The following is inspired by my notes beginning in chapter 2 of Scaruffi’s book.
In the tradition of philosophy, there have been different attitudes and relations to the issue of consciousness. For the most part, consciousness was something incorporated into the architectonic of a particular philosopher; this allows for an impressive array of contexts and perspectives.
For instance, there is the most basic question, “What is mind?” In a way, it runs parallel (or after) a philosophy of materialism, that says that the reality of materials is made of stuff, and therefore so too for the reality of consciousness (whatsoever what other details might be conjoined to that description). This basic dichotomy manifests itself by the approach of understanding mind qua differentiated from matter.
And that’s one approach, but before becoming embroiled in its details, I’d like to slip in the question, Could it be that it is a type of match-fixing to ask about consciousness after having already conceded that it is different from matter? It is intuitive to say that some things are fundamentally different. But how many classes of fundamental difference are we willing to entitle? The experienced, like memory and identity. The abstract, like triangles and Art. The nominal, like the species of bee or a single rock. The material, that weighs and has height. (That was a train of thought; not a prescription for reality).
After having hinted at the ball of knots that is a possibility, it can be appreciated that it is not even easy to locate mind, let alone define it by a contrary relationship with some sort of materialism. In any case:
There is an intuitive difference between mind and matter, which is weird, because if we’re honest, we only have a single example of a mind, our own case study “I”.
There’s an interesting difference between the approach of Aristotle, and the approach of Descartes. The Frenchman held mind separate to matter, while the Greek pointed to the difference between life and the inanimate. A benefit I award to Aristotle, is that mind becomes a phenomenon of life – which is intriguing, and on one hand raises the question of, But isn’t life then a phenomenon of matter, but on the other hand one can answer that that does not invalidate the approach, since the same paradox results when instead mind is the phenomenon of matter (i.e. this paradox is a pre-existing condition).
Let’s take it a bit further and see where things end.
A quick Get me out suggestion is that of epiphenomenalism, saying that Mind is a by-product of matter in the same way that smoke is a by-product of fire. There are a few queries to be applied here, aside from the nature of this mind. I include in that curious smokescreen, the first thing to ask, What is the nature of the parallel in this illustration. Let’s begin with definitions. Fire is a chemical conflagration which coexists with smoke whose particles also resided in that which we call the “fuel” of a fire. Thus I’ve produced a holy trinity of the fire, which manifests itself in three modes physically simultaneously. The flames, the smoke, and the fuel. On one hand, it is senseless to talk about smoke without flames, but only on one hand. Nevertheless, it can also be persuaded that the flames are the agent of the smoke’s existence, and in that argument, flames are more fundamental. (Saying that mind is a by-product does not enlighten us on the question of What is the nature of mind, and quite clearly focuses on The ways mind is different from matter. This is not a reason to avoid the scenario.) In that case (or two cases, at least) mind both is intrinsic and equivalent to the matter it parallels, but also ontologically inferior (judging?)
T. Huxley used a similar analogy [reference: SEP], the relation of steam to the locomotive engine, given that not only is the smoke a side-effect of the locomotion’s workings, but also, therefore, it plays no role in the locomotion’s function.
In the dimension of Shades of Red, radically different existences have different shades of red. Mutatis mutandis in the dimension of Transcendental Possibility; mind and matter are two radically different existences (and all differences are radical, otherwise they would not be different). One is a sort of firetruck red, the other a sort of pink; radical. So too with materialism and mind, called into existence upon the plains of nothing.
Let’s backtrack another time (and mayhap not the last). The preceding question to epiphenomenalism is, How do mind and body affect each other. That can have its own turn being prompted by John Searle‘s identification of useless dichotomies. Including (and illustrated by), Is my ability to ski something that is mental or that is physical? Thus we begin by saying that Everything is Neither. Matter is a phenomenon of Nothing, and so is mind but in a way that depends on matter (thus allowing for the mind to form its own mode of existence although whatever mode it takes must provide a scope of a differentiation.
So is the difference between classical dualism and this merely that here there is a dependence of ontology? That question may be answered in the affirmative. In those cases, I suspect that epiphenomenalism offers architectonic support to certain other philosophies (including even some monism and identity theories). But what if one wants to press onwards to No, what then?
