[MD] The Word is Not the Thing

[Ham Priday]

John, Marsha, Platt and All --


While catching up with past posts on this topic, I spotted John's reference 
to Robert Lanza, who is associated with Biocentrism.  I wonder if that 
association is valid.  Although I haven't read Lanza's book, I did run a 
synopsis of his thesis on my website a couple of years ago.  While the 
author defines Biocentrism as "a world view with the perspective that life 
creates the universe instead of the other way around," he doesn't state that 
LIFE creates the universe.  Read his summary statements carefully:

"The questions physicists long to ask about nature are bound up with the
problem of consciousness. Physics can furnish no answers for them.  'Let
man,' declared Emerson, 'then learn the revelation of all nature and all
thought to his heart; this, namely; that the Highest dwells with him; that
the sources of nature are in his own mind.'

"Space and time, not proteins and neurons, hold the answer to the problem of
consciousness.  When we consider the nerve impulses entering the brain, we
realize that they are not woven together automatically, any more than the
information is inside a computer.  Our thoughts have an order, not of
themselves, but because the mind generates the spatio-temporal relationships
involved in every experience.  We can never have any experience that does
not conform to these relationships, for they are the modes of animal logic
that mold sensations into objects.  It would be erroneous, therefore, to
conceive of the mind as existing in space and time before this process, as
existing in the circuitry of the brain before the understanding posits in it
a spatio-temporal order.  The situation, as we have seen, is like playing a
CD-the information leaps into three-dimensional sound, and in that way, and
in that way only, does the music indeed exist."
                                             -- R, Lanza: A New Theory of 
the Universe

Note that the terms he uses to identify the "creator" are "consciousness" 
and "mind", neither of which is Life.  This may be a minor matter to the 
biologist, but I think it's a significant point for the philosopher. 
Biology is the study of organic life forms, and biocentricity clearly 
designates the community of living creatures as the central agent or focus 
of the universe.  Consciousness, on the other hand, is "pre-cerebral".  As 
Lanza says: "It would be erroneous to conceive of the mind ...existing in 
the brain before understanding posits in it a spatio-temporal order."

I agree with everything Lanza says as a biologist; but the theory he has 
articulated is not grounded in Biology.  Wikipedia defines Biocentrism as "a 
scientific theory that posits that life creates the universe rather than the 
other way around."  Since Consciousness is not life but, rather, an 
undefined attribute of cognitive creatures, wouldn't Anthropocentrism be a 
more definitive label than Biocentrism for Lanza's philosophy?

What are your final thoughts on Biocentrism as another Word (that) is Not 
the Thing?

Just curious,
Ham

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Marsha,
The really neat thing I like about Wikipedia is how quickly it evolves.  I
went there this morning and found two quotes on responses to Biocentrism
that I bet you'd like that weren't there a month ago...

Richard Conn Henry, Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Johns Hopkins
University <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johns_Hopkins_University> pointed
out that Lanza's theory is consistent with quantum
mechanics<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics>,
"What Lanza says in this book is not new. Then why does Robert have to say
it at all? It is because we, the physicists, do NOT say it--or if we do say
it, we only whisper it, and in private--furiously blushing as we mouth the
words. True, yes; politically correct, hell no!"
[15]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biocentrism#cite_note-14>

-------------------

Like that?  I did.  Physicists whispering in private and blushing furiously.
 What an evocative image that makes!

And then an old friend of yours chimed in too...

---------------------

Indian physician and
writer[16]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biocentrism#cite_note-15>
[17] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biocentrism#cite_note-16> Deepak
Chopra<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepak_Chopra> stated
"Lanza's insights into the nature of consciousness [are] original and
exciting" and that "his theory of biocentrism is consistent with the most
ancient wisdom traditions of the world which says that consciousness
conceives, governs, and becomes a physical world. It is the ground of our
Being in which both subjective and objective reality come into existence."[
18] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biocentrism#cite_note-17>


On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 11:46 AM, MarshaV <valkyr at att.net> wrote:

> John,
>
> I like all that is described.  But I am still most fascinated by Quality
> experience as simply patterned experience and unpatterned experience.
> That this Quantum Science is on the front edge and creating new patterns
> is very exciting to read about. I love that there is so much Mystery
> still there and you occasionally read sentences like, 'The experiment
>  has been done and it works, but we don't know what it means.'
> That is cutting edge!  From what you've posted on Biocentricism
> it is also front-edge,  theorizing, and very exciting. I'd like to read
> more about it.  But there is unpatterned experience too, with no
> claims to anything.
>
> Marsha
 _____________
>
> "He who neglects the present moment throws away all he has."
>   (Friedrich von Schiller)


> -----Original Message-----
> From: moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org
> [mailto:moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org] On Behalf Of John Carl
> Sent: Tuesday, September 15, 2009 1:44 PM
> To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
> Subject: Re: [MD] The Word is Not the Thing
>
> Marsha,
> I haven't been talking about Biocentricism lately, but I picture it as
> encapsulating all you describe. Here see how much the MoQ -tweaked version
> you agree with:
>
> 1. What we perceive as reality is a process that involves
>     our consciousness. An "external" reality, if it existed, would by
>     definition have to exist in space. But this is meaningless, because
>     space and time are not absolute realities but rather tools of the
>     human and animal mind.
> 2. Our external and internal perceptions are inextricably intertwined.
>     They are different sides of the same coin and cannot be divorced
>     from one another.
> 3. The behavior of subatomic particles, indeed all particles and
>     objects, is onextricably linked to the presence of an observer.
>     Without the presence of a conscious observer, they at best
>     exist in an undetermined state of probability waves.
> 4. Without consciousness, "matter" dwells in an undetermined state
>     of probability. Any universe that could have preceded
>     consciousness only existed in a probability-state.
> 5. The universe is fine-tuned for mind-life, which makes perfect
>     sense as mind-life creates the universe, not the other way around.
>     The "universe" is simply the complete spatio-temporal logic of
>     the self.
> 6. Time does not have a real existence outside of animal-sense
>     perception. It is the process by which we perceive changes in the
>     universe.
> 7. Space, like time, is not an object or a thing. Space is another form
>     of our animal understanding and does not have an independent reality.
>     We carry space and time around with us like turtles with shells.
>     Thus, there is no absolute self-existing matrix in which physical 
> events
>     occur independent of life.