The Sexes

[Orenholt]

Bees, ultraviolet light, the mind, all are merely perceptions that exist only upon conception.

So could we rephrase that as "they're experiences based on ideas"?
If that is the case then I suppose I can see how that COULD be true because each "thing" is only a concept.
I think I might get it now.
But why does this mean that there is no reality "out there"?
Aren't the concepts dependent on the perceptions rather than the other way around?

Actually I read Quinn differently than you here. In fact, I already made a post about it.

I will come back to this later after I've considered it a while.

Absolutely. Egotistical attachment in any form is made up of delusional thinking.

So being attached to the idea of heroism for example can be both practical and delusional.
I'll consider this one further also and I'll let you know when I've come to a conclusion or question.

[Kelly Jones]

KJ: No one has ever experienced their own brain directly. They have only ever perceived empirically that consciousness appears to require a brain. It's not an absolute logical truth that consciousness is created by a brain. One can never peep behind the workings of consciousness to find out.

O: Ok name something that's conscious that doesn't have a brain.

At the moment, it would have to be you (but attributing consciousness is a tad dubious). You clearly didn't read what I wrote (see bold text), but assumed that I wrote that brains don't exist or have no connection with consciousness.

KJ: You're not a logical person, are you? Evidently you have some talent for conceiving of the existence of something that you can't conceive of, that no one else has.

O: Just because you can't conceive of something doesn't mean that it's not real.
There may be life on other planets but according to your logic it's not even there because you haven't perceived it yet.
Sure it may not have an appearance to you yet but that's not because it isn't real.

"There may be life on other planets" --- a concept, is it not?

You're not understanding. It's not about not being able to conceive of something, but simply not conceiving of it. Whatever exists beyond and outside any consciousnesses, never experienced, perceived, or conceived of, has no form, nor existence. It could only have form, and exist as such, if it appears in consciousness.

What is beyond consciousness is not nothingness whatsoever (since that is immediately made impossible by the presence of things right now in consciousness), nor is it something distinct. It exists only as some "blurry void" because the nature of consciousness makes it so; logically, it is part and parcel the Nondual.

KJ: If you thought about things a bit more, you wouldn't be wasting people's time pointing out your illogicalities. If needs = wants, then how could needs be dependent on wants?

O: Needs are just wants in disguise. You only need something IF you want something so essentially they're the same.

I'm sorry, but if they're the same, then there wouldn't be two different words, with different usages and contexts. Take for instance, a human's unconscious, biological need for bile salts in order to digest and breakdown fats, without which salts the animal would eventually die, compared to a human's conscious and psychological desire for sexual intercourse, without which the animal would not die. The biological need is not the same as the psychological want. Trying to equivocate them is to no purpose that I can see (there are two words, after all), and spiritually does away with a very important tool.


.

[Russell Parr]

So could we rephrase that as "they're experiences based on ideas"?

I really don't care how we phrase it, as long as the point is understood.

But why does this mean that there is no reality "out there"?

Indeed it does. Even further, it means that our "reality" isn't as real as it seems.

Aren't the concepts dependent on the perceptions rather than the other way around?

They are interdependent.

So being attached to the idea of heroism for example can be both practical and delusional.

Egotistical attachment is always delusional. Attachment otherwise, such as continuing to believing that we'll experience pain if we place our hand on the stove, is practical.

[Orenholt]

At the moment, it would have to be you (but attributing consciousness is a tad dubious). You clearly didn't read what I wrote (see bold text), but assumed that I wrote that brains don't exist or have no connection with consciousness.

I was mainly replying to the statement "it's not an absolute logical truth that consciousness is created by a brain".
Why are we throwing empiricism out the door?
If you're saying that brains do exist then why did you criticize me and say "She literally believes that a brain exists "out there", beyond her own experiences of the world. But scientific materialism is a very popular error, so I'm not surprised." ?

"There may be life on other planets" --- a concept, is it not?

Yes, it's a concept but the "life" may be inconceivable itself. Or are you saying that nothing is inconceivable?

What is beyond consciousness is not nothingness whatsoever (since that is immediately made impossible by the presence of things right now in consciousness), nor is it something distinct. It exists only as some "blurry void" because the nature of consciousness makes it so; logically, it is part and parcel the Nondual.

I think this has more to do with psychology than with reality itself.
Plus I think we're on different tracks because I don't accept the word "exist" as "to have an appearance of".

