December Days: Spirituality

[jack]

When I was talking about prompts I used the word "spirituality", and simont asked what I meant by it, and I realised that what I really wanted was to spill the religion post onto another day.

Last post, I think I described what I didn't believe about religion. Basically, "anything supernatural".

However, I've recently been feeling that there's something I want to explore but I'm not quite sure what. Partly that I know more people who believe in God, but in total have beliefs really similar to mine, and I want to understand that. And partly that I've been thinking in terms of spiritual health, not in terms of a supernatural spirit, but in terms of "being aware of myself" and "giving up being scared of things I'm scared to try" and of "actually doing things I always felt I should do" and generally becoming healthier as a whole mind. And basically everything that is (I think) part of the mind, but in how the mind itself works or doesn't work, not in how it represents facts.

Comments

[jack]

we're talking about the universe as we can sense it and reason about it.

OK, that makes sense. Then I would have said, yes, an emergent property of physics. But I'm not sure that's actually bearing on the question. What I'm pretty sure of is that everything that actually happens, is physics, due to neurons, and isn't due to some supernatural effect (assuming we agree what "supernatural" means). But the things you are classifying into metaphysics, I'm not sure of. I'm sure they're not supernatural.

But I'm not sure what I do think about them. Is consciousness, some level of self-awareness? Or the sensation experienced by being me (and, presumably, everyone else?) Or something I haven't thought of? Or is it a meaningless concept? I don't dismiss that last option -- I think many things DO turn out to meaningless when examined closely.

But I'm not sure what's meant by things like "that doesn't explain my consciousness". If consciousness is a sensation in humans similar to fear or blue in humans and also other mammals -- then we don't understand exactly how it's caused, but it's clear that's by neurons and hormones. Or if it's some level of self-awareness (like being able to reason about your self and future self), then likewise. I'm not sufficiently sure what I mean by consciousness to answer either way, but language like "can't explain" seems to suggest our lack of knowledge is in "how" not "what to call it", which I'm not sure of...

I would say that, for so long as you're agnostic on the issue, you're behaving as though it might be meaningful to make the distinction, at which point "intelligent" and "conscious" at least in potentia have different meanings and there's no category error in discussing that potential distinction?

I guess it's like, someone saying "do people other than you have flargle-wargle?" It's not that there's a specific concept which people either have or don't but I don't know which. It's that I'm not sure what question I'm asking myself. I have no concept what "intelligence without consciousness" would mean, but I'm leaving open the possibility it might mean something I haven't realised yet, even if I don't understand what that might be.

I am still mulling over the rest of your post -- I don't quite get it, but I'm not sure what questions to ask.