The Agora 💭

[A Fellow Lighter]

"The Telephone Exchange"

"We are accustomed to talk," writes Professor Karl Pearson, "of the 'external world,' of the 'reality' outside us. We speak of individual objects having an existence independent of our own. The store of past sense-impressions, our thoughts and memories, although most probably they have beside their psychical element a close correspondence with some physical change or impress in the brain, are yet spoken of as inside ourselves. On the other hand, although if a sensory nerve be divided anywhere short of the brain, we lose the corresponding class of sense impression, we yet speak of many sense-impressions, such as form and texture, as existing outside ourselves. How close then can we actually get to this supposed world outside ourselves? Just as near but no nearer than the brain terminals of the sensory nerves. We are like the clerk in the central telephone exchange who cannot get nearer to his customers than his end of the telephone wires. We are indeed worse off than the clerk, for to carry out the analogy properly we must suppose him never to have been outside the telephone exchange, never to have seen a customer or any one like a customer—in short, never, except through the telephone wire, to have come in contact with the outside universe. Of that 'real' universe outside himself, he would be able to form no direct impression; the real universe for him would be the aggregate of his constructs from the messages which were caused by the telephone wires in his office. About those messages and the ideas raised in his mind by them he might reason and draw his inferences; and his conclusions would be correct—for what? For the world of telephonic messages, for the type of messages that go through the telephone. Something definite and valuable he might know with regard to the spheres of action and of thought of his telephonic subscribers, but outside those spheres he could have no experience. Pent up in his office he could never have seen or touched even a telephonic subscriber in himself. Very much in the position of such a telephone clerk is the conscious ego of each one of us seated at the brain terminals of the sensory nerves. Not a step nearer than those terminals can the ego get to the 'outer world,' and what in and for themselves are the subscribers to its nerve exchange it has no means of ascertaining. Messages in the form of sense-impressions come flowing in from that 'outside world,' and these we analyze, classify, store up, and reason about. But of the nature of 'things-in-themselves,' of what may exist at the other end of our system of telephone wires, we know nothing at all.

"But the reader, perhaps, remarks, 'I not only see an object, but I can touch it. I can trace the nerve from the tip of my finger to the brain. I am not like the telephone clerk, I can follow my network of wires to their terminals and find what is at the other end of them.' Can you, reader? Think for a moment whether your ego has for one moment got away from his brain exchange. The sense-impression that you call touch was just as much as sight felt only at the brain end of a sensory nerve. What has told you also of the nerve from the tip of your finger to your brain? Why, sense-impressions also, messages conveyed along optic or tactile sensory nerves. In truth, all you have been doing is to employ one subscriber to your telephone exchange to tell you about the wire that goes to a second, but you are just as far as ever from tracing out for yourself the telephone wires to the individual subscriber and ascertaining what his nature is in and for himself. The immediate sense-impression is just as far removed from what you term the 'outside world' as the store of impresses. If our telephone clerk had recorded by aid of a phonograph certain of the messages from the outside world on past occasions, then if any telephonic message on its receipt set several phonographs repeating past messages, we have an image analogous to what goes on in the brain. Both telephone and phonograph are equally removed from what the clerk might call the 'real outside world,' but they enable him through their sounds to construct a universe; he projects those sounds, which are really inside his office, outside his office, and speaks of them as the external universe. This outside world is constructed by him from the contents of the inside sounds, which differ as widely from things-in-themselves as language, the symbol, must always differ from the thing it symbolizes. For our telephone clerk sounds would be the real world, and yet we can see how conditioned and limited it would be by the range of his particular telephone subscribers and by the contents of their messages.

"So it is with our brain; the sounds from telephone and phonograph correspond to immediate and stored sense-impressions. These sense-impressions we project as it were outwards and term the real world outside ourselves. But the things-in-themselves which the sense-impressions symbolize, the 'reality,' as the metaphysicians wish to call it, at the other end of the nerve, remains unknown and is unknowable. Reality of the external world lies for science and for us in combinations of form and color and touch—sense-impressions as widely divergent from the thing 'at the other end of the nerve' as the sound of the telephone from the subscriber at the other end of the wire. We are cribbed and confined in this world of sense-impressions like the exchange clerk in his world of sounds, and not a step beyond can we get. As his world is conditioned and limited by his particular network of wires, so ours is conditioned by our nervous system, by our organs of sense. Their peculiarities determine what is the nature of the outside world which we construct. It is the similarity in the organs of sense and in the perceptive faculty of all normal human beings which makes the outside world the same, or practically the same, for them all. To return to the old analogy, it is as if two telephone exchanges had very nearly identical groups of subscribers. In this case a wire between the two exchanges would soon convince the imprisoned clerks that they had something in common and peculiar to themselves. That conviction corresponds in our comparison to the recognition of other consciousness."

