Richard Dawkins Facepalms at Deepak Chopra

[Rick O'Shez]

OK. Show me where the everyday world leaves off and the sub-atomic world begins.

The everyday world is what we humans experience. Mystics are humans and have no experiential access to the sub-atomic world.
And by the way, atoms really are very small!
How big is an atom

 

[Rick O'Shez]

You realize their illusory quality upon awakening.

That is an insight into the conditionality of experience and has nothing whatsoever to do with the sub-atomic world. Insight is always based on experience, and we can't experience atoms and quarks.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

You are deliberately misrepresenting what I'm saying.

No, you are the one who is deliberately misrepresenting both Buddhism and science. Your persistent attempts to conflate Buddhist insight into the everyday world of human experience with the workings of the sub-atomic world are very misleading and just plain wrong.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Re-read Lama Govinda's statement again:
"The Buddhist does not believe in an independent or separately existing external world, into whose dynamic forces he could insert himself. The external world and his inner world are for him only two sides of the same fabric, in which the threads of all forces and of all events, of all forms of consciousness and of their objects, are woven into an inseparable net of endless, mutually conditioned relations."

That's an insight into the conditionality of human experience and nothing whatsoever to do with atoms and quarks. You really are flogging a dead horse with the Buddhist teachings, you'd be better off looking to Hindu ideas which seem more in line with your theories of Cosmic Consciousness and Ultimate Reality. You're also flogging a dead horse with the references to quantum mechanics, you don't understand the basic science.

 

[godnotgod]

So it is dishonest to use this phenomenon to claim that the world is an illusion. As you say, it is real.

Buddhist lama, oh yeah. He may live from a begging bowl, but someone else spends the day knee-deep in night soil in the rice paddy. Just another variety of the scam that is religion.

I should have been clearer. I meant that: "the virtual mass being created remains as [if it were] real mass". It is not real mass; it is virtual mass, continually being re-created via fluctuations in the unified field.

Your last statement is one of complete ignorance of Asian culture and spirituality.

 

[godnotgod]

There is no "awakening" to be had. At least there is no evidence of it.

Then don't make absolute statements like: 'there is no awakening', when you simply do not know, especially in light of so many others who have reported such awakenings. If you really have the open mind of a man of Reason, you would allow the possibility of a state of consciousness beyond that of the mind of Reason.

And now you are saying contradictory things. Well somewhat contradictory. Rather you are making leaps that don't make sense together even if your argument was taken as true.

If the world is made of quantum fluctuations, which it seems to be, and lets say for just a moment that I agreed with you that it in some way shape or form that actually took away from the "realness" of the universe (which I don't allot but simply for the sake of this point...) WHY would this have anything to do with the "illusion" concept that this is all part of a lower consciousness? Great the universe isn't how we precieve it to be. This isn't new information. But why would you suddenly be able to tack on more baseless unknown qualities of the universe? You jump from "illusion that it is solid" to "this is a dream and we have a higher consciousness". Both seem totally independent and unconnected in your argument yet you tie them together as if they do.

There is no contradiction. Man is simply asleep, dreaming that this world is real, and that the character he is playing out is real, when it is fiction. Awakening shows him otherwise. We're still talking the same world; only the way it is viewed has changed. In fact, the ordinary mind is none other than the mind of Higher Consciousness. It's just that it has now awakened and a transformation of mind has occurred.

There can be calculations without a fully developed human brain yes.

That is not what I was referring to. You said that rudimentary thought occurs when the brain is regulating heartbeat, digestion, breathing, etc., so I asked if that meant that there is thinking without a thinker of thoughts.

 

[godnotgod]

No, you are the one who is deliberately misrepresenting both Buddhism and science. Your persistent attempts to conflate Buddhist insight into the everyday world of human experience with the workings of the sub-atomic world are very misleading and just plain wrong.

I never said that!

Once again:

There are not two worlds

The everyday 'physical' world is comprised totally of sub-atomic virtual particles. What we call 'things' are illusory.

That means that the nature of 'physical' reality is virtual. We only perceive it as 'real' because we do so via the 5 senses.

When the Buddha looked into the nature of the effervescent world, he saw that it was empty of inherent nature. IOW, there are no 'things' as such.

 

[godnotgod]

The everyday world is what we humans experience. Mystics are humans and have no experiential access to the sub-atomic world.
And by the way, atoms really are very small!
How big is an atom

So what? Answer the question: where does the everyday world leave off and the sub-atomic world begin? You do understand the question, right?

 

[Rick O'Shez]

That means that the nature of 'physical' reality is virtual. We only perceive it as 'real' because we do so via the 5 senses.

