where we come from

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Paul Werbos

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Aug 2, 2017, 2:15:52 PM8/2/17
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At times on this list, when people say "it is all one, just consciousness, none of that complex stuff"... it reminds me of those neuroscientists who thought of consciousness as a state of "synchronization" in which all neurons output the same bit, in effect. No real brain is just one bit. Synchronization is an essential part of brain design, but a different kind of synchronization. (For data and empirical results, see my paper last year in open-access journal Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience.) Likewise, those who imagine that the ocean of higher consciousness is just a pure homogeneous salt solution are blocked by this strong false image from making any progress towards getting there.  If all you care about re the ocean is that it is salty, and you discuss it at emotional arms length, purely as a game of words and hermeneutics, you won't get very deep at all, or begin to appreciate the complexity of life therein.

What IS that complexity like?

I was hoping to post two good images on my personal blog, but one was overlaid by a picture of my wife in the one image which survived, and the other is ONE of the interesting images from google news: 


http://www.express.co.uk/news/science/836204/dark-matter-cosmic-web-universe


Two very different images in these stories.... images well worth meditating on, since this is where we actually come from.

Beyond the earth -- and far surpassing the true knowledge of any of us on earth -- is this vast connected ecology, billions of years old at the least. It is real, here and now. It validates Loren Eiseley's poetic images in his introduction to Voyage to Arcturus. 

If we underestimate the vast reality out there... well, there are small creatures in little ponds on earth who do not appreciate even the larger planet they are living on. Some are insects, doomed to a short life anyway, while others are tadpoles of a sort, who will learn sooner or later, if they are alert enough to survive. 


I hope you do, and I hope I can help somehow. 

Srinivasa Rao Kankipati

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Aug 3, 2017, 10:53:45 AM8/3/17
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Definitely higher consciousness may be existing. Just as lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have, some among us may be having the faculty of a higher type of consciousness. But imagination may be running riot in assuming that consciousness is an ocean, with salt or sweet water. Nobody has so far proved that life is an ocean, all the same life exists in all living beings. I feel we need not unnecessarily elevate any human faculty to a universal level, and postulate that bits of it are permeating human beings. For example smelling is a faculty of beings, but there cant be anything like universal smelling. Similarly there is nothing like universal urination, divine defecation, etc. And consciousness cannot exist without the object of consciousness. If you are conscious, what are you conscious of? Swami Vivekananda questioned how many of us can think of infinity, except in terms of a big stretch of sky or a vast area of ocean. Consciousness certainly is a wonderful gift of nature, gift of a different kind and not of the same degree as the brain experiencing it. But I think we are following wrong leads by extending consciousness to universal levels or assuming it is billions of years old, when the universe itself is not more than fourteen billion years old. 

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David Schwartzman

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Aug 3, 2017, 11:42:03 AM8/3/17
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A voice of reason for a change! 
But why waste your breathe when the creationists don't accept the knowledges of science? Of course they have a right to believe whatever they want, but I hope they are not supporting the persecution on non-believers.

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Zoran Josipovic

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Aug 3, 2017, 3:40:25 PM8/3/17
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right, but just as every normal adult human has some capacity for
different types of attention, so it is likely that pure consciousness 
or nondual awareness is a basic, fundamental level of our consciousness that is implicitly present in all humans, but becomes explicit through some type of practice like meditation, an extraordinary life event, or through altered states brought on by other means.
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Ganesh L S

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Aug 3, 2017, 3:40:25 PM8/3/17
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What is it that is common to everything in the Universe, and eternal too?


After all, by whatever science or logic we may use, something can never be transformed into absolutely nothing, and likewise absolutely nothing cannot be transformed into something.  Something exists, and it is eternal because it cannot be transformed into absolutely nothing, by science or otherwise.  Given this basic philosophical belief, any theory of the beginnings of our Universe, including the Big Bang, may at best be true, but incomplete though.  They tend to lead to more questions than the answers they present, and it is the unadulterated conceit and cussedness of some Scientists that such incomplete truths continue to be celebrated.  Innocently?


It doesn't matter whether we deal with Universal smelling, urination or defecation - i'm sorry, but should we consider other human actions too?


In any case, isn't it intriguing that we explicitly accept the absence of commonly acceptable definitions of consciousness and yet continue with our attempts to delve into Universal consciousness and other phenomena in our Universe, including urination and defecation.


Can we be humble enough to recognize and accept that currently we do not know that we do not know about some questions that are bound to arise in the future following every marginal or great discovery of Science?  Or, are we going to be conceited enough to reject the idea of the possibility of such questions arising?  This only points to the incompleteness of Science, as we know and practice it, and not the incompetency of Scientists.


It is high time that die-hard Scientists learn to accept the eternal and universal limitations of Science, even granting all the glory and grandeur due to it.  Let us not forget for a moment that Faith exists at the edge of Science.


Best wishes,

LSG.
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Paul Werbos

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Aug 3, 2017, 4:58:52 PM8/3/17
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More reply to Srini --

I apologize that, in writing so fast, I neglected another important point you asked about:

"Why should we assume that HUMANS are more connected to ... soul... than the rest of life on earth?"

Indeed, I also disagree with the theory that humans have souls but animals don't.

Actually, it is not a matter of yes or no. Undisciplined human minds, relying too heavily on a kind of verbal logic which assumes a "yes" or "no," black or white answer to every question, usually underestimate the fuzzy or continuous variables of life -- like consciousness, spiritual connection, reincarnation, etc. Reality is full of continuous variables. So no, don't worry, I am not one of those people who say "yes" to human soul
and "no" to animals or plants or biosphere in general.

In my theory of how brains work (published in places like Frontiers of Systems Neuroscience, Neural Networks and IEEE transactions), the wiring of the human brain actually is a step above that of other mammals, in a way which is responsible for the kind of language and symbolic reasoning we use and abuse so much. But it is not an old or fully evolved capability; it can be a double-edged sword. It allows us to be very effective in probing far in space and time and answering questions, about soul and deep experience as well as physics; however, it also allows us to be pig-headed, and invent fantasies of empty words, and be cold and out of touch far more than any of the creatures I see in my back yard. I described the human "soul' as our connection to the larger "noosphere" of the earth, which connects not only to humans but to the rest of the planet as well, in a diversity of ways. 

In truth, to do justice to your point, I should confess some honest but imperfect and unscientific thoughts on this subject:


Best regards,.

   Paul


On Thu, Aug 3, 2017 at 4:24 PM, Paul Werbos <paul....@gmail.com> wrote:
Good afternoon, Srini!

On Thu, Aug 3, 2017 at 10:37 AM, Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com> wrote:
Definitely higher consciousness may be existing. Just as lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have, some among us may be having the faculty of a higher type of consciousness. But imagination may be running riot in assuming that consciousness is an ocean, with salt or sweet water. Nobody has so far proved that life is an ocean, all the same life exists in all living beings. I feel we need not unnecessarily elevate any human faculty to a universal level, and postulate that bits of it are permeating human beings.
 
I posted the images at:

Now that our best scientific knowledge clearly shows a huge connected network full of free energy, even though the matter is mostly not the kind we are familiar with, it would be surprising if the universe were NOT pulsing with life, even if life based on a type of matter we are not familiar with. These pictures do not look like diffuse radiation emanating from ordinary matter, even though there is a connection. 

BUT: you are asking a key question. Why should we assume that WE, in our fullest real existence, have any facilities of sensing or thinking beyond what we see in the brain?

Indeed, most psychologists would agree with you that humans do not, plain and simple. They know it is physically impossible. They often "know" what is physically and mathematically possible more than most physicists would claim to know. I once held the same view, and I fully understand how strong the logic is to support it. Donald Hebb explains why, at the start of his classic book The Organization of Behavior. But personal experience forced me long ago to look into the evidence of personal experience and, yes, of parapsychology and of work in the book Consciousnesss edited by Goleman. Some of us feel convinced that there is enough evidence to justify believing that humans do have sensing and/or thinking capabilities beyond what can be explained by the neural networks of the brain alone, and of them some of us want to understand better what is going on and why. 

In past years, I would emphasize that I fully respect the view which Hebb presented... but that is less and less completely true. In www.werbos.com/Mind_in_Time.pdf (a paper published in Russia), I discuss the concept of sanity or zhengqi; in time, those who achieve true sanity -- open eyes, open heart -- are likely to HAVE the kinds of experience which propels one further, if one is not held back by the kind of irrational fears described in the NSF-funded peer-reviewed work of Greeley and McCready (reprinted in Goleman's anthology).

 
For example smelling is a faculty of beings, but there cant be anything like universal smelling. Similarly there is nothing like universal urination, divine defecation, etc. And consciousness cannot exist without the object of consciousness. If you are conscious, what are you conscious of?

None of this last part contradicts what I was saying, I think. When I spoke of higher intelligence in emergent networks of life the cosmos (or computers), I did not speak of infallible or omniscient intelligence -- even though parents may SEEMS omniscient compared to their babies. But yes, the word "conscious" is fuzzy enough that one could say it applies to a universe governed by a Lagrangian density -- or not; it is more important that we understand what such models tell us, than whether we append a label to them. 

 
Swami Vivekananda questioned how many of us can think of infinity, except in terms of a big stretch of sky or a vast area of ocean. Consciousness certainly is a wonderful gift of nature, gift of a different kind and not of the same degree as the brain experiencing it. But I think we are following wrong leads by extending consciousness to universal levels or assuming it is billions of years old, when the universe itself is not more than fourteen billion years old. 

Huh?

You say it is illogical to assume a biology billions of years old, when we agree the universe is no younger than 14 billion years? That is inconsistent and illogical. Also, since my vision is not universal, I do not claim to see further than 10 billion years or so; I do not know how old it really is, and I do not have a firm belief about how much older it might be. I have looked into the evidence for general relativity., and been surprised at just how strong it is compared to all alternatives discussed and how well it fits experiment. But looking into the evidence for the variety of Big Bang theories, I am not really convinced, one way or another. The most "impressive data' is reconstructed by imputations based on particular theories. With new evidence that might change... but which way? In any case, 14 billion years is already a lot of time, when there is a truly huge connected field of play.

