Beyondo
Active Member
As I said before varying shades of "something"...
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As I said before varying shades of "something"...
godnotgod
Thou art That
Yes, exactly, and like the illusion of the snake, we think that physical reality is 'real', when it is simply a manifestation of the Absolute, which IS real. The reason we make this error is because we are viewing the Absolute through the filter of Time, Space, and Causation. When we are able to see beyond these layers, we find that the phenomenal world IS the Absolute disguised as the world. This is Maya.
Reality is either real or it is not. If it is not, you are deluded into thinking that it is. Any reality other than True Reality cannot be real, and so that would have to include virtual reality. Not being real, it must, then, be illusory.
Or is there more than one true reality?
Though we cannot 'measure' the theme of a novel, it's reality can be adequately demonstrated by the progress of the novel itself. At certain points in the story, we can point to certain key features that repeat themselves to tie the novel together and create the theme. Not so with the concept of the mind, especially as it is self-created. Mind only exists when one is aware of it, and only within the present moment, but it is mind itself with which we are aware of mind. There are moments in our lives when we pay no mind to mind, and simply involve ourselves in whatever activity we happen to be immersed in at the time. We do not need mind to exist, but we do need conscious awareness, the higher the better.
Maya does the same thing, and on a universal scale, but it already exists. It does not need to be artificially created or generated as virtual reality does. The causes of Maya are so powerful that it can determine the course of historical events and outcomes, which it has, of course. There is either the realization of True Reality or there is Delusion. Living in True Reality is to be free from suffering; living in the world of Maya and believing it to be real is to suffer.
But god (and the devil) is a virtual reality for those who believe he does exist. We create our own virtual reality, act upon it, and the effects of those actions affect others in a very real way. The Inquisition comes to mind as a prime example.
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Beyondo
Active Member
Again you speak nonsense. You have no definition but try to use language as if you really are defining something. Oh but I forgot something doesn't exist.:sarcastic
You're limited thinking causes this misunderstanding. You confuse illusion with emergent phenomena. Virtual reality is real its not an illusion, no more than a computer game is an illusion. The computer game is a real thing, its rules cause real behavior to happen to the virtual characters and the human players that participate in them through avatars. In fact the computer game has a foot print in the physical by consuming resources!
Here again your thinking limits your ability to fathom mind/brain. Mind is not self created, where did you even get this idea, what evidence do you present that proves that statement. Mind is a product of brain, proof is in MRI scans, clinical cases of individuals with brain damage, etc. What you call awareness is a product of Brain, again proven by MRI scans. Scientist have even been able to predict decisions a person will make before they make them by analyzing what parts of the brain are active! Mind and consciousness are one in the same. You're inability to qualify aspects of mind is one of the problems. You immerse yourself in eastern mysticism and fail to note "Qualia". Qualia is a form of what you call awareness. Qualia can be experienced as a product of brain functioning, however without shot term memory such episodes of qualia disintegrate and the individual no longer has the awareness that such qualia happened and therefore can never learn beyond their present state of experiences. Such individuals with severe hippocampal damage will take food from their plate and the moment after they've swallowed are astonished that there is a plate of food in front of them, with no memory of haven eaten! They never learn or remember new experiences. Such a condition is what you're describing with your idea of consciousness, it neither has a memory or the capacity to extend beyond a fixed state. Mind needs brain, consciousness is mind.
Your hocus pocus mysticism isn't fooling anybody here. Maya is a misunderstanding of how reality works. You try to define an ultimate reality with nirvana but you fail to realize that you end up just creating another theory. You neither prove your nirvana or describe it so as to make predictions from it.
Here again you prove not to understand the concept of virtual reality. Virtual reality is not a belief. It is a premise of rules that interact with matter, while the notion of a god or devil seem like some kind of generated reality, what you're really describing is the virtual reality of mind believing in a god or devil.
In any case Buddhist believe in karma which is no different than a wrathful god or devil to punish the wicked. It would seem that your Buddhism suffers from the same delusions as any other religion...
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godnotgod
Thou art That
Belief is not a premise of rules that interacts with matter to create a virtual reality?
