Marcus Abundis’s Critique of philosophy’s Hard Problem of Consciousness.

This is an addendum item to supplement my previous essay, which asks why philosophers seem to have such a hard problem with accepting what scientific study of physical reality and evolution is teaching us about our selves. 

This is dedicated to students who are tired of philosophy’s “Hard Problem” of consciousness sucking all the air out of the room. Here I share the critique of a bona fides philosopher, Marcus Abundis, who does a fascinating job of critiquing a 1996 book by David Chalmers, “The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory.” 

Abundis’s critique isn’t perfect, but it is an excellent start worth digesting and building upon. I will follow this with a closer look at some of the critique his effort has received.

Why is it important? Because down to Earth physical sciences and evolutionary understanding, along with allowing the evidence to dictate our story, needs serious and vocal defending more than ever.

Thanks to the permission granted through his CC-BY copyright designation I’m able to share pretty much his entire paper for your perusal, without any commentary, except for your own engaged-mind's musing as you graze through his thoughts.

“Intelligence and the Hard Problem of Consciousness—With ‘Dual-Aspect Theory’ Notes” 

By Marcus Abundis, 

Fielding questions regarding the problem of appreciating physical reality. Part #2

It started with: “Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now.” Then I came to understand that essay was actually all about my own impression of philosophy’s Hard Problem. So in that regard it was a necessary chapter in this project, that I could build on with some hard work into understanding the Hard Problem as philosophers understand and discuss it. This is reflected in, “Addendum — A Philosopher Schools Citizenschallenge.” After a false start and more work I wrote, “Why the Hard Problem of Appreciating Physical Reality?” To which Robin Retallick offered some constructive pushback which I felt compelled to respond to and share, while hoping for a little more dialogue. As written up in; “Fielding questions regarding the problem of appreciating physical reality.” Retallick has offered some more interesting pushback. It has offered me another opportunity to try and clarify some of the finer details of what I’m trying to get to the table.

Press enter or click to view image in full size

Fielding questions regarding the problem of appreciating physical reality. #1

 Robin Retallick offered some thoughtful feedback to my, “Why the Hard Problem of Appreciating Physical Reality?” Since discussing this has been one of my goals I’m going to turn his comment into an article and welcome others to add their thoughts.

I informed Robin of my plan and he said, go for it. With a thanks to Robin here it is. I started by copying and pasting his words into a document. I left his words complete, simply inserting a lot of breaks for me to share my perspective between his pushback.

Robin Retallick: “I think this longer explanation makes our point of disagreement much clearer.

“I have no problem with your evolutionary story as an account of increasing biological complexity. Nor do I dispute the extraordinary correlations science continues to uncover between physical processes, brains, behavior and conscious experience.

“My problem is that your explanation begins by assuming the very architecture at issue.”

Why the Hard Problem of Appreciating Physical Reality?

An exercise in Evopoetry.

Reflections of a science enthusiast’s seven decade love affair with learning about Earth; what was going on around me; and how that connected with what was going on within me.

Philosophers ask: why does physical processing feel like anything at all? Joseph Levine called it the Explanatory Gap, and David Chalmers popularized it as the Hard Problem.

I, on the other hand, have spent decades wondering how any complex creature could possibly not have had a sense of “being.” Even if originally only a most flimsy feeling lacking all introspection.

Why do I care? Well, I guess because breeding and family circumstance have had me in love with, and engaged with this planet that created me. One could even say, I’ve been invested in the scientific adventure of discovery since before entering kindergarten in 1959. I caught the last gasp of the age-old wonder that once possessed mankind because I was introduced to the wonder of humanity’s ageless questions, while many of those mysteries still existed. Then early 1980s there was Attenborough’s: Life On Earth, insightful beyond description. So I consider myself a card-carrying enthusiastic, curious, critical-thinking spectator of my world through the scientific lens. I’ve undertaken this exercise in “Evopoetry” to see if I could convey a crystallization of that adventure.

My story started with appreciating Earth’s evolution, not as an intellectual construct, but as real physical happening that produced my ‘me’ and my world, one day at a time.

Thanks to that I’ve long possessed a visceral appreciation that I possess half a billion years worth of evolving generations under my bellybutton. This attitude has fed a conviction that my body knows more than I do, so I learned to pay attention to it. It paid off. It’s why I make a point of identifying as an Earth-centrist. Here’s my story.

It’s my perspective, based on my lived experience plus the scientific understanding I have gained from among the best and brightest minds Humanity has had to offer. That’s why I share many names and sources for the curious; check ’em out, you won’t be disappointed.

We start at the beginning, where there was a rigid consistency as primal hydrogen and helium was joined by gravity, evolved our Periodic Table of Elements via star formation and annihilation. These atoms were entities. This is based on observations that atoms send and receive information; impinge upon and accrete with other entities; possess unique properties according to their composition and arrangement.

Of course, it was all on a quantum, gravitational level. Choice didn’t exist; and awareness had nothing to do with it.

