Also consciousness is a limiter in that it uses conceptual structures to interpret information content of our perceptions.
This.
Our minds are constrained by all kinds of limitations.
- Our eyes can only pick up a very limited part of the spectrum, and only in a small area straight ahead. Our peripheral vision isn't even in color (Grab some pens with different colored caps and ask someone to hold one up in your peripheral vision, then say what color it is), and our eyes are bouncing around like crazy, requiring image-stabilization to even look coherent.
- Our ears too have a very limited range. No subsonic or ultrasonic sounds here thank you very much.
- Touch: Ask someone to poke you on your thigh with one or two pencils with you not looking. You won't be able to tell the difference. Temperature range is also very limited.
- Smell and taste. Not too shabby, but can't compete with say, a dog or a shark.
- Language is woefully inefficient. Can't remember the exact bandwidth, but it's pretty bad, and different languages give different conceptual frameworks, so in many cases they're not even compatible.
And not to mention all the senses we don't even have. We can't orient ourselves to the earth's magnetic field for instance (At least not consciously. Could be why some people have a great sense of direction I guess), and there's a whole host of senses out there that we don't have.
Then there's the universe itself, 96% of which we don't even know
what is, and the fact that pretty much every inch of it will kill us instantly and unpleasantly.
And timescales: The universe is almost 14 billion years old. We have been around for about 200K years. We're not even the blink of an eye.
Yup, we're
special.
Oh, and a quick dig at those waiting for a spiritual transformation of humanity: sounds very...
transhumanist (OOGA-BOOGA!).
"I only read American. I want my fantasy pure." - Dave