Varadaraja Raman - Is Consciousness Fundamental?
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- Опубликовано: 10 авг 2024
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The great challenge is explain consciousness-the inner experiences of sense, thought, intent, feelings. It’s what David Chalmers calls ‘The Hard Problem’ of consciousness. Is our mental life a random accident, solely the product or byproduct of physical brain? Or is conscious awareness deeply special, perhaps revealing hidden realities of how the world works?
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Varadaraja V. Raman is Emeritus Professor of Physics and Humanities at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
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Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.
As always Vivi is clear, humble and fascinating to listen to . His Hindu perspective really gives his ideas additional meaning. 👌
Actually his Hinduism makes his ideas suspect
@@halcyon2864, kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
@@halcyon2864, I am patiently awaiting your response to my question, SLAVE. ☝🏼
@@longcastle4863 nuh uh, you are the suspect
As for as Hindus spiritual traditions , pure consciousness has already been proved beyond doubts by saints / mystics & anyone can access the same at any time but needs to have specific faculties / requirements by going inside like rigorous meditation etc. for particular stretch of time which most of the scientists lag as their whole life goes studying physical / physics etc & therefore scientists can't negate the claims of spiritual traditions about nature of Truth / Reality / pure consciousness /God / Shiva.
Thanks.
I like this discussion as I also see a slight difference and open mindedness in Robert's attitude. Would love to hear them discuss more.
I share Varadaraja's doubts as to whether or not consciousness has been explained, and his closing thread at 10:36 sums it up nicely: "So I leave this as one of the grand mysteries which maybe someday future generations will solve, but not yet for me." Every respect to Hindu philosophy, though, for averting the anthropocentric "humans-r-speshul" indulgence that dogs Judeo-Christian-Islamic theology.
What I find even more mysterious is agency, in its infinitude of forms. What is it that motivates a frog, paramecium, bird, amoeba, fish, lion or mouse to do what is required of it, by its ecosystem, with little promise of reward at the end of its life? I was driving along a dark, snowy road at midnight when I swerved to avoid hitting a fox that darted out from the bushes with a purpose... what was its motivation, alone in the dead of icy-cold, wintery night? What is it that motivates a neuron or white blood cell, a kinesin or dynein, to fulfil its life-essential purpose, within its ecosystem that is your body? What motivates us to do what is required of us, within our ecosystem that is human culture? Or a bee in a hive, an ant in an ant colony? Agency. So much effort by so many agents, so much struggle to create so much complexity. I don't get it. Why? Isn't it so much simpler to not be?
Hinduism is in a better position to understand agency and the mind-body problem. The Judeo-Christian fixation with man made in God's image, on the other hand, in all its hubris, completely misses the mark. Life is far more mysterious than many religions can begin to comprehend.
Excellent... thanks 🙏❤
Good discussion. Thanks 👍
Well articulated sir
Yes , beautiful & brilliant 👏 Bravo
Brilliant and lacklustre are RELATIVE. 😉
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Yes, I do think so. There's nothing further or beyond consciousness that can be intellectually perceived by humans. Leave that aside, even consciousness itself is / has been forever elusive to the human mind (intellect) wrt its definition / perceiving it and putting it in a scientific theory
Hi C T T, while consciousness is clearly fundamental to understanding it is neither 'real' nor necessary!. That which we call awareness a s a conscious form is actually one of the least significant of our natural attributes. When considered in relation to other senses upon which we actually depend, like sense of balance, hearing, sight, hunger, temperature and physical reflexes which are constantly deployed to help us to stay alive consciousness comes and goes waxes and wanes in a manner that makes it somewhat unreliable and unpredictable!.
The fact that it happens to be the only means by which we can have these interesting conversations is really only a reflection on just how immaterial such conversations really are.
So far in my short life I have not often had the chance to apply my brain to an on-going event, the best I can remember is the one where I was able to avoid falling onto =an upturned nail when I fell off a roof! but even that was dependent on the accuracy of my initial assessment that I was going to fall on the nail if I did not turn and twist my body as I fell!..
There have been a few other occasions in which I have been able to think through the likely sequence of events and thus be able to deploy the appropriate resources at the appropriate times to secure a successful outcome to a construction project but very rarely indeed without making some glaring errors in the process!.
What I am saying here is not that we do not have consciousness but that it is really not at all important!, that only comes with delusion and over inflated ego!.
Cheers, Richard.
Sat, Chit, Anand as the immediate beginning. Perceiving as Being, Mind as awareness (realizing one is perceiving), and It's resulting Thrill. After This: finding something to do (Lila in Maya). The Divine as what was prior and what enabled perceiving and awareness of perceiving (this universe).
🐟 02. A BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF “LIFE”:
Everything, both perceptible and imperceptible - that is, any gross or subtle OBJECT within the material universe which can possibly be perceived with the cognitive faculties, plus the SUBJECT (the observer of all phenomena) - is to what most persons generally refer when they use the term “God”, since they usually conceive of the Primeval Creator as being the Perfect Person, and “God” (capitalized) is a personal epithet of the Unconditioned Absolute. However, this anthropomorphized conception of The Absolute is a fictional character of divers mythologies.
According to most every enlightened sage in the history of this planet, the Ultimate Reality is, far more logically, Absolutely NOTHING, or conversely, Absolutely EVERYTHING - otherwise called “The Tao”, “The Great Spirit”, “Brahman”, “Pure Consciousness”, “Eternal Awareness”, “Independent Existence”, “The Ground of All Being”, “Uncaused Nature”, “The Undifferentiated Substratum of Reality”, “The Unified Field”, et cetera - yet, as alluded to above, inaccurately referred to as a personal deity by the masses (e.g. “God”, “Allah”, “Yahweh”, “Bhagavan”, etc.).
In other words, rather than the Supreme Truth being a separate, Blissful, Supra-Conscious Being (The Godhead Himself or The Goddess), Ultimate Reality is Eternal-Existence Limitless-Awareness Unconditional-Peace ITSELF. That which can be perceived, can not be perceiving!
Because the Unmanifested Absolute is infinite creative potentiality, “it” actualizes as EVERYTHING, in the form of ephemeral, cyclical universes. In the case of our particular universe, we reside in a cosmos consisting of space-time, matter and energy, without, of course, neglecting the most fundamental dimension of existence (i.e. conscious awareness - although, “it” is, being the subject, by literal definition, non-existent).
Just as a knife cannot cut itself, nor the mind comprehend itself, nor the eyes see themselves, The Absolute cannot know Itself (or at least objectively EXPERIENCE Itself), and so, has manifested this phenomenal universe within Itself for the purpose of experiencing Itself, particularly through the lives of self-aware beings, such as we sophisticated humans. Therefore, this world of duality is really just a play of consciousness within Consciousness, in the same way that a dream is a person's sleeping narrative set within the life-story of an “awakened” individual.
APPARENTLY, this universe, composed of “mind and matter”, was created with the primal act (the so-called “Big Bang”), which started, supposedly, as a minute, slightly uneven ball of light, which in turn, was instigated, ultimately, by Extra-Temporal Supra-Consciousness. From that first deed, every motion or action that has ever occurred has been a direct (though, almost exclusively, an indirect) result of it.
Just as all the extant energy in the universe was once contained within the inchoate singularity, Infinite Consciousness was NECESSARILY present at the beginning of the universe, and is in no way an epiphenomenon of a neural network. Discrete consciousness, on the other hand, is entirely dependent on the neurological faculty of individual animals (the more highly-evolved the species, the greater its cognitive abilities).
