Journal of Forensic Legal & Investigative Sciences Category: Forensic science Type: Research Article

Philosophy of Mind in Paul C Mocombe’s Theory of Phenomenological Structuralism

Paul Mocombe C1*
1 West virginia state university, The Mocombeian Foundation, Inc., Lauderhill,, Florida, United states

*Corresponding Author(s):
Paul Mocombe C
West Virginia State University, The Mocombeian Foundation, Inc., Lauderhill,, Florida, United States
Tel:+786 3564920,
Fax:+954 7493190
Email:pmocombe@mocombeian.com

Received Date: Sep 17, 2019
Accepted Date: Oct 21, 2019
Published Date: Oct 28, 2019

Abstract

This work highlights the nature and origins of mind according to Paul C. Mocombe’s structurationist theory of phenomenological structuralism.  The author, building on the quantum computation of ORCH-OR theory and the multiverse ideas of Haitian ontology/epistemology and quantum mechanics proposes a complete metaphysical materialist understanding of the constitution of consciousness and the human mind.  The work posits that consciousness is an emergent fifth force of nature, a quantum material substance/energy, psychion, the phenomenal property of which is recycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverse and becomes embodied, via the microtubules of brains and multiple worlds, as the mind of human actors.  It (mind) is manifested in simultaneous, entangled, superimposed, and interconnecting material resource frameworks, multiple worlds, as praxis or practical consciousness of organic life, whose stored and processed information and memories in-turn become the phenomenal properties of material (subatomic particle energy, psychion) consciousness that is recycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverses at the quantum and macro-world levels.

Keywords

Language Game; Orch-Or Theory; Phenomenological Structuralism; Praxis; Panpsychism; Structurationism; Social Class

INTRODUCTION

This work highlights the nature and origins of mind according to Paul C. Mocombe’s structurationist theory of phenomenological structuralism.  The author, building on the quantum computation of ORCH-OR theory and the multiverse ideas of Haitian ontology/epistemology and quantum mechanics proposes a complete metaphysical materialist understanding of the constitution of consciousness and the human mind.  The work posits that consciousness is an emergent fifth force of nature, a quantum material substance/energy, psychion, the phenomenal properties of which are recycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverse and becomes embodied, via the microtubules (protein structures in the neurons) of brains and multiple worlds, as the mind of human actors where quantum computations take place.  It, the mind and consciousness, is manifested in simultaneous, entangled, superimposed, and interconnecting material resource frameworks, multiple worlds, as praxis or practical consciousness of organic life, whose stored processed information and memories in the microtubules of the brain’s neurons in-turn become the phenomenal properties of material (subatomic particle energy, psychion) consciousness that is recycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverses at the quantum and macro-world levels. 

BACKGROUND OF THE PROBLEM

Consciousness here refers to subjective awareness of phenomenal experiences (ideology, language, self, feelings, choice, control of voluntary behavior, thoughts, etc.) of internal and external worlds.  The academic literature “describes three possibilities regarding the origin and place of consciousness in the universe: (A) as an emergent property of complex brain neuronal computation, (B) as spiritual quality of the universe, distinct from purely physical actions, and (C) as composed of discrete ‘proto-conscious’ events acting in accordance with physical laws not yet fully understood” (Hameroff and Penrose, 2014, pg. 70) [1].  The latter position, (C) represents the ORCH-OR (“orchestrated objective reduction”) theory of Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose (2014) [1], which includes aspects of (A) and (B), and posits that “consciousness consists of discrete moments, each an ‘orchestrated’ quantum-computational process terminated by… an action [objective reduction or OR] rooted in quantum aspects of the fine structure of space-time geometry, this being coupled to brain neuronal processes via microtubules” (pg. 70).  In this view, the understanding is that a proto-conscious experience existed in the universe, panpsychism, and as a result of emergent structures of the brain it (proto-conscious experience, psychion) became embodied and evolved as a result of quantum neuronal computations of “brains”.  That is to say, in the protein structures, microtubules, of the neurons of the brain, which serves or acts like a quantum supercomputer, information and memories are stored and processed to orchestrate human conscious awareness.  For me, building on Paul C. Mocombe’s (2018) structurationist theory with its basis in ORCH-OR theory, this conscious awareness is an emergent material substance the phenomenal properties of which becomes the mind of human actors expressed in entangled and superimposed multiple worlds as their practical activity or practical consciousness. 

