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Reality

hado117 said:
this cant be the point. evolution occurs by chance. A mutation is needed, the mutations are not chosen therefore the point cannot be to evolve.
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Mutations happen by chance. Natural selection chooses the mutation that will survive best.....to its environment. But I get you, I can not make my body, or future offspring develop whatever mutation I want.
 
Northern Light said:
There is only one reality, and it's in this moment, nowhere else.

Delineating illusion vs. real is just mind talking. Everything is empty of substance, regardless of what you choose to call it.

There is only present awareness as one continuous thing. Everything overlaying it is just a narrative, including narratives about the past or future, or fantasies. The myth of self is part of this.

If you meditate and silence the extraneous dialogue, all that remains is total stillness/emptiness. Anything you *think* is happening arises and dissolves into that, on a moment to moment basis. We live in a continuous, unseparated holographic universe.

There is nothing beyond this present moment. This is as good as it gets.
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'This present moment' only exists for your specific frame of reference.

Change the frame of reference (say to a photon travelling somewhere) then it's present moment is completely different, with a different reality (as the photon 'perceives' it).
 
zyzygy said:
Whenever you get the chance.
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I disagree. While my D.N.A. would do the world so much good. I think some dna should be cherished, like a fine wine. lower species utilize lower instincts.
 
grip said:
Though the potential for reality preexisted perception, we actually create our own reality by perceiving it.
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Or, we generate a subjective experience that is a result of physical facts of the world. Including the physical facts of the condition of your brain, as it perceives.


"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
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It produces what we call "sound waves," so yes. Sound exists, even if there are no organisms to perceive it.


Without the 'conscious' perception of reality, it simply doesn't exist, at least not in the same way.
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Yes, it does. It just isn't perceived by an organism.


The question now is how does reality (universe) exist without being perceived? It has no sight, sound, feeling, smell or taste only the potential energy to create these effects through an avatar.
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Perception by an organism is not required for something to exist.


Mammals, animals, insects etc are made up of minerals, water and electric-chemical reactions but is this all we are?
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Yep


In the simplest terms this is an accurate statement but I'd like to hope something more magical is actually occurring.
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Wishes don't summon ontological structures into existence.


If you think about the computations of the square root of Pi or the endless combinations of computer code, zeros and ones, it's not hard to discern that the universe has unlimited characteristics.
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Unless it does. E.g. nothing can go faster than c in a vacuum. I'd say that's a limit.


You cannot separate humans and animals from their connected existence to the universe as a whole. We evolved from inanimate material to become self aware as part of our environment, which is a form of existentialism.
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Uh... no, you can't separate organisms from a universe. However, evolution is not existentialism, in any meaning of the terms I'm aware of.


It's similar with quantum mechanics as Schrodinger's cat paradox or a particle wave function collapse that the universe is affected or possibly brought into focus by the act of being observed or perceived.
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No, it isn't.

Schrodinger's Cat was a thought experiment designed to illustrate the counterintutive nature of QM. "Observation" did not refer literally to human perceptions, it refers to interactions of particles. It was not meant to say, in any literal sense, that "human perception creates the universe."
 
grip said:
Here's a thought experiment that ideas preexisted the physical universe. Before humans ever create anything, an invention exists as only a mental image of electrical impulses, then someone crafts and transforms it from preexisting material into a functional object to serve a purpose. This is an example of how nature has evolved humans from particles of once existing star dust.
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Not so much. Building tools is a very different thing than organisms evolving.


There is no necessity for an ecosystem on a planet, other than to make animated life forms.
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There is no necessity, period. Ecosystems don't have a purpose.


If consciousness is a result of a higher and more complex energy that results in perception, then the universe might be generating the physical phenomenon from an unseen dimension in order to realize its potential.
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Please. We're tiny meatbags on a tiny planet in a tiny slice of the universe. If every organism on Earth died today, the universe would keep on spinning into we don't know how long.

