Comment by lo_zamoyski
Comment by lo_zamoyski 3 days ago
I would say there are a couple different people that tend to dominate with their opinions on this subject in the techbro space, neither of which have any philosophical sophistication in the domain. These are the pop. sci. interloper and the scientific specialist. However, it is the former that are more numerous, and as Dunning-Kruger would help predict, more vocal on average.
The interloper believes in a more-or-less popularized version of atomic theory and confuses it with metaphysical atomism. He thinks science has demonstrated this naive atomic theory-cum-metaphysical atomism. When challenged, the interloper insists that while science doesn't know yet how these mysterious phenomena happen, it is absolutely certain that the explanation will fall neatly into the schema of his naive atomic theory-cum-metaphysical atomism, even when it has been explained to him that his naive atomism makes such phenomena impossible by definition. He stubbornly insists that since "everything is just atoms and the void, man", that all phenomena must be explicable in terms of this naive atomism. Furthermore, he will inevitably reach for some kind of hand-wavy appeal to "evolution" and the ever convenient "emergence" as a catch-alls to which, again, the burden of explanation is conveniently deferred.
Philosophically, most of this is ill-defined rubbish and a dumpster fire of confusion.
Where "souls" are concerned, sadly this is an area where many have been perpetually stuck in the 17th century mire of Cartesian dualism. The notion of what "soul" means to the techbro or even the specialist is no different than what it is to the average man on the street. Some vague ectoplasmic thing haunting a body, basically. But if we look at sophisticated notions like that proposed and analyzed by Aristotle within the context of hylomorphic dualism, we find that a soul is really just the form of a living thing, where "form" is the cause of what a thing is. So, for a ball of bronze, the "sphericity" is its form and that which causes the thing to be a ball of bronze. Negate that, and you negate the thing. Of course, balls of bronze are not alive, so we do not call their form their soul. Soul according to this understanding is not a thing, but the formal cause of a thing. It cannot explain per se what conscious is, as only some forms cause conscious beings. So no Aristotelian would look to soul qua soul for an explanation of consciousness. What he might do is look at an analysis of the kinds of souls Aristotle proposes (vegetative, sensitive, rational), where the latter two display their respective forms of consciousness. Of course, form provides a basis for resolving much more than just questions concerning consciousness.
Perhaps I am of the sort you speak of, I feel philosophically content with the idea it’s atoms and other particles all the way down and there’s some pattern that gives rise to consciousness… and believe that everything is conscious to different degrees… perhaps this is naive? Love to hear any suggestions for reading to challenge this viewpoint if it is obviously flawed in some way