Finding the 'Child Perspective'

Froclown

I disagree that your own perspective matters.

What matters is the truth, when in experiment it shows that your perspective falls short of truth, then you MUST cast it away without a second thought.

TRUTH alone in the most important. Better to be without a perspective, ie to be totally unsure and bewildered than to hold a perspective that does not match objective evidence, as discerned in controlled experiments.

Poet

But what if there is no truth? What if there are only 6 billion truths?

And if there is just one truth, then I'm betting on it not being the Boss Hog perspective, yee-haw.

Nash's Paranoid schizophrenia became such an integral part of the American Psyche during the Cold War, I think that many have yet to shake it off.

OAE

93

@Froclown said

"
What matters is the truth, when in experiment it shows that your perspective falls short of truth, then you MUST cast it away without a second thought.

TRUTH alone in the most important. Better to be without a perspective, ie to be totally unsure and bewildered than to hold a perspective that does not match objective evidence, as discerned in controlled experiments.
"

When I mentioned “perspective” I meant it as in your own unique, evolving perspective on Thelema in particular. In other words your opinion of what Thelema means to you.

Naturally, the scientific method is ideal to get the best possible reliable results. Personally I am careful with classifying these results as absolute truth. In time I might gain greater understanding on the given subject and understand that what I saw as truth was actually a part of a greater more complex structure and therefor only part true.

Froclown

This, There is no truth is an absurd notion.
Why not say there is no bowl of fruit, because there are 100 paintings of it and they are all a bit different.

Well, if there is no model, then what are the artists painting? how do they know to paint fruit and not tees or tractors.

Your brain is only an impression of a REAL and thus TRUE event in the world. No matter what you do with magick, it only alters the way in which your brain makes impressions and how it makes guesses based on those impressions.

The universe that is annihilated in Samadhi is not the real world, the fruit bowl is never changed, only the mind is wiped clean and no impression is cast upon it. The mind can then re-order the way in which it takes impression from the ground up, from the first step in the algorythm of perception

Is there a Being, if YES go to 2 if no go to 3
What color is the Being if RED go to 4 if Blue go to 5.. etc
Nothing is here, Go to 1.

That is a rather simplified version. But step one related to Kether and thus to Hadit.

Mike

@Froclown said

"
The universe that is annihilated in Samadhi is not the real world, the fruit bowl is never changed, only the mind is wiped clean and no impression is cast upon it. "

Just for clarification: have you attained, that is, actually experienced, Samadhi?

(Note: I have not.)

I ask because your arguments thus far seem to be leaning very strongly toward the intellectual/rational/logical side of things, and leaning away from the experiential side, and both my logical studies and my (admittedly non-extensive) experience have shown to me that logic and intellect, applied to such topics as "the nature of existence itself" or "mystical states far-removed from normal consciousness," tend to fail or produce circular or nonsensical answers - think about the nonsense physics has thus far produced from attempting to directly reconcile quantum mechanics with general relativity (i.e. negative probabilities, infinities, probabilities with imaginary factors, etc.).

Mike

Also, for the record - due to the principles described in general relativity theory, all observers will measure the same speed for light regardless of their relative motion to each other - this will cause them to disagree on elapsed time and distances.

Due to this and due to our motion relative to each other, you and I will not see the same bowl of fruit as we go to paint it - we will see the bowl of fruit as it was some finite time in the past due to the finite speed of light, and so it is with all perception, which takes place over a finite amount of time. We never see anything external as it "is," only as it "was." Not only this, but we will disagree about when it was due to motion relative to each other, assuming there is any.

Mainstream science only deals with observable phenomena - the entire range of phenomena that we can observe, however, will be necessarily distorted by each of us due to these principles - you and I cannot observe the same atoms in the same way, and we also disturb these atoms by observing them.

If you know of wavefunctions, then you will know that it is impossible to pinpoint any qualities particles have without observing and necessarily disturbing them. The "reality" of the particles appears to depend intimately on whether or not we observe them, and how.

The absolute external reality of anything at all is not quite as firm as it may seem, IMO.

Froclown

That is a totally false notion of QM.

When you look at say a tree, it is not changed by observation.
Let's say however you are blind and can't see the tree from light reflected from it, so you have to hit the tree with an ax to know where it is, Well in this case you are chopping holes in the tree thus changing it by means of your method of observing it.

