The Illusion of Illusionism

[seeds]

If? Sure, when you start there almost anything is possible.

If not though?...

...I'm most interested, however, not in what others here [including myself] believe about this, but what they are able to demonstrate that all rational men and women are [philosophically or otherwise] obligated to believe in turn.

You, of course, are not obligated to believe any of this.

The bare minimum of what I am shooting for is for you to at least be open-minded to the fact that I am merely trying to give you a tentative insight into what God might possibly be.

Click.

For those here who do believe in a God, the God, my God, I propose that we take that belief and explore it given the following factors:

1] a demonstrable proof of the existence of your God or religious/spiritual path
2] addressing the fact that down through the ages hundreds of Gods and religious/spiritual paths to immortality and salvation were/are championed...but only one of which [if any] can be the true path. So why yours?
3] addressing the profoundly problematic role that dasein plays in any particular individual's belief in Gods and religious/spiritual faiths
4] the questions that revolve around theodicy and your own particular God or religious/spiritual path

And, in particular, number four. In other words, reconciling a God, the God with this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_earthquakes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_l ... _eruptions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t ... l_cyclones
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tsunamis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landslides
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fires
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_epidemics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deadliest_floods
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t ... ore_deaths
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_diseases
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinction_events

The reconciliation of the above with the existence of God is simple.

I suggest that in the same way we were not meant to reside in our mother's womb forever, likewise, we are not meant to reside in this universe (in God's "cosmic womb") forever.

Therefore, the extensive list of death inducing circumstances you provided above is simply a list of the varying means by which, metaphorically speaking, "God's water" is broken, so that our souls can be delivered (born) into the higher context of reality in which God, and our ultimate form - (the same form as God) - will finally be revealed to us.

From my own frame of mind "here and now", it would seem that if a God, the God does exist then He is either in sync with Harold Kushner's rendition of Him or He is nothing less than a sadistic monster.

If this universe truly is the mind of a higher consciousness, then do you honestly believe that you possess the intellectual wherewithal to second guess the motives and methods of a Being who is capable of creating the unfathomable order of the billions of galaxies of suns and planets held within this vast spatial arena?

Has it never occurred to you that things are the way they are for logical reasons? And that an Entity who, again, is capable of creating the unthinkable order of the universe, might just know what it's doing?

Good grief, man, if God truly does exist, then realize that compared to God, you are the metaphorical equivalent of this...

And the fact that you have already "demonstrated" to yourself that you hold a "measure of control" over an inner dimension of reality that, at certain times, seems to be "almost as real" as this outer dimension of reality,...

Okay, but that frame of mind was brought about by the THC. In fact, back in the day when I had access to LSD...were all of these at times truly bizarre experiences also "God given"?

Regardless of how it was brought to your attention, the fact that you acquired a precursory glimpse of the greater potential of your mind is all that matters.

Furthermore, you need to stop imagining that God's central consciousness (God's "I Am-ness") is conscious of and directly involved in every piddly thing we humans do.

And it's one thing to experience things "in our heads" and another thing altogether to connect the dots between that and a God, the God. Other than, in turn, "in your head". Again, back to the gap between what you believe and what you are able to demonstrate [even to yourself] is in fact true.

The experience I described in my "Burning Bush-like" encounter with God - viewtopic.php?t=41452 - was most definitely not "in my head." No, it was a physically tangible presence that manifested from outside of my body.

And I realize that it in no way meets your rigid requirements for a "demonstration" of proof for the existence of God, nevertheless, you'll just have to take my word for it, for that's all I can provide at this time.

Did you even read my account of the experience?

You insist that the veracity of these ideas must somehow be "demonstrated" to you.

Well, from my perspective, there are only two ways in which my theory could be demonstrated to you.

One way is if you were to die and awaken into full consciousness and thus discover the full potential of your mind.

Believe me, if, after I am dead, my mind is still around at all, that's better than oblivion, right?

Right.

And all I am saying is that, if after death, your mind is still around (implying eternal life), then you must have something logical to do. In which case, the creation and maintenance of your own personal universe, created from the living fabric of your very own being...

(something of which you've already had a precursory glimpse of via dreaming)

...is the only thing that makes any sense when it comes to filling the void of endless time and endless existence.

And the other way is for God to directly impart these ideas to you in the same way they were imparted to me in my "Burning Bush-like" encounter with God that I painstakingly described in this thread...

viewtopic.php?t=41452

Look, I accept the fact that, given free will, those other than me have had personal experiences with God. Assuming of course that is not just one of many mental "conditions".

