The 'Miracle' of Consciousness

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Although I've always been very self-aware and I know there are a great many people out there who are, its felt stranger and stranger in terms of having any sort of positive purpose if, in fact, we are just animations of genes that materialize and dematerialize as our lives come and go. As a kid and in my early teens its probably why the concept of 'God' never messed with my head, it just felt logical if I had such a strong sense of self-awareness, analyzed the guy I saw in the mirror, had that uncanny feeling like there was something so much more to me than eating, breathing, procreating, etc., and even most NTs and Aspies don't seem lost on this... it really doesn't seem fair.

True, fair has been a very dirty 4-letter word in my book, its always been a weak word that felt like it was used by people who just weren't stong enough to cope with the world they really lived in. But I also think of it like this - the need for self-actualization is a HUGE detriment to survival of the fittest, at least when it doesn't involve being the most alpha male or female in the area. If nature just set into motion a small single cell, just through the constant pounding and writhing of the sea when the moon was only half the distance from the earth that it is now, that that cell joined with other cells, fused to become larger bacteria, plankton, fish, turtles, sharks, whales, amphibians, dinosaurs, mammals, reptiles, birds, apes, and eventually our breed, in a world where alphahood is the crowning trait behind everything - what the f' is up with consciousness? It seems like if that's the case, if the bottom line order is so depraved that being one's best self and striving to grow only has value in terms of social value and flexing ones genetic health - its far more of a curse than anything.

So why do we have it? It would be way too easy for me to just default to the Nag Hammadi or Gnostic Christianity and see some complex myriad of higher beings rought by a benevolent force who just wanted to share the joy of existence and that the Logos's slip of confidence when he got too ambitious had us too lost to know that God is out there. That's what my emotions want me to believe, that's what my heart wants me to believe.....why is that though? Why do we need to have that side of ourselves when everything we see around us tends to lend so much proof that we are nothing more than a collection of chemicals and genes? This is the same reason I think so much of the world tends to run from bottom-line reality in terms of what they can measure and being truly sterile about it - it creates a real bleak, tragic, and pathetic picture of existence. Still though, in the absence of a higher spirituality, what is the point of consciousness? Not at all trying to prove the existence of God with this thread, just really wondering what the f--- natural law got out of this. If we really are soulless monkeys its not even right that we have it...

That is the question: why exist in a world where existence wouldn't matter? If our existence has no purpose then why not the bullet? Just to pursue ourselves? We can glorify and deify ourselves as much as we want but we still ultimately are either serving our ends, even in suicide, even in homicide, even in love, even in hate, even in everything that makes us *human*, and in the end these ends are nothing. If my greatest end at a given moment is scratching my behind, what is the point? I dunno, I sometimes question myself on the purpose of life and it brings me to very nihilistic points.

techstepgenr8tion:

Wow. I think you have summed up much of my own thoughts and it’s downright spooky. I feel that at least I’m not the only conscious being, that I can reject solipsism, unless your post is just some kind of elaborate trick. I've always been extremely aware of my own existence and emotions while at the same time I'm extremely skeptical. It often feels like these two sides of me are at odds. I feel as if my own existence is a paradox.

From an outsider perspective, there seems to be no true need for consciousness in terms of the material world. Still I don’t see any evidence that consciousness could occur outside my physical existence. When the electrical impulses cease traveling through my brain I might as well not exist.

techstepgenr8tion wrote (in part):...what is the point of consciousness? --- A variety of answers are possible it seems to me.

Having a sense of 'I' is what fuels the intuition that there is another component, especially when 'I' craves beautiful landscapes and sunsets, certain types of art or music, desires to do things that gratify me at the deepest levels but which won't get me laid (ie. not pinned on procreation). Its not of course proof any which way but, it makes the situation extra odd and seemingly illogical.

People claim that that sense of self and need to rise above helps with preservation of the species, that's all well and good to a point until you see where many where this is the strongest, if the world really went haywire, would simply rather lay down their lives than exist in the next phase of things. Even among atheists I can't imagine the 'life uber alis' being unconditional with all or even most. Some people have that fetish but it seems like it takes a rather rare breed of person to fear oblivion more than living in a set of conditions beyond a certain threshold that each person seems to have set at different levels.

The strangest thing for me, when I was a kid I felt like a sentient being really surrounded by robots, like people simply couldn't feel or think on the level that I could and it seemed like the cool/bad kids were the only ones who had stand out personalities so, I tended to gravitate in that direction some. As I look back though I was right to an extent, people have grown, matured around me, become more elaborate, but I still feel like I'm something all together different - my AS doesn't account for it either as I can feel just as alone here as well as finding an equal ratio of aspies and NT's who seem to share this with me. I have to really doubt though that the kids around me when I was younger weren't sentient, they were definitely functioning and prioritizing in a much different way but, I think that struggle in my life has highlighted a lot of my questions about my self, about the bigger picture, etc. etc.

