I can see how it could be the case from a physical perspective, that on some fundamental level, matter and consciousness are both some type of field, and that it is how these fields manifest on a macro level that the universe is populated with physical stuff and our awareness of it. However that is not the same as saying that a consciousness field is one and the same field as a sensory field.
I don’t want to nitpick with your position bc in the end it is well thought out and just as likely to be right as some of the other views brought forward in this thread.
However, as I tried to pick out in an earlier response post, your conception of consciousness and “awareness” seem very specific and differ from other conceptions of it, I think. Although as I said, I do think others share your view.
Let’s call it the “view finder” concept of consciousness/awareness. It’s the view that consciousness is kind of like an observer, and it’s blank (observing nothing) until there are some contents for it to observe.
So the thinking follows that there can be all kinds of contents (physical stuff) and it just needs consciousness/awareness to “observe” it.
This imo is not the nature of consciousness. Yes, from consciousness comes “awareness” but not by being an observer/view finder. Conceiving of consciousness in this way leads to the homunculus issue. Consciousness is not an observer.
Consciousness (commonly referred to as phenomenal consciousness) is hard to define but it is feeling or qualities aka qualia. Specifically it IS qualia, not the act of “observing” qualia.
One can see how one might think of consciousness as an observer that is aware of the world, but IMO
phenomenal consciousness is better conceived as the substrate in which world and self models imbued with quality are instantiated.
Organisms create world and self models in which phenomenal selves are aware of the world.
Instead, the evidence strongly suggests multiple different structures within the brain ( visual cortex, auditory cortex ect. ) are independently responsible for their own fields, and that together they are unified into an audiovisual experience by the thalamocortical loop, which has its own associated field. There is ample evidence for this in that activity in our sensory regions can be isolated and measured in the absence of any sensory experience, particularly, in REM sleep.
I think the field approach is warranted for a lot of the reasons you capture, the combination problem being one of them.
However suggesting phenomenal consciousness could emerge from non phenomenal processes is problematic for a host of reasons covered over the years here.
Recently MA approached these problems (ouroboros) from a more philosophical perspective.
Again, you may be right that strong emergence occurs, but I will continue to struggle with the notion that a non-phenomenal, physical substrate is primarily of a phenomenal, physical substrate.
This situation mirrors exactly what I was suggesting above in that consciousness is like a blank canvass, a baseline state, and that qualia are disturbances in that state. They are manifested as particular types of experiences depending upon the properties associated with the type of disturbance they produce.
I too believe that various qualia are perturbations in a consciousness “field”; however, it is the same quantum fields(s) that we identify as the matter fields.
The perturbation that we identify as the brain (extrinsically) is the perturbation that we identify as the mind (intrinsically).
So what seems to be happening in ultra simplified form, is that sensory stimuli reach sense organs that send signals to corresponding brain regions, that create associated sensory fields that disturb the consciousness field. The disturbances in the consciousness field then induce a reaction in receptors in the thalamocortical loop, which transmits those signals to the various processing centers in the brain.
That absolutely could be the case. Strong emergence and mental causation will need to be physically and philosophically addressed if this is the case. But it’s certainly as plausible as any other approach atm
I can imagine a couple of workarounds to that, but ultimately it's out of my depth. A related article linked from
Philosophy, Science, and the Unexplained deals with EM fields in neuronal structures and their effect on associated biological systems.
Again, as noted, the mind does have field like properties, but methinks this is due to its nature and a quantum field rather than a field emitted by non-phenomenal neurons.
But for the most part we seem to appreciate each others views. We understand the challenges to both and I’m happy watch for disco overs that may support strong emergence in the future.