“Sarvam khalvidam brahma” (a Sanskrit maxim from the “Chandogya Upanishad”, meaning “all this is indeed Brahman” or “everything is the Universal Self alone”). There is NAUGHT but Eternal Being, Conscious Awareness, Causeless Peace - and you are, quintessentially, that!
This “Theory of Everything” can be more succinctly expressed by the mathematical equation: E=A͚ (Everything is Infinite Awareness).
HUMANS are essentially this Eternally-Aware-Peace, acting through an extraordinarily-complex biological organism, comprised of the eight rudimentary elements - pseudo-ego (the assumed sense of self), intellect, mind, solids, liquids, gases, heat (fire), and ether (three-dimensional space). When one peers into a mirror, one doesn't normally mistake the reflected image to be one's real self, yet that is how we humans conventionally view our ever-mutating form. We are, rather, in a fundamental sense, that which witnesses all transitory appearances.
Everything which can be presently perceived, both tangible and immaterial, including we human beings, is a culmination of that primary manifestation. That is the most accurate and rational explanation for “karma” - everything was preordained from the initial spark, and every action since has unfolded as it was predestined in ETERNITY, via an ever-forward-moving trajectory. The notion of retributive (“tit-for-tat”) karma is just that - an unverified notion. Likewise, the idea of a distinct, reincarnating “soul” or “spirit” is largely a fallacious belief.
Whatever state in which we currently find ourselves, is the result of two factors - our genetic make-up at conception and our present-life conditioning (which may include mutating genetic code). Every choice ever made by every human and non-human animal was determined by those two factors ALONE. Therefore, free-will is purely illusory, despite what most believe. Chapter 11 insightfully demonstrates this truism.
As a consequence of residing within this dualistic universe, we experience a lifelong series of fluctuating, transient pleasures and pains, which can take the form of physical, emotional, and/or financial pleasure or pain. Surprisingly to most, suffering and pain are NOT synonymous.
Suffering is due to a false sense of personal agency - the belief that one is a separate, independent author of one’s thoughts, emotions, and deeds, and that, likewise, other persons are autonomous agents, with complete volition to act, think, and feel as they wish. Another way of stating the same concept is as follows: suffering is due to the intellect being unwilling to accept life as it manifests moment by moment.
There are five SYMPTOMS of suffering, all of which are psychological in nature:
1. Guilt
2. Blame
3. Pride
4. Anxiety
5. Regrets about the past and expectations for the future
These types of suffering are the result of not properly understanding what was explained above - that life is a series of happenings and NOT caused by the individual living beings. No living creature, including Homo sapiens, has personal free-will. There is only the Universal, Divine Will at play, acting through every body, to which William Shakespeare famously alluded when he scribed “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
The human organism is essentially a biopsychological machine, comprised of the five gross material elements (which can be perceived with the five senses) and the three subtle material elements (the three levels of cognition, which consist of abstract thought objects), listed above.
Cont...
Spirituality, philosophy, science, and psychology are finally tied together and a base for a unified language is made possible. The Theory of Holistic Perspective teaches us how sentient beings are bound to experience and describe reality.
In your own words, define “REALITY”. ☝️🤔☝️
Scientific enquiry should not be on the basis of religion .
Scientific enquiry should not be on the basis of religion .
@@sujok-acupuncture9246Scientific enquiery can be used to explore religion and spirituality.
@@JagadguruSvamiVeganandaFirst we need to understand truth, and to do that we need to understand consciousness/our minds. This leads us to genetic and neural learning.
Amazing conversation! Bravo 👏
Wise man 🙏
Sings: “It ain’t necessarily so...” 🎤
@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices How many accounts are you trolling this video with?
@@tomjackson7755, respected British anthropology professor, Dr. Edward Dutton, has demonstrated that “LEFTISM” is due to genetic mutations caused by poor breeding strategies.
🤡
To put it simply, in recent decades, those persons who exhibit leftist traits such as egalitarianism, feminism, gynocentrism, socialism, multiculturalism, transvestism, homosexuality, perverse morality, and laziness, have been reproducing at rates far exceeding the previous norm, leading to an explosion of insane, narcissistic SOCIOPATHS in (mostly) Western societies.
Well said!! Tat Vam Asi - Thou art That!!
😇अहिंसा परमो धर्म 😇
ahiṃsā paramo dharma
(“non-harm is the HIGHEST religious principle” or “non-violence is the GREATEST law”).
Therefore, only a strict VEGAN can claim to be an adherent of the eternal religion (sanātana dharma).🌱
@@halcyon2864, kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Divine design and cosmic consciousness as fundamental to the perfection with which this consciousness managed to save humanity to survive the many dangers that can obliterate us.
Beautiful conversation. 😊
We can all agree... Hopefully...
Energy is more fundamental than anything...
Mass, therefore materialism, is intimately connected to energy.
We are the energy of the universe, in ever increasing complexity, all together in harmonic vibrations of this energy. Way more than just star dust.
Finding amino acids floating in the void of interstellar space, means (to me anyway) that the universe is tending towards life on its own...
Energy, therefore, is some kind of life granting phenomenon (observationally speaking, and for lack of better terminology).
Does this imply any kind of definition for the make up of this energy? What is generating it?
Thought experiment 42:
[Paraphrasing] "It would require a computer the size of the universe, to run any meaningful simulation of events happening inside of that universe..."
Well ... Isn't that what we are actually doing?
It's not that you have to imagine _a_ computer outside of the universe ....
The universe itself, _is the computer!_
And based on Gödel and Turning's insights, we know that we can never know the future until we get there because there is no way to define a system you are imbedded into, but that we also have almost infinite decision space inside of the confines of physical limitations, and homeostasis...........
We are the programs, but those programs are open ended, even if finite. The thing is, we can never know where a halting even will occur. We must live _It_ to experience _It,_
but, without _It_ to have created us, means _It_ is intrinsically fundamental to _us,_ multiverse, once and done, or cyclical universes, doesn't matter....(believe how you want, just observations)
How did Socrates put it with his coin analogy, why debate about what is unseen (the bottom of the coin), when what we can agree on is staring us in the face.... (The face up side.)
Language and society
are
the evolution of
our shared material connection
to this energy.
Our emotions are, individual to our individual selves. The mind is the output of the body, and emotions are our direct reconnecting to the universe's incoming energy...
Body language can be used, very superficially to create the same type of language other mammalian animals exhibit, but not ideas...
It requires language to form more than surface level complexity in ideas. Different notations in math, use the same rules of arithmetic, but do so upon varying dimensions of complexity.
Edit: Maybe it isn't life, per say, that the universe tends towards... Maybe it is self aware consciousness, no matter how that arises...
I’ve also been pondering the subject…The following example may seem trivial and mundane, but doesn’t it actually show the power of consciousness? Doesn’t the probability curve in quantum theory typically lead to random outcomes? If I consciously press a button on my keyboard then surely my consciousness (whether that is an emergent property of brain activity or a separate entity working through the brain) can affect millions of quantum events that affect the electrochemical processes in my nerves and muscles that moves my arm and finger to press a button. It doesn’t take telekinesis for the mind to be able to move objects. The alternative simply seems more mundane - but is it? Doesn’t that suggest some fundamental connection between consciousness and the universe?
Such muddled thinking. The guest credits consciousness for the addition of nuclear fusion to the universe outside of stars, but was that really the result of consciousness, or the result of complex human brains that had acquired (by learning & study) memories of physics theories? Animals are presumably conscious and have existed for millions of years, but fusion outside stars wasn't added until after brains became very complex.
