That seems to be another way of saying that 'information' within the universe (and perhaps beyond the universe) is massively integrated, which many physicists and mystics alike believe. What further conclusions can we reach from that premise concerning the nature of consciousness as an aptitude of embodied living entities? Why separate 'the mind' from the experientially embodied consciousness out of which it is obviously developed?
-
NEW! LOWEST RATES EVER -- SUPPORT THE SHOW AND ENJOY THE VERY BEST PREMIUM PARACAST EXPERIENCE! Welcome to The Paracast+, eight years young! For a low subscription fee, you can download the ad-free version of The Paracast and the exclusive, member-only, After The Paracast bonus podcast, featuring color commentary, exclusive interviews, the continuation of interviews that began on the main episode of The Paracast. We also offer lifetime memberships! Flash! Take advantage of our lowest rates ever! Act now! It's easier than ever to susbcribe! You can sign up right here!
February 1, 2015 — Burnt State
- Thread starter Gene Steinberg
- Start date
Free episodes:
That seems to be another way of saying that 'information' within the universe (and perhaps beyond the universe) is massively integrated, which many physicists and mystics alike believe. What further conclusions can we reach from that premise concerning the nature of consciousness as an aptitude of embodied living entities? Why separate 'the mind' from the experientially embodied consciousness out of which it is obviously developed?
S
smcder
Guest
Truly a theory whose grasp exceeds its reach ...
Also, I would like to have one of those coins. I would go everywhere and ask people for change.
S
smcder
Guest
I just read that in a Juvenille Non Fiction book the brain continues to pump out signals 37 hours after death.
Re reflection theory: imagine sitting on a couch projecting reflections onto a wall from two mirrors one is holding in the hands. On the wall, the reflections seem very far apart and possess amazing capabilities of movement, etc. But in "reality" their sources are very close together in space (albeit a different space) and have mundane movements.
That is just a metaphor, of course.
More precisely it's an analogy, and analogies can be, often are, highly misleading.
You also wrote above:
If 3D space is an illusion, then travelling "through" it may be an illusion as well.
Possible. But the more we attempt to reduce all experience to an illusion, the closer we come to the currently dominant 'meme' that we live in a virtual reality rather than an actual reality. That line of thought accords well, of course, with the abstractness of most information theory employed as a computational path to understanding consciousness, which is why I think it appeals to you. If all reality is virtual, there is no actual reality to be explored, either locally or nonlocally.
Very interesting. Were any experimental sources cited to support that claim?
S
smcder
Guest
Ill look and see ... it was a donated book, most of which end up at my house ...
If so, that phenomenon needs to be studied alongside the discovery reported by von Lommel that a number of deep coma patients (formerly considered to be 'brain-dead', vegetative) have been demonstrated to show significant brain reactivation at the point when the decision has been made to turn off their life-support systems.
To clarify, that doesn't mean these patients come back/return to fully conscious biologically tenable life. The observed reactivation of brain networks to significant levels (in some cases as much as a 90-percent increase in measured brain activity) lasts as long as four or five minutes and then, so far as I know from reading von Lommel, subsides. It suggests to me that consciousness and awareness linger at very low levels in brain-damaged patients, perhaps long enough for the individual to become present again at the moment of his or her actual death.
DissectionStalker
Paranormal Adept
No matter what the theory of everything 'really' is we all seem to be locked into a space-time continuum that is at least allowing us to share information planet wide. Maybe if we can develop quantum "fractal holographic" tuners, we might be able to tune-in to the other realms that might locate information beyond our understanding of local vs whole vs other dimensions, etc. These still seem to be external devices to the human body, and these don't seem likely to be products to use for our lifespans. It's also very difficult for me to understand how this tuner will work using human devised computer languages unless we work-out mathematically what the theory of everything is... and Vallee's "information theory" seems to be dependent on that understanding too.
For a personal and direct experience it seems likely that DMT is a better connection to what our brains are connected to and with other realities. That may offer more personal insight than any theories or external devices will.
