Quantum Darwinism, Science and Spirit
Quantum Darwinism changes the whole idea of what objectivity is, and what it means that the material world is objective. In quantum Darwinism the objectivity of the world is not a matter of an intrinsic separateness of things. Rather, it is a matter of redundancy, and what survives. In the IIP-VGF framework this principle extends throughout the classical world, beyond quantum decoherence itself.
Redundancy always involves a "many", a plurality. But not necessarily a plurality of the thing that is objective. A greenhouse is objective because it is the same greenhouse no matter who observes it. Even if it is the only greenhouse like that in the world. And its objective properties are independent of who observes it. That's what makes it what we call "objective". What that means is that these properties turn out to be the same for every observer, even though every observer may have a different view of it, because their view of it depends on the relation between the greenhouse and themselves. But what makes all the different views of the greenhouse correlate in this way, is not that the greenhouse is fundamentally separate from the observers. Rather, it is that the greenhouse and the observers have the same generative origin. And the means of generation involves creating redundancy.
In the example of the greenhouse all observers of the greenhouse as something objective are themselves redundant, different decoherence images of that kind of observer, when it is in a state that enables observation of the greenhouse. The greenhouse is itself part of the structure of each observer in that state. In evolutionary, symbolic intelligence, you might not think so. But the scientific fact is that what each observer perceives and experiences as the greenhouse is a neural construct created by their own brain. This neural construct is continually updated by incoming information through the sense, from the objective world. But that doesn't mean the objective world is separate. It means the objective world is a different part of the process - the process through which all these brains and the greenhouse have come about in the first place.
Things in the objective world are not objective by virtue of being separate. They are objective through the principle of redundancy. The obvious apparent separation of objective things in time and space is because time and space is the fundamental, root redundancy for everything. The evolution of evolutionary intelligence and observers comes after the stabilisation of space and time in the generative process. That doesn't mean that consciousness evolves from space and time. That's not the case, because the whole generative process is itself a decoherence image. Nonetheless, the generative process is the deepest way that the structure and dynamics of ourselves and our existence can be understood in symbolic intelligence.
This doesn't mean that religion, spirituality and God have no place in this understanding, or that structure and dynamics is all there is. But when things are put into the proper perspective, in which science genuinely meets spirit, science doesn't collapse into spiritual talk, and what is spiritual cannot be reduced to science. When things are put into the proper perspective, then understanding concerns the nature of generativity. Without generativity there wouldn't be anything. It is generativity that gives rise to evolution, the species, us, and our intelligence. Which embodies our consciousness. And that's why understanding the generativity itself is essential if there is going to be a meeting of science and spirit.
Redundancy always involves a "many", a plurality. But not necessarily a plurality of the thing that is objective. A greenhouse is objective because it is the same greenhouse no matter who observes it. Even if it is the only greenhouse like that in the world. And its objective properties are independent of who observes it. That's what makes it what we call "objective". What that means is that these properties turn out to be the same for every observer, even though every observer may have a different view of it, because their view of it depends on the relation between the greenhouse and themselves. But what makes all the different views of the greenhouse correlate in this way, is not that the greenhouse is fundamentally separate from the observers. Rather, it is that the greenhouse and the observers have the same generative origin. And the means of generation involves creating redundancy.
In the example of the greenhouse all observers of the greenhouse as something objective are themselves redundant, different decoherence images of that kind of observer, when it is in a state that enables observation of the greenhouse. The greenhouse is itself part of the structure of each observer in that state. In evolutionary, symbolic intelligence, you might not think so. But the scientific fact is that what each observer perceives and experiences as the greenhouse is a neural construct created by their own brain. This neural construct is continually updated by incoming information through the sense, from the objective world. But that doesn't mean the objective world is separate. It means the objective world is a different part of the process - the process through which all these brains and the greenhouse have come about in the first place.
Things in the objective world are not objective by virtue of being separate. They are objective through the principle of redundancy. The obvious apparent separation of objective things in time and space is because time and space is the fundamental, root redundancy for everything. The evolution of evolutionary intelligence and observers comes after the stabilisation of space and time in the generative process. That doesn't mean that consciousness evolves from space and time. That's not the case, because the whole generative process is itself a decoherence image. Nonetheless, the generative process is the deepest way that the structure and dynamics of ourselves and our existence can be understood in symbolic intelligence.
This doesn't mean that religion, spirituality and God have no place in this understanding, or that structure and dynamics is all there is. But when things are put into the proper perspective, in which science genuinely meets spirit, science doesn't collapse into spiritual talk, and what is spiritual cannot be reduced to science. When things are put into the proper perspective, then understanding concerns the nature of generativity. Without generativity there wouldn't be anything. It is generativity that gives rise to evolution, the species, us, and our intelligence. Which embodies our consciousness. And that's why understanding the generativity itself is essential if there is going to be a meeting of science and spirit.