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 Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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 Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack*  [Re: Strumpling]
#2278101 - 01/27/04 03:22 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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>> What has happened here? Has objective reality changed since the creator is no longer around? is that possible?
No, it is not possible. An objective reality must be an unchanging reality. Since there is no unchanging reality, there is no objective reality. Reality is entirely subjective.
>> It may be that the concept of "software" is merely a construct of the mind...but if you are going to admit that "something" of the computer exists physically without anyone around.
The response to this is related to the second, third and fourth paragraphs of the response to:
>> The tree makes no sound when it falls in the woods with nobody around?
That's correct. If there is no entity possessing an ear conciousness to apprehend as "sound" the vibrations that move through the air, then there is no sound. This is cleary understandable. Though, if we are to maintain the integrity of this reasoning, we must extend it into every element of our experience, because "vibrations", "air", "molecules" and so forth cannot be apprehended as such without a conciousness available to do so.
At the end of the game, "existence" itself cannot come into being without a conciousness available to apprehend it. Existence serves as the condition upon which conciousness thrives, and conciousness serves as the condition upon which existence thrives. The two are forever locked in dynamic unity, much like what is seen in the following example:
The inner world and the outer world are the same entity and are only nominally distinct. Therefore, it follows that there is no objective existing reality. Every aspect of existence is a dependent-related phenomena. Just as current does not come from a battery until both the positive and negative terminals are connected, action does not come from inaction until both the concious and existential terminals are connected.
We are able to see further and further into the macroscopic universe because our minds continue to probe further and further into the macroscopic universe. We are able to see deeper and deeper into the microscopic universe because our minds continue to probe further and further into the microscopic universe. Since the inner world and the outer world are the same entity and are only nominally distinct, our explorations into the outer world are like us trying to touch our own finger tip using our finger, or trying to bite our own teeth, or to see the back of our heads by craning our necks.
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Alan Stone
Corpus
Registered: 11/23/02
Posts: 986
Loc: Ten feet up
Last seen: 18 years, 9 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: trendal]
#2278118 - 01/27/04 03:27 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
trendal said:
I don't have to know that it "computes" for it to still compute! Just because I have no idea what it's doing...doesn't change what it's doing.
It all depends on perspective. On the conscious level of a human being living in the Western world, it is still computing. However, on another level there's just electrons serving as cue balls in divine snooker, passing eachother by and colliding. For all we know, our galaxy could be a set of cueballs on a yet bigger motherboard.
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It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
- Aristotle
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 Swami
Eggshell Walker
Registered: 01/18/00
Posts: 15,413
Loc: In the hen house
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Strumpling]
#2278120 - 01/27/04 03:28 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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If somebody makes an object and calls it a Flambungo, then it is a Flambungo
Do you have any good sources for a slightly used Flambungo? I thought one would go nicely out on my vermada right next to my chammy...
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The proof is in the pudding.
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Alan Stone
Corpus
Registered: 11/23/02
Posts: 986
Loc: Ten feet up
Last seen: 18 years, 9 months
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 Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Swami]
#2278181 - 01/27/04 03:49 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Stop wase-timing ! 
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It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
- Aristotle
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Strumpling
Neuronaut
Registered: 10/11/02
Posts: 7,571
Loc: Hyperspace
Last seen: 12 years, 10 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2278308 - 01/27/04 04:44 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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"If there is no entity possessing an ear conciousness to apprehend as "sound" the vibrations that move through the air, then there is no sound. This is cleary understandable. Though, if we are to maintain the integrity of this reasoning, we must extend it into every element of our experience, because "vibrations", "air", "molecules" and so forth cannot be apprehended as such without a conciousness available to do so."
so are you saying that without a conscious being, the everything is simply the everything, and that it takes consciousness to isolate pieces of the whole from itself through observing differences in perception?
Like if nobody's around when the tree falls, the thing that the word "sound" points to occurs. It doesn't make a sound, but something happens that if somebody were around, they would call sound. What we mean when we say sound - that happens when that tree falls. Vibrations of air molecules or whatever - that occurs, there's just nothing around to "apprehend" this event. But still, the air molecules vibrate, even though they don't have those labels and aren't separated from "the whole" by a conscious being, they're still there, part of the whole - just not recognized as "sound" obviously because we made that word up to describe the phenomenon that actually happens.
that's how I see it anyway, for now 
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Insert an "I think" mentally in front of eveything I say that seems sketchy, because I certainly don't KNOW much. Also; feel free to yell at me.
In addition: SHPONGLE
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Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Strumpling]
#2279377 - 01/27/04 10:54 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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>> so are you saying that without a conscious being, the everything is simply the everything, and that it takes consciousness to isolate pieces of the whole from itself through observing differences in perception?
