Ezra Klein

You can't automate things.

And in this case, he's talking about the fact that you might have two competing needs.

Let's say you're hungry and you're tired and you have to decide which to privilege.

And that takes decision-making.

And what consciousness does is open up this space to resolve uncertainty.

So if everything was predictable in the world and you could be certain when this happens, that happens, you know, and you had a kind of neat algorithm to deal with contingencies,

You don't need it.

But a lot of life presents us with uncertainty.

And that's when consciousness arises.

Yeah, I think that's right.

I haven't really thought about that that much.

One of my takeaways is that we have to be kind of pluralists of consciousness, that there are many different kinds and that psychedelic consciousness should be counted as one of them or the mystical forms of consciousness that James talks about.

And then there's everyday consciousness and spotlight consciousness.

And that, so I think we all have a toolkit to some extent.

And we experience, I mean, the kind of consciousness you experience as a meditator is very different than the kind you do at work, right?

Or when writing.

I mean, writing is a great example.

That's a very peculiar form of consciousness.

Yeah.

I think that's my biggest discovery as someone who lives in his head most of the time, how important having a body is to being conscious.