Thank you for this. After spending about 50 years of my life as a Bible-believing Christian I am no longer a believer after reading Gods of the Bible. However, I hold out for some proof that we do have ‘souls’ and that our consciousness does live on after our bodies die. I have become bitter and cynical after the events of the past 5 years and my shock over the lies fed to us about so many things - especially the Bible — has just about destroyed my ability to find joy in anything. So your article brings me some hope that perhaps there is more to life than, just, life.
Another thoughtful essay. I admire you for educating us on the kinds of thought experiments and evidence those of your ilk think about.
Personally, it seems that there is enough evidence that it is consciousness first, brain second. So inverting the hard problem is the way to go.
I am more interested in considering the prospects which arise once we collectively accept that that is the way it works.
Does the stream of consciousness ever terminate? What happens when we stop identifying with the radio and recognize that we are the transmitted signal? If there is no end to our real existence, what is the utility of holding on to existential fear? If a population is fearless, how much sway can authority have?
Thank You for this fine follow-on to Josh's work, Madhava.
There is an assumption embedded in your reasoning, which I would like to (non-dualistically? :-) point out:
"... interested in considering the prospects which arise once we collectively accept that that is the way it works."
"I" seek to "know" that meaning, but it is mostly being patient, and somewhat generally receptive, while "I" do other things, because life has a lot to do, when you know it matters.
To "me", the convergence may be a convergence of revelation of the spiritual realm(s), particularly the "Sambhogakaya" realm of consciousness, often referred to as the "bliss body", which I think is superficial, therefore misdirecting. It is difficult to find a reference to convey an aspect of Sambhogakaya, which was conveyed to me in a teaching by a Lama in 2001 or 2002, but it jumped into my mind at that moment. The Nirmanakaya is they physical realm, easy enough, and the Dharmakaya is the realm of absolute consciousness, a distant abstraction for most of us, but the Sambhogakaya is a realm of swirling, not-quite-formed, near-potentialities in a world where many of us might agree that consciousness co-creates the "real world", but might disagree upon how that works.
In my consciousness, in that moment, I saw Sambhogakaya as the mystical realm of influencing the becoming-reality, the realm of "fruitful prayer" and guided devotion to "the will of God", or "Universal Consciousness".
'The “Sambodakaya” is the level of psychic experiences: dreams, visions, psychic powers, visionary journeys, gods and goddesses, angels, and demons. It is the realm where everything is fluid and trippy, swirling and vibrating.
In Advaita, this is known as “svapna”, or “dreaming”. In Christianity, it is “The Holy Spirit” – the subtle, uncapturable Divine energy bubbling and flowing through all things.'
How much of our feeling of separateness comes from identification with a particular body? Is the consciousness that survives death our individual consciousness or do we rejoin a universal consciousness or something in between?
In the poem, I'm a droplet in the mist above the ocean, destined to fall back into the ocean after a short flight in the air. It's a poem rather than a scientific theory or a philosophic exposition because I'm still reaching for an elusive understanding of the relationship between my individual consciousness and universal Consciousness.
To me, the sense of separation that we experience is one of the deepest mysteries. I suspect that most of the thoughts that appear in my head and I think I made them up are really planted there telepathically, or they're cultural constructs, or they're messages from the big C. But the sensation I have when I stub my toe is very different from the sensation I have when you stub your toe.
Well, I was trying to make a joke about the perception of self-wave-ness within an ocean, but you are fielding this with a completely straight answer, which is also appropriate, and I have to wonder if you have a wry smile.
In the paper by Podolski, Lanza, and Barvinski, there is a discussion on the renormalization of gravity in the presence of a network of observers measuring spacetime geometry. That scientific paper is discussed in the book "The Grand Biocentric Design: How Life Creates Reality", by Robert Lanza and Matej Pavšič, with Bob Berman. In that book, one can find a discussion---within the context of quantum mechanics---about the role of consciousness in the Universe. That book goes far beyond the previous two books on biocentrism. Deepak Chopra wrote in his review: "No one has gone further, or more convincingly, than Lanza and Pavšič do here. If it ever becomes accepted wisdom that “the universe as mind” is true, The Grand Biocentric Design will be looked upon as a significant milestone along the way."
