What is Panspiritism?

What is Panspiritism?

Steve Taylor

In panspiritism there are two essential (and related) distinctions. The first is between individual conscious beings and fundamental consciousness; and the second is between material things, which are pervaded with fundamental consciousness without having their own interior consciousness, and living things, which are both pervaded with fundamental consciousness and also have their own minds. According to panspiritism, the entire universe is animate and conscious, since all things are animated with spirit. But there is a difference between the way rocks and rivers are alive and the way that people, insects, or even amoebas are alive. Rocks and rivers do not have their own psyches, and are therefore not individually conscious. So although consciousness pervades them, they aren’t conscious themselves, whereas organisms have their own individual consciousnesses, to different degrees of complexity.

We can think of fundamental consciousness as a kind of ‘dynamic field’ which enfolds and immerses the whole universe (and possibly other universes). Its creativity enables it to generate matter so that physical forms can arise and exist within it. An analogy here would be with waves on the surface of an ocean, which have an individual form as waves but are also united with the ocean as a whole and are of the same nature as the ocean. (This analogy is slightly misleading, though, since fundamental consciousness has no surface. Perhaps more accurately, we should think in terms of current or eddies that arise within the depths – or main body – of the ocean.)

Once the material universe had been generated, the dynamic creative quality of fundamental consciousness continued to operate in material structures, enabling greater organisation. Eventually this led to the development of life. Here physical forms became complex enough to channel fundamental consciousness. And once life originated, the creativity of spirit was an important factor in evolution, impelling life forms to develop greater complexity, which in turn allowed life to channel consciousness more intensely, and so to develop a more expansive internal consciousness. Living beings became more sentient and autonomous, whilst still immersed in and pervaded with fundamental consciousness.

There is some interesting stuff relating to development of this idea from Pre-Socratic philosophy down in the article, worth checking out IMO.

Awesome find Sciborg!  This is right up my street. 

Beyond Materialism: Why science needs a spiritual perspective to make sense of the world

Steve Taylor

In this article I will suggest that the assumptions of materialism are groundless, and that there is actually a good deal of evidence against them.

One suggested explanation for adaptive mutation comes from the relatively new field of 'quantum biology.' Quantum biology attempts to explain mysterious biological phenomena in terms of principles of quantum physics such as superposition and entanglement. Applied to the example above, a quantum explanation would be that the genome of the bacteria exists in a state of 'superposition.' That is, it doesn't exist in any one particular state, but in a myriad of possible states, some of them mutated and others non-mutated. But when certain circumstances arise, the genome 'collapses' into the appropriate mutated state.
However, adaptive mutation could simply be an expression of the same creativity that allows life forms to move towards greater complexity and consciousness. This creativity gives life forms the flexibility to respond to challenges. In the above example, bacteria clearly aren't developing into a more complex and conscious form, but the same creative principle may be at work. There is dynamic quality in living beings which enables them to develop in the appropriate way.

This also suggests that a spiritual view of evolution doesn't have to dispense with genetic mutations as an important factor. Mutations may still be the main overt way in which change occurs. The only difference is that, according to this view, beneficial mutations don't happen (or at least don't always happen) randomly. Mutations may be generated by the impetus of evolution, as a means of creating change. According to this theory, mutations occur as a part of the unfolding of the process of evolution, generating inevitable changes that lead to more complex and conscious forms.

Of course, there are important areas that remain unexplained. I have not explained - and it is perhaps not possible to explain - the process by which matter arises out of fundamental consciousness, or the process by which cells and brains canalise fundamental consciousness. Nevertheless, I believe that panspiritism offers a sound basis for the understanding of the universe. It is certainly much more coherent and inclusive than materialism.

Steve Taylor recently uploaded this essay on panspiritism that was published to the journal Zygon where he makes a case for its superiority to things like panpsychism: 

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full...zygo.12649

In recent years, panpsychism appears to have undergone something of a resurgence in the philosophy of mind (Skrbina 2017; Goff 2019). As dissatisfaction with physicalist approaches to consciousness has increased—and as the “hard problem” of how neurological activity might equate to or produce consciousness has become apparently more intractable—the alternative of presuming that consciousness is in some sense fundamental to the world has become more appealing. In panpsychism, the problem of how mind or consciousness could arise out of matter is resolved by positing that mind was always involved in matter. Simple particles have an intrinsic nature of consciousness (or consciousness is an irreducible property of particles, along with other properties such as mass and charge). So consciousness did not need to arise because it was already there.

However, panpsychism is certainly not the only alternative to materialism. In this article, I would like to propose another nonmaterialist perspective, which in my view has more elegance and explanatory potential than panpsychism. It is an approach that—in different variants—has a long and rich philosophical history. This is an approach that could be termed panspiritism. It is possible to see panspiritism as occupying the middle ground between monism and dualism, or between idealism and dualism. Indeed, this is how the Indian philosophy of Bhedabheda Vedanta—which is very similar to panspiritism—is often conceived, as an integration of monist and dualist traditions.

The spirit of the universe

Steve Taylor

The gap between panpsychism and idealism is bridged if one infers that fundamental consciousness, instead of being a property of elementary material particles, pervades the fabric of space itself, from where it is then canalized into living beings. In this essay, Prof. Taylor limits himself to presenting his philosophy of panspiritism, as opposed to providing an argument for it. We believe this presentation appeals to enough intuition to justify its standalone publication.

Why is it necessary to see matter as pervaded with spirit? Couldn’t we simply see matter and spirit as wholly distinct, in dualistic terms? However, panspiritism is a philosophy of oneness (although at the same time it is not wholly monist). It is the all-pervading nature of fundamental consciousness that brings all phenomenal things into oneness—not simply the oneness of living beings who share the same essential internal consciousness, but also the oneness of all nonmaterial things, which are one because they are products of, and are pervaded with, fundamental consciousness. Certain interactions of the mind and the body (such as the influence of mental intentions over the form and functioning of the body, as illustrated by the placebo effect or healing under hypnosis) would be inexplicable without an intimate interconnection between the mental and physical.2 A sense of unity—or at least intimate connection— between one’s own being and the material world is also one of the core elements of mystical experiences. Significantly, mystical experiences also sometimes feature reports of a radiance or energy, which pervades all space and objects, bringing them into oneness.

In addition to their animistic beliefs in spirits that could inhabit and influence phenomena, many indigenous groups developed concepts of a fundamental spiritual principle, which has some similarity with panspiritism. For example, many native American groups developed concepts of a “great spirit” or “great mystery.” The Tlingit of the Pacific North-West refereed to this spiritual principle as yok, the Hopi Indians called it maasauu, the Pawnee called it tirawa, the Dakota called in taku wakan, the Lakota called it wakan-tanka, while the Haudenosaunee called it orenda, the eastern Algonquians called it manitou, and so on. Elsewhere in the world, the Ainu of Japan—an indigenous tribal people of Hokkaido in Northern Japan—developed a similar concept of ramut, while in parts of New Guinea there was a similar concept of imunu. The similarity of these concepts with each other and with the panspiritist concept of a fundamental spiritual force is striking (and demands further investigation than I am able to devote to it here3).

A form of consciousness that pervades all nature impels physical structures to become more complex and, eventually, canalizes itself into our individual being. This is what Dr. Steve Taylor, from Leeds Beckett University, argues in his presentation during our 2021 ‘The Science of Consciousness‘ work conference. Late in 2021, we’ve also published a related piece by Dr. Taylor.