So, we have the teaser, where's the entree?

Somewhen, I have heard of Godfrey-Smith. The word, Metazoa means little to me. Just as did metadata, when first I heard it. Metazoa sounds metaphysical. Metadata, if I understand it rightly, means lots of data. So, does Metazoa actually mean lots of life forms? It might seem so. The book could be a good one. I may even read it....then, I would at least have a crack at understanding his position(s)/reasoning(s).
My ensuing remarks will likely be too simplistic; too pedestrian for PT's readership. I don't mind. I was out of circulation, just like a lot of others since March of 2020. However, that said, 1. I am a strong proponent of the notion of evolution. There are many of us, since Mr. Darwin. I have never had the privilege of visiting the Galapagos Islands. But, I have seen pictures; heard stories. It appears, with isolation, time has largely stood still there. 2. Mind is a quality of higher-end primates, i.e., humans and their precursive, hominid ancestors. There may be other thinking creatures. Somewhere. Those could even be Metazoans, or for all we know, protozoans.. We just don't know.... 3. It is concievable, I suppose, that in some other somewhere or somewhen, the 'zoans might even be artificial life forms of some sort. I mean, look at what we are doing with artificial intelligence!!! 4. There are other notable points of isolation on this little blue planet. Madagascar comes to mind. And, there are some pretty anomalous things living in Australia. Godfrey-Smith has doubtless visited some of those places himself.
Mr. Godfrey-Smith sounds like someone PT will have back. Maybe. The scroll of repetition seems a good formula for the shows. I further suppose it may depend on what he does; how he thinks; what he writes in the next two to six years?
I do not know if the Metazoan notion will endure. But, it is no worse than Searle's ideas about direction of fit, or Dewey's pronouncement regarding beliefs. Or even Donald Davidson's propositional attitudes Flavors change. Positions come and go. Giants live on. Dodos are extinct. Or, are they?....

Been hearing lots of ideas about mind, matter and such in the past few months. Several thinkers have dangled their toes (and reputations) into the abyss of consciousness. Reading Goff's latest right now. He writes of materialism, dualism and panpsychism, opting for the last as his position of choice---for the moment. Cristoph Koch seems the most avant-garde in his outlook. He asks:: IS Consciousness Everywhere? Being old school, I have to say, no, it is not, IMO. Seems many either wanted to explain consciousness or explain it away---the old joke regarding Dennett's book, some years ago.
Now, we have folks attributing this illusive property of mind to electricity,water, microbial life and a host of other more-or-less animate and inanimate materials. I cannot see it. This quasi-new age phenomenon obscures the unique nature of something which emerged from evolving life: awareness, the sense of self, and so on. The ideas about non-living things accruing ability to think are ludicrous on their face, seems to me. I doubt I am among a minority who think so. If, as some at least imply, consciousness just does not matter, maybe we ought to just leave it alone, rather than trying to rewrite reality. Hopefully, we will not give up on the adventure. To me, it seems too important. Far too much time and effort have been invested. Einstein never gave up on relativity. We should not wimp out on this one either. Maybe it is not what we think it is. That could matter much more.

Sure, consciousness is everywhere. That does not mean it is IN everything.

Another slant on thinking: when Descartes posited his 'i think, therefore, i am'. he clearly had something in mind.. There are two readings of his intention in this statement. Whether one reads it one way or the other sorta depends on how conscious one believes he was, compared with his contemporaries. Some years ago, Julian Jaynes wrote about bicameral minds, and how consciousness originated when the bicameral mind 'broke down'. I don't recall him saying when that breakdown began. Or ended. Everything I have seen and experienced in a longish life indicates to me that we are still , frequently, unable to make up our minds. This was his point in calling indecisiveness bicameral. Some have suggested that schitzophrenia is an outgrowth of bicameralism..I don't know if that is right, or is just some theorem derived from deduction. I would speculate ( without irrefutable proof) that schitzophrenia has been with us from the beginnings of human consciousness, whenever those were.

Whatever we think of Jaynes and his ideas, we should understand, I think, that human consciousness is a gift, as Edelman put it: wider than the sky. Incomparable to any other quantitative or qualitative attribute we can think of. So, to the new benefactors of, contributors to the notions of panpsychism,I say be careful what you wish for. fYI, if you do not know, Jaynes still has a fiercely loyal following. Nothing wrong with that.

Amen to your statement on truth. Agree. Wholeheartedly. As well as with your hope concerning consciousness. I guess I' ll have to add the Metazoa book to my list. My semi-retired neuroscience prof friend in Ecuador warned me of Australians, citing their criminal lineages. I think he was being facetious. But,, i just don't know.
Best,
HGN.

Metazoa, by Godfrey-Smith: outstanding book. Keen insights.

Loved the book. For where it went. 99% ? No. His approach is certainly thoughtful. I don't know how it is I find it incredible. Jaynes' notions about bicameral ( divided) mind were difficult enough. I suppose that if we are to believe, much/most of his claims/assertions, we must accept classical ideas about evolution, natural selection, etc. What I am doubting, doubted before, when reading his book, was the idea of divided mind, and that we were somehow freed when it 'broke down'. We have divided mind, seems to me. It is an occupational hazard. Godfrey-Smith's first love is oceanography. Matters of consciousness are secondary. His priority is clear to me. Anything else is gravy. Well, good or bad, that's how I see it.

All, duly noted. I see your concerns, as mentioned in the above comments from july 24, 2021. I have not been an avid follower of Sam Harris, but something he either said (or echoed) struck me as cogent...your mind is all you've got. There has been discussion here and elsewhere on the notion of self or selfness. Some have argued self is an illusion. But I wonder if that is right. Insofar as most of us have a mind, it seems to me we(mostly) have a sense of self. It might even be claimed that self is a manifestation of that outside sense that is intuited but illusive...the same as, or emergent from consciousness. I'm not going that far---it seems too easy, far too, uh, obvious? What it does feel like is this: self and mind are properties of our being. Heidegger's dasein or something like that.
The stuff, constituting our brain and its' functions, is something like the machinery, or, platform for this mind/self program....well, I am just daydreaming here. But, it does appear that, on a different level, Godfrey-Smith's cephalopods think. Whether their minds afford a sense of self is, as they say, another story. Welcome to 2022. May we all be able to see more clearly.

Sounds like what's wanted is a consciousness-model which can apply across diverse species. Understanding a scientific model as a kind of fiction which is systematic and discussed as informative for non-fictional objects which are to be explained, in an article from 2008* Godfrey-Smith distinguishes between three types of applications of such models to objects: mathematical, metaphysical, and deflationary (or what might be called "replacing"). The first consists of abstract objects, the second of uninstantiated universals (as e.g. Plato's Ideas), and the third embodies the models which are independent objects and come to be governed by their own rules instead of those of the entities to be explained, (hence Godfrey-Smith's term "deflationary"), referring to the decrease in informative value. Computer-modeling can be seen to be of this latter variety. When talking about application of models of consciousness to different zoological species it is the second kind, the metaphysical, which appears to my mind as the most appropriate. This is because all that one can confirm by experience of the phenomenon of consciousness is what concerns one's own, the cause of which remains hypothetical. For this reason any invariant cause could not be instantiated by its occurrence in another creature, since it could only be confirmed by its experience, not by the researcher's. In this way Harold's "thinking cephalopods" could be shown to exist without having to specify all the details of the model of its cause. Is that at least somewhat plausible?
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*Peter Godfrey-Smith, "Models and Fictions in Science", Philosophical Studies 143 (2009): pp. 101-116.

Abstract objects make up the first, run 3 universals the second, and the models themselves, the third, are autonomous objects.