How Panpsychism Can Explain Consciousness | Rupert Sheldrake

Rupert Sheldrake is a biologist and author of more than 85 scientific papers and 9 books, and the co-author of 6 books. He was among the top 100 Global Thought Leaders for 2013, as ranked by the Duttweiler Institute, Zurich, Switzerland's leading think tank. His two most recent books Science and Spiritual Practices and Ways to Go Beyond And Why They Work are about rediscovering ways of connecting with the more-than-human world through direct experience.

#conciousness #panpsychism #rupertsheldrake

DELVE DEEPER

[ArjunLSen]

Sheldrake is to me not only brilliant but heroic. He has an outstanding mind, superior to that of the materialist reductionists who sit on their nineteenth century instincts and decry new thinking. But thinking over carefully the two positions as Sheldrake describes them I am convinced that he is right because as far as consciousness and Mind at large go, it is his view that has the greater explanatory power. And like all great minds whose work is so solidly based that it cannot be dismissed, he makes the materialists who think he's mistaken profoundly uncomfortable. They try to dismiss him with titters and polite jokes but despite their superficisl.clevernrss as well as.erudition in science they have no instinct for truth, only in holding on to what they mistakenly imagine is an unassailable doctrine of materialism. Sheldrake is our most reliable and formidable guide to the larger mentalist view of fundamental reality.

[hagitterkeltoub]

sheldrake in my view, is one of the most brilliant thinkers of our time. thank you for clear and coherent explanations.

[eugenesokol]

I love Rupert Sheldrake's view of the conscious universe! It makes more sense than the limited materialistic view.

[bobs]

"Consciousness is the realm of possibility". This is brilliant.

[contemplateeternity]

Another scientist who figured it out. Everything is conscious, just remove yourself from the human experience for a short period of time and it becomes obvious.

[thoughfullylost]

Thank you for putting Rupert sheldrake on he is an amazingly unique and interesting theorist and experimentalist

[EaZiE]

Seems right to me, considering quantum physics, that everything is fitted with possibility. Everything responds to the world in its way (that is called consciousness by pansychists) but the more complex the interactions, the greater consciousness, requires more capable brains which have evolved in humans to achieve it and will continue to do so. All this can only happen if everything is connected.

[guyolive]

That the universe is alive and conscious is an age old buddhist teaching.

[kseniyabobro]

What then is the viewpoint of believing life happened by chance and our existence is random and consciousness emerged within us without a higher purpose, BUT ALSO having the awareness to live a purposeful and meaningful life..

“Maybe that’s enlightenment enough: to know that there is no final resting place of the mind; no moment of smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom...is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go.”

[cpcnw]

See also Donald Hoffman 'The Case Against Reality' and Pim Van Lommell 'Consciousness beyond Life'

[QueenYak]

Such a beautiful man...his mind is so fine.

[nelsonsoucasaux]

One more great talk by one of the most important truly avantgarde scientists of our times.

[ROARobinson]

“Accelerating the slide down the slippery slope into a full blown animism”…love this ❤

[lostmarxbro]

You are that which you are seeking- Francis of Assisi

[bhaskarjyaachatterjee]

I feel this is a stolen concept from Advaita Vedanta Philosophy.
It is more than 2000 years old.

[TheUltimateSeeds]

Panpsychism (and especially its cousin “idealism”) could also help in explaining the phenomenon of “abiogenesis.”

If we can consider the possibility that the universe is “mental” in nature, ...

(as per a Berkeleyan form of idealism, for example)

...then the presumption is that all of the material features of the universe (suns, planets, water, sand, molecules, electrons, etc.) are literally alive* as is suggested in Panpsychism.

*(Note: not conscious or self-aware, just imbued (saturated) with the essence of life (of a higher universal consciousness) in the same way that the substance that forms our dreams is imbued with our own personal life essence).

In that sense, if life is already present within the fabric of reality, then it is simply a tiny little step in accepting how inanimate (yet living) matter could become animate matter in the form of evolvable micro organisms (i.e., abiogenesis).

[meiyuc]

Human beings are really struggling with the hard problem. Until a great genius like Darwin comes about, there might not be a satisfactory explanation to this particularly interesting question.

[markwilson]

Consciousness requires brains made from physical properties. Materialism is the only theory that makes sense.

[miguelbinha]

Latency and potentiality, much more than possibility. "It is possible" seems to be just a covert way of denying one Creator and opening the doors to a multiplicity of origins.

[Bix]

I love Rupert...such an original thinker!
And he is absolutely correct regarding panpsychism/animism vs materialism. Check his facial expressions beginning at around 6:45 - he makes me laugh.