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My unfounded pet theory is that everything other than us has always had a form of consciousness... that is, a feeling of presence. But that it’s tied to a feeli

My unfounded pet theory is that everything other than us has always had a form of consciousness... that is, a feeling of presence. But that it’s tied to a feeling of connectedness. The insect doesn’t differentiate the presence of itself from the presence of the flower it’s in. It’s all one presence. So what we label “consciousness” is the ability to turn off the connectedness thing. We see ourselves as present and everything else as abstract or distant. I think it’s evolutionarily adaptive, because the insect doesn’t _really_ care if it’s eaten by the flower. It’ll recoil from stress but it won’t fight to continue to exist with the same fervor that a “conscious” creature will. But the irony for many of us is we are on a journey to rekindle that connected feeling. A major goal of life for some is to shed the lie of individualism and keep in mind the truth we knew before we became “conscious”—that we don’t really exist separately from the world around us. We are part of thousands of collective consciousnesses and we can only perceive the world at all through those collective eyes.

adwn 6y ago
> I think it’s evolutionarily adaptive, because the insect doesn’t _really_ care if it’s eaten by the flower. It’ll recoil from stress but it won’t fight to continue to exist with the same fervor that a “conscious” creature will. What I conclude from your statement is that you've never watched a nature documentary in your entire life. A fly in a spider web: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0SkOXtq7Nw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0SkOXtq7Nw Seems to me that this fly doesn't really consider itself a part of the spider web, and it very much cares whether it'll be eaten by the spider. It also seems to put up quite the fight. By your theory, that would mean the fly is conscious.
- erikpukinskis 6y ago
  I think you can, via instincts and learning, recoil. But... have you ever been in fight or flight mode? Subjectively it doesn’t feel like consciousness to me, it’s more a form of blacking out. I’m not suggesting that “human consciousness“ is what allows us to recoil. I’m saying it adds another layer of survivalism on top of normal organism survival. It allows someone to move their family across an ocean, or spend your life building rockets to get off Earth. Like, I don’t think Elon musk would be trying to get to Mars without his human consciousness telling him not just that humans are unique and distinct from the world, but that he personally is unique and distinct from the world. And I guess I’m saying there’s another form of “consciousness” which I guess I have to call “life consciousness” to differentiate it from this “human consciousness” and that the differentiating factor that human consciousness feels separate from other consciousnesses. And that was an evolutionary advantage for us apes and our survival. Definitely not suggesting it’s the only way an organism fights for its survival.

adwn 6y ago

> I think it’s evolutionarily adaptive, because the insect doesn’t _really_ care if it’s eaten by the flower. It’ll recoil from stress but it won’t fight to continue to exist with the same fervor that a “conscious” creature will. What I conclude from your statement is that you've never watched a nature documentary in your entire life. A fly in a spider web: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0SkOXtq7Nw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0SkOXtq7Nw Seems to me that this fly doesn't really consider itself a part of the spider web, and it very much cares whether it'll be eaten by the spider. It also seems to put up quite the fight. By your theory, that would mean the fly is conscious.

erikpukinskis 6y ago
I think you can, via instincts and learning, recoil. But... have you ever been in fight or flight mode? Subjectively it doesn’t feel like consciousness to me, it’s more a form of blacking out. I’m not suggesting that “human consciousness“ is what allows us to recoil. I’m saying it adds another layer of survivalism on top of normal organism survival. It allows someone to move their family across an ocean, or spend your life building rockets to get off Earth. Like, I don’t think Elon musk would be trying to get to Mars without his human consciousness telling him not just that humans are unique and distinct from the world, but that he personally is unique and distinct from the world. And I guess I’m saying there’s another form of “consciousness” which I guess I have to call “life consciousness” to differentiate it from this “human consciousness” and that the differentiating factor that human consciousness feels separate from other consciousnesses. And that was an evolutionary advantage for us apes and our survival. Definitely not suggesting it’s the only way an organism fights for its survival.