The Boy Who Lived Before - Documentary about a childs memories of another life

[Randall]

When I say 'always' I don't mean in a perpetual sense, I mean as a whole.

In no way did I intend to generalise a group of people or label them 'the same'. However, there is no question (in my mind anyway) that throughout history and up to the present day, religion (as an entity unto itself which, by the way, stretches far beyond your community in Canada ) has had more of a negative effect on humanity than positive and is still a major cause of separation in all it's forms including sexism, homophobia, racism and war.

Anyway, I have a feeling we're getting way off topic.

Yes, we're getting off topic, and I'm glad to hear you didn't mean to generalize, but the statement, "Organized religions have always and always will do more harm than good." is in fact a very broad and hard line generalization. Sometimes it's too easy to do that, and although I'm no fan of religion, I felt that because it was such a sweeping statement, it deserved some balanced counterpoint. Even if we go beyond the boundaries of Canada ( second largest country in the world ) we can still find plenty of examples where religion isn't actually doing more harm than good. In reality, the evidence for your statement is limited mainly to historical examples before the separation of church and state, and in less evolved nations where the church is still an influential political entity. I think if we were able to separate the religion from the politics we'd find that most of the harm done is actually political and not religious.

For example, the two largest and bloodiest wars in history WWI and WWII were instigated and carried out after the separation of church and state by politicians and industrialists. Despite the problems with religion today, you'll also find that in general, the church is active in advocating human rights, including the right to life and dignity and freedom from tyranny and torture. It's just that we're so appalled by the acts of vengeance and greed for power carried out in the name of religion that we're tempted to paint all religion with the same brush. In the absence of religion, would all the violence really stop? I don't think it's quite that simple. Still, I can't argue that someday it would be nice to see humanity mature to the point where we could find out.

 

[Tyger]

All this talk of religion is making me feel queasy. Organized religions have always and always will do more harm than good. 'Spirituality' (if you want to call it that) on the other hand is (in my opinion) the next step of our evolution - the evolution of consciousness and the realization that physical reality is just a small piece of a much larger pie.

This is fairly easy to achieve should you decide to genuinely look within yourself for answers. (I know that sounds like a cliche but, whatever...)

The use of the term 'religion' in this conversation was always problematic. Totally agree.

Bolded underline - this is the cutting edge of 'research' imo. Harder to engage because requires substantial inner work - the 'look within' - but every bit as rigorous - if not more so - than materialistic science.

 

[Randall]

The use of the term 'religion' in this conversation was always problematic. Totally agree.

Still waiting on those definitions as you are using them in your explanations: The Boy Who Lived Before - Documentary about a childs memories of another life | Page 3 | The Paracast Community Forums

As I was saying, one at a time please. Otherwise I'll end up even more confused.

 

[Michael Allen]

The Hitchens book is really good, but perhaps a little exaggerated. For example, absolutist statements like "everything" tend to indicate a bit of fanaticism. I haven't read Dawkins' most recent work, but in the past I've found him to be a bit too hard line, going so far as to suggest that religion should be outlawed. As much as I don't have any religious faith, I don't think people should be thrown in jail for simply exploring it either. Since I ran across that article a few years ago Dawkins seems to have softened his stance a little on banning religion, confining it to being banned in schools. Mind you, I'm not personally in favor of any form of youth indoctrination either.

I too am not very keen on the idea of banning the exploration of the history and methods of human "spirituality" -- however we should be mindful that some religious groups (i.e. the most vocal) are not necessarily going to accept the status quo as is. Currently school curriculums in the US and UK are being invaded by pseudo-scientific "teach the controversy" faithists who's real purpose is to overturn or otherwise reverse the last 100 years of advancement in science. So sure are they of their own fundamentalism, they are willing to disregard evidence to the contrary and I don't think we should humor them (in this I am in total agreement with the likes of Hitchens and Dawkins*). I simply think the stakes are too large, since they would like nothing more than to have evolutionary biology and genetics put on the same level as their personal experience and mythology.

