Galen Strawson seems to be suggesting that there are rich multi-level degrees of experience in our reality. All things are able to experience at some level.
The Idea that there is only one subject, NOT a self-reflective planning being but, rather simply "that which experiences"(as a unitary spatiotemporally unbound field), is the most parsimonious, self consistent & explanatorily powerful hypothesis currently on the table imo. & it is NOT at all what is meant by solipsism as typically defined. Literally everything is "in" that one mind which exists. That includes ALL matter/energy, spacetime itself & most importantly even all of the seemingly "separate" minds & their associated brains. That is very different from saying that everything "is" aware. The BIG difference is that it does grant individual inner experience to ALL creatures(as proper "parts" of TWE ) as opposed to subatomic particles for instance. The inanimate universe as a whole is what the "rest" of mind/TWE looks like via perception from the perspective of those seemingly separate proper "parts". A modern monistic analytic straight up idealism like "Kastrup's alters" is what currently connects the most dots & by FAR imo. Funny how Robert tends to always shy away from such notions yet much more deeply entertains virtually all other obviously flawed alternative isms like panpsychism. But at least it has finally become "fashionable" to oppose mainstream physicalism bc its so obviously flawed.
Well stated. I know Robert is acquainted with Bernardo Kastrup, but he's never done a Closer to Truth interview with him. I don't know why, other than it's a reflection of Robert's physicalist prejudice. I follow a lot of Galen's ideas, but he does not appear to be familiar with Kastrup. If the two of them were to have a dialogue, I bet there would be more agreements than disagreements.
@iarguephilosophy To avoid infinite regress, you can't go on explaining one thing in terms of another forever. That mind is the only thing in the reduction base, which is used to subsequently explain everything else. & you can't say much else about it, aside from it too is also mental/experiential in nature. Just like the only thing we can ever be sure of, our own C, where everything both begins & ends, as far as we're concerned. It makes the totally abstract shadow universe of materialism seem silly imo. & unlike panpsychism which also bypasses the hard problem, it does so without a combination issue & in a way thats not inconsistent with anything we know from physics. Though at least the Panpsychists are brave enough to abandon the mainstream narrative. In short, that mind would be the unified field of QFT from physics (if it was singular as opposed to 17?). You don't ask where your starting assumption(s) come from. It would be like asking a materialist where do those constants of nature / dead particles/waves/fields come from, they just are. The idea of "in"(space itself) may have no intrinsic meaning at the fountainhead of existence itself.
@iarguephilosophy That is of course still one of the BIG Q's. I'd say not exactly but kind of sort of 🤪. There is a 7-part video playlist on Essentia foundation's channel that gives quite a comprehensive overview.
Yeah yeah, it is simultaneously one subject and 7 billion separated subjects. Not only that doesn't make any sense (decombination problem), but it is also not clear at all how those subjects can share an objective world and be inside each others subjective world. Kastrup is a meme 👎
It is such an incredibly large leap to go from: I have a mind (as far as I know, the mind comes only from the brain) which perceives things and I can only detect things if the mind is active. To: There is one mind in the universe and our minds are just a mode of that mind or whatever squishy language you wish to choose. To me, this seems like an excellent case for simply saying "I don't know what the origin in nature of consciousness is". We know we can systematically destroy someone's consciousness by destroying physical parts of the brain until the heart stops beating and the brain no longer has any activity. I don't know how you conclude anything except "the default position is that the brain is the likely origin of the mind in the individual and it remains to be demonstrated that this mind is part of some consciousness or mind outside that body".
Which is exactly why these conversations are so important right now because, many would say to the contrary, that the millions of documented cases like Near Death Experiences, remote viewing, experiments involving mediums and so on have abundantly shown that there seems to be access to consciousness outside the current paradigm of physical mind, brain, physical consciousness. And so it has become incredibly important to explore how such a system might work and in what ways we may have to alter our understanding of consciousness to accommodate the growing set of evidence. This is just science doing science. Old frameworks get replaced all the time, and for the most part there is resistance to these changes until they become the standard.
I would also add that these concepts are truly hard to conceive until you’ve had experiences that utterly uproot your understanding of consciousness (which, I’ll suggest, is not interchangeable with ‘the mind’ as it appears in your comment). In my case, I would’ve 100% agreed with you until a year ago when I had my near death experience. Words can’t describe how transformative such experiences are. Meditation can open you to all sorts of things if you’re willing to let your belief expand beyond your current system.
@@PerkBuilders That is just a personal experience. In no way can you demonstrate that consciousness exists separate from the brain, let alone that it permeates all matter.
@@infinitemonkey917 and as well, with that frame of thought, every scientific observation ever made, since the beginning of humanity, has been a ‘personal experience’ made by a conscious observer; a personal experience verified by many other people who also happen to experience the same observation.
These ideas have been buzzing round my brain for several years now. Strawson’s writing is well-written and has enable me to understanding panpsychism better, but they’re not knock-down definitive. Mind is difficult for a physicalist tending to monism.
Yup. I'm right there with you. When people say that the mind "emerges" from the brain's activity, that means as much to me as if someone said, "Well, stability emerges if you give a two-legged stool a third leg." I have one of those WTF responses. The stool gains stability because the opposing vectors of force balance out. There's no "emerging". We just haven't figured out how to express as well what happens when the brain "minds".
The subject is a social construct. Humans infer its existence as a result of social intuition, which is deeply rooted. Language, which is obviously for socialising, is also heavily presupposed with the subject. I propose that the subject is likely an illusion, meaning its fundamental essence or substance is not what it appears. In this view, the subject _is_ the quale. There are only qualia, including the ones about being someone or having a viewpoint. There is no "you". There is only experience, as one unified happening.
when causation (subjective) produces physical action, it also produces conscious awareness of both the physical action and the subjective cause? physical action is consciously experienced by subjective cause?
This was interesting. He sort of threw a spinball at the end though. I think it is useful to discern between "organisms" and "aggregates". An organism would be a unified subject, whereas an aggregate is only (or mostly) merely a collection of simpler subjects, including possibly a collection only of the simplest level of all subjects -- be it atoms or fundamental particles, if indeed these things do exist anything like they are currently conceived. Some centuries of materialism have left us with the illusion that a "particle" can't be a subject.... but I don't see much of a strong argument for that case at all. It can especially be a subject in a pan-experientialist picture even more than in a panpsychist (referencing psyche) picture, literally taken. The "subject" expressing as a subatomic particle need be no more than an ultra-rudimentary experience-to-itself of the small energy differential or behaviour that it is. It clearly does not have to be a tiny "mind" in there. So that problem is not really that "hard", philosophically speaking. The issue of One Divine Subject versus multiple (or multitudinous) subjects is more thorny. It doesn't seem that that which is multiple could be the ground of being (for what would it be multiplying out of or from?). So perhaps the ground of being is the "ground" of subjectivity that is not yet **actually** a subject until it is expressed as one or another kind of information-energy packages, whether that be as simple as a subatomic particle or as complex as a giraffe, or as "aggregate" as a table or a shoe. It is also possible that subjects are stacked Russian doll fashion (holonically) rather than just vertically or side by side. So for instance, the atoms in your body may be rudimentary subjects, somewhat in themselves, but also a contributing part of, and in a sense absorbed into, the larger subject that is you (the human) perhaps also with other intermediate layers between. Likewise, we could be subjects (though not necessarily finally independent, absolute subjects) within larger structures, such as species subjectivities, all the way up to the whole of nature, or the whole of cosmos, traditionally called "God" by whatever way one wishes to interpret that term. In that picture, only the top level subject would be truly unconditional. Other subjects would exist by way of it. To take the human "organism" again, you couldn't have a heart or lungs without the atoms of them, to be sure, but you ALSO couldn't have the heart and lungs without the existence of the organism's top-level holon, its "human-ness". It would also be possible, I guess, to furnish a viewpoint where the ground as the ground of subjectivity only, gives rise to multiple but essentially independent layers of "subjects". In that situation, your subjecthood would not finally be dependent upon your relation to an ultimate or top-level subject (God), but something that exists in you simply as a unified expression from the subject-spawning (but itself subjectless) ground of being (as opposed to an aggregate like a table or shoe, see above). For my money though, I think it's a peculiar mixture of both.
Very interesting comment! However, I don't think it's really that easy to get from an "ultra-rudimentary experience-for-itself" to human minds without postulating that the rudimentary forms of experience constitute, in some sense, "tiny minds". If classically the problem for all sorts of "emergence" theories of mind has been to explain at precisely which point of material complexity minds emerge and why, then I think your answer (to this particular question) just ends up not answering this question. If those rudimentary forms of experience don't really constitute minds, at what point of experiential complexity do we call something "a mind"? One possible way forward would be to actually eliminate talk about "minds". Could we make do with only talking about different forms and gradations of experience? I agree that, for example, "atomic subjects of experience" most probably don't have self-consciousness in the way that we do (or at least think we do). But if we want to say that we have "minds" and atomic subjects lack them, a further account of the emergence of minds from mere experience is required.
@@WelkinShaman I see the question of whether something is a "mind" or not as secondary. What matters is whether there is experientiality, i.e. "something that there is to be...(that thing). We humans have added layers, such as, we can recognise and discuss that there is "something that there is to be us" which particles or even human "dream selves" are unlikely to be able to do...but still experiential, I think.
@@greensleeves7165 I get you, and I very much agree with you: the "what's-it-likeness" is central, further layers such as being able to self-reflect or narrativize those experiences are secondary. I gues I just wanted to nitpick on the question of whether experientiality requires a "mind".
Strawson wrote a short essay in 2015 entitled 'Nietzsche's Metaphysics?'. In it he gives a detailed brief description on his fundamental view of reality with reference to Nietzsche. It's very interesting as his explains his 'identity metaphysics'. He does not mention panpsychism in it. I read it when it was first published and read it again after seeing this interview. He does not subscribe to the idea of "human-ness" and is against what he calls separatism and staticism; in fact he does not see any real or fundamental distinction between object/process/ property/state/event in reality these are more to do with our language he says.
If people believe consciousness is more then the brain then why can the consciousness change when there is braindamage like a tumor or something like that. Where does the consciousness go when we are under anesthesics ? Why does the consciousness of people with demention change ? And i know there are people who say that the brain is like a radio and is only receiving the signals (consciousness) and if the radio is broken , the signal doesn't do his work. But if that is true then consciousness is useless if the receiver (the brain) is damaged or death? Or can someone explain me otherwise?
This is certainly intersting. I profoundly admire Spinoza too! What I don’t get is why conciousness emerging from ‘subjective’ particles is any more or less plausible than arguing conciousness emerges from quantitative matter. In other words, the hard problem is still there - yes, it’s a slightly different hard problem. And we still have no explanation for the nature or thesis to explain emergence. I don’t see this resolving any of our existing problems?
