> > > This is a question I asked a few months ago and could not myself answer. Someone here is bound to come up with a better solution than I.
> > >

If your basic question as it stands translates to, "What causes human consciousness?" then I have, in a previous post http://www.rinkworks.com/rinkforum/view.cgi?post=22302 , indicated some of the components of the known physical brain/mind/self interaction. Much of our knowledge about active states of self-awareness comes from brain injury observations and self-reports.


> > > I think it can only be answered by one who believes in free will and no soul.
> > >

Not necessarily. The exact opposite: I *don't* believe that any human has inherent "free will" -- and yet I do believe that there is a spirit part, *separate* from the consciousness of the physical brain/personality that is generated by the brain.


> > > If one does not believe in a soul and does not invoke a hitherto unknown principle, the consciousness must reside within the physical human body. If consciousness can be effected through complex reactions of matter, all matter must be at least infinitesimally self-aware. How then should this affect the way we treat all matter, animate or otherwise?
> >
> While the arrangement and reactions of some matter yield full consciousness, does it necessarily create it? If so, out of what? It seems more likely to me that it would be a property of the matter that is accentuated by the arrangement and reactions, as a lightning storm accentuates charge and a planet accentuates gravity. As a property, I don't mean to say that each subatomic particle is fully aware of its own existance, but that it contains some infinitesimally basic building block of consciousness.
>

Er... Even with the additional qualifications on top of your original statement, the difficulty with the question, as gremlinn and Kaz! identified it, is still there. I think your question suffers primarily from a problem of Abstraction. You need to concretely define who, or what kind of matter (inanimate object/plant/animal/person), might experience the type of consciousness or self-awareness you are discussing. You'd also need to distinguish whether the "full consciousness" you mean is pro-active self-recognition, or just a general but alert awareness of environment as adeptly outlined by instinct.

Your qualified question, "Does each particle of matter contain some infinitesimally basic building block of consciousness?" is a presupposition similar to an inductive fallacy of division, as gremlinn noted. Because the whole item [like a human brain] has a certain property [of consciousness], you're asking whether the *individual parts* must also have that property. Restated, the generalized presupposition could appear to read in clearer terms,

/ / / / / Complex chemical interactions in SOME matter can create consciousness;
/ / / / / therefore, are the individual particles of ALL matter potentially residually 'aware' on some complex chemical level?

The question implies: that there is no real difference between the properties of things which occupy opposite ends of a continuum -- from constituent parts going towards the whole object -- because it assumes there is no definable moment when one becomes the other. This assumption is not sustainable. In the example of the brain, the actions of many neurons, synapses, and neurotransmitters can have an overall powerful emergent effect which we could call 'consciousness'. When working individually, these neuronal brain processes are not that much different than nerve processes in the rest of your body. Working together, however, the whole is mysteriously greater than the sum of its parts.

Wolf "does this answer any part of the question you wanted to ask?" spirit