Mind’s spread into nature implies weak, not strong, panpsychism

Evidence

Although the failure of discontinuity is usually presented as implying strong panpsychism (the thesis that consciousness is fully present everywhere and present especially in nature), this would only follow if we make the on-off assumption about mind associated with human hyperseparation: mind is either totally present in a human or humanoid form or completely absent. Once mindfulness is conceived in more diverse, continuous and graduated ways, the failure of discontinuity leads only to the much more plausible thesis of weak panpsychism, the view that mindlike qualities are to be found in nature, that there is no basis for an absolute break or an unbridgeable gulf marking humans as mindhavers off from the rest of the universe. — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 495

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces and distinguishes ‘weak panpsychism’ — the middle-position Plumwood defends as the non-dualistic, graduated alternative to both dualism and strong panpsychism.
• XREF: This on-off reasoning about mind mirrors the earlier logic (ch9) on masters treating dominated classes as either fully human or subhuman — good cross-reference for the Eco-Justice settler-colonial thread. — connects to: Resolving nature dualism needs reconceiving humans as more natural and nature as more mindlike — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 465; Choosing consciousness as mind’s mark guarantees a human-superiority result — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 488; Intentionality gives nature continuity with mind without collapsing difference — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 500
• SEED: Essay angle: ‘the on-off assumption’ — how a false binary in philosophy of mind (either full consciousness or none) is what forces the choice between dualism and strong panpsychism.

Broader Connections

• Intentionality gives nature continuity with mind without collapsing difference #corroborates (0.85) — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 500