Wow, you are responding to me from 3 years ago.

rofl...wow...sorry yo, I should have check the dates. I don't usually see to much graverobbing around here - probably best I start keeping an eye on my grandma's jewelry again .

Yeah, there's been a spree of it.

Evidently I am a very strange creature. I tremendously enjoy eating, sleeping, running, jumping, driving a a car, flying an airplane, seeing fascinating things through a telescope or a microscope, watching a very funny movie or being frightened by a horror show. It makes me feel very good to be able to help things that need help like other people, dogs and cats and birds and mice. When a wasp or a bumblebee is trapped in a bus I capture it and let it go free. When there is a wonderful thunderstorm I delight in the lightning and the rumble of thunder. I read many very entertaining books and magazines with fascinating experiences, listen to great music, talk with all sorts of amusing and informative people, experiment with drawing, painting, sculpture, amusing original devices. I feed wild birds, explore the local woods and delight in seeing rabbits, foxes, hawks, and other living creatures. I am fascinated with all the varieties of different plants and how they grow and congregate and mix with other plants. And this barely touches my interests. I am almost 85 years old and I have barely scratched the surface of all there is to see and feel and taste and smell and hear. What the hell is wrong with you people?

Define consciousness.

Yes, you are.

I concur with techstepgenr8tion! lol

But Sand, given your age I envy you. You grew up in a day and age when there was still adventure to be had, a world left to be explored and even conquered. We still have this today, but few youth actually willing to do it.

Where I grew up, there was no cable TV or internet. My parents bought me a Tandy CoCo3, which I though was the stupidest thing in the world because all I could do on it was play two or three games and write a few programs in BASIC, which didn't ever really amount to anything. I still remember the Atari and the original Nintendo, so there wasn't very much to do OTHER than roam the woods, go fishing, race bikes downhill on dirt/gravel roads at the speed of light, get in fights, and so on. We had dogs and cats for pets, sure. But we also had the (dis)pleasure of taming feral cats that crept around the barn. Other people had pet parakeets, I had a pet chicken and a quail. I knew KIDS who played with ammonium nitrate and built bombs LONG before you heard about domestic terrorism. And that was just for fun. I mean, you're roughly 50 years older than me, so that kind of life is much more ingrained into you. I count myself lucky that, even in the 1980's, that I was able to grow up the way I did as the technology and the decadence of the decade didn't hit us. I never even used a PC, didn't even know what DOS and Windows were until 11th and 12th grade. But I started making music with it almost as soon as I was able to!

My point is that, especially among us aspies, we tend to me a much more individualized and isolated people in part because we have the luxury to do so or are otherwise unaware that we CAN break away from this existence. I think for some of us, like tech, that can be a good thing in that it allows us to be introspective. All we can do is hope that our experiences at some point catches up with yours. We're still very young yet, Sand. Don't give up on us!

FWIW--I never stopped being a "nature" boy. The environment in which I live, the Mississippi Delta is horribly grotesque and unattractive compared to what I grew up with. I'm surrounded by a flat, alluvial plain covered as far as the eye can see in corn, cotton, and catfish. The central prairie and hill country, where I grew up, is much more conducive to exploring the world outside the house. If the humidity here isn't too forbidding, there are several parks that are still good for getting out of the house, which is something we do try to expose our children to. For me, my memories have become my passion, and my musical work as of late has turned to digitally recreating some of those sound environments I grew to love some 20 years ago. A project I'm working on now uses additive/FM synthesis to simulate a water environment. Perhaps I'll post it on youtube when I finish...

The world hasn't changed that much and there is still mystery and interest in any accumulated bit of dirt in any flowerpot or whatever you can scrape off the rocks in a lakeside. Every day I read in science news about revelations on the most ordinary things. The whole damned world is still out there and it's wide open to be looked at and enjoyed instead of begging to be a cog in some kind of dumb world order.

We know less about the bottom our our oceans than we know about the planet Jupiter. There is still plenty to see and learn about. We still do not understand what is happening beneath the mantel of the earth. There is much more to learn about weather.

We live in a blessed time. Lots of problems to solve and plenty of technology to use to solve them. We have yet to build a sustained underwater habitat. That is plenty of fun and work for the willing and able. Then there is the matter of building sustained habitats on the moon. The dark side is waiting to be turned into pig fat city for the astronomers View from the moon will give us the best seeing in the history of the human race.

Anyone who says we have run out of things to learn and do simply has turned their brains off.

ruveyn

Hear, hear!! !!