new hypothesis on "why we're here"

[qwe]

so i've been watching a lot of Lexx, a show whose over-arching theme is Death (and sex, but this thread is about death). the theme of this thread is, what happens when we die? and before we were born?

for the purposes of this thread, we must assume that:

A) there is a "soul". not necessarily a spiritual soul, but there is something besides normal brain cells in our brain (or a link to something) that enables our brains to produce qualia / true awareness, separating us from computers. (if you believe in Strong AI, you will have to temporarily shed that belief as it does not make sense in the context of this hypothesis). this "soul" is either eternal, or approximately so: once a "vessel" dies, the soul enters a new vessel

B) happiness and sadness, or attraction and repulsion, have meaning to the soul, in any or most vessels

now we can get started. here is a graph, showing the happiness of a few random people over their lifespans. for simplicity, just assume that the halfway height is "baseline", and under baseline is "sad":

the question is this: what about before and after that graph??? the following extension of the graph is the easiest to conjure, because in order to comprehend this graph, we need only consult ideas that we have already grasped in this life:

in the above graph, our past and future lives are somewhat similar to our present life. however, must this be the case?

the universe is very complex. many different types of self-sustaining patterns are probably possible, from plasma life forms to humans. so, vessels carrying a soul, if that vessel is not human, could experience things we could not even imagine. their pleasure, and their pain, could be entirely incomprehensible by us (as well as their general lives). so, these could also be the case:

the universe seems pretty random. we are here due to the anthropic principle it seems. the universe is also rather fractal-like. so, in the above graph, option A, the simplest to come up with, is probably quite likely. vessels experiencing pain we cannot imagine, and pleasure we cannot imagine, are out there, and when we die, we could go either way*****

however, it is also quite likely that we come into THIS universe by choice, which would mean we may come in order to escape something. this would represent graph B. this universe may be amazing compared to others, so we come here to escape things. (so, if graph B is the case, once we die, we all go to "hell")

then again, it is also likely that this universe is much worse than other universes. i mean, sentient people get sucked up in tornadoes, ran over by tidal waves, natural disasters abound, and natural selection builds the life forms around here. so, perhaps this is a sort of "hell", which would mean, when we die, we will all go to "heaven". this would represent graph C

there are three final options that i can see. D will be ignored, because i don't see how it would make much sense. E and F, as you can see, involves souls being created every time a human is created (rather than, in cases A through C, a soul entering a body by will*)

in E, you simply die once your body dies. in this graph, it is likely that whatever mechanism produces qualia, whatever our "soul" is, is so interwoven with our neural architecture that the death of our brain is the death of our soul as well ** (another implication). so, graph E represents the normal Strong AI approach

in F, a soul is created each time a human is created, however the soul will live on after that. this seems to be what many people believe, but if we are born and then live on after death, why does it """start here"""!? if we consult the anthropic principle, the odds are pretty low that our indefinite "soul lifespan" starts here!

so... these are the possibilities i can think of, for life after death, if happiness and sadness have any meaning. weird stuff huh? what happens after death? (note: please don't bring up the DMT stuff, the psychedelic experience right before death. it may happen, sure, but it is physical and within this universe. i am talking about leaving that brain entirely, and DMT is an integral part of the physical brain on the 3-brane we call the universe. i suppose, though, that it is possible that something like DMT could assist in the transfer of our soul to the next vessel***)

how could science hope to approach these topics? perhaps by searching for the link between qualia and the mind (is there a point within the brain where a stream of information simply "ends" and results in no activity, and another point where a stream of information simply "comes from nowhere"? these would be points where the brain is communicating with some other entity, or perhaps an entity that is very small, so small that it is in a realm with physics we have not yet investigated)

anyway, i guess this is another "life after death" thread, but i think this is coming at it from a new angle so it's ok not very scientific, but we don't have much to hold on to in the first place. perhaps these ideas will bounce off some people and lead to further ideas. so discuss!

it seems, in the first graph, person green was a very happy individual until he died of cancer, while person blue is rather depressed his whole life except in his twenties when he was getting laid

hopefully the graphs make some sense. the big arrows with question marks, means that the happiness change would represent a similar scenario to the graph of either A, B, or C (aka, the question mark is a wild card--either case works)

--- --- ---

* If souls enter bodies at will, for example when the body is born, or conceived, or about 2 months, or whatever, an interesting implication arises: what if many of us are real philosophical zombies, without any soul? many of us would be "real" people, experiencing true qualia, while others would be Turing Test lemmings. wouldn't that explain a lot?

