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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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May 26, 2018 - 07:59pm PT
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reality requiescat in pace
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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May 26, 2018 - 08:30pm PT
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reality is an illusion brought on by a shortage of beer
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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May 28, 2018 - 06:25pm PT
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“I’ve never had any revelation through [drugs], but a kind of waking trance—this for a lack of a better word—I have frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone. This has come upon me through repeating my own name to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out of the intensity of this consciousness of individuality, individuality itself seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not a confused state but the clearest, the surest of the surest, utterly beyond words—where death was an almost laughable impossibility— the loss of personality (if so it were) seeming no extinction, but the only true life. I am ashamed of my feeble description. Have I not said the state is utterly beyond words?”
(Alfred Lord Tennyson)
“It is our firm conviction that beyond this “wall of flesh” lies an alien world only slightly concerned with us, so that much energy is required to command or attract its attention, or to change its behavior. It was there before we were born, and it will continue after we die. We live in it temporarily . . . . This whole illusion has its history in ways of thinking, in the images, models, myths, and language systems which we have used for thousands of years to make sense of this world. These have had an effect on our perceptions which seems to be strictly hypnotic."
(Alan Watts)
As can be seen on this and other threads here, the mind’s ability to analyze experience into things, categories, classes, taxonomies, archetypes, events, etc. for accurate perception is to see everything through the lens of the mind. Mind is conditioned by language, and it is inherently dualistic. The mind is a mental filter. Mind is an instrument that’s being used for measurement. It is like a ruler that we all learned to use in primary school.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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May 28, 2018 - 10:52pm PT
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It [mind] is like a ruler that we all learned to use in primary school.
In a sense. But consider the mind of wolves or ravens, for example. Does your simile extend to them?
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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May 29, 2018 - 08:09am PT
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I hope to read Michael Pollan's new book, How to Change Your Mind: The New Science of Psychedelics.
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_5_8/136-6571194-5754001?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=michael+pollan+how+to+change+your+mind&sprefix=michael+%2Caps%2C217&crid=3BU2AVPTC7757
In the meantime, Pollan's appeared on podcasts, including Harris's. FWIW, I thought it was interesting, informative.
Freedom from the Known...
https://samharris.org/podcasts/127-freedom-known/
"I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation with Sam Harris on his Waking Up Podcast." -Pollan tweet
Ezra Klein (Vox) and Joe Rogan, other podcasts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=10&v=tz4CrWE_P0g
We have one kind of consciousness, plants another?
It really seems to me if more people grokked information engineering/science (eg, via years in a lab working with circuitry as the medium), and grokked the control of info processing and communications thereof, this would shed more light on the relations, fundamental as they are, between "reality" and "perception of reality" (or "representation of reality") ala the mind-brain.
We're evolved living systems engineered by Mother Nature as information processing systems in order to "get on" in our environments.
We are collectively a long ways from this understanding. But we're heading in that direction, I think.
Future VR is going to blow our minds.
Hope the final epitaph doesn't read: Too smart for their own good.
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re: familial bias training
Anyone here know where I could get familial bias training?
It's been brought to my attention that I present with so-called familial bias. Evidence (from a poll/questionnaire I took): I'd rush into a hall of rooms in a burning building to save my two grandchildren rather than rush into another hall to save a family of five. The prospect of saving just two compared to the possibility of saving five indicates familial bias. The claim: Familial bias is, well, bias, and as such therefore needs to be neutralized/overridden. Just as racial bias is a shortcoming, so too is familial bias. Solution: familial bias training (cf: racial bias training).
Maybe there's another pov: While racial bias is a bad thing (immoral) familial bias is a good thing (moral). Some biases bad, others good. Hm.
implicit biases, prejudice
oops, wrong hand...
https://imgur.com/zngMSpi
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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May 29, 2018 - 11:37am PT
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HFCS: Future VR is going to blow our minds.
This is the “What is Mind?” thread. It would be helpful to at least describe what it is that’s going to be blown / wow’ed / or torn apart.
Content is what occurs *in* mind. What is the base or the context upon which mind operates? Oh, no, wait. For most folks here, mind = brain. So, I guess, the brain is what’s going to be blown?
Here we appear to be running as fast as we can to nowhere in particular. (“Forget the question. . . . I have a speculation about a speculation.”) Brother.
(Ever notice how the word “nowhere” is a conjunction of “now” and “here?” Never mind.)
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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May 29, 2018 - 12:05pm PT
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Mind is dormant without a task (content). Once a task appears the brain begins its processes and mind comes alive. Trite, but true. Of what value is attempting to witness the dormant stage?
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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May 29, 2018 - 12:50pm PT
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Why would anyone make a career of rescuing stupid humans?
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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May 29, 2018 - 03:25pm PT
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jogill: Mind is dormant without a task (content).
I take it you’re talking about what you know through experience, or are you positing a theory you have?
