Is The Uncertainty Principle Incompatible With Determinism?

In addition to the Water that makes up water and ice, there are many other things which make up the universe as well. Even among the mystics, water was not the only element.

 

In short .. the big bang.

 

Which would still imply Oneness

 

Of course not. The difference is seeing them as essentially separate or not.

 

If your only point is that there was a universal oneness at the beginning of the universe and we should be aware of this fundamental connectivity, then I think you're arguing with phantoms. You (particularly you with how liberal you are in regards to supporting evidence) can easily point to the mainstream science theory of a 'Big Bang Singularity' or all the Grand Unified Theories waiting in the wings to expand/replace the Big Bang theory, as all ideas that point to there being a fundamental oneness to the universe and we are in agreement there.

If your point is that consciousness is all pervasive, that therefore the implications are I should approach my desk or the basketball hoop at the local park with the same respect as conscious agents like a person or even a cat/dog, then you're on your own there. If you mean there is like a conscious universal overseer, I am curious as to why you are hesitant to call it God?

 

I would combine the two first ones. The big bang theory is already pointing towards Oneness, and so everything that has existed since that point still has the same essential oneness. There could be multiple overseers, elementals, etc. or not, but nonetheless, it's all One in the Universe. This fundamental understanding in relationship to a person or to even a cup, shifts your relationship to it automatically. A cup is of the same ultimate essence as the Empire State Building, Michael Jordan, or a homeless person.

 

So what? "Same ultimate essence"? Where do we go with that? Must we all join hands and chant OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHM! Big Bang is a theoretical construct expressing our best current scientific understanding of the cosmological evidence.That's a bit different from "The Truth". Like all of our "knowledge", it rests on assumptions: the laws of physics are universal, the universe is homogeneous, and our observations of it aren't from a privileged location (e.g., its center). Assumptions have a way of making an ass of u and me. If any of them are wrong, Big Bang doesn't hold up, and some alternative like Steady State, Eternal Inflation, the Oscillating Model, etc., might become the preferred view. Even if Big Bang is true, as I believe it is (I'm willing to accept the assumptions), I don't think "fundamental oneness" is anything to get mystical about. Whether or not historical origins trump obvious differences among the Empire State Building, Michael Jordan, and a homeless person depends on subjective values and perceptions, and what you may or may not be smoking or drinking at the time.

 

Actually, it makes a huge difference of whether you perceive Oneness or not. Wars only exist because humans are caught up in Egoic Duality. If there was a collective shift to a realization of Oneness, we would operate more like one organism on planet Earth. Treat it from a Fractal perspective.

Oneness on both an internal and external level also confirms As Above, So Below, Magick, and the interaction of humans' consciousness with the Universal Consciousness field.

You're willing to accept the assumptions? You're being hypocritical and making an ass of yourself.

 

Perception of oneness can also lead to dehumanizing reductionism, e.g., "we're all 'nothing but' atoms, matter in motion, etc. "Same ultimate essence". Perception is just that: a subjective apprehension of reality by means of demonstrably faulty senses. Your New Age jargon may give you and others the illusion of insight into reality, but I doubt it will be of much use in solving the world's problems.Translated: Wars only exist because humans are driven by attachment to their egos. If we came to accept the idea that others are similar to us and that our individual egos aren't that important, we could work things our co-operatively. I agree, but the problem is getting others to do so on a global level. The world's religious leaders and great moral philosophers have been preaching it for eons to no avail, and their "followers" have even engaged in warfare over who preached it best. Biologist E.O. Wilson thinks that the duality between competition and co-operation is built into our brains by evolution. If Magick and the Universal Consciousnss are up to the job, bring them on, but if you have to convince others that they are more than fuzzy ideas you have a difficult task ahead.

As for your accusation of hypocrisy, I plead inevitability. All of our knowledge and beliefs, including science, rest on networks of assumptions that are unavoidable. Most basic are the ones Santayana called "animal faith". For example, as I type this, I assume that you and the other persons I send this to are real. Life is essentially a gamble in which I make bets about reality, such as the "joyful bet" Luther called religious faith. But I try to make educated bets based on reason and the best available evidence. I think the Big Bang theory fits that definition, as do a majority of scientists who study cosmology. My reference to the limitations of assumptions underscores the gambler's dilemma--the risk of being wrong. While I make my way confidently through life on the basis of my judgments about best evidence, I also realize that I'm probably wrong about three-quarters or more of these. C'est la vie.

 

I'm still stuck on how you view a cup as conscious, even going by your own speculation you suggested the brain may be just a receiver to make us conscious, which would still be an integral aspect of perceptonium and there is no such parallel with a cup. Maybe you were using that word as a placeholder for lacking of a better, until we started mentioning 'oneness' and 'essence.'

