Let’s see. You’re laughing because you, in contrast, have certain knowledge of what consciousness is and isn’t in an empirically measurable way. This while at the same time holding that whether the proposition “I am conscious of this text” can hold a truth-value is unanswerable. :up:

As I previously expressed: Good luck with that!

An unorthodox hypothesis to address your concerns:

Suppose that two or more – hence, at least two – instantiations of individuated awareness co-occur. In other words, suppose solipsism to be false. (This shouldn't be that hard to hypothesize.)

The awareness-resultant time and space (one could add causality to the list as well) that is requisite of these multiple instantiations could then either be a) strictly relative to the instantiation of awareness addressed or b) equally applicable to all instantiations of awareness that in any way interact.
That space, time, and causality which falls under (b) would not be partially applicable to any but, again, would be equally applicable to all concerned. It would hence be completely impartial – objective in at least this sense – such that its occurrence would be fully independent of any one instantiation of awareness.

The process by which this objective space, time, and causality manifest could not here be that of causality. I would instead need to be the outcome of material causes in Aristotelian terms. In this case, where the ultimate constituents are these very instantiations of awareness: in this hypothetical, the cosmos’s prime matter. Its not a relation in which that which determines occurs before that determined – as causality is – but instead is one in which the two necessarily occur simultaneously.

The greater the quantity of these individuated instantiations of awareness, the more stable would their commonly shared objective world of space, time, and causation be. For example, in presuming that only humans are awareness endowed, there currently co-occur over 7 billion instantiations of awareness on Earth. Assume all life is so endowed and … one gets the picture.

In such a universe, there would then be an objective world that is perfectly impartial to the whims of any one instantiation of awareness – that is in this sense perfectly independent of individual minds. Nevertheless, this very objective world could not however occur in the absence of Kantian categories.

That said, in such a world, that which is objective would then necessarily inform each individual instantiation of awareness – skipping over a minefield of details, such that in humans the objective human brain informs, and in turn gives form to, the instantiation of first-person awareness we term our conscious selves. No brain, no instantiation of awareness; yet awareness at large, when globally conceived, remains to keep such a universe going.

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This is only a very rough sketch of just one possible account regarding Kantian categories and the objective world. Other accounts might also be possible to envision such that they make sense of the two. All the same, though there obviously would be innumerable details to yet work out, I so far don’t see any self-contradiction in the hypothetical just provided.

I’ve provided it only to illustrate that ways of accounting for both an objective world and the Kantian categories are not impossible to devise.

You just switched from “conscious of x” to “first person awareness”. Are we talking about a thing or a process, counterfactually speaking here?

I was talking about a process. — apokrisis

And how is any awareness of which we can be in any way aware of not a process? Even none-empirical experiences such as those of our own happiness and sureness (as two examples) are process. Never mind our awareness of percepts and, hence, of empirical data.

Besides, as I’ve previously expressed, I make no inferential speculation as to awareness being an entity/substance, a process, both, or neither. Period. That unknown, or uncertainty, or vagueness as you term it, is part of my stance.

So what is first-person awareness? One should intimately know via one's own experiences.

And then when you make claims about consciousness of x - as something more than attention+reporting - is consciousness of the presence of a colour the same as consciousness of some bit of text? And is consciousness of a lump of rock the same as consciousness of a bit of text? — apokrisis

I've already addressed these questions here.

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Yes, you do need to back to the drawing board and do some work on your definitions so that there could be a less amateur discussion here. — apokrisis

From our exchanges it so far seems to me you want to win arguments by vanquishment – as though philosophy were a zero-sum game. It isn’t. You might want to ask more questions of those you disagree with, answer those questions you’ve been asked by them, and address the replies you've already been given.

This since we're so candidly exchanging advice on what the other should do.

Capable of being wrong rather than not even wrong. — apokrisis

How can something entirely nonsensical be wrong instead of not even wrong?

Still not even an attempt to define your use of consciousness here then? You had many chances now. That says you can’t do it. — apokrisis

Back to the drawing board: What’s wrong with “first-person awareness” as a definition for consciousness? Well, unless one finds the given definition to be entirely nonsensical.

Let me insult you again. You continue to weasel your way out of the requirement to provide a counterfactual definition to fit your counterfactual proposition. Technically, your position becomes not even wrong, simply vague. — apokrisis

He replieth!

Counterfactual conditionals (also subjunctive or X-marked) are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances, e.g. "If Peter believed in ghosts, he would be afraid to be here." — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional

What on earth are you talking about??? Other than your ego's need to insult - which does hold semantic value - your expressions are entirely nonsensical.

That "I am conscious of this text" is not a counterfactual proposition, no more than is "the cat is on the mat".

Your turn.

