Matter (body), mind and consciousness are always one and inseparable. Not only animals except humans but plants and minerals have mind and consciousness! – And consciousness “pervades the universe”!

It would be difficult to give a definition of consciousness. It would be as difficult as or more difficult than to give a definition of body and mind. I have my wife cut my hair and I have never been to a barber for more than 25 years. Every time when I see the hair on the floor, I think “it was my hair a short time ago.”

I used to work for a preparatory school. There was a grumpy clerical staff. She always gave an unpleasant reaction to students. But when I saw her one day, she was in a good humor like a new person and kind to students. So I stared at her for a while. Suddenly, it flashed through my mind that “Oh, she has managed to empty her bowels for the first time in many days!” I was moved by the fact that pooh is so spiritual. I honestly thought: “pooh is actually spirit itself, isn’t it?”

What I want to say is that it is difficult to distinguish between matter and mind on a deeper level. The blogger In Deep often writes about the topic of bacteria in intestines. I understand that it is difficult to distinguish between intestinal bacteria and human mind. And if so, it would be more difficult to distinguish matter from mind and consciousness.

How about thinking like this? Matter (body), mind and consciousness are always one and inseparable. As we cannot separate body from mind and consciousness, isn’t is natural to think that not only animals other than humans but plants and minerals have mind and consciousness?

As seen in the previous article:“Dogs can sense the state of mind of their owners away from them,” however, we could not explain it unless we think that mind expands beyond body. So it is natural to think that consciousness“pervades the universe.”

Masatoshi Takeshita

January 21, 2022

Note:

Shanti-phula has indicated some parts of the following text in black bold-faced type or in red letters.

English translation of an excerpt from a Japanese article: TOCANA– January 18, 2020

“There is consciousness even in quark and proton” suggested by a British university professor! Consciousness never comes from the brain ..  A definitive edition of panpsychims!

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The new book by Dr. Philip Goff, a professor at Durham University, Britain and philosopher, “Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness”has been in the news. Surprisingly, Dr. Goff suggested in the book that there is consciousness even in quark and proton.

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Consciousness is usually considered to be something that comes from substance of brain. In contrast, Dr. Goff maintains that consciousness is fundamental and pervades the universe.  <snip> However, what Dr. Goff calls as consciousness is not self-consciousness or consciousness that can reflect self-existence but simply “experience”, joy, pain or visual experience or auditory experience, etc. 

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Human consciousness or experience is extremely complicated, but that of animals gets simpler and that of plants gets far simpler. The point is that consciousness becomes gradually simple and weakened like this but it never becomes zero.

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The view like this that everything has consciousness is called “pansychism.”Although it sounds spiritual, Dr. Goff claims that philosophy of panpsychism that deals with consciousness is necessary in terms of a complement to science that cannot handle “quality.” 

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