I'm sorry, but if they're the same, then there wouldn't be two different words, with different usages and contexts. Take for instance, a human's unconscious, biological need for bile salts in order to digest and breakdown fats, without which salts the animal would eventually die, compared to a human's conscious and psychological desire for sexual intercourse, without which the animal would not die. The biological need is not the same as the psychological want. Trying to equivocate them is to no purpose that I can see (there are two words, after all), and spiritually does away with a very important tool.

You only need the salts IF you WANT to live.
Besides, isn't everything all one thing anyway?

[Orenholt]

Aren't the concepts dependent on the perceptions rather than the other way around?

They are interdependent.

Hmm I can see how concepts would be dependent on perceptions.
Your thought about a tree depends on the experience of seeing a tree.
But your experience of seeing a tree depends on your thought about a tree?
Then why can't we just think of flying green giraffes and have an experience of them?
Or do you count the image in our mind's eye as an "experience"?

If so, I think I understand. Thanks.

[Russell Parr]

It's kinda like the chicken and the egg question, isn't it? On one hand, our conceptions are built upon that which we perceive, yet the perception means nothing until our minds conceive an identity for it.

Although, if we were to determine a strict order of operations, what you said is more correct, the perception comes first.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Then why can't we just think of flying green giraffes and have an experience of them?

You can, you just haven't tried enough. If you can imagine an image, you can hold it until the experience of it arises (literally). Clearly you wouldn't be able to do this for something that you couldn't imagine.

[Orenholt]

Then why can't we just think of flying green giraffes and have an experience of them?

You can, you just haven't tried enough. If you can imagine an image, you can hold it until the experience of it arises (literally). Clearly you wouldn't be able to do this for something that you couldn't imagine.

What? How is it possible that I could just manifest a flying green giraffe out of thin air just by thinking about it?
I mean, sure I could draw one or make a sculpture of one but make a real one? No way. That's insane.
At best I would be causing myself to have a hallucination.

[Leyla Shen]

Kelly Jones:

Only if you're still clinging to causality as if it really exists (i.e. to things). Causality cannot be caused, by definition, so it is not a thing that exists relatively. Since it doesn't exist relatively, it has no distinction, shape, form and character. In other words, well, what is causality?

Well, okay. But this is really problematic. It's too easily understood for what it is not. We can't escape from our dualistic thinking in any other way than to recognise such logical absolutes. But without comprehending those logical absolutes, with this you might as well be saying nothing really exists except the objective universe.

Explaining emptiness presents the same problem as trying to explain A=A.

[Leyla Shen]

This, in fact, is an inverted example of that:

SeekerOfWisdom wrote:
You can, you just haven't tried enough. If you can imagine an image, you can hold it until the experience of it arises (literally). Clearly you wouldn't be able to do this for something that you couldn't imagine.

[Kelly Jones]

Leyla,

There's no problem that I can see. One started with the belief that things are really there. Then, enters the concept of causality, and dualism comes into focus as how one thinks the world. Causality conceptually helps to deconstruct that initial belief, "loosening" the psychology of egotism. One's understanding is ever-improving as one goes. At this point, when causality has seeped deeply into the mind, and into all aspects of one's being, there uprooting the habits of ego and corrosively eroding every love and burning every bridge to worldliness, then the human realm is reached, and understanding is ready for lovelessness. The higher ideals enter the pyre: Causality, Truth, Ideality, Perfection, etc. etc. etc. They all enter the burning fire. Understanding has revealed Reality has no form, and the natural result is for that understanding to shed its light back on itself.

There is no problem, nor absurdity at all. It is just a process of gradually correcting previous less-advanced stages of reason, using later ones. It doesn't mean the earlier stages were faulty, just limited in their accuracy. One step leads to the next, that's all.


.

[Dan Rowden]

Relativity doesn't falsify Newtons Laws.

[Dan Rowden]

Oh, and there are lots of animals that don't have "brains" as we normally understand such a thing, and yet they display "want" behaviour as described by Orenholt. It's a ganglion stand off really.

[Dan Rowden]

Then why can't we just think of flying green giraffes and have an experience of them?

You can, you just haven't tried enough. If you can imagine an image, you can hold it until the experience of it arises (literally). Clearly you wouldn't be able to do this for something that you couldn't imagine.

What? How is it possible that I could just manifest a flying green giraffe out of thin air just by thinking about it?