Edited April 23 by A Fellow Lighter

[A Fellow Lighter]

"The Telephone Exchange" Revised

I suggest that this extract be read over carefully, not once but several times, and that the reader try to make quite clear to oneself the position of the clerk in the telephone exchange, i.e. the position of the mind in the body, as depicted by Professor Pearson, before recourse is had to the criticisms of any one else. One cannot find anywhere better material for critical philosophical reflection.

As has been seen, our author accepts without question, the psychological doctrine that the mind is shut up within the circle of the messages that are conducted to it along the sensory nerves, and that it cannot directly perceive anything truly external. He carries his doctrine out to the bitter end in the conclusion that, since we have never had experience of anything beyond sense-impressions, and have no ground for an inference to anything beyond, we must recognize that the only external world of which we know anything is an external world built up out of sense-impressions. It is, thus, in the mind, and is not external at all; it is only "projected outwards," thought of as though it were beyond us. Shall we leave the inconsistent position of the plain man and of the psychologist and take our refuge in this world of projected mental constructs?

Before the reader makes up his mind to do this, I beg him to consider the following: 

1.  If the only external world of which we have a right to speak at all is a construct in the mind or ego, we may certainly affirm that the world is in the ego, but does it sound sensible to say that the ego is somewhere in the world?
2. If all external things are really inside the mind, and are only "projected" outwards, of course our own bodies, sense-organs, nerves, and brains, are really inside and are merely projected outwards. Now, do the sense-impressions of which everything is to be constructed "come flowing in" along these nerves that are really inside?
3. Can we say, when a nerve lies entirely within the mind or ego, that this same mind or ego is nearer to one end of the nerve than it is to the other? How shall we picture to ourselves "the conscious ego of each one of us seated at the brain terminals of the sensory nerves"? How can the ego place the whole of itself at the end of a nerve which it has constructed within itself? And why is it more difficult for it to get to one end of a nerve like this than it is to get to the other?
4. Why should the thing "at the other end of the nerve" remain unknown and unknowable? Since the nerve is entirely in the mind, is purely a mental construct, can anything whatever be at the end of it without being in the mind? And if the thing in question is not in the mind, how are we going to prove that it is any nearer to one end of a nerve which is inside the mind than it is to the other? If it may really be said to be at the end of the nerve, why may we not know it quite as well as we do the end of the nerve, or any other mental construct?

It must be clear to the careful reader of Professor Pearson's paragraphs, that he does not confine himself strictly to the world of mere "projections," to an outer world which is really inner. If he did this, the distinction between inner and outer would disappear. Let us consider for a moment the imprisoned clerk. He is in a telephone exchange, about him are wires and subscribers. He gets only sounds and must build up his whole universe of things out of sounds. Now we are supposing him to be in a telephone exchange, to be receiving messages, to be building up a world out of these messages. Do we for a moment think of him as building up, out of the messages which came along the wires, those identical wires which carried the messages and the subscribers which sent them? Never! we distinguish between the exchange, with its wires and subscribers, and the messages received and worked up into a world. In picturing to ourselves the telephone exchange, we are doing what the plain man and the psychologist do when they distinguish between mind and body,—they never suppose that the messages which come through the senses are identical with the senses through which they come.

But suppose we maintain that there is no such thing as a telephone exchange, with its wires and subscribers, which is not to be found within some clerk. Suppose the real external world is something inner and only "projected" without, mistakenly supposed by the unthinking to be without. Suppose it is nonsense to speak of a wire which is not in the mind of a clerk. May we under such circumstances describe any clerk as in a telephone exchange? as receiving messages? as no nearer to his subscribers than his end of the wire? May we say that sense-impressions come flowing in to him? The whole figure of the telephone exchange becomes an absurdity when we have once placed the exchange within the clerk. Nor can we think of two clerks as connected by a wire, when it is affirmed that every wire must "really" be in some clerk.

The truth is, that, in the extracts which I have given above and in many other passages in the same volume, the real external world, the world which does not exist in the mind but without it, is much discredited, and is yet not actually discarded. The ego is placed at the brain terminals of the sensory nerves, and it receives messages which flow in; i.e. the clerk is actually placed in an exchange. That the existence of the exchange is afterward denied in so many words does not mean that it has not played and does not continue to play an important part in the thought of the author.