@MaryEve Iwicki, I have stumbled upon Dr. Heiser's lectures on the Bible, which I believe would not run counter to "Gods of the Bible" (though I have not read the latter) and if anything it has deepened my understanding of the Bible in a way that supports Faith. Yes, the OT discusses multiple Gods, but this doesn't mean the Judeo-Christian message is wrong. I think it means that the idea that there is only one God/Trinity and nothing between Him and us is just very incomplete. Dr. Heiser passed away a few years ago, but lectures are on YouTube.
Hi Josh. Very good article. Contains the same theory of my own TOE called A Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything, published in 2012. Consciousness as the ground state, reality built up from the quantum state, the brain as a receiver. Your explanation here of the brain synapses functioning at the quantum level is an excellent refinement. One of my substack readers recommended your article to me, and I can see why.
I was going to comment, trying to convey thoughts, and I saw Madhava's comment, and included some words there, to point to a moment of perception I experienced during a teaching.
The other part is a thank-you for tying together some dead ends of pondering mental inquiry, especially the thought I had that consciousness might somehow influence physical manifestations through the slack of the "uncertainty" probability buffers in what looks like a mechanical universe, otherwise.
This path into the relationship seems most elegant to "me".
Superlative, Josh. The reason why I am an ardent fan is you keep stretching my mind beyond boundaries I was oblivious of.
Some layman’s observations (excerpts from your article in quotes):
"We should invert the question: How does consciousness create the brain? The hypothesis is that consciousness is a fundamental reality, more fundamental than space, time, and matter. (Consciousness is, after all, what we know most directly.) We can explore the possibility that consciousness created the physical world as a playground for itself, and created life and then brains to explore that playground from many different perspectives."
– This is my belief as it makes the most logical sense, assuming the word logic can be applied to the subject. But which ‘consciousness’? It doesn’t make sense each individual consciousness or soul could/would create its own physical manifestation and set that into a whole private world for itself. Aside from the implausibility of the gazillion universes this would result in, one has to make certain irrational assumptions:
a) an individual consciousness would create a destructible, all too short-lived, physical self to house itself and
(b) it would create anything less than a perfect world around that self to make the most of its existence.
Yet we know for a fact none of us is perfect, let alone immortal. Buddhism revolves around the ‘suffering’ the physical self must endure and transcend to achieve 'nirvana'. Similar to the concept of 'moksha' in Hinduism.
Two further questions arise from this. Is there a Supreme Consciousness, the 'Paramatma' or soul of souls according to Hinduism? The imperfections in all individuals and in the world they inhabit strongly suggest something much higher than individual consciousness is at play. Which then leads to the all time big question: Is there a God?
I feel your essay would be greatly enriched by taking the leap of mind to the god question. Anything short of that will leave it an unfinished business.
"At the end of the 19th century, William Jameswrote of consciousness as having an enduring existence apart from matter, and the brain as a kind of transponder that connects an individual consciousness to a body made of matter, and the nervous system that controls it."
"More detailed examination of the architecture and chemistry of the brain might confirm or falsify the idea that the brain is not the creator of consciousness, but the connection that puts consciousness in touch with the physical body."
– These two statements make the most compelling argument for me on the superiority of an indestructible soul, or mind over matter. I can’t wait to read your next two parts. Especially on your teaser if computers (or AI) could become conscious. I can guess what you would say, but it has to be said explicitly.
I've long thought that consciousness is the fundamental substance of the Universe, but don't have the physics depth to do much with that insight. I especially appreciate how you seek to derive the connection between the world of physics and consciousness. I suspect the invariance of the speed of light offers a clue.
Thank you for this. After spending about 50 years of my life as a Bible-believing Christian I am no longer a believer after reading Gods of the Bible. However, I hold out for some proof that we do have ‘souls’ and that our consciousness does live on after our bodies die. I have become bitter and cynical after the events of the past 5 years and my shock over the lies fed to us about so many things - especially the Bible — has just about destroyed my ability to find joy in anything. So your article brings me some hope that perhaps there is more to life than, just, life.
Read Surviving Death by Leslie Kean
https://www.amazon.com/Surviving-Death-Journalist-Investigates-Afterlife/dp/0451497147/
Hi Josh.
I think you may appreciate my own take on overcoming death. I have a number of podcasts on the subject on my Gnostic Insights podcast. Here's one: https://gnosticinsights.com/near-death-experiences-gnosis/
Thank you - I will!
Another thoughtful essay. I admire you for educating us on the kinds of thought experiments and evidence those of your ilk think about.
Personally, it seems that there is enough evidence that it is consciousness first, brain second. So inverting the hard problem is the way to go.
