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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:14am PT
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It seems we just can't stay away from religious references (sorry jgill). The model of consciousness that jstan is proposing has been around for at least the past 4,000 years in the forms of Hinduism and Buddhism. The Jains who are a sect of Hinduism, take this to its most extreme by wearing masks so they won't accidentally inhale any insects and are known to sleep on straw mats with fleas to offer themselves to the fleas. Some of them also eat only fruits and nuts that have already fallen from trees, as they understand plants to have a type of consciousness also.
Of course, the ultimate hypocrisy is when we boil the water in places like India and Nepal and slaughter thousands if not millions of those conscious little beings. Since the locals don't see them, they don't worry about that. As for myself, knowing how hard it is to kill amebas once they have invaded my body, I take delight in killing the little *@#$%&+^ and given how much suffering they've caused me over the years, really don't have compassion for them. I have compassion for sentient beings until it comes to amoebas, giardia, fleas and lice. I justify this by saying they are engaged in violating the Buddhist precept of right livelihood. The other trouble makers I'm vaccinated against.
I did once hear a high ranking Tibetan priest say that Buddhism is anti evolution. I was dismayed as I had always understood differently. Then he explained, evolution is all about selfishness and survival. Buddhism is about selflessness and even giving up one's life to save another. The wonder is that as mentioned above, insects with much less intelligence have managed this philosophy without moral teachings. Then again, they seldom fight to the death and enslave each other over symbols and ideas. Biological evolution has more than a few contradictions like that. Culture appears to have evolved in part, to correct our own excesses.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:24am PT
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"The model of consciousness that jstan is proposing has been around for at least the past 4,000 years in the forms of Hinduism and Buddhism." -Jan
Not from a modern science perspective it hasn't. In other words not from a modern (control) systems and neurobiologic perspective.
Really this comment is no different from saying the model of evolution that Darwin proposed has been around for at least a couple thousand years (as many ancients, for eg from Greece, believed Man derived from fish).
The ancients, even "earlies" 500 years ago, certainly didn't model consciousness on brain machinery and its complex mechanisms.
From a scientific context, if that's what we're in, we should strive to be accurate, whats more we should strive not to be misleading.
.....
"In 5-billion yrs the Sun will expand & engulf our orbit as the charred ember that was once Earth vaporizes. Have a nice day." -NdGT
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Jun 16, 2015 - 11:47am PT
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Sorry fructose, I will never confine myself to just one system of thought. Meanwhile you might ponder where your preference for singular explanations comes from. Monotheism can take many forms you know.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 12:05pm PT
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So what's next Jan, will it be you telling students it was Anaximander who came up with "the model of evolution" 2500 years ago? Are we to have no standards on the justification that all systems of thought count, that every system of thought is as good as any other? go ahead, everybody does it, change perspectives or points of view at will till you get one that agrees with your sentiments?
Thank Atheist-God my "preference" is adhering to modern science as a standard particularly where facts matter (or where facts vs contrafacts are in contention for attention).
Have a nice day. :)
.....
"In the morning... call me Caitlyn"
That's just nuts.
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jstan
climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 12:46pm PT
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My device of discussing "C" instead of "Consciousness" was rejected by just one poster, I
think. Doing this allowed us to avoid 1000 confused posts over several years attempting to
reconcile all of our differing personal feelings as to what Consciousness is. We could get down
to discussing "C" as it was defined, right away.
Also I limited myself to considering only the early evolutionary stages and the dynamical forces
that may have been operative at that time. If tests show a plausible connection between "C"
and the development of defensive modes among specie- maybe we have conclusion.
Whatever "C" is, it is something widely possessed. We have to await the tests to see if "C" is
learned and when it is learned.
Feels good to be able to hope for a conclusion.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Jun 16, 2015 - 12:49pm PT
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If you don't care for history, no problem. We each have our own interests. Fish aren't one of my interests either as food or symbolism.
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jstan
climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 01:00pm PT
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The angler fish may have an interesting story to tell. When did the bait stem develop in this
specie? Is the physiology of the fish such that survival required the development of such an
organ? The smaller size of the more "unimportant" male suggests significant pressure on the
specie. And incorporating the male's body into that of the female suggests an increase in
efficiency. Has the angler fish retained sexual reproduction? Perhaps by having the testes emit
its sperm into the water instead of directly into the female?
That stuff is real history.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 01:10pm PT
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"That stuff is real history." jstan
No doubt.
That stuff got me hooked. On biology. On evolution.
