Goetic "Demons"
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irregardless is correct spell check didn't underline it.
Besides I was raised during the renaissance.
Well actually it was a renaissance fair. but my uncle Vince, thats not his real name, he was just some guy who dressed like Leonardo Di Vinci. Anyway he used to say irregardless all the time, and I would say Irregardless uncle Vince.
He was always teasing my with modern technology I had never seen before. one day he showed me a light bulb, I thought it was full of devils, it did scare me so. But Uncle Vince just laughed and said "irregardless".
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93
I found portions of this essay by Uncle Aleister a pertinent meta-commentary on the ongoing discussion.
www.ashami.com/eidolons/On_Thelema
Call it an argument from authority
93 93/93
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Yeah, that's good.
I came here just to post these words from an aquaintance of mine:
"There is only one reality. If you move your finger that is reality.That means you are in the highest reality. Meditation is suspect! Once you get to a certain level, ego tries to creep in, and thats where you battle. The ultimate reality will try to make you insane. Thats where you cross the threshold. Will you be insane, or will you experience ultimate reality?"
Which, although not perfectly worded, is nice and simple. Clinging to the notion that all experience necessarily originates from the physical realm, which can be discovered and described bit by bit in an infinite regress misses the point, imo.
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Is the mind which is subject to the illusions of physical existing things not itself a thing.
What I mean is, are not the workings of the mind, not a something "mind" that is performing a function "workings".
Thus the physical objects one encounters are derived via the workings of the mind. Even if all things are derived from a "non-physical" source. It is the case that the way they represent themselves in the illusions of the mind is not as some plastic ever-changing propertyless clay, but as particular things which have a particular way about them. We encounter a tree and we know it is a tree and not a rocket-ship, a spoon, the feeling of sorrow, or the taste of cheese. A tree is a tree, it exists as what it is and has a way about it that is fairly consistently a trees way of being. A tree does not appear in the way of a tree and also not in the way of a tree. We never encounter something that is in a state of potentially appearing as a tree or not appearing as a tree. Nor de we encounter things that seem mostly to appear as a tree, but might potentially be something un-tree like.
Also we only seem to observe 3 dimensions of space, and the way of space is generally the same, we don't loose concentration and end up in some strange parallel universe, inhabited by objects and entitien unlike those we are familiar with.
So, the fact that things seem consistent and to have set ways of being about them, means that our minds must be rather fixed and limited as to how they take in the pure source and convert it into perceptual illusions.
That means even if the things we see are not things at all, but this potential non-physical essence, the mind itself must be a kind of rather solid actualized thing with a set way about it.
Now, if the mind is going to convert this source essence into things that seem to have a set way about them. Then the mind must be able to distinguish this bit of the source from that bit, it must be able to figure out how to convert it into different things. But this essence is not this or that, then the mind can only create the same illusions from it. Since we perceive different kinds of things, not just one kind of thing, there must be a way to split up the different kinds of essence, into different kinds of physical illusions.
We have determined that the mind is either not of the same pure potential without property and way of being, as it has the property of being able to create a certain type of illusion. If the mind is a kind of that essential substance, then perhaps there are other kinds. The kind that becomes space, the kind that becomes time, the kind that becomes trees, colors, etc. The mind detects these different kinds of this, and the mind creates maps of these detections. Those maps are the physical world, the map of the minds faculty to detect these types is the body. What become colors in the minds maps, are attributed to the eyes.
The point here being that the physical world, where things have specific ways about then, reflects the trans-physical world, that things are this way not that way. If there was no way about things, it would be constant chaos.
And sure, your mind in unique, its way of creating physical maps is unique, that unique make up, and unique relation to the absolute essence. in the TRUE WILL.
What you claim nullifies the TRUE WILL, its a would mean everything is a complete homogeneous mixture of every property and all opposite properties, but no actual properties. Everything would be the case and not be the case, in the same sense at the same time.
How do you plan if everything is equally as true as it is false. A bit called because is what that is. Its also the 0 in 0=2. The very limit of the rational mind, the point where the mind takes the pure essence and starts mapping sensory and logical categories to it. It is before these categories. The pure epistemic substance. And what comes before this 0. What is the world before the mind, the absolute which enters the mind and becomes the cosmos?
A riddle. If one can't help but project a bit of his own reflection in the world, what does does he find within.
SSSHHH! Be still.
GET OUT OF THE WAY!!!
just wait, calm, steady.
I SAID OUT OF THE WAY!
hush, wait wait, there it is!
Damn thats yourself again.
GET OUT!
Stand somewhere else
make a space for it.
look to the stars for clues.
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Thank you both Redd Fezz and Froclown for this long discussion! I don't think I have to read philosophy after this. Amazing job, Redd!
