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Invisibledorkus
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Consciousness - the hen or the egg?
    #5433147 - 03/23/06 07:11 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?

Is consciousness subjective in nature, or does science misunderstand when they examine the nature of consciousness only from this individual perspective?

Can humanity's thoughtfield be tied up to the earth's electro-magnetic field? If so, would that mean that we are just receivers of thoughts passing through? Which again would be us tuning ourselves to harnest different thoughts/vibrations.


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Invisibleniteowl
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433273 - 03/23/06 08:20 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

dr_mandelbrot said:
Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?




Consciousness (god/spirit/soul) brings forth and controls all matter.


Quote:

Is consciousness subjective in nature, or does science misunderstand when they examine the nature of consciousness only from this individual perspective?




Science can only understand what it is able to see.
Consciousness is unseen/hidden.
Science will often only see what it wants to see.


Quote:

Can humanity's thoughtfield be tied up to the earth's electro-magnetic field? If so, would that mean that we are just receivers of thoughts passing through? Which again would be us tuning ourselves to harnest different thoughts/vibrations.




We are all a part of Earths spirit/soul.
We are all (animal, plant, mineral..Mother Earth) trying to reach a "higher place/next level" in life.

When the collective thoughts/vibrations of the Earth are high enuf we will go thru some form of change.

What this change will be....:shrug:


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Live for the moment you are in now
Don't be bogged down by your past
Don't be afraid of what lies in your future


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OfflineSeussA
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433331 - 03/23/06 08:47 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

> Can humanity's thoughtfield be tied up to the earth's electro-magnetic field?

Guess that explains why all the astronauts that visited the moon turned into drooling fools as soon as they left Earths orbit...  :rolleyes:


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433372 - 03/23/06 08:57 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?

It sounds to me you are asking about the Primacy of Existence vs. Primacy of Consciousness metaphysics.
Existence is primary. To be conscious is to be conscious of something. Consciousness with nothing to be aware of is a contradiction in terms. Because to be conscious is to perceive something, consciousness requires something outside of itself in order to function; consciousness requires and is dependent upon, existence.


Is consciousness subjective in nature, or does science misunderstand when they examine the nature of consciousness only from this individual perspective?

Consciousness is subjective - defined as particular to an individual. Consciousness is also objective, for it is integrated into the objective existence of nature. Consciousness is simply the subjective manifestation of the brain's activity - it is not some entity apart from the brain. I reject the mind/brain [or mind/body] dichotomy. There is no more or less "interaction" between our mind and brain then there is between the vision and our eyes; between hearing and our ears, between digestion and our stomach, and so forth. We are one integrated whole.


I couldn't take your third question seriously enough to answer it. But Suess answered it much more succinctly and better than I would have.



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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Seuss]
    #5433516 - 03/23/06 09:32 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I heard that astronauts leaving comes back with a very changed outlook on life. Maybe a tour to space could be the ultimate mind-expansion. I don't believe that you would be left drooling if your mind was less polluted by a collective drive. I think it would leave you highly aware.

Thank you all for answering. I'm sorry if the question was dumb. :grin:


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Invisibledblaney
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5433524 - 03/23/06 09:33 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

it is not some entity apart from the brain. I reject the mind/brain [or mind/body] dichotomy. There is no more or less "interaction" between our mind and brain then there is between the vision and our eyes; between hearing and our ears, between digestion and our stomach, and so forth. We are one integrated whole.

:thumbup:


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5433554 - 03/23/06 09:39 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Is it possible to have non-local experience of consciousness? To be in a state of no-thingness? And if this is possible, wouldn't it be natural to consider the subjective conscious experience (illusion of separate existence) to merge or sort of glide back into wholeness (nothingness) as infinite potential? If again this were true, wouldn't the identification to form automatically manifest from this infinite potential of nothingness, end therefore emerge anwew?


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OfflineAkira
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433620 - 03/23/06 09:53 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

It all comes down to the age old question, does the world around us mold according to human consciousness or does human consciousness itself mold according to the world around us. Are our ideas a product of an objective reality or is an objective reality a product of our subjective ideas?

I always use to think when my friend asked me that question that if we do say that organized matter is a product of human consciousness, then it would have been impossible for the world to exist before us as it is. Meh.... But in the end I cannot ignore my "religious experiences" (in the words of William James), no matter what questions remain unanswered. We are definately Gods walking in a game of Legos.....


--------------------

Orissa India Bulk Grow (Tub Tek)
Bulk Steamer Pasteurizer Tek

"Our intention is our eternal fingerprint in the universe."

We know that God is good, and so are hamburgers and hot dogs. We know that hamburgers and hot dogs definitely do exist, so then by deduction of logic God too must also exist. Hamburgers + Hot dogs = God.... Duh


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Akira]
    #5433650 - 03/23/06 09:57 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I saw an interview with the Norwegian author and philosopher Jostein Gaarder who frantic and joyful almost screamed that we were the eyes of the universe.

I don't think the question is about whether the universe is human consciousness, but more that the consciousness would be observing itself through all forms of existence, including the human perspectives.


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433729 - 03/23/06 10:12 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Reality is nothing. Expectation is everything.


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5433859 - 03/23/06 10:43 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

To be conscious is to be conscious of something. Consciousness with nothing to be aware of is a contradiction in terms. Because to be conscious is to perceive something, consciousness requires something outside of itself in order to function[.]

How can you know this? I would like to learn more, because it goes against my whole understanding and experience. Do you agree with the Buddhist perspective of illusion of ego, or is that counter to your world-view?


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5433897 - 03/23/06 10:52 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Is it possible to have non-local experience of consciousness?

If I understand what you mean correctly, then I must ask: What is the basis for even suggesting/asking such a thing? I admit, I can think of nothing except "out-of-body-experiences".

Ergo, I will expand upon that particular basis. I, have actually experienced two occasions of what others would refer to as an "out-of-body-experience". Both of them occured many years ago when I was in high school, in the Netherlands. One occurred under the influence of a heavy dose of mushrooms, the other; under a heavy dose of mdma/ecstasy.

In the experience of the former, I was basically "out of it", and literally "visited" certain places -all of which were curiously mundane- that I had become acquainted with. But the aspects of these locations which I witnessed were insanely mundane - for example, the corner of a brick in the wall of bricks on the corner of my house, on the lower side, close to the ground - things like that.

The latter, was a far more vivid and lucid experience. I was walking towards my home after a long, long night of mdma-infatuation [to put it discreetly], and it was dark, cold and wet as it had just rained. I came up to my house's door, opened it as stealthily as I could've, took my shoes off and began to walk upstairs..


..And there I was, standing in the middle of the road, in a drugged stupor, well past midnight. It was dark, cold and wet - and I had no longer had shoes on. I didn't see them anywhere. At that moment, I was still so out of it, that I barely registered what precisely happened. And so I continued walking, in my socks.
What I experienced was unbelievably realTM.

But what actually happened in both cases? I literally dreamed while wide-awake. I've learned that hallucinogenic mushrooms activates the same areas of your brain that are active while you are dreaming in your sleep. And I can only conclude that the precise same thing happened under my doseage of mdma - I literally lapsed into my mind's dreamery. And given the context and scenario of what I had experienced with my "mind's eye", it is likely that I was attempting to escape from the reality that I had to walk home in such cold, dark, wetness; I wanted to be in the safe confines of my home.


I've also discussed with other people their own similar experiences, and one that comes to mind was of a fellow Dutchman who reported an "out-of-body"-like experience, under a dose of hallucinogenic mushrooms. He experienced being a witness of himself from behind, while he was walking. Of course, after analyzing and taking into consideration all the facts at hand, we both agreed that it was a form of acute mental imagery/dreamery. The mind has immense capability for this kind of thing.
This reminds me of a humorous quote that comes to mind:
"Thomas Edison did more for civilization than all the gurus and all the world's religions." Steve Jobs

Anyway, to sum up: No I do not think it is possible to have an actual, "non-local" experience of consciousness.


To be in a state of no-thingness?

Is to not exist.

As such, your corollary does not warrant any further response - not from me, anyway.



--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


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OfflineShroomDoom
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5434046 - 03/23/06 11:23 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

according to modern science matter cannot be independent of consciousness, without consciousness how can there be matter?


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5434120 - 03/23/06 11:38 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Still what you are describing are subjective experiences, and I am asking about experiences of consciousness outside of time and space. What some epileptics and mystics describe as merging with the Light, or Atman. What I wonder is if people believe Samadhi exists as an undivided state of mind where the inner world would be beheld and observed as direct duplication of the outer. As two sides of the same coin, that the center is everywhere which is nowhere. Non-local.


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: ShroomDoom]
    #5434137 - 03/23/06 11:43 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

ShroomDoom said:
according to modern science matter cannot be independent of consciousness, without consciousness how can there be matter?




Matter does not require one's faculty of perception to percieve it, in order for it to exist.

I do agree that the experience of matter cannot be indepenent of consciousness, but that is a different story.

Feel free to provide sources to such modern sciences that show otherwise.


Dr_Mandelbrot, I don't understand your question/assertions. You are speaking in a language that is rather incoherent to me.



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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


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OfflineAkira
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5434519 - 03/23/06 01:38 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

"Matter does not require one's faculty of perception to percieve it, in order for it to exist."

^^But it(matter) is not independent from the faculty of ones own perception either. Duality is an illusion of human perception, but that's just my belief dont ask me for any "logical" proof.  :smile:


According to Quantum Theorists it it now known that particles can disapear when their is no observer. Where do they disapear to? How do they (the observer) know they disapear without observing it's disearance? I dont know but alothough


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Orissa India Bulk Grow (Tub Tek)
Bulk Steamer Pasteurizer Tek

"Our intention is our eternal fingerprint in the universe."

We know that God is good, and so are hamburgers and hot dogs. We know that hamburgers and hot dogs definitely do exist, so then by deduction of logic God too must also exist. Hamburgers + Hot dogs = God.... Duh


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OfflineBlueCoyote
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5434775 - 03/23/06 02:41 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

...There is no more or less "interaction" between our mind and brain then there is between the vision and our eyes...



If you add our whole body and our exteriours to our mind, then yes.
And if you know, that there is a big (not yet fully declared) difference from what we physicaly see and what we mindfully percieve, then yes.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5434939 - 03/23/06 03:25 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

i'm personally interested in some of the new quantum models of consciousness which a few scientists are now turning to. here's a link to some publications if anyone is interested:

http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/publications.html


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InvisibleMystikMushroom
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5434946 - 03/23/06 03:28 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Everything is energy. Matter and consciousness too are made of energy. The paradox is in where all the energy of everything came from. The answer is...it never came at all in first place! LOL, It's a paradox that we as rational/logical thinking beings can't seem to understand.

When you are taken out of normal consciousness via power plants of heavy mental training (yogic, tantric, taosit, ect...) you see a more distanced and zoomed out view of reality that shows that everythig that was, is, or will be is in a constant state of flux/oneness.

Everything that can and could happen and has happened is always happening...my life is just one of the celluloid frames stacked somewhere in the infinite, ever moving mobius looking master stack.

I just wish I knew how to navigate my consciousness into and out of them, bookmark favorite ones, and exist for however long I pleased in them. . .

I need more training... :confused:


Edited by MystikMushroom (03/23/06 03:32 PM)


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InvisibleLakefingers

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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5437883 - 03/24/06 10:59 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

dr_mandelbrot said:
Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?

Is consciousness subjective in nature, or does science misunderstand when they examine the nature of consciousness only from this individual perspective?

Can humanity's thoughtfield be tied up to the earth's electro-magnetic field? If so, would that mean that we are just receivers of thoughts passing through? Which again would be us tuning ourselves to harnest different thoughts/vibrations.




What's consciousness?


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Lakefingers]
    #5437911 - 03/24/06 11:06 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

That is exactly what I am wondering. Some seem to think of it as the subjective experience of being.

What is your take on it?


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OfflineBlueCoyote
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MystikMushroom]
    #5438120 - 03/24/06 12:20 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

mymu :smile: Very well said. I have often trouble navigating there, too. But I think that is normal in 'common' life; so one needs some 'quiet-zones' to focus and bring clearance into ones mind back again.
I am missing it for quite a long time now, and got sick of flue in consequence of a failing immune-system.
This gets me a little break, but life in full is some artistic act of balance to keep ones mind stable (in)between many aspects, for our consciousness will sustain in some beneficial, healthy, useful and 'free' manner.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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OfflineOctavius
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5438199 - 03/24/06 12:44 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Conciousness is highly obective for without brain matter there is nothing to give off the sparks of our true being.