It is interesting to see how a man of science, whose reflections compel him to deny the existence of the external world that we all seem to perceive and that we somehow recognize as distinct from anything in our minds, is nevertheless compelled to admit the existence of this world at every turn.

But if we do admit it, what shall we make of it? Shall we deny the truth of what the psychologist has to tell us about a knowledge of things only through the sensations to which they give rise? We cannot, surely, do that. Shall we affirm that we know the external world directly, and at the same time that we do not know it directly, but only indirectly, and through the images which arise in our minds? That seems inconsistent. Certainly there is material for reflection here.

Nevertheless the more we reflect on that material, the more evident does it become that the plain man cannot be wrong in believing in the external world which seems revealed in his experiences. We find that all attempts to discredit it rest upon the implicit assumption of its existence, and fall to the ground when that existence is honestly denied. So our problem changes its form. We no longer ask: Is there an external world? but rather: What is the external world, and how does it differ from the world of mere ideas?

~ G.S. Fullerton 

Edited April 23 by A Fellow Lighter

[A Fellow Lighter]

Thoughts Are More Real Than Objects 

"Idealism is often regarded as a philosophy entailing that the world exists just in our heads, which is obviously false. Rising philosophical star Dr. Jeremy Dunham argues that this view of idealism is a misconception. Idealism is a much more realist worldview than we think, and more realist than its alternatives, as it does not deny the existence of the most real things there are: thoughts. This essay is the latest instalment of our The Return of Idealism series, produced in a collaboration with the Institute of Art and Ideas (IA). It was first published by the IAI on 19 April 2024." ~ https://www.essentiafoundation.org/thoughts-are-more-real-than-objects/reading/

What is idealism? Throughout history, in most cases, philosophical idealism is a metaphysical position. The idealist is concerned with reality’s fundamental nature. It is often mistakenly thought to be a reductive theory of the fundamental nature of reality. Many critics have supposed that the idealist tries to reduce reality to the subjective states of individual minds. According to this form of subjective idealism there is no world outside our minds. This view is often associated with the British empiricist Bishop Berkeley (1685-1753). Famously, when told that such idealism was irrefutable, the English author Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) shouted, “I refute it thus” and kicked a stone. The idealist therefore is thought to be the one who denies. They are anti-realist, anti-materialist, anti-naturalist, and certainly anti-stones.

This way of thinking about philosophical idealism is misleading. Many kinds of philosophers have both voluntarily and involuntarily been referred to as idealists. However, they are united by an understanding of idealism as a form of realism. Idealism is not a reductive philosophy. It argues for the real existence of elements of reality often dismissed. It is a realism about ideas. Even Berkeley frames his position as a realism. He wrote that “the real things are those things I see, and feel, and perceive by my senses.”

Berkeley opposed his view to those who regard our rich conscious phenomenal world, the world of tastes, feels, colours, and sounds, as in some way less real than the physical world. For Berkeley, the real stone is the coloured object which we see and feel and that resists us when kicked. If Johnson kicked the stone as hard as I imagine, he entered a world of pain. For Berkeley, this world is the real world. His idealism is ampliative, not reductive. Its aim is to account for the full extent of our reality. Berkeley, then, is not anti-stone. He argued that only idealism can do justice to stones.

Although idealism may refer to a doctrine that affirms the reality of our ideas in this subjective sense, there is another sense of the word ‘idea.’ This is the Platonic Idea, often referred to as ‘Form’ or ‘Universal.’ Idealism shares something in common with the modern philosophical view known as Platonism. But there are significant differences. Platonists defend the existence of universals in addition to particular properties. A Platonist about properties, for example, believes that in addition to the individual things in the world that have redness amongst their properties, such as the red pen in front of me and the red symbols on my computer screen, there is the universal redness. This universal isn’t in front of me. It doesn’t exist anywhere in space or time. It is an abstract object. An abstract object is neither physical nor mental. It is causally inert, fixed, and unchanging. Yet, when we see redness in the world, this redness is an exemplification or instantiation of that universal. Particular red things are united by the fact that they instantiate this universal. Accordingly, the modern Platonist seems to postulate two worlds. One of abstract objects and another in which they are instantiated. However, since the abstract objects are causally inert, the relationship between these worlds is mysterious.

One of the most important schools of idealism in its history is that known as absolute idealism. It originates with Hegel in Germany, but flourished towards the end of the nineteenth-century with many adherents in the Oxbridge philosophy departments and worldwide. Here, the idea in idealism explicitly refers to Plato’s ideas. However, the absolute idealist attempts to bring the two worlds described above together into one. Consequently, the abstract universal is made concrete.

