When we go return to where we came from before our birth it simply means the absence of consciousness. In this universe, you can either be conscious or not. There is something mysterious and magical about this phenomenon that seemingly differentiates our lives from simpler or even single celled organisms which seem more like biological robots.
It may very well be that the next time a consciousness manifests and forms a 'you' from 'the place before birth' you may as well be born as a cow, shackled in the darkness among feces. Kept from the warmth of your mother with cold metal spikes attached to her udder, ripping open the young flesh of your nose when you seek its nourishment.
How many times did we wake up yet from this 'place before birth'? How likely is it to be born as human among the conscious life forms on Earth? Nevermind being born as healthy human in the developed world in the 21st century.
Between the clear dry science and the mysterious wonder of a perception of 'self' and being consciously aware I just feel dizzy about it all.
I think you use the word "consciousness" as a thought stopper.
A though experiment: Imagine I have no consciousness, but I can run circles around you, outperform you, outpredict you, game you, have a better intuition (gasp), or be more creative (gasp squared). What's left of the magic now?
Interesting point, this is why I love these discussions so first of all thank you.
When we strip away all of these aspects from 'the magic' it gets really interesting to think about what's left. And this is always where it becomes hard to articulate for me. Would you describe yourself as a robot performing a set of finite predetermined tasks? A system merely responding to pattern recognition? Are we just a more complex version of ants following some chemical impulses?
I cannot shake the feeling that it's more of a 1+1=3 kind of thing, where the sum is more than the addition of parts. In Complex Systems Theory it would be emergent behavior, I suppose.
I read you. What I find helpful is not to trust my own internal perspective on how I think I think. Things become much clearer when I consider more neutral ground, yes, ants, chatgpts, rocks, etc.
So, yes, I still wonder what would be the advantage of a conscious ant, besides
hubris.
> Are we just a more complex version of ants
The same evolution caused humans and ants, that's all. Oak is not a version of orca.
> emergent behavior
This time it's a canonical thought stopper, on the level of "idiopathic disease".
When we go return to where we came from before our birth it simply means the absence of consciousness. In this universe, you can either be conscious or not. There is something mysterious and magical about this phenomenon that seemingly differentiates our lives from simpler or even single celled organisms which seem more like biological robots.
It may very well be that the next time a consciousness manifests and forms a 'you' from 'the place before birth' you may as well be born as a cow, shackled in the darkness among feces. Kept from the warmth of your mother with cold metal spikes attached to her udder, ripping open the young flesh of your nose when you seek its nourishment.
How many times did we wake up yet from this 'place before birth'? How likely is it to be born as human among the conscious life forms on Earth? Nevermind being born as healthy human in the developed world in the 21st century.
Between the clear dry science and the mysterious wonder of a perception of 'self' and being consciously aware I just feel dizzy about it all.