Notes on the Mind, Consciousness, God, and the Now
I have the now. That is given. But how can I describe it phenomenologically to an alien or a non-biological being? Perhaps as a field in which contents appear. And that field is mine (yours). It is centred. It has duration. And it appears continuous in experience.
Content appears as mine (yours). This is a feature of the experience of the now. External content is perceived through the senses, while thoughts arise internally, yet both appear in the same field. Moreover, this content is centred on a “here”. Hypothetically, external and internal contents appear in the same field because they correspond to neural activity that culminates in conscious experience. As for mineness – the property of experience that allows us to feel it as ours – it may be an evolutionarily selected trait and/or an emergent property of a certain degree of organisation. Whether a by-product of complexity or a fundamental property of the universe, consciousness is what makes appearing in the now possible.
We have access only to this field in which contents appear. And in this field – the now – we have access to the experience of the world. This suggests that, at the level of experience, the past and the future are not directly accessible. The past would therefore be inferred through memories in the now, and the future through anticipation in the now.
The content of the now is always given. Both memory and anticipation appear as present contents, while the “world” appears in the now as experience mediated by the senses, never directly. Given this, if our access to the world is indirect, there is a discrepancy between what is external and what is phenomenologically perceived. One hypothesis, then, is that all (or part) of the experience of the now is internal and mediated, and corresponds to a physical state, or at least to the organisation/structure implemented by that state.Content appears as mine (yours). This is a feature of the experience of the now. External content is perceived through the senses, while thoughts arise internally, yet both appear in the same field. Moreover, this content is centred on a “here”. Hypothetically, external and internal contents appear in the same field because they correspond to neural activity that culminates in conscious experience. As for mineness – the property of experience that allows us to feel it as ours – it may be an evolutionarily selected trait and/or an emergent property of a certain degree of organisation. Whether a by-product of complexity or a fundamental property of the universe, consciousness is what makes appearing in the now possible.
Content has duration. It is discrete in experience, but it is lived as though continuous. We have access to the now, and the mind uses memories to anchor the sense of continuity in experience. There may be a gap between ontological continuity and experiential continuity. Deep sleep, anaesthesia, coma, and fainting are examples of absences of memory that allow us to reconstruct only a before and an after, outside the gap, yet still reconstruct a sense of experiential continuity. It is therefore assumed that, although memory is not an obvious condition for experience at a single instant, it is a necessary condition for experience with continuity and possibly identity. Memory alone, however, does not explain the feeling of mineself, which seems to exist in the now, nor does it demystify the origin of consciousness.
What remains when we remove narrative and memory
By anchoring identity and continuity to conscious experience, memory is insufficient to explain why I feel so distinctly myself within experience – the “here” – independently of narrative continuity. The mineself, which can phenomenologically be described as experience appearing as “mine”, does not seem to depend on memory or on the narrative it creates. What, then, is the now without them? Imagine an extreme case of dementia in which autobiography disappears completely – there would still be a “for me” within experience. Given this, if the narrative collapses completely, does the “mine” collapse as well, or does it remain? There may be no reportable identity, yet there may still be mineness.
Consciousness, mineness, and organisation
Consciousness presupposes mineness. Mineness disappears when the emergent organisation is “switched off”, at the level of the existence of experience (anaesthesia, brain death). What happens when autobiographical narrative ceases (in extreme cases of dementia), however, remains unknown.
When the neural substrate is switched off, experience either does not occur or is not accessible. This points towards consciousness emerging on the basis of organisation.
On the other hand, if mineness persists even when memories and narrative collapse, this leaves open whether the “for-me” can be fully explained by organisation or whether it points to something more basic.
Memory is a condition of continuity/narrative identity, but it does not seem to be a condition of mineness; therefore, the “hard problem” seems to lie in the “for me” of the instant rather than in continuity. Thus, while memory seems to explain the story, it does not seem to explain the narrator. The knot lies between the “for me” and the now.
When the neural substrate is switched off, experience either does not occur or is not accessible. This points towards consciousness emerging on the basis of organisation.