The believer thinks and acts as if his belief is real, in a very real way, which impacts the real world. I fail to see the difference between your notion of virtual reality and the outcome of acting upon a belief in god or devil. If the buck stopped at mere belief, without acting upon it, I would agree with you. But the fact is that the idea of god is so real for the believer, he does act upon it, to the extent of killing, if need be.
Karma is just cause and effect. All it is saying is that what you do returns to you. No god or devil are required. You do it to yourself. What's so difficult about understanding the universal truth of that? And no, it is not the same as the punishment meted out by a wrathful god.
Well, if I DID think of it as 'MY Buddhism', then I would be deluded, because Buddhism is about non-attachment, even to Buddhism. However, it is true that many Buddhists do suffer from delusions, just as anyone does, but the reason they practice Buddhism is to try to dissolve those delusions away. Enlightenment is the goal, and the condition which accomplishes just that. Enlightenment is not a doctrine by which one can become deluded. That is why it is called Enlightenment. Yes, some Buddhists do make it a doctrine, and are deluded. But Enlightenment is a very real thing, though it is Nothing Special. It is simply our ordinary but true way of being. You seem to want to say that to practice Buddhism means one will be deluded. Buddhism does not delude. We delude ourselves. It is for this very reason that Buddhism focuses on practice, rather than doctrine, because it is via practice, by clearing the mind, that delusion is dissipated.
godnotgod
Thou art That
Virtual reality is a simulation; it is artificial, and those who practice it KNOW that it is simulated and artificial. In effect, it is a deliberately designed illusion that appears to be real.
Even though the outcomes of a computer game may have real life consequences (I just read that avatars can be sued), the computer game itself is not real. It is a simulation of something that IS real.
Now, I can say the same thing about a certain level of consciousness in which the participants firmly believe themselves to be real and awake, when they are actually fictional and asleep. The Third Level of Consciousness, that of Waking Sleep, in which most of mankind finds itself, is such a state. Participants act upon the world, thinking they are accomplishing something real, when in reality they are but characters caught in a drama. The characters are a hodge-podge collection of traits acquired and internalized via of social indoctrination since childhood to the point that the actor believes himself to be that character, so immersed in the role, when he is just following a script written by others. There are certain clues that give the facade away, however, and the participant, over a period of time, begins to question his own identity. At some point, he realizes that it was all a sham, as his authentic self begins to awaken. When this occurs, he enters the Fourth Level of Consciousness, that of Self-Transcendence, and can attain even higher levels of awareness. Imagine the players in a virtual reality game in which they clean forgot they were playing a game, and the game became all too real for them, so that everything they thought and did was taken absolutely seriously. That is the Third Level that most of mankind find himself on.
Buddhism is not a religion in the sense you are suggesting it to be. Religions are primarily about Salvation of the soul. Buddhism is about Spiritual Awakening from the Third Level of Consciousness into the Fourth and beyond to attain liberation from the consequences of living a fictional, karma-driven life on the Third.
Ha! Like the believer who puts forth the idea of a god, it is incumbent upon him to prove its existence, and not upon the head of the non-believer. You are the one who is pushing the existence of an entity you call "mind". All I am asking is that you show me such an entity. As far as I am concerned, it is a self-generated concoction of itself. It does not exist. It is only a concept, and a shallow one at that. The 'I' is but a shabby fraud, and it knows it.
All of the above has only to do with the conditioned self, and the behavior of the condtioned self, stored in the brain's memory banks, can be predicted. Where brain damage exists, that much of the conditioned self is absent. But the authentic self is not conditioned, nor is its existence dependent upon the brain. It precedes the origination of the brain, and goes on beyond the death of the brain. In other words, it is Unborn, and therfore, Deathless. It's reality can be verified in the Here and Now via of spiritual awakening, which is possible via of meditation and breath control. It is this awakened true self, and not the concocted self of the brain, that has no history, no memory, like a mirror which reflects perfectly, but which does not retain any image:
"We are dead because each man recognizes himself simply and solely as his past. His "I", his continuity and identity, is nothing but an abstraction from his memory, since what I know of myself is always what I was. But this is only tracks and echoes, from which the life has vanished. If the only self which I know is a thing dead and done, a was, a "has-been", and I am ever reluctant to admit that I am dead, my only recourse is to work and struggle to give this "has-been" a semblance of life--to make it continue, move, get somewhere. But because it is dead, and has all the fixity and permanence of an unchangeable fact, this "I" can only go on being what it was. Like a machine, it can only repeat itself ad nauseum, however fast it may be run.