Paul C. Mocombe’s (2016, 2019) [2] structurationist sociology, phenomenological structuralism, which attempts to resolve the structure/agency problematic of the social sciences, builds on the ORCH-OR theory and panpsychism of Hameroff and Penrose, while holding on to the multiverse hypothesis of quantum mechanics and Haitian ontology/epistemology, which the authors reject because it is not “a more down-to-earth viewpoint” (Hameroff and Penrose, 2014, pg. 51). For Mocombe (2016, 2019), quantum superposition, wav-function realism, entanglement, and evidence in Haitian Vodou of spirit possession, which represent ancestors from a parallel world, Vilokan, of the earth’s of which we ought to pattern our behaviors and structures, are grounding proofs for the acceptance of the multiple worlds hypothesis of quantum mechanics.  Within the latter hypothesis, the understanding is that “each possibility in a superposition evolves to form its own universe, resulting in an infinite multitude of coexisting ‘parallel’ worlds.  The stream of consciousness of the observer is supposed somehow to ‘split’, so that there is one in each of the worlds-at least in those worlds for which the observer remains alive and conscious.  Each instance of the observer’s consciousness experiences a separate independent world, and is not directly aware of any of the other worlds” (Hameroff and Penrose, 2014, pg. 50).  It is within this multiple worlds hypothesis that Mocombe constitutes the notion of consciousness and mind in the universe according to his theory of phenomenological structuralism.  For Mocombe, consciousness is an emergent fifth force of nature, a quantum material substance/energy, psychion, tied to the photons of the electromagnetic field, dark matter, and energy, the phenomenal properties, the stored information and memories, of which are recycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverse and becomes embodied via the microtubules of brains.  In the embodied human actor consciousness emerges as a mind, which is manifested in simultaneous, entangled, superimposed, and interconnecting material resource frameworks as embodied praxis or practical consciousness, whose stored memories and processed information in-turn becomes the phenomenal properties of material (subatomic particle energy, psychion) consciousness that is recycled/entangled/superimposed and embodied throughout the multiverses at the quantum and macro-levels.

THEORY AND METHOD

Structurationist sociology synthesizes structure and agency via the concept of praxis or practical consciousness; accounting for human agency or practical consciousness via the actions associated with structural reproduction and differentiation within a particular material resource framework [3,4]. This latter factor, according to [5] Paul C. Mocombe (2019), only accounts for one aspect of human action (i.e., structural reproduction and differentiation) in a material resource framework, however.  Building on structurationist sociology, Mocombe argues that the “moments, or movements, which escape from the compound of socially constructed identifications” are the product of an individual actors’ (mental) stance/analytics (Martin Heidegger’s term) vis-à-vis three types of structures/systems of signification amidst the practical consciousness associated with societal structural reproduction and differentiation (the social system): 1) the (chemical, biological, and physiological) drives (forms of sensibility and understanding) of the body and brain (the biological system), 2) impulses or phenomenal properties of residual past/present/future consciousnesses or recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic/chemical particles encapsulated in and as  the neuronal energies of the brain via microtubules (the physical system), 3) and actions or practical consciousnesses resulting from the deferment of meaning in ego-centered linguistic and symbolic communicative discourse (the linguistic system).   