On the other hand, if mineness persists even when memories and narrative collapse, this leaves open whether the “for-me” can be fully explained by organisation or whether it points to something more basic.
Memory is a condition of continuity/narrative identity, but it does not seem to be a condition of mineness; therefore, the “hard problem” seems to lie in the “for me” of the instant rather than in continuity. Thus, while memory seems to explain the story, it does not seem to explain the narrator. The knot lies between the “for me” and the now.
The knot
The knot lies in the “for me” of the now. Perhaps the “for me” is only narrative, a flow of experiential continuity. “For me” is a vector that may run either from the outside in or from thought to the perception of that thought, and thus presupposes “some” duration – at least a beginning and an end. The “for me” is not an instantaneous atom; it is a minimal temporal structure. The now is not a point – it is an interval in which this structure manifests itself. But this does not explain the direction, the belonging. We know that the endpoint of the vector appears as the “I”, and perhaps that is precisely what the “I” is. And if the “I” is this function of belonging, what makes there be “belonging” rather than neutrality?
If the “for-me” cannot be explained by continuity or narrative, I may suspect that consciousness is not a local accident. We do not know, however, whether time generates consciousness for us or consciousness generates time. If the “for me” cannot be reduced to temporal/narrative organisation, this opens space for the hypothesis that time emerges from a domain in which a minimal “for someone” already exists.
It is important to clarify what I mean by belonging. By belonging I mean a “here”: a natural direction of the content of the now towards an “I”, without choice. This may introduce the hypothesis that something more basic than the neural network itself is at work in the now. But is it truly directed towards the “I”, or merely available to it? When we experience metaconsciousness, we realise that the content has been presented. We realise that we do not choose the content—even the process of metaconsciousness itself was something presented. Ultimately, although the content is not chosen, perhaps the relevance assigned to it is. Or perhaps that too is another neural process presented to consciousness. Then where is agency?
It is important to clarify what I mean by belonging. By belonging I mean a “here”: a natural direction of the content of the now towards an “I”, without choice. This may introduce the hypothesis that something more basic than the neural network itself is at work in the now. But is it truly directed towards the “I”, or merely available to it? When we experience metaconsciousness, we realise that the content has been presented. We realise that we do not choose the content—even the process of metaconsciousness itself was something presented. Ultimately, although the content is not chosen, perhaps the relevance assigned to it is. Or perhaps that too is another neural process presented to consciousness. Then where is agency?
Agency
If consciousness emerges from cerebral organisation and complexity, agency would be reducible to the physical neural causal chain. If consciousness is fundamental, agency would ultimately be rooted in the conscious domain, even if constrained. Questions remain in both cases: is agency free to choose among alternatives under exactly the same conditions? How free? And if it is free, where does it originate?
If I do not choose the content, where would the alternatives appear? Even if freedom were limited only to the relevance or selection of content, we are confined to a single content in the now. There are no alternatives as competing contents in the instant. Given this, we do not control the generation of content. Therefore, the idea of free will as “I choose what arises” is implausible. Perhaps agency is not affected by this determinism. Perhaps agency, in that case, is not creating thoughts but choosing how to act in response to them. And will the response to that choice also be presented? If even the response is presented, the “I” is not a causal author but merely the endpoint of belonging. And we return to the original problem: why is there belonging? This returns us to the knot because we have not deciphered the reason for the direction of the “for me” vector in the now. And is that belonging emergent or fundamental?
Belonging presupposes a “here” as a control centre and a marker of ownership, “mine”. But what is truly “here”? Thoughts may be presented (even as external) if consciousness is regarded as their observer. Thoughts may seem not to be “mine” if I assume that I have no control over them. But there is an observer. One can imagine observing the observer, but we never truly observe it. Yet not controlling a thought does not necessarily mean that the thought is not mine. The observer does not appear as an object; it appears as a centre.
