Consul wrote:I still have difficulty understanding your view. Do you postulate a fieldlike world-soul/-spirit?
This view can be called cosmopsychism, and there is both a substantialist and a non-substantialist (actualist or processualist) version of it: according to the former, the world-soul is a mental substance, which is the substrate of mental attributes (or mental states/events/processes), and the world as a whole is a whole composed of a mental substance and a physical substance, the "world-body". And according to the latter, the world-soul is not a mental substance but a spatiotemporal field of mental activity, of mental events or processes, whose substrate is the physical substance, the world-body or world-organism.
Not really.
The main difference is that, in cosmopsychism, the world-soul and "its" world-body are a sort of a
single universal unit, whereas in the view I presented, there is finite number of
distinct, autonomous and identifiable, individual sipirits. Each spirit itself, as an individual, might be seem to somewhat resemble the "processualist" view above, in that it can be seen as a "process" whose substrate is the *para*-physical substance I called "a region of the vibrational field or medium". That medium permeates everything, and exists
within each spirit, where it constitutes the sustrate or substance, as well as
in between separate spirits, where it serves as a communication medium.
The views I written in
this thread are
not properly presented--and that is a reason why you have difficulty understand it--because I might have made the mistake of referencing a different thread (and post) (
http://onlinephilosophyclub.com/forums/ ... 73#p284473) where I presented them the first time.
Now I'll paste right here what I wrote there (unedited). I hope it serves to clarify the views I've been presenting.
----
... this is my own personal belief system (personal in that I adopted and
adapted it, not in that I invented it). So here I can elaborate as much as I need. But, as I mentioned in another thread, I always try to keep references to a belief system as little and short as possible, so I'll try to do that. Below is a summary as short and to the point as I can write it, and is only so I can answer your question:
(a) the physical universe is considered to be subset of a larger universe (which I call a Parauniverse).
(b) the Parauniverse is a set of of finite entities called Spirits (and I don't like that word due to its overloaded meaning, but I have to stick to it). Spirits are the fundamental units of consciousness. They are individual, autonomous, free-will agents possessing cognition, volition, affection and motivation.
(c) the Parauniverse also contains a sort of Primordial Source, named God. God did create something, but it was only the finite set of spirits. The physical universe is not his creation (even though it can and should be said that in anything that happens, from the creation and evolution of the universe to our everyday actions, God's guide is always reaching out as far and deep as "the free-will agents" (I don't like to say spirits) would listen)
(d) and, the Parauniverse contains a fundamental fluid [I would actually call it a Field, but I'm still sticking to the original term until I can figure out what this is supposed to be]. This fluid or field is a vibrating medium by which spirits can communicate (they emit and receive vibrations) (I have absolutely no idea what this vibrations are supposed to be, except that they are NOT EM but something more fundamental). Also, spirits "occupy" a certain volume of fluid (not sure what this is really supposed to mean, and might refer to the extent to which a "point" spirit can exert his will into the fluid, or some such)
(e) The Physical Universe came about after a (really large) period of time in which there was only the Parauniverse, populated with the finite number of spirits.
(f) For reasons that go well beyond the scope of this thread, a large subset of the spirits begin to recursively tear apart and become spirit fractions. In ways that I do not yet understand, or can even picture, a spirit fraction is proportionally conscious. That is, its cognition, volition, affection and motivation (hence his degree of free-will) is proportional to the relative "volume" of the fraction. The vibrational state or rate also diminished in proportion (but I have no idea what this is supposed to mean and as I have no idea what spirits are supposed to vibrate)
(f.1) This continued until the fragmentation reached a certain lower-limit (related not so much to the relative volume but the diminished vibrational state), and at the edge of this limit, the Physical Universe emerged.
(g) The elements of the physical universe (today we would say the set of Fermions) directly are (or is directly generate by) the spirit fractions that dropped below the vibrational limit mentioned in (f.1)
(h) After the Big Bang, the whole of reality would be the Parauniverse, populated by both whole and fractional spirits (of many different proportions), and the enclosed (physical) Universe being the subset of fractional spirits at the edge of the vibrational fragmentation threshold.
(i) At least since the Big Bang (but probably even way before), Evolution started, and one the the main vehicles of evolution is the formation of complex systems. That is, the zillions of spirit particles (spirits fragmented down to the very limit) started to aggregate and try to form "proportionally larger pseudo-units", that is, trying to extend their diminished degree of consciousness (not in the same way a single unit whole spirit has a larger consciousness, but in the way the collective consciousness of the complex allows them to reach out farther and deeper, sort of like we humans do in a team)
(j) Since the Big Bang, spiritual particles (now being physical particles) aggregated, to form complex systems as the vehicle for evolution, not only with each other but also with non-physical spiritual fragments (non-physical for having a slightly higher vibrational state and volume by virtue of being a larger proportion), forming a hierarchical complex and not just a flat aggregate.
(k) Each complex system has a non-physical apex in the hierarchy which in turns allows a complex made of simpler complexes to have an even higher and larger spiritual fragment at its apex.
(l) All the way up to the single biological case of a complex system having a whole unit spirit (not a fragment anymore) at the apex: a human being.
....