"Abstract: In the April 2002 edition of JCS I outlined the conscious electromagnetic information field (cemi field) theory, claiming that consciousness is that component of the brain’s electromagnetic field that is downloaded to motor neurons and is thereby capable of communicating its informational content to the outside world. In this paper I demonstrate that the theory is robust to criticisms" — McFadden

Yes. That sounds like a superficially plausible theory. But Materialists will ask, "where's the physical evidence" of an Information Field, and of "downloading" by the brain? Invisible Electromagnetic fields can seem spooky, hence they are imagined by ghost-hunters to be the substance of spirits : ectoplasm. The readings of their electronic instruments are indeed evidence of electromagnetism, but to interpret that static as the presence of a human soul may not be solid enough to convince a skeptic. Who may interpret the signals as the presence of an electrical mechanism, such as a cell phone, power-line or refrigerator . . . . and of belief prior to evidence.

So for me, the jury is still out on the CEMI Mind Field hypothesis. :chin:


*1. The CEMI (Conscious Electromagnetic Information) theory of consciousness, proposed by Johnjoe McFadden, posits that consciousness is an electromagnetic field generated by the brain's neurons. This theory suggests that neuronal firing creates an electromagnetic field which integrates information from the brain's digital processes, with consciousness arising as a part of this field that can influence subsequent neural activity. According to the theory, non-conscious actions are processed solely within the neuronal network, while conscious, voluntary actions are driven by neurons that receive input from this electromagnetic field.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=cemi+theory+of+consciousness
Note --- Animal brains are known to be electro-chemical organisms. But the Hard Question remains : how do those sparks & spurts transform from measurable Physical events into meaningful metaphysical Mental ideas & feelings. How does a flow of electrons integrate information? What integrating power connects a row of isolated dots into a continuous line? What are the steps & stages of transformation?

PS___ The clue I'm working on is the lab-measured relationship between physical Energy and mental Information?

All of this still operates entirely within the materialist frame. It searches for an objective correlate—some measurable physical proxy—that can be mapped onto the intentional, semantic, and affective dimensions of experience. McFadden’s “cemi field” belongs to the familiar genre of quasi-scientific proposals that promise to locate consciousness in some previously overlooked physical substrate. But despite adopting new language (“information field,” “downloading,” “integration”), it remains materialist in essence: the hope is that adding one more physical principle will bridge the explanatory gap.

But ask the obvious question: even if such a field were discovered, would it bring us one step closer to the meaning of "know thyself"? The point is that we already have intimate acquaintance with consciousness—not as an object among objects, but as the observer, to whom anything appears as an object in the first place. No amount of empirical elaboration on electromagnetic dynamics touches this first-person dimension. It only charts more correlations.

So I think Mcfadden's confidence in 'solving' the hard problem is misplaced. Problems are things for which solutions are possible; mysteries are circumstances of which we are a part (McGinn?). In that sense the hard problem is not a puzzle awaiting a clever physical hypothesis. It is the modern reappearance of an older insight: that the subject cannot be catalogued as one more item in the world, any more than walking far enough will take you to the horizon.

All of this still operates entirely within the materialist frame. It searches for an objective correlate—some measurable physical proxy—that can be mapped onto the intentional, semantic, and affective dimensions of experience. — Wayfarer

I suspect that this Ontological & Epistemological dichotomy has plagued philosophers from the time of Plato & Aristotle : Hyle (matter) vs Morph (form). Which is why I focus on the modern understanding of Information (energy + form), as a possible way to bridge the gap in the map. :worry:

Science answers mysteries by using the scientific method to investigate unexplained phenomena, from the ancient mystery of Earth's regular seismic pulse to the modern enigma of dark matter. When faced with the unknown, scientists formulate hypotheses, conduct experiments, and analyze data to develop theories, though some phenomena, like the conditions before the Big Bang, may remain outside of current scientific reach.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=science+answer+to+mysteries
Note --- The mystery of the Hard Problem is not about Phenomena, but Noumena. Yet that Physical/Spiritual distinction is denied by Materialists.

