleasures obtained by interacting with society’. This paper only briefly describes how the brain evaluates and prioritizes activities based on the eventually (combined) expected total pleasure. This paper thus contributes predominantly in understanding the very core mechanisms of pleasure or sadness (mental pain). For another example, this paper explains the mechanism behind the desire to eat a sweet and the pleasure from eating a new sweet. This paper explains the mechanism of how a bad experience causes sadness. A person may not be much interested in an intrinsically tasty sweet due to a bad experience (such as a severe stomach upset) with that specific sweet in the past. This happens since the person gets the combined effect of ‘the desire to enjoy that sweet’ and ‘the recollection of the memory of the bad experience with that sweet in the past’. An intense bad experience with that specific sweet in the past may influence the present desire to enjoy that sweet. This and other integrative effects are already known and explored by the available theories of emotions and psychodynamic and psychoanalytic literature. Therefore, no new noteworthy contribution is made in this area through this paper. This paper refers to these concepts only to the extent necessary. This paper focuses on the origin of the very core affects of emotions – pleasure and sadness. Comparison or correlation with many old and recent non-relevant theories and hypotheses (like the theory of constructed emotion- Barrett, 2017; predictive processing -Friston, 2010; etc.) is unnecessary due to exclusive focus and findings of this theory/concept. This theory intersects little or very little with most of the previous theories and hypotheses of neuroscience, psychology and philosophy in this area.

The flow of the discussion/content in this paper is given in the index below.

Index:

Definitions

Considerations (available knowledge of the brain)

Illustrations (framework development/validation from common knowledge and literature)

General bliss (happiness) and meditational bliss (conceptual framework subpart)

The Operating System of The Brain (Buddhi) (conceptual framework)

Review of literature (comparative analysis/implications)

Future research directions

Factors affecting information gathering by an animal

Basic organization of processing in the brain

Conclusions

References

 

Definitions

The important terms used in this paper are understood/interpreted as defined below.

Sense: Information directly received by the brain through sense organs.

E.g.: Taste of a fruit sensed through the tongue, sound from drums sensed through the ears, etc.

State: The state of an animal with respect to its environment, by way of its abilities or actions.

E.g.: Being the leader of a group, being achiever of a medal, climbing a tree as a challenge, playing a video game, having economic status, having social status, etc.

Some state information requires crossing challenges and some state information does not require crossing challenges. State is not understood or is not so well understood by animal brains as by human brains because of differences in analytical abilities, memories and other reasons.

The Operating System of The Brain: The primary control system (process) in the brain. This is the desire for pleasures/happiness (information), which is the driving force of living in animals with brains. This is known as Buddhi in Sanskrit and the majority of the other Indian languages. Mind (manas in Sanskrit and the majority of the other Indian languages) is a supporting system under the control of the Buddhi. Buddhi and Mind are different functionalities in the processing (processes in the consciousness) system of the brain.

Information element: Distinct information from a source or ‘an information’.

E.g.: taste of a sweet, music, crossing a sublevel in a video game, etc.

 

Considerations (Available Knowledge of The Brain)

1.     The brain receives or considers two kinds of information from nature. One is non-associative information such as taste, sound, smell, image, etc., and the other is information of association(link) such as the fruit is linked to a tree, light is linked to the Sun, students are linked to roll numbers, etc.. The information of association is referred to as link in the remainder of this article. Non-associative information and links are considered by the brain together most of the time.

2.     The information in the long-term explicit memory of the brain naturally decays slowly. The information in short-term memory decays very quickly.

3.     The interpretation by the brain from the data it receives from the environment is known as information. All the information considered (observed) by the brain is stored in the memory (short-term and then long-term explicit memory depending on the repetitions of learning). Similarly, all the information in the memory is perceived as known.

4.     The brain takes time to know/store/learn information. It cannot know all the available information instantly. For example, the taste of a fruit is known completely only after it is eaten for some duration. Complete taste information (the perception of a food is usually a combination of many tastes, flavors, texture, chemical sensations, etc.) of a fruit cannot be perceived in the first bite.

5.     Compared with storing the majority of the information, complete storage/memorization of any information element takes much more time. For example, the roll number of a student (associating a known number to a student) can be memorized decently in just a couple of repetitions of learning. However, perfect memorization of the roll number of the student requires several repetitions of learning until the memory is formed firmly (memory solidification).

6.     The brain has a limit to the amount of information it can process at a time due to the size limit of sensory and temporary memories. For example, a two-digit number can be memorized in a single go. Memorizing a mobile phone number requires dividing the mobile phone number into multiple small parts and then arranging/linking the parts one after the other over the time sequence. All of the mobile number can not be conscious in the brain at once.

7.     The brain can imagine a nonexistent state information (such as imagining being a top political leader in the future) or interpret state information by observing others (such as feeling and enjoying a victory of others). Sense information such as an unknown taste information or the taste of a food eaten by others cannot be imagined or interpreted.

8.     Repeated learning (storage) or repeated recall of the same information (memory) solidifies the memory (information).

9.     Animals other than human beings do not have analytical ability and the ability to imagine as much as possessed by human beings.

10.  All the positive emotions an animal gets have pleasure at the core and all the negative emotions an animal gets have Sadness at the core. Worry, cry, feel of physical pain, etc., have different levels of sadness. Happiness, enjoying humor, enjoying the taste of a food, listening to liked music, having a meditational sense, etc., have pleasure in different levels. There is already sufficient evidence that the activated hedonic brain circuitry during all pleasant feelings is common (Berridge and Kringelbach 2015). Hatred, selfishness, jealousy, etc., are not primary emotions and are not directly associated with pleasure or sadness; however, these are understandings or feelings in the process of getting pleasure or getting rid of sadness.

11.  Differences in the level of emotions between animals (including humans) for the same received information are due to the differences in the physiologies, genes, environmental influences, etc., of the animals. For example, Person A and Person B both find mangoes tasty, but Person A feels mangoes as the tastiest fruits, whereas Person B feels mangoes as tasty but not the tastiest. The brain of person A could be losing the specific taste information of mangoes faster (memory decay) than that of person B after eating them and therefore could be finding them as very tasty every time owing to the vacuum of taste information of mangoes. The same person A might have a slower memory decay to the tastes of other fruits.

12.  Animals and people have general bliss (happiness). The bliss is noticeable when a person is mentally relaxed or peaceful. Severe analytical thinking or physical pain or strong interrupting senses (such as a loud sound, strong smell of fish, extremely bitter food) deprive the brain of the general bliss (happiness).

13.  Happiness is not as pleasurable as many other pleasures are. For example, if a person is offered to choose between ‘just staying relaxed’ and ‘eat a new tasty food’, that person would definitely choose to eat the new tasty food.

14.  The brain does not enjoy physical pain and some strong interrupting senses. A person may enjoy a slightly bitter taste in a food. An extremely bitter food is not enjoyable, and at the same time, extreme bitterness prevents the brain from thinking about anything else. Similarly, the strong smell of a fish is not enjoyable and it also prevents the brain from thinking about anything else.

15.  We know that brain opioid network activation is correlated with pleasure (Jern et al. 2023; Putkinen et al. 2025).

16.  At least some memory should be forming during pleasure, since the brain receives at least some information for memorization while indulging in pleasure (at least information not related to pleasure). Modern research provides evidence that high opioid network activation significantly increases neuronal activity in specific memory-related regions. Opioid drugs consumption is observed to cause memory formation. It is so far thought or assumed to be pathological or addiction memory. However, there is no clear evidence to prove that the memory formed during opioid drug consumption is indeed or only pathological (Borjkhani, Bahrami, and Janahmadi 2018; Zhang et al. 2016). This memorization may be interpreted as directly related to pleasure itself. Therefore, memory formation in general could be positively correlated with pleasure.

                           

Illustrations (Framework Development/Validation from Common Knowledge and Literature)

This section unambiguously deducts and validates the arguments of this paper including the main argument that pleasure is memorization or that pleasure is quenching the memorization thirst. The illustrations validate the arguments by explaining that every pleasure situation involves memorization or only memorization, that pleasure is proportional to memorization (Shannon entropy) and that every sad situation involves less memorization.

