100%. The whole discipline of biological taxonomy, how species are classified, the modern version of which originated with Carl Linneaus, can be traced back to Aristotle.
Sure, but in the context it’s a reasonable summary. And the ‘culture wars’ over science and religion can hardly be dismissed.
That’s an interesting and challenging OP, especially for a bunch of exceptionalist philosophers such as ourselves!
You start by talking about a Sense Of Self, and then talk about consciousness. Are you intending these to have more or less the same meaning?
Would it, in principle, be possible for an organism to evolve and gain a sense of self in so far as it makes a practical distinction between itself and its environment such that it uses resources from its environment to feed itself, grow, reproduce, make predictions, avoid harm, all without the ‘lights on’? It seems to me that there are the functions of life on the one hand, and phenomenal awareness on the other, and that the former could theoretically manage without the latter. Indeed it’s not clear what consciousness adds on top of the functions of life that could possibly be useful. Perhaps you think that consciousness is nothing other than these functions.
As regards the confluence of facts, I am, as a philosopher, ignorant of these. I did do an a-level in Biology, but I haven’t surveyed modern biology. Could you give a few examples of the facts you have in mind?
As presented it feels like a trick question.
What is our frame of reference?
Why not think small? Paramecium, or eukaryotic cells. Under the proper framing those are certainly beings.
Dr. Reber and Dr. Lane and others would suggest that primitive self “awareness” is a requirement for survival. Anyone want to dispute that? Try it without invoking imaginary elements ( zombies, or Mary, or some such) !
They will also point out that even for a bacteria, that entity must feel like something when conditions become hostile, as well as feel something totally different in the presence of good food and safe environment, as opposed to conditions that throws off homeostasis. How else would it act to protect itself and thrive?
A Starling is a being, but a swarm of Starlings behaving in unison is not a being. Where that boundary lies? Somewhere in Earth’s deep past. Time, experience, culling, complexity, emergence happens.
Though I imagine “beings” arose with minimal complexity, then like Las Vegas, one thing leads to another and cascading consequences takes over.
I believe Nagel’s framing and Chalmers’ challenge is an example of how the structure of a question can blind and make understanding impossible.
@noAxioms, a realistic evolutionary perspective isn’t worried about labels and strict classifications, because nature simply does not operate that way. Not that there aren’t good reasons for us classifying. But, when we get carried away and try to rigidly apply it to minutia, it’s increasingly counter-productive - again simply because Nature does not play by our rules.
I would rather start with appreciating the significance of Earth’s geology + chemistry + time hammering out the Krebs cycle. That’s mind-boggling enough; and significant; and worth taking on board.
It is literally what created biology with all its implications and potentials.
But with a sniff I’m told that’s boring and not the job of philosophers “our job is metaphysics”.
Okay, then perhaps people who are seriously interested in understanding one’s Self and one’s own living consciousness should consider giving up on philosophy and taking up evolutionary biology. Then, perhaps come back equipped to expose the D-N-C paradigm as a self-indulgent, counter-productive, intellectual exercise in human exceptionalism some are seeing it as. 
oops did I go too far?
John Searle wouldn’t think so.
Physical reality is that living whole organisms produces consciousness - because without it one is literally clueless. Guaranteed chum for something else to eat.
Remember that we are the product of half a billion years of 100% survivors. That’s not to be sniffed at.
We’ll never understand our human drama by keeping our imagination within our mental mindscapes and turning our backs on physical-biological-evolutionary reality.
We need to let in the physical world along with the scientific insights from people who are qualified to study as near objectively as we can hope, with stumbled along the way. So what, that’s life.
Dr. Solms as another scientist who’s thrown down the gauntlet with his summary of the modern scientific synthesis:
Human consciousness is best understood as a reflection of our living body communicating with itself, as it non-stop interacts with the interior and exterior of self.
Senses + Body + Brain + (Interactions, interior & exterior) = awareness of self, consciousness on a spectrum to our human introspection.
Philosophy can either keep with a contrived linguistic trick challenge - for instance, by what right do we think we are supposed to be privy to another’s experience ? I mean what is up with Nagel’s question to begin with? Is it God envy or something?
I can’t even know what’s within my twin’s mind, let alone another creatures. Why should I ? ?
Oh heck yeah, ask and I’ll do my best to answer and to provide sources to legitimate scientists and other learned sources. My point was simply don’t take my word for it, I may be a passionate enthusiast, but I’m no expert.
My interest is in helping people become aware of something that gets way the hell too little air time. Not in pumping myself up.
Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now.
Addendum — A Philosopher Schools Citizenschallenge.
A counterpoint to Cc’s “Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now — A story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.”
Thanks for your comment.
The OP must be referring to how biology is brain-focused (physical) while philosophy is mind-focused (nonphysical). Some people think mind = brain function. Much of modern medicine is brain-focused. I knew a young shrink who edified me that mental problems are physical problems. He was an MD and he said it with a twinkle in his eyes. This was 20 or so years ago. Things change.
That’s the problem. You wrote in your essay, which you kindly linked to, “Seek and ye shall find.” Well, that’s exactly what I did. Curiosity always got the better of me—Who am I? What is consciousness? What are Space, Time, and Matter? How did Life originate? And I searched. And connected the dots. And I eventually found answers that satisfied me. And now I’ve come here because, like you, I need questions. I need new paradoxes I haven’t yet solved. I need reasoned discussions so I can identify hidden gaps in my own knowledge and ask myself new questions.
So I’m all for discussion.
For example, I might question your statement:
“Awareness and consciousness have been one of nature’s main projects since the beginning of life.”
I doubt it. Life may not evolve to consciousness if conditions aren’t conducive. There is no necessity for a specific stage of evolution, only a certain probability. Just like for the emergence of life.
…and yet I do dismiss them. TBH, I’ve never understood what all the fuss is about. There is no conflict between one belief system and another, but only difference. And difference is NOT (necessarily) deficit.
All I can suggest become familiar with the world of the likes Arthur Reber’s CDC (cellular theory of consciousness), or Nick Lane’s most recent book Transformer that finished with its superb epilogue SELF - which points the astounding fact that the chemistry at the base of life, is not the utterly random affair most label it - in fact it turns our that basic chemistry of life used loaded dice. That profound and is worth taking on board.
Is that a nice way of saying there’s no difference between faith-based thinking and science based rationalism?
What specifically supports your point of view? Can you provide your own argument?
No, it’s more of an example of me not thinking-through the consequences of what I wrote. 
However, as you asked me in that way, I will observe that arguments that are actually fact-based are often not quite what they seem to be, or are assumed (and hoped) to be. We are often too quick to assign certainty and ‘facthood’ to our ideas, I think. Perhaps to bolster them with an authority they don’t really have…? 
IMO! 
I’ve been peppering my comments with these scientific sources to the point that I’m worried someone will complain.
I did recently finish an effort that lasted nearly eight years, to continue learning and summarize what I’ve learned from scientist experts, at the end I offer a list of scientists and links.
Chalmers’ “Hard Problem” and the Living Moment of Now
A story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.
Addendum — A Philosopher Schools Citizenschallenge
A counterpoint to Cc’s "Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now - a story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.
Agreed, that’s where critical thinking and engaging with others comes in.
I know I’m the easiest person to fool, so I don’t particularly trust myself, but then again I know what I know and can defend what I’ve learned, with a willingness to hear valid new information to help refine my current knowledge base.
Conversely, with valid information that exposes my convictions being in errors, I’m more than willing to accept the hurt feeling and lick my wounds, then absorb the new information and come out the end a better me for the learning.
@ Angel
Been thinking Nick Lane is who you should probably start with then don’t forget to check in with Dr. Arthur Reber and muse on this CDC.A scientific approach to understanding your “Self” - Nick Lane PhD. A Students Resource.
Striving to Understand Consciousness. (with a little help from Nick Lane)
Reber does a great job of fielding some decidedly hostile questions.
Cellular Basis Consciousness #2 Reber’s Q/A - Student’s Resource, transcript of highlights.
The “Cellular Basis of Consciousness” proposal - A Student’s Introduction to Dr. Arthur Reber’s CBC
Thank you! I’ll take a look.
In the 70’s two Chilean biologists introduced the concept of autopoiesis, which describes the nature of a living system as one that can produce and maintain itself. Their work has led to philosophical theories of consciousness such as embodied cognition and enactivism, and arrived just in time as alternatives to the typical computationalism and dualism that haunts the philosophy of mind. So I think it’s fine to be optimistic about the direction, even despite the very long death throes of the more superstitious theories.
These are three very different philosophers! Chalmers is somewhat sympathetic to panpsychism, which is precisely not aggrandizing humans. I’m not sure who you are grumpy with exactly. Reber’s placing of consciousness very early in the evolutionary process will find much agreement among philosophers, especially those hard-problem mongers for whom panpsychism may be a plausible solution.