No one brings a shaman rain-dancer to a conference of climatologists for "equal time" in debate on earth systems; and scientists do not roll the bones or consult their astrology charts to get answers to their probing questions. Cultural relativism, as a fashion, has taken most of the world's sentient beings hostage in their own learning (why learn something new if there's no reality or truth behind anything?) -- coupled with the priest or minister's exhortation that absolute answers are to be found in their doctrines, you have a dangerous dangerous memeplex in formation. On one side you have people who believe that knowledge is completely ephemeral and "relative" and on the other side you have the people fraudulently providing all the answers...

In addition, I think that the horrors of this planet (and there are many) belie the notion that an All-Mighty loving beneficent being is watching over us, indeed is completely ridiculous when you think about it, even if we are promised an afterlife of bliss. Everything about this doctrine just "feels wrong" to me and I can't help but think of the millions of innocent dead people (many of them children) who fall into the jaws and mandibles of this life or otherwise end their short lives in some violent manner....this is an epic retort to anyone who dares think that God loves us or has our well-being as his (it's) highest goal.

*Terry Eagleton likes to combine the two authors into "Ditchkins" -- typical (but entertaining!) academic fappery you'd expect from a literary theorist.

 

[Tyger]

Still waiting on those definitions as you are using them in your explanations: The Boy Who Lived Before - Documentary about a childs memories of another life | Page 3 | The Paracast Community Forums

As I was saying, one at a time please. Otherwise I'll end up even more confused.

It's a time issue, Ufology. It's one thing to write stream-of-consciuosness about a momentary point of interest and passion - it's quite another to offer up a dictionary of terms. More serious - more time consuming. Work has begun in earnest and time is at a premium until a break. :-(

 

[Randall]

I too am not very keen on the idea of banning the exploration of the history and methods of human "spirituality" -- however we should be mindful that some religious groups (i.e. the most vocal) are not necessarily going to accept the status quo as is.

You've certainly outlined the more problematic areas. I don't support youth indoctrination into any religious belief system. But then again the primary purpose of early education is socialization. Socialization and indoctrination aren't all that dissimilar.

 

[Randall]

It's a time issue, Ufology. It's one thing to write stream-of-consciuosness about a momentary point of interest and passion - it's quite another to offer up a dictionary of terms. More serious - more time consuming. Work has begun in earnest and time is at a premium until a break. :-(

Surely one item at a time can't be all that time consuming. There's no need to create a "dictionary" all at once you know. Like I said, just start with what you mean by the word "universe". Or are you saying you need more time to reflect on that particular topic? I wouldn't be surprised. Sometimes we presume we know what we're talking about, but when faced with the challenge of explaining it, we suddenly find ourselves at a loss for words. If that's the case, I understand, and by all means, take your time.

 

[Tyger]

Surely one item at a time can't be all that time consuming. There's no need to create a "dictionary" all at once you know. Like I said, just start with what you mean by the word "universe". Or are you saying you need more time to reflect on that particular topic? I wouldn't be surprised. Sometimes we presume we know what we're talking about, but when faced with the challenge of explaining it, we suddenly find ourselves at a loss for words. If that's the case, I understand, and by all means, take your time.

Sometimes a horse is just a horse. As I mentioned I am not using the terms in any unique way. Googling always works for me. Many thanks for understanding time crunches.

 

[Randall]

Sometimes a horse is just a horse. As I mentioned I am not using the terms in any unique way. Googling always works for me. Many thanks for understanding time crunches.

You may not be using them in a "unique way", but you are using them in a specific way that isn't clear. For example my dictionary has 5 different meanings for the word "universe", but for all I know what you mean still isn't among those. It also would have taken you less time to briefly say what you mean than to tell me to just Google it so that I could guess from another 12 million results. So now I'm getting the impression that either you're being evasive or you just don't want to tell us for some unknown reason. That's OK too. If that's what you prefer, your posts can go on looking like a mishmash of mystical quasi-New Age gibberish. At least I've made a genuine effort to try to understand your worldview. But I'm not going to continue wasting time trying pry it out of you.

