Phil Forum : Panpsychism

[Gnomon]

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussi ... ent/433359

Evolution & Growing Awareness

consciousness in some shape must have been present at the very origins of things. — turkeyMan

Yes. I am open to Panpsychism. But you should expect that some on this forum will be prejudiced against the concept of universal consciousness, due to its prevalence in New Age mystical & magical notions. Yet, there is growing acceptance of a more scientific understanding that the potential for mind & consciousness was somehow inherent in the Big Bang. William James came to his conclusion, long before New Ageism emerged, and it was based on pragmatic logic, not on empirical evidence. Psyche (Mind) is a metaphysical concept, so its existence in physical objects is counter-intuitive, and inexplicable, to those committed to a Materialist worldview.

Since Consciousness is not physical, but metaphysical, direct empirical evidence is hard to come by. You can't X-ray a rock to see if it contains awareness of its environment. But many modern scientists have inferred that the emergence of Mental & Metaphysical phenomena was not an accident, but implicit in the constitution of the Singularity that gave birth to our world. Panpsychism is not yet the orthodox view of mainstream Science, but there seems to be a burgeoning "new paradigm" among younger scientists.


Panpsychism : And whilst physicalism offers a simple and unified vision of the world, this is arguably at the cost of being unable to give a satisfactory account of the emergence of human and animal consciousness. Panpsychism, strange as it may sound on first hearing, promises a satisfying account of the human mind within a unified conception of nature.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/


The Incredulous Stare : Many people, both philosophers and non-philosophers, find deeply counterintuitive the idea that fundamental constituents of the physical world, such as electrons, have conscious experience. And many take this to be a good reason not to take panpsychism seriously.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panp ... /#IncrStar

Panpsychism :
Literally, “all mind”. The belief that everything material, however small, has an element of Mind. Higher, more complex, forms of Mind are called “awareness” or “consciousness”. Lower & simpler forms are called “energy” or “information”.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page16.html

New Ageism :
An alternative religious movement that spread through the occult and metaphysical communities in the 1970s and 80s. It looked forward to a “New Age” of love and light and offered a foretaste of the coming era through personal transformation and healing. The movement’s strongest supporters were followers of modern esotericism, a religious perspective that is based on the acquisition of mystical knowledge and ritual magic. Its eclectic doctrines borrow from Eastern & Western occult traditions. Note : although some of its pandeistic & panpsychic cosmology may seem similar to Enformationism, its antiscience & irrational attitude is in opposition.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page16.html

The EnFormAction Hypothesis :
http://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

Physics of Consciousness : https://www.closertotruth.com/interviews/55454

[Gnomon]

The incredulous stare is still the appropriate response. — Banno

I agree that it's the appropriate response for a Physicalist. But for some of us the most important things in the world are non-physical. And Consciousness remains the "hard problem" for Physicalism : how does matter know anything?

However, if Mind is somehow intrinsic to the material world, then the emergence of Mind from Matter is not a problem. And that is the logically credible postulate of my Enformationism thesis. If Information is more fundamental than matter, then matter & mind are both forms of Information. But what is Information? It may not be what you think, or believe.

Physicalism : "the Panpsychism problem"
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/

Consciousness : "information integration theory"
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness/

Consciousness :
Literally : to know with. To be aware of the world subjectively (self-knowledge) and objectively (other knowing). Humans know Quanta via physical senses & analysis, and Qualia via meta-physical reasoning & synthesis. In the Enformationism thesis, Consciousness is viewed as an emergent form of basic mathematical Information.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page12.html

Is Information fundamental? :
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/i ... ndamental/
https://www.closertotruth.com/series/in ... undamental

Information :
Knowledge and the ability to know. Technically, it's the ratio of order to disorder, of positive to negative, of knowledge to ignorance. It's measured in degrees of uncertainty. Those ratios are also called "differences". So Gregory Bateson* defined Information as "the difference that makes a difference". The latter distinction refers to "value" or "meaning". Babbage called his prototype computer a "difference engine". Difference is the cause or agent of Change. In Physics it’s called "Thermodynamics" or "Energy". In Sociology it’s called "Conflict".

[Gnomon]

Many modern scientists embrace pan-psychism — turkeyMan

Even one in the hard sciences would impress me. There are probably a few out there. — jgill

Yes, there are a few "hard" scientists out there who take the notion of Panpsychism seriously. It's not yet mainstream, but the "soft" sciences of Information Theory and Systems Theory are pioneering the study of Nature for clues to how & why Life & Mind emerged from the physical process of Evolution. Most of the research is based on Information & Computation theories. Hard physicists, who are still searching for the bottom line of physics by smashing particles, are not likely to encounter many signs of Life or Mind. But, softer Quantum Theorists, are dealing with much mushier aspects of reality, and may be more open to the idea that a potential for Life & Mind was inherent in the original Singularity program, in the form of non-physical Information. Since Life & Mind are not physical phenomena, but metaphysical functions, their study is often limited to "soft" Theory, rather than "hard" empirical Practice.

If you're interested in some cutting edge research, I recommend the 2017 book by members of the Santa Fe Institute for interdisciplinary theoretical research (outside traditional boundaries). The collaborative book is From Matter to Life : Information and Causality, and it's editors include a Physicist, an Astrobiologist, and a Mathematical Cosmologist. Among the contributors are not one, but seven, physicists, along with Biologists, Chemists, Mathematicians, Philosophers, and Psychologists. This is cutting-edge stuff, so those whose knowledge of science remains in the 20th century may not be aware that the "soft" sciences are beginning to play a prominent role in the science of the Information Age.

For obvious reasons, the book does not mention the ancient term Panpsychism. But its core concept, that Life & Mind & Matter are all forms of metaphysical Information, is a modern formulation of the same notion. An early expression of that view was pioneering physicist John Archibald Wheeler ("it from bit"), who said : “All things physical are information-theoretic in origin and this is a participatory universe… Observer-participancy gives rise to information.”. This book is not for the general public, but for those who have the scientific background to appreciate the implications of state-of-the-art research.

Santa Fe Institute : . . . an independent, nonprofit theoretical research institute located in Santa Fe (New Mexico, United States) and dedicated to the multidisciplinary study of the fundamental principles of complex adaptive systems, including physical, computational, biological, and social systems. The Institute is ranked 25th among the world's "Top Science and Technology Think Tanks" . . .
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Fe_Institute

From Matter to Life : https://www.amazon.com/Matter-Life-Info ... mozilla-20