According to your transcription, one of the audience members asked Reber whether consciousness admits of degrees or not. Why did he ask that?
Apologies for slow reply. Never as much free time as one plans.
You as an individual have not survived for half a billion years. Not you as a species either. Yes, it’s a goal of individuals that can act towards a deliberate goal.
I was questioning the goals of evolution. You seemed to be talking about evolution in your comment, which has no goals, only effects. You did admittedly word it as the survival of you and me as individuals. I assure you that we’ll both die in far less than the time you mention.
I didn’t dismiss it, I corrected it. It’s been happening on Earth for about 9x the length of time you mention above.
[I] wonder how you’d define Evolution (as in, what is your mental conception of Evolution?)
In that context, I’d define it as natural selection acting upon terrestrial life. There’s a fair chance that abiogenesis didn’t occur here, so it may have started further back than 5 GYr, but it wouldn’t be terrestrial life back then either.
Natural selection (evolution) acts on far more than life forms, so I had to include my context.
I gave several examples, including small ones. I can tie two people together in a 3-legged race. They act as a unit. Are they a being or are the two individuals cooperating?
It may indeed depend on framing, but if that’s true, then you being a life form is just a mental designation with no basis in reality. You kind of indicate that yourself in the paragraph that quotes “Nature does not play by our rules”.
You reach for small. Good choice. Same question. You say that under proper framing, eukaryotic cells are certainly beings. OK, but my body is made mostly of a collection of eukaryotic cells. Am I just a community of them, or am I something emergent? What happens to the ‘self awareness’ of all those cells when they’re part of something larger? They can and do die for the good of the emergent being, so their goal isn’t just self survival.
If I am a being and the 3-legged entity is not, what’s the difference? That’s my question. When does the community of individuals become a new being? Closest macroscopic example is probably a bee hive, a being in itself more than it is a commune of cooperating individuals. Yes, it has a primitive self awareness and acts for survival not of the species, but of the hive.
Mary isn’t self aware? News to me.
Confusing instinct/automatic reaction with deliberate acts. Again, such assertions kind of depend on how the terms are defined or framed.
Good example, and of something that was likely hammered out before cells evolved.
Or go Searle’s route and make sure there’s always a curtain one is not allowed to peek behind.
Hard to defend that. Ever notice that in all the fossil record, they’ve never found a species that is a direct ancestor of humans? Ever notice that none of them survived? OK, we’re descended from something, so in that sense they survived, but if it was say some kind of fish, we’re not fish. It’s a difficult sell to say it survived. But it left something behind, even if not a fossil.
Will humans leave anything (besides fossils) behind, something that lives beyond us? Should we? What should be the judge of that?
I think it was meant as evidence against monism, but I’m no expert.
Did a little digging,
I like it, that is, it makes sense to me.
Thanks for sharing that.
Following in the footstep of the preceding who was walking in the footstep of Catholism.
It started insisting that human mind is a supernatural something or other, that god must have given us - and it has never explicitly extracted itself for that religion.
In my experience philosophers seems totally uninterested in (if not downright hostile toward) Evolution and what it has to teach an inquiring mind - which seems like nothing so much as a theological handover.
Why not? Seems like a rational question.
If consciousness is a product of the living organisms interacting with their environment - wouldn’t it make sense that as organisms and environments get more complex, creature awareness must of necessity improve and adapt?
Lordie, lordie do I relate to that. 
Here’s to having a busy life.
Oh but in a very real sense my physical body has survived for a half billion years, and my bloodline has achieved two new generations, who would not be here if not for me.
My body is absolutely dependent on every one of those previous generations. Becoming aware of it, has transformed my understanding of and relationship with my body immeasurably.
Whereas my mind is limited by my own existence, recording my life’s experiences and lessons learned.
Spot on. The nuance I sometime forget to include is that I’m referring to my “generational bloodline” (or body plan) going back half a billion years.
As for Earth having to refine conditions and to a create minerals and molecules that life required took 9x as long. (Check out Robert Hazen for a mind blowing journey through mineral evolution) With the Krebs cycle which invented biology going back roughly 4 billion years, within a few 100 million years first simple cells appeared. With eukaryotic complex cells taking nearly 2 billion more years to develop.
With eukaryotic cells demonstrating all the hallmarks of “intelligent” behavior. How to find food, discerning between good and bad food, keeping the good stuff inside, excreting the correct stuff, locomotion, learning, ability to get around, avoidance, attraction.
Agreed.
I thought my starling analogy responded to that.
That is a direct denial of evolution and your biological self.