Do you just want to keep refining your metaphors for a lifetime to abstractly 'think about' this reality, or do you want the direct connection to use your mind/brain with its own natural chemical antidote: DMT to understand what we naturally can experience by direct connection? The unique quality about DMT is its natural occurrence in almost all living things, so if used wisely it is safe. It is metabolized easily and quickly by the body, so we can utilize it just fine. It's just a matter of dealing with "the psychology" and your state of mind. Are you mentally healthy enough to endure it and come out the other side to still function in your daily lives? I think many people can do that with proper preparation and a safe environment to do it in.
Check-out this video about it. One guy said he lived a thousand years of experiences with a 15 minute dose. DMT is metabolized so quickly that "this voyage" only goes from a few minutes to maybe 20 minutes. I haven't heard of bigger doses that last longer or are really needed to discover what is "there". Unfortunately, I have no personal experience to offer, so I'm just going on what other people have said about it.
Past the halfway point encountering ET and Other Intelligences, UFO's, Abductions are mentioned too. I think those experiences may be highly dependent on what you believe in or are exposed to. Here is an active video:
Last edited:
S
smcder
Guest
Soupie
Paranormal Adept
I don't think the goal of investigation is "to reduce all experience to an illusion," but in the process of peeling back the layers of the onion, we see perhaps that the level of reality at which our conscious awareness resides is not the only level of reality.
That does not make our reality an illusion per se; I prefer the term veneer.
An excerpt from the "Mind, Matter, Meaning, and Information" website of Robin Faichney:
Subatomic physics can be viewed as the most determined attempt ever made to reach the objective state: just what is that stuff out there really made of? Judged by this standard, it has failed, and is doomed to remain a failure because absolute objectivity is unreachable; on the other hand in science failures can be as valuable as successes; and the fact that physics cannot be as purely objective as once seemed possible, is no reason why it should not continue to aid our understanding. (Though, as it continues to venture out still further away from the mid-range, which is the realm of ordinary experience, I think that the phenomena encountered are bound to become more and more difficult to understand.)
When we get down to the quantum level, observation seems to affect the phenomena being observed—according to the prominent physicist John Wheeler, we now have to think of scientific investigators as participators, not observers. Uncertainty can apparently occur in the object as well as the subject—because outwith the mid-range the subject/object dichotomy breaks down just as does that of wave and particle. In each case these are different aspects of one phenomenon. Wave and particle are two “sides” of one thing, but the wave/particle (or “wavicle“) and its “observer” are not ultimately separable either. They are mere components of the experimental system.
(Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics, Wildwood House, London, 1975, p145.)
Subject and object are related in two ways: not only are people conscious of things, as in the experimental context, but we also are things, or rather have an objective aspect—the body—as well as a subjective one. And just as wave and particle seem to us incompatible, so we still cannot understand how one thing can be both subject and object—how matter can be conscious. Matter is in fact no more conscious than particle is wave. Reality has what appear to us as subject-type and object-type characteristics. That we cannot quite reconcile these is due to our position within it: our particular viewpoints, with their physical and psychological characteristics; and the simple fact that we are part of the picture we are trying to see.
Because we, as subjects, are embedded in reality ourselves—each being as real as any rock even though we are higher level entities—our understanding of it, and in particular, the us/it interface, is seriously hindered—if we are part of it, how can we visualise our connection with it?
Our connection with the universe is actually just the fact that we are part and parcel of it. The alienation of the individual from the rest of reality, of subject from object, is an illusion, an intellectual artefact.
Classical physics allowed us to be relatively objective about part of the picture; that worked, as far as it went, because it was a part that did not seem to contain any subjects, being concerned with lower, but not too low, levels—those we perceive more or less directly, containing the prototypical objects.
Quantum physics, however, tried to take the method to its logical conclusion, and left the realm of ordinary experience, with its simple objects. The clean subject/object distinction was thus lost, and we could no longer exclude subjects, or subjective aspects, from any part of the picture; the “observer” ultimately cannot avoid participation, being embedded in both reality in general, and the experimental system in particular. “Matter” and “consciousness” have unproblematic meanings only within the language games of ordinary experience.