You raise an important issue about panpsychism that is simply not addressed in the video. That said, it is not consciousness _per se_ that emerges because it is there all along, from bottom up. Rather what emerges (in some arrangements of matter but not in others) is a new distinct and unified _subject._ Items like pants, shirts and tables are not unified objects the way that humans (and doubtless other animals) are. Perhaps that is the crucial factor. However, with that nuance in place, I think you are quite right - it is no more obvious how a new unified subject can emerge from all the little sub-atomic subjects than it is how consciousness can emerge from non-conscious matter. (The original hard problem.) It gets worse. What leaves the 'hard problem' even more intact is that there seems little discussion of how the physical and experiential aspects of, say, an electron are supposed to be related. That too should ring bells. I think that panpsychism simply buries this 'hard problem' deeper down, and the threat (if it is one) of dualism gets buried along with it - though, crucially, still left breathing. Frankly I am not convinced that the cost of this panpsychist burial of the 'hard problem' is worth it. All it offers is the blind hope that no one will notice that it is just as much without solution as it always has been. Panpsychists, I feel, are the philosophical equivalent of ostriches. Poor Galen - and I do like him. I think also that the whole concept of an 'emergent property', where there is no reductionist aspect to go with it (as there is with solidity and liquidity, for instance) is little more that an appeal to sheer magic plus the endlessly repeated but nonetheless hopeless issuing of the good old promissory note that one day science may elucidate the matter.
@@theophilus749 great comment - I’m on board with everything you said! Yep - I see what you mean re emergence! That does seem to be the panpsychist view. Yes I think you’re correct about the panpsychist hard problem being more about the subject arising out of the concious particles - which is a much easier problem than the classic Chalmers hard problem of conciouness arising out of matter. But I agree too - while the problem of subjectivity is much easier to solve that the Hard Problem the issue with panpsychism is the relationship between matter and conciousness - it does have an almost dualist flavour. I know Goff argues that it is the properties of spin and charge of the particle that are the conciousness - so he maintains nothing new is added. But it does still leave an exeplanatory gap - namely why are spin and charge concious properties? The problems just seem to regress back one level? Another thing I really struggle with re panpsychism is a much more straight forward skepticism of - what reason do we have to think that innate material objects are concious? Aside from it allows a neat solution to other philosophical problems? And why do organisms have observable concious behaviors when clouds, tables, phones etc do not? I put panpsychism in the interesting but I’m not convinced basket…
@@dhammaboy1203 Hello Again, and many thanks for your kind comment. I will pick up on just one point you make, though. You say that "Aside from it allowing a neat solution to other philosophical problems" that panpsychism leaves you unconvinced. I am glad you are unconvinced, but just that would be a pretty _good_ reason to accept panpsychism, wouldn't it ? - if it could pull off such a monumental achievement. There are many philosophical solutions to many philosophical problems but few are good enough to offer neat solutions to _other_ philosophical problems. Indeed, most struggle to be satisfactory solutions even to their _own_ problem, never mind others. Not too worry though, we seem to think that panpsychism _fails_ to offer any neat solution even to its own problem, that it merely buries the problems further down, leaving only the appearance of being a solution. Your struggle is well placed, though, and I'm entirely with you. If there's a problem of how human beings can be concious then it's little wonder that there's an even bigger problem with how ever smaller items (electrons, for example) can be conscious. What could it be _like_ to be an electron? I'll give panpsychism one team-point, though: it is at lest well motivated. It at least accepts that consciousness cannot be understood as a mere ghostly epiphenomenon riding on the back of processes described in merely physicalist terms. Whatever else can be said of consciousness, it really does seem more fundamental than that. Panpsychism may be a rather daft solution, even slightly neurotic, but it is the last word in calm thinking compared with the near clinical insanity of the believe that consciousness is an illusion.
You are right to some extent. That's a problem for emergent panpsychism. So not only it shares the same problem but also undermines the motivation behind panpsychism, and postulating micro experinces seems unnecessary. If someone is not an emergent panpsychist, then faces the combination problem.
@@theophilus749 two solutions that I think are quite interesting are Bernardo Kastrup’s Analytical Idealism (a modern revision of Idealism which is controversial but very well argued by Kastrup) and Hoffman’s Concious Realism which argues that consciousness is a universal primitive IOW - it’s fundamental (and yes he then argues that it’s been here since the start of the universe). Hoffman makes it clear he’s not arguing for Idealism btw. I also like Jackson’s epiphenomenal qualia (which I must admit suffers from the usual issues of pure physicalist world views where conciouness start to sounds like an almost magical property). Any theories of conciousness you like that I should check out?
If we could answer the question as to where consciousness "goes" when an anesthetic is administered we would have a better idea of what it actually is (or is not).
Isn't that how Roger Penrose thinks we ought to proceed? There is also the questions of where does consciousness 'go' when we sleep or how is it altered by the ingestion of certain plants or drugs that appear to have some sort of natural connection to our brain chemisty. it is an interesting topic.
@@divertissementmonas It is interesting, also scary. Scary because every test I have ever heard of suggests strongly that it is a physical manifestation of the brain. I'm 77 years of age. This scares me.
@@jamesnordblom855 I'm 75. It scares me, too. I watched my mother, a very intelligent person, mentally disintegrate in her old age as her brain slowly turned into Swiss cheese and the person I knew all my life disappeared bit by bit. And, I wept for her fears and her terrors and her tears and her begging me to help her, and there was nothing I could do. That was a very persuasive argument that consciousness is physical. And, she hasn't contacted me since she left. So, there's that, too.
6:10 - wow, what a strong resistance Robert has to the fact that idealism is not just a concept of religious people, it's the belief and the field of work of MANY scientists also, which he didn't mention. He tries to disregard idealism as a valid hypothesis for science, that's obvious right at the beginning when he calls it "ridiculous", which is a very inelegant way to start a conversation with someone that may be flirting with that hypothesis... ultimately it's inelegant period, no matter what's the stance of the other person. But he presents no argument to debunk idealism, just calls it ridiculous. Well, that's not high-level debate. Idealism is as legitimate a hypothesis as physicalism. And there are very serious and competent scientists working on that hypothesis (many of them were already interviewed here). If it weren't legitimate as a hypothesis, it should be simply promptly refuted by physicalist scientists. But why hasn't it been refuted yet? Because it's hard to do that. As long as it's not possible to refute it so far, it remains a valid hypothesis and can reconcile many aspects of reality that physicalism can not.
Well said!!! I do enjoy Robert's Closer to Truth series. He's one of the best interviewers around, with the scientific credentials to dig deep into the issues. But he does have a physicalist-reductionist mindset, which is clearly evident in most if not all of his presentations.
To say that a claim which has no empirical evidence to support it is hard to disprove isn't saying much. That also makes it hard to prove. When you contemplate _that_ difficulty with respect to proof, you might begin to suspect that there's no there there. And, isn't this the fundamental problem with any claim that is not based upon physical evidence? Not just the evidence that something exists but also the evidence that some process is involved, that something is actually happening, i.e. cause and effect. I often get the feeling, when listening to some of Robert's interviews, that I've traveled back in time to the Middle Ages, and I'm listening to a discussion of how many angels might be able to dance on a pin.
@@1thomson Generally speaking, philosophical questions, by definition, are not the type of questions that can be proved or disproved by empirical evidence. That's why they fall in the realm of philosophy rather than science. Physicalism cannot be proved by empirical evidence, either. It is based on the belief and assumption that "matter" (whatever matter is), is not conscious. Indeed, one of the strongest points that Galen Strawson repeatedly makes is that there is no evidence whatsoever upon which to base this physicalist assumption, and that the only thing we can know with absolute certainty is that consciousness exists.
A hypothesis must be rooted to reality and the laws of nature ... otherwise they are just "stories" and can never be test & confirmed to be fact. Only an Intelligence with a Mind, free will, nature & consciousness ... makes abstract & physical Functions. Man is a physical intelligence ... with a physical body ... & .... has the Mind of an Intelligence. Do the maths.
@@nietztsuki Speaking of Medieval thinking, I suppose that I'm applying Occam's Razor. Why posit the existence of something when it's not necessary to do so in order to explain what's happening? Of course, Descartes' argument for believing that we exist because we experience our own consciousness is persuasive. But then, he had to posit the existence of God to explain how he could believe what his indisputably existing consciousness was telling him about everything else. Unfortunately, that part of his argument never quite convinced me. I'm just too lazy, I guess. I accept that my fallible senses are, indeed, reacting to something real "out there" and that I'm not just a brain-in-a-jar, alone in the Universe-of-Me. Of course, I can't prove that, either. It just feels right. Oh, God, I'm making an intuitionist argument, aren't I? It's all falling apart. Strawson just confuses me. One of my best friends worships Strawson. We argue all the time. It's wonderful. But, I still think I'm right, and he's wrong. So, there. 😏
2:20 Well, no. The Buddha's theory of dependent origination is exactly a description of how consciousness arises without there being a self that is the experiencer.
It does seem that particles are reacting to one another. So in a sense they have some sort of awareness of their state. Extremely primitive, but they are reacting to their environment. Perhaps the reaction is the basis for awareness and it's a cumulative result.
@@francesco5581 I would argue that the accumulation of reactions results in intelligence somehow. Not necessarily that a particle is inherently intelligent.
I think it's a bit of a jump to postulate rudimentary awareness on the basis of particle physics. Based on our empirical evidence particles (on the atomic level, don't know enough about quantum states to really talk about them) could just as well be "dumb matter" caught in causal chains that are governed by the laws of physics (the classical mechanical view of nature). I think that at least at this point in the development of empirical methods there can't really be empirical evidence for particles being aware or having a rudimentary experience. The evidence for this hypothesis comes from philosophical reasoning.
The mind is physical emerging with quantum events. Consciousness is fundamental and predates quantum events and is not subject to anything elemental. When we understand vibration and how the three forces impact and guide it, all will likely become more clear.
This is just quasi religious transfiguration. It's the vanity of the human mind, the desperation to be meaningful that makes you "think" your mind is more than just a physical function of your body to just keep it alive at low costs. Energy is not "experience". Gosh... this is so close to esotericism. Cringe.
Perhaps Fiona MacPherson correctly sees Galen Strawson endorsing a property dualism of some sort ie: "This paper is divided into two main sections. The first articulates what I believe Strawson's position to be. I contrast Strawson's usage of 'physicalism' with the mainstream use. I then explain why I think that Strawson's position is one of property dualism and substance monism. In doing this, I outline his view and Locke's view on the nature of substance. I argue that they are similar in many respects and thus it is no surprise that Strawson actually holds a view on the mind much like one plausible interpretation of Locke's position. Strawson's use of terminology cloaks this fact and he does not himself explicitly recognize it in his paper. In the second section, I outline some of Strawson's assumptions that he uses in arguing for his position. I comment on the plausibility of his position concerning the relation of the mind to the body compared with mainstream physicalism and various forms of dualism. Before embarking on the two main sections, in the remainder of this introduction, I very briefly sketch Strawson's view." Source: MacPherson, F. Property dualism and the merits of solutions to the mind-body problem: A reply to Strawson. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):72-89 (2006) And this does seem to me to jive with Diane O'Leary's view that property dualism is what can help medicine in it's current state of confusion: "Awais Aftab: Your impressive work on dualism in medicine and psychiatry has forced me and many others in medicine and psychology to reexamine long-standing assumptions. I would refer readers to your papers on medicine’s metaphysical confusion, the biopsychosocial model, and your recorded talk as part of the Philosophy of Psychiatry webinar series to learn about your views in detail.1-3 Can you briefly explain your argument that medicine has misunderstood dualism?... Source: Aftab, A. The Case for Dualism in Medicine-Philosophical Misunderstandings and Clinical Implications: Diane O’Leary, PhD. Psychiatric Times. July 20, 2023. Vol. 40, No. 7
Breath in and you focus/concentrate/more conscious towards someone you talk with,,breath out and you feel more focus FROM the person towards YOU. (atleast with my schizophrenia)
As a neuroethologist myself, very interested in how the brain construct reality from multimodel perception I find difficult to follow these ideas even though I am really interested also in the philosophical aspects surrounding consciousness I mean I think I don’t get the full point of his non-idealism but pan psych view…
Don't waste your time on panschycism, because it is a dualist concept. All dualist concepts are trash. There are two non dualist concepts - materialism and the philosophy of non duality belonging to eastern mysticism. Now, materialism is a chauvinist or a dogmatic philosophy because it steamrolls its opposing views without providing satisfactory reason to do so. They mystic view, on the other hand, is based on inner subjective experience of a few who can acquire the ultimate knowledge by enhancing their perception which enables them to experience all the dimensions of reality. The problem with this approach is that inner subjective experience does not belong to the scientific domain.