I am more interested in considering the prospects which arise once we collectively accept that that is the way it works.
Does the stream of consciousness ever terminate? What happens when we stop identifying with the radio and recognize that we are the transmitted signal? If there is no end to our real existence, what is the utility of holding on to existential fear? If a population is fearless, how much sway can authority have?
I hope to address some of this next week. Maybe we can do a piece together...
Thank You for this fine follow-on to Josh's work, Madhava.
There is an assumption embedded in your reasoning, which I would like to (non-dualistically? :-) point out:
"... interested in considering the prospects which arise once we collectively accept that that is the way it works."
"I" seek to "know" that meaning, but it is mostly being patient, and somewhat generally receptive, while "I" do other things, because life has a lot to do, when you know it matters.
To "me", the convergence may be a convergence of revelation of the spiritual realm(s), particularly the "Sambhogakaya" realm of consciousness, often referred to as the "bliss body", which I think is superficial, therefore misdirecting. It is difficult to find a reference to convey an aspect of Sambhogakaya, which was conveyed to me in a teaching by a Lama in 2001 or 2002, but it jumped into my mind at that moment. The Nirmanakaya is they physical realm, easy enough, and the Dharmakaya is the realm of absolute consciousness, a distant abstraction for most of us, but the Sambhogakaya is a realm of swirling, not-quite-formed, near-potentialities in a world where many of us might agree that consciousness co-creates the "real world", but might disagree upon how that works.
In my consciousness, in that moment, I saw Sambhogakaya as the mystical realm of influencing the becoming-reality, the realm of "fruitful prayer" and guided devotion to "the will of God", or "Universal Consciousness".
This catches a bit of that: https://intromeditation.com/Wordpress/the-teaching-of-the-three-bodies/
'The “Sambodakaya” is the level of psychic experiences: dreams, visions, psychic powers, visionary journeys, gods and goddesses, angels, and demons. It is the realm where everything is fluid and trippy, swirling and vibrating.
In Advaita, this is known as “svapna”, or “dreaming”. In Christianity, it is “The Holy Spirit” – the subtle, uncapturable Divine energy bubbling and flowing through all things.'
only those blinded by two dimensional thinking need to have proof that there are three
I would go a step further and propose 3-D time. We are sometimes told to think of space and time similar to mass and energy so why not 3-D time?
A principle of universal orthogonality implying 3-D of time each with 3-sub (physical) D. Time would be elevated from the 4th dimension to the 1st.
A corollary to Occam's Razor. Why would nature deny the possibilities?
But what exists after we die, the brain or consciousness?
How much of our feeling of separateness comes from identification with a particular body? Is the consciousness that survives death our individual consciousness or do we rejoin a universal consciousness or something in between?
We come into this world awash with tears,
Mourning our incipient separation—
Too soon we age and leave it, mired in fears,
So loathe to part with individuation.
The waves that crash, the foam atop the seas,
Disguise the ocean, fathomless, profound—
And when that water splinters into me’s,
Myriad ephemeral droplets abound
And frolic in a mist one glorious trice
Fall terror-bound back in the womb, coalescing,
Rejoin the life that once was all they knew…
Perhaps our fear of change provides a clue
Why human arts nor nature’s quite suffice
To sustain appreciation of our blessing.
But Josh, I am a Wave, not an Ocean!
(right?)
In the poem, I'm a droplet in the mist above the ocean, destined to fall back into the ocean after a short flight in the air. It's a poem rather than a scientific theory or a philosophic exposition because I'm still reaching for an elusive understanding of the relationship between my individual consciousness and universal Consciousness.
To me, the sense of separation that we experience is one of the deepest mysteries. I suspect that most of the thoughts that appear in my head and I think I made them up are really planted there telepathically, or they're cultural constructs, or they're messages from the big C. But the sensation I have when I stub my toe is very different from the sensation I have when you stub your toe.
Well, I was trying to make a joke about the perception of self-wave-ness within an ocean, but you are fielding this with a completely straight answer, which is also appropriate, and I have to wonder if you have a wry smile.
Sorry I missed that. I was inspired to write a spoof today, and people seem to be taking it at face value. I don't know what to make of that.
https://joshmitteldorf.substack.com/p/memo-from-daniel-dennett-1942-2024
Josh, you have a dry sense of humor, even dryer than my own, though I sometimes do slapstick, too.
I have often had the problem that people "don't get my jokes".