** Whether this is the case or not (that the death of our brain results in the death of our soul), it is definitely true that our soul/qualia and our brain/clockwork-gears-mind are intimately linked. Our memories are stored globally in our neural architecture, and the death of our brain means the death of our memories, desires, morals, ideas, et al. If we do indeed live on after death, we are not going to see our loved ones, dance and sing bla bla bla. While heaven could exist, perhaps in the way that i stated above, i highly doubt that there is some mechanism that transfers all of the data in our brains immediately before our death so that we are still the same person/consciousness after death****. i mean, we remember nothing of any past life right? so why should we think we would carry anything into the future life?

*** Real astral projection? Hehe, usually i am not this wacky. I think...

**** Is it possible that we are "rescued", upon death, by beings more advanced and living in a realm inconceivable to us? in this manner, our souls would be collected by this alien species upon our deaths, and given new vessels. this would partly explain the "mechanism". perhaps this alien realm is even where we come from?

***** One central question to this whole thread: Do we pick the next vessel for our soul, or is it a "ride", is there some mechanism that transfers us and we have no control over this process?

---

(edit) Here's the simplified version i was talking about:

 

[MynameisnotDeja]

Wow.. I gotta say.. you are so incredibly amazing and awesome for this post. Did you make all those graphs? They made total sense to me. Good job and excellent way of laying out what you want to discuss. Honestly that was one of the most enjoyable things I've read in here. :D

Wow.. where to even begin. You presented so much it's pretty mind blowing. I definitely have my beliefs on this topic and I'm trying to think where they would even fit. I guess I'll start with your "central question".

Do we pick the next vessel for our soul. In some sense, yes. But saying "we" pick it obviously wouldn't be right, as "we" don't become "who we are" until we are in the body. This fits well with my beliefs.

I basically feel that all life comes from source, and this life we are living in this realm is a temporary separation from source. Our bodies, our lives, are a vessel for the Universe to experience itself. And when that experience is done, I believe "we" go back to source. So I suppose if I had to pick from your graphs, I'd say my beliefs align with A, B and C, but depending on the life and the type of experience.

I think that "God" is composed of all things, all life, and that we are like tiny cells in a massive body of a spiritual "being". That being, I feel, is the earth itself. I think there might even be a religion that believes this, but I don't usually try and label my spirituality.. but yes, I feel the earth is a living thing, with a spiritual consciousness. She seeds our life. I feel we are all apart of her body, and our bodies come from her. The mother. God, I feel, the light of the Universe, is the father.

I can't even really explain all my beliefs very well. It's stuff I've seen in my visions, trips, and dreams that was just so.. overwhelmingly beautiful. But so BIG, I find it nearly impossible to explain. I've meditated on this a lot and I think that the true nature of the meaning of life, and what happens when we die, etc. It's all so much bigger, more beautiful, and much more complex than we could ever imagine. That's part of what makes life so awesome.

The problem I have with those graphs is that they show things in a line. And I believe linear time to be a complete and total illusion. I DO believe in some sort of reincarnation or past lives, but I don't believe they happened in the "past" or "future" because I feel linear time only exists in this realm. I think the reason some people connect to past lives, is that it's all happening at the same moment. One beautiful moment, going out in all directions, like a stone thrown into water. I realize this doesn't make sense, but this is what I've seen in my dreams. I'm not sure it's MEANT to make sense in this life.

If I had to sum it up best I could, Id say we are a part of earth, and a part of God, the mother and the father, we come from source and go back to source when we die, and that like attracts like, both in this life and in general, so I feel that ideas like "karma" or "heaven and hell" come from that. Like, maybe if a person lived their entire life in misery and anger, their particular energy (or "cell" in the big body) would incarnate into the next life carrying a similar energetic burden. This is my explanation anyway. So while I do BELIEVE in "karma" of sorts, I also believe karma can be completely overcome just by deciding so.

My theory of time being a total illusion also works in well with my belief in some sort of "fate". Ever get the weird feeling of deja vu, or premonitions? I've always had a lil tiny bit of a 6th sense, dreaming about things before they happened and what not. I don't believe this is because I can "see the future", I believe it because there is no future, and I'm just somehow tapping into the existence of all people, places, things, events, etc being in the same eternal moment.

Well that's enough babble from me for now. I could go on and on all night about my feelings about life. All of this stuff really does my head in, but I love it! Maybe the only purpose of all of this is so we sit around tripping out and trying to figure it out. That's what I think anyway. I think we die, and become a part of "big" consciousness again, and then all this probably seems pretty silly.

 

[Seanmi]

Cut the graphs, its simple why were here...


