defining conciousness

I tried, but I'm not sure I follow what you're getting at As far as I understand, consciousness is produced by the interaction of different parts of the brain. There's no reason to assume that anything outside of a brain 'produces' or experiences consciousness.

I say no reason; there is no rational reason. There are very good psychological reasons why so many make that assumption, to do with something called "agency detection". We are programmed to be aware of others, their actions and their intentions. So much so that it is intuitive to assume that whenever things of importance happen, they are caused by something with intentions, and they happen for a reason. This is a natural response. It takes an unintuitive leap to actually decide that some things are not caused in this way. This is I think where much spiritual belief comes from - it's the natural application of our tendency to detect agency and intention. These tendencies exist for very good evolutionary reasons

 

ok i'll try again from another angle...
as concious entities, our entire makeup is a result of the external physical environment. Based on the information we recieve from this external physical environment, we then change or accept it acording to our personalities.

our personalities are made up of biases which we form about the external physical environment depending upon our past experiences.

so our personalities are totally dependent on the external environment

and so as concious entities effecting the external environment we are also effecting each other. and cuasing us again to effect the xternal environment.
but we could never have been capable of effecting the environment unless itself had allowed us to do so...
we are questioning because we can, the external environment has allowed this to be so, and so we are the external environment questioning itself through the eyes of humans.

the universe has probably created loads of the pockets of doubt across itself.. us and the earth is just one of many.

 

Evolutionary biology demonstrates how things as complicated as human brains can come to exist as a result of totally blind and random processes, there is absolutely no requirement for any sort of design or intent or purpose to explain something like the human mind.

It's interesting that you say the universe "allows" this to be and is therefore "questioning". That something gives rise to something else doesn't mean that thing was intended. Cause is not the same thing as purpose.

You are attributing humanlike mental processes and intentions to the universe and as such begging the question - it's a circular argument. The argument goes: question - "How is the universe conscious?" answer - "Because it intends". But it cannot intend without consciousness in the first place, so you're assuming the thing you're trying to prove.

There's no requirement to make such an assumption, it doesn't fit with anything we know about how the universe works. There is no likely mechanism for it, and no reason to assume anything other than a human mind is capable of intending in this way. The only reasons for this kind of assumption are psychological, an effect I outlined in my last post

A question: how would you define this belief? Is it a position of faith? Why do you believe this?

 

i'm not sure how or even why it would need to be defined 'tis but another philosophy in the sea of human questioning.

however why i belive this is a different matter..
humans have been spiritual since the begining but it has been twisted and bastardised through religion dictating how people should be spiritual.

before judiaism, christianinty and islam, most spritual philosophies were very similar even tho they spawned thousands of miles away from eachother.
Taking the prechristian european beliefs of the wiccan, the eastern beliefs of tao which later became zen, and the native american beliefs both north and south, we find similarities in terms of energy webs, the power of mind and the ability to spiritualy transend, to become one with the flow of energies.

people involved in these beliefs have been transending for centuries.. even some of those who follow the more opressive modern religions have transended.
so are we to beleive that this is all mumbo jumbo as likely as being abducted by aliens?
or is there something more to it.

there are things that cant be explained by science yet.. but that is no reason to suggest they dont exist... dark matter has only just been discovered but it and its effects have always existed.

 

This is a fascinating topic

That very similar religious ideas have been spawned in very different cultures tells us something about the human mind and its innate dependence on certain ways of perceiving. The earliest religious ideas are actually 'ancestor worship'... that is, the belief that when a relative dies their spirit lives on, disembodied but still with intentions and awareness, and can to an extent perform actions as an incorporeal spirit. This is used to explain natural phenomena that hold social import - your neighbour's house fell down because he angered a spirit. Notice that spirits and gods, however the ideas are formulated, always perceive things in a way that is remarkably similar to the way humans perceive ... why should this be? Because we create them according to the only way we know how to perceive. Why should god or the universal consciousness, whichever you call it, have the same kind of consciousness, the same basic aims, fears and intentions as us? Because they are our own projections

This is all true. Spirituality is a very real phenomeon, it's fundamental to how most people think about their existence. The problem if you're interested in truth and logic is to try to understand what causes these beliefs, given that we have practically elimated the 'truth' of such beliefs as being extremely improbable. So we need to look for more probable sources for these innate human concepts. I'm very interested in understanding the innate spiritual beliefs that humans have, and always have had. An approach from the angle of evolutionary psychology seems to me to provide the best and most probable explanation I have encountered *so far*