Imagining that the entire universe brought human beings into existence, so the universe could contemplate its own navel, is absurdly self-aggrandizing.


That would make the mind more than the sum of its parts, when its interacting with the interconnected energy of nature through the conscious senses. If this is true
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It isn't. We're just talking meat, and we don't necessarily connect to "nature." Sorry.


We physically activate and connect to the universal program or quantum field of consciousness at a certain level of mental alertness. Which also makes us all connected to each other through the same energy field.
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There is no universal program. There is no universal energy field influencing human consciousness. Please spare us the pseudo-science, kthx


The way we know that energy, like particles, can be connected by a dimensionless field is that in quantum physics, entangled particles remain connected so that actions performed on one affect the other, even when separated by great distances.
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No, that's not how it works.

1) Entanglement is not assumed to be causal in nature.
2) Not everything is entangled. I'm pretty sure most of the electrons in your brain are not entangled; if they are, it's for a very brief period of time; and it's not entangled to electrons inside anyone else's brain.


The most common pondering is probably, where did this infinite dimensionless energy source come from, especially since the universe's most observable feature is 'cause and effect.' One could hypothesize that the original energy, of which the physical universe is an extension, is a singularity of pure consciousness and self awareness incarnate.
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Sure, if you're desperate to infuse reality with magic.

By the way, there's another quite plausible option: The "original energy" has always existed, and was not conscious, and is not conscious. Only little tiny blips of the matter in the universe, an inconsequentially small amount, are conscious.


Only consciousness is actually real and unchanging, while physical existence is an extension of our perception as a continuously moving simulation. The universe, through nature, is a movie being played and our minds are the screen on which it's viewed.
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Considering that the basis of your theory presumes the existence of a bunch of physical objects, your claim here is self-defeating.
 
grip said:
It's daunting to try and get our heads around an unfathomable concept of a conscious energy that basically exists everywhere...
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It's pretty easy to dispense of it as a flight of fancy.


It would for all intensive purposes
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"intents and purposes" btw ;)


Once the universe in its nature has evolved creatures capable of interacting with it through perception, it takes on its current form and brings reality into focus.
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I'm sorry, but that is patently absurd.

The diameter of our Hubble Volume is probably around 91 billion light-years, and its mass is roughly 3 x 1055 g. Most of this is not observed by any organisms. The idea that we're having an effect on the entire universe, just by being conscious, doesn't make sense.


And life was never meant to be about good vs evil, that's only an elementary way of teaching others how to identify the difference of being happy and prosperous from ways of being unsuccessful and miserable.
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Ethics 101 is thataway ---->

By the way, nothing about what you're suggesting lends itself to any specific theory of ethics. E.g. if we are all Blissed Out Cosmic Consciousness, then pain is just some other sensation, and why shouldn't we run around and cause each other to suffer? It's all cosmic, dude.
 
grip said:
In summation, love requires sacrifice, always.
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If you say so


The supreme conscious energy had to cease occupying its perfect unified non-form alone to make space for us and inhabit it.
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There is no supreme conscious energy. Stars and quarks and galaxies are not conscious. Nothing ceased any sort of "perfect unified non-form."


Once the imperfect and temporal physical creation has served its purpose, much like our own bodies, it could potentially be remade into something more permanent. For now "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances."
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Human beings and consciousness have no specific purpose.

Our individual bodies merely exist, reproduce (usually but not always) and die. Our species will exist, until it doesn't; even if we evolve, whatever we evolve into will eventually perish. Organisms are not permanent. Species are not permanent.
 
Visbek said:
Or, we generate a subjective experience that is a result of physical facts of the world. Including the physical facts of the condition of your brain, as it perceives.



It produces what we call "sound waves," so yes. Sound exists, even if there are no organisms to perceive it.



Yes, it does. It just isn't perceived by an organism.



Perception by an organism is not required for something to exist.



Yep



Wishes don't summon ontological structures into existence.



Unless it does. E.g. nothing can go faster than c in a vacuum. I'd say that's a limit.