Your 'oneness' idea seems a bit fluff, like I don't see it as very practical necessarily but on the surface it appears fairly harmless as a belief towards some of life's unanswerables. I don't really get okie's gripe particularly with his Christian background in mind. The idea slightly reminds me of a musing Richard Dawkins has in one of his book regarding the timeline of evolution and life being interconnected. There was a particular case he talks about where they perform tests on a monkey, which essentially would equate to torture if done to another human. In illustrating the longevity of the evolutionary timescale as well as how narrow focused our ethics and norms are, he prompts the question on how far back of a timescale would we be looking at where performing the tests on the monkey would be considered unethical?

 

There’s a revolution going on in science.
A genuine paradigm shift. While mainstream science remains materialist, a substantial number of scientists are supporting and developing a paradigm based on the primacy of consciousness.Dr. Amit Goswami, Ph.D, a pioneer of this revolutionary new perspective within science shares with us his vision of the unlimited potential of consciousness as the ground of all being, and how this revelation can actually help us to live better. The Quantum Activist tells the story of a man who challenges us to rethink our very notions of existence and reality, with a force and scope not felt since Einstein. This film bridges the gap between God and Science. The work of Goswami, with stunning precision and without straying from the rigors of quantum mechanics, reveals the overarching unity inherent in the worlds major religions and mystical traditions.

www.quantumactivist.com

 

I think copying and pasting the same thing into a half dozen different threads is a bit cheesy and is why people feel you are a demagogue.

Maybe Dr Goswami could explain to these people his concept of overarching unity inherent in the worlds major religions and mystical traditions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcqFWr6h4qc

 

You saw the studies for yourself. What are your thoughts on them?

 

"I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics"

-Richard Feynman

I think that there's a lot of armchair physicists out there who think that because there is something spooky with quantum mechanics and because there is something spooky with consciousness that therefore the two are linked in these obvious ways.

I think I need way, way more data before I form any kind of conclusion, even a tentative one.

I found the NDE paper to be quite spurious; right in the abstract it says "The NDE is an authentic experience which cannot be simply reduced to imagination, hallucination, lack of oxygen, etc". That is called begging the question; starting from that assumption will obviously force you to conclude that something mystical is happening. I'm nowhere near convinced that NDEs are not simply a result of brain physiology and trauma, and the mind-boggling complexity of consciousness.

As someone who has experienced hundreds of psychedelic experiences I'm always amused and baffled when people say of some phenomenon, "It couldn't have just been created by the mind" . . . it's an odd way of celebrating the majesty and power of consciousness to box it into parameters which fit the bill of the particular phenomena you wish to explain. I think we havent' even got a clue as to just what the human mind is capable of "just imagining" . . . for one, our entire reality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY

 

The fact is, that the data is the data. Non-local communication is happening on repeated laboratory experiments. All you're going to do is say "well, I don't think we have a clue as to what Quantum Mechanics is. It can't be something spooky (you seem to have this opinion more than not), even though something spooky is going on with quantum mechanics and consciousness. And there's no way they could be related, because I mean, that would be too Spiritual. That's what Mystics have always talked about. But they can't be right"?

If everything is in the mind but reality is made out of Consciousness, then your dilemma of psychedelic trips is solved in regards to whether it's a hallucination or not. It's both subjective and objective because the subjective is of the same substance as the objective.

And why are you always referencing the "experts" when it is convenient for you, because "they would know", but when I am referencing someone whose textbook is a staple in introductory University courses, he's nothing more than an "armchair physicist"?

I'm always baffled at the notion that a certain drug can't allow you to peer certain aspects of reality that are otherwise incapable of being perceived in your default state of consciousness, and that it's written off as nothing but in the mind, and therefore a hallucination.

You already try to argue all the time that EVERYTHING is in your mind, so are you arguing that EVERYTHING is a hallucination? And if all of your experience of "outer" reality is nothing more than in your mind, then that's no different than saying what Aswami is saying, which is that all that is "out there" is one and the same as all that's "inside", because all is made out of the same Consciousness. This is what the Hermetics also said, and many other Mystics.

Even The Buddha proclaimed "I and all other beings have Awakened simultaneously". What this means is that he woke up to "The One".

 

Well like I've heard Terence McKenna suggest, I think we should embrace hallucination in regards to psychedelic drugs. There are some psychedelic users who try to distance themselves from the term, probably because of the associations with mental illness, it perhaps being a slight misnomer for the vast majority of psychedelic phenomena, as well as hallucination not being a phenomena that's particularly valued in our society.

I think most who have done psychedelics and even those who have done studies on them see a value in these experiences in regards to being able to see certain aspects of reality that are not normally readily accessible, however in terms of hallucinatory content, from what I've read they tend to fail in terms of providing evidence to some external reality unto themselves.

 

Look at the drawings that are done when people are tripping. Isn't that a representation of how outer reality changes? Artists' entire style changes.

