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Is Consciousness a Result of Evolution
- Thread starter idav
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Cobol
Code Jockey
The bicameral state is a hypothesis in psychology that argues that the human mind once assumed a state in which cognitive functions were divided between one part of the brain which appears to be "speaking", and a second part which listens and obeys.
It was the normal and ubiquitous state of the human mind as recently as 3000 years ago. Humans would have experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of a schizophrenic. Rather than making conscious evaluations in unexpected situations, the person would hallucinate or get admonitory advice or commands and obey without question.
The Conscious of one's own thought processes that often direct the behavior of those labeled schizophrenic. So basically consciousness began when visual and auditory hallucinations of god stopped, so yes consciousness is a result of human evolution.
It was the normal and ubiquitous state of the human mind as recently as 3000 years ago. Humans would have experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of a schizophrenic. Rather than making conscious evaluations in unexpected situations, the person would hallucinate or get admonitory advice or commands and obey without question.
The Conscious of one's own thought processes that often direct the behavior of those labeled schizophrenic. So basically consciousness began when visual and auditory hallucinations of god stopped, so yes consciousness is a result of human evolution.
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That is an interesting take especially considering what makes language possible is the processing of mental objects.
Yes.
Our consciousness is a special what if scenario: What if consciousness were a time bound process? What if knowledge was limited? In another sense we are answers to the questions "What is knowledge?" "What is knowing?" and "What am I?" People can consider questions about what is real and where did we come from. This is a special thing to do. Rocks cannot do it. Omniscient things could not do it either. Our consciousness is neither tiny nor enormous. It is the right size to ponder what it means to know.
I also agree that evolution is what gives rise to our consciousness, but I think our consciousness models some latent potential that exists in the Mathiverse.
allfoak
Alchemist
If the hypothesis is correct.
I hold Consciousness to be fundamental and the universe is all a play/drama of the One Consciousness.
Nothing really special (as the source is One) but humans exhibit consciousness operating through the most sophisticated brain on earth and thus capable of exhibiting the highest level of conscious found on earth.
Human consciousness isn't special. Human intelligence is, at least on this planet, but not consciousness. My dogs are conscious just like I am.
Even if there were a god that injected consciousness into us, that god didn't create it. Like us, it must have found itself conscious before it made its first decision, and cannot therefore be its author or inventor..
Doesn't a fundamental consciousness diminish the idea of humans having a "higher" level of consciousness compared to other lifeforms?
Why? Consciousness is One, Infinite and Eternal. It illuminates all finite living forms to the capacity of the form. Hence a human can experience more sophisticated consciousness than a mouse because of the human's more complex brain.
Evolution is funny in a way that it doesn't really allow us to break down consciousness without considering level of intelligence. It is the point that chemicals appear to be learning that consciousness even seems like a thing otherwise it would just be chemical reactions via stimuli.
When you say there is a "higher level of consciousness" it implies evolution to achieve such a thing.
The human brain evolved to allowed to for higher (more sophisticated) consciousness than say a mouse. Think of a 20 Watt bulb and a 1,000 Watt bulb. The current than runs through both is of the same type but the 1,000 Watt bulb is capable of producing higher illumination. The same power source (Consciousness/God/Brahman) illuminates all bulb sizes (living things).
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The bulb thing makes sense at an atomic level but not going to the chemical level where more sophistication means lifeforms with the ability to learn simply based on chemical complexity. When looking at different species of animal and other non-aware things in nature, one can easily see the evolutionary process going from simple sensory to cognition. Your implying all action/reaction is equal to sensing but not all chemical reactions imply any sort of cognition nor do simple physical reactions.
Remember that I come from the position that the material can never produce consciousness. Consciousness is the fundamental mystery and incarnates the material with consciousness.
I think it should be pretty obvious to anyone who studies the nature of consciousness and knows a thing or two about evolution that consciousness evolved to help us defend ourselves from threats and dangers. It serves an important function in self defense by identifying and defining the "self" that is to be defended.
Without consciousness, we would still have reflexive self defenses -- such as ducking our heads when something is thrown at them -- but we would not know to defend ourselves against perhaps the majority of threats and dangers to us.
Consciousness also appears to serve an important -- and closely related -- role in foresight.
Without consciousness, we would still have reflexive self defenses -- such as ducking our heads when something is thrown at them -- but we would not know to defend ourselves against perhaps the majority of threats and dangers to us.
Consciousness also appears to serve an important -- and closely related -- role in foresight.
We still have the ontological (or metaphysical) problem of understanding the relationship of consciousness to those chemicals. I believe that we have four formulations:
materialism - consciousness is an epiphenomenon of matter like wetness with water,not water molecule is wet, and no atom or neuron is conscious, but if enough of the proper material elements are brought together inthe right way, consciousness arises fromthem
idealism - matter is derivative of mind, which is the most fundamental (or only) substance. George-ananda seems to represent this school.
neutral monism - mind and matter are both derivative of the same prior substance.
dualism - mind and matter are radically disparate substances unrelated to one another (Descartes).
You and others might find this article called "A New Theory Explains How Consciousness Evolved" at
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/06/how-consciousness-evolved/485558/ of interest. Here's an excerpt:
"What is the adaptive value of consciousness? When did it evolve and what animals have it? The Attention Schema Theory (AST), developed over the past five years, may be able to answer those questions. The theory suggests that consciousness arises as a solution to one of the most fundamental problems facing any nervous system: Too much information constantly flows in to be fully processed. The brain evolved increasingly sophisticated mechanisms for deeply processing a few select signals at the expense of others, and in the AST, consciousness is the ultimate result of that evolutionary sequence. If the theory is right—and that has yet to be determined—then consciousness evolved gradually over the past half billion years and is present in a range of vertebrate species."
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
That happens even now. The phrases "My heart says", "it is my heart's desire" are because of this.The heart does not say or desire anything. It is part of our own brain. One part talks, the other listens. Rumination. Consciousness is because of evolution.
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I feel like the ontological issues of consciousness have to ignore chemical and biological evolution. Just looking at the history of the earth alone through a scientific lens would suggest consiousness is a complex system of interaction, energy harnessing and chemical reactions. Any extraordinary feats we think impossible would easily be achieved in the quantum realm.
Some have suggested that interactions in time is what allows anything to have the ability to know and react in a way that utilizes changes over a span of events.