To give God Glory..........Real simple

 

[stonerfromohio]

Were all here... and I think were here to love, to bask in the simple feeling of being, to help others, to help liberate others from their imagined suffering, to act in unity with surroundings and humanity, to discover your true self. I do not think graphs or complex logical algorithms or a math equation or complex models that categorize everything into a "map of reality" accomplish anything substantial in terms of embracing our true nature and loving others. I am going to school for psychology and philosophy and often times I get so bored of ego's pitted against each other scrutinizing every little detail about everything. I can assure you that "god" would not get mad over missing a detail in a map or messing up the numbers in an algorithm and unless "god" or "the universe" has a sick sense of humor I don't think he created graphs to determine where we will end up after death. Nor do I think the creation of graphs based on data collected from this world could lead to any definitive or remotely close answers to the "afterlife".
I love analyzing death, sex, afterlife all that but I think we have to be careful we don't get caught up in models, graphs, concepts, ideologies, dogmatic religions.

I often feel that society has deviated into crazy crazy abstract thinking, crazy metaphysics, way too big of maps to "encompass all of reality" and its causing harm to our society. I think the internet plays a big part in spreading around these conceptual "memes".

 

[stonerfromohio]

Wow.. I gotta say.. you are so incredibly amazing and awesome for this post. Did you make all those graphs? They made total sense to me. Good job and excellent way of laying out what you want to discuss. Honestly that was one of the most enjoyable things I've read in here. :D

Wow.. where to even begin. You presented so much it's pretty mind blowing. I definitely have my beliefs on this topic and I'm trying to think where they would even fit. I guess I'll start with your "central question".

Do we pick the next vessel for our soul. In some sense, yes. But saying "we" pick it obviously wouldn't be right, as "we" don't become "who we are" until we are in the body. This fits well with my beliefs.

I basically feel that all life comes from source, and this life we are living in this realm is a temporary separation from source. Our bodies, our lives, are a vessel for the Universe to experience itself. And when that experience is done, I believe "we" go back to source. So I suppose if I had to pick from your graphs, I'd say my beliefs align with A, B and C, but depending on the life and the type of experience.

I think that "God" is composed of all things, all life, and that we are like tiny cells in a massive body of a spiritual "being". That being, I feel, is the earth itself. I think there might even be a religion that believes this, but I don't usually try and label my spirituality.. but yes, I feel the earth is a living thing, with a spiritual consciousness. She seeds our life. I feel we are all apart of her body, and our bodies come from her. The mother. God, I feel, the light of the Universe, is the father.

I can't even really explain all my beliefs very well. It's stuff I've seen in my visions, trips, and dreams that was just so.. overwhelmingly beautiful. But so BIG, I find it nearly impossible to explain. I've meditated on this a lot and I think that the true nature of the meaning of life, and what happens when we die, etc. It's all so much bigger, more beautiful, and much more complex than we could ever imagine. That's part of what makes life so awesome.

The problem I have with those graphs is that they show things in a line. And I believe linear time to be a complete and total illusion. I DO believe in some sort of reincarnation or past lives, but I don't believe they happened in the "past" or "future" because I feel linear time only exists in this realm. I think the reason some people connect to past lives, is that it's all happening at the same moment. One beautiful moment, going out in all directions, like a stone thrown into water. I realize this doesn't make sense, but this is what I've seen in my dreams. I'm not sure it's MEANT to make sense in this life.

If I had to sum it up best I could, Id say we are a part of earth, and a part of God, the mother and the father, we come from source and go back to source when we die, and that like attracts like, both in this life and in general, so I feel that ideas like "karma" or "heaven and hell" come from that. Like, maybe if a person lived their entire life in misery and anger, their particular energy (or "cell" in the big body) would incarnate into the next life carrying a similar energetic burden. This is my explanation anyway. So while I do BELIEVE in "karma" of sorts, I also believe karma can be completely overcome just by deciding so.

My theory of time being a total illusion also works in well with my belief in some sort of "fate". Ever get the weird feeling of deja vu, or premonitions? I've always had a lil tiny bit of a 6th sense, dreaming about things before they happened and what not. I don't believe this is because I can "see the future", I believe it because there is no future, and I'm just somehow tapping into the existence of all people, places, things, events, etc being in the same eternal moment.

Well that's enough babble from me for now. I could go on and on all night about my feelings about life. All of this stuff really does my head in, but I love it! Maybe the only purpose of all of this is so we sit around tripping out and trying to figure it out. That's what I think anyway. I think we die, and become a part of "big" consciousness again, and then all this probably seems pretty silly.