 

[Michael Allen]

• 
  

  [*]Universe
  [*]Existence
  [*]God
  [*]Physical
  [*]People ( whole persons )
  [*]Energy
  [*]Spiritual
  [*]Ego
  [*]Soul
  [*]Mental body
  [*]Emotional Body

This is an interesting exercise. I think I may give it a try and see what happens.

Universe: The totality of existence
Existence: Pertaining to the experience of a particular or conglomeration of events by a person
God: That on the basis of which the universe becomes an existent entity
Physical: Pertaining to the relations of the least comprehensible units of existence.
Person: That on the basis of which a conglomeration of existent things team up and experience other things as one.
Energy: The capacity for which one existent thing to encounter and affect another
Spiritual: That on the basis of which a Person can be aware of their own personhood
Ego: The faculty for which a person can represent themselves to themselves.
Mental Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Physical qua Ego
Physical Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Mental qua Ego
Emotional Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Spiritual qua Ego(?)
While we are at it we should define body

Body: The Universe existing-ly.

*whew*

And don't believe a bit of it...

 

[Randall]

This is an interesting exercise. I think I may give it a try and see what happens.

Universe: The totality of existence
Existence: Pertaining to the experience of a particular or conglomeration of events by a person
God: That on the basis of which the universe becomes an existent entity
Physical: Pertaining to the relations of the least comprehensible units of existence.
Person: That on the basis of which a conglomeration of existent things team up and experience other things as one.
Energy: The capacity for which one existent thing to encounter and affect another
Spiritual: That on the basis of which a Person can be aware of their own personhood
Ego: The faculty for which a person can represent themselves to themselves.
Mental Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Physical qua Ego
Physical Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Mental qua Ego
Emotional Body: A category simulation (fiction) of the Body attempting to represent the Spiritual qua Ego(?)
While we are at it we should define body
Body: The Universe existing-ly.
And don't believe a bit of it...

Yes. Interesting indeed. It didn't take you long either. But why tell us not to believe any of it though? Is this your guess at what Tyger means?

 

[Michael Allen]

Yes. Interesting indeed. It didn't take you long either. But why tell us not to believe any of it though? Is this your guess at what Tyger means?

Well means I cranked it out quickly -- its a guess at what anyone might mean when they use the terms. The main point I was driving at was that any set of strings for each one would constitute an interdependent structure--albeit a slightly hierarchical one, although my views do not allow for a strict hierarchy. I said not to believe it because there's probably additional sets of definitions (if you consider another tuple of consistent sentences for each spread) that might be just as consistent.

{Universe: \Def_a1, Existence: \Def_a2, God: \Def_a3...} vs {Universe: \Def_b1, Existence: \Def_b2, God: \Def_b3...} vs ... {Universe: \Def_z1, Existence: \Def_z2, .... } //escape sequences added to avoid the stupid emoticons

The one I provided has a governing "super rule" that fits my view more or less.

The more interesting part of this exercise comes when we start to drill down on the sentences I provided in my formal indicators--in fact it might be good to set them all up as formal indicators.

For instance, with God, the humorous formal indicator might be

God is that to which all human beings apply the label "God"


God is that on the basis of which the universe becomes a totalized referential totality to sentient beings

Of course once you work out the "bases" of this definition, you find out that human beings are themselves a necessary constituent of embodied "Godhood"

Sentience: that on the basis of which a self-aware being concerned of its own existence grows equiprimordially with its own referential totality of things in the universe (i.e. points back to God). ​

Existence, God and Persons are intertwined at some level of my system (and if its not, then I will have to make a few changes)

And then there's a problem with the notion that God is the basis for all existent things--if that's true then God itself is not an element of the known universe. (I wish we had a better gender neuter pronoun in English!!).

For instance, problem arise when you put the creator of the universe as an element in the same universe (I once watched a model theory meta-mathematician break his brain on this and try to create some kind of logic string that would formalize god as an existent being that created all existent beings).