From one point of view, there are no waves, no particles, no subjects, no objects, no matter and no minds. These are just concepts, categories projected upon a reality far more subtle and complex, when analysed, than we can imagine. On the other hand, in some of these cases at least, it seems that we only project what is really there, but cannot directly perceive due to the limitations of our senses. [That's true for matter as well as mind.] Our ordinary experience is just as valid as any analysis, and it is the need to either declare one of any such duality the overall winner, or find some substrate in which they are entirely reconciled so that can be the winner, that is the illusion here—they are equally valid, but each is more appropriate on different occasions, in different contexts.
Can we get beyond subject and object?
When we get down to the quantum level, observation seems to affect the phenomena being observed—according to the prominent physicist John Wheeler, we now have to think of scientific investigators as participators, not observers. Uncertainty can apparently occur in the object as well as the subject—because outwith the mid-range the subject/object dichotomy breaks down just as does that of wave and particle. In each case these are different aspects of one phenomenon. Wave and particle are two “sides” of one thing, but the wave/particle (or “wavicle“) and its “observer” are not ultimately separable either. They are mere components of the experimental system.
(Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics, Wildwood House, London, 1975, p145.)
Subject and object are related in two ways: not only are people conscious of things, as in the experimental context, but we also are things, or rather have an objective aspect—the body—as well as a subjective one. And just as wave and particle seem to us incompatible, so we still cannot understand how one thing can be both subject and object—how matter can be conscious. Matter is in fact no more conscious than particle is wave. Reality has what appear to us as subject-type and object-type characteristics. That we cannot quite reconcile these is due to our position within it: our particular viewpoints, with their physical and psychological characteristics; and the simple fact that we are part of the picture we are trying to see.
Because we, as subjects, are embedded in reality ourselves—each being as real as any rock even though we are higher level entities—our understanding of it, and in particular, the us/it interface, is seriously hindered—if we are part of it, how can we visualise our connection with it?
Our connection with the universe is actually just the fact that we are part and parcel of it. The alienation of the individual from the rest of reality, of subject from object, is an illusion, an intellectual artefact.
Classical physics allowed us to be relatively objective about part of the picture; that worked, as far as it went, because it was a part that did not seem to contain any subjects, being concerned with lower, but not too low, levels—those we perceive more or less directly, containing the prototypical objects.
Quantum physics, however, tried to take the method to its logical conclusion, and left the realm of ordinary experience, with its simple objects. The clean subject/object distinction was thus lost, and we could no longer exclude subjects, or subjective aspects, from any part of the picture; the “observer” ultimately cannot avoid participation, being embedded in both reality in general, and the experimental system in particular. “Matter” and “consciousness” have unproblematic meanings only within the language games of ordinary experience.
From one point of view, there are no waves, no particles, no subjects, no objects, no matter and no minds. These are just concepts, categories projected upon a reality far more subtle and complex, when analysed, than we can imagine. On the other hand, in some of these cases at least, it seems that we only project what is really there, but cannot directly perceive due to the limitations of our senses. [That's true for matter as well as mind.] Our ordinary experience is just as valid as any analysis, and it is the need to either declare one of any such duality the overall winner, or find some substrate in which they are entirely reconciled so that can be the winner, that is the illusion here—they are equally valid, but each is more appropriate on different occasions, in different contexts.
Can we get beyond subject and object?
S
smcder
Guest
Moved to C&P.
Last edited by a moderator:
Burnt State
Paranormal Adept
I'm thinking reality does have some mirrors after all. If we are part of the reality we are trying to see, then we are certainly seeing ourselves reflected in that reality. Subjectivity allows for the UFO to be many things to many people, as Bigfoot has his own permutations, as countless as the humanoids listed on Rosales' site. Reality is virtually inside our head, and we make metaphor as we receive it.
