By the 'species mind', I mean, rather than positing a 'universal mind', realising that as members of both a species and a culture, we live in a world of collective understandings and conventions of meaning. That's a theme in Hegel, who said that the ideas we have of the world are social, which is to say that the ideas that we possess individually are shaped by the ideas that other people possess. Our minds have been shaped by the thoughts of our culture and society through the language we speak, their traditions and mores and the cultural and religious institutions of which we are a part (what Hegel means by 'geist'). This is also reflected in constructivist philosophies and in sociology, like Berger's 'Social Construction of Reality'. That is at the basis of what is called in phenomenology the 'lebenswelt' - the meaning-world of humanity.

The question will remain, how then can you say the world existed before humans, if it's a collective construct? Isn't a 'universal mind', or a being assigned the role of God in Berkeley's philosophy, required to account for its apparent permanency even in the absence of any human mind whatever

Consider this. All of the vast amounts of data being nowadays collected about the universe by our incredibly powerful telescopes and particle colliders is still synthesised and converted into conceptual information by scientists. And that conceptual activity remains conditioned by, and subject to, our sensory and intellectual capabilities — determined by the kinds of sensory beings we are, and shaped by the attitudes and theories we hold (which is the lesson of embodied cognition and enactivism). And we’re never outside of that web of conceptual activities — at least, not as long as we’re conscious beings. That is the sense in which the Universe exists ‘in the mind’ — not as a figment of someone’s imagination, but as a combination or synthesis of perception, conception and theory in the mind (which is more than simply your mind or mine). That synthesis constitutes our world, and we can't see anything from 'outside' of it. As is well known, when it comes to speculative theories of the Universe prior to the singularity, the mind boggles. And I think this is also the lesson of the conundrums of modern physics, all of which tend to undermine the very notion of a 'mind-independent reality' (by the way, superb introductory article to QBism by one of its two main progenitors. QBism also tends to support the perspective I'm describing.)

Getting back to Hoffman, I think his central point is that 'the object' has no intrinsic existence apart from its incorporation into the meaning-world that comprises experience (although I think his terminology is clumsy, what he's arguing against is not 'reality' per se, but 'objectivism', although that would make for a far less flashy title). But this is why he says he has 'solved' the hard problem - he's solved it, by showing that the object can't exist outside our experience of it (which doesn't mean that it literally ceases to exist when not perceived, more that what we perceive as existence itself is a conceptual construct or vorstellung.) Whereas what modern science has tended to do is to declare that 'the subject' is completely separate from the external realm, and that meaning and quality (qualia) only inhere in the internal or subjective dimension of thought, thereby devoiding the 'real' world of meaning and purpose. Hoffman is arguing by means of cognitive science that this is a faulty cognitive construct, albeit one which is almost the default condition for the modern individual and in which we're all embedded to some degree.

how then can you say the world existed before humans, if it's a collective construct? — Wayfarer

I do think there is indeed some strangeness here in 'the ancestral realm.'

Meillassoux argues that post-Kantian philosophy is dominated by what he calls "correlationism", the theory that humans cannot exist without the world nor the world without humans.[6] In Meillassoux's view, this theory allows philosophy to avoid the problem of how to describe the world as it really is independent of human knowledge.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quentin_Meillassoux

For me, the world is not our construct. We who see the world are in and of the world. I claim that there is an unbreakable unity of us and language and the shared world. Heidegger loved his hyphens for just this reason. We can focus on this or that aspect, but all our equiprimordial. (It's one concept, perhaps, when unfolded.)

I claim that philosophy presupposes being-with-others-in-the-world-with-language as its condition of intelligibility.

Anyway, though Meillassoux has found something like a glitch in the matrix, I still don't see how to compute a phrase like "describe the world as it really is independent of human knowledge." Any such description would be an attempt at human knowledge. So it looks to me like a glorified round square. But I admit it's a hard thing to make sense of.

Whereas what modern science has tended to do is to declare that 'the subject' is completely separate from the external realm, and that meaning and quality (qualia) only inhere in the internal or subjective dimension of thought, thereby devoiding the 'real' world of meaning and purpose. — Wayfarer

As I understand it, the subject is deindividualized but not dematerialized. Science itself doesn't need qualia or direct experience. Consensus suffices. Popper makes a great point about the problems of using direct experience. Here's a paraphrase.

