Month: May 2022

IF, THEN, ELSE – It’s Not Complicated

Still drafting a longer thesis on my full metaphysics, prompted in this earlier post, but the premises are quite straightforward:

IF – we allow that physics (physicalism / materialism) are
fundamentally about information and processes (ie computation).

THEN – I’m happy to be considered a physicalist, and that all evolved phenomena, including those of subjective consciousness and intuitive right-brained world-views, are also physical, BUT physicalism is then more than materialism (with more than matter & energy as fundamental, see IF).

ELSE – “Orthodox” physical science
cannot explain consciousness.

AND

IF – we allow that physical science involves more than logically objective determinist causation – including an organic subjective perspective.

THEN – I’m happy to agree that all that exists and can be known in the universe can be described by physical science.

ELSE – “Orthodox” physical science has many limitations
and cannot even address “the hard problem” and many more aspects of human subjectivity..

This post prompted by this ludicrous twitter exchange this morning:

And of course the whole thread is simply a follow-on from my two previous posts about the hopelessness of any “definition” of consciousness and definitions generally.

Goff is right on one thing. It’s healthy that public media carry dialogue that is sceptical of physicalism as materialism.

=====

[Post Note:

BTW, I completely give up on Goff as any kind of progressive thinker – his political ideology means he simply cannot see through the dimwit @OwenJones84, a conspiracy theorist of the highest order.

Many patient attempts by @NaturalPhilosopher to get him to see multiple subtle views in the “TERF Wars” for example – another culture war stirred-up by the likes of @OwenJones84 – are rejected or simply ignored. I once called him “close but no cigar” in his pan-psychist thesis, but all evidence in dialogues since suggests he’s just in it for disingenuous mental exercise. He really holds no coherent view on anything. A lost cause imho.]

Important Pirsig Highlights

I made a single reference to Pirsig and “quality” in the previous post about Kastrup and “consciousness”. It prompted me to re-read a few earlier references I’d written – a couple of which I realise I’m quite proud of, and thought I’d “re-up” on these pages:

“After the Fireworks” (July 2018)
– a retrospective on the Pirsigian journey shortly after his death.

“If Something’s Missing, Just Write it” (August 2018)
– subsequent reflection on shared / parallel life trajectories.

“Hoops of Fire” (September 2008)
– an earlier signing-off at a Minnesotan cross-roads in my own life.

And for completeness simply bookended by:

The most recent “On Quality” (2022)
and earlier
my conference paper “It’s Evolutionary Psychology, Stupid.” (2005)
and (pre-Pirsig) my MBA Dissertation on Change & Culture (1991)
where some of my issues were first documented.

All prompted by getting my head around “just write something!“

Kastrup’s “Definition” of Consciousness

In this dialogue Bernardo Kastrup gives us his working definition of “consciousness:

That whose excitations
are the experiences we have.
(Independent of our experiencing of them.)

The sine qua non of experience.

Raw subjectivity
Raw basic experience.

This is Pirsigian quality.

He doesn’t use the formulation above in his book “The Idea of the World”, but I concluded there that his perspective there was already Northrop, Pirsig, Whitehead, take your pick. (That link to the book review in fact includes as comprehensive a statement of my position as any.)

Since most people using the word consciousness mean something – stuff & things – much richer, many layered, experience in many dimensions, than this raw essence I see this qualitative essence of experience as proto-consciousness – so rather than seeing pan-psychism or literal idealism, I say pan-proto-psychism. Framed like this it’s not remotely contentious?

[His model of Alters and TWEs – in his book above – just seems to pile confusion on top of what is quite a straightforward monism. Why do people go for controversy and disagreement when there is synthesis and agreement there to be had? Yeah, I know, clicks and sales.]

Anyway just more grist to my definitions mill:

“The trouble with definitions is that although they can be practically useful, the one thing which they cannot do, is definitively define a thing”

[Broad v Narrow. Systems Thinking – architectural levels of detail ignorable. Onward and upward.]

Paradigmatic Shift – Objects to Systems?

I watched a talk by Eva Jablonka on the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES) which I’ve mentioned previously in connection with Kevin Laland et al. (In fact she provides one of the cover blurbs for his “Darwin’s Unfinished Symphony“.)

Apart from the general plea for the phenotypic focus (*) on evolutionary change – of which (DNA) genetics are simply one (important) aspect along with several other epigenetic processes – with which I’m already on-board, I was struck by one particular section captured in this screen shot:

The more general underlying problem with mainstream / orthodox science – that the style of thinking itself excludes proper consideration of alternatives, even alternatives that might solve long-standing problems.

I often talk in terms of many stalemates boiling down to being too narrowly and objectively reductive in “what counts as evidence”. Yes, we all demand evidence – empirical evidence – in support of any thesis, but we might need to be more open-minded in what evidence is available for consideration.

Those quotes above from Fleck are excellent – very reminiscent of Kuhnian revolutionary paradigm shifts – in terms of denial preceding tipping points. In terms of what counts as evidence this stood out:

“judgement which
the thought-collective
considers evident”

“The Thought-Collective” – ie a group-think problem.

The emphasis on style of thinking captured by the orthodox paradigm – where I am very much pushing “Systems Thinking” alternative to objectivity for want of a better definition of the orthodoxy. Even the textbook definitions of genotype and phenotype are trapped inside objectivity. Fascinating possibilities here.

(*) focus on the whole organism (typical individual and the species) properties and behaviour, not just its DNA and gene-sequencing as if the former is simply / wholly the expression of the latter. It’s not.

In all questions of inheritance it’s about what kinds of property or process information can be captured (remembered) and communicated (transmitted) directly or symbolically to future generations. I’ve never been too precious about even genes being all that clearly defined objectivity, so have never found objections to memes on such grounds to be problematic. (Jablonka has herself been sceptical about memes previously). But the lines we draw round stuff to consider them as “distinct things” we give names to have always been essentially pragmatic / useful – and organisms are no different in defining their own boundaries. (Consider the Python’s black knight?)

Anyway, boxes & arrows / nodes & edges / trees or networks – are the natural language of Systems Thinking. Loved this too:

John McGeoch

A musical interlude:

A couple of years ago I posted some pictures I took of John McGeoch, back in 1978 when he was playing in Howard Devoto’s Magazine, in a Facebook thread reminiscing on Devoto and Magazine.

(Photos taken at The Nashville Rooms, a regular London pub-rock bar in the days of punk, that later became The Three Kings. I seem to recall that Lemmy and Phil were in there that night, playing the gaming machine.)

Anyway, John died young – aged 48 in 2004 – but in his time played in and impressed several important bands including Siouxsie and Visage (both of whom I also saw, the latter with John) and more significantly here, Public Image Limited (PiL) who I follow to this day. He was the link between Keith Levine (original) and Lou Edmonds (to this day) in the PiL sound.

This post is really an excuse to link to (a) this 6 part audio documentary, and (b) below some footage from a festival gig in Estonia in 1988. Despite the intrusive Estonian talking heads / interviews, and the tinny sound, great to see both John and Lou (with Johnny, Bruce and that must be Alan Dias on the bass?) performing The Public Image, Home and Rise.

And the reason for posting? There is a new biography of John McGeoch.
“The Light Pours Out of Me” (2022) by Rory Sullivan-Burke.