Each time you have conversations with Annaka, I really enjoy them. First, because you are both remarkably well spoken and intellectually engaging. Second because your enjoyment of each other is so joyful. Excited to listen to her documentary, thanks for this breath of fresh air.
Your conversations with Annaka are so delightful. Therefore, I find it really regrettable that two so smart people, and brilliant communicators, purportedly nondualists and anti-dualists, so consistently talk about consciousness dualistically, as a mental object (or aggregate of objects) that you have direct access to, as mental subjects.
Check out your former guest Jay Garfields video on YouTube "cognitive illusion and the immediacy of experience" (https://youtu.be/HRuOEfnqV6g?si=CqRkcc-0N9QFJ666). That's real non-duality, freeing yourself from introspective illusions.
You simply have to face up to the hard problem of anti-physicalism. If you want to reject physicalism, either you believe the laws of physics are being violated in brains, or you're an epiphenomenonalist., in which case your arguments have nothing to do with consciousness.
Look, if your brain is wired up to find it's internal self-modelling as unquestionably irreducible, important and different in kind to everything else, then that is what you're going to believe. There is no you separate from the beliefs, as they are physically instantiated in your brain. If your brain is wired up to think there is something so significant about it’s self-modeling that it defies reductive computational reductive explanation, then that is what you will believe and express. But there is no you to observe any properties of consciousness. There is no direct access to anything at all. It just doesn't work like that. And that by no means undermines the reality of consciousness.
I just finished listening to this conversation. It was very enjoyable in both content and format. It was a pleasure listening to Sam and Annika speaking back and forth as interviewer and interviewee and as husband and wife. I really appreciate content like this and I am looking forward to hearing the rest of Lights On. Thanks to you both.
By the way, I thought Lights on was an audio book, it's actually an audio documentary. I have actually never listened to an audio documentary on Audible. What a great format! It's over 11 hours long. Super cool!
The problem with science is that it’s limited to what we can perceive with the senses and infer with the intellect. Scientists assume that consciousness arose out of inert matter, but how can that be? The more logical conclusion turns everything around by stating that the world isn’t out there, the world is in you (I’m the world). In other words, objects rise out of consciousness. That means consciousness is the substrate and everything else is just superimposed. The mind is like a virtual reality player and I am just the witness. Thus, non-duality is much more elegant an answer than thinking we can squeeze consciousness out of dead matter. Will scientists ever find the cause of consciousness? No, because they’re looking in the wrong direction.
That’s been my view too. I find the proposition that consciousness “emerges” at some arbitrary point utterly absurd. 10,000 cells don’t have consciousness but 10,001 cells do? It’s ridiculous. What is a “cell” if not a concept we’ve created to describe phenomenona? There are no “cells” in the world, things just are what they are. By describing them we inevitably reduce them to what can be expressed with words - but words aren’t the real thing, otherwise you’d be able to drink the word “water”.
All these phenomena appear in consciousness and the mind creates concepts for them. How could consciousness itself then ever be reduced to being a phenomenon that emerges?
I am so glad you are revisiting this topic. I, for one, have slowly come to a place where if I had to bet, I would say it is fundamental. When I first "realized" this, it was a profound impacting - like and existential crisis that lasted weeks. Over the years, I've been trying to 'disprove' this idea in my own experience - but simply can't. Once the perspective finally shifted, I really couldn't see things any other way. I've spent my life learning all the things from the small to large trying to understand the science of the universe at a deeper level - and the more you learn the more you hear the same punchline; there's more mystery. Things just get weirder and weirder. Now, with this perspective shift, things finally makes "sense" (ironic sense) it terms of what I understand about the universe and my experience. And once consciousnesses became fundamental from my perspective, I simply can't unsee it.
Two things bother me: Sam’s reliance on “there’s something that it’s like to be a ____” as a definition of consciousness; and what do you mean by “foundational?”
What’s it like to be a rock? Well, you sit there and don’t move and don’t have thoughts. Like me when I meditate. Is a hibernating bear like a rock? Sorta. Is a tree stump like a rock? Sorta. Is a sleeping person like a rock? Sorta. Is “defiance” like a rock? Hmmm not really…? For me, for my stupid, rock-like brain, I need a different definition. Or explain the “it’s like something to be something” definition better. If anyone can do it , then Sam.
There’s certainly something that it’s like to be a sleeping human, as made evident by the fact that we have dreams.
Also, a hibernating bear or a person in coma may in fact not have any consciousness in that state, so no, there’s nothing that it’s like to be unconscious, but bears and humans are also able to be awake. Stones on the other hand are never awake, at least not where I live
"What if consciousness is fundamental" is a perfectly valid question to ask... but I fail to see there is any inkling that it will be an interesting question. For all that have been discussed in the podcast, the motivation provided can be summed up as "we know practically nothing about the nature of conscious experience". We don't even have a definition of consciousness.
If we take lack of knowledge as an invitation to conjure up an alternative hypothesis (the default being physicalism), then the hypothesis "Sam Harris is an almighty god that blesses each human being with consciousness" is equally valid and uninteresting. Both are not proven to be incorrect, both shakes up our knowledge of the world, yet we don't dignify one with a serious discussion but we do for the other.