All of this is simple & obvious .... but Man chooses to ignore the obvious because he believes otherwise. Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today. The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function. The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain. Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence. Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions. The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence. The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul). The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul). Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence. Everything in the Universe ... including Man (Intelligence) ... is a Function. Machine Analogies .... are OBSERVATIONS .... by the only known intelligence in the Universe that natural processes ( eg Universe, Life) are like like Unnatural processes ( machines or physical Functions). Man knows only an intelligence like Man makes things that are processes with purpose & form/design( functions). Free will Nature & Consciousness are simply functions of the Mind of an Entity. Animals & Man are Natural Entities .... with a natural mind (brain) ... and there own form of free will, nature & consciousness because Man is the only known Intelligence is the Universe(Function). And again, you all will completely ignore this simple fact ... because you have free will, nature & consciousness to think, believe, say & do whatever you want with the facts & evidence .... that proves God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago. smh
Sir, the brain is just the organ of consciousness. It's the sensorium; it simply supplies the transcendental personality connected to it with data via the neuronal signaling mechanism. And this data is used by the conscious personality who is _by nature_ a thinker, a feeler and a great integrator to obtain a "taste" of the sense-objects of the material world.
Imagine a nonphysical consciousness attaches a second time to a person. Is that what makes some smarter than others? Some try to say that consciousness is non physical, then why and how it attaches to each new born human? and is it possible to have two or three consciousness? People are confused, they don't realize that there are different qualities of consciousness, and that consciousness is a physical property of every human body. Just because no one has recognized consciousness in a human body it doesn't mean it does not exist.
If all particles theoretically arise from fundamental quantum fields, it’s theoretically possible that individual consciousness arises from a consciousness field. The field of the observer.
Big fat nope on OP. But since Existence manifests itself in such amazing ways, it's not impossible in theory for consciousness to arise in other forms besides animals.
@@javiej Plants, animals, fungi, all living creatures seem to have consciousness, though, with respect to non-humans, they can not directly report on their experience.
@@prestonbacchus4204 I was just giving a first example, as requested. Other animals with neural systems also have consciousness in some degree, we have experiential evidence that they exhibit typical behaviour caused by "feelings" such as experiencing panic, dreaming, etc. But there is no indication than plants and other organisms without neurons have it. (Note I'm not saying that there can not be other non neuralogical based ways to experiment feelings, just that we have no experimental evidence for this)
Galen repeats that "the subject of experience cannot be in itself an idea".I wonder how we could analyse this claim in detail, there is a lot into it begging precise justification. The whole chat leaves a bit question mark in my mind. What is mean here by "an idea"? Maybe I am missing something, but this whole discussion seems like terribly shallow to me, wrt most theories of the mind and subjectivity. What am I missing ? Most cimplex phenomena in nature are not compositional in the way Galen suggests. E.g. it is not true that every subatomic particle has a "bit of life", or that every subatomic particle of a piano has a "bit of music", or that every word has a bit of a poem, or every transistor on my lap has "a bit of computing power". This seems too simplistic, almost medieval.
How can anyone claim there’s nothing physical about the mind when we dream, every night, we are literally conscious in non physical constructs of our mind every night.
What they are so stubborn about is how the physical view though highly effective is in fact derivative. However idealism is considered "unscientific" while they ruminate in: "The Mystery of Consciousness"
@@visancosmin8991 Mainstream establishment thinker's. In a way he's right except he should say "everything appears to be ideas" which would be trivial if they actually had a proper fundamental theory of experience. The appearance of God, the cosmic, the other etc. would be obvious "illusions" or ideas if they actually understood the "deeper mechanics" inside of the cell. Instead they get Nobel Laureates and other "expert theorists" to write and sell books. However most of these people are not gifted with engineering expertise, experience and insights on how complex systems work, so they have a difficult time dismissing a lot of extraneous information. A good engineering mind thinks in terms of time domains and not just bandies about terms like energy, physical, consciousness etc.
Subjects, ideas, matter, feelings, energies, forces... It's all the same. We make up the differences just by context or points of view. We're actually not defining things, we're just contextualizing, and trying to contextualize (define) consciousness can only be a mistake generated by a biased (contextual) understanding of reality. It's like trying to contextualize the contextualizing itself!
I prefer panvitalism to panpsychism. It seems to me that all entities in the universe are alive to some extent, but most have no mental aspects (and don't need them). The whole point of experiencing is being able to do something about those experiences. There's no sense in, say, a rock experiencing its existence if it can only offer passive resistance to assaults. That would be hell. On the other hand, stars and planets have their own way of living, and we are an extension and expression of their lives. You might point out that a rock is not alive, but it is a part of a larger living system. Likewise, the billions of dead cells in your body, about to be recycled, are not alive either, but they are also part of a larger living system.
To be made OF something is not the same as being made BY something... Idealism says everything is made OF ideas, but it's made BY consciousness. Materialism says everything's made OF matter, but it's made BY cause and effect, or the "laws of the universe". To say a thing is made OF something is to identify it's components, BY identifies it's creator. So idealism's definition is fine. Reality is made OF ideas, and is made BY mind.
Do thoughts create mind or does mind create thoughts or are we simply talking labels in which 'mind' is simply the collective noun for thoughts? If thoughts exist then they must have a nature. Is there one fact we know with certainty about the nature of a thought? Is the thought of a tree identical to a tree or does the thought of a tree represent a tree? If thoughts are representations and our minds are made entirely of thoughts, what then is a tree? Surely it must be something? Seems to me this is where the thought of 'matter' comes in pretty handy.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Huh, I replied to your comment, but it looks like it was deleted by YT. I can only assume it was because I included a link to my website... That's annoying.
@@veritopian1823 Again, sans link, might be worth trying. I sometimes lose comments by going away before clicking on REPLY. Yes, annoying, especially if one's comment was unusually brilliant.
Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today. The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function. The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain. Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence. Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions. The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence. The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul). The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul). Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence. There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago. There is no evidence that nature can make the simplest function.
when a new theory or paradigm comes in, it doesn't "throw out" what came before. It encompasses and explains everything better than before. Einstein didn't throw out Newton, he raised Newton's ideas up unto another level. Darwin didn't throw out all systematic biology of his time, he brought it to a whole new universal view. However, when Einstein and Darwin came in, people did have to throw out most of their beliefs. If you study the history of science, you'll become more open-minded to ideas that seem absurd or inconceivable. Science evolves precisely with that. You cannot be a conservative for too long in science. There comes a time when you have to revisit your beliefs and views about reality. The discussion these guys are having in the video is legitimate since everything we can do when we witness the bizarre results of experiments in quantum mechanics is to speculate and try to interpret it in a way that makes sense. And we cannot do it so far. All interpretation is always subject to discussion.
You are happy to throw out the fact that only an Intelligence makes Functions ... and ... Man is the only known Intelligence in the Universe with the INTELLECT to always deduce from OBSERVATION that that anything that is a Process with purpose & form(Function) can only be made by by an entity like Man (Intelligence). There is no evidence that nature & natural process( Functions) can make & operate the simplest physical Function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago .... or .... today. The only evidence we have is Functions are made by an Intelligence. Freewill, nature & consciousness are simply a function of the MIND of an entity. Animals & Man ... are natural entities ... with a natural mind (brain) and their own form of free will,nature & consciousness because is the known INTELLIGENCE is a Universe that is a FUNCTION. Man is a Natural Intelligence with a Mind .... made by ... an UNNATURAL Intelligence with a Mind. The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL (soul/spirit). The Mind of Man ... is natural (brain) & unnatural (soul). There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul .... less than 6 000 years ago. There is no evidence that Nature & natural processes made the Universe & Life which are functions composed of functions. Again. You all reject this simple & obvious fact about Functions ... because you have free will & nature ... to think, believe, say & do whatever you want to the evidence that proves God & a 6 day Creation.
The intelligible realities are not physical, only when the reciprocal, which is matter, recieves the image, like that of a mirror. From clay, a mug is fashioned. We applied this idea to the clay, because of its structure, usage, purpose, we define it not from other clay, but from other contrasting objects of ideas. There is however, only clay. So what is real. I question what I precieve with my two eyes to even be real. It seems real. The cloak is likely not real. If you believe in materialism, you believe in only what you can see and touch.
"The atoms or elementary particles themselves are not real; they form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than one of things or facts." ~Werner Heisenberg
I suspect that panpsychists who see experience as fundamental, and those that see information as fundamental and physical processes as computational are saying the same thing in different language. When he says fundamental particles are experiential I think you could better say that they carry information. Personally I think the latter take is closer to the truth (ha, ha). I think experience and consciousness are forms of information processing, but that doesn't make all information processing experiential. A horse is a form of animal, but that doesn't make all animals horses.
hA guys gr8 viDO, not to bug U but I was jst tryng to find NEthing physical that’s not ‘in the mind’ so-2-sPk.. hav U evr Cn NEthing or heard of NEthing lIk that? Cms a-bit trikE 2 fInd🤔..
Oh wow, an actual lab! Strong emergence of subjectivity may just be a brute fact. It feels like something to be a part of the universe called a 'person' and we're pretty sure the same goes for a universe lump we call a 'cat'. But outside of our own experience the phenomenon is completely inaccessible. We have no experiments and no theory and zero progress has been made for centuries. We can analyze the phenomenon from the outside by comparison but the phenomenon itself remains completely inaccessible. And all of that is indifferent to materialism. Consciousness seems to need a computational substrate but doesn't care what the substrate is made of, and there's no need to posit some magical ingredient that enables consciousness. It just feels like something to be a part of the universe, or more accurately a computational form, and we can characterize it but as to why or how we have zero knowledge down to all derivatives.
if experience is something intrinsic to any element the within a body there would be multiple identities at the same time. maybe there are but they don’t interfere with each other. for example there could be say ten almost identical identities that think they act (no free will) the same way. Anyway I think it’s more likely consciousness is emerging phenomenon that by chance it just happened to occur. That’s because if we analyze the history we had no life, then simple organisms that I don’t see a reason why they would experience anything then brains evolved more and more and at some point consciousness was present which seems like something that simply happened, well sort of, I can’t find a way to explain it clearly. I mean it would require a coincidence. You start with simple mechanical systems then very complex then processing power and at some point consciousness but incidentally the consciousness was actually present at low level?! now even at low level it would be the same mystery except could be even harder to understand.
idea or the better modern term information is indestructible ergo immortal so if you could erase the whole universe they would survive somewhere, but where...
Could physical nature happen inside conscious existence? Might conscious existence form something in physical nature, such as brain, to interact with conscious existence, or mind?
