Is Science Compatible with Mysticism?

[Willamena]

Yes? And how is this different than what I am saying? They differ- but they don't. Duality is looking at how they differ.


Are you addressing me?

Nevermind. Carry on.

 

[Windwalker]

 

[godnotgod]

Well, none of those things must necessarily be true in order to discern a figure.

Let's take a look, shall we?

I stated the first observation about the image as:

Originally Posted by godnotgod
...ground defines figure, therefore, it is dependent upon ground for it's existence, or manifestation.

You previously stated the following:

Originally Posted by Mr Spinkles
...I would say what allows me to discern a human figure is the contrast between light and dark which defines a distinct edge, and that edge traces the silhouette of a human figure.

...to which I replied:

Originally Posted by godnotgod
OK. In other words, it is the (back)ground, which defines figure, correct?

...to which you responded:

Originally Posted by Mr Spinkles
Sure.

So, did you change your mind?

I post here the image again for your examination:

 

[godnotgod]

There are lots of misleading statements in that video but first and foremost, it does not address the issue of whether everything in the universe is entangled. That was the claim made in your earlier video. This video only mentions entanglement to say that microtubules in the brain "are close enough to become entangled". But, according to your first video, they were already entangled. With everything. No matter how close or far apart they are.

So it seems your latest video disagrees with your previous video on whether everything in the universe is entangled, or not.

You are failing to pay attention, once again!

Either you did not watch the entire video, or you did not get the message. There is no disagreement between the two videos. Watch again. Pay attention. If you still see disagreement, please return here and post again.

For what it's worth, Penrose is a brilliant physicist but his theory of consciousness is his own pet theory, it is not an "established theory" and Penrose would probably be the first to admit it. He's quite humble about these things. The video claims Penrose "mathematically derived" the truth of his theory but in fact, other physicists have "mathematically derived" that it isn't true. So it's a debate, with Penrose in an extreme minority. Maybe he's right, I don't know. But what's significant for our discussion is this: it's because Penrose is a competent physicist that he knows not everything in the universe is entangled in a significant way, and that is why he needed microtubules (or some other molecule) to be close to each other to potentially become entangled in his theory.

OMG! What a convoluted mess!

First of all, this idea evolved through three important figures, not just Penrose: Kurt Godel, the mathematician upon whose Theorem Penrose based his research; Penrose himself, whose ideas never became a theory at all, as you falsely claim, but remained in the realm of hypothesis, because he lacked evidence that organic material in the brain was capable of conducting these Orchestrated Objective Reductions; and then, Dr. Stuart Hameroff, who was the scientist who changed Penrose's hypothesis into an established scientific theory, deducing that the brain is capable of performing Quantum tasks via microtubules. So it was not Penrose who 'needed microtubules' for anything. He either did not know about them, or if he did, did not think them of any significance in the process. All he suspected, was that 'some [unknown] organic material' in the brain must be responsible for Quantum computing, but he did not know what it was. He was not a neuroscientist as Hameroff is, for one thing. It was Hameroff who saw that microtubules were what Penrose was looking for.

Your completely erroneous (and quite frankly laughable, to say the least) statement that:

"... what's significant for our discussion is this: it's because Penrose is a competent physicist that he knows not everything in the universe is entangled in a significant way, and that is why he needed microtubules (or some other molecule) to be close to each other to potentially become entangled in his theory."

Did you say you were a scientist? How can you claim that and then make things up like this? My eyes near fell out of my head!

So surely now you must concede that your previous video was misleading about quantum entanglement?

Nope.

Or was your latest video the one that was misleading ... ? They can't both be right.

Nothing is misleading. Both videos are in agreement. It is your distorted interpretation that is misleading YOU.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Let's take a look, shall we? ...
So, did you change your mind?

I don't know. Let's take a further look. You asked what it is that allows one to discern a figure in the image. I said:

"[T]he contrast between light and dark ... defines a distinct edge, and that edge traces the silhouette of a human figure"​

And you said:

"No, there's nothing wrong with your answer. 'Figure and Ground' is just the accepted nomenclature for this kind of image, and says in 3 words what yours says in several."​

I took this to mean that there was nothing wrong with my answer, and that your talk of "figure" and "ground" says the same thing as my answer. But now you are saying things which go beyond my answer, and things which aren't even true of the image.