How can you not? In fact, you just did.

I mean, sure I could draw one or make a sculpture of one but make a real one? No way. That's insane.

I love you. I know it's not real. I know it's insane. I know I can't prove it and show it to you but dammit it's real!!! It's real I tell you!! Please believe me!!!!! Arrggghhh!!!

At best I would be causing myself to have a hallucination.

Oh, ok, forget I spoke.

[Orenholt]

Oh, and there are lots of animals that don't have "brains" as we normally understand such a thing, and yet they display "want" behaviour as described by Orenholt. It's a ganglion stand off really.

Hmm... I guess if you wanted to be REALLY liberal about your use of the word "want" you could say that plants that bend toward the sun display "wanting" behaviors. But then again plants have no sense of self. Isn't that interesting? ;)

[Orenholt]

But why does this mean that there is no reality "out there"?

Indeed it does. Even further, it means that our "reality" isn't as real as it seems.

How does it follow that because everything is a concept based on a perception that the perceptions are false?

[Russell Parr]

I wasn't too sharp in that response, I meant there are no things out there, whereas reality is equivalent to the totality. I was also alluding to humanity as a whole when I said "our", as most people are obviously deluded on these matters.

[Orenholt]

I wasn't too sharp in that response, I meant there are no things out there, whereas reality is equivalent to the totality. I was also alluding to humanity as a whole when I said "our", as most people are obviously deluded on these matters.

Gotcha. :)

[Kelly Jones]

If you're saying that brains do exist then why did you criticize me and say "She literally believes that a brain exists "out there", beyond her own experiences of the world. But scientific materialism is a very popular error, so I'm not surprised." ?

The existence of the brain, and its connection with consciousness, is only ever experienced, and indirectly, through one's very own consciousness, just like all other data about the world. A bird chirping, perched on a telephone wire, is perceived at a very specific perspective of sight and sound: that created by the senses. Scientists tell us much about how these senses work, and the data appears reliable and congruent. Nevertheless, one can never have certainty that the causes behind the constructions of consciousness are indeed so.

The point is, the model of reality that is called the universe by scientists, is only ever that: a model. This is why empiricism isn't the tool for understanding what is ultimately real. Empiricism always falls back onto the limitations of the senses. By contrast, the philosophical method provides certainty, because its logical axioms and proofs are wholly a priori, not dependent on the afterproof of the senses.

KJ: "There may be life on other planets" --- a concept, is it not?

O: Yes, it's a concept but the "life" may be inconceivable itself. Or are you saying that nothing is inconceivable?

" 'life' " --- a concept, is it not?

I'm trying to get you to focus in on the way your own mind is constructing beliefs about what is ultimately real. That is all.

KJ: What is beyond consciousness is not nothingness whatsoever (since that is immediately made impossible by the presence of things right now in consciousness), nor is it something distinct. It exists only as some "blurry void" because the nature of consciousness makes it so; logically, it is part and parcel the Nondual.

O: I think this has more to do with psychology than with reality itself.
Plus I think we're on different tracks because I don't accept the word "exist" as "to have an appearance of".

I think you are too brainwashed by scientific materialism, to trust in your own mind. That is why you don't have what it takes to be a philosopher.

KJ: I'm sorry, but if they're the same, then there wouldn't be two different words, with different usages and contexts. Take for instance, a human's unconscious, biological need for bile salts in order to digest and breakdown fats, without which salts the animal would eventually die, compared to a human's conscious and psychological desire for sexual intercourse, without which the animal would not die. The biological need is not the same as the psychological want. Trying to equivocate them is to no purpose that I can see (there are two words, after all), and spiritually does away with a very important tool.

O: You only need the salts IF you WANT to live.

Strange how scientific materialists tend to be poor scientists.

It doesn't matter how much wishing and wanting you do, your liver and gallbladder will keep squirting out bile salts.

Besides, isn't everything all one thing anyway?

Like Carl Sagan's Cosmos, you mean.......?


.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

What? How is it possible that I could just manifest a flying green giraffe out of thin air just by thinking about it?
I mean, sure I could draw one or make a sculpture of one but make a real one? No way. That's insane.
At best I would be causing myself to have a hallucination.

If you can see something, touch it, interact with it, that is as real as it gets, because experience is as far as 'universe' goes.

In fact, every single name for anything part of 'universe', are all just names for objects appearing in consciousness, sensations/mental formations arising in the mind.