But unless they are able to provide me with a way to experience it myself then that's all it really is: a personal experience.

I've already provided you with a way of experiencing and verifying the veracity of my theory:..........die.

Either test it, or stop complaining about not being provided with a way to experience the truth about the existence of God.

And, let's face it, any number of these folks...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

....might have their own rendition of "personal experiences" with God. Why yours and not theirs?

Because mine is not only an all-inclusive (no strings attached) concept that applies to all beings throughout the universe, but it represents an outcome for all of us that literally cannot get any more perfect for everyone.

And that's because it suggests that we are all equal members (equal siblings) of the "highest species of being" in all of reality,...

(the same species of being as God)

...who will not only experience the gift of life together - forever,...

...but will forever pass the gift on to others in the same way we received it.

Furthermore, notice in one of my illustrations,...



...that the evolution of our perception of God has been an ever-ascending process.

And it's not that I am implying that I can't be wrong, no, I am simply insisting that it's time for a new vision of God. I'm talking about a new vision of God that is not only more compatible with our modern discoveries in cosmology and quantum physics,...

(which have left the old visions of God floundering and drowning in their wake)

...but one that actually makes sense.
_______

[iambiguous]

You, of course, are not obligated to believe any of this.

The bare minimum of what I am shooting for is for you to at least be open-minded to the fact that I am merely trying to give you a tentative insight into what God might possibly be.

Click.

For those here who do believe in a God, the God, my God, I propose that we take that belief and explore it given the following factors:

1] a demonstrable proof of the existence of your God or religious/spiritual path
2] addressing the fact that down through the ages hundreds of Gods and religious/spiritual paths to immortality and salvation were/are championed...but only one of which [if any] can be the true path. So why yours?
3] addressing the profoundly problematic role that dasein plays in any particular individual's belief in Gods and religious/spiritual faiths
4] the questions that revolve around theodicy and your own particular God or religious/spiritual path

And, in particular, number four. In other words, reconciling a God, the God with this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_earthquakes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_l ... _eruptions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t ... l_cyclones
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tsunamis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landslides
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fires
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_epidemics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deadliest_floods
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t ... ore_deaths
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_diseases
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinction_events

The reconciliation of the above with the existence of God is simple.

Simple? Okay, but there's still what you believe about Him "in your head" here and now, and what, beyond a world of words or a leap of faith or a wager that comforts and consoles you, you are able to demonstrate what others ought to believe about Him.

Let's go there.

I suggest that in the same way we were not meant to reside in our mother's womb forever, likewise, we are not meant to reside in this universe (in God's "cosmic womb") forever.

Therefore, the extensive list of death inducing circumstances you provided above is simply a list of the varying means by which, metaphorically speaking, "God's water" is broken, so that our souls can be delivered (born) into the higher context of reality in which God, and our ultimate form - (the same form as God) - will finally be revealed to us.

I have absolutely no idea what this means "for all practical purposes" given human interactions in which many of these folks...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

...have their very own "a God, the God, my God" rendition of it. Again, why yours? Just because you believe it "in your head"?

From my own frame of mind "here and now", it would seem that if a God, the God does exist then He is either in sync with Harold Kushner's rendition of Him or He is nothing less than a sadistic monster.

If this universe truly is the mind of a higher consciousness, then do you honestly believe that you possess the intellectual wherewithal to second guess the motives and methods of a Being who is capable of creating the unfathomable order of the billions of galaxies of suns and planets held within this vast spatial arena?

Has it never occurred to you that things are the way they are for logical reasons? And that an Entity who, again, is capable of creating the unthinkable order of the universe, might just know what it's doing?

No, of course, I would never suggest that. But until the existence of this "higher consciousness" is actually established by you -- by anyone -- why should others just accept what you argue here? How is it not just sheer speculation on your part? Where's the empirical, experiential, material proof of it? All you seem to have had is a "personal experience" that others are just expected to take your word regarding.

As for logic, the only reason it exists at all is because matter "somehow" evolved into us and we created/invented a language that either could or could not be intertwined seamlessly in our interactions out in the world. And my whole point is that unless a God, the God does exist, then mere mortals don't have access to objective morality. Unless, of course, I'm wrong. And for those who think I am, let them note a moral issue that is of particular importance to them, and we can explore our respective moral philosophies on a new thread in the applied ethics forum.