For example, you go beyond what I said when you say that the "ground" is formless (I take this to refer to the black area). I didn't mention this because it isn't necessary to discern a figure: the black area needn't be black and "formless", you could put all sorts of patterns or forms in it (checkerboard, other human figures) and the human silhouette would still be discernible as long as there was some kind of contrast or edge around it.

Another example: you say that some of the image is "temporal" while the rest of it is "ever present". It might feel good to say things like that, but I can't see how it's accurate. It seems like you are projecting what you imagine about the image onto the image itself. Like I said, it's not a movie. It's an image. Every pixel, white and black, is as "ever present" and unchanging as every other pixel. Even if the shape of the silhouette suggests movement (like a person dancing), that need not be true in order to discern a figure. If the figure was just standing there, as motionless and "ever present" as anything else in the image, it would still be discernible.

You can agree or disagree with my answer, but you asked for it and I gave it. I'm sorry if it wasn't the answer you were hoping for. I think I've been a good sport about this and it's time for you to be a good sport, too. Instead of twisting MY answer into yours, why don't you give YOUR answer, and make whatever point you wanted to make? It's your turn.

 

[atanu]

I'm not sure I understand your question. Are you asking for proof against solipsism?

Not really.

What I am saying is that the awareness of you (an object) seeing an apple (another object) and a third party witness of the same object who ratifies your vision are all in single awareness. The ego self has no power to know this source of awareness.

You can comprehend it better if you compared this with the dream situation where you may see yourself, an apple, and me ratifying that you were eating the apple. If I contradited you in your dream, you might murder me. Only when you come out of your dream can you laugh that you murdered me over such a petty issue.:yes:

How can we really prove that the same is not the situation in waking also?

 

[Mr Spinkles]

godnotgod, Re: the entanglement of the universe,

Yes I'm perfectly aware that the video mentioned Godel and Hameroff, and that it was the anesthesiologist Hameroff who first suggested microtubules as the entangled things doing the quantum computing (a suggestion embraced by Penrose and then developed by both men in collaboration). I believe you have totally misconstrued what I said, but let's keep our eye on the ball here and not get side-tracked over who-did-what. The issue is whether, according to established physics, everything in the universe is entangled or not.

It was Hameroff who saw that microtubules were what Penrose was looking for.

And what was Penrose looking for? What was it about microtobules that could be candidates for what Penrose was looking for? Answer: Penrose was looking for things in the brain which might be in quantum entanglement. Why would Penrose need to look for such things if, according to your first video, everything in the universe was already entangled? From your video:

"Hameroff showed that the microtubules were close enough to each other, due to their being positioned in such high [sic] clusters, to allow the pi-orbiting electrons to become quantumly entangled."​

Now, this proposal about microtubules is highly controversial. But for the sake of argument, we needn't worry about that. What is not controversial is that everything is NOT entangled. Hence the need find something, such as microtubules, which might be entangled due to special circumstances such as being "close enough to each other" etc.

Compare this to your previous video, "Where science and Buddhism meet PART 2":

"...We realize all matter and energy that we experience right now, has, and always will be, entangled ... quantum entanglement seems to point to a true oneness within the universe."​

If all matter and energy right now is entangled then I guess there was no point in worrying about microtubules in the Penrose/Hameroff theory of consciousness, huh?

And to answer your last question, yes I am a scientist, a physicist actually, although just a humble grad student. My area happens to be biophysics. But please understand, for our purposes here the only thing I am claiming to know for certain is the status of scientific opinion. I just feel the videos you posted give the impression that the weight and authority of scientific opinion is on their side. All I'm doing is pointing out the fact that it is overwhelmingly not on their side, in case you care to know. That's all I'm saying. I'm honestly not trying to rain on your parade here. All I'm saying is, "Hey! I happen to know something about this! Let me point out something you may not realize, which might help you on your merry way." You don't have to believe whatever mainstream science says, but you shouldn't be mislead into thinking what you believe is mainstream science. I'm really just trying to be of some use to you.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Not really.

