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53: The Case Against Reality | Don Hoffman (classic + updated)

The After On Podcast

CHAPTER

The Dualist Argument for Consciousness

Consciousness cannot do anything for real. It can only appear to do things, but it can't actually have effects in the physical world. If you're trying to explain why natural selection favored organisms that had conscious experiences, if those conscious experiences do nothing, then they cannot affect your fitness. So if consciousness has no causal powers, it cannot evolve by natural selection. And there cannot be an evolutionary theory of it.

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