What’s It Like to Be a Universe: Implications of Being In, Of, and About a Brain, or a Speculative Panconsciousness Approach to Quantum Nonlocality

Journal of Speculative Philosophy 36 (3):323-339 (2022)
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Abstract

ABSTRACT The problem of quantum nonlocality references instantaneous entanglements happening between particles at great distances, putting under question physical assumptions about time and local effects. Despite a wide range of proposed solutions in physics, the problem persists; however, due to the recent interest in panconsciousness and panpsychism in philosophy as well as numerous suggestions that consciousness and quantum physics are intimately related, I argue in favor of thinking strange quantum effects—and nonlocality as case in point—in lieu of conscious activity happening at a universal scale. Drawing on the mind-brain problem or “the hard problem” as an intellectual resource and particularly pertinent metaphor in the case helps to illuminate the argument; briefly stated, I argue that a conscious universe eliminates the necessity of thinking distance as a problem needing to be resolved to comprehend disparate physical observations. In other words, I offer a speculative vision for quantum nonlocality and ultimately aim to encourage scholars to more carefully consider what it is like to be In, Of, and About a brain when thinking about the universe.

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David R Gruber
University of Nevada, Las Vegas

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What is it like to be a bat?Thomas Nagel - 1974 - Philosophical Review 83 (4):435-50.
What is it like to be a bat?Thomas Nagel - 1979 - In Mortal questions. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 435 - 450.
Quantum nonlocality as an axiom.Sandu Popescu & Daniel Rohrlich - 1994 - Foundations of Physics 24 (3):379-385.
Hegel's Speculative Sentence.Andrew Haas - 2021 - Philosophy and Rhetoric 54 (3):213-239.
Panpsychism: A Response to the Anthropocene Age.Arianne Conty - 2021 - Journal of Speculative Philosophy 35 (1):27-49.

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