I'd like to chime in with a couple of responses, DrFree. I think there are a handful of points you made that warrant further discussion. Also, having somewhat of a background in philosophy, I'd like to present an entirely
different view on the nature of sentience (
i.e.,
consciousness).
DrFree said:
Our own sentience seems to be an emergent property of the behavior of our brains (although the boundary between brain processes and other processes is indeed a tenuous one).
Hmmm ...
so tenuous, in fact, that while sentience may
seem to some to be emergent, I would submit that it is not. The idea of emergent sentience, or
`epiphenomenalism,' is simply the result we get when we apply Ockham's Razor to our effort to understand mind (or consciousness). But I believe our reasoning here is flawed, because it rests on incomplete (because, ultimately,
short-sighted) observations.
Were we to further investigate consciousness, we would find that it
not, in fact, epiphenomenal - but in many ways
just the reverse. As I suggested in my first post on this thread, another (and common enough) view of consciousness (sentience, mind, etc.) is the
Cartesian view, in which the outer world (
res extensa) of physical forms is complemented by a subjective, or interior world (
res cogitans) -
of equal ontological signficance. But I would go further, and suggest that it is the
latter world (or worlds), which is the more fundamental (important, basic, vital, etc.), and this becomes a critical factor as we draw analogies between Gaia and human states of being ... and relationships amongst/between each of these.
DrFree said:
If Gaian sentience is like human sentience (and we don't have evidence of another model), then we would need to look for a similar information system on a Gaian scale. One hypothesis is that human being and computers function like a network of neurons, with high volumes of data (signals) passing among them.
Again, I disagree with the first statement, because I find the evidence for non-emergent sentience
voluminous and
unending. It simply requires a different means of approach than most individuals are willing to invest - or at least a deeper level of commitment. Armchair philosophy
will very unlikely lead to the conclusion that consciousness exists
prior to and
apart from the physical body, exterior world, etc.
Simply reading the right books will also probably fall short ... and although
direct experience is usually part of the prerequisite, even this can be questioned - such that a skeptic
will remain a skeptic until s/he becomes sick of it, and finally admits of another possibility (of understanding, or interpretation).
But the point regarding neural networks seems
unavoidable as we draw parallels to Gaia Theory and to what is
known about the human brain (as an
instrument, or
agent of consciousness - its
seat in the physical body, as Descartes pointed out). I don't think I emphasized nearly well enough in my earlier post(s) that we should consider
at least hypothetically that consciousness is active (let alone present!) at other "levels" or in other
states of being (than the physical). This becomes
critical if we are to see certain parallels between the microcosmic (human) dimension and the macrocosmic (Gaian) dimension of being, let alone beyond ... Gaia relative to even greater entities .... as DrFree mentions.
DrFree said:
Of course, just because we have an information network doesn't mean that sentience has emerged. In human beings, that took millions of years of evolution (yes, well before homo sapiens emerged as a species).
I think this is begging the question -
"Just exactly how did sentience emerge?" Admittedly (and obviously), yes, there has been progress in the evolution of consciousness. This much can be agreed upon, but what most upholders of evolutionary theory seem to overlook, is that history -
especially if one looks beyond (or behind) the prejudiced, short-sighted view of the "experts" - is as marked by
decline(s) in culture(s) and civilization(s) as by rise(s) or increase. And yet, as even the
experts of western, conventional science have begun to discover, the familiar picture of stupid, Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal ape-man evolving into super-intelligent, genius (
sic) homo sapiens ...
is flawed. Not even flawed, it is patently absurd.
This is not the proper forum to argue the (true) age of the Pyramids or Great Sphinx, but as I have pointed out several times ... posterity will one day show that we are looking at 200,000+ year old
Temples -
and not the 4 or 5 thousand year old
tombs which biased Egyptologists (such asDr.Zahi Hawass) maintain. Even today's research shows that we can easily date the
water erosion damage on these structures
prior to the most recent flood of approx. 10,000 years BC. And since the jury is still out regarding the
exact methods used to construct these amazing monuments ... I think we had better allow, at least for the present, that the degree of architectural perfection (or
precision) found in such structures is evidence, itself, of a level of knowledge
even in excess of that found among today's "expert" builders. And what of it?
Well, it just means we'd better leave off the usual round of hasty conclusions about history being a spontaneous, chance ascent from
stupid, ape-like hominids
... to the brilliant
Einsteins of today. If civilizations such as Atlantis
did exist (say, 1 million to
5 million years ago), we have every reason to believe that they were
every bit as accomplished as we are today - and even
more so, in certain ways. Stories indicate
universally that ultimately the Atlanteans could not sustain their society, because their focus became selfish and
their development imbalanced ... relative to a greater evolutionary scheme (
sic).
History repeats itself, and the Atlanteans were apparently not the first civilization (for certainly
Mu, or Lemuria preceded her - at least accordingly to legend) to bring the karmic fruit of (exterior - not
ultimate) destruction upon themselves. Nor were they the last, according to an overall
consensus opinion of most spiritual traditions ... as discussed on
other threads & forums on this site. Our days -
especially the decadent ones - are numbered, thus our every action (both individual & collective) helps determine the future ...
on every scale! And this has
everything to do with Gaia Theory, because ...
It suggests that
somehow, the planet has survived whatever cataclysms have occurred in the past - whether humanly (
i.e., karmically) precipitated, or natural, such as by meteors, comets, earthquakes, flood, etc. What then,
is the nature of the relationship between humanity and this planet ... if we have survived the numerous cataclysms - over millions of years (regardless of one's stance on prior continents/civilizations) - which have threatened our very existence? Why are we still here ... or if one wants to ask the opposite question,
why are we threatened again & again by such cataclyms & the (apparent) threat of extinction?