 

" if the truth can be told as to be understood, it willbe believed."

this is fundimental to the personification of the universal spirit.
when humans began losing the power of transendence to thier own ignorance and will for power, those who did transend had to try and expalin this to their people.. the best way has always been personification... all the religious texts personify the changing of ages. the new testament is a personification of sun worship through the idea of this christ character.

to suggest that the conciousness that the universe holds is the same or similar to that of humans is fickle and wholey inprobable, but sometimes necessary beleif:

It is not what you belive, but the intent with which you believe it.

but the idea of a gloabl or universal conciousness is only improbable from your angle.
100 years ago it was improbable that we would land on the moon or have atom bombs or solar powered cars... now tho.. not so.

there are somethings that are real and yet improbable... for example
when me and my brothers were born my aunt experienced labour pains, and she was on the other side of the world, ok i thought she is a twin with my mum maybe some wierd psycic link was involved. then however my mother had labour pains when natalie went into labour with our child... our son was born a week early and on the other side of the world from my mother.

improbable.. but real...
improbable is not impossible... just because your method of universe analysis says it's improbable doesn't means it doesn't exist.

 

I don't want to burst the bubble (that's not my intention at all) but your mother and aunt probably have stomach aches and pains of varying intensity quite often. Once when it happens to coincide with an important event this commonplace and unremarkable fact takes on significance. We've all had dreams about people then heard from them the next day. If coincidences like that never happened you should start to get worried because it is so very likely that they will.

I asked before if this was a spiritual belief, and it does seem to have that character to me. If so I'll stop pouring my messy scepticism all over it I have an annoying habit of wanting to understand how things actually work and thinking about likely mechanisms to explain the things we all experience For me mystical explanations are just a cop-out because they provide no mechanism, they just make assertions which can't be backed up.

(We covered this before: Improbable does not mean impossible - it means very unlikely. We should never close off the improbable as a possible explanation but Occam's razor teaches us that as a rule the simplest explanation requiring the fewest unlikely steps is *usually* the best.)

 

that is exactly what i expected you to say.. and is what people viewing the world from your angle often say.. but my mother is a very health lady and knows what labour pains feel like (3 times)...so for her to feel labour pains the exact same hour that natalie first felt hers seems to be a bit too coincidental... it may very well be coincidence... but for someone viewing the world from my angle, saying it is coincidence is the cop out.

 

Well, coincidence is the most likely explanation. If you choose to believe in an explanation which is probably the wrong one, then that I suppose is the very definition of a faith.

There are many *possible* explanations; one of which is that the Flying Spaghetti Monster came and invisibly poked your mother's stomach with His Noodly Appendage. Why not pick that one? I would suggest it's because you subconsciously choose to interpret the available evidence in a way which you find psychologically appealing or comforting. That is very often the case with these kinds of ideas - it shows a lack of interest in properly investigating and evaluating according to the best evidence available in favour of what is probably a comforting delusion.

 

or maybe, the thought that it is a coincidence is the way you interpret it to be most psycologically appealing or comforting to you.. the fact that you have chosen to dismiss it as "just coincidence" shows lack of intrest in properly investingating the pheonomenom... it shows that you conform well to the hardline scientific explanation that prevents you from evaluating the universe in anyother way than that which is proven to be true.

coincidence is the scientific equivelent of "god did it"

 

I would disagree with that because if something can be explained according to known mechanisms it is the safest and most rational thing to assume that those known mechanisms are in fact likely responsible.

Of course this does not mean we should stop seeking to understand the things we can't yet explain

 

Okay, spanner in works.

A fly percieves its environment at a much higher speed than humans. If a human tried to live as a fly he would be fascinated to see humans standing still not doing a lot.

Similarly a human percieves his environment (stimuli) at a much higher speed than universes interact with their surroundings. Occasionally one universe's brain's synapses (a human for instance) might trigger, through a delayed reaction to stimuli (eg. subconciously preparing for labour pains, conveyed to Auntie in a telphone conversation) an impulse (false labour pains) in an unconnected synapse (Auntie!).

What I am trying to say is, the conciousness of the universe may or may not exist, but it could be separate to the coincidence/"delayed reaction" of the phantom labour pains.

We may have opened two discussions here!