Basically working out all of these terms in such a system pretty much dissolves their meanings away from their formerly prosaic connotations.

Probably the most shocking definition was the "physical"

Physical: Pertaining to the relations of the least comprehensible units of existence.

This was honestly what I thought of first and it sounded wrong...but then I realized that what we denote as "physical matter" is simply the relations and structure between the smallest and least comprehensible (i.e. what was in medieval terms "indivisibility") of the units in our co-experienced phenomenal world. Well this also requires a reinterpretation into a framework that takes some X in the world as its starting point, with "physical" as a mode of the being of being-in-the-world of dasein.

What we appear to be doing when we construct these dictionaries of definitions like the one above is simply articulating the space of the world as ourselves in-the-world. This is why fundamentally we are doomed to considering any formalization like the one presented above.

 

[Michael Allen]

Getting back to the boy who lived before, we might postulate the existence of some artifact which has the ability to infuse the memories of a past experience in the span of an unspecified moment spanning through the (real) lifetime of the boy. Memories being nothing more than a state configuration of the brain, it's theoretically possible to create such a configuration such that the effect of "reincarnation" could be attained. This is similar to Bertrand Russell's "born 5 minutes ago with your memories" what-if. Certainly we wouldn't have any need to postulate either the existence of "god," a supervisory "spirit" or any other etheric mystical layering of the universe, it could be created from the very plenum of physical existence itself. Let's say a race of beings had nanotech that was able to quickly infuse itself and reconfigure certain pathways and neural connection configurations corresponding to a set of viscera, such might be even done at the embryonic stage or later, prior to the formation of language.

This is very similar to the The Inner Light (Star Trek TNG) episode where Picard lives an entire lifetime in the span of a few minutes (presumably his brain downloading the contents from the mysterious probe). I have heard of this being called "orthogonal time," an intuitive picture of the flow of time outside one timeline into another and with the subsequent rejoining in the same place.

Of course one not need the ability to create a holographic experience fed into some processing unit in order to figure out the brain neuronal configuration--they could simply take the previous brain of a former individual and reduce its contents to a signal that could be graphed or mapped back into a new host.

This is all pure speculation of course, but it shows that even if something like this were to exist, one would not need to needlessly multiply and deploy mystical entities and make stranger claims on the universe than is already posited by our current scientific understanding*. While we may not have the means now to plant memories or thoughts in an individual, certainly we have enough empirical understanding of the brain to know that something might be done if we knew which of the billions of switches we needed to throw in order to accomplish the deed. Fortunately, we are masters at throwing now trillions of switches in mere fractions of a second with basic and more advanced logical operations (such as the letters on my screen right now appear as I type them)--crude though it may be with respect to the data and signal processing of the brain, still its only a matter of time.

* Here's a case in point: MIT discovers the location of memories: Individual neurons | ExtremeTech

 

[Burnt State]

Wow, the whole organized religion/god of creation thing was not what I saw Tyger trying to promote here at all. In his previous metaphysical, romantic poets post I thought he more clearly presented his position. There I found a more esoteric series of considerations arguing for other ways of knowing beyond science.

And beyond science and reason people may use their sense perception, emotion, memory, faith, language etc. as other ways of informing and defining their reality. To limit the discussion of faith where a god observes and intercedes on behalf of her creation is not a god I can begin to imagine, but a prime mover of physical reality, or the embodiment of transcendence, is something worthy of aspiring towards. As far as trying to become a spiritual being, a zen master, bodhisattva and godhead in our own right, by cycling through various repeated forms, or lifetiemes - these all strike me as a worthy pursuit and way of being.

In the beginning was the word; and it was made by the poet. Then the priest stole the word to make laws and a religion. Then the people lost their ways of knowing through their imagination and went to Walmart to go shopping instead.

p.s. Tyger - loved the Kieslowski moment. If anyone has seen his films, like The Double Life of Veronique, then you know that what informs this way of knowing has little to do with science.

