The source of the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness'

[LukeJTM]

Hi all! This is my first time posting on here. I don't know many people on here, I heard about this forum's existence through Discord. But, I don't know how many people on here have used Discord, I think AshvinP goes by the name Awakening Soul on there--he has shared links to some threads on here through Discord to different people (including myself).

I am writing this post to see if anyone here has insight they'd like to share regarding the so-called hard problem of consciousness and its origins (or similar). I know that a few people on here are interested in Rudolf Steiner's epistemology, I am trying to use it for this post.
As far as I understand he encourages people to introspect on themselves and the activity of thinking itself, which seems to be a core facet of esoteric practice. Gaining inner freedom, in thought and action, seems to be the central focus of Steiner's "The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity" (die Philosophie der Freiheit). The way to inner freedom is using introspection or meditation, becoming conscious of what is unconscious within ourselves (which is basically depth psychology).
Steiner tried to demonstrate that knowledge is gained in two core ways: perception (e.g. sensory observation) and concept (e.g. the ideas we have about objects in the sense-world). However, Steiner seemed to argue that the ideas we have about objects are actually shadows of ideas which come from spiritual domains of nature, and give rise to physical processes, and our experiences; we need to do introspective work to gain fuller knowledge of those Ideas (and the beings producing them). Goethe seemed to have a similar approach.
So it would seem that the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity is laying a kind of starting point for esoteric training.

Steiner also tried to demonstrate how it is often the case that the two elements--perception and conception--are initially sort of split into two parts, and as a result we experience duality such as subject and object, I and World, mind and matter, etc. Human beings have a fundamental desire to unify these dichotomies back together.
I think he also tried to demonstrate that humans have a type of reasoning faculty in us that allows us to gain knowledge and things like that. It is a faculty that allows us to transform raw sense-data into meaningful phenomenon. There is an author similar to Rudolf Steiner called Owen Barfield, and I have read a little bit of his work. It seems that he went to great lengths to demonstrate the existence of this subtle reasoning faculty. For example, when I hear bird song, I don't really hear just sound or "sound waves" coming in, there is something inside my mind that turns this raw sound into something that I recognize as a particular bird song.
Another examples is when I read some writing, the raw visual data might just be squiggles on a page but there is a process within me that, unconsciously, turns these squiggles into something with meaning; we see the meaning when we read rather than just arbitrary shapes. This is what is happening when reading this forum.
A great example I heard recently was when we look at some picture, but it's not clear what we are looking at, it just looks confusing; we can't figure out what it is meant to be represent. And when someone points out it what it is meant to represent, e.g. it is meant to be a dog, we then see the dog very easily. It becomes almost impossible to unsee it.
I think this faculty within us is also a cause of the phenomenon called pareidolia.

So what I am hoping to discuss is how this is connected to these various insoluble problems that keep cropping up in modern philosophy and science, such as the 'hard problem of consciousness' (how physical processes create something mental). My supposition so far is that this problem has arisen because there does not seem to be a deep focus on the conceptual activity that is happening within us; as in, the inner faculties that allow us to form these ideas. As Steiner argued in PoSA "He [the materialist] overlooks that, in doing so, he is merely shifting the problem from one place to another. He ascribes the power of thinking to matter instead of to himself. And thus he is back again at his starting point." In other words, these problems originate within ourselves, not in the world itself. Therefore, it is logical that we should look within ourselves to discover the missing knowledge instead of putting total faith into the possibility that, someday, material science will explain all these problems away (which is something a lot of materialists seem to put faith in).

Since I have referred to Steiner's epistemology, I would also like to bring in his "Human and Cosmic Thought". I have only read lecture 1 and 2, I remember that he takes you through the different metaphysics positions like you are going around a circle, and points out that often philosophers can reason to one worldview and just stop there. Which I think is also another source of these hard problems in philosophy such as "how does matter create mind out of itself?".

However, I think another significant source of these conundrums is because modern man (at least in western cultures) has lost connection with spirituality. And therefore limitations of knowledge are inevitable.

I have also noticed that a similar 'hard problem' that keeps cropping up among philosophers and scientists is along the lines of "how do the separate contents of experience unite into a single experience?". However, I believe this 'problem' is solved easily through introspection; it is that subtle Reason faculty (I tried to describe above) that allows us to separate, and unite back together, the contents of experience.

So to finish off, those are my thoughts right now. I am wondering if anyone here has any deeper insight into the cause of the 'hard problem of consciousness', or similar conundrums, because I think it could provide valuable insight that I simply can't give on my own. Or if anyone wants to share any feedback on what I have written feel free to do so. Much thanks.

