Bernardo Kastrup (born 21 October 1974) is a Dutch philosopher and computer scientist best known for his work in the field of consciousness studies, particularly his development of analytic idealism, a form of metaphysical idealism grounded in the analytic philosophical tradition. He has written several books and papers arguing against physicalism and proposing that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality. Kastrup is the executive director of Essentia Foundation, which curates and publishes "the latest analytic and scientific indications that metaphysical materialism is fundamentally flawed".[1]
Early life and education
Bernardo Kastrup was born in Niterói,[2] in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and later moved to Switzerland, but currently lives in the Netherlands.[citation needed]
He graduated in electronic engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in 1997.[2] He received his Ph.D. in computer engineering with the thesis Automatic synthesis of reconfigurable instruction set accelerators from the Eindhoven University of Technology, where his research focused on reconfigurable computing and artificial intelligence.
He earned his second Ph.D., in philosophy, from Radboud University Nijmegen, with his research focused on philosophy of mind and ontology. His doctoral dissertation was Analytic Idealism: A consciousness-only ontology,[3] which articulated the metaphysical position he would continue to develop and for which he would become most widely known.[citation needed]
Since the publication of his dissertation, Kastrup has continued to advance and popularize his theory.[4][5] He has written for numerous publications, including Scientific American,[6] where his articles critique physicalist interpretations of consciousness and offer an idealist alternative.[7] Kastrup is also an author, with several books that explore consciousness and reality from the perspective of analytic idealism. These include Why Materialism is Baloney, The Idea of the World, and Decoding Jung’s Metaphysics.
Philosophical work
Kastrup is best known for the development of analytic idealism, a metaphysical and ontological framework that posits phenomenal consciousness is the fundamental "reduction base" of reality as a whole, and that individual minds are dissociations of the monist universal mind.[8][9][10]
^Goff, Philip (8 July 2020). "Response to Bernardo Kastrup". Conscience and Consciousness. Archived from the original on 14 September 2024. Retrieved 14 September 2024.
.jpg)