Yes, but it is much more subtle than we first realize. The old koan "If a tree falls in the forest, does it make sound?" is only a means of referring to the way all things exist everywhere. This is how it was originally intended, as a means of pointing to a profundity so vast that it is unspeakable except by skillful linguistic gesturing.
We have firmly grasped the understanding that an apprehending conciousness is required to assign "sound" to a certain series of phenomenon. Where we have gone astray is in assuming that this is the level at which this explantion stops. We can see this by refining the question. "When a tree falls in the forest, and nobody is around to experience the phenomena of molecular vibrations, does it release any energy?" The answer to this question is the same. "No. Molecules, vibrations, energy and so forth cannot exist independently of an apprehending conciousness." We can take this even further with the question, "If an assembly of fundamental consituents is destroyed amidst another conventionally unique assembly of fundamental consituents, and no sentient arrangement of elementary particles is available to interpet the interaction between these two conventional distinctions, is there an ultimately distinguishable phenomena unfolding?" Again, the answer is no, for all the same reasons.
>> they're still there, part of the whole - just not recognized as "sound" obviously because we made that word up to describe the phenomenon that actually happens.
There is no phenomena that actually happens. There can be no actuality. Implicit in the word "actuality" is seperateness, and there can be no ultimate distinction between reality and observer. The two are the same entity, and are only nominally distinct.
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 Dark Triangles - New Psychedelic Techno Single - Listen on Soundcloud
Gyroscope full album available SoundCloud or MySpace
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Keyannki
newbie
Registered: 10/15/03
Posts: 40
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2279556 - 01/28/04 12:09 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Ped: so you're claiming there are no elves, werewolves, vamps, or dragons, huh? 
next, you say illusory. I'd say its 3D expression, working progress.
there is no objective reality. Reality is entirely subjective.
fundamentals can be proven wrong all the time. I have enough proof to know there such objectivity. an invocation of samatha is not subjective if two or more people feel it, especially in waking state.
now about the Koan. take a trans-hypothetical scenario:
black mage concocts a lovespell. heehee The target doesn't have a clue. the mage releases the spell from long distance (miles). The target is caught under the spell, under the mage's control.
it doesn't have to this spell. can be any. Attaching an entity. Energy draining. the main point is the theoretical possibility of the manifestation and target (whatever it is) having no awareness of it.
next, America and Canada. Oh, there is a distinction. Separation and division serves several purposes - Creativeness, individualism, independence. whether it is used for or perceived as good or bad is dependent on the beholder. You. Even the names of the country as the mentionables above has its own discrete characteristics and personalities. One of them in America is a vibration of the no. 5. any large governing bodies, whether business or the armed forces, love to do very very illegal, inethical acts. Enron, Amway/Quixtar, and world.com in corporate business
in the military - air forces using uppers and downer drugs to maintain the pilots performance. as of late, there has been reports of pilots making decisions on impaired judgment. there is current case involving two pilots erronaneously bombing a canadian company. there as another one in the first gulf war where nine brits died from a pilot's mistaken, substanced-influenced recognition of ground enemies.
there is more but i'm offtopic.
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Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Keyannki]
#2279676 - 01/28/04 01:19 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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>> Separation and division serves several purposes
That it does. Convention allows us to properly interact with our environment. The error is in assuming these conventions to be ultimately and inherently real.
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Strumpling
Neuronaut
Registered: 10/11/02
Posts: 7,571
Loc: Hyperspace
Last seen: 12 years, 10 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2279716 - 01/28/04 01:49 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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So I think the idea is that without conscious beings, there is no label, so there is
.
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Insert an "I think" mentally in front of eveything I say that seems sketchy, because I certainly don't KNOW much. Also; feel free to yell at me.
In addition: SHPONGLE
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Keyannki
newbie
Registered: 10/15/03
Posts: 40
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2279743 - 01/28/04 02:17 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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you didn't answer my first question. please answer it. and the hypothetical too. what i briefly presented is very real to those who practices it. as such, it is anti-thetical to the Koan. if the target is not aware of it, it shouldn't work at all according to your explanation.
another example, someone sees *it* in a dream before it happens in reality.
That it does. Convention allows us to properly interact with our environment. The error is in assuming these conventions to be ultimately and inherently real.