You do a lot of weaselling to avoid supplying a definition to the term that I must give a yes or no answer on. — apokrisis

You belittling insults aside (yes, that apes win by posturing is a fact of nature), how on earth could I when you address the proposition of "I am conscious of this text" as neither having a truth-value nor being without one. Weaselling, huh. Nonsense pure and simple.

I’ll help you out. Do you mean something more than attending and reporting if I agree I am conscious of the text? If more, what exactly? — apokrisis

And here it is. In assuming that "I am conscious of this text" can be true (what a stupendous presumption on my part; for who knows if this proposition can in fact be true, after all. Right?):

The addressed "I" is not identical to the text it is being conscious of. The text is other to that whose occurrence is addressed by the term "I", which holds awareness of the text. Fast forward to what I've previous said in this thread, and that which is addressed by the term "I" holds conscious awareness of empirical givens without itself being an empirical given - either to its own conscious being or to any others. Of note, even though the addressed "I" can only occur in a duality to other which it observes and thereby constitutes a self, it is never identical to that which it observes. Again, it is thereby other in relation to all empirical data. An AI program attends and responds to information - as does an alarm clock - but is not endowed with a conscious being which we term "I" in propositions such as that provided.

Yours is a denial of those truths whose consequences are not useful to you - that of consciousness's occurrence very much included. I don't much admire your approach, for the same reason I don't admire the approach of Young Earth Creationist among others.

Try to insult me in a wiser way the next time around. That way, you end up having the last word.

Alright, my bad if I was a bit smug in my reply. But cool.

What is your theory of truth? — wonderer1

My own theory of truth in a nutshell: that which conforms to what is actual is true. Prior to you then testing out any and all possible ways this might not hold - but do if you so care - the question I asked apo was not based on "my theory of truth" but on his, regardless of what it might be.

I gave you the answer. Your question suffers from logical vagueness. Affirming yes or no would make no useful difference. — apokrisis

Honesty is important. For trust and the like. No, you only just gave me your answer right now. Its value here overlooked.

It remains up to you to define consciousness in terms that pragmatically means anything measurable if you are indeed talking about “the science” of it. Or even just it’s metaphysics. — apokrisis

To precisely demarcate what personal conscious is is not to define one's personal consciousness in ways that are measurable. Nor does metaphysics mandate that what is shall itself be measurable. I'll here point this truth at your own worldview, which infers the Apeiron to be a required aspect of what is real: The Apeiron by definition is immeasurable, and yet it is still what your metaphysics relies on at a basic level of explanation.

So I’ll let others explain their own views as best they can, — javra

You did a splendid job of misrepresenting what biosemiosis claims. :up: — apokrisis

Either the extrapolated worldview of the cosmos you endorse is not one of biosemiotics or I stand by what I previously said - so far finding nothing that contradicts my statements.

Besides, this is between you and @Gnomon.

Unless you want to bring me into it. But then, in this thread about the science of consciousness you’ve so far been unable to address the rather basic question of whether “I am conscious of this text” is a truth-baring proposition. Not much of anything to go on here. So I’m not inclined to participate.

you may be able to enlighten me about Biosemiotics (BS). Which has been proposed as an alternative to Panpsychism (PP) as a mechanism for the emergence of Mind from Matter. — Gnomon

I won’t be much help, and this because I so far find this very quoted affirmation to be nonsensical. Bio-semiotics is the semiotics of life – it addresses the meaning transference of lifeforms and all this entails. To apply biosemiotics to a former cosmos devoid of life from which life emerged will either necessitate a panpsychistic cosmos by default or, else, again, it will make no sense: the semiotics of life, i.e. biosemiotics, applied to processes of non-life in attempts to explain life’s emergence and all aspects of life, thereby explaining the semiotics of life. It’s circular reasoning consisting of a great sum of allegories and metaphors that utilize poorly defined words (if they are at all defined: e.g., life, meaning, etc.) that – after all the smoke and mirrors pass by – ultimately explains nothing: we start with biosemiotics to explain biosemiotics via a very fancy loop. Or, more simply, we use premise A to explain A. And then call it a done deal: everything explained, including the very issue of A which we were principally focusing on.

I have nothing against the study of biosemiotics. But using life to explain life from the vantage of a non-living (else, life-devoid) cosmos, again, to me so far does not make sense. Philosophically speaking. But that’s just fallible me.

So I’ll let others explain their own views as best they can, if they so wish.

I'll have to think about that more. It seems to me that the "end" does not exist until it is actualized. Thus, God's desire is posterior to the existence of the end. — Count Timothy von Icarus

The end never occurs, exists, as an actualized end until the moment its actualized, if this moment ever manifests, true. But the end one pursues will occur as that for the sake of which one does what one does; i.e., it will occur as a telos. As an actively held telos, it will then limit or bind what one generates to its own self - for all which one brings about will be so brought about for the purpose of transforming one's telos into an actualized endstate (at which juncture the telos vanishes). This, at the very least, is my take on the more basic premises of teleology.