This admits two readings. The first is that there is already a minimal “for someone”, and “here” is the basic form of that experience. The second is that a “here” emerged from organisation as an operational centre, in which the observer is a function rather than an object. Curiously, the latter explains why the observer cannot be observed. The former explains why there is a “for someone” rather than neutrality.
The key to determining which reading is correct may lie in analysing whether belonging degrades in cases where organisation becomes fragmented – confusion, dissociation, or disintegration of the field. If “here” were to degrade in such a case, that would point towards an emergent hypothesis; if it persisted even with narrative collapse, it would point towards the hypothesis of a minimal “for someone”.
If I do not choose the content, where would the alternatives appear? Even if freedom were limited only to the relevance or selection of content, we are confined to a single content in the now. There are no alternatives as competing contents in the instant. Given this, we do not control the generation of content. Therefore, the idea of free will as “I choose what arises” is implausible. Perhaps agency is not affected by this determinism. Perhaps agency, in that case, is not creating thoughts but choosing how to act in response to them. And will the response to that choice also be presented? If even the response is presented, the “I” is not a causal author but merely the endpoint of belonging. And we return to the original problem: why is there belonging? This returns us to the knot because we have not deciphered the reason for the direction of the “for me” vector in the now. And is that belonging emergent or fundamental?
Belonging presupposes a “here” as a control centre and a marker of ownership, “mine”. But what is truly “here”? Thoughts may be presented (even as external) if consciousness is regarded as their observer. Thoughts may seem not to be “mine” if I assume that I have no control over them. But there is an observer. One can imagine observing the observer, but we never truly observe it. Yet not controlling a thought does not necessarily mean that the thought is not mine. The observer does not appear as an object; it appears as a centre.
This admits two readings. The first is that there is already a minimal “for someone”, and “here” is the basic form of that experience. The second is that a “here” emerged from organisation as an operational centre, in which the observer is a function rather than an object. Curiously, the latter explains why the observer cannot be observed. The former explains why there is a “for someone” rather than neutrality.
The key to determining which reading is correct may lie in analysing whether belonging degrades in cases where organisation becomes fragmented – confusion, dissociation, or disintegration of the field. If “here” were to degrade in such a case, that would point towards an emergent hypothesis; if it persisted even with narrative collapse, it would point towards the hypothesis of a minimal “for someone”.
There are examples showing that the clarity of “here” can expand, contract, or become blurred – notably through medication, psychosis, or extreme fatigue. This suggests that the manifestation of “here” is modifiable and depends on organisation. However, it does not directly prove emergentism, because a minimal “for someone” may persist even while being shaped by organisation.
The real test, therefore, is not the modulation of “here” but its fragmentation. If it were possible, hypothetically, to fragment “here” organisationally – through division or instability – and a minimal “for someone” nevertheless persisted independently of narrative, this would favour the hypothesis of consciousness as a fundamental property, or at least show that mineness is not a product of narrative. Even so, emergentism can accommodate this if the “for-someone” arises from mechanisms more basic than autobiographical narrative. What decides between the fundamental and the emergent, then, is not narrative: it is explaining why there is a “for-someone” rather than neutrality. In other words, the knot returns to the beginning.
So far, we have always spoken of mineness. We know that content is presented to consciousness. But does it arrive already directed towards the “I”, or does it simply appear and then become appropriated? When we experience metaconsciousness, we notice the thought. But what happens when we ask, “Was this thought already mine, or did I appropriate it?” The thought exists independently of the will, and there may be a tendency to believe that we appropriate the one that serves our narrative (endorsement) rather than believe that it carries the basic mark of being mine (mineness). It is more comfortable for us to believe that it is a choice (endorsement). But is that choice also presented? And the response itself? Perhaps the possibility of choice is only a comforting illusion.
We do not choose the generation of content. But where is the boundary between content and choice? Perhaps this is not choice versus content, but a gradient. But do we truly choose? As always, there are two hypotheses: either choice exists as the capacity to vary the response while holding the same content constant, or the feeling of choice is a post-rationalisation made after content appears. Either everything is content, or choice is something.
