Pantheism and panpsychism

[veclock]

I am saying the action potential that sends an electrical impulse down the cell is not consciousness.

These action potentials and impulses are not connected. They are not a single entity.

Every impulse is started with chemical activity and results in chemical activity, not electrical activity.

Each electrical impulse is separated from the previous and next impulse by mechanical activity of the cell and chemical activity.

They cannot be forming some greater whole based on electricity. They are not connected. They are adjacent.

My opinion.

Okey! Not electrical activity, but chemical activity. What is chemical activity? It's atoms and molecules exchanging electrons and bonding due to electromagnetic forces, right?
So still lots of electromagnetism in the process. But you're right that it's more than that. Lots of protons and neutrons and photons moving around.
Could the sum of all activity and forces involved in brain activity be responsible for consciousness?

I get your point that the impulses are separated. Valuable argument. What happens when you count in the quantum uncertainness of quantum particles. Since it's a cloud of probability, it might bridge some gaps and create a continuity?

Thank you for sharing your view and adding to the interesting discussion. I do not have a firm opinion, very agnostic since it's such a hard problem. So I'm not debating, just trying out different ideas and challenging others. Hopefully to gain more insight and get more clues!

What do you think is responsible for consciousness?

 

[bilby]

Consciousness interacts with matter - your thoughts can lead to actions.

There are only four forces that interact with matter at scales larger than an electron but smaller than a solar system; If consciousness isn't electromagnetic, then it is either gravitational, or mediated by the Strong or Weak nuclear interaction. As the names suggest, the Strong and Weak nuclear interactions act on scales too small to be plausible candidates; And gravitational forces are incredibly weak, and any subtle gravitational effects in the brain would be swamped by those of the massive planet on which we stand. So consciousness is, inescapably, an electromagnetic phenomenon - just like almost everything in human experience.

Or all of quantum field theory is not just wrong, but massively and obviously wrong. (It isn't. We checked).

Any speculation that consciousness isn't electromagnetic in nature needs to overcome this extremely serious hurdle. Otherwise it's as divorced from reality as perpetual motion machines - it's pure fantasy woo about something that is demonstrated to be incompatible with settled and well understood physical law.

 

[veclock]

Consciousness interacts with matter - your thoughts can lead to actions.

There are only four forces that interact with matter at scales larger than an electron but smaller than a solar system; If consciousness isn't electromagnetic, then it is either gravitational, or mediated by the Strong or Weak nuclear interaction. As the names suggest, the Strong and Weak nuclear interactions act on scales too small to be plausible candidates; And gravitational forces are incredibly weak, and any subtle gravitational effects in the brain would be swamped by those of the massive planet on which we stand. So consciousness is, inescapably, an electromagnetic phenomenon - just like almost everything in human experience.

Or all of quantum field theory is not just wrong, but massively and obviously wrong. (It isn't. We checked).

Any speculation that consciousness isn't electromagnetic in nature needs to overcome this extremely serious hurdle. Otherwise it's as divorced from reality as perpetual motion machines - it's pure fantasy woo about something that is demonstrated to be incompatible with settled and well understood physical law.

True. And the other way around, matter can interact with consciousness.

I agree with you, if consciousness is the result of a force then electromagnetism is the most obvious.
But an alternative view is it could be a state of matter, namely the sum/flow of all molecules in the brain.

If we stick to the electromagnetic view... question is... is any electromagnetic flow conscious? Is there a quantum consciousness at the basis of physics, that adds up to our consciousness when complexity increases?

Why is it that so many people taking LSD, which makes neurons fire continuously, experience an expanded consciousness that is connected to everyone elses? Almost like consciousness is a field, like the electromagnetic field, perhaps the same field. Take the visualization of the fabric of spacetime like a blanket, with planets in it creating the gravitational valleys. I'm visualizing a field similar to that but brains instead of planets.

Also regarding Neuralink and the possibility to link brains. This has already been done by nature, in conjoined twins.

Watch this documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGslJPaxbD8

These twin girls can send thought back and forth inside their head, communicating with each other. They essentially share a mind. Might their two consciousnesses overlap, like a venn diagram? I think conjoined twins is a very important piece in this puzzle.

 

[untermensche]

There is no known effect of electricity or magnetism that results in consciousness.

The brain does have electrical activity. The propagation of an impulse along the cell is electrical activity.

But the electrical activity is not connected. It is just a bunch of tiny unconnected impulses.

