(January 6, 2012 at 4:17 pm)Shell B Wrote: Well, the problem perhaps is that he is misunderstanding what a universal constant is. The definition of universal constant is not "exists outside of science's observation of it."
Hm, I see what you mean, but let's try to look at it from another perspective. We've established that it is real because it exists. Things that exist, as you said earlier, are not dependent on our conscious perception of them, they simply exist. Now, the statement that consciousness is a universal constant is false in the sense that science has not labeled it as such. Science is dependent on human knowledge, thus it is limited. But, that is not to say science can not grow and eventually determine consciousness as a universal constant. For example, what happened before gravity? We saw things happen and we couldn't explain them, but science eventually matured and now we have gravity as a universal constant. I could see the same thing happening for consciousness. But perhaps I'm wrong, as is usually the case.
Brevity is the soul of wit.