Uh... no, you can't separate organisms from a universe. However, evolution is not existentialism, in any meaning of the terms I'm aware of.



No, it isn't.

Schrodinger's Cat was a thought experiment designed to illustrate the counterintutive nature of QM. "Observation" did not refer literally to human perceptions, it refers to interactions of particles. It was not meant to say, in any literal sense, that "human perception creates the universe."
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Visbek said:
Not so much. Building tools is a very different thing than organisms evolving.



There is no necessity, period. Ecosystems don't have a purpose.



Please. We're tiny meatbags on a tiny planet in a tiny slice of the universe. If every organism on Earth died today, the universe would keep on spinning into we don't know how long.

Imagining that the entire universe brought human beings into existence, so the universe could contemplate its own navel, is absurdly self-aggrandizing.



It isn't. We're just talking meat, and we don't necessarily connect to "nature." Sorry.



There is no universal program. There is no universal energy field influencing human consciousness. Please spare us the pseudo-science, kthx



No, that's not how it works.

1) Entanglement is not assumed to be causal in nature.
2) Not everything is entangled. I'm pretty sure most of the electrons in your brain are not entangled; if they are, it's for a very brief period of time; and it's not entangled to electrons inside anyone else's brain.



Sure, if you're desperate to infuse reality with magic.

By the way, there's another quite plausible option: The "original energy" has always existed, and was not conscious, and is not conscious. Only little tiny blips of the matter in the universe, an inconsequentially small amount, are conscious.



Considering that the basis of your theory presumes the existence of a bunch of physical objects, your claim here is self-defeating.
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Visbek said:
It's pretty easy to dispense of it as a flight of fancy.



"intents and purposes" btw ;)



I'm sorry, but that is patently absurd.

The diameter of our Hubble Volume is probably around 91 billion light-years, and its mass is roughly 3 x 1055 g. Most of this is not observed by any organisms. The idea that we're having an effect on the entire universe, just by being conscious, doesn't make sense.



Ethics 101 is thataway ---->

By the way, nothing about what you're suggesting lends itself to any specific theory of ethics. E.g. if we are all Blissed Out Cosmic Consciousness, then pain is just some other sensation, and why shouldn't we run around and cause each other to suffer? It's all cosmic, dude.
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Visbek said:
If you say so



There is no supreme conscious energy. Stars and quarks and galaxies are not conscious. Nothing ceased any sort of "perfect unified non-form."



Human beings and consciousness have no specific purpose.

Our individual bodies merely exist, reproduce (usually but not always) and die. Our species will exist, until it doesn't; even if we evolve, whatever we evolve into will eventually perish. Organisms are not permanent. Species are not permanent.
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Fail.

Never took any philosophy classes, huh? Better come with something better than basic comebacks and knowledge picked up watching "How The Universe Works".

Step your quantum physics game up if you want to impress.
 
Northern Light said:
My head falls under the category of "everything", as does yours. :)
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I'm sitting on the floor in a corner of a sparsely furnished room, arms crossed and rocking back and forth while chanting ...Let us contemplate the void.. the chanting is slow and methodical , drawing out the word void into V-OH- EEED and trailing off into an abrupt exhale vo ee d ahh.
 
hado117 said:
I'm sitting on the floor in a corner of a sparsely furnished room, arms crossed and rocking back and forth while chanting ...Let us contemplate the void.. the chanting is slow and methodical , drawing out the word void into V-OH- EEED and trailing off into an abrupt exhale vo ee d ahh.
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The void isn't something you contemplate. It's something you are.

Any effort made to try and achieve stillness is already taking place in the presence of stillness.

The paradox is that, in order to get it, you need to stop trying.

;)
 
Northern Light said:
The void isn't something you contemplate. It's something you are.

Any effort made to try and achieve stillness is already taking place in the presence of stillness.

The paradox is that, in order to get it, you need to stop trying.

;)
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Thats what I said to the people to whom I owe money .
 
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