This is exactly what you have in QM, in order to see say an electron you have to bash ether a huge photon into it that knocks it off course or a small photon that it collects and has to slow down. So you can ether hit it hard and know how fast it was moving when you hit it but now it has changed location. or you can hit it lightly and know where it is, but it will change speed. You can't ever know both location and speed, because the means of measuring one changes the other.

Yes, our perceptions will be different, because we have different brains that are effected by in the case of sight the effect of light on the eyes. We have different retinas too, and different angles to from the tree, etc.

However, if I shut by eyes the tree does on stop existing, or else when I close my eyes the tree would vanish for you also. Since I know that when others shut their eyes the world still exists, that proves than the world is not in anyone's mind, it is in the world.

Magick rituals effect the mind and senses of the performer, not the world. Say there is a picture that can be seen as a duck or a cow, depending on if you look at the white or the black as the foreground. I can do a magick ritual than helps me to see the white as the foreground and behold I have changed the duck into a cow. But, I did not change the photo at all, I changed my brain. In no way does the fact that I see the cow going to make it so that other people will see the cow.

All so called paranormal effects can be traced to a change in the way the brain interprets perceptions and memories. Maybe you bump a candle with your arm, and your brain decided to remember it as if the candle fell mysteriously, in order to confirm your bias to prove the existence of poltergeist phenomena.

Mike

@Froclown said

"That is a totally false notion of QM.

When you look at say a tree, it is not changed by observation."

The tree is, in fact, changed by observation, just not on a perceptible level, and in this case we aren't consciously shooting photons at it.

Everything a photon touches is necessarily changed - in order to see anything, you only see it as it is after it has been changed by a photon... some finite time in the past.

I'm just trying to say that science can only deal with observable phenomena, and all observable phenomena have natures that are dependent on the observer.

@Froclown said

"
This is exactly what you have in QM, in order to see say an electron you have to bash ether a huge photon into it that knocks it off course or a small photon that it collects and has to slow down. So you can ether hit it hard and know how fast it was moving when you hit it but now it has changed location. or you can hit it lightly and know where it is, but it will change speed. You can't ever know both location and speed, because the means of measuring one changes the other. "

Yes, but there is absolutely no evidence that the electron possesses a definite, unique speed or location until we force it to assume one or the other by the act of observation, which necessitates change. Of course the tree isn't macroscopically changed by photons hitting it, but to say the tree isn't changed at all by photons hitting it just isn't the case.

The idea of decoherence isn't fully worked out, as far as I know - there appears to be a change in rules, if you will, as one moves from the microscopic to the macroscopic, and there is no one theory that adequately describes this transition as of yet, but certainly all macroscopic objects also behave quantum mechanically at that level.

The "hidden variables" concept is very hard to include, and, by Occam's Razor, we really don't need it - quantum mechanics works (in the sense that our mathematical descriptions of it are coherent and accurate), in spite of our "common sense" and assumptions about how the universe should work.

(Also, just for the record, the photons are just more or less energetic, not bigger or smaller. Just trying to keep everything factually accurate).

Froclown

The tree is changed by photons hitting it, which has nothing to do with my observation.

The very same photos hit the very same tree, no matter if after the fact those photons strike some one's eyes or not. So the act of placing your eyes in front of the stream of photons deflected from the tree does not change the tree.

Mike

As far as I'm aware, though, until the system is formally and mathematically observed, the entire system is in a superposition, including all of the photons, as far as we are concerned (and we can't separate this system from us, because it's a construction of ours).

Have you heard about the experiment where they fired photons down 1 of 2 paths, with detectors on the other end, and when they had the detectors off, not only was it impossible to determine which path the photon took to the end, but it mathematically traveled both paths? (And mathematically is the most "real" we can get at this level).

I really wish I could remember the names of the experiments; Brian Greene talks about them in The Fabric of the Cosmos, IIRC; if not that, then The Elegant Universe.

My points are thus:

Until observed by a human observer (apparently), quantum systems do not behave as though they are rigidly determined, or have definite characteristics.
Quantum mechanically, reality behaves according to mathematical law and probability. We have no idea what actually "exists" at that level, however; is an electron a particle? Is it a wave? Is it just a mathematical construction to explain something that follows a pattern but is basically bewildering beyond that?
We cannot separate the observer from the observed, for they do not make sense without each other. It makes no sense to say a planet occupies a particular point in space; we have to specify its location in relation to something else. I don't believe it is possible to ever specify anything absolutely - everything must be explained relative to something else.