Kant argued that we can only know the phenomenal world, the world as it appears to us through our senses and cognitive faculties. We cannot directly experience noumena, but they are the underlying reality that causes our perceptions of phenomena.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=kant+noumena
Note --- Noumena are not Percieved by physical senses, but Conceived by mental imagination.
Perceive : to become aware of, know, or identify by means of the senses.
Conceive : to form an idea or imagine it in your mind.

Problems are things for which solutions are possible; mysteries are circumstances of which we are a part (McGinn?) — Wayfarer

Thanks for that reference. I suspect that the success of the empirical method, in over-turning time-honored beliefs, has given modern scientists confidence that it can solve any problem or mystery. But McGinn observes that, for philosophical "mysteries", the experiencing Observer is part of the Problem of learning how & why we experience the real concrete world in terms of abstract ideas. :cool:

Problems are challenges to our current knowledge that we can realistically expect to solve through scientific inquiry or logical deduction. They are external to our being and can be overcome.
Mysteries are aspects of reality that are inherently beyond the scope of human cognitive abilities, not just temporarily unsolved. According to McGinn's view, we are inextricably part of the mystery itself (as conscious beings trying to understand consciousness), which is why we can never achieve a complete, objective solution in the same way we solve a "problem"
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=+Problems+are+things+for+which+solutions+are+possible%3B+mysteries+are+circumstances+of+which+we+are+a+part+%28McGinn%3F%29.

I should add a caveat about McGinn. His “mysterian” view is useful in one narrow sense: he at least takes the reality of consciousness seriously, and he recognises that the standard physicalist story hasn’t solved anything. In that respect he’s a welcome counterweight to the eliminativist impulse.

But I think his explanation for the “mystery” goes astray. He says we can’t understand consciousness because humans lack the right conceptual equipment — as if a special metaphysical faculty were required to see how brain processes give rise to experience.

The difficulty is simpler, and much less exotic: the scientific conception of “nature” that we inherited from Galileo and Descartes deliberately brackets out subjective experience in order to describe the world in purely quantitative, third-person terms. So when we later try to fit consciousness back into that picture, it naturally appears inexplicable. (This has also been subject of the discussion in the First v Third Person thread.)

That’s not a cognitive failing, it’s a conceptual one. The framework within which he's considering the problem has already excluded what it is we’re trying to understand. So I think McGinn identifies the symptom correctly — the intractability — but not the underlying cause. 'Knowing your own mind' is still eminently feasible but maybe it doesn't mean what a lot of people would like it to mean.

Ref: https://www.newdualism.org/papers/C.McGinn/McGinn_1989_Mind-body-problem_M.pdf

That’s not a cognitive failing, it’s a conceptual one. — Wayfarer

Very good

[C]onsciousness ... appears inexplicable.

That’s not a cognitive failing, it’s a conceptual one. — Wayfarer

:up: :up:

Finally, you agree with us eliminativists and physicalists that, in effect, "consciousness" is not what it "appears" to be (e.g. a homuncular / user illusion).

I have never posited consciousness as a 'thinking thing' or as an homuncular entity. And an illusion is something that only a mind can entertain. Although I suppose I can't do anything about selective readings.

So when we later try to fit consciousness back into that picture, it naturally appears inexplicable. . . . . The framework within which he's considering the problem has already excluded what it is we’re trying to understand. — Wayfarer

I wasn't familiar with the minority philosophical position, that a Theory of Mind should be eliminated*1 from consideration of the human role in reality. I suppose that it's an attempt to remove the "bathwater" of imaginary gods & ghosts --- along with the "baby" of self-knowledge --- from folk philosophy, as unreal & immaterial. Such purging would result in elimination of Philosophy forums, which waste time & words on literal non-sensation.

