Thread: Collective Consciousness

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

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If we operate under the assumption that human consciousness is purely physical,

Is this the perspective from which you wish this disussion be driven from , or limited to?

I read everything, and I'd like to ask are you just trying to make a point that collective consciousness simply exists? Or is there more?

Anyways, I found the writing interesting especially on the middle part regarding mob mentality.

Originally Posted by NonDualistic

Is this the perspective from which you wish this disussion be driven from , or limited to?

Not necessarily, I'm open to any interpretation.

From reading your commentary above, it looks like that you are defining the collective consciousness as something different than what has been otherwise discussed here before.
I remember Merlocks argumets against being part of a collective as defined as individual consciousnesses being directly tied together, arising theselves from a one larger consciousness, or collective.
Your definition here seems to speak of the collective in an opposite construction to that. One where the collective is what arises from the individual consciousnesses coming together.

Is this being taken rightly?

It is. My goal is to establish the collective consciousness as an existing phenomenon regardless of the perspective from which it is approached. One can say that it is a metaphysical connection of minds but one cannot refute its existence simply by refuting this particular interpretation.

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

It is. My goal is to establish the collective consciousness as an existing phenomenon regardless of the perspective from which it is approached. One can say that it is a metaphysical connection of minds but one cannot refute its existence simply by refuting this particular interpretation.

Onus( havnt seen him around here in a long time)told me about a book by Carl Jung which I read on his suggestion. Cant remember the name and dont have it here at the moment, as I lent it to someone else, but it speaks of the same basic principle you are describing here. It talks of how people surrender their individuality to a "collective" mindset, conscious or unconscious. Lots of labels can be bent to apply.

What we run into with your undertaking here is a "war" of words and definitions. Clarity of meaning is going to be difficult as best in picking and choosing what labels to apply.

There cant be much argument that there is a phenomenon to which a greater , wider, mass psuedo consciousness arises from a group of gathered individuals. Such can be seen openly everywhere. Religion, polotics, social groups etc etc. are all examples. The more "advertised" or circulated or broadcast the group and its thinking is, the more it pulls into its ranks more individuals. The more individuals it pulls, the more powerful that particular mass consciousness becomes. Simple observation.

Another simple observation is in that the group then also influences the individual consciousness or thinking. Really, I do not like the definition of this phenomenon as being consciousness. It is more to the tune of thinking and thoughts upon consciousness of the individual. Not consciousness itself. the idea of a group or mass or collective consciousness in of itself is in my view a illusion of sorts. It is not real in so much as the definition of consciousness is implied.

One must also note that I look upon awareness and consciousness as being distinct from one another. In this view I have, Consciousness is something that arises to or upon awareness. There is always the awareness of something prior to any conscious disecting or defining of it.

The point though, that I am trying to make is that this idea of a mass collective is in itself conscious by the common definition and has thoughts and motives of its own that are not exactly dependent on the individuals involved.

I don't think it is merely a collection of ideas that individuals hold because there are ideas involved that no one individual holds all of. For instance; the idea of politics. No one person can say that they embody all that is politics but we can easily say that politics is a self contained idea. We as individuals have our own separate ideas about politics but not a single one of us contains all of the ideas that make up the one idea that is 'Politics'.

This collective consciousness you are talking about is what a lot of people refer to as God. This collective consciousness is more like a huge memory, not something capable of awareness or consciousness. Also, what you talk about, that no one of us contains all of the ideas that make up the one idea is pretty interesting, this reminds me of the allegory of the cave of Plato and the world of ideas. He was discussing similar topics.

It's already pretty obvious a collective conscious defined as global memory or global culture does indeed exist, but this collective consciousnesss being conscious on itself? I don't understand how you got to that point..

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

The point though, that I am trying to make is that this idea of a mass collective is in itself conscious by the common definition and has thoughts and motives of its own that are not exactly dependent on the individuals involved.

I don't think it is merely a collection of ideas that individuals hold because there are ideas involved that no one individual holds all of. For instance; the idea of politics. No one person can say that they embody all that is politics but we can easily say that politics is a self contained idea. We as individuals have our own separate ideas about politics but not a single one of us contains all of the ideas that make up the one idea that is 'Politics'.

Is the collection of thoughts and ideas a consciousness unto itself?

That is an interesting question.

Is such a collection capable of making decisions and executing them, bringing the results of those decisions into existance? ...into form?

If so , how ? what are the mechanics of it?

The mechanics would be like a huge pool of water. The collective consciousness is the body of water. The waves are the creations of the consciousness. Without water, there would be no waves. This metaphor also shows how everything is interconnected and can influence eachother and how the body of water is aware of everything. Maybe thats a way you could explain the collective consciousness being aware.

