Does consciousness play a fundamental role according to contemporary physics?

[Gambit]

The same thing I did before. You misunderstood a popular science book which begins with the line "This book is controversial" and there are very few physicists who believe that the measurement problem or quantum physics has anything to do with consciousness, as for one thing it would imply that quantum mechanical processes didn't exist until conscious beings did, and that quantum mechanical processes only exist where conscious beings are there to observe them. Neither is true.

Consciousness is as fundamental as mass, charge, and spin. It's called panpsychism.

 

[George-ananda]

it would imply that quantum mechanical processes didn't exist until conscious beings did, .

Couldn't the creator be that conscious being?

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Consciousness is as fundamental as mass, charge, and spin. It's called panpsychism.

Then it doesn't resolve the measurement problem.

 

[Gambit]

Then it doesn't resolve the measurement problem.

Sure it does. An "observer" causes the collapse of the wave function.

 

[Bunyip]

George Ananda

How could a creator be the first cause? If nothing existed, how could a creator exist? How did it come to exist? What created it?

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Sure it does. An "observer" causes the collapse of the wave function.

Everything is an observer, thus nothing needs to collapse and there is no quantum physics. Alternatively, everything is an observer and never collapses, and the result is the same. Also, the observable properties of quantum systems are mathematical functions. Spin, momentum, etc., are matrices, and they are "fundamental" to the statistical structure of quantum mechanics, not to reality (as if we could directly relate the formalisms with the physical, there would be no measurement problem and we'd have our one-to-one correspondence between the mathematical representations and the physical properties/states/etc., they represent.

 

[Gambit]

George Ananda

How could a creator be the first cause? If nothing existed, how could a creator exist? How did it come to exist? What created it?

God is self-existing.

 

[Gambit]

Everything is an observer

Right. It's an all-pervading consciousness.

 

[Bunyip]

God is self-existing.

Oh ok, so the whole first cause argument reduces to nothing more than special pleading. OK.

 

[Bunyip]

Right. It's an all-pervading consciousness.

In what way are cameras conscious? X-RAY photography plates and so on? The observer in your example could be simply a bit of photoreactive film.

 

[Gambit]

Oh ok, so the whole first cause argument reduces to nothing more than special pleading. OK.

Why is it special pleading?

 

[Bunyip]

Why is it special pleading?

Because it cites the conclusion as the one exception to its rule. It is a logical fallacy.
The first premis is: Everything that begins to exist must have a cause.
But it really doesn't mean that, what it really means is:
Everything that begins to exist except for God, the solution to this logical argument must have a cause.

So it posits as a solution the exception to its own rules. Essentially disproving its own first premis.

 

[Gambit]

In what way are cameras conscious? X-RAY photography plates and so on? The observer in your example could be simply a bit of photoreactive film.

On the panpsychist view, consciousness is ascribed to subatomic particles.

“That which we experience as mind…will in a natural way ultimately reach the level of the wavefunction and of the ‘dance’ of the particles. There is no unbridgeable gap or barrier between any of these levels. ... It is implied that, in some sense, a rudimentary consciousness is present even at the level of particle physics” - David Bohm (1986: 131).

(Bohm, D. 1986. “A New Theory of the Relationship of Mind and Matter.” Journal of the American Society of Psychical Research, 80(2).)

 

[Gambit]

Because it cites the conclusion as the one exception to its rule. It is a logical fallacy.
The first premis is: Everything that begins to exist must have a cause.
But it really doesn't mean that, what it really means is:
Everything that begins to exist except for God, the solution to this logical argument must have a cause.

So it posits as a solution the exception to its own rules. Essentially disproving its own first premis.

I see your flaw. God never "begins to exist." God simply is. (God transcends time and therefore is not subject to change.)

 

[Bunyip]

On the panpsychist view, consciousness is ascribed to subatomic particles.

Ok, so they reduce consciousness to a quality of subatomic particles. If consciousness is in all things, how can it have come first? And how could it exist independently of those things it is ascribed to? Pansychism conflicts with your idealism.

 

[Bunyip]

I see your flaw. God never "begins to exist." God simply is. (God transcends time and therefore is not subject to change.)

Yes, that is called special pleading. You create an exception to your own premis and use it to from the conclusion - special pleading.

 

[Gambit]

Yes, that is called special pleading. You create an exception to your own premis and use it to from the conclusion - special pleading.

You're really making a sophomoric argument. God is not a contingent being who comes into existence. God is a necessary being whose self-existence must be presupposed in order to account for the existence of all other beings that are contingent.

 

[Bunyip]

You're really making a sophomoric argument. God is not a contingent being who comes into existence. God is a necessary being whose self-existence must be presupposed in order to account for the existence of all other beings that are contingent.

I'm not making any argument - sophomoric or otherwise, I just pointed out that the argument from first cause is a fallacy called 'special pleading', also 'affirming the consequent' and a number of others.

You must presuppose - you must assume your conclusion is true to form your premis. I'm not making a sophomoric argument, YOU are relying on a version of the Kalam - a logical fallacy.

When you have to presuppose the characteristics of your conclusion in order to form your premis, you are special pleading.

 

[Bunyip]

You're really making a sophomoric argument. God is not a contingent being who comes into existence. God is a necessary being whose self-existence must be presupposed in order to account for the existence of all other beings that are contingent.

Notice how if you just replace 'God' in your argument with ' The Universe' it works exactly the same.If we presuppose that the universe is a necessary being, whose self existence must be presupposed in order to account for the existence of all other things that are contingent...........

Think of it this way - if you have to presuppose that the entity whose existence you are arguing for exists AND have to give that entity a suite of unique characteristics. You don't have a useful proof.

 

[Gambit]

Notice how if you just replace 'God' in your argument with ' The Universe' it works exactly the same.If we presuppose that the universe is a necessary being, whose self existence must be presupposed in order to account for the existence of all other things that are contingent...........

No, it doesn't. The universe is in time. As such, it is contingent.

Think of it this way - if you have to presuppose that the entity whose existence you are arguing for exists AND have to give that entity a suite of unique characteristics. You don't have a useful proof.

We have to presuppose something that is nonphysical (nonspatial and nontemporal), immutable, and necessary in order to account for something that is physical (spatial and temporal) , mutable, and contingent. It's really that simple.