We might notice a data void and a general intellectual resistance to the experience of the qualities of living in favour of ideas, thoughts, consciousness, and mind. Perhaps the reason we are stuck in this old paradigm of thought and the denial or diminishment of the rest of our lived experience is that we live in social, industrial, political, and technological systems that prioritize the mind above all else.
This publication was inspired by scientists who are exploring the decolonization of identity, history, and science, quantum physicist Shohini Ghose and Mi'kmaq astrophysicist Hilding Neilson, who were featured by CBC Ideas in the recent episode, Perimeter Institute Conversations About Science and Identity.
What would happen if we began with the whole, with the full experience of being alive in a living universe where the quantum points to something beyond the physical and the quantitative? What if the physical is a metaphor for the metaphysical? What if the essence of reality is beyond what we can measure, quantify, and know? We know that we don’t know so much of what we don’t know. The attempt to know the infinite overwhelms the mind and we miss the opportunity to really live, because of that sense of overwhelm.
In philosophy of mind, qualia (singular form: quale) are defined as instances of subjective, conscious experience. The term qualia derives from the Latin neuter plural form (qualia) of the Latin adjective quālis meaning “of what sort” or “of what kind” in a specific instance, such as “what it is like to taste a specific apple — this particular apple now.”
Examples of qualia include the perceived sensation of pain of a headache, the taste of wine, and the redness of an evening sky. As qualitative characteristics of sensation, qualia stand in contrast to propositional attitudes, where the focus is on beliefs about experience rather than what it is directly like to be experiencing.
I feel like we need a shift away from centring the mind and the quantitative. What if the regenerative movement was a focus on what cannot be quantified, on life as the ground of being and the physical quanta merely evidence of that greater reality? That would be a paradigm shift in meaning, value, and significance.
What if qualia are the inner essence and the quanta are the outer expression of reality? A shift in perspective and perception might change everything. We might call that change a qualis social revolution.
“We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. This is the divine mystery supreme. A wonderful thing it is and the source of our happiness. We need not wait to see what others do.”