I can relate to pretty much everything you just said

 

[yougene]

** Whether this is the case or not (that the death of our brain results in the death of our soul), it is definitely true that our soul/qualia and our brain/clockwork-gears-mind are intimately linked. Our memories are stored globally in our neural architecture, and the death of our brain means the death of our memories, desires, morals, ideas, et al. If we do indeed live on after death, we are not going to see our loved ones, dance and sing bla bla bla. While heaven could exist, perhaps in the way that i stated above, i highly doubt that there is some mechanism that transfers all of the data in our brains immediately before our death so that we are still the same person/consciousness after death****. i mean, we remember nothing of any past life right? so why should we think we would carry anything into the future life?

I think many experiences we have of a soul are already decoupled from our complete waking selves. How many times have you had a dream where your complete waking identity simply wasn't present?

*** Real astral projection? Hehe, usually i am not this wacky. I think...

I always saw astral projection experiences and death experiences being of the same category.

***** One central question to this whole thread: Do we pick the next vessel for our soul, or is it a "ride", is there some mechanism that transfers us and we have no control over this process?

The Tibetan have a conception of transition states called Bardos.

Accounts of these sorts of death experiences are common across all cultures. Whether these experiences represent a transition state to another life, you'll never know until you die or work with these states.

Assuming the Bardo conception is valid, these are still dream like states. Do you have any control of what happens in your dreams? If through practice you have an ever-presents in dreams and deep sleep then yeah your presents can carry over into these transition states.

 

[qwe]

MyNameIsNotDeja

thanks for the compliments . yeah i just used MS Paint, you could make those graphs if you played around with paint for a little while no problem

>>I think that "God" is composed of all things, all life, and that we are like tiny cells in a massive body of a spiritual "being">>

we have to be careful here when we used the word spiritual; i'd agree that that is possible, but if the earth is alive in such a way, i would say that the earth is a physical living being just like we are also physical living beings, since the earth is made up of physical stuff.

if there is a "mind" that exists that represents information exchange across all of earth, if the biosphere is "sentient" (i don't think it has the necessary information networks, but who knows), it would be a physical being just like us right? so you gotta define the word "spiritual"

i think i share your belief in a sense (though, in a wider scope than just earth; what if the planets, stars, galaxies, what if all of these objects, moving in accordance with gravity, comprise a GIANT universe above us, a universe that we cannot see because we are limited to seeing only about 13.7 billion lightyears away, and hundreds of galaxies would just be a tiny component in this universe? cool stuff huh? but back to earth!)

>>That being, I feel, is the earth itself. I think there might even be a religion that believes this, but I don't usually try and label my spirituality>>

type in "gaia" in wikipedia, there's the label you're thinking of

>>but yes, I feel the earth is a living thing, with a spiritual consciousness. She seeds our life. I feel we are all apart of her body, and our bodies come from her. The mother.>>

there was a GREAT 60's/70's psychedelic hippie philosopher, Alan Watts, his lectures are available online, and one of the greatest ideas ive taken from him was the following sentence: "the earth peoples" in the same sense that an apple tree apples. it just underscores how intimately bound to the universe, that we are part of everything (miss salvia always expresses th
is to me in a very..humorous and insane way). what's more, this science fact was popularized by tim leary: all of the atoms in our bodies were in stars for most of their lifetimes. we ARE starlight/stardust

so, when eastern philosophies talk about "oneness" and such, it's definitely not ALL mumbo jumbo. we often forget our connection to the rest of the universe, we forget we are a thinking sack of meat with no "boundary" between our body and the universe (lexx tries to remind us of this; most of the insults are along the lines of "shut up you sack of meat" or "skinbag", and you can imagine the imaginative slurs for the living dead and the robot head and the various sentient beings they come across)

about your thoughts on linear time, definitely possible. time is a weird concept and i hope i live to see the day when we start to be able to investigate what is behind it

i've often wondered if we A) all have different qualia-producing entities, or B) we all "share" one soul. how could we all share one soul? easy... one soul would inhabit each body in the way that it inhabits one body. the reason we wouldn't know that this is true, is because each body has its own mechanisms for thought, each body is disconnected from each other body. but we could still be sharing the same mechanism to produce qualia--a fractal soul

>>If I had to sum it up best I could, Id say we are a part of earth, and a part of God, the mother and the father, we come from source and go back to source when we die>>

the problem with the summary, in my opinion, is the use of words that are so hard to define. however, if i were to sum it up in a similar way, i'd say something similar, except we wouldn't be part of earth; we need to start looking outward toward the stars! that's where we ultimately came from, that's where the earth came from. i'd say we are a part of this universe like a rock or a table, and that the UNIVERSE peoples. perhaps the earth peoples, some other planet 50 lightyears away nooples (a noople is a type of person i just now made up who has 3 legs), and some other planet jooples (they have both sex organs. don't ask)

however, we also need to reach beyond our "3-brane", beyond our 4 dimensional spacetime that we percieve, because physics tells us there's probably more out there, and the possibilities are fascinating. (see: lisa randall, warped passages. and flatland)