Thus when the dead man talks, he gives us the facts; he tells all and says nothing. But when the living man talks, he gives us poetry and myth. That is to say, he gives us a word from the unconscious--not from the psychoanalytical garbage-can, but from the living world which is not to be remembered, of which no trace can be found in history, in the record of facts, because it is not yet dead.
"Before Abraham was, I AM"
The world of myth is past, is "once upon a time", in a symbolic sense only--in the sense that it is behind us, not as time past is behind us, but as the brain which cannot be seen is behind the eyes which see, as behind memory is that which remembers and cannot be remembered. Thus poetry and myth are accounts of the real world which is, as distinct from the dead world which was, and therefore will be*."
from: 'Myth and Ritual in Christianity', by Alan Watts
*"Prophecy is the contamination of the future with the past"
Alan Watts
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godnotgod
Thou art That
Originally Posted by godnotgod
What is it about emergent phenomena that makes it 'real'?
Virtual
The term virtual is a concept applied in many fields with somewhat differing connotations, and also, differing denotations.
The term has been defined in philosophy as "that which is not real" but may display the salient qualities of the real. Colloquially, 'virtual' is used to mean 'almost', particularly when used in the adverbial form e.g. "That's virtually [almost] impossible".
This usage of 'virtual' is found in many fields.
In computing: virtual reality
Virtual reality (VR) is a term that applies to computer-simulated environments that can simulate places in the real world as well as in imaginary worlds.
From Wikipedia
*****
Virtual reality is not real.
What we normally think of as 'reality' is also not real.
The universe (the snake) is apparitional. Only The Absolute (the rope) is real.
"The Universe is the Absolute seen through the screen of Time, Space, and Causation. Time, Space, and Causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen, and when It is seen on the lower side, It appears as the Universe. So not only is the Universe apparitional, it's the Absolute seen through Time and Space, and that allows us to understand why the physics of the Universe takes the form that we see.
That the Universe is the Absolute seen through the screen of Time, Space and Causation allows us to get some interesting information, albeit in negative terms, about the Absolute. Since it is not in Time, it cannot be changing. Change takes place only in Time. And since it is not in Space, it must be undivided, because division and separation occur only in Space. And since it is therefore One and undivided, it must also be Infinite, since there is no "other" to limit it. Now "changeless," "infinite," and "undivided" are negative statements, but they will suffice.
We can trace the physics of our Universe from these three negative statements. If we don't see the Absolute as it is, we'll see it as something else. [ie 'maya"] If we don't see it as changeless, infinite, and undivided, we'll see it as changing, finite, and divided, since in this case there is no other else. There is no other way to mistake the changeless except as changing. So we see a Universe which is changing all the time, made of minuscule particles, and divided into atoms."
John Dobson, Sidewalk Astronomers
The Equations of Maya
What is it about emergent phenomena that makes it 'real'?
Then why call it 'virtual'? If it is real, as you claim, then it cannot be virtual.
Virtual
The term virtual is a concept applied in many fields with somewhat differing connotations, and also, differing denotations.
The term has been defined in philosophy as "that which is not real" but may display the salient qualities of the real. Colloquially, 'virtual' is used to mean 'almost', particularly when used in the adverbial form e.g. "That's virtually [almost] impossible".
This usage of 'virtual' is found in many fields.
In computing: virtual reality
Virtual reality (VR) is a term that applies to computer-simulated environments that can simulate places in the real world as well as in imaginary worlds.
From Wikipedia
*****
Virtual reality is not real.
What we normally think of as 'reality' is also not real.