But that lacuna would leave the world populated only by lumps of animated matter, some of whom walk bi-pedally and support large brains atop a vertical spine, and who create Cultures*2 that go beyond the providence, and instincts, of physical Nature. But, on a Philosophy forum, shouldn't we include the products of Philosophy (ideas, intelligence) in our analysis? That subjective inward focus would leave time & space for the objective stuff of Science to the experts on physics & chemistry websites. :nerd:


*1. Eliminativism is the view that some things, particularly mental states like beliefs and desires, do not exist and are part of a flawed, "folk" theory that a more advanced science (like neuroscience) will replace. It argues that these concepts are so fundamentally incorrect that they are not just reducible to physical processes but must be eliminated entirely, much like how concepts from older theories were discarded. For example, an eliminative materialist would argue that we don't have beliefs or desires, but rather that our current understanding of them is a pre-scientific theory that will be replaced by a more accurate description of brain activity.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=eliminativism

*2. The statement "culture is metaphysical" suggests that culture is not a simple, tangible thing, but a complex system of shared meanings, beliefs, and values that are fundamental to our understanding of reality and human existence. It implies that culture provides the underlying "metaphysics"—the basic principles that shape our worldview—for a society. This view posits that culture isn't just a product of social interaction, but a reality in itself, with its own properties, which can be analyzed philosophically.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=culture+is+metaphysical

I've been a Dennett antagonist ever since before joining this Forum. I thought the title of his book Consciousness Explained was ridiculously pompous (and indeed, it was widely parodied as 'Consciousness Ignored'. Galen Strawson satirically suggested that Dennett should be sued for deceptive trade practice. Been over it too many times.

And an illusion is something that only a mind can entertain. — Wayfarer

What about mindless facial recognition software that misrecognizes faces? Illusion =/= misrecognition, no?

It’s an artifact as such an extension of human capabilities.

It's not a "mind" and yet capable of illusions (just as LLMs can hallucinate).

The data recorded by such devices can’t be an illusion until it is interpreted by a user. Otherwise it’s just pixels.

LLMs are different, as the operations they perform are orders of magnitude more complex than image capture. Regardless, their ‘hallucinations’ are possible concatenations of words and phrases. Ask any of the LLMs whether they are sentient beings, and they will always respond in the negative.

For the record, I will never accept eliminativism because it denies the very thing that makes knowing, questioning, arguing, or explaining possible in the first place. Consciousness is not an optional theoretical posit—it is the ground of the awareness within which every fact, every argument, and every experience appears. To “eliminate” it is to eliminate the condition of appearance itself. Whatever difficulties consciousness poses for physicalist explanation, denying its reality is not a solution but a performative contradiction: the eliminativist must rely on the very phenomenon he claims does not exist in order to assert that it does not exist. For me, the given reality of experience is more fundamental than any theory, and no philosophical outlook that begins by denying the existence of its own ground can ever be persuasive. That is my last word on it.

You’d think that would be ‘nuff said.

You'd think!

“….This** can never become popular and, indeed, has no occasion to be so; for finespun arguments in favour of useful truths make just as little impression on the public mind as the equally subtle objections brought against these truths.…”
(** this being, or reducible to, critical thinking)

I've been a Dennett antagonist ever since before joining this Forum. I thought the title of his book Consciousness Explained was ridiculously pompous (and indeed, it was widely parodied as 'Consciousness Ignored'. — Wayfarer

Ironically, even some (supposedly) pragmatic scientists are entertaining (seemingly) spiritual explanations for consciousness*1. Such modern theories are more Mathematical (mental) than Material (substantial)*2. Meanwhile, the concept of "higher dimensions"*3 has been adopted by some religious thinkers as a more sciency-sounding term for what the ancients imagined as an out-of-reach celestial "spiritual" realm.

Personally, I have no experience of dimensions beyond those of mundane space-time. Even "moments of creativity or deep thought" feel ordinary to me. And I don't know how we might "measure" them, other than how we measure Time, in increments of environmental cycles relative to physiological rhythms. And yet, String Theorists seem to take un-measureable multiple dimensions for granted, because the mental math can easily go beyond what counts for the material senses.

Strangely, Math is supposed to be a form of Logic, but has discovered numerical values that are beyond Reason : Irrational & Transcendental. Is it a sign that Mind is not physical, but Meta-Physical? We can imagine future Utopias and Paradises, but never actually reach their golden gates. Even so, are ideas & ideals, that have no manifestation in matter, somehow more real than mundane reality? Or simply a way for humans to strain against the restraints of physical laws?

