Cleverest conversation I have yet heard

Don Hoffman says that consciousness is prior to matter, He undergoes a thorough and logical interrogation by someone who is not of his school of thought. The exchange is a model of how people should speak. Respectful, incisive, and utterly clear, these two go at it, shedding light not heat. What a treat to hear them! Hoffman never gets caught rejecting a proposition unnecessarily. He accepts that his thinking is compatible with several different outcomes, or schools of thought, but is frank about preferring one, and not others. Each person escapes arguing about stupid things and each rapidly exposes the nature and direction of his thought. They are a real pleasure to listen to.

The interlocutor suggests that, instead of there being two classes of being: matter and mind, which is the idea that constitutes dualism, consciousness might be more like a fundamental force of the universe, such as is each of gravity, electromagnetism, the strong force and the weak force. Consciousness might be, or not be, utterly fundamental. My inclination is to believe that consciousness is utterly fundamental. But my pleasure was in having to deal with someone who could make that sort of vital distinction, and force me to be more clever.