If, at the mental level, everything is the effect of physical causal chains, then there is no possibility that “it could have been different”: everything is a consequence, there is no bifurcation in the now, and therefore no alternatives in the now from which to choose immediately. Choice may then be an illusion determined by the presentation of contents that appear to be choices. If, at the mental level, there is a fundamental property that allows alternatives to bifurcate within the now, then there is choice at the level of the now. Perhaps, therefore, the existence of free will as a real bifurcation is related to whether consciousness is a fundamental property of the universe. However, even if consciousness is fundamental, why would that introduce bifurcation? Could it not be equally determined? I do not know.
In this case, being fundamental merely opens the door to the possibility of bifurcation; it does not guarantee it. For real bifurcation, first, there must be real indeterminacy—that is, the future cannot have a single outcome determined by prior conditions; there must instead be several physically possible futures. Second, there must be conscious control over that indeterminacy and authorship of the choice. Third, the whole process must be coupled to the now rather than occurring a posteriori. If any one of these conditions fails, a fundamental consciousness amounts to no more than another form of determinism.
The problem is that, when I observe my own experience, even the choice seems to be presented, leading me to believe that I am facing a physical consequence disguised as free will. But even if choice is an illusion, the “for me” remains – someone is experiencing the illusion.
We do not choose the generation of content. But where is the boundary between content and choice? Perhaps this is not choice versus content, but a gradient. But do we truly choose? As always, there are two hypotheses: either choice exists as the capacity to vary the response while holding the same content constant, or the feeling of choice is a post-rationalisation made after content appears. Either everything is content, or choice is something.
If, at the mental level, everything is the effect of physical causal chains, then there is no possibility that “it could have been different”: everything is a consequence, there is no bifurcation in the now, and therefore no alternatives in the now from which to choose immediately. Choice may then be an illusion determined by the presentation of contents that appear to be choices. If, at the mental level, there is a fundamental property that allows alternatives to bifurcate within the now, then there is choice at the level of the now. Perhaps, therefore, the existence of free will as a real bifurcation is related to whether consciousness is a fundamental property of the universe. However, even if consciousness is fundamental, why would that introduce bifurcation? Could it not be equally determined? I do not know.
In this case, being fundamental merely opens the door to the possibility of bifurcation; it does not guarantee it. For real bifurcation, first, there must be real indeterminacy—that is, the future cannot have a single outcome determined by prior conditions; there must instead be several physically possible futures. Second, there must be conscious control over that indeterminacy and authorship of the choice. Third, the whole process must be coupled to the now rather than occurring a posteriori. If any one of these conditions fails, a fundamental consciousness amounts to no more than another form of determinism.
The problem is that, when I observe my own experience, even the choice seems to be presented, leading me to believe that I am facing a physical consequence disguised as free will. But even if choice is an illusion, the “for me” remains – someone is experiencing the illusion.
Even when imagining the absolute – free will belonging to God – we find gaps. The concept of God lacks the semantic stability needed to sustain any straightforward claim to universality: it varies historically, culturally, and metaphysically. Even so, if we grant a more narrowly defined formulation – God as the architect of reality – the concept remains under pressure. Intentional agency presupposes will, choice, and orientation towards an effect; this requires some form of before and after, even if only logical. Yet the classical God is conceived as timeless, simple, and immutable. Under these conditions, speaking of wanting, deciding, or planning ceases to be literally coherent and becomes, at most, weakened analogical language. If timelessness is retained, agency dissolves; if agency is retained, timelessness ceases to be absolute. This is where the collapse occurs: the classical personal God attempts to retain simultaneously attributes that contradict one another.
The classical personal God presupposes will. Without will, God loses the characteristic that makes God personal. We can imagine God as an impersonal ground – nature, being, laws – thus devoid of will and therefore capable of being timeless. But in this sense, where is the boundary between what is real and what is God? If we stretch the definition of God until it means reality itself, the need to speak of God is reduced because the term becomes redundant.
