Consciousness or coincidence?
My old friend Andy and I differ on what accounts for consciousness: Andy says consciousness is a characteristic of sophisticated nervous systems and thus diminishes down the phylogenetic scale. In his view, consciousness is a consequence of a nervous system’s myriad sensory input, making any creature “down the phylogenetic scale” less conscious than those up that scale. My only argument with his view is that it is too narrow. For me, consciousness feels a great deal deeper. (photo: consciousness or coincidence?)
I think of consciousness, especially the synchronous, spontaneous moment-to-moment experience, as an emergent property of ‘quantum weirdness’. Deep down quantum non-locality tunes individual consciousness to cosmic consciousness, so to speak. As chapter 52 holds, Use the light but give up the discernment which chapter 56 backs up, with This is known as mysterious sameness. For another take on this, google [The Nonlocal, Entangled, Conscious Universe – Menas Kafatos].
Andy says the more sophisticated the nervous system, the more conscious. Conversely, I say everything is conscious, from atoms to humans: no nervous system necessary here. Here, each thing’s biological and/or chemical processes determine its experience of consciousness.
Admittedly, seeing everything is conscious is a stretch, so I’ll limit this to the biological side of consciousness—survival self-consciousness. Here, this sense-of-self is an expression of the biology based survival instinct, and applies to all living creatures. Non-living things, like rocks, don’t have the same survival requirements needed to preserve their form and function. That is met by the intrinsic qualities of their constituent molecules.
Research reported in Science News’, Living Physics, supports the broader view. As one researcher put it, “Now, with growing evidence that quantum weirdness indeed exists in biological systems, scientists are looking for ways to tell how, or even if, nature exploits these effects to confer an advantage.” For more, google [Growing evidence that quantum weirdness exists in biological systems].
Interestingly, quantum weirdness parallels chapter 1’s These two are the same, but diverge in name as they issue forth and chapter 56’s, This is known as mysterious sameness. Clearly, there is no way to prove Andy’s or my view. Like Schrödinger’s cat, perhaps both views exist in two states, true and false. From that standpoint, they are equal. Take your pick and your observation will determine the outcome. Of the two, I prefer mine because it offers me a deeper sense of unity and communion with all things of which I’m conscious.
The moral of this story: If you can’t prove either of two theories, picking the one that offers a deeper sense of connection makes sense. After all, we are social animals. Thus, anything that can enhance our sense of connection should certainly feel better.