What if bytemaster's right ...

[CLains]

That's it!  All we have to do now is move from a block chain to a block rope.

[Stan]

That's it!  All we have to do now is move from a block chain to a block rope.

[CLains]

I found this interesting.

"Before I say, “everything we thought we knew about physics is wrong” let me qualify that statement.  Modern physics isn’t wrong. It’s irrational."

The Grand Unified Theory of Physics Has Been Discovered
https://practicallawandjustice.liberty.me/the-grand-unified-theory-of-physics-has-been-discovered/
BILL GAEDE’S ROPE HYPOTHESIS

Remember those people saying that quantum mechanics is weird?
Well actually, if you define probabilities as the square of COMPLEX-valued probability amplitudes .. then quantum mechanics becomes LINEAR (as in 1+1=2)
Though it took physics about 30 years to understand that

 

[xh3]

there is only environment. Inside the environment the only things that can exist are useful and resonant with the forces of the environment.

[sittingduck]

I don't think bytemaster only considers his happiness.  He views everyone as part of himself and supports non violence.  Clearly these are signs that his philosophy is often misrepresented. 

[gamey]

If I recall correctly, BM does not believe in man made global warming.  (Although I think it can be proven as far as anything empirically observed .. at least how CO2 / greenhouse gasses absorb radiation)  Seeing his life philosophy is an interesting one and explains a thing or 2. I can't say I agree at all if his view is as he presented it.

"I don't know, so I take the easy way out and damn the consequences! It is about me being happy." <- This sort of thought process leads to a lot of evil things.

This whole life is a simulation sounds like some new age philosophy that came about after computers have become mainstream.

[Bitcoinfan]

I think the statement that everything is "cause and effect" may be misleading.  Can something simply exist without cause?  We know that the very first thing in the "cause->effect" chain must have no cause.


For starters cause and effect assumes time is real and not an illusion.  If you remove time from the equation there is no cause / effect.

If we are to say that everything in life is not "cause and effect", and timelessness is the ultimate basis of truth, then should we not remove it completely from our vocabulary.  If not, every time we use the word why or cause, then were being contradictory, because we are using a word that we believe is not really there?

All of history is merely a memory in the present moment much like all of the future is merely a dream in the present moment. Neither the past nor the future can be proven to exist. All we know right now is that you have a "memory" of something but that memory does not make that "something" real.

 
The Piano Problem: Why when a man reaches for the piano the first time, can't he play that tune that he heard on the radio, although he already knew how to do so years in the future.  Why would it instead months and years of recollected practice to reach that point of mastery? 

The question that bears to mind is, since we are in fact non-linear in nature, why do we extrapolate the world linearly.  Why are we somehow locked in one frame of time? 

Time is relative, and flexible and, according to Einstein, "the dividing line between past, present, and future is an illusion". So reality is ultimately TIMELESS. This sounds pretty bizarre from the view of classical physics, but from the view of consciousness theory and spirituality, it fits in perfectly.

The Greeks commonly held this belief, as they saw mind was good and the body was bad.  At the point of death, the mind was suppose to transcend the body.  Both Einstein and the Greeks believed in an eternal universe.  As a philosophical humanist, Einstein was extremely wedded to the idea that the universe was static and unchanging, and thereby eternal.  His own theory of general relativity indicated that the universe must be either expanding or contracting. Unable to believe what his own equations were telling him, Einstein introduced a cosmological constant (a "fudge factor") to the equations to avoid this "problem."  This mistake would not serve him well, when Edwin Hubble took Einstein to his observatory and showed Einstein that the Universe was in fact expanding and similarly enough did have a beginning.  Einstein would admit to his mistake and called it the biggest blunder of his life. 

[Thom]

Some more thoughts, because I just can't stop when the ball is rolling...

Science already shows, quite clearly that we are not our "ego." The ego is indeed an avatar. Why? Because everything you see around you, the colors, the objects, the sound, the shadows, in short, everything in your consciousness, is in your brain, a responsive representation of outside information. You are the "screen" where everything is displayed. So if you identify with your body or the space behind your eyes, you are suffering a magnificent illusion, because that "point in space" exists in a space that is wholly already inside the representation your brain creates.

You are the whole, no single part within it.

In the West Hume was one of the first philosophers to point out that try as you might, you can't find a the "ego" behind the eyes, or anywhere else, if you stop for a second and try. Then you will realize that you have an implicit, abstract belief in something that is not really there in the concrete; in other words a kind of illusion. I.e the "ego" is an illusion.