What I am saying is that the awareness of you (an object) seeing an apple (another object) and a third party witness of the same object who ratifies your vision are all in single awareness. The ego self has no power to know this source of awareness.

You can comprehend it better if you compared this with the dream situation where you may see yourself, an apple, and me ratifying that you were eating the apple. If I contradited you in your dream, you might murder me. Only when you come out of your dream can you laugh that you murdered me over such a petty issue.:yes:

How can we really prove that the same is not the situation in waking also?

We can't prove it. What we can do, is propose hypotheses and then test them against experience, and see where the evidence leads. I would claim that the evidence favors the hypothesis that everything is not just a dream.

For example, I had a recurring nightmare once as a child. In this nightmare, I would be chased by witches. One morning, after awaking from one such nightmare, I said to myself: "The next time you encounter a witch, remember: this is a dream. Witches aren't real, and they can't hurt you." The next time I had the nightmare, I remembered this, and I stopped running away. In fact (I know this sounds unbelievable, but it's true) I realized I was dreaming, I turned around and pointed at the witches and made them vanish. Then I decided to fly (although I couldn't quite get the hang of it, I kept crashing). Although it wasn't my intent, in doing this I performed an experiment, using my own experience as a guide, on the hypothesis that the dream state is equivalent to the waking state.

Suffice it to say that the experiments we perform on our own experience turn out quite differently in the waking state. I trust this point hardly needs elaboration. And this is evidence (not proof) that other human beings you encounter while awake are indeed real, and not just creations of your own imagination. (Do you really believe otherwise, or did you just want to see if I could arrive at this conclusion starting from the basis of one's own experience?)

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

For what it's worth, Penrose is a brilliant physicist but his theory of consciousness is his own pet theory, it is not an "established theory" and Penrose would probably be the first to admit it.

I don't think he's actually a physicist. He's a mathematician, or mathematical physicist. At any rate, it's not exactly his "pet theory", as
1) He and Hameroff developed the Orch OR consciousness model together (which you already know, but I'm including it to cover all bases)
and
2) He got the ball rolling. There are now other quantum consciousness models (e.g., Stapp's), and even quantum-like models.

Buddhism and quantum mechanics was wrong in its suggestion that the entire universe is entangled, according to physics?

Alas, you have only physicists and other scientists (mainly, at least) to blame for this. The otherwise highly esteemed database Science Direct for some reason hosts the journal EXPLORE, which published the paper "All Tangled Up: Life in a Quantum World". The author quotes from the book The Conscious Universe: Parts and Wholes in Physical Reality (published by Springer no less): "the universe on a very basic level could be a vast web of particles that remain in contact with one another over any distance in no time in the absence of the transfer of energy or information.”

Now, technically "in contact" and "entanglement" can be completely different things, as one is technical and the other is why we have pseudo-science citing actual science. But it is not the general public who is to blame here. It is scientists who don't mind publishing sensationalism. Also, considering the state of physics at the moment (on the cosmological/astrophysics scale, the quantum level, and the attempts to unify the two), the actual scientific literature often sounds at least as implausible.

First of all, this idea evolved through three important figures, not just Penrose: Kurt Godel, the mathematician upon whose Theorem Penrose based his research;

Kurt Gödel was perhaps the greatest logician of all time. He also was practically insane, and died because of it. More importantly, he is but one player in a long history of research upon which Penrose built one component of his theory. Boole, Frege, Russell, Whitehead, Turing, von Neumann, Church, Searle, and others were essential not only for Penrose, but (in most cases) for Gödel.

Dr. Stuart Hameroff, who was the scientist who changed Penrose's hypothesis into an established scientific theory

It's not established anything. Most neuroscientist haven't even heard of it, and most of those who have rejected it. Including some who think that quantum physics is essential for consciousness.

Penrose himself...lacked evidence that organic material in the brain

He still does. And he covered "organic material in the brain" before he and Hameroff got together. It's in The Emperor's New Mind in great detail. The difference between Penrose's "synaptic clefts" and the Orch OR model is basically nil.