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OfflineAkira
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Octavius]
    #5438633 - 03/24/06 02:52 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

^^Einstein said that if we were to use 100% of our brains we would no longer require physical bodies and instead become pure energy, thus having no more "brain matter" to spark consciousness...........

Consciousness transcends all forms of the "empirically known" human experience.


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Orissa India Bulk Grow (Tub Tek)
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"Our intention is our eternal fingerprint in the universe."

We know that God is good, and so are hamburgers and hot dogs. We know that hamburgers and hot dogs definitely do exist, so then by deduction of logic God too must also exist. Hamburgers + Hot dogs = God.... Duh


Edited by Akira (03/24/06 02:53 PM)


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5438813 - 03/24/06 04:02 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

"...to be conscious is to perceive something, consciousness requires something outside of itself in order to function..."

Only in the parlance of materialism. Consciousness, even for Husserlian Phenomenologists*, can be conscious of itself. This is reflexive consciousness and describes a process of involution that is is often considered the 'mechanism' of the Transcendental Ego.

If the physical universe developed from a zero-dimension Singularity, then the Reality itself and the apprehension of what came before physics seems to me to be metaphysical, by definition. I therefore assume the stance of Intuition as the most appropriate psychic function that I possess in order to have any kind of knowledge of THAT which gave rise to the universe. Thinking, Feeling and Sensing have no affinity for apprehending Mystery (using Jungian categories), and Mystery preceeds manifestation, hence the primacy of consciousness.

I personally stand with the Kabbalists who describe intuitively the notion of Tsim-Tsum - the formation of the Singularity by a
'withdrawal' of the Infinite density the 'distance' of a Singularity, into which the realm of Pure Ideas could begin to manifest (exist), 'externally' as you say from the Divine Mind. Like a 'contractile vacuole' in an Infinite Amoeba, the universe continues to expand, with the curved 'boundary' expanding into the 'Infinite Divine Substance.' The universe could expand eternally into the Infinity of God, but others, like the Hindus, say that it will collapse upon itself, returning to the Singularity - perhaps to repeat the process forever with infinite variations.

In whatever scheme, THAT which is ontologically prior to creation is ontos, Being - Essence - hence, philosophically, 'Essence precedes Existence,' or 'God precedes Creation' theologically cast.

* I don't know if anyone ever footnoted before, but here is a brief 'clear' description of what I'm referencing. My former materialistic perception of 'Existence precedes Essence' was caused by my failure to push further back into the source of my mentation. Hence:

" The transcendental-phenomenological reduction is a methodological device, required before one can begin to do phenomenology. Roughly, it is the transition from an ordinary, straightforward attitude toward the world and the objects in to a reflective attitude....Once we perform the reduction, Husserl claimed, we discover what he called 'the transcendental ego,' or 'pure consciousness,' for which everything that exists is an object. We discover that whatever is in the world is only as an object for our pure consciousness...Phenomenology is now characterized as the exploration and description of a realm of being, previously unsuspected, which is the absolute foundation of the experienced world, a realm of being, moreover, which is not accessible to empirical observation but only to phenomenological description and to something Husserl called 'eidetic intuition'...Because the existence of the transcendental ego is indubitable, its discovery serves both to distinguish phenomenology from the empirical sciences and to provide the Archimedean point at which to begin our studies."

From The Encyclopedia of Philosophy , Volumes 3 and 4, p.98


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5438873 - 03/24/06 04:33 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Thank you, Markos. I was hoping you would give your take on this.


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5438947 - 03/24/06 04:58 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I can't help myself when people who frequent The Shroomery of all places, continue to remain 'unconverted' to a non-materialistic perspective of Reality. I suppose that I have waxed somewhat fanatical with regard to this, but maybe I have been blessed with some penetratingly illuminative experiences that made it impossible for me to consider that 'creation gave rise to God.' Unless existence-creation is itself eternal in a static universe, (which seems unlikely), then there is a point of creation, prior to which there was only Mystery. Mystery then precedes manifestation. Mystery precedes physics, and is therefore metaphysical and non-physical. But I'm repeating myself.  :blush:

'Pete and Repeat were in a boat. Pete fell out. Who was left?'  :crazy:


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γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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OfflineBasilides
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5438978 - 03/24/06 05:14 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I've thought that too. During the psychedelic experience consciousness ridden spirit-stuff is everywhere. It's observing an obvious infrastructure, and it's fascinating that so many people today are tripping and not seeing this. There's nothing particularly fantastic about this, since it's just witnessing the obvious. I don't get how people can see a million different things at once, instead of seeing several events unravelling towards a singular moment.


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5439952 - 03/24/06 11:27 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I don't disagree that a consciousness can be conscious of itself - as in introspection.

However, I disagree with any absurd notion that implies separating consciousness from existence.

Here is why.

-Consciousness is an emergent property of our brain's neural network and related phenomena.
-Consciousness is the faculty of perceiving that which exists.
-Without the existent of our brain, we have no consciousness.
-Therefore, our consciousness depends on existence.


Furthermore,
-Consciousness is a process of constituents of reality performing operations on other constituents of reality, where former constituents are "operators" and latter constituents are "operands".
-A process is a change that constituents of reality go through as reality changes over time.


Ergo,
-It is trivial to think of a small Reality, one that has operators and operands, where the operators are operating on operands and the operands are simply parts of the small Reality, and the operators are parts of the small Reality, the operators only operate on "itself" where "itself" is the small Reality.


I can't help myself when people who frequent The Shroomery of all places, continue to remain 'unconverted' to a non-materialistic perspective of Reality.

Unconverted to the mysticism of spirit, as opposed to the mysticism of meat?
If simply recognizing that existence has primacy over consciousness makes me a "materialist" in your eyes - if the false alternative of materialism/idealism is all you are cognizant of, then oh well.

Markos wrote:
"Essence precedes Existence"

Non-sequitur. Essence cannot precede existence. Essence must exist, before it can even begin to precede anything at all. Existence is all there is, there isn't anything that "precedes" it. Anything that would precede it, would have to exist - thus negating the premise that it "precedes existence".
The premise precedes the proof. Existence precedes consciousness.



--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (03/24/06 11:34 PM)


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OfflineBasilides
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5440141 - 03/25/06 12:52 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Non-sequitur. Essence cannot precede existence. Essence must exist, before it can even begin to precede anything at all. Existence is all there is, there isn't anything that "precedes" it. Anything that would precede it, would have to exist - thus negating the premise that it "precedes existence".
The premise precedes the proof. Existence precedes consciousness.




I think when he says "existence" he is referring to physics and materiality, not ideas like the "existence of essence". Essence is what sustains all that exists. It is the essence of mystery that made material existence an extensive manifestation in the first place. Essence exists, but essence is not physical existence. COnsciousness precedes existence, because it is existence itself that co-creates individual consciousness. The substance of each individual before manifestation is simply unarticulated essence; sparks of essence that have not yet absorbed an experience through existence. It is much like a mirror and a beholder.

Mystery makes up the metaphysical blue print of sequential, moment-to-moment unfolding existence. Each "moment" in materiality essentially replaces the previous one, unveiling an all-persisting NOW - essence, mystery, divinity.. these are all words attributed to Ultimate Reality. Mystery does precede physics. Physical existence is a "known" substance. What is known manifests from the Great Unknown.


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5440240 - 03/25/06 02:49 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Existence is conceptual (man, ape, stone,...). There is something prior to some existence what exists before and so on until you come to the final and first cause :wink: (prior to our perception of existence, what makes an existence itself, was the perceived object and that formed out of something, too, you know, the Apfelstrudel :wink:)


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......................................................
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5440451 - 03/25/06 08:23 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Every one of your premises are contrary to the spiritual/metaphysical position. I have already amply expressed examples pertaining to the spiritual and you refuse or are unable to regress to the same point of origin but establish yourself in conditions of 'stable' existence long after origination has occured, and without any comment on the Mystery which precedes creation.

You are like Newton, explaining how things work in a macro sense but completely ignorant of how things operate on a micro or quantum level. Completely different conditions, completely different governing principles, completely different implications for the ultimate nature of material reality.

You are defining the neurologically based models of brain consciousness and fail to grok that Consciousness (AKA Spirit) is posited by the spiritual/metaphysical position as GOD. Thus, it is upon the Reality of GOD that this position is taken, as the eternal Ground of Being. So, if you wish to insist that there is no such eternal Ground of Being (no attributes or lack thereof being debated here), no 'infrastructure' of Ultimate Reality, then we cannot proceed with this interaction. We have a stalemate.

There is no such thing as a "mysticism of meat." You do not return to first principles when you attempt to define phenomena with the term mysticism - a term which has nothing whatsoever to do with the complexity of the human-mammalian biological entity which exists in the milieu of Earth's biosphere. If you are interested in a mysticism that 'encompasses' the complexity of biological and phenomenal existence in general, I would enthusiastically recommend that you take a look at any of the works by priest-paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (e.g., The Phenomenon Man, The Future of Man, The Divine Milieu, Human Energy, Hymn of the Universe, Prayer of the Universe). Any of these works would address the empirical nature of existence yet organize the Great Chain of Being under the Mystical Body (Chardin was a Catholic) of what he called "The Omega Point." Or not.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5441012 - 03/25/06 01:10 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?

the second one.

Is consciousness subjective in nature, or does science misunderstand when they examine the nature of consciousness only from this individual perspective?

huh?

Can humanity's thoughtfield be tied up to the earth's electro-magnetic field?

what is a "thoughtfield"?


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5441471 - 03/25/06 04:15 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Markos:
In whatever scheme, THAT which is ontologically prior to creation is ontos, Being - Essence - hence, philosophically, 'Essence precedes Existence,' or 'God precedes Creation' theologically cast.

Skorpivo:
Existence is all there is, there isn't anything that "precedes" it. Anything that would precede it, would have to exist - thus negating the premise that it "precedes existence".

I think you guys are both describing the same thing, but are getting caught up in semantics. Markos is calling the phenomenal world of physics and the universe that we know of "existence", and that which came before it "essence". Skorpivo is calling that which came before the phenomenal world, as well as the phenomenal world itself, "existence", and he calls consciousness and self-consciousness "essence". At least this is the way I interpreted this.

I think a key question here is what there was before the phenomenological universe. Skorpivo, you state that before it, there was only 'existence' (and Markos, you state that there was only 'essence'). But now I ask you to describe this 'existence'/'essence' to me, using the affirmative. What qualities or characteristics did it have? Was it big? Small? Light? Dark?

Much of modern physics regards the big bang as the birth point of what we call 'matter' (atomic and subatomic particles). It was a singularity. Do you agree with this?

If so, then before the Bang, matter simply did not exist. If matter did not exist, then how could we possibly describe Reality before the Bang in the affirmative? The only way we could describe it would be in the negative, as Dionysius the Areopagite did.

Quote:

We therefore maintain that the universal and transcendent Cause of all things is neither without being nor without life, nor without reason or intelligence; nor is it a body, nor has it form or shape, quality, quantity or weight; nor has it any localized, visible or tangible existence; it is not sensible or perceptible; nor is it subject to any disorder or inordination nor influenced by any earthly passion; neither is it rendered impotent through the effects of material causes and events; it needs no light; it suffers no change, corruption, division, privation or flux; none of these things can either be identified with or attributed unto it.




He continues...

Quote:

Again, ascending yet higher, we maintain that it is neither soul nor intellect; nor has it imagination, opinion reason or understanding; nor can it be expressed or conceived, since it is neither number nor order; nor greatness nor smallness; nor equality nor inequality; nor similarity nor dissimilarity; neither is it standing, nor moving, nor at rest; neither has it power nor is power, nor is light; neither does it live nor is it life; neither is it essence, nor eternity nor time; nor is it subject to intelligible contact; nor is it science nor truth, nor kingship nor wisdom; neither one nor oneness, nor godhead nor goodness; nor is it spirit according to our understanding, nor filiation, nor paternity; nor anything else known to us or to any other beings of the things that are or the things that are not; neither does anything that is know it as it is; nor does it know existing things according to existing knowledge; neither can the reason attain to it, nor name it, nor know it; neither is it darkness nor light, nor the false nor the true; nor can any affirmation or negation be applied to it, for although we may affirm or deny the things below it, we can neither affirm nor deny it, inasmuch as the all-perfect and unique Cause of all things transcends all affirmation, and the simple pre-eminence of Its absolute nature is outside of every negation- free from every limitation and beyond them all.




