Value and Purpose

with Dr. Iain McGilchrist

In a previous lecture for the Pari Center, Iain McGilchrist argued for the nature of consciousness as a foundational element in the cosmos, not derivative from anything else. In this presentation he will not attempt to repeat that argument, but start from where he left off.  In his new book, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World (Perspectiva Press, November 2021), McGilchrist asks how we come to know anything at all, and move on to consider what we can say about the irreducible ‘building blocks’ of reality: time, space, matter, of course—but also (and perhaps for some people surprisingly) consciousness, values, purpose and the sense of the sacred. Value and purpose are implied by the very nature of consciousness itself; constitutive of reality, not ‘invented’ (though obviously particular values and particular purposes may be). Although science is popularly thought to contradict such a view it does not, rightly understood, do so at all; indeed reason and evidence strongly supports such a conclusion. McGilchrist holds that our failure to understand this lies at the heart of our current global predicament.