The universe (the snake) is apparitional. Only The Absolute (the rope) is real.
"The Universe is the Absolute seen through the screen of Time, Space, and Causation. Time, Space, and Causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen, and when It is seen on the lower side, It appears as the Universe. So not only is the Universe apparitional, it's the Absolute seen through Time and Space, and that allows us to understand why the physics of the Universe takes the form that we see.
That the Universe is the Absolute seen through the screen of Time, Space and Causation allows us to get some interesting information, albeit in negative terms, about the Absolute. Since it is not in Time, it cannot be changing. Change takes place only in Time. And since it is not in Space, it must be undivided, because division and separation occur only in Space. And since it is therefore One and undivided, it must also be Infinite, since there is no "other" to limit it. Now "changeless," "infinite," and "undivided" are negative statements, but they will suffice.
We can trace the physics of our Universe from these three negative statements. If we don't see the Absolute as it is, we'll see it as something else. [ie 'maya"] If we don't see it as changeless, infinite, and undivided, we'll see it as changing, finite, and divided, since in this case there is no other else. There is no other way to mistake the changeless except as changing. So we see a Universe which is changing all the time, made of minuscule particles, and divided into atoms."
John Dobson, Sidewalk Astronomers
The Equations of Maya
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Beyondo
Active Member
No, the computer game is real otherwise you could not buy it and play it! The computer game is a real thing and is it is as an object no different than a rock! This is the whole point of why I am elaborating on virtual reality. Virtual reality is a real phenomena, it is a non-physical product of matter but it is a thing just like any other object in reality. Soo too is the mind. Do you get it now?
Beyondo
Active Member
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
No, the computer game is real otherwise you could not buy it and play it! The computer game is a real thing and is it is as an object no different than a rock! This is the whole point of why I am elaborating on virtual reality. Virtual reality is a real phenomena, it is a non-physical product of matter but it is a thing just like any other object in reality. Soo too is the mind. Do you get it now?
A computer game is real enough, but even so the very medium that defines it as such will eventually deteriorate away into nothingness or "space". Same as with a virtual reality. It can be real enough for the moment due to it arising from matter and can be true as you say, but it eventually deteriorates in relation to the medium that produces it, thus affecting any defined "realness" towards it. There is no true object in reality due to the processes of change. Being that the case, there is nothing substantial to hold on to as it were. Emergent phenomena is not real because it is subject to the same processes of change as everything else. Everything's fluid.
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Beyondo
Active Member
Change in itself doesn't constitute a lack of realness. Something that can not change can not learn or adapt. Permanence is static, just as death is. Persistence however can be eternal. Here again computer science introduces new concepts: The instancing and persistence of something as information. The subtly here can be found in the flaw to the grandfather paradox of hypothetical time travel.
If you recall the grandfather paradox is is where a man travels back in time and kills his grandfather preventing his father's birth and therefore his birth. Most believe that when the man goes back to his time he will vanish because he was never born. However the instancing of information as this man was never destroyed! If the information as it was instanced is not literally destroyed then it persists! It does not require a link to its past. It is equivalent to a virus in a computer, once the virus is deployed it doesn't matter if you destroy the means of how it was deployed in the computer's memory. Even though the man is never born in the changed time line the prevention of his birth does not destroy what he is.
Eastern religion failed to understand that it is not permanence that makes something eternal, it is persistence! As such change is apart of existence and strategies are employed to persist. Life are the only forms of matter that employ strategies to persist. Everything that life is made of and has caused life to be changes. Without change there would be no life, there would be no humans, there would be no universe, there would be no reality...
godnotgod
Thou art That
No, the computer game is real otherwise you could not buy it and play it! The computer game is a real thing and is it is as an object no different than a rock! This is the whole point of why I am elaborating on virtual reality. Virtual reality is a real phenomena, it is a non-physical product of matter but it is a thing just like any other object in reality. Soo too is the mind. Do you get it now?