For a common example, Alice intends to go to the store. Her having gone to the store doesn't yet exist - and might never exist if, for example, Alice becomes barred from so doing due to an unexpected friend's call that she deems to be more important to prioritize. Here, suppose nothing bars her from so going to the store. "Going to the store" is her intent, her telos - which will occur (non-physically) as that which guides all her ensuing activities aiming to fulfill this telos (i.e., to make it an actualized endstate). This very telos, then, in this sense alone, serves as a determinant of her actions. In the complete absence of all teloi - both conscious and unconscious - Alice's behaviors could then all be perfectly random.

As a more abstract example, many conceive of all life seeking optimal self-presertavion. Here tentatively granting this, optimal self-preservation will then be the at least unconscious telos of all life: one can never perfectly fulfill this telos while living. It does not exist as might some actual object exists; nor does it exist as a completely fulfilled endstate. It, here, nevertheless is deemed to be the intent (telos) that guides, motivates, teleologically determines all behaviors enacted by lifeforms. One that is not of lifeforms willful creation.

In these two examples, while we can select certain teloi to be thereafter guided by, we do not select - much less create - inherent teloi such as that of pursuing optimal self-preservation. And to select any one telos (e.g. intent) from two or more alternative possibilities, we in this very activity will need to be guided by teloi (else our behavior is random). Due to this - if I've explained things well enough - we ourselves cannot choose, much less create, all the teloi which determine our behaviors (both cognitive and physical).

Then, as an example applicable to the notion of an omnipotent deity: Does the omnipotent deity abide by that which is good or, else, is this deity the creator of the very ideal of the good? If the former, then the good here is a telos which guides, motivates, teleologically determines this omnipotent deity toward a potential endstate has not yet realized in full and which the deity did not create.

Hence, here, either the good as telos is an existentially fixed aspect of reality (which simply "just is") that either directly or indirectly governs the activities of everything, very much including those of this omnipotent deity - in which case this deity cannot be all powerful, for he is limited or bounded by the good which is not of his creation - or, else, this omnipotent deity is the very creator of the good.

Its the latter interpretation that I take logical issue with: to create entails intentional creation which, in turn, entails intents/teloi. One could for example ask: for the sake of what (i.e., with what telos) did this omnipotent deity create the good? If he deemed this creation good, then he didn't create the good. And one can argue this line of thought more abstractly: There is an infinite quantity of creations - always with some telos that determines the creations of this omnipotent deity (for otherwise the creations would be random) which this omnipotent deity neither created not chose but is instead guided by and, hence, limited and bound by.

OK, now that I've written this - tough I'll post it any way - I realize that it might be hard to understand or maybe poorly expressed. In which case, at this point, maybe it might be better to leave things where they're at? Inconclusive though things might be.

Not super relevant to the topic at hand, but I think it would be interesting to unpack why this strong tradition of seeing God involved in sustaining all things, filling all things, came to decline in favor of the "divine Watchmaker," or a God who mostly doesn't act in the world and only sometimes intervenes, and who always does so supernaturally. — Count Timothy von Icarus

FWIW, these are the views I so far hold: in the history of mankind, there has repeatedly emerged the notion of a certain uncreated given that "just is" on which everything we know of is dependent. For materialists, this given is matter. For those who are often labeled spiritual, this given has either been an individuated psyche with superlative abilities in all respects (i.e., a deity, replete with the deity's requisite abilities to perceive things and to hold agency as a psyche) or, historically preceding this concept, a certain something that by its very properties cannot be an individuated psyche. Both these notions can be addressed by the term "God". Plato's "The Good", which later morphed into the neoplatonic "The One", serves as one example of God as non-deity. So too does the Judaic notion of G-d which takes the form of the Ein Sof. So too the Eastern notion of the Brahman.

In Western culture, polytheism (including henotheism) converged with philosophical notions of the absolute (e.g., Neoplatonic notions of "The One") to create the notion of something that holds the properties of the philosophical notion of the absolute while at the same time being a singular deity of superlative powers - a singular absolute deity which can hear your thoughts/prayers and act as he (intentionally) wishes in turn.

There's quite a lot more, obviously, both in terms of this very issue and in terms of the wide array of spiritual and theistic belief structures that occurred in the history of the West. I'll here add that the non-deity understanding of God can at the very least be amiable to certain interpretations of pantheism and panentheism - and, therefore, to nature and naturalism (e.g., as aspects of the Stoic-like logos which this absolute in one way or another entails) - whereas the God-as-deity understanding requires that the deity stands in contrast to the nature which he creates and/or created. And, as per your example of the Gnostics, one can hold onto this uncreated, existential aboslute while also upholding the occurrence of deities (in this case, that of the Demurge as a prime example; also of Sophia as that deity which leads toward this very absolute that dwells beyond the Demurge and his creations).