Best of luck... 

Bruno Marchal

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Aug 4, 2017, 1:05:02 PM8/4/17
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Dear Ganesh,


On 03 Aug 2017, at 19:25, Ganesh L S wrote:

What is it that is common to everything in the Universe, and eternal too?

Maybe the Arithmetical Reality? 

It is more than eternal. It is beyond time and space.



After all, by whatever science or logic we may use, something can never be transformed into absolutely nothing, and likewise absolutely nothing cannot be transformed into something.

I am glad to hear that.



 Something exists, and it is eternal because it cannot be transformed into absolutely nothing, by science or otherwise.  


Yes. No atomic bombs can destroy a number, nor can prevent it to divide some other number. Maybe we can assert 2+2=5 under torture, but that will not change anything about the plausible true relation.




Given this basic philosophical belief, any theory of the beginnings of our Universe, including the Big Bang, may at best be true, but incomplete though.

Is there a universe? Current science does not address this question, almost taboo since the closure of Plato's academy, 1500 years ago.

The physical reality might be very important, but it might be the shadow of something else. A good candidate is that the physical reality is the arithmetical reality, seen from inside, from some "angle". I can argue that it has to be like that if the brain is emulable by a universal machine.




 They tend to lead to more questions than the answers they present, and it is the unadulterated conceit and cussedness of some Scientists that such incomplete truths continue to be celebrated.  Innocently?

Probably not. Some scientists are more dogmatic on matter than some fundamentalists or radicals. Some are sincere and never get the opportunity to doubt. Others have learn to doubt, but hides it, for diverse reasons usually related with the little ego (the antipode of the higher self).



It doesn't matter whether we deal with Universal smelling, urination or defecation - i'm sorry, but should we consider other human actions too?

In any case, isn't it intriguing that we explicitly accept the absence of commonly acceptable definitions of consciousness and yet continue with our attempts to delve into Universal consciousness and other phenomena in our Universe, including urination and defecation.

It looks you believe sincerely in a primary universe?

Someone asked me---what is the purpose of the Awakening? I answered that it is the Way the NoName can go to the Toilet, so that he can go back to the Bed and the Sleep, and pursue the Dream in better Condition.


Can we be humble enough to recognize and accept that currently we do not know that we do not know about some questions that are bound to arise in the future following every marginal or great discovery of Science?

In science we never know. We can only ask questions like "Do you see what I see?" and "Do you believe what I believe?", and we learn only when our belief are contradicted by something/someone.

Science cannot be separated from Religion. True ideal religion only extends ideal science and never contradict it. It study the surrational, in between the rational and the irrational. But we can only search ideal science and ideal religion. Even if we find them, it breaks if we present it as such.

The opposition science=true/religion=fiction, common among atheists and strong materialists, makes science into pseudo-science, and leave the religion to the argument per authority.




 Or, are we going to be conceited enough to reject the idea of the possibility of such questions arising?  This only points to the incompleteness of Science, as we know and practice it, and not the incompetency of Scientists.

Now, the beauty of science, and of the universal machine, is that they can discover their limitation, and indeed become spiritual, which means trust what is far bigger than themselves but which can be also themselves when seen from some other "angle".

In Occident, science is born in -500 (Pythagoras), and died a millenium later in +500 (Damascius, closure of Plato Academy),. Science has not yet restarted. The Enlightenment Period has not been transformed. Science will start again when theology/metaphysics will come back at the faculty of science. It means recovering the right of making modest theories and assumptions, and reason, knowing we can never claim having the truth.



It is high time that die-hard Scientists learn to accept the eternal and universal limitations of Science, even granting all the glory and grandeur due to it.

They do. I prefer to refer to the die-hard Scientists you refer above as pseudo-scientists.


 Let us not forget for a moment that Faith exists at the edge of Science.

Science is only the lantern, and it generates its own shadow and it light only a tiny piece of the possible real. Without faith, why would we even lighten the lantern?

Be it a primary physical universe, or 2+2=4, without some faith, we go nowhere.

Faith is not the enemy of doubt and reason. Only bad faith feels reason and doubts as an enemy. Only bad reason fear faith.

Best,

Bruno





Best wishes,
LSG.
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Ganesh L S

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Aug 5, 2017, 4:08:27 AM8/5/17
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Thank you, dear Bruno, for your thoughtful response.  I have not fully comprehended your Arithmetic Reality theory/model.  Yet, my limited exposure does raise my curiosity to learn more about it.  Your recent elucidation was definitely absorbing and useful.


My general belief while witnessing and participating minimally in this whole discussion about:

a) Consciousness,

b) its emergence and manifestations,

c) what came first,

d) free will and fate,

e) various models of our Universe and life in it, and so on,

is that for anything at all to exist, manifest and evolve, the potential or capacity to do so including the governing conditions, laws and rules (CLaR), and the meta CLaR, have to pre-exist first and foremost as the primal seed, and unconditionally too.


It is that something which would naturally be universal and eternal even while transcending or being beyond time and space as you have pointed out - i certainly accept that observation of yours fully.  I wish to learn about the extent to which the logic of unconditional pre-existence of such a potential or capacity as the primal seed, would be correct or wrong.  How can anything at all exist, happen, or evolve without the primitive, unconditional potential or capacity to do so?


The actual phenomena themselves clearly reveal the existence of both deterministic/certain aspects as well as non-deterministic/probabilistic aspects.  In this sense, complete predictability of phenomena in our Universe, and their control, would be a mirage that we can keep on chasing eternally.  Perhaps the joys and excitement in our lives is due to the latter aspects.


Meanwhile, i must tender my deepest respects to so many of you who are participating with the greatest earnestness of intellectual purpose and sharing your insights and knowledge.  Agreements, disagreements and alternative interpretations apart, what a fine intellectual experience this continues to be for me.  I am very, very grateful.


Best wishes,
LSG.
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From: online_sa...@googlegroups.com <online_sa...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Bruno Marchal <mar...@ulb.ac.be>
Sent: Friday, August 4, 2017 9:49 PM

Serge Patlavskiy

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Aug 5, 2017, 4:08:27 AM8/5/17
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-
Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com> on August 4, 2017 wrote:
>Can you prove that the kind of cognition that animals 
>have is the same kind that humans have?
.
[S.P.] The proof is simple: the animals and humans behave in the same way in similar reality situations. 
.
Second. I do not talk about the "kind of cognition" and I do not understand what you mean by this phrase. I talk about the mechanisms of consciousness. I say that the mechanisms of consciousness are the same to all the living organisms. I say that for the organism to stay alive, its exemplar of consciousness must be expediently evolved and potent. I say that every living organism demonstrates rational behavior. 
.
Now, the ball is with you. Please, suggest any proof or evidence that "lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have".
.
Best,
Serge Patlavskiy


From: Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com>
To: Serge Patlavskiy <serge.pa...@rocketmail.com>
Sent: Friday, August 4, 2017 6:47 PM
Subject: Re: private_Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

Can you prove that the kind of cognition that animals have is the same kind that humans have?

On 4 August 2017 at 09:20, Serge Patlavskiy <serge.pa...@rocketmail.com> wrote:
Dear Srinivasa,
you wrote:
>Just as lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have ...

Can you, please, suggest any proof or evidence that "lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have". Instead, the firmly established facts tell us that every living organism demonstrates an expediently rational cognitive activity. If its cognitive activity would not be expediently rational, the organism could not stay alive. 

The doctrine that the human only is endowed with reason is antiscientific.

Best,
Serge Patlavskiy


From: Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com>
To: Online_Sadhu_Sanga@ googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, August 3, 2017 5:53 PM

Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

BMP

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Aug 6, 2017, 9:05:13 AM8/6/17
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Dear Paul

Namaste. Yes, difference is real, but we can't even say 'difference' if there is not at the same time identity, just as the idea of 'blind' could never even be imagined if we did not know what it means to see. Opposites may seem real on their own, but that is a product of abstraction from the concrete relation that exists between opposites. To comprehend that relation. that contradiction is the real achievement of reason from which the very idea of 'contradiction' itself is possible.

Sincerely,
B Madhava Puri, Ph.D.
Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute







From: Paul Werbos <paul....@gmail.com>
To: "online_sa...@googlegroups.com" <Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 2, 2017 2:14 PM
Subject: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

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Ganesh L S

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Aug 23, 2017, 1:09:19 PM8/23/17
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P​lease help confirm if there exists a hierarchy of consciousness with different levels (combinations of capabilities), or not, in our world.  We can then engage in discussions that could attempt to extend the "our world" context to larger systemic contexts, including the entire Universe (or, multiverses?)


There is enough and more evidence today of consciousness in other living creatures ranging from the micro to the macro.  The term "collective consciousness" in human society has also been researched into and written about.


We do not have sufficient evidence, in our frames of reference, about consciousness in non-living matter.  Please let us shed and share more knowledge (already, there have been some e-mails on this topic in our group) about the possibility of consciousness in energy.  To what extent does Mother Nature reveal consciousness via her systems, processes and mechanisms?


We can observe that consciousness can be identified at least at two levels, viz., receiving and radiating?  In the former, self-referencing processes and stimulus-response mechanisms and behaviour will be fascinating to examine deeply, or perhaps even feed forward mechanisms and behaviour.  In the latter, in addition to the above two features, we should examine the process of radiation or explicit revelation of consciousness and its influences, and also the concept of "purpose".  Other participants can suggest many other aspects that will warrant the generation of greater insights.


Here are a few of my questions or thoughts.

Am i alive right now as i am keying in this e-mail?  Well, it seems that i am alive and conscious that i am alive (self-referencing is performed).  But, as some folks may observe, "it's all maaya".  Obviously, those folks received my information stimulus and responded in good faith.  So, we can infer that i have radiated "something", to those folks who received my stimulus and within their frames of reference termed my experience as "maaya" in good faith.  But, this doesn't stop with this exchange.  Here's another line of conscious observation and questioning.