Want to take your own God there?

And it's one thing to experience things "in our heads" and another thing altogether to connect the dots between that and a God, the God. Other than, in turn, "in your head". Again, back to the gap between what you believe and what you are able to demonstrate [even to yourself] is in fact true.

The experience I described in my "Burning Bush-like" encounter with God - viewtopic.php?t=41452 - was most definitely not "in my head." No, it was a physically tangible presence that manifested from outside of my body.

And I realize that it in no way meets your rigid requirements for a "demonstration" of proof for the existence of God, nevertheless, you'll just have to take my word for it, for that's all I can provide at this time.

My own requirements? On the contrary, given that there are literally dozens and dozens of One True Paths from which to choose, and with all that is stake on both sides of the grave, who would not require from you more than just what you believe in your head?

And, sure, you can just take my own word for that.

Look, if you or anyone else here ever has a "personal experience" with the God, an experience in which they are either able or not able to provide me with a way to experience Him myself, then [to me] that's all it is: a personal experience.

Then the part where some of these personal experiences revolve around one or another mental "condition". A frame of mind I have very little chance of either understanding or...rebutting?

[iambiguous]

The Illusion of Illusionism
Raymond Tallis sees through a physicalist confusion.

Enter the illusionists. The most lucid and committed among them is Keith Frankish, who embraces ‘strong illusionism’. According to Frankish, “phenomenal consciousness, as usually conceived, is illusory”.

More to the point [mine], do the illusionists themselves enter into all of this of their own free will? After all, if we embrace or conceive only that which we were never able not to embrace or conceive...?

In case you’re wondering whether you read that correctly, he adds, “According to illusionists, our sense that it is like something to undergo conscious experiences is due to the fact that we systematically misrepresent them (or, in some versions, their objects) as having phenomenal properties.” So phenomenal consciousness is an illusion – the product of introspection misrepresenting cerebral events. This remains true even when the phenomenal experiences are projected onto external objects – as when we see a red apple or locate a pain in our foot.

Here, I am not at all sure what "for all practical purposes", given day to day interactions with others that precipitate conflicting goods, this means. Anyone here able to connect the dots between this particular world of words and the experiences they have had? All the while having to assume that one can accomplish this of one's own free will. A leap of faith given the gap and Rummy's Rule.

In this way, illusionism denies any need for radical theoretical innovation to deal with phenomenal experiences – because they are illusory.

Or so some philosophers will argue. Others however will argue just the opposite. On the other hand, if there is no real distinction between theory and practice here, then what? Then back to being stuck or being "stuck". Or, for particular compatibilists, being "stuck"?

The challenge now becomes, not to explain why experiences have phenomenal properties, but why they seem to have them. And so the problem of phenomenal consciousness is replaced by the illusion problem; of how it comes about that we misrepresent complex physical events in the brain as simple phenomenal ones.

In my view, the challenge here revolves first and foremost around accepting the fact that neither science nor philosophy has yet to come up with anything in the way of a resolution. Even explaining how -- why? -- the brain can go about resolving this given all that we still do not grasp about the existence of existence itself, raises a ton of uncertainty.

[Trajk Logik]

Some physicalists propose that reality is simply a relation of mathematics, or that mathematics is fundamental. But mathematics is an abstraction.

In my opinion, reality is not physical or mental. It is informational. Information is fundamental.

Information is also an abstraction, just like mathematics.

Not necessarily. I often use information interchangeably with processes and relations.

As I pointed out earlier, there is nothing "physical" about matter. It's relations all the way down. Objects are just relations of smaller objects and those smaller objects are just more relations of even smaller objects, ad infinitum.

Information is the relationship between causes and their effects. The tree rings you observe in a tree stump inform you of the age of the tree. The tree rings develop as a result of the way the tree grows throughout the year - a causal process. Information exists wherever causes leave effects. There is no cause without effects and vice versa, which is why information/relations is fundamental.

I should also add that abstractions are the effects of prior causes and are also causes themselves. They are the effects of certain experiences and they cause certain types of behaviors. So, in a way, abstractions, or ideas, are just as real as the door jam you stub your toe on. How do abstractions cause effects in a "physical" world? The answer is that the world is not "physical". It's all information/relations/processes (Whitehead).