If this Reality/Existence completely transcends all affirmations and even all negations, then can one actually say that it "existed" or "exists"?


--------------------
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But makes for the heaviest sword"
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5441563 - 03/25/06 05:01 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Every one of your premises are contrary to the spiritual/metaphysical position.

Depending on however you like to define such terms, of course.


I have already amply expressed examples pertaining to the spiritual and you refuse or are unable to regress to the same point of origin but establish yourself in conditions of 'stable' existence long after origination has occured, and without any comment on the Mystery which precedes creation.

Regress to the same point of what you think is the "Origin". In regards to that matter, I hold that there is no "origin".

An excerpt from http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/branden.htm
Quote:

The man who asks, "Where did existence come from?" or "What caused it?" is the man who has never grasped that existence exists. This is the mentality of a savage or a mystic who regards existence as some sort of incomprehensible miracle - and seeks to "explain" it by reference to non-existence.

Existence is all that exists, the nonexistent does not exist; there is nothing for existence to have come out of - and nothing means nothing. If you are tempted to ask, "What's outside the universe?" - recognize that you are asking, "What's outside of existence?" and that the idea of "something outside of existence" is a contradiction in terms; nothing is outside of existence, and "nothing" is not just another kind of "something" - it is nothing. Existence exists: you cannot go outside it; you cannot get under it, on top of it, or behind it. Existence exists - and only existence exists: There is nowhere else to go.





You are like Newton, explaining how things work in a macro sense but completely ignorant of how things operate on a micro or quantum level. Completely different conditions, completely different governing principles, completely different implications for the ultimate nature of material reality.

Not a fair assessment at all. Unlike what you are professing to be the truth, quantum physics has actual evidence supporting it - not mere anecdotes of vague mysticism. There is no objective, scientific or logical basis for claiming that our consciousness does anything other than what we observe it doing or anything other than what it is: The faculty of percieving that which exists, which is an emergent phenomena of our brain.


You are defining the neurologically based models of brain consciousness and fail to grok that Consciousness (AKA Spirit) is posited by the spiritual/metaphysical position as GOD.

You are defining the mysticism-based models of brain consciousness and fail to grok that consciousness is the faculty of percieving existence, and is posited by the Law of Identity.


So, if you wish to insist that there is no such eternal Ground of Being (no attributes or lack thereof being debated here), no 'infrastructure' of Ultimate Reality, then we cannot proceed with this interaction. We have a stalemate.

It's moreso that you are professing our consciousness to be such an "infrastructure". Again, this is comitting the fallacy of context-dropping; you are dropping the context of what consciousness actually is and does. Like most mystics, you take whatever remains in the unknown darkness of reality, and in the absence of factual knowledge, proceed to establish fantasies in thin-air. I see this occurring all the time in regards to Quantum Mechanics, in regards to evolutionary theory, in regards to many, many historical instances involving situations whereby folks didn't have sufficient knowledge of a phenomena - and as a result, fell to mysticism. On the bright side, we've come a long way from the age of witchdoctors and spell-chanting savages.


There is no such thing as a "mysticism of meat."

To the contrary - just as there are those who've tried to escape from the bodily and/or physical reality and construct elaborate castles of 'other-worldly' fantasies in thin-air, there are those who've tried to deny the efficacy of consciousness altogether and/or profess the non-existence of non-material entities, read: the mind.




--------------------
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Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (03/25/06 10:25 PM)


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5441748 - 03/25/06 05:54 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

May I throw into discussion, that consciousness is devinitely NOT only that, what percieves what exists !?


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5441878 - 03/25/06 06:32 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

You are free to throw anything into the discussion that you wish. However, if you only choose to toss in arbitrary one-liners, without any elaboration or logical basis on your part, then don't expect much of a response.


With that said, I'll reiterate:
Consciousness is the faculty of perception.
Consciousness exists as a specific type of existent with a specific identity. To claim that it does any thing other than facilitating perception of existence, is completely baseless, arbitrary and without merit.

To claim "consciousness is more than percieving that which exists" is equally valid as the claim "hearing is more than registering auditory events in reality", or "vision is more than the faculty of sight".



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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5442245 - 03/25/06 08:57 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I especially think of the perception of imagined stuff. The perception of future i. e., may be the most profound kind of that. It is definitively something, what is percieved (by everyone) without its present existence in reality.

There is also a large subjective component of the viewer, which is added to the perceived object itself. That links to 'see what one wants to see'.
If the subjective components of perception will raise above a certain level, then we talk about personal disorder, which is objectively stated as 'illness', but is existent, nevertheless, not perceivable yet, by objective standards. So, the perception of mind (consciousness) is not only that, what really exists, in terms of evaluable objective data imprint of the outerworld reality. The subjectivity is a large part of consciousness, too, even to the part of imagination.
I think that this is not everything, what influences our consciousness in regards to our perception, but it should be sufficient as an example.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5443236 - 03/26/06 04:01 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

dr_mandelbrot said:
That is exactly what I am wondering. Some seem to think of it as the subjective experience of being.

What is your take on it?




Crayfish have a subjective experience of being -- are they conscious?

I studied consciousness at the university for a few years, because I was interested in knowing what the scientists and philosophers had to say about. Unfortunately, I discovered that their perspectives are just as incomptent, and almost as useless, as, non-materialist
and un-empirical accounts of consciousness.

Describe "consciousness" (essentially by reducing it to ways of speaking and thinking that are incapable of grasping consciousness) as much as you want, find all the transcendent categories of consciousness you want, do all the metaphysics of consciousness you want and yet you'll never find, reduce, nor understand consciousness.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Lakefingers]
    #5443560 - 03/26/06 09:14 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Describe "consciousness" (essentially by reducing it to ways of speaking and thinking that are incapable of grasping consciousness) as much as you want, find all the transcendent categories of consciousness you want, do all the metaphysics of consciousness you want and yet you'll never find, reduce, nor understand consciousness.





:bow:

Well said


--------------------
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dblaney]
    #5443616 - 03/26/06 09:38 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Well I'm a big fan of the Christian Neoplatonist Dionysus the Areopagite, and the Via Negativa is the only thing one can do to 'suggest' the ineffable Mystery.

Skorpivo and I are on two different sides, and they are decidely NOT the same thing using different semantics. To Skorpivo, and those of his persuasion, it is "absurd" to posit God (which is what the philosophical term Ontos/Being is really about). God is Real, defined as Ultimate Reality, but God does not 'exist!' That is to say, God does not partake of existence, meaning, any space-time creation. This means not only matter, but much more subtle existence - space-time devoid of matter. Space-time partakes of extension, hence form. God (Pure Consciousness) is non-substantial and does not 'exist' in spacio-temporal dimensionality or form.

Whereas our neural tissues, connected and fed of course from all the other interactive bodily systems my conduct electrical impulses in ways more complex than silicon-based computer intelligence, our consciousness is a microcosm of the Macrocosmic Consciousness from which all of creation derives from a Neoplatonic (and a spiritual) point of view. Humans are said to be 'made in the image and likeness of God' and this is what that Biblical saying refers to. It is a cosmic and a mystical apprehension of how it all is. Reality is multilayered, but Ultimate Reality transcends the phenomenal world. That is to say, God in Unknowable as God Knows God, but again I am unknowable to others as I know myself. I am not saying that God is a super person either, but the Reality is greater than human comprehension of personality, not lesser. We creatures may well have developed from amino acids and lightning, but the Idea behind the electrons in lightning, as well as the Ideas behind every nuance of creation from quarks to quasars, are Ideas derived from God/Consciousness/Essence.


--------------------
γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5443625 - 03/26/06 09:43 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

SkorpivoMusterion said:
Every one of your premises are contrary to the spiritual/metaphysical position.

Depending on however you like to define such terms, of course.


I have already amply expressed examples pertaining to the spiritual and you refuse or are unable to regress to the same point of origin but establish yourself in conditions of 'stable' existence long after origination has occured, and without any comment on the Mystery which precedes creation.

Regress to the same point of what you think is the "Origin". In regards to that matter, I hold that there is no "origin".

An excerpt from http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/branden.htm
Quote:

The man who asks, "Where did existence come from?" or "What caused it?" is the man who has never grasped that existence exists. This is the mentality of a savage or a mystic who regards existence as some sort of incomprehensible miracle - and seeks to "explain" it by reference to non-existence.

Existence is all that exists, the nonexistent does not exist; there is nothing for existence to have come out of - and nothing means nothing. If you are tempted to ask, "What's outside the universe?" - recognize that you are asking, "What's outside of existence?" and that the idea of "something outside of existence" is a contradiction in terms; nothing is outside of existence, and "nothing" is not just another kind of "something" - it is nothing. Existence exists: you cannot go outside it; you cannot get under it, on top of it, or behind it. Existence exists - and only existence exists: There is nowhere else to go.





You are like Newton, explaining how things work in a macro sense but completely ignorant of how things operate on a micro or quantum level. Completely different conditions, completely different governing principles, completely different implications for the ultimate nature of material reality.

Not a fair assessment at all. Unlike what you are professing to be the truth, quantum physics has actual evidence supporting it - not mere anecdotes of vague mysticism. There is no objective, scientific or logical basis for claiming that our consciousness does anything other than what we observe it doing or anything other than what it is: The faculty of percieving that which exists, which is an emergent phenomena of our brain.


You are defining the neurologically based models of brain consciousness and fail to grok that Consciousness (AKA Spirit) is posited by the spiritual/metaphysical position as GOD.

You are defining the mysticism-based models of brain consciousness and fail to grok that consciousness is the faculty of percieving existence, and is posited by the Law of Identity.


So, if you wish to insist that there is no such eternal Ground of Being (no attributes or lack thereof being debated here), no 'infrastructure' of Ultimate Reality, then we cannot proceed with this interaction. We have a stalemate.

It's moreso that you are professing our consciousness to be such an "infrastructure". Again, this is comitting the fallacy of context-dropping; you are dropping the context of what consciousness actually is and does. Like most mystics, you take whatever remains in the unknown darkness of reality, and in the absence of factual knowledge, proceed to establish fantasies in thin-air. I see this occurring all the time in regards to Quantum Mechanics, in regards to evolutionary theory, in regards to many, many historical instances involving situations whereby folks didn't have sufficient knowledge of a phenomena - and as a result, fell to mysticism. On the bright side, we've come a long way from the age of witchdoctors and spell-chanting savages.


There is no such thing as a "mysticism of meat."

To the contrary - just as there are those who've tried to escape from the bodily and/or physical reality and construct elaborate castles of 'other-worldly' fantasies in thin-air, there are those who've tried to deny the efficacy of consciousness altogether and/or profess the non-existence of non-material entities, read: the mind.




Simply stated: you simply have not Experienced "Cosmic Consciousness" yourself, or you would Know the position that I advocate. Your philosophy is of one who has not yet had the Experience, but your world view will be shattered if you are granted it.


--------------------
γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5443865 - 03/26/06 12:01 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

We creatures may well have developed from amino acids and lightning, but the Idea behind the electrons in lightning, as well as the Ideas behind every nuance of creation from quarks to quasars, are Ideas derived from God/Consciousness/Essence.

You remind me of someone who observes that our skyscrapers and automobiles were volitionally created, and didn't necessarily have to exist as such, for they were creations of man's own choices - and then over-extends that conclusion to Mother Nature. He concludes therefore, that the planets in orbit around the sun did not have to be, because nor did man's creations.
He fails to realize that the metaphysically given is not governed by will, choice, or consciousness - but by the Law of Identity. The metaphysically given is necessitated, i.e., absolute.

Nature, i.e., the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated; it cannot come into or go out of existence. All the countless forms, motions, combinations and dissolutions of elements within the universe - from a floating speck of dust to the formation of a galaxy to the emergence of life - are caused and determined by the identities of the elements involved. Nature is the metaphysically given - i.e., the nature of nature is outside the power of any volition.

