Presence and Difference…
Property Dualism of Being and Human Consciousness
“The world is a great mirror. It reflects back to you what you are”…
— Thomas Dreier
“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen, not only because I see it but because by it, I see everything else”…
— CS Lewis
In The Ghost in the Machine — Intelligence is not Computation the prevailing narrative of Artificial General Intelligence was challenged to its core.
An endemic Modern & Post-Modern belief system that can literally be traced back to the emergence of Modernism and ideas eminating from 16th-17th Century French Rationalist Philosopher Rene Descartes.
Cartesianism
Cartesians hold that certain knowledge can be derived through reason from innate ideas (a pure reason — Kant).
Whilst recognising the existence of God as being perfect and omnipotent , Descartes distinguished God’s nature to the finite & fallible nature of Human Being’s and their intellect.
At the time, Descartes believed the act of thinking reveals the certainty of existence (i.e. Cogito, ergo sum — I think, therefore I am).
It is the first principle prior to any proof of God.
It is known independently of divine revelation, through direct introspection and the act of doubt.
In Meditations, Descartes argues that the idea of an infinite and perfect being (God) must have a cause with at least as much formal reality as the idea has objective reality.
Since a finite being like himself cannot be the source of an idea of such infinite perfection, Descartes concludes that only God, as an existing infinite being, could be the adequate cause of this idea.
Therefore, the very presence of the idea of God in the human mind serves as a rational ground for concluding that God exists.
He also concludes that we cannot know the material world directly, not even through our bodies.
It is only through our ideas that represent the material world that we can know what exists recognising that God is not a deceiver.
In other words, certainty about the external world, requires God’s existence as a guarantor of the truth of clear and distinct perceptions.
Cartesian Dualism
This distinction between the Human Mind and the Material World gives rise to Descartes making a substance ontological distinction (grounded in Liebniz Law (Identity of Indiscernibles)) between our Human Minds (res Cogitans) and Human Bodies (res Extensa) & broader material world.
A cartesian dualism that was pivotal in re-orientating Modern and Post-Modern Philosophical Intellectual inquiry towards a Primacy of Human Consciousness (e.g. Cartesianism, Gnosticism, Nietzschean Perspectivism, Nominalism, Umwelt) and the Primacy of Man (e.g. Theology of Marxism and Modern Gnosticism).
Rather than viewing Man embodied and entangled in the World in which he inhabits (i.e. Man participating in Reality), the widespread embracement of Cartesianism viewed Reality through the prism of Man standing on a balcony of Cartesian Abstraction — a Mind Dependent Representation (i.e. Knowledge) that separates the Object from the World**** (i.e. apart from the World ).
**** Note — Similar to Heidegger’s concept of Vorhandenheit (Present-at-Hand) and how consciousness reflects conceptual objects divorced from its contextual function.
Reality was a Mind Dependent Representation anchored in rules of Logic (i.e. Study of norms, structures, and forms of Thought) - a Rationalism.
Hence:
- The World is a Cartesian mechanical machine;
- The Mind is a Cartesian mechanical machine (a computer);
- The Body is a Cartesian mechanical machine; and
- The Cells are comprised of software and hardware (Cartesian mechanical machines) to be programmed and optimised.
In other words, intelligence is computational and can be represented & determined by rules of logic (syntax).
Hence, classical computing gradually transforms into machine learning and is ultimately, anthropomorphised into artificial general intelligence based on an endemic Cartesian World View where intelligence is determined by more & more data and computation.
Viewing Reality from a Cartesian balcony of abstraction (apart from the World).
A Modern and Post-Modern Reality grounded in the Primacy of Human Consciousness, a Primacy of Man and Man as God ( e.g. Marxism).