1.     Listening to music:

Music has a different sound pattern (of different frequencies, amplitudes, their sequential arrangement and repetition) from that of the general sounds reaching the ear from ambience. The sound pattern information of general sounds from ambience is well known to the brain. However, the music pattern information is new to it (high Shannon entropy). People like to listen to music until they know (memorize) most of it. The only known key process occurring in the brain while listening to music and feeling pleasure is memorization. It is obvious in this context that pleasure is knowing information (memorization) and therefore the desire is memorization (information) thirst. The happiness from the mental relaxation caused by melodious music or the context of the music can be other reasons for pleasure.

There are some evidences suggesting that pleasure may be positively correlated with memorization and vice versa as detailed in the point 16 of the considerations section above (Borjkhani, Bahrami, and Janahmadi 2018; Zhang et al. 2016), reinforcing the deduction above.

2.     Listening to the sounds of birds:

The sounds of some birds have a rare timbre. Therefore, people like to listen to those sounds to know the timbre information of those sounds. When listening to the rare sound of a bird for the first time, the brain understands that there is a lot of new information (high Shannon entropy) in the sound (obviously we know the meta-information that the sound has a lot of new information or novelty), but can memorize/recall only some information of the sound after the first listening (learning). The brain tries to keep listening to the sound of the bird until knowing majority of the sound information of the bird (until knowing the meta-information that there is not much additional information being memorized with each additional listening). These are the obvious logical and conscious steps that happen in the process of memorizing anything, which help us in consciously knowing if we know something partially or completely at each stage. Wholistically, the only known key process occurring in the brain while listening to a new sound of a bird and feeling pleasure is memorization.

3.     Eagerness to disobey:

Suppose that a mother of a child draws a line on the floor and asks her child to not cross the line and warns of a minor punishment if the line is crossed. Disobeying usually involves some risk of punishment. Therefore, disobeying is challenging. This challenge makes the child feel uncertain if he/she is capable of crossing the line. Thus, this new restriction gives scope to a new (currently unavailable or not very sure) state information – “I am capable of crossing the line". The only considerable thing that the child gets if he/she crosses the line is this state information. Thus, it is clear that pleasure in this context is knowing state information. Therefore, the child shows eagerness to cross the line to ensure that he/she is capable of crossing the line. The meta-information that the child has before crossing the line is “Being capable of crossing the line state information is available, but it is not yet associated with self to makeup the new information that I am capable of crossing the line”. Suppose that the mother only draws a line and puts no restriction. In this case, the child is as free to be on the other side of the line as he/she is on the current side. Thus, there is no new state information available due to no challenging restrictions. The only thing that a brain gets by crossing a challenge is the memorization of a new state information (associating a new state to self). Clearly, the only new perceivable things created by challenges are state(s) information.

4.     Playing a video game:

Suppose that a boy received a new video game as a birthday gift. When he opens it for the first time, he tries to obtain the state information: “I crossed (capable of crossing) several sub/minute challenges in the first level and also I won (capable of winning) the first level in the video game”. Typically, a single level of a video game has several sub/minute challenges to cross and thus gives a new state information element on crossing each of those sub/minute challenges. This makes each level of a video game a potential contributor of a lot of new state information (for example, a single level of a Temple-run game has several sub challenges such as taking sharp turns and jumping over hurdles before finishing the level successfully). For winning in the first level, he does some effort. If he crosses the first level after some effort, then he wants to obtain the state information from the second level. Similarly, he tries to obtain state information from all the succeeding levels or he gets some other more prioritized work. The boy does not necessarily remember all of the state information from the video game in the long term. He may forget the sub challenges crossed in each level of the video game as soon as a level in the game is finished or even before a level in the game is finished. This illustration clarifies that pleasure comes only from loading information and does not require long-term memorization. The music and images in a video game can be additional contributors to new information.

5.     Participating in a local running race:

Suppose that there is a running race being conducted in a recreation club for 100 participants, where one participant A has a prior rough estimate (and expectation) of his potential position as 50 based on the available knowledge of his own fitness level and the general fitness level of other participants. Therefore, participant A has associated (memorized/knew) position 50 to himself in the race, even before the actual race event. Suppose that there are no additional pleasure influencers such as prizes or additional benefits to the winners. All the participants of the running race run at their respective full potential in the event, therefore running is equally challenging to all the participants.  If the participant A actually gets the position 50 in the event, then A neither gets thrill nor get sad at the result as the outcome is as predicted (This is an example of a well known general experience in competitions when the outcome is as estimated in advance). This scenario validates that there is no pleasure when there is no new information to memorize. If the participant gets position 49, he gets a little thrill since he now associates position 49 to himself. If the participant A gets position 10 (assuming that his prior estimation was not close to reality), then he obviously (common and obvious observation) gets great pleasure  from the event. Why does A get more pleasure on getting position 10 than getting position 49?  Getting position 10 involves more new memorization than getting position 49. A associates positions 10, 11, 12…49 to himself on getting position 10 (logically lower positions are within the scope of the position 10 and the participant is conscious that he crossed the lower positions). Thus, it is validated that great pleasures come from great amounts of memorization. Also it is validated that the same level of challenge can cause different levels of pleasure based on the outcomes, which means that pleasures need not be proportional to challenges.

                                                                                                   {The rank/position numbers (such as 1,2,3…10) are only used/memorized for easy reference to the actual rank. The existence of a rank or position in a race or competition is independent of notations such as numbers or alphabets, etc. For example, in a three-person competition of persons A, B and C; we can express that A wins in a position ahead of B and C without using any number or alphabet to refer to his/her position.}

                                                                                                   {There is possibility of doubt that why a participant cannot imagine himself to be having whatever rank he wants instead of practically trying for it. This does not happen because every possible state information element is logically already available/known in the imaginary world of a person; which means that, in the imaginary world, already person holds whatever rank he wants. Therefore, only practical information is not memorized in the brain, so a participant tries to obtain practical information}

6.     Participating in a contest with some confidence in winning:

Suppose that a person X attends a weightlifting challenge in a recreation club to lift a weight of 30 kg with a single hand, without prior experience of attempting to lift 30 kg with a single hand. Before trying to lift the weight, suppose that person X has some confidence (expectation) that he can lift the weight with a single hand (This scenario is an example of common experiences involving uncertainty). If a person thinks about such event about 20 times in a day, he would associate win to self about 10 times and loss (no association of win) about 10 times in an uncertain situation; whereas in a very highly confident or sure situation, the same person would associate win to self all the 20 times. We know that each association solidifies a memory and a time gap causes fading away or decay of a memory. Obviously, something loaded into the brain (or recalled) 20 times per day stays in the memory stronger and longer than something loaded 10 times per day. Here, we can clearly understand the differences in memorization (linking a state or status to self) levels based on the confidence level. Here, person X knows in advance that he is likely to be able to lift the weight, which means that he loaded some of the information (partial memorization) of the state of being able to lift the weight, even before trying to lift the weight. People usually have some level of prior confidence/expectation in all types of challenges. Confidence depends on prior experiences and knowledge of the circumstances of a challenge. Only an actual lifting of the weight provides actual situation data at the time of lifting to form a strong memory of having lifted the weight. Therefore, if the person actually lifts the weight in the contest, he loads the full information (The knowing gap or memory gap between knowing something with uncertainty and knowing something for sure) of the state of being able to lift the weight and thus gets pleasure from memorization (every time he thinks about the event after actually winning, he associates only a win to himself because of the situational evidence from the event).

7.     Losing a contest:

Suppose that a person attends a weightlifting challenge in a recreation club to lift a weight of 30 kg with a single hand. Before trying to lift the weight, suppose that the person has some confidence (expectation) that he can lift the weight with a single hand. This means that he loaded some of the information of the state of being able to lift the weight, even before trying to lift the weight. Suppose that the person is actually not able to lift the weight with a single hand when he tries to lift the weight and loses the contest (loss and failure are words used in language and they are data to convey the absence of win and success respectively. A person who does not participate in the contest has no new/additional state information with respect to the contest, similar to the person who loses the contest). He now firmly memorizes the current state as having not won the contest owing to the actual situational evidence of having not won the contest. The previously partially memorized state information of winning the contest due to some confidence immediately starts fading away in the memory with time because of the absence of data to remind the win in the contest. He also has no new/additional state information to load into the brain from the contest. He starts thinking and analyzing deeply in search of the same or different information in the future. There is no other known thought phenomenon happening in the brain when a person is sad. Thus, it is validated that sadness (mental pain) involves less information load into the brain. Known studies correlate with the explanation above that sadness (mental pain) involves less information load into the brain because of severe analysis (or physical pain). Sadness is found to activate several regions of the brain, including the liking hedonic hotspots, orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus; which are major participants in the analysis process that involves memory recall. The wanting hedonic hotspots that identify pleasure (new information) are found to be less active during sadness. (Euston, Gruber, and McNaughton 2012; Kirkby et al. 2018; Pandya et al. 2012; Phan et al. 2002; Price and Drevets 2010; Ressler and Mayberg 2007; Rolls, Cheng, and Feng 2020).