No. An illusion is also real. It is a real illusion. While the game as a game is real, it is only a simulation (get it?...s-i-m-u-l-a-t-i-o-n), as in "reasonable facsimile thereof" of something else. It is not the real deal; not the thing it is emulating. You can virtually shoot virtual people in a virtual game, but no one dies, even though you are playing a REAL GAME. Now, if, for some reason, you became psychologically entranced by the virtual game, and continued to play it in real life, where you failed to understand the difference, and you got a real gun and shot a real person, then that is the effect of the virtual game, but the game itself is still not real, though it may have real effects on reality.
Virtual Reality games are programmed. Reality is not. That is what makes it reality, as it is a living, spontaneous condition of being, without history; without memory. It emerges complete out of the Present Moment, at each and every moment.
If you think reality is programmed, then you are conditioned and living on the Third Level of Consciousness, that of Waking Sleep, in which you are a fictionalized character, thinking you are real, and acting on the world as a karma-driven individual. You are attached to the wake of the ship rather than being at one with the cutting edge of the ship itself.
You keep harping on 'THE MIND', but cannot show it to me. There is no difference between you and a religious believer who claims god exists. And don't give me that crap about MRI's and electro-stimulation of regions of the brain.
"Look, Joe! He's twitching and singing a song every time I touch the probe in this area! Gee! That must be his MIND!"
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Beyondo
Active Member
You still don't get, virtual reality is a noun, therefore an object! But it is an object with no physicality! You get caught up in the fact that it the computer game is simulating a scenario. That has nothing to do with the fact that there is a non-physical artifact that matter can produce. This same artifact is the brain producing the mind! Because the brain is simulating consciousness, get it?
YOU ARE CLUELESS! You haven't even address the issues of quantum reality versus gauge phenomena. Your religion is incapable of dealing with that because it has no notion of emergent behavior. Reality is a product of quantum phenomena and therefore a form of virtual reality! You've haven't made this bridge because you are caught up in your eastern mysticism!
You keep harping on 'THE MIND', but cannot show it to me. There is no difference between you and a religious believer who claims god exists. And don't give me that crap about MRI's and electro-stimulation of regions of the brain.
"Look, Joe! He's twitching and singing a song every time I touch the probe in this area! Gee! That must be his MIND!"
HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I SAID that there is no single place in the brain where the mind resides. This is what SCIENCE has proven! Your mysticism simply makes claims without validation and when asked to prove its claims it then states: "oh you require proof? you are stuck in Maya!"
Peelease! The nirvana you describe is static, unchanging, a state of oblivion! Your descriptions of a higher plane are like that of a babbling five year old! And when claiming to understand notions of physics such as light and time you get lost in a mystic cloud!
But Oh I forgot how sophisticated the great Buddha was, so sophisticated that he couldn't discipline himself to diet! Mind No Mind, cheese burger cheese burger cheese burger!:jester3:
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godnotgod
Thou art That
Nope! Consciousness make brain:
Meditation Grows the Brain
Reality is.... a form of virtual reality. Sure. Uh huh.
Nyet. Reality is what is behind quantum phenomena, quantum phenomena only being a manifestation of the Absolute Reality, which is the only One True Reality, and that One True Reality is Nothing. You don't see the forest because you are still hung up on the trees, and because you are hung up on the trees, you think you have superior knowledge. As Watts said, the dead man gives us the facts but tells us nothing.
Yes indeed. The mind, which is YOU (that is, this "I"); is sitting in the cockpit in your brain and steering the body around.:biglaugh: What a joke! No wonder Asians find stupid Westerners laughable. Were it not for the fact that they are nothing more than Big Brain Big Monkeys brandishing extremely dangerous weapons, I would laugh myself.HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I SAID [Oooooooh!]
Yeah, sure. You still have not shown me this 'mind'. You have proven nothing. nada. zilch.
You should know: you make frequent virtual reality trips there all the time.
Even a babbling five year old can see it, but you, with all your superior knowledge, still have not learned to see correctly. Too much baggage in the way.
Scientific knowledge is not understanding. You have the facts, but no understanding. You just rattle. Ho hum....Nibble....nibble....nibble.....