Presence and Difference: An Alternative Dualism — Mind Dependent Representation (i.e. Conscious Self — Ego) and Mind Independent Properties (i.e. Being)
“So we must start from this dual nature of intelligence as something both biological and logical”…
— Jean Piaget
Presence: Being — A is in B and B is in A (a Monism — Mind is in Being (Descartes — act of thinking reveals certainty of existence) — Being is in the Mind (Rosmini — idea of Being) — this Being (Dasein) to Being (Sein) (Heidegger — relationship of Being) )
Difference: Conscious Self (Ego) — A is not B (Mind Dependent Representation — Mind Independent Reality (Duns Scotus — Realism))
Let’s begin by stating a hypothesis:
Cartesian Dualism which is anchored in Liebniz Law and a substance dualism (i.e. res cogitans and res extensa) can be re-considered in the 21st Century as a property dualism in human consciousness (i.e. conscious self/ego and self/non-ego). Or stated differently, humans participate in Reality via Consciousness that is grounded in Being. Truth is Being understood (i.e. idea of Being — Rosmini and act of Being — Aristotle & Aquinas) by the Human Mind (i.e. Conscious Self — Ego). This double consciousness reflects a property dualism and a natural tension between a mind-dependent representation (i.e. conscious self — ego) and a mind independent reality (i.e. Being). A property dualism that reflects both a Presence ( i.e. A is in B and B is in A — Note: Meaning emerges from the relational nature (Dasein — Heidegger or Semiotic Triadic — Peirce or Intentional Consciousness — Husserl)) of Being (i.e. idea of Being — Rosmini and act of Being — Aristotle & Aquinas) and Knowledge emerges by bridging the Difference (i.e. A is not B) in understanding of Conscious Self & Ego and the meaning of Being. In other words, the different properties of a Mind Dependent Representation to a Mind Independent Reality anchored in Being.
This metaphysical framework reinterprets Cartesian dualism as a property dualism within consciousness.
“All the actual character of consciousness is merely the sense of shock of the non-ego upon us”…
— Charles Sanders Peirce
The ego and non-ego are not two substances but distinct modes (refer Peirce — Categories) within a unified ontological field — Being-in-participation (refer Husserl — Intentional Consciousness — refer Heidegger — Dasein).
“Science is the work of the human mind, which is destined rather to study than to know, to seek the truth rather than to find it” …
– Évariste Galois
The Mind is not merely a mirror of reality, nor a solipsistic projector, but a participant in the event of truth (Logos) through Being and the gift of reason (faith & reason).
This framework avoids the pitfalls (infinite errors — dialectical materialism) of both materialist reductionism (which collapses mind into brain) and idealist solipsism(which collapses reality into a primacy of human consciousness).
It also recognises the relational nature of Being, Meaning and Knowing (i.e. this Being (Dasein) to Being (Sein) — Heidegger , Semiotic Triadic (Peirce) and Intentional Consciousness (Husserl))
Instead, it affirms:
- Presence: Being is the light and condition of all cognition;
- Difference: The ego is finite, perspectival, and representational; and
- Mediation: Truth arises through the structure of human semiosis, Triadic nature of Reason (Aristotle, Bacon & Peirce) and a Divine Order of Things (Rosmini — Real Being, Ideal Being & Moral Being).
Such an ontology affirms that truth is Being understood by the human mind, not in a totalising way but as a participatory unfolding (i.e. a Breath of Being).
The dual structure of consciousness — egoic and ontological — grounds both the possibility of error and the promise of meaning, being and knowing.
This double consciousness does not split the self but enriches it, inviting the human person into an ever-deepening reflective dialogue with Being.
By distinguishing between the ego as a mind-dependent representation and the self’s openness to disclosure through Being as mind-independent reality, we arrive at a new type of property dualism that reflects both the Presence and the Difference between Consciousness Self — Ego and its participation in Being.
This dualism is not a division but a dynamic embodied tension of Personhood (Pope John Paul II), Monism (Peirce) and Entanglement (Peirce — Pragmaticism & Continuum) — one that grounds the very structure of truth, semiosis, and philosophical inquiry.
Through the contributions of Aquinas, Heidegger, Rosmini, Husserl and Peirce, we move beyond Cartesianism (i.e. a Cartesian Balcony of Abstraction & Reductionism) towards a new metaphysical language grounded in entangled Being, Meaning (Peirce) and this Being’s (Dasein) relationship to Being (Sein) (Heidegger).
One that preserves the independence of the Human Mind & our Agency and at the same time recognises an objective independent Reality and Divine Order of Things within the revelation of meaning through Being.
A re-orientation to a triadic understanding of both Reason and Being.
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