---

so... my issue with your philosophy, in a nutshell, its that it's anthropocentric and earthcentric

what is the universe? in most sci fi shows, the greatest enemies are the "grey goo" scenario: small machines that can take any sort of material, and use that material to build more of themselves. does that sound familiar? yeah...... it's how we evolved!

so the universe is a place where matter arranges itself according to certain laws, and sometimes, something pops up that will sustain itself and make more of itself. eventually it becomes complex enough to think, and (perhaps) evolve a link or mechanism to create qualia (get a soul). and here we are!

this can probably happen anywhere in the universe, even in stars or clouds of gas/plasma in space! anywhere where patterns can sustain themselves

stonerfromohio

>>Were all here... and I think were here to love>>

this is a common philosophy and it's great because it has us helping people. but love is something that evolved in mammals during our evolution. it is also subjective to us. and, why would a being or god or universe create a whole bunch of other beings in order to watch them love eachother? perversion?

besides, it is very probable that there are sentient beings out there that do not experience the feeling we call love, which is my main problem with the idea that "we were put here to love" or that "love is everything". i can see how love is everything, SUBJECTIVELY. but i cannot see how the concept of love can be applied to the universe as a whole and then be renamed "god" or whatever else it is called

>>Nor do I think the creation of graphs based on data collected from this world could lead to any definitive or remotely close answers to the "afterlife".
I love analyzing death, sex, afterlife all that but I think we have to be careful we don't get caught up in models, graphs, concepts, ideologies, dogmatic religions.>>

hence the disclaimers. in order to think about those graphs, you must assume some things, namely, that happiness is a concept that has meaning for vessels other than humans, that souls travel from vessel to vessel rather than perish, et al. the graph represents an idea of what could happen to us after death, eg, graph F is just saying "our souls are created when our bodies are born, and they continue to live on after our death"; it's just representing that idea pictorally. i am not saying that the graph *IS* reality, i am saying that that graph could possibly indicate the level of happiness that we have before and after death, like a graph can indicate the level of power consumed or food eaten or whatever, the graph is not the food but it offers information or ideas about the food. there are only a certain number of possibilities for how happiness could vary after death, so i put them all up and thought about em basically

but you are right, we are in very high uncertainty here

something is behind this whole wacky space and time and energy business though. something is making the universe tick. true, we cannot know what it is (yet). but we can speculate, based on the properties of this universe, a little bit about what MIGHT be out there (see: braneworld, branes, the bulk, lisa randall), being on the earth we can determine properties like its radius and circumference and such even though we never leave the "flat plane" that the earth appears to be

>>I often feel that society has deviated into crazy crazy abstract thinking, crazy metaphysics, way too big of maps to "encompass all of reality" and its causing harm to our society. I think the internet plays a big part in spreading around these conceptual "memes".>>

interestingly, i think that this phenomenon, while it can lead to harm, it actually is bringing us "out of the dark". i'll make a thread today, as it's another big thing i've been thinking about. the internet generation, i believe, will lead us to another revolution similar to the 60's. this time, though, earth will be ready, and the counter-culture will not only win underground and in the ideas that live on from it, but also climb aboveground itself and become a new culture

yougene

>>I think many experiences we have of a soul are already decoupled from our complete waking selves. How many times have you had a dream where your complete waking identity simply wasn't present?>>

hmm. about the dream example, the part that is decoupled to allow you to do weird things you'd never do in real life (aka you can have a totally different personality even in dreams), is, i would say, the physical part of our mind; brain cells firing randomly, and the brain attempting to make a pattern from all these signals. but qualia is "reduced" definitely in most dreams, you are right about that; but how much of the decision-making-apparatus, which changes during a dream, is composed of physical components that we know about like brain cells, and how much of this decision making apparatus is part of the "soul", whatever the soul is composed of? (the soul is also physical, in my assumptions usually, it's just not made of anything we know of yet)

a very large percentage of our brain is "dead" as far as qualia is concerned. for example, a huge chunk of our brain takes in visual data, takes out the sparkles and random crap produced as artifacts by our eyes (taking psychedelics makes it so that this "noise" is NOT eliminated as much, contributing to certain visuals. just an interesting side note), highlights edges and targets moving patterns, creates patterns from memory. but only the end product, the end stream of information that was produced by this process, is sent to "the seat of our qualia" or the soul. huge swaths of the brain are "dead" as far as souls are concerned; they are classic computers, input integrate output