In several places, Plato suggests that things have the properties they do in virtue of participating in the Idea (or universal). A beautiful thing is beautiful in virtue of the fact that it participates in the Idea of beauty. However, this suggests that the particulars stand in a causal relationship with the universals. Ideas are causally responsible for the existence of properties in the concrete world. Perhaps we are wrong to think of Plato’s Ideas as abstract objects after all? Abstract universals are causally inert, so whatever relationship there is between them and their instantiating particulars, it cannot be causal. This is the absolute idealist’s starting point. The universals do not exist outside of our world. They are immanent to it. They are not abstract, rather they are concrete. As Hegel claimed, since the living world is concrete not abstract, those who consider universals as abstract kill the living thing.

This kind of idealist argues that our world has the structure or form that it does because of the universals immanent to it. Hegel wrote that “The universal is the essential, true nature of things” and that “through thinking these over we become acquainted with the true nature of things.” Any individual bear, for Hegel, has a universal nature. It’s that aspect of its nature it shares with any other bear and thus enables us to identify it as a bear, even if we’ve never seen this individual bear before. But it is also different to every other bear. It has particular features that distinguish it from any other bear and make it an individual.

Crucially, in the case of the concrete universal, the particular features that make an individual the individual it is are not external to the universal but rather contained within it. You do not get the individual bear by bundling a bunch of extra particulars to the universal bear. Hegel dedicates much of his famous Phenomenology of Spirit to demonstrating that if you start with properties that are only externally related, it’s impossible to combine them together into the kind of unities that make up our world. A bear isn’t a bundle of qualities. It’s a self-preserving organism for which the parts depend on the whole as much as the whole depends on the parts. Its particular properties, like the thickness of its fur, are different in the winter than in the summer because they are internally related to the organism as a whole and sensitive to its survival needs.

What does it mean to say that the concrete universal contains particulars within itself? It means that the individual bear becomes the individual bear not by addition, but by negation. To think the abstract universal, you abstract away all the properties that differentiate one bear from another and the universal is whatever is left. The concrete universal, on the other hand, includes all those differences. The particularisation of the bear is the process by means of which it negates the properties that do not belong to it, leaving behind just those that make it the individual bear.

This is the meaning behind Hegel’s often quoted phrase: all determination is negation. ‘The true, infinite universal’, Hegel writes, ‘determines itself… it is creative power as self-referring absolute negativity. As such, it differentiates itself internally.’ This points to an important characteristic of the concrete universal: it determines the development of the individual. The universal guides the bear’s ideal development. It should develop from a cub to a yearling and then from a young adult to a mature adult. However, it develops in its own particular way. Although all bears develop from cub to yearling, only this individual cub developed in this particular way. The thought is that if you took away from the universal every particular way that the bear might develop, leaving us with the abstract universal consisting of just the features all bears share, you’re actually left with nothing. Certainly, you’re left with nothing living. You’ve murdered the living thing.

According to the most prominent contemporary metaphysical readings of Hegel, such as Robert Stern’s, the concrete universals should be understood as similar to Aristotelian substance kinds. This means that there are as many concrete universals as there are individuals to instantiate them. Emily is the individual human she is because she is a self-particularising concrete universal. However, the absolute idealists who dominated the British philosophical world towards the end of the nineteenth century believed that all these concrete universals were ultimately interrelated as parts of one all-encompassing concrete universal.

For the nineteenth-century British idealist Bernard Bosanquet, the perverse thing about abstract universals is that the wider their extension is, the less there is to them. This is because you get the universal giant panda when you abstract everything particular away from every individual giant panda. Then, to get the universal bear, you must abstract all the features that particularise it as one of its particular species of bear, like giant panda. To get the universal mammal you then abstract all the features that make each animal a mammal rather than a reptile, bird, or fish. The more things that supposedly instantiate a universal, the sparser the features of that universal are.

On the contrary, the logic of the concrete universal, Bosanquet says, does violence to the ‘inverse ratio of intention to extension.’ There is not less to the universal animal than there is to the universal bear, rather there is more because the universal animal contains bear within it and a whole host of other animals too. It’s the most substantial Noah’s ark you can imagine. However, if bears are part of a higher universal of mammals and mammals are part of a higher universal of animals, why stop there? Couldn’t there be a universal ‘living thing’? And perhaps one above that? For Bosanquet, this is exactly right. We keep going until we end up with just one concrete universal, the absolute Idea, the world as a whole. For Bosanquet this is ‘a system of members, such that every member, being ex hypothesi distinct, nevertheless contributes to the unity of the whole in virtue of the peculiarities which constitute its distinctness.’ In agreement with the Aristotelian reading of idealism, each individual is the self-particularising of the concrete universal, but, ultimately, it’s one and the same concrete universal self-particularising in various different ways.

