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Human Complexity: A Symphony of Vital Rhythms

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The Patient as a Person

Part of the book series: New Paradigms in Healthcare ((NPH))

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Abstract

Discussing the “patient as a person” issue is a challenging proposal for a new work direction for the health care provider, closely connected to the fundamental but totally unsettled problem of the emergence of consciousness. I emphasize the concept of group mind, proposed by McDougall in 1921, to establish the social nature of what the psychologists call unconscious and I emphasize the bottom-up nature of the process of self-organization that has led to the establishment of this social mind. My group is working on a solid foundation of a process of self-organization that applies to human beings and to the neurons of the brain as well. This new theory emphasizes the importance of crucial events for intelligence and innovation and it predicts a surprisingly efficient transportation of information between the brain and the social mind. The definition of unconscious implies a close connection between the patient and his/her social environment that the health care providers should take into account. On the other hand, the process of self-organization is made with a theoretical approach based on the rhythms of biological processes, thereby leading me to adopt the metaphor of conductor-less orchestra. This explains also why music may play an important role as a therapy, under the condition of resting on the high variability shared by both the brain and the group mind. This chapter reflects the main results of my own group in the last 30 years and it should be considered only as one of the many instruments and voices that hopefully will contribute in establishing the practice of new medicine in the near future.

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Acknowledgments

PG warmly thanks ARO for support through Grant No. W911NF-15-1-0245.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Nonlinear Science, University of North Texas, Denton, USA

    Paolo Grigolini

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  1. Paolo Grigolini
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Correspondence to Paolo Grigolini .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Clinical Physiology Institute, CNR, Pisa, Italy

    Alessandro Pingitore

  2. Civilisation and Forms of Knowledge Department, Universita di Pisa, Pisa, Italy

    Alfonso Maurizio Iacono

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Grigolini, P. (2023). Human Complexity: A Symphony of Vital Rhythms. In: Pingitore, A., Iacono, A.M. (eds) The Patient as a Person. New Paradigms in Healthcare. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23852-9_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23852-9_12

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