If I live in trauma, or am looking for answers to my trauma, or if fear is dominating the mind as the mind attempts to perceive reality, then it stands a strong chance of becoming metaphorically nightmarish. To resolve the tensions that anti-structure brings to our lives we need to externalse our grief, anger, fear and trauma and give birth to monsters all the time. We all have them in us already so it's not too hard to fid them.
Now I know we all lead different lives and some people prefer to be nomadic, or live as a trogdolyte, but for the most part we are tribal, feel safe in the collective, and meet all our remaining desires through communitas. Joining with the other in conversation or at the hips creates empowerment and belonging. Reality, at its best, is a co-creative process and so there is something of a collective consciousness at work. We do affect each other during our cycles and experiences of time.
If I told you I grew up in a very calm middle class Northern Ontario neighborhood where in a ten minute walking radius from my house there was: one man that killed himself and brutally killed his family, another who tried, one suicide & multiple attempts, numerous bouts of sleepwalking, many divorces, drug dealing, the Myth of the Dopeman - a caped man wearing a knife who sang on top of the local school roofs, some bizarre sexual assaults and heaps of domestic violence, car accidents, a neighbour professing sweet love to the single nurse he lived beside at 1 am dressed in costume while his wife slept next door and a number of very memorable extreme storms then it should be no wonder that I saw a UFO with someone who was also experiencing her own anti-structural childhood.
We fill in the gaps of discontinuous reality and make metaphor merrily as we have no other way to sort through it all. It's all a hall of mirrors, a hallucinogen's hologram, a horror house sideshow where anything is possible. In fact anything you can imagine has already happened. You may even have had a hand in it just by thinking about it.
Last edited:
Burnt State
Paranormal Adept
But not only are there patterns that we use to navigate time and these learned patterns assist in our perceptions of reality. Depending on the nature of our relationships, I think the feelings of disorder may help to call forth the monsters, or not, from the mind. Procreation has tendencies towards disorder which may include trauma, thus creating similar patterns of experience or may produce resilience as a survival skill.
Burnt State
Paranormal Adept
Just watched The Babadook with daughter - a good intense psychologcal watch, cerebral & well written, brilliant acting, and an accomplished stunning first direction with all in camera effects. Look out for this director in the future. You can see in her work Lynch, Polanski, Méliès and Von Trier whom she studied under.
Director Jennifer Kent has created a classic horror, a wonderful anti-structure narrative of intense family drama. It is the story of a mother who lost her husband and how her own grief and son's stresses result in their destabilization. They collaborate to create a wonderful paranormal tale of altered personal states that includeseverything from the anticipation of the demonic monster to poltergeist activities. It demonstrates how the trauma of grief is the monster. This movie is an excellent example of what I think the paranormal is mostly about. Well worth the watch.
Director Jennifer Kent has created a classic horror, a wonderful anti-structure narrative of intense family drama. It is the story of a mother who lost her husband and how her own grief and son's stresses result in their destabilization. They collaborate to create a wonderful paranormal tale of altered personal states that includeseverything from the anticipation of the demonic monster to poltergeist activities. It demonstrates how the trauma of grief is the monster. This movie is an excellent example of what I think the paranormal is mostly about. Well worth the watch.
N
Neil Sorsby
Guest
Fuck me. He shouldn't be teaching any one.
Burnt State
Paranormal Adept
Don't worry, in my class everyone gets the paradigm shift that they can handle and no more. And, as far as how youth integrate trauma into their lives, they really do need platforms for voicing their own anti-structural experiences and make claims for what they see as a means to restore order, for themselves and collectively. I champion youth expression, so that they can assert the significance of their own narratives, to give arguments about how they need to be treated and the resources that they need access to. All kids tell us that they can't learn until they feel good about themselves, so self-esteem building through confidence in one's voice, and having the skills to distribute it digitally, may be a very necessary survival skill in an age of information. At least that's how I see it.
But here's a good paradigm shifter for the forum from the latest RM episode:
A TRANSIT OF CONTINGENCIES