Those words feel like crazy-making to me.
Yes but the amazing beauty is that nature isn’t a trickster the way we people are. It has internally consisted systems and protocols, otherwise what we witness around us, could have never come into existence in the first place.
Way back in construction days, I had a boss who would occasional tell me: You didn’t have to ask that!
If you had asked about fungus, then we’d both have some heavy lifting.
Or a sponge.
Can you push yourself through a sieve and reconstitute yourself?
Reber addressed the question of swarm behavior.
Would you say that a winning basketball team is a being or a team?
Sorry, you missed my point.
Besides, it is true, Mary isn’t self aware, Mary is a figment of our imagination.
Humans have made a habit of labeling everything an animal does as instinct - but the more science dig down the more meaningless the human notion of “instinct” becomes. Heck on a slight tangent apparently with more observation the label of Nocturnal, Diurnal animals is a misnomer, to always gets more complicated than we can imagine.
First there was chemotaxis, then came complexity and endless days and nights, to figure it out systems that could do better.
No I don’t.
What are you expecting, and what do you think is missing?
Well actually we were fish for a while, way back, before that we were worms. Go figure.
An awful lot of destruction, we have become a geological/biological force. Insanely, by the time our current actions play out, our Earth biosphere will be reset to a primitive it has seen in 65 million years.
That’s where we get a pass, no one will judge, it will simply be what it is.
Okay that’s not totally true, there’s that little voice within our heads who will judge. But it’s proven to be a lousy judge, so don’t know if that helps any.
Don’t know what that’s referring to.
In its simplest form - monism - the philosophical view that all of reality comes from one single substance, principle, or ultimate reality. It sounds reasonable enough. But then the hair splitting begins, and my head starts to spin, and I back out the room.
Thanks for the dialogue!
Hmm. This strikes me as a bit paranoid. I mean there are religious types who like to choose their philosophy to suit their views and ignore science a bit, and maybe you’ve come across a whole squadron of them, and if so, you have my sympathy. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is what’s true and what isn’t, and claims, from sciency types and religious types alike should be judged on their merits, no? Chalmers comes from a pretty rational cognitive science background as far as I know.
Anyway, I think evolution is fab. But I don’t think consciousness evolved, I think it was there from the start.
If consciousness is a product of the living organisms interacting with their environment - wouldn’t it make sense that as organisms and environments get more complex, creature awareness must of necessity improve and adapt?
Absolutely, it would. But consciousness, as a concept, is binary, I suggest. I’m not the first person to notice this. It’s on/off, not a gradual thing. There are no borderline cases of it. That means it can’t have evolved, because evolution happens gradually. Even the quick bits happen in stages.
Thanks for your pushback @bert1
No it’s looking at the history of human thought.
I don’t care where he’s from, I care about what he writes and says and the unhealthy distraction it’s caused these past three decades.
I’d like you to find some scientific studies to support that. Also when I say consciousness, I think the consciousness continuum, while I suspect you are think “human level introspection” - biologically, evolutionarily that is simply the most extreme advance example of what nature could do, when all changing conditions worked out right.
Oh, and even our human level of consciousness, would be impossible without a myriad of “subconscious” layers of biological systems communicating with itself, in order to keep the homeostasis happy, while dealing with the physical world out there. (writing all that off, as simply autonomous and irrelevant, is blinding.)
Sorry, it is not enough to know that “evolution” happened, what matters is having an appreciate for what actually unfolded to make us possible.
Seems to me, nothing about humans makes sense without that realistic evolutionary biological foundation to build upon.
Guess that’s why I take it so seriously.
Science has to identify some subject-matter to study. And this preliminary stage is conceptual and definitional. We have to say ‘an orangutan is that orange thing in the tree’ before scientists can start studying orangutans. Otherwise they won’t know what to study. We start with the concept. Prima facie, consciousness does not admit of degree, just as, prima facie, an orangutan is the orange thing in the tree. I suggest that is the starting point. Upon further study, it may become intelligible how consciousness can admit of degree. Indeed, it appears to be intelligible to you already. Perhaps you could could point to a developmental stage (in perhaps an embryo or in evolution) to a creature or structure that is a borderline case of a conscious entity. I find it impossible to conceive of. Can you think of an example of a borderline case?
If you are saying that consciousness in humans depends on a whole load of things involved in being human, then I agree with you. But I think you are aiming at a more general conclusion than that.
We’re not talking about human beings, we’re talking about consciousness. Everyone agrees human beings evolved. What is in dispute is whether consciousness evolved.