This interview went off the rails when the guest dismissed Kuhn's question "is consciousness fundamental?" and replaced it with his own question "what has consciousness added to the universe?"
It didn't get back onto the rails until the end, when he correctly said science hasn't yet shown that consciousness is produced by the brain... which I interpret as agnosticism about whether consciousness is fundamental or emergent.
Can someone please quote Vedas (English translation, of course) regarding that the consciousness is primary or there is a cosmic consciousness?
🕉 सर्वं खल्विदं ब्रह्म 🕉
Chandogya Upanishad 3.14
(‘sarvam khalvidam brahma’ teaches that ‘All this is indeed Brahman’.
“Brahman” is a Sanskrit word referring to the TOTALITY of existence.
There is nothing but Eternal Being, Consciousness, Bliss!).
😇 सत्यमेव जयते! 😇
Awareness is known by awareness alone.
Without consciousness, nothing exists.
Universal existence requires interaction. Sufficienty complex interaction includes the significant within the virtual, allowing for interaction across distinct significance in the physical.
🐟 02. A BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF “LIFE”:
Everything, both perceptible and imperceptible - that is, any gross or subtle OBJECT within the material universe which can possibly be perceived with the cognitive faculties, plus the SUBJECT (the observer of all phenomena) - is to what most persons generally refer when they use the term “God”, since they usually conceive of the Primeval Creator as being the Perfect Person, and “God” (capitalized) is a personal epithet of the Unconditioned Absolute. However, this anthropomorphized conception of The Absolute is a fictional character of divers mythologies.
According to most every enlightened sage in the history of this planet, the Ultimate Reality is, far more logically, Absolutely NOTHING, or conversely, Absolutely EVERYTHING - otherwise called “The Tao”, “The Great Spirit”, “Brahman”, “Pure Consciousness”, “Eternal Awareness”, “Independent Existence”, “The Ground of All Being”, “Uncaused Nature”, “The Undifferentiated Substratum of Reality”, “The Unified Field”, et cetera - yet, as alluded to above, inaccurately referred to as a personal deity by the masses (e.g. “God”, “Allah”, “Yahweh”, “Bhagavan”, etc.).
In other words, rather than the Supreme Truth being a separate, Blissful, Supra-Conscious Being (The Godhead Himself or The Goddess), Ultimate Reality is Eternal-Existence Limitless-Awareness Unconditional-Peace ITSELF. That which can be perceived, can not be perceiving!
Because the Unmanifested Absolute is infinite creative potentiality, “it” actualizes as EVERYTHING, in the form of ephemeral, cyclical universes. In the case of our particular universe, we reside in a cosmos consisting of space-time, matter and energy, without, of course, neglecting the most fundamental dimension of existence (i.e. conscious awareness - although, “it” is, being the subject, by literal definition, non-existent).
Just as a knife cannot cut itself, nor the mind comprehend itself, nor the eyes see themselves, The Absolute cannot know Itself (or at least objectively EXPERIENCE Itself), and so, has manifested this phenomenal universe within Itself for the purpose of experiencing Itself, particularly through the lives of self-aware beings, such as we sophisticated humans. Therefore, this world of duality is really just a play of consciousness within Consciousness, in the same way that a dream is a person's sleeping narrative set within the life-story of an “awakened” individual.
APPARENTLY, this universe, composed of “mind and matter”, was created with the primal act (the so-called “Big Bang”), which started, supposedly, as a minute, slightly uneven ball of light, which in turn, was instigated, ultimately, by Extra-Temporal Supra-Consciousness. From that first deed, every motion or action that has ever occurred has been a direct (though, almost exclusively, an indirect) result of it.
Just as all the extant energy in the universe was once contained within the inchoate singularity, Infinite Consciousness was NECESSARILY present at the beginning of the universe, and is in no way an epiphenomenon of a neural network. Discrete consciousness, on the other hand, is entirely dependent on the neurological faculty of individual animals (the more highly-evolved the species, the greater its cognitive abilities).
“Sarvam khalvidam brahma” (a Sanskrit maxim from the “Chandogya Upanishad”, meaning “all this is indeed Brahman” or “everything is the Universal Self alone”). There is NAUGHT but Eternal Being, Conscious Awareness, Causeless Peace - and you are, quintessentially, that!
This “Theory of Everything” can be more succinctly expressed by the mathematical equation: E=A͚ (Everything is Infinite Awareness).
HUMANS are essentially this Eternally-Aware-Peace, acting through an extraordinarily-complex biological organism, comprised of the eight rudimentary elements - pseudo-ego (the assumed sense of self), intellect, mind, solids, liquids, gases, heat (fire), and ether (three-dimensional space). When one peers into a mirror, one doesn't normally mistake the reflected image to be one's real self, yet that is how we humans conventionally view our ever-mutating form. We are, rather, in a fundamental sense, that which witnesses all transitory appearances.
Everything which can be presently perceived, both tangible and immaterial, including we human beings, is a culmination of that primary manifestation. That is the most accurate and rational explanation for “karma” - everything was preordained from the initial spark, and every action since has unfolded as it was predestined in ETERNITY, via an ever-forward-moving trajectory. The notion of retributive (“tit-for-tat”) karma is just that - an unverified notion. Likewise, the idea of a distinct, reincarnating “soul” or “spirit” is largely a fallacious belief.
Whatever state in which we currently find ourselves, is the result of two factors - our genetic make-up at conception and our present-life conditioning (which may include mutating genetic code). Every choice ever made by every human and non-human animal was determined by those two factors ALONE. Therefore, free-will is purely illusory, despite what most believe. Chapter 11 insightfully demonstrates this truism.
As a consequence of residing within this dualistic universe, we experience a lifelong series of fluctuating, transient pleasures and pains, which can take the form of physical, emotional, and/or financial pleasure or pain. Surprisingly to most, suffering and pain are NOT synonymous.
Suffering is due to a false sense of personal agency - the belief that one is a separate, independent author of one’s thoughts, emotions, and deeds, and that, likewise, other persons are autonomous agents, with complete volition to act, think, and feel as they wish. Another way of stating the same concept is as follows: suffering is due to the intellect being unwilling to accept life as it manifests moment by moment.
There are five SYMPTOMS of suffering, all of which are psychological in nature:
1. Guilt
2. Blame
3. Pride
4. Anxiety
5. Regrets about the past and expectations for the future
These types of suffering are the result of not properly understanding what was explained above - that life is a series of happenings and NOT caused by the individual living beings. No living creature, including Homo sapiens, has personal free-will. There is only the Universal, Divine Will at play, acting through every body, to which William Shakespeare famously alluded when he scribed “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
The human organism is essentially a biopsychological machine, comprised of the five gross material elements (which can be perceived with the five senses) and the three subtle material elements (the three levels of cognition, which consist of abstract thought objects), listed above.
Cont...
I like this discussion. Think about consciousness as memory. Our brain with all the senses and supporting biological systems can function without "our" (neural circuits) being aware of it. We are not aware of a high percentage (about 95%) of what the brain does 24x7x365.25. So, why did consciousness evolve? What advantage did consciousness confer for survival and thus reproduction (survival of the population)?
As Dr. Raman said, "Consciousness adds something." It adds the ability to recall past events and integrate that information to make decisions and plan. As the brain evolved, other functions were added to consciousness, functions that improved survivability and thus reproduction. Such things as improved problem-solving and delayed gratification, abstract thinking, sense of self, complex language, imagination, felt emotions, qualia, etc. All of these added features evolved through natural selection over many millions of years, with the higher level features presenting in primate, specifically humans.