Thinking deprives the brain of happiness also (the brain can either feel happy or think at a time. The brain cannot do both simultaneously as we know). There is already sufficient evidence that the activated hedonic brain circuitry during all pleasant feelings is common (Berridge and Kringelbach 2015). Additionally, since pleasure comes from memorization (of information), as validated in the above illustrations, happiness must also be some kind of information originating from within the brain itself. Since happiness is feeble (less pleasurable) (explained in point 13 of considerations section), it must have less information density (information memorize-able per unit of time) than a typical new sense or state information. During deep thinking, the brain becomes thirsty with little information to load, including the information of happiness, and this is perceived as sadness.

8.     Participating in a famous running race:

Suppose that a participant is in the 7^th rank in the latest famous running race that is conducted frequently in a locality. The information available regarding the race in the brain of the participant is as follows: I am in the 7^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 7^th rank. “I am in the 8^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 8^th rank (logically 8^th rank is within the scope of the 7^th ranker and the participant is conscious that he crossed the lower ranks). I am in the 9^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 9^th rank. I am in the 10^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 10^th rank. I am not in any rank in the running race and fans recognize that (logically; not having any rank is true while he holds a rank; because not having any rank is under his scope. i.e., not having the 10^th rank is also under his scope)”. I run faster than many people in society. The information of recognition by the running race fans is large, as it is made up of the information of recognition by each of the running race fans. The information of the state of being faster runner than many people in society is also made up of many information elements. This abundant information would keep the participant happy for a good amount of time, to the extent that he can interpret/perceive.

His brain does not contain information such as “I am in the 4^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 4^th rank”, “I am in the 5^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 5^th rank”. Therefore, he wants to obtain that not existing state information by putting some effort and then participating in this race. Suppose that the participant does not think of the 1^st or 2^nd rank for now as it is not possible for him obviously. He does some effort to improve his ability to obtain new state information, and now his actual rank capability (very confident) is 5 and the participant loads the state information of being in the 5^th rank into his brain, but the race fans do not know his present capability. For expected information “running race fans recognize that I am in the 5^th rank in the running race”, he participates in the new race of running. He is less confident in obtaining the 4^th rank based on the available data and experience, so he loads partial state information (weak memorization due to less consideration and limited supporting data to think of and remind the 4^th rank) of being in the 4^th rank. He is even less confident of getting 3^rd rank and thus loads even weaker state information (weaker memorization due to very little data to think of and remind the 3^rd rank) of being in the 3^rd rank into his brain.

If the participant gets the 5^th rank in this race, his brain loads the new state information “fans recognize that I am in the 5^th rank in the running race”. “Fans recognize that I am in the 5^th rank in the running race” information addition is pleasure. The state information of the 6^th rank is also obviously loaded as it is within the scope of the 5^th rank.

If the participant gets the 4^th rank in this race, his brain loads the reaming state information of “I am in the 4^th rank” on top of the previously loaded partial state information and makes a firm memory. He also loads the new state information: “Fans recognize that I am in the 4^th rank in the running race”. The state information of the 5^th and 6^th ranks is also obviously loaded, as they are within the scope of the 4^th rank.

If the participant gets the 3^rd rank in this race, his brain loads almost new (full) state information “I am in the 3^rd rank”. He also loads the new state information: “Fans recognize that I am in the 3^rd rank in the running race”. The state information of the 4^th, 5^th and 6^th ranks is also obviously loaded, as they are within the scope of the 3^rd rank.

If the participant gets the 8^th rank due to unexpected competition from the opponents, he makes a firm memory of having got the 8^th rank based on the actual circumstances of the race completion. He also has no new state information to load into the brain from the contest. He starts thinking and analyzing deeply to improve the rank in the future. This thinking deprives the brain of happiness (pleasure from within the brain itself) also. The participant may not spend much time for pleasures such as eating a tasty food or listening to a good music while in deep thinking and analysis mode and thus may further deprive the brain of information loading. The brain becomes thirsty with little information to load, and this is perceived as sadness. The previously known state information “I am in the 7^th rank in the running race and running race fans recognize that I am in the 7^th rank” fades away in the memory of the participant with time because of no reminding data to consider the 7^th rank.

Getting the first rank for the participant gives more pleasure than getting the 5^th or the 6^th rank when he was in the 7^th rank in last race; because getting the 6^th rank adds just one additional state to the getting the 7^th rank. However, “I am recognized in the 1^st rank” adds information of all states associated with ranks 1 to 6.

If the person (brain) cannot at all expect to win any race (suppose he is a person with a disability or general person who cannot compete in a race), then he (brain) does not try to know any information of being in a rank, as it is not possible (cannot be received and stored).

9.     Wishing fall of economic status of relatives:

If known people such as relatives fall in economic status and go below self-status, it means the relative increase in self-status (new state information). Therefore, people wish the fall of status of known people to a level below their own status to obtain new status information regarding themselves. Even if people wish for an increase in the status of other people with low status, they wish that others should not match or cross their own status.

10.  Curiosity:

New information is the only key thing obtained from cracking some secrets. Therefore, if people are eager to crack secrets (curious) that are known to give no other benefits other than just giving a previously unknown information, the brain must be thirsty for new information from cracking such secrets.

For example, trying to know the atmosphere of Saturn (even if this knowledge is not expected to benefit us in other ways than just knowing it).

11.  Knowing a story:

Instead of knowing a story by some author, we can create a story by ourselves. However, our self-created story is what we imagine as we want. Therefore, the self-created story is readily available in self-imagination (self). Therefore, there is no story information unknown from self-imagination. The story information by some author or artist is not known unless we know it by reading or listening or watching (if it has a new story plot not known before).

The content of a story is interpreted in the same way as a real situation by the brain as we know. Therefore, we feel by the information from a story in the same way as in a real situation. A story could consist of new state information, relaxation/peaceful moments, uncovering secrets and new twists (a twist is a new information, as it is unexpected in advance and very novel in the context of the twist).

12.  Knowing a joke:

A joke (disparagement or ridiculing others is not a joke and not discussed in this example) has high-density information from twists. A twist is a new information, as it is unexpected in advance and very novel in the context of the twist. Knowing the novel information from the context in a joke causes pleasure. In other words, if we divide a joke into two parts – the part or revelation before the twist and the twist, the association between the two parts already known individually is very novel or new information; thus, knowing this new association information provides pleasure.

A joke example:

I found a way to earn money easily without doing any work or business or having property. I will tell you if you give me 1000 bucks.

Explanation:

After knowing the first sentence, the addressee expects to know a decent detailed logic to earn money easily. However, the addresser is actually asking 1000 bucks to obtain money for himself in the second sentence. This is far from what the addressee expects after getting the first sentence. Therefore, the second sentence is a very novel association to the first sentence (twist), as it is far from the expectations (estimations/imaginations) of the addressee. Digesting a twist is association of two contexts in the brain that were never previously associated. This is knowing of a large amount of information in a few sentences (dense information or high Shannon entropy). This type of high-density information reception from jokes is pleasure.

It is clearly validated here that pleasure from jokes or twists is for the same reason as the pleasure from any other pleasure sources, which is knowing information or memorization.

13.  Waiting for relatives at the railway station:

In this case, the waiting person feels to do something to get some new or decayed information until his or her relatives arrive (time pass). Since he knows some means of obtaining information, he tries for them, such as eating snacks or reading jokes in a newspaper instead of being idle. This is because the brain always keeps trying to get some new or decayed (forgotten) information. This is a typical well known common experience and validates that brain is thirsty for information and is in constat hunt for new information.

