OK. Sorry if my faith and philosophy offends you ... but in respect of what is a good premise, my I have another bite at the cherry?
Not offended by you at all, but I am not particularly fond of the ideology
Basic premise:
Well I would, and I do, agree, but many would dispute that. Many would argue that consciousness arose as the result of a long evolutionary process, some even argue that consciousness is an unexpected side-effect and by-product ...
But whatever ... is not consciousness is a property of something, so how would you define that which is conscious, or how would you define the principle of consciousness?
My understanding of consciousness has to do with awareness and the concept of a Universal Mind (of which we are all within, and are intimately connected to)
Equally, 'consciousness' must be conscious of something, to realise its own consciousness, so we seem to be dealing with subject and object from the outset ... ?
I would agree, but again not everybody would. In the evolutionary series, consciousness is a relative newcomer ... and if so, why would consciousness, as the principle of all things, create a cosmos in which that property is largely absent?
This is where we diverge, as I see the whole Universe as conscious.
We are just one aspect of that Consciousness and we seem quite oblivious to it for the most part. This is our flaw or our handicap which we are to struggle against and overcome (have dominion over), Our state of ignorance that is.
Well the phenomena of consciousness is a fact ... but that it exists is all that one can say as a fact ... but another and equal, if not overwhelming fact, is that for millenia consciousness did not exist?
Are you not opening yourself to the criticism that you are anthropomorphising the Cosmos? You could be said to be rendering everything in relation to consciousness, because you are conscious, whereas creation is creation, and was there for billions of years before man was, and will be there for billions of years after ... in the timescale of the cosmos, consciousness, like humanity, would hardly register?
One could say the same from the perspective of a bacteria in our own body which may not be aware of the entire entity which it dwells within.
So too people do not recognize the being which we dwell within as the scale is so vast compared to ours.
Ah ... hang on ... this is something new ... what is the 'all that is'? It must be more than consciousness, for all the reasons argued above — I can agree that ATI is conscious of Itself as Itself, and It's self-consciousness is perfect, whereas our self-consciousness is imperfect ... but I still would not agree that even perfect self-consciousness is still a
quality or a way of being of a something, so there is still something that is perfectly conscious of itself, but other than its own consciousness ...
Also, 'ATI' would seem not to reside in each consciousness, as many would say they are not conscious of ATI at all.
That is their defect. Not all are oblivious.
And just because a person is completely oblivious to something does not render it untrue.
If there is an ATI it does not then reside in the consciousness of the individual. It is
accessible to the consciousness, but does not reside there ... if it did, everyone would be conscious of it?
That is your take on it, but I don't agree with the logic for reasons I have already explained.
So where, if at all, does it reside?
Everywhere, It is All That Is, It is God, or at least what we can perceive with our limited faculties.
Hmmm ... if consciousness is an individualisation of ATI, even if its the primary and principle individualisation, then it is not itself ATI, and ATI is infinitely more than just consciousness.
The quantity of individualisations occurring does not factor here, its the qualitative determination that is absolute in the equation ...
Is not consciousness itself one mode of being, with its equivalents — semi-consciousness, unconsciousness, non-consciousness ... ?
No, as you are talking about self awareness here and not Consciousness.
Should I call it Super-Consciousness to help you get the difference?
And is not 'psychology' another anthrpomorphism? Who else besides man practices psychology as a self-referential science? A pet might employ apparently psychological strategems to make us do things, but we cannot deduce they study psychology as a science ...
... so to call the universe a 'psychological growth medium' is surely to make everything relative to oneself, rather than relate oneself to the universe?
How many times is life compared to a refiners fire or a purifying experience, a place of choices and testings, where one gets to build what they will only to have it subjected to a final endurance test, so build not on sand, etc.?
Big problems here ... as ATI is now subject to quantitative determination, ATI thus becomes fragmented and dispersed by individualisation, then ATI is subject to growth and decay according to the growth and decay of the universe ... at times there are more of ATI because there are more 'things', and at times less ... and more importantly, when the universe ceases to be, so does ATI ... and surely before the universe was, there was no ATI ... so that brings us round to where did the universe and ATI come from, unless you're saying that both are eternal?
The problem is of your own devising due to your logic manipulations.
Besides it has been postulated that the universe expands and contracts, so it goes through its own (from our point of view) incredibly long birth-life-death-rebirth cycles which are so long that we can scarcely fathom the concept.
And you have to allow for the corruption of ATI ...
Also, the very human assumption — anthropomorphisation again — that 'experience' is what life is all about. Experience is a human concept, to explain its own self-reflective circumstance ... it doesn't have to apply to anything else?
Experience is not something which humans have a monopoly on.
How can ATI be deficient of experience, and still be ATI? If it needs experience, its not all at all ... ?
If C cannot be quantified, then nothing can be predicated of C, which your initial statement does ...
+++
Perhaps this is a fruitless endeavour, but the original point I was trying to get across, and I apologise for doing it badly, is that many of the problems we raise in our speculations have in fact been answered by Greek philosophy ... the road we're travelling has been well-travelled before, and those who have done so have cleared the path for our benefit.
As someone said, 'all philosophy is a footnote to Plato' and to think one has thought up something new and original invariably finds the ancients had been there, done that ...
This
website offers a banquet for consideration.
If there was one place to start, I would check out Johannes Scotus Eriugena, but then that's because he's from the tradition I know, so Christian (even though a 'naughty boy' in many people's eys — not mine, however) ... if Vajradhara's around he might offer something from his own philosophical tradition, and Seattlegal is pretty eclectic, I think ...
... and then there's Earl ... hopefully he would have clocked the mention of Eriugena, that usually makes his ears prick up!
Eriugena is pertinent because he approaches the subject from an anthropological perspective which is very 'now', without falling into the errors of anthropomorphisation ...
Thomas
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