P. S. I am unsure if I have posted this in the correct room. If I am in the wrong room, please let me know, because I am unfamiliar with how this forum works.

[Stranger]

The 'hard problem of consciousness' only exists within the framework of materialistic ontology, and so this is where it has its origin. It is an artificial/abstract problem pointing to the fact that materialistic ontology is incoherent with reality as it is given in our direct phenomenological conscious experience.

[Federica]

Hi Luke! I haven't read your post yet - I'm writing to say: Welcome, and that you are undoubtedly in the right room (well, yes, I have read your P.S.)

[Cleric K]

I am writing this post to see if anyone here has insight they'd like to share regarding the so-called hard problem of consciousness and its origins (or similar). I know that a few people on here are interested in Rudolf Steiner's epistemology, I am trying to use it for this post.

I would add that in more general terms the hard problem arises in the context of reductionistic thinking. It may not be necessarily materialistic in nature. We can have idealistic reductionism too. If we try to imagine consciousness as 'made of' some miniscule 'particles' of consciousness, then the mode of thinking in essence is not too different from that of materialism. There's still an irreconcilable chasm between the mental picture of what we imagine consciousness to be and the actual real spiritual activity that does the imagining. Also, here in the forum we have spoken before about the fact that reductionism doesn't necessarily imply reducing to 'small' things (like particles). Reductionism refers to the way of thinking, we reduce everything to thoughts, it doesn't matter if the thoughts refer to small or big things. Thus we have used also the term 'mystical reductionism' which pictures one single unity and tries to derive everything from it. Maybe an illustration will help:



Let's imagine that there's spiritual depth to reality symbolized by the spheres. Our intellectual life is like a conceptual cross-section of reality. Reductionism in this sense is any attempt to picture reality entirely as a combination of these circles (concepts) in the intellectual plane. The fact that this intellectual plane is tightly related with the brain, makes it feel that it is only a personal mind.

The path of spiritual development goes through the concentration of thinking such that we begin to sense the deeper currents that underlie purely intellectual thought phenomena.

A hard problem exists for any intellectual endeavor that attempts to make a purely mental model of reality contained in the plane and never attempts to seek the spiritual experience of the depth. Any attempt to solve that problem simply amasses more and and more circles in the plane, which contributes nothing but only makes the whole picture more complicated.

There's nothing inherently wrong with the intellect. In fact, even the picture above, even though 3D looking, is still only a 'circle' in our thinking life. Yet it is fully possible to see that circle as a symbol, as a parable for something that can be experientially known but through certain efforts.

[AshvinP]

However, I think another significant source of these conundrums is because modern man (at least in western cultures) has lost connection with spirituality. And therefore limitations of knowledge are inevitable.

I have also noticed that a similar 'hard problem' that keeps cropping up among philosophers and scientists is along the lines of "how do the separate contents of experience unite into a single experience?". However, I believe this 'problem' is solved easily through introspection; it is that subtle Reason faculty (I tried to describe above) that allows us to separate, and unite back together, the contents of experience.

So to finish off, those are my thoughts right now. I am wondering if anyone here has any deeper insight into the cause of the 'hard problem of consciousness', or similar conundrums, because I think it could provide valuable insight that I simply can't give on my own. Or if anyone wants to share any feedback on what I have written feel free to do so. Much thanks.

P. S. I am unsure if I have posted this in the correct room. If I am in the wrong room, please let me know, because I am unfamiliar with how this forum works.

Hey Luke,

Glad to see you here! As you can see, I moved the post to General Discussion since people generally frequent this section and not the others.

I think another question we can ask to penetrate a bit deeper into the cause is, why is it so difficult for people to notice (and remember) the role of their own first-person conceptual activity when observing the world? After all, Steiner is simply bringing our attention to something very intimate and verifiable to our experience. Perhaps your experience of reading PoF was similar to mine - I wondered, 'how did I miss this reality for so long?' So there is clearly something within our soul-life which actively works towards keeping us in the dark about this integral spiritual activity which should otherwise be obvious to anyone paying close attention to how they make sense of the world.

We could say this something generally manifests as a lack of interest/wonder in the living processes of the world and a tendency to avoid responsibility for exercising our inner faculties. After all, if our thinking isn't integral to the perceptual World Process we observe, then we don't need to follow its thread inwards to the spiritual depths as Cleric illustrated. Then we can continue relying on the familiar and convenient intellect and its circular thoughts on the horizontal plane to investigate the world, because we feel there are no deeper currents of thought-nature modulating the intellectual perspective we are employing. So an inquiry into the deeper causes of the intellectual hard problems really leads us into the depths of our own soul-life, and, as you know, that is what esoteric practice is interested in unveiling as well.