(2:20) *GS: **_"You can't have experience without a subject to be experienced."_* ... There is a "ladder of learning" one must ascend to reach the level of subjective experience: data, then knowledge, then subjective experience, followed by judgment. Prior to Big Bang, Existence stood on the *data* rung of the ladder (mathematics). For the first 10 billion years, Existence stood on the *knowledge* rung (structure). Over the past 4 billion years, Existence has been standing on the *subjective experience* rung of the ladder (life). Now, with the unprecedented emergence of self-aware humans, Existence now stands on the *judgment* rung of the ladder of learning. Our ongoing production of *value judgments* allows "Existence" the necessary data to script the next stage of existential evolution.
@@browngreen933 *"Existence itself doesn't care about us one bit."* ... Science has openly stated that the human brain is _by far_ most highly complex structure in the known universe. If Existence doesn't care, then why didn't it just stick with inanimate structure? Why the evolutionary move into self-awareness?
@@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC Because Existence and evolution don't appear to work on a caring principle. That's our own bias that we bring to the table. Put another way, Existence allows, but Existence (and evolution) don't care.
@@browngreen933 *"Because Existence and evolution don't appear to work on a caring principle."* ... That's not my question. My question is why Existence didn't simply stick with inanimate structure? What compelled Existence to crank out living, self-aware structures that can produce value judgments about Existence when everything could have just as easily remained at the inanimate matter level? You made the claim, "Existence doesn't care about us one bit" ... _so why bother?_ *"Put another way, Existence allows, but Existence (and evolution) don't care."* ... Allows? Did humans make a request to exist ahead of time and Existence/Evolution "allowed" our request to move forward?
If it is at least a "possibility" that Bishop Berkeley was right, in that the universe is the MIND of a higher Being, then that would suggest that all matter throughout the universe, from the fusion cores of the stars, right down to the keyboard you are typing on, is literally alive (note: not conscious, just alive). And that's because all universal matter would be imbued (saturated) with the life essence of this higher Being in precisely the same way that our own life energy infuses and saturates our thoughts and dreams.
@@visancosmin8991 I try to choose my words carefully in these TH-cam comment sections so as not to rattle the cages of the hardcore materialists.😂 However, to your point, it's simply not true that there is _only_ consciousness, for consciousness needs something through-which to express itself (as in something to see, feel, hear, taste, and smell). Hence the duality of mind and matter (with universal matter simply being an extremely advanced and highly resolved version of the same fundamental substance that composes our dreams).
That sounds like hylozoism - Greek hyle 'matter' and zoe 'life'. The belief that matter is intrinsically alive. It differs from panpsychism as they privillage soul/psychic attributes.
Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today. The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function. The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain. Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence. Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions. The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence. The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul). The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul). Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence.
What do you mean by 'Physical" , Atomic Elements ? Most of the Cosmos is really not fundamental as a physical aspect of matter, the idea that all things matter is false, and what the world is really made of, no man knows.
Catholic teachings erroneously allows evolutionary theology and that Creation was NOT over 6 literal days less than 6 000 years ago. The Torah(Bible) is clear that is was 6 days ... and ... for prophesies 1 day is like a year or 1000 years. This is why we have a 6 day creation & 7th day belongs to God .. that Universe is less than 6 x 1000 years old and Jesus will return to rule for 1 x 1000 years to rule the Earth before Judgement day. The Catholic religion is Christian ... but it has introduced false or erroneous teaching. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make & operate the simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago. There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago. Only an intelligence ( who has a Mind, free will, nature, & consciousness) makes Functions. Man is Natural Intelligence ... with a body that is clearly a physical Function composed entirely of functions. The Mind of an intelligence is unnatural (soul/spirit). The Mind of Man is natural (brain) & unnatural ( soul).
Es un error decir que el sistema de Spinoza, es panteista. Panteísta o panteísmo, es una palabra forjada por John Toland entre los siglos 17 y 18, para elogiar al sistema filosófico de Spinoza, interpretando y queriendo Toland dar a entender que Dios es en todo, o está en todas las cosas, y esto es un error de interpretación. Hay otros que han querido indicar que Spinozs no es panteista sino, panenteista. Y también es un error de interpretación.
Subject- placed or situate under. So subject is placed or situated under an idea. To have an idea to create, then comes the subject of the idea. Regardless there has to be something over a subject. Which then gives proof to God and his word. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16.
The Monad is the singularity. The number associated with the Monad is zero. The geometric dimension associated with the Monad is zero-dimensional space. The elementary/fundamental particle associated with the Monad is quarks. 1) no spatial extension 2) zero size 3) exact location only 4) 6000 trillion trillion trillion (39 zeroes after 6k) times stronger than the force of gravity. 0D Monad (SNF) 1D Line (WNF) 2D Plane (EMF) 3D Volume (GF) "He is the invisible Spirit, of whom it is not right to think of him as a god, or something similar. For he is more than a god, since there is nothing above him, for no one lords it over him. For he does not exist in something inferior to him, since everything exists in him. For it is he who establishes himself. He is eternal, since he does not need anything. For he is total perfection. A being can have a relationship with a God but not the Monad as that would be a contradiction." - The Apocryphon of John, 180 AD.
God Sri Krishna says our existence consist of 3 levels 1.gross body 2.subtle body i.e mind, intellect and ego 3.Soul.Now conciousness emarges from soul and mind is the interface between outer world and soul.
@@wthomas5697 When your mind goes in hell for contemplating on lust , anger and greed , then if you remember Him he can save your mind from going to hell.
You know when somebody has no idea about what he is talking when you listen the term "energy" and "non physical" in the same phrase. "Energy" is a property of a physical system, it is not a thing existing on its own. By definition. It is a mathematical number that we assign to physical systems based on experimental measurements. Not a kind of non physical magic like they pretend. If they like to talk about such ideas I'm fine with it, but they should invent another word for those rather than using a well defined term as Energy is. Saying "a kind of non physical energy" is no different than saying "a kind of non physical banana"
@Peace and Love It is physical, by definition. Physics is a natural science studyng light, matter, it's fundamental components, forces the acting in them and how they move. As long as light is studied by Physics it is "physical"
This is kind of a lame argument because all it proves is that they’re using a different definition of energy than you are. It does nothing to dismiss what they have defined as energy only point out that it is not what a physicists would mean by energy. I mostly agree with you. The mind is in the brain and goes out forever when we die, life is inherently meaningless, etc. it’s just dishonest to pursue this type of argument
Mind is non physical. It is just a spinner and revolver of thoughts. If you don't think, mind does not exist. If you generate thoughts, it can exist at plank radius of orbit . If you add more energy to it, it spins at larger radius and begins to gain mass and becomes physical.physicality is an illusion created by Mind..the order is consciousness, energy, intelligence, Time, space,mind, thought, sound, light, matter
I quit subscribing to this channel because it's become full of pseudo science. Robert is looking for reassurance that there is something after this, there isn't.
I also said on another of their video's , this channel shouldnt be called closer to the truth but " closer to the lie people want to believe because they can not live with the tought of no afterlife"
Listen to me GOD CREATOR, I Jesus I am here with each of you, I INCARNE few months ago in Québec city. So as I said take care I make the world shake because I am very not pleased with what is going on the VATICAN IS an enemy of Jesus, China, Russia, all those country's leaders who abuse each of You for so long those DYNASTYS WHO ARE CONTROLLING those leaders should understand that I am here on earth with my entire ARMY of ANGELS, I make build a base on the moon also all over solar systems and the sky on earth I have the hole sky covering the world. I want those who I hate DYNASTYS WITH COPER BLOOD BLUE BLOOD DYNASTYS LOOK I AM HERE FOR YOU AND THOSE IRON RED BLOOD WHO WORK FOR YOU. ME JESUS I WILL SHOW YOU THAT I AM HERE IT'S TIME FOR WAR AGAINST MY ENEMY'S. THEY WILL TASTE ME AND DIE WITH THE MOST HORRIBLE EXCRUCIATING PAIN THAT WILL LAST FOR LONG TIME. EACH OF HUMANITY WILL FINALLY AS A NEW CHANCE AFTER THOSE PROPHETIC DAYS. DON'T FORGET THAT I GAVE TO IRON BLOOD RED BLOOD HUMAN BEINGS TO EACH OF YOU MY DAUGHTER WHO AS THE NAME OF HERE GRANT MOTHER MADELEINE. THIS GIFT IS TO SHOW EACH OF YOU THAT I WILL CHANGE THE SCRIPTURE OF THE APOCALYPSE AFTER THOSE PROPHETIC DAYS YOU WILL HAVE THE NEW CHANCE AND MY DAUGHTER MADELEINE IN TIME will show and give to you each of You the most amazing gift is possible for a civilization who suffered as you as your ancestors that I PROMISE that I will be back,.you will see how much really I love and care for you ....
It’s a shame Mr. Strawson is not at least a bit more famous, because his biopic starring Liam Neeson would be a must-see.
It's as if Liam Neeson were to stop going to the gym and hit the books
Galen Strawson seems to be suggesting that there are rich multi-level degrees of experience in our reality. All things are able to experience at some level.
Mind is a property of brains, materialism explains everything.
What is a property? Where do properties exist?
Materialism doesn’t explain consciousness. Not the least bit. Empirical science doesn’t even detect consciousness outside your own mind.
The Idea that there is only one subject, NOT a self-reflective planning being but, rather simply "that which experiences"(as a unitary spatiotemporally unbound field), is the most parsimonious, self consistent & explanatorily powerful hypothesis currently on the table imo. & it is NOT at all what is meant by solipsism as typically defined. Literally everything is "in" that one mind which exists. That includes ALL matter/energy, spacetime itself & most importantly even all of the seemingly "separate" minds & their associated brains. That is very different from saying that everything "is" aware. The BIG difference is that it does grant individual inner experience to ALL creatures(as proper "parts" of TWE ) as opposed to subatomic particles for instance. The inanimate universe as a whole is what the "rest" of mind/TWE looks like via perception from the perspective of those seemingly separate proper "parts". A modern monistic analytic straight up idealism like "Kastrup's alters" is what currently connects the most dots & by FAR imo. Funny how Robert tends to always shy away from such notions yet much more deeply entertains virtually all other obviously flawed alternative isms like panpsychism. But at least it has finally become "fashionable" to oppose mainstream physicalism bc its so obviously flawed.
Well stated. I know Robert is acquainted with Bernardo Kastrup, but he's never done a Closer to Truth interview with him. I don't know why, other than it's a reflection of Robert's physicalist prejudice. I follow a lot of Galen's ideas, but he does not appear to be familiar with Kastrup. If the two of them were to have a dialogue, I bet there would be more agreements than disagreements.
@@nietztsuki Yup, probably to both.
@iarguephilosophy To avoid infinite regress, you can't go on explaining one thing in terms of another forever. That mind is the only thing in the reduction base, which is used to subsequently explain everything else. & you can't say much else about it, aside from it too is also mental/experiential in nature. Just like the only thing we can ever be sure of, our own C, where everything both begins & ends, as far as we're concerned. It makes the totally abstract shadow universe of materialism seem silly imo. & unlike panpsychism which also bypasses the hard problem, it does so without a combination issue & in a way thats not inconsistent with anything we know from physics. Though at least the Panpsychists are brave enough to abandon the mainstream narrative. In short, that mind would be the unified field of QFT from physics (if it was singular as opposed to 17?). You don't ask where your starting assumption(s) come from. It would be like asking a materialist where do those constants of nature / dead particles/waves/fields come from, they just are. The idea of "in"(space itself) may have no intrinsic meaning at the fountainhead of existence itself.
