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It's a sad paradox that self-awareness, which we think of as our unique advantage, is driving us to consume excess resources and extinguish ourselves.
Ever read Escher, Gödel, Bach? Self-awareness isn't either/or, it's a continuum. Self-referential feedback loops are what give rise to intelligence, and the more of them you have, the more intelligence you have. Metacognition is how we avoid being manipulated via our primitive drives.
Kimmo-
Ever read Escher, Gödel, Bach?
Gödel, Escher, the Eternal golden braid, brilliant book with lots of theories about AI and consciousness.
I recall it compared our brain and consciousness to either an ant nest or beehive I can't remember. Worth a read, especially the meta, Lewis Carroll influenced introductions to each chapter -
Ever read Escher, Gödel, Bach? Self-awareness isn't either/or, it's a continuum.
I really wouldn't cite that book as proof of anything, although cognitive science is one of the very few subjects in the book he knows a lot about. It's a speculative exploration of ideas based on some things he has observed in those topics he knows well, extended into areas he knows much less about. Even he wouldn't say it's proof of anything.
Before agriculture, our mythology served to keep us in harmony with our environment
Was this the result of the mythology, or was that mythology the result of having to live like that?
We managed it for a hundred thousand or a few million years
The fact that our distant ancestors lived differently at a time when they had very little choice doesn't mean anything about what we're capable of when we do have power and choice (on a social group/species level, before anybody starts). I sincerely hope we can find our way to better ways of thinking and living that last, but what our ancestors were doing in the last Ice Age and earlier is objective proof of nothing at all. We aren't facing their challenges, and they weren't facing ours.
You keep citing as absolute facts things that aren't proven. One problem with that is that any progress to better ways of doing things really does need objectivity.
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I'm trying to keep this simple. What I've noticed recently is that if I think of the goals I used to have, of big house, wife, kids, friends, in the lap of luxury, I feel miserable if I compare myself with people who have achieved that. I used to hang out with people who were on 300-700k per annum years ago. They also had a plan for a multimillion payoff from private equity or a partnership or property development or something. By now some of them are top consumers, private jets and all that. One of them has a stately home with a staff of 75. I'm a virtual shut-in who has done 2 years' work in the last 30, buying the marked down food in the supermarket. If I think about absurdism and brownian motion, I feel fine about it.
skydancer
itsbruce
nick_h.
May I try a philosophical take? Our species has a powerful sense of self-awareness. This makes many of us search for a meaning to our lives.
But there is none. So we try to find meaning by making our mark with excess consumption and displays of power. It's a sad paradox that self-awareness, which we think of as our unique advantage, is driving us to consume excess resources and extinguish ourselves. We need to accept that our lives are trivial, inconsequential, just a molecule in a planet-sized brownian motion.
I have done this. It's quite calming but it has an unfortunate label, absurdism, which doesn't sell it that well. And to be honest I wouldn't have accepted this willingly. It's been forced on me by having ME for 30 years. I'm 62, with almost no friends and family and no money or self-determination, and I realise my life is never going to add up to anything. Anything at all. This is my enlightenment.
I wish I had come to it willingly when I was 16 and agonising about what to do with my life. Are there people here who have always known this? Maybe the zen and yoga types? Perhaps more likely to be women than the often egoist, selfish, aggressive men?
This is another way of saying that the patriarchy has doomed us. A matriarchy could save us from ourselves, but the patriarchy is in the driving seat and will not share it.