Anyway, it seems that Consciousness, unbounded by physical limitations, remains a mystery in search of a logical, tangible, explanation. Religious interpretations may meekly accept Spirituality as beyond Reason. But epistemological Philosophers tend to hold-out for a rational understanding, instead of incomprehensible and extra-sensory blind faith. Don't promise me a tantalizing heavenly hereafter, make it real, here, now! :halo:


*1. Spiritual Consciousness :
Physicist Michael Pravica has proposed a controversial theory that human consciousness could originate from higher dimensions beyond our physical reality. This theory, rooted in the concept of hyperdimensionality, suggests that during moments of creativity or deep thought, consciousness may transcend the brain to connect with these unseen realms. While this idea is speculative and not widely accepted, it opens up the possibility that consciousness is not purely a product of the brain and could potentially exist beyond the physical world.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=Human+Consciousness+Comes+From+a+Higher+Dimension%2C+Scientist+Claims%E2%80%94Meaning+It+Could+Transcend+the+Physical+World
Note --- Is this scientist explaining Consciousness by imagining invisible & dubious parallel realities?

*2. Higher dimensions are a concept in mathematics and physics that represent directions beyond the three spatial dimensions (length, width, and height) and one time dimension we experience. These additional dimensions can be thought of as more "degrees of freedom" for movement, or as mathematical and theoretical spaces used to describe phenomena. While some theories, like string theory, propose the existence of up to 10 or 11 dimensions, these extra dimensions may be curled up or "compactified" at extremely small scales, making them undetectable.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=higher+dimensions
Note --- Do we actually experience Four Dimensions, or do we merely accept it conventionally?

*3. In a spiritual context, a higher dimension can refer to states of consciousness beyond our everyday, three-dimensional physical experience, characterized by greater awareness, love, and unity. It can also describe a more transcendent, eternal, or "unseen" reality that is beyond linear time and separation. These concepts are often tied to spiritual growth, moving from a focus on the ego and material world to a more enlightened, purposeful existence.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=higher+dimension+meaning+spiritual
Note --- Is this higher realm populated by spirits & gods, or merely by ideal Platonic Forms, whatever that is?

I should add a caveat about McGinn. His “mysterian” view is useful in one narrow sense: he at least takes the reality of consciousness seriously, and he recognises that the standard physicalist story hasn’t solved anything. In that respect he’s a welcome counterweight to the eliminativist impulse.

But I think his explanation for the “mystery” goes astray. He says we can’t understand consciousness because humans lack the right conceptual equipment — as if a special metaphysical faculty were required to see how brain processes give rise to experience. — Wayfarer

The problem with Mysterian*1 philosophy is that it gives-up on the ancient philosophical quest : to explore the Hard Questions that are not subject to objective answers. Such speculative exploration*2 can be proven wrong though, when observations contradict the conjectures. Today, we might say that dragon warnings about Mars, are "not even wrong". But there are plenty of other scary features of the red planet, that should give rocket-ship explorers pause : 2015 film, The Martian.

Personally, I think we do have "the right conceptual equipment" for seeking answers to the Hard Problem. Yet our "metaphysical faculty" of Reason & Logic does not produce "Hard" evidence, in the sense of physics & chemistry & neurology. Instead, it's our ability to imagine things that possess no material structure, but only logical structure : patterns & relationships. That's why I continue to explore the relation of Causation to Consciousness. I don't think Consciousness is fundamental, but Causation, and its cousin Information, may be essential to the evolving world.

Awareness of things & events inside and outside the body is not some magical substance, but a temporal process*3 : change over time. It transforms sensory data into mental ideas & feelings. That's why I think our metaphysical faculty is more like causal Energy than inert Matter. Recent scientific studies have noted the fundamental relationship between Physical Energy and Metaphysical Mind*4. Further rational & empirical research may eventually dispel the "Mystery", by identifying the causal steps & phase changes between physical Causation & metaphysical Transformation. :nerd:


*1. Mysterianism is the philosophy that some questions, particularly the hard problem of consciousness, are fundamentally unsolvable by humans due to the inherent limitations of our cognitive abilities. This perspective, most famously associated with Colin McGinn, argues that while consciousness is a natural phenomenon and not supernatural, our brains are not equipped to understand how the physical matter of the brain creates subjective experience. It is not the same as saying we don't know the answer yet, but that we can never know the answer.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=mysterianism+philosophy
Note --- Mysterianism may be a modern form of Spirituality and Taboo, in that it imagines non-overlapping magisteria like Heaven & Earth.