The result of this is that we owe our individuality to a larger whole in which we are all systematically related and which relates us to each other in a fundamental way. Earlier I claimed that many people incorrectly regard idealism as a philosophy that is characterised by the things that it is against. However, here we find something that this kind of idealist really is anti: the idea of fundamental separateness. This has significant ethical implications. The most important absolute idealist of the twenty-first century, Timothy Sprigge (1932-2007), wrote that absolute idealism’s main message is that ‘we are nearer the core of things when we partly transcend it [our separateness] in cooperative ethical, cultural, and intellectual endeavours and in mutual aid.’

Idealism is a label that has been used to refer to a huge variety of different philosophical positions. I’ve focused on metaphysical versions to show how different idealism is from its common misconceptions. Idealism is not a reductive philosophy but an inflationary one. Idealism aims to do justice to the full extent of the characteristics of the world in which we live. Any thorough-going realism, any realism that takes every feature of our world seriously, must be a realism about the idea.

~ Jeremy Dunham 

[A Fellow Lighter]

The Importance Of A Philosophical Position 

Before one can do any serious philosophy, it is imperative that s/he understands one's own position regarding something as fundamental as how one thinks of the world of one's experience: Is it out there, happening independently from one's mind? Or is it in here 🧠, occurring through the mind's constructive capacity? Note that I'm not simply referring to the world, but to a world of one's own experience, rather. This is because I want to make it clear what it is we're dealing with here, as some of us, if not most, will be quick to argue that they are without a position in this matter because they are not philosophical. 

However, you do, in fact, have a position, even though you might claim to have no interest in philosophy or down right have nothing to do with it. This is because philosophers aren't doing anything alien to the plain man when doing philosophy, as with botany or geology or any other science, the philosopher only does what the plain man will do rather unsystematically. You have a position regarding the world of experience. Everyone does, for experience is quite a universal thing in the human world, wouldn't you say? No, it is merely a matter of you not having made a distinction of your position, yet. And thus making it distinguishable from, let's say, your neighbor's or any other philosopher's position which might contradict yours should you be given the chance to discuss it.

Your position on the world of experience simply refers to how you understand your experience of the world as you experience it. For example, when you're waiting in a line to a food stand, do you regard this as a personal experience or an impersonal experience. You might be quick to think that this is obviously a personal experience because you're the only one who can understand what it is like for you in that particular moment of waiting. But some will understand it to be impersonal simply because s/he is not alone, everybody else who is in line is experiencing the same thing as s/he is – waiting for food. See, no one has asked you how you're understanding the experience of waiting in line, but you are already doing it anyway. And so it can be with your position of your world experience. How you understand your experience of the world is a position of its own philosophical merit. The only difference is that no one had asked you to express it.

Without a self-realised position, it may be difficult to do some proper philosophy because you have no referential framework for considering other arguments. Some folks might argue that not having a position is good because it allows you to be open minded and free to develop your own unique philosophical position. Yes, that would be true if a person in fact did not have a position in this matter. However, experience is a universal thing, and chances are that a person would have long developed a position before s/he could even reflect on it. For instance, when it comes to the question of whether there is an external world or not – just the world that we know, the world of experience: I reject the position of an external world, that is, a world external to one's experience. And, I may not be so interested in figuring out which school of thought affirms the existence of such a world as much as I would be interested in learning more from the schools that don't. This can happen, yes.

However, because I am interested in doing philosophy in a careful way, I am determined in learning from both positive and negative arguments, having realized my own understanding of the world. 

[A Fellow Lighter]

Philosophy As The Nature Of Consciousness 

In my previous post, "The Fundamentals", I discuss the work of philosophy in comparison to other occupations. My main point is that philosophy has nothing to do with survival and is without economical practicality. But I also delve into the description of philosophy itself, describing it as an activity rather than a thing of study. In fact, I go on as to call it the very movement of consciousness itself, emerging from its unconsciousness and onwards to awakening. Now, here, I will elaborate. 

In this world, we are familiarised with two concepts of design: natural design and artificial design. Basically, a thing of nature and a thing of man. It is pretty easy to distinguish the artificial from the natural, perhaps its the easiest thing if one possesses common sense. However, just because it's easy, that doesn't mean that mistakes cannot be made. After all, man himself is a thing of nature, isn't he? But let's explore some of the differences between artificial and natural. 