I didn't mean convention. I'm referring to the essence and spirit of free-will. I was specific about it. separation to you is creative distinction to me as a way of expressing Free-Will's individualism. in my example on America, even if it was inethical, its still expression of America's individualism, the no. 5.
now, if it isn't real, there's no point in playing the game of life. how else would a soul, evolving, learn to grow if it couldn't be fooled? being fooled is the right description. how about using it as just a tool.
for me, 3D is very much real to me. at the experience level. nothing quickens the heart like a mack truck bearing down on you. knowing full well if you don't jump out of the away, you're pancakes. the trauma and pain received from such an impact will be carried past physical death if it happens. the continous karmic stream of this event will manifest in the next life. who knows, the soul will develop some new phobia. scared shitless of every vehicle he/she sees.
Edited by Keyannki (01/28/04 02:19 AM)
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Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Keyannki]
#2279768 - 01/28/04 02:43 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Your question seems to be about premonition.
If someone is able to anticipate an event before it occurs, how can it be a mere appearance to mind?
The quick answer is that the moment of premonition is an awakened karmic imprint of clairvoyance as attained by that individual in a past life as a highly realized practitioner of some form of mental discipline, be it Buddhism, Paganism, Martial Arts, and so forth. With concentration comes a widening of perspective into both time and space. In this way, both the premontion and the actual phenomena are appearances to mind.
You may not believe in Karma or past lives. By the same token, I may not believe in werewolves and black magic. I sincerely hope that we can mutually respect eachother. It is difficult to engage an individual when there is no mutual respect.
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Anonymous
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2280002 - 01/28/04 07:42 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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- Post History Deleted Upon User's Request -
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buttonion
Calmly Watching
Registered: 04/04/02
Posts: 303
Loc: Kansas
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 Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2280086 - 01/28/04 08:32 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Wow Ped, you really have a gift for conveying these mind-bending ideas. It takes me a long time to organize my thoughts and compose posts about it. I wonder what your background is. Have you posted about you background elsewhere or can you give a brief history?
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Concepts which have been proved to be useful in ordering things easily acquire such an authority over us that we forget their human origins and accept them as invariable.- Albert Einstein
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Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: buttonion]
#2280545 - 01/28/04 11:16 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Training and practice, that is all. And a whole lot of patience, perserverance. I've been studying Buddhism for about two years; formally practicing for about 6 months. As an independent scholar/meditator, I found my practice to be quite directionless, and found it difficult to connect ideas with eachother smoothly upon articulation. After I began formal training under a teacher, these problems began to evaporate. There is a lot to be said for cultivating single-pointed concentration!
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Dark Triangles - New Psychedelic Techno Single - Listen on Soundcloud
Gyroscope full album available SoundCloud or MySpace
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raytrace
Stranger
Registered: 01/15/02
Posts: 720
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Strumpling]
#2280900 - 01/28/04 01:20 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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Something doesn't need "meaning" to exist in my opinion
Software is meaning. And meaning cannot exist independently of context.
The whole universe could be a computer simply because there's a calculator on my desk, and that calculator is part of the universe. Therefore, the universe does calculations, making "computer" an acceptable label for the universe.
No, I truly mean that anything can be a computer on its own right.
A rock is not a computer.
Ok, lets have a look at your rock. On a first appearance it?s just an ordinary rock, nothing special. Now, we wear our all-purpose glasses and zoom into the rock ? zap ? there we are. Holy fuck, what is going on? A rock is not something static, it?s a process! Lets switch the glasses to objective-computer-detecting mode ? zap ? there we are. Holy fuck, again! There are countless computers and computer within computers here. Why?
Lets take out my laptop and compare them. What do we have here? Two pieces of the physical universe obeying the same physical laws. What we objectively see here is just causally-linked events. By projecting our assumptions on these events, we create the notion of information. Information does not have inherent existence beyond what we define it to be. Moreover, the organization of these causally linked events cannot prevent us to see computation going on in their relationship. We just have to define the appropriate framework or appropriate context if you like, to make it meet our purpose. Architecture does not matter.
(According to the Church-Turing hypothesis, any two computers are equivalent since they can emulate a Turing machine which can reach the limit of what can be computed by a machine based on ordinary materials)
The only requirement that any piece of the universe needs to be a computer is to contain causally-linked events, which is really the only sort of piece of universe you can find. We use the laptop instead of the rock just because our culture created it in a way that is efficient for us to use.
Therefore, a computer does not objectively exist.
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raytrace
Stranger
Registered: 01/15/02
Posts: 720
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: raytrace]
#2280916 - 01/28/04 01:26 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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I agree with Ped up to the point that our reality is just abstractions. However, I do not share his opinion that there is no objective universe whatsoever. My position is actually between Ped and Strumbling. Our reality is just abstractions but there is an objective universe.
But what is this objective universe?
