McGilchrist on consciousness

In this short discussion he summarizes the basis thesis of his new book: The Matter With Things. Also see the video. It is indeed consistent with our explorations in the Facebook Integral Postmetaphysical Spirituality forum. And also with Derrida's de/reconstruction. His statements about postmodernism are true for some in that movement, particularly its American branch, but not about Derrida and de/re. At least what I read from Caputo, his preeminent American translator, who has worked with and understands the man and his work. But I get how those indoctrinated in kennilingus cannot see that and just lump him in with the rest. So be it. From McGilcrest:

 

"In this talk I have chosen to make some very simple reflections on one aspect of consciousness: its relational nature. Indeed I hold that everything is relational, and that what we call things, the relata, are secondary to relationship. Consciousness is always ‘of’ something: what is the nature then of that something that is both in part constitutive of, and in part constituted by, that relationship?

 

"In the last century or so, there has been a tendency, at least in popular discourse, to pull reality in opposing directions. Some scientists, whether they put it this way or not when they are asked to reflect, still carry on as if there just exists a Reality Out There, the nature of which is independent of any consciousness of it: naïve realism. These are usually biologists; you won’t find many physicists who would think like that. In reality, we participate in the knowing: there is no ‘view from nowhere’. As John Archibald Wheeler put it: ‘this is a participatory universe’. Of crucial importance is that this fact does not in any way prevent science legitimately speaking of truths – far from it. We desperately need what science can tell us, and postmodern attempts to undermine it should be vigorously resisted. Two important truths, then: science cannot tell us everything; but what science can tell us is pure gold. Any attempt to suppress science (I distinguish science sharply from technology), for whatever reason, is dangerous and wrong.

 

"Meanwhile, on the other hand, there are philosophers of the humanities who think that there is no such thing as reality, since it’s all Made Up Miraculously By Ourselves: naïve idealism. Such people, by the way, never behave as though there was no reality. Nor of course, by its own logic, can they claim any truth for their position.

 

"These viewpoints are closer than they look. One party fears that if what we call reality were in any sense contaminated by our own involvement in bringing it about it would no longer be worthy of being called real. The other fears that, since we manifestly do play a part in its coming about, it’s already the case that it can’t be called real. But just because we participate in reality doesn’t mean we invent it out of nowhere, or solipsistically project it on some inner mental screen; much less does it mean that the very idea of reality is thereby invalidated.

 

"I take it that there is something that is not just the contents of my mind – that, for example, you exist. There is an infinitely vast, complex, multifaceted, whatever-it-is-that-exists-apart-from-ourselves. The only world that any of us can know, then, is what comes into being in the never-ending encounter between us and this whatever-it-is. What is more, both parties evolve and are changed through the encounter: it is how we and it become more fully what we are. The process is both reciprocal and creative. Think of it as like a true and close relationship between two conscious beings: neither is of course ‘made up’ by the other, but both are to some extent, perhaps to a great extent, ‘made’ what they are through their relationship.

 

"The relationship comes before the relata – the ‘things’ that are supposed to be related. What we mean by the word ‘and’ is not just additive, but creative.

 

"There is no one absolute truth about the world that results from this process, but there are certainly truths: some things we believe will be truer than others. The nature of the attention we bring to bear is of critical importance here. A maximally open, patient, and attentive response to whatever-it-is is better at disclosing or discerning reality than a response that is peremptory, insensitive, or – above all – shrouded in dogma."