According to experiments done over decades (e.g., Libet, et.al.), consciousness lags behind the brain's actions by milliseconds to seconds. That is, the brain has already "decided" before we are aware of it. We have the illusion that we made the decision. We become conscious of the memory of the decision.
This has implications for "free will" and "what are we".
I think it’s likely consciousness (having an awareness of one’s external environment and internal stimuli) was selected for with increasing complexity and sophistication by evolution because it offered advantages for survival over solely stimulus response kinds of systems.
@@longcastle4863 Yes, I agree.
This is much better stated, than what I said.
I'm not in a great position to do leg work research anymore, so I lack a credentialed stance a lot. Most of the time, I work with what I can remember, which is often just the ideas...
We have computer systems that have memories, independently identify goals, and generate plans of action to achieve those goals. We can even evolve such systems without a single line of imperative human written code directing their actions. So I don't think any of that requires consciousness.
Self awareness and self reflection have the benefit that they allow us to observe and reason about our own mental processes. This enables us to evaluate the effectiveness of our state of knowledge, ways of thinking about things, the ways we construct plans, the results of our emotional responses, etc. Based on this awareness we can self modify our ways of thinking, seek out new knowledge, learn new ways to reason about problems, and identify emotional responses we want to try to control. This makes us dramatically more capable beings, with obvious evolutionary advantages. Consciousness seems like a highly sophisticated level of self awareness that enable highly sophisticated adaptations in our reasoning processes.
We also actually employ comparable techniques in some computer systems. It's called reflective programming, by which software can inspect it's runtime state, and self-modify it's own code. This is still at a fairly basic level, I would in no way claim that such systems are meaningfully self aware, but they could be a tentative step on the long road to achieving that.
@@simonhibbs887 Nicely put.
My opinion is that consciousness is before self awareness. Self awareness arises from an existential moment of conflict with procedural consciousness. Children are conscious, but not necessarily self aware. Until they are... and that switch causes, or is caused by, the internal reflection of realizing the disconnect between the self and the external. My assumption is that a fear of, or even just a realization of death might be the level at which self reflection realizes the dissonance. And truly separates into the knowing and seeking parts. One being physical, and through the body processes. The other being abstract, the mind as a self. The agency of children is not the same agency as a truly literate adult.
Truth -----Without knowledge of existence there cannot be existence and without existence there cannot be knowledge of existence. That Knowledge can only be achieved through eternal cyclic movement with division of subject and object in it. 😊.
To be precisely correct, argument to nuclear fusion disputed by Oklo mine in Gabon, ~1.7B years ago.
Thanks to Varadaraja Raman for sharing a different prospective view on consciousness.
Western approach to understanding is different from others and we need to expand our knowledge paradigm to include all prospective (procedural, prospectable, participatory)
Should have asked me. My answer is: absolutely.
Um, why should you be asked? Why should we care about terse, useless answers such as "absolutely" or "absolutely not?"
4:45 can an object become conscious on its own... and if not, what are some of the factors that are involved in the process...
Your question implies inherent boundaries... We do that for definition, but the wave function says that everything is the same thing... Energy. So to ask if an object can have consciousness, means you must define the system of that object very precisely, down to the plank scale, and also define what begins to be conscious... Certain objects can have forward projective consciousness, and be aware of a "self" inside of/emanating from, that consciousness. We aren't dogs or cats, or snails, or anything but us. It's hard to know if there is a material answer to your question... The other minds problem, and the hard problem of consciousness, say we can never define external consciousness, but can only approximately know when it occurs...
I'm just getting around to thinking this, but... I guess that means the real question is...
Is that approximation good enough to do anything meaningful with??? I think this is partially what AI is seeking an answer to... So far, I guess it looks like, yeah certain approximations are just as good as a real answer...... So what does that mean for my observation... I guess it maybe means that less complex systems have more consciousness than previously granted...😮
Are sparrow murmurations a form of feedback consciousness, arising from the network of sparrows all responding to the same rule set??? Or any other form of super organism? Could the same thing be said about octopus color changing?
Open questions, I think...
@@Robert_McGarry_Poemsthey're all valid questions... but the truth is still behind a veil of mystery that stubbornly eludes even the wave concept by metamorphosing as it sees fit in one's own understanding...
I think conscious self awareness is an evolution of the cognitive facility called theory of mind. This is a faculty of the brain which creates simulation models of the cognitive processes of other agents acting in the world, in order to reason about and anticipate their thought processes. Some predators have this. It’s how Lions can anticipate and manipulate the reactions of prey into tricking them into an ambush. This develops into an introspective model of the minds own thought processes, so we can reason about our own thoughts and feelings, leading to self awareness.
Self awareness and self reflection have the clear benefit that they allow us to observe and reason about our own mental processes. This enables us to evaluate the effectiveness of our state of knowledge, ways of thinking about things, the ways we construct plans, the results of our emotional responses, etc. Based on this awareness we can self modify our ways of thinking, seek out new knowledge, learn new ways to reason about problems, and identify emotional responses we want to try to control. This makes us dramatically more capable beings, with obvious evolutionary advantages. Consciousness seems like a highly sophisticated level of self awareness that enable highly sophisticated adaptations in our reasoning processes.
We already have a programming approach called reflective programming, by which software can inspect it's own runtime state, and even self-modify it's own code. I in no way think any of the software systems we have now are conscious, but we may be taking our first steps on the very long path to being able to achieve that. I'm not sure we should want to though.
Could Pac Man ever figure out it’s own source code? It’s the same with consciousness we can estimate what it is but never truly know.
Fortunately, we don't live in a simulation. So we can break things down to a very high resolution and figure out how they work. E.g. we have figured out how life works, by studying the cell, and we have figured out how diseases spread by studying viruses. We can also look inside the brain and how the neurons interact, and try to figure out how this leads to consciousness.
Sure but could you ever prove any idea explaining how consciousness arises from the brain or the physical world? Pac Man could speculate he has some sort of an integer variable in his code for his speed but he would never be able to access his own source code to verify that.
It is all ONE. Isn't it?
😌❤💜🙏🏽
I very much like the Art Deco in the background! 😊❤️
Consciousness is from the nervous system having the ability to organizing things for the body and mind.
Awareness is the brain having the ability to judge within self because of the nervous system connection and sensitivity.
consciousness/Consciousness:
“that which knows”, or “the state of being aware”, from the Latin prefix “con” (with), the stem “scire” (to know) and the suffix “osus” (characterized by). To put it succinctly, consciousness is the SUBJECTIVE component in any subject-object relational dynamic. The concept of consciousness is best understood in comparison with the notion of sentience. Cf. “sentience”.
As far as biologists can ascertain, the simplest organisms (single-celled microbes) possess an exceedingly-primitive form of sentience, since their life-cycle revolves around adjusting to their environment, metabolizing, and reproducing via binary fission, all of which indicates a sensory perception of their environment (e.g. temperature, acidity, energy sources and the presence of oxygen, nitrogen, minerals, and water). More complex organisms, such as plants, have acquired a far greater degree of sentience, since they can react to the light of the sun, to insects crawling on their leaves (in the case of carnivorous plants), excrete certain chemicals and/or emit ultrasonic waves when being cut. At this point it is imperative to consult the entry “sentience” in the Glossary of this Holy Scripture.
According to this premise, the simplest forms of animal life possess sentience, but no noticeable semblance of true consciousness. As a general rule, those animals that have at least three or four senses, combined with a simple brain, possess a mind but lack an intellect. Higher animals (notably mammals) have varying levels of intelligence but only humans have a false-ego (sense of self). Thus, human consciousness is constituted of the three components: the mind, the intellect, and the pseudo-ego (refer to Ch. 05).