The literal cost of “will” is the same as the cost of “choice” in humans. Both presuppose time. Therefore, neither can exist in the “instant”. The now was defined as having duration. Is that duration sufficient for “choice” to manifest? If the now is a window, then choice – if it exists – is not a point but a trajectory within that window. The question becomes: is there bifurcation with authorship – consciously choosing one alternative on the basis of alternatives presented within the window of the “now” – or merely a presented unfolding – watching alternatives unfold without finding a point at which the decision for a particular branch can be identified? If it is a presented unfolding, choice is narrative; if there is authorship, we must explain where it comes from.
Let us test this – appetite: the impulse to go and eat appears. That impulse was physical and uncontrolled. The alternatives are “eat” or “not eat”. The decision is biased by the impulse: there is a tendency to “eat”. The alternative “not eat” appeared. The central question is this: did the alternative “not eat” appear as a real option within the interval of the “now”, or only as an a posteriori concept? Between the impulse and the act there is time, in the subsequent “nows”, and that time can be used to decide a posteriori not to eat despite the immediate impulse to eat. If the alternative appears only in the subsequent “nows” (say, before the act of getting up to go to the refrigerator), then there was no bifurcation in the “now” of the impulse; there was delayed inhibition. At least in this example, that suggests the hypothesis of a delayed unfolding and, consequently, reinforces the hypothesis of choice as narrative.
Perhaps freedom is not in the now. Perhaps freedom depends on the succession of nows. Perhaps it is a trajectory. And at some point, there may be the possibility of choosing. When? In the pause? Immediately before action? I cannot say precisely. But if freedom exists, perhaps it is not constant across all nows, but present only in some. Perhaps inserting a pause – even if that too may be narrative – redirects the trajectory. Perhaps within the pause there is a point at which the tension between alternatives pre-evaluated in earlier nows, even if subconsciously, collapses into a decision that took two (or more) alternatives into account. And perhaps choice resides in that now, and not in others, and a bifurcation occurs. I therefore correct myself: perhaps freedom is not in “all” nows. And it makes me think that if choice lies in the pause, and if the pause itself is a choice, perhaps I choose to pause so that I can choose. It is a meta-choice, and it can lead me to find myself standing still. But I am left with this, and perhaps the reader will be too: perhaps the pause is the first point at which the system can inhibit the automatic trajectory. And even if the will to pause is partly presented, the capacity to pause can be trained and become more frequent. Even so, the question remains: who pauses? Authorship or presentation? I do not yet know.
The pause
I cannot distinguish whether the intention to pause appears before the body stops, or whether the body stops and the intention appears afterwards. But it is useful to define the boundary between intention and decision: is intention a “tendency towards”, a presentation of possibilities, and decision a point of no return? Or is it still possible to “turn back”? If so, would that be another bifurcation (or oscillation) within the branch of possibilities? Perhaps intermediate steps still need to be assumed – deliberation and commitment. And reconsideration? I call commitment the moment when the trajectory is already internally “closed”, even before the body moves – indicating the point of no return.
It seems natural to think that the pause is the “candidate temporal location” in which choice could satisfy these conditions, since they involve more than intention and decision, and this requires time. Without a pause, the impulse seems to lead directly to commitment. Given this, it seems reasonable to infer that the pause creates more room for conscious deliberation.
Metaconscious experience leads me to believe that the mind responds more readily to the body than the body responds to the mind. When the body changes first (stops, breathes, slows down), the mind follows. That said, even if we cannot distinguish whether the body stops before the intention to stop appears, perhaps we can consciously introduce deliberation more often by establishing a logical sequence (regardless of where it begins) in which the body makes the mind slow down and opens a window, making choice more possible and then feeding back into this cycle.
I still cannot quantify the minimum temporal duration of that pause. But it must be long enough to contain intention/inclination, deliberation/oscillation, commitment (internal closure), and the point of no return. It probably involves a chain of nows, and choice, if it exists, may be distributed rather than point-like. Perhaps there is no “magical instant of choice”, and it is instead the consequence of a sequence. Given the initial premise that nows are intervals, this is consistent with the possibility that successive nows culminate in a choice – narrative or not, free or not. And searching for the instant means searching in the wrong place: what exists, if anything does, is an interval in which a trajectory closes. And if so, what remains of the “I”? An endpoint of presence?
