Peter Forrest - Is Consciousness Ultimate Reality?

Is consciousness deepest reality, the ground of being of the cosmos? If the question is "What brought all into existence?" the answer is "Consciousness". Some say this is a 'cosmic consciousness' of which our personal consciousness is a small part. Others, that the ultimate consciousness is God. Others, that consciousness and cosmos are both deep reality.



Peter Forrest teaches the areas of Epistemology and Metaphysics at the University of New England. He works in the area of the philosophy of physics, epistemology, the philosophy of religion, and other issues in metaphysics and epistemology.


Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[johnsagnella]

I just learned more about what he is than what consciousness is.

[theotormon]

I think his argument makes perfect sense and is quite logical. I believe he is saying that the feeling of there being an observer to qualia is just another "appearance" in the qualia itself. Generally speaking, it might help if philosophers spoke more specifically about the different ways we experience qualia rather than just lumping them all together as "consciousness." The visual field that we each experience, for example, must have a somewhat different nature than emotion, pain, pleasure, etc.

[Bassotronics]

The irony of the brain having consciousness is failing at trying to explain it’s own consciousness.

[theliamofella]

When people say “how can electrical impulses and neurological activity cause experiences “, we could say the same about matter “matter is just a countless bunch of atoms that are each almost empty space” but it still appears as a solid object

[saijibottsaijibott]

I can't get enough conversations on consciousness.

[pv]

Robert, well done grilling your guest with difficult questions! Your guest talked so much and said so little.

[gracerodgers]

Whatever consciousness is, I'll take it... I love it, I love life, don't you?😁

[-by-_Publishing_LLC]

(1:30) *PF: **_"So, one part of the machine records what another part of the machine is doing."_* ... This corresponds to the ToE I present in my book. Consciousness is not the ultimate reality; it's the information process used for experiencing reality. Consciousness is the highest level of data acquisition, processing, and evaluation, along with the ability to generate new information. After 13.8 billion years, 8 billion individual "information generators" are supplying Existence with all-new information.

The evaluation and generation of Information is what is at the core of Existence, and the fact that you're watching this video to extract and evaluate the information it presents speaks to this reality.

[ianbrown]

Is it my imagination or is Robert starting to lose a bit of patience with not knowing the nature of consciousness :-D

[JungleJargon]

The Spirit of Truth is the ultimate reality, yes! Absolutely!

[chilluminati]

Consciousness definitely is ultimate reality because without it you wouldn't be able to experience this.

[Frank-sijd]

How is it possible that philosophers come up with 3 names for certain correlated theories, 2 of which are more or less clearly defined in the name of the theory and 1 describes almost only a desire but leaves the context completely in the middle?

[jamesruscheinski]

causation could be ultimate reality? has subjective unity?

[jamenta]

Among the most interesting (open) scientific/philosophical questions in our lifetime: "What is consciousness?" "Is consciousness simply the product of a brain?"

Will science ever be able to resolve this question? I think it might be able to sometime in the future. But it will require an objective, non-biased searched for the truth.

[anaymark]

In response to the commentary thread (from a few hours ago) started by "Saijibott": The word "mind" is no more comprehensively explanatory than the word "consciousness", because no single word is going to do all the necessary conceptual work of defining the mechanisms of human experience. And while I agree that all
experience is a "function of the mind", your assertion of "free will" as a coherent quality or characteristic of human experience is demonstrably false-- not just theoretically: you can quickly perceive this truth for yourself. A quick example is Sam Harris's brief audio "guides" to realizing this directly, which I listened to through the Waking Up app, but which might be available elsewhere online (I haven't checked). In a couple minutes, you can see for yourself that there is definitely *voluntary* opposed to *involuntary* actions, like a muscle spasm, or your automatic ability to, for example, recognize a person's face, or visually perceive color, etc. etc. You can voluntarily do whatever you want, but if you investigate carefully the emergence of that "choice" in consciousness, you will see that it simply appeared "on its own", and that "free will" is nowhere to be found. The confusion between voluntary action and "free will" is understandable, because one of the characteristics of consciousness (or "mind") is the distinct "feeling" that you are doing what you want, that you are not being coerced into a particular choice. But this is only the experience of voluntary functioning— not "free will". Also, your assertion regarding "nature" is only as intelligible as your working definition of "nature", which is vague and broad to the point of being meaningless. Either "nature" is synonymous with "everything that is experienced" (which therefore provides no more clarity than a word like "everything"), or else it's generally meant in the everyday sense of "nature" vs. "manmade" things, which is useless in terms of trying to shine some productive light on the challenges of comprehending the mechanisms/experiences of "mind". Didn't mean to write at length, but hopefully this is of use and provides more clarity and precision in thinking about this expansive subject of inquiry.

[vitus.verdegast]

You can't get away from consciousness. Even if you try to imagine what the world would look like if you weren't there, your imagination is still the unacknowledged participant in the situation. The universe is an experience, the subjective observer and the objective reality are two sides of the same coin. An object is seen against the background of mind. Would the sun be bright without eyes to see it? Would rocks be hard without sensitive skin to feel them? Consciousness measures relationships and tells itself a story about what is going on, without the self there would be no boundaries, no outside and therefore no inside. This doesn't mean that you control reality with that little notion of yourself called the ego.

[kafiruddinmulhiddeen]

It’s highly suspicious that this series does not support Bernardo Kastrup. It seems like they are deliberately ignoring him.

[AtheistCook]

I am atheist and i will always put my schooling first, But, when i was a kid i was able to dream what was going to happen to me the next day, this always hunted me all my life and later in life i came to the conclusion that the future already exists. There is something about consciousness that goes beyond time and is not just a brain function. I will probably never know the answer.

[Spirit_sunya]

I really love the thumbnail for today's video, however the content is still a battle for which Robert has been wrestling for a long time. It doesn't mean that I am totally contented with worldly knowledge but what I can beginning to say is probably our perspective of understanding the radical aspect of life or consciousness is limited to science alone. Every scientific innovation has always been based on observation by human beings, so while exploring or trying to know human consciousness, would walking the path of science solely get us to the destination? I am not quite in agreement with that, because when I want to know the truth I will have to take all the paths conducive for the journey. Nevertheless, I am eagerly waiting to see a day where Robert takes a different leap mostly to the eastern part of the globe and meet SADHGURU(Jaggi Vasudev) in the peninsular India and what happens. I don't know why but I am so sure that he will start uncovering himself to a different dimension of human being rather discussing brain impulses, neuron shots, etc. We know the geographical location of human brain in a human body, still we have no idea what MIND itself is, what LOVE or Emotion is. And consciousness is something which enables all our faculties and knowing it, needs striving but in a different direction. We can believe what science says about mind or love or consciousness but we can also choose to uncover truths through other ways as well which might have a subjective experience to it. Every time a notification pops I am eager to see a video of progressive realization but I feel we are consciously walking in circles, It's time Robert, let's go take a tangential path. Let's meet the Yogis in India. I am waiting with my adrenal rush all over me to see that video.

[SantamanitaClauscaria]

Two of my favorite proponents of a consciousness-based reality are Bernardo Kastrup and Rupert Spira. I would love to see either of them on this channel.