@Froclown said
"So, the fact that things seem consistent and to have set ways of being about them, means that our minds must be rather fixed and limited as to how they take in the pure source and convert it into perceptual illusions.
That means even if the things we see are not things at all, but this potential non-physical essence, the mind itself must be a kind of rather solid actualized thing with a set way about it."
It seems detrimental to the progress of the TRUE WILL to not take into account that our observations of ourselves might be temporary and physical space only the model our minds make up. Especially if we're viewing a closed system, a holographic projection that is as much inside us as outside us. So to me this is not getting what Redd is trying to convey. And it's also not getting what Crowley meant according to the URL posted earlier in this thread:
"Now then, with regard to the explanation of the Law given elsewhere in The Book of the Law, "Love is the law, love under will", while will as above shown is of absolute logical and ethical validity, it can only be executed by the process of assimilation of all foreign elements; that is, by love. To refuse to unite oneself with any phenomenon soever is to deprive oneself of its value—even of life itself, as in the case of the Black Brothers, shut up in the Abyss, and doomed to conscious disintegration in the realm of disconnected ideas and experiences, to "perish with the dogs of Reason." This refusal is only enacted when one is convinced that the new phenomenon is hostile to the set of experiences already acquired and made part of oneself. But it is a serious mark of imperfection, of grave failure to realize the facts in the matter, to take this attitude. Even supposing, for one brief moment and for argument's sake alone, that the new idea under consideration is so incompatible with the experiences already acquired and assimilated that their destruction is necessitated if it is to be accepted, then one fact stands out vividly, showing clearly that the old set of experiences is so imperfect as to be actually unfitted to continue its erstwhile existence; its destruction would be an advantage to that being, enabling a reconstruction along totally different lines—a reconstruction which would lend itself more readily to the acquisition of new experiences and apparently contradictory ideas."
Once again, in other words, it's detrimental to the progress of the TRUE WILL to not include external stimuli such as the possibility that all we have observed so far might be completely wrong; so wrong, in fact, that we might not even be minds in bodies surrounded by physical space in the web of time.
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@Froclown said
"Is the mind which is subject to the illusions of physical existing things not itself a thing.
What I mean is, are not the workings of the mind, not a something "mind" that is performing a function "workings". "
No, that's exactly the point. Mind is not a thing at all and neither are the "workings of mind". We might refer to it as such for convenience, but in reality, there is no beginning or end to "mind," no quality to mind at all other than awareness and infinite potential. "The workings" arise in relation to the environment. Everything is in flux and impermanent. When thoroughly examined, there is nothing we can depend on (double meaning there). There is nothing to stand on (the earth is my witness). Since mind is beyond all concepts of thingness, it can't be considered a thing in any real sense. This is utterly tied in with the concepts of overcoming ego and da'ath.
EDIT: Yeah, what Malaclypse said.
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even a hologram is something.
even non-local implicit information is something.
If there is a mind, then it clearly is something, or else it would be nothing with no potential. Potential is something.
The fact that we can mean the mind and not something other than the mind means it is something. The fact that we can mean my mind or your mind means that there are multiple minds.
If there is mind an then there is environment, those are both things.
Yes tho sort of thing that they are is not the thing they seem to be. Everything we see, think, and experience in mind stuff. It is temporary and changing. Because the environment which is not mind, has an effect on they mind, and this creates the appearance of all the ephemeral things the mind experiences.
If there isn't anything going on, then what is experienced by the mind, in what way can the mind come to produce appearances if not via some process.
Haw can a non-thing undergo a process?
If the mind has no set way about it, then how come it tends to see only one version of reality, why don't the things we see flicker and morph into all sorts of other things, space-time collapse into all manor of non-euclidean possibilities,
If all there is, is an infinite sea of possible worlds, then their is no reason the mind would be able to stick to ane particular word, or even why one particular mind could manifest rather than other minds.
There would be nothing but dim flickering images with to substance, no self to tie those images down, no WILL to this or that. Just a sea of images floating in and out of focus randomly like the answers in an 8 ball.
This is the abyss, it is the workings or the mind deprived of its external stimulation, unlocked from reality, it has no real object to portray is image, so if cycles its whole library or possible thoughts and perceptions to fill the space.
but REALITY is what it is, not what the mind can see. The TRUE REALITY is what that which the mind harmonizes its library of images in attempts to approximate.
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Yeah, I made the same exact argument about a hologram before a few years back. But, no, it isn't. Why? Because if nothing is actually a thing-in-itself, then a hologram is, like everything else, not a thing. This is why we reduce the idea of "things" to the idea of 'experiences'. You can argue that an experience is a thing if you like, but it's just more playing with words... because it's not, really, a "thing."
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"make no difference" means "things" are all the same in essence, which is to say they are not things and by distinguishing them as such, they become "different" (ie. "things").