*2. Here Be Dragons : The phrase was thought to be a literal warning from mapmakers to mariners that they should proceed with caution because the area was uncharted and potentially hazardous.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=maps+used+to+say+there+be+dragons+here

*3. A conscious process is a mental operation that a person is aware of and often in control of, involving explicit awareness of thoughts, memories, feelings, and sensations. These are the processes that form a person's subjective experience of being aware of themselves and their surroundings, such as planning or recalling a memory, and are distinct from unconscious processes that occur automatically.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=consciusness+process
Note --- A Process is a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end. A.N. Whitehead's process philosophy conjectures that reality is fundamentally a dynamic and creative "becoming" rather than a collection of static "things". The Evolutionary Process seems teleological : directed by intention, not accident. Of course, the Intender may remain a mystery until . . . .

*4. Energy is a form of Information :
No, information and energy are not the same thing, but they are fundamentally linked, and information can be converted into energy.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=information+is+energy

You’d think that would be ‘nuff said. — Mww

The problem is that the idea of physicalist inconsistency is a strawman given that eliminativists do not seek to eliminate or discount the fact of being conscious (consciousness) but instead believe that it is an entirely neural, that is physical, process, and that the kind of default imagining of what consciousness is, based on the "seeming" of introspection and rationalist conceptualization, is an illusion.

Now, of course they may be wrong, and there seems to be no way to test that hypothesis, as there is no way to test the idea that consciousness is somehow (although the somehow remains obscure) non-physical.

The point I would contend is the idea on either side of the debate that their conclusions are "slam dunk". That idea only shows dogmatism, closed-mindedness.

Useful truths making just as little impression as those useful truths brought against……..

Thing is, consciousness is already strictly a metaphysical conception, hence necessarily non-physical, from which follows that to ascribe to it the possibility of being an integral brain state in accordance with eliminativism, is contradictory, and upon having attributing to it a theoretical brain-state correlate in accordance with materialism, to then attempt to measure the brain state hypothesized by that correlate, is impossible.

Whatever the material correlate to metaphysical consciousness may be, it isn’t consciousness. And whatever metaphysical conception consciousness may be, it isn’t material.
—————-

Put a guy in a chair, hook him up to some device, tell him to think of something……can you even imagine what kind of machine will immediately display the ‘57 DeSoto the guy picked as his thought? No doubt his own brain can bring up the image, so the constructed device would most likely be something like the brain, in order to display what the brain produced. But we don’t know how the brain presents material correlates, so constructing a device the operation of which is unknown to us insofar as its performance is congruent to the brain’s, is manifestly unintelligible.

Even if that were possible, and say there actually was such a device, guy gets up from the chair, might even be awe-struck….but still can’t properly express why he hates the taste of Lima beans, gets back in the chair, gets hooked up, and the device display should by all accounts remain empty, for the human cannot think anything aesthetically, but only subjectively feel some relevant condition qualitatively satisfied by one of them. The subjective condition in the form of mere feeling, is as much a resident of his consciousness as the bean, yet only one of them can be displayed on a device recording brain states related to human thoughts in particular or thinking in general.

Do you really think, that upon being proven by one of the hard sciences, that all metaphysical entities are in fact demonstrable brain states, you will cease speaking from the first-person perspective? If science proves there’s no such thing as “I”, will you therefrom stop saying, e.g., “I think ‘mericans got their heads up their collective asses when it comes to football!!!”

Even if it is the case the metaphysical entity represented by “I” is in fact a brain state, but there is no awareness of brain state activity as such in human consciousness, then it must be logically true that brain state itself is a metaphysical entity, from which follows necessarily that any display on a constructed external physical measuring device, is also a metaphysical entity, insofar as the intuition of its appearance to the senses merely represents a coexistent representation. The human intellectual system, whatever its named speculative constituency, prohibits any other interpretation of the objectivity outside itself.