Right now, i am alive, i.e., my entire being is physically alive, and would even be fit for the due certification medically and legally.  Does this imply every conceivable geometric point within my body possesses life at this moment?  Is each and every such geometric point within me capable of radiating life, or providing reflective information of the absence of life, and the attendant signals to some or all other points within my body?  This line of observation and questioning is to point to the analogy about our Universe and consciousness within and permeating it (Universal consciousness?).


Perhaps, most or all of us would observe and agree that it is not necessary that every conceivable geometric point in our physical bodies (anna maya kosha) is alive or holds life.  However, it is an observable fact that the presence or absence of life in every conceivable geometric point can be indicated through commonly acceptable procedures and mechanisms, or at least through some process of reasoning.  Minimally, every conceivable geometric point should be capable of radiating or reflecting the presence or absence of life respectively.  So what?  Well, if we can observe and claim that we, as whole beings, are alive, i.e., life permeates our bodies and radiates its existence, despite the observable and/or acceptable fact of its absence in some or many of the conceivable geometric points within our bodies, why should we not extend this argument to our Universe and consciousness within and permeating it?  Briefly, if we use the term "living human (noun)" or the term "human (adjective) life" and accept their ramifications, then why not "conscious Universe (noun)" or "Universal (adjective) consciousness"?


I will be grateful to learn from your responses that should force me to take deeper dives into observations, reasoning, inferring and believing.


Best wishes,
LSG.
--------------------------------------------------------

Oliver Manuel

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Aug 23, 2017, 5:56:35 PM8/23/17
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Dear friends,

Energy released by oxidation provides evidence of consciousness in humans and other animals but  energy released by neutron repulsion [1] provides evidence of 
consciousness in the Creator and Sustainer of atoms, lives and planets in the solar system  that is far beyond my comprehension. 

1.Oliver K. Manuel, “Neutron Repulsion”, The APEIRON Journal 19, 123-150 (2012):  http://redshift.vif.com/JournalFiles/V19NO2pdf/V19N2MAN.pdf

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Dear LSG,

 "P​lease help confirm if there exists a hierarchy of consciousness with different levels (combinations of capabilities), or not, in our world”.

In response to your first question I would like to draw your attention to the Theory of the Six Levels of Consciousness put forward by the yogi and philosopher Srinivas Arka.

For my PhD I undertook research to help validate the third level of his theory. The theory  is based on phenomenology - his own inner experiences and explorations of that of his pupils. The six levels  are Mind, Subliminal-Mind, Feeling-Mind, Emotional-Heart, Heart-Soul and Pure- Self:

 M (Mind) – Consciousness: Mind is the first layer, which manifests on the surface of the cerebral region. As it becomes sharpened by the cultivation of learning, it evolves into a faculty called intellect.

SM (Subliminal-Mind) – Consciousness: The second level, which is below the surface mind, is the subliminal or subconscious mind. We are unaware of its potential and capabilities, which may seem incredible to the surface mind. Many daily activities are governed by the subconscious mind.

F (Feeling-Mind) – Consciousness: The third level is the feeling mind. This feeling-consciousness generally prevails in the heart area and can thus be called the Heart of Heart-Consciousness. It includes an emotional faculty called intuition. Almost all mothers have this faculty naturally available and readily accessible to help them understand the intense needs of their children and people they care about.

H (Emotional-Heart) – Consciousness: The fourth layer is the deeper heart where you feel emotions with even greater intensity. This can be called the spiritual heart, or your inner consciousness. The presence of the surface mind is reduced and the presence of subliminal or subconscious mind is enhanced. It is formed by impressions gathered through what you have learned and experienced along with the memory of your personality.

HS (Heart-Soul) – Consciousness: The fifth level is between the deeper heart and the ultimate essential being (Soul). Here you experience inner-space and the Mystical Universe, where the laws of physics start reversing and lead you to experience many alternative realities and possibilities that give access to your own soul. Here you become more connected with Nature and the forces of the Universe.

PS (Pure-Self) – Consciousness: The sixth layer is Core-Consciousness. This is the very essence of your whole presence and of everything that you feel, think and do. It is addressed as Soul or Self. [Arka 2013] (pp. 37–38)




"Based on the Arka's theory of the six main levels of consciousness, this study predicted that people would show a trend towards a more feeling-based consciousness after being trained to go below their thinking mind. In order to test this, a scale was constructed under the name of the Feeling-Consciousness Scale (FCS). The scale items were based on Arka´s work and information derived from interviews with people who had practiced the IM method for more than 7 months.  Using a repeated measures design, the FCS was filled in by 8 male and 23 female participants comprising of five different groups, before and after attending five IM training sessions spread over 6 weeks (a total of 13.5 hours). The second time the scale was administered, several open questions were added (Lindhard, 2016, abstract). 

 
In  a pre-post test design I found a  difference in scores as measured by the Feeling Consciousness Scale (FCS)  at the .001 level. This suggested a shift towards a  more feeling based consciousness which was supported by the open questions. The scale includes items such as unity, peace, intuition, positivity, awareness of emotions, and connection to one's inner Self, sometimes expressed as soul, inner being, or atman

This is only a start in validating this theory and my study needs to be repeated using bigger number. However I personally feel it helps scientists out of a dilemma as both the thinking mind and a more feeling based  intuitive consciousness are recognised. The theory is also a road map for people who use a heart based method of meditation like the Intuitive Meditation Method.  Based on embryology, in my thesis I also go into the importance of the heart as being the organ of “incarnation”. 

If you are interested I can pass you a link to it - it is on Research Gate. A paper based on the study has also been published this year https://benthamopen.com/FULLTEXT/TOPSYJ-10-27

Kind regards - tina 



Tina Lindhard
PhD Consciousness Studies (IUPS)
President CCAEspaña
CICA: Chair of Consciousness Research
conso...@gmail.com

Paul Werbos

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Aug 24, 2017, 3:11:01 PM8/24/17
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On Thu, Aug 3, 2017 at 10:37 AM, Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com> wrote:
Definitely higher consciousness may be existing. Just as lower level beings do not have consciousness that we humans have, some among us may be having the faculty of a higher type of consciousness. But imagination may be running riot in assuming that consciousness is an ocean, with salt or sweet water.

Good morning, Srini ! (Please forgive and correct me if that is not the proper form of address.) 
I just now returned from Nepal, and see your email. Clearly I need to be more precise here.

In showing that impressive new image of dark matter from scientific measurement, I did not mean to say "This vast ocean of dark matter, connected to myriad galaxies, is one mind." Rather, as a connected ocean of free energy and matter, I see it as a vast ecology, just like the oceans of earth. It connects many minds, small and large, just as our oceans contain many bodies, brains and minds which have emerged form the kind of evolution one should naturally expect in such a system.

I should apologize for a mixed metaphor here, in using the word "ocean" twice, for two different related metaphors.

I do claim that the paranormal or spiritual experiences accepted by many of us (in general terms, with different views about the details of who has done what) cannot really be explained without a simple but jarring adjustment of two basic assumptions:(1) above all, assuming that we as individuals have "souls," a kind of living complement to our brains and bodies, which are essentially just cells in the larger "noosphere" of earth, a living entity which is a small part of that larger ocean of life (same ocean as in the picture); and (2) minor change in the measurement model used in quantum field theory, to allow for crosstime phenomena. Both are a bit jarring, but the latter is actually MORE logical than the ad hoc measurement formalism used today, and can be tested by relatively simple experiments in quantum optics. The former does demand that we explain how such a noosphere could come to exist, which Verdansky and Teilhard de Chardin never did; evolution within a larger ocean of life is indeed the obvious explanation, ONCE one accepts that this invisible living connection is actually there. 

But then comes the mixed metaphor.

I really enjoyed the discussion in nepal the day before the Science and Scientist conference. As we discussed life-long learning, one person said: "But we will not need life-long learning. After samadhi, you already know everything, so no new learning is needed." I was very happy that others disagreed, so I was not the only outlier, and I did not have to speak first. There was some agreement: samadhi is like being connected to the internet. It is not an end, but a beginning. And then comes the firehose of information you must learn to cope with, and use to the benefit of humanity. EXACTLY now my mixed metaphor: it is less like a firehose of information, and more like an ocean of information.

OK, I apologize. This ocean of information is not the same as the ocean of life in the picture. In fact, that raises a question: how far does the new ocean of information actually go to include everything in that picture? If we can connect ultimately to the whole of the earth noosphere which we are part of, to what extent do the senses and faculties of the earth include some ability to sense or even communicate with what lies beyond the earth? And even -- how much is friendly and how much not in that truly enormous ocean of life? 

But I do not mean to claim anything about that question!!

At the start of my talk in Nepal, I first admitted: "If anyone on earth says 'I now know everything and am bigger than the solar system,' I simply do not believe him. The earth is already huge beyond any of us, and it is enough of a challenge for us now to raise the capabilities of our souls, and of our personal union of body, brain and soul, to better lock into the vastly greater resources and capabilities (and needs) of the earth as a whole. " Of course, my first action even on boarding the airplane back from Nepal was to return to field theory mathematics issues which do address the physics of the cosmos as a whole, so I do not mean to overstress the theme of focusing only on the earth level.. but what I am called to do is not exactly what others are called to do. We have so many diverse mixes of responsibility, at multiple levels.

The "ocean of information" is still a useful metaphor, I think, even though it is NOT the same as that ocean of life, because people can be overwhelmed when they see the incoming information as a kind of firehose, like watching France24 or (worse) CNN 24 hours a day like Donald Trump, instead of calmly attending to the larger picture crossing larger space and time, giving you freedom where to focus. 

Best of luck,

     Paul


 
Nobody has so far proved that life is an ocean, all the same life exists in all living beings. I feel we need not unnecessarily elevate any human faculty to a universal level, and postulate that bits of it are permeating human beings. For example smelling is a faculty of beings, but there cant be anything like universal smelling. Similarly there is nothing like universal urination, divine defecation, etc. And consciousness cannot exist without the object of consciousness. If you are conscious, what are you conscious of? Swami Vivekananda questioned how many of us can think of infinity, except in terms of a big stretch of sky or a vast area of ocean. Consciousness certainly is a wonderful gift of nature, gift of a different kind and not of the same degree as the brain experiencing it. But I think we are following wrong leads by extending consciousness to universal levels or assuming it is billions of years old, when the universe itself is not more than fourteen billion years old. 

