consciousness

...the structure of Life is the structure of consciousness -- not as metaphor, not as simile, not as a reflection. Plenty of Life's body can hear that. It is so obvious, and it eats up almost all of the world of artistic or literary criticism, because there is no literature, there is no music, there is no sculpture, that is a metaphor for life -- it IS Life. Nothing is a metaphor for anything else except to children. You have to tell a child, "Don't do so-and-so." "Why?" "Well, because a troll will jump out and nibble your toes away and you don't want that to happen." You can't tell a child exactly what he's asking you to tell, so you speak to him in metaphors.

To believe that there is something humans do, willfully or not, that has a secret message, is to still be playing in the kindergarten arena, even if you're doing it to yourself. To forge a new kind of consciousness is to be able to forge a new kind of sight. You must SEE that the structure of Life is the structure of consciousness. This is so obvious that no one notices it...

--Jan Cox

"{re: the question of how consciousness could arise from matter generating an inexplicable mystery}...I affirm that this mystery is purely artificial and grows out of assuming an inadequate base of reference. For 'matter,' 'thing,' and 'relation' are creatively constructed notions and by no means originally given material. On the contrary, consciousness is original and is presupposed in the very power to recognize and formulate a problem...Thus every element that is brought into any speculation is, of necessity, within the field of consciousness...This much we know, even though we know nothing else, 'Consciousness is.' For it is presupposed even in the acknowledgement of ignorance and in the agnostical and skeptical attitudes...Consciousness is the common denominator underlying the possibility of any philosophy, world view, religious attitude, art, or science. I, therefore, affirm the systematic primacy of consciousness as such."

Also see: consciousness-without-an-object.

--Franklin Merrell-Wolff

For a completely different slant, c.f.,The Constant Neural Disquiet: Mechanics 101