Humans think natural law, but humans do not think in terms of natural law. The brain, because it is a natural object, must therefore be thought to operate in terms of natural law in order for a human to understand the possibility of it….and he immediately defeats his own purpose in using one to explain the other.

Your point is nonetheless well-taken.

The point I would contend is the idea on either side of the debate that their conclusions are "slam dunk". That idea only shows dogmatism, closed-mindedness. — Janus

Good point! Accusations of "dogmatism" and "closed-mindedness" have traditionally been directed toward people of Faith. So, it's ironic that posters on a philosophy forum would display those characteristics in dialogs that can't be proven or dis-proven empirically. For example, Eliminativism requires a closed mind, and Immanentism seems to be based on the dogma of Materialism. Are those "slam dunk" positions signs of faith in the belief system of Scientism? :wink:

Thing is, consciousness is already strictly a metaphysical conception, hence necessarily non-physical, — Mww

That would be so only on certain question-begging presuppositions.

The point is that neither idealism nor physicalism are, contrary to what their opponents like to suggest, self-refuting. Actually idealism is not usually criticized for being self-refuting, but rather for being explanatorily impotent, implausible or even incoherent in that the only forms of idealism which can serve to explain our everyday experience rely, in order to give an account of how shared experience could be possible, on ideas like God or universal mind or collective mind' ideas which themselves are not able to be satisfactorily conceptually explicated or related to everyday human experience.

I stil maintain that an effective (if not 'slam dunk') argument against physicalism is from classical philosophy: that linguistic communication would be impossible if materialism were true. Or, as Lloyd Gerson put it, you could not think if materialism were true.

Aristotle, in De Anima, argued that thinking in general (which includes knowledge as one kind of thinking) cannot be a property of a body; it cannot, as he put it, 'be blended with a body'. This is because in thinking, the intelligible object or form is present in the intellect, and thinking itself is the identification of the intellect with this intelligible. Among other things, this means that you could not think if materialism is true… . Thinking is not something that is, in principle, like sensing or perceiving; this is because thinking is a universalising activity. This is what this means: when you think, you see - mentally see - a form which could not, in principle, be identical with a particular - including a particular neurological element, a circuit, or a state of a circuit, or a synapse, and so on. This is so because the object of thinking is universal, or the mind is operating universally.

….the fact that in thinking, your mind is identical with the form that it thinks, means (for Aristotle and for all Platonists) that since the form 'thought' is detached from matter, 'mind' is immaterial too. — Lloyd Gerson, Platonism v Naturalism

Interpretation - De Anima III.4–5. Here, Aristotle argues that thinking cannot be the act of a bodily organ because the intellect receives forms “without matter,” i.e., as universals; it grasps the idea of the object, which is an intellectual, not a sensory, act. Whereas a bodily organ always perceives specific material thing. But the intellect must be capable of receiving any form whatever, which requires that it be “unmixed” with the body (429a15–b22).

In the act of thinking, the intellect is identified with the form it thinks. Since the form considered as intelligible is not a particular, and no brain-state can be anything other than a particular, the thinking intellect cannot be identical with any material structure. This is why Aristotle says that intellect is “separate,” “impassive,” and “unmixed.”

Gerson is simply stating this classical Aristotelian point: if materialism is true—that all mental acts are particular physical states—then universal thought would be impossible, and without it, you could not think. But universal thought occurs. Therefore materialism cannot give an adequate account of thought.