On history and even fish, too. :)
Sheepshead, for instance. A Ca spearfishing favorite. The male turns into the female after a period of time. Or is it vice versa? so long ago now... lol
Just checked. It's female to male.
So it's something of a bruce jenner in reverse.
Call me Bruce. :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_sheephead
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Jun 16, 2015 - 04:56pm PT
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Nevertheless, if you can demonstrate that raw awareness takes one into the infinitesimal world of QM by uncovering something physicists have not seen, you will have earned a Nobel Prize
Gill just summed it up in one sentence.
Can you do that, JL?
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WBraun
climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 05:22pm PT
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uncovering something physicists have not seen
Physicists haven't seen sh!t yet.
They're so arrogant making stoopid claims and misleading everyone.
They're just plain stuck in their miserable finite little material world.
Open the door and you'll see the real everything ......
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 16, 2015 - 05:27pm PT
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So we might as well call ourselves a nation based on traditional Hittite values, only filtered through Judaic copyists.
i'm certainly enthralled with the whole story. Like what got man with his monkey mind use of tools to grow out of the jungle, to building pyramids in the desert? We can only understand from what they've left behind. Hammurabi may be credited with recording some laws. But certainly others were around doing the same, the Egyptians for example.
Could it have been Homo-sapiens awareness to love which caused him the need for laws? Or maybe his laws drove his awareness of love?
Whichever rte they both, love and law seem to go hand in hand as far as Man's social conscious is concerned.
It's interesting that man's intellect as we see it some 4k yrs ago in the few recordings we have. Mostly had to do with love, laws, and war.
Moses wrote Genesis estimated at 1300-1250 BC. His account from God tells of a man and women NAKED, and unashamed in a garden. God gave them free reign except for ONE law, don't eat from this tree. Together they respected the law. It was when a third opinion entered the garden, one opposed to God's, that they challenged and broke the law.(i think this is why christians are skeptical of scientist!) After man broke the law his awareness was that of shame and fear. He scurried to cover himself up and hide.
It makes me wonder if we could communicate with monkey's and tried the same experiment, what would be the outcome?
Jan,
so the 10 commandments are Laws handed down to Moses from God. The ol'timer's refer to them as The Law. Some include the entire old test. with the other 600+ laws under the title, The Law. You understand laws. Today if you were to go 90mph in a posted 50mph, you would be punished with a fine of $550. or something justifiably fair. This is civil, and good. And virtually every law we have levies on our bodily actions. There just aren't many secular laws dealing with emotional distress. i wouldn't get fined if i flipped you off, or pissed you off. In the OT they didn't have laws stating 50mph speed limit, obviously. They had thou shalt not eat pork, for their own ligetimant reasons. These 600+ laws are material laws, and carried a material fine. Here lies the problem, one believes when he pays his material dept, he is in right-standing spiritually with God. NOT true. When one paid his material debt, it only opened the door for spiritual awareness. One still needed to repent, and many dropped the ball. That's why God is able to say,'I never knew you'. There are many religions practicing this method today, christians alike.
The 10 commandment's differ from the other 600. In that they aren't as much a material law as they are a spiritual one. Christian's can see this because they are brought out of the bondage of the Law through Jesus Christ. If you look close, you'll reconize God didn't give these to man to preach at one another. We are to read them as individuals, as if God were telling us directly. They are a spiritual model for a Whole kind of Love, an agoppy Love. We were created to experience different types of love. Our hearts prove that to our minds. The first 4 show us the path for a love of our Creator. The next 6 show us how to love our parents, love ourselfs, and love our neighbors. If we are disobedient to 1 of these 10, we are failing to love, thus being disobedient to all 10. When we are obedient to all 10, our Love is inline with God's Love, which align's ourown love with our parents, and our friends.
This is the 10 comm. meaning i was referring to when i said all modern-man has the 10 written in their hearts :)
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Jun 16, 2015 - 06:47pm PT
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In fact take my body who will, take it I say, it is not me.
Does this sound like an oyster to you?
Are silkworms cosmologists?
Do humans have good imaginations?
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 07:50pm PT
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We wonder what they're discussing...
The distinction between "awareness" and "consciousness"?
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 16, 2015 - 08:26pm PT
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that may have been operative at that time. If tests show a plausible connection between "C"
and the development of defensive modes among specie- maybe we have conclusion.