Generally speaking, consciousnesses, actions (practical consciousness), learning, and development within Mocombe’s phenomenological structural ontology are the product of the embodiment of the phenomenal properties of recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic neuronal energies/chemicals, psychion, of the multiverse objectified in the space-time of multiverses via the aggregated body and the microtubules of the brain.  Once objectified and embodied the phenomenal properties of the neuronal energies/chemicals encounter the space-time of physical worlds via a transcendental subject (mind) of consciousnesses (the aggregation of a universal-self superimposed and entangled across the multiple worlds of the multiverse) and the drives and sensibilities of the aggregated body and brain in reified structures of signification, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, and communicative discourse defined and determined by other beings that control the resources (economics), and modes of distributing them, of the material world required for physical survival in space-time.  The Heideggerian (mental) stances/analytics, “ready-to-hand,” “unready-to-hand,” and “present-at-hand,” which emerge as a result of conflict between the embodied transcendental ego vis-à-vis its different systems, 1) the sensibilities and (chemical, biological, and physiological) drives of the body and brain, 2) drives/impulses of embodied residual memories/information or phenomenal properties of past recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic/chemical particles, 3) the actions produced via the body in relation to the indeterminacy/deferment of meaning of linguistic and symbolic signifiers as they appear to individuated consciousnesses in ego-centered communicative discourse, 4) and the dialectical and differentiating effects, i.e., structural reproduction and differentiation, of the structures of signification, social class language game, of those who control the economic materials (and their distribution, i.e., mode of production) of a world are the origins of practical consciousnesses.  All four types of actions, the drives and sensibilities of the body and brain, drives or phenomenal properties of embodied recycled/entangled/superimposed past consciousnesses, structural reproduction/differentiation stemming from the mode of production, and deferential actions arising from the deferment of meaning in ego-centered communicative discourse via the present-at-hand stance/analytic, exist in the material world with the social class language game, i.e., the physical, mental, emotional, ideological, etc. 5) powers of those who control the material resource framework as the causative agent for individual behaviors.  In other words, our (mental) stances in consciousness/mind vis-à-vis the conflict between the (chemical, biological, and physiological) drives and sensibilities of the body and brain, (societal) structural reproduction and differentiation, drives of embodied past/present/future consciousnesses of recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic/chemical particles of the microtubules, and deferential actions arising as a result of the deferment of meaning in ego-centered communicative discourse determines the practical consciousness we want to recursively reorganize and reproduce in the material world.  The power and power positions of those who control (via the mode of production, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, and communicative discourse) the resources (and their distribution, i.e., mode of production) of a material resource framework, and the threat it poses to the ontological security of an embodied actor, in the end determines what actions and identities are allowed to organize and reproduce in the material world without the individual actor/agent facing marginalization or death. 

It is Being’s (mental) stance/analytic, “ready-to-hand,” “unready-to-hand,” and “present-at-hand,” in consciousness vis-à-vis the conflict, or lack thereof, between the (chemical, biological, and physiological) drives and sensibilities of the aggregated body and brain, drives/impulses (phenomenal properties) of residual past/present/future consciousnesses of recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic particles of microtubules, alternative practices which arise as a result of phenomenological meditation and deferment of meaning, along with the differentiating logic or class divisions of the social relations of production, which produces the variability of actions and practices in cultures, social structures, or social systems.  All four types of actions are always present and manifested in a social structure to some degree contingent upon the will and desires of the economic social class that controls the material resource framework through the actions of its body (practical consciousness), language/symbols, ideology, ideological apparatuses, communicative discourse, and social relations of production.  They choose, amidst the class division of the social relations of production, what other meaning constitutions and practices are allowed to manifest themselves in the material world without facing alienation, marginalization, domination, or death. 

Hence, we never experience the things-in-themselves of the world culturally and historically in consciousness.  We experience them structurally or relationally, the structure of the conjuncture of the mode of production, its language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, etc., and our (mental/mind) stances/analytics, ready-to-hand, unready-to-hand, present-at-hand, vis-à-vis these things as they appear to and in consciousness determine our practical consciousness or behaviors.  