(which is how our brains evolved. the first neural nets made a muscle fire once it was stimulated, then evolution differentiated brain cells into INPUT and OUTPUT cells so that an input stimulated cell would cause a output cell to become stimulated, and then neural cells were further differentiated into INPUT OUTPUT and INTEGRATE cells, the integration cells being the cells that act on the information, taking input and producing the correct output based on the input. <-- this paragraph just another note about how connected we are with the universe)

so in sum, IDK

the bardos idea is interesting. i'll read about it while stoned tonight heh

 

[MynameisnotDeja]

we have to be careful here when we used the word spiritual; i'd agree that that is possible, but if the earth is alive in such a way, i would say that the earth is a physical living being just like we are also physical living beings, since the earth is made up of physical stuff.

Well yes of course, that IS what I believe. I really worded that wrong, because I wrote it last night when I was tired as hell. What I meant to say is that I believe the earth is a living being with a spiritual consciousness (like, a large sleeping giant, dreaming a dream) and that she is the physical, the mother. And that God, is the spiritual, the father, and we are composed of both the mother (physical bodies) and the father (the light, which all things are made of as well).

i think i share your belief in a sense (though, in a wider scope than just earth; what if the planets, stars, galaxies, what if all of these objects, moving in accordance with gravity, comprise a GIANT universe above us, a universe that we cannot see because we are limited to seeing only about 13.7 billion lightyears away, and hundreds of galaxies would just be a tiny component in this universe? cool stuff huh? but back to earth!

Yes! Absolutely! And I feel if mother earth is alive, who knows, maybe "she" is just a tiny cell in something infinately bigger. Maybe it goes on forever in that way. And deep down within our cells are atoms and molecules which are actually other universes. And it goes on and on..

what's more, this science fact was popularized by tim leary: all of the atoms in our bodies were in stars for most of their lifetimes. we ARE starlight/stardust

LOL yep, exactly.

i've often wondered if we A) all have different qualia-producing entities, or B) we all "share" one soul. how could we all share one soul? easy... one soul would inhabit each body in the way that it inhabits one body. the reason we wouldn't know that this is true, is because each body has its own mechanisms for thought, each body is disconnected from each other body. but we could still be sharing the same mechanism to produce qualia--a fractal soul

One of the deepest spiritual experiences I ever had was the sudden and overwhelming knowledge that we were all one.

the problem with the summary, in my opinion, is the use of words that are so hard to define. however, if i were to sum it up in a similar way, i'd say something similar, except we wouldn't be part of earth; we need to start looking outward toward the stars! that's where we ultimately came from, that's where the earth came from. i'd say we are a part of this universe like a rock or a table, and that the UNIVERSE peoples. perhaps the earth peoples, some other planet 50 lightyears away nooples (a noople is a type of person i just now made up who has 3 legs), and some other planet jooples (they have both sex organs. don't ask)

Yes, you are right, good points!

so... my issue with your philosophy, in a nutshell, its that it's anthropocentric and earthcentric

Yes, you're right there too. That's one thing I like about myself and my spirituality. It's constantly evolving and my view of how things work keeps getting broader and more beautiful. That's just how I see things at the point I'm at now but if my life continues on in the same way its gone in the past, I know my spiritual viewpoints will only continue to grow. I never say "this is what I believe, and thats it. Im done." I feel it's so important to always be open to seeing something in a new way. That's how we find truth.

this can probably happen anywhere in the universe, even in stars or clouds of gas/plasma in space! anywhere where patterns can sustain themselves

It's so badass. :D

Btw, qwe, this is a little off topic, but have you ever heard of active/awakening Kundalini, or experienced it, and if so what are your thoughts on it? It's something that I, for whatever reason, have been randomly blessed with and experienced quite a bit of. When I first ever experienced it I was just like "WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS???" but then I began researching and learning it happened to others. It sort of relates to this topic because a lot of these visions I've had happened to me during times of extremely active kundalini.

If any of you guys have heard of it and want to discuss it, I'll start a separate thread about it. It's one of the most amazing things I've ever experienced in my life.

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

Wow qwe, I'd have to say this is one of the better works in amateur metaphysics I've read in some time.

The most difficult part about postulating 'we choose our next existence', to me at least, is: who is this 'we' that does the choosing? Is there indeed a consistent discrete entity that maintains its discrete existence from one life (or one iteration, if you prefer) to another? Or can a sentient being DO NAUGHT BUT go on to a new existence entirely based on the particulars of his/her last existence? I guess this gets down to the nature of choice and the old debate about free will, so I won't derail any further.

Great stuff, in any case. I'm very intrigued to see someone with a physics background delve into the field of metaphysics.