DrFree said:
A question that I think still needs to be answered is how sentience could emerge in a single individual. Human beings evolved to be sentient. Step by step over the eons, slight changes transformed simple sensory awareness into sentience.
Allowing, for a moment, that this is an
accurate picture of our
physical development
from an exterior perspective - and taking into account the broadest sweep of time (yes, millions of years) - this seems, indeed, to be the critical question! An even more important one, for most, is: "
Why did we become conscious/self-conscious
in the first place!?!"
But I submit that we are barking up the wrong tree if we hold
for one second to the mistaken notion that
anything in all of Cosmos is "but a fortuitous occurrence of atoms," as the
blind physicists of yesterday conjectured. We may be wary of making drastic statements that smack of `Intelligent Design' theory ... but let's at least admit the obvious - there are
too many coincidences even in just the room you sit in ... to be so naive. That there is
guidance involved -
from somewhere, somehow ... whatever our own personal angle on this question ... should be openly explored. Any other approach is simply to ignore the forest for one's favorite
& more familiar tree.
DrFree said:
Gaia, however, is an individual, not a species. It does not evolve, it changes. It's systems change through the evolution of individual species, and the emergence of Gaian sentience is unlikely to have been a factor in that evolution.
That doesn't rule out the emergence of Gaian sentience, but it does require a new model of how it happened.
I agree that it is difficult to compare the notion of Gaia (as an individual) to an individual human being,
precisely because the scale of being we're looking at in the case of Gaia is much vaster.
I begin to beg the question, if I simply state that Gaia is one of numerous planetary existences of the same scale ... which I did in my first post in this thread. However, I cannot avoid stating this idea
at least tentaively ... since it helps to
bridge the gaps between neurons in some kind of a Galactic brain, just as humans (as brain cells) do in
Gaia's brain.
If we can accept such a notion
tentatively, then much more will fall
gracefully into place, and the end result (to skip
quite a few intermediate propositions, I realize) ... is that a comprehensive picture of
Universal Cooperation emerges, in which all beings - and being itself - is shown to have its proper place & purpose. This is no less than a Cosmology and an Anthropology in which
Unified Field Theory becomes a vital
first step toward understanding the real,
scientific mechanics (or
physics/metaphysics) of our environment. And the ideas are really
nothing new - they are but fresh formulations of ideas that have been taught since the dawn of time (however many civilizations back this may go).
I have no space here to rehash this proposition regarding
Gaia-like entities .... but I feel this is
an incredibly important topic - given our unhealthy obsession with polluting our planet and pushing her & ourselves to the very brink of destruction. If we could but understand the depth, and true significance, of relationships between ourselves & the planet - we might be less inclined to "
leave it all up to G-d," as many are wont to do ... or to
pass the proverbial buck of responsibility, which seems to characterize
too many of Gaia's human inhabitants' lives/attitudes. DrFree, your next statements are poignant ...
DrFree said:
Another question is the mental health of Gaia. A healthy mind in a healthy human brain requires sound integration of a large number of subsystems, and not just those within the brain/mind. If Gaia were to become sentient now, I would expect her (to use the classical pronoun) to be schizophrenic. The various human cultures are too much at odds for a healthy global mind to emerge.
But that might be precisely the challenge. A healthy Gaia depends on a healthy earth and a healthy, integrated relationship among human cultures. A NeoGaian religion, one in which all local religions acknowledge and welcome the God in other local religions, while at the same time engaging in respectful dialog with one another, might be a path towards world peace that we have not yet found.
By the way, if Gaia is the sentience of the earth, might there not be a God of the Universe? (Communication among astronomical nodes, measured over light-years, would seem to be too slow to be translated into human communication. I don't think the difference in scale can be bridged.)
I would contest this last bit,
sound on the surface of the argument, but even 4th-dimensionally, space as we know it is virtually annihilated. Other factors enter in, when we consider interplanetary and interstellar communication - even between entities on the scale of Earth's
Gaia. However, both travel and communication are not hindered by the issues with which science still struggles in today's theorizing.
The solution will come once we admit to two recognitions: (a) the one, regarding the nature of consciousness and being - as I have argued already -
such that we come to know ourselves as existing in 4th-dimensional (or emotional), 5th-dimensional (or intellectual), and greater (Spiritual) levels of awareness & being, and (b) the greater exploration of our interior being amidst or upon these levels, such that we become equally adept at
self-consciously living in these worlds, and in manipulating the matter (or material) thereof ... as we are in the physical, or exterior, world.
It is not that we do not already
have being within subtler worlds, or states of consciousness (the
res cogitans) ... it is simply that most of us are not
self-conscious therein & thereof. This becomes a useful comparison as we explore the nature of the being
and awareness of the entity,
Gaia - for it is one thing to have sentience,
and another entirely to have
self-sentience, or self-consciousness. And that latter, as we well know, is not simply the
pinnacle of individual attainment - for anyone half-awake can observe that
"not all self-consciousnesses are equal" (to put it awkwardly) ... there being greater
qualities of self-consciousness, up until the point that the personal
ego - as most of us have come to know ourself - is
transcended and all but forgotten, having given over to a more inclusive view & understanding of "self." This begs
all sorts of philosophical questions ... but then, this is a forum and an ever-evolving discussion, so if this is not the place to do it, I don't know what is!
I will defer my re-visitation of esoteric ideas regarding Gaia-like entities until a future post ... sometime soon, I hope, in order to mesh with this already-lengthy treatise.
Peace,
andrew