There is no good metaphor to describe the arising of appearances because all of our relative concepts revolve around "thingness." But, if a bunch of people came to the conclusion that a sand castle was the fortress of a very small king, they would be surprised when the wind blew it away. To go beyond the notion of the typical example of a mirage or a hologram, apply the idea of a sand castle blowing away to the fortress of your ego. Every "thing" is an agreed-upon construct built upon other agreed-upon constructs which are not as they appear and even the observer is not reliable or real.
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yes, but we never see the sand or the castle.
An artist makes a painting, but he can only make the painting out of paint. He can only use the colors of paint that he has. If he paints a stone wall, the canvass has paint on it, not stone. No matter how well he creates the appearant texture and color of the stone wall, it is still actually paint. If he paints abstract shapes, it is still paint. If throws random smudges, its still paint. If he paints nothing, he has pools of paint, which might be anything but are not yet actually any particular image.
Our minds don,t use paint, but they have limits. You can only see certain colors, only hear certain sounds, only feel certain sensations, taste certain flavors, smell certain scents.
Just because a man can only see black and white, does not mean other colors (light wave-lengths) do not exist. It just means that those light wave-lengths have no means of expressing themselves to him. Just because a man has no eyes does not mean the world is dark.
So you see, man can use his library of things he can see to paint his world. He can create abstract shapes in his imagination, and in some instances these abstractions are even colored with a paint he calls space-time location. Other times they are colored with a paint called the inner eye or in the mind.
But man does not always create abstract paintings (imagination) much of the time what we do is create approximations of some existing thing that is presented to the mind, from outside the mind. Actually, its not created actively, but we passively allow the external thing to accumulate the paints of the mind, we never see that external thing, only the accumulation and combination of mind paint, the stuff thinking.
An unseen other thing clothes itself in colors, space-time locations, textures, smells, tastes, sounds, also emotional and rational concepts.
If what you mean by the thing not being physical, that in is not in possession itself of the conceptual paints of the mind, then I agree it is not.
but, if by non-physical, you mean that there is not some state in which that thing happens to be rather than some other state. If you mean that there is only one homogeneous source of all perceptions, and that source has no way about it. Then I say that is not the case nor is in possible.
However, the raw paints of the mind when withdrawn from all external sources and not being actively directed by imaginations of the WILL. These paints, are not in any particular way, they spill random fragments all over the canvass of the mind. Thoughts, emotions, senses, all blur together egos pop in and out of being, nothing in actual, just a jumble of forms seeking something to latch on to, but one has cut the tie to the physical substance, with the constant montra NOTHING IS TRUE, NOTHING IS TRUE. The paints can not stick to the canvass, the WILL does not allow them.
Eventually the mind exhausts itself, the canvass lays blank, no thought appear, no emotions, no egos, no sense data.
This is the 0.
But eventually, the in this totally placid state the mind receives something, it is not WILLED, the mind is not quick to color this in its own image. But slowly the image takes shape of its own, the mind, without conscious intent, without the EGO or the HGA in the way, forms this object pure and simple with out the normal bells and whistles.
This object in its purest simplified sense, come into awareness, like a leaf gently landing it the most tranquil pool of water. This is true understanding.
The leaf is REAL, the blank canvass of the mind is real, the paint the mind uses is real.
This is a continuous process, a physical process in the sense that the nature of each thing interacts with the nature of the others to create the finished universe.
You can not separate the phenomena from its source. The image is like unto the object, and the process that links object to image is a single cosmos, is a physical process.
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I don't see why you're having such a problem with this; you're the one who said, "you are nothing!" Hmm, I guess you were just trying knock me off my "high horse" due to a general misunderstanding about "mind over matter." Oh, no wait! You understand everything I'm saying. I forgot.
Well, let me try again:
What is it that plunges into karma? Only the energy of what is real when it divides itself into an inside and outside. As soon as you have inside and outside you have concepts, hence also attachments and aversions, among other things. Take away that inside/outside energy and what's left to plunge into karma? At that point we realize real nature is just a process of constant, never-ending manifestation. Further, the manifestations themselves are empty. There's no there there. Also, the process itself is empty in a different sense. We can't say there's no there there of the process, since it will never stop manifesting the reflections, it was never born, it will never cease. But it is still empty - since it is always instantly ready to reflect any appearances irrespective of whether or not it currently contains any. So then what's left of karma? Fry your seeds!Well, see you later on some other thread one day, perhaps...
It's been "real." -
yes, things "manifest" in the mind. But in actuality nothing ever "manifests" it is always there, we are always there too.
When that which is me encounters that which is something else, then a perception of it manifests in my mind.
The sense or I-ness is a manifestation of the mind, but the actual body is an actual thing in the world.
I don't see what is hard to understand about this.