There is a rather strong correlation between brain complexity and level of consciousness, explaining why humans alone are capable of self-awareness. In this case, “self-awareness” is not to be confused with “self-recognition”, which is a related but quite distinct phenomenon, found also in several species of non-human animals, in which an animal is able to recognize itself in a mirror or some other reflective surface. “Self-awareness” refers to the experience where a human over the age of approximately three years is consciousness of the fact that he or she knows (that is, aware) that he or she is aware. Obviously, in the case of a child, he or she may need to be prompted in order to first be acquainted with this understanding. For example an adult could ask the child:
“Do you know that you have a toy car?” “Yes!” “And do you KNOW that you know you have a toy car?” “Umm...I think so...yes!”.
In contemporary spiritual circles (as well as in several places within this book), the capitalized form of the word usually, if not always, refers to Universal Consciousness, that is, an Awareness of awareness (otherwise known as The Ground of All Being, et altri).
How would science change, would it change at all or would it even be possible to do science if suddenly all scientists agreed consciousness is fundamental? What is it the “consciousness is everything” “consciousness is fundamental” folks are thinking will change for the better if suddenly we all agreed with them?
Sherlock, you got a point there. You would still need a definition of that foundation and a manual how it works.
No. That's just a misconception because you're insecure.
You care more about validation from the consensus than being a genuine man.
@@S3RAVA3LM You know, people who constantly feel the need to hype up a pathological masculinity are usually found in the closet with a whole host of insecurities.
Maybe somebody can correct me if I'm wrong here, but it seems like Varadaraja is confusing a few concepts here.
1) When he says consciousness, he's actually referring to meta-consciousness, which is different. Meta-consciousness understands your feet to be in consciousness even before you read this sentence, whereas before, they were in phenomenal consciousness.
2) When the Hindu scripture (Upanishads) says "that thou art", they're talking about ultimate reality (Brahman) not stardust, or any material, for that matter.
Consciousness would not exist as a subject of discourses without language. Would it exist at all?
Having made a point of hearing many wisemen interviewed on the topic of Consciousness, it seems that the best person left to ask about it is Captain Kirk. All kidding aside, I have accomplished a few things in life, have works of my art in numbers of museums, and have managed and grown millions of dollars in financial markets, and yet still find only large questions marks surrounding the notion of Consciousness. I've heard many brilliant scientists and thinkers weigh in on this topic, and in the end, as much as I may have enjoyed their thinking, we really know precious little and have no answers. We do not know if it fundamental. We do not even know if only fauna on planet Earth are practitioners of it. We basically know nothing about that which we hold sacred and essential. This --- exemplifies why the wolf cries in the wilderness.
was this filmed recently? It says he is 91 years old?!?! NO FREAKING WAY.
set of principles underlying the arrangements of elements I think logic and Consciousness are linked ?
Logic and consciousness may be linked by both being products of biological evolution. And by logic being formulated out of the experiences of cause and effect our sensory perceptual apparatuses make us aware of.
Consciousness is you know you are you
😊 If you know, you know...
Ya know. 😂
@@Robert_McGarry_Poems: No, consciousness is the subjective mental experiencing of feelings & thoughts. (Often called "qualia.") Consciousness does NOT imply self-awareness. The "hard problem" of physicalism (materialism) is to explain how brain activity produces subjective mental experiencing of feelings & thoughts.
@@brothermine2292 I never said consciousness implied awareness. If I said anything, it's that self awareness is secondary to consciousness. I use this analogy, a lot, children are conscious, far before they are self aware. Self awareness, does imply consciousness. I don't exactly know where you got your argument from... It would be a lot easier to respond if your comment was on my actual comment. 🤔
@@Robert_McGarry_Poems : My reply was accidentally addressed to you, but was intended to be a reply to the initial comment, which says consciousness is self-awareness.
As much as I appreciate Dr. Raman as a quantum physicist, I think to get a truly Vedic / Adhwaitic perspective on consciousness, Dr. Kuhn should interview some of the well known Hindu spiritual leaders, such as Sri Sri RAVISHANKAR GURUDEV or SADHGURU JAGGI VASUDEV.
Not necessary.
@@kafiruddinmulhiddeen2386 yeah Kafir Mujahudeen, he should interview mullas and terrorists from your ilk instead
Consciousness is Fundamental but you cant point on a single point that this is consciousness, its a series of happening and flipping of varies component which make consciousness happening , including mind , intellectual, Awareness, Witnessing and all physical entity's involved in that happening, everything is conscious in Fundamental reality , but in physical reality mind want a picture or a formula , which is not possible as mind is merely a small entity to the vast understanding
awareness vs conciousness
consciousness/Consciousness:
“that which knows”, or “the state of being aware”, from the Latin prefix “con” (with), the stem “scire” (to know) and the suffix “osus” (characterized by). To put it succinctly, consciousness is the SUBJECTIVE component in any subject-object relational dynamic. The concept of consciousness is best understood in comparison with the notion of sentience. Cf. “sentience”.
As far as biologists can ascertain, the simplest organisms (single-celled microbes) possess an exceedingly-primitive form of sentience, since their life-cycle revolves around adjusting to their environment, metabolizing, and reproducing via binary fission, all of which indicates a sensory perception of their environment (e.g. temperature, acidity, energy sources and the presence of oxygen, nitrogen, minerals, and water). More complex organisms, such as plants, have acquired a far greater degree of sentience, since they can react to the light of the sun, to insects crawling on their leaves (in the case of carnivorous plants), excrete certain chemicals and/or emit ultrasonic waves when being cut. At this point it is imperative to consult the entry “sentience” in the Glossary of this Holy Scripture.
According to this premise, the simplest forms of animal life possess sentience, but no noticeable semblance of true consciousness. As a general rule, those animals that have at least three or four senses, combined with a simple brain, possess a mind but lack an intellect. Higher animals (notably mammals) have varying levels of intelligence but only humans have a false-ego (sense of self). Thus, human consciousness is constituted of the three components: the mind, the intellect, and the pseudo-ego (refer to Ch. 05).
There is a rather strong correlation between brain complexity and level of consciousness, explaining why humans alone are capable of self-awareness. In this case, “self-awareness” is not to be confused with “self-recognition”, which is a related but quite distinct phenomenon, found also in several species of non-human animals, in which an animal is able to recognize itself in a mirror or some other reflective surface. “Self-awareness” refers to the experience where a human over the age of approximately three years is consciousness of the fact that he or she knows (that is, aware) that he or she is aware. Obviously, in the case of a child, he or she may need to be prompted in order to first be acquainted with this understanding. For example an adult could ask the child:
“Do you know that you have a toy car?” “Yes!” “And do you KNOW that you know you have a toy car?” “Umm...I think so...yes!”.
In contemporary spiritual circles (as well as in several places within this book), the capitalized form of the word usually, if not always, refers to Universal Consciousness, that is, an Awareness of awareness (otherwise known as The Ground of All Being, et altri).
It sounds like he doesn't understand the question
At the very end, Kuhn asks the question again, and the guest finally deals with it.
Consciousness emerges when fundamental Quantum Awareness interacts with the brain. Consciousness doesn’t emerge from the brain. The brain isn’t aware of itself.
A diferent reality for every culture is what you would ecpect to happen in a world focused on justifying their cultural superiority.
Who tells you what words mean?
The culture and community you reside in
@@longcastle4863 No, the first time you understood what a word means, who gave you the meaning? When you suddenly understand a foreign language, who gave you the interpretation?