If we apply this insight to Descartes we find that the sentence, "I think, therefore I am," really can only mean "there is thinking going on," but who is aware of this thinking? Is thinking aware of itself? If you pay close attention, you find that no, thinking is not aware of itself, but speaks like the explicit word and is located specifically inside the whole conscious representation or field, and is understood within that complete light. Therefore, "Consciousness IS."

Finally, Kant nearly became an idealist because it was difficult to understand how consciousness could grasp anything outside itself. Whenever we are conscious of something, it is our consciousness that we are directly experiencing, not the thing itself. Kant grappled with how to get an objective science out of this position, and we are still largely living in his shadow.

If we want to unify Spirituality (What am I?) and Science (What is the World?) what is the best way to go from here?

I'm more fascinated by the sudden open-mindedness of "Science" (other than Rocket Science, naturally).

Historically, Science has lagged in that department.  Flat earth.  Geocentric Universe.  F=ma.  "God does not play dice."

But now serious scientists, extrapolating from the Giants of the 20th century, are seriously considering the Simulation Hypothesis.  Without needing or even attempting to explain whether that simulation is an emergent property of hyper reality, some fiendishly clever software or the will of an Omnipotent Being.

It doesn't matter which.   The point is they have discovered that "reality" behaves like a simulation.   The Matrix.   The implication is that the Laws of Physics are programmable. Non-linear.  Non-causal.  Like a scriptable blockchain. 

The speed of light turns out to be a variable constant.

And that would imply that "magic" is possible.  Even routine.  Observed "miracles", like quantum entanglement, are thus something to be investigated, not ridiculed. 

Those who say things like "man will never fly" are the ones who should be ridiculed.

Clarke's Three Laws are three "laws" of prediction formulated by the British science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. They are:

• When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right.
  When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
• The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
• Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Once you get to that point, the most interesting area of scientific investigation is the so-called "supernatural".

Because that is merely the part of the "natural" that science has yet to concede.

Right on Stan, especially point #2. The tension within me between the "double-blind, provable, repeatable" scientific method vs the intuitive, uncertain speculation is very real. I recognize the value of the scientific method as a huge leap in the advancement of useful knowledge, but I also see the value in creativity, intuition and things far less tangible. The correct balance is often very difficult to achieve.

[Thom]

3. Life is a dream, I am just a first person avatar, all of life and everything I perceive is part of one consciousness which is beyond my ego and which many would attribute the qualities of God. 

I will admit I still heavily lean towards an absolute basis of reality, despite our inability to know it comprehensively, tho my contemplation into the nature of consciousness lately has been thinking more about a singular consciousness of which my ego is only a small portion.

The original "Highlander" said, "There can be only one", but if consciousness is more than an effect of matter we don't have (or have not yet discovered) how to transcend our perspective beyond our ego perception, at least not in a manor that is provable in ways we currently understand.

Another observable characteristic of what we call reality is it's self-similar (i.e. fractal) nature. If our consciousness is just one "level" of an endless chain of awareness levels, then perhaps there is no end to their super or sub levels, they just "are". If life in all forms occupies just one of those levels, it may explain why the consciousness of a single mitochondria can't comprehend the vastness of what we can, tho it is a part of us.

Such discussions are entertaining yet paradoxical, b/c whatever your believe, we all participate and interact under many assumptions. Life is an opportunity to explore, adapt, grow and thrive. Intent is everything, and life is an opportunity to make it so. What is your life's intent? What are your struggles, passions, cares & concerns? What is the current belief system you base your conscious life around? Do you deeply understand your own personal history and how it motivates you and directs your intent, or are you just playing out and reacting based on the mountain of previous decisions you and the rest of humanity has made that led you to this point?

As to @Stan's comments concerning quantum physics, I found an interesting video series that was quite persuasive IMHO that explains the behavior of the double slit experiment which is the foundation of the Kantian "everything is relative, nothing can be known for certain" perspective of quantum physics.

Like, can you dig it, it's all about plasma man. Let's see what Stan does with that 

[Bitcoinfan]

One of the nice things about simulations is you don't have to start them at the beginning.

This simple MATLAB simulation has non-zero initial conditions.

So, if you were only interested in the part of history that involved human civilization, you could theoretically start your simulation of a 14 billion year old universe at some convenient point like, say, 6000 years ago.

If that's what happened, how would Science know the difference?

One of the nice things about simulations is you don't have to start them at the beginning.

So, if you were only interested in the part of history that involved human civilization, you could theoretically start your simulation of a 14 billion year old universe at some convenient point like, say, 6000 years ago.

