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Still Here (feat. Tymisha Harris)

from The Rap Guide to Consciousness by Baba Brinkman

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about

Overview:
Even if we don’t have a soul and there isn’t an afterlife and no divine being is looking out for us, we can still find meaning and purpose in the brief time we have to enjoy our conscious experiences. That meaning comes from the people we meet and connect with, the feelings we feel, the ideas we explore, the contributions we make, and the discoveries we pursue as we seek to understand ourselves and the universe. Pretty soon we’ll all be nothing, but until then, we’re still here. So don’t forget to look around and appreciate the perspective you’re fortunate enough to have.

lyrics

Lyrics

I never could sit still and just watch a show from my seat
I had to peak behind the scenes if I was intrigue
Stick my brain inside an fMRI machine
And see this piece of meat that’s somehow my ground of being
Three pounds of ground beef, every single experience
Originates somewhere in its various signal carriers
I met a scientist who could explain the brain areas
Satisfactorily, so I naturally married her
Now I got a baby mama ready with the quickest answers
She’s the opposite of sycophantic with the wicked banter
And if I ever take the kids out and forget the pampers
She flips out like “Use your frickin’ hippocampus!”
She’s got a doctorate in consciousness and taught me lots of it
I get my lyrics peer reviewed over sausages
She loves to break down my views and postulates
And her seal of approval is good for boosting my confidence
And when we get to finishing each other’s thoughts
I wonder where my consciousness starts and her’s stops
I think I must be running her perspective internally
Like a PC on a Mac virtual machine
Baby, maybe one day you’ll lose to me some kind of dementia
And I promise I’ll do my best to always try to remember
But when the connections are severed, what’s left of us?
Let’s make the best of this quick existence, love

We were nothing when this all began
And soon we’ll disappear
And be nothing once again
But until then, we’re still here
We’re stardust, we’re memories
Flesh and blood and self-aware
We’re dancin’ electricity
While we’re still here

So give me roses, give me oceans
Give me love and tears
Give me all the riches of my senses
Stimulation, while I’m still here

Newsflash! It might come as a huge shocker
But there’s no evidence for souls, or chakras
Every mathematician, every musician, author
Architect, smooth talker, nothin’ but clockwork
Awkward! What a terrible tragedy
Everybody hallucinating their own little fantasy
And when the details agree, we call it “reality”
We call it a “self” – it’s a centre of narrative gravity
Another set of cells that tell you how good it feels
Adding to an autobiographical magnetic field
Memories cling to it, and continue to build
Until a person emerges from within a set of skills
A person emerges from a physical brain
Matter in motion, but it can’t remain
There’s no reason to think consciousness continues
After the brain degrades, or moves to different venues
Unless you consider wishful thinkin’ a “reason”
In which case there’s a lot you should probably believe in
But there’s reason to believe in this
We can do things to improve the experience
Of all the other sentient beings sharing this
Sequence of sensational, celebratable moments
So take a deep breath
And see what you notice

We were nothing when this all began
And soon we’ll disappear
And be nothing once again
But until then, we’re still here
We’re stardust, we’re memories
Flesh and blood and self-aware
We’re dancin’ electricity
While we’re still here

So give me roses, give me oceans
Give me love and tears
Give me all the riches of my senses
Stimulation, while I’m still here

Anil Seth:
With a greater sense of understanding
Comes a greater sense of wonder
And a greater realization that we are part of
And not apart from the rest of nature
And, when the end of consciousness comes
There’s nothing to be afraid of
Nothing at all

credits

from The Rap Guide to Consciousness, released April 20, 2018
(D. Brinkman, T. Caruana, T. Harris)
Produced and Mixed by Tom Caruana
Keys by Simon Kendall

Further reading:
• www.brainpickings.org/2016/05/31/sean-carroll-the-big-picture/
• www.preposterousuniverse.com/poetic-naturalism/

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Baba Brinkman New York, New York

Science rapper and inventor of several novel hip-hop variants. Canadian transplant to New York. Pathological optimist.

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