This is not “panpsychism” — nothing is imbued with anything — it simply is what it is. Energetic physical stuff in its own right, taking up a specific reference frame, interacting with others’ reference frames. Nothing more, nothing less.

A cosmos filled with entities constrained within their own particular physicality and cone of potential. Each oblivious to its being. Because there was no need for it and no means to it. Yet a something! With a unique frame of reference and a substance of its own.

Addendum — A Philosopher Schools Citizenschallenge

 A counterpoint to Cc’s, “Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now — A story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.”

Introduction: I’m not looking to convince anyone so much as to connect with science-respecting people who are tired of gratuitous philosophical mysterianism and trust in physical reality and Evolution as guides to understanding ourselves, along with our deepest questions.

Press enter or click to view image in full siz

(March 9, 2026) - Citizenschallenge wrote: Thank you Professor for your invitation and I’ll gladly take you up on your offer.

Eight years ago when the Human Mind ~ Physical Reality divide snapped into focus for me, like an old time 35mm slide, the experience and clarifying perspective inspired me to write: “The Missing Key to Stephen Gould’s “Nonoverlapping Magisteria” - so titled because a rereading of his essay triggered the coalescence of decades worth of musings

As for consciousness, that interest goes way back to my youth, I even tried wading through Nagel's essay in the mid-70s until the vertigo got to be too much for me and I tossed in the towel.

In any event, my "Human Mind ~ Physical Reality divide" insight (clarification) started me on a path of knocking on the doors of genuine philosophers via email, occasionally letters, also engaging with the local College Philosophy Department and their Philosophy Club, showing up, listening, sharing handouts, inviting dialogue. The experience has been akin to the sound of one hand clapping. But that wasn’t going to stop me from learning about this philosophical conundrum.

It took eight years of living, questioning, reading, thinking, writing to reach the level of resolution that enabled me to write “Chalmers’ Hard Problem and the Living Moment of Now”  that I finished this past April. A collection of fact-based scientific evidence and arguments doing its best to tell a significant story challenging the Descartes-Nagel-Chalmers paradigm with its Hard Problem of Consciousness and its assumed explanatory gap between body & brain, and sense of self & mind.

The D-N-C mindset can’t conceive of body-brain creating a sense of self and thought. For me, Evolutionary biology makes this intellectual-construct of a body-mind gap unnecessary — since, the moral of our cumulative scientific understanding is that creature experience and awareness of self were never separate to begin with.

Chalmers' "Hard Problem" and the Living Moment of Now

A story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.

A Thesis Challenging the Descartes-Nagel-Chalmers "Consciousness" Paradigm

Presented to the Fort Lewis College Philosophy Club in Durango

If you’ve plunged into the philosophical arena of human consciousness, I think we’d agree—if on nothing else—that the expert dialogue is a great big ball of confusion. After all, in a 2024 survey by Robert Kuhn, there are 325 competing philosophical and scientific theories of consciousness. That’s not theories closing in on understanding; that’s 325 opinions that don’t convince any peers.

At the head of this ball of confusion is the Descartes-Nagel-Chalmers paradigm, summed up in Chalmers’ Hard Problem of Consciousness: Why and how do physical processes in the brain (neural activity) give rise to subjective experience? What is it like to be something? How does matter become thought?

Writer Marvin Von Renchler excellently summarizes the flaw in the Hard Problem: “Rather than demonstrate a separation between physical processes and subjective experience, it is assumed.”

Biologically, everything we observe points to continuity: increasingly complex systems of memory, integration and self-referential processing emerging stepwise under selection pressures. There is no clear place for something non-physical to be introduced.

Von Renchler concludes that, “The ‘hard problem’ is less an unsolved mystery and more a framing issue, a mismatch between philosophical categories and how evolved systems actually work.”

There’s another objection I’ve yet to receive a serious response to: Why search for our mind wholly within our brain in the first place?

The Meaning of Jesus of Nazareth, Considered.

 Over at CFI Forum a thread was started under the title Jesus Mythicism is Reaching Mainstream regarding the historicity of Jesus. That is, was Jesus once an actual flesh and blood person? It reminded me of an article Tanner wrote Nov 15, 2025, There’s No Real Evidence for Jesus. Truth or Myth? I read it a couple weeks ago and it keeps coming back to mind. The two have rekindled my interest in trying to formulate and share a comprehensible Earth-centrist’s perspective on Jesus.

Why did Jesus become and remain the ultimate superstar for so many?

What to make of the evidence regarding Jesus of Nazareth’s physical reality–in relation to all the stories added onto his memory (long after his life was finished), that increasingly deify Jesus?

Press enter or click to view image in full size

Stained glass, Jesus on Mt. Tabor, at Tabor Church, Chicago. ©Beatriz Romero

To give the “moral of this story” substance, I need to start by sharing some background. Being an Earth-centrist I can’t relate to the obsession with theological writings & debates. It is all too much talk for talk, for me. That doesn’t mean I’m oblivious to Christianity and Jesus. Still, the last time I actually wrestled with Jesus’s meaning was as a teen and 20s. After that, Earth and her evolution took over my heart and soul, and there was no looking back for me.