14.  Loving animals, friends and country:

When a person observes the environment in search of information, he/she looks at animals and people and observes what they are doing (of course). He/she works for the happiness of the observed animals and people, which is in fact an effort to add information into his/her own brain through observation of the state information and happiness of others. The state information of others can be felt, but the sense information cannot be felt. Feeling of a new state information of others requires only understanding that state. For example, a person can feel the state of a new winning in a competition by his/her friend, but he/she cannot imagine and feel the taste information of a new food eaten by his/her friend. Many people give tasty food (sense information) to others, because themselves got tasty food from others in the past or want tasty food in the future from others if themselves become unable to earn tasty food by themselves (this is adherence to dharma/law/what is right).

Love also removes stress and gives relaxation to others from support to others; and the same relaxation can be felt by the self, which is a state of happiness (a common well known experience).

(Interpretation of others’ emotions is not as effective as understanding of self-emotions. This is because of the limited ability of the brain to analyze others’ emotions from observation, which varies among animals and person to person; and lesser stimulation coming from others’ information environment than from the self, as generally others will not be staying with the self continuously.)

15.  Attending a big entertainment show with number tags:

Suppose that a person attends a big entertainment show by buying a ticket. The show organizers issue tokens with serial numbers to the spectators at the entrance of the show for the purpose of managing the spectators. The person attending the show knows the numbers already from the school days. The person finds it interesting (some pleasure) to know that the show has numbers associated with the spectators (pleasure from such/any new experiences is a common known observation). Here, the new information is the information of association(link) between the number system and the spectators at the show, which is strange to him.

16.  Knowing student ID number in a school:

Suppose that a small boy Tom who knows numbers gets assigned a class ID number for the first time in his experience. He takes it as a surprise to associate himself to a number in the class. This novel experience is indeed a pleasure. Suppose that Tom joins a new high school after some years. Even before a number is assigned to him, he is already aware that a number will be assigned to him and his classmates. He thinks occasionally about all numbers from 0 to 100 as associated with him (based on the known general number assignments to students in his experience) before the actual number is revealed. Therefore, Tom associated (memorized) all the numbers from 0 to 100 with him without solidifying any of those numbers in his memory as associated with him (knows each of the number as his with uncertainty). Suppose the number 36 is assigned to him and revealed. Knowing the number 36 as associated to himself will not give him a great surprise as he already weakly associated number 36 to him even before the number was revealed. Now, he only solidifies the association of number 36 to himself in his memory on top of the earlier weak memorization (loads the memory gap between knowing with uncertainty and knowing for sure). The first memorization after knowing that his number is 36 is somewhat interesting (pleasureful) as it gives scope for some good memorization although it was already weekly memorized before knowing his actual number. Subsequent repetitions of association to solidify the memorization gradually give less pleasure with each successive repetition (We know that any memory solidifies after a few repetitions of learning and thus the scope for further memorization does not exist). Each step described above is an obvious, universal, general, relatable and so factual experience.

The remaining link information decreases gradually towards zero with each repetition of learning (memorization). The last few repetitions have hardly any information, but those repetitions are inevitable to memorize the link perfectly. The overall new information density (information received per unit of time spent in memorization) of such perfect memorizations is very little. The brain loses more pleasurable happiness at the cost of such perfect memorizations. Therefore, the brain does not like perfect memorizations. Animals memorize links perfectly only on the need basis while hunting for other information.

17.  Losing a costly mobile phone:

Losing a working mobile phone causes sadness (mental pain). Losing an already damaged mobile phone does not cause any sadness. Losing things is a known (habituated) information. Therefore, the sadness from losing a working mobile phone is not because of the minor link information of the phone being lost (linking losing to a phone). The majority of the sadness is due to the cost involved in buying a similar replacement phone as not expected in advance. The thought of buying a replacement phone brings the thought of losing some money unexpectedly and causes consideration of the loss (missing) of some other predetermined (stored/felt/known/imagined) state information such as buying a new jewel or a new dress or a new video gaming console, etc. due to the money being spent for the replacement phone. Deep thought and analysis deprives the brain of happiness and thus keeps the brain thirsty for information (sadness). All the steps/experiences explained above are very relatable, common and well known to be facts. This illustration validates that sadness (mental pain) is staying thirsty without new information load into the brain.

18.  Feeling very hungry:

Hunger is a pain. To get rid of the burning sensation inside the stomach, which distracts the brain from knowing any information including happiness (information from the brain itself) and keeps the brain thirsty (sadness), animals consume food. The brain does not (cannot) consider the information in physical pain and some strong interrupting senses (such as a very strong smell of a fish or a strong bitter taste) for enjoyment (of course we do not enjoy pains and interrupting senses). There are already some evidences indicating that the brain centers that become active during sadness because of physical pain or mental pain are the same. In other words, the brain processes the sadness because of a physical pain or other reasons similarly (DeWall et al. 2010; Eisenberger, Lieberman, and Williams 2003; Eisenberger 2008; Kross et al. 2011). The taste information of food is another factor for consuming food.

19.  Participating in both swimming and running competitions:

Suppose that a person is physically fit enough for both swimming and running competitions. He participates in a swimming competition first and wins at some level and enjoys the state information of winning in swimming. Now, although he knows the concept of winning, he also participates in the running race to obtain the winning state information in the running race. Here, the new state information of winning in a competition can also be interpreted as making a new association (link information) of the known concept of winning to a certain competition. A new association is formed only by winning in a new(different) competition through participation.

20.  Torturing an insect:

Let us consider a small boy torturing an ant and enjoying it. Here, what happens is, the information of “how the ant jumps and moves peculiarly when tortured” is understood (known) by the boy. It is not possible to imagine and feel the actual pain of others, unlike the feeling of the state information of others. However, it is possible to recall a little of the self-pain and the state of sadness during a self-pain in the past while observing the painful situation of others. This ability to relate builds up with experience and age and leads to the sense of dharma (law/what is right) that if I torture others, others also can torture me. The sense of dharma prevents people from torturing others in nature. The small boy does not understand dharma (law/what is right) to not torture insects due to his young age. Therefore, he finds enjoyable information in a suffering insect’s peculiar movements.

21.  Enjoying bullying:

Some people can interpret bullying (disparagement or ridiculing) as the fall of status of others. The fall of status of others causes a relative increase in the status of the self and gives pleasure from the new state information.

22.  Supporting their own team in a game:

In a multinational game, the winning state information of the team of a country directly affects the state information of all the people who associate themselves with that country, because a team represents a whole country. People cannot feel state information about others as much as they feel about themselves (feeling about self or self-team is easier than feeling about others who are usually not attached to self continuously). Therefore, people enjoy/prefer the win of the self or a team of a self-associated country more than the win of others or a team of another country.

23.  Eating a sweet:

Case 1: Sweet has not been eaten for many days

When a sweet is not tasted for many days, the information regarding the taste (perception of a food is usually a combination of many tastes, flavors, texture, chemical sensations, etc.) of the sweet is lost in the brain to some extent because of decay of the long-term explicit memory in the brain. The nuances are not well remembered after several days, although the overall taste make up information is generally remembered decently. The brain then seeks to know the majority of the information of the taste of the sweet. Therefore, the brain starts analyzing ways to taste the sweet. If it gets that sweet, knows its taste information (memorizes), which is pleasure.

Case 2: Sweet just eaten up to satisfaction

The information is already stored (memorized). Therefore, no more sweet is needed for the taste information. Therefore, the brain stops analyzing ways to obtain the taste information of the sweet. If the tongue yet provides the already existing information to the brain regarding that sweet, the brain ignores that information and tries to switch to obtaining some other unknown information by priority.

Case 3: Got a new sweet when the stomach is already full

Eating when the stomach is already full causes stomach pain. Therefore, people may eat a very little of the new sweet to load the majority of the taste information or they may not eat at all as the sadness from stomach pain may dominate the joy/pleasure from the taste information of the sweet. Physical satiation because of stomach fullness is another cause of reduced interest in food when the stomach is full. This satiation reduces sensitivity to the information of food (Cees et al. 2004; Cummings and Overduin 2007).

Case 4: feeling a little hungry and got a sweet

The information about anything in the brain is generally linked (co-exists) with some other information/memory in the brain (stimulation). The mild burning sensation of the stomach increases forced attention to the stomach and thus the consideration of food (of course obvious), which is related to the stomach. This concentrated consideration of food leads to the concentrated consideration of the taste information of food and leads to more effort to obtain food than it should be for the amount of taste information only. This means that the brain tends to change the normal priority for information gathering under exposure to information sources and stimulation. Here, the impact of temptation/luring on the Buddhi, which usually prioritizes information sources based on the amount of possible/expected information is explained.

