I certainly agree that mathematics is non-material - indeed a lot of our reality is non-material Shakespeare's plays, or novels, theories of all sorts etc. All these may use matter to hold a representation of what they are, but they are in essence non-material. However, it seems to me that these represent a passive sort of non-material entity. The dynamics of the solar system doesn't 'decide' to do anything, it is a passive construction that we can use to compute the positions of the planets at a future time. Conceptually it is no different from a huge look-up table.
If you equate your mental self with a mathematical construction, you deny your own free will, and we are back with the old question - why should X (where in this case, X is a piece of mathematics!) experience qualia? I think you need an active non-material entity to experience anything.
I feel we have to get away from the tendency to frame theories like consciousness is X, where X can be anything from an oscillation to a spreading activation, to some sort of computation, to a piece of maths! This approach just goes nowhere, and theories of consciousness of this sort just exist for a while and then go out of fashion to be replaced by another of the same sort!
We may just have to agree to disagree about this - I don't know!
David
hi David. You are correct in your conclusions about denying free will, etc. All I can do is fall back on Leibniz and say this is why he invented the idea of "pre-established harmony".
Qualia are not a particular mystery in yoga, only in neurophysiology where we need to get relatively homogeneous neurons to make blue, red, green, a continuous series of pitches, pain, smells, tastes, etc. In yoga (actually, in reality, just that yoga recognizes this reality) the qualia exist on the inner planes. Blue is a "thing in itself" on the inner planes. The right series of vibrations from the external world, through the eye, through the brain, through the etheric body serve as an address code to present blue to consciousness on the astral plane. So, the qualia problem will never be solved by only looking at the physical plane. Can I prove this? No because it involves nonphysical things. So it can't be proven via physical experiments or devices. However, one can learn to move on the inner planes and "see" how the colors and other qualia are accessed via these channels. When this happens, you will prove this to yourself.
[Side note: I have seen the source of colors in our visual awareness. I discuss it a little in
Beyond the Physical, I call it the "color field" or something like that. It is very abstract how it works. All colors are present all the time when we see, only some get pushed in the background, somewhat analogous to when you look at the foreground the background becomes blurry. There is a filter system in the brain that normally only lets the main color through into awareness. Although it you stare at anything long enough, the other colors will bleed into your awareness to some extent.]
So yes, this implies that when we perceive even the physical world in our consciousness when awake, we are simultaneously perceiving (at least a very small portion of) the astral world. That is where all the qualities of perception come from. They are not present in the physical body at all. All the qualities of consciousness are vibrations (dynamical patterns) in consciousness even more subtle than the subtlest physical phenomena, such as a plasma or a photon.
I have said a few times and don't mind repeating it: consciousness is the medium in which everything occurs. It is a magical substance from whence everything arises. You cannot reduce consciousness to anything else. Everything that exists reduces to consciousness. It is the ground of being.
There is a lot of semantic confusion on this point. As humans we have very complex minds. They see, hear, etc on the sensory front, think, imagine, speak, etc on the cognitive front, dream, etc on the altered states front. These are all just patterns inside of consciousness. The patterns are made from the medium, but the medium transcends the patterns. If you listen, for example, to Searle in Alex's interview with him, Searle confuses the word "consciousness" for the patterns that appear in the awareness of humans. A yogi would not make this mistake because he uses different words for all this. The patterns are vrittis, the mind is manas, consciousness is dismatrah. The yogi does not mistake the medium, dismatrah, for the patterns in the medium, vrittis. And the vrittis make very complex structures (just like cells make complex structures called organs and organisms). A most important structure is manas, (what we would call the sum of the conscious and unconscious minds) but there is also the structure called buddhi (or ahamkara), which most here would relate to the term "ego" or "sense of I-ness".
If these ideas are new to you, they just sound like another theory, and a pretty simple-minded and dumb one at that. But as your understanding of the meaning of these terms grows and you see that these terms represent realities you can actually watch moment by moment in your own "mind", and as you learn the yogic methods to interact with and tame these aspects, these ideas shift from some weird philosophy to a new, and very effective, vocabulary for framing your experience.
And this transition doesn't happen overnight but is a gradual recognition that these words refer to real ingredients that make up your experience.
Anyway, I am happy to bet you one dollar the qualia problem will never be solved in physical terms because all the qualities of our awareness are vrittis of a finer kind happening on the inner planes.
Anyway, take this as you may. It is my considered opinion after studying a lot of different ideas and having a few really unusual experiences.
Thanks for the conversation, David.
Best,
Don