 

I tend to think that psychedelics alter the "abstraction model" of our psyche. Our minds abstract information, categorizing it into certain categories and such. By restructuring the abstraction model, you can see the same thing from a new perspective. Much like in mathematics, expressions and functions can be refactored in different ways, allowing you to see aspects of it that weren't apparent before even though the value of the expression or the behavior of the expression is the same. The same mathematic expression can be manipulated, factored, etc in numerous different ways, all of them being equivalent but one particular form may be more useful or allow more insight dependent upon what exactly your intentions are.

I think the mind works this way, it forms abstraction models it uses to interpret the external reality in a meaningful way. By refactoring this model, some aspects that were hidden behind layers of abstraction are now able to become accessible.

 

The data is highly ambiguous and sparse. These lab experiments are nowhere near the number and rigour that would allow us conclude anything like this.

It would help you if you stopped putting words in my mouth and especially assuming what my stance is on things considering you get it wrong most of the time. Just engage in a normal conversation like an adult instead of pitting me against things in order to make me fit into your narrative of 2012 et al. For example, I didn't say quantum mechanics isn't spooky, i said it IS spooky. That's a big difference, and if you would just slow your roll and focus more on learning rather than on trying to score Gotcha's, you would benefit more.

I also didn't say there's no way that consciousness and QM could be related, I said that it's not good to just assume so from limited data. It's got nothing to do with spirituality, and this is getting tiring dude. I am very spiritual. I think true, transformative spirituality is the only game in town.

Your category of "the Mystics" also is highly suspect, undefined, and we could form a thread just to argue about what and who constitutes a "mystic".

Sure, but then a hallucination is still a hallucination right? Like, being stranded in the desert and seeing an oasis that isn't actually there, is still seeing something that isn't actually there, even if all reality is consciousness (whatever that means). Calling everything one thing actually doesn't get you anywhere (this is the crux of the atheism/pantheism symmetry).

Go slower. You majorly misread this, as you misread in the deleted thread when I referenced problems with the radio interpretation of consciousness.

I wasn't calling a PhD physicist an armchair physicist; that would be like calling a married man a bachelor. Do you really think I am operating on that level?

Armchair physicist is a term to describe virtually anybody who ISNT a PhD physicist.

(The problems I referenced in the deleted thread were not problems with one's reputation in the scientific community, again, that is so far below what I was speaking about. I was referencing the scientific problems of postulating a new mechanism for consciousness, ie, the radio analogy. It seems to have more "moving parts" than an emergent model and thus is subject to Occam's Razor from a purely hypothetical standpoint.)

Why does this baffle you? You know that if you eat large amounts of diphenhydramine that you may converse with friends who are not really there and utilize objects to perform tasks which are not even in front of you or being performed. You know that it is possible to perceive any kind of phenomena under all kinds of conditions, and that phenomena is not "really" happening. So why does a psychedelic experience get a free pass? It's not like there's no such things as hallucinations right

There's nothing "nothing but" about being in the mind. It's all we know.

Again with the references to the hermetics and mystics. I really am not interested to be quite honest. I don't see the relevance; even if they arrived at a correct interpretation of reality, they did it through a modality quite different than what we are discussing here, which is QM and science. I have no dogmatic beef with any "mystics" or "hermetics" because I simply do not know to whom you are refering nor what their works are.

It makes no sense to say that "everything" is a hallucination because we define hallucination as being different from a correct perception of true reality. It would be like saying "Everything is a mirage" . . . well then, what is "miraging"?

If you say so. I don't buy it wholesale. Maybe he didn't even say that; maybe he didn't even exist. Who cares what some guy said anyways? Sounds pretty poetic to me. Maybe he had some true, profound discoveries, and also a sprinkling of false discoveries that seemed true to a guy living in his place and time with his worldview. Maybe that statement makes sense to a man having a transcendental experience in a Hindu society where they believe that all selves are one self. Is that true? Is that a thing?

Seek more questions instead of thinking you have all the answers already.



I stumbled across this and thought it was pretty cool. Not making any claims that it's 100% correct but it gets us thinking:




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjfaoe847qQ

^ Absolutely watch the "Lean Back" linked at the end of that video! If you think you've got reality, the brain, and consciousness figured out, you're really hallucinating

 

I am a mystic. I come from the standpoint that there is no way we can come from a place of consciousness, not otherwise knowing what consciousness is, and then go back and say "My consciousness is this, because my consciousness says so."

If you have no idea what your consciousness is in the first place, you have no idea how it is working, and therefore you have no idea if the information it garners is credible. There's literally no feasible way of utilizing consciousness as a measuring device to ultimately determine anything about consciousness. As I say, it would be like using a ruler to determine that it itself is twelve inches long.

So I call myself a mystic, because I believe in the existence of an utter mystery through which all things possess a sense of mystery. I think this should qualify me as a mystic, unless being a mystic means I have to burn incense and gaze into crystal balls.