Originally Posted by ChaybaChayba

The mechanics would be like a huge pool of water. The collective consciousness is the body of water. The waves are the creations of the consciousness. Without water, there would be no waves. This metaphor also shows how everything is interconnected and can influence eachother and how the body of water is aware of everything. Maybe thats a way you could explain the collective consciousness being aware.

The way in which the understanding arises within me, is that the "pool of water", the "body of water" is aware. Awareness is its intrinsic nature, its intrinsic reality.

To be able to be "Self aware", to be able to look at oneself with the realization of "I am", requires a consciousness to arise to the awarenes, upon the awareness.

Such is likened to the white caps of the waves on the surface of the body of the ocean. They curl back towards the depths, looking down into those depths as they roll along on the surface.

This is what "enlightenment" itself is, it is a consciousness arising, evolving to the point where the awareness recognizes itself through the consciousness unfolding. The dropping of the separated false ego sense created in the environment of cause and effect, and realizing the true interconnected nature of Being, in awareness.

Originally Posted by NonDualistic

The way in which the understanding arises within me, is that the "pool of water", the "body of water" is aware. Awareness is its intrinsic nature, its intrinsic reality.

To be able to be "Self aware", to be able to look at oneself with the realization of "I am", requires a consciousness to arise to the awarenes, upon the awareness.

Such is likened to the white caps of the waves on the surface of the body of the ocean. They curl back towards the depths, looking down into those depths as they roll along on the surface.

This is what "enlightenment" itself is, it is a consciousness arising, evolving to the point where the awareness recognizes itself through the consciousness unfolding. The dropping of the separated false ego sense created in the environment of cause and effect, and realizing the true interconnected nature of Being, in awareness.

None of that or the post you were replying to actually deals with the mechanics of anything. Analogies and metaphors may help some to grasp difficult concepts but you can't actually use them to demonstrate how something actually works.

Awareness is easy to explain and describe, since awareness arises through the senses. Anything that can take in data is aware.

To clarify my answer to your question in a previous post; I don't necessarily care if the topic strays from a purely materialistic description of the phenomenon, as long as it doesn't spiral into the realm of vaguely spiritual esoteric ramblings which it already is. Already neither of you are talking about collective consciousnesses at all and are going on about water waves which, quite frankly, do not really apply to this topic at all.

It seems like what you are talking about, Xaq, are emergent properties of systems at a higher level of organization than what we would call an individual. The question then is, do you consider such collective consciousnesses to exist in some form before the complex social beings that comprise them come to exist, or are they dependent upon evolutionary processes, or none of the above?

Also, is such a collective fully conscious now, or does it merely have an animal awareness ripe for full consciousness?

Originally Posted by Taosaur

It seems like what you are talking about, Xaq, are emergent properties of systems at a higher level of organization than what we would call an individual. The question then is, do you consider such collective consciousnesses to exist in some form before the complex social beings that comprise them come to exist, or are they dependent upon evolutionary processes, or none of the above?

Also, is such a collective fully conscious now, or does it merely have an animal awareness ripe for full consciousness?

I think it is definitely an interdependancy that we are talking about. I don't think consciousness exists without a system to be conscious, but the development of the system does not progress without a certain level of consciousness present. Of course, if you look at a big enough picture eventually you'll see a conscious system that is big enough to incorporate the mechanisms of time within its internal structure and so on this scale the concepts of before and after become meaningless.

I think there are different conscious systems that bare different degrees of consciousness, even just within the social structure of human kind. a group of 50 people or less can act as a single consciousness, but its goals may be minimal and its life time may be limited. Larger more sustained groups have more intricit motives and could therefore can be considered as 'more conscious'.

Most of the time, it is hard to pin point what exactly is the product of a mass mentality and what is simply the workings of a single individual without having intimitate knowledge of the inner workings of the group in question. What may appear to be a mass conscious act might very well be motivated by a small group of illuminati-esque power players turning the screws.

First off, 'neurons' or 'neurones', not 'nuerons'. Sorry, that was just bugging me a bit.

Secondly, I don't think a single consciousness could arise by the interactions of people in a society, like a single giant entity; consciousness being strictly defined as the essenential component for experience, the 'experiencer' so to speak (which is what I mean when I talk about consciousness). It's very hard to nail down why, as scientifically we really don't have any idea why consciousness arises (I want to persue this in my career though, I'm trying to get into theoretical and computational neuroscience), but I think one of the key reasons is that this global brain wouldn't have any sensory inputs. Where would they come from? And what would it be like to be this mind?