24.  Watching beautiful images and scenery:

The beauty of an image or scenery depends on the amount of new information it has. A 2D square shape has straight sides, parallel opposite sides, equal length sides, opposing corners, etc. information that is a little rare and thus causes pleasure on watching the square shape. A 2D mango shape is somewhat peculiar in nature with the bottom turning to a side and thus has a rare shape information that causes pleasure. A rainbow has 7 main colors and innumerous transition colors in between. It is slightly difficult to memorize a rainbow as a rainbow has a large amount of color and color arrangement information, thus causing great pleasure on watching it. It is clear from these examples that the amount of pleasure is proportional to the amount of information that can be memorized.

25.  Memorizing a song:

Memorizing the lyrics of a song involves linking the known words or sentences corresponding to the context in the song sequentially over time. People listen to the lyrics curiously once or twice until decent memorization (short-term memorization and subsequently a little long-term memorization) of the lyrics, which is a little pleasure. Memorizing the lyrics of a song perfectly (solid long-term memorization) takes much more time (listening several times) than does memorizing the lyrics roughly after listening to the song just a few times. Therefore, perfect memorization of lyrics in a song is not enjoyable for singers. The majority of the enjoyable information in a song comes from the rhythm in the song. Therefore, listening to a song is enjoyable to listeners mainly because of the rhythm in it. Memorizing the rhythm perfectly is also very time consuming, so the brain loses interest in listening to a song after listening to it a few times.

26.  Memorizing paths:

If a person is asked to draw random paths on a paper, he can draw innumerous different paths as different combinations of lefts and rights. The information of all different possible paths is already known to him. Remembering the path to office (or a shop) involves linking one of the known paths perfectly to the office (or a shop). If the path is complex, it is not enjoyable to memorize it perfectly.

27.  Memorizing the phone numbers of people:

A typical person can tell infinite numbers. Listening to a number has no unknown information unless it has a rhythm information, as in 527352735273. Memorizing a specific phone number of a specific known person requires dividing the specific phone number into multiple small well-known numbers and then linking the parts one after the other over the time sequence and memorizing the overall phone number (We know that we usually memorize phone numbers as a set of linked chunks). Then, the specific phone number must be linked to the specific known person. People curiously notice or listen to the mobile phone numbers of people once or twice if that information is available effortlessly. Perfect memorization requires several repetitions of learning (memorization) with very little additional information with each learning. Perfect memorization is time consuming, with low-density new information at the cost of more pleasurable happiness. Therefore, it is not enjoyable to memorize the mobile phone numbers of people perfectly.

28.  Olympic running race rank number vs jersey number:

The Olympic running race rank number of a participant is a reference number for the enormous amount of state information carried by that rank. An Olympic running race Gold medal winner obtains the state information elements of being faster runner than every individual person on the Earth, without repeated learning (rapid loading of information elements without memorizing them permanently) of any of those information elements. He also receives an enormous amount of dense state information of a large number of individual people on the Earth knowing his win. The jersey number of a participant in the Olympic running race has only the single information element of what known number is linked to the participant. Therefore, the Olympic running race in the 1^st rank gives enormous amount of pleasure. People notice the jersey number once or twice curiously if it is visible effortlessly, owing to the limited (single) link information carried by it. Permanent memorization of the jersey number at the cost of losing more pleasurable happiness and other dense information while memorizing the jersey number firmly is not preferred by anyone.

29.  Doing a software job:

Some jobs such as a software job involve considerable analytical thinking and perfect memorization (memory solidification) of a lot of information (a lot of low density information). This is why these jobs are not much enjoyable, as they deprive the brain of more pleasurable happiness and other dense information (high Shannon entropy) and keep it thirsty. The theory of this paper perfectly explains such common experiences.

30.  Becoming famous as a bad person:

Generally, the majority of people think of themselves as being in the state of a good person or an average person by character. They also have a little state information that a few others are aware of their state. This is a naturally occurring default state of character to most people by birth. A person becoming famous as a very good person (better than most other people) adds the state information of being very good and the state information of many others being aware of his goodness. Thus, becoming famous as a very good person causes a lot of pleasure. If a person becomes convicted of a very large crime and becomes famous, that person loses the state of being in about middle state in the world with respect to character. He loses all states until the bottom states with respect to character. He also loses all states until the bottom states in the minds of other people aware of him. Although the previously known state information cannot be directly erased from the brain, consideration of the loss of states causes ignoring the previously known state information and forgetting/decaying (stop associating the states to self) over time. Sadness comes from thinking and analyzing to regain the state information and thus depriving the brain of happiness and other pleasures while thinking.

31.  Being sad for the death of a family member:

The concept of death is not a new information for grown up people. The news of the death of a family member only provides the link information of a specific date/day of death out of several already partially linked dates/days, which is a very little new information. The death of a family member mainly causes consciousness of the loss of support for the self and thus pushes people into thinking and loss of happiness. Additionally, people miss the chance to observe the happiness of a person and feel that happiness, if a person is dead. Additionally, if a person is contributor to several kinds of enjoyments (care taker such as a parent), the death of such a person leads to severe thinking and thus deprives the brain of happiness and other enjoyments while thinking. The amount of sadness that people feel for the death of a person depends on the awareness of the amount of care given by the dead person when that person was alive. People also think deeply due to the missed expected state information of the dead people (such as getting higher status by buying costly vehicles, buying new houses, gaining financial status, gaining more social status, etc.). Thinking for these reasons deprives the brain of happiness. People may not be able to enjoy other pleasures such as tasty food, music, etc. during severe thinking resulting from death news. This sadness due to the severe deprivation of happiness and other pleasures strongly dominates the miniscule link information (pleasurable) of the specific date/day of death.

32.  Music with large intervals of rhythm:

Music with large intervals of rhythm is not much enjoyable due to the limited short-term memory of people. Short-term memory cannot recognize/perceive repetition (rhythm) information if the interval of a rhythm is lengthy. Therefore, music is enjoyable well only if the rhythm interval is within a maximum of a few seconds. This validates that pleasure and memorization (scope for memorization) are correlated and proportional (actually the same).

 

General Bliss (Happiness) and Meditational Bliss (Conceptual Framework Subpart)

This section is interpreted in the best reasonable manner with some hypotheses.

1.     Animals with brains evolved to have a baseline pleasure in the form of general bliss (happiness) so that animals do not hook on less dense (less enjoyable) information (for example, solid memorization of which specific known stone shape is in which specific known place, solid memorization of phone numbers, etc.), which is abundant in the vicinity of the animals. Additionally, happiness is not as pleasurable as many information elements are. This allows animals to interact with nature actively for information-rich sources and thus increases the chances of survival. For example, if a person is offered to choose between ‘just staying relaxed’ and ‘eat a new tasty food’, that person would definitely choose to eat the new tasty food.

2.     Hypothesis 1: Since pleasure comes from memorization (of information) and also the activated hedonic brain circuitry during all pleasant feelings is common (Berridge and Kringelbach 2015), happiness must be some kind of information originating from within the brain itself (endogenous). Happiness and the so told denser sense of bliss in meditation (greater bliss in meditation as described by the people with the experience of meditation) is very probably the sense of the neural electric energy (noise/ambience) information of the brain sensed by some specific part (may be within the limbic system) of the brain. When this information is sensed, it is stored in some specific location of the brain, because it is sensed as an information element. Animals do not become bored of happiness, which means that this information dries up very fast (fast decay) while it is stored unlike the information of senses from the sense organs that has relatively slow decay. Therefore, neural electric energy (noise/ambience) can be sensed and known continuously, as it decays very quickly, so there is always a good vacuum of neural energy information. Therefore, happiness (we know that happiness is not boring) or meditational bliss can be experienced continuously throughout life in the absence of interruptions and distractions.

3.     This information from the brain itself causing happiness is feeble. It cannot be felt as long as we consider the relatively intense external environment. This is similar to that loud sounds can make weak sounds not easily noticeable to ears.

