Practicing a Prismatic Approach on the Matter/Mind Dilemma: Wheels Within Wheels

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I’ll dare to state this as a Negative Truth: Any transition from a lower level of being to a higher order isn’t rooted in the lower order.

An order emerges that exceeds the previous level. But not just exceeds it in power and mass, but in kind. A wholly different organization somehow leaps out of a previous organization without precedent. This lower order can’t give birth to something utterly new without a leap from nothing. So mind doesn’t appear to be a product of matter.

The so-called “new physics” seems to agree. They view the world starting with an infinite potential of information (a form of mind), which precedes the explosion of energy, which condensed into matter. What they’re suggesting is that Mind is the starting point. And Mind is the source of energy, which condenses into matter.

But let’s ask the question anyways: Can matter be responsible for mind?

Is it possible that it is and it isn’t, depending, as always, on context? Is this relationship like a wheel that can be spun in both directions when needed? If we look at the universe as starting with an explosion of energy, we will watch that energy coalesce into matter, which grows in complexity until it produces brains and minds. From there, we’ll also see a secondary wheel spinning in reverse, whereby minds generate energy, and energy is interest, is curiosity, is motivation to re-form matter into tools and computers?

Our mistake might lie in assuming that the wheel only spins in one direction, or starts at the same place. Or is operating on only one level at a time. What if matter, mind and energy are three phases of the same ungraspable movement, spinning in all imaginable ways in any context, wheels within wheels?Read More »

Quick Footnote to A Fly Fable

Not that A Fly Fable should be read literally, but my brother found these two interesting articles on animal intelligence that shows yet again that fiction has no chance of keeping pace with reality.

Bee-Brained: Inside the Mind of a Bee

Three mind-blowing facts about the minds of bees and flies: 1) lonely flies get drunk; 2) bees are optimistic or pessimistic based on life experience; and 3) flies and bees have sleep patterns reminiscent of REM and Deep sleep stages

Canine Exceptionalism: Trainers working with dogs every day have documented extraordinary talents and skills. Will science ever catch up?

Dogs are a hell of a lot smarter than we imagined. Same goes for Everything, including plants.