In my opinion it is very doubtful consciousness is some electrical or magnetic effect.

There is no model that shows consciousness arising from electricity or magnetism.

The electrical hypothesis has been around a long time.

It has not yielded any understanding.

 

[untermensche]

I am saying the action potential that sends an electrical impulse down the cell is not consciousness.

These action potentials and impulses are not connected. They are not a single entity.

Every impulse is started with chemical activity and results in chemical activity, not electrical activity.

Each electrical impulse is separated from the previous and next impulse by mechanical activity of the cell and chemical activity.

They cannot be forming some greater whole based on electricity. They are not connected. They are adjacent.

My opinion.

Okey! Not electrical activity, but chemical activity. What is chemical activity? It's atoms and molecules exchanging electrons and bonding due to electromagnetic forces, right?
So still lots of electromagnetism in the process. But you're right that it's more than that. Lots of protons and neutrons and photons moving around.
Could the sum of all activity and forces involved in brain activity be responsible for consciousness?

I get your point that the impulses are separated. Valuable argument. What happens when you count in the quantum uncertainness of quantum particles. Since it's a cloud of probability, it might bridge some gaps and create a continuity?

Thank you for sharing your view and adding to the interesting discussion. I do not have a firm opinion, very agnostic since it's such a hard problem. So I'm not debating, just trying out different ideas and challenging others. Hopefully to gain more insight and get more clues!

What do you think is responsible for consciousness?

The chemical activity is not connected either.

Brain activity is electrochemical activity. It does not appear as if anything should arise out of it.

Why should a consciousness arise from cells sending impulses to one another?

I have no idea what consciousness is beyond the subjective experience of having a mind and being conscious of things.

Someone claimed this. They said consciousness is some effect from one of the four fundamental forces:

Or all of quantum field theory is not just wrong, but massively and obviously wrong.

That does not follow at all.

We have these so-called "quantum effects" that defy our understanding of the world. Quantum entanglement. The uncertainty principle.

Five weird quantum effects

https://cosmosmagazine.com/physics/five-weird-quantum-effects/

I think consciousness is some unknown quantum effect of matter/energy.

It is not an electromagnetic effect or a gravitational effect or a large or small force effect.

 

[veclock]

The chemical activity is not connected either.

Brain activity is electrochemical activity. It does not appear as if anything should arise out of it.

If you count in the sum of all the electrochemical processes in the brain, not just the impulses, but also between biochemicals inside the neurons and between neurons, etc, then one should be able to consider it connected.

But if not, maybe it doesn't even need to be connected? Maybe your argument is like saying "a cloud is not a cloud because the individual raindrops doesn't touch". Because maybe consciousness is like a cloud. If there's a quantum consciousness then the interconnected flow of electrochemical activity could be viewed as a complex "cloud" of quantum consciousness, resulting in our "macroscopic" consciousness?

Why should a consciousness arise from cells sending impulses to one another?

It doesn't have to... but consciousness seem to be associated with brains, where there are brain activity, and that brain activity consists of neuron impulses. It doesn't have to be the impulses but the interconnectedness of it, creating some weird geometry / state of matter that results in consciousness. Or it might be pure information that in this case is transmitted by electrical impulses but could be transmitted by anything else.

I think consciousness is some unknown quantum effect of matter/energy.

Quite possible! The argument I'm trying to lay out goes hand in hand with this, since electrons are quantum particles. But let me ask you, do you think this quantum effect gives rise to consciousness only in complex structures like the brain, or even at the quantum level for individual particles?

 

[Elixir]

Consciousness may or may not "arise from cells sending impulses to one another" but there's no evidence that it can exist without it.
Of course, what exactly consciousness is, is unknown. And everything that is known about anything is an effect of matter/energy, so unter's surmise can hardly be wrong.

do you think this quantum effect gives rise to consciousness only in complex structures like the brain, or even at the quantum level for individual particles?

I think it's probably fractal like everything else. Inside of every muon there is a whole other universe, and meanwhile, our universe is just a muon in some vastly bigger universe... and ALL of it is "conscious", but not in the same way we are as discrete biological organisms at our own scale in this universe.

 

[untermensche]

If you count in the sum of all the electrochemical processes in the brain, not just the impulses, but also between biochemicals inside the neurons and between neurons, etc, then one should be able to consider it connected.

That has been the working hypothesis for a long time.

The flow of charge via electrochemical means has been considered an unbroken flow of charge.