Of course there are even deeper layers to investigate than our personal soul-life, but that's our immediate point of contact with the forces which generally maintain our reductionist thinking on the horizontal plane, continuously confusing our conceptual symbols for realities-themselves, whether they are materialistic, spiritualistic, or anything in between.

[Güney27]

Hello,
I saw videos on Youtube today in which prominent physicists talk about intelligence and extraterrestrial life.
This has caused some thoughts in me, which I would like to share here after a long period of inactivity.
It's nothing new on this forum, but spelling it out myself helps me get a better understanding of things.

..............................
Today's educated man thinks that a higher civilization can be identified by having a magnificently developed intellectual capacity. Such extraterrestrial beings are unconsciously perceived as gods due to their supposed intellectual power. This proves how our intellectual consciousness, tries to dampen down,our understanding of the world. Because our intellectual state of consciousness is, for the majority of its operating time, occupied with things given through the sense organs, it is fair to say that we are trapped in the material world. Our intellect sees itself as the pinnacle of all knowledge and thus closes itself off to everything supernatural. That is not to say the intellectual, that the intellect is something perishable, it is useful for modeling and manipulating the external world, but of little use in the field of ontology, because in its realm, it replaces a living world with abstract, dead and mechanical models

[Güney27]

The hard problem of consciousness emerges from trying to swap our innermost beings for abstract models. Our scientists try in vain to solve the puzzle. It is their discipline of abstract thinking, of modeling reality, that brings these problems to light. In principle, it is not possible to squeeze our spiritual activity into thoughts and say that this chain of thoughts is the reason for my spiritual activity, although without the activity that produces them and their meaning, this chain of thoughts would never have existed.
Our physiology correlates with our states of consciousness, but this fact is not sufficient to reduce our consciousness to those. I recently read that Steiner recommends perceiving things in the outside world as symbols, for example snow for purity and so on....
Wouldn't human physiology also be a symbol for our innermost being? I find it interesting to think about the esoteric meaning of our body.

[LukeJTM]

The 'hard problem of consciousness' only exists within the framework of materialistic ontology, and so this is where it has its origin. It is an artificial/abstract problem pointing to the fact that materialistic ontology is incoherent with reality as it is given in our direct phenomenological conscious experience.

I think everyone here grasps that much. I intended the post to look more deeply into this, and/or other connected factors that give rise to these "hard problems".

[LukeJTM]

Hi Luke! I haven't read your post yet - I'm writing to say: Welcome, and that you are undoubtedly in the right room (well, yes, I have read your P.S.)

Thanks, Federica. I originally posted it in a different room, but AshvinP said he moved it to general.

[LukeJTM]

I would add that in more general terms the hard problem arises in the context of reductionistic thinking. It may not be necessarily materialistic in nature. We can have idealistic reductionism too. If we try to imagine consciousness as 'made of' some miniscule 'particles' of consciousness, then the mode of thinking in essence is not too different from that of materialism. There's still an irreconcilable chasm between the mental picture of what we imagine consciousness to be and the actual real spiritual activity that does the imagining. Also, here in the forum we have spoken before about the fact that reductionism doesn't necessarily imply reducing to 'small' things (like particles). Reductionism refers to the way of thinking, we reduce everything to thoughts, it doesn't matter if the thoughts refer to small or big things. Thus we have used also the term 'mystical reductionism' which pictures one single unity and tries to derive everything from it.

You make some very interesting points in your post. Such as how reductionism can also reduce everything to thoughts (conceptual models for ex.), rather than just physical things. I hadn't considered that side before.
Since this forum also is about Bernardo Kastrup, his idealism does seem guilty of using the idealist reductionism you are speaking of. I've noticed that his model, generally, doesn't seem much different from materialism in terms of how it functions. Because, he basically posits some blind Will force that creates the physical world, as well as experiences (it seems to function the same as blind matter honestly), and that our minds are something 'dissociated' from the cosmic mind until we die...not much different from how materialists consider minds to be something totally private or isolated from everything else, except that it's reduced to some 'dissociative boundary' rather than brain chemistry. And so on.

Regarding the mystical reductionism. Perhaps it is more useful to focus on HOW everything is one? And, trying to cultivate oneness in practice (for ex. meditation) could be useful? Do you have any thoughts on that?