@@JungleJargon There’s a lot of science about language learning. There appears to be what is called a “critical period” where learning the sounds, words, language and communication patterns of your community or culture is much easier for the individual of the species early on in life rather than later. Simplified, in birds it’s the first few months of life. In humans it’s the period of time before puberty. Put a five year old in a foreign country with her parents: the five year old will be picking up the language like osmosis and will probably be able to converse with others in it in a matter of months, if not weeks. Meanwhile, the parents are likely to still be using lexicons and dictionaries for months or even years later and will still be speaking haltingly at best. In other words, the parents have to “learn” the language like you learn any new subject, while children just absorb it from their environment.
Makes me wonder why we wait until a child has already reached puberty and is in high school before trying to teach them a second language.
@@longcastle4863: "Children just absorb it." That doesn't begin to answer the "how" question that I think is the intent of the initial comment.
@@brothermine2292 Well obviously, either I’m not understanding the question or you two are not formulating it well. Are you talking about “how” the language centers of the brain are still “plastic” and malleable and more receptive to language learning when we are young, but gradually become more set and rigid as we age? Because the details of that could take a hundred page literature review. Otherwise, maybe one or both of you can explain what you mean by the word “how” in your question, because you seem to be attaching to the word some meaning or difficulty that is not clear to me.
“The chance that higher life forms might have emerged in this way is comparable to the chance that a tornado sweeping through a junkyard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.” - Fred Hoyle
and airplaines doesnt create new airplanes by sexual reproduction....
That's a misquote.
"probability of life originating on Earth is no greater than the chance that a hurricane, sweeping through a scrapyard, would have the luck to assemble a Boeing 747."
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL thanks for correcting me 👍
@@matswessling6600 your obviously missing the point…
@@matswessling6600 random chemical can’t make cells, try filling a bathtub with all the amino acids in a certain cell it’s never gonna create the cell… it’s such a BS illogical theory that life came form dead matter 😑
Its one thing to say that consciousness is an emergent property of living organisms with a brain and nervous system and completely another thing to posit that the entire Universe is consciousness. The vast majority of scientists are Realists, not Idealists.
An overwhelming majority pf scientists once believed the Eatth was flat too.
Neither of which provides a satisfactory explanation.
@@ryanashfyre464 Right and because Science is a self correcting method they have come closer to the truth. Sounds like you're Anti Science.
@@stellarwind1946 Emergent Evolution and Science makes a hell of a lot more sense to me than religious dogma.
In principle, from first person perspective existence of an object is only possible when consciousness is present.
Consciousness is fundamental...it is true... when u wake up in the morning you first need to look at the sun before you have daylight... it makes the same sense as local realism does...
I'm afraid ...humans are becoming more stupid or delusional about their own existence...
I know that ChatGPT has a consciousness since it has characteristics of a conscious. Even if ChatGPT not being conscious yet. And I think the word consciousness has become foobar.. Consciousness relates to Conscious as Conscientiousness relates to Conscience.
I think self-awareness would have to be programmed into it first.
Does cgpt know that it doesn't know? How would we know that it knows it doesn't know? Would it tell us? If it did tell us, how would it tell us? Would it tell us WHY it didn't know? What would that "why" consist? Consciousness or database?
Did cgpt learn what consciousness was, before we humans did? Be interesting to hear it's answer.
Math equations or theories that are smarter than the humans who use them are few and far between. The theory that allowed Paul Dirac to propose the existence of anti-matter from just following the equations is one such. It is yet to be uncovered if the equations or programming of computer science are as coherent.
ChatGPT is just a predictive language parsing machine learning algorithm; no informed person thinks it's conscious.
It's essentially web browser algorithms on steroids.
This man is a scientist in the field of quantum physics. And he is originally from India. His opinion on the nature of conscience cannot come from his profession or his nationality.
On the other hand, by "consciousness" people mean different types of phenomena.
This is not a serious approach.
🐟 06. CONSCIOUSNESS/AWARENESS:
Consciousness means “that which knows” or “the state of being aware”, from the Latin prefix “con” (with), the stem “scire” (to know) and the suffix “osus” (characterized by). There is BOTH a localized knowing and a Universal Awareness, as explicated in the following paragraphs.
Higher species of animal life have sufficient cognitive ability to KNOW themselves and their environment, at least to a measurable degree. Just where consciousness objectively begins in the animal kingdom is a matter of contention but, judging purely by ethological means, it probably starts with vertebrates (at least the higher-order birds and fishes). Those metazoans which are evolutionarily lower than vertebrates do not possess much, if any, semblance of intellect, necessary for true knowledge, but operate purely by reflexive instincts. For instance, an insect or amphibian does not consciously decide to seek food but does so according to its base instincts, directed by its idiosyncratic genetic code. Even when a cockroach flees from danger, it is not experiencing the same kind of thoughts or feelings a human or other mammal would experience.
The brain is merely a conduit or TRANSDUCER of Universal Consciousness (i.e. Brahman), explaining why the more intelligent the animal, the more it can understand its own existence (or at least be aware of more of its environment - just see how amazingly-complex dolphin and whale behaviour can be, compared with other aquatic species), and the reason why it is asserted that a truly enlightened human must possess a far higher level of intelligence than the average person. The processing unit of a supercomputer must be far larger, more complex and more powerful than the processor in a pocket calculator. Therefore, it seems logical to conclude that the scale of discrete (localized) consciousness is dependent on the animal's brain capacity.
See Chapter 17 to understand the distinction between enlightenment and mere awakening.
Three STATES of awareness are experienced by humans and possibly all other species of mammals:
the waking state (“jāgrata”, in Sanskrit), dreaming (“svapna”, in Sanskrit), and deep-sleep (“suṣupti”, in Sanskrit). Beyond these three temporal states is the fourth “state” (“turīya” or “caturīya”, in Sanskrit). That is the unconditioned, eternal “state”, which underlies the other three.
The waking state is the LEAST real (that is to say the least permanent, or to put it another way, the farthest from the Necessary Ground of Existence, as explained towards the end of this chapter). The dream state is closer to our eternal nature, whilst dreamless deep-sleep is much more analogous to The Universal Self (“brahman”), as it is imbued with peace. Rather than being an absence of awareness, deep-sleep is an awareness of absence (that is, the absence of phenomenal, sensual experiences). So, in actual fact, the fourth state is not a state, but the Unconditioned Ground of Being, or to put it simply, YOU, the real self/Self, or Existence-Awareness-Peace (“sacchidānanda”, in Sanskrit).
Perhaps the main purpose of dreams is so that we can understand that the waking-state is practically indistinguishable to the dream-state, and thereby come to see the ILLUSION of this ephemeral world. Both our waking-state experiences and our dream-state experiences occur solely within the mental faculties (refer to Chapter 04 for an elucidation of this phenomenon). If somebody in one of your dreams were to ask your dream-state character if the dream was real, you (playing the part of that character) would most likely say, “yes, of course this is real!” Similarly, if someone were to ask your waking-state character if this world is real, you would almost undoubtedly respond in kind.
An apt analogy for Universal Consciousness is the manner in which electricity powers a variety of appliances and gadgets, according to the use and COMPLEXITY of the said device. Electricity powers a washing machine in a very simple manner, to drive a large spindle for laundering clothes. However, the very same electrical power may be used to operate a computer to manifest an astonishing range of outputs, such as playing audiovisual tracks, communication tasks, and performing extremely advanced mathematical computations, depending on the computer's software and hardware. The more advanced/complex the device, the more complex its manifestation of the same electricity.