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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May 29, 2018 - 03:34pm PT
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Dingus: If you did, you were off route. You can't get there from here.
Hey, buddy, here’s a little experiment for you.
Look at anything; focus your attention on it. See how your awareness gains detail and specificity and other things that were in awareness diminish into a vague clarity.
Awareness is like a flashlight. The more you look, the more you see. Noticing brings more noticing. You don’t need any theories to see more. All you need is awareness. Hence, you can start to observe the very nature /essence of your mind. No metrics are needed. No constructs are needed. No statistics are needed. Just look carefully—if you might be interested in such things. (Of course, there is no inherent significance to any of it, nor to anything else either—and THAT could be another realization and pointer to the question of “What is Mind.”)
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i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
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May 30, 2018 - 07:42am PT
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From The Great Courses, Unlock Your Memory's Untapped Potential -
6 "Human memory is reconstruction, not replay"
...is that why we can see the same thing differently?
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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May 30, 2018 - 07:47am PT
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(Ever notice how the word “nowhere” is a conjunction of “now” and “here?” Never mind.)
Baba Ramdas?
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i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
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May 30, 2018 - 07:56am PT
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That's good Ed!
I looked up Double Negative Examples and found this
"That attitude won't get you nowhere."
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i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
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May 30, 2018 - 10:28am PT
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Many around you want to point out “reality” to you. They say, “Face the facts. Look at what-is.” And we say to you, if you are able to see only what-is—then, by Law of Attraction, you will create only more of what-is… You must be able to put your thoughts beyond what-is in order to attract something different or something more.
Excerpted from The Law of Attraction, The Basics of the Teachings of Abraham on 7/1/06
Our Love
Esther (Abraham and Jerry)
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yanqui
climber
Balcarce, Argentina
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For most folks here, mind = brain.
Maybe I'm just speaking for myself, but I'm not sure anyone in this thread would agree to such a simple and misleading equation, even for the sake of argument.
I mean, sure, I like to be realistic. Along those lines, I need my brain to be aware or conscious like I need my fingers to type out this message, my arms to lift up that chair, or my legs to go for a run. The activity that goes on in there is a fundamental (and to some extent "necessary") part of the process. This dose of "realism" is a long way from the equation mind = brain. Among other things, my "mind" also is very much dependent on my family experiences, the teachers I've had, the friends I've made, the people I've loved (and hated). It's complex. And I don't mean just the "contents" of my mind. I also mean the way my mind works when I make decisions, the way I carry out a task, what I value, what I think is important when I make choices. Those experiences are not just "contents", they become part of the process.
I suppose the idea that awareness is like a box or a vessel with contents can be illuminating in certain circumstances. Metaphors like this can be clarifying in the right context Maybe there is some value in "looking" for the empty vessel and I just don't see it. Who knows? But I get the feeling that maybe we shouldn't take our metaphors too seriously. Still, I can see a value in occasionally trying to shut down the barrage of structured thought, to obtain a state of "calm". The same sort of thing with a different interpretation?
So what's Liston missing in this photo: the vessel, the contents, or some activity of the brain. Now here or nowhere?
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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yanqui,
Cheers.
We read differently. I think many people here say the mind is the effect of brain activity: to wit, brain = mind.
You seem process-oriented. “Brains Do Things.” They take in and assimilate experiences, training, education—the structuring of which requires tokens, linkages, and operations (nouns and verbs). “Realism” indicates a weltanschauung, and it is essentially a placeholder used as a backdrop for all those tokens, linkages, and operators. One’s personal paradigm can be often another piece of content.
If you think that awareness might be some kind of box, then I ask you: where is the box located? What is outside of awareness? If you would think that all phenomena are the results of awareness, then it seems to me that you’d have to say that with no awareness, there would be no phenomena. That implies that there is nothing outside of awareness. Phenomena requires observation. Observation creates phenomena. Logically (if you’re into such things), nothing exists outside of awareness. What you see is what your attention has lit up or projected. Awareness is like a flashlight.
You seem to think that investigations into mind and awareness is about attaining “a state of calm.” That might be true for many people initially interested in meditation or spirituality. It certainly seems to be a contemporary objective for those in the “mindfulness” movement, but I suggest that it’s an early stepping stone to seeing. When the mind is allowed to quiet itself (that busy little janitor upstairs), then one can begin to see without the limitations the mind imposes. The limitations are the very things (conditionings) you refer to in your post: family experiences, teachers you’ve had, how you make decisions, the way you carry out a task, what you value, what you think is important, etc.
Processes and contents. It’s possible to see without them.
P.S. Nice photo. What do *you* think Liston is missing?
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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I rather like the idea of the spectrum of awareness initiated through a mysterious physical process and running from a strange empty stage to a completely focused state in which all extraneous content is suppressed. 0 ≤ A(t) < 1.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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So what's Liston missing in this photo:
Guess we would need to ask him? But how could he know?
I agree with yanqui, in that there is not a simple answer.
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