Natural designs tend to be more complex and organic, with shapes and patterns that arise from natural processes. Artificial designs, on the other hand, are often simpler and more geometric, reflecting the constraints of manufacturing and human planning. Natural forms often exhibit irregularities and variations, while artificial designs tend to be more uniform and repetitive due to mass production techniques. Natural designs are optimized for function within an ecosystem. Artificial designs may prioritize aesthetics or specific human needs, sometimes leading to forms that appear out of place in nature.

So pretty easy, right. It seems the key ability in being able to differentiate between artificial and natural lies upon understanding how man and nature work. Nature seems more occupied with balancing itself out, and man seems more occupied with advancing oneself. So it is clear whenever we come across a design that it falls under man or nature. Society is man's work. The economy is man's work. Technology is man's design.  Education is man's design.. Various fields of study are man's work. But is philosophy also man's design? 

Philosophy requires conscious thought, analysis, and reasoning, which are distinctly human capabilities. We develop philosophical questions and systems to understand the world and our place in it. However, curiosity and the desire to understand are fundamental human traits. Philosophy might be seen as a natural extension of this inherent inquisitiveness, a way to grapple with complex questions that arise from our experience of the world. So, then, our keen interest in doing philosophy appears to be a tendency rather than a design. Which makes sense because as far as survival goes, philosophy seems more about balancing out man's ego in relation to the world as opposed to advancing him.

Consciousness is a burden. For instance, unlike with other species, the awareness of our own mortality is enough to cause anxiety or fearfulness which can hinder our survival greatly. Hence it is one of those things that the plain man will rarely think about. Such thoughts don't even make 2% of one's daily thought patterns. One's mortality is an awareness so far down suppressed  that only a direct questioning of it is the only thing that can bring it up into the conscious mind. And, our mortality is just one thing. What about loneliness – that awareness of one's personal world which almost guarantees that no one can ever truly know what you do. Your point of view is yours and yours alone. Or what about love – the awareness of your own longing for true companionship and the awareness of knowing that you might never really get it or truly have it. The list can go on, but I think I've made my point.

There is only one way for humanity to ease this burden, and that is by doing philosophy. Which is, really, an attending to those matters of consciousness rather than the suppressing of them. By design, man wouldn't philosophise because it is a direct threat to his ego. So, then, this can only mean that philosophy is nature taking its course, a balancing of some sort. Perhaps there is the objection of classifying nature as entirely physical, having nothing to do with the mental world. But, then, man himself is a product of nature, remember? So whatever man is, nature is. In fact, who's to say that man is not an expression of nature, one of many to say the least? What if consciousness doesn't begin with man?

We cannot let our egos deceive us to the point of hopelessness by claiming that real intelligence begins with man. Perhaps we are more like the waves of the ocean as opposed to the ocean itself. The movement of the ocean is nature, and the water is consciousness itself. If what we call nature is capable of expressing design, then maybe it is just as conscious as we are if not more. Or, maybe,  everything begins with consciousness moving, not matter? I call philosophy an activity because I can differentiate between a man-made thing and a natural thing.

Edited April 25 by A Fellow Lighter

[A Fellow Lighter]

Naturalism As My Philosophical Position 

Naturalism, in philosophy, is a theory that relates scientific methods to philosophy by affirming that all beings and events in the universe, whatever their inherent character may be, are natural. Consequently, all knowledge of the universe falls within the pale of scientific investigation. Although naturalism denies the existence of truly supernatural realities, it makes allowance for the supernatural provided that knowledge of it can be had indirectly, that is, that natural objects be influenced by the so-called supernatural entities in a detectable way.

This position I've not taken by selection, that is, choosing it in particular rather than one of the others. This position I've taken by adaptation, that is, discovering that this is what my experience of the world has enabled or allowed me to make sense of the world. If it were up to me, I'd probably opt to not having a position as this would be the best way to ensure open-mindedness in my inquiries and research. However, we are ego-functional, which means that pure objectivity is nearly impossible for us to achieve. So, rather than pretending to be something I'm not, I am choosing to embrace all that I am as means of remaining aware of potential blind-spots in this critical endeavor. And what I am is a naturalist.

Naturalism presumes that nature is in principle completely knowable. There is in nature a regularity, unity, and wholeness that implies objective laws, without which the pursuit of scientific knowledge would be absurd. Man’s endless search for concrete proofs of his beliefs is seen as a confirmation of naturalistic methodology. Naturalists point out that even when one scientific theory is abandoned in favour of another, man does not despair of knowing nature, nor does he repudiate the “natural method” in his search for truth. Theories change; methodology does not.