KARMA = cause and effect. "the karma of the Que-ball is transfered to the 8-ball" It means the exact same thing as the Que-ball contacted the 8-ball thus pushing it" It's just a Hindu word that means causation.
magick and meditation do not change the world out their, they change the way the brain works, allowing it access to its process of model building. It allows the brain to Meta-program itself.
If I look at you meditate, no matter how deep your Samadhi, I will not see you dissolve into pure energy, I will not see the universe reduce to a point of pure awareness, nor that point disperse into nothingness.
The same reason that when you dream, those images are not something I can see, their is no "dream world" its just disperse memory elements in the mind firing in the inner vision system.
Magick produces dreams in the brain, while awake, sometimes by deconstructing the process by which the brain builds models of sensory data.
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@Froclown said
"even a hologram is something.
even non-local implicit information is something.
[...]
Yes tho sort of thing that they are is not the thing they seem to be. Everything we see, think, and experience in mind stuff. It is temporary and changing. Because the environment which is not mind, has an effect on they mind, and this creates the appearance of all the ephemeral things the mind experiences.
If there isn't anything going on, then what is experienced by the mind, in what way can the mind come to produce appearances if not via some process.
Haw can a non-thing undergo a process?"
How come you so adamantly need experience to end in things and not process, was the first question that came to my mind at this. I think I remember reading this somewhere earlier in this thread, but let's repeat it anyway: if something exists and is rooted in eternity, than because it exists as it does it can't be the original cause, so therefore things must be caused by change instead of the opposite. Whereby I seem to turn your entire reasoning upside down, no? The mind seemingly needs to model experience into things and not change, yes, but that's why the saying goes 'don't look at the finger that points to the moon', because there's no other way to say It.
@Froclown said
"If the mind has no set way about it, then how come it tends to see only one version of reality, why don't the things we see flicker and morph into all sorts of other things, space-time collapse into all manor of non-euclidean possibilities,"
Did you read the articles about astronomers changing the age of the universe (was it?) by their observation of dark matter a while ago? Quantum physics like that pours water on my argumentative seeds.
Btw: Of course, if physicists could prove any of this stuff, it wouldn't be probabilistic physics, now would it? So I would argue the science is already complete as it is.
@Froclown said
"If all there is, is an infinite sea of possible worlds, then their is no reason the mind would be able to stick to ane particular word, or even why one particular mind could manifest rather than other minds."
That's why I choose to go by the temporary theory of synchronized causality; sort of like Hume's reasoning, but with the addition that the foundational forces governing the omniverse (now that it's officially proven that parallel universes exist, I'm skipping directly to that definition) can fall down wells of experiences, though they have to dig themselves out again in order to get back to the completely fluctuating, probabilistic reality which isn't governed by entities/units/whatever. In admitting this, I might have dug myself into a trap, of course, but the discussion is getting a bit repetitive imo, and I don't have enough pride to find it bad to play the loser in that case. But you have to win first, Fro. Oh, you have got to win first...
@Froclown said
"There would be nothing but dim flickering images with to substance, no self to tie those images down, no WILL to this or that. Just a sea of images floating in and out of focus randomly like the answers in an 8 ball."
Yeah, that's what I think too. When I started with lucid dreaming, I soon realized how much I could learn from staying aware while falling asleep and especially dreaming. Watching how things took shape, while beginning as a flicker of light or something, an association struck in my mind and out the flicker floated like a blot of ink touching the paper surface until my associations had made it into a figure with environment and all. There's no telling what that specific flicker of light really is imo, just as there's no telling who is at fault in relativistic discussions in a finite sense, which is most probably why they never end.
@Froclown said
"but REALITY is what it is, not what the mind can see. The TRUE REALITY is what that which the mind harmonizes its library of images in attempts to approximate."
...according to the models made only from mind observations, which (imo) should tell the mind observers that it's more logical to assume there is no external reality we can disclose and call Reality. And here we're back to square one, because:
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From <!-- w --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.egodeath.com">www.egodeath.com</a><!-- w -->
"There is a level of control beyond the ego that gives rise to the ego's control actions, which are not self-originating. Personal self-control is secondary-level control. The ego effectively and apparently is the only origin of its actions, but this isolated autonomy of the ego's power is illusory. The ego's power is an epiphenomenon; a mere appearance that arises as a result of the more ultimate driving factor beyond or outside the ego. The primary level of control is the underlying ground of being, or block universe, which gives rise to the ego's entire stream of thoughts and control actions."
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That doesn't contradict what I've said, because there's no proof directed to the ego from this. Though the theory is one I would agree with, I still not think it negates what I'm saying. In fact, I gave an example of this way back in the thread, almost when I first became involved in the discussion. I said something like the ego being the product of control made from completely disconnected locations from it, and the ego could very well be a coincidence as seen from that, for all we know, whereby I meant that what you just quoted was negated as a fact as well.