Consciousness and Fundamental Reality

by Philip Goff

A core philosophical project is the attempt to uncover the fundamental nature of reality, the limited set of facts upon which all other facts depend. Perhaps the most popular theory of fundamental reality in contemporary analytic philosophy is physicalism, the view that the world is fundamentally physical in nature. The first half of this book argues that physicalist views cannot account for the evident reality of conscious experience, and hence that physicalism cannot be true. Unusually for an opponent of physicalism, Goff argues that there are big problems with the most well-known arguments against physicalism―Chalmers' zombie conceivability argument and Jackson's knowledge argument―and proposes significant modifications.

The second half of the book explores and defends a recently rediscovered theory of fundamental reality―or perhaps rather a grouping of such theories―known as 'Russellian monism.' Russellian monists draw inspiration from a couple of theses defended by Bertrand Russell in The Analysis of Matter in 1927. Russell argued that physics, for all its virtues, gives us a radically incomplete picture of the world. It tells us only about the extrinsic, mathematical features of material entities, and leaves us in the dark about their intrinsic nature, about how they are in and of themselves. Following Russell, Russellian monists suppose that it is this 'hidden' intrinsic nature of matter that explains human and animal consciousness.

Some Russellian monists adopt panpsychism, the view that the intrinsic natures of basic material entities involve consciousness; others hold that basic material entities are proto-conscious rather than conscious. Throughout the second half of the book various forms of Russellian monism are surveyed, and the key challenges facing it are discussed. The penultimate chapter defends a cosmopsychist form of Russellian monism, according to which all facts are grounded in facts about the conscious universe.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Science, Metaphysics, Neuroscience

304 pages, Hardcover

Published August 18, 2017

About the author

University of Liverpool, UK

Reviews

[Searnold]

Any rating I would give to this work is little more than my howling frustration with it. Hence, that rating (somewhere between zero and naught) would be misleading and unfair. As I read this work or tried to, my response to it became the drone of “please make up your goddamned mind; something either is or is not workable. And your explanations can be said differently from the way they were “philosophically”stated.”
Yes. This work, in spite of my long abiding interest in philosophy, was nevertheless not for readers such as myself.
And yes my response to it is the predictable “blank stare”.

[Justin Goodman · Rating 4 out of 5]

An unarguably clear building up of his argument for cosmopsychism, the idea that cosmos is the only fundamental entity and our consciousnesses are aspects grounded in it. What is commonly called consciousness reflects the broader consciousness of the cosmos. A little New Age sounding (a point he admits) but which, in the context of this book, isn't based in pure spiritualism. Not that I'm particularly qualified to judge, but I'm not sure how convinced I am of the arguments.

At one point Goff introduces the idea of vertical/horizontal aspects and explains that "utterly determinate material nature of the brain" is a vertical aspect [of the "utterly determinate material state of the universe"] while the "computational properties of the brain" are horizontal aspect [of the "utterly determinate material state of the universe"], and this feels like reintroducing dualism where he doesn't intend to all while trying to rebut an argument that deflates the very fundamental notion of Phenomenal Transparency. PT (the claim that phenomenal concepts "reveals the nature of the entity it refers to, in the sense that it is a priori...what it is for that entity to be part of reality") being the foundational premise of his argument, it make me leery.

Nevertheless, an incredibly interesting and self-critical book that's a fun (if very rigorous) experience.

[Dolf van der Haven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this book if you are a non-philosopher and like to get a headache.
Seriously, this is hard philosophy, not written for the heneral public. I am a fan of consciousness theory and read all sorts of things about it, but this pure philosophical account went too far for me.
The author actually does a great job leading the reader through his logic and his refutation of all sorts of physicalism is acceptable (I am more of a panpsychist myself anyway, so he didn't need to convince me much).
In the end it did remain obscure to me what the author's exact model of the world was based on his eventual theories. This, along with a more practical application of his theory, would have helped putting things into real-life context.

[Lorenzo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating, commendable work that advances a bold metaphysical vision of cosmopsychic harmony. Provokes the imagination and challenges dearly-held assumptions about the mind.

[Natalia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like all text books, this one needs to be read slowly, but steadily. I found Goff's arguments sometimes very convincing, sometimes less, but always very stimulating. I enjoy this reinvention of metaphysics, and for me, it has extreme value and meaning. But this book is made both for sympathizers and sceptics, written with extreme care and meticulously, patiently addressing all perks and caveats of opposing and sister theories, until arriving to his, so far, most promising working theory. An example of how philosophy and academical work should be made. A solid, humble and inspiring contribution to our mission of understanding reality.

[Philemon - · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although this book is supposed to be a criticism of physicalism (philosophical materialism), it spends too much time what other academics and philosophers are doing and too little time making a strong case of Mr. Goff's own beliefs. The result is largely a muddle, busily differentiating the splinter groups making up the current anti-physicalist scene.

Goff's own splinter choice, (Bertrand) Russelian monism (RM), on the surface seems a little dubious. A little googling shows that RM is mostly out of date. Over a century old, its historical focus has largely been logic and language issues from the Wittgenstein era, not scientific cosmological methods as we now know them. RM's main physical references, to objects and their properties, harken back to 19th century Newtonian physics, largely ignoring such things as fields and quantum effects.

Oddly, Goff scarcely considers Alfred North Whitehead (Russell's Principia partner), whose later-life work was exactly what Goff says he's interested in: trying to speculate about possible ontological reorganizations that would displace from almighty matter at least some spark of consciousness (or in Whitehead's view, experience) at the base.

Maybe someday Goff will come out with his own more mature, coordinated attack on physicalism. If I live that long, I'll certainly want to read it.

[Noah Welsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Using his "Consciousness Constraint" which posits the axiomatic truth of the reality of subjective first person experience, Goff brings a thought provoking challenge to the traditional Darwinian solution to the "Hard Problem of Consciousness." To paraphrase, philosophers (amateur and professional) find ourselves enamored with Occam's Razor, but all too often forget that it necessitates not merely the simplest explanation of a phenomenon but the simplest *sufficient* explanation of a phenomenon. Goff proceeds to argue that the causal structure of physical reality is not sufficient to explain the sentient dimensions of reality. He presents a particular version of Russellian Monism as an alternative.

I am not convinced by the entirety of his arguments, but I'll likely still be ruminating about some of his points a decade hence -- that in itself is a strong testament to the value of this book to anyone interested in technical philosophy of mind arguments.

[Alfie Munkley · Rating 3 out of 5]

A real chin scratcher. The first part is a hardcore chain of logical reasoning and the second is a fun dive into panpsychism.

[Andrea M · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unexpected. I honestly thought que iba de filosofia. My bad. Still muy interestante tho, me ha gustau