I very much doubt we'll be able to arrive at any definitive conclusion on the matter, but this is a basic outline of my own best current appraisals.

I might come back to this latter on if beneficial. Let me know.

Your focus here is on God's desires (which are a part of God - this thought God is supposed to be divinely simple and thus partless) whereas mine was on God's teloi, or ends, that God seeks to actualize via his desires (which are other in respect to God). The latter, to my mind, necessarily entailing the reality of teleology. The end addressed is, again, apart from what God is. (Much like the universe is not, traditionally in the West, of itself an aspect of God but instead is God's creation.) In the latter case of teleological motives for creation - thereby of intent-ional creation - there will always then be an end which was not God's creation but which God seeks to actualize. With both the latter entailing lack of being "all-powerful".

The solution is generally to define omnipotence more carefully, to reject the law of the excluded middle in some sense, maybe just for God, of to reject the God of classical theism as incoherent. I would go with the latter. — Count Timothy von Icarus

You've brought up good examples. Plenty more; such as Genesis 2 onward portraying God as an omnipotent being that had no control over what the serpent did.

But yes, I go with the latter as well.

Coincidentally, I just came across a YouTube video, by Sabine Hossenfelder, on the topic of "why the universe is not locally real". [...] To quote an old TV ad : "Is it real, or is it Memorex?" :smile: — Gnomon

Just saw the video. Very interesting. Still, first off, I’m no expert in the intricacies of modern physics and, secondly, all modern physics is chockfull of inference (the speaker’s reference to multiple worlds theory’s possible disagreements with some of the premises as one example). So, I’ll let others engage in the heavy-duty physics interpretations of these latest findings.

For what its worth, though, in terms of non-locality and all the other weird aspects of quantum physics:

We often assume that we conscious humans are the be-all and end-all of awareness – this as (mind-endowed) observers. Bring back the facts of biology into this equation and we multicellular organisms are constituted of individual living cells – from individual skin cells to individual neuron cells. Grant that each of these individual cells is endowed with its own primitive mind (as per, for example, the enactivist stance of Evan Thompson in his book "Mind in Life") – needless to add, cells to which the multicellular organisms in which they occur serves as their commonwealth upon which each such cell is dependent and whose preservation each such cell operates to maintain – and you obtain the following biocentric like perspective:

Each one of these primitive mind endowed (and, hence, awareness endowed) cells is constituted of organic molecules – some of which which have been empirically evidenced to exhibit at least some QM properties. *** The cell itself, however, does not exhibit QM properties. Skipping a good deal of rational inference, for each cell to properly function so as to live requires that each cell of itself settles all the QM weirdness (which, again, can apply to various organic molecules and, needless to add, their components) in a way that at the very least ends up resembling our locally real world.

We are constituted of these cells. Those that pertain to our CNS then constitute our own mind and give form to our own conscious awareness.

Going by the aforementioned, then, our own empirically known world will then necessarily be locally real.

I know, the just expressed is in certain respects speculative – or at least will appear so to those who might disagree with some of the premises expressed, such that an individual cell holds its own primitive mind, one that thereby also observes its environment (think, for a blatant example, of an ameba that recognizes and must readily distinguish predator from pray). All the same, this perspective so far works for me as a way of making sense of how QM applies to our empirically known reality.

At any rate, nice video / info!

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*** for example:

https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/11/09/238365/a-natural-biomolecule-has-been-measured-acting-in-a-quantum-wave-for-the-first-time/

https://phys.org/news/2020-07-diffract-molecules.html

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Edit: As a quick addendum to the proposed perspective: I take this to be readily evident but it might not be so to others: our immediate environment is always thoroughly infused with cellular life, be it diploid (e.g., eukaryotes such as ameba) of haploid (e.g. bacteria on solid surfaces and pollen in the air) – all of which would, in the previously given perspective, of itself settle quantum weirdness so as to successfully persist as an individual cell … one that interacts with its environment, including with other (locally real) cells. So, in this interpretation, we always dwell in a non-QM empirical world - this if one’s own body’s makeup were to not be enough (though I currently think it is). Our empirical awareness of QM's validity only comes into play when we focus - not on life, but - life's (as well as non-life's) material components.

[...] Together those processes make up the mind. Is it real? Yes. Is it physical - good question. What kind of a thing is it? I'm not sure, but I do believe it is a manifestation of physical, biological, neurological processes. — T Clark

Shoot. Going by that definition, I could qualify as a materialist myself. :wink: No bones to pick. Cool definition. :up:

Was in a rush with my last post. But regarding God’s intentionality, here’s a maybe better expressed argument:

Either a) God intentionally generated an initial given (e.g., the occurrence of light as per Genesis 1) or b) God has been intentionally generating givens for eternity such that there never was any initial given that God intentionally generated.

