Recorded in late May 2017, in this episode of Book of Nature, your hosts grapple with what it means to be sentient – to have a conscious existence.   Subjects of discussion include philosophical underpinnings of what it means to be a self, and the essence of the mind-body problem, and how both scientists and Christian thinkers conceive of the self in terms of the material and the immaterial.  Needless to say we opened up more issues and raised more questions than we answered… but is this any different than normal?

We also include the following links for your perusal – hope you enjoy!  Click here to listen!

-Todd

https://aeon.co/essays/the-hard-problem-of-consciousness-is-a-distraction-from-the-real-one

https://aeon.co/essays/consciousness-is-not-a-thing-but-a-process-of-inference

https://aeon.co/essays/materialism-alone-cannot-explain-the-riddle-of-consciousness

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/27/daniel-dennetts-science-of-the-soul

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/02/12/two-heads

http://opensciences.org/blogs/open-sciences-blog/232-consciousness-why-materialism-fails

http://consc.net/papers/facing.html

http://consc.net/papers/moving.html

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Mind-body_problem:_New_approaches