No understanding of consciousness, which is an understanding of the phenomena of experience, has come from this hypothesis.

It doesn't have to... but consciousness seem to be associated with brains, where there are brain activity, and that brain activity consists of neuron impulses. It doesn't have to be the impulses but the interconnectedness of it, creating some weird geometry / state of matter that results in consciousness. Or it might be pure information that in this case is transmitted by electrical impulses but could be transmitted by anything else.

Consciousness is associated with brains. It is associated with cellular brain activity. It is associated with certain concentrations of neurotransmitters in the brain. It is associated with blood flow. It is associated with the flow of oxygen.

The cells are creating the electrical activity.

But what is "reading" the activity? What is turning the activity into a complex experience and also turning some activity into something having the experience?

I think consciousness is some unknown quantum effect of matter/energy.

Quite possible! The argument I'm trying to lay out goes hand in hand with this, since electrons are quantum particles. But let me ask you, do you think this quantum effect gives rise to consciousness only in complex structures like the brain, or even at the quantum level for individual particles?

I think that just as evolution blindly built an eye it also blindly connected to a quantum effect of some kind that gives rise to consciousness.

I think consciousness arises from some feature of the brain. Not from all matter.

Which takes this back to the topic of this thread.

 

[bilby]

I think consciousness is some unknown quantum effect of matter/energy.

Quite possible! The argument I'm trying to lay out goes hand in hand with this, since electrons are quantum particles. But let me ask you, do you think this quantum effect gives rise to consciousness only in complex structures like the brain, or even at the quantum level for individual particles?

It's NOT possible.

Quantum theory clearly rules out the existence of ANY unknown effects on the applicable scales. We built the Hubble Space Telescope and the Large Hadron Collider because all the remaining unknowns in quantum physics require either very large scales, or very high energies.

There are no unknown quantum effects that can influence just a single human (or just a single cellular behaviour in a human brain) without atomising him.

Whatever consciousness is, it is absolutely and definitely a result of known physical effects. Either that or quantum field theory is massively and obviously wrong. (It really is not. We really have checked).

 

[untermensche]

There are no unknown quantum effects that can influence just a single human (or just a single cellular behaviour in a human brain) without atomising him.

It is not an effect on the human.

It is a subatomic effect that arises from the interplay of matter and energy arranged in a certain manner.

We do not understand all the subatomic quantum effects.

The Collider was built to look for particles.

But when you have particles you do not necessarily have the whole story.

What are the particles made of?

What are the things that make up the particles made of?

And so on.

Quantum entanglement is not an electrical effect. It is not a gravitational effect. It is not a large or small force effect.

Consciousness could be an effect like that.

 

[untermensche]

When this "observer effect" was first noticed by the early pioneers of quantum theory, they were deeply troubled. It seemed to undermine the basic assumption behind all science: that there is an objective world out there, irrespective of us. If the way the world behaves depends on how – or if – we look at it, what can "reality" really mean?

Today some physicists suspect that, whether or not consciousness influences quantum mechanics, it might in fact arise because of it. They think that quantum theory might be needed to fully understand how the brain works.

The physicist Pascual Jordan, who worked with quantum guru Niels Bohr in Copenhagen in the 1920s, put it like this: "observations not only disturb what has to be measured, they produce it… We compel [a quantum particle] to assume a definite position." In other words, Jordan said, "we ourselves produce the results of measurements."

Beginning in the 1980s, the British physicist Roger Penrose suggested that the link might work in the other direction. Whether or not consciousness can affect quantum mechanics, he said, perhaps quantum mechanics is involved in consciousness.

The idea of looking at quantum effects to explain consciousness is not something I invented.

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20170215-the-strange-link-between-the-human-mind-and-quantum-physics

To make the claim that consciousness is not a quantum effect is to claim you know all the quantum effects. It is to say that all quantum effects are apparent to human observers and their machines right now.

 

[veclock]

I think it's probably fractal like everything else. Inside of every muon there is a whole other universe, and meanwhile, our universe is just a muon in some vastly bigger universe... and ALL of it is "conscious", but not in the same way we are as discrete biological organisms at our own scale in this universe.

I've had this idea about a timeless infinite fractal of universes and infinite timelines of every universe. Different timelines comes from the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics. When I've been on psychadelics it's become quite obvious that consciousness is what allows us to navigate between timelines with our choices in this infinite fractal of timelines. Even though it felt like a religious experience in many ways I'm of course not gonna hold it as proof of anything. But what is interesting is when a vast majority of people taking "consciousness expanding substances" report similar philosophical realizations.