 

[Max Power]

qwe

watch this lecture

http://academicearth.org/lectures/dualism-physicalism

very much related to what you're talking about.

peace.

 

[qwe]

Wow qwe, I'd have to say this is one of the better works in amateur metaphysics I've read in some time.

The most difficult part about postulating 'we choose our next existence', to me at least, is: who is this 'we' that does the choosing? Is there indeed a consistent discrete entity that maintains its discrete existence from one life (or one iteration, if you prefer) to another? Or can a sentient being DO NAUGHT BUT go on to a new existence entirely based on the particulars of his/her last existence? I guess this gets down to the nature of choice and the old debate about free will, so I won't derail any further.

Great stuff, in any case. I'm very intrigued to see someone with a physics background delve into the field of metaphysics.

thank you very much. this reminds me of another metaphysics question ive thought about for a long time:

if there is a mechanism which will transfer your qualia-producing-entity ("soul") to another soul-carrying-vessel upon death,

would it "malfunction," and your soul become eliminated, if you die in the middle of a nuclear explosion, or otherwise almost instantly?

or perhaps time has no meaning for this entity or realm within which the entity exists, or perhaps even a nuclear explosion is too slow for it? or perhaps we all share the same consciousness anyway so it doesnt matter and a baby born just means the "one consciousness entity" fractals into one more body

another odd question... what sorts of malfunctions could exist with qualia? perhaps some mental disorders where we've found NO trace of physical cause could be linked? there are lots of funny things you could think of, if there were an "oopsy" in the normal qualia-transfer or qualia-production business

about free will ( you can derail my threads into any subtopics you want; it keeps the thread alive. plus i'm a moderator giving permission to derail the thread ), since i believe that the qualia/soul producing mechanism is *physical*, i would still say that a human with a soul is deterministic and feeling free will only as an illusion

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

if there is a mechanism which will transfer your qualia-producing-entity ("soul") to another soul-carrying-vessel upon death,

would it "malfunction," and your soul become eliminated, if you die in the middle of a nuclear explosion, or otherwise almost instantly?

Hmm... Two further matters you'd need to clear up in order to answer this, seems to me. First, is death, a.k.a. the exit from this sentient existence, modeled well as a point in time? Is there a clear cut point after which someone would be subjectively dead to this world, never to return? Or is this better thought of as a gradual process, like good beatmatching? I'm aware that in Western medicine death is defined as the point after which enough of the brain's cells have undergone programmed cell death as to render the organ permanently nonfunctional. But it seems to me someone could be essentially passed on before this point.

Secondly, what is the nature of the vehicles that carries one through the Bardo states, as it were?

 

[MynameisnotDeja]

another odd question... what sorts of malfunctions could exist with qualia? perhaps some mental disorders where we've found NO trace of physical cause could be linked? there are lots of funny things you could think of, if there were an "oopsy" in the normal qualia-transfer or qualia-production business

I don't personally believe the Universe malfunctions. I just think there are reasons for these sorts of things which are far beyond what we can understand. I think karma has a lot to do with it.

 

[qwe]

^ i believe you misunderstood. i meant, like, a random mutation in a fly could give it an extra leg instead of a wing, in nature---that fly would die, and you could say that "nature made a mistake" ***in a sense***. that's the sense i was talking about, that is, what if there is a transfer process to move your soul from one vehicle to the next, and what if this process can be interrupted, stopped, altered, etc. weird stuff would happen

the fact that those errors do NOT seem to happen, may indicate that a fractal consciousness which we all share is more probable (besides, why would each new human create a new soul? perhaps we just all link to the same one, that seems much simpler; aka see reasoning in O.P. about why i determined that graph F was a low probability)

Btw, qwe, this is a little off topic, but have you ever heard of active/awakening Kundalini, or experienced it, and if so what are your thoughts on it? It's something that I, for whatever reason, have been randomly blessed with and experienced quite a bit of. When I first ever experienced it I was just like "WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS???" but then I began researching and learning it happened to others. It sort of relates to this topic because a lot of these visions I've had happened to me during times of extremely active kundalini.

i've only read a little bit about kundalini awakening. i've always had a state of mind similar to what people say you are supposed to achieve during meditation, so i don't know, all i know is my mind is quite quite ODD hehe

the only "visions" i've had, fully immersive visions, were induced by psychedelics. i've never had visions on meditation, though i have had visuals

i just read wiki's article on it. i don't think so, BUT i will try to attain it. hopefully my girlfriend will be really open minded i've always wanted to try tantric exercises in addition to my meditation

 

[MynameisnotDeja]