So if you want to call it a hallucination, that is fine, but then you would have to call all of this a hallucination also, which is silly, it is as real as it gets.

Life is a dream, (like a dream), meaning nothing exists but manifestations of the mind. The body is also a manifestation of the mind. Without the body, experience of the mind continues. The brain is not the cause of consciousness.

'eternal life'

Keeping aware of form and seeing it arise from nothing, walking through the fields, then being aware of that bright day light fade back to nothing, only to realize your eyes have been closed the whole time, may help lend some perspective.

[Orenholt]

The existence of the brain, and its connection with consciousness, is only ever experienced, and indirectly, through one's very own consciousness, just like all other data about the world. A bird chirping, perched on a telephone wire, is perceived at a very specific perspective of sight and sound: that created by the senses. Scientists tell us much about how these senses work, and the data appears reliable and congruent. Nevertheless, one can never have certainty that the causes behind the constructions of consciousness are indeed so.

The point is, the model of reality that is called the universe by scientists, is only ever that: a model. This is why empiricism isn't the tool for understanding what is ultimately real. Empiricism always falls back onto the limitations of the senses. By contrast, the philosophical method provides certainty, because its logical axioms and proofs are wholly a priori, not dependent on the afterproof of the senses.

Ok I get what you're saying but I still don't see why you would completely ignore empiricism when it comes to the brain. Sure there's a definite POSSIBILITY that this is all fake or a dream somehow but isn't it logical to conclude anything from empirical evidence?

It's like you're saying that dinosaurs never existed because you never saw a live one despite the fact that there are fossils.

Are you saying that nothing is inconceivable?

I'd still like to know your answer for that.

I think you are too brainwashed by scientific materialism, to trust in your own mind. That is why you don't have what it takes to be a philosopher.

Just because I don't readily gulp down everything I'm told doesn't mean that I don't have potential.
Skepticism is a virtue, not a vice.

It doesn't matter how much wishing and wanting you do, your liver and gallbladder will keep squirting out bile salts.

You could have them removed though.

My point is that anything you "need" is IF you "want" to accomplish something.

[sue hindmarsh]

Orenholt wrote:

How does it follow that because everything is a concept based on a perception that the perceptions are false?

It’s not that the perception of a thing is necessarily false (or true) it is that perceptions are by their very nature untrustworthy. You can only build a tentative reality from them. For example, we look at the fossil evidence and extrapolate from it that dinosaurs existed. But we can’t be sure that they ever did exist, we can just accept that they might have. This doesn’t make dinosaurs any less real, for as an example their existence and every other things existence relies on that same reasoning. And that’s fine, because for the most part it is practical for us to see things this way.

For science and ordinary day to day life that way of looking at things can work fine, but when it comes to philosophy such guessing isn’t enough. Ultimate reality is what matters, so certainty is what one is after – and that can only be found through logic.

[Pam Seeback]

Then why can't we just think of flying green giraffes and have an experience of them?

You can, you just haven't tried enough. If you can imagine an image, you can hold it until the experience of it arises (literally). Clearly you wouldn't be able to do this for something that you couldn't imagine.

What? How is it possible that I could just manifest a flying green giraffe out of thin air just by thinking about it?
I mean, sure I could draw one or make a sculpture of one but make a real one? No way. That's insane.
At best I would be causing myself to have a hallucination.

Why would you cloud your awareness with such imaginings by whatever name you call them?

[Orenholt]

Why would you cloud your awareness with such imaginings by whatever name you call them?

I wouldn't. I was just saying that for the sake of example.

[Orenholt]

Orenholt wrote:
It’s not that the perception of a thing is necessarily false (or true) it is that perceptions are by their very nature untrustworthy. You can only build a tentative reality from them. For example, we look at the fossil evidence and extrapolate from it that dinosaurs existed. But we can’t be sure that they ever did exist, we can just accept that they might have. This doesn’t make dinosaurs any less real, for as an example their existence and every other things existence relies on that same reasoning. And that’s fine, because for the most part it is practical for us to see things this way.

For science and ordinary day to day life that way of looking at things can work fine, but when it comes to philosophy such guessing isn’t enough. Ultimate reality is what matters, so certainty is what one is after – and that can only be found through logic.

Ok I can accept that. BUT why would we disregard empirical evidence that consciousness comes from the brain? I know it's just a guess but isn't it a logical one given what information we have?