The binding problem is a central problem in overcoming the mind-body dilemma in both philosophical perspectives of human reality and epistemology as well as in cognitive science and artificial intelligence models of the human brain and mental operation. Basically, we must ask how the brain organizes itself, and integrates its various networks and centers of neural activity, to achieve human consciousness and mind, especially in consideration of highly developed states of human reason and intellect. Analytical approaches have sought mechanical solutions to this central problem, in terms of neural networks and models of the neuron, but these solutions fall short of a complete solution to this kind of problem.

In the anthropology of knowledge there occurs a very similar problem in the question of  (1) linking human cognition to symbolic behavior and (2) extending symbolic behavior to the cultural construction of human reality and to definitions of human culture. This problem is not in fact unrelated, and the theoretical-methodological solution I developed for the latter question in terms of symbolic framing provides a potential solution for the former problem as well.

We may say at the outset that if the human brain is looked at from the standpoint of human systems theory, then we can understand clearly that the mind is the central emergent property of the integration of the brain, and the components of the brain maintain themselves in a complex and dynamic kind of equilibrium, involving normally a diurnal-nocturnal cycle of sleep and wakefulness. We can further say that because symbolic behavior and integration appears to be the uniquely defining characteristic of human mind, as opposed to that of other known animals, then we can understand that the emergent integration of the mind has to do with the mechanical organization of the brain to produce symbolic awareness. This symbolic awareness is behaviorally expressed and linguistically encoded and articulated. 

We can attribute by inference states of mind to other species of animal, especially obvious in highly intelligent animals. Experiments with primates teach us that primate intelligence is as sophisticated as human intelligence in many dimensions and shows many of the same basic components of symbolic self-awareness and self-reflection that is characteristic of human conscious awareness. Primates in captivity take readily to human cultural preoccupations and patterns, and primates in natural settings have demonstrated the emergence of rudimentary cultural adaptations and expectable variability of patterning between different groupings.

If we examine what is unique about human knowledge systems, and universal to these systems, compared to inferable animal states and systems of knowledge, we can apply primarily the trait of "world openness" to human knowledge systems versus what can be called an "Uexkullian closed world" of the animal. We may state a continuing human plasticity to learn and adapt to the environment on the basis of cognitive processing of perceptual inputs and behavioral interactions that continues throughout the life cycle. We can refer as well to what can be called the cognitively directed behavior that is relatively independent of instinctual constraints or basic drives, though obviously influenced by these drives. Human beings demonstrate a remarkable degree of voluntarism and arbitrary willpower, as well as a cunning of foresight and planning.

Human knowledge systems can be said to be symbolic systems of encoded signals that have a material form and that demonstrate basic design features of human language. We may refer to these as linguistically encoded cultural texts. These systems provide largely directive or alternative relative templates that are used for guiding human behavior, or alternatively for the symbolic justification and rationalization of events. In preliterate or oral societies, knowledge systems largely took the form of mythologies and associated magical lore that were utilized to explain and organize the world, including human social relationships. Story telling has been an important part of this process. Encoding often to the form of ritual performance and even architectural construction and aesthetic design in folk arts.

With the advent of systems of writing, attributed in the main to the need for record-keeping connected to the rise of large scale state-organized systems, and the advent of craft and labor specialization as well as the rise of a formal priesthood, human knowledge systems took on a sense of developmental differentiation that allowed a new level of understanding and comprehension of the world to be achieved. Associated with this is a sense of abstraction and awareness of conceptual independence of ideas from realities. Associated with this also is the classical idea of the "Birth of Tragedy"--the rise of an Apollonian virtue theory of the rule of law and order and the regulated organization of human society. Vast repositories of knowledge thus developed that represented organized collections of texts and these provided a framework for extended and systematic systems of knowledge transmission.  

The next revolution of human civilization arrived with the advent of mass printing technologies, which allowed the broad dissemination of texts and provided a basis for increasing rates of literacy. Associated with the advent of printing in Europe was the rise of the Renaissance as well as the early development of a form of market capitalism and early forms of craft and cottage industrialization. The key noetic transformation of human knowledge systems was at this period of time the rise of science and the rise of a non-idealized and naturalized view of humankind. With this came the active exploration of the world and of worldview, and the development of a broader range of alternative systems of knowledge. Associated with this was the questioning of basic precepts and dogmas by which traditional cultural knowledge and worldview had been organized, particularly as a product of a Medieval Scholasticism that was focused on the problem of the exegetical translation and interpretation of sacred texts.

The most recent revolution of human civilization has occurred essentially in the last fifty years with the rise of electronic broad-casting media and especially digital forms of knowledge recording and storage. I see the advent of the Internet and newer satellite based wireless technologies to be an extension of the same processes begun with the radio and television broadcasting of the previous era, as well as with photographic and film recording technologies. 

We are today in the midst of this newest knowledge revolution and we do not know the consequences of this in terms of the patterns of integration of our world. We may say clearly that we are dealing with symbolic and organizational structures in the world that are essentially obsolete and that are anachronisms of the past standing in the way of future progress. There is also no way to knowing for certain the outcomes of this direction of development. What can we expect from the future of development. I'm inclined to think that the next knowledge revolution of human civilization will be the achievement of comprehensive systems of integration that are fully automated and that might be based upon hybrid or exotic forms of quantum knowledge storage and manipulation.

General Systems Essays, Vol. II