^ i believe you misunderstood. i meant, like, a random mutation in a fly could give it an extra leg instead of a wing, in nature---that fly would die, and you could say that "nature made a mistake" ***in a sense***. that's the sense i was talking about, that is, what if there is a transfer process to move your soul from one vehicle to the next, and what if this process can be interrupted, stopped, altered, etc. weird stuff would happen

Ah, thats a crazy thought! It makes sense to me. There are more possibilities than are imaginable within our minds, I think. If I could only express the hunger I feel to understand all this.. damn. It's too much.

the fact that those errors do NOT seem to happen, may indicate that a fractal consciousness which we all share is more probable (besides, why would each new human create a new soul? perhaps we just all link to the same one, that seems much simpler; aka see reasoning in O.P. about why i determined that graph F was a low probability)

Yes, exactly. All are one.

i've only read a little bit about kundalini awakening. i've always had a state of mind similar to what people say you are supposed to achieve during meditation, so i don't know, all i know is my mind is quite quite ODD hehe

I don't know what the wiki article said (will look in a moment) but I have found there is a lot of wrong or misleading info on the net about kundalini, it seems a lot of the people writing about it haven't even experienced it.

It's unbelievable, I can't even understand how it's real. It's like having superhuman powers, well fuck that, not LIKE, it IS having superhuman powers. There are some theories that people like Jesus Christ may have simply had fully awakened Kundalini which is why they could touch people and heal and stuff like that.

I believe we all have that potential and that this kundalini lies sleeping in all people. What I don't understand is how it spontaenously wakes up in me. I usually don't even do anything to make it happen, it just suddenly happens.

I will probably start a thread about it.

 

[LivingInTheMoment]

QUOTE>there is a "soul". not necessarily a spiritual soul,

It would have to be, if there is oneness! Besides the atoms and the molecules, the oneness of the energy that humans are made of. Not the energy we derive from foodstuff, that is not what we are made of, tht is just the fuel for running the vesel.

QUOTE>I just think there are reasons for these sorts of things which are far beyond what we can understand. I think karma has a lot to do with it.

yes, I personally believe that IF metaphysically we reborn then we are doing the recycling for a purpose, to heal one another, to be catalysts for healing and change-and to heal our torments so that we can proceed to the stage of pure enlightenment, where then we merge with the oneness.
That until that happens we reborn again and again until we learn those lessons and heal to be able to merge in that oneness.
We cannot heal by ourselves, we need others to heal, and these are few and in between.

Well, it is all questionable ofcourse, but one always wonders! Why could we be here, if there is no other purpose, are we here just to become fossils at the end of the struggle?
It gives more meaning to feel there is more then just that! To have a purpose! Are we healing one another though? So we defeat our purpose!

i didn't go through the long posts, I would have liked to, but can't, but there are some great points, just by running quickly over them.
You have placed a lot of work into it and thought!..gwe

 

[Enlitx]

I disagree with your initial assumptions about there even being a soul. There is more to the brain that neurons, but it is most probably a quantam holographic field that has a bidirectional relationship with the electric currents involved. All available evidence suggests that your mind is you. Take out certain parts of the brain or alter its chemistry and you fundamentally alter who you are. Once the brain is dead, the field ceases to exist. Once you die, that is it.

 

[MynameisnotDeja]

Once you die, that is it.

Your opinion, which I respectfully disagree with (and agree at the same time). Damn those loose semantics again.

 

[L2R]

nice thread, qwe.

but i think you assertions are more accurately described as "how we're here" than "why...".

 

[stonerfromohio]

I think the 14 unanswerable questions are pertinent here...

Questions referring to the world: concerning the existence of the world in time

Is the world eternal?
or not?
or both?
or neither?
Pali texts omit "both" and "neither".

Questions referring to the world: concerning the existence of the world in space

Is the world finite?
or not?
or both?
or neither?
Pali texts omit "both" and "neither".


Questions referring to personal experience

Is the self identical with the body?
or is it different from the body?
Questions referring to life after death

Does the Tathagata exist after death?
or not?
or both?
or neither?

The Buddha remained silent when asked these fourteen questions. He described them as a net and refused to be drawn into such a net of theories, speculations, and dogmas. He said that it was because he was free of bondage to all theories and dogmas that he had attained liberation. Such speculations, he said, are attended by fever, unease, bewilderment, and suffering, and it is by freeing oneself of them that one achieves liberation.

And when I said that I feel were here to love I should of phrased it differently I think when humans love and feel connection they feel fufilled, the warmth of that "spiritual connection" is healthy for humanity I didnt mean that we are particularly here for any single purpose or any purpose in general. I think humanity can create purpose where they feel necessary.