Process philosophers claim that there are many sound philosophical reasons to take the processual aspects of nature, cognition, and action as fundamental features of reality. The perhaps most powerful argument for process philosophy is its wide descriptive or explanatory scope. If we admit that the basic entities of our world are processes, we can generate better philosophical descriptions of all the kinds of entities and relationships we are committed to when we reason about our world in common sense and in science: from quantum entanglement to consciousness, from computation to feelings, from things to institutions, from organisms to societies, from traffic jams to climate change, from spacetime to beauty. Moreover, results in cognitive science, some philosophers have claimed, show that we need a process metaphysics in order to develop a naturalist theory of the mind and of normativity. These arguments form the background for the processist criticism of the focus on substance in Western philosophy. The bias towards substances seems to be rooted partly in the cognitive dispositions of speakers of Indo-European languages, and partly in theoretical habituation, as the traditional prioritization of static entities (substances, objects, states of affairs, static structures) at the beginning of Western metaphysics built on itself. In contrast, process philosophy shows fewer affinities to any particular language group and can allude to a rich tradition of reflection in many of the great schools of Eastern thought.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/

The flawed idea of dualism derives from the illusion that the world is physical - that the world is as it appears in the mind of static space occupied by static, solid, objects compared to the mind as a process. In declaring the mind as the illusion rather than the way the world is represented in the mind, just pulls the rug out from under all of science as science is built upon observations and the ideas built upon those observations. Objects as static substances is the illusion, not the process or relations that underlie them.

[Atla]

Some physicalists propose that reality is simply a relation of mathematics, or that mathematics is fundamental. But mathematics is an abstraction.

In my opinion, reality is not physical or mental. It is informational. Information is fundamental.

Information is also an abstraction, just like mathematics.

Not necessarily. I often use information interchangeably with processes and relations.

As I pointed out earlier, there is nothing "physical" about matter. It's relations all the way down. Objects are just relations of smaller objects and those smaller objects are just more relations of even smaller objects, ad infinitum.

Information is the relationship between causes and their effects. The tree rings you observe in a tree stump inform you of the age of the tree. The tree rings develop as a result of the way the tree grows throughout the year - a causal process. Information exists wherever causes leave effects. There is no cause without effects and vice versa, which is why information/relations is fundamental.

I should also add that abstractions are the effects of prior causes and are also causes themselves. They are the effects of certain experiences and they cause certain types of behaviors. So, in a way, abstractions, or ideas, are just as real as the door jam you stub your toe on. How do abstractions cause effects in a "physical" world? The answer is that the world is not "physical". It's all information/relations/processes (Whitehead).

Process philosophers claim that there are many sound philosophical reasons to take the processual aspects of nature, cognition, and action as fundamental features of reality. The perhaps most powerful argument for process philosophy is its wide descriptive or explanatory scope. If we admit that the basic entities of our world are processes, we can generate better philosophical descriptions of all the kinds of entities and relationships we are committed to when we reason about our world in common sense and in science: from quantum entanglement to consciousness, from computation to feelings, from things to institutions, from organisms to societies, from traffic jams to climate change, from spacetime to beauty. Moreover, results in cognitive science, some philosophers have claimed, show that we need a process metaphysics in order to develop a naturalist theory of the mind and of normativity. These arguments form the background for the processist criticism of the focus on substance in Western philosophy. The bias towards substances seems to be rooted partly in the cognitive dispositions of speakers of Indo-European languages, and partly in theoretical habituation, as the traditional prioritization of static entities (substances, objects, states of affairs, static structures) at the beginning of Western metaphysics built on itself. In contrast, process philosophy shows fewer affinities to any particular language group and can allude to a rich tradition of reflection in many of the great schools of Eastern thought.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/

Processes and relations in the sense that you're using them, are also abstractions.

[Trajk Logik]

Information is also an abstraction, just like mathematics.

Not necessarily. I often use information interchangeably with processes and relations.

As I pointed out earlier, there is nothing "physical" about matter. It's relations all the way down. Objects are just relations of smaller objects and those smaller objects are just more relations of even smaller objects, ad infinitum.

Information is the relationship between causes and their effects. The tree rings you observe in a tree stump inform you of the age of the tree. The tree rings develop as a result of the way the tree grows throughout the year - a causal process. Information exists wherever causes leave effects. There is no cause without effects and vice versa, which is why information/relations is fundamental.

I should also add that abstractions are the effects of prior causes and are also causes themselves. They are the effects of certain experiences and they cause certain types of behaviors. So, in a way, abstractions, or ideas, are just as real as the door jam you stub your toe on. How do abstractions cause effects in a "physical" world? The answer is that the world is not "physical". It's all information/relations/processes (Whitehead).