"Creation" does not [and metaphysically cannot] mean the power to bring something into existence and out of nothing. "Creation" means the power to bring into existence an arrangement [or combination or integration] of natural elements that had not existed before.
The best and briefest identification of volitionary power in regard to nature is "Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed." -- Francis Bacon. Again, one may ask, "But.. where did existence come from?" Again, I must refer to Branden's adroit refutation of such "creationism":
http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/branden.htm

One who thinks that consciousness "itself" creates existence, fails to realize or accept the fact that to be conscious is to be conscious of something. Consciousness must always have an object. So, to be conscious of one's consciousness is to be conscious of one's consciousness of...an object. There has to be something that one is conscious of in order for consciousness to exist. Then and only then can one be conscious of one's process of being conscious. And nor is consciousness a "thing" in the sense of an entity, any more or less than vision or hearing is; but a faculty or process - just as is vision, hearing, digestion and so forth.

This exposes the fallacy inherent in creationism, which says that God, a pure spirit or consciousness, created everything else that exists. But if, prior to creation, nothing else existed except God, then God himself could not exist, because he would then be a consciousness with nothing to be conscious of, which is a contradiction in terms.

Once again, as I've said before, it is perfectly logical and reasonable to extend the observation that we as volitional, sentient beings have consciousness as a product of this Earth's existence, to the entire Universe itself. There is no reasonable or logical basis for claiming that consciousness can do anything other than what we CAN and DO observe it doing.
Consciousness can not exist without reality. Reality can exist without consciousness.
Reality precedes "truth", much as the premise precedes the proof. There can be no "truths" in relation to a consciousness with no reality by which to refer, just as there can be no proofs in relation to a consciousness with no premise by which to refer.

Ergo, existence exists, and is primary.


Simply stated: you simply have not Experienced "Cosmic Consciousness" yourself, or you would Know the position that I advocate. Your philosophy is of one who has not yet had the Experience, but your world view will be shattered if you are granted it.


Simply stated: you simply assume too much. You do not know what experiences I've had - you may certainly assume that I haven't interpreted my experiences in a way that you chose.




--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (03/26/06 01:35 PM)


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5444129 - 03/26/06 02:08 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

As I stated, there are things, that don't exist but are processed by consciousness.
Secondly, there is something prior to existence, prior to creation, if you talk of the universe. It's called singularity and virtually brings something into existence out of 'nothing'. (Bacon did not know about singularity)


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Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5444312 - 03/26/06 03:19 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

As I stated, there are things, that don't exist but are processed by consciousness.

No comprende. If something doesn't exist, then how can one be conscious of it?


Secondly, there is something prior to existence

To be something is to exist. Therefore something cannot be "prior to" existence.


It's called singularity and virtually brings something into existence out of 'nothing'.

[Playing along for a moment]: Nothing that you know of - would be the truly accurate statement. All you're doing is pointing to your own nescience, and mistaking that to be a metaphysical entity, resulting from a failure to distinguish between metaphysics and epistemology. Your position is akin to those who think that the "Big Bang" literally came out of "nothing" per se. In actuality, we just don't know precisely what gave birth to the Big Bang. But a rational, logical individual can confidently conclude that if something gave birth to the Big Bang, then something exists.




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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5444972 - 03/26/06 07:15 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

SkorpivoMusterion said:
As I stated, there are things, that don't exist but are processed by consciousness.

No comprende. If something doesn't exist, then how can one be conscious of it?



I simply made the example of the perception of the future, which, by default, does not exist yet, and has not to become true according to the perceived one. But everyone does this.


Quote:

Secondly, there is something prior to existence

To be something is to exist. Therefore something cannot be "prior to" existence.


It's called singularity and virtually brings something into existence out of 'nothing'.

[Playing along for a moment]: Nothing that you know of - would be the truly accurate statement. All you're doing is pointing to your own nescience, and mistaking that to be a metaphysical entity, resulting from a failure to distinguish between metaphysics and epistemology. Your position is akin to those who think that the "Big Bang" literally came out of "nothing" per se. In actuality, we just don't know precisely what gave birth to the Big Bang. But a rational, logical individual can confidently conclude that if something gave birth to the Big Bang, then something exists.



I can stay happy if one says "existence, depending to the creation of our universe, stems from some unknown cause, which pre-existed outside of the realm of our perceivable reality and got real through singularity." :laugh:
I think (you know me), even with two existing things in reality, there can and is more then simple addition, if one adds these things for creational purposes. I think I have read that you defy the rule of 'the sum is MORE then its parts'. I think this rule is true.
And I hope to bring some (even) rational knowledge to the principles 'behind' that.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: BlueCoyote]
    #5445102 - 03/26/06 08:02 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I simply made the example of the perception of the future, which, by default, does not exist yet, and has not to become true according to the perceived one. But everyone does this.

Our conceptive-imaginative-extrapolative projections of the future are precisely that: conceptual constructs. First you state the perception of something, then you clarify the non-existence of that something. If that something is non-existent, then it was actually something else that was being percieved in the first place. See: First sentence of this paragraph. We're getting increasingly sidetracked from the point: That consciousness is not some "Thing" as in an entity, but rather, a biological process or faculty - like vision, hearing or digestion. To claim that it does anything other than what we observe it doing [facilitating perception through our senses] is arbitrary and without merit.


I can stay happy if one says "existence, depending to the creation of our universe, stems from some unknown cause, which pre-existed outside of the realm of our perceivable reality and got real through singularity."

If I understand you, you're still insisting that existence has a cause. Once again: Existence cannot have a cause, for a cause, by definition, exists.
All this "singularity" and "creation" tripe that you keep bringing up has little to no substantial support, no factual reasoning behind it. So it looks like you're going to be unhappy, because I will continue to stand firmly by my metaphysical, objective convictions.


I think I have read that you defy the rule of 'the sum is MORE then its parts'. I think this rule is true.
And I hope to bring some (even) rational knowledge to the principles 'behind' that.


What do you mean by a "rule"? At any rate, I've maintained that metaphysically speaking, an entity is only the sum of it's parts - nothing more, nothing less. Epistemologically, one can say otherwise. That is to say, conceptually speaking. MushmantheManic had a good example of such recently, pertaining to biological terms.



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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5445331 - 03/26/06 09:27 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Your statements about God as being impossible are wrong, but what you say does lead into interesting arguments for the necessity of creation through which God can come to know God. Freke and Gandy bring out this notion in their three publications about Gnosticism that I have posted about (enthusiastically) lately.

I do not assume too much about Cosmic Consciousness. It is Consciousness of Cosmic proportion - R.M. Bucke's famous term from the 19th century publication of the same name, and is so compelling an inlfuence that its implications just are not ignored. One does not experience Cosmic Consciousness and remain wedded to a position of simple empiricism applied to "Ultimate Concerns" (P. Tillich).

Moreover, you stated in an earlier post that you do not believe in an origin to the universe. You must therefore maintain a static theory of the universe (one that seems untenable from a scientific cosmological view) and one that seems untenable from a mythological cosmology, i.e., most of the world's creation myths since time immemorial (an Intuitive apprehension of Reality). Even here you insist that the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated." Please. If you concede to empirical evidence about the Big Bang it undermines your piss-poor pantheism which makes the phenomenal universe eternal. You live in a universe with no 'Transcendenz' and thus, as I stated earlier, you could NOT have had any experience with Cosmic Consciousness which is the microcosmic realization of the Transcendental Reality, which is 'God.' So which is it? It can't be both.

Regardless, I stand with the philosophers East and West, Plato and Buddha and all that have followed, despite their formulational differences. This dialogue is repetative and tiresome. I was once where you are and can never regress. You will not be able to grok my perspective until you have received a cosmic encounter. The trip is directional toward this understanding. Good evening to you.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5446243 - 03/27/06 03:24 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

You don't say that the perception of the future is abitrary or without merit. That would be false.
And you admit, that there are unknown things beyond singularity. Other would be false.

Like Jiggy once said, why see reality with one eye, if we have two ?
I follow this example, respecting your extreme position in the realm of scientific valuable datas, to make sense of, but I stay at my position (firmly, too) that there is much more, that we don't know, but can perceive intentionally, to add to our abstract models, making some sense of (even counter-check) them, not to be trapped in some egocentrical solipsism (I know, you don't like it either), which overevaluates human intellect :wink:


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


Edited by BlueCoyote (03/27/06 03:36 AM)


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5449714 - 03/28/06 12:22 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Even here you insist that the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated." Please.

Matter, substance or energy cannot be destroyed or annihilated, although they can change various forms. Moreover, if they cannot be annihilated, they could not have been "created". The indestructible is uncreatable. And when I say "the universe as a whole", I mean: Existence; the totality of all existence. Existence cannot be created or annihilated.

We cannot conceive of the creation of force, or of its destruction. Force may be changed from one form to another - from motion to heat - but it cannot be destroyed or annihilated.

If force cannot be destroyed it could not have been created. It is eternal; static.

Moreover, matter, substance or energy cannot exist apart from force. Force cannot exist apart from matter. This has been shown by several scientists, but most clearly by Buchner.


If you concede to empirical evidence about the Big Bang it undermines your piss-poor pantheism which makes the phenomenal universe eternal.

I've touched upon this more than once. I don't disagree that there was some incidental "big bang", of course. My sole contention in this matter is: that which gave birth to the big bang, exists, and existence is eternal. Once more, by "Universe", I mean existence; the totality thereof.


Regardless, I stand with the philosophers East and West, Plato and Buddha and all that have followed, despite their formulational differences.

-=Browses personal library and picks out a Taoist book, flips to page 211=-

"Those who follow Tao declare that there is no evidence that a god created our world. They have not found any empirical proof, and they cannot accept the idea philosophically."

Well, some smart folks these surfers of the Tao are. I guess that makes us both, Markos. I, too, stand with both West philosophy and East philosophy - at least, in specific, certain principles.





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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5449831 - 03/28/06 01:50 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Was existence always was, then?

I think at a certain point this boils down simple formula.

It is said the universe is expanding. If it is, that means at certain point in "manifested", or sparked.

I like to look beyond that point - beyond manifestation. Lets say the universe isn't expanding. It has to be a certain size then. It has to have "borders" whether expanding or not.


It's... I dunno. I think large chunk of humanity sees the metaphysical phenomena, while others do not.

I just keep thinking about the borders of the universe - impossible to touch, impossible to break through. Breaking through would enter God Herself. The only way through is to become what is on the otherside.

I don't understand how some cannot see the borders of materiality, and to just for a second, ponder the other side. I have had extensive debates about this with a friend of mind, and no matter how many times I explained it, no matter how many metaphors I used, he saw nothing but an empty void beyond the borders of the bubble of physics. Like total blankness, where nothing is possible as opposed to a deepened mystery - where anything is possible.

Penetrate the borders with your heart and you will see the hidden secret :heart:


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


Edited by St_Valentinus (03/28/06 02:16 AM)


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5449866 - 03/28/06 02:25 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

If I may propose that our (perceivable) universe is only a part of some (parallel and serial) multiverse, then there can exist things, which are beyond our perception-horizonts and even materialists could get a grip on how things can be 'created' into the existence 'we know' from there.

So, I absolutely have no problem to see, that there exists something prior to our known existence, whatever it may be.
Even if it is only a possibility, which could be cut away by Occam, I won't dismiss it until proven wrong. But all realism and rationalism points otherways.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5450036 - 03/28/06 06:02 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Taoist cosmology is simply wrong. They imply a 'steady state' universe. What they say regarding the current state of human-cosmic interaction is extremely insightful, but pick up after the notion of Origination.

Your metaphysics pertaining to Ontology and Existentialism are also erroneous.
God does not "exist" but God is the Reality from which existence derives. There is a truly profound difference which you do not grok.

Phenomenological-Existential Psychology as a discipline is essentially about what we are discussing. What you posits makes no sense to a position which is cognizant of the Transcendental ever-receding horizon of the Mystery. There is nothing Transcendental in your view, no possibility of radical origination. Plus it eternalizes phenomenon, which is preposterous. The Laws of Thermodynamics (one of which you keep paraphrasing) only applies to physics after physics came into being. The early universe was of a superheated nature in which the physics were completely different from the physics to which the now known laws pertain. Possibly, like many people, even philosophically interested people like yourself, the notion of Creation is terrifying as it implies a 'Creator' which is too mind-blowing a concept. But...it's time to blow your mind. That might result in a Transcendental Experience - Cosmic Consciousness.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5452184 - 03/28/06 05:34 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Taoist cosmology is simply wrong. They imply a 'steady state' universe. What they say regarding the current state of human-cosmic interaction is extremely insightful, but pick up after the notion of Origination.