If (a), the generation of this initial given (call it X) was then necessarily to some extent limited or bounded (hence, determined) by an end – for the sake of which it was generated – which, as end aspired toward, could not have been generated by God prior to God’s very first, intentional generation (i.e., his generation of X). Here, then, God was himself to some degree limited or bounded (determined) by his actively held intent (telos or goal or aim), an intent held by him which he did not create and which he did not instantaneously realize. Therefore, God was not - and thereby is not - omnipotent.

If (b), then the conclusion of (a) also applies – for, here, there never could have been an initial, intentionally created end (for the sake of which future creations would be enacted). To intentionally create such an end (call it Z), an end for the sake of which this created end Z is brought about is required. One could here draw this out ad infinitum and, always, there will be one end for the sake of which a creation is made which was not itself God’s creation yet was requisite for God’s intentionally creating anything. Hence, God is not omnipotent.

Lastly, were God able to fulfill all ends that God aims to fulfilling – as would be required of omnipotence – then God would at such juncture no longer be intentionally (i.e., teleologically) creating anything whatsoever. For all God’s intents would have here become fully actualized as God intended. Therefore, the omnipotence of a psyche logically mandates that the psyche does not intentionally generate anything - for there here is nothing that this omnipotent psyche has not been yet able to actualize.

Due to the aforementioned, no individuated psyche (no individuated anything, actually) that is teleologically driven - of which intentionality is a form - can possibly be omnipotent.

Hence, an omnipotent creator deity is logically impossible. Same is valid for the impossibility of an omnipotent designer, programmer, etc.

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Hopefully that makes better sense. Would welcome to hear any flaws in this reasoning.

I really don't see how that follows. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's fare. It was tersely given argument.

If the universe develops teleologically why does that entail that God is guided by the same goals? I don't even see how this necessarily applies to God's immanent activities and properties. — Count Timothy von Icarus

"It doesn't" to both questions.

It only requires that God has goals in what God does. If God does not have any goals, then irrationality or, at best, arational reasoning (if that can even make sense). If God does have goals, then these ends with God pursues cannot rationally all be God's creation. This is because the very act of creating (and of designing, programming, willfully generating, etc.) is intentional. Hence, it is driven by at least one end which is a priori to the act of creation for the sake of which the creation is enacted.

This is likely still too terse. Followed through, though, it at least currently seems to me that no god can be omnipotent (if at all occurrent) - for any god will abide by at least one telos/end that this god did not create. An end which the god seeks to actualize, but has not yet had the ability to.

B. Seems to imply that having goals necessarily implies a lack of agency. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I find quite the contrary to be the case: Agency cannot occur in the absence of teloi, i.e. of ends for the sake of which agency is enacted. This is what makes our free will intentional (here, for those of us who at least entertain the possibility of free will). We as agents are neither "fully determined" nor "perfectly undetermined by anything" in what we do. And each choice we make will be intentional (an unintended choice is nonsensical). This then, to me at least, entails that our freely willed choices are always partly determined by the ends we actively hold for the sake of which we so generate a made choice. While at the same time not being fully, or absolutely, determined as per traditional interpretations of causal determinism.

Surely one isn't free if one's behavior is arbitrary. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Hence free will needing to be intent-driven or intent-semi-determined - and, thereby, intentional.

The ability to rationally develop one's own goals and the ability to have second and nth order goals about one's own desires are both generally taken as prerequisites for freedom. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I grant this. And it, to my mind, can get complex. But then in so developing one's goals via one's free will, one's free will, to be intentional, will need to be telos-driven (i.e., semi-determined by teloi which are a priori to this developing of end to follow in the future). In sort: otherwise one's develping of goals would be unintentional and, hence, arbitrary.

How does this not rule out all free will? — Count Timothy von Icarus

No. It is, I find, a requisite for free will's occurrence. This with free will loosely defined at the metaphysical freedom to choose otherwise in the same situation - something which causal determinism disallows. (But then, neither does this in and of itself validate the reality of our being endowed with free will.)

Depends on how you look at it. :joke: — Gnomon

That's as good an answer as I'll probably get in regard to my question. :grin: Thanks for it.

Empirical science ignored the mental aspects of reality for centuries, because it was associated with Souls, Spirits, and Ghosts. — Gnomon

I myself think of this as "Empirical science ignored the mental aspects of reality for centuries, because it was associated with Psyche (as in "psychology" - the study of psyche)". But yea, your assessment seems to be about right.

The Great Programmer designed the universe to ... ? — unenlightened

Even in denying the validity of the argument I've presented against exactly such a "The Great Programmer", you do realize this question can only be answered via a teleological reason, don't you? In other words, by providing an end for the sake of which the means (in this case, the universe) was set in motion.