We initially know, experience, and utilize the things of and in consciousness in the preontological ready-to-hand mode, which is structural and relational.  That is, our bodies encounter, know, experience, and utilize the things of the world in consciousness, intersubjectively, via their representation as objects of knowledge, truth, usage, and experience enframed and defined in the relational logic and practices or social class “language game” (Wittgenstein’s term) of the institutions or ideological apparatuses of the other beings-of-the-material resource framework whose historicity comes before our own and gets reified in and as the actions of their bodies, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, mode of production, and communicative discourse (social class language game).  This is the predefined phenomenal structural, i.e., ontological, world we and our bodies are thrown-in in coming to be-in-the-world.  How an embodied-hermeneutically-structured Being as such solipsistically view, experience, understand, act, and utilize the predefined objects of knowledge, truth, and experienced defined by others and their conditions of possibilities in the mind in order to formulate their practical consciousness is albeit indeterminate.  Martin Heidegger in Being in Time is accurate, however, in suggesting that three stances or modes of encounter (Analytic of Dasein), “presence-at-hand,” “readiness-to-hand,” and “un-readiness-to-hand,” characterizes the mind’s views of the things of consciousness represented intersubjectively via bodies, language, ideology, and communicative discourse, and subsequently determine our practical consciousness or social agency.  In “ready-to-hand,” which is the preontological mode of human existence thrown in the world, we accept and use the things in consciousness with no conscious experience of them, i.e., without thinking about them or giving them any meaning or signification outside of their intended usage.  Heidegger’s example is that of using a hammer in hammering.  We use a hammer without thinking about it or giving it any other condition of possibility outside of its intended usage as defined by those whose historicity presupposes our own.  In “present-at-hand,” which, according to Heidegger, is the stance of science, we objectify the things of consciousness and attempt to determine and reify their meanings, usage, and conditions of possibilities as the nature of reality as such.  Hence the hammer is intended for hammering by those who created it as a thing solely meant as such.  The “unready-to-hand” outlook is assumed when something goes wrong in our usage of a thing of consciousness as defined and determined by those who adopt a “present-at-hand” view.  As in the case of the hammer, the unready-to-hand view is assumed when the hammer breaks and we must objectify it, by then assuming a present-at-hand position, and think about it in order to either reconstitute it as a hammer, or give it another condition of possibility.  Any other condition of possibility that we give the hammer outside of its initial condition of possibility which presupposed our historicity becomes relational, defined in relation to any of its other conditions of possibilities it may have been given by others we exist in the world with who either ready-to-hand, unready-to-hand, or present-at-hand attempts to maintain the social class language game of power.  In the ready-to-hand stance the latter unconsciously practices and attempts to reproduce the social class language game of power by discriminating against and marginalizing any other conditions of possibilities of their social class language as determined by those in ideological power positions.  They may move to the unready-to-hand stance in response to those who they encounter that attempts, present-at-hand, to alter the nature of the dominant social class language game they recursively reorganize and reproduce as outlined by those in power positions who are present-at-hand of the dominant social class language game. In either case, not all beings achieve the present-at-hand stance.  The latter is the stance of science and ideologies, which are tautologies when they profess that their stances represent the nature of reality as such, and those in power positions, who choose, among a plethora of alternative present-at-hand social class language games, what alternative practical consciousnesses outside of their social class language game that are allowed to manifest in the material world. 