In content, existents may not be "steady" in the sense of always transforming and changing, but the context: Existence, is static; eternally steady.


God does not "exist" but God is the Reality from which existence derives. There is a truly profound difference which you do not grok.

Any "reality" from which "Existence" derives will naturally have to exist ["non-existence" is merely a relational concept], be it in some form of meta-energy or whatever. I know that you keep implying "consciousness" by the word God - and as I've said before, it isn't so much that we're/you're espousing there to be some sort of "infrastructure" to the "cosmos", rather it's the what. You hold it to be consciousness, I hold it to be existence. Note that I do not state what form of existence, but rather underscore that it exists. This is because, unlike many mystics, I do not claim to be omniscient. I am well aware, that in reality, no one can actually know - have actual, objective knowledge about the things we are discussing, insofar as the "what" goes. However, there are no things that are truly unknowable [not to be confused with the unknown], for every existent must interact with reality and -in principle- we can become aware of any and every existent [knowing that it is, not what it is] through inference.

So in addition to the fact that we're not omniscient, what then, is the basis for rejecting the notion that what exists insofar as this reality we're talking about, is consciousness? Because of the fact that there is no sensory or rational evidence to ever suggest that consciousness can be divorced [or totally independent] from existence, or that consciousness does anything other than what it actually does and what we actually see it doing: facilitating the process of perception through our bodily senses.
There is all the evidence to the contrary, and all the more reason to establish that whatever this "ground of reality", is: existence.

On what grounds is it denied that existence precedes consciousness? There is none. There is no rational or sensory evidence to suggest otherwise at all.

Of course, mystics with their under-differentiated and over-integrated metaphysics and epistemology, often can't help but "feel" that it [an existent or existence] must be..."consciousness!", neglecting that they are only pointing to their own consciousness, resulting from a failure to differentiate and integrate. This is a common mentality amongst savages, children and of course, mystics. It is an immature and ultimately, dangerous state of mind with often far-reaching consequences if one does not grow out of it [as all healthy folks do]. Making stuff up, and then professing the made-up stuff to be actual truth is, as history shows, a dangerous, dangerous habit. Not to mention it is very anti-spiritual. Living in full acceptance of facts, is very spiritual.


Plus it eternalizes phenomenon, which is preposterous. The Laws of Thermodynamics (one of which you keep paraphrasing) only applies to physics after physics came into being. The early universe was of a superheated nature in which the physics were completely different from the physics to which the now known laws pertain.

As long as existence exists, so will phenomena. Physics - whose subject matter is "matter & energy" - never really 'came into' existence [I noticed you used the word being - an off-shoot of the primacy of consciousness theory?]. It has always been true of reality. The familiar and common 'laws of physics' - those that hold true in the knowable universe - are contextual laws, in a kind of counter-intuitive manner. In other words, physics [or metaphysics] was always existing; the laws were how humans discovered a certain order to how things work.


Possibly, like many people, even philosophically interested people like yourself, the notion of Creation is terrifying as it implies a 'Creator' which is too mind-blowing a concept. But...it's time to blow your mind. That might result in a Transcendental Experience - Cosmic Consciousness.

Possibly, like many people, even philosophically interested people like yourself, the notion of no "godly creator" is terrifying as it implies a lack of divinity which is too scary a concept. But...it's time to wake up. That might result in a Transcendental Experience - Cosmic Honesty.



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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452236 - 03/28/06 05:44 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

even philosophically interested people like yourself, the notion of Creation is terrifying




i am quite new to to the disucsion of suc things but isnt this sort of projection abuot anothers emotions a basic no no in philsophy? is this not a form of ab hominim ? and a detracktion from the conversation?


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452388 - 03/28/06 06:23 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

But...it's time to wake up. That might result in a Transcendental Experience - Cosmic Honesty.

:winner:


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452566 - 03/28/06 07:03 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Not a very creative finish, but an obvious stalemate. We're done here.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MushmanTheManic]
    #5452610 - 03/28/06 07:09 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

If you think so, you must be an Existentialist too. It's a grim vision, and not one that I would want to try and live with. Fortunately, I AM awakened.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452612 - 03/28/06 07:10 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Of course, mystics with their under-differentiated and over-integrated metaphysics and epistemology, often can't help but "feel" that it [an existent or existence] must be..."consciousness!", neglecting that they are only pointing to their own consciousness, resulting from a failure to differentiate and integrate. This is a common mentality amongst savages, children and of course, mystics. It is an immature and ultimately, dangerous state of mind with often far-reaching consequences if one does not grow out of it [as all healthy folks do]. Making stuff up, and then professing the made-up stuff to be actual truth is, as history shows, a dangerous, dangerous habit. Not to mention it is very anti-spiritual. Living in full acceptance of facts, is very spiritual.




Why don't you respond to my responses? I want a piece of this discussion too..  :crazy:

Mystics don't "feel" the cosmic infrastructure. They see it. They become it. They completely discorporate into it. Physics doesn't disappear. It simply becomes quiet. Whatever manifested structure physical phenomena has, it simply becomes unnoticed, or subtle - Mystery automatically illuminates when physics have been simmered, and this is gnosis.

The mystic as immature? Isn't this just an ad hominem attack? How many self-identified mystics do you know? For one thing, not that many people are esoterically minded. You must certainly have quite the intuition when it comes to generalizing a group of people that are quite quiet, unknown for the most part and spread through out the earth.

It was the mystic Rumi who wrote "Love is a furnace and ego its fuel.". It's totally ironic that you're calling mystics immature, as traditionally in history they were the ones persecuted by childish orthodoxies that were nothing more than institutionalized spiritual brown nosing.

You don't have the slightest clue what spiritual immaturity is. If you want to see a perfect example of stunted spiritual growth, look at the Mullahs of Afghanistan who are calling for the death of Abdul Rahman whilst proclaiming he must die for "Insulting God,". The God of these Mullahs must be a cry baby, so it's not surprising they act like one too. It's poor conceptualizations like these that ultimately define spiritual immaturity.

The mystic - who lives and breaths the Love of God, is a human being who has finished growing within. They have finished growing because by nature they are terminally curious. To me, maturity is defined by a permanent state of curiousity. The fact that you refuse to fathom what is beyond the borders of existence is in itself stunted spiritual growth.


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5452667 - 03/28/06 07:23 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

The fact that you refuse to fathom what is beyond the borders of existence is in itself stunted spiritual growth.

Wrong. I don't refuse to fathom - believe it or not, I look out at the night sky, gaze at the milky way and wonder.

What I actually refuse, is to mine mystery for ores of intellectual onanism out of some personal dissatisfaction with reality, or escape from reality or simple epistemological negligence.

That would be quite emblematic of stunted spiritual growth.



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Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (03/28/06 07:35 PM)


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452832 - 03/28/06 08:12 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Great thread here.  :smile: :smile:

The truth can only be experienced first hand. 

look up blavatsky


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5452967 - 03/28/06 08:40 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

That honestly sounds like a nihilistic approach to things.

Good for you, you're a tough guy! You can handle it!

I cannot. This world is utterly absurd. It's dreadfully painful. It's not painful because of wars, stress, sickness, and disease. It is painful for me because it seperates me from God - but it's a needed process. A face needs to be attached to my spark first, and I am thankful to God for all I got, and for all the people I have gotten to know. Maybe I'm weak - but this doesn't make me spiritually immature. It makes me a curious seeker, as one who seeks is generally unsatisfied anyway, and that is what feeds a matured curiousity. A hauty mentality is an immature one.

You, like many others, simply do not need God. You seem content with eternal sleep instead of eternal life, so more power to you. I had a friend who once talked about how excited he was about death because "you're asleep forever and never have to worry about anything ever again.". Stuff like that scares me.

This nihilistic muchismo is what is really immature. I'm no tough guy, Skorp. But I am aware as to where I'm going, and that is straight to the Breast of God where I'll burn in the Light forever. It's not even a matter of faith, but knowledge - gnosis. I know what awaits my being. And with a bit of luck, I'll still be able to communincate with loved ones in the Light of God, including my dead dog, who was also not a tough guy (he was a shy pooch)... spiritual maturity and imagination go hand in hand, because anything is possible with God. Hazrat Inayat Khan used to always talk about the power of imagination, and how the self can live an unlimited life within.

You probably believe that since I "need" God that I simply created this post-mortem fantasy in my head. It is the need for God in people that brings them into the Light. God is to the consciousness and heart what water and food is to the flesh. Without God - consciousness dies. It dies - it disappears, and that person becomes dust forever. That is the real tragedy. A man can survive about two months tops without food. A very tough man at that. Likewise, without God, one can only remain conscious for as long as their brain and organs are fully functional.

What do you have to lose anyway, other than your pride? Use your imagination. The second you use your imagination to fathom God's love for you, He begins to reveal the actual nature of reality to the lover. What starts off as childlike faith matures into complete knowledge of reality. The leap of faith - that moment of innocence in the heart, however, is the only requirement for gnosis. There is an Islamic hadith that chokes me up everytime I read it, "You come to me walking, I come to you running." All it takes is single honest step. One step foward, and the hidden secret comes charging at you like a bull. Where is God the rational mind asks? He's everywhere, waiting for everyone. He is silenly screaming "Know me!" But those who refuse to seek Him will never know Him, for it is metaphysically impossible for God to reveal herself to a being that refuses to understand or identify. Even if He wanted to give eternal life to deceased materialists, He couldn't. It's impossible, because only those who have become divine may enter the Divine.

At this point for me at least, there's no turning back. Just like physical growth, it is impossible to become "younger" again. The same applies to the growth of the soul. Once it grows to the point where gnosis is possible, regressing to a previous state is an impossibility.

God bless


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5453008 - 03/28/06 08:51 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

St_Valentinus said:
That honestly sounds like a nihilistic approach to things.

Good for you, you're a tough guy! You can handle it!

I cannot. This world is utterly absurd. It's dreadfully painful. It's not painful because of wars, stress, sickness, and disease. It is painful for me because it seperates me from God - but it's a needed process. A face needs to be attached to my spark first, and I am thankful to God for all I got, and for all the people I have gotten to know. Maybe I'm weak - but this doesn't make me spiritually immature. It makes me a curious seeker, as one who seeks is generally unsatisfied anyway, and that is what feeds a matured curiousity. A hauty mentality is an immature one.

You, like many others, simply do not need God. You seem content with eternal sleep instead of eternal life, so more power to you. I had a friend who once talked about how excited he was about death because "you're asleep forever and never have to worry about anything ever again.". Stuff like that scares me.

This nihilistic muchismo is what is really immature. I'm no tough guy, Skorp. But I am aware as to where I'm going, and that is straight to the Breast of God where I'll burn in the Light forever. It's not even a matter of faith, but knowledge - gnosis. I know what awaits my being. And with a bit of luck, I'll still be able to communincate with loved ones in the Light of God, including my dead dog, who was also not a tough guy (he was a shy pooch)... spiritual maturity and imagination go hand in hand, because anything is possible with God. Hazrat Inayat Khan used to always talk about the power of imagination, and how the self can live an unlimited life within.

You probably believe that since I "need" God that I simply created this post-mortem fantasy in my head. It is the need for God in people that brings them into the Light. God is to the consciousness and heart what water and food is to the flesh. Without God - consciousness dies. It dies - it disappears, and that person becomes dust forever. That is the real tragedy. A man can survive about two months tops without food. A very tough man at that. Likewise, without God, one can only remain conscious for as long as their brain and organs are fully functional.

What do you have to lose anyway, other than your pride? Use your imagination. The second you use your imagination to fathom God's love for you, He begins to reveal the actual nature of reality to the lover. What starts off as childlike faith matures into complete knowledge of reality. The leap of faith - that moment of innocence in the heart, however, is the only requirement for gnosis. There is an Islamic hadith that chokes me up everytime I read it, "You come to me walking, I come to you running." All it takes is single honest step. One step foward, and the hidden secret comes charging at you like a bull. Where is God the rational mind asks? He's everywhere, waiting for everyone. He is silenly screaming "Know me!" But those who refuse to seek Him will never know Him, for it is metaphysically impossible for God to reveal herself to a being that refuses to understand or identify. Even if He wanted to give eternal life to deceased materialists, He couldn't. It's impossible, because only those who have become divine may enter the Divine.