However, it is hardly clear that this problem implies the "God of classical theism," a God that only seems to exist in philosophy journals anyhow, — Count Timothy von Icarus

Haven't read the entire OP yet, but as to this, the reality of teleology directly contradicts the occurrence of the "God of classical theism".

This omnipotent God (psyche) either a) unintentionally creates everything or b) intentionally creates everything.

If (a), reasoning (emotive as well as cognitive) goes down the drain, and anything might be - which at the very least rules out the existential requirement for such a God.

If (b) then God Himself is teleologically driven, and hence determined, by His intentions - all intentions being teleological, i.e. intent/goal/end driven. Therefore, God here can rationally only remain subject to teloi (goals) which God does not (intentionally) create but, instead, intends to fulfill (irrespective of what they might be). Hence, here, God cannot be the omnipotent "creator of everything" - for he cannot, when rationally addressed, create (intentionally) his own intents by which he's driven when so creating.

There's always blind faith ... but when it comes to reasoning, the reality of teleology is logically incompatible with an omnipotent God that creates everything.

This goes out to those who are not irreducibly fixated on the unquestionable reality of their own particular worldview, whatever it might be (if any).

"Apparently, monistic Materialism solves the origin problem by denying that it is a problem : consciousness is not real, but ideal : a figment of imagination, so it literally does not matter. Dualism just accepts that we tend to think of Mind & Matter as two completely different things, and never the twain shall meet : hyle + morph = real matter + ideal form. Monistic Panpsychism assumes that Matter is an illusion generated by the inherent mental processes of nature (a priori Cosmic Consciousness), hence matter does not matter." — Gnomon

While I wouldn't say that physicality doesn't matter, I'm in general agreement with the given description of panpsychism. Nevertheless:

So conceived it seems to me that a world of so called “monistic panpsychism” would yet necessarily consist of an ontological duality: namely, between 1) awareness (with any kind of ur-awareness which might apply to non-life included) and 2) everything that is not awareness (which, as such, thereby informs, and thereby gives form to, awareness). Here, then, all aspects of mind and body that awareness can be in any way aware of would ultimately consist of the same basic stuff - with mind and matter being only a property dualism of this substance (rather than being two ontological substances). And, in conformity with the boldfaced and underlined parts of the quote, this underlying stuff/substance which is “everything that is not awareness” would itself ultimately be the product of awareness when globally addressed - this then likely in a multiplicity of different ontological manners.

Then: Properly speaking, would you interpret panpsychism thus understood to be an ontological monism or an ontological, non-Cartesian dualism?

Hence, is consciousness actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc.? — javra

This is monism. This is reductionism. So how I think of things – how Peirce thought of things, how systems science thinks of things – just doesn't share your ontological commitments. You are trying to jam square pegs into round holes. — apokrisis

My lack of effort, you say. Alright then. Baby steps.

Here's a proposition: "I am conscious of this text." In your worldview, does this proposition have a truth-value?

Yes. But what are the ontic commitments of this term "real" that you employ. Or what has become now the term "ontic" that I guess is supposed to mean "really real" or "fundamentally real" or "monistically real". — apokrisis

None of that, or at least not necessarily "fundamentally real". The ontic is that which ontology is the study of. That which is actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc. Hence, is consciousness actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc.? It need not be fundamental for me to make my argument that it cannot be empirically studied by the sciences. But if you deem it illusory, fictional, etc. then that's a disagreement on what is actual and what is not in this world.

I've told you I am a holist and not a reductionist and therefore don't buy the causal cop-out that is supervenience.

So your line of argument goes wrong from there. I am not a reductionist. And you don't seem to have a clue about what else that leaves. — apokrisis

Could you calm down a bit? First off, you could interpret "to supervene" as "to be dependent on something else for truth, existence, or instantiation (definition pulled from Wiktionary)", which is what I intended. Let me know of a more appropriate term to express this and I'll use it: If A's occurrence holds X, Y, and Z as its constituents, then A is dependent on X, Y, and Z in such manner as that just quoted. And obviously this does not negate holistic top-down processes from operating on X, Y, and Z.

Secondly, of main interest was the one question I previously asked, together with what is meant by you to be "an idea".

But I'll cut the crap. If you have no intent to discuss the issue, then so be it.

Really what? Really an idea? Really material? Really semiotic – as in the modelling that connects the two? — apokrisis

I didn't ask "really". I asked "real". As in something that ontically occurs. Not as an idea, but as that which apprehends the idea of consciousness when so thought of.

"Really material" would be contingent on what you here mean by matter; I'll tentatively interpret you meaning that matter is the constitutional makeup of any given (what Aristotle intended by "matter") - and that consciousness thereby supervenes on its own constituents. If this is an accurate interpretation of what you here mean by "material reality", I then easily accept this to be true.