4.     Hypothesis 2: People say that they get intense pleasure in deep meditation. This means that the information density from meditational bliss is probably greater than that from happiness and on par with the densest information coming through the sense organs, in the near complete absence of interruptions, distractions and other thoughts. Therefore, meditation may be the best way to quench the thirst for information, as meditational bliss can be experienced continuously throughout life in the absence of interruptions and distractions. Therefore, meditating may be the most pleasurable way of living. Although there is very significant mention of pleasure in happiness and deep meditation in many Indian-origin old texts, sufficient study is required in this area using modern techniques and tools (Deshmukh 2023; Woollacott, Kason, and Park 2021).

5.     Love or friendship support a person (animal) and reduce mental stress (thinking) to some extent. A proper understanding of the environment and life also can reduce unnecessary mental stress. Reduced mental stress gives scope for happiness.

6.     Hypothesis 3: Different animals are exposed to different information/influences of nature more and thus evolved to tolerate them (not interrupted by them) more. For example, men roam for more time in forests to gather food, and women spend more time taking care of their children. Therefore, the brain of men is less sensitive (does not find much information and is not disturbed) to green color and the brain of women is less sensitive to pink. Men enjoy some happiness while watching the green color, and women enjoy some happiness while watching the pinkish colors. Similarly, very smooth melodious music detaches people from the external senses and takes into happiness.

 

The Operating System of The Brain (Buddhi) (Conceptual Framework)

The cognitive process steps/sequence of the operating system of the brain (the obviously and commonly known process of desiring for pleasures/happiness) are given and explained below at a high level through the theory of this paper based on the above illustrations and the section on general bliss (happiness).

1.     Obtain the meta-information about the pleasure sources: Obtain all the possible meta-information (generally link information) of information elements (‘all possible senses of objects’, states, secrets, twists and happiness) from the environment to add information to the memory (either searched for or coming unintentionally). Example of a meta-information element: “Sweets in a shop at the XYZ location taste good (We already know that new information is found in different places/paths. The link information of one of the different known paths for a shop with tasty sweets is given here)”.

(Animals other than humans have limitations in analyzing and dreaming. Therefore, they do not understand or well understand states and some secrets. They are weaker in analyzing the world for information.)

2.     Shortlist pleasure sources: If an unknown (sense or state or secret) information element is not zero in content, it is not already stored (memorized) completely or partially in the brain and can be obtained (obtainable); prioritize that information element to attempt to obtain the information. Else, neglect for getting.

3.     Prioritize the pleasure sources: Give priorities to different unknown information elements on the basis of ‘the right time for getting the information’, ‘the effective amount of information obtainable per unit period of attempt’, ‘the information density (information per unit of information loading time)’ and ‘the obtainability of the information’; for attempting (the amount of information that an information element contains, information density and the obtainability of that information affects the priority in direct order; and the total time needed for obtaining affects the priority in reverse order).

                  Effective amount of information=basic information amount – information including information from happiness missed due to physical pain or some strong interrupting senses occurring in obtaining basic information (information missed due to physical pain or a strong interrupting sense is generally less common than basic information).

The brain does not enjoy physical pain and some strong interrupting senses. The brain does not (cannot) consider the information in physical pain and some strong interrupting senses (such as a very strong smell of a fish or a strong bitter taste) for enjoyment. Physical pain and some strong interrupting senses distract the brain from knowing any information including information from happiness, and thus cause sadness. Physical pain and some strong interrupting senses are always rejected by the buddhi. The buddhi prioritizes to get rid of (reject) physical pain and some strong interrupting senses in the prioritization for information.

      This prioritization is performed by the operating system (buddhi) without further analysis. Then, buddhi directs the mind to analyze the information sources and environment deeply and reprioritize the information elements considering the effective information (effect on the other information elements or pleasures) obtainable in the long run (this prioritization and reprioritization can be called cognitive appraisal and reappraisal respectively). We know this obviously that we desire all kinds of things and then we apply our mind to analyze.

      (All this prioritization can occur with the buddhi stimulated by the information elements or environment or some knowledge of the past experiences, leading to over or under prioritization; improper or insufficient analysis by the mind, due to the influence of the buddhi to adhere to its initial decisions (wishful thinking); and incorrect or insufficient analysis by the mind irrespective of the influence of the buddhi (with the available information for analysis). Therefore, the average information obtained after attempts can be less than what could be obtained in the absence of these limitations). (The known psychodynamic and psychoanalytic concepts of integrative behavior explore some of this process in detail).

4.     Direct the mind to plan in detail and work for the information elements according to the priorities.

5.     Always keep watching for more pleasure sources: If a task is being performed by the buddhi or the mind, consider new information elements from the environment at regular intervals or when interrupted by an intense sense.

To obtaining information or avoiding lack of information, the mind is directed by the buddhi to invent new means through imagination and analyzing whether the objects in the imagination can be used to obtain information or avoid some loss of information and how, which is called the creativity of the mind.

6.     Under the success of an attempt to obtain the expected information element, the buddhi adds (knows) that information of sense or state or secret or twist or happiness into the memory, which is called pleasure (while adding information, sometimes the brain may activate body organs in different ways in different animals, such as the physiological responses we see when a person is happy from a sense or state or secret or twist information). Failure/partial failure to obtain the expected information through an attempt can lead to analysis of the reasons for failure or thinking and analyzing deeply in search of the same or different information in the future, which keeps the brain thirsty (sadness) without much information loaded into the brain. Sadness may induce some special physiological responses in the body, such as crying, tearing, etc., in some animals. (The available literature dedicated to emotions covers physiological reactions to positive or negative emotions in more detail).

Figure 1. Pictorial view of Buddhi interacting with memory, nature and mind as the central driving system of an animal

 

Review of Literature (Comparative Analysis/Implications)

The notable points in the existing literature are discussed and reviewed in this section as follows.

The reward centers of the brain have been segregated into wanting hedonic hotspots (centers) that cause pleasure and liking hedonic hotspots (centers) that encode pleasure. Lesions in the wanting centers are known to cause loss of interest in pleasure causing sensory inputs. The liking centers are active during pleasure (Funahashi 2011). The wanting centers of the brain can be interpreted as the information thirsty centers that analyze an input for information quantity and information density. This means that the buddhi (the operating system of the brain) is predominantly executed by the wanting hedonic hotspots of the brain. The liking hedonic hotspots of the brain can be interpreted as centers with a predominant role in transmitting information to the memorization regions of the brain, since it has been established in this paper that pleasure comes from the memorization of information. There is already sufficient evidence that liking hedonic hotspots play a greater role in memory formation than wanting hedonic hotspots do (Brand and Markowitsch 2006; Euston, Gruber, and McNaughton 2012; Gogolla 2017; Ramus et al. 2007; Rolls 2004). Thus, Buddhi is what is executed by the reward centers of the brain.

Dopaminergic pathway (wanting hedonic hotspots) regulated satiation has been identified through some of the existing research work (Baikorcid 2021; Dietrich and Horvath 2009; Petrovich, Holland, and Gallagher 2005; Volkow, Wang, and Baler 2010). However, the mechanism of executing satiation in this pathway has not been found out. This paper has established that satiation or reduced interest in pleasure sources results primarily from the decreased remaining information from the sensory inputs or other kinds of pleasure causing incidents as the learning of information progresses. Therefore, this is the mechanism/logic of the dopaminergic pathway in satiation. Sensory-specific satiation has been identified by some of the existing studies to occur predominantly in the orbitofrontal cortex (Critchley and Rolls 1996; Rolls 1981). The orbitofrontal cortex interacts with the liking hedonic hotspots. Sensory-specific satiation could be at least partially influenced by dopaminergic pathway-regulated satiation. Further research is needed to elucidate the influence of dopaminergic pathway-regulated satiation on sensory-specific satiation.

There are several early studies on motivation, such as expectancy-value theory. Expectancy-value theory explains how value (perceived reward) leads to motivation while one has expectancy (Atkinson 1964), without clarifying the mechanism of the brain in identifying value or reward worthiness.

Another existing idea (not proven) is that the brain likes challenges probably due to scarcity bias, which means that when a challenge is faced, the brain thinks that the object or success achievable through challenge is scarce owing to exclusive traits such as resilience, intelligence, or effort required to cross the challenge. It has been validated through the scarcity bias principle that scarce things are valued more (Cialdini 2001; Mullainathan and Shafir 2013; Tversky and Kahneman 1974). However, it is not understood by the existing literature, why scarce things are valued more. In fact, scarce things are more challenging to obtain with the potential to provide state information by overcoming/crossing challenges, in addition to the basic value of those things. Therefore, scarcity bias should actually be understood as challenge-liking. How challenges provide pleasurable state information by overcoming/crossing challenges is illustrated and established in this research paper.

