Are we closer to understanding the nature of consciousness than we were twenty years ago? Ever since Chalmers posed ‘the hard problem’ of consciousness, of why sentient organisms have subjective experiences, the debate has gone in circles. Papers on the subject variously conclude, There really is a hard problem, there […]
mind
35 posts
David Bohm, whose unique interpretation of quantum mechanics has been shunned for fifty years by most physicists, may now be back in favour thanks to a new experiment performed by Aephraim Steinberg of the University of Toronto. While most Network members are no doubt more familiar with David Bohm’s philosophical writings or […]
Depth Psychology has never had it easy. Most articles in New Scientist and other scientific journals denounce psychoanalysis as pseudoscience, a collection of disproved and discredited techniques for curing mental illness. At worst, a scam. A long review article by Oliver Burkeman recently published in the Guardian takes a different view that […]
In a recent panel discussion hosted by Science and Non Duality (SAND), posted on youtube, several top scientists and explore their current understanding on the nature of consciousness. Participating were, Stuart R. Hameroff, MD, Director of the Center for Consciousness Studies Julia Mossbridge, Ph.D., Director of the Innovation lab at […]
The existence of “free will” was thrown into question in a famous study conducted by Benjamin Libet in the 1980s in which he demonstrated that his subjects responded to stimuli before they were even aware of them. A person’s brain records precursor activity to moving an arm before that person […]
The debate on the nature and origin of consciousness has lately taken an unexpected turn. Rather than restricting consciousness to the human species, the new theories such as Integrated Information Consciousness (IIC) are expanding the notion of consciousness to many material entities, non-biological included. After a long detour into the […]
A recent news item tells us that the Raelian sect – an American group which teaches that the human race stems from intelligent aliens who generated it by cloning themselves – now claims to have produced two actual babies by cloning. This is not, of course, a very plausible story. […]
Editorial by Paul Kieniewicz, December 2015 According to sources at the UK Met Office, the world is officially about one degree warmer than in pre-industrial times. There is nothing magical about the one degree figure except that it is half the way to 2 degrees, regarded by many climatologists as […]
Man, afraid to be alive, Shuts his soul in senses five; From fields of uncreated light Into the crystal tower of sight; And from the roaring songs of space Into the small flesh-carven place Of the ear whose cave impounds Only small and broken sounds; And to his narrow sense […]
Many readers will be aware of the furore occasioned by a recent publication of Daryl Bem, which seems to violate the presuppositions of scientific materialism. This is an edited version of Larry’s editorial in Explore. Scientists are supposed to be evidence-based and reasonable, but this episode reveals deep-seated prejudices with […]