But then its being semiotically real as a "modeling that connects the idea to its constituents" can so far to me only be a misguided inference. And this precisely because I so far cannot make either rational or experiential sense of awareness of itself being an idea - I so far cannot understand how it can be an idea that thereby (due to its semiotics) then holds awareness of other ideas. This would result in turtles all the way down, for all ideas have their constituents - e.g., lesser ideas or connotations, all of which further supervene on the operational parts of a CNS - here apparently entailing that the idea of, say, evolution is in fact itself endowed with first-person awareness.

So I'll again ask a question in the name of optimally impartial philosophical enquiry:

Do you find that consciousness can only be "a) an idea and b) its constituents which are c) connected semiotically by modeling"?

Your previous reply - and I thank you for it - indicates yes. So, if your answer is "yes", then please express what "an idea" signifies in this context - such that consciousness becomes distinctly different from the idea of evolution which consciousness can be aware of (in that while the first is aware the second is not).

My bad for assuming you might have had the curiosity and knowledge to follow arguments already much simplified. — apokrisis

Their implications are so far too vague to be clear, apo. Do you uphold that first-person awareness, aka consciousness, is real?

↪javra
Ask RogueAI. — apokrisis

My bad for not clarifying: my last question regarding kindergarten was rhetorical.

As to RogueAI asking me, can you not, you know, express your views in manners that others can understand?

:blush:

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Why do I feel like I'm in kindergarten ... on a philosophy forum? One of those things one might never know.

Remind me which one you are again? — apokrisis

Use more syllables, apo. Meaning transference is important to discussions.

Oh, no. I understand symbols devoid of content. :wink:

I have no idea what any of this huge sentence means. Sorry. — Tom Storm

no worries

Maybe you could entice me to. What's an example of something that is not a social construction according to these texts and Vygotskain psychology.

Besides, you really have nothing to correct in what I interpret your state of mind to be?

metaphysical frameworks, such as idealism and panpsychism, which were derided as baseless nonsense by the positivists of the past, are back in new forms. But such claims cannot be taken as a true description of an ultimate reality for there is no credible realist theory of language that would make sense of such claims. — Tom Storm

I am wondering what people who study philosophy think of this claim as it strikes me as an interesting argument and might breathe some new life into debates about idealism. — Tom Storm

As someone how holds imperfect knowledge in this realm (in all realms, actually), at this point in our history I find the quoted argument for the most part valid. Nevertheless, for those of use don't remove the objective idealism from out of Peirce's metaphysics of objective idealism (with his notion of Agapism, for example, very much included), his is one example of a description of reality which can - I so far think - at the very least facilitate a "a credible realist theory of language" that thereby makes sense of the very metaphysics addressed - one wherein the physical world is effete mind in relation to which propositions can either be true or false. But I grant that Peirce's writings (and I have not as of yet read all of them) are not amongst the most analytically stringent writings out there in terms of presenting a coherent whole. (My favorite in this regard was the pantheistic metaphysics of Spinoza's Ethics; agree or disagree with it, it was exceedingly transparent in its premises-conclusion format; but no, not a system of either idealism or panpsychism.)

You're making him sound like an idiot! — RogueAI

It was in no way my intention to.

I anticipate and expect that he will correct me in any way that my statements might misrepresent him. Still, from past discussions on this topic in this thread, this is what I've honestly gathered.

ps. I should have written Chat GPT (not GTP)

I’ve noticed that @apokrisis hasn’t responded to a number of your questions, so I’ll do my best to do so in my honest interpretations of his state of mind. @apokrisis can of course readily correct me wherever he finds me mistaken in anything I say (it is, after all, a best current understanding).

(I wrote this before seeing both yours and @bert1's most recent replies; posting it all the same)

Apo is an eliminativist who deems all speak of first-person awareness and, hence, of consciousness to be a linguistic social construct devoid of real referent(s). Because of this, all your questions regarding the reality of consciousness as first-person awareness are nonsensical to him - with answers that are "not even wrong" as he might say. We are all – take your pick – moist robots or philosophical zombies that hypnotize ourselves via our language into illusions of being consciously aware when, in fact, no such thing can ever and in any way occur.

The socially constructed term (as though there could occur any linguistic terms that aren’t) we specify as “consciousness”, however, can be behavioristically interpreted and defined as “evidenced input into a system conjoined with the output of same said system”.

Hence, if a robot or computer program can report on inputs – with Chat GTP as one example of this - it is then as conscious as anything else. No awareness required - or, for that matter, possible. At least not as anything that is in any way real.

Thanks for the reply. Yes, there is the connotative issue of modernity vs. primitivity at play, and all that this might imply.

Likewise, instead of presuming that essential Potential was fully-formed into Consciousness at the beginning, ... — Gnomon

Only want to here point out that most ancient perspectives - such as that of Stoicism - in no way held such a view of an animistic world. This turn of events emerged with Abrahamic perspectives.