 

[Tyger]

Wow, the whole organized religion/god of creation thing was not what I saw Tyger trying to promote here at all. In his previous metaphysical, romantic poets post I thought he more clearly presented his position. There I found a more esoteric series of considerations arguing for other ways of knowing beyond science.

Thank you. Beyond physical science.

And beyond science and reason people may use their sense perception, emotion, memory, faith, language etc. as other ways of informing and defining their reality. To limit the discussion of faith where a god observes and intercedes on behalf of her creation is not a god I can begin to imagine, but a prime mover of physical reality, or the embodiment of transcendence, is something worthy of aspiring towards.

In the Sanskrit named Brahma. In the West, the 1st Principle (for reasons of culture called colloquially 'Father God'). What is often ignored - or unknown - is that the ancients had a fairly rigorous science that 'explained' the universe - but it was a synthesizing view - dealing with the material and non-material universes in total. Often cutting edge science finds itself face-to-face contemplating what was said in the ancient Sanskrit texts.

As far as trying to become a spiritual being, a zen master, bodhisattva and godhead in our own right, by cycling through various repeated forms, or lifetiemes - these all strike me as a worthy pursuit and way of being.

And if one wants to, one can verify the reality of this scenario - but it takes a kind of rigor beyond the scope of physical science.

p.s. Tyger - loved the Kieslowski moment. If anyone has seen his films, like 'The Double Life of Veronique', then you know that what informs this way of knowing has little to do with science.

It is a science imo - but of another kind, another order.

The dialog here has degenerated into a by-play of good/better/best - and that's unfortunate, because it's not about comparisons.

As I said, there is plenty of 'bad' religion to go around - and there is equally enough 'bad' science going around. The testimonies to the latter can be found in the most unexpected places - like Amazon, where I like to read the comments after book reviews. Buried in one comment section today was this gem quoted below.

I offer it here because it speaks to most people's experience who try to enter the field of science - it is human nature, as corrupt as religion, as corrupt as politics, as corrupt as any place human beings cast their actions, marbled with inconsistent motives and intentions. The results of that corruption, mislead people, create ill-conceived policies, and can cause (too often) pain and suffering and death.

Science at it's best is thrilling - and I adore the chase for the fact and the new idea - but science is not the 'shining city on the hill'. It has been too long away and distant from it's philosophical roots imo.

I do biomedical research science for a living, and I can definitely say that severe, frustrating, limiting, and irrational dogma is everywhere in scientific disciplines. When a scientist spends his professional life pursuing an aspect of reality that he believes in, he's not giving it up without a battle.

The abuse established scientists can heap on their more innovative fellows can end careers. Such nastiness is small minded and unprofessional, but so widespread that graduate students are taught how to attenuate their papers and proposal so as not to give offense.

I have to laugh at how many people believe the "scientific process" is sacred. Even the noblest data can't trump selfish human nature. Got an outlier in your standard curve? Just throw it out and move on. "Controlled settings?" Doing the same misguided experiment over and over, no matter how rigorously, still gives the wrong conclusions. Science is often BS.

 

[Michael Allen]

There I found a more esoteric series of considerations arguing for other ways of knowing beyond science.

Science:
"The intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment."

So this knowing beyond science we'll term hyper-science (its a temporary label, nothing more)

So now we can say that hyper-science is a "method" (black box formal indicator) of knowing that which is not available via the "systematic study of the structure of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment."

Ok, I will cede one such "knowing" method: its called "being born." The explanation of course requires some material that has been found from the sciences of biology, genetics and natural selection--in other words this means we'll need to subsume the findings of science as the condition for the possibility for hyper-science. As you are already born with the biological structures needed to categorize and mark the world in its own structure (read Kantian categories if you wish) -- being that this primordial knowledge did not arrive from the methods of science (systematic study of the structure...etc), it can be justifiably added to your "ways of knowing beyond science."