The Buddha was not so foolish as to claim sophistication. That is best left for those who claim to have superior knowledge.
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godnotgod
Thou art That
Wrong! That is what orthodoxy states. Mystics just tell you to get into the drivers seat yourself so that you can SEE for yourself. Yes, the spiritual experience can be validated, but first you must let go your concepts about reality, such as virtual reality, science, and the like.
godnotgod
Thou art That
Brain is not the center of consciousness; the hara is:
Centering Awareness for Peace & Justice
*************************************************************
"In many cultures, spiritual practice and philosophy of being have recognized the center of the body to be the center of consciousness and the point of access to transpersonal power. From ancient times, many cultures have developed customs which energize the body's center with specific patterns of movement and breath. These customs have persisted as traditions of dance, healing rites, martial arts, and practices such as yoga and hara-training. (Hara is the Japanese word for the body's center both as physical site and as center of consciousness.)
Recent research in Western science joins with these ancient traditions to suggest that consciousness is not localized in the brain but rather is spread throughout and beyond the body. If consciousness is indeed a field, then we're apt to address the field as a whole by addressing its center. If the field of consciousness spreads throughout the body, then we're apt to address the center of consciousness by addressing the center of the body.
The center of the body is already known to be our center of gravity and the center of our electromagnetic field as well."
http://www.honoringyourbelly.com/inspiration/articles/unified_field.html
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godnotgod
Thou art That
The Reality As You Know It Does Not Exist
[youtube]OZj9Qps8H6M[/youtube]
YouTube - The Reality As You Know It Does Not Exist
[youtube]OZj9Qps8H6M[/youtube]
YouTube - The Reality As You Know It Does Not Exist
godnotgod
Thou art That
"There is no matter as such.
All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together.
We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter."
Max Planck
Another way of saying that "everything comes out of nothing".
In the East, this has been known for centuries. Some think that Quantum Mechanics is some kind of new view or discovery. It is not. It is only new in relation to the old Newtonian and Copernican models. In reality, it has always been that way, and it has always been that way in the present moment. That is what the East has been quietly telling us all along, and which Western Science is just beginning to scratch the surface of, confirming the Eastern view as it progresses. In the end, when all this 'newness' wears off, it will simply become part of our ordinary, everyday reality. It is just the way things are, and the key is to learn to see it just that way, and that way is not any particular view, but a universal view. In other words, it is looking at reality from the point of view of the universe itself, rather than from the point of view of a conceptual model of the universe. When looked at in this way, the universe is no longer an object of our observation because we ourselves are the universe looking at itself.
Corrective vision.
All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together.
We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter."
Max Planck
Another way of saying that "everything comes out of nothing".
In the East, this has been known for centuries. Some think that Quantum Mechanics is some kind of new view or discovery. It is not. It is only new in relation to the old Newtonian and Copernican models. In reality, it has always been that way, and it has always been that way in the present moment. That is what the East has been quietly telling us all along, and which Western Science is just beginning to scratch the surface of, confirming the Eastern view as it progresses. In the end, when all this 'newness' wears off, it will simply become part of our ordinary, everyday reality. It is just the way things are, and the key is to learn to see it just that way, and that way is not any particular view, but a universal view. In other words, it is looking at reality from the point of view of the universe itself, rather than from the point of view of a conceptual model of the universe. When looked at in this way, the universe is no longer an object of our observation because we ourselves are the universe looking at itself.
Corrective vision.
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godnotgod
Thou art That
Consciousness Drives The Universe
[youtube]y9bVd3BspIQ[/youtube]
YouTube - Consciousness Drives The Universe
[youtube]y9bVd3BspIQ[/youtube]
YouTube - Consciousness Drives The Universe
Beyondo
Active Member
Ah, let's see Max Planck got it from Decartes! But Beyondo has gone a step further by demonstrating that chaos, as standing waves interacting with one another, can and do converge on patterns! So such a matrix need not be conscious...
Oh But I forgot the great Buddhist godnotgod has zero computer skills to either duplicate the approach Beyondo describes or find fault in it, other than it conflicts with his mysticism.