 

and so who is responsible for explaining it

we should not really be set in the avid contradictions we have found ourselves in... but instead be pooling the resources of knowledge to try and explain what can not yet be explained... rather than waiting for the magickal man with a white coat and a phd to tell us how to think.

we should be focusing on being co-creators of relaity rather than passive consumers of it.

so rather than commiting things to the realm of the coincidental, or suggesting that god made it in a soup bowl we should be trying to enrich our own reality with explainations.

so what if we were to suggest that humans projected an electro magnetic field which some people report to being able to see and call auras.
now these auras are contunually fluctuating dependent on the owners state of mind. These fluctuations cause waves that travel through the astral planes like ripples in a pond.
if anothers aura is vibrating on a similar wavelength then the information can be picked up and interpreted subcociuosly into that persons reality.

 

definitely.. the thread has taken a new and interesting twist...

i think it pays to give explaining a go.. otherwise as i said above.. we are merely passive consumers of other peoples reality.

 

I tend to agree but I would suggest that pinning yourself down to particular explanations without any evidence or reason to do so (in other words mere conjecture or speculation) is doing precisely that - suggesting that god made it in a soupbowl.

There are endless possiblities for investigation and discovery yet to be made, it's of pivotal importance to keep an open mind. Why pin yourself to a conjecture? You should let the evidence guide your thoughts, not your thought guide a selective interpretation of the evidence

Another conjecture which like the psychic connection thing, cannot be supported with evidence and which rational investigation proves to be probably wrong.

I would sugest that believing this kind of thing despite evidence to the contrary - and good evidence which provides fascinating psychological explanations of it - is to close yourself off to the true wonders of existence

 

are you saying that there is no electro magnetic radiation given off from humans, and suggesting that there are no auras even tho thousands of people claim to be able to see them. and science has already proven that humans build bioelectromagnectic crystals in the cortex and that even bones carry a certain amount of electromagnetic conductivity.

so why is it probably wrong to assume that all this electromagnetic activity is devoid of field or aura, which can be picked up by others.

 

Of course humans give off tiny electromagnetic fields. They are miniscule and almost certainly imperceptible to the human eye. No controlled study has ever demonstrated a human ability to detect electromagnetism at the levels produced by the human body with the naked eye. That thousands of people see them is fascinating but they are probably not experiencing what they claim to be. (Millions think they talk to god!)

This is the purpose of rational investigation: to go beyond what seems to be so and to truly embrace the wonder of possibility

 

so not condemming it to coincidence then...
just out of interest, do you have an explaination other than coincidence... it would be nice to hear an explaination rather than a damning critisism.

 

Coincidence doesn't seem like it could play a part in the manifestation of visual phenomena

I don't know what the explanation is. There are many possibilities.

One possibility is that the human body gives off electromagnetic radiation which is as yet undetected by instruments designed for that purpose; that the body somehow modulates its magnetic field according the person's wellbeing by an unknown mechanism; that this field is then picked up by light sensors (eyes) which are not usually capable of detecting this kind of radiation; but that this only happens in some people and never happens under laboratory conditions.

Another possible explanation is that the Flying Spaghetti Monster (pasta be upon him), in His Infinite Noodliness, flies down and surrounds some people with a ring of tagliatelle. He coats this tagliatelle in tomatoey, pestoey or cheesey sauces; and this accounts for the colour that some people sometimes see.

Yet another is that those who experience visual phenomena like auras are experiencing some form of synesthaesia (where sense perceptions get muddled up due to a developmental abnormality in the brain); we constantly pick up on a plethora of imperceptible signals that people give off which can give us clues as to their wellbeing, state of mind, mood, etc. Perhaps this emotional response is sometimes experienced by some people as a visual sense perception.

I really couldn't say what causes this phenomenon. But the last explanation I proposed at least is a hypothesis which provides a possible mechanism which is not out of keeping with things we already know about how minds and electromagnetism and perception of light work. It does not multiply entities beyond necessity and as such obeys Occam's razor. It would of course be foolish to accept this hypotheses as a viable theory until tests were done to verify its likelihood. The same goes for all three theories I propose, but I think I know which one I would be tempted to test first

 

ok... going with the last and more probable theory; can we say that aura's or mind reading or anything thats a little bit goofy can be attributed to subconcious interpretations of someone elses subconcious messages sent through posture or tonal inflection in voice or whatever. making it a subconcious reflection of self.

now, the interpretations of someones subcocious reflection of self will be different with each reader, as interpretation is based on the biasas of personality.

so i guess the next question is;
Can a subconcious reflection of self, once read by another, change the recievers subconcious reflection, and thereby causing a wave of 'subliminology'?