@iarguephilosophy That is of course still one of the BIG Q's. I'd say not exactly but kind of sort of 🤪. There is a 7-part video playlist on Essentia foundation's channel that gives quite a comprehensive overview.
Yeah yeah, it is simultaneously one subject and 7 billion separated subjects. Not only that doesn't make any sense (decombination problem), but it is also not clear at all how those subjects can share an objective world and be inside each others subjective world. Kastrup is a meme 👎
Listening to this conversation I wish I had a few more billion neurons so I could fully understand. Totally enjoyable none the less.
It is such an incredibly large leap to go from:
I have a mind (as far as I know, the mind comes only from the brain) which perceives things and I can only detect things if the mind is active.
To:
There is one mind in the universe and our minds are just a mode of that mind or whatever squishy language you wish to choose.
To me, this seems like an excellent case for simply saying "I don't know what the origin in nature of consciousness is". We know we can systematically destroy someone's consciousness by destroying physical parts of the brain until the heart stops beating and the brain no longer has any activity. I don't know how you conclude anything except "the default position is that the brain is the likely origin of the mind in the individual and it remains to be demonstrated that this mind is part of some consciousness or mind outside that body".
Which is exactly why these conversations are so important right now because, many would say to the contrary, that the millions of documented cases like Near Death Experiences, remote viewing, experiments involving mediums and so on have abundantly shown that there seems to be access to consciousness outside the current paradigm of physical mind, brain, physical consciousness. And so it has become incredibly important to explore how such a system might work and in what ways we may have to alter our understanding of consciousness to accommodate the growing set of evidence. This is just science doing science. Old frameworks get replaced all the time, and for the most part there is resistance to these changes until they become the standard.
Or, as Frankish argued, consciousness is merely an illusion.
I would also add that these concepts are truly hard to conceive until you’ve had experiences that utterly uproot your understanding of consciousness (which, I’ll suggest, is not interchangeable with ‘the mind’ as it appears in your comment). In my case, I would’ve 100% agreed with you until a year ago when I had my near death experience. Words can’t describe how transformative such experiences are. Meditation can open you to all sorts of things if you’re willing to let your belief expand beyond your current system.
@@PerkBuilders That is just a personal experience. In no way can you demonstrate that consciousness exists separate from the brain, let alone that it permeates all matter.
@@infinitemonkey917 and as well, with that frame of thought, every scientific observation ever made, since the beginning of humanity, has been a ‘personal experience’ made by a conscious observer; a personal experience verified by many other people who also happen to experience the same observation.
These ideas have been buzzing round my brain for several years now. Strawson’s writing is well-written and has enable me to understanding panpsychism better, but they’re not knock-down definitive. Mind is difficult for a physicalist tending to monism.
Yup. I'm right there with you. When people say that the mind "emerges" from the brain's activity, that means as much to me as if someone said, "Well, stability emerges if you give a two-legged stool a third leg." I have one of those WTF responses. The stool gains stability because the opposing vectors of force balance out. There's no "emerging". We just haven't figured out how to express as well what happens when the brain "minds".
Excellent.... thanks 🙏.
The subject is a social construct. Humans infer its existence as a result of social intuition, which is deeply rooted. Language, which is obviously for socialising, is also heavily presupposed with the subject. I propose that the subject is likely an illusion, meaning its fundamental essence or substance is not what it appears. In this view, the subject _is_ the quale. There are only qualia, including the ones about being someone or having a viewpoint. There is no "you". There is only experience, as one unified happening.
Nice 👌:)
I enjoyed this video clip
Particles are the jewelry we wear on our energy costume when we go to this carnival. We are God..
when causation (subjective) produces physical action, it also produces conscious awareness of both the physical action and the subjective cause? physical action is consciously experienced by subjective cause?
This was interesting. He sort of threw a spinball at the end though.
I think it is useful to discern between "organisms" and "aggregates". An organism would be a unified subject, whereas an aggregate is only (or mostly) merely a collection of simpler subjects, including possibly a collection only of the simplest level of all subjects -- be it atoms or fundamental particles, if indeed these things do exist anything like they are currently conceived.
Some centuries of materialism have left us with the illusion that a "particle" can't be a subject.... but I don't see much of a strong argument for that case at all. It can especially be a subject in a pan-experientialist picture even more than in a panpsychist (referencing psyche) picture, literally taken. The "subject" expressing as a subatomic particle need be no more than an ultra-rudimentary experience-to-itself of the small energy differential or behaviour that it is. It clearly does not have to be a tiny "mind" in there. So that problem is not really that "hard", philosophically speaking.
The issue of One Divine Subject versus multiple (or multitudinous) subjects is more thorny. It doesn't seem that that which is multiple could be the ground of being (for what would it be multiplying out of or from?). So perhaps the ground of being is the "ground" of subjectivity that is not yet **actually** a subject until it is expressed as one or another kind of information-energy packages, whether that be as simple as a subatomic particle or as complex as a giraffe, or as "aggregate" as a table or a shoe.
It is also possible that subjects are stacked Russian doll fashion (holonically) rather than just vertically or side by side. So for instance, the atoms in your body may be rudimentary subjects, somewhat in themselves, but also a contributing part of, and in a sense absorbed into, the larger subject that is you (the human) perhaps also with other intermediate layers between. Likewise, we could be subjects (though not necessarily finally independent, absolute subjects) within larger structures, such as species subjectivities, all the way up to the whole of nature, or the whole of cosmos, traditionally called "God" by whatever way one wishes to interpret that term. In that picture, only the top level subject would be truly unconditional. Other subjects would exist by way of it. To take the human "organism" again, you couldn't have a heart or lungs without the atoms of them, to be sure, but you ALSO couldn't have the heart and lungs without the existence of the organism's top-level holon, its "human-ness".
It would also be possible, I guess, to furnish a viewpoint where the ground as the ground of subjectivity only, gives rise to multiple but essentially independent layers of "subjects". In that situation, your subjecthood would not finally be dependent upon your relation to an ultimate or top-level subject (God), but something that exists in you simply as a unified expression from the subject-spawning (but itself subjectless) ground of being (as opposed to an aggregate like a table or shoe, see above).
For my money though, I think it's a peculiar mixture of both.
Very interesting comment! However, I don't think it's really that easy to get from an "ultra-rudimentary experience-for-itself" to human minds without postulating that the rudimentary forms of experience constitute, in some sense, "tiny minds". If classically the problem for all sorts of "emergence" theories of mind has been to explain at precisely which point of material complexity minds emerge and why, then I think your answer (to this particular question) just ends up not answering this question. If those rudimentary forms of experience don't really constitute minds, at what point of experiential complexity do we call something "a mind"?
One possible way forward would be to actually eliminate talk about "minds". Could we make do with only talking about different forms and gradations of experience? I agree that, for example, "atomic subjects of experience" most probably don't have self-consciousness in the way that we do (or at least think we do). But if we want to say that we have "minds" and atomic subjects lack them, a further account of the emergence of minds from mere experience is required.
@@WelkinShaman I see the question of whether something is a "mind" or not as secondary. What matters is whether there is experientiality, i.e. "something that there is to be...(that thing). We humans have added layers, such as, we can recognise and discuss that there is "something that there is to be us" which particles or even human "dream selves" are unlikely to be able to do...but still experiential, I think.
@@greensleeves7165 I get you, and I very much agree with you: the "what's-it-likeness" is central, further layers such as being able to self-reflect or narrativize those experiences are secondary. I gues I just wanted to nitpick on the question of whether experientiality requires a "mind".
Strawson wrote a short essay in 2015 entitled 'Nietzsche's Metaphysics?'. In it he gives a detailed brief description on his fundamental view of reality with reference to Nietzsche. It's very interesting as his explains his 'identity metaphysics'. He does not mention panpsychism in it. I read it when it was first published and read it again after seeing this interview. He does not subscribe to the idea of "human-ness" and is against what he calls separatism and staticism; in fact he does not see any real or fundamental distinction between object/process/ property/state/event in reality these are more to do with our language he says.
If people believe consciousness is more then the brain then why can the consciousness change when there is braindamage like a tumor or something like that. Where does the consciousness go when we are under anesthesics ? Why does the consciousness of people with demention change ? And i know there are people who say that the brain is like a radio and is only receiving the signals (consciousness) and if the radio is broken , the signal doesn't do his work. But if that is true then consciousness is useless if the receiver (the brain) is damaged or death? Or can someone explain me otherwise?
How would a subject produce experience of physical nature? How would physical nature experience a subject?
Exactly.
This is certainly intersting. I profoundly admire Spinoza too!
What I don’t get is why conciousness emerging from ‘subjective’ particles is any more or less plausible than arguing conciousness emerges from quantitative matter.
In other words, the hard problem is still there - yes, it’s a slightly different hard problem. And we still have no explanation for the nature or thesis to explain emergence.
I don’t see this resolving any of our existing problems?
You raise an important issue about panpsychism that is simply not addressed in the video. That said, it is not consciousness _per se_ that emerges because it is there all along, from bottom up. Rather what emerges (in some arrangements of matter but not in others) is a new distinct and unified _subject._ Items like pants, shirts and tables are not unified objects the way that humans (and doubtless other animals) are. Perhaps that is the crucial factor.
However, with that nuance in place, I think you are quite right - it is no more obvious how a new unified subject can emerge from all the little sub-atomic subjects than it is how consciousness can emerge from non-conscious matter. (The original hard problem.)
It gets worse. What leaves the 'hard problem' even more intact is that there seems little discussion of how the physical and experiential aspects of, say, an electron are supposed to be related. That too should ring bells.
I think that panpsychism simply buries this 'hard problem' deeper down, and the threat (if it is one) of dualism gets buried along with it - though, crucially, still left breathing. Frankly I am not convinced that the cost of this panpsychist burial of the 'hard problem' is worth it. All it offers is the blind hope that no one will notice that it is just as much without solution as it always has been. Panpsychists, I feel, are the philosophical equivalent of ostriches. Poor Galen - and I do like him.
I think also that the whole concept of an 'emergent property', where there is no reductionist aspect to go with it (as there is with solidity and liquidity, for instance) is little more that an appeal to sheer magic plus the endlessly repeated but nonetheless hopeless issuing of the good old promissory note that one day science may elucidate the matter.
@@theophilus749 great comment - I’m on board with everything you said!
Yep - I see what you mean re emergence! That does seem to be the panpsychist view.
Yes I think you’re correct about the panpsychist hard problem being more about the subject arising out of the concious particles - which is a much easier problem than the classic Chalmers hard problem of conciouness arising out of matter.
But I agree too - while the problem of subjectivity is much easier to solve that the Hard Problem the issue with panpsychism is the relationship between matter and conciousness - it does have an almost dualist flavour. I know Goff argues that it is the properties of spin and charge of the particle that are the conciousness - so he maintains nothing new is added. But it does still leave an exeplanatory gap - namely why are spin and charge concious properties? The problems just seem to regress back one level?