DISCUSSION

Hence, as outlined above, phenomenological structuralism posits consciousness to be a material substance, the by-product or evolution of recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic particles unfolding with increasing levels of abstraction within material resource frameworks enframed by the mode of production, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, and communicative discourse of bodies recursively reorganizing and reproducing the ideals of the latter factors as their practical consciousness, which becomes the phenomenal properties of microtubules in the neurons of brains that are  cycled/entangled/superimposed throughout the multiverse.  The mind is an epiphenomenon of the latter processes.  That is to say, the logical consequence regarding the evolution and constitution of the multiverses, and their contents, based on the assumptions of superposition, wave-function realism, action-at-a-distance, phenomenal properties of microtubules, and panpsychism of quantum mechanics, for [6] Mocombe, is similar to the intersecting worlds theory highlighted in Haitian Vodou, which parallels the physics, “membrane theory,” of Lisa Randall and Raman Sundrum (1999).  This materialist proposal, in keeping with the logic of Haitian Vodou and the “brane theory” of Randall and Sundrum, posits that there might be an additional dimension on the cosmological scale, the scale described by general relativity, which gives rise to four dimensional multiverses within it.  That is to say, our universe is embedded in a vastly bigger five-dimensional space (the four-dimensional space of relativity, plus a fifth dimension for the subatomic forces including consciousness), a kind of super-universe.  Within this super-space, our universe is just one of a whole array of co-existing universes (Haitian Vodou only accounts for our universe and its parallel), each a separate four-dimensional bubble within a wider arena of five-dimensional space where consciousness (a subatomic material force tied to the photons of the electromagnetic field, dark matter, and dark energy) is recycled/entangled/superimposed between the five-dimensional super-space, i.e., superverses, the multiverses, and microtubules of brains the content of which are its phenomenal properties, which give rise to practical consciousness and the mind.  

The individual being is initially constituted as superimposed, entangled, recycled, and embodied subatomic particles of multiple worlds of the multiverse, (inter)connected via the wave-function of photons of the electromagnetic field, and the psychion of dark matter and energy, which have their own predetermined form of understanding and cognition, phenomenal properties, based on previous or simultaneous experiences as aggregated emergent matter (this is akin to what the Greek philosopher Plato refers to when he posits knowledge as recollection of the Soul) that becomes embodied in the protein structures of neurons, i.e., microtubules.  Again, the individual’s actions are not necessarily determined by the embodiment and drives of these recycled/entangled/superimposed subatomic particles, psychion and photon, which are embodied in the microtubule neurons of the brain.  It is conflict and an individual’s mental stance, ready-to-hand, unready-to-hand, and present-at-hand, when the subatomic particles become aggregated matter or embodied, which determines whether are not they become aware, present-at-hand, of the subatomic particle drives and choose to recursively reorganize and reproduce the content of the drives as their practical consciousness. 

This desire to reproduce the cognition and understanding of the (chemical, biological, and physiological) drives of the recycled/entangled/susperimposed subatomic particles, however, may be limited by the structuring structure of the aggregated body and brain of the individual subject.  That is to say, the second origins and basis of an individual’s actions in macro-worlds are the structuring drives and desires, for food, clothing, shelter, social interaction, and sex, of the aggregated body and brain, which the subatomic particles constitute and embody.  In other words, the aggregated body and brain is preprogrammed with its own (biological, chemical, and physiological) forms of sensibility, understanding, and cognition, structuring structure, by which it experiences being-in-the-world as aggregated embodied subatomic particles.  These bodily forms of sensibility, understanding, and cognition, such as the drive and desire for food, clothing, shelter, social interaction, linguistic communication, and sex, are tied to the material embodiment and survival of the embodied individual actor, and may or may not supersede or conflict with the desire and drive of an individual to recursively (re) organize and reproduce the structuring structure of the superimposed, entangled, and recycled (phenomenal properties of) subatomic particles.  If these two initial structuring structures are in conflict, the individual moves from the ready-to-hand to the unready-to-hand stance or analytics where they may begin to reflect upon and question their being-in-the-world prior to acting.  Hence just as in the case of the structuring structure of the subatomic particles it is an individual being’s analytics vis-à-vis the drives of its body and brain in relation to the impulses/vibrations/frequencies of the subatomic particles, which determines whether or not they become driven by the desire to solely fulfill the material needs of their body and brain at the expense of the drives/desires of the subatomic particles or the social class language game of the material resource framework they find their existence unfolding in. 