Statements can be justified only by other statements, and therefore testing comes to an end, not in the establishment of a correlation between propositional content and observable reality, as empiricism would hold, but by means of the conventional, inter-subjective acceptance of the truth of certain basic statements by the research community.

The acceptance of basic statements is compared by Popper to trial by jury: the verdict of the jury will be an agreement in accordance with the prevailing legal code and on the basis of the evidence presented, and is analogous to the acceptance of a basic statement by the research community

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper/#BasiStatFalsConv

Sellars also makes a case against the assumption of something absolutely Given (like pure redness?) which cannot be questioned.

The question will remain, how then can you say the world existed before humans, if it's a collective construct? — Wayfarer

Culture can determine the forms in which we understand things, but it cannot account for the everyday fact that we don't only see things in the same general ways, but see exactly the same things in detail at the same places at the same times. And as I said earlier even animals share a world with us, and they have not been inducted into our culture.

Consider this. All of the vast amounts of data being nowadays collected about the universe by our incredibly powerful telescopes and particle colliders is still synthesised and converted into conceptual information by scientists. And that conceptual activity remains conditioned by, and subject to, our sensory and intellectual capabilities — determined by the kinds of sensory beings we are, and shaped by the attitudes and theories we hold (which is the lesson of embodied cognition and enactivism). And we’re never outside of that web of conceptual activities — at least, not as long as we’re conscious beings. That is the sense in which the Universe exists ‘in the mind’ — not as a figment of someone’s imagination, but as a combination or synthesis of perception, conception and theory in the mind (which is more than simply your mind or mine). — Wayfarer

All of that is not sufficient to explain the simple facts of everyday experience. Consider this: I hear a cow mooing, and my dogs start barking at the same time, If I let them out they run straight over to the neighbour's field where the cows are. Now either there really is something mind-independent "out there" producing those sounds that I and the dogs are responding to, or our minds are connected somehow in some way we have no awareness of, or there is some other explanation we cannot even imagine, but culture cannot explain it, that much is obvious.

what he's arguing against is not 'reality' per se, but 'objectivism' — Wayfarer

Half way through the book, and still not confident about what it is he is claiming. I can't decide if the vacillation is rhetorical or if he really does not understand the distinctions he is trying to deal with.

Culture can determine the forms in which we understand things, but it cannot account for the everyday fact that we don't only see things in the same general ways, but see exactly the same things in detail at the same places at the same times. — Janus

This is where the non-objectivity of quantum mechanics enters the picture. When you seek the underlying, objective ground from which all of the objects of everyday experience are supposedly derived, it is found to be different for every observer (e.g. https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a40460495/objective-reality-may-not-exist/)

All of that is not sufficient to explain the simple facts of everyday experience. — Janus

Again, not saying the world is 'only in your mind'.

This is where the non-objectivity of quantum mechanics enters the picture. When you seek the underlying, objective ground from which all of the objects of everyday experience are supposedly derived, it is found to be different for every observer (e.g. https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a40460495/objective-reality-may-not-exist/) — Wayfarer

"In a field where intriguing, almost mysterious phenomena like “quantum superposition” prevail—a situation where one particle can be in two or even “all” possible places at the same time—some experts say reality exists outside of your own awareness, and there’s nothing you can do to change it. Others insist “quantum reality” might be some form of Play-Doh you mold into different shapes with your own actions. Now, scientists from the Federal University of ABC (UFABC) in the São Paulo metropolitan area in Brazil are adding fuel to the suggestion that reality might be “in the eye of the observer.”"

If there is no objective ground, if we all mold our own realities, then how do we explain the fact that we all see the same things? Take the "quantum cat" that is neither dead nor alive, or both dead and alive, before an observation is made: how do explain that on observation everyone will agree as to whether it is dead or alive if there is no objective reality, and no connective coordination between individual minds?

Again, not saying the world is 'only in your mind'. — Wayfarer

What are you saying then: would there be anything at all if there were no human minds according to you?