But what is "reading" the activity? What is turning the activity into a complex experience and also turning some activity into something having the experience?

One way of answering that question is to assume that consciousness is a fundamental part of physics, maybe all of it, maybe some parts of it. Then the activity would be the same thing as consciousness, nothing extra is needed to be "reading" the activity because it's "reading" the whole universe all the time. But somehow, reading more intensely as complexity increases, like in a brain. However, I understand that this argument falls quite flat since a sleeping brain is quite unconscious and still shows very much complex activity. So is there a solution for that counterargument? Maybe the activity has changed in some fundamental part during sleep that some necessary component is turned off. Maybe the register of time? Maybe consciousness can't work without that? I don't know enough about the brain to go much further here, maybe someone can fill in or correct me here.

I think that just as evolution blindly built an eye it also blindly connected to a quantum effect of some kind that gives rise to consciousness.

I think consciousness arises from some feature of the brain. Not from all matter.

Which takes this back to the topic of this thread.

Yes then you answered what I brought up above. That might be true. Haven't neuroscientists pinpointed exactly which part of the brain that is conscious? Because the processing parts are subconscious, then when the brain sends the processed info further we become aware of it. So it needs to reach that conscious part.

It's NOT possible.

Quantum theory clearly rules out the existence of ANY unknown effects on the applicable scales. We built the Hubble Space Telescope and the Large Hadron Collider because all the remaining unknowns in quantum physics require either very large scales, or very high energies.

There are no unknown quantum effects that can influence just a single human (or just a single cellular behaviour in a human brain) without atomising him.

Whatever consciousness is, it is absolutely and definitely a result of known physical effects. Either that or quantum field theory is massively and obviously wrong. (It really is not. We really have checked).

I don't think anyone proposed anything outside the standard model. But isn't it still possible to "subdivide" what's in the standard model to even smaller details, that might yet be unknown. Or the known particles might affect extra dimensions in a way that gives rise to consciousness? More like that, rather than adding some extra unknown force or particle, I get what you're saying.

Quantum entanglement is not an electrical effect. It is not a gravitational effect. It is not a large or small force effect.

Consciousness could be an effect like that.

Agree, latest I've heard from Brian Greene is that the fabric of space time is stitched together by the threads of quantum entanglement. What if the complex structure of the brain and entanglements going through it creates a very special geometry of entanglements for example...

 

[bilby]

I've had this idea about a timeless infinite fractal of universes and infinite timelines of every universe. Different timelines comes from the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics. When I've been on psychadelics it's become quite obvious that consciousness is what allows us to navigate between timelines with our choices in this infinite fractal of timelines. Even though it felt like a religious experience in many ways I'm of course not gonna hold it as proof of anything. But what is interesting is when a vast majority of people taking "consciousness expanding substances" report similar philosophical realizations.


One way of answering that question is to assume that consciousness is a fundamental part of physics, maybe all of it, maybe some parts of it. Then the activity would be the same thing as consciousness, nothing extra is needed to be "reading" the activity because it's "reading" the whole universe all the time. But somehow, reading more intensely as complexity increases, like in a brain. However, I understand that this argument falls quite flat since a sleeping brain is quite unconscious and still shows very much complex activity. So is there a solution for that counterargument? Maybe the activity has changed in some fundamental part during sleep that some necessary component is turned off. Maybe the register of time? Maybe consciousness can't work without that? I don't know enough about the brain to go much further here, maybe someone can fill in or correct me here.

I think that just as evolution blindly built an eye it also blindly connected to a quantum effect of some kind that gives rise to consciousness.

I think consciousness arises from some feature of the brain. Not from all matter.

Which takes this back to the topic of this thread.

Yes then you answered what I brought up above. That might be true. Haven't neuroscientists pinpointed exactly which part of the brain that is conscious? Because the processing parts are subconscious, then when the brain sends the processed info further we become aware of it. So it needs to reach that conscious part.

It's NOT possible.

Quantum theory clearly rules out the existence of ANY unknown effects on the applicable scales. We built the Hubble Space Telescope and the Large Hadron Collider because all the remaining unknowns in quantum physics require either very large scales, or very high energies.

There are no unknown quantum effects that can influence just a single human (or just a single cellular behaviour in a human brain) without atomising him.