At this point for me at least, there's no turning back. Just like physical growth, it is impossible to become "younger" again. The same applies to the growth of the soul. Once it grows to the point where gnosis is possible, regressing to a previous state is an impossibility.

God bless




:thumbup:


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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5453261 - 03/28/06 09:49 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

This nihilistic muchismo is what is really immature.

Yes, indeed, it truly is much more mature to console yourself with conjectures and ridicule those inferior beings who demanded evidence.

It's not painful because of wars, stress, sickness, and disease. It is painful for me because it seperates me from God

It is unfortunate that rather than finding wars, stress, sickness, and disease a source of pain, you're concerned about your attachment to God.


Edited by MushmanTheManic (03/28/06 09:56 PM)


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5453290 - 03/28/06 09:57 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Wow!

:heart:


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5453300 - 03/28/06 09:59 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Nihilistic? No, I do not have some sort of "eh, fuck it all, who cares, nothing matters, so what, bah humbug" attitude. But given your mystical bias, I am not surprised that you interpreted my position as that.

First you claim that I'm spiritually immature because I do not wonder, or am in awe of greater mysteries.

Then I clarify that your perception was mistaken, and that it is the intellectual raping of such mystery that I do not follow, and that I do in fact "fathom".

Then you retort that I'm nihilistic because of this? Please.


But I must admit, I'm quite surprised at how honest you are in elucidating your feelings throughout your post. Not sure if this was entirely subliminal or what. You admit that you perceive the world as painful, and that God is your escape.
You admit that the imagination [!] is the greatest asset to your "spiritual maturity", which apparently you measure by the magnitude of blind, intellectual groping in the darkness; by faith, rather than reason.


Overlooking the fact that you didn't at least extend the courtesy to clarify what definition of "God" you are going by [which is an extremely muddled up, multi-defined word as it is], I will leave it to the readers of this thread to decide for themselves whether or not they should conscientiously live their life based on scrupulous facts, objective knowledge, reason and in reality..or blindly live their life on groundless beliefs that the next mystic peddles them, blind faith at mercy of their emotions, whims and under constant assault from reality.




--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (03/28/06 10:07 PM)


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5453341 - 03/28/06 10:09 PM (17 years, 10 months ago)

"
Overlooking the fact that you didn't at least extend the courtesy to clarify what definition of "God" you are going by [which is an extremely muddled up, multi-defined word as it is],"

funny how i understand what he means perfectly.


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Deviate]
    #5453883 - 03/29/06 02:53 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

I see many unbalanced and extreme, if not dangerously wrong points in Skopicos posts. Perhaps I will find the muse to point them out, later.
Inbetween: St.Valentinus: :thumbup: :heart: :Markos


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
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'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5453971 - 03/29/06 04:22 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Yes, imagination! Existence is but a dream. When the imagination realizes it is a dream, it begins to live an unlimited life - in a way, the imagination manipulates physics in transrationality, allowing consciousness to become transcendental. But, like consciousness within its own dream, it is not aware that it is in a dream. It mistakes the theatre they are witnessing for reality.

The spiritual imagination allows consciousness to awaken to its own reality. You demand empirical data. Why? What kind of precept is that for a genuine relationship - a genuine appreciation of one another, as is the substance between God and a beloved? The lovers of God are but a thin cloth on the countenance of the Divine.

I may not be able to bend spoons with my mind, but I learned how transcend the dream of physics. Anyone can, really. All it takes is that one leap of faith - rebirth. A mystic in many ways can be described as born again, but still aging.

What do you have to lose? Is being branded as "irrational" by a few of your peers really the end of the world (excuse the irony)? Faith is not irrational. It is transrational. You have to believe that you are trapped inside a dream before being presented with the knowledge that you really are actually inside a dream. That is spiritual growth; the transition from faith to knowledge.


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5454112 - 03/29/06 07:42 AM (17 years, 10 months ago)

Hey and scorpivo :heart: :heart: of course, too. I like discussion with you :thumbup: Let's see if that will lead somewhere :smile:


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5455370 - 03/29/06 02:12 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

funny how i understand what he means perfectly.

Then you should clarify Valentinus's God for us befuddled unbelievers.

You demand empirical data. Why?

Beyond the realm of empirical data, anything goes. If we disregard the empiric base of knowledge, we could construct a valid argument that the Earth is shaped like a cone and is resting on the back of a giant purple turtle. If you abandon empiricism, what is to stop a person from believing this? What constitutes a sound belief?

Knowledge of the universe is not derived from merely thinking about the universe and describing, based exclusively on your introspective thoughts, how it functions (baseless rationale such as geocentricism or impetus), instead it is derived from observing the universe.

Why do I demand empiric data? Because, without it, you're alone with unverifiable speculations.

How many new discoveries have been a result of faith, verses a result of research? Why should I adopt faith and abort evidence?


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MushmanTheManic]
    #5455874 - 03/29/06 04:39 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

The Big Bang was the singularity. All that is, is all that was, at the moment of the big bang. Now separated by time and space, but still all that is.



--------------------
Study the past...
See the future...


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5455928 - 03/29/06 05:03 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

I am an empiricist with empirical matters, and a mystic with mystical matters.
We both understand that faith in sensory data and reason can put men on the moon, but that kind of faith is helpless in human depth psychology and quality of interpersonal relationships, and useless in the apprehension of mystical Unity. It is a very sterile kind of mechanical 'thinking' which requires elements from the non-rational parts of mind in order to introduce novelty, creativity and inventiveness. I am reminded of Fredrich Kekule's dream of the Ouroboric serpent (a snake with its tail in its mouth for the uninitiated). When Kekule had this dream image, he realized the ring structure of benzene and upon that insight he single-handedly shifted the whole paradigm of organic chemistry and all that followed. The Ouroboros is an archetype of the Collective Unconscious, and a symbol that appeared to the ancient mystics along with transformational insights of transcendental matters. It is kind of like those black monoliths in '2001: A Space Odyssey,' which appeared whenever a radical paradigm shift was about to happen. In Kekule's case the insight was empirical, to the Gnostics the insight was mystical.

The empirical (physical) domain is informed by the empirically psychic domain, which in turn derives from yet deeper sources that are un-conscious and therefore not rational. The whole apparatus of rational, ego-based perceptual thinking originated in prerational unconsciousness. Many advocates of isolated rationality as the defining identity of consciousness even deny the existence of the unconscious! Like a lotus flower which originates in dark muddy origins, grows up into waters which grow less and less murky and more and more clear, only to emerge in the air and light, the ancients used this plant as an apt symbol for mind: preconscious, conscious and superconscious or prerational, rational and transrational.

Existentialists, exclusivist empiricists and atheists often have a lot in common. Their's is a reality that is perceptibly organic only in the domain of biology, leaving out the greater meaning of 'organic' (merely the sterile dictionary definition) which draws upon many other vectors of development in the empirical universe; vectors which, when taken collectively, illustrate to the mystical mind The Great Chain of Being, and the whole as infinitely more than the sum of its parts. The empirical existentialist cannot "see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wildflower" after the manner of a poet. Whereas the presence of centromeres, spindles and genes in a dividing cytoplasmic cell seems comprehensibly purposeful to the life of a cell, and perhaps by extension to the life of an organism that is embedded in the biosphere, the notion of star nurseries contributing stellar bodies (rather than Golgi bodies) to galaxies in a expanding universe with an unknown teleology remains non-teleological - purposeless, designless, meaninglessly phenomenal to the empirical existentialist! The cosmic perspective is absent, such a one cannot see the forest for the trees!

Rather than spiritual immaturity, I sense spiritual nearsightedness. The micro level which can be grokked empirically is available to rational consciousness, but the Macro level which defies mere rationality cannot be "grokked in fulness." It is a myopic spirituality, and like all kinds of blindness it is horrible and sad. The ONE, the At-One-Ment, is just not available. It can't be described any more than color can be described to a blind man. Like you, I agree/feel that it is the "mystic vision" that makes mere existence livable. It provides a passion which exceeds and outlasts all the embodied-based passions. In the dying words of Thomas Alva Edison: "More Light!"



--------------------
γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5456052 - 03/29/06 05:44 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Yes, imagination! Existence is but a dream.

St. Valentinus wrote:

You seem content with eternal sleep instead of eternal life, so more power to you. I had a friend who once talked about how excited he was about death because "you're asleep forever and never have to worry about anything ever again.". Stuff like that scares me.

Now look who's really at "sleep" here.


The spiritual imagination allows consciousness to awaken to its own reality

One's imagination certainly allows for one to escape from reality. But imagination doesn't pay for the prices of such evasion.


You demand empirical data. Why?

In addition to what MushmantheManic said: Self-respect. You, on the other hand, demand blind faith. Why?


What do you have to lose?

What do I have to lose by being irrational, by following blind faith, by promoting the refusal or inability to think; to reason? Damn near everything. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll pass. As a healthy adult, I cannot and will not regress as you'd so like.
Allow me to demonstrate. Here are the four stages of spiritual growth:
1)
Infantile Narcissism [unprincipled whim worship] - healthy folks exit this stage at age 3 [hence the term: 'the terrible twos'].

2)
Mysticism [blind adoption of unearthly - read: unreal - principles] - healthy folks usually exit this stage between the ages of 10 and 20.

3)
Skepticism [a dis-reverence of principles] -- healthy folks usually exit this stage between the ages of 15 and 30.

4)
Objectivism [proper reverence of proper principle] - healthy folks never exit this stage [once entered].

It is also important to note that stages can't be skipped. You must [at least, metaphorically] go 'through' them, or you are doomed for a future backslide. Reality usually forces folks to exit stage 1, but collectives [think of Fundamentalists] can work to keep folks stuck in stage 2. Exiting stage 2 is scary - because of the deep-seated [though imaginary] comfort that it affords. The jump to stage 4 involves identification of the immutability of certain principles [which were previously thought mutable].



Faith is not irrational. It is transrational.

To imply that accepting a premise at face-value, a belief without [or against] any rational or sensory evidence has so much as a shred of rational element in it, is pure folly. If anything, faith is anti-rational. Faith is an act of mental destruction. If there is no evidence for a claim, then accepting it is irrational. It is more likely to be false then true [since there are more false ideas then true ones, being that there is only one reality]. Building a structure of knowledge on such a flimsy foundation will leave it shaky and unstable. Eventually, even if confronted with evidence against it, one's mind will be so dependent on the belief that fear of one's world view collapsing will encourage one to reject the evidence. When this happens, one acts against reality. This is an act of destruction.


You have to believe that you are trapped inside a dream before being presented with the knowledge that you really are actually inside a dream.

Just like how one has to believe in ghosts, goblins or demons for one to "see" them? Just how like one has to believe that the lady with a crystal ball is psychic, for one to have an "accurate" reading? You are suggesting that I suspend my critical thinking skills, read: lapse into ignorance, so that I can revert to the mentality of a primitive savage, who'll accept any arbitrary premise at face value. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll pass.


That is spiritual growth; the transition from faith to knowledge

Spiritual growth does not stem from falsehood. Faith does not give rise to knowledge. Reason is the only basis for knowledge. Knowledge requires clarity and the identification of limits and boundaries. Only reason can collect sensory data into something meaningful, which is clear and definable. To speak of knowledge that we don't understand is a contradiction in terms. Emotions, perceptual memories, or vague notions are not knowledge. Knowledge is lucid and can only be formed by the use of reason. Reason is the faculty that identifies and integrates the information provided from our senses, into concepts. The method it employs is logic; the art of noncontradictory identification. Reason is the only grounds upon which all men can meet. There is no other path. Reason is absolute.



--------------------
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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Basilides]
    #5456296 - 03/29/06 06:28 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

"Reason is the only basis for knowledge."

No different than a Fundamentalist Christian with a valuation of reason instead of faith in Jesus Christ as the means for apprehension. Absolutist. Idolatrous. Imagine someone who enters into a personal relationship - a sexual relationship - in which one cannot 'know another after the flesh,' because "reason" is the "only basis for knowledge," because Reason is absolute. ["Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!"]

I believed this weltanschauung until I was about 19. At 18 I had written "Fuck for Science" on the wall next to my bed in phosphate-laden laundry detergent, so it would glow purple-white under my black-light. What was I thinking? This was not really going to charm the girls I was trying to bed. It was not romantic, it was not poetic, or philosophical. It made no sense at all to anyone but to me. "HEY Everybody! I'm into science!" [Response: Who cares? Life and love are not scientific problems to be solved, nor do scientific 'hows?' have anything to do with possibile 'whys?'] This is what early 20th century occultists called 'The Vision of the Machinery of the Universe.' It is an H.R. Giger vision. It is identification with The Matrix. It is the nighmare from which I am awakening.