Process philosophers claim that there are many sound philosophical reasons to take the processual aspects of nature, cognition, and action as fundamental features of reality. The perhaps most powerful argument for process philosophy is its wide descriptive or explanatory scope. If we admit that the basic entities of our world are processes, we can generate better philosophical descriptions of all the kinds of entities and relationships we are committed to when we reason about our world in common sense and in science: from quantum entanglement to consciousness, from computation to feelings, from things to institutions, from organisms to societies, from traffic jams to climate change, from spacetime to beauty. Moreover, results in cognitive science, some philosophers have claimed, show that we need a process metaphysics in order to develop a naturalist theory of the mind and of normativity. These arguments form the background for the processist criticism of the focus on substance in Western philosophy. The bias towards substances seems to be rooted partly in the cognitive dispositions of speakers of Indo-European languages, and partly in theoretical habituation, as the traditional prioritization of static entities (substances, objects, states of affairs, static structures) at the beginning of Western metaphysics built on itself. In contrast, process philosophy shows fewer affinities to any particular language group and can allude to a rich tradition of reflection in many of the great schools of Eastern thought.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/

Processes and relations in the sense that you're using them, are also abstractions.

How so? Seems like you didn't bother reading my whole post. If it's abstractions all the way down does that not prove my point as well?

[Atla]

Not necessarily. I often use information interchangeably with processes and relations.

As I pointed out earlier, there is nothing "physical" about matter. It's relations all the way down. Objects are just relations of smaller objects and those smaller objects are just more relations of even smaller objects, ad infinitum.

Information is the relationship between causes and their effects. The tree rings you observe in a tree stump inform you of the age of the tree. The tree rings develop as a result of the way the tree grows throughout the year - a causal process. Information exists wherever causes leave effects. There is no cause without effects and vice versa, which is why information/relations is fundamental.

I should also add that abstractions are the effects of prior causes and are also causes themselves. They are the effects of certain experiences and they cause certain types of behaviors. So, in a way, abstractions, or ideas, are just as real as the door jam you stub your toe on. How do abstractions cause effects in a "physical" world? The answer is that the world is not "physical". It's all information/relations/processes (Whitehead).


https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/

Processes and relations in the sense that you're using them, are also abstractions.

How so? Seems like you didn't bother reading my whole post. If it's abstractions all the way down does that not prove my point as well?

"Abstraction all the way down" makes no sense. Abstract vs concrete thinking is a dichotomy of human thinking, it's a way of thinking, that can't be all the way down.

People who think that it's all information/processes/relations/abstractions/maths/functions/matter/energy/systems/etc., just don't get the point that reality doesn't reduce to something like this. It doesn't reduce to anything.

[Trajk Logik]

Processes and relations in the sense that you're using them, are also abstractions.

How so? Seems like you didn't bother reading my whole post. If it's abstractions all the way down does that not prove my point as well?

"Abstraction all the way down" makes no sense. Abstract vs concrete thinking is a dichotomy of human thinking, it's a way of thinking, that can't be all the way down.

People who think that it's all information/processes/relations/abstractions/maths/functions/matter/energy/systems/etc., just don't get the point that reality doesn't reduce to something like this. It doesn't reduce to anything.

Another flippant philosopher using words in a way that they don't seem to understand the implications of how they are using the words.

Aside from the fact that nothing you said addresses what I have said, if some way of thinking does not reduce to anything then thinking itself becomes fundamental by default. Solipsism would be the case.

What is thinking if not the processing of (sensory) information? Do not your perceptions inform you?

[Atla]

How so? Seems like you didn't bother reading my whole post. If it's abstractions all the way down does that not prove my point as well?

"Abstraction all the way down" makes no sense. Abstract vs concrete thinking is a dichotomy of human thinking, it's a way of thinking, that can't be all the way down.

People who think that it's all information/processes/relations/abstractions/maths/functions/matter/energy/systems/etc., just don't get the point that reality doesn't reduce to something like this. It doesn't reduce to anything.

Another flippant philosopher using words in a way that they don't seem to understand the implications of how they are using the words.

Aside from the fact that nothing you said addresses what I have said, if some way of thinking does not reduce to anything then thinking itself becomes fundamental by default. Solipsism would be the case.

Yeah that didn't make a lick of sense.

[Trajk Logik]

Yeah that didn't make a lick of sense.