The scarcity bias principle in existing literature has another major defect. It is assumed that the magnitude of the scarcity/challenge and the perceived added value are proportional. However, the perceivable pleasure from a challenge or scarcity of an object actually depends on the amount of state information that is receivable through the challenge/scarcity. For example, some born rich people enjoy social and economic status without having to cross/overcome any challenge or facing scarcity in their life. This paper has established through the illustrations above that crossing challenges and having a social status provides similar state information to that of being in a certain new state. Thus, challenges are not necessary for the brain to enjoy state information. For another example, very rich people do not perceive a typical buyable object as highly valued and highly demanded like a poor person does, just because that object becomes slightly scarce over time. Let us take another example. Suppose that there is a running race being conducted in a recreation club, where the participants do not have a prior estimate of their potential positions after the race and that there are no additional pleasure influencers such as prizes or additional benefits to the winners. All the participants of the running race run at their respective full potential, so running is equally challenging to all of the participants. However, the person who comes in the first rank gets more pleasure from the state information of the win than do the persons who come in lower positions (which is well known and obvious), as described in the illustrations above. Therefore, it is clear that crossing a challenge can cause pleasure, but the same level of challenge can cause different levels of pleasure. A little challenge to someone can give the same amount of pleasure as a big challenge to someone else. When scarcity bias is measured on a group of people wholistically, the scarcity/challenge and the amount of pleasure may look proportional. More precisely conducted experiments such as those in the running race example explained here would prove that the scarcity and value are not necessarily proportional. Therefore, scarcity/challenge and perceived value/pleasure are not necessarily proportional.

The brain mechanism behind pleasure from humor or jokes has never been interpreted meaningfully. The pleasure from a joke with a twist and the pleasure from disparagement or ridiculing others are entirely different pleasures but are bundled under a single term humor in much of the existing literature. One notable theory is the theory of incongruity. People laugh at the juxtaposition of incompatible concepts and at defiance of their expectations – that is, at the incongruity between expectations and reality. According to a variant of the theory known as resolution of incongruity, laughter results when a person discovers an unexpected solution to an apparent incongruity, such as when an individual grasps a double meaning in a statement and thus sees the statement in a completely new light. However, common people already know without the need for these theories that all jokes have incongruity. What was missing in all these existing theories is the logic of why an incongruity or resolution of incongruity causes pleasure. How a joke with a twist gives pleasure is explained in the illustrations above in this paper. If we divide a joke into two parts – the part or revelation before the twist and the twist, the association between the two parts already known individually is novel or new information, and thus, knowing this new association information provides pleasure. There are other concepts such as relief theory, superiority theory, benign violation theory, etc. to explain humor. The majority of these concepts give examples of pleasure from ‘disparagement of others’ or ‘perception of change in self-status’ in different contexts and use different terminologies to refer to these contexts without explaining the mechanism of the brain behind pleasure in these contexts. The pleasure from disparagement or ridiculing others (bullying) is a result of the perception of an increase in self-status leading to new state information, as explained in the illustrations above in this paper. References have been provided to all notable articles that have tried to explain humor (Gervais and Wilson 2005; McGraw and Warren 2010; Lintott 2016; McGraw et al. 2012; Provine 2004).

Pleasure/joy and memorization were thought to be different processes, although it is well known that they always occur simultaneously, because the mechanism or the exact cause of pleasure/joy was not known before. It has been assumed that the reward centers of the brain themselves result in pleasure. Memorization is thought to be useful in future decisions. This paper has established that memorization is part of pleasure since pleasure comes from knowing information. In other words, pleasure is quenching of the memorization thirst.

The significance of memory fading for obtaining pleasure was not recognized because experiencing pleasure was considered to be a different process from memorization. It has been illustrated in this paper above, how memory fading (decay) is important for pleasure (information memorization) from the same source of pleasure again and again with time gaps.

The patterns, level and speed of fading of memory were not known or appreciated sufficiently until recent empirical studies (Cooper, Kensinger, and Ritchey 2019). The fading speed of a memory is also dependent on the solidification level of that memory (Walter et al. 2019). These empirical findings stand as proof of memory fading, and they collectively enabled knowing how memory fades.

Music has been defined/understood as the science and art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity. The mechanism of how and why this phenomenon causes pleasure has not been explained by the existing psychology or neuroscience literature (Murrock and Higgins 2009; Schafer et al. 2013). The existing literature predominantly concentrates only on the evolutionary benefits of music and how music can be used as a therapy. The functional brain imaging technologies helped in identifying the reward centers and other brain areas that become active during pleasure from music, without explaining how a music is assessed by the brain for its reward worthiness. It is very obvious that novel music brings pleasure, but it was not known, why or how novelty brings pleasure. The status of the existing research is similar in explaining the pleasure from food and visuals. This paper has well established and explained through the illustrations above, how and why music, some sounds such as the sounds of birds, foods with different tastes (combinations of tastes, flavors, textures and chemical sensations) and visuals give pleasure. The data from pleasure sources, such as a music reaching the brain itself does not create pleasure. Only new or decayed information from pleasure sources provides pleasure. That is why novelty gives pleasure. Pleasure is proportional to the quantity and density of the information loaded into the brain from any of these sources.

As analyzed in this paper above, physical pain distracts the brain from knowing any information including happiness (information from the brain itself) and keeps the brain thirsty (sadness). This is a state similar to sadness because of mental pain, such as losing a contest. There are already evidences indicating that the brain centers that become active during sadness because of physical pain or mental pain are the same. In fact, people use the same words such as ‘pain’ to express sadness from physical or mental origin. In other words, the brain processes sadness because of physical pain or other reasons similarly (DeWall et al. 2010; Eisenberger, Lieberman, and Williams 2003; Eisenberger 2008; Kross et al. 2011). Sadness is found to activate several regions of the brain including the liking hedonic hotspots, orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus, which are major participants in the analysis process that involves memory recall. The wanting hedonic hotspots are found to be less active during sadness. (Euston, Gruber, and McNaughton 2012; Kirkby et al. 2018; Pandya et al. 2012; Phan et al. 2002; Price and Drevets 2010; Ressler and Mayberg 2007; Rolls, Cheng, and Feng 2020). This aligns with the explanation in this paper that sadness involves less information load into the brain because of severe analysis or physical pain.

It has been assumed that the reward centers are wired to individually identify the pleasure from different kinds of sensory inputs reaching the brain and other pleasure causing experiences such as a joke or crossing (overcoming) of a challenge. For example, if a question is asked as to why people enjoy music, the available answer is “The brain is wired to enjoy music”. This answer provides absolutely no information on the mechanism of obtaining pleasure. If a question is asked as to why people enjoy crossing challenges, the available answer is “The brain is wired to enjoy crossing challenges”. Thus, the existing literature considers that the brain has several mechanisms to identify the reward worthiness of different kinds of sensory inputs and other pleasure causing experiences. It has been well established in this research paper through the illustrations given above that the mechanism to identify reward worthiness is common (same) for all causes of pleasure and is based on whether that sensory input or experience carries information (memory) that is not already present in the brain.

 

Future Research Directions

Although the illustrations section above already sufficiently clarifies the strong positive correlation between memorization and pleasure, the following are the possible tests that would reinforce this theory further or falsify it at least to some extent.

1.     More studies to observe opioid network activation in the brain during different levels of pleasures of different kinds by test subjects, such as pleasures from winning challenges, listening to jokes, eating palatable food, etc., would confirm if opioid network activity is always strongly positively correlated with pleasure intensity and/or pleasure duration. Opioid network activity is an indicator of potential memory formation.

2.     More studies to observe activity in the memory regions of the brain during different levels of pleasures of different kinds by test subjects, such as pleasures from winning challenges, listening to jokes, eating palatable food, etc., would confirm if memorization is always strongly positively correlated with pleasure intensity and/or pleasure duration.

3.     At least PET or MRI studies are required to confirm the hypotheses made here that the general bliss and probable intense bliss during deep meditation could be due to memorization of some endogenous information generated in the brain. Activation of at least some memory regions of the brain and endogenous noise/information generation and reception should be observable in these studies. Deeper research on the default mode network may provide some insights in this direction.