Another thing I really struggle with re panpsychism is a much more straight forward skepticism of - what reason do we have to think that innate material objects are concious? Aside from it allows a neat solution to other philosophical problems? And why do organisms have observable concious behaviors when clouds, tables, phones etc do not?
I put panpsychism in the interesting but I’m not convinced basket…
@@dhammaboy1203 Hello Again, and many thanks for your kind comment. I will pick up on just one point you make, though.
You say that "Aside from it allowing a neat solution to other philosophical problems" that panpsychism leaves you unconvinced. I am glad you are unconvinced, but just that would be a pretty _good_ reason to accept panpsychism, wouldn't it ? - if it could pull off such a monumental achievement. There are many philosophical solutions to many philosophical problems but few are good enough to offer neat solutions to _other_ philosophical problems. Indeed, most struggle to be satisfactory solutions even to their _own_ problem, never mind others. Not too worry though, we seem to think that panpsychism _fails_ to offer any neat solution even to its own problem, that it merely buries the problems further down, leaving only the appearance of being a solution.
Your struggle is well placed, though, and I'm entirely with you. If there's a problem of how human beings can be concious then it's little wonder that there's an even bigger problem with how ever smaller items (electrons, for example) can be conscious. What could it be _like_ to be an electron?
I'll give panpsychism one team-point, though: it is at lest well motivated. It at least accepts that consciousness cannot be understood as a mere ghostly epiphenomenon riding on the back of processes described in merely physicalist terms. Whatever else can be said of consciousness, it really does seem more fundamental than that. Panpsychism may be a rather daft solution, even slightly neurotic, but it is the last word in calm thinking compared with the near clinical insanity of the believe that consciousness is an illusion.
You are right to some extent. That's a problem for emergent panpsychism. So not only it shares the same problem but also undermines the motivation behind panpsychism, and postulating micro experinces seems unnecessary. If someone is not an emergent panpsychist, then faces the combination problem.
@@theophilus749 two solutions that I think are quite interesting are Bernardo Kastrup’s Analytical Idealism (a modern revision of Idealism which is controversial but very well argued by Kastrup) and Hoffman’s Concious Realism which argues that consciousness is a universal primitive IOW - it’s fundamental (and yes he then argues that it’s been here since the start of the universe). Hoffman makes it clear he’s not arguing for Idealism btw.
I also like Jackson’s epiphenomenal qualia (which I must admit suffers from the usual issues of pure physicalist world views where conciouness start to sounds like an almost magical property).
Any theories of conciousness you like that I should check out?
If we could answer the question as to where consciousness "goes" when an anesthetic is administered we would have a better idea of what it actually is (or is not).
Isn't that how Roger Penrose thinks we ought to proceed? There is also the questions of where does consciousness 'go' when we sleep or how is it altered by the ingestion of certain plants or drugs that appear to have some sort of natural connection to our brain chemisty. it is an interesting topic.
@@divertissementmonas It is interesting, also scary. Scary because every test I have ever heard of suggests strongly that it is a physical manifestation of the brain. I'm 77 years of age. This scares me.
Consciousness goes under anesthetic to the same place where light goes when you hit the off switch.
@@jamesnordblom855 I'm 75. It scares me, too. I watched my mother, a very intelligent person, mentally disintegrate in her old age as her brain slowly turned into Swiss cheese and the person I knew all my life disappeared bit by bit. And, I wept for her fears and her terrors and her tears and her begging me to help her, and there was nothing I could do. That was a very persuasive argument that consciousness is physical. And, she hasn't contacted me since she left. So, there's that, too.
@@browngreen933 so , nowhere 😛 i'm happy with that . I dont want to " live" forever
Does experience produce a subject? Or does a subject have experience?
6:10 - wow, what a strong resistance Robert has to the fact that idealism is not just a concept of religious people, it's the belief and the field of work of MANY scientists also, which he didn't mention.
He tries to disregard idealism as a valid hypothesis for science, that's obvious right at the beginning when he calls it "ridiculous", which is a very inelegant way to start a conversation with someone that may be flirting with that hypothesis... ultimately it's inelegant period, no matter what's the stance of the other person. But he presents no argument to debunk idealism, just calls it ridiculous. Well, that's not high-level debate.
Idealism is as legitimate a hypothesis as physicalism. And there are very serious and competent scientists working on that hypothesis (many of them were already interviewed here). If it weren't legitimate as a hypothesis, it should be simply promptly refuted by physicalist scientists. But why hasn't it been refuted yet? Because it's hard to do that. As long as it's not possible to refute it so far, it remains a valid hypothesis and can reconcile many aspects of reality that physicalism can not.
Well said!!! I do enjoy Robert's Closer to Truth series. He's one of the best interviewers around, with the scientific credentials to dig deep into the issues. But he does have a physicalist-reductionist mindset, which is clearly evident in most if not all of his presentations.
To say that a claim which has no empirical evidence to support it is hard to disprove isn't saying much. That also makes it hard to prove. When you contemplate _that_ difficulty with respect to proof, you might begin to suspect that there's no there there. And, isn't this the fundamental problem with any claim that is not based upon physical evidence? Not just the evidence that something exists but also the evidence that some process is involved, that something is actually happening, i.e. cause and effect. I often get the feeling, when listening to some of Robert's interviews, that I've traveled back in time to the Middle Ages, and I'm listening to a discussion of how many angels might be able to dance on a pin.
@@1thomson Generally speaking, philosophical questions, by definition, are not the type of questions that can be proved or disproved by empirical evidence. That's why they fall in the realm of philosophy rather than science. Physicalism cannot be proved by empirical evidence, either. It is based on the belief and assumption that "matter" (whatever matter is), is not conscious. Indeed, one of the strongest points that Galen Strawson repeatedly makes is that there is no evidence whatsoever upon which to base this physicalist assumption, and that the only thing we can know with absolute certainty is that consciousness exists.
A hypothesis must be rooted to reality and the laws of nature ... otherwise they are just "stories" and can never be test & confirmed to be fact.
Only an Intelligence with a Mind, free will, nature & consciousness ... makes abstract & physical Functions.
Man is a physical intelligence ... with a physical body ... & .... has the Mind of an Intelligence.
Do the maths.
@@nietztsuki Speaking of Medieval thinking, I suppose that I'm applying Occam's Razor. Why posit the existence of something when it's not necessary to do so in order to explain what's happening? Of course, Descartes' argument for believing that we exist because we experience our own consciousness is persuasive. But then, he had to posit the existence of God to explain how he could believe what his indisputably existing consciousness was telling him about everything else. Unfortunately, that part of his argument never quite convinced me. I'm just too lazy, I guess. I accept that my fallible senses are, indeed, reacting to something real "out there" and that I'm not just a brain-in-a-jar, alone in the Universe-of-Me. Of course, I can't prove that, either. It just feels right. Oh, God, I'm making an intuitionist argument, aren't I? It's all falling apart. Strawson just confuses me. One of my best friends worships Strawson. We argue all the time. It's wonderful. But, I still think I'm right, and he's wrong. So, there. 😏
Anything works the way it works in accordance with how you make it. Tables and chairs work if they have legs that are all of the same length.
2:20 Well, no. The Buddha's theory of dependent origination is exactly a description of how consciousness arises without there being a self that is the experiencer.
It does seem that particles are reacting to one another. So in a sense they have some sort of awareness of their state. Extremely primitive, but they are reacting to their environment. Perhaps the reaction is the basis for awareness and it's a cumulative result.
yes the cumulative result of "intelligent" matter that produce at the end self awareness
@@francesco5581 I would argue that the accumulation of reactions results in intelligence somehow. Not necessarily that a particle is inherently intelligent.
@@wthomas5697 i think that just "acting" or "reacting" require a basic level of "intelligence".
@@francesco5581 Billiard balls colliding requires "intelligence" on their part? Questionable.
I think it's a bit of a jump to postulate rudimentary awareness on the basis of particle physics. Based on our empirical evidence particles (on the atomic level, don't know enough about quantum states to really talk about them) could just as well be "dumb matter" caught in causal chains that are governed by the laws of physics (the classical mechanical view of nature). I think that at least at this point in the development of empirical methods there can't really be empirical evidence for particles being aware or having a rudimentary experience. The evidence for this hypothesis comes from philosophical reasoning.
What is energy? What are quarks made of?
*"What is energy? What are quarks made of?"*
... Information.
The mind is physical emerging with quantum events. Consciousness is fundamental and predates quantum events and is not subject to anything elemental. When we understand vibration and how the three forces impact and guide it, all will likely become more clear.
Why dont you interview bernardo kastrup
This is just quasi religious transfiguration. It's the vanity of the human mind, the desperation to be meaningful that makes you "think" your mind is more than just a physical function of your body to just keep it alive at low costs. Energy is not "experience". Gosh... this is so close to esotericism. Cringe.
I can not agree more .
Perhaps Fiona MacPherson correctly sees Galen Strawson endorsing a property dualism of some sort ie:
"This paper is divided into two main sections. The first articulates what I believe Strawson's position to be. I contrast Strawson's usage of 'physicalism' with the mainstream use. I then explain why I think that Strawson's position is one of property dualism and substance monism. In doing this, I outline his view and Locke's view on the nature of substance. I argue that they are similar in many respects and thus it is no surprise that Strawson actually holds a view on the mind much like one plausible interpretation of Locke's position. Strawson's use of terminology cloaks this fact and he does not himself explicitly recognize it in his paper. In the second section, I outline some of Strawson's assumptions that he uses in arguing for his position. I comment on the plausibility of his position concerning the relation of the mind to the body compared with mainstream physicalism and various forms of dualism. Before embarking on the two main sections, in the remainder of this introduction, I very briefly sketch Strawson's view."
Source: MacPherson, F. Property dualism and the merits of solutions to the mind-body problem: A reply to Strawson. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):72-89 (2006)
And this does seem to me to jive with Diane O'Leary's view that property dualism is what can help medicine in it's current state of confusion:
"Awais Aftab: Your impressive work on dualism in medicine and psychiatry has forced me and many others in medicine and psychology to reexamine long-standing assumptions. I would refer readers to your papers on medicine’s metaphysical confusion, the biopsychosocial model, and your recorded talk as part of the Philosophy of Psychiatry webinar series to learn about your views in detail.1-3 Can you briefly explain your argument that medicine has misunderstood dualism?...
Source: Aftab, A. The Case for Dualism in Medicine-Philosophical Misunderstandings and Clinical Implications: Diane O’Leary, PhD. Psychiatric Times. July 20, 2023. Vol. 40, No. 7
Breath in and you focus/concentrate/more conscious towards someone you talk with,,breath out and you feel more focus FROM the person towards YOU. (atleast with my schizophrenia)
Descartes said that something exists that doubts therefore a benevolent God exists. This conversation is similarly astute.
As a neuroethologist myself, very interested in how the brain construct reality from multimodel perception I find difficult to follow these ideas even though I am really interested also in the philosophical aspects surrounding consciousness I mean I think I don’t get the full point of his non-idealism but pan psych view…
@@visancosmin8991 You people are so ridiculous.
Don't waste your time on panschycism, because it is a dualist concept. All dualist concepts are trash.
There are two non dualist concepts - materialism and the philosophy of non duality belonging to eastern mysticism.
Now, materialism is a chauvinist or a dogmatic philosophy because it steamrolls its opposing views without providing satisfactory reason to do so.