 

[atanu]

We can't prove it. What we can do, is propose hypotheses and then test them against experience, and see where the evidence leads. I would claim that the evidence favors the hypothesis that everything is not just a dream.

For example, I had a recurring nightmare once as a child. In this nightmare, I would be chased by witches. One morning, after awaking from one such nightmare, I said to myself: "The next time you encounter a witch, remember: this is a dream. Witches aren't real, and they can't hurt you." The next time I had the nightmare, I remembered this, and I stopped running away. In fact (I know this sounds unbelievable, but it's true) I realized I was dreaming, I turned around and pointed at the witches and made them vanish. Then I decided to fly (although I couldn't quite get the hang of it, I kept crashing). Although it wasn't my intent, in doing this I performed an experiment, using my own experience as a guide, on the hypothesis that the dream state is equivalent to the waking state.

Suffice it to say that the experiments we perform on our own experience turn out quite differently in the waking state. I trust this point hardly needs elaboration. And this is evidence (not proof) that other human beings you encounter while awake are indeed real, and not just creations of your own imagination. (Do you really believe otherwise, or did you just want to see if I could arrive at this conclusion starting from the basis of one's own experience?)

I think that the main point is still not grasped. The red part is gross misunderstanding of what I tried to convey. The ego self has no power to create anything. I am talking of an indivisible awareness of which ego self has no inkling. The blue part may be a dream within a dream or this experience of yours is actually akin to the experience of many mystics who refuse to be driven by a chimerical ego and become free of the ego self driven horrible dream. Ego self is the notion that "I am this body-brain".

Science is valid once it is axiomatically accepted that the diversities that appear to mind-senses are true. However, there will be times in experiential-phenomenal waking states (and often as nightmares in dream states) when the individual will cry in pain and will long for release. That will be the time when the individual will be forced to introspect "Who Am I?". Who am I that is suffering so much? For example, a man sleeps without anxiety etc.. He is free of anxiety and/or pain as long as he sleeps. The same man on waking up begins to cry about his problems. There will be times when such a man under duress may wish for a death. Is the man who is peacefully asleep different from the man who is under extreme anguish in waking state? What happens in this transition?

Spirituality has its use then. To one who is yet to experience the pain of ego destruction (that is inevitable some time or other), my writings here will appear as mere ramblings.

We can't prove it. What we can do, is propose hypotheses and then test them ---
Suffice it to say that the experiments we perform on our own experience turn out quite differently in the waking state. I trust this point hardly needs elaboration. And this is evidence (not proof) that other human beings you encounter while awake are indeed real, and not just creations of your own imagination. (Do you really believe otherwise, or did you just want to see if I could arrive at this conclusion starting from the basis of one's own experience?)

Science is always based on ratification by a third party, starting with the axiom that the third party is objective. I am questioning this axiom. All evidences you cite are based on the axiom. How does that prove the axiom? Let me repeat the essential part of what I said.

--- the awareness of you (an object) seeing an apple (another object) and a third party witness of the same object who ratifies your vision are all in single awareness.

You can comprehend it better if you compared this with the dream situation where you may see yourself, an apple, and me ratifying that you were eating the apple.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

And to answer your last question, yes I am a scientist, a physicist actually, although just a humble grad student. My area happens to be biophysics.

A biophysicist!? Fantastic. I may have to abuse this newly acquired fact and annoy you with questions from time to time. I came across references to literature in biophysics in systems biology, nanotechnology, and quantum physics (e.g, quantum dots, the physics of transmembrane signaling, spectroscopy, etc.), and still haven't figured out how the two areas which the "hard" scientific community knows the least about in terms of classical reductionism and mainstream scientific methods (biological systems and quantum mechanics) somehow emerged into a discipline in which research could be produced beyond that done in chemistry and the life sciences). After a fair amount of reading, the field seems to be mostly chemistry and appled phyiscs, and I'm still not sure how it is a seperate field (or rather, how joining the current state withing physics and that within biology leads down roads unexplored or would-be unexplored). It seems to me that the interdisciplinary research in chemistry and the life sciences kind of already covers everything biophysics might, as the remaining literature on biology consists of work not discusses (from what an outsider can see, anyway) within biophysics (e.g,. Rosen's work and those that followed him into systems biology). Theoretical Molecular Biophysics covers the Hodkin-Huxley model from 70 years ago, and varous topics in physcs, such as e.g, thermodynamics seem to be discussed outside of biophysics (e.g., The Thermodynamic Machinery of Life, Nonequilibrium Thermodynamics, Biological Physics (Progress in Mathematical Physics), etc.). Is it simply the interdisciplinary nature of the field that makes it seem as if it is rather redundant, or have I missed some vital research?

