Dark Pool of Light, Volume One: The Neuroscience, Evolution, and Ontology of ConsciousnessIn books like Embryogenesis and Embryos, Galaxies, and Sentient Beings, author Richard Grossinger brought together the subjects of biological embryology and the esoteric process of human consciousness becoming embodied ("The embryo is the universe writing itself on its own body"). In Dark Pool of Light, his latest creation, Grossinger weaves neuroscience-based behaviorism and the phenomenology of "being" and reality together with psychological and psychospiritual views of "that single thing which is most difficult to understand or vindicate: our own existence." In 2008 Grossinger began studying with noted psychic teacher John Friedlander, who helped him refine his vision of cerebral and somatic awareness to still-subtler levels. "Dark Pool of Light began unnamed in the journals of my psychic work with John Friedlander," says Grossinger, "not so much a record of actual practices as insights from them and extensions out of them." An expansive inquiry into the nature of consciousness, the series examines the tension between the scientific and philosophical, and psychic views of the same phenomena, and includes "field notes" and experiential exercises that invite the reader to make their own explorations. Dark Pool of Light is divided into three volumes, which the author calls "movements"; the allusion to music is apt, for the book unfolds in a truly symphonic manner. In Volume 1, Grossinger begins with the scientific and philosophical, analytical views of reality, exploring the science, parascience, philosophy, and psychology of consciousness. Covering topics as diverse as current discoveries in neuroscience and the philosophy of the ancient Greeks, the book gives a broad overview of the bodies of knowledge concerning the nature of reality and consciousness. |
Contents
CHAPTER ONE What the Fuck Is This? | 10 |
CHAPTER THREE Consciousness Everything and Nothing | 43 |
Protoconsciousness | 63 |
Nonconsciousness | 96 |
CHAPTER Six Qualia or Zombies? | 127 |
CHAPTER EIGHT The Quantum Brain | 243 |
CHAPTER NINE The Ontology and Cosmology of Consciousness | 282 |
CHAPTER TEN The Subtexts of Science | 322 |
Common terms and phrases
actual animal atoms awareness basis behavior biological brain cells cerebral Claude Lévi-Strauss cognitive Colin McGinn complex cortex create creatures Darwinian Deacon Dennett dream effects Elemental Mind embryo Embryogenesis emergent energy entropy epiphenomenal everything evolution evolved existence existential experience fact Freud function functionalist genes genetic Güven Güzeldere hominids human ibid identity inside John Searle Jule Eisenbud machine matter meaning mechanism memory mental metaphysical microtubules molecular molecules monitors mysterious Nature of Consciousness Ned Block ness networks neural neurons Nick Herbert nonconscious North Atlantic Books objects ontological operating organs Owen Flanagan panpsychism particles person phenomenal philosophical physical physicist planet processes properties qualia quantum quantum entanglement reality Relaxed Selection representation Richard Grossinger robot scientists sciousness sense sensory Siri Hustvedt space structure synapses Terrence Terrence W theory thermodynamic thing Thomas Nagel thought tion tissue unconscious universe waves zombie