One very interesting and related idea though is the China brain, which is basically about the question: does it matter that neurons are made of little bits of phospholipid bilayer and protein and water and ions? Couldn't they be made of plastic, or wood, or metal, as long as they worked?

In fact, couldn't you replace every neuron in the brain with a Chinese person with a telephone to contact other Chinese people, and a list of instructions which tells them how to react exactly like a neuron would; and wouldn't the resultant network be conscious?

Isn't it just more likely in the real world where each person, Chinese or otherwise, has not only a telephone but a dozen other channels as well, and dozens of possible activities per channel, with both numbers rising with the advent of new technologies, that our feedback networks may cross a threshhold into something like, or greater than, what we now call 'consciousness' in individuals? What sensory inputs are we lacking? In addition to the 5+ senses of every human on earth, we have an increasing number of eyes, ears, fingers, feelers and more exotic sensory apparati aimed outward into space, from which we process and respond to signals with ever greater rapidity.

It's just a thought experiment on my part, but I definitely see the possibility of one or more trans-human intelligences emerging, though I don't think such an entity has reached maturation yet. The idea is explored in Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End and David Brin's Earth, among other stories.

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

None of that or the post you were replying to actually deals with the mechanics of anything. Analogies and metaphors may help some to grasp difficult concepts but you can't actually use them to demonstrate how something actually works.

Awareness is easy to explain and describe, since awareness arises through the senses. Anything that can take in data is aware.

To clarify my answer to your question in a previous post; I don't necessarily care if the topic strays from a purely materialistic description of the phenomenon, as long as it doesn't spiral into the realm of vaguely spiritual esoteric ramblings which it already is. Already neither of you are talking about collective consciousnesses at all and are going on about water waves which, quite frankly, do not really apply to this topic at all.

I am quite willing to leave the esoteric talk alone as much as possible, but you will have to address the questions I set forth, rather than just blowing by them as you have just done. Those questions were quite pertinent to your discussion unfolding, and had little to do with any "mysticism".

Even my comments towards ChaybaChayba had some bearing on existant realities of the relationship between awareness and consciousness if one would look to see such.

You can't model the universe as a result of a pool of water with waves in, you need particle models also... and anyway, you probably need network theory and such mathematical things to explain consciousness, physical models will likely have very little to do with it.

Originally Posted by NonDualistic

I am quite willing to leave the esoteric talk alone as much as possible, but you will have to address the questions I set forth, rather than just blowing by them as you have just done. Those questions were quite pertinent to your discussion unfolding, and had little to do with any "mysticism".

Even my comments towards ChaybaChayba had some bearing on existant realities of the relationship between awareness and consciousness if one would look to see such.

I addressed your questions in almost all of my posts to one extent or another.

Let me recap for you;
I don't think ideas are conscious in and of themselves, but ideas are non-existent in and of themselves and need a system to inhabit. In this way, they are like water waves; they require a medium. Once cannot say that it is merely the medium or the energy flowing through it that is the wave, to use your favorite analogy, and one cannot say that it is merely the idea or the brain that holds consciousness.

Whether or not such an entity is "capable of making decisions and executing them, bringing the results of those decisions into existance" is the current topic of discussion so I didn't really see any purpose to answering that question with a direct response. I would say yes, which is why I posted the thread.

The mechanics as I see them are very likely much like those present in meme theory, the difference being that once the singular meme evolves into a complex system of thought, it would gain a certain level of consciousness in much the same way that simple cells eventually develop into complex organisms.

I think the most important difference between biological evolution and social/cultural/memetic evolution is the rate of progression. Information is duplicated, retransmitted and altered millions of times a second with our current technology and the rate is growing exponentially. 'Cultural organisms' have the potential to grow and evolve much much faster than biological ones.

To address Taosaur; I have some questions for you. Do you think it would be easy or hard to recognize the autonomous motives of a collective consciousness from the perspective of a small piece of that collection? Do you think you would even know what to look for? Do you think that such a consciousness would necessarily manifest itself in a way that humans would recognize at all? To me this seems like a cell realizing the nature of a human body.

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

To address Taosaur; I have some questions for you. Do you think it would be easy or hard to recognize the autonomous motives of a collective consciousness from the perspective of a small piece of that collection? Do you think you would even know what to look for? Do you think that such a consciousness would necessarily manifest itself in a way that humans would recognize at all? To me this seems like a cell realizing the nature of a human body.

It's a possibility, but if our biosphere comprises a conscious entity at present, 'tis a sickly lad, and probably a cutter.

Originally Posted by Taosaur

It's a possibility, but if our biosphere comprises a conscious entity at present, 'tis a sickly lad, and probably a cutter.