Again, I apologize for mixed metaphor. The ocean of LIFE in the connected span across galaxies has had billions of years in which to evolve. I was not referring here to a single brain billions of years old. 
It would be highly speculative and scientifically questionable to assume a span of existence of this ocean of energy and matter less than 10 billion years. How much MORE than 10 billion years is now a matter of sheer speculation for us, and I myself have yet to probe a few of the scientific uncertainties related to that number.

 
Best of luck,

     Paul

Paul Werbos

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Aug 24, 2017, 6:40:22 PM8/24/17
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On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 12:59 PM, Ganesh L S <l...@iitm.ac.in> wrote:

P​lease help confirm if there exists a hierarchy of consciousness with different levels (combinations of capabilities), or not, in our world.  We can then engage in discussions that could attempt to extend the "our world" context to larger systemic contexts, including the entire Universe (or, multiverses?)


Thank you, Ganesh, for raising a very real and important question. 

We all have different pictures. We can agree on some important things, and cooperate on that basis. Some disagreements are a matter of words and style, but some are different.

My own answers to your questions are based not only on science and experience, but on a kind of hard core realistic viewpoint of what exists in this cosmos. I was delighted this week to learn that Ramanuja (perhaps the most important writer in one of the three main schools of Vedanta) was also a realist, and also pushed the practical view that our personal souls are cells in a larger consciousness, but my realism is probably at the far Western end of what is within the pale for discussion here. 

In particular, I humbly and tentatively but with great focus try to develop the following picture: that our entire cosmos is a curved Minkowski space, exactly as in Einstein's general relativity theory; that the only thing which substantively exists in a fundamental way in this cosmos is a set of "force fields" or "continuous functions" over that cosmos; and that this cosmos possesses a "Lagrangain energy density function" from which may be deduced all the laws of physics, which are in turn the foundation on which atoms, bodies and brains all develop as emergent phenomena or patterns. In my paper in the conference book, I called this picture "Einsteinian materialism," but perhaps "Einsteinian realism" would have been a more precise and less inflammatory term.

Einsteinian realism would naturally tend to agree with you, that "consciousness" as we know it exists at many levels in the brains of this planet, which have evolved in bodies on this planet. Furthermore, as a hard core realist, I expect higher levels of consciousness as we know it mainly exist as patterns similar to brains (governed by the same type of general neural network mathematics), in one or two places: (1) brains evolved in a larger ecology, mainly the great "ocean of life" of dark matter and energy interacting with ordinary matter; and (2) computer type brains, which in fact we know we can build to a much higher level (even though I do not want to!) and which may well exist elsewhere in our cosmos. 

But there is a fourth possible higher consciousness: IF the ultimate Lagrangian function can in fact be expressed as nonnegative definite, could the Lagrange-Euler equations governing the cosmos actually be the limiting case of neural network mathematics, in the limit as approximate optimization goes to perfect exact optimization? If that mathematical model is correct, do those cold looking equations actually say that the cosmos is a kind of perfect intelligence, albeit with "motive" or 'telos" or "utility function' (Lagrangian)
quite different from what we humans recognize as something worth caring about? In that case, should we call the cosmos itself "conscious" or not?

My position on that question is that the question does not matter. The sloppy English word "conscious" is not so important here. What is more important is to understand what the Lagrangian is (or what alternative theory works better if this approach eventually fails, which it has not yet done), and what it implies for what we should expect to see in our lager scale experiments both in the lab and in our lives. In truth, the Lagrange/Einstein picture implies MUCH more interesting and weird behavior than people might imagine.
Year ago, before chaos theory was developed, people imagine that simple ordinary differential equations not even doing optimization could not yield wild and interesting behavior; chaos theory was the revolution which proved this wrong. Here, with 4 dimensions instead of just 1, and with perfect optimization in a highly nonlinear situation, linked to the weirdness we already know in quantum field theory... we need to understand how there is a lot more weirdness out there than high school mathematics would consider possible. 




 

There is enough and more evidence today of consciousness in other living creatures ranging from the micro to the macro.  The term "collective consciousness" in human society has also been researched into and written about.


We do not have sufficient evidence, in our frames of reference, about consciousness in non-living matter.  Please let us shed and share more knowledge (already, there have been some e-mails on this topic in our group) about the possibility of consciousness in energy.  To what extent does Mother Nature reveal consciousness via her systems, processes and mechanisms?


Again, I see ordinary brains and noospheres as  consciousness in evolved living matter.
Consciousness over "computer hardware" is another debate, for another email, and I suppose not what you meant in reference to Mother Nature. Consciousness of cosmos itself I have said enough about already. 


We can observe that consciousness can be identified at least at two levels, viz., receiving and radiating?  In the former, self-referencing processes and stimulus-response mechanisms and behaviour will be fascinating to examine deeply, or perhaps even feed forward mechanisms and behaviour.

For practical life on mundane life, and in the realm of soul, we are mainly "knowledge workers." It is important for us knowledge workers to remember we all must pay enough respect to all three jobs -- to input, to process, and to output, all of us. To listen and work hard to truly hear and understand; to deeply analyze, recrystallize, think and be creative, using faculties from intuition to nonverbal brain activity to higher symbolic reasoning, integrated together; and to communicate in a way to make the fruits of the first two activities available to others (though properly guiding our physical actions is also important). 

So we all must receive and radiate both. In truth, I agree with most of my Quaker friends that deep dialogue is a central exercise both of body and of soul which we are called to enhance and develop and exercise and experiment with, whatever our level of development. 

 In the latter, in addition to the above two features, we should examine the process of radiation or explicit revelation of consciousness and its influences, and also the concept of "purpose".  Other participants can suggest many other aspects that will warrant the generation of greater insights.


In Nepal, Muni and I both agreed quite emphatically that "telos" is of central importance to all our various activities, and is one good foundation for cooperation and communication. 

Of course, Aristotle's concept of telos has led to many branches or children. I myself draw very heavily on the branch which went from "telos" (seen as happiness or a kind of sense of light or joy) to "utility functions" (as per Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, whose original philosophy of utilitarianism was much more enlightened than some of its fundamentalist followers, a problem they shared with many other philosophers like Confucius, Jesus and Mohammed), to John Von Neumann (the gateway to many continents I have explored). It is fascinating to see the similarity in tone and feeling between Aristotle's Nichomachean ethics (easily downloaded for free from the web) and work by folks like Howard Raiffa of the Harvard Business School trying to understand people's utility functions!! Yet I agree with Muni that insights from spiritual experience  deepen all this, as do insights from neural network mathematics, all consistent with each other.

As you say, "telos" is an important and complex area which can be used for much more sharing of insights and integration of understanding. 


Here are a few of my questions or thoughts.

Am i alive right now as i am keying in this e-mail?  Well, it seems that i am alive and conscious that i am alive (self-referencing is performed).  But, as some folks may observe, "it's all maaya".  Obviously, those folks received my information stimulus and responded in good faith.  So, we can infer that i have radiated "something", to those folks who received my stimulus and within their frames of reference termed my experience as "maaya" in good faith.  But, this doesn't stop with this exchange.

Certainly. The development and expression of such dialogue is deeply fundamental and natural. It is the truncation of dialogue which would be unnatural and unhealthy. Those political and social patterns which have such a damping effect are a great drag on us, and a serious challenge for us to try to overcome. 

 

 Here's another line of conscious observation and questioning.


Right now, i am alive, i.e., my entire being is physically alive, and would even be fit for the due certification medically and legally.  Does this imply every conceivable geometric point within my body possesses life at this moment?  Is each and every such geometric point within me capable of radiating life, or providing reflective information of the absence of life, and the attendant signals to some or all other points within my body?  This line of observation and questioning is to point to the analogy about our Universe and consciousness within and permeating it (Universal consciousness?).

We did not have so much discussion in Nepal about consciousness at levels smaller or below that of the mammal brain. Well, there was a lot of parallel type discussion of microbial life and evolution. Since that is another large subject, I will leave it to others to comment. In my Einstein realism view, specialized to also believing earth noosphere exists, I would say that microbes like us are to some extent symbiotic systems, with a mundane consciousness in the machinery of the cell (adequately describable within modified quantum electrodynamics, MQED) and a coupling to the noosphere of earth -- both at much lower levels in each cell than what human individuals have. Of those who have argued for more at the cellular level -- oddly, I was most impressed  by a light but serious science fiction series, the Gatekeeper trilogy by Orson Scott Card. How much truth is there in HIS (experientially grounded) view of consciousness below the human level? I simply do not know. Muni mentioned that vedantists talk about seven levels of consciousness at a lower level,  but we did not have time to talk more about that aspect. 

================

Best regards,

   Paul

N.Panchapakesan

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Dear Paul

 Your post on reality, made me pause and think about the disquiet I have been feeling for some time about the direction of the posts in the past few months.

Your final line about answers being different for different persons was, of course, a big relief. My disquiet is related to the absence of  “mention” of emotions in all the discussions. There is lot of passion and even anger displayed in the posts but no discussion of emotions like love or compassion or their importance.

  I would say that the bedrock of reality is “Love” not “Lagrangian”. It is the extraordinary joy and love that makes one feel that there is unity and everything is connected. Every description of the peak experience talks about unity. It is love that brings one down to earth (or to “village”, in Bruno’s language, “along with a little ego, wanting to help others”, as he put it). The ego goes away during the experience.

      There are many ways of describing reality.  The trouble with using Lagrangian formalism, as basic reality, in my opinion, is that  science knowing human beings are then essential to describe it. Our understanding of history of the universe , at present, allows for the presence of human beings only for a very short period in this history, though we believe that universal soul or consciousness is always there.   You may be aware of the conversations between Rabindranath Tagore and Einstein, where they disagreed about having a reality without any observers.