--------------------
γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5456490 - 03/29/06 07:02 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

We both understand that faith in sensory data and reason can put men on the moon, but that kind of faith is helpless in human depth psychology and quality of interpersonal relationships

Sensory data does not require faith. It is observed, and open for all to see.
To imply that reason [and sensory data] is helpless in psychology and interpersonal relationships, is quite incorrect.


It is a very sterile kind of mechanical 'thinking' which requires elements from the non-rational parts of mind in order to introduce novelty, creativity and inventiveness.

I suspect you think reason [or objective thinking] must be seperate from passion. Since reason and objectivity is the act of conforming one's thoughts to reality, it should be clear that this is possible regardless of any influences.


Existentialists, exclusivist empiricists and atheists often have a lot in common. Their's is a reality that is perceptibly organic only in the domain of biology, leaving out the greater meaning of 'organic' (merely the sterile dictionary definition) which draws upon many other vectors of development in the empirical universe; vectors which, when taken collectively, illustrate to the mystical mind The Great Chain of Being, and the whole as infinitely more than the sum of its parts.

If you imply that I cannot or do not symbolize as you've done, you are incorrect. I am quite capable of being poetic in my conception of existence. However, I do not mistake my subjective [as in particular to], poetic expressions to equate with metaphysical reality. I am epistemological in epistemology, and metaphysical in metaphysics. Furthermore, I have learned the importance of understanding Numeracy.


No different than a Fundamentalist Christian with a valuation of reason instead of faith in Jesus Christ as the means for apprehension. Absolutist.

Indeed - absolutist is the common point. As such, it is unfortunate that Christianity [and such] has given absolutism a bad name with their arbitrariness. However, when a principle is absolutist because it reflects a metaphysical absolutism of nature, it is a justified absolutism.

I'd like to ask you: Are you implying that I am spiritually short-sighted? If so, then I ask: Am I spiritually short-sighted regarding matters we CAN and DO know - here on Earth; or only in esoteric matters, dealing with "other-worldly" realms?




--------------------
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5456838 - 03/29/06 08:01 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Great post :thumbup:

I think of rationality as something that is very adaptive. It is exercised in barnacle-laden moments of everyday life - it has to, I would think. At the same time, these almost unconscious routines in existence refine the myopic spiritual mind-set. People begin to only identify themselves with their empirical identities instead of the true self - that spark of divinity that became clothed in flesh at physical birth. I think of this spark as much like a seed that needs to be nurtured so it can flourish. The sprouting of unconscious nature to the fully conscious relationship with God is full off hidden potential.

The kind of passion life has with God is indescribable. It is as if the world is in control (and not random), in the unravelling moment. I have dreams that are more or less reminders of God's love. At times I can taste the fullness of God, and it soaks the heart like polish. And the type of people I encounter in life, I see these as esoteric tests, opportunities and blessings, that go well beyond coincidence. Opportunities to help people and opportunities to learn from people.

Honestly, I can go on all day as to the many ways God has given intense purpose to my life. Other people notice this, and with a bit a luck, they'll wonder if they might be missing out on something spectacular; because life in the Light of the Divine is sweet.  :sun:



--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5457052 - 03/29/06 08:39 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Now look who's really at "sleep" here.

In what way? I see the theatre of life for the dream that it is. I do not confuse it any longer with reality, but rather as an idea - God's idea. God's dream. Exactly what makes a tree "real"? What makes anything in existence "real"?

One's imagination certainly allows for one to escape from reality. But imagination doesn't pay for the prices of such evasion.

It is imagination that comes to understand reality. I do not regard existence as reality. If was reality, it would illuminate in metaphysical discorporation. It does not. Rather, what you regard as reality becomes so subtle in such discorporation, it is the grand counterpart of repeating a word over and over again until it loses all meaning despite it's continued recitation. I do not see how it can possibly be regarded as definitive reality on the simple basis that it is known and understood on a definitive level as individuals know it.

In addition to what MushmantheManic said: Self-respect. You, on the other hand, demand blind faith. Why?

Self-respect? In your own eyes or that of other people?

It is also important to note that stages can't be skipped. You must [at least, metaphorically] go 'through' them, or you are doomed for a future backslide. Reality usually forces folks to exit stage 1, but collectives [think of Fundamentalists] can work to keep folks stuck in stage 2. Exiting stage 2 is scary - because of the deep-seated [though imaginary] comfort that it affords. The jump to stage 4 involves identification of the immutability of certain principles [which were previously thought mutable].

Fundamentalists and Mystics couldn't possibly be in the sane developmental stage of one another. Explain how you came to this preclusion?


To imply that accepting a premise at face-value, a belief without [or against] any rational or sensory evidence has so much as a shred of rational element in it, is pure folly. If anything, faith is anti-rational. Faith is an act of mental destruction. If there is no evidence for a claim, then accepting it is irrational. It is more likely to be false then true [since there are more false ideas then true ones, being that there is only one reality]. Building a structure of knowledge on such a flimsy foundation will leave it shaky and unstable. Eventually, even if confronted with evidence against it, one's mind will be so dependent on the belief that fear of one's world view collapsing will encourage one to reject the evidence. When this happens, one acts against reality. This is an act of destruction.


What evidence is there against the Mystery?

Just like how one has to believe in ghosts, goblins or demons for one to "see" them? Just how like one has to believe that the lady with a crystal ball is psychic, for one to have an "accurate" reading? You are suggesting that I suspend my critical thinking skills, read: lapse into ignorance, so that I can revert to the mentality of a primitive savage, who'll accept any arbitrary premise at face value. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll pass.

Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot - to name a few demons, goblins and ghouls. I do not use my imagination literally or legalistically. I use it mystically.

Spiritual growth does not stem from falsehood. Faith does not give rise to knowledge. Reason is the only basis for knowledge. Knowledge requires clarity and the identification of limits and boundaries. Only reason can collect sensory data into something meaningful, which is clear and definable. To speak of knowledge that we don't understand is a contradiction in terms. Emotions, perceptual memories, or vague notions are not knowledge. Knowledge is lucid and can only be formed by the use of reason. Reason is the faculty that identifies and integrates the information provided from our senses, into concepts. The method it employs is logic; the art of noncontradictory identification. Reason is the only grounds upon which all men can meet. There is no other path. Reason is absolute.

Faith in God is the prerequisite of Trust in Truth. Without it, there is no compliment between God and man. The relationship is hardly mutual if your devotion to Mystery is conditional - read: limited.


--------------------


"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."


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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #5457399 - 03/29/06 09:53 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Firstly, I'd like to clarify that I've not committed philosophical suicide, so consequentially, I'm not an Existentialist!

We both understand that faith in sensory data and reason can put men on the moon, but that kind of faith is helpless in human depth psychology and quality of interpersonal relationships

I'm not sure what you're referring to by "depth psychology" but...
If you were unable to observe your interactions with others, and the results of such interactions, I highly doubt you'd be able to form meaningful relationships or even comprehend what a 'relationship' was. Empiricism and rationalism both seem extremely useful to interpersonal relationships.

The empirical existentialist cannot "see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wildflower" after the manner of a poet.

I don't see why not.

Their's is a reality that is perceptibly organic only in the domain of biology, leaving out the greater meaning of 'organic' (merely the sterile dictionary definition) which draws upon many other vectors of development in the empirical universe; vectors which, when taken collectively, illustrate to the mystical mind The Great Chain of Being, and the whole as infinitely more than the sum of its parts.

What you call The Great Chain of Being, I call causality. I think empiricism and Daoism are readily compatible.
"Nothing occurs at random, but everything occurs for a reason and by necessity."

Whereas the presence of centromeres, spindles and genes in a dividing cytoplasmic cell seems comprehensibly purposeful to the life of a cell, and perhaps by extension to the life of an organism that is embedded in the biosphere, the notion of star nurseries contributing stellar bodies (rather than Golgi bodies) to galaxies in a expanding universe with an unknown teleology remains non-teleological - purposeless, designless, meaninglessly phenomenal to the empirical existentialist!

Everything in biology serves the purpose of continuation and hath no other master.

Rather than spiritual immaturity, I sense spiritual nearsightedness.

I think you may be confusing doubt with absolute denial. I don't deny the possibility of anything, but I don't claim absolute certainty of anything either.

I freely speculate on 'the meaning behind it all' what it is, whether it exists or not, what if means for me, etc. I have a few suspicions, but no solid beliefs. In the end, all my speculation is still speculation, and I make sure to remember this. As Robert Anton Wilson so eloquently put it, "If you think you know what the hell is going on, you're probably full of shit."

It is a myopic spirituality, and like all kinds of blindness it is horrible and sad.

That is your subjective evaluation. Personally, I couldn't be happier with my philosophical position. You'll never be able to enjoy the near infinite void of wonder if you constrain yourself with beliefs and delusions. Even if I was shown undeniable evidence that Objectivism or Christianty was correct, I'd still be tempted to still cling to my current worldview, because it makes everything so damn interesting and wonderful.

"For the average man, the world is weird because if he's not bored with it, he's at odds with it. For a warrior, the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable."


Edited by MushmanTheManic (03/29/06 09:55 PM)


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MushmanTheManic]
    #5457482 - 03/29/06 10:15 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

"That is your subjective evaluation. Personally, I couldn't be happier with my philosophical position. You'll never be able to enjoy the near infinite void of wonder if you constrain yourself with beliefs and delusions."

so you're saying you have no beliefs?

"Even if I was shown undeniable evidence that Objectivism or Christianty was correct, I'd still be tempted to still cling to my current worldview, because it makes everything so damn interesting and wonderful."

isn't that the exact type of irrationality you've been arguing against?


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Invisibledblaney
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5457484 - 03/29/06 10:16 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Since reason and objectivity is the act of conforming one's thoughts to reality

I think this is a point where I'd like to comment on something.

From your posts, I gather that you see conforming one's thoughts to reality as one of, if not the highest goal and highest metaphorical plane that man can ascend to. But here's the thing: if man's thoughts are not separate from man the thinker, and man the thinker is not a separate entity from the rest of existence, then every thought man thinks is already completely conformed to reality, as they can't exactly deviate, just as a monkey can't somehow become more of a monkey, or less of a monkey.

In this sense, a Zen master will use complicated tricks to eventually help the student realize this fundamental truth, as well as helping them transcend thoughts (since no matter how true to reality thoughts may be, so long as at some basic level the student identifies with the thoughts or the thinker, a sense of division between thoughts/thinker/reality exists). Don't confuse this with the thoughtlessness of infants, as they aren't a fully grown human and have not yet become capable of this identification or perhaps even thinking in any form.

Once one is capable of existing in a state of no-thought (and of course this isn't generally an easy task, as one has to transcend all attachments and desires in the process), then one can experience unitive knowledge of Reality, by contrast with rational knowledge (not to suggest that this unitive knowledge is irrational, rather it is transrational) of reality. Unitive knowledge of Brahman/Atman is also known as liberation or enlightenment.


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln


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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Deviate]
    #5457539 - 03/29/06 10:38 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

so you're saying you have no beliefs?

Yes.

isn't that the exact type of irrationality you've been arguing against?

Maybe.


Edited by MushmanTheManic (03/29/06 11:04 PM)


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MushmanTheManic]
    #5457568 - 03/29/06 10:47 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

but you've stated beliefs multiple times throughout your posts. "You'll never be able to enjoy the near infinite void of wonder if you constrain yourself with beliefs and delusions. "

^that is a belief.


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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Deviate]
    #5457608 - 03/29/06 10:58 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

I know.  :frown:
I could argue it's a necessary truth, but I have decided to spare you from such articulate babel, instead I shall provided you with this masterfully rephrased for Meta-Mushalogical accuracy quote:
"I doubt you'll be able to enjoy the seemingly near infinite void of wonder if you constrain yourself with beliefs and delusions."


Edited by MushmanTheManic (03/29/06 11:00 PM)


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OfflineDeviate
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: MushmanTheManic]
    #5457639 - 03/29/06 11:05 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

i could also qualify all my statements with "i doubt that..." or "it seems likely to me that...."


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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: Deviate]
    #5457748 - 03/29/06 11:31 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

You should.