Whatever consciousness is, it is absolutely and definitely a result of known physical effects. Either that or quantum field theory is massively and obviously wrong. (It really is not. We really have checked).

I don't think anyone proposed anything outside the standard model. But isn't it still possible to "subdivide" what's in the standard model to even smaller details, that might yet be unknown. Or the known particles might affect extra dimensions in a way that gives rise to consciousness? More like that, rather than adding some extra unknown force or particle, I get what you're saying.

Quantum entanglement is not an electrical effect. It is not a gravitational effect. It is not a large or small force effect.

Consciousness could be an effect like that.

Agree, latest I've heard from Brian Greene is that the fabric of space time is stitched together by the threads of quantum entanglement. What if the complex structure of the brain and entanglements going through it creates a very special geometry of entanglements for example...

Any smaller scale effects are irrelevant at larger scales. If you have a good description of how a carbon atom behaves, it can be understood in terms of the subatomic components and their interactions, but those components cannot give rise to behaviour that defies the description you started with.

This has been demonstrated to be universally true. And it's a bloody good thing too, or Newton couldn't have done any of his work without first having determined the full details of the Standard Model, including those bits we don't yet have full details for.

When experimental and observational behaviour matches theoretical behaviour, no new information about smaller scales can change the larger scale results. Only where they disagree can an understanding of the next 'lower' level provide new insights or describe unexpected or novel phenomena.

This is counterintuitive, but true. I believe it was Wigner who demonstrated it - it was one of that generation on Nobel winning physicists.

 

[veclock]

Any smaller scale effects are irrelevant at larger scales. If you have a good description of how a carbon atom behaves, it can be understood in terms of the subatomic components and their interactions, but those components cannot give rise to behaviour that defies the description you started with.

This has been demonstrated to be universally true. And it's a bloody good thing too, or Newton couldn't have done any of his work without first having determined the full details of the Standard Model, including those bits we don't yet have full details for.

When experimental and observational behaviour matches theoretical behaviour, no new information about smaller scales can change the larger scale results. Only where they disagree can an understanding of the next 'lower' level provide new insights or describe unexpected or novel phenomena.

This is counterintuitive, but true. I believe it was Wigner who demonstrated it - it was one of that generation on Nobel winning physicists.

For behaviors in PHYSICS, yes. But we're talking about consciousness.
Consciousness is so mysterious and such a separate subject from everything else, that it's also the only thing that can challenge materialism as a world view.
You know, materialism is like, everything is made up of quantum particles ect. Physical building blocks of some sort. A consciousness centered world is like, "I think, therefore I am, but I can't prove that anything in the external world exist. Everything outside might just appear in my consciousness".
I'm trying to be a bit in the middle, leaning more towards materialism. But to do that, consciousness needs to be represented by, or the same thing as, something in the physical material world.
So making that connection, wont change anything about the physical behaviors you're talking about, at all.

 

[untermensche]

People have been working under the assumption that consciousness is an electromagnetic effect for decades.

We have no model where electromagnetic energy somehow turns to consciousness.

We have no model where electromagnetic energy approaches consciousness.

We have no model for anything resulting in consciousness.

The phenomena of experience seems beyond human comprehension.

 

[bilby]

Any smaller scale effects are irrelevant at larger scales. If you have a good description of how a carbon atom behaves, it can be understood in terms of the subatomic components and their interactions, but those components cannot give rise to behaviour that defies the description you started with.

This has been demonstrated to be universally true. And it's a bloody good thing too, or Newton couldn't have done any of his work without first having determined the full details of the Standard Model, including those bits we don't yet have full details for.

When experimental and observational behaviour matches theoretical behaviour, no new information about smaller scales can change the larger scale results. Only where they disagree can an understanding of the next 'lower' level provide new insights or describe unexpected or novel phenomena.

This is counterintuitive, but true. I believe it was Wigner who demonstrated it - it was one of that generation on Nobel winning physicists.

For behaviors in PHYSICS, yes. But we're talking about consciousness.
Consciousness is so mysterious and such a separate subject from everything else, that it's also the only thing that can challenge materialism as a world view.
You know, materialism is like, everything is made up of quantum particles ect. Physical building blocks of some sort. A consciousness centered world is like, "I think, therefore I am, but I can't prove that anything in the external world exist. Everything outside might just appear in my consciousness".
I'm trying to be a bit in the middle, leaning more towards materialism. But to do that, consciousness needs to be represented by, or the same thing as, something in the physical material world.
So making that connection, wont change anything about the physical behaviors you're talking about, at all.

