• Consciousness is characterized by the capacity to suffer and is the source of political authority in modern societies
• The capacity to suffer is the determining factor of an entity‘s ethical and political standing
• Questions of consciousness have an impact on ethical and political debates, from race and gender to ecology and taxation
• Victimless crimes are now judged based on the potential to cause suffering to sentient beings, as opposed to being judged by divine commandment
• Theories of consciousness should be able to help us measure and scale suffering in order to be considered legitimate
• Debate is still raging about animal welfare and whether animals have the same kind of consciousness as humans
• Scholars must be careful when making claims about the ability to measure and scale consciousness as it could have explosive ethical and political implications
• If a strong Theory Of Consciousness is developed, it could lead to hierarchy of Consciousness between humans and other animals
• As artificial intelligence progresses, it is important to remember the difference between intelligence and consciousness and not privilege intelligent computers over conscious humans.
Published December 7, 2022
Visit YouTube to watch Yuval Noah Harari’s original lecture The Politics of Consciousness | video lecture with Yuval Noah Harari