Setting Sail on Our Year-Long Journey

The First Question: What Can We Know for Certain? (The Nature of Consciousness #1)

Welcome to our first exploration together. For those of you who would like to read along as we go, this week we’re diving into the opening pages of The Nature of Consciousness (pages 1-5) where we encounter what may be the most fundamental question any mind can ask.

For those following along with the book, we’re beginning with the Introduction, titled ‘The Hard Problem of Consciousness’. If you don’t have a copy, no worries at all – each week’s exploration is designed to stand on its own.

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A Foundational Error in Human Understanding

Our world culture is founded upon the assumption that reality consists of two essential ingredients: mind and matter. In this duality, matter is considered the primary element, giving rise to the prevailing materialistic paradigm in which it is believed that mind, or consciousness – the knowing element of mind – is derived from matter.

How consciousness is supposedly derived from matter – a question known as the ‘hard problem of consciousness’ – remains a mystery, and is indeed one of the most vexing questions in science and philosophy today.

And yet, this universal assumption, with all of its profound implications throughout human history, has prevailed despite there being no evidence that it is true! It is a universal belief that runs contrary to our actual experience.

As we shall see, all that could ever be known about is experience. And thus, experience must be the ultimate measure of reality.