Metaconscious experience leads me to believe that the mind responds more readily to the body than the body responds to the mind. When the body changes first (stops, breathes, slows down), the mind follows. That said, even if we cannot distinguish whether the body stops before the intention to stop appears, perhaps we can consciously introduce deliberation more often by establishing a logical sequence (regardless of where it begins) in which the body makes the mind slow down and opens a window, making choice more possible and then feeding back into this cycle.
I still cannot quantify the minimum temporal duration of that pause. But it must be long enough to contain intention/inclination, deliberation/oscillation, commitment (internal closure), and the point of no return. It probably involves a chain of nows, and choice, if it exists, may be distributed rather than point-like. Perhaps there is no “magical instant of choice”, and it is instead the consequence of a sequence. Given the initial premise that nows are intervals, this is consistent with the possibility that successive nows culminate in a choice – narrative or not, free or not. And searching for the instant means searching in the wrong place: what exists, if anything does, is an interval in which a trajectory closes. And if so, what remains of the “I”? An endpoint of presence?
Regardless of whether choice is a trajectory – a chain of nows – the “I” appears in all of them. Is the “I” the true author of the trajectory? Or is the “I” simply a vectorial convergence towards a “for me”, ultimately independent of control? This seems answerable by investigating the nature of the “I” and how it might consciously exercise agency along the trajectory of choice. Therefore: is agency an act or a presentation?
At the absolute level, even without an author, there is an endpoint of belonging – a “for someone”. Mineness and agency are distinct problems. Why does that “for someone” become “for me”? Is the “I”, on the one hand, illusory, generated in each now and shaped by narrative, or, on the other hand, persistent – a “for me” independent of narrative? Or is there an intermediate possibility, with a stable minimal self overlaid by narrative? In any case, the problem of individuation remains: why is the “for someone” “for me” and not someone else? There is an obvious centralisation, but why?
Evolutionarily, there was a need to integrate neural signals within an operational centre – say, the brain. Perhaps this centralised direction of neural signals causes a “for me” to “emerge”, thereby creating the illusion that this “for me” is basic when it actually results from an organisational complexity that, during each “now”, culminates in the operating system repeatedly reaching that conclusion about itself. But is the operating system itself consciousness, or is it the substrate on which something basic is actually implemented? The emergence of consciousness, in which the “for-me” is an inevitable effect of an egocentric architecture – a system that must act from a centre – explains the functional mechanism, but it does not explain the “appearing”. Perhaps the brain allows something fundamental to “appear”, and perhaps it is a condition for complexity. But if so, what should we say about an ant, which lacks the complexity of the human brain but also has centralisation? Is the level of consciousness proportional to the level of complexity? What about a machine with an operational centre and a high degree of organisational complexity? Would that be sufficient for “appearing”?
There is a hypothesis that “appearing” is an individual subjective condition and serves as a reference for the current now. Perhaps the now is a manifestation of consciousness, a temporal frame of reference, a coordinate, rather than a causal physical consequence. Given this, consciousness does not alter physical time; it defines the experiential temporal coordinate – the “now” – from which the world appears to me. In other words, perhaps consciousness defines the “now”, rather than the “now” defining the conscious state.