 

Factors Affecting Information Gathering by An Animal

The total amount of information (pleasure) an animal can obtain in its life depends on the availability of information in the environment for the animal, natural disasters, unexpected environmental conditions, an animal’s ability to obtain information, wisdom, and other mental aspects of the animal, getting a disease naturally and the decaying nature of an animal’s explicit memory (a fast-decaying brain memory will forget information quickly and can get it again and again and vice versa. However, fast decay may also reduce the knowledge that is useful in obtaining information).

 

Basic Organization of Processing in The Brain (Mostly Available knowledge and Additional Discussion)

The buddhi and the mind are functionalities of the processing in the brain. The buddhi generates the key commands (Operating functions) to run the animals. The continuous desire for pleasures that we know is the main constituent of buddhi. The mind executes these commands at a lower level under the control of the buddhi. Since both of these are functionalities of the same processing functionality, the exact functional border between the buddhi and the mind is not analyzed here. 

The buddhi takes help from the mind. Additional analysis; building up new information based on the existing data; innovation also happen in the mind. All these abilities aid in getting information or avoiding loss of information. The mind analyses information elements before final decisions are taken by the buddhi to attempt for that information element. However, the mind is influenced by the buddhi to adhere to the initial decisions (wishful thinking/biased thinking) of the buddhi.

For getting information, the mind is directed by the buddhi to invent new means; through imagination and analyzing if the objects in the imagination can be used to get information and how, which is called creativity of the mind. Good creativity needs enough information in the memory in less decayed state (The person should have enough knowledge. Long-term memory should be good to possess abundant less decayed information over long run) and good short-term memory to use the information in the memory in imagination and analysis process effectively. Forgetfulness affects analysis and so creativity.

The buddhi can undergo stimulation from the environment or information elements under high perceptibility of the information elements, leading to over prioritization (sometimes lower prioritization) for those elements by the buddhi.

When the buddhi identifies an information element and decides to get it, it influences the mind to do restricted analysis of that information element in favor of getting that information (wishful thinking/biased thinking); deviating from the fact based correct logical analysis. How this happens is as follows. The job of the mind is analyzing all the aspects pertaining to an information element to make a final decision on the priority, feasibility, consequences and worth of getting that information element. The analyzed aspects within the capacity limits of the mind are all combinations of assumptions, ‘available facts’ and ‘things of imagination’ that can be related to the information element. However, the buddhi influences the mind in such a way that the mind is pulled back (cut short) from analyzing the aspects that will prohibit the obtainment of an information element and the mind is freely allowed to analyze the aspects that support getting of the information element. Sometimes the mind does a little or no analysis under the influence of the buddhi and the buddhi proceeds with its initial decisions. Analytically strong mind uses a little chance given to it by the buddhi in such circumstances to come up with right decisions.

Sometimes, the mind cannot analyze correctly or sufficiently irrespective of the influence of the buddhi (with the available information for analysis). In such cases also, inappropriate decisions are taken by the processing functionality.

Short-term memory, knowledge (long-term memory enables to have good knowledge) and forgetfulness affect analysis. If some information that can help to make right decisions is readily available in the memory (knowledge), it helps in the decision-making process when needed. Having knowledge of what to do, when and how depends on observation, analytical ability and availability of corresponding knowledge sources (books, environment, etc.).

Serial-Thinking:

A lot of data reaches the brain in parallel through sense organs. But, only one of them receives concentration. For example, when I am in deep concentration on my book, I do not observe normal sounds, people walking, etc., happening around me. When I am not concentrating deeply into something, I easily notice all the things happening. If I had parallel observation, I should notice the things around me always at the same level. Therefore, what may look like happening in parallel is actually happening serially. In this case, I have the sense of things happening around while having deep concentration on the book also, but for a too short time and so I do not have good knowledge of them. When there is no much urge to concentrate on book, I spend more time for other things also in between.

When we are thinking / minding about some specific thing, we come out of concentration in two ways. One way is that the brain automatically stops concentration after regular focus intervals by its nature and traverses other items in its consideration in a brief traverse interval. The frequency of focus intervals an item gets depends on the priority of that item as decided by the buddhi. The processing in the brain is a repeating cycle of focus and traverse periods. Second way is interruption. When I am typing here, I noticed the loud sound of a TV just because that TV sound loudness has the ability to forcefully interrupt using the interrupting mechanisms of the brain for strong inputs. Therefore, what is running in parallel here is an interruption mechanism, but not the main thinking itself. This interruption mechanism runs as a co-process of the main thinking.

When I want to drink water, my brain processes the data of glass, water and drinking along with many other things. At any instant, there is only one thought / information element. In each thought element, many data objects are processed together (parallel processing of data, such as water and glass imagined together). Interpretation or analysis happens only serially (a series of related thought elements. First notice thirst, then relate thirst to a memory of water satisfying thirst, relate it next to water in a glass, etc.). I.e., thinking is serial even when data processing is parallel. Therefore, the brain processes only one thought (a set of related objects) at a time.

The received information density can vary between different information elements (depending on the amount of parallel data processing in each thought and other causes such as sensitivity to different information elements) and also between the repetitions of learning of a single information element.

Since information can be received (thought) serially, the amount of pleasure from an information element is proportional to the duration of the information reception from that information element to quench the thirst for information and the density of the information element. Therefore, if a person can get continuous top pleasure forever in deep meditation, meditational bliss is the best pleasure.

Subconscious-mind:

The existence of subconscious or unconscious mind does not have any firm proof. For example, if you are struggling for an idea in your work, the chances of getting a good idea are better when you take a break and then return to work than when you continuously keep thinking for an idea in the work environment. This could be, as a break takes a man out of a single dimensional thinking on the problem, or the brain regained thinking ability after some rest from serious thinking. There need not necessarily be an unconscious process running during a work break. Its existence cannot be proven with the available data. Further, all the behaviors interpreted traditionally as resulting from subconscious or unconscious mind can also be interpreted through the alternative explanations like above and/or other known psychodynamic integrative concepts (integrative analysis by the brain is also explained in the execution steps of the operating system of the brain above).

 

Conclusions

1.     Animals with brains have thirst for information. Pleasure is the state of the brain when knowing new or decayed (forgotten) information. The state of being thirsty (not knowing information) due to analytical thinking or lack of information availability is sadness (mental pain).

2.     Physical pain and some strong interrupting senses (such as a very strong smell of a fish or a strong bitter taste) distract the brain from knowing any information and thus cause sadness. The brain does not (cannot) consider the information in physical pain and some strong interrupting senses for enjoyment.

3.     Animals evolved to have thirst for information because it is the only effective way for them to actively interact with nature for survival, which is buzzing with information of light, sound, chemical reactions and pressure. The process of gathering information and rejecting physical pain and strong interruptions is the living in animals.

4.     Animal brains experience some baseline pleasure in the form of general bliss (happiness) in the absence of interruptions and distractions. Animals with brains evolved to have happiness so that animals do not hook on less dense (less enjoyable) information (for example, solid memorization of which specific known stone shape is in which specific known place, solid memorization of phone numbers, etc.), which is abundant in the vicinity of the animals. Additionally, happiness is not as rich in information density as many information elements are. This makes animals to interact with nature actively for information-rich sources and thus increases the chances of survival. Since pleasure comes from memorization(of information) and also the activated hedonic brain circuitry during all pleasant feelings is common, happiness must be some kind of information originating from within the brain itself.

5.     The decisions of the buddhi are influenced by environmental stimulations. The analytical decisions of the mind (manas) are influenced by the buddhi. Additionally, the mind may not be able to analyze correctly or sufficiently sometimes irrespective of the influence of the buddhi.

6.     The information density from meditational bliss is probably greater than that from happiness and on par with the densest information coming through the sense organs, in the near complete absence of interruptions, distractions and other thoughts. Therefore, meditation may be the best way to quench the thirst for information, as meditational bliss can be experienced continuously throughout life in the absence of interruptions and distractions. Therefore, meditating may be the most pleasurable way of living.

 

Statement of data availability:

Data sharing is not applicable to this article, as no new data was created in this study.

Statement of ethical approval:

Ethical approval is not applicable to this article because this study did not involve any new data creation or analysis, and no animals or humans were involved in the study.

Statement of Conflict of Interest:

The corresponding author declares that there are no conflicts of interest.

Statement of Informed Consent:

Informed consent is not applicable for this study, as no human subjects were involved in this study.

 

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