Consciousness must interact with the physical world (and vice versa).

All possible physical interactions at the relevant scales are now fully understood. There cannot be any unknown physical interactions.

So either consciousness is a physical phenomenon (presumably an emergent property of extremely complex electromagnetic interactions); Or consciousness has zero influence on the physical universe (which renders the concept meaningless).

Consciousness cannot challenge materialism; Materialism is demonstrably correct.

There are two kinds of people. Those who understand that materialism is proven, and those who are wrong.

This isn't an open question. It's been answered unequivocally. Sadly, many philosophers simply don't believe that physics can make such a declaration. But that's because they don't believe something that, if they had the relevant education, they would know to be true.

It's not necessary to approach the question from both sides - unless neither gives a definitive answer, in which case it's useful to approach the subject from as many directions as possible. Once a definite answer is known, approaching from another direction can only either tell you nothing, or tell you what you already know (or would know if you had the relevant education).

Consciousness IS a behaviour in physics.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I'd like to start a discussion about two terms and their relation to each other: Pantheism and panpsychism.

Pantheism is the view that the world is god. The universe, multiverse, everything = god. From now on, when I write "universe", I mean the sum of all universes/multiverses. Everything.

This can often be meant metaphorically. In theism, God is the highest entity. In materialistic atheism, the universe is the highest. Then a pantheist might say, well if the universe is the ultimate reality in which everything is contained and created, then the universe is god. In other words, still atheism but with a metaphorical use of the word god, where the thoughts of god is the laws of physics. Other pantheists might say that there is a god that have thoughts and a will, like a monotheistic god, but the universe is its body.

Then there is panpsychism and the problem of consciousness. We currently have no explanation for consciousness. Although there seems to be a materialistic neurological process for every conscious process, it's hard to explain why these processes couldn't go on "in the dark", as in a philosophical zombie without a consciousness, doing everything we do but without experiencing it. With developments in AI and robotics, we will soon face the question whether our robots are conscious or not.

Panpsychism is the view that all systems are conscious. Brains, computers, calculators, bee hives, ant nests, forests, lightnings, melting snowflakes, some might even say atoms.
Consciousness is simply built into physics. There's another term called panprotopsychism, where atoms aren't really conscious, but you gain more consciousness the more complex the system grows. This seems more reasonable in my mind. There's also some tricky problems with panpsychism. The problem of subsystems. Our brains do much in the dark (the subconscious parts), then after it has processed it further, the conscious part of our brain gets access to it. So is it possible that the other parts of information processing in our brains/bodies are conscious, but separate? Is it possible that the nerve systems in our guts and heart are conscious? These systems are more complex than smaller animals brains, and we would probably argue that all animals are conscious.

In any reasonable form of panpsychism, you wouldn't say that a chair is having thoughts. Our brains can do that, because they are complex and built for thoughts, problem solving, information processing ect. But a chair (or rather, matter in general) could have some form of inner experience.

Then there's also quantum mechanics where observation affects the outcome of an experiment. This might perhaps be the measuring tools interfering with the particles. Or consciousness itself?
Also, there's the splitting of universes, where you choose both to go to the right and to the left, the universe splits in two and you do both. That's another example of where you might say that consciousness plays a role.

So panpsychism is a philosophical view that kind of answers the problem of consciousness. But if that's true, then I think that it has implications for whether pantheism is true or not.

If all systems are conscious, then the universe is conscious, because it is one system. It's not built as a brain, so it shouldn't be able to having thoughts, solve problems, punish people or communicating with humanity. But it should be able to experience itself.

Personally I'm agnostic about this, but I'm exploring these thoughts right now to see how well they hold up.
Please give me your thoughts on panpsychism and how it relates to pantheism!

It sounds to me like, consciousness is mysterious, therefore we can apply it to anything and say it's conscious, without saying anything. Isn't it just to make the mundane seem more mysterious and cool?

I'm cool about that. But then just say that. Why the extra steps?

 

[untermensche]

It sounds to me like, consciousness is mysterious, therefore we can apply it to anything and say it's conscious, without saying anything. Isn't it just to make the mundane seem more mysterious and cool?

I'm cool about that. But then just say that. Why the extra steps?

We know why we have consciousness though.

It is an evolved trait that serves as a survival mechanism.

Being aware of the lion helps the humans kill it or run away from it.

