The Metaphysics of Matter

Many people talk about the need for metaphysics to be unified with physics, so that the essential structure of reality we term the 'atom' represents at the lowest level something intrinsic and essential to what we, as thinkers, experience on the level of consciousness. The Atom and the Mind should be dynamically contiguous, unified by the same sort of lawfulness.

When we talk about consciousness, we need to be clear that we are talking about the evolution of biological life on planet Earth. We are talking about the metaphysics of the organism before we talk about the metaphysics of consciousness. The metaphysics of the organism should follow the metaphysics of matter. The rules of the smallest degree should reappear again and again at higher spatiotemporal scales.

Metaphysics of Reality: the Trinity

So what is the metaphysics of our mind? By metaphysics, I mean 'coordinates', in the sense that there is a basic movement of energy from one pole to another pole. The concept of 'polarity' is itself a function of this metaphysics - this essential symmetry. What is this symmetry? Self and Other. What is the third element? The flow of meaning from one to the other, back and forth. The trinity may then be defined as Self, Other, and Affect.

The ancients, being metaphysically attuned to the concept of God, but insufficiently attuned to the nature of their own being, fell into the error of projecting their own needs for a metaphysical drama between God and Humanity (known as "Man" in philosophical literature before the modern era) and in the process dissociated the presence of an evolutionary reality which placed "humanity" ahead of God - at least in the ontological scaffoldng of being, the reality of "man" must not be ignored, as that reality provides the very entrance point into a deeper understanding of existence itself.

Atoms

The atom is made of a trinity of protons, neutrons and electrons. There is, furthermore, really just a symmetry, and the movement of an energy, which is similar to the symmetry of self and other, and the 'affect' which moves between them. Protons and neutrons together make the nucleus of an atom. Within each of them lie three quarks which are forever glued into their configuration, forcing protons and neutrons into being. Between the two of them, the nucleus of the atom is 2000 times (at the very least) heavier than the electron. The electron is the source of asymmetry in reality: its emergence in the way that it works depends on the weak force within a star. The electron is an expression of that weak force, even if that expression is expressed millions of miles away from where the element was first synthesized.

Is this a metaphor, or an archetype, of self, other, and affect? Is self and other akin to the proton and neutron? And the feeling which flows between us, the rule of the electron, which is itself the basis of chemistry and all of biology?

More to Find

There is more to be found in the world we live in. With the emergence of life, the quality of three separates in a similar way to the duality of nucleus and electron; in the cell, there is a gene, as well as a protein in the membrane of the cell, and an external molecule (called a co-factor) which that protein embedded in the membrane is quantumly entangled with. Again, two things on the inside (gene/protein) which express the symmetry tensegrity of the whole, with something - an essential element - on the outside, which helps reconstitute the original structure.

This particular example is not entirely clear with the earlier one about the proton/neutron + electron. Remember, the pattern in metaphysics we are working from to establish our sense of order is the categories of self, other, and the way we're affected. In the atom, self and other is the symmetry associated with proton/neutron, whereas in the cell, the symmetry is between the gene (nucleic acid) and protein (amino acid) relationship. The cell is a microcosm of the mind, so lets notice how this metaphysics is found within its dynamics. What occurs between proteins and nucleic acids? The entire metabolic cycle, or the transformation of larger molecules into metabolites, which are then transformed into the macromolecules of nucleic acids and proteins. Metabolism, then, is correlated with the electron, and also with the concept of Affect. Like the electron, metabolism and affect is spread out across a field of relationships - essential symmetries - which hold the cell and the mind together.

The cell, in turn, is as symmetrically connected to the external molecule it feeds upon as nucleic acids are with membrane proteins. If this is so, what is the "affect" which corresponds to the cellular relationship with the external molecule? There must be some fundamental tensegrity in the electromagnetic field between the population of responsive proteins in the membrane, and the molecule in the environment which its metabolic systems seek to connect with. Same thing.

You can see how the growth in the complexity of the organism is simultaneously an ontological 'widening' of the sorts of trinities which generate our experience of reality through the, again, triadic relational affects we can experience towards reality: fun/play, care, and awe, each have their own objects which are 'symmetrical' to the selves needs. Care is the Hub; Awe is the ground of Being, and the planet we live upon and our own body constitute the play-fun we obviously seek in existing.

a reply to: Astrocyte

I'm waiting for the day when we have what is considered a true AI, I'd like it [The AI] to run the double slit experiment to see if ITS consciousness affects the outcome

originally posted by: SLAYER69
a reply to: Astrocyte

I'm waiting for the day when we have what is considered a true AI, I'd like it [The AI] to run the double slit experiment to see if ITS consciousness affects the outcome

But consciousness didn't affect the outcome.

If you are in the dark, and you reach out to see if that glass of water is there, and you inadvertently knock the glass over, your consciousness didn't knock the glass of water over. Your method of determining if it was there, did.

AI would get that, and between it and the other AI go "I I I I I I I I I I I I WE WE WE WE DID NOT" .. at least according to facebook AI, anyway.

originally posted by: SLAYER69
a reply to: Astrocyte

I'm waiting for the day when we have what is considered a true AI, I'd like it [The AI] to run the double slit experiment to see if ITS consciousness affects the outcome

It won't, I predict.

However I recall, the act of a human observing the experiment was shown to be the 'cause' of the difference of expected results.

a reply to: Astrocyte

Space... the final frontier.. well, except for atoms. There is more space within an atom than there is .. atoms.

The human body is a collection of organisms that over millions and millions of years, coalesced and developed a symbiotic relationship, much like the Portuguese Man O'War. Each part working in unison to create the illusion of a single thing. Self preservation, energy consumption, and reproduction.

We are no different, we are made up from different colonies of cells all orchestrated to perform something in return for something else. Even our gut is a diverse microbiome of bacteria, which serve many different roles; not US, but without them we'd die. Our nervous system, enteric nervous system (the second brain) etc, all acting independently to preserve the whole.

What is different, is that one glob of cells that evolved from self preservation, to needs, to wants, to dreams. The brain. And with self awareness, came the self. The whole. And the need to know why. Why? Why not. Pareidolia, a function of self preservation, became everything from things of beauty encased within stone, to be carved out and displayed, to small furry animals on Mars. Pieces of toast now contain the face of someone our needs to know why, sufficiently explained to people who, without even more why's answered, found faith.

We are the cells that make us, but we are all, a complicated conglomeration of different things, symbiotic things, living in harmony... when the brain permits.

Atoms... a universe within the infinitely small. How do we expect to ever see beyond that which is limited to us by the very fact of infinity. When what we can see, is so largely ignored anyway.

originally posted by: SLAYER69
a reply to: Astrocyte

I'm waiting for the day when we have what is considered a true AI, I'd like it [The AI] to run the double slit experiment to see if ITS consciousness affects the outcome

Why would you expect something created by humans for humans to have any affect different to the humans that created it? It'd just be an extension of it's creator's "consciousness" whether it could make it's own decisions or not.

Can we get more information about matter through our senses...?