Indeed. I don't disagree, although like I've said; the motives may be hard to fathom. For all we know, us humans are like a cancerous growth and we are being subjected to a healthy dose of chemotherapy.

Edit; Honestly, I think dissociative Identity disorder makes for a better analogy.

Personally, I suspect that if a Grand Emergent consciousness is possible, it will rely very much on both our information networks and the increasing speed and complexity with which we transport physical materials, including organisms. There's also the possibility that the next step in emergence that will be an entity unto itself will not resemble anything we would call consciousness at all.

If you haven't read it, you would very much enjoy Star Maker, by Olaf Stapledon

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

I addressed your questions in almost all of my posts to one extent or another.

Let me recap for you;
I don't think ideas are conscious in and of themselves, but ideas are non-existent in and of themselves and need a system to inhabit. In this way, they are like water waves; they require a medium. Once cannot say that it is merely the medium or the energy flowing through it that is the wave, to use your favorite analogy, and one cannot say that it is merely the idea or the brain that holds consciousness.

Whether or not such an entity is "capable of making decisions and executing them, bringing the results of those decisions into existance" is the current topic of discussion so I didn't really see any purpose to answering that question with a direct response. I would say yes, which is why I posted the thread.

The mechanics as I see them are very likely much like those present in meme theory, the difference being that once the singular meme evolves into a complex system of thought, it would gain a certain level of consciousness in much the same way that simple cells eventually develop into complex organisms.

I think the most important difference between biological evolution and social/cultural/memetic evolution is the rate of progression. Information is duplicated, retransmitted and altered millions of times a second with our current technology and the rate is growing exponentially. 'Cultural organisms' have the potential to grow and evolve much much faster than biological ones.

To address Taosaur; I have some questions for you. Do you think it would be easy or hard to recognize the autonomous motives of a collective consciousness from the perspective of a small piece of that collection? Do you think you would even know what to look for? Do you think that such a consciousness would necessarily manifest itself in a way that humans would recognize at all? To me this seems like a cell realizing the nature of a human body.

Thanks for recapping.

This is knida of neat, in that what you and Tao are getting at in your way of describing, is about just what I am getting at in the esoteric way I am dealing with it. We seem to be looking at essentially the same thing, much in the same way too.

The issues I seem to have in your defining all this is mostly in the definitions of awareness and consciousness, and the differences I note between the two.

I'll be thinking on this all afternoon while doing other things, but would it be accceptable to bring into this discussion my take on awareness and consciousness and the relationship between the two? I would be making reference to meditative experiences and Buddhist related teachings.

Originally Posted by Taosaur

Personally, I suspect that if a Grand Emergent consciousness is possible, it will rely very much on both our information networks and the increasing speed and complexity with which we transport physical materials, including organisms. There's also the possibility that the next step in emergence that will be an entity unto itself will not resemble anything we would call consciousness at all.

If you haven't read it, you would very much enjoy Star Maker, by Olaf Stapledon

I probably would, and based on the wiki description of the book, it is about ideas that are very similar to the ones I am trying to address here (which is probably why you brought it up)

I think the idea of networks being a part of this emergent consciousness is very pertinent and also offers a glimpse into the inner workings of its 'mind'. All of the viral videos and ideas out there on the internet that can't be attributed to a single person are the ideas of the entity that is the internet itself. There is an interdependence between the network and the individuals, but no individual is significant in and of his/herself.

Whenever I see news reports (on television) about these internet phenomena the idea of the internet as its own discrete entity is cemented in my mind because these reporters always refer to it as such without really meaning to. They have no other way to do it, since there is no individual who is 'anonymous' or whatever and so in all of our minds it becomes this extra human thing that is spreading star wars kid or whatever else.

Originally Posted by NonDualistic

Thanks for recapping.

This is knida of neat, in that what you and Tao are getting at in your way of describing, is about just what I am getting at in the esoteric way I am dealing with it. We seem to be looking at essentially the same thing, much in the same way too.

The issues I seem to have in your defining all this is mostly in the definitions of awareness and consciousness, and the differences I note between the two.

I'll be thinking on this all afternoon while doing other things, but would it be accceptable to bring into this discussion my take on awareness and consciousness and the relationship between the two? I would be making reference to meditative experiences and Buddhist related teachings.

Any and all things are acceptable. Don't take my admonition of esoterics as a deterent. All I am saying is that if your ideas are not presented in a format that we can all understand and speak about, then you will have trouble getting a response. I am trying to keep the discussion as straight forward as possible so anyone that may wander in can participate.

Also, I loath metaphors that make the subject of discussion less clear since this is contrary to their purpose in the first place.