But human consciousness is different because of language.

Because of language humans have cultural evolution as ideas emerge and evolve.

The whole group benefits when one genius figures something out and relays their finding through language.

Why would a rock have consciousness?

We have consciousness because it helps us to survive.

What would a rock use it for?

 

[veclock]

People have been working under the assumption that consciousness is an electromagnetic effect for decades.

We have no model where electromagnetic energy somehow turns to consciousness.

We have no model where electromagnetic energy approaches consciousness.

We have no model for anything resulting in consciousness.

The phenomena of experience seems beyond human comprehension.

Right, we don't even know if words or maths will be enough to create a model for it.

Does consciousness need building blocks...? Can it be divided, merged, overlapped with others etc. My prediction is that with brain-to-computer tech, Neuralinks, brain to brain tech, we might begin to experiment with these questions.
If I remember correctly, split brain experiments already has some clues though?

Question: is any electromagnetical activity conscious? If we can connect our brain to a computer which is doing it's own neural activity. If that activity then appears in our consciousness, then maybe we could assume that it was like merging two clouds of consciousnesses?

We know why we have consciousness though.

It is an evolved trait that serves as a survival mechanism.

Being aware of the lion helps the humans kill it or run away from it.

But human consciousness is different because of language.

Because of language humans have cultural evolution as ideas emerge and evolve.

The whole group benefits when one genius figures something out and relays their finding through language.

Why would a rock have consciousness?

We have consciousness because it helps us to survive.

What would a rock use it for?

That's not necessarily true. A "philosophical zombie", a "mindless machine", could be programmed to react to external stimuli and avoid danger.
That's what a self driving car does. Evolution could equally well have given rise to philosophical zombies that does exactly what we and other animals does.
I would argue, that the existence of an inner experience of 'being something', must therefore be part of the universe in some fundamental way.

Consciousness must interact with the physical world (and vice versa).

All possible physical interactions at the relevant scales are now fully understood. There cannot be any unknown physical interactions.

So either consciousness is a physical phenomenon (presumably an emergent property of extremely complex electromagnetic interactions); Or consciousness has zero influence on the physical universe (which renders the concept meaningless).

Consciousness cannot challenge materialism; Materialism is demonstrably correct.

There are two kinds of people. Those who understand that materialism is proven, and those who are wrong.

This isn't an open question. It's been answered unequivocally. Sadly, many philosophers simply don't believe that physics can make such a declaration. But that's because they don't believe something that, if they had the relevant education, they would know to be true.

It's not necessary to approach the question from both sides - unless neither gives a definitive answer, in which case it's useful to approach the subject from as many directions as possible. Once a definite answer is known, approaching from another direction can only either tell you nothing, or tell you what you already know (or would know if you had the relevant education).

Consciousness IS a behaviour in physics.

Why would it have to interact with the physical world? Not if it IS some aspect of the physical world.
To have an analogy. Colors doesn't really exist, they are just mental representations of wave lengths. It's like saying red has to interact with the wavelength it is represented by.
I'm trying to argue that consciousness itself could be represented by some aspect of the physical world, maybe electromagnetism, maybe a certain complex structure of electromagnetism, maybe all of physics, maybe some other quantum phenomena.

"Consciousness cannot challenge materialism; Materialism is demonstrably correct.
There are two kinds of people. Those who understand that materialism is proven, and those who are wrong."

I'm not taking a stance against materialism. I've been a materialist most of my life but I also have to give the devil his due. No one you meet can prove to you they are real. You can't prove you weren't created 1 second ago with all your memories of past experiences.
Even physicists like Lawrence Krauss admits this. And goes on to say it's highly unlikely. And I agree. Materialism is by 99% likely true. But the only thing that prevents it from being 100% likely is this argument that the only thing you really know is your own consciousness.
I know it's not pleasant to admit it. I can't know for a fact that the keyboard I'm typing on right now is there for real. I can feel it, but those sensations are just nerve impulses in my brain. There's a tiny probability I'm in an advanced VR game, a dream, tripping on an alien drug, etc.

 

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It sounds to me like, consciousness is mysterious, therefore we can apply it to anything and say it's conscious, without saying anything. Isn't it just to make the mundane seem more mysterious and cool?

I'm cool about that. But then just say that. Why the extra steps?

No... we might be able to test it, with brain-to-computer and with brain-to-brain technology.
Why would it be like saying nothing? It has huge existential implications.