Wednesday, January 29, 2020

Neil Peart (of Rush): A Memoriam

Rush's drummer and lyricist Neil Peart passed away on January 7th, 2020 at the age of 67. He was widely considered to be one of the best rock drummers in the world. I found this New Yorker tribute and this one by Rolling Stone to be among the best.
Other noteworthy tributes include Bret Stephens (New York Times) and Nick Raskulinecz (at Ultimate Guitar). Rushisaband has a comprehensive list.

Rush's Power Windows album brought me out of a depression (in 1985/1986). It was also instrumental in helping navigate the treacherous passage that every (non-Western) immigrant has to take. Marathon and Territories were really helpful. Neil Peart's lyrics could be "on the nose" at times but those two songs in particular, spoke to me. Here's a lyric snippet from The Garden (Clockwork Angels):
The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect

So hard to earn, so easily burned
In the fullness of time

A garden to nurture and protect
While Tom Sawyer, YYZ, Fly by Night, Working Man, 2112 and Spirit of Radio are well known Rush songs, I thought quite a bit about Rush's best tracks [and the criteria included composition, emotion, vocals (ouch) AND playing]. Came up with this list.


Honorable mentions:


And their best cover:

Heart Full Of Soul (the old Yardbirds song)

Update (2020/02/06): Liz Swan (an academic philosopher at the University of Colorado, Boulder) has a great article on Neil Peart in Psychology Today. She especially focuses on Rush's Hemispheres album and in particular, dwells on the importance of "uniting heart and mind in a single perfect sphere." I'd add that the lyrics on Hold Your Fire (a under-appreciated Rush album, at least lyrically) also emphasize the inner world while elaborating on the themes of Hemispheres in a non-mythological way.

But it's Liz Swan's take on consciousness that caught my eye (and what are the odds that a person would be into Rush AND consciousness). She writes "There is a misguided question in contemporary philosophy called “the hard problem” which was conceived in a philosophical vacuum..." and goes on to say "My own personal answer to this question is that we wouldn’t have the privilege of being alive in the 21st century to ask these questions if we hadn’t in fact been in touch with our world qualitatively the whole time." Since I've thought about the hard problem of consciousness since 1996, a response is absolutely required. It's not the case as Liz Swan says that access to our own phenomenology (via being "in touch with our world qualitatively") renders the hard problem moot. The issue is: what is the relationship between phenomenology and physicalism - the most successful modern doctrine of the world and its dynamics. Of course, we have access to experience. But, how do we accommodate experience within the "natural order." That's the hard problem. I (and many others have suggested) that this implies that our understanding of physicalism and what it entails is cracked. But, cracked how? There's no consensus at present. Whether you're a dual aspect theorist, neutral monist, panpsychist, emergentist, cosmo-psychist or cosmo-holist (my view), you have to concede that there's no consensus on that which is absolutely central to existence - experience.

4 comments:

  1. I think here, "It's not the case as Liz Swan says that access to our own phenomenology (via being "in touch with our world qualitatively") renders the hard problem moot. The issue is: what is the relationship between phenomenology and physicalism" you switch from a first-person perspective to a third-person perspective, meaning, you switch from experience to intellectualizing experience (which Heidegger warns against in Being and Time).

    So, this question, "how do we accommodate experience within the "natural order"? is what I feel is misguided. Don't try to accommodate it, just accept it.

    "Whether you're a dual aspect theorist, neutral monist, panpsychist, emergentist, cosmo-psychist or cosmo-holist" humans experience the world qualitatively because we're animals and it's how animals survive and thrive in their worlds.



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  2. It's not clear what is meant by "just accept it" in the case of phenomenology. Later the comment goes on to say "because we're animals and it's how animals survive and thrive in their worlds". This suggests a biological naturalism combined with a "Don't Ask" policy. Further, note that Heidegger's maxim goes nowhere as well. And in the east where phenomenology has been studied for far longer than in the west, you end up with enlightenment and mysticism traditions which are fine but don't ultimately help in scientific pursuit. In any case, biological naturalism goes nowhere since it tries to elide the distinction between life and consciousness which doesn't work.

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  3. I'm not sure I follow your reasoning here. (this is Liz Swan, by the way) and I don't know much about Phenomenology. The just accept part is this: whereas scientists look at the world and infer theories of how it works from their observations, philosophers often build theories of how the world is and then try to force their observations into those theories. So why can't philosophers square physicalism with qualitative experience? Because their theory is limited; a theory of a physical universe has to allow for qualitative experience because it's self-evident. We are beings that think and feel. So are our pets. So are tiny little less complex organisms, in their own little ways. Scientists got it right at least in making observations (we experience the world, unlike robots) and thus let's build theories that accommodate that fact.... philosophers build theories and then puzzle over why the world doesn't fit into their neat, little, limited theories.

    I hope that makes my point of view a bit clearer? David Hume said, "be a philosopher, but amidst all your philosophy, be still a man." Organisms are in fact in touch with their living environments qualitatively, so let's start there.

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  4. This is absolutely fine BTW since your basic assertion is that consciousness is a natural part of the world. The question is how? What's the relationship between biological processes and our inner experience? Is it a function of our embodiment? In that case, what is embodiment? Why is embodiment accompanied by sensations, feelings etc. The scientist seems to be saying "Just accept it and keep working", whereas the philosopher is at least asking how these two are related.

    Phenomenology is just the study of interiors (sensations, perceptions, emotions, etc.) pioneered in the west by Husserl, Merleau-Ponty and William James but it's also been a staple of the east (Buddhism, Vedanta) for a very long time. (Don't know if you've read Evan Thompson's Mind in Life but I think you'll like it.)

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