By analytic idealism, I take it to be that reality is fundamentally (ontologically) one mind which has dissociated parts (like bernardo kastrup's view). — Bob Ross

Physicalism's conflation of the territory with the map is exposed (I would say) in the hard problem of consciousness whereof there is always an conceptual, explanatory gap between mechanical awareness and qualitative experience — Bob Ross

Analytic Idealism is a theory of the nature of reality that maintains that the universe is experiential in essence.

That does not mean that reality is in your or our individual minds alone, but instead in a spatially unbound, transpersonal field of subjectivity of which we are segments.

... the notion that nature is essentially mental—is the best explanatory model we currently have.

I think that science proper is the acquiring of how entities relate to each other and not what they fundamentally are — Bob Ross

For example, imagine that we are able to build a biological brain and monitor every section of it exactly. We've learned that a particular string of responses equates to the brain being happy. But do we know what its like to be that brain experiencing happiness? No. Another crude way of describing the hard problem is the act of trying to objectively experience another thing's subjective experience. We can only experience our own mind, we cannot experience another's. This is a problem whether you take a physical or mental view of the world. — Philosophim

Now, sometimes I do hear physicalists rightly point out that an analytical idealist is not actually providing an explanation to consciousness at all but, rather, simply positing it as fundamental without a detailed account of mind (i.e., of how it works) which, to them, is more epistemically costly than obscurely explaining mind in terms of emergence from the brain. To that, I disagree as, although certain aspects of mind may never be fully understood, there are many problems in idealistic accounts of the world that are soft problems (as opposed to hard problems) and I don't see the soft problem of how exactly the mind completely works as more epistemically costly as positing a hard problem to explain it. — Bob Ross

Is it? In what way is this claim an explanation? Does it merely assert the very thing it is to explain? — Fooloso4

First, what is your definition of reality?

How does the statement above differ from stating that the mind is simply an interpreter of reality?

So there is no question that mechanical processes of the brain cause qualitative experiences.

The hard problem is that we cannot ourselves know what it is like for another being to experience that qualitative experience.

We've learned that a particular string of responses equates to the brain being happy. But do we know what its like to be that brain experiencing happiness? No

Another crude way of describing the hard problem is the act of trying to objectively experience another thing's subjective experience.

Of course, I'm not sure what you mean by "physicalism" either

I'm assuming we're speaking about the idea that everything is essentially reduced to matter and energy, so please correct me on this where necessary.

If the nature of reality is essentially experiential does this mean that prior to experiential animals there was no reality

Given our limited experience how can we move beyond our experience to something prior to it?

What do we know of subjectivity beyond the personal and interpersonal?

Is it? In what way is this claim an explanation? Does it merely assert the very thing it is to explain?

Isn't it the modern scientific paradigm that everything is relative to something else?

Even the core of spacetime functions on relative terms.

So can someone even claim that something is something in itself?

Everything in the universe has some connection to each other, energy transfers, everything is entropic

There are no notions that something that is just what it is, separate from everything else.

My position is that our consciousness emerged from a simple evolutionary origin of adaptability.

But in essence I think that the notion in science that everything relates to everything else is fundamental for the universe, maybe even beyond, and that specific definitions of objects core definition of being are made-up by us to be able to communicate better about reality.

I then think that our mind, consciousness and cognition needs to be viewed as an emergent phenomena based on an analysis of its original evolutionary function and how our advanced form of experience and self-awareness are emergent factors out of these fundamental evolutionary functions

One little grain of sand, or one little atom is conscious sounds odd.

Sounds like neo-Schopenhauerian metaphysics.

First of all, very few people actually believe in "materialism" meaning, that very few people think that all we are bits of matter that can be reduced to tiny particles and that emotions are just chemicals.

But mental properties couldn't be explained by these mechanical properties, ergo dualism.

