[MD] What is SOM?

[ARLO J BENSINGER JR]

[Ham]
Have I finally addressed your questions satisfactorally?

[Arlo]
I read your post five time and couldn't find one bit of it addressing the
questions I've raised. If its just me, I'd be happy for anyone else to jump in
and point out where you've answered my questions.

[Arlo had asked]
So I ask, again, Ham, if it is NOT social participation that lies at the root
of man's unique consciousness, what does?

[Ham]
And again I say that the root of man's consciousness is the division between 
sensibility and otherness which is the primary dichotomy.

[Arlo]
And is this division genetic? Social? Ethereal? What? Where does this division
come from? How do we get it? Is it learned? Innate? And if innate, then how is
it not genetic?

[Ham]
I make no distinction between "modern man" and the species Homo-sapiens.  

[Arlo]
Fair enough. So the unique consciousness you speak of, the "divide", is found
in all homo-sapien species, from earliest on? Okay. So, the species from which
homo-sapien descended, they did NOT have it, I suppose? So, what changed?
Again, the only thing I see you pointing to at all is genetics, that some form
of genetic mutation/adaptation occurred in the primate line that instead of
growing a tail or a toe grows us a consciousness? If that is not what you are
saying, please correct.

[Arlo had asked]
So this "immanent core", was it present in the primates from which we descend?

[Ham]
Probably not.

[Arlo]
So again, Ham, "what changed?" Did some primate just wake up one day with a
consciousness? Or was it a mutation that occurred in utero, so that a baby
primate was born with a genetic mutation that grew him a consciousness? Did God
look down on the primates and wave his magic wand and abracadabra they all had
suddenly had consciousnesses? 

This is the issue you continue to skirt. I know, social participation had
nothing to do with "what changed", so what did?

[Arlo had asked]
If not, then what accounts for its appearance in the evolutionary time-line? If
not social participation, and not genetics, then what?

[Ham]
That's like asking, When does consciousness appear in the developing child?

[Arlo]
My view is it appears as the child socializes. I know you disagree. But this
addresses both evolutionary time-line and development equally. I'll skip this,
since you know what I think. So I ask again, "what changed" between early
pre-primates and homo-sapians that gave the latter a "consciousness" where none
existed in the former?

[Ham]
In existential terms, consciousness develops over the life of the individual in 
the same way that the brain does.

[Arlo]
So consciousness IS like an ethereal organ. The brain develops according to
genetics, is this how the consciousness does as well? Actually the "invisible
organ" is as close as you come to an answer in this post. 

[Ham]
Likewise, in evolution, it develops gradually from genus to species, eventually
emerging 'full bloom' in the final form which you and I are concerned with.

[Arlo]
So its genetic? Like skull shapes and body hair and posture? And, now I can
ask, "what makes it evolve"? We know how genetic mutations are the root of
biological evolution. Mutations occur, some structures are favored via
survival, some are not. 

What is the mechanism by which "consciousness" evolves from genus to species?
Why is OUR consciousness today "more evolved"? Is it based in our biological
brain genetics? So just like the process by which humans lost their body hair
over time, so too did consciousness evolve? Is that right?