They mystic view, on the other hand, is based on inner subjective experience of a few who can acquire the ultimate knowledge by enhancing their perception which enables them to experience all the dimensions of reality. The problem with this approach is that inner subjective experience does not belong to the scientific domain.
All of this is simple & obvious .... but Man chooses to ignore the obvious because he believes otherwise.
Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today.
The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function.
The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain.
Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence.
Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions.
The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence.
The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul).
The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul).
Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence.
Everything in the Universe ... including Man (Intelligence) ... is a Function.
Machine Analogies .... are OBSERVATIONS .... by the only known intelligence in the Universe that natural processes ( eg Universe, Life) are like like Unnatural processes ( machines or physical Functions). Man knows only an intelligence like Man makes things that are processes with purpose & form/design( functions).
Free will Nature & Consciousness are simply functions of the Mind of an Entity.
Animals & Man are Natural Entities .... with a natural mind (brain) ... and there own form of free will, nature & consciousness because Man is the only known Intelligence is the Universe(Function).
And again, you all will completely ignore this simple fact ... because you have free will, nature & consciousness to think, believe, say & do whatever you want with the facts & evidence .... that proves God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago. smh
Sir, the brain is just the organ of consciousness. It's the sensorium; it simply supplies the transcendental personality connected to it with data via the neuronal signaling mechanism. And this data is used by the conscious personality who is _by nature_ a thinker, a feeler and a great integrator to obtain a "taste" of the sense-objects of the material world.
Imagine a nonphysical consciousness attaches a second time to a person. Is that what makes some smarter than others?
Some try to say that consciousness is non physical, then why and how it attaches to each new born human?
and is it possible to have two or three consciousness?
People are confused, they don't realize that there are different qualities of consciousness, and that consciousness is a physical property of every human body. Just because no one has recognized consciousness in a human body it doesn't mean it does not exist.
Wow, that's some of the dumbest tripe I've yet to see here & that's going some.
Non-dualism says that individual experiencer is also a part of the universal consciousness in which the whole objective universe is also embedded.
If all particles theoretically arise from fundamental quantum fields, it’s theoretically possible that individual consciousness arises from a consciousness field. The field of the observer.
Can anyone present any example of "consciousness" that is not associated with a physically living person?
Dogs
Big fat nope on OP. But since Existence manifests itself in such amazing ways, it's not impossible in theory for consciousness to arise in other forms besides animals.
@@browngreen933 Of course you are correct.
@@javiej Plants, animals, fungi, all living creatures seem to have consciousness, though, with respect to non-humans, they can not directly report on their experience.
@@prestonbacchus4204 I was just giving a first example, as requested. Other animals with neural systems also have consciousness in some degree, we have experiential evidence that they exhibit typical behaviour caused by "feelings" such as experiencing panic, dreaming, etc. But there is no indication than plants and other organisms without neurons have it. (Note I'm not saying that there can not be other non neuralogical based ways to experiment feelings, just that we have no experimental evidence for this)
Galen repeats that "the subject of experience cannot be in itself an idea".I wonder how we could analyse this claim in detail, there is a lot into it begging precise justification. The whole chat leaves a bit question mark in my mind. What is mean here by "an idea"? Maybe I am missing something, but this whole discussion seems like terribly shallow to me, wrt most theories of the mind and subjectivity. What am I missing ? Most cimplex phenomena in nature are not compositional in the way Galen suggests. E.g. it is not true that every subatomic particle has a "bit of life", or that every subatomic particle of a piano has a "bit of music", or that every word has a bit of a poem, or every transistor on my lap has "a bit of computing power". This seems too simplistic, almost medieval.
Wow. Totally agree with Galen. Idealism is a mistake but pan-psychism is likely.
How can anyone claim there’s nothing physical about the mind when we dream, every night, we are literally conscious in non physical constructs of our mind every night.
I think we all instinctually know that nothing is as it seems.
What they are so stubborn about is how the physical view though highly effective is in fact derivative. However idealism is considered "unscientific" while they ruminate in:
"The Mystery of Consciousness"
@@visancosmin8991 Mainstream establishment thinker's. In a way he's right except he should say "everything appears to be ideas" which would be trivial if they actually had a proper fundamental theory of experience. The appearance of God, the cosmic, the other etc. would be obvious "illusions" or ideas if they actually understood the "deeper mechanics" inside of the cell. Instead they get Nobel Laureates and other "expert theorists" to write and sell books. However most of these people are not gifted with engineering expertise, experience and insights on how complex systems work, so they have a difficult time dismissing a lot of extraneous information. A good engineering mind thinks in terms of time domains and not just bandies about terms like energy, physical, consciousness etc.
Subjects, ideas, matter, feelings, energies, forces... It's all the same.
We make up the differences just by context or points of view. We're actually not defining things, we're just contextualizing, and trying to contextualize (define) consciousness can only be a mistake generated by a biased (contextual) understanding of reality. It's like trying to contextualize the contextualizing itself!
You are a true skeptic:)
I prefer panvitalism to panpsychism. It seems to me that all entities in the universe are alive to some extent, but most have no mental aspects (and don't need them). The whole point of experiencing is being able to do something about those experiences. There's no sense in, say, a rock experiencing its existence if it can only offer passive resistance to assaults. That would be hell.
On the other hand, stars and planets have their own way of living, and we are an extension and expression of their lives. You might point out that a rock is not alive, but it is a part of a larger living system. Likewise, the billions of dead cells in your body, about to be recycled, are not alive either, but they are also part of a larger living system.
To be made OF something is not the same as being made BY something... Idealism says everything is made OF ideas, but it's made BY consciousness.
Materialism says everything's made OF matter, but it's made BY cause and effect, or the "laws of the universe".
To say a thing is made OF something is to identify it's components, BY identifies it's creator.
So idealism's definition is fine. Reality is made OF ideas, and is made BY mind.
Do thoughts create mind or
does mind create thoughts or
are we simply talking labels in which
'mind' is simply the collective noun for thoughts?
If thoughts exist then they must have a nature.
Is there one fact we know with certainty
about the nature of a thought?
Is the thought of a tree identical to a tree or
does the thought of a tree represent a tree?
If thoughts are representations and
our minds are made entirely of thoughts,
what then is a tree?
Surely it must be something?
Seems to me
this is where
the thought of 'matter' comes in pretty handy.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL
Huh, I replied to your comment, but it looks like it was deleted by YT.
I can only assume it was because I included a link to my website...
That's annoying.
@@veritopian1823 Again, sans link, might be worth trying.
I sometimes lose comments by going away before clicking on REPLY.
Yes, annoying, especially if one's comment was unusually brilliant.
Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today.
The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function.
The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain.
Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence.
Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions.
The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence.
The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul).
The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul).
Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence.
There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago. There is no evidence that nature can make the simplest function.
Let's just throw out a thousand years of science, and go with what "seems" right to this guy.
If you think he is throwing out anything in science, then you don't understand what he is saying.
@@visancosmin8991 sarcasm?
when a new theory or paradigm comes in, it doesn't "throw out" what came before. It encompasses and explains everything better than before.
Einstein didn't throw out Newton, he raised Newton's ideas up unto another level. Darwin didn't throw out all systematic biology of his time, he brought it to a whole new universal view. However, when Einstein and Darwin came in, people did have to throw out most of their beliefs.
If you study the history of science, you'll become more open-minded to ideas that seem absurd or inconceivable. Science evolves precisely with that. You cannot be a conservative for too long in science. There comes a time when you have to revisit your beliefs and views about reality.
The discussion these guys are having in the video is legitimate since everything we can do when we witness the bizarre results of experiments in quantum mechanics is to speculate and try to interpret it in a way that makes sense. And we cannot do it so far. All interpretation is always subject to discussion.
You are happy to throw out the fact that only an Intelligence makes Functions ... and ... Man is the only known Intelligence in the Universe with the INTELLECT to always deduce from OBSERVATION that that anything that is a Process with purpose & form(Function) can only be made by by an entity like Man (Intelligence).
There is no evidence that nature & natural process( Functions) can make & operate the simplest physical Function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago .... or .... today.
The only evidence we have is Functions are made by an Intelligence.
Freewill, nature & consciousness are simply a function of the MIND of an entity.
Animals & Man ... are natural entities ... with a natural mind (brain) and their own form of free will,nature & consciousness because is the known INTELLIGENCE is a Universe that is a FUNCTION.
Man is a Natural Intelligence with a Mind .... made by ... an UNNATURAL Intelligence with a Mind.
The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL (soul/spirit).
The Mind of Man ... is natural (brain) & unnatural (soul).
There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul .... less than 6 000 years ago. There is no evidence that Nature & natural processes made the Universe & Life which are functions composed of functions.
Again. You all reject this simple & obvious fact about Functions ... because you have free will & nature ... to think, believe, say & do whatever you want to the evidence that proves God & a 6 day Creation.
The intelligible realities are not physical, only when the reciprocal, which is matter, recieves the image, like that of a mirror.
From clay, a mug is fashioned. We applied this idea to the clay, because of its structure, usage, purpose, we define it not from other clay, but from other contrasting objects of ideas. There is however, only clay.
So what is real.
I question what I precieve with my two eyes to even be real. It seems real.
The cloak is likely not real.
If you believe in materialism, you believe in only what you can see and touch.
"The atoms or elementary particles themselves are not real; they form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than one of things or facts."
~Werner Heisenberg
“a world a potentialities or possibilities” then what’s wrong with calling that world the reality?
@@rotorblade9508 Maybe the same coin with two different sides?
I suspect that panpsychists who see experience as fundamental, and those that see information as fundamental and physical processes as computational are saying the same thing in different language. When he says fundamental particles are experiential I think you could better say that they carry information. Personally I think the latter take is closer to the truth (ha, ha). I think experience and consciousness are forms of information processing, but that doesn't make all information processing experiential. A horse is a form of animal, but that doesn't make all animals horses.
hA guys gr8 viDO, not to bug U but I was jst tryng to find NEthing physical that’s not ‘in the mind’ so-2-sPk.. hav U evr Cn NEthing or heard of NEthing lIk that? Cms a-bit trikE 2 fInd🤔..
Oh wow, an actual lab! Strong emergence of subjectivity may just be a brute fact. It feels like something to be a part of the universe called a 'person' and we're pretty sure the same goes for a universe lump we call a 'cat'. But outside of our own experience the phenomenon is completely inaccessible. We have no experiments and no theory and zero progress has been made for centuries. We can analyze the phenomenon from the outside by comparison but the phenomenon itself remains completely inaccessible. And all of that is indifferent to materialism. Consciousness seems to need a computational substrate but doesn't care what the substrate is made of, and there's no need to posit some magical ingredient that enables consciousness. It just feels like something to be a part of the universe, or more accurately a computational form, and we can characterize it but as to why or how we have zero knowledge down to all derivatives.
Man is the embodied Breath of Life, Man is the incarnation of the Breath of Life.
Time is the Will of God, Time space is the Mind of God.
if experience is something intrinsic to any element the within a body there would be multiple identities at the same time. maybe there are but they don’t interfere with each other. for example there could be say ten almost identical identities that think they act (no free will) the same way.
Anyway I think it’s more likely consciousness is emerging phenomenon that by chance it just happened to occur. That’s because if we analyze the history we had no life, then simple organisms that I don’t see a reason why they would experience anything then brains evolved more and more and at some point consciousness was present which seems like something that simply happened, well sort of, I can’t find a way to explain it clearly. I mean it would require a coincidence. You start with simple mechanical systems then very complex then processing power and at some point consciousness but incidentally the consciousness was actually present at low level?! now even at low level it would be the same mystery except could be even harder to understand.
idea or the better modern term information is indestructible ergo immortal so if you could erase the whole universe they would survive somewhere, but where...