Lastly, we know so little about personal identity and how it actually works, that it just makes no sense to say objects in the universe are "disassociated complexes" of a universal mind

I would like to clarify that analytic idealism is not a form of pansychism: I do not hold that reality is fundamentally matter that has consciousness but rather that everything is in consciousness (i.e., one universal mind). Pansychism and the like still have the exact same hard problem of consciousness, as there is not possible explanation for how the little grain of sand or atom is became conscious itself. — Bob Ross

But plenum of experience with which things are manifestations becomes more interesting. Sounds like neo-Schopenhauerian metaphysics. — schopenhauer1

It is one method of answering the hard problem without going into granularity. — schopenhauer1

But plenum of experience with which things are manifestations becomes more interesting — schopenhauer1

By “reality” I am abstracting the entirety of existence under an abstract entity. I view it kind of like speaking of being as “substances” which are abstracted entities of kinds of existences (e.g., substance dualism is two kinds of being where monism says there is only one): similarly, I abstract the sum total of existence into “reality”. Reality is being (including all types one may believe in). — Bob Ross

So there is no question that mechanical processes of the brain cause qualitative experiences.

I disagree. For example, let’s say that you are holding and seeing a green pen. A neuroscience (and biologist) can absolutely account for how your brain knows that the pen is green (i.e., the reflection of wavelengths in sunlight in relation to what the object absorbs and the interpretation of it by the brain), but they cannot account for the qualitative experience of the green pen. — Bob Ross

There is absolutely no reason why you should be having a qualitative experience of the green pen even granted the brain functions that interpret it as green. — Bob Ross

The hard problem is that the reductive physicalist method cannot account for qualitative experience at all. — Bob Ross

Things are manifestations of experience? — Fooloso4

Experience of what? Experience? Mind? — Fooloso4

It is evident that things that have mind have experience but it is not evident that what they experience is mind or experience and not things. — Fooloso4

So, to answer your question, there was a reality before any animals (as science suggests). — Bob Ross

Given our limited experience how can we move beyond our experience to something prior to it?

I am not sure I am completely following ... — Bob Ross

What do we know of subjectivity beyond the personal and interpersonal?

A lot. I can reasonably infer that I was born and before that my mother and father existed (for example). — Bob Ross

It is the best metaphysical theory I have heard (so far) for what reality fundamentally is ... it posits that we should reduce everything fundamentally to mind — Bob Ross

and claims that we can do so while adequately fitting the data of experience. — Bob Ross

Things are manifestations of experience?
— Fooloso4

Yes — schopenhauer1

It isn't evident that everything is made of a couple dozen whizzing particles, but here we are. — schopenhauer1

There is a logical leap from our being experiential to the universe being experiential. We have no experience of the experience of the universe or of it being experiential. It seems to be a form of anthropomorphism. — Fooloso4

We have no experience of something fundamental. That there must be something fundamental is merely an assumption that rests fundamentally on our desire that the universe to be intelligible to us. — Fooloso4

We have, however, made considerable progress in explaining things physically. The claim that things are experience (esse est percipi?) does not explain anything. — Fooloso4

Can you explain how that works? — Fooloso4

We have, however, made considerable progress in explaining things physically. The claim that things are experience (esse est percipi?) does not explain anything. Where do we go from there? How do we distinguish between experiences? Is the dream of getting hit by a train as real as getting hit by a train? Will the dream train get me where I need to go? — Fooloso4

Then I recognized the Schopenhauerian aspect of this. — schopenhauer1

I wasn't under the impression that the hard problem was specifically about our inability to experience the experiences of another, but rather a question of how can conscious experience be explained in terms of physical interactions at all. — wonderer1

I think that's a good point. Kastrup seems to be influenced by Schopenhauer and it seems that he has taken the notion or will and the world as representation of will, changed some terms and added some speculative insights from QM and psychology. Notably, the idea that people are dissociated alters of Mind at Large (will) with metacognitive capacities which Mind at Large does not have. Mind at large being a blind and striving instinctive consciousness - sounds familiar... — Tom Storm

My answer to you asking the question* would be that it is not the chemicals, but the loss of the chemicals being arranged grandma-ishly that I am mourning, because I really liked the effect of the chemicals being arranged grandma-ishly. — wonderer1

Why this kind of architecture and not another kind? Why would a unitary thing be so complicated? — schopenhauer1

Yes, that's kind of my reaction too. — Tom Storm

But then why is there an internal time/space, why is there a Platonic Form, and why how are these interacting with Will? Is Will the internal time/space, is Will outside this? — schopenhauer1

Right. Knowing all the details of what is physically going on in a system (brain) is a different matter from having the experiences resulting from the processes which are occurring in that system.

But why should we find that even surprising on physicalism, let alone a hard problem? — wonderer1