THE EVOLUTIONARY EMERGENT OF UNIQUE SELF: A New Chapter in Integral Theory | Marc Gafni (2011)

ABSTRACT This article outlines the basic teachings of a new chapter in Integral Theory: the post-metaphysical evolutionary emergence of Unique Self. The article begins by contextualizing the Unique Self conversation within a larger discussion on individuality and traces the emergence of the Unique Self teachings through the life and writings of the author. The core Western understanding of individuality and its affirmation of the dignity of the separate self is contrasted with the Eastern teaching of dissolution of the small self, before both are integrated into a higher integral embrace through a new understanding of Unique Self. This article elucidates how the teachings of Unique Self fundamentally change the classical enlightenment paradigm through the assertion that enlightenment has a unique perspective, which might be termed the “personal face of essence.” Perspective taking, which emerges from enlightened consciousness, is rooted in the ontological pluralism that lies at the core of the Hebrew textual tradition. The new enlightenment teaching of Unique Self therefore rests on a series of integral discernments between separateness and uniqueness, ego and Unique Self, and personal and impersonal man. The Unique Self teaching suggests a new understanding of enlightenment through intersubjective love; the Unique Self perception is then set within an evolutionary context of being and becoming, in which it is seen to express one’s response to the personal address of the evolutionary God impulse itself. In this sense, Unique Self is understood to be an essential chapter in the emergence of a truly evolutionary mysticism.

KEY WORDS consciousness; ego; enlightenment; Integral Theory; Unique Self

A Journey to the Source of Consciousness | Prof Mark Solms | Psychology Today

Reproduced from: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-hidden-spring/202102/journey-the-source-consciousness A Journey to the Source of Consciousness http://www.psychologytoday.com Here is a 13-point synopsis of a book I published in the U.S. last week: The Hidden Spring. 1. The great 19th-century physiologist Johannes Müller believed that animate organisms “contain some non-physical element or are governed by different principles than are inanimate things.” Helmholtz, Brücke, du… Read More

New project for a scientific psychology: General scheme | Mark Solms (2020) | Neuropsychoanalysis

This is a revision of Freud’s “Project for a Scientiﬁc Psychology: General Scheme.” It updates the original, sentence for sentence where possible, in light of contemporary neuroscientiﬁc knowledge. The principle revisions are as follows. (1) Freud’s conception of “quantity” (the precursor of “drive energy”) is replaced by the concept of “free energy.” This is the energy within a system that is not currently performing useful work. (2) Shannon’s conception of “information” is introduced, where information is equivalent to unpredictability, and is formally equivalent to “entropy” in physics. (3) In biology, the fundamental purpose of “homeostasis” is to resist entropy – i.e., to increase predictability. Homeostasis turns out to be the underlying mechanism of what Freud called the “principle of neuronal inertia.” (4) Freud’s conception of “contact barriers” (the physical vehicles of memory) is linked with the modern concepts of consolidation/reconsolidation, whereby more deeply consolidated predictions are less plastic (more resistant to change) than freshly consolidated ones. (5) Freud’s notion of sensory “excitation” is replaced with the concept of “prediction error,” where only that portion of sensory input which is not explained by outgoing predictions is propagated inwards for cognitive processing. (6) Freud’s conception of “bound” (inhibited) cathexis, the main vehicle of his “secondary process” and voluntary action is equated with the buﬀering function of “working memory”; and “freely mobile” cathexis (the vehicle of Freud’s “primary process”) is equated with the automatized response modes of the nondeclarative memory systems. (7) Freud’s notion of ω (the system “consciousness”) is replaced by the concept of “precision” modulation, also known as “arousal” and “postsynaptic gain.”

Will Covid-19 Awake Us? The Unconscious System Plague | Prof John McMurtry | Global Research

Like others, I have thought from the first day of the Covid-19 pandemic that it was forcing us to awake from exponential life-system destruction by ‘business as usual’ to our common life-ground.

Antonio Damasio | From Feelings to Socio-Cultural Homeostasis

The Strange Order of Things is a pathbreaking investigation into homeostasis, the condition that regulates human physiology within the range that makes possible not only survival but also the flourishing of life. Antonio Damasio makes clear that we descend biologically, psychologically, and even socially from a long lineage that begins with single living cells; that our minds and cultures are linked by an invisible thread to the ways and means of ancient unicellular existence and other primitive life-forms; and that inherent in our very chemistry is a powerful force, a striving toward life maintenance that governs life in all its guises, including the development of genes that help regulate and transmit life. The Strange Order of Things is a landmark reflection that spans the biological and social sciences, offering a new way of understanding the origins of life, feeling, and culture.

Prof Mark Solms – A Neuropsychoanalytic Perspective on the Hard Problem of Consciousness / Why and How Consciousness Arises / Consciousness Itself is Affect: Felt Uncertainty in the Face of Oblivion

Video Presentations A Neuropsychoanalytic Perspective on the Hard Problem of Consciousness Why and How Consciousness Arises At our Feb. 5 Grand Rounds, Mark Solms, PhD, of the University of Cape Town, presented on how the metaphysical experience of consciousness relates to the physical brain—and why psychiatrists should care. Consciousness Itself is Affect: Felt Uncertainty in… Read More

Biological Evolution as Defense of ‘Self’ | William B. Miller, Jr., John S. Torday & František Baluška

Although the origin of self-referential consciousness is unknown, it can be argued that the instantiation of self-reference was the commencement of the living state as phenomenal experientiality. As self-referential cognition is demonstrated by all living organisms, life can be equated with the sustenance of cellular homeostasis in the continuous defense of ‘self’. It is proposed that the epicenter of ‘self’ is perpetually embodied within the basic cellular form in which it was instantiated. Cognition-Based Evolution argues that all of biological and evolutionary development represents the perpetual autopoietic defense of self-referential basal cellular states of homeostatic preference. The means by which these states are attained and maintained is through self-referential measurement of information and its communication. The multicellular form, either as biofilms or holobionts, represent the cellular attempt to achieve maximum states of informational distinction and energy efficiency through individual and collective means. In this frame, consciousness, self-consciousness and intelligence can be identified as forms of collective cellular phenotype directed towards the defense of fundamental cellular self-reference.

The Cosmologic Continuum From Physics to Consciousness | John S. Torday, William B.Miller

Reduction of developmental biology to self-referential cell-cell communication offers a portal for understanding fundamental mechanisms of physiology as derived from physics through quantum mechanics. It is argued that self-referential organization is implicit to the Big Bang and its further expression is a recoil reaction to that Singularity. When such a frame is considered, in combination with experimental evidence for the importance of epigenetic inheritance, the unicellular state can be reappraised as the primary object of selection. This framework provides a significant shift in understanding the relationship between physics and biology, providing novel insights to the nature and origin of consciousness.

The Immaculate Misconception by Zoltan L. Torey

Reproduced from: http://www.imprint.co.uk/pdf/Torey.pdf The Immaculate Misconception by Zoltan L. Torey Correspondence: Zoltan Torey, 15 Woodlands Avenue, New Lambton, NSW 2305, Australia. ztorey@bigpond.com.au An earlier version of this article was given as an invited keynote talk at the conference Toward a Science of Consciousness 2004 at Tucson, AZ. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 13, No. 12, 2006, pp. 105–10 The… Read More