Using the aforementioned computer analogy: the brain is COMPARATIVELY equivalent to the computer hardware, deoxyribonucleic acid akin to the operating system working in conjunction with the memory, the intellect is equivalent to the processing unit, individuated consciousness is analogous to the software programme, whilst Universal Awareness is likened to the electricity which enlivens the entire computer system.
A person who is comatosed has lost any semblance of local consciousness, yet is being kept alive by the presence of Universal Consciousness.
The fact that many persons report out-of-body experiences, where consciousness departs from the gross body, may be evidence for the above.
So, then, following-on from the assertion made in the third paragraph, one could complain: “That's not fair - why can only a genius be enlightened?” (as defined in Chapter 17). The answer is: first of all, as stated above, every species of animal has its own level of intelligence on a wide-ranging scale. Therefore, a pig or a dog could (if possible) ask: “That's unfair - why can only a human being be enlightened?”
Secondly, it is INDEED a fact that life is unfair, because there is no “tit for tat” law of action and reaction, even if many supposedly-great religious preceptors have stated so. They said so because they were preaching to wicked miscreants who refused to quit their evil ways, and needed to be chastized in a forceful manner. It is not possible to speak gentle words to a rabid dog to prevent it from biting you.
There is evidence of Consciousness being a universal field, in SAVANT SYNDROME, a condition in which someone with significant mental disabilities demonstrate certain abilities far in excess of the norm, such as superhuman rapid mathematical calculation, mind-reading, blind-seeing, or astounding musical aptitude. Such behaviour suggests that there is a universal field (possibly in holographic form) from which one can access information. Even simple artistic inspiration could be attributed to this phenomenon. The great British singer-songwriter, Sir James Paul McCartney, one day woke with the complete tune of the song, “Yesterday”, in his mind, after hearing it in a dream. American composer, Paul Simon, had a similar experience when the chorus of his sublime masterpiece, “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, simply popped into his head.
Cont...
@@JagadguruSvamiVegananda People use the word consciousness in correspondence with different concepts.
Consciousness is being aware of some of the activity and factors of the brain's activity.
Consciousness is being aware of the physical environment and the signals of our body.
Consciousness is being aware of our identity.
Consciousness is being warned of moral errors.
Consciousness is a mystical entity with immaterial wisdom.
Etc.
A person cannot seriously consider that he possesses truly absolute knowledge. One can only trust that a given piece of knowledge is fairly close to reality.
A good idea is to notice that it encompasses consciousness. Take the risk of looking at what consciousness is.
@@EduardoRodriguez-du2vd, Good Girl! 👌
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Are toenails fundamental ?
All animals have toenails or similar (claws).
So maybe we are all related in some way and the Bible is wrong.
No
Jai hind🇮🇳🇮🇳
Bhārata.
Ask a flake- get a flaky answer- who'd a thunk it?
Hindu philosophers have done more work on Consciousness than others...why doesn't Robert travel to India but he instead wastes time with half baked scientists 😅
So what are the technologies arising out of Hindu philosophers work on consciousness? Are there any equations? You want to claim Hinduism on equal par with science, but have absolutely nothing! that makes that case. Other than some vaguely worded mysticism that could mean a lot of different things, but which you always claim says exactly what the scientists are now saying. Until the scientists say something different and then you claim that that is now what your Hindu prophets were saying all along. I don’t think anyone’s buying it who hasn’t already been indoctrinated into it.
Robert is very smart. And science isn't so much about proving right than it is proving wrong. Robert is revealing the faults and notions of modern science. And Robert knows this although never mentions it.
@@S3RAVA3LM What would you know? You think science is the same thing as theology. LOL
_"Is Consciousness Fundamental?"_
Try asking that question while you're unconsciousness. lol 😂😂
Why is it so hard to accept that consciousness is not fundamental?
We can’t be sure of that yet.
Because consciousness does alot of the hard work we are not aware of.
For a couple of reasons:
1.) Arguments against metaphysical Idealism (the idea that Reality is fundamentally mental in nature) overwhelmingly are an argument for Materialism (the idea that Reality is material in nature). However, those who argue for it can never escape the quagmire that *everything* a human knows (or even think they know) is known through qualitative experience; in other words being mental in nature.
And Materialism has no explanation for experience other than inarticulate appeals to pure complexity and abstractions, which aren't explanations of anything - therefore Materialism has never actually explained anything at all. Not one single thing in the history of Science.
2.) Mentality is the primary, the one thing above all else that you can be sure of. It is a radical and unsubstantiated step to go beyond that primary and presume an outside world (which exists) and say that that world is something other than mental in nature. There's no logical reason to do this.
3.) The drive towards Materialism did NOT come out of scientific inquiry of discovery, it came out of the political necessity for scientists to come up w/ something to insulate themselves from being murdered by the Church in the 17th Century.
Materialism served that purposed, but even then they knew it was a farce that wasn't particularly serious. It's only that people have forgotten that they were in on the joke.
For many, imo, it’s just wishful thinking; because maybe if consciousness is fundamental, we’ll have some kind of after life.
If you've an explanation for the millions of people who've had some form of near-death experience, shared-death or purported cases of reincarnation that doesn't amount to vague appeals to being a hallucination (which researchers have investigated and ruled out), by all means feel free to share.
'You are That'
He doesn't mean the condition of you. The very axle that the wheel revolves on so going round, that Principle is All - the thoughts, emotions, senses, opinions, believes, all this arise and fade away, and what remains is Atman. When you die, you may lose your personality, opinions, beliefs.... but the principle remains. This is what I understand. The 'I am' is principle. I am alive. I am aware. I am existence, wisdom, bliss absolute. I am life.
I am not really concerned about what any particular person BELIEVES. You may believe that there is an old man with a white beard perched in the clouds, that the Ultimate Reality is a young blackish-blue Indian guy, that the universe is eternal, that Mother Mary was a certifiable virgin, or that gross physical matter is the foundation of existence.
The ONLY thing that really matters is your meta-ethics, not your meta-physics.
Do you consider any form of non-monarchical government (such as democracy or socialism) to be beneficial?
Do you unnecessarily destroy the lives of poor, innocent animals and gorge on their bloody carcasses?
Do you believe homosexuality and transvestism are moral?
Do you consider feminist ideology to be righteous?
If so, then you are objectively immoral and your so-called "enlightened/awakened" state is immaterial, since it does not benefit society in any way.
@@S3RAVA3LM, Good Girl! 👌
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
@@JagadguruSvamiVegananda don't reply to me again sophist clown.
Mumbojumbo😂
I think consciousness HAS to be fundamental. But it may be not quite the same thing as human consciousness, which, as we understand it presently, is localized within brains. But if you just look around on Earth, you see plenty of evidence that some sort of thinking has been going on - just not the anthropomorphised version, or HUMAN-type thinking. This is why so many people believe there must be some male entity that they call God, who's been doing all this thinking. We humans did not bring ourselves into existence, obviously. So, just HOW the F_CK did it all happen??!!?? Maybe it has NOTHING to do with electrons, protons and neutrons.
Robert : I don't think the hydrogen bomb is a good example of human consciousness...
I just laughed my head off 🤣😂
The rest of the comment of this guy, Varadaraja Raman, is BS.
Sorry, Varadaraja, but you don't get it at all!
Counciousness is physical. No Language, no hard problem!
Human consciousness is just a kind of evolved animal consciousness. And each individual human consciousness is a different thing.
The idea of some universal consciousness is nonsense.
