I see the human organism as a layering of different levels of consciousness. Each layer supports mostly automated processes that sustain the layers beneath it.
For example, we have cells that only know what it’s like to be a cell and to perform their cellular processes without any awareness of the more complex layers above them. Organs are much more complex than cells and they perform their duties without any awareness of anything above them either. And the complexity keeps increasing with various systems like endocrine, cardiovascular, etc. Then we have our subconscious and finally our conscious.
At our level, we do not consciously control any of the layers beneath us. Our primary task is to keep our bodies alive.
This got me thinking… isn’t it a little too self aggrandizing to think that we have a near infinite layering of consciousness beneath us and then it just stops at our level of awareness? What if there is some other conscious process that exists above us within our own bodies?
When people take psychedelic drugs they often describe achieving a higher level of awareness akin to ecstasy. Well what if this layer is always there actively ”living” within us but we are just the chumps that go to work, do our taxes, and exercise, while it doles out just enough feel good chemicals to keep us going (sometimes not even that)?
I think that is the point. Does a cell have any evidence of something above it?
A cell doesn’t have evidence of anything and is incapable of pondering such a thing. So the very idea of a cell having evidence is absurd.
The idea of a person having evidence is not absurd. And I would argue that there is evidence that there is not a higher consciousness in our bodies. There is no bodily system that behaves in a conscious way other than the brain.
Except you can not prove that we are capable of pondering this higher level of consciousness just like a cell is unable to ponder anything as we understand it. For all we know, this higher level of consciousness also has a Reddit equivalence and has provided the same response as you in that they argue our own level of consciousness has no capacity to ponder anything. Or at least it’s definition of what it is to ‘ponder’.
Maybe we are a single conscript in an infinite number of alternate universes that together with an infinite number of related and connected conscripts create some higher level of consciousness. Have you considered that?
You also technically can’t fully know that the cell has no awareness, ability to ponder, etc…because you are presuming those things stem from attributes that are exclusively human, when that might not be the case.
That is why I said ponder anything… as we understand it.
Well no I can’t disprove it because it’s not falsifiable. But there’s no evidence for it so in my opinion it’s not worthy of much consideration beyond a half-hearted musing.
I haven’t considered those things but again I would want to see evidence for them before taking them seriously. The first step would be proving that alternate universes exist. I’m not a physicist but I know this has been theorized. Is there any evidence for it yet? Then you would need to demonstrate that communication between these universes is happening in our brains somehow. At that point you might start to wonder about such things.