Mobile marine organisms, increasingly
sensitive to environmental alterations, responded, e. g., by either approaching
life-enhancing heat or avoiding excessive heat. Eventually, one organism also
felt the heat. That organism had become sensitive enough not only to respond
and move but also to sense. This qualitative change initiated
consciousness. Sensations were followed by perceptions, thoughts and
imagination. By definition, the earliest sensation cannot have been intended or
planned because intention and planning presuppose consciousness.
Although, as yet and as far as we know,
consciousness is only a minute part of the cosmic process, the entire process is
necessary to generate consciousness:
the initial explosion filled space with
gasses composed of the lightest elements;
gravitational collapse of gas into stars generated the density and heat that synthesize heavier elements necessary for life;
stellar explosions fill a second generation of stars and planets with heavier elements;
some life became conscious.
gravitational collapse of gas into stars generated the density and heat that synthesize heavier elements necessary for life;
stellar explosions fill a second generation of stars and planets with heavier elements;
some life became conscious.
If the initial explosion had not
occurred, then consciousness would not exist. If the stars were not there, then
we would not be here. Did the explosion occur in order to generate consciousness
and do the stars exist for the same purpose? No, because a purpose presupposes
consciousness. If any powerful intelligent beings did design this universe, then
their consciousness must have originated elsewhere. Consciousness as such cannot
fulfill any purpose. Our universe generates consciousness. Other conceivable
universes do not.
There are at least three cosmic eras:
BC, Before Consciousness; AC, Animal Consciousness; HC, Human Consciousness.
Only in the third era can conscious beings discuss consciousness – and disagree
about it. Many of our contemporaries do not agree that there was a BC in this
sense. There are many theists. Also, when I was a Philosophy Evening Class
Tutor, a student argued that what I call the BC era depends on consciousness
because we cannot discuss it without referring to consciousness, even if the
consciousness in question is just our consciousness of the hypothetical era
while we are discussing it! Certainly our discussion of a hypothetical BC era
depends on our consciousness of it but how can the era itself depend on our
later consciousness? Surely it is the other way around. And, if not, then how
did we originate?
Believers in a BC can regard it as
preparing for consciousness provided that they do not interpret this preparation
in a way that presupposes consciousness. It is only we who look back at an
earlier period and regard it as preparing for ours. The formation of the English
Channel “prepared for” the history of Britain as an island. Earth’s uniquely
large satellite may have “prepared for” life by gravitationally thinning out the
terrestrial atmosphere, then “prepared for” land life by causing large tides
facilitating the evolution of amphibians.
Being became conscious. Every other
event either prepares for or elaborates this. The heat/cold and pleasure/pain
dichotomies must have been early sensations. Organisms approaching food and
evading predators at some stage began to feel hunger and fear. Amphibians
learned the difference between dry and wet.
Consciousness, although of supreme value
to us as reflective beings, originated as a by-product of natural selection,
because pleasure and pain have survival value. An active organism that
experiences harm as pain fears pain so avoids harm. Biologically, we help kin
because they bear the same genes as us and help others because they might help
us in return. Psychologically, this is experienced not as calculating
self-interest but as moral obligation. We value self-conscious beings as ends,
not as means, but this is our value system, the system of self-conscious
beings. It is not written in the heavens. Being will continue if consciousness
ceases.
The neutrality of being on moral issues
need not concern us because only self-conscious beings can have values.
We make value judgements. We start by needing heat, food etc for
survival, regard these as good things at least for ourselves, naturally share
them with our offspring and close kin because we are social, not solitary,
animals who live or die in groups and then extend moral obligation to the rest
of mankind. The Samaritan is our neighbour. We naturally extend the word “good”
from its non-moral use, applied to things we need and like, to its moral use,
meaning the obligation to share such “good” things with others.
“Being” means only that which is
independently of consciousness whether or not it is an enduring substance. Its
nature is the subject of scientific enquiry. It is also called “nature”,
“matter”, “mass”, “energy” etc, is the subject of all consciousness and becomes
self-conscious through organisms which are individual subjects. We can
say that being values consciousness but it only does so through conscious
beings. It only values anything through conscious beings.
There may be a PC, Post-Consciousness,
era. We do not know whether consciousness will transcend entropy, escape to
another universe or end soon:
mental states are momentary;
conscious beings are transient;
consciousness has so far existed through finite time on Earth and might end here soon.
conscious beings are transient;
consciousness has so far existed through finite time on Earth and might end here soon.
Some Hindu scriptures identify the
Absolute as Being-Awareness-Bliss or Existence-Knowledge-Joy. This formula
corresponds to one interpretation of the Christian Trinity which personifies the
three aspects:
the Father is (“I Am”);
the Son or Word is his self-knowledge;
the Spirit is their joyous union.
the Son or Word is his self-knowledge;
the Spirit is their joyous union.
I disagree on several grounds
with Christianity but the Hindu formula scores two out of three. Like
Christianity, and like all idealist philosophy, it reifies consciousness but it
also recognizes both the primacy of being and the transcendent nature of
contemplative experience, the “joy” of the unitive awareness of being.
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