But here's the interesting part where this whole schema probably falls apart and collapses on itself: what would you call the working out of this "knowledge" in a chain of organisms down a line of hereditary descent? Each successive generation trying out new things and the genes passed from a previous organism are preserved an registered into the future--this working out of "knowledge" finally reaching your current status today as an embodied brain thinking machine. Now mind you most of this "knowledge" is instinctual and "unconscious," but knowledge nevertheless drawn out by millions of years of successful (and not-so successful) experiments where the results are tabulated into the volumes of the next generation, and so on...

The interesting thing is that this picture is probably simultaneously esoteric (hidden, because your own instincts are transparent to yourself) and exoteric (because your average everyday dwelling and coping with the world is pretty much out in the open ), and above all, scientific. I propose that if there are any ways of knowing beyond science, it is something we are already assuming and taking for granted as the common basis of human understanding.

 

[Zephyr]

When I examine narratives unspooling from the soil of human thought, I look to see where such ideas tend as they track knowledge like a plant reaching for the sunlight.

Religious dogmas project rigidly to one destination. Any deviation from the narrow path negates the whole narrative leaving the traveler without form, a ghost.

All zombies go to paradise. But they serve as useful soldiers on this plane for political despots claiming to be the voices of popular deities.

 

[Zephyr]

You've certainly outlined the more problematic areas. I don't support youth indoctrination into any religious belief system. But then again the primary purpose of early education is socialization. Socialization and indoctrination aren't all that dissimilar.

I chose SDA because scientific observation would never be sacrificed to the altar of faith.

The focus was building people, not pedagogues and more edifices.

One should graduate from church like a child growing too large for its crib and move on in life. Those who do not are as travelers in a train station waiting for.....whatever it is they're waiting for.

 

[Randall]

I chose SDA because scientific observation would never be sacrificed to the altar of faith ...

Sorry for my ignorance but, what is "SDA"? I'm guessing the "S" is for science?
I liked your train station analogy. I think my rustic mountain village along the winding path toward truth was perhaps a little romanticized.

 

[Zephyr]

Getting back to the boy who lived before, we might postulate the existence of some artifact which has the ability to infuse the memories of a past experience in the span of an unspecified moment spanning through the (real) lifetime of the boy. Memories being nothing more than a state configuration of the brain, it's theoretically possible to create such a configuration such that the effect of "reincarnation" could be attained. This is similar to Bertrand Russell's "born 5 minutes ago with your memories" what-if. Certainly we wouldn't have any need to postulate either the existence of "god," a supervisory "spirit" or any other etheric mystical layering of the universe, it could be created from the very plenum of physical existence itself. Let's say a race of beings had nanotech that was able to quickly infuse itself and reconfigure certain pathways and neural connection configurations corresponding to a set of viscera, such might be even done at the embryonic stage or later, prior to the formation of language.

This is very similar to the The Inner Light (Star Trek TNG) episode where Picard lives an entire lifetime in the span of a few minutes (presumably his brain downloading the contents from the mysterious probe). I have heard of this being called "orthogonal time," an intuitive picture of the flow of time outside one timeline into another and with the subsequent rejoining in the same place.

Of course one not need the ability to create a holographic experience fed into some processing unit in order to figure out the brain neuronal configuration--they could simply take the previous brain of a former individual and reduce its contents to a signal that could be graphed or mapped back into a new host.

This is all pure speculation of course, but it shows that even if something like this were to exist, one would not need to needlessly multiply and deploy mystical entities and make stranger claims on the universe than is already posited by our current scientific understanding*. While we may not have the means now to plant memories or thoughts in an individual, certainly we have enough empirical understanding of the brain to know that something might be done if we knew which of the billions of switches we needed to throw in order to accomplish the deed. Fortunately, we are masters at throwing now trillions of switches in mere fractions of a second with basic and more advanced logical operations (such as the letters on my screen right now appear as I type them)--crude though it may be with respect to the data and signal processing of the brain, still its only a matter of time.

* Here's a case in point:

Where did Ezekiel's visions originate?