Consciousness as Natural Selection

Experience - conscious experience, if you will - is as much a matter of ruling things out as it is of ruling things in. To experience everything as infinite, in William Blake’s memorable turn-of-phrase, is to experience nothing, strictly speaking. Consciousness is sharpened precisely to the degree that it is focused, and it is focused by exclusion, by selecting among potential factors.

Consciousness is selection. Indeed, I am tempted to say, ‘natural selection’. Is there, after all, any other kind?