The doubt remains: why “for me” and not another? Imagine an exact copy of me, with the same synapses and the same microstate. Perhaps this is impossible, because the microstate depends on location in space, and we cannot create an exactly identical copy if both occupy the same space. But imagine a temporally cyclical universe in which the same microstate repeats infinitely – would there be any way to know whether it is the same “for me” rather than another? At this moment, I am living “this” state, at this time. Is there any guarantee that I had, or will have, the same “for me” in the past and future? Perhaps not, if we imagine the “now” as a temporal coordinate. There is no guarantee that “this for-me” traverses time; at most, there is only a guarantee that the pattern may reappear with its own “now”. And what happens to the current “now”? It probably ceases when the process that produces it – its organisation—ceases; that is, when organisational continuity (the brain) ceases. Everything therefore indicates that, for the “I” to continue, the organisation that permits the allocation of consciousness must continue. And the question arises: even if there is continuation with the loss of (physical) memories, would that continuation give rise to a new “for me”, or would the same “for me” continue? And is there a difference? Perhaps there is a minimal “for me” that is independent of narrative. And if it is independent, what truly happens to it when organisational continuity ceases?
If consciousness is a temporal reference, when the substrate of organisational continuity ends, its locus disappears, regardless of whether we speak of emergentism or fundamentalism (even the latter requires a substrate for temporal reference and individuation). Narrative depends on memories, and these depend on that organisation. If a minimal “for me” exists, narrative collapses when that substrate ends. Perhaps, in certain limit states, the perception of time dilates in the moments before cessation. After that, there is no experience because there is no “now”. This is difficult to conceive, since consciousness does not know what it is not to exist—it is difficult to conceive non-experience because every conception is experience. The “for me” is local to the now: when the now ceases, the field in which any “I” can appear ceases with it.
Experiential continuity is illusory – the narrative joins intervals in which nows are integrated into a coherent thread. What is illusory is not the immediate flow of the field, but the idea of a continuous “I” as an entity that traverses the nows. And if each now is a discrete conscious window and a temporal reference, then time between nows can be divided infinitely. For experience, it is simply nothing. What implications does this have? What crosses the gaps?
Experiential continuity is illusory – the narrative joins intervals in which nows are integrated into a coherent thread. What is illusory is not the immediate flow of the field, but the idea of a continuous “I” as an entity that traverses the nows. And if each now is a discrete conscious window and a temporal reference, then time between nows can be divided infinitely. For experience, it is simply nothing. What implications does this have? What crosses the gaps?
Perhaps there is total discontinuity and nothing crosses the gaps, with only the identity-bearing “I” existing discretely and momentarily in each now. Perhaps there is narrative and organisational continuity without phenomenological continuity, sustaining the identity-bearing “I” while consciousness occurs in pulses. In the first hypothesis, several different instances of the identity-bearing “I” appear, only seemingly linked by narrative. In the second, only narrative and organisational continuity maintain the identity-bearing “I”. In both cases, narrative is necessary to maintain the identity-bearing “I”.
If the hypothesis of consciousness occurring in pulses is not confirmed, the identity-bearing subject itself is “recreated” in each now by narrative, with narrative serving as the only “cement” of identity. Information is stored in memories and can be active in the conscious moment as a neural impulse, but this presupposes a before and an after: the information must be reactivated in the now, yet it must already exist in storage. In this model, the “I” is information being processed in the now, egocentrically organised around an operational centre.
If the hypothesis of consciousness occurring in pulses is confirmed, there is a persistence of the subject across time, likewise supported by information. Phenomenologically, nothing changes – but the question arises: is there a relationship between the persistence of the subject and the “for me”? And is information a vehicle through which the subject persists (fundamental), or is it the substrate of the subject itself (emergent)?
If the hypothesis of consciousness occurring in pulses is not confirmed, the identity-bearing subject itself is “recreated” in each now by narrative, with narrative serving as the only “cement” of identity. Information is stored in memories and can be active in the conscious moment as a neural impulse, but this presupposes a before and an after: the information must be reactivated in the now, yet it must already exist in storage. In this model, the “I” is information being processed in the now, egocentrically organised around an operational centre.
If the hypothesis of consciousness occurring in pulses is confirmed, there is a persistence of the subject across time, likewise supported by information. Phenomenologically, nothing changes – but the question arises: is there a relationship between the persistence of the subject and the “for me”? And is information a vehicle through which the subject persists (fundamental), or is it the substrate of the subject itself (emergent)?
(unfinished)