I have already described science to be a rather systematic extension of common thought. Science, by nature, relies on experiential data for insight, not anything outside of experience. This tells us that the common man is naturally empirical when it comes to making sense of the world, and that only in the absence of evidence does s/he become speculative. From this it is clear that the naturalist has, for his philosophical inquiries, common thought as his foundation. 

While naturalism has often been equated with materialism, it is much broader in scope. Materialism is indeed naturalistic, but the converse is not necessarily true. Strictly speaking, naturalism has no ontological preference; i.e., no bias toward any particular set of categories of reality: dualism and monism, atheism and theism, idealism and materialism are all per se compatible with it. So long as all of reality is natural, no other limitations are imposed. Naturalists have in fact expressed a wide variety of views, even to the point of developing a theistic naturalism.

The concept of a source for the natural universe is not an anti-naturalist position in as far as naturalism is concerned. So long as this source is functions accordingly with the natural universe, that is, it is simply the source and not the anything outside of the natural creation, it is compatible with naturalism. All natural patterns have a  source or sources to their system, thusly it is also expected with the universe itself to have such a point or points of initiation.

Only rarely do naturalists give attention to metaphysics (which they deride), and they make no philosophical attempts to establish their position. Naturalists simply assert that nature is reality, the whole of it. There is nothing beyond, nothing “other than,” no “other world” of being.

Metaphysics deals with the fundamental nature of reality, existence, and knowledge. Naturalism, on the other hand, focuses on explaining the world through natural laws and scientific principles. The whole purpose of this journal is developing a cosmology which reconciles the physical with the metaphysical. Autonoetism is fundamentally a naturalistic theory. 

[A Fellow Lighter]

Autonoetism – the Common Thought Approach 

What is the first known thing in the natural universe? 

In the world of common thought, experience reigns supreme. So rather than beginning my cosmology with the so-called fundamental questions, which are essentially the unknowable things of the universe, I instead pose a more direct question. While "What is the first known thing in the natural universe?" isn't the typical starting point for a full-fledged cosmology, it can be a stepping stone for developing a cosmology using a common thought framework. The limited scope offers a set trajectory for exploration and logical investigation. We can begin this research by exploring the knowable instead of the unknowables such as the origin of the universe. How can one know the origin of the universe without being there to witness it? Such fundamental queries only invite speculative thinking. Whilst with a limited scope type of query, we can begin with what man can know.

So what is the first known thing in the natural universe? Our current understanding suggests space is a fundamental property of the universe, perhaps even emerging alongside time itself in the Big Bang. If space is intrinsic to the universe's existence, it could be argued to predate any objects or energy within it. But is it the first known thing? Time seems to have a direction, with a past, present, and future. This inherent directionality is a property not observed in space and could be argued as a foundational aspect of reality. 

Is it matter? Is it space? Is it time? I propose consciousness is the first known thing in the natural universe. 

[A Fellow Lighter]

I  want to state that it is not physicality per se that is experienced first, rather it is consciousness.  Hence consciousness itself is the first known thing in the natural world. This perspective aligns with various philosophical and scientific views that emphasize the primacy of consciousness in our understanding of reality

The evolutionary theory presented on consciousness posits that consciousness is an evolving ability to sense and respond to biological forces for survival. This definition suggests that consciousness emerges from the need to interact with and adapt to the environment, emphasizing its intimate connection to life and the natural world.  However, there are those like A. A. Adedire who argue that the constancy of awareness, rather than the personal self, defines the essence of mind. This awareness, as the foundation of the world, is consistent with the orderly nature of reality and can be seen as the primary element behind all experience

David Chalmers, in "Consciousness and its Place in Nature," discusses the challenge of fitting consciousness into our conception of the natural world. He explores how consciousness, as a fundamental aspect of experience, does not neatly align with traditional views of the physical world.

A lot of arguments can be made regarding the position of consciousness in the natural world, but one thing us for certain: the first knowable thing in the natural world is consciousness, everything else is merely an idea of that object of consciousness. 

[A Fellow Lighter]

The first knowable thing in the natural world is considered to be our own consciousness or subjective experience. As sentient beings, we have direct access to our thoughts, perceptions, and emotions, making them the most immediate and accessible aspect of the natural world to us. This subjective experience forms the foundation of our understanding of reality and serves as the starting point for inquiry into the nature of existence. From there, we can explore the external world through observation, experimentation, and empirical investigation, gradually expanding our understanding of the cosmos.

