Re: CONSCIOUSNESS

Dear Otto,

you see seem to identify consciousness with the world openness and to think
this somehow in _theological_ terms.
The problem with consciousness is, that it was conceived (probably not by
Descartes, who, according to some philosophers like A. Kemmerling from
Munich, was not concerned with consciousness) as something inside the brain,
where representations of the so called outside world were stored etc. This
metaphoric was questioned by philosophers like Heidegger and (more recently)
R. Rorty (following some lines from American Pragmatism). To-be-in-the-world
in the sense of being open to possibities and to _construct_ the _world_ in
the sense of such possibilities is not identical with to-be-conscious in the
sense of a state of mind. In some sense conciousness is based (in our case)
on our bein-in-the-world and not the other way around. This presupposes also
not only that we are conscious about some possibilities and not of others,
but that the world-openness itself is for us a _relative_ one (as past and
future, in their own (!) way of being-present (and absent) to us, are
foreclosed, at least partly: we can foresee somethings, and bring them into
(well: not consciousness, really, or not only) the openness in which we live
(either in an explicit or implicit or tacit way). Tacit knowledge is, as
Polayi remark, not the same as unconscious. Well excuse me for all this,
most of what I wanted to say remains... tacit!
kind regards
rafael

-----Urspr|ngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Prof. Otto E. Rpssler (by way of)
<rossler@theonext.itc.uni-tuebingen.de>
An: Multiple recipients of list <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Datum: Montag, 25. Mai 1998 11:28
Betreff: CONSCIOUSNESS

>
>Dear fis collegues
>
>I apologize for being very tight, temporally, so that I could not
>participate in any of the open discussions so far. But at least I would
>like to send some comments to the current neuro discussion about "the
>phenomenon of consciousness":
>
>------------------------------------
>
> Consciousness, this word introduced into Western thinking by
>Descartes in collaboration-at-a-distance with Calderon (La vida es
>sueno), is usually misunderstood in the West up to this day.
>
> The confusion is not easy to pinpoint. A modern simile would be
>the word "paper" - or "www". Tim Berners-Lee once said on TV "I have
>given the world a new kind of paper to write upon, now it is up to
>the world what is going to be written on it". Chuang-Tzu called it
>"the water". The fish are unable to see it and talk about it, he claimed.
>
> Poincare once coined the term "three-dimensional paper" and claimed
>it to be a desirable tool to draw on (in) it in 3-space, thinking of
>chaotic trajectories presumably. We since have 3-D trajectories
>drwan by computers, of course, yet again mostly without appreciating
>what we have.
>
> Consciousness would be the least appreciated thing and the most
>worthy-of-appreciation-thing at the same time. All we have is
>consciousness. There is no world, except in consciousness.
>Aristotle said that without consciousness (psyche), there is no time.
>The same applies to space, of course. And to everything else.
>
> In the West, consciousness is believed to be an appendix to
>matter. This is wrong, as Descartes knew. Matter is a little
>internal character making its appearance within the movie of
>consciousness. Science and physics only deal with the shadows, the
>quantitative relations, within all the rich primary content of
>consciousness - its qualities and its nowness character. It is
>always now in consciousness, there is nothing but now. And time
>just creeps through it surreptitiously.
>
> What then IS consciousness? "Everything" is not enough. If it is
>more than everything, what is it?
>
> It is indestructible and primary. There is no way to destroy it.
>But there is also no way even to conceive of its being created. It
>is more solid than concrete. Etcetera pp.
>
> Everybody's consciousness is a different infinity, with a
>different fragrance and sweetness. If people are in love, what they
>really are in love with is this substance, right.
>
> This appears like a good point to stop, isn't it?
>
>Otto
>
>
Received on Mon May 25 14:45:35 1998