 

[Windwalker]

Arguing how this or that theory in science validates mystical experience and insight, is like opening the pages of the Bible and citing passages and then citing theologians to prove it. Both acts are handing over its unique insights to disciplines outside its domain. Why? Why is it that the great physicists themselves who had insight into these areas of physics and were the pioneers of them, did not believe they had anything to do with spirituality and mystical experience, and yet themselves were mystics? In other words they were mystics, not because of the science, but in spite of it. That seems telling to me.

 

[godnotgod]

I believe you have totally misconstrued what I said, but let's keep our eye on the ball here and not get side-tracked over who-did-what. The issue is whether, according to established physics, everything in the universe is entangled or not.

No, the issue is the one you raised: whether both videos are in agreement. You continue to compare the Penrose/Hameroff focus on the brain/microtubule phenomena with the first video's position of entanglement being universal, without paying attention to the final chapter of the second video, which basically concludes with the same idea.

This little issue also has to do with the scientific view called 'emergent theory', in which it sees the brain creating consciousness, contrasted with the mystic's view that consciousness is non-local and universal.

 

[godnotgod]

Arguing how this or that theory in science validates mystical experience and insight, is like opening the pages of the Bible and citing passages and then citing theologians to prove it. Both acts are handing over its unique insights to disciplines outside its domain.

Let's be clear about one thing here: the mystical experience does not rely on scientific information at all. If there were no science at all, there would still be mystics experiencing the universe directly. My point is that mystics do not need to validate their experience via science. They always look at scientific information via the mystical view, because the mystical view already holds everything. Science is merely pointing out details and features of the universe as it goes along. This is not to say, once again, that the mystic 'sees all, knows all'. That is poppycock. But the mystic sees beyond the surface details that science is focused on and penetrates right into the very heart of the matter. The scientific model of analysis actually prevents this from happening. So once the mystic is in union with the essence (and that is the whole point of his endeavor), how is it that any details that science 'discovers' via nibbling around the edges validate the mystic's first-hand experience?

 

[Sunstone]

But the mystic sees beyond the surface details that science is focused on and penetrates right into the very heart of the matter.

Example?

 

[Windwalker]

Let's be clear about one thing here: the mystical experience does not rely on scientific information at all. If there were no science at all, there would still be mystics experiencing the universe directly.

Directly, yes, but in what manner? I haven't put together my promised post about entomological pluralism yet, but will lay out some basics here: Eye of flesh, eye of mind, eye of spirit.

• To know the world directly with the eye of flesh it is a sensory-motor experience. You physically interact with the world on impulse and instinct, and information is imparted to you.
• When the human mind interacts with the physical word, trying to gain understanding this is mental models. Science examines the physical universe, using mind-objects to create models, that then as you point out, may distract them from seeing beyond those. They create blockage, if you will, blind spots. Science examining nature is a empiric-analytic process. It is essentially monological.
• When the human mind interacts with other human minds it gains its knowledge through interview, through dialog. You don't understand who I am by examining my brain, you come to know me through dialog - mind to mind. Examining my brain tells you nothing about who I am inside, except only on surface details. Mind to mind is hermeneutical, it is psychological relying on mental models as well of the mind-spaces, whereas mind to matter is empiric-analytical using mental models of the physical spaces.
• Enter now the domain of the spiritual. As the mind attempts to penetrate the spiritual, or the transcendent domain beyond mind. It too uses symbols, as that is what mind does to "see" the world. There is a sensed experience, an intuition, a faith of something beyond the mind and its worlds, and it attempts to penetrate or model such experiences using those. This is soteriological in nature, mandelic, archetypal. They are symbols of something beyond themselves in the domain of transcendent spirit.
• Finally, in the domain of spirit to spirit, that is direct apprehension beyond mental models, all symbols, or any physical or mental informational portals. This is Gnosis.