Edward Feser amplifies the point:

Consider that when you think about triangularity, as you might when proving a geometrical theorem, it is necessarily perfect triangularity that you are contemplating, not some mere approximation of it. Triangularity as your intellect grasps it is entirely determinate or exact; for example, what you grasp is the notion of a closed plane figure with three perfectly straight sides, rather than that of something which may or may not have straight sides or which may or may not be closed. Of course, your mental image of a triangle might not be exact, but rather indeterminate and fuzzy. But to grasp something with the intellect is not the same as to form a mental image of it. For any mental image of a triangle is necessarily going to be of an isosceles triangle specifically, or of a scalene one, or an equilateral one; but the concept of triangularity that your intellect grasps applies to all triangles alike. Any mental image of a triangle is going to have certain features, such as a particular color, that are no part of the concept of triangularity in general. A mental image is something private and subjective, while the concept of triangularity is objective and grasped by many minds at once. — Edward Feser

Feser makes the same point in contemporary terms: a mental image of a triangle will always be of one specific triangle (isosceles, oriented, coloured, etc.), whereas the concept of triangularity is perfectly determinate, universal, and shareable among many minds. Because the object of intellection is universal, and because thought consists in the mind’s identity with that universal form, no physical state—necessarily a particular—can be identical to an act of understanding.

And from Bertrand Russell:

It is largely the very peculiar kind of being that belongs to universals which has led many people to suppose that they are really mental. We can think of a universal, and our thinking then exists in a perfectly ordinary sense, like any other mental act. Suppose, for example, that we are thinking of whiteness. Then in one sense it may be said that whiteness is 'in our mind'. ... In the strict sense, it is not whiteness that is in our mind, but the act of thinking of whiteness. The connected ambiguity in the word 'idea', which we noted at the same time, also causes confusion here. In one sense of this word, namely the sense in which it denotes the object of an act of thought, whiteness is an 'idea'. Hence, if the ambiguity is not guarded against, we may come to think that whiteness is an 'idea' in the other sense, i.e. an act of thought; and thus we come to think that whiteness is mental. But in so thinking, we rob it of its essential quality of universality. One man's act of thought is necessarily a different thing from another man's; one man's act of thought at one time is necessarily a different thing from the same man's act of thought at another time. Hence, if whiteness were the thought as opposed to its object, no two different men could think of it, and no one man could think of it twice. That which many different thoughts of whiteness have in common is their object, and this object is different from all of them. Thus universals are not thoughts, though when known they are the objects of thoughts. — Betrand Russell, The World of Universals

Of course, the nominalist objection will be that there is no universal 'triangle', only particular triangles, which we can see resemble each other. But that objection fails because it can't explain what it appeals to. A mental image or sensory perception is always specific: coloured, sized, oriented, isosceles or scalene, etc. But the concept of triangularity is exact, universal, and common to all minds. No image captures this, and no neural configuration can be identical with something that applies to indefinitely many images. Moreover, nominalism presupposes the very universals it denies: similarity, classification, identity of meaning, and the laws of logic are themselves universals. Without universals, no two thinkers could ever mean the same thing, no inference could be valid beyond the moment, and mathematics would be impossible. This is why the Aristotelian argument stands: the universal content of thought cannot be reduced to any particular material state, and a materialist–nominalist account cannot explain the phenomenon it tries to deny, as any explanation will implicitly rely on the very universal categories of thought which nominalism insists are unreal.

This is the sense in which the mind “constructs” or “creates” the cosmos: not as an external agent shaping an independent material realm, but as the ongoing process of perception, interpretation, and conceptual synthesis that yields our experience of a coherent, ordered world — which is precisely what kosmos meant. The Buddha’s teaching that “within this fathom-long body, with its perception and intellect, is the cosmos, its origin, its cessation, and the path to its cessation” (AN 4.45) is making the same point: the world-as-lived, the meaningful, structured world of experience, is constituted through the operations of cognition. This is not solipsism, nor the denial of an external world, but an insistence that the world we inhabit is inseparable from the activity of consciousness that renders it intelligible. And that, of course, is the bridge to both phenomenology and enactive cognition.

.

Whatever the material correlate to metaphysical consciousness may be, it isn’t consciousness. And whatever metaphysical conception consciousness may be, it isn’t material. — Mww

The philosophy of consciousness has always circled around a central mystery. But empirical science was supposed to dispel those ancient enigmas with indisputable "hard" evidence. For example, Newtonian physics provided mundane explanations for celestial pattern puzzles that had entranced imaginative naked-eye sky-gazers for millennia. The evidence was direct observation, aided by vision-enhancing technology, and vetted by mathematical logic.

