very interesting JL, will have to watch that after market hours. I have been thinking about all this. On one side we have the materialists who say there is nothing outside the material universe and if you roll the dice enough times then a universe will appear out of nothing out of which will eventually appear consciousness. The religious folks will tell you that in the beginning was the word. The word was with God and the word was God and through it all things were made.
I heard someone a while ago put all of this very succinctly into modern terms free of all scientific and religious jargon. He asked "Did consciousness arise from the universe or did the universe arise from consciousness??" I thought that statement communicated the whole argument so incredibly elegantly. We know now (ironically through science) that time is not what we once thought it was so just because consciousness came after the Universe in the chronological sense as we perceive it may not necessarily mean anything.
As to the question of whether consciousness can effect the material world I think you will find that regardless of the underlying truth (whatever that may be) that science at this point in history will be doing their dangdest to discredit that idea. Not for scientific but rather political reasons. The current party line is that this is a material universe with nothing external to it and no correspondence will be entered into and those who deviate from the path shall be mocked and scorned and severely disfellowshipped from the science community. Because if consciousness has an actual real effect on the material world what you would have then is paramount to a mini big bang (a little bang perhaps). A physical phenomena that originated from consciousness.....and of course, as we know, this would never do.