Yeah, I'm sure that is what I said about your post. Now you're resorting to "I know you are but what am I?" arguments? Pathetic.

[Atla]

Yeah that didn't make a lick of sense.

Yeah, I'm sure that is what I said about your post. Now you're resorting to "I know you are but what am I?" arguments? Pathetic.

How did you go from 'there is no cozy basic thing like information or relations, that everything reduces to' to 'thinking must be fundamental by default'?

What is thinking if not the processing of (sensory) information? Do not your perceptions inform you?

What is this about? Do you take metaphors like 'processing of information' and 'informing someone' completely literally? Or are you implying that I believe thinking doesn't exist?

[iambiguous]

The Illusion of Illusionism
Raymond Tallis sees through a physicalist confusion.

There is an obvious objection to illusionism. How can I be wrong about the existence of something for which I have inescapable evidence? Of course, I can be mistaken as to the existence of something that I believe is out there because of my experiences: I may incorrectly think I have seen a red apple. Or I may incorrectly classify it as a plum. I cannot, however, be mistaken that I have had an experience of a colour (even though I might misname it because I have a poor grasp of colour terminology). But while phenomenal consciousness can be mistaken as to its description or its object, it cannot be mistaken as to its own existence

This seems to be another rendition of "I think, therefore I am". On the other hand, might it not be, "I think only what my brain compels me to think, therefore I am behaving only as I am able to behave."

It's not that he is classifying an apple as a plum incorrectly. After all, if his brain has compelled him to do so what does if really mean for all practical purposes to be either correct or incorrect? Someone may note that he has done so. But only because they were never able not to note this.

Though, again -- click -- I'm always willing to concede I am simply unable "here and now" to grasp this in the most reasonable manner.

The belief that I am seeing a pink elephant may be erroneous; but not that I am having the experience of seeing a pink elephant.

Then around and around in circles the hardcore determinists and libertarians seem to go in reacting to this. Some will believe one thing, others another. Then the manner in which the compatibilists claim to...reconcile determinism and free will? He had to classify the apple incorrectly but he is still responsible for doing so?

But believing what you do is one thing, demonstrating that what you believe [correctly or incorrectly] you believe autonomously another thing altogether.

In short, a phenomenal experience does not have to be veridical to exist, or to have happened, or to require explanation. My being wrong about the intentional object of my experience does not prove that I did not have the experience.

Nor, in my view, does it prove that because you believe/think you had a particular experience, this means you must have experienced it freely. We're no less stuck trying to explain the gap between what we do believe is unfolding "in our head" here and all that we simply do not comprehend about the manner in which the human condition fits into an explanation for the existence of existence itself.

[iambiguous]

The Illusion of Illusionism
Raymond Tallis sees through a physicalist confusion.

The obvious problem for anyone denying the existence of phenomenal consciousness is that they have to doubt something whose existence is indubitable.

Unless, of course, a more obvious problem is that Tallis does not grasp [cannot grasp] how [let alone why] it is our brains compelling us to deny it. Doubt and certainty then reflecting both sides of the same wholly determined reality.

Just try doubting the reality of toothache when you’re in the grip of it.

While such experiences may not portray what’s going on in your brain, they are no less real for that.

That's not my point, however. I'm just not sure if my point does in fact reflect anything in the way of...of what exactly? Unlike most, I often find myself coming back time and again to this:

All of this going back to how the matter we call the human brain was "somehow" able to acquire autonomy when non-living matter "somehow" became living matter "somehow" became conscious matter "somehow" became self-conscious matter.

In other words, I will almost certainly go to the grave just as bewildered about the reality of human existence as I've ever been. Whereas others here might go to the grave absolutely convinced their own understanding of the human brain really, really is the correct one.

And what does it mean to argue we don't grasp what is actually going on in the brain when we experience things, but that this doesn't make them any less real? And -- click -- how far are we today from grasping the human brain fully? 10%...20%...90%?

Barely scratched the surface?

There is no appearance-reality gap for the sufferer from toothache, or indeed for any ‘hard’ (to explain) conscious experience. The other phenomenal experiences that you have while you are looking about you as you sit in the waiting room, clutching your jaw, are no less real, either.

Now all he has to do is find a brain scientist who, step by step by step, can explain precisely how our material brains did acquire the capacity to experience things autonomously. I am myself "here and now" convinced that this is certainly possible. As with most others, there's a "deep down inside me" self that "just knows" I have free will. But that's hardly the same thing as actually demonstrating it.