If there is no objective ground, if we all mold our own realities, then how do we explain the fact that we all see the same things? — Janus

What I already said about the collective nature of mind. Besides, the laws of physics still hold at micro-levels, but they're probabalistic, there is no 'absolute object', therefore no absolute objectivity. Do have a read of that Conversations article on QBism that I linked.

According to QBism, an approach developed by Christopher Fuchs and me, the great lesson of quantum mechanics is that the usual starting point of the philosophers is simply wrong. Quantum mechanics does not describe reality as it is by itself. Instead, it is a tool that helps guide agents immersed in the world when they contemplate taking actions on parts of it external to themselves. — Ruediger Schack

Would there be anything at all if there were no human minds according to you? — Janus

The answer to that could only be silence.

Science itself doesn't need qualia or direct experience — green flag

That is the way post-Cartesian science is constructed - the individual subject confronting a world of material objects directed by mechanical laws.

This is being broken down by e.g. embodied cognition, enactivism, and cognitive science. The assumed absolute barrier between subject and object, so characteristic of post-Cartesian science, is being found to comprise a porous boundary.

What I already said about the collective nature of mind. Besides, the laws of physics still hold at micro-levels, but they're probabalistic, there is no 'absolute object', therefore no absolute objectivity. — Wayfarer

So your "collective mind" includes the animals as well? I'm not saying there are objects independent of human experience and understanding, I am saying there is "something" which, with incredible reliability, gives rise to a shared world of experience, which includes not only humans but (at least some) animals. How do we explain this if our minds are not somehow collectively coordinated or it is not the mind-independent nature of the physical ? Are there any other explanations you can think of?

The answer to that could only be silence. — Wayfarer

Why? You don't want to commit yourself because then you might have to admit something you don't want to?

For what it's worth I don't hold to any view, but I do think there either has to be a collective coordination of minds or else a stable mind-independent physical reality at the level of perception. I cannot think of any other alternative, can you?

How do we explain this if our minds are not somehow collectively coordinated or it is not the mind-independent nature of the physical ? Are there any other explanations you can think of? — Janus

I don't really see the problem. I fully accept the naturalist account of evolution. All organic life is related, as evolutionary theory demonstrates.

What I'm rejecting is a philosophical stance which attributes a kind absolute value to the objective domain. Actually the insight I had goes back to my first Honours thesis on Emerson and the transcendentalists. It is that we're not actually outside of, or other to, reality as such. But that awareness of ourselves as separate individuals is very much the hallmark of modern individualism, and also the condition of the separated individual. That is what gives rise to the 'Cartesian anxiety' which is the kind of metaphysical angst ofmodernity.

As for the world as we have never known it - what could be said? I mean, even if we study the cosmos right back to nanoseconds after the big bang, it is the observing mind that brings order and perspective to that analysis. From a naturalistic perspective, sure, h. sapiens only came along in the last ten minutes (speaking metaphorically) but it is in that form that all of this becomes somewhat intelligible, But science itself has come to realise the role the mind has in orchestrating the order we perceive, hence Wheeler's 'it from bit' and 'participatory cosmos'.

The answer might be found in Philosophical Investigations, §201:

For what we thereby show is that there is a way of grasping a rule which is not an interpretation, but which, from case to case of application, is exhibited in what we call “following the rule” and “going against it”.

It's what we do.

I don't really see the problem. I fully accept the naturalist account of evolution. All organic life is related, as evolutionary theory demonstrates. — Wayfarer

Then I don't know what you are proposing. Culture cannot explain a shared world. If we want to try to think of explanations for a shared world, then we are left to speculation, and I don't see a whole raft of competing theories, but really just two.

What I'm rejecting is a philosophical stance which attributes a kind absolute value to the objective domain. — Wayfarer

I'm not sure what that even means. but if you are referring to naive realism; I also reject that.

I mean, even if we study the cosmos right back to nanoseconds after the big bang, it is the observing mind that brings order and perspective to that analysis. From a naturalistic perspective, sure, h. sapiens only came along in the last ten minutes (speaking metaphorically) but it is in that form that all of this becomes somewhat intelligible, — Wayfarer

Yes the world is only intelligible to humans in human forms of intelligibility: no argument there.

if you are referring to naive realism — Janus

More metaphysical naturalism, which is naive realism on steroids :rofl:

What exactly do you take the claims of metaphysical naturalism to be?

