Panpsychism - a philosophy with a future

by slimboyfat 142 Replies latest social current

  • ballistic
    ballistic

    Cofty I would have agreed with you once upon a time. Thing is, you can experience different states of consciousness, what it's like to be a rock for example, or a particle. Might take years of practice; other people just take mushrooms. And in a weird ironic way, with regard to your first point, some people arrive at the conclusion that they have experienced "the ground of all being".

  • Ruby456
    Ruby456

    slim

    I think panpsychism makes a lot of sense but I'm not 100% convinced. Maybe around 30% convinced, if I had to quantify it. But I think it's an idea worth thinking about.

    the problem I have with panpsychism is that it is too much associated with spooky ideas like esp and spoon bending and other suchlike phenomena. Rupert Sheldrake does argue fairly convincingly about such phenomena but I prefer self organising complexities and criticalities as in these theories there is room for lots and lots of coincidences to occur, for butterfly effects and for probabilities coming to fruition.

  • cofty
    cofty
    Thing is, you can experience different states of consciousness, what it's like to be a rock for example - ballistic

    Yes we usually call that being dead.

  • jp1692
    jp1692

    This just in: Do fish suffer? (Scientific American, November 21, 2017)

    Although the author, science writer John Horgan, gets the plural of octopus wrong, he nevertheless sheds some interesting light on this discussion. It’s not revolutionary, but thought-provoking and very readable.

  • Jayk
    Jayk

    We learned alot since asimov died but pretty much everything he was about is true. Be it science fiction then, turned to be science fact.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    I knew someone who knew Asimov. Because I remember talking to them about Asimov, and they said he was really grumpy in person. But now I can't remember who it was I was talking to at the time. So strange to remember a whole conversation but not remember who I had it with. Am I getting old?

    Radio 4 was all about driverless cars tonight. They say it will only be a few years now.

    Will robots have consciousness? If all matter is minimally aware then maybe it adds another dimension (or maybe not) to the whole robot awareness thing, and the Turing test.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    The same person told me Asimov wrote books about the Bible too. Who was that now?

  • Jayk
    Jayk
    Not sure if he wrote anything about the bible. He wrote science fiction (i-robot) he came up wih the 3 laws of robotics which i-robots is about. Most is non fiction is for dumb people like myself can understand. Michio is a nut, his book "physics Behind The Impossible" talks about creating a death star. Not exactly how star wars does it but, using a collapsing star and turning the black hole into a weapon essentially.
  • jp1692
    jp1692

    Isaac Asimov was a biochemist that also wrote fiction. He was damn good at both.

    There should be a rule: People should at least have a basic idea of what they are taking about before they post on a topic and/or thread.

    Seriously, some of the posts on this thread are just embarrassing for the lack of awareness, knowledge and thoughtfulness about this subject. The irony is palpable.

  • Jayk
    Jayk

    Thay article "do fish suffer" is interesting. I have family who are vegetarians but thought eating fish was ok because we think fish don't feel pain. Or thought they dont. I heard there is a theory that the fact we can think words in or head or talk to ourselves in our own head. That has something to do with telekinesis. In one of the original planet of the apes movies the humans who went underground learned to speak without talking. Kinda like that first episode of star trek with the aliens that have huge brains.

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