Objective knowledge from science about our moral intuitions is “impartial” and even mind-independent. Obtaining mind-independent knowledge is the standard goal in science. — Mark S

While I fully agree that objective knowledge - hence either perfectly impartial knowledge or a relatively impartial knowledge that aims toward the former - is the goal of the empirical sciences as an enterprise (all aspects of the scientific method function so as further approach this end), I'm not at all in agreement that any knowledge - including one that can by hypothesized as completely impartial - can ever be awareness independent. And I can here only interpret "mind-independent knowledge" to be just that: knowledge whose occurrence is not in any way dependent on awareness.

This disagreement might then likely be an insurmountable impasse for us.

And, perhaps most importantly, he was on an episode of "The Simpsons." — T Clark

:lol:

Objective knowledge about why our shared intuitions about good are what they are could be similarly useful. — Mark S

I don't disagree with this, but find it agreeing with my previous post. "Objective knowledge" cannot be interpreted as a (physical) object whose attributes are thereby equally applicable to all co-existent minds in impartial manners. Hence, I so far can only interpret it as "impartial knowledge" regarding our shared intuition about the good. Yet, to in fact be impartial, this knowledge will need to be equally applicable in valid manners to all minds the world over - if this is at all possible. And this, again, is not a theme for science to discover but, instead, one for meta-ethics to investigate.

If I'm missing something let me know.

A very well thought-out OP.

I don't know if I should throw this monkey-wrench into the wheels, but I will. For science and philosophy to converge on the issue of morality, what is first needed is a common understanding of the the term "good" references in all cases, irrespective of whether moral or not.

The mass murderer considers murdering innocent bystanders a good pleasure to obtain - this in terms of their own mind's workings. What then, for example, unifies as an underlying facet of all conceivable behaviors that which is good to the unconstrained mass murderer with that which is good to, for example, Mother Teresa?

Here is not addressed the issue of cooperation (which can be at the very least inferred from empirical observations), cooperation's mores, and the societal (or even universal) morality that can thereby obtain as a facet of these mores. Here is addressed why any such optimal means of cooperation is deemed - maybe in an a priori way - something good to begin with. In contrast, for one possible to conceive example, there is the the good(ness) to be aspired toward of a cosmically obtained absolute nonbeing - this as entertained by most, if not all, antinatalists - wherein the very process of cooperation is deemed to be a deficit of that which is good and, thereby, in this sense alone, an existential bad (for some measure of suffering will yet occur in such cooperation at least at times).

So what makes optimal cooperation, rather than absolute nonbeing, good? (as an aside, with a heads up that notions such as that of Nirvana entail being - this in contrast to the nonbeing longed for by the antinatalist)

Philosophically, the issue is not - or at least, is not foundationally - that of "what proposition specifies that which is in fact good" but, instead, "what universal attribute(s) constitute the very existential occurrence of good and bad (and, by extension when applied to psyches, the potential for evil)". Here circumscribing everything from a good piece of pie, to a good argument, to a good killing (from a vengeful murder's point of view just as much as from a hunter's or farmer's that kills for strict sustenance, etc.), to a good morality (such as the morality of female circumcision can be for some, but is not so deemed by most of the West - etc.) ... and everything else under the sun.

The later philosophical issue enquirers into something that cannot be empirically observed - but is instead presumed in empirical observations. And while i grant that not all philosophers are concerned with this issue, many are.

In sum, it so far seems to me that science and philosophy can only happily, satisfactorily, converge on the issue of morality only if both agree on what the meaning of "good" (regardless of the language in which it is expressed) can and does signify, and what it applies to in all its conceivably instantiations. (Again, including what Stalin deemed to be good for himself (and others) and what Mother Teresa deemed to be good for herself (and others) both here being individual instantiations of this very same meaning - of that which is good - as its meaning is here equally applicable to both). And this underlying issue of what I deem to be meta-ethics I find cannot be obtained via science but, instead, potentially only via philosophy.

This is intended for one and all:

*1. Panpsychism :
Though it sounds like something that sprang fully formed from the psychedelic culture, panpsychism has been around for a very long time. — Gnomon

Though my current conviction makes me partly dogmatic about the two being equivalent, I’m at the same time curious to discover how my understanding could be wrong – hence the question:

In what conceivable way is panpsychism not a reclothing (i.e., re-branding or re-veiling) of the quite ancient and, back then, basically ubiquitous notion of animism?

In other words, what can possibly be rationally different between panpsychism and animism as metaphysical understandings of reality?

----

As a reminder, to say that “everything is endowed with anima” is equivalent to saying that “everything is endowed with psyche” - first term being Latin and the second Greek, with both terms having the same underlying meaning.

And if animism needs to be made more palatable, the Stoic notion of an “anima mundi” is basic animism conceived of in stratified layers of efficacy in relation to the cosmos / whole.