What exists objectively is a dance (read: a continuous dynamic process composed of causally-linked events). Whether it is choreographed (determined) or not may not be safe to answer. Science says it is. And it may be. But that does not prevent indeterminism to come into play. How? Through subjective experience.
What is objectively happening, is happening. There might be no way to change that?
- BUT -
Our reality is constructed by the abstractions created in the consciousness. There is an infinite set of abstractions we can experience. Consciousness is the choice of which abstraction to experience from the infinite set. This is different from free-will. There might be no objective free-will, but there is an implicit choice of what to experience on the act of perception. This choice is indistinguishable from existence.
Now, you might say that it is the process of thought i.e. the function of neurons that determines your choice. BUT, consciousness has to precede brain function, simply because without consciousness, there are no brains.
Objectively, brains (notice the parallel with computers) do not exist. They merge with all other objects into the faceless objective universe. Something that is not discrete, something that does not have something else to compare itself to, cannot be said to exist.
If this still doesn?t do the trick for you, then consider this:
Thoughts do not exist in the objective universe, cause what is a thought without someone being conscious of the thought? Thought is the meaning of a brain function, but there can be no meaning without consciousness.
How can you insist that software or thoughts exists independently of an observer, when both are the ?meaning? of a physical function??
To claim that software or thoughts exist independently of an observer, that is they exist objectively, means that you are claiming the existence of another reality separate from matter i.e. a metaphysical world. That makes you a dualist.
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raytrace
Stranger
Registered: 01/15/02
Posts: 720
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: raytrace]
#2280924 - 01/28/04 01:29 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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>>What is really funny is that abstractions are not really needed in the universe, yet we experience them and this is what makes things real. Isn?t this almost mystical?
Ped:
Abstractions are necessary for us to properly interact with our environment.
Well, they may be necessary for us to exist, BUT the universe would exist anyway and everything would probably happen in the exact same way if consciousness and thus abstraction would not exist. That is because everything would follow the same physical laws. The particles would do the exact same movements, but we and the reality we experience would not exist. Consciousness mysteriously comes in, without being necessary.
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raytrace
Stranger
Registered: 01/15/02
Posts: 720
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: raytrace]
#2280959 - 01/28/04 01:47 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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If you are about to reject what I am saying anyway, at least read carefully what I am saying
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Ped
Interested In Your Brain
Registered: 08/30/99
Posts: 5,494
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 7 years, 4 months
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: raytrace]
#2281305 - 01/28/04 03:23 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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It seems your position is that while our experience is completely pervaded by our abstracting minds, beneath the abstractions we impute upon our experience of reality is an underlying objective reality existing and unfolding continuously from it's own side, independent of all sentient beings.
I see the relationship between conciousness and existence to be the ultimate dependent relationship which has brought all of our universe into being, and continues to propell it. We can understand that a system cannot operate without the continuous input of some form of energy. We can also understand that energy which is put toward structured use occurs in dependence upon the relationship between two causal factors. A magnet and a coil of wire on their own are inert. The moment they become involved in a dependent relationship, energy is produced. In this same way, conciousness on it's own is inert unless involved in a dependent relationship with an existential plain. And an existential plain is inert unless involved in a dependent relationship with an apprehending conciousness.
Being that existence and conciousness are involved in a dependent relationship, if either is removed from the equation, both will cease. It is because conciousness and existence are involved in a dependent relationship that the objects we apprehend exist in dependence upon mind. It is because of our delusions that we perceive objects as rigid and distinct. Even having overcome our delusions, all things that we perceive exist in dependence upon mind.
As I had said earlier: Existence serves as the condition upon which conciousness thrives, and conciousness serves as the condition upon which existence thrives.
We seem to have no qualms with the notion of removing concious subjects from the plain of existence, and imagining that existence would continue on into endless time. However, if we were to contemplate removing the existential plain from experiential conciousness, we encounter a thick and hazy fog. It is unfathomable. Why this double standard?
--------------------
Dark Triangles - New Psychedelic Techno Single - Listen on Soundcloud
Gyroscope full album available SoundCloud or MySpace
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raytrace
Stranger
Registered: 01/15/02
Posts: 720
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Re: *cough* EXISTENCE *hack* [Re: Ped]
#2281425 - 01/28/04 04:08 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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yeah, I get your point and I consider it to be valid. However, I think it is more convenient to adopt a framework that acknowledges the abstraction of an objective universe, as it allows as to explore existence by scientific means, which I think is consistent with a pragmatic paradigm whose utter purpose is to serve the purpose we have set out to serve. And I think that the pursue of knowledge is a reasonable way (edit: for some of us) to spent our time locked in existence. So lets play the realists, but lets not forget we just play.
Edited by raytrace (01/28/04 04:13 PM)
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