Consciousness

[ChristineM]

Exactly. Which is why I believe consciousness precipitates matter but am smart enough not to go to the mat over my limited understanding. It is irksome that some are arrogant enough to presume otherwise.

There appears to be quite a few arrogant ones about, many simply confuse awareness with consciousness

 

[YmirGF]

There appears to be quite a few arrogant ones about, many simply confuse awareness with consciousness

Oh, my goodness, I think we have a winner!

 

[George-ananda]

My only quibble with this is if it is so obvious then why isn't the idea mainstream?

Where did Planck imply it is obvious? He knows it is just the opposite of obvious, counter-intuitive to science thinkers. That is why the quote is so striking.

 

[YmirGF]

Where did Planck imply it is obvious? He knows it is just the opposite of obvious, counter-intuitive to science thinkers. That is why the quote is so striking.

But readily understandable by his peers, to whom, the quote was addressed.
It's not like he made the comment while appearing on The Daily Show, Oprah or Dr. Phil.

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

I'll just note that no one has won a Nobel Prize for discovering the true nature of consciousness...or that consciousness is the fundamental reality...

Maybe someday...

 

[Willamena]

Do you agree that there must be a substantial reality behind all created things?

No, actually I believe that reality is nothing more or less than all things.

Edit: Each thing that makes up the world comes into being by virtue of relation to all the other things that make up the world. You might say that otherness creates things, but by 'create' I do not mean that they arise from nothingness. By 'create' I mean that they are isolated, quantified, named, qualified, and finally identified and grasped in consciousness and language. That is what it is to become a 'thing.' No thing exists apart from the whole, and only in the whole does it have its identity. The whole does not have the identity of 'reality' apart from any things.

 

[George-ananda]

But readily understandable by his peers, to whom, the quote was addressed.
It's not like he made the comment while appearing on The Daily Show, Oprah or Dr. Phil.

Actually I think the quote was from a German magazine interview. Magazines were Oprah before the invention of TV.

Certainly traditional scientists have a materialist bent and have a natural resistance to heresy.

 

[YmirGF]

Actually I think the quote was from a German magazine interview. Magazines were Oprah before the invention of TV.

Certainly traditional scientists have a materialist bent and have a natural resistance to heresy.

I'll admit I hadn't bothered looking into it and due to the way it was presented, as has been in the past on RF, I assumed it was a more academic setting. That this was not part of any academic paper is, in and of itself, very telling.

 

[godnotgod]

I very much doubt it. Brain research indicates that virtually all brain function is carried out without involving consciousness.

For example, a famous brain experiment back in 2008, based on a detectable brain change representing a particular kind of decision, demonstrated that observers knew the subject's decision up to seven seconds before the subject did.

Or take a more local example. Where are these words I'm typing in the quarter-second before I type them? Certainly not in my conscious mind. And where are the words you speak in the quarter-second before you speak them? Again, certainly not in your conscious mind. (That's the basis of Auden's notable remark, "How do I know what I think till I hear what I say".)

Or how does your brain make choices? Sometimes with exact reasoning and all your books or brochures open around you, but far far more often by a process you never notice although you feel you own the decision made. The basic decision-making processes are well-studied and described, and aren't done consciously ─ you never know beforehand just why you feel like strawberry today when chocolate's always been your favorite.

The more we learn, the more we think consciousness is an incident of thought, not central to it.

...or that there are areas of consciousness functioning of which we are not aware. IOW, it is not OUR consciousness; it is non-local consciousness, with the brain simply being a tool consciousness utilizes to take care of certain functions that would get in the way of an event requiring our immediate awareness and attention, such as an impending auto accident.

That brain functions go on 'without consciousness' may simply be a case of consciousness already having pre-programmed the brain for such functions.

It has been proven that the brain is capable of non-local communication. Here:

http://www.deanradin.com/FOC2014/Grinberg1994.pdf

 

[YmirGF]

We cannot get behind consciousness but we can through the use of this knowledge and reas on understand many things that are otherwise left a mystery.
The only reason I can surmisevfor not allowing this knowledge to be tested is because it is beyond the boundaries that science has erected.

OK. Then why are so many who argue this are so very unpersuasive? Keep in mind, I do believe consciousness precipitates matter. I simply don't go down this rabbit hole often.

 

[godnotgod]

I'll just note that no one has won a Nobel Prize for discovering the true nature of consciousness...or that consciousness is the fundamental reality...

Maybe someday...

The only way that would occur is for consciousness to be an object of itself, which is not possible. It's like the eye trying to see itself. Scientists utilize the very consciousness they are 'investigating' in an attempt to understand it in an observer/observed manner, which is consciousness having taken one step away from itself into the area of mind. Mind thinks; consciousness sees, without thought. The moment there is thought, there is the subject/object split. Consciousness is that state of awareness prior to the mind's ability to conceptualize about what it sees. There is no such thing as the 'observer of the observed'; there is only observation itself, without an agent of observation. What we think of as 'the observer' is simply part of the process of observation.

 

[allfoak]

No, actually I believe that reality is nothing more or less than all things.

Edit: Each thing that makes up the world comes into being by virtue of relation to all the other things that make up the world. You might say that otherness creates things, but by 'create' I do not mean that they arise from nothingness. By 'create' I mean that they are isolated, quantified, named, qualified, and finally identified and grasped in consciousness and language. That is what it is to become a 'thing.' No thing exists apart from the whole, and only in the whole does it have its identity. The whole does not have the identity of 'reality' apart from any things.

Not sure that is even possible.