In the paper by Podolski, Lanza, and Barvinski, there is a discussion on the renormalization of gravity in the presence of a network of observers measuring spacetime geometry. That scientific paper is discussed in the book "The Grand Biocentric Design: How Life Creates Reality", by Robert Lanza and Matej Pavšič, with Bob Berman. In that book, one can find a discussion---within the context of quantum mechanics---about the role of consciousness in the Universe. That book goes far beyond the previous two books on biocentrism. Deepak Chopra wrote in his review: "No one has gone further, or more convincingly, than Lanza and Pavšič do here. If it ever becomes accepted wisdom that “the universe as mind” is true, The Grand Biocentric Design will be looked upon as a significant milestone along the way."
@MaryEve Iwicki, I have stumbled upon Dr. Heiser's lectures on the Bible, which I believe would not run counter to "Gods of the Bible" (though I have not read the latter) and if anything it has deepened my understanding of the Bible in a way that supports Faith. Yes, the OT discusses multiple Gods, but this doesn't mean the Judeo-Christian message is wrong. I think it means that the idea that there is only one God/Trinity and nothing between Him and us is just very incomplete. Dr. Heiser passed away a few years ago, but lectures are on YouTube.
Hi Josh. Very good article. Contains the same theory of my own TOE called A Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything, published in 2012. Consciousness as the ground state, reality built up from the quantum state, the brain as a receiver. Your explanation here of the brain synapses functioning at the quantum level is an excellent refinement. One of my substack readers recommended your article to me, and I can see why.
Thank You Josh.
I was going to comment, trying to convey thoughts, and I saw Madhava's comment, and included some words there, to point to a moment of perception I experienced during a teaching.
The other part is a thank-you for tying together some dead ends of pondering mental inquiry, especially the thought I had that consciousness might somehow influence physical manifestations through the slack of the "uncertainty" probability buffers in what looks like a mechanical universe, otherwise.
This path into the relationship seems most elegant to "me".
Thank "you" again.
Superlative, Josh. The reason why I am an ardent fan is you keep stretching my mind beyond boundaries I was oblivious of.
Some layman’s observations (excerpts from your article in quotes):
"We should invert the question: How does consciousness create the brain? The hypothesis is that consciousness is a fundamental reality, more fundamental than space, time, and matter. (Consciousness is, after all, what we know most directly.) We can explore the possibility that consciousness created the physical world as a playground for itself, and created life and then brains to explore that playground from many different perspectives."
– This is my belief as it makes the most logical sense, assuming the word logic can be applied to the subject. But which ‘consciousness’? It doesn’t make sense each individual consciousness or soul could/would create its own physical manifestation and set that into a whole private world for itself. Aside from the implausibility of the gazillion universes this would result in, one has to make certain irrational assumptions:
a) an individual consciousness would create a destructible, all too short-lived, physical self to house itself and
(b) it would create anything less than a perfect world around that self to make the most of its existence.
Yet we know for a fact none of us is perfect, let alone immortal. Buddhism revolves around the ‘suffering’ the physical self must endure and transcend to achieve 'nirvana'. Similar to the concept of 'moksha' in Hinduism.
Two further questions arise from this. Is there a Supreme Consciousness, the 'Paramatma' or soul of souls according to Hinduism? The imperfections in all individuals and in the world they inhabit strongly suggest something much higher than individual consciousness is at play. Which then leads to the all time big question: Is there a God?
I feel your essay would be greatly enriched by taking the leap of mind to the god question. Anything short of that will leave it an unfinished business.
"At the end of the 19th century, William Jameswrote of consciousness as having an enduring existence apart from matter, and the brain as a kind of transponder that connects an individual consciousness to a body made of matter, and the nervous system that controls it."
"More detailed examination of the architecture and chemistry of the brain might confirm or falsify the idea that the brain is not the creator of consciousness, but the connection that puts consciousness in touch with the physical body."
– These two statements make the most compelling argument for me on the superiority of an indestructible soul, or mind over matter. I can’t wait to read your next two parts. Especially on your teaser if computers (or AI) could become conscious. I can guess what you would say, but it has to be said explicitly.
Thank you, Josh! I’ve been listening to Lynne McTaggart’s The Field and this adds to my understanding. Looking forward to your next post…
I've long thought that consciousness is the fundamental substance of the Universe, but don't have the physics depth to do much with that insight. I especially appreciate how you seek to derive the connection between the world of physics and consciousness. I suspect the invariance of the speed of light offers a clue.
Keep digging!