Generally we assume that the world just exists – sitting there dead and meaningless – the object of our perceptions. The world doesn’t just exist – it shows up. It presents itself to us through layers of interpretation. William James talked about our experience of the world as being ‘thick’ – thick with layers of [...]
All posts by Jeff Carreira
The Transformation of the Present Moment
Posted by Jeff Carreira on May 24, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/05/24/the-transformation-of-the-present-moment/
William James and the Flow of Pure Experience –or– Why are two experiences better than one?
What you are experiencing right now is all there is – at least that is one of the implications of William James’ radical views on reality. William James was the first great American psychologist and one of founders of the philosophy of Pragmatism. The philosophical vision that was closest to his heart he called Radical [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on May 16, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/05/16/william-james-and-the-flow-of-pure-experience-or-why-are-two-experiences-better-than-one/
Did Modernism Isolate Us from the World?
The world doesn’t just exist, it shows up for us. It appears as the pure experience of the present moment. And one of the most amazing things about the world is that it changes – from age to age, generation to generation, over the course of a human lifetime, and through the duration of a [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on May 10, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/05/10/did-modernism-isolate-us-from-the-world/
Thinking About Thinking Series: The Circumstances around us are changing faster than we can
The world and everything in it is changing all the time, and our beliefs about it all must change at least as quickly. Often they don’t. We find ourselves stuck in beliefs whose time has passed, not knowing which questions to ask or what direction to take forward. What beliefs are you holding onto right [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on May 3, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/05/03/the-circumstances-around-us-are-changing-faster-than-we-can/
Thinking About Thinking Series: You May Not Be Who You Think You Are
We think we are a “something”—an entity that emerged in the universe on a planet called Earth. Are we really? What is a human being? What am I? Am I my body, my brain, my thoughts? Superficially it seems that we are simply some combination of all of these things and more. When you look [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on April 26, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/04/26/you-may-not-be-who-you-think-you-are/
Thinking About Thinking Series: Human Life is a Risk
Every step we take, every action, every choice to do anything is ultimately an act of faith. Most of the time, thankfully, we live with an ongoing sense of certainty. We imagine that the world is predictable enough to support us. Then there are those moments in which everything gets swept away. We lose a [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on April 19, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/04/19/thinking-about-thinking-series-human-life-is-a-risk/
Are we just Thinking Things in a World?
What do we really know about the relationship between the world and our experience of it? That is an important question and there are at least three things that we can be sure of. We all know that we have a subjective experience of the world. We all see, hear, taste, smell and feel the [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on April 12, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/04/12/are-we-just-thinking-things-in-a-world/
Cartesian Dualism and Brains In Vats
If you could put your brain in a nutrient bath so that it could keep on functioning outside of your body what would it (or would it still be you) experience? Would it still have your memories in it? Would it remember that they were yours? Would it still experience itself as you? Would you [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on April 6, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/04/06/a/
The Ego Tunnel and the Nature of Reality
Thomas Metzinger’s new book The Ego Tunnel weaves research in out-of-body experiences, lucid dreaming, phantom limbs and other extraordinary human occurrences with leading edge neuroscience to create a convincing picture of how neural activity constantly creates what we experience as reality. Our entire experience of what is; our bodily sensations, our identity and our experience [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on March 29, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/03/29/the-ego-tunnel-and-the-nature-of-reality/
Society and the True Self, Part 4: Up from Inside the Matrix
In my last post I described how many of us awaken to find ourselves in the middle of a life that is more a reflection of social mores than our own autonomous choices. We look at the reality of our lives and realize that the choices that we have made are expressions of the social [...]
Posted by Jeff Carreira on March 22, 2012
http://evolutionaryphilosophy.com/2012/03/22/society-and-the-true-self-part-4-up-from-inside-the-matrix/