We only have the 5 senses. Or are you claiming the existence of a sixth super-sense which can directly experience the weird behaviour of the sub-atomic world?

 

[Rick O'Shez]

So what? Answer the question: where does the everyday world leave off and the sub-atomic world begin? You do understand the question, right?

It's a meaningless question because the everyday world is the one we experience, the world of Newtonian mechanics, the world where bricks are solid and will hurt your foot if you drop one. The Buddha experienced the everyday world and not the sub-atomic world, so please don't keep pretending he had an insight into quantum mechanics, it's utter nonsense.

You seem to think that quoting random snippets from Buddhism and Hinduism and quantum mechanics somehow makes your theories more credible, but it doesn't. You just end up misrepresenting all of them, trying to fit square pegs into round holes.

 

[godnotgod]

That's an insight into the conditionality of human experience and nothing whatsoever to do with atoms and quarks.

Again you are trying to conflate Buddhist insight into the everyday world of human experience with the workings of the sub-atomic world, this completely misrepresents both Buddhism and science.

What Quantum physics has done is to move closer to what the mystics have been saying all along:

"Nothing is more important about the quantum principle than this, that it destroys the concept of the world as 'sitting out there', with the observer safely separated from it by a 2O centimeter slab of plate glass. Even toobserveso miniscule an object as an electron, he must shatter the glass. He must reach in. He must install his chosen measuring equipment. It is up to him to decide whether he shall measure position or momentum. To install the equipment to measure the one prevents and excludes his installing the equipment to measure the other. Moreover, the measurement changes the state of the electron. The universe will never afterwards be the same. To describe what has happened, one has to cross out that old word 'observer' and put in its place the new word 'participator'. In some strange sense the universe is a participatory universe.'

The idea of 'participation instead of observation' has been formulated in modern physics only recently, but it is an idea which is well known to any student of mysticism. Mystical knowledge can never be obtained just by observation, but only by full participation with one's whole being. The notion of the participator is thus crucial to the Eastern world view, and the Eastern mystics have pushed this notion to the extreme, to a point where observer and observed, subject and object, are not only inseparable but also become indistinguishable. The mystics are not satisfied with a situation analogous to atomic physics, where the observer and the observed cannot be separated, but can still be distinguished. They go much further, and in deep meditation they arrive at a point where the distinction between observer and observed breaks down completely, where subject and object fuse into a unified undifferentiated whole....

This, then, is the final apprehension of the unity of all things. It is reached-so the mystics tell us-in a state of consciousness where one's individuality dissolves into an undifferentiated oneness, where the world of the senses is transcended and the notion of 'things' is left behind....

Modern physics, of course, works in a very different framework and cannot go that far in the experience of the unity of all things. But it has made a great step towards the world view of the Eastern mystics in atomic theory. Quantum theory has abolished the notion of fundamentally separated objects, has introduced the concept of the participator to replace that of the observer, and may even find it necessary to include the human consciousness in its description of the world. It has come to see the universe as an interconnected web of physical and mental relations whose parts are only defined through their connections to the whole."

Untitled

 

[Rick O'Shez]

More new-agey psuedo-sciencey word salad. Good luck with that.

 

[godnotgod]

We only have the 5 senses. Or are you claiming the existence of a sixth super-sense which can directly experience the weird behaviour of the sub-atomic world?

Why do you persist in jumping to idiotic conclusions?

So you claim to be Buddhisht, whatever that means. Use your noggin. What mode of consciousness do you suppose the Buddha used which allowed him the insight into the way the 5 senses work?

 

[godnotgod]

More new-agey psuedo-sciencey word salad. Good luck with that.

Way over your head, I'm afraid. Perhaps someday, but not today. More work, Buddhisht!

 

[godnotgod]

... the everyday world is the one we experience, the world of Newtonian mechanics, the world where bricks are solid and will hurt your foot if you drop one. .

OK, but I want you to show me where the world of Newtonian mechanics leaves off and the world of sub-atomic particles begins. You claim they are two different worlds; I am saying they are one and the same. I really don't think you understand this simple question, but I'll give it one more try. Go for it.

 

[Looncall]

What Quantum physics has done is to move closer to what the mystics have been saying all along:

"Nothing is more important about the quantum principle than this, that it destroys the concept of the world as 'sitting out there', with the observer safely separated from it by a 2O centimeter slab of plate glass. Even toobserveso miniscule an object as an electron, he must shatter the glass. He must reach in. He must install his chosen measuring equipment. It is up to him to decide whether he shall measure position or momentum. To install the equipment to measure the one prevents and excludes his installing the equipment to measure the other. Moreover, the measurement changes the state of the electron. The universe will never afterwards be the same. To describe what has happened, one has to cross out that old word 'observer' and put in its place the new word 'participator'. In some strange sense the universe is a participatory universe.'