Suddenly, certainty about star-gods! But then, Quantum physics came along and muddied Newton's math with Uncertainty. An article in Oct/Nov 2025 issue of Philosophy Now magazine discusses the ramifications of that scientific set-back to an era when science & superstition were often indistinguishable.

Quantum Physics and Indian Philosophy, by Kumar & Varshney, looks at reality from both perspectives, and sees the same now & then parallels that spawned Fitjof Capra's 1975 book, The Tao of Physics. An important lesson from such unorthodox approaches to Science is that the broader context is important : Holism. After millennia of searching for the fundamental Atom of Reality, physicists were appalled to find that the notion of a hard bottom to the material world was an illusion : Maya.

So scientists turned their attention from bits of matter, to bits of information, and to unbounded timeless universal Fields of Potential*1 . Only to find that ancient cow worshipers got there before them : "Ultimate reality (Brahman) is infinite, eternal, and beyond time, space, or change, has no shape or qualities, and is the source of everything."*2 Where does Consciousness fit into Newton's model of space & time, or to Einstein's remodel of space-time? Does the big C exist in time, and occupy space?

The PN article also notes the "tendency toward romanticization --- when for instance it's claimed that ancient Indian sages anticipated quantum ideas"*2. Likewise, those who speculate on threads like this may be accused of a propensity for Spiritualization. :smile:


*1. Cosmic Field of Potential :
Physicists and cosmologists call this divine source the Unified Field. In a profound sense, Brahman (the Vedantic concept) and the Unified Field of physics appear to be synonymous.
https://www.hinduhumanrights.info/quantum-physics-and-vedic-unified-consciousness/

*2. Quantum Physics & Indian Philosophy :
both disciplines challenge the classical notion of an objective, observer-independent reality, and elevate the role of the observer.
Philosophy Now magazine

that linguistic communication would be impossible if materialism were true. — Wayfarer

I see no reason to believe that. Perhaps you are working with a redundant model of material as 'mindless substance'. If material in all its forms were nothing but mindless substance, then of course it would follow by mere definition that conscious material is impossible. But that is specifically the "question-begging presumption" I was referring to.

I see no reason to believe that. — Janus

Can you rebut the arguments that I provided from Gerson, Feser, Russell? Or is it just 'what you reckon'?

↪Gnomon
The point is that neither idealism nor physicalism are, contrary to what their opponents like to suggest, self-refuting. Actually idealism is not usually criticized for being self-refuting, but rather for being explanatorily impotent, implausible or even incoherent in that the only forms of idealism which can serve to explain our everyday experience rely, in order to give an account of how shared experience could be possible, on ideas like God or universal mind or collective mind' ideas which themselves are not able to be satisfactorily conceptually explicated or related to everyday human experience. — Janus

Yes. The difference between modern Philosophy and modern Science lies in their explanatory means & methods : the exploring mind of the Natural Philosopher can go beyond the space-time bounds of the material world, and the self-imposed limits of Scientism. But, when conjectures become dogma and speculations become scripture, an open-mind line has been crossed. Besides, even "space-time" and "fabric of reality" are ideal, not real. :wink:

Note --- Idealism and related philosophies, may be impotent to explain immaterial ideas in material terms. Yet religious beliefs have the power to explain "shared experiences" in terms of feelings. And philosophical conjectures are judged, not on material evidence, or scientific orthodoxy, but on Logical Potency.

... "Ultimate reality (Brahman) is infinite, eternal, and beyond time, space, or change, has no shape or qualities, and is the source of everything" ... — Gnomon

... this speculation is indistinguishable from ancient (Vedic, Greek) atomists' void¹ or quantum vacuum of contemporary fundamental physics (wherein "classical swirling-swerving atoms" are far more precisely described as virtual particles (i.e. planck events)) :wink:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atomism-ancient/ [1]

Can you rebut the arguments that I provided from Gerson, Feser, Russell? — Wayfarer

Sure, mate, eezy peezy – (In addition to what @Janus says) their primary assumption, in effect, conflates, or equates, abstract (map-making) and concrete (territory) which is a reification fallacy (e.g. "Platonic Forms") and renders their arguments invalid. :clap: