(For context, I wrote this in response to a friend just now introducing me to another friend of theirs, who specifically is working to develop their own philosophy regarding the field of ontology - my friend thought our two ideas should interact - below, you can see my initial response):

i guess a way i could start, is by explaining what panpsychism is

its a theory basically, that even socrates, plato, etc brought up in their time - essentially, it’s the theory that consciousness is an intrinsic property of existence, hence the name “pan” as in all, and “psyche” as in soul (the original greek meaning) - from this, my own lil added-on bits to the theory, i believe it makes the most sense given the very recursive nature of the universe (the microcosm is to the macrocosm as the macrocosm is to the microcosm, everything is a reflection of itself), that consciousness builds on itself based on its orientation relative to one another, aka energy itself and how its arranged, energy = “soul” = “spirit” basically

experiments such as the split-brain experiment hint at this as well, where they would cut a patient’s brain down the center to reduce seizures, but both sides couldnt directly communicate with one another but would still try to help the other side of the brain through various means - basically, acting as if 2 separate brains entirely, yet 1 collective brain all the same

i think as well that we are all one thing, and that biological life is merely a subset of “life” aka anything that changes, for life IS change and everything is changing all the time, even empty space itself on the quantum level, always fluctuating - thus, i say everything is alive as well, simply BECAUSE it changes (and IS change itself), even if the base unit of consciousness that builds on itself is null (even in computer theory, different arrangements of the empty set can form different cardinalities to count all the way to infinity, all the natural numbers - although silly to say this manifests anything real beyond the abstract, its something i use as an analogy at the least as to how i guesstimate it may work), or even if panpsychism isnt true, even poetically speaking, i think of everything as “alive” as we are, and that us deeming the rest as “non-living” is merely cosmic narcissism due to ego / ignorance

we specifically are merely a form of change that is aware of itself in a unique (“human”) way, yet we are of course still our individual slices at the same time (some more duality of the universe right there too lol) - but yeah, i wanna make it clear as well i dont think of panpsychism as a religion, more so a theory, as im not trying to tell the universe how it is, but rather, i am immensely curious and passionate in trying to let the universe “tell” me how it is

currently panpsychism is the theory that makes the most sense to me thus far when it comes to consciousness, and over the past couple years of me thinking on it, i still havent found anything better, so as it stands its my best current guess given all i know as an indiviaul :3

oh and as a fun little P.S., if panpsychism IS true, then given the other nature of the universe we can seem to know better than anything (other than that we know nothing and everything is a guess and hence we gotta try to give it our best guess lol), that “change is the only constant,” this logically implies that reincarnation is inevitable for all things. everything is a shapeshifter, basically - aka, different forms of the same core thing, aka the flow of change - some may call it dao, some may call it energy, some may call it “God,” theyre all metaphors for the same ineffable and craziness that change, changes, for no reason and yet from it comes every reason ever, too - “meaning only comes after things start happening” basically

this also indicates both birth and death are a lie as well - it’s merely a change of states or awareness, but not a change of existence - we were already “dead” before our birth… yet, we changed, into the form that was aware of its own change, indicating we likely were (and still are) just the very energy itself that formed our bodies, just flowing through the universe each on their own paths before our birth, for example, the food our mothers had to eat while we were in her womb lol, if it came to form our neurons themselves, then one could say those are bits of our “soul,” but really, the ego is a lie too, and it’s all one collective “soul.” a story of stories, change for change

and when you die, you simply go to “sleep,” unable to now sense the passage of time without your forms of input/output (limbs, eyes, brain structure, etc.), thus infinity in an instant - itd be like going to sleep, waking up the next second, not remembering the dream just like we do in real life, its a time skip - youd just snap into the next instance of awareness, it would seem

“samsara,” into “nirvana,” back into “samsara”

however u wish to word it :3