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 DividedQuantum
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 The illusory nature of reality 
#24009369 - 01/14/17 10:07 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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"All mass is interaction." --Richard P. Feynman
If the proton nucleus of a hydrogen atom were the size of a golf ball, the "orbiting" electron would be almost a mile away. Why do we not observe the world as empty space? Because of the nature of interaction. The web of relationships in which we are involved determine our perceived reality.
The Sanskrit word maya, found in Hinduism and Buddhism, seems to refer to this basic "emptiness." The word has multiple meanings in practice, but the most common definitions are as "illusion" or "magic." It is interesting that in the twentieth century, we in the West discovered through physics a basic truth that had been recognized in parts of Asia for thousands of years.
As Feynman tells us, all mass is interaction. How do you approach such a viewpoint? What does maya mean to you?
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redgreenvines
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Maya is mental. the buddhist term voidness, and illusoryness refer to cognitive process, not to physics.
I think it is charming but inefficient to spend too much time extrapolating the wisdom of the ancients into vaguely metaphorical scientific analogs.
On the other hand, if something inspires new insights into physics or some other branch of knowledge, that is great, but inspiration itself is not a physical force, nor is it a material thing. The inspiration of some idea is not equal to the idea.
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DividedQuantum
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It has always seemed to me that they are isomorphic. Do you think two different processes govern two different illusions in the bedrock of reality? It seems to me they are one.
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redgreenvines
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any perception is already an illusion in so far as it takes the sensations and ascribes relatedness to it from memory.
the act of ascription adds or changes reality by interpreting it.
when you say isomorphic, are you declaring a magical truth?
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laughingdog
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1) our senses are each limited to a certain small range
2) we are missing certain senses ( sonar, magnetism, etc.)
3) then we combine and interpret the results (the raw sense data) in the brain to form an inaccurate/approximate model of the world
4) then we overlay the model with our biases and conditionings
All this without considering particle physics, astronomical time scales and distances, our ignorance as regards death, the unconscious mind, the nature of the self, mind, the dream state, & consciousness.
And finally we ignore our ignorance, and are generally rather emotionally reactive as regards relatively unimportant things much of the time, which results in much unnecessary suffering.
Hence the terms maya and samsara would seem appropriate in describing the human condition.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: redgreenvines]  1
#24009703 - 01/14/17 12:28 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said:
any perception is already an illusion in so far as it takes the sensations and ascribes relatedness to it from memory.
the act of ascription adds or changes reality by interpreting it.
when you say isomorphic, are you declaring a magical truth?
I don't disagree with you, and no, nothing magical. I am of the opinion that on some level, the outward, objective aspect of reality has a direct subjective correlate. And that is what I was suggesting. I don't think you're wrong at all, though. Perhaps it just serves to illustrate how deep and multifaceted the illusion really is.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: laughingdog] 1
#24009711 - 01/14/17 12:31 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
laughingdog said:
1) our senses are each limited to a certain small range
2) we are missing certain senses ( sonar, magnetism, etc.)
3) then we combine and interpret the results (the raw sense data) in the brain to form an inaccurate/approximate model of the world
4) then we overlay the model with our biases and conditionings
All this without considering particle physics, astronomical time scales and distances, our ignorance as regards death, the unconscious mind, the nature of the self, mind, the dream state, & consciousness.
And finally we ignore our ignorance, and are generally rather emotionally reactive as regards relatively unimportant things much of the time, which results in much unnecessary suffering.
Hence the terms maya and samsara would seem appropriate in describing the human condition.
Yes, I quite agree, and well said. I think your comments serve to illustrate how, as I have written just above, fundamental and complex the illusion really is.
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DieCommie
Registered: 12/11/03
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Maybe a better title would be "The illusory nature of perception". Since we all seem to agree that fundamentally reality is unknowable. The illusion is a self deception that perspective is reality. Its not, even if it is the best we got.
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Rahz
Alive Again
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It's primary use to my mind is to suggest the senses alone are insufficient to perceive the nature of something. To provide contrast it must be determined what maya is not, and that is what I refer to as tendency, or potential, the conditions and qualities of the universe which give rise to material/spiritual phenomena and not the phenomena itself.
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rahz
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"Human beings are born with different capacities. If they are free, they are not equal. And if they are equal, they are not free."
~Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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redgreenvines
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: Rahz]
#24009890 - 01/14/17 02:05 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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we can perceive facets of a thing's nature, but we do not perceive the totality of it.
and what we perceive is always trailing a little behind.
this is the nature of perception.
maya is more about extrapolating from inadequate views into a complete mess of wrongness. Kind of like Trump.
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laughingdog
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: laughingdog]
#24009912 - 01/14/17 02:23 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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and in some more detail:
1) our senses are each limited to a certain small range
both in terms of:
distance, or effective range, before fadeout
and
range of perceivable frequencies
as well as
subject to the doppler effect
and
all sorts of interferences
Many animals have certain senses that are , ‘better’ than the similar senses in humans. And even humans vary greatly, for example some have photographic memory and others perfect pitch.
2) we are missing many senses ( sonar, magnetism, radio waves, polarity of light, some animals sense earthquakes before they happen, etc.)
The senses are not evolved to cognize reality accurately. They are only to enable a specific organism in a specific habitat, to survive, eat, and reproduce in that habit, as it exists at specific geologic time, on a specific planet.