The validity of the one does not necessarily follow from the validity of the other. There is no necessary relation between a form of subconscious “judgement” in intuition, merely from judgement as a given conscious mental activity in understanding. — Mww

I explained in detail why it is necessary to conclude that there is some form of "judgement" occurring at a subconscious level. You said: "This is tantamount to proposing that sensibility thinks". I said that there is no need to restrict "judgement" to conscious thinking. I didn't suggest a necessary relation, only that the inclination to restrict "judgement" to conscious mental activity is a misunderstanding of the nature of living beings.

What exactly do you take the claims of metaphysical naturalism to be? — Janus

Pretty much as per the encyclopedia entries:

According to Steven Schafersman, geologist and president of Texas Citizens for Science, metaphysical naturalism is a philosophy that proposes that: 1. Nature encompasses all that exists throughout space and time; 2. Nature (the universe or cosmos) consists only of natural elements, that is, of spatiotemporal physical substance—mass–energy. Non-physical or quasi-physical substance, such as information, ideas, values, logic, mathematics, intellect, and other emergent phenomena, either supervene upon the physical or can be reduced to a physical account; 3. Nature operates by the laws of physics and in principle, can be explained and understood by science and philosophy; and 4. the supernatural does not exist, i.e., only nature is real. — WIkipedia

This is what results if you take the Christian worldview and replace religion with science, and the divine commandments with the laws of physics. As I said before 'the Jealous God dies hard'.

"It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists." Your boy recognized the importance of the unknowable, so at least that much can be said in his favour. — Janus

That's a great quote. I think it's about the radical contingency (?) of the world, the thereness of the there. To it's more like what Sartre called beneath all explanation.
**********

The experience that we need in order to understand logic is not that something or other is the state of things, but that something is: that, however, is not experience.

...

To say 'I wonder at such and such being the case' has only sense if I can imagine it not to be the case. In this sense one can wonder at the existence of, say, a house when one sees it and has not visited it for a long time and has imagined that it had been pulled down in the meantime. But it is nonsense to say that I wonder at the existence of the world, because I cannot imagine it not existing. I could of course wonder at the world round me being as it is. If for instance I had this experience while looking into the blue sky, I could wonder at the sky being blue as opposed to the case when it's clouded. But that's not what I mean. I am wondering at the sky being whatever it is. One might be tempted to say that what I am wondering at is a tautology, namely at the sky being blue or not blue. But then it's just nonsense to say that one is wondering at a tautology.

@Wayfarer, @Tom Storm

So I read the book. Still processing what seems to be a bit of a mess – which may be down to my still piecing it together. This is just some preliminary remarks.

Most of the text seems to be a defence of scientific realism, somewhat re-dressed.

Central to the 'denial of materialism' titular to this thread is the exact nature of Conscious Realism. This is the topic of Chapter Ten, much of which strikes one as speculative. For example Hoffman claims "physicists realise that spacetime is doomed", but there is, so far as I a can see, no such consensus.

More worrying is his definition of consciousness in terms of the PDA loop:

This is a diagrammatic representation of the mathematical definition given in the appendix. The obvious issue here is the extent to which the consciousness of a PDA loop corresponds to consciousness as understood in ordinary language. The PDA loop looks like a formalisation of "response to stimulus", were an experience leads to an action. Is that really all that is involved in consciousness?

The inclusion of "world" worried me at first, it seemed at first Hoffman was assuming the existence of reality. But it appears that what he has in mind here is an iterative process, where "world" is replaced not by space, time and such stuff of our common acquaintance, but with other PDA loops... Not sure what to make of that.

Amongst other things he makes a point of rejecting panpsychism because it relies on dualism, as well as Kant's thing in itself.

Two resources for further consideration. The first is a cut down version fo the book, the second a substantive critique by an Australian academic.

https://sites.socsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/ConsciousRealism2.pdf
https://philpapers.org/archive/ALLHCR.pdf

Thanks. Lots of homework there.

