Questioning causality

Since brain physics does not provide an exhaustive explanation of consciousness, one author suggests that consciousness may not, in fact, be a by-product or causal consequence of brain activity:

"Phenomenal consciousness has no satisfactory explanation in the strict natural scientific physicalist framework. This may be an indication of consciousness not being a causal outcome of neurophysics at all. If this is the case, there would be no grounds for postulating that the collapse of neurophysical structures at death would dissolve consciousness and its constituent elements. If consciousness does not disappear when neurophysical functions terminate, the near-death experience could be an indication of the continuation of consciousness after the collapse of brain functions. This would be in line with the proposal that higher spatio-temporal dimensionality is involved in the emergence and maintenance of phenomenal consciousness, even after death."

This quote by Pekka Reckhard (pictured ©Suonna Kononen) represents a dualist or idealist view in the philosophy of mind, challenging the prevailing materialist and physicalist understanding of consciousness.

Here is a concise breakdown of the text's key arguments and their logical progression:

What is The Hard Problem? The text begins with the observation that the natural-scientific, physicalist model fails to explain phenomenal consciousness—that is, internal, subjective experience or "what it is like" to experience something.

Considering life after death: If consciousness is not bound to the physical functioning of the brain, there is no logical basis to assume that the cessation of the brain's electrochemical activity (death) would extinguish consciousness.

What are near-death experiences (NDEs)? Viewed in this light, near-death experiences are seen as potential evidence that consciousness persists even after brain function collapses, rather than merely being hallucinations caused by cerebral oxygen deprivation.

"Phenomenal consciousness has no satisfactory explanation in the strict natural scientific physicalist framework. This may be an indication of consciousness not being a causal outcome of neurophysics at all. If this is the case, there would be no grounds for postulating that the collapse of neurophysical structures at death would dissolve consciousness and its constituent elements. If consciousness does not disappear when neurophysical functions terminate, the near-death experience could be an indication of the continuation of consciousness after the collapse of brain functions. This would be in line with the proposal that higher spatio-temporal dimensionality is involved in the emergence and maintenance of phenomenal consciousness, even after death."

The text refers to a hypothesis suggesting that phenomenal consciousness might be linked to higher space-time dimensions. This would explain how consciousness persists and functions independently of the three-dimensional material world we know, even after death.