Now please note that anytime you try to talk about such Gnostic experience, you now descend into mind and its symbol sets, and they become highly symbolic. Then to discuss them with another, you are now working against their symbol sets. When then further we descend into using science to talk about the mystical, you are reducing the transcendent to an object in space and time that empiric-analytic inquiry investigates. It's like taking God and reducing him to a Yeti, and using scientific investigation to prove its existence.

The mystical experience does not tell you what science does, because it does not use models or symbols of any sort. All science is, is creating mental models of reality. But it does not look into the human mind domains, except in the "soft sciences", and it certainly does not look into the content of the spiritual, except in trying to "explain it" as a brain function or something, which is like trying to "explain" me, without even talking to me first hand, directly.

Does mystical experience unite all these domains? Only experientially as the whole person functioning within each sphere. But each domain has to interact within its own sphere. If you are going to speak of the material world, then you are going to use that mindset. If you are going to speak of culture, then you are going to speak of the experience of mind in a group context. If you are going to speak of spiritual experience, then you are going to speak of through the eye of spirit in its respective domain.

As a human, we are all of these domains. And to me spirituality ties them all together. But the language of science is the language of science. If you tie Buddha's enlightenment to a scientific model, the minute the model changes, Buddha loses his enlightenment.

 

[Straw Dog]

This little issue also has to do with the scientific view called 'emergent theory', in which it sees the brain creating consciousness, contrasted with the mystic's view that consciousness is non-local and universal.

But you're not speaking for all views among mystics here.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Alas, you have only physicists and other scientists (mainly, at least) to blame for this.... Also, considering the state of physics at the moment (on the cosmological/astrophysics scale, the quantum level, and the attempts to unify the two), the actual scientific literature often sounds at least as implausible.

True, physicists are partly to blame and that's why I'm trying to do my part to clear up the confusion here. Part of the problem is audience. When physicists communicate to an audience of scientists about things like quantum entanglement, they may say something about cats and basketballs but it's understood that this is for the purpose of pedagogy. Everyone in the audience knows that we are really talking about atoms and other tiny/special objects where quantum effects are significant. They know this just from the context, without it being stated explicitly. But to a lay audience, the context is lost and this can give the misleading impression that quantum effects at the level of atoms can be simply extrapolated out to the level of basketballs. Hey, maybe I'm entangled with my coffee at this moment; maybe a thought that enters my head on this side of the Earth instantly, non-locally affects my friend who resides on the other side of the Earth; maybe if I "observe" my boss' position, he'll fly out of the office at terribly high speed due to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

Is it simply the interdisciplinary nature of the field that makes it seem as if it is rather redundant, or have I missed some vital research?

It's interdisciplinary. It's redundant in the sense that natural phenomena do not naturally divide themselves up into biophysics vs. related fields. Biophysics is just a label for a research approach emphasizing the tools of physicists, and may include things like single-molecule manipulation, atomic force microscopy, x-ray crystallography, modeling DNA as an elastic rod, etc. But there are no hard and fast boundaries, at the nano-scale physics and chemistry and biology all sort of blend together. The way to deal with it is to have lots of collaboration across disciplines leveraging each person's area of expertise (physics vs. chemistry vs. biology). The world is just too complicated to do it otherwise these days.

 

[godnotgod]

The mystical experience does not tell you what science does, because it does not use models or symbols of any sort. All science is, is creating mental models of reality. But it does not look into the human mind domains, except in the "soft sciences", and it certainly does not look into the content of the spiritual, except in trying to "explain it" as a brain function or something, which is like trying to "explain" me, without even talking to me first hand, directly.

In the video 'Big Bang Buddhism' which I provided several posts earlier, the monk states that science looks out into the universe with powerful telescopes, but Buddhism looks instead through the telescope from the other end, back at that which is viewing.

 

[dust1n]

OK. In other words, it is the (back)ground, which defines figure, correct?

Background and figure define each other.