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- I am learning about some insane stuff in English right now, so let me break down what I just learned
- Overview: We do not know how consciousness exists-- this is called the Hard Problem of Consciousness. This comes from the idea that atoms and molecules themselves do not innately have consciousness. That being said, we as humans have a conscience. We believe that conscience is within the brain however, science says that it is not within the brain but rather outside of the brain. Breaking it down into different types of analysis, we have 1. Materialism. 2. Idealism (Platonism). 3. Dualism
Materialism is the perspective that says memories and awareness come from certain parts of the brain. Derrida (a psychoanalyst) found through various tests that there is no part of the brain that is traceable to memories. Many have questioned how dementia works; this is not technically known. When scientists were studying the memories of mice, monkeys, and caterpillars (butterflies), they would find the active parts of their brain during remembers and then remove the active parts, and they still had the ability to remember. Across all species, no matter how much of the brain was removed, memory was still found. There was also a study done on a microscopic organism that has about 10% of brain tissue compared to humans; this organism also had the capability to remember despite the removal of the majority of the tissue. This brings us to Idealism (also known as Platonism after Plato's allegory of the cave)- Materialism
Idealism is the theory that memory comes from a kind of "resonance," as Derrida, among other analysts, thought. The idea is that memories come from outside of the brain (memories and consciousness) from a type of wave patterns that activate memories. From Plato's allegory of the cave (which if you don't know is the story about how people who have been taught what certain things are their entire lives will have a hard time understanding and accepting beliefs that challenge this thought process, and that those who do understand it cannot express this in any terms those inside the cave will remember) another thought came called "deconstructionism" where you deconstruct your personal beliefs, hence the foundations of idealism. This is how science came to think that among the various possibilities, René Descartes' most famous line is "I think, therefore I am" or, as he said, "Cogito, ergo, sum" because he wanted to understand consciousness. Together, they found that based on what we know, and can know, memories (and consciousness) are found outside of the brain as a type of resonance.- Idealism (Platonism)
- Dualism
Dualism is a combination of both materialism and idealism. In other words, dualism says that for consciousness to work, there has to be a physical part of the brain that receives the message from the metaphysical "resonance" outside of the brain that transforms it into memory. The best, and most sound, metaphor for this is like a radio: When the radio is destroyed, is the music gone? No, the music still exists however, the receiver, transformer, or other part that makes the radio work is broken and therefore seems as though it does not exist. We can think of it like this as well. What is the thing you love the most? If you destroyed it, would that mean that love is gone? No, we still know what love is, even if we don't love anything, because we understand that the lack of love must be love, and therefore love exists.
HOW DOES THIS TIE INTO QUANTUM PHYSICS???- WELL!!!
Quantum physics and the understanding of practically the universe is the method saying that things can only work as long as they are being perceived WHICH means that a resonance of memory must, therefore, be somewhere because-- while not in memory form-- it has to be received consciously in order to work and function SO memory (and thereby conscious) must be found outside of the brain because even without a brain memory still exists, even in our most unconscious states we know that it exists because we can lack it. Also, since quantum mechanics relies on the conscious perception of "it," there is a resonance that is found outside of the brain (like a transmitted message or song) that connects the two into a physical thing. In other words, conscious perception of quantum mechanics is only able to work so long as there is a transmitted connection outside of the brain....
Here are my sources :) (Note entirely sure you can access them since they are from my downloads folder) (Also there are more I just can't find/upload as links)
https://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/observations/coming-to-grips-with-the-implications-of-quantum-mechanics/file:///C:/Users/donts/Downloads/ACC%20-%20ENG%20122%20-%20Unit%204%20Week%2011%20-%20James%20D.%20Madden%20-%20The%20Case%20for%20Dualism%20pp.%2019-30.pdf
file:///C:/Users/donts/Downloads/ACC%20-%20ENG%20122%20-%20Unit%204%20Week%2012%20-%20James%20D.%20Madden%20-%20The%20Case%20for%20Dualism%20pp.%2030-36.pdf
file:///C:/Users/donts/Downloads/ACC%20-%20ENG%20122%20-%20Unit%204%20Week%2011%20-%20Plato's%20Allegory%20of%20the%20Cave%20-%20excerpt%20from%20the%20Republic%20-%20CAVE.pdf
Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness
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Nono <3
Omg I love this post!!