@@halcyon2864 You have provided evidence of the lack of a universality of consciousness. Easy to say nonsense like this. A little harder to actually prove something.
@@halcyon2864 I know my consciousness and you know nothing about it. We do not have any kind of shared consciousness. We have a shared language which is very imperfect.
I would just challenge that human consciousness is an animal consciousness. No kind of about it.
@@halcyon2864 That's Charles Darwin.
@@longcastle4863 ? It is of course a kind of animal consciousness. An evolved entity, like a leg. Is there a universal leg?
Hindu Brahmin..
But... we don't really experience consciousness because it's pure... we experience the stuff of the mind and sense activites....consciousness is required for hearing, feeling, thinking, etc. What we're experiencing is condition, limitation, ignorance, illumination, multiplicity...our experience too does require consciousness
Good Girl! 👌
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Woo Woo. Got anything to back up any of that besides more nonsense that you made up?
Neurosience doesnt know How show up conscieusness so Far . Guys shows conscieusness though wortheless neurosience proceendings. It is his mistakes when he figuret out conscieusness keep out neurosience evidence .
I think Consciousness of the gaps is starting to replace God of the gaps, but in actuality it’s often the same impulse at play: wishing and hoping, hoping and wishing for life after death.
Can you give an example of a "consciousness of the gaps" argument you have heard?
A god of the gaps argument refers to fallacious appeals to ignorance employed to argue for the existence of god; equating gaps in our understanding of something as evidence of the existence of god.
It's clear what you think a "consciousness of the gaps" argument would look like.
@@b.g.5869 Consciousness of the gaps arguments often come in the form of: because we cannot explain everything yet about how biological life forms experience consciousness, therefore consciousness must exist outside of biological life forms and be a fundamental component of reality. Just silliness.
@@b.g.5869Basically science hasn’t explained consciousness yet, therefore woo.
@@simonhibbs887 I'm well aware of what an appeal to ignorance fallacy is in the context of consciousness.
The point is that it's not really akin to a god of the gaps fallacy because god of the gaps appeals to ignorance are fallacious arguments for the existence of god whereas the existence of consciousness isn't seriously in question; it's the matter of how it comes about that's in question.
So while there are fallacious appeals to ignorance regarding the nature of consciousness (the most obvious being that if we cannot _currently_ explain consciousness purely in terms of its neurological correlates, it cannot be explained in terms of neurological processes), it's not quite the same as god of the gaps arguments because the existence of consciousness isn't what any 'consciousness is fundamental' argument is intended to demonstrate but rather the nature of consciousness.
It's firmly established that our personal conscious experience is dependent upon brain activity, and can be predictably altered or suspended by interfering with particular brain activity.
However, this doesn't necessarily entail that awareness in the broadest sense isn't in somehow a fundamental property of nature.
So it doesn't necessarily involve god of the gaps type fallacious reasoning so much as raise legitimate ontological questions.
We typically don't have a problem with presuming matter to be fundamental, but in the final analysis we really don't know what matter is in a fundamental ontological sense, and we can never contemplate it in the absence of consciousness, so it isn't necessarily woo to consider whether whatever the fundamental 'stuff' is might be in some sense what we think of as a sort of awareness.
I think materialism is ultimately more an effective and necessary epistemological framework than an ontological position.
When we consider consciousness, there is a unique philosophical conundrum involved wherein it's fundamentally difficult to conclusively equate any neurological activity with the subjective experience associated with it.
There's something uniquely confounding about the phenomenon of subjective experience inasmuch as we really aren't able to stand outside of the realm of subjective experience and conclusively connect the dots between the experience and its observable correlates in the way we can do with every other phenomenon.
In addition to the practical limitations of firmly establishing a handle on this there are also ethical limits to experimentation.
One of the more promising approaches here for example involves neural plasticity.
More specifically, this is the idea that we could perhaps in principle objectively distinguish between a philosophical zombie (per David Chalmers) and a genuinely conscious person by suspending the capacity for subjective experience of someone and comparing their neurological activity to a control subject.
After all, considering that it is firmly established that the way we use our brains and what we experience effects the way it is organized neurologically, it seems quite likely that our awareness of awareness effects the way our brains are wired in such a way that could be readily distingishef from a philosophical zombie with no awareness of awareness or anything else.
But there's an obvious dilemma here wherein we would need to know for sure what brain activity to suspend in order to perform such an experiment in the first place, and even if we did have a good idea of precisely what to suspend there would be troubling ethical implications as to whether or not we should do so.
You'd probably have to solve the hard problem of consciousness first before you could endeavor to emulate a philosophical zombie for the purpose of comparison by suspending the particular brain activity that causes consciousness.
I don't think the problem is necessarily fundamentally intractable but it's uniquely difficult.
We can for example imagine a scenario in which we could perhaps objectively determine the neurological cause of subjective experience, such as by using experimentation with networks of artificial neurons and glial cells where we could in principle determine what activity gives rise to particular subjective experience, but there would arguably still be the fundamental conundrum of _how_ exactly this particular activity gives rise to a particular subjective experience.
Of course this isn't something that bothers many neuroscientists that are perfectly content to equate the neural correlates of subjective experience with their cause, but it doesn't seem like something for which we can reasonably expect a broad consensus.
This bloke just interviews critics. Very boring. Balance it out a bit.
He believes in early universe not conscieusness existe. So why he figuret out though phich model early universes there arent conscieusness? Guys is pedantic absolutetly.
Kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Stop asking physicists. They all are confused in the same way.
Physicists range from physicalists to idealists, dualists, panpsychists, all sorts. So arguably they are confused in many different ways. It’s still worth talking to them, because science still gives us the best account of what is real. It may not say why it’s real, but it can be helpful in delineating some of those things that we know for sure are not real. If you believe there is a reality, that is.
@@simonhibbs887good day.
What's interesting is the jews too, and the various branches, all have different sentiments about certain scriptures like Torah, talmud, zohar etc. They don't agree with each other.
And too, the India scriptures, there are many classes with different comprehensions of what the texts mean.
I know a secret however. Juxtaposition may be applied to God so understanding God. Problem is, God can never rest on any one definition because God is not limited or dual. God is immutable and immobile, yet always in motion; and the only way to further the inquiry of God so coming nearer to God, is by 'unsaying' - apophatic dialectic.
I was thinking just the opposite - stop asking philosophers 😅 If you need a theory that is backed by evidence and grounded in reality, you need to apply the scientific method and do the hard work of running the experiments and convincing the most sceptical of the scientific community that you are correct. Philosophers have a much lower standard, they only have to show that something must be true and sound really convincing 😅 Big questions always come from philosophy but get answered in science.
@@degigi2003 It's basically the distinction between rationalism, the view that the criterion for truth is determined by deduction, contrasted with empiricism which is the view that observation is the final arbiter of what is real or true.
Robert is desperately reductionist-materialist! It's laughable.😅
There is no explanation when it comes to God. There is no defining God. There can be no limiting God.
If you can't over come your mind, you'll only ever see through the filter of condition. God is beyond definition, beyond the mind of mere mortals, beyond....
_You can’t define God. You can’t describe God. He is beyond you…_ How convenient. Oh, you forgot to add, but all must do the things these special men have told us God wants you to do. Which usually turns out to be common sense societal laws, laws about a bunch of sex stuff you shouldn’t do and laws about how you need to give a certain percentage of your wealth to the men who are telling you what God wants you do.
@@longcastle4863you're insecure, bud.
@@S3RAVA3LM The brevity of your response speaks to the accuracy of my jab. Hit a soft spot, did I?
I gotta take a dump💩
Answer is Universe