There has to be something that motivates a hypothesis, and unfortunately, I feel like the motivation here is the same wishful thinking as all the religious philosophers of the past who really *wants* there to be more than physicalism.
Addressing the "strong assumption" about physicalism: it's also just a hypothesis. A lack of proof is not a disproof. But different from the other two hypotheses, physicalism have worked pretty darn fine in the past and neuroscience is ever encroaching on what was once thought outside the realm of science.
I should add that Sam's previous discussions on consciousness also doesn't convince me of much, but that is another wall of text
Sam, you mention that an input output would explain a system and it got me thinking
Is consciousness an input on the brain? If it isn't, how is "your brain" able to know that "you" are conscious? And if it is, how is consciousness interacting with matter?
Came here to say ....that I do have an intuition that plants are conscious! and I hope we all gain that feeling/intuition at some point. One thing that I suspect holds us back is our experience of time, because something that "looks like consciousness" to us is movement that reacts to outside stimulus. potentially these time lapse videos will help bridge the gap for anyone curious to have the plants are conscious intuition. https://youtu.be/0gUh6F4kmaw?feature=shared
If we were moving much slower, or had more time to sit and look, we might be thinking about plants differently.
Hi Sam … I just listened to your brilliant wife … My question: since we know that there is a spectrum of human intelligence from lower to high, does consciousness also operate the same way, where by some humans are “more” conscious than others? Thanks …
Season 1 of the Telepathy Tapes podcast made me a believer that telepathy is real. The most current Season 2 episode has Tom Campbell sharing his "Theory of Everything" where he talks about telepathy, and consciousness in general. He also believes that consciousness is fundamental.
What does Annika think about Telepathy and Tom Campbell's theories? I would love to hear a Making Sense show on telepathy and consciousness.
Hey, Sam. Have you or your wife ever had a discussion or interaction with David Bentley Hart regarding this topic? After recently reading him and listening to this conversation, it seems you may each be coming to a similar conclusion from somewhat different backgrounds. It would be interesting to hear the three of you revisit this together. Thanks for all of your content.
Each time you have conversations with Annaka, I really enjoy them. First, because you are both remarkably well spoken and intellectually engaging. Second because your enjoyment of each other is so joyful. Excited to listen to her documentary, thanks for this breath of fresh air.
I think its very fitting that this is episode 404…
404 Page Not Found, or is it?
A Zen Koan perhaps.
Haha yes spot on!!
Your conversations with Annaka are so delightful. Therefore, I find it really regrettable that two so smart people, and brilliant communicators, purportedly nondualists and anti-dualists, so consistently talk about consciousness dualistically, as a mental object (or aggregate of objects) that you have direct access to, as mental subjects.
Check out your former guest Jay Garfields video on YouTube "cognitive illusion and the immediacy of experience" (https://youtu.be/HRuOEfnqV6g?si=CqRkcc-0N9QFJ666). That's real non-duality, freeing yourself from introspective illusions.
You simply have to face up to the hard problem of anti-physicalism. If you want to reject physicalism, either you believe the laws of physics are being violated in brains, or you're an epiphenomenonalist., in which case your arguments have nothing to do with consciousness.
Look, if your brain is wired up to find it's internal self-modelling as unquestionably irreducible, important and different in kind to everything else, then that is what you're going to believe. There is no you separate from the beliefs, as they are physically instantiated in your brain. If your brain is wired up to think there is something so significant about it’s self-modeling that it defies reductive computational reductive explanation, then that is what you will believe and express. But there is no you to observe any properties of consciousness. There is no direct access to anything at all. It just doesn't work like that. And that by no means undermines the reality of consciousness.
Other than that. Great podcast!
I just finished listening to this conversation. It was very enjoyable in both content and format. It was a pleasure listening to Sam and Annika speaking back and forth as interviewer and interviewee and as husband and wife. I really appreciate content like this and I am looking forward to hearing the rest of Lights On. Thanks to you both.
By the way, I thought Lights on was an audio book, it's actually an audio documentary. I have actually never listened to an audio documentary on Audible. What a great format! It's over 11 hours long. Super cool!
The problem with science is that it’s limited to what we can perceive with the senses and infer with the intellect. Scientists assume that consciousness arose out of inert matter, but how can that be? The more logical conclusion turns everything around by stating that the world isn’t out there, the world is in you (I’m the world). In other words, objects rise out of consciousness. That means consciousness is the substrate and everything else is just superimposed. The mind is like a virtual reality player and I am just the witness. Thus, non-duality is much more elegant an answer than thinking we can squeeze consciousness out of dead matter. Will scientists ever find the cause of consciousness? No, because they’re looking in the wrong direction.
That’s been my view too. I find the proposition that consciousness “emerges” at some arbitrary point utterly absurd. 10,000 cells don’t have consciousness but 10,001 cells do? It’s ridiculous. What is a “cell” if not a concept we’ve created to describe phenomenona? There are no “cells” in the world, things just are what they are. By describing them we inevitably reduce them to what can be expressed with words - but words aren’t the real thing, otherwise you’d be able to drink the word “water”.