The social class language game, and its differentiating effects, an individual find their existence unfolding in is the third structuring structure, which attempts to determine the actions of individual beings as they experience being-in-the-world as embodied subatomic particles.  The aggregated individual finds themselves objectified and unfolding within a material resource framework controlled by the actions of other bodies, which presuppose their existence, via the actions of their bodies (practical consciousness), language, communicative discourse, ideology, and ideological apparatuses stemming from how they satisfy the desires of their bodies and subatomic particle drives (means and mode of production).  What is aggregated as a social class language game by those in power positions via and within its mode of production, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, and communicative discourse attempts to interpellate and subjectify other beings to its interpretive frame of satisfying their bodily needs, fulfilling the impulses of their subatomic particles, and organizing a material resource framework at the expense of all others, and becomes a third form of structuring individual action based on the mode of production and how it differentiates individual actors.  

That is to say, an individual’s interpellation, subjectification, and differentiation within the social class language game that presupposes their being-in-a-world attempts to determine their actions or practical consciousness via the reified language, ideology, etc., of the social class language game, the meaning of which can be deferred via the communicative discourse of the individual actors.  Hence, the deferment of meaning in ego-centered communicative discourse of the language and ideology of a social class language game is the final means of determining an individual’s action or practical consciousness outside of, and in relation to, its stance, i.e., analytics, vis-à-vis the drives of subatomic particles, drives and desires of the body and brain, and structural reproduction and differentiation.  

Whereas the practical consciousness of the transcendental ego stemming from the impulses of embodied subatomic particles are indeterminant as with its neuronal processes involved with the constitution of meaning in ego-centered communicative discourse (Albeit physicists are in the process of exploring the nature, origins, and final states of subatomic particles, and neuroscientists are attempting to understand the role of neuronal activities in developing the transcendental ego and whether or not it continues to exist after death).  The form of the understandings and sensibilities of the body and brain are determinant as with structural reproduction and differentiation of the mode of production, and therefore can be mapped out by neuroscientists, biologists, and sociologists to determine the nature, origins, and directions of societal constitution and an individual actor’s practical consciousness unfolding.

CONCLUSION

The interaction of all four elements or processes in relation to the (mental) stance of the transcendental ego of the individual actor is the basis for the human mind and action, praxis/practical consciousness, in a world where consciousness emerges as a material substance, psychion, of the multiverse.  However, in the end, consequently, the majority of practical consciousness will be a product of an individual actor’s embodiment and the structural reproduction and differentiation of a social class language game given 1) the determinant nature of embodiment, form of understanding and sensibility of the body and brain amidst, paradoxically, the indeterminacy of impulses of embodied subatomic particles and the quantum neuronal processes involved in ego-centered communicative discourse; and 2) the consolidation of power of those who control the material resource framework wherein a society, the social class language game, is ensconced and the threat that power (consolidated and constituted via the actions of bodies, mode of production, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, and communicative discourse) poses to the ontological security of an aggregated individual actor who chooses (or not) either ready-to-hand or present-at-hand to recursively reorganize and reproduce the ideals of the society as their practical consciousness.  It should be mentioned that in response to this latter process, those in power positions who internalize the ideals of the social structure and recursively (re) organize and reproduce them as their practical consciousness are in the unready-to-hand stance when they encounter alternative forms of being-in-the-world within their social class language game.  They dialectically attempt to reconcile the practical consciousness of their social class language game with the reified practical consciousness of those who have deferred their meanings for alternative forms of being-in-the-world within their social class language.  They can either accept, marginalize, or seek to eradicate the deferred or decentered subject or their practices for the purpose of integration.

REFERENCES

Citation: Paul Mocombe C (2019) Philosophy of Mind in Paul C Mocombe’s Theory of Phenomenological Structuralism. Forensic Leg Investig Sci 5: 033.

Copyright: © 2019  Paul Mocombe C, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.


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