That's very thorough and i appreciate it. I don't really have much chance of knowing if any of this is well argued or not - that's where our comrades who know philosophy and have time to read come in. How is Hoff a realist if he is a type of idealist who agrees 90% with Kastrup. Can you explain how this works?

he PDA loop looks like a formalisation of "response to stimulus", were an experience leads to an action. Is that really all that is involved in consciousness? — Banno

Does this not sound reductive?

The inclusion of "world" worried me at first, it seemed at first Hoffman was assuming the existence of reality. But it appears that what he has in mind here is an iterative process, where "world" is replaced not by space, time and such stuff of our common acquaintance, but with other PDA loops... Not sure what to make of that. — Banno

That sounds confusing.

He puts paid to my idealist gloss on his work in a couple of paragraphs:

Ideas similar to MUI theory are found in various forms of idealism. But, as Searle (2004, p. 48) says:

idealism had a prodigious influence in philosophy, literally for centuries, but as far as I can tell it has been as dead as a doornail among nearly all the philosophers whose opinions I respect, for many decades, so I will not say much about it.

This is a simple misunderstanding. MUI theory is not idealism. It does not claim that all that exists are conscious perceptions. It claims that our conscious perceptions need not resemble the objective world, whatever its nature is. — Donald Hoffman

Yeah, sorry it's not clearer. So Conscious Realism takes as fundamental some entity - he posits a particular quantum wave in some places - that can "act" in response to some "experience" which brings about a change in the "world" - and notice here he is already making use of intentional language. So begins consciousness. These loops interact, so as mentioned another loop can form a part of the "world", but they also may be able to take a place in the "experience" or the "action", substituting so as to produce increasing complexity.

Like Leibniz' Monads.

But these other loops can be unknowable, a bit like the thing-in-itself, and this seems to lead to Hoffman to realism, but I am not sure how to articulate that leap.

The index is a bit shit. I recall reading that, but now can't find it. Page? I thought it was followed by a back-tracking towards idealism.

Top of p100. The thing I'm suspicious about is that we don't know what is real outside our desktop metaphor. I thought a scientist would at least have a shot at it. A shrug just doesn't cut it.

This is a simple misunderstanding. MUI theory is not idealism. It does not claim that all that exists are conscious perceptions. It claims that our conscious perceptions need not resemble the objective world, whatever its nature is — Donald Hoffman

Ok. Thanks.

Yeah, sorry it's not clearer. So Conscious Realism takes as fundamental some entity - he posits a particular quantum wave in some places - that can "act" in response to some "experience" which brings about a change in the "world" - and notice here he is already making use of intentional language. — Banno

Not your fault. So really Hoff's thesis is as we already gleaned - reality isn't what humans see - there is a reality but it's not apprehendable to humans in its 'actual form'. Is this not a version of Kant's noumena, etc?

there is a reality but it's not apprehendable to humans in its 'actual form'. Is this not a version of Kant's noumena, etc? — Tom Storm

Well, what was Kant's noumena? There's not much agreement there. But Hoffman explicitly rejects comparison between his views and noumena, in that he claims we can know stuff about the ultimate reality - indeed, that's what his PDA supposedly sets out. Science can lead to a theory that is true. (Bottom p.82)

Top of p100 — Wayfarer

Hmm. Don't see it. Penguin paperback?

The thing I'm suspicious about is that we don't know what is real outside our desktop metaphor. — Wayfarer

The looping consciousnesses are what is real...

Yeah, stretches credulity.

Ok then I totally don't understand what is being argued. I'm not sure how science can lead to truth when Hoff says we are hardwired by evolution to be unable to recognise reality. Maybe at some point someone can set out 7 or 8 dot points summarising the gist of it. :wink:

Maybe at some point someone can set out 7 or 8 dot points summarising the gist of it. :wink: — Tom Storm

Yeah, Perhaps one of the folk who claim to understand it will do so.

So there are three aspects to the account:

1. Fitness beats truth
2. The interface theory of perception
3. Conscious realism

Fitness beats truth is the argument that we have evolved not to sense what is the case, but to sense whatever we need to in order to reproduce. The interface theory roughly says that the world we perceive is constructed by - not sure what exactly, but mind or consciousness or something - in such a way that we don't sense what is real, but made-up stuff, again in order to survive. Conscious realism argues that what is real are mini-consciousnesses described by the triangle above, and by some twiddly maths. And nothing but these is real.