    In life sciences and even in many parts of chemistry, a microscopic (Lagrangian) description is not useful. Secondary concepts like valence or hydrogen bonding are much more helpful.

  While the proposed experiments by you or Jack Sarafati  will revolutionise quantum description and natural science, they will not affect the ethical , moral framework given by spirituality. The mental thumb rules like “Advaita” and “Do unto others as you would that they do unto you “ need holistic realisations, not natural science, like even Feynman had pointed out.

   I find ,there is too much of mind and too little of heart in our discussions.

 Be here and now. Love and be joyful.

Warm regards

Panchu


N. Panchapakesan
New Delhi, India


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Oliver Manuel

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Dear Panchu,

Those who awake to reality seem to discover a benevolent Higher Power.  But Fearof nuclear annihilation and the survival instinct may have separated humanity from recognition of the benevolent power of neutron repulsion in the Sun's pulsar core.

With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel

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Paul Werbos

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Sep 4, 2017, 5:30:41 PM9/4/17
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On Mon, Sep 4, 2017 at 12:09 PM, N.Panchapakesan <nargis...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Paul

 Your post on reality, made me pause and think about the disquiet I have been feeling for some time about the direction of the posts in the past few months.

Your final line about answers being different for different persons was, of course, a big relief. My disquiet is related to the absence of  “mention” of emotions in all the discussions. There is lot of passion and even anger displayed in the posts but no discussion of emotions like love or compassion or their importance.

  I would say that the bedrock of reality is “Love” not “Lagrangian”. It is the extraordinary joy and love that makes one feel that there is unity and everything is connected. Every description of the peak experience talks about unity. It is love that brings one down to earth (or to “village”, in Bruno’s language, “along with a little ego, wanting to help others”, as he put it). The ego goes away during the experience.



Thank you, Panchu, for reminding us all  of such important points.

As finite beings, we have personal bedrocks of being different from, and smaller than, the bedrock of the cosmos as a whole.
 
For all finite conscious beings -- from fish brains to noospheres and more -- I would claim that all intelligent creatures have their intelligence coupled to some kind of primary motivational system, which provides some kind of measure of progress or happiness or telos or  cardinal utility function. 

Long ago, when I was an undergraduate (and not yet a believer in paranormal or spiritual phenomena), I remember reading Nietzsche's Genealogy  of Morals (and  mostly agreeing). Instead of harping on good versus evil, he said, we should think more about "good" and "bad,' about our natural inborn deep (esthetic?) reactions to different states of our experience. Are we sensitive to what gives us a primal feeling like light, versus what gives a primal feeling of darkness or ugliness? It is a tricky matter to probe what our deepest feelings really are..
getting past social conventions, hopes and fears, and ideologies... but it can be done. From the viewpoint of science, this makes a lot of sense, since it is the primal feelings, not the verbal constructs we learn later, which truly energize human minds in any case. I tend to think that this kind of shift in attitude is what caused the later unexpected paranormal experiences which led to further shifts in my senior year in college.

Some would ask: "Which one IS it? Alignment, like bhakti? Happiness? Purpose? telos? Cardinal utility function?" In my view, these words are all trying to articulate the same actual phenomenon, and we can appreciate that phenomenon  better if we learn a way of thinking in which all aspects are considered and advanced TOGETHER without contradiction.

But even a naive, mundane brain faces a serious learning  challenge:"How can I learn WHICH kinds of specific experience result in the "this light" versus "this dark" feeling at the deepest level? Even if it must be rough, how can I translate this general abstract/direct goal into something more specific which I know how to pursue?"
Aritsotle, in  Nichomachean Ethics (an easy free download on the web) addressed the question by asking "what causes humans to feel happiness?" Actually a major school of economics now asks the same.

In Western mysticism, the expression "life, light and love" is one nice if rough way of expressing this association (see 

As we get closer to unity of mind with the entire noosphere of earth or solar system... it hits me that love and truth, as universal concepts, may ultimately have more power and permanence than any of the more specific archetypes of human cultures, as powerful as those may be and as important as reflections of more basic concepts.
I certainly have friends in the Judeo-Christian traditions who have had very deep commitments to the spirit of love, people I respect deeply, whom I am grateful to maintain cooperation with. And I note how the bhakti movement has strengthened the spirit of love in India as well, and how the focus on love in the West also owes something to the earlier efforts by Empedocles, an early spiritual teacher whose impact should not be underestimated. 

Yet, for me, the spirit of truth is coequal, and ironically it tends to pull us beyond the limits of this solar system more than the spirit of love on its own would immediately do. 
And yes, even Nietzsche invokes the spirit of truth, properly, as something which goes beyond the limitations of some of the hoary book- based ideologies of the Indo-European culture world. The spirit of truth and the spirit of love are properly synergistic, and all ever so important even within the limits of us in this solar system. 

Even as we approach unity with the noosphere of earth as a whole, if it is authentic and not an illusion of ego (like the "denial" illusion discussed in Valliant's important book on human psychology), the sense of purpose, the drive for truth and love, and the sense of purpose, do not dissolve away but are enlarged in scope. In Buddhism, some say the Buddha takes on the pains of the entire world. 

 

      There are many ways of describing reality.  The trouble with using Lagrangian formalism, as basic reality, in my opinion, is that  science knowing human beings are then essential to describe it.



There is no real trouble even for mundane brains, let alone noosphere, in trying to understand how the larger cosmos works. There is no contradiction. 

    In life sciences and even in many parts of chemistry, a microscopic (Lagrangian) description is not useful. Secondary concepts like valence or hydrogen bonding are much more helpful.

  While the proposed experiments by you or Jack Sarafati  will revolutionise quantum description and natural science, they will not affect the ethical , moral framework given by spirituality.


As finite beings, we certainly face issues of how to reconcile and unite our personal finite first person experience (even if expanded to the whole noosphere) with what we learn about larger objective reality. My views of that are summarized in www.werbos.com/Mind_in_Time.pdf. The specific type of philosophy (or Jack type physics/philosophy) which is just a matter of formal word games can never accomplish such an integration, no matter how much hyperbole and authority and ontology it tries to imagine in unaided words.

Yet even a mouse without its soul can do better, in achieving integration. There is a mundane level of sanity or integration possible, even before the use of words. Beyond that, there is a level of sanity or integration possible, beyond Jack's kind of mentality, before significant spiritual input. Mundane sanity is an important steppingstone to the next level of sanity or integration, connecting the (sane) spiritual level to the sane brain -- but in truth there have been examples of people who achieve spiritual connection without sanity either of brain or of soul, who are a bit of a problem for themselves and others, especially with misuse of drugs. I like what Annie Besant said about that in her book on thought-forms, and I was happy to see her books on the shelves of Mahatma Ghandhi, who understood a lot about real enlightenment and about service to humanity. 


   I find ,there is too much of mind and too little of heart in our discussions.


There was a  bit of more direct spirit in the week in Nepal, for which I am very grateful.

 .

 Be here and now.



Yes, and way out there too as well, as we move the eyes of the spirit more freely and consciously.

Warm regards,

   Paul

Andris Heks

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Sep 4, 2017, 5:59:36 PM9/4/17
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Dear Panchu,


I could not agree with you more about the importance of love. 

But you seem to have missed my dialogue about it with several of the contributors on these pages.

So here I send my basic article about it to you pasted again for your attention and comments.


The only other point I would make is the all inclusiveness of the love I write about. 

The cosmic-personal almighty lover, that HShe (i.e. the fusion of He and She, Shiva and Shakti) is  all inclusive. 

HShe is in all of us and includes every one of us without exception. Hse is not just emotional. Hse is trans-emotional, therefore utterly devotional. The only One who can love everyone individually and all collectively.

Hence in SHim we, from SHim we can derive our only authentic cosmic-psychosocial-personal identity.

The task is to move from divisive emotion and fragmenting surface rationality to the unifying depth devotionality of this Lover.


Humillimus Servus,


Andris


 TOWARDS AN INTEGRAL SCIENCE OF LIVING CONSCIOUSNESS OR CONSCIOUS LIVING.           

©  Andris Heks 18.08.2017

 

 Can we transcend our perhaps futile attempts to talk about consciousness on its own rather than attempting to experience and then to describe the seamless union of primal eternal consciousness and primal eternal life as the united aspects of the most primal cosmic cause of all: the Eternal Being of Love, the ‘I AM’, that is both the One eternally unmanifest potential whole and His-Her (HShe) eternally changing, transient material forms.

 

At this point I must declare my own biases: I come from a Hungarian youth, blessed with intimacy with arguably the most ancient, holistic and perhaps a Golden Age (Krita Yuga) derived, incredibly wise mother tongue: Hungarian.

 

I am nearly 71 and I have lived in Australia since the age of 18 and for the last forty years I immersed myself in Psycho- and Yoga therapies as a Social Worker.

In particular, I intensively trained and practiced in my work, simultaneously, in the arguably most powerful experiential Western psychotherapy, Dr Jacob Moreno’s Psychodrama and the most powerful holistic Eastern experiential spiritual discipline in Integral Yoga.

Having tried to integrate the two, the last few years I have also been working on integrating Yoga with religious Faith.

 

Having been a sworn materialist atheist for thirty years, since a few years ago, I have come to the experiential realisation of the nonsense of my atheistic position and the absolute necessity of unshakable Faith if I was ever gain a glimpse of the truth.

 

I am impressed by the claim that reason and faith are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to contemplate the truth.

Amen to this!

 

In particular, I have been working lately on integrating the Yogic and Christian takes on the nature of truth.

 

By constantly referring back to the ancient wisdom in my monistic Hungarian mother tongue and attempting to articulate it in English, I may be in the position to make a humble contribution towards trying to gain a verifiable glimpse of Transcendental Love; the very essence of Living Consciousness.

 

The Hungarian has a word for such love, that is absent in English.

 

That word is the extraordinarily wise word of ‘SZERELEM’.

 

The equivalent word in Hungarian to the English word ‘Love’ is ‘Szeretet’.

 

But while the Hungarian word ‘Szerelem’ subsumes ‘Szeretet’, the English concept of love, it is far more comprehensive, is deeper, and it is primordially fundamental.