Interesting that you used the word start twice and are somehow positing that there was a beginning, hence the cosmological argument.  The simulation had to start somewhere: whether it began first with an advanced civilization in the future or 6000 years ago during.    What makes today 2015 as the observation, as opposed to 1942, doesn't remove the fact that there was still a first point.

The question comes from this is what makes today 2015, as the observation, as opposed to 1942 as where the arrow of time begins?   
 

[xeroc]

I found this interesting.

"Before I say, “everything we thought we knew about physics is wrong” let me qualify that statement.  Modern physics isn’t wrong. It’s irrational."

The Grand Unified Theory of Physics Has Been Discovered
https://practicallawandjustice.liberty.me/the-grand-unified-theory-of-physics-has-been-discovered/
BILL GAEDE’S ROPE HYPOTHESIS

Remember those people saying that quantum mechanics is weird?
Well actually, if you define probabilities as the square of COMPLEX-valued probability amplitudes .. then quantum mechanics becomes LINEAR (as in 1+1=2)
Though it took physics about 30 years to understand that

[Xeldal]

I found this interesting.

"Before I say, “everything we thought we knew about physics is wrong” let me qualify that statement.  Modern physics isn’t wrong. It’s irrational."

The Grand Unified Theory of Physics Has Been Discovered
https://practicallawandjustice.liberty.me/the-grand-unified-theory-of-physics-has-been-discovered/
BILL GAEDE’S ROPE HYPOTHESIS

[CLains]

Indeed.  It might even go further than that to include the nutty scientists and the objectively religious!

Exactly!

All of history is merely a memory in the present moment much like all of the future is merely a dream in the present moment. Neither the past nor the future can be proven to exist. All we know right now is that you have a "memory" of something but that memory does not make that "something" real.

I agree with this, but if we zoom in on the present again we find, lo and behold, a trinity of Past, Present and Future. We know this tri-unity quite immediately in our conscious experience. This conscious partition of time is unlike the "external" partition of objective time, but it still presents a problem, a kind of stubborn illusion, just like the illusion that the ego is distinct from the understanding and consciousness as a whole. Any hard analysis of reality into components like mind/reality, and past/future, is ultimately a philosophical debt that we must pay back again by finding a unifying explanation that gives rise to the duality. One might also suspect that similar answers lurk beneath both of these divisions..

[Stan]

One of the nice things about simulations is you don't have to start them at the beginning.

This simple MATLAB simulation has non-zero initial conditions.

So, if you were only interested in the part of history that involved human civilization, you could theoretically start your simulation of a 14 billion year old universe at some convenient point like, say, 6000 years ago.

If that's what happened, how would Science know the difference?

I think the statement that everything is "cause and effect" may be misleading.  Can something simply exist without cause?  We know that the very first thing in the "cause->effect" chain must have no cause.

For starters cause and effect assumes time is real and not an illusion.  If you remove time from the equation there is no cause / effect.

All of history is merely a memory in the present moment much like all of the future is merely a dream in the present moment. Neither the past nor the future can be proven to exist. All we know right now is that you have a "memory" of something but that memory does not make that "something" real.

Time is relative, and flexible and, according to Einstein, "the dividing line between past, present, and future is an illusion". So reality is ultimately TIMELESS. This sounds pretty bizarre from the view of classical physics, but from the view of consciousness theory and spirituality, it fits in perfectly.

Actually that is one of the fascinating points made in the referenced video on the Simulation Hypothesis.

Our decision to observe a photon or not seems to be able to affect which slit (or side of a galactic gravitational lens) it passed in the near or distant past.

[bytemaster]

One of the nice things about simulations is you don't have to start them at the beginning.

This simple MATLAB simulation has non-zero initial conditions.

So, if you were only interested in the part of history that involved human civilization, you could theoretically start your simulation of a 14 billion year old universe at some convenient point like, say, 6000 years ago.

If that's what happened, how would Science know the difference?

I think the statement that everything is "cause and effect" may be misleading.  Can something simply exist without cause?  We know that the very first thing in the "cause->effect" chain must have no cause.

For starters cause and effect assumes time is real and not an illusion.  If you remove time from the equation there is no cause / effect.

All of history is merely a memory in the present moment much like all of the future is merely a dream in the present moment. Neither the past nor the future can be proven to exist. All we know right now is that you have a "memory" of something but that memory does not make that "something" real.

Time is relative, and flexible and, according to Einstein, "the dividing line between past, present, and future is an illusion". So reality is ultimately TIMELESS. This sounds pretty bizarre from the view of classical physics, but from the view of consciousness theory and spirituality, it fits in perfectly.