The Project I’m Working On

Towards an integral vision of consciousness studies

The most paradigmatic ‘no-progress’ quest that science has been bumping into since its beginnings is the question of the origin and nature of consciousness. Some aspects of our conscious experience seem to be irreducible and do not allow for a description and explanation inside a materialistic paradigm. There are questions regarding consciousness on which science hasn’t progressed much since Descartes' thoughts on the mind-body problem.

Undoubtedly there has been enormous progress in the neurosciences, especially due to groundbreaking technological advancements such as the invention of powerful scanning imaging tools and measuring devices like functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), positron emission tomography (PET), transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), magnetoencephalography (MEG), and new generation electroencephalography (EEG), not to mention all the advances in microscopy that have allowed us to observe the structure and function of nerve cells down to almost the molecular level. The structure of our brains has been mapped with the utmost precision, and many secrets of its functions have been unveiled and mapped in great detail, while thousands of scientific peer-reviewed papers on the subject are published every year.

Yet, we know nothing about the true nature and origin of consciousness. While the debate on the nature of consciousness and its emergence in the cosmos isn’t new, it received new impulse in the late 1980s and in the 1990’s “decade of the brain,” largely due to the extraordinary technological advances in brain monitoring techniques. Several attempts were made to develop new naturalistic theories of consciousness in the frame of modern neuroscience, cognitive sciences, or computational or non-computational theoretical frameworks, but with little or no success. Meanwhile, David Chalmers became famous for pointing at the so-called ‘hard problem of consciousness,’ highlighting the explanatory gap between our first-person subjective qualitative experiences (qualia) and the third-person neuroscientific perspective based on the empirical observation of neural correlates.

The background theoretical assumption is always the same: the mind-brain identity theory. It starts from the unquestioned premise that it is the brain that produces consciousness.

However, the lack of any tangible progress and the failure of this approach to the problem of consciousness is now slowly but steadily becoming ever more visible. There is now mounting evidence pointing against a strict naturalistic interpretation of mind and consciousness. Though this new information is still largely ignored because of ideological reasons, this lack of progress is convincing some scientists and philosophers of mind that the purely naturalistic viewpoint can’t be exhaustive and needs to be revised. To a lesser degree but, perhaps, as a non-negligible factor, some were also influenced by skepticism towards neo-Darwinism as the ultimate paradigm for a materialistic non-teleological account of evolution.

A growing dissatisfaction towards physicalism as the ultimate word in the studies of consciousness and evolution is growing even among intellectuals traditionally loyal to a materialistic Western and analytical philosophical tradition. While material monism is still the dominant view, the idea that a strict mechanistic and intellectual understanding of the world and Nature is the only pathway to truth is becoming increasingly unconvincing. What was once an almost insignificant intellectual minority has now grown into a visible splinter group, though still not a majority, let alone a homogeneous representation. Nevertheless, it is to be expected that as time passes, the alternatives to physicalism will become more vocal and will receive more attention and recognition, reaching a critical mass that, at some point, will make ignoring it an impossibility.

Indeed, a clear symptom that shows how Western metaphysics is rediscovering its own roots is the revival of old metaphysical worldviews like philosophical idealism, pantheism, panentheism, panpsychism, cosmopsychism, substance dualism, substance monism, and further developments or modifications of them. This variety of non-physicalist frameworks, spanning throughout the philosophy of mind, consciousness studies, cognitive sciences, neuroscience, and psychology, constitute an impressive trend toward old and new metaphysical ontologies.

However, this metaphysical renaissance isn’t devoid of problems either. These purely intellectual theories, speculations, and conjectures, are too much based on a Western scientific, rationalistic, and third-person approach. I claim that this is the root cause of many of the inconsistencies and paradoxes that question their validity.

It is at this juncture that I would like to kick in with a philosophical project that, at least potentially, could go beyond mere philosophy and lead to a different practical approach in science and, ultimately, to the understanding of our true and intimate nature of human beings and our place in the universe.

I propose that these apparent inconsistencies arise because we often view them as mutually exclusive, rather than recognizing them as diverse but complementary elements of a broader cosmology that unifies them into an integral theory of consciousness. However, to grasp the integral structure that underpins these varied theoretical frameworks, we must first identify some of their common limitations.

Firstly, the Western philosophy of mind must be more open to its Eastern counterpart. The fact that the Asian tradition was mainly a first-person contemplative approach, not a third-person scientific and analytical understanding of reality, doesn’t make it less valuable. To the contrary, we must understand it as a necessary complement to the present rationalistic mindset that still affects Western metaphysics.

Secondly, the low-dimensional metaphysical paradigms that assume a purely physical, or purely mental or, at best, the binary matter-mind dual-substance stance, together with the conflation of the mind and consciousness categories must be reconsidered. This ‘dimensional reduction’ is one of the main crippling factors that prevented further progress.

Thirdly, in panpsychism and various forms of idealism where reality's foundation is considered mind-like or consciousness-like, the nature of this universalization as a 'cosmic Mind,' 'universal Mind,' or 'Mind at large,' as A. Huxley termed it in 1954, remains largely unaddressed. The Mind with capital letter M, is often equated with an anthropomorphic human-like rational and analytic mind. Or, worse, it becomes an instinctive and blind mind or will devoid of telos and intelligence like Spinoza or Schopenhauer assumed. However, assuming to the contrary that it could be a trans-rational mind and positing the existence of a supraconscious, in addition to the subconscious, could lead us to a very different and more exhaustive picture of reality.