Conclusion? I gotta think before any defense systems were set up. Their was first some offenses. Like getting to know his own species. You know friends, and girl friends. And they prolly ate before they became aware of being eaten. I would use birds or wolves as an example.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 16, 2015 - 09:03pm PT
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Whatever "C" is, it is something widely possessed. We have to await the tests to see if "C" is learned and when it is learned.
This is where the battles of the tongue start. Consciousness is fundamentally awareness of being alive. Ok? A baby is conscious. And i would say, a baby is already conscious of being a human being from the get go. At 52 I am conscious of living to a ripe ol age of 112. I can imagine that in my minds eye. But the fact is I'm only AWare of living 52 yrs. Babies are conscious of needing to eat. But they aren't aware of where it comes. At first they cry to get the boob. But after a year or two they start pointing at the boob.
I wish I were sure where JL's Sentience falls in all this?
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WBraun
climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 09:22pm PT
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Sentience is the key that unlocks everything.
It is the original source of everything .....
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:03pm PT
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Steven Pinker...
"People like us who are passionate about ideas often find ourselves mystified that there are people out there who are not. But we need to keep in mind that half the population is below average in intelligence (funny how that tautology sounds so politically incorrect), and that a good proportion of the rest are congenitally low in personality traits like openness to experience, need for cognition, and intellectance -- the interest in ideas for their own sake, as opposed to tangible and practical concerns."
http://www.parlio.com/qa/pinker/
"Economic historians tell us that new technologies at first often fail to deliver on their promise, because it takes time for users to figure out how best to deploy them. This seems to be happening with on-line discourse. In theory it ought to elevate the level of discussion from what we see in monopolist, one-way punditry, but in practice it’s been polluted by the griefers, trolls, and dittoheads. I like to think that Parlio will begin a process of adapting and fine-turning digital forums so that they can realize their promise of multiplying our collective intelligence."
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:37pm PT
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^^^ don't you find it a bit ironic you highlight that? LOL
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Jun 17, 2015 - 09:28am PT
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Blue, you really should read about east Asia, but particularly Japan, where people think very differently than we do but have much better outcomes on many things.It may seem obvious to you living in a diverse individualistic society that everyone needs laws and that God would naturally be a law giver. However, other societies operate differently. Japan has few laws, it is considered a disgrace to go to court, and they have 1% (one percent) of the lawyers that the U.S. does. Needless to say, life is different and much more agreeable as a result. They also have far fewer policemen per capita and most aren't armed.
The average Japanese is not religious but observes religious customs from at least three different religions. Nobody is concerned with heaven or hell, yet their crime rate is miniscule compared to ours. A woman can walk anywhere at night alone. Public nude bathing including of mixed sexes has been the norm for centuries, and sex is considered just another bodily function. Of all the societies I've lived in, Japan is composed of the kindest, most polite and considerate people I've ever met. The Japanese truly live by the Golden Rule rather than a set of laws.
Rather than trying to please a judgemental God, the Japanese are concerned with living harmoniously with their family and neighbors and not bringing shame on their group. They clearly recognize that rules are made up by humans to benefit society and are not laid down from heaven. Different societies, different rules and the rules can be changed as the circumstances evolve. They naturally think their customs are best for their own situation, and point to their pleasant and well ordered society as the measure but they don't expect other people to be like them. If you learn and follow their rules, you are considered civilized by their standards, not righteous by some religious standard.
All of east Asia follows these precepts more or less, though it becomes harder, the more diverse and individualistic the society is and the Japanese are the masters. Though totally different than us, you can not deny that their different values have resulted in the same or better success. Though they have no natural resources, they are the world's number two economy, they have one of the lowest crime and addiction rates, they score higher than almost everyone on education levels, and 80% of the people consider themselves middle class. Contrast that with America, particularly the Bible Belt, and then seriously think about whose values are better and which values you should be trying to spread.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jun 17, 2015 - 10:34am PT
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Paul, it is as if... the girl asking Dawkins her question at 57:10 in the Dawkins Pell discussion was speaking on your behalf...
Not at all... the statement was that religion poisons everything; there is no good in religion and that's simply not true. You want truth, well, the truth is that religion very often helps in a situation where nothing else can.
Dawkins' quest for truth is commendable, let's hope he finds it, but what religion offers is consolation. Religion offers sense in the face of what is overwhelming experience: this existence will end, my friends and family will be no more as they were. Science offers only the cold reality of that fact, its truth. Fine. Religion offers a consoling understanding, rituals that placate our grief, metaphors that offer insight into the strangeness of our conscious nature and what is inevitable in our lives. Let science prove the truth of our insignificance... to what end?
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