I often talk about this in terms of vaguely specified ideas about
quantum entanglement in the brain, but the really important part is the
radical disjunction between the physical ontology of the natural sciences
and the manifest nature of consciousness. I cannot emphasize enough
that this is a huge gaping hole in the scientific understanding of the world,
the equal of any gap in the scientific worldview that came before it, and tha
the standard “scientific” way of thinking about it is a form of property dualism,
even if people won’t admit this to themselves.
I am among those who “won’t admit this to themselves”. In fact, I think it is nonsense—there is no “gap”.
Science doesn’t understand how the brain works well enough to make one—but that is not more of a “hole in the scientific understanding of the world” than is embryology, or muscles or metabolism—which we don’t completely understand either.
I don’t agree with the bits about “quantum entanglement” or “dualism” either—this material is just all wrong, in my view.
I wouldn’t worry about the “quantum entanglement” part, which is not needed for the more general claim that we don’t know squat about consciousness.
Anyway, I disagree—embryology, muscles, and metabolism are not mysteries in the way that consciousness is. I find it astonishing you would even make the comparison.
Science doesn’t understand how the brain works well enough to make one—but that is no more a “hole in the scientific understanding of the world” than is embryology, or muscles or metabolism—which we don’t completely understand either.
I don’t agree with the bits about “quantum entanglement” or “dualism” either—this material is just all wrong, in my view.
I am among those who “won’t admit this to themselves”. In fact, I think it is nonsense—there is no “gap”.
Tim, that’s an astonishing assertion. It sounds to me like you just claimed that we fully understand the mechanism that generates consciousness.
Science doesn’t understand how the brain works well enough to make one—but that is not more of a “hole in the scientific understanding of the world” than is embryology, or muscles or metabolism—which we don’t completely understand either.
I don’t agree with the bits about “quantum entanglement” or “dualism” either—this material is just all wrong, in my view.
I wouldn’t worry about the “quantum entanglement” part, which is not needed for the more general claim that we don’t know squat about consciousness.
Anyway, I disagree—embryology, muscles, and metabolism are not mysteries in the way that consciousness is. I find it astonishing you would even make the comparison.
Science doesn’t understand how the brain works well enough to make one—but that is no more a “hole in the scientific understanding of the world” than is embryology, or muscles or metabolism—which we don’t completely understand either.
I don’t agree with the bits about “quantum entanglement” or “dualism” either—this material is just all wrong, in my view.