 

It is a combination of Eros, Filial love, Agape and Caritas; transcendental and human love, in a stunning claim to be the Logos of all!

 

Let me present to you some of the linguistic evidence that I deciphered over the years, about why this may be so.

 

First, it is important to understand about the holistic Hungarian language, that it derives from the perception of the Whole and the words then depict aspects of this whole in an entanglement in cause-effect chains.

As if they were constituting interconnected pieces of a pre-existing but infinitely expanding  jigsaw puzzle.

 

So, in the word ‘Szerelem’ we have a number of fundamental and causally related etymons in a stunning unfolding of meaningful explanation.

 

The first syllable is ‘szer’.

 

Szer is in turn constitutes the first three letters of ‘szerv’ from which the ‘szerv’ word itself and its further extension ‘szervezet’ clearly derive. 

 

Now, ‘szerv’ means ‘organ’ and ‘szervezet’ means ‘organisation.’ 

The former: ‘organ’ clearly stems from the latter: ‘organisation.’

 

So now we have a stunning insight here about the Hungarian ‘szerelem’, i.e. the ‘primordal love’ concept, that begins to point to its fundamentally primal nature.

 

It tells us already in the first syllable that ‘love’ organises! 

 

And once we have deciphered the rest of this word, it becomes crystal clear that love is the primal living organising principle of all!!!

 

So, let’s go on analysing the word ‘szerelem’, because a number of amazing meanings emerge from such analysis, all pointing to the absolute primacy of  ‘Szerelem’; the notion of its being the essence of a Living, Loving, Cosmically and Personally Conscious Being.

 

 

So, within the first syllable of ‘szer’ we have a smaller irreducible etymon: ‘er’.

 

Now, ‘er’ in turn is the first syllable of ‘eredet’, that is ‘origin’ in English.

Wow, now we are getting further!

 

So, we learn here that szerelem is not only organising but it is also the originally, and therefore, arguably, the eternally organising factor.

 

This is also stunningly confirmed in the Sanskrit word for love: ‘prem’.

 

That is, because ‘prem’ is also the etymon of ‘premium’, primal and therefore the very first!

 

In case you are still not convinced, lets go to the next critical part of the word, 'szerelem'.

 

It is, of course, ‘elem’. 

And elem is the Hungarian word for the English ‘element’! 

 

Hey!

 

So, what we have learnt so far is that perhaps there is an ancient Hungarian realisation, that szerelem (Love) is the primal organising element of the Cosmos!

 

I rest my case!

 

O.K. But what does this have to do, even if true, with consciousness and life?

 

Lets go back to the word szerelem, because we might just find our trump cards in it.

(Unpolluted by President Trump).

 

So, szerELem, also have the critical etymon, ‘el’ in it.

 

It is the root of both ‘ELeven=lively and ‘ELme’=mind or consciousness. 

((‘Lively’ (eleven) is the root element of Life (‘ÉLet’)).

 

So, what we have here in szerelem is:  the primally original element of all organising love with its two intrinsic aspects of life and consciousness seamlessly present as constituents of His-Her One Being!

 

Why ‘being’? Because it or more correctly, HShe

(I coined this term as English lacks it, as the ‘union of He and She’)

is living and is conscious.

 

Can I now rest my case?!

 

Of course, this is the beginning and not the end of the story, because Hungarian also teaches us how such Loving Spirit materialises and manifests itself in the human Soul and how such Soul derives, is sustained by and returns to such eternally living and organising Loving Spirit.

 

I WOULD APPRECIATE YOUR COMMENTS.

Andris Heks






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Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from
 
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TOWARDS AN INTEGRAL SCIENCE OF LIVING CONSCIOUSNESS OR CONSCIOUS LIVING.docx

Deepa Sn

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Sep 5, 2017, 4:47:40 AM9/5/17
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Dear Panchapakesan,

Yes, the importance of reality is well noted.



Best Regards
Deepa
-------------------
Dr.S.N.Deepa M.E.,Ph.D.,
Associate Professor
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering
Anna University
Regional Campus: Coimbatore
Coimbatore - 641 046



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John Jay Kineman

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Sep 5, 2017, 4:34:59 PM9/5/17
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We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from experiment or other experience what we can know are only the models.  Some recent thinking has followed this logic plainly, without adding more assumptions than this most basic fact has in it. Thus parsimoniously, the first thing we know with certainty is the modeling relation. That is consistent with even Descartes meditations on reality expressed in his proof of reality by the faculty of awareness "I think therefore I am". The most obvious next step is to suppose that if such consciousness establishes me as an "I" existent observer, and I know of nothing else that establishes anything, except through that awareness, then perhaps it is modeling relations all the way down.  That too is an assumption, but it is based on the one primal fact of existence. To make the assumption that there is a different kind of reality that does not involve such a known relation between awareness and existence is not warranted, not parsimonious, fanciful. Thus true science should proceed as it did before the Vedas, retaining wholeness with awareness. Mind is in nature at all levels. Hence the reality we should assume is the modeling relation itself. It comprises four causalities in both Veda and later Greek philosophy (Aristotle).  But western science decided to model what the observer observed as if it is independent of observation, which the most fundamental fact already established denies. The new physics, in whatever form it takes, has to return to a true fundamental ontology, which is modeling modeling relations themselves. This was the genius of Robert Rosen's relational mathematics.

Yours, 
John
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Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 5, 2017, 5:13:11 PM9/5/17
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On Tue, Sep 05, 2017 at 06:50:48PM +0000, John Jay Kineman wrote:
> We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling relations
> between reality and mental models of it. Whether from experiment or other
> experience what we can know are only the models.

That's a questionable claim. To have a model, it's necessary to have access
to the reality it resembles. Otherwise all we would have to compare models
to is other models; there'd be no way to ground or prove them against
reality. While it may be that to know a reality we need both access to it
_and_ models, that's a different claim, that modeling and perception go hand
in hand.

In any case, you can't have "modeling relations between reality and mental
models" unless you have, on the one hand, direct experience of reality, and
on the other, experience of models which capture various aspects of it.

Best,
Whit

Serge Patlavskiy

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Sep 6, 2017, 5:18:49 AM9/6/17
to Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com
-
John Jay Kineman <john.k...@colorado.edu> on Sep 5, 2017 wrote:
>We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling 
>relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from 
>experiment or other experience what we can know are only the 
>models.
.
[S.P.] This is another way of talking about a distinction between Noumenal Reality (which we postulate to exist objectively and independently of the activity of consciousness) and Phenomenal Reality (or a totality of models/knowledge about Noumenal Reality that every organism possesses due to activity of own consciousness).
.
In so doing, we are not talking about the "reality" of the very model -- we are talking about the adequacy of the constructed model, or about the extent to which the constructed model corresponds to some entity which is postulated to exist objectively out there (or belongs to Noumenal Reality). 
.
To make his/her subjective model more adequate, a person needs to gain more data by performing additional observations, and/or by conducting more experiments, and/or by enquiring the others whether their models are compatible with the one the given person constructs, thereby solving the problem of intersubjectivity. Any living organism, to stay alive, tries to have a model of the, so called, "outer world" expediently adequate.
.
The mechanistic/physicalistic model of a living consciousness-possessing organism is less adequate than the model (which I suggest, as for one) that is able to formalize complex systems and which takes into consideration the activity of informational factor.
.
As to John's statement that "Mind is in nature at all levels", for me, it is a purest panpsychism. 
.
As to the question "Where we come from?", I would like to ask myself: "Where this very question comes from?". :-)
.
Best,
Serge Patlavskiy



From: John Jay Kineman <john.k...@colorado.edu>
To: "Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com" <Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 5, 2017 11:41 PM

Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from experiment or other experience what we can know are only the models.  Some recent thinking has followed this logic plainly, without adding more assumptions than this most basic fact has in it. Thus parsimoniously, the first thing we know with certainty is the modeling relation. That is consistent with even Descartes meditations on reality expressed in his proof of reality by the faculty of awareness "I think therefore I am". The most obvious next step is to suppose that if such consciousness establishes me as an "I" existent observer, and I know of nothing else that establishes anything, except through that awareness, then perhaps it is modeling relations all the way down.  That too is an assumption, but it is based on the one primal fact of existence. To make the assumption that there is a different kind of reality that does not involve such a known relation between awareness and existence is not warranted, not parsimonious, fanciful. Thus true science should proceed as it did before the Vedas, retaining wholeness with awareness. Mind is in nature at all levels. Hence the reality we should assume is the modeling relation itself. It comprises four causalities in both Veda and later Greek philosophy (Aristotle).  But western science decided to model what the observer observed as if it is independent of observation, which the most fundamental fact already established denies. The new physics, in whatever form it takes, has to return to a true fundamental ontology, which is modeling modeling relations themselves. This was the genius of Robert Rosen's relational mathematics.

Yours, 
John


Вірусів немає. www.avast.com

Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 6, 2017, 9:32:39 AM9/6/17
to 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D.
On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 03:00:12AM +0000, 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D. wrote:
> -
> John Jay Kineman <john.k...@colorado.edu> on Sep 5, 2017 wrote:
> >We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling
> >relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from
> >experiment or other experience what we can know are only the
> >models.
> .
> [S.P.] This is another way of talking about a distinction between Noumenal
> Reality (which we postulate to exist objectively and independently of the
> activity of consciousness) and Phenomenal Reality (or a totality of models/
> knowledge about Noumenal Reality that every organism possesses due to activity
> of own consciousness).

Contrary to your shared stance, I stand with J. Krishnamurti on the superior
value of direct awareness. Models are secondary to awareness. Awareness
presents the world in a breadth and complexity beyond any model we are
capable of. Awareness is the gold standard. Models, even the best of them,
are but fool's gold by comparison.

Best,
Whit

Paul Werbos

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Sep 6, 2017, 3:37:20 PM9/6/17
to Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com
On Tue, Sep 5, 2017 at 5:10 PM, Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> wrote:
On Tue, Sep 05, 2017 at 06:50:48PM +0000, John Jay Kineman wrote:
> We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling relations
> between reality and mental models of it. Whether from experiment or other
> experience what we can know are only the models.

