This is just a thought I had a while ago, something I can’t find an answer to. I’m not making any claims about anything, nor am I looking for an argument as to whether consciousness exists. Ok? Good, let’s begin…
The nature of the mind, or of consciousness, is often claimed to be the primary mystery of life. But is this only because of how the mind is juxtaposed with physical matter (which is seen as relatively unproblematic)? People wonder about the nature of consciousness, but never about the nature of matter. (Or at least not with the same perplexity with which they discuss consciousness. Granted Hume and Plato and the pre-Socratics and others discussed the nature of matter.)
Is it possible that the only reason consciousness seems mysterious is because we try to explain it in terms of the physical? Perhaps the nature of consciousness is… to be conscious. To have thoughts, feelings, perceptions, memories - these are all things with which we are perfectly familiar, and actually manage quite well with most of the time.
No one ever takes a piece of wood in their hand and say, “What the hell is this stuff? Why does it have texture and colour? Why won’t this other piece of wood pass through it?” Matter just doesn’t seem to perplex us in the same way that consciousness does.
That’s my question: is the nature of consciousness any more mysterious or problematic than the nature of matter and if so, why?
I think the difficulty of consciousness comes from the fact that the mind makes a transition from an “unknowable world” to world of space and time, and it’s conceptually impossible for us to “know” the former. Matter is part-and-parcel of consciousness.
Feelings, memories, and perceptions are one thing; relatively uncomplicated conscious expressions. Thoughts are something else, i think.
I think it’s a mistake to equate mind and consciousness; ‘recognition’ is key, i think. You can see, in the neocortex, a mechanism for icon representation. ‘Recognition’ is a movement from a global conscious perception to an iconic representation in the neocortex characteristic of cognition (what i consider a defining property of ‘mind.’)
Kids do this all the time while learning motor skills and the apparent physical laws that govern this universe (for example: no two objects can occupy the same space at the same time, though how one verifies this I don’t know) though of course few, if any, philosophers do this.
I don’t believe that it is, we have neither a demonstration of a thing-in-itself nor a consciousness-in-itself. There was a lengthy discussion between me and a transcendental phenomenologist here about a year ago that, while aggressive and long-winded, was extremely interesting and expanded on this debate with detail. I don’t have the time to go into it all now but I’ll look for the thread when I get a moment and post it, if you’re interested.
You are your example, i am mine… O.K., maybe not a consciousness-in-itself… O.K., maybe not a thing-in-itself. In-itself is an interesting constraint. I approach it from the angle that, you have one example of what it’s like to be a thing, an animal, and you; and they’re all conscious. A responsible scientist ought to consider consciousness rather fundamental. It looks to me like it expresses around a cusp.