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dblaney]
    #5457855 - 03/30/06 12:22 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Mushman wrote:

Firstly, I'd like to clarify that I've not committed philosophical suicide, so consequentially, I'm not an Existentialist!


And I'd like to point out to Markos as well, that I am also not an Existentialist. I may be a Realist/Naturalist/Atheist/Aristotelian/Objectivist, but Existentialist I am not.

Dblaney, context, context, context. You're speaking in the context of existence, whereas I'm speaking in the context of factual knowledge, logic and sensory evidence.

Btw, Markos, I think you've given the obvious impression that I [and those in the same boat as I am] hold some "grim" view of reality. You've described a "nightmare existence" from which you are trying to "awake" from. I don't follow that reality is intrinsically "nightmarish" or "grim" - it simply is as it is; it is metaphysically objective. It is only because of this that I, can construct my own benevolent life; that I can have a benevolent Sense of Life. You've admitted that the "mystic view" makes life more livable. How this isn't glaring enough of a fundamental bias for escapism is beyond me.

In a sense though, I have a similar view - in that I recognize I ought to 'romanticize' my life if it is to be a fully enjoyable, passionate one. However, the basis upon which I establish such romanticizations is the verifiably objective, absolute reality that requires no leaps of faith. In short: by the grace of nature itself. I choose the reality orientation.

And nor is such a disinclination to mysticism a sign of 'short-sighted spirituality'. In fact, it is because I've learned to think in long-terms [read: conceptually] regarding consequences of philosophical principles, that I hold the positions which I do today.




--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


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OfflineBlueCoyote
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5458071 - 03/30/06 02:09 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

For me it will stay a riddle, how one can dismiss something completely, only because there is 'partly' untruth in it. Even scorpivo said there is not everytime falseness in imagination, aka perceptions of what not exists.
For me, it is to bring the true and good parts from imagination, who can become real. Then, you have your example of something, which pre-existed somewhere not perceivable by others (in my head) and became reality.
To dismiss it completely is to throw out the child with the bath.
I like it to grasp a reality, which is much bigger (in micro and macro and other 'dimensions') as we can perceive with our limited rational abilities.
Like future has proven many concepts, who were previously imagined, became true, yet, one can also see this causal relationship the other way round to find something 'behind' the reality of conscious perception of something, or the existence of the perceived.
The goal is, to make these imaginations as precise as possible. Like someone said before, without derivation with the aid of imagination, we still would be apes, or less.


--------------------
Though lovers be lost love shall not  And death shall have no dominion
......................................................
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Acceptance is the absolute key - at that moment you gain freedom and you gain power and you gain courage'


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Offlinefresh313
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dorkus]
    #5458087 - 03/30/06 02:23 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

dr_mandelbrot said:
Does consciousness organize as matter (all matter) or does matter exist prior to consciousness and thus neurons produce consciousness?





it seems u need matter to create the architecture before u can achieve/recieve conciousness

does it organize as matter? i think conciousness effects many systems most people would believe are purely physical in nature.


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5458302 - 03/30/06 05:47 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

"You've admitted that the "mystic view" makes life more livable. How this isn't glaring enough of a fundamental bias for escapism is beyond me."

Physically, I am fully ensconced in the cosmos [world], psychically I can identify with my physicality or my spirituality, and spiritually, I am Consciousness which, being unbounded, contains my mind-body and the entire cosmos. It is not a matter of escaping the physical as it is a matter of turning my psyche to Realize myself as Consciousness.

"I choose the reality orientation."

'I choose the Reality orientation,' in the Platonic sense of trying to grasp the Pure Ideas that give form to the material cosmos. However, I am like a scuba diver who has forgotten his weight belt and must make a serious effort to swim down to a depth before being brought back up to the surface of things. Having received glimpses of The Deep, I am sustained in my mundane natural existence. I Know that there is an underlying reality that both creates and sustains the surface appearance of psychophysical reality.

Inasmuch as both Plato and Aristotle were students of Socrates, it is weird that their respective metaphysics are being argued in this, our dialogue, more than two millennia later. Introverted Intuitive and Extroverted Sensing types will always see things along these disparate philosophical lines, and never the twain shall meet. I say we call it a day.


--------------------
γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself


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Invisibledblaney
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5458539 - 03/30/06 08:03 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

SkorpivoMusterion said:
Dblaney, context, context, context. You're speaking in the context of existence, whereas I'm speaking in the context of factual knowledge, logic and sensory evidence.




The way I see it, there is no difference whatsoever between existence and factual knowledge, logic, and sensory evidence about existence. While these methods of knowing existence are good and can take you far, they do have a limit. So long as you buy into factual knowledge at some level, and believe it to be something more than simply symbolic of existence, then it's exceedingly difficult to realize that you are a manifestation of existence itself. This is why so many have said that man's final end is unitive knowledge of Reality. Rationality and logic are very powerful tools, but they should be recognized as means to the end.

And speaking of sensory evidence, think of all of the monks and practitioners and sages of new and old who have practiced and meditated and achieved unitive knowledge of Reality. They all say essentially the same thing, that Nirvana and Samsara are the same, and that one ought to always Be Here and Now. They also speak of the illusory nature of reality.


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln


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InvisibleSkorpivoMusterion
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Re: Consciousness - the hen or the egg? [Re: dblaney]
    #5458874 - 03/30/06 09:52 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

The way I see it, there is no difference whatsoever between existence and factual knowledge, logic, and sensory evidence about existence.

Both exist, that is the commonality. However, there is a constitutional difference between arbitrary, imaginary existence, and factual, objective existence. My thoughts can either adhere to the Law of Identity, or it can run amok in babblative, meaningless, noise.
And if you reply something along the lines that "But we're all just making babblative, meaningless, noise.", then that ends this discussion - I refuse to discuss with those who waste my time.


While these methods of knowing existence are good and can take you far, they do have a limit.

A is A - anything actual has a limit.


So long as you buy into factual knowledge at some level, and believe it to be something more than simply symbolic of existence, then it's exceedingly difficult to realize that you are a manifestation of existence itself.

Assuming you're applying this to myself, I think you meant "something less". But of course, it's not that I don't have a problem thinking of myself as a manifestation of existence itself. There's a hint.


Rationality and logic are very powerful tools, but they should be recognized as means to the end.

Indeed and agreed.


And speaking of sensory evidence, think of all of the monks and practitioners and sages of new and old who have practiced and meditated and achieved unitive knowledge of Reality.

I'm not following this esotericism very well. But for all I know, I may have had a similar experience, but simply processed/interpreted/viewed it differently.


They also speak of the illusory nature of reality.

On the other hand, I speak of the real nature of reality. Why espouse some belief that reality is "just some dream"? [Overlooking the fact that it denies the Primacy of Existence] What's the purpose of such a belief? What does it accomplish?




--------------------
Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.


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Invisibledblaney
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The Primacy of Existence vs. The Primacy of Awareness [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
    #5476199 - 04/03/06 07:25 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Okay, I've been away for a couple of days and have had some chance to think about this topic, because I view it as a fundamental cornerstone of all philosophy.

I maintain that since the subject and object are of one and the same substance, call it what you will, then what we perceive as duality is actually illusionary. Here's why: when you break everything down to its smallest level, you have minute quanta bouncing and moving about inside empty space. Form and space: one of the highest forms of duality. But you couldn't have empty space if you didn't have form, and vice versa: you couldn't have form if you didn't have empty space. So they imply each other, just as the front of a coin implies the back of a coin. But the front and back of a coin are still part of the one and the same coin.

So what is the Reality that underlies form and space? If you say that the universe we are perceptually aware of is ALL of Reality (such as Spinoza saying Deus sive Natura), then I would say that you are looking at it from too limited of a perspective. For this universe had a concrete beginning, and science acknowledges that it will have a concrete end. If this universe is Reality, then that would mean that Reality had a beginning and an ending which doesn't make much sense, since that would mean that before the universe and after the universe there will be mere Nothingness, boundless empty space (Void), but then that too would be part of Reality. So we must conclude that Reality is timeless (eternal). Quantum mechanics also shows us that there is an infinite sea of unmanifest potentialities. For instance, I could be scratching my head right now, but I'm not, so the action of me scratching my head remains an unmanifest aspect of Reality. So then Reality consists of the manifest and the unmanifest. Thus I conclude that Reality is both eternal and infinite.

Now however, we come across a paradox. The universe is not Real (since it is finite), yet it is also not non-existent. And yet, this paradox is merely a statement of fact, which is called Maya. Maya has its basis in Reality (also known as Brahman).

There is another problem: the relation between the finite and the infinite. "If we believe that the finite has an absolute reality of its own and that it has emerged from the Infinite and is an actual transformation of the Infinite, or if we regard the Infinite as a transcendental first cause of the phenomenal world (a position held by most Christian theologians), then we must admit that the Infinite is infinite no longer. A God [a charged term, here I think it is used interchangably with Reality] who transforms Himself into the visible univese is Himself subject to transformation and change - He cannot be regarded as the absolute reality. A God who creates a world limits Himself by the very act of creation, and thus ceases to be infinite. The question, 'Why should God create at all?' remains unanswered."*

Ok so let me now return to the original question of the true nature of Reality. There are many views on this, obviously. As I mentioned in a previous post, Dionysus the Areopagite talks about Reality with negations. Since Reality is infinite and eternal, anything you say about it cannot possibly encompass It in its entirety, hence Huxley's terming Reality "immanent-transcendent". Now then, I'm not sure if one can successfully craft a logical argument for Reality being pure unbounded Awareness (consciousness), or at least, I haven't seen one. Likewise, I haven't seen such an indisputable argument for Reality not being pure unbounded Awareness. I dispute the argument that consciousness MUST be of an object, because during deep sleep, for instance, there is still a most basic level of consciousness intact, yet it has no object, not even itself. What evidence is there for this? Upon awaking, the mind still remembers "I knew nothing." What reason have I for believing the Primacy of Awareness? Without fail, every person who has achieved Liberation (from the illusion of Maya), Enlightenment, unitive knowledge of Reality, whatever name you would like to apply to the phenomenon, they all say that our very essence is Atman, pure, undifferentiated awareness, that Atman is not different from Brahman (Reality), and that Maya (the material universe as we know it) is but an illusion superimposed on the ultimate Reality, just as one can superimpose the image of a snake onto a rope if one has recently seen a snake.


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln


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Invisibledorkus
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Re: The Primacy of Existence vs. The Primacy of Awareness [Re: dblaney]
    #5476282 - 04/03/06 07:43 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Very well said.

This thread turned out well. Despite my folly of electro-magnetic fields. :grin:


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Invisibledblaney
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Re: The Primacy of Existence vs. The Primacy of Awareness [Re: dorkus]
    #5476377 - 04/03/06 08:04 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

Hehe, well I'd bet that electro-magnetic fields do have some subtle impact upon us that we just aren't aware of.

I'm glad you made this thread, it has (at the very least) helped give me impetus to think through a few crucial philosophical ideas.


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln


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Invisibledblaney
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Re: The Primacy of Existence vs. The Primacy of Awareness [Re: dblaney]
    #5482991 - 04/05/06 01:39 PM (17 years, 9 months ago)

I just wanted to bump this and add a quote by the Dalai Lama:

Quote:

When talking about the beginninglessness of consciousness, I don't personally think that there is a possibility of coming up with an affirmative argument or reason. Although one can explain it on the basis of tracing the substantial continuum of consciousness, I don't think one can come up with a one hundred percent affirmative proof in the sense of a logical deduction. However, the strongest argument is that if we adopt a contrary position, which is that there is a beginning, then we have to accept that either there is an external creator, an agent, which also leads to problems, or we have to accept some type of uncaused event, one which has no cause and conditions. Again, that is logically incoherent and inconsistent.




--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln


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OfflineShampioenier
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The Egg came first then the chicken [Re: dblaney]
    #5485694 - 04/06/06 08:40 AM (17 years, 9 months ago)

don't you guys know anything? Chickens evolved from dinosaurs, and dinosaurs had been crappin out eggs way before any chicken gave a single cluck;
i.e the egg came before the chicken; the REAL QUESTION IS;
WHICH CAME FIRST, THE REPTILE OR THE EGG? BUT IN ESSENCE MANY PROTOSOA HAD BOTH PROPERTIES OF EGG AND CREATURE, SO it was hard to establish at this point where binary logic had no heresay.


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