I think the universe is thinking about the quark and the quark about the universe. — TheMadFool
Music is like magic... — Eminem, Till I Collapse
...We have minds and the superorganism that we're part of - communities, cities, states, nations - behave remarkably like individuals.
If this pattern - having a mind - is part of the fractal structure then organs, cells, atoms, electrons, quarks, in fact everything, should have a mind.
Panpsychism, both in upwards, towards greater complexity and downwards, towards greater simplicity. — TheMadFool
We have minds and the superorganism that we're part of - communities, cities, states, nations - behave remarkably like individuals. — TheMadFool
Really? Does a government act like an individual? If so, then most individuals wouldn't make it through the day. Waffling and indecisive, of two minds, making huge mistakes in physical conflicts, and throwing away their savings at the drop of a hat. — jgill
Fractals are objects that are self-similar which I understand as the preservation of a pattern at different levels of organization.
We have minds and the superorganism that we're part of - communities, cities, states, nations - behave remarkably like individuals.
If this pattern - having a mind - is part of the fractal structure then organs, cells, atoms, electrons, quarks, in fact everything, should have a mind.
Panpsychism, both in upwards, towards greater complexity and downwards, towards greater simplicity.
I think the universe is thinking about the quark and the quark about the universe. — TheMadFool
How would you define ‘mind’? — Possibility
I don't know how this pattern manifests at the cellular level but if a cell eats, grows, shits, senses, then maybe, just maybe, it can think too. — TheMadFool
And if so, would it have inhibitions, like humans? In social psychology, groups tend to act more strongly with fewer inhibitions than individuals. When a large group of cells get together all hell could break loose. As in the growth and spread of cancer. — jgill
To me mind is the sum total of all thoughts - the immaterial or so it seems and the apparent physical origin of mental activity (thoughts) the brain - the material. As far as the OP is concerned, both the immaterial - the plans and policies of a community as a super-organism correspond to thoughts and the people, as physical bodies can be taken as the brain. There is a remarkable similarity between societies and individual humans; for instance take racism in which we have one community against another and the actions and reactions of these communities is comprehensible in terms of individual human feelings of hate, outrage, respect, contempt, etc.
I don't know how this pattern manifests at the cellular level but if a cell eats, grows, shits, senses, then maybe, just maybe, it can think too. — TheMadFool
don’t believe these ‘material/immaterial’ and ‘physical/mental’ dichotomies are helpful in understanding ‘mind’. The plans and policies of a community can be understood as material/immaterial as well as physical/mental, and so can the people.
‘Mind’ can be understood more broadly as a structure of relations between one system (the organism, inclusive of the brain) and another (its environment) that work to dissolve or maintain the distinction. A single cell structure, for instance, consists of chemical and spatial relations that collaboratively maintain a relative equilibrium between relation with, and distinction from, what lies beyond the structure. Relating too much with the environment risks the existing relational structure itself, but relating too little limits the potential energy available to the system. ‘Mind’ in this primitive sense refers to the extent to which the cell’s relational structure also relates beyond the system, as well as the extent to which it limits the system’s potent — Possibility
Well, for there to be a relation there has to be things, here mind and its environment, that can be related. In other words, we must know and define mind before we can study its relations. — TheMadFool
And if so, would it have inhibitions, like humans? In social psychology, groups tend to act more strongly with fewer inhibitions than individuals. When a large group of cells get together all hell could break loose. As in the growth and spread of cancer.
— jgill
Right on the money I believe. I know my opinion doesn't count as truth but have you noticed that, according to Agent Smith of Matrix fame, the way humanity has populated the earth looks very much like a virus spreading across the planet - consuming everything in its path as it were. So, though I believe in the idea of a super-organism I'm not yet convinced that humanity's head or heart is in the right place, at least not yet. — TheMadFool
The same applies to the body and its cells which form a kind of mini eco-system kept stable by means of the immune system that detects and eliminates rogue cells but every now and then some of them break through our best defenses and become cancer. — TheMadFool
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