> If you’re a materialist, you probably think that rabbits are conscious... But only someone who is coming from a perspective outside of materialism would find

> If you’re a materialist, you probably think that rabbits are conscious... But only someone who is coming from a perspective outside of materialism would find this "consciousness" some magical property. The conclusion that "the United States is probably conscious" is only interesting or shocking if you come from a perspective that human consciousness is some special thing to begin with. From a materialist perspective the idea that essentially 'all complex systems share a lot in common, including what we would call "consciousness"' is sort of the point. When you regard consciousness as not particularly more interesting than any other complex system, such as a tornado, because it is just a material process like any other, driven by the same forces as any other, then all of the wind is taken out of this argument. Only someone who already objects to materialism would find this claim remotely interesting.