Fourthly, in the above-mentioned frameworks, the evolutionary perspective is scarcely addressed, if not entirely absent. What is evolution, and what is its function and purpose from a metaphysical standpoint? Accepting evolution as a physical fact of natural history, as well as acknowledging a non-physical substrate inherent in the material universe, necessitates a paradigm that explains the relationship between the two. The emergence of a supposedly trans-physical consciousness and immaterial mind within the physical evolutionary context has been considered by only a few thinkers, such as T. de Chardin in his cosmic theology and J. Gebser in his historical view of the emergence of the 'structures of consciousness’ but remains a largely unexplored philosophical domain. Looking upon biological evolution not only in terms of evolving organisms but also evolving souls, allows us to see life from a perspective that opens new vistas.

My aim is to develop an integral framework that shows how, once we take off these ‘reductive glasses,’ everything finds its place in a harmonious grand vision where the previous paradoxes naturally disappear. It is a philosophical approach that expands these ideas into a theory of universal consciousness grounded in a monistic, panentheistic, teleological, spiritual evolutionary emergentist metaphysical cosmology. A cosmology based on a multi-dimensional and trans-rational ontology of universal planes of existence. This extension offers greater explanatory power for addressing issues in contemporary natural philosophy and science, particularly in evolutionary biology and consciousness studies, thereby providing a broader platform for reconciling science and spirituality.

My starting point is largely inspired by the metaphysics of the Indian mystic, poet, and philosopher Sri Aurobindo who developed an integral cosmology on some of these lines, with one of the most comprehensive first-person mystical accounts of reality that includes the evolutionary process from a trans-rational perspective. However, Sri Aurobindo’s spiritual cosmology is rooted in an Indian spiritual tradition to which the Western philosophy of mind, especially that rooted in the analytic tradition, might struggle to relate. Nonetheless, if appropriately translated into a modern scientific and philosophical language, his ontology can greatly enrich the contemporary Western scientific and philosophical approaches to consciousness studies with a new light, furnishing a conceptual platform that can enlarge them to a new synthesis, and building a bridge between East and West, science and spirituality.

Thus, the project I’m working on will, hopefully, make this synthesis.

In a sense, I already did delineate a first sketch in my book “Spirit calls Nature.” There you will find “a comprehensive guide to science and spirituality, consciousness and evolution in a synthesis of knowledge.”

However, I’m working on another version that will reformulate this synthesis of knowledge around a collection of peer-reviewed papers that I have published in different journals and with a few other articles to come.

Here is a brief recap of the papers I published so far.

In this article, I point out how neuroscientific evidence does not point at the mind-brain identity theory so unambiguously as commonly believed. On the contrary, a long list of neurological aspects and their phenomenology suggest how several brain functions can be best accommodated inside a transmissive paradigm rather than a generative one. This led me to write “An evidence-based critical review of the mind-brain identity theory.” A video presentation of this can be found here.

The same can be said about some dogmas in biology. For example, the idea that biology has finally falsified vitalism–that is, the existence of life-forces, or of some immaterial or subtle element that characterizes life–is commonly taken as an unquestioned fact. But the truth of the matter is that biology simply ignores this hypothesis and posits its non-existence a priori. Whereas there a many good reasons to think otherwise. To know why, take a look at my article “Vitalism and cognition in a conscious universe.”

For some time, I was busy with the question relating to free will. As a physicist, I couldn’t resist the temptation to ask whether quantum mechanics could have something to do with consciousness. I ended up realizing that indeed, it has, but not in the sense people usually think of the subject. Here also we must widen our perspective and see the brain not as the source or ‘generator’ of consciousness, but as an individuation of a universal consciousness. Then “Quantum Indeterminism, Free Will, and Self-Causation” begin to make sense. From this, I was able to extend this view with a follow-up article on "quantum indeterminacy and libertarian panpsychism" that not only illustrates how quantum randomness can be regarded as a 'backdoor' for free agency in an otherwise seemingly strictly deterministic clockwork universe, but also how this can lead to a theory of universal consciousness, that is, a form of libertarian panpsychism.

While, if you want to get an understanding of what I call the ‘integral cosmology’ of Sri Aurobindo from the perspective of consciousness studies you can also begin here: “The Integral Cosmology of Sri Aurobindo: An Introduction from the Perspective of Consciousness Studies.”

Meanwhile, to get a glimpse of my approach and, of course, also about other topics I’m ruminating on, you might like to read through the blog posts of my Substack newsletters.

For other topics not related to consciousness studies, especially in quantum physics and my past work as a postdoc, you can browse through my ResearchGate page.

Or, finally, you can simply follow me on Twitter.

I hope that helps in clarifying what I’m working on. For any further questions, feel free to ask (marco dot masi at gmail dot com).

 

Published papers

"Quantum Indeterminacy and Libertarian Panpsychism"
Mind and Matter, 22 (1):31-50, 2024.

"An Evidence-Based Critical Review of the Mind-Brain Identity Theory"
Frontiers in Psychology, 27 October 2023, Sec. Consciousness Research, Vol. 14, DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1150605 

"The Integral Cosmology of Sri Aurobindo: An Introduction from the Perspective of Consciousness Studies"
Integral Review, Vol. 18 No. 1 September 2023

"Quantum Indeterminism, Free Will, and Self-Causation"
Journal of Consciousness Studies, 30, No. 5–6, 2023, pp. 32–56, 2023.
DOI: 10.53765/20512201.30.5.032 

"Vitalism and Cognition in a Conscious Universe" -
Communicative & Integrative Biology, Volume 15, Issue 1, 2021.
DOI: 10.1080/19420889.2022.2071102

See also my physics papers on Researchgate.