 

[allfoak]

OK. Then why are so many who argue this are so very unpersuasive? Keep in mind, I do believe consciousness precipitates matter. I simply don't go down this rabbit hole often.

It is not a matter of persuasion but rather that science will not even consider the subject because it is out of the realm of what we consider science.
Statements being made about reality that go beyond what can be tested with current methods are ignored regardless of how plausible they may be.

 

[YmirGF]

It is not a matter of persuasion but rather that science will not even consider the subject because it is out of the realm of what we consider science.
Statements being made about reality that go beyond what can be tested with current methods are ignored regardless of how plausible they may be.

I know, but in the vast majority of cases, that "plausibility" is more akin to wishful thinking and more often than not, vapid speculation, as evidenced in this very thread. The thing about Planck's statement is the exact opposite could also be true. We may never know which is correct. Which makes the topic moot as per the rather clever posts by @Willamena

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

The only way that would occur is for consciousness to be an object of itself, which is not possible. It's like the eye trying to see itself. Scientists utilize the very consciousness they are 'investigating' in an attempt to understand it in an observer/observed manner, which is consciousness having taken one step away from itself into the area of mind. Mind thinks; consciousness sees, without thought. The moment there is thought, there is the subject/object split. Consciousness is that state of awareness prior to the mind's ability to conceptualize about what it sees. There is no such thing as the 'observer of the observed'; there is only observation itself, without an agent of observation. What we think of as 'the observer' is simply part of the process of observation.

I'm a pluralist, not a monist or dualist. I understand the argument, but I disagree.

And I am skeptical of the ability of humans to understand in any but the broadest of ways many of the phenomena that we experience--consciousness being one of those things.

The quote that someone posted earlier, about the moon not existing if no one looks at it: who is that 'no one?' Because to my mind, every atom of the Moon, and the Earth, and lots of them outside of that system, within the solar system and beyond, are constantly making 'observations' of the moon, even if there are no conscious beings standing around to not make the observations...I don't think 'mind' has anything to do with it, and I'm pretty sure that I don't agree with the characterization that "Consciousness is that state of awareness prior to the mind's ability to conceptualize about what it sees." That doesn't to me seem to be borne out by evidence.

 

[allfoak]

I know, but in the vast majority of cases, that "plausibility" is more akin to wishful thinking and more often than not, vapid speculation, as evidenced in this very thread. The thing about Planck's statement is the exact opposite could also be true. We may never know which is correct. Which makes the topic moot as per the rather clever posts by @Willamena

The subject has merit when one understands that the ancient mystics have been saying this all along.
Now we begin to hear these things from science and the mystics just yawn and ask what all the excitement is about.

 

[godnotgod]

.... I'm pretty sure that I don't agree with the characterization that "Consciousness is that state of awareness prior to the mind's ability to conceptualize about what it sees." That doesn't to me seem to be borne out by evidence.

When you stop the mind from thinking, does consciousness cease to be self-evident?

 

[godnotgod]

No, actually I believe that reality is nothing more or less than all things.

But what you call 'all things' cannot exist without the space between them. So 'reality' must include that space. Actually, if you can somehow define what space is, you will know what 'things' are.

Edit: Each thing that makes up the world comes into being by virtue of relation to all the other things that make up the world.

All such 'things' co-arise, and co-subside along with all other 'things'. This is Buddha's Law of Dependent Origination, and because of it, it is said that all phenomena are empty of inherent self-nature. IOW, there are no 'things'; there is only the appearance of separate 'things', which are form-features on the surface of reality. We now know, for example, that what we have been calling a 'particle' is actually the result of energy fluctuations in the surrounding field in which it is found. So we now have the science of 'field theory'.

"form is emptiness;
emptiness is form"
The Heart Sutra

You might say that otherness creates things,

What 'otherness'? Where is the separation from what you call 'things' to this 'otherness'? Reality is singular and seamless. What you call 'things' are none other than this 'otherness', and this 'otherness' is none other than 'this-ness', and what is 'this-ness' than consciousness itself?

The Universe is none other than all 'things'.

but by 'create' I do not mean that they arise from nothingness.

But how can it be otherwise?

By 'create' I mean that they are isolated, quantified, named, qualified, and finally identified and grasped in consciousness and language. That is what it is to become a 'thing.' No thing exists apart from the whole, and only in the whole does it have its identity. The whole does not have the identity of 'reality' apart from any things.

Therefore, the whole IS none other than those very 'things', the whole being The Universe, which is not a vessel that contains such 'things', but rather, is comprised of those 'things', without which there would be no whole.

Your definition of 'creation', ie; that which is 'isolated, quantified, named, qualified, and finally identified and grasped in consciousness and language', is a thought-form, not a thing. It is held in memory, but does not exist in what we call 'the material world'. Only when such thought-forms are actualized do they become what we call 'things'.

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

When you stop the mind from thinking, does consciousness cease to be self-evident?

Is consciousness self-evident at all, under any conditions? I've seen that asserted, here and elsewhere, but I haven't seen it demonstrated in any way that clearly "wins" over other models of consciousness. And it certainly appears that is because it is not defined in clearly testable ways acceptable to all of those who are studying it.

 

[YmirGF]

The subject has merit when one understands that the ancient mystics have been saying this all along.
Now we begin to hear these things from science and the mystics just yawn and ask what all the excitement is about.

So, as a self-realized, self-identified modern mystic, who has basked in the glow of Oneness on many occasions, do you not wonder why I simply do not agree with the vapid and authoritarian assertions made by those whose camp I supposedly share?