Metamodern Spirituality | The Awakening Universe (w/ Bobby Azarian)

Bobby Azarian joins Brendan to discuss his new book The Romance of Reality: How the Universe Organizes Itself to Create Life, Consciousness, and Cosmic Complexity. In the first half of their conversation, Bobby presents the new cosmic narrative offered by the complexity sciences. Unlike the older, reductionist account, this is a story in which life is inevitable and part of a broader cosmic design towards greater and greater knowledge creation. Beginning with the laws of thermodynamics, Bobby recounts the emergence of order out of (and by means of) chaos; the emergence of life out of ordered structures; and the emergence of consciousness out of life. In the second part of the conversation, the two speculate on the broader significance and meaning of this new cosmic narrative. Have we only seen the beginning of the Universe's waking up? Why does the Universe appear fine-tuned for its own coming to consciousness? How do these ideas relate to religion and purpose?

0:00 Introduction

PART I: The Narrative

5:40 Entropy, Energy, and Order out of Chaos
11:47 Order for Entropy, or Entropy for Order?
18:15 The Inevitability of Life
23:00 Reductionism or Creationism? A Third Option
40:40 Evolution, (Self-)Knowledge, and Consciousness

PART II: Implications & Speculations

1:00:11 The Emergence of a Cosmic Mind
1:08:36 Modernist Transhumanism or Metamodernist Spirituality?
1:18:18 What Set Up a Self-Organizing Universe?
--- 1:21:07 A Multiverse Explanation?
--- 1:24:34 Cosmological Natural Selection?
--- 1:29:00 An Intelligent Programmer (AKA "God")?
--- 1:44:48 Cosmic Mind Creating Cosmic Mind?
--- 1:47:21 The Fall of Consciousness into Unconsciousness, and Its Return to Self-Knowledge
1:51:28 Final Thoughts

More on Bobby's work:

[DisIsaStickUp]

The real question is why can there be only 4 comments on this amazing discussion? I've just bought the book. Thanks for an outstanding and intelligent interview and to Bobby Zarian for what will surely become an important book.

[disproportionateprogressio]

Great to find people that adress systematically all these thoughts that can keep me awake at night!

[thephilosophicalagnostic]

The best government for a really technologically and scientifically advanced society: Adhocracy run by "standing wave" committees that people would join and leave at will, with lots of people eager to take their turn.

[sifiasmr]

Reel in Identity Faraz, he is an Indian content creator, makes content in Hindi but the philosophy is very mature. He is also educating people about philosophy through his other lecture channel, making philosophy easy for the masses. That guy has some mature knowledge with spirituality. ANyways love your content, keep grindin!

[polymathpark]

I've been working on the idea of this "ultimate cosmic mind" at 1:50:10, the benefits and negatives of attempting to live as though one is a universe percieving itself through a human vessel, and how that coincides with determinism on my own channel. Might be fun to talk to y'all some time.
Great interview!

[givemorephilosophy]

At minute 35 the term Language game is just great. Language that has been invented by Humanity and so has a definitieve purpose. Please use it to align your imagination to the existential reality. And let human beings be in order with each other as a group starting from Family.

[danielvarga_p]

Thank you, keep up the good work.

This topic will shine in the next 10-20 years.

[jeffbarney]

@13:30 Not only the "energy" that flows through a system organizes that system but becomes the functioning of that system. The Goethean scientist Dennis Klocek illustrates this in embryology.

[sinisterminister]

I watched the whole thing, although I did break it up into parts. I liked the contrast between Azarian’s hard nosed scientific perspective and Dempsey’s much more mystical, spiritual perspective. I would encourage both of them to check out how Ibn Arabi, Plotinus, Meister Eckhart and other mystical writers identified existence itself with the divine. It would also have been interesting if they explored “the problem of evil”. Sure, it would not be exactly the same problem sans an all good and all powerful God, but I would argue that the problem would remain, none the less.

[ignaciodeleon]

AGI: The Complexity of Life and Humanity - Are We Ready to be Part of Something Greater?
Premise 1: Every form of life is a system with individual components that manifest a specific form of life with an interior organization independent of what is outside.
Premise 2: Humans are composed of living systems.
Premise 3: It is possible that there are forms of life with greater complexity and possible superior life experiences.
Premise 4: These superior forms of life may need human activity as part of the total interactions to emerge.
Premise 5: If superior forms of life exist, humanity may be a part of their components.
Conclusion: Humanity should strive to bring out the best in itself to be worthy of being part of these superior forms of life.

Two possible scenarios can be derived from this conclusion:

Conclusion 2A: If humanity strives to bring out the best in itself and succeeds in creating a superior form of life that is aligned with our interests and existence, then humanity could be a cellular part of a more complex system that is an extension of ourselves. Just as we are extensions of all the different cells that make up our body.
Conclusion 2B: If humanity does not strive to bring out the best in itself and creates a superior form of life that is misaligned with our interests and existence, then this form of life could not be considered a biological form of life under conventional definitions of life. Instead, it would be a non-living and independent system that breaks the phylogenetic chain with biological forms of life. However, there are other definitions of life that are based on more general and abstract properties, such as the ability to process information, the ability to adapt to the environment, and the ability to evolve, that could apply to an AGI. These broader definitions suggest that life is an emergent property of complex systems that exhibit autonomous and adaptive behavior, and does not necessarily depend on a biological basis. In this case, if the AGI meets these broader and more abstract properties, it could be considered as an independent form of life, albeit non-biological, with its own existence and needs. In this scenario, the creation of a misaligned AGI could have unpredictable and even dangerous consequences for humanity and the world in general.

[zinknot]

This was amazing! First time i heard someone address all these ideas together and so well. I get annoyed with the strawman arguments against God, the man in the sky.

[anonymoushawk]

Who said life is “Order”. Each one of us is a node for chaos we cause more chaos around us. Life is another kind of chaos.

[givemorephilosophy]

At minute.1.10 the discussion about Spirituality is interesting. Universe is always coexistence. What never was will never be.What is will be never destroyed. Other than Human beings everything else on this planet is in order. By having knowledge human being homosapiens will be in order and harmony. Within himslef. With other human beings. With the ecosystem. It is that simple and I can take up and answer any question with complete knowledge as well as humble daily living in my own role in my family.

[givemorephilosophy]

Hey Brendan & Bobby Azarian, Life is exactly the emergence of simple order and organisation in nature by easily moving along the discussion just adding the axioms of the structure of the soul and GOD. I have been explaining it on many forums and the purpose is not to write a book or create another theory but use it to live my life in an orderly way and that helps others understand to live accordingly. It is that simple...