That's a questionable claim. To have a model, it's necessary to have access
to the reality it resembles. Otherwise all we would have to compare models
to is other models; there'd be no way to ground or prove them against
reality. While it may be that to know a reality we need both access to it
_and_ models, that's a different claim, that modeling and perception go hand
in hand.


Please forgive that I dabble in deconstruction again -- this time with the word "model."

At least in studying the functional (teleological) level of mundane intelligence in the brain,
as in my paper last year on that subject ( Regular Cycles of Forward and Backward Signal Propagation in Prefrontal Cortex and in Consciousness, by Paul Werbos and Yeshua (J.J.) Davis, Front. Syst. Neurosci., 28 November 2016.),
I would claim that the rat brain ALREADY contains a kind of predictive model of its environment, even at a level of life where words and mathematics do not yet exist. The paper discusses exactly where in the brain it is. 

When we start building explicit mathematical models to predict our experience, we are simply learning to upgrade our symbolic reasoning to START to catch up with what the nonverbal part of our mind already knows how to do, even (logically) before that capability is enhanced by inputs from the soul. In other words, we are upgrading our symbolic reasoning in a way which allows better integration with the nonverbal part of ourselves, both mundane and spiritual. 

Does the soul, too, need to learn more mathematics? That always makes me think of nice, highly readable first person accounts by Ingo Swann, whose capabilities were tested in peer-reviewed IEEE publications (in the flagship top journal), who may have said a FEW silly things like all the rest of us at times, but is still well worth reading. He described what problems he had in remembering NUMBERS in his remote viewing and out of body experiments. I also think of a book by Ouspensky where he reported on how different people seemed to vary in how far they had advanced (learned) in their "essence.". 

All for now. Best of luck,

   Paul



 

In any case, you can't have "modeling relations between reality and mental
models" unless you have, on the one hand, direct experience of reality, and
on the other, experience of models which capture various aspects of it.

Best,
Whit
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Serge Patlavskiy

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Sep 6, 2017, 3:37:43 PM9/6/17
to Online Sadhu Sanga
-
Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> on Sep 6, 2017 wrote:
>Models are secondary to awareness.
.
[S.P.] Is what you call "awareness" a result of the activity of consciousness? By the way, please, fill in the blanks in the following sentence: "I use the term "awareness" to stand for ...".
.
Second. The all we can know about Noumenal Reality is due to activity of our consciousness. In general, the given organism's consciousness creates a model of Noumenal Reality for this organism, or it creates this organism's version of Phenomenal Reality. (The two-word term "Phenomenal Reality" stands for "model of Noumenal Reality").
.
Third. Whatever model our consciousness constructs, it corresponds to Noumenal Reality always to such or other degree of adequacy, or it is to such or other degree good, sufficient, full, etc. Even when you look at your wife, you cannot be certain for 100% that what you see is an element of Noumenal Reality (or that this something is a real object), but not a figment of your imagination created by your consciousness in the given situation or under certain circumstances.
.
Thanks for your reaction,
Serge Patlavskiy



From: Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com>
To: "'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D." <Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, September 6, 2017 4:31 PM

Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from
_________________________________________
From: "'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D." <Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, September 6, 2017 12:18 PM
Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

-
John Jay Kineman <john.k...@colorado.edu> on Sep 5, 2017 wrote:
>We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling 
>relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from 
>experiment or other experience what we can know are only the 
>models.
.
[S.P.] This is another way of talking about a distinction between Noumenal Reality (which we postulate to exist objectively and independently of the activity of consciousness) and Phenomenal Reality (or a totality of models/knowledge about Noumenal Reality that every organism possesses due to activity of own consciousness).
.
In so doing, we are not talking about the "reality" of the very model -- we are talking about the adequacy of the constructed model, or about the extent to which the constructed model corresponds to some entity which is postulated to exist objectively out there (or belongs to Noumenal Reality). 
.
To make his/her subjective model more adequate, a person needs to gain more data by performing additional observations, and/or by conducting more experiments, and/or by enquiring the others whether their models are compatible with the one the given person constructs, thereby solving the problem of intersubjectivity. Any living organism, to stay alive, tries to have a model of the, so called, "outer world" expediently adequate.
.
The mechanistic/physicalistic model of a living consciousness-possessing organism is less adequate than the model (which I suggest, as for one) that is able to formalize complex systems and which takes into consideration the activity of informational factor.
.
As to John's statement that "Mind is in nature at all levels", for me, it is a purest panpsychism. 
.
As to the question "Where we come from?", I would like to ask myself: "Where this very question comes from?". :-)
.
Best,
Serge Patlavskiy


_______________________________________
From: John Jay Kineman <john.k...@colorado.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, September 5, 2017 11:41 PM
Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

We need to understand that we 'know' physics because of modeling relations between reality and mental models of it. Whether from experiment or other experience what we can know are only the models.

<abridged>

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Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 6, 2017, 7:47:09 PM9/6/17
to Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com
On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 02:26:48PM -0400, Paul Werbos wrote:

> Please forgive that I dabble in deconstruction again -- this time with the word
> "model."
>
> At least in studying the functional (teleological) level of mundane
> intelligence in the brain, as in my paper last year on that subject
> ( Regular Cycles of Forward and Backward Signal Propagation in Prefrontal
> Cortex and in Consciousness, by Paul Werbos and Yeshua (J.J.)
> Davis, Front. Syst. Neurosci., 28 November 2016.), I would claim that the
> rat brain ALREADY contains a kind of predictive model of its environment,
> even at a level of life where words and mathematics do not yet exist. The
> paper discusses exactly where in the brain it is. 

Quite right to do so. Andy Clark has a recent book out, Surfing Uncertainty:
Prediction, Action and the Embodied Mind, which is much concerned with
bootstrapping predictive models. It's brilliant. I'm in the middle of it, so
can't yet summarize his final conclusions. But I'd take him to largely agree
with you on the rat brain.

To perceive something, quite trivially is to have expectations of it. It's
not a rock if, having been seen as a rock, it doesn't behave as a rock. If
it's a rock-colored rat, your "model" of it was wrong. Or, more to the
point, you didn't perceive it correctly. Same as if you took a rock for a
rat. So perception and modeling go hand-in-hand, as I'd have it.

Yet I also find Searle's book, Seeing Things as They Are, an important
corrective to the lazy philosopher's habit of mistaking the complicity of
models in perception for a world in which we had no direct perception, but
only ever perceive a muddle of models. That's just wrong, Searle argues, and
I believe he's right. When we call the lowest-level expectations "models"
we're stretching the metaphor of "model." Expectation and perception, on the
lowest level, are bound up in each other. Yet perception can take the lead,
and go beyond expectation. To claim we don't have direct perception of the
world because we obviously have expectations of what we perceive -- thus
"models" -- comes from a failure to see this.

The best of reality exceeds our expectations, and we can, if we attend well,
perceive that it does. Perception stretches our expectations, stretches our
ability to model -- on whatever level. A sunset, a lover, a fresh bit of art
takes us beyond anything we've expected, anything our models have predicted,
and the world is new again.

Best,
Whit

Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 6, 2017, 7:47:09 PM9/6/17
to 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D.
On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 05:57:47PM +0000, 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D. wrote:
> -
> Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> on Sep 6, 2017 wrote:
> >Models are secondary to awareness.
> .
> [S.P.] Is what you call "awareness" a result of the activity of consciousness?
> By the way, please, fill in the blanks in the following sentence: "I use the
> term "awareness" to stand for ...".

I use the term awareness to stand for awareness. It's an accurate arrow
pointing towards that. We all know the difference between focusing awareness
on something, and not doing so. I use it for what it is we focus if we
meditation on a candle flame, or a melody.

"Consciousness" is a problematic term. "Awareness," really, is not. The last
thing I'd do is define "awareness" in terms of "consciousness." On the other
hand, "con-scious" as "together-seen" suggests that consciousness is a
twining of multiple awarenesses; but let's leave that as a suggestion here.

> Second. The all we can know about Noumenal Reality is due to activity of our
> consciousness. In general, the given organism's consciousness creates a model
> of Noumenal Reality for this organism, or it creates this organism's version of
> Phenomenal Reality. (The two-word term "Phenomenal Reality" stands for "model
> of Noumenal Reality").

Perhaps Kant had it wrong. You speak as of an organism had one grand model.
Yet all the evidence at hand is for small, specific models of aspects of
what we perceive, not a single grand model which constitutes all we
perceive. The unity is not in our models. We all hold many conflicting,
contrasting, incompatible models used pragmatically to apprehend various
aspects of our world. The only unity is in our world, not our models. We
have models that posit unities, but all of them are incomplete sketches,
none capable of comprehending the breadth of our aware experience. Of
course, some of us turn away from awareness towards our models, and miss
that.

> Third. Whatever model our consciousness constructs, it corresponds to Noumenal
> Reality always to such or other degree of adequacy, or it is to such or other
> degree good, sufficient, full, etc. Even when you look at your wife, you cannot
> be certain for 100% that what you see is an element of Noumenal Reality (or
> that this something is a real object), but not a figment of your imagination
> created by your consciousness in the given situation or under certain
> circumstances.

Oh no. My wife is quite real. If you're not sure of the reality of your
wife, I'd suggest Martin Buber's I and Thou as a place to start.

Best,
Whit

John Jay Kineman

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Sep 7, 2017, 4:39:31 AM9/7/17
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Interesting feedback, however i think by focusing on the semantics of our words, awareness, model, consciousness, direct perception (?), etc., all well and good when building the lexicon ... my main point is being missed and the error i am pointing out persists.

Take these terms at their most general definition. Say model is what we know, whether obtained directly or from experiment. Say model is to direct god-like knowledge, as one's first impression os such revelatory experience, the first reflection in the mind of whatever reality you assume, and other scientific models are just more worked models. Ok for a thought problem?