[A Fellow Lighter]

Investigating the first knowable thing in existence 

The standard definition of consciousness, often used in philosophy, psychology and neuroscience, is the following:

Consciousness is the state of being aware of, and able to think about, one's own existence, thoughts and surroundings. 

The key components of consciousness, here, are:

• Awareness — the capacity to be aware of internal states (thoughts, emotions and sensations) and external stimuli (environments and inhabitants).
• Subjectivity — the quality of experiences that are personal and unique to an individual. 
• Intentionality — the directed-ness or about-ness of mental states. Consciousness is often about something. 
• Qualia — the qualitative aspects of conscious experiences such as the redness of a red or the pain of a headache. 
• Self-Reflection — the ability to think about and reflect on one's own mental states and processes. 

Different levels of states of consciousness:

• Wakefulness — the state of being alert and engaged with the environment. 
• Sleep — involves various stages, including REM sleep which is associated with vivid dreaming. 
• Altered States — states induced by meditation, hypnosis, drugs or certain mental health conditions. 

Consciousness in different contexts:

• Philosophy — explores the nature, origin and implications of consciousness, often dealing with questions like the "hard problem" (why and how subjective experiences arise from physical processes).
• Psychology — studies consciousness through behavior, cognition and neurobiological processes, often looking at attention, perception and awareness. 
• Neuroscience — investigates the neural correlates of consciousness, identifying specific brain regions and networks involved in conscious experiences. 

There are several theories about consciousness. Here I will mention the major theories in detail. 

High Order Thought theory

Proponents: David Rosenthal, Peter Carruthers. 

Core idea: A mental state becomes conscious when it is the object of a high order thought (a thought about a thought). 

Mechanism: For example, if you see a red apple, the perception of the apple is a first order mental state. It becomes a conscious experience when you have a higher order thought that you are seeing the red apple. 

Implications: This theory suggests that consciousness requires a kind of metacognition or thinking about one's own thoughts.

Higher Order Perception theory 

Proponents: Same as HOT theory, but with a focus on perception. 

Core idea: Consciousness arises from the integration of information in a "global workspace" in the brain. 

Mechanism: Information from various subconscious processes is broadcast to a network of neurons thus making it globally available for decision making, action and verbal report. 

Analogy: It's like a theater spotlight that brings certain information into focus for the entire system while the rest remains in the dark.

Information Integrated theory

Proponents: Giulio Tononi

Core idea: Consciousness corresponds to the capacity of a system to integrate information. 

Mechanism: The theory quantifies consciousness using a measure called phi which represents the degree of integrated information. Higher phi values indicate more integrated and hence more conscious systems. 

Implications: IIT suggests that any system that integrates information (biological or artificial) could possess some level of consciousness. 

Phenomenological Approaches 

Proponents: Various, including Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. 

Core idea: Focuses on the subjective, first-person experience of consciousness. 

Method: Descriptive rather than explanatory. It aims to describe the structures of experience from the point of view of the subject. 

Key concepts: Intentionality (consciousness is always about something), lived experience, embodiment (the body as a primary site of knowing the world).

Multiple Realization theory

Core idea: Different neural structures can give rise to the same conscious experience. 

Mechanism: Emphasizes the diversity of neural substrates across species and individuals that can generate consciousness. 

Recurrent Processesing theory

Proponents: Victor Lamme, Stanislas Dehaene.

Core idea: Consciousness arises from recurrent or re-entrant neural activity rather than just feedfoward processing.

Mechanism: Persistent and reciprocal signaling within and betwixt different brain regions is crucial for conscious perception. 

Orchestrated Objective Reduction theory

Proponents: Roger Penrose, Stuart Hameroff.

Core idea: Consciousness results from quantum computations in microtubules within neurons.

Mechanism: Combines principles of quantum mechanics and neuroscience. Conscious events are proposed to be orchestrated by biological processes and then collapsed by quantum processes.

Embodied Cognition 

Proponents: Francisco Varela, Ethan Thompson, and others. 

Core idea: Consciousness arises from the interaction between an organism and its environment. 

Mechanism: Emphasizes the role of the body in shaping the mind. Cognitive processes are deeply rooted in the body's interactions with the world. 

Panpsychism 

Proponents: Philip Goff, Galen Stawson.

Core idea: Consciousness is a fundamental feature of all physical entities, not just brains.

Mechanism: Every particle or fundamental entity has a basic form of consciousness. Complex consciousness arises from the combination of simpler forms.