When we look at the senses of various animals this is obvious. We perhaps don't usually stop to think that we are included in this fact.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: laughingdog]
#24009942 - 01/14/17 02:40 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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I suppose one way to say it is that human perception, and our picture of the world, is essentially a virtual reality program we carry around with is in our heads. And as you point out, it does not, for one example, contain the alternate universe that exists around a dog's sense of smell, to which no human probably can relate. Of course, examples are legion.
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laughingdog
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yes
part of this talk deals with this
been awhile since I watched it
QUOTE: "Dan Simons explores why we see the world as it ISN'T.
Daniel Simons is head of the Visual Cognition Laboratory at the University of Illinois. His research explores the ways in which our beliefs and intuitions about the workings of our own minds are often mistaken and why that matters. He is best known for his experiments revealing striking failures of perception and the limits of visual awareness. His research is exhibited in science museums worldwide and his writing has been published in many newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The Chicago Tribune. He recently co-authored the book, "The Invisible Gorilla, and Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us" (Crown, 2010)."
also
first part of this talk deals with this
later I think he goes off the deep end...
been awhile since I watched it
QUOTE: "Despite substantial efforts by many researchers, we still have no scientific theory of how brain activity can create, or be, conscious experience. This is troubling, since we have a large body of correlations between brain activity and consciousness, correlations normally assumed to entail that brain activity creates conscious experience. Here I explore a solution to the mind-body problem that starts with the converse assumption: these correlations arise because consciousness creates brain activity, and indeed creates all objects and properties of the physical world. To this end, I develop two theses. The interface theory of perception states that perceptual experiences do not match or approximate properties of the objective world, but instead provide a simplified, species-specific, user interface to that world. Conscious realism states that the objective world consists of conscious agents and their experiences; these can be mathematically modeled and empirically explored in the normal scientific manner." ... etc
possibly also
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Stanislas+Dehaene
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DividedQuantum
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: laughingdog]
#24010775 - 01/14/17 08:29 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Interesting videos. The first video is cool. I love those sidewalk pieces by that guy, I don't remember his name, but that's a unique talent. What I found most interesting, and many of us know it but forget, is the truth that we see only a fraction of a degree of the sphere of world around us. He pointed out that if you look at your thumb at arm's length, that's about the extent of the area of detail we see. If there's something in our peripheral vision, we turn to put our small sight-beam on it. Quite a perspective.
In the second video, and I'm not sure you were aware of it, but interestingly, in this gentleman's math of conscious agents, physical particles (represented by Schrödinger's equation) are identical in their math to asymptotic behaviors of the dynamics of conscious agents. Meaning, the math he has developed to describe the dynamics he has discovered when he models conscious agents is identical to the math for quantum particles as given by the appropriate solution to the Schrödinger equation (a.k.a. the wave function). This actually dovetails rather perfectly with my thoughts in the original post. He further suggested that consciousness is the only thing that science has ever observed, with which I agree.
Fun stuff.
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 akira_akuma
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even our psychology is illusory.
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beforethedawn
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: akira_akuma]
#24011131 - 01/15/17 12:17 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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If it's an illusion then it's supposed to be here.
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Can't you see you're fucking blind?
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akira_akuma
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: beforethedawn] 1
#24011214 - 01/15/17 01:27 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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if it wasn't here, we'd be insane.
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zzripz
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defining 'illusory':
Quote:
illusory (adj.) Look up illusory at Dictionary.com
1590s, from French illusorie, from Late Latin illusorius "ironical, of a mocking character," from illus-, past participle stem of Latin illudere "mock, jeer at, make fun of," literally "play with," from assimilated form of in- "at, upon" (see in- (2)) + ludere "to play" (see ludicrous).
Hmmm so in this definition it is meaning that reality is mocking us? Not sure if OP would agree with his meaning meaning this?
I am assuming that people looking at this are all psychedelically experienced?
MY experience with psychedelics right from my first time dramatically revealed to me that there are depths of reality that kind of are like facades until you get to a real feeling of deeper observation.
For example, someone my be pretending to be a certain role, but with psychedelic eyes you feel you are seeing though that illusion.
Same is so with eg a tree. BEFORE you may have looked at the tree as 'just a tree'. In fact by the time I did LSD when 15, trees, and nature in general was dull and boring and I was more into cities. But psychedelics saw through this. it was THAT facade which was illusory, not nature, but that!The conditioning of culture with its 'education' system and mass media.
With psychedelic inspiration tress, wildlife, grass, wood, walls, all seemed absolutely ALIVE!!! breathing, full of meaning, deeply connected with me.
Anti-psychedelic propaganda would call this experience illusory, as have some people I have bumped into who themselves claimed to have had psychedelic experience, and said such experience was 'distortion' etc. I was shocked when I encountered that, mostly when I first got online.
Edited by zzripz (01/15/17 05:06 AM)
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BlueCoyote
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: laughingdog]
#24011313 - 01/15/17 05:38 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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redgreenvines
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Re: The illusory nature of reality [Re: BlueCoyote]
#24011345 - 01/15/17 06:26 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Maya when infused with personality is quite mocking.
Often on salvia, people have a sense of being mocked by mind: i.e. put in a tv game show.
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