Could physical nature happen inside conscious existence? Might conscious existence form something in physical nature, such as brain, to interact with conscious existence, or mind?
(2:20) *GS: **_"You can't have experience without a subject to be experienced."_* ... There is a "ladder of learning" one must ascend to reach the level of subjective experience: data, then knowledge, then subjective experience, followed by judgment.
Prior to Big Bang, Existence stood on the *data* rung of the ladder (mathematics). For the first 10 billion years, Existence stood on the *knowledge* rung (structure). Over the past 4 billion years, Existence has been standing on the *subjective experience* rung of the ladder (life). Now, with the unprecedented emergence of self-aware humans, Existence now stands on the *judgment* rung of the ladder of learning.
Our ongoing production of *value judgments* allows "Existence" the necessary data to script the next stage of existential evolution.
Human consciousness is a microscopic speck likely due for early extinction. Existence itself doesn't care about us one bit.
@@browngreen933 *"Existence itself doesn't care about us one bit."*
... Science has openly stated that the human brain is _by far_ most highly complex structure in the known universe. If Existence doesn't care, then why didn't it just stick with inanimate structure? Why the evolutionary move into self-awareness?
Wow, religion destroys brains.
@@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC
Because Existence and evolution don't appear to work on a caring principle. That's our own bias that we bring to the table. Put another way, Existence allows, but Existence (and evolution) don't care.
@@browngreen933 *"Because Existence and evolution don't appear to work on a caring principle."*
... That's not my question. My question is why Existence didn't simply stick with inanimate structure? What compelled Existence to crank out living, self-aware structures that can produce value judgments about Existence when everything could have just as easily remained at the inanimate matter level?
You made the claim, "Existence doesn't care about us one bit" ... _so why bother?_
*"Put another way, Existence allows, but Existence (and evolution) don't care."*
... Allows? Did humans make a request to exist ahead of time and Existence/Evolution "allowed" our request to move forward?
If it is at least a "possibility" that Bishop Berkeley was right, in that the universe is the MIND of a higher Being, then that would suggest that all matter throughout the universe, from the fusion cores of the stars, right down to the keyboard you are typing on, is literally alive (note: not conscious, just alive). And that's because all universal matter would be imbued (saturated) with the life essence of this higher Being in precisely the same way that our own life energy infuses and saturates our thoughts and dreams.
@@visancosmin8991 I try to choose my words carefully in these TH-cam comment sections so as not to rattle the cages of the hardcore materialists.😂 However, to your point, it's simply not true that there is _only_ consciousness, for consciousness needs something through-which to express itself (as in something to see, feel, hear, taste, and smell). Hence the duality of mind and matter (with universal matter simply being an extremely advanced and highly resolved version of the same fundamental substance that composes our dreams).
That sounds like hylozoism - Greek hyle 'matter' and zoe 'life'. The belief that matter is intrinsically alive. It differs from panpsychism as they privillage soul/psychic attributes.
Everybody here ignores the simple fact ..... that only an Intelligence makes Functions. There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make the first & simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago, let alone today.
The Universe is an Isolated Thermodynamic System. All thermodynamic Systems are Functions. and originate from the surrounding system which must provide the matter, energy ... & .... space, time, laws ... & ... intelligence to exist & to function.
The Human Body ... is a Thermodynamic Systems .... as is the brain.
Man is a Natural Intelligence .... made by an ... UNNATURAL Intelligence.
Anything Natural is composed of matter, energy ... & ... is part of the space, time, & laws of this Universe which is Natural physical Function composed entirely of Functions.
The Universe is a Natural System ... that was made in an Unnatural System, with unnatural laws & an Unnatural Intelligence.
The Mind of an Intelligence is UNNATURAL ( ie spirit or soul).
The Mind of Man .... therefore must be natural (brain) & unnatural (soul).
Again. Everybody is ignoring the fact ... that anything that is a FUNCTION can only be made by an Intelligence.
Who knows?
What do you mean by 'Physical" , Atomic Elements ? Most of the Cosmos is really not fundamental as a physical aspect of matter, the idea that all things matter is false, and what the world is really made of, no man knows.
He’s assuming the physical and so he has autonomously come to an inconsistent worldview.
Mind is prerequisite for physical
That’s a pretty watered-down version of panpsychism.
I'm no expert but I think the non-physical emerges from the physical,
The Catholic teachings about God actually captures a lot of this.
Catholic teachings erroneously allows evolutionary theology and that Creation was NOT over 6 literal days less than 6 000 years ago.
The Torah(Bible) is clear that is was 6 days ... and ... for prophesies 1 day is like a year or 1000 years. This is why we have a 6 day creation & 7th day belongs to God .. that Universe is less than 6 x 1000 years old and Jesus will return to rule for 1 x 1000 years to rule the Earth before Judgement day.
The Catholic religion is Christian ... but it has introduced false or erroneous teaching.
There is no evidence that nature & natural processes can make & operate the simplest physical function 13.7 or 4 billion years ago.
There is only evidence that God created Man with a body & soul less than 6 000 years ago.
Only an intelligence ( who has a Mind, free will, nature, & consciousness) makes Functions.
Man is Natural Intelligence ... with a body that is clearly a physical Function composed entirely of functions.
The Mind of an intelligence is unnatural (soul/spirit).
The Mind of Man is natural (brain) & unnatural ( soul).
Es un error decir que el sistema de Spinoza, es panteista. Panteísta o panteísmo, es una palabra forjada por John Toland entre los siglos 17 y 18, para elogiar al sistema filosófico de Spinoza, interpretando y queriendo Toland dar a entender que Dios es en todo, o está en todas las cosas, y esto es un error de interpretación. Hay otros que han querido indicar que Spinozs no es panteista sino, panenteista. Y también es un error de interpretación.
No.... Dumb question....
Anything non-physical about cats
Subject- placed or situate under. So subject is placed or situated under an idea. To have an idea to create, then comes the subject of the idea. Regardless there has to be something over a subject. Which then gives proof to God and his word. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16.
The Monad is the singularity.
The number associated with the Monad is zero.
The geometric dimension associated with the Monad is zero-dimensional space.
The elementary/fundamental particle associated with the Monad is quarks.
1) no spatial extension
2) zero size
3) exact location only
4) 6000 trillion trillion trillion (39 zeroes after 6k) times stronger than the force of gravity.
0D Monad (SNF)
1D Line (WNF)
2D Plane (EMF)
3D Volume (GF)
"He is the invisible Spirit, of whom it is not right to think of him as a god, or something similar. For he is more than a god, since there is nothing above him, for no one lords it over him. For he does not exist in something inferior to him, since everything exists in him. For it is he who establishes himself. He is eternal, since he does not need anything. For he is total perfection. A being can have a relationship with a God but not the Monad as that would be a contradiction."
- The Apocryphon of John, 180 AD.
God Sri Krishna says our existence consist of 3 levels 1.gross body 2.subtle body i.e mind, intellect and ego 3.Soul.Now conciousness emarges from soul and mind is the interface between outer world and soul.
What the hell does he know?
@@wthomas5697 When your mind goes in hell for contemplating on lust , anger and greed , then if you remember Him he can save your mind from going to hell.
@@chayanbosu3293 Your mind is already in hell as a result of your confusion as to the nature of reality.
You know when somebody has no idea about what he is talking when you listen the term "energy" and "non physical" in the same phrase. "Energy" is a property of a physical system, it is not a thing existing on its own. By definition. It is a mathematical number that we assign to physical systems based on experimental measurements. Not a kind of non physical magic like they pretend. If they like to talk about such ideas I'm fine with it, but they should invent another word for those rather than using a well defined term as Energy is. Saying "a kind of non physical energy" is no different than saying "a kind of non physical banana"
@@visancosmin8991
Wow, what a fkn stupid response.
@Peace and Love It is physical, by definition. Physics is a natural science studyng light, matter, it's fundamental components, forces the acting in them and how they move. As long as light is studied by Physics it is "physical"
This is kind of a lame argument because all it proves is that they’re using a different definition of energy than you are. It does nothing to dismiss what they have defined as energy only point out that it is not what a physicists would mean by energy. I mostly agree with you. The mind is in the brain and goes out forever when we die, life is inherently meaningless, etc. it’s just dishonest to pursue this type of argument
Mind is non physical. It is just a spinner and revolver of thoughts. If you don't think, mind does not exist. If you generate thoughts, it can exist at plank radius of orbit . If you add more energy to it, it spins at larger radius and begins to gain mass and becomes physical.physicality is an illusion created by Mind..the order is consciousness, energy, intelligence, Time, space,mind, thought, sound, light, matter
@@visancosmin8991 cats exist because I have to clean the litter box
Metaphysics
Joy, beauty and harmony (heaven) has no mass and weight.
Misery, ugliness and conflict (hell) has no mass and weight either.
Let's talk more stupidities, because we don't have something else to do...🥴☹️
Galen is my ex wife’s name.
I won’t comment about their physical appearances…..😂
I quit subscribing to this channel because it's become full of pseudo science. Robert is looking for reassurance that there is something after this, there isn't.
I also said on another of their video's , this channel shouldnt be called closer to the truth but " closer to the lie people want to believe because they can not live with the tought of no afterlife"
No, there is not. There is only physics that you do not understand.
Listen to me GOD CREATOR, I Jesus I am here with each of you, I INCARNE few months ago in Québec city. So as I said take care I make the world shake because I am very not pleased with what is going on the VATICAN IS an enemy of Jesus, China, Russia, all those country's leaders who abuse each of You for so long those DYNASTYS WHO ARE CONTROLLING those leaders should understand that I am here on earth with my entire ARMY of ANGELS, I make build a base on the moon also all over solar systems and the sky on earth I have the hole sky covering the world. I want those who I hate DYNASTYS WITH COPER BLOOD BLUE BLOOD DYNASTYS LOOK I AM HERE FOR YOU AND THOSE IRON RED BLOOD WHO WORK FOR YOU. ME JESUS I WILL SHOW YOU THAT I AM HERE IT'S TIME FOR WAR AGAINST MY ENEMY'S. THEY WILL TASTE ME AND DIE WITH THE MOST HORRIBLE EXCRUCIATING PAIN THAT WILL LAST FOR LONG TIME. EACH OF HUMANITY WILL FINALLY AS A NEW CHANCE AFTER THOSE PROPHETIC DAYS. DON'T FORGET THAT I GAVE TO IRON BLOOD RED BLOOD HUMAN BEINGS TO EACH OF YOU MY DAUGHTER WHO AS THE NAME OF HERE GRANT MOTHER MADELEINE. THIS GIFT IS TO SHOW EACH OF YOU THAT I WILL CHANGE THE SCRIPTURE OF THE APOCALYPSE AFTER THOSE PROPHETIC DAYS YOU WILL HAVE THE NEW CHANCE AND MY DAUGHTER MADELEINE IN TIME will show and give to you each of You the most amazing gift is possible for a civilization who suffered as you as your ancestors that I PROMISE that I will be back,.you will see how much really I love and care for you ....
panpsychists unite!
galen is committing a fallacy of composition/division