The idea of 'participation instead of observation' has been formulated in modern physics only recently, but it is an idea which is well known to any student of mysticism. Mystical knowledge can never be obtained just by observation, but only by full participation with one's whole being. The notion of the participator is thus crucial to the Eastern world view, and the Eastern mystics have pushed this notion to the extreme, to a point where observer and observed, subject and object, are not only inseparable but also become indistinguishable. The mystics are not satisfied with a situation analogous to atomic physics, where the observer and the observed cannot be separated, but can still be distinguished. They go much further, and in deep meditation they arrive at a point where the distinction between observer and observed breaks down completely, where subject and object fuse into a unified undifferentiated whole....

This, then, is the final apprehension of the unity of all things. It is reached-so the mystics tell us-in a state of consciousness where one's individuality dissolves into an undifferentiated oneness, where the world of the senses is transcended and the notion of 'things' is left behind....

Modern physics, of course, works in a very different framework and cannot go that far in the experience of the unity of all things. But it has made a great step towards the world view of the Eastern mystics in atomic theory. Quantum theory has abolished the notion of fundamentally separated objects, has introduced the concept of the participator to replace that of the observer, and may even find it necessary to include the human consciousness in its description of the world. It has come to see the universe as an interconnected web of physical and mental relations whose parts are only defined through their connections to the whole."

Untitled

Where do you get all this specious crap? It is a horrible misuse of science. (By the way, you should indicate your sources when you cut-and-paste.)

The eastern mystics are/were con men making up elaborate word salad to gull the gullible, and so are the so-called quantum mystics. They are just the latest in a long line of mountebanks getting others to do the hard work of survival.

 

[tiki]

Dawkins is arrogant intolerant evangelist same as who he accuses. #AngryAtheists

 

[outhouse]

Dawkins is arrogant intolerant evangelist same as who he accuses. #AngryAtheists

And Deepak Chopra is imaginative and makes it up as he goes creating and teaching a pseudo reality.

 

[tiki]

And Deepak Chopra is imaginative and makes it up as he goes creating and teaching a pseudo reality.

Good point. It excuses mocking and insulting few billions people that do not believe as you! Always its gonna help a discussion if you mock and insult people.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

What Quantum physics has done is to move closer to what the mystics have been saying all along:

"Nothing is more important about the quantum principle than this, that it destroys the concept of the world as 'sitting out there', with the observer safely separated from it by a 2O centimeter slab of plate glass. Even toobserveso miniscule an object as an electron, he must shatter the glass. He must reach in. He must install his chosen measuring equipment. It is up to him to decide whether he shall measure position or momentum. To install the equipment to measure the one prevents and excludes his installing the equipment to measure the other. Moreover, the measurement changes the state of the electron. The universe will never afterwards be the same. To describe what has happened, one has to cross out that old word 'observer' and put in its place the new word 'participator'. In some strange sense the universe is a participatory universe.'

The idea of 'participation instead of observation' has been formulated in modern physics only recently, but it is an idea which is well known to any student of mysticism. Mystical knowledge can never be obtained just by observation, but only by full participation with one's whole being. The notion of the participator is thus crucial to the Eastern world view, and the Eastern mystics have pushed this notion to the extreme, to a point where observer and observed, subject and object, are not only inseparable but also become indistinguishable. The mystics are not satisfied with a situation analogous to atomic physics, where the observer and the observed cannot be separated, but can still be distinguished. They go much further, and in deep meditation they arrive at a point where the distinction between observer and observed breaks down completely, where subject and object fuse into a unified undifferentiated whole....

This, then, is the final apprehension of the unity of all things. It is reached-so the mystics tell us-in a state of consciousness where one's individuality dissolves into an undifferentiated oneness, where the world of the senses is transcended and the notion of 'things' is left behind....

Modern physics, of course, works in a very different framework and cannot go that far in the experience of the unity of all things. But it has made a great step towards the world view of the Eastern mystics in atomic theory. Quantum theory has abolished the notion of fundamentally separated objects, has introduced the concept of the participator to replace that of the observer, and may even find it necessary to include the human consciousness in its description of the world. It has come to see the universe as an interconnected web of physical and mental relations whose parts are only defined through their connections to the whole."

Untitled

you're absolutely right- not so long ago, many atheist academics declared classical physics a complete and immutable explanation for the physical world, making God 'redundant'.
It's no coincidence that Planck was a skeptic of atheism-

exactly the same for evolution, the same pressure to stop at the simplest superficial explanation, slap a 'science' label on it and walk away

not so long ago, many atheist academics declared classical physics an 'immuatble' explanation