Them my point is about what we think we are reflecting by knowledge of it. I am saying that we must consider that reality to comprise just the same processes as you might assume are involved is acquiring human knowledge. We are observing, in. Nature, the same process of a acquiring knowledge that we are using to know. Modern science and thinking tends to imagine an object of knowledge, from science or direct perception, but the object is also such a process. Thus an infinite holarchy of observers observing observers, and the objects of such a relation are what is illusory, maya.

Yours,
John
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John Jay Kineman

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Sep 7, 2017, 11:59:47 AM9/7/17
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To try to be even more clear on the view i am presenting, we could say perception, awareness or consciousness, knowledge, etc. does not observe or encounter objects as such, but rather objectifies observer relations (what i referred to as modeling relations) in nature. We are observing the observership process that constructs nature. This was thought to be unworkable as a formalism because it is infinitely reflexive, but it is working.

Yours,
John

> On Sep 6, 2017, at 5:46 PM, Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> wrote:
>
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Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 7, 2017, 3:04:49 PM9/7/17
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On Thu, Sep 07, 2017 at 03:08:39PM +0000, John Jay Kineman wrote:

> To try to be even more clear on the view i am presenting, we could say
> perception, awareness or consciousness, knowledge, etc. does not observe
> or encounter objects as such, but rather objectifies observer relations
> (what i referred to as modeling relations) in nature. We are observing the
> observership process that constructs nature. This was thought to be
> unworkable as a formalism because it is infinitely reflexive, but it is
> working.

John,

So, given N observers, nature emerges in the relations between those
observers-as-observers? The atom (or Adam?) in your universe is an observer,
and all else is the relationship between these atoms?

When you say modeling/observer relations are "in" nature and then say they
"construct" nature, I take it you don't mean "constructed of." For instance,
my house is constructed of boards; but boards didn't construct it;
construction workers did.

Given the incredibility stability of nature -- e.g. certain constants appear
to measure the same for quite different observers in different locations --
it would seem that if nature is any distance from "objective," that distance
is incredibly minimal. It does not appear, for instance, that altering an
observer can alter the speed of light.

I'm not arguing against your picture. Just trying to see what it entails.

Best,
Whit

Diego Lucio Rapoport

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Sep 7, 2017, 3:04:50 PM9/7/17
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Dear John,
You stated that it is "infinitely reflexive but it is working", while allow me to observe that if it is working indeed, the observation of our modelling, than alike in semiosis when an infinity regress is believed to be the case rather than a supradual Klein Bottle logophysics as in Steven Rosen's Radical Recursion and in my own ontoepistemlogy, then the alledged infinite regress is an interpretation that coheres with the dualistic ontoepistemology but certainly does not cohere with the actual phenomenology.
So perhaps you may actually explain why in your take this regress is not the case.
Thanks,
Cordially,

Diego Lucio Rapoport

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Serge Patlavskiy

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Sep 8, 2017, 4:48:26 AM9/8/17
to Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com
-
Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> on Sep 7, 2017 wrote:
>I use the term awareness to stand for awareness. ... We all know the
> difference between focusing awareness on something, and not doing
> so.
.
[S.P.] Needless to say that defining unknown through the unknown is a blatant violation of the criteria of formal correctness -- I don't think we could continue our discussion on an irrational basis. As to "focusing awareness on something", here we should talk about enframing of some entity -- the element of Noumenal Reality, and transforming it into (or modeling it as) the object of study. So, this stage of the process of cognition has nothing to do with "awareness" at all. I use the term "awareness" to stand for relation between "self-subject" and "self-object", and therefore I prefer to talk about "self-awareness", or "self-reference". 
.
I mean that such concepts as "awareness", "consciousness", "information", "mind", etc. are strictly theory-laden -- a comprehensive paradigm in the field of consciousness studies is not established yet. Therefore, if you use some terms, you must necessarily indicate what concepts these terms stand for. Otherwise you should evade using these terms at all. 
.
[Whit Blauvelt] wrote:
> You speak as of an organism had one grand model. Yet all the evidence at 
>hand is for small, specific models of aspects of what we perceive, not a 
>single grand model which constitutes all we perceive.
.
[S.P.] I really cannot understand what is going on here. Even my tom-cat understands a difference between a term and a concept, or between a territory and a map. I said: I use the term "Phenomenal Reality" to stand for the "model of Noumenal Reality". This is tantamount of stating that I use the term "map" to stand for the "model of a territory". Who's talking about some mysterious "grand model"? 
.
I state that every organism possesses its own unique (subjective) version of Phenomenal Reality. What does this mean? This means that every organism possesses its own unique set or totality of experience, knowledge, information, feelings, illusions, etc. etc. it has due to activity of own consciousness over a period of own life.
.
I talk about ever updating model of the, so called, "outer world" the given organism lives in. I talk about the need for any living organism to have the "model of the outer world" as adequate as possible. What does the phrase "as adequate as possible" mean? It means that I talk about expedient/satisfactory correspondence between a model (or the given person's version of Phenomenal Reality) and an "outer world" (or Noumenal Reality), but not about 100% correspondence between them.
.
[Whit Blauvelt] wrote:
>Oh no. My wife is quite real.
.
[S.P.] The key phrase in my argument was: "in the given situation or under certain circumstances", but you, seems, prefer not paying attention to such "trifles". The empirical fact is that there is no way for us to be sure for 100% that what we see is something known/familiar for us. Hope, you have heard about such clinical facts as prosopagnosia. But, even for a healthy man, if you see two women who look the same, talk the same, and behave the same, it is not possible for you to tell which one is your wife, and even which one is a living organism and which one is a walking robot or a manikin.
.
In general, there is no way for us to be sure for 100% that what we see (or deal with) is a consciousness-possessing living organism. It is only the organism itself that can be sure for 100% that it does possess consciousness. It is only your wife who can be sure for 100% that she is real, consciousness-possessing, and ... still your wife. :-)
.
With respect,
Serge Patlavskiy



From: Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com>
To: "'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D." <Online_Sa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, September 7, 2017 2:46 AM

Subject: Re: [Sadhu Sanga] where we come from

Вірусів немає. www.avast.com

John Jay Kineman

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Sep 8, 2017, 10:00:09 AM9/8/17
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Understood, and thank you for asking.

Right, it would be fundamentally observer relations that can form a closed loop of causation between with efficient entailments (dynamics) and inverse "functional" entailment to create an M-R system that defines life and identity. Modeling relations also reduce to mechanisms if, instead of closing to form life, they are kept causally open within a common interactive context; e.g the material world. Organisms internalize classical contexts which are then impredicative with respect to the external environment. Regarding purely physical behavior, from reduced modeling relations, it would obey a uniform classical domain only to the the degree of granularity of events in that domain, thus following quantum decoherence behavior with possible different histories between observer definitions. With regard to cosmology it implies a fractal origin as a space-time (four dimensional) scale expansion (ongoing inflation). Lots of bizarre predictions in cosmology but all seem not just plausible but explain the data better.

The best way to understand this view is that the foundation is complex and from that foundation you can explain life as a special closure of fundamental complexity, which internalizes it as self and mind; and classical systems as a special reduction which approximates a mechanism, to the precision of reducing events.

John
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Whit Blauvelt

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Sep 8, 2017, 10:00:10 AM9/8/17
to 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D.
On Fri, Sep 08, 2017 at 03:26:57AM +0000, 'Serge Patlavskiy' via Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D. wrote:
> Whit Blauvelt <wh...@csmind.com> on Sep 7, 2017 wrote:
> >I use the term awareness to stand for awareness. ... We all know the
> > difference between focusing awareness on something, and not doing
> > so.
> .
> [S.P.] Needless to say that defining unknown through the unknown is a blatant
> violation of the criteria of formal correctness -- I don't think we could
> continue our discussion on an irrational basis.

Are you seriously maintaining that you don't share the common first-person
experience of focusing awareness? The willingness to "pretend away" stuff
that we all experience is frustrating. If we can't point to things we see in
common as evidence to be explained ... yes theory is a lot easier if we can
consign much of the evidence to oblivion.

> [Whit Blauvelt] wrote:
> > You speak as of an organism had one grand model. Yet all the evidence at
> >hand is for small, specific models of aspects of what we perceive, not a
> >single grand model which constitutes all we perceive.
> .
> [S.P.] I really cannot understand what is going on here. Even my tom-cat
> understands a difference between a term and a concept, or between a territory
> and a map. I said: I use the term "Phenomenal Reality" to stand for the "model
> of Noumenal Reality". This is tantamount of stating that I use the term "map"
> to stand for the "model of a territory". Who's talking about some mysterious
> "grand model"?

Reality occurs as a unity to us. Now, if what occurs to us is only
phenomenal reality, as you have it, then phenomenal reality occurs as a
unity. Yet models, as we well should know, are multiple, differ in obvious
ways in their schemes and abstractions and scales and coordinate systems.
So if phenomenal reality is truly the model you take it to be, it's
different from all the various models we use and are familiar with. It is,
precisely, a "mysterious 'grand model'." You introduced that concept, not
me.

> [Whit Blauvelt] wrote:
> >Oh no. My wife is quite real.
> .
> [S.P.] The key phrase in my argument was: "in the given situation or under
> certain circumstances", but you, seems, prefer not paying attention to such
> "trifles". The empirical fact is that there is no way for us to be sure for
> 100% that what we see is something known/familiar for us. Hope, you have heard
> about such clinical facts as prosopagnosia. But, even for a healthy man, if you
> see two women who look the same, talk the same, and behave the same, it is not
> possible for you to tell which one is your wife, and even which one is a living
> organism and which one is a walking robot or a manikin.

First off, this claim you're making is assuming the results of an experiment
which has never been done. Sure, if I'm blind, I can't see the difference.
That's no proof of your thesis. And if you take two photos of two twins, at
poor resolution, the husband of one of them can't identify them apart. So
what? If my wife is replaced by a robot, then insofar as the robot behaves
precisely as she would, the robot is known/familiar for me. It is precisely
by being known/familiar for me that the situation is set up where, when the
robot goes into surgery, I can be surprised at the lack of internal organic
structure. But behaviorally, my knowledge of the robot/wife was both
sufficient and true. That's part of your posit.

Best,
Whit
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