All these phenomena appear in consciousness and the mind creates concepts for them. How could consciousness itself then ever be reduced to being a phenomenon that emerges?
You should check my blog. I have answers to all these questions.
I am so glad you are revisiting this topic. I, for one, have slowly come to a place where if I had to bet, I would say it is fundamental. When I first "realized" this, it was a profound impacting - like and existential crisis that lasted weeks. Over the years, I've been trying to 'disprove' this idea in my own experience - but simply can't. Once the perspective finally shifted, I really couldn't see things any other way. I've spent my life learning all the things from the small to large trying to understand the science of the universe at a deeper level - and the more you learn the more you hear the same punchline; there's more mystery. Things just get weirder and weirder. Now, with this perspective shift, things finally makes "sense" (ironic sense) it terms of what I understand about the universe and my experience. And once consciousnesses became fundamental from my perspective, I simply can't unsee it.
Two things bother me: Sam’s reliance on “there’s something that it’s like to be a ____” as a definition of consciousness; and what do you mean by “foundational?”
What’s it like to be a rock? Well, you sit there and don’t move and don’t have thoughts. Like me when I meditate. Is a hibernating bear like a rock? Sorta. Is a tree stump like a rock? Sorta. Is a sleeping person like a rock? Sorta. Is “defiance” like a rock? Hmmm not really…? For me, for my stupid, rock-like brain, I need a different definition. Or explain the “it’s like something to be something” definition better. If anyone can do it , then Sam.
There’s certainly something that it’s like to be a sleeping human, as made evident by the fact that we have dreams.
Also, a hibernating bear or a person in coma may in fact not have any consciousness in that state, so no, there’s nothing that it’s like to be unconscious, but bears and humans are also able to be awake. Stones on the other hand are never awake, at least not where I live
Yeah. This “something that it’s like” is not working for me. I feel like that guy who can’t see the Magic Eye images.
You really need to talk to Joscha Bach.
Great episode. Bought the doc on Audible. Have Annaka on more!
"What if consciousness is fundamental" is a perfectly valid question to ask... but I fail to see there is any inkling that it will be an interesting question. For all that have been discussed in the podcast, the motivation provided can be summed up as "we know practically nothing about the nature of conscious experience". We don't even have a definition of consciousness.
If we take lack of knowledge as an invitation to conjure up an alternative hypothesis (the default being physicalism), then the hypothesis "Sam Harris is an almighty god that blesses each human being with consciousness" is equally valid and uninteresting. Both are not proven to be incorrect, both shakes up our knowledge of the world, yet we don't dignify one with a serious discussion but we do for the other.
There has to be something that motivates a hypothesis, and unfortunately, I feel like the motivation here is the same wishful thinking as all the religious philosophers of the past who really *wants* there to be more than physicalism.
Addressing the "strong assumption" about physicalism: it's also just a hypothesis. A lack of proof is not a disproof. But different from the other two hypotheses, physicalism have worked pretty darn fine in the past and neuroscience is ever encroaching on what was once thought outside the realm of science.
I should add that Sam's previous discussions on consciousness also doesn't convince me of much, but that is another wall of text
Sam, you mention that an input output would explain a system and it got me thinking
Is consciousness an input on the brain? If it isn't, how is "your brain" able to know that "you" are conscious? And if it is, how is consciousness interacting with matter?
Came here to say ....that I do have an intuition that plants are conscious! and I hope we all gain that feeling/intuition at some point. One thing that I suspect holds us back is our experience of time, because something that "looks like consciousness" to us is movement that reacts to outside stimulus. potentially these time lapse videos will help bridge the gap for anyone curious to have the plants are conscious intuition. https://youtu.be/0gUh6F4kmaw?feature=shared
If we were moving much slower, or had more time to sit and look, we might be thinking about plants differently.
Hi Sam … I just listened to your brilliant wife … My question: since we know that there is a spectrum of human intelligence from lower to high, does consciousness also operate the same way, where by some humans are “more” conscious than others? Thanks …
Season 1 of the Telepathy Tapes podcast made me a believer that telepathy is real. The most current Season 2 episode has Tom Campbell sharing his "Theory of Everything" where he talks about telepathy, and consciousness in general. He also believes that consciousness is fundamental.
What does Annika think about Telepathy and Tom Campbell's theories? I would love to hear a Making Sense show on telepathy and consciousness.
Hey, Sam. Have you or your wife ever had a discussion or interaction with David Bentley Hart regarding this topic? After recently reading him and listening to this conversation, it seems you may each be coming to a similar conclusion from somewhat different backgrounds. It would be interesting to hear the three of you revisit this together. Thanks for all of your content.
I strongly recommend to interview Joscha Bach regarding his conceptive model of consciousness:
https://youtube.com/@joschabach?
si=2HD7ikl0LVnjZFSh
The unification of Sam^Joscha will be an effective conversation for the ages; multiplied by high utility to the listening Audience.