How, then, can we talk about trees or bowls of fruit unless we specify which tree or which bowl of fruit, and according to whom or what? We can't even talk about existence without relating it to non-existence.

To bring this into a Crowlean arena:
Zero equals Two; once the Two are annihilated, there is Nothing left. There is no tree unless there is not-tree to compare it to (in this case, a human observing the tree).

If there is an "objective world," we surely cannot know it as it is in and of itself.

Froclown

Just because we can not talk about it, just because language and conscious thought are based on interaction between duality, just because we can't know about the electron until we see it or have some interaction with it, does not mean that it fails to exist outside of our knowledge of it.

0=2 only applies to the minds eye, the way in which we identify and explain to ourselves what is happening in our brain chemistry, it does not explain the reality of events as they are actually happening outside of our interaction with them.

Just because I don't know if the light is on or off in a closed fridge, and I can only make a guess that it is 50/50 on or off, until I open the door and look, and opening the door to look changes the state of the light. That does not mean the light is neither on nor off, until I look at it.

Danica

@Froclown said

"Just because I don't know if the light is on or off in a closed fridge, and I can only make a guess that it is 50/50 on or off, until I open the door and look, and opening the door to look changes the state of the light. That does not mean the light is neither on nor off, until I look at it."

well, for you in that moment and position practically it means just that - the light is neither on nor off.

esse est percipi

Mike

@danica said

"
@Froclown said
"Just because I don't know if the light is on or off in a closed fridge, and I can only make a guess that it is 50/50 on or off, until I open the door and look, and opening the door to look changes the state of the light. That does not mean the light is neither on nor off, until I look at it."

well, for you in that moment and position practically it means just that - the light is neither on nor off.

esse est percipi"

I would like to tentatively put forth the hypothesis that "on" and "off" are just distinctions we make psychologically, and don't necessarily reflect the nature of the universe outside of our heads, whatever that phrase means; What I mean by this is that the light can't be said to be on or off until someone observes it to determine whether it is on or off, and thus we can declare that it is on or off according to someone. The reason I put this forward is that, again, going back to the finite speed of light, two observers moving relative to each other will not agree on time or distance - if a light goes off on a train and we are moving relative to it, we will not agree on when that light when off or what else was happening simultaneously, and we are both correct, mathematically.

Froclown, what do you think about this? I'm curious.

Froclown

Relativity math has nothing to do with it either.

Reality exists in a particular way outside of ALL frames of reference, the fact that speed and frame of reference effects measurements, does not mean that they effect the REAL actual event as it is in it sell outside of all measurements.

The light is EITHER on OR it is off.

It exists as it does irregardless of if anyone is looking at it or not.

All we can say before we look is "I don't know, it is MAYBE on or off, maybe it is blinking, but I know it's not a koala.

Just because I don't know and have no means to know, does not mean the actuality of the thing I don't know exists in the up in the air state of maybe. IT is only in my brain that it's a maybe, in the box it has a single definite state, and always has had that state, before, during and after the fact of by looking at it.

Unless the switch that turns the light off or on is tripped by the act of my opening the door in order to see it.

Poet

I never said "What if there is no reality?" I said: "What if there is no truth?"

Or, to put it another way:

@Froclown said

"

Reality exists in a particular way outside of ALL frames of reference
"

Not such an absurd notion then, seeing as we both agree.

Although it could also be added that seen logically one way if reality exists outside of ALL frames of reference, as you say, then no-one can lay claim to its actuality as no-one has the ultimate frame of reference to be able to verify completely its existence.

How are you able to prove for instance that we are not just code within a virtual reality software simulation, programmed with false memories to make the experience appear real?

Statistically, if we assume such virtual realities could exist, with seemingly self-aware programs, indistinguishable from "reality" (both not too far beyond current technologies) it can easily be shown that the odds of you actually inhabiting the "real" world instead of a simulation are ridiculously small.

Danica

@Froclown said

"Just because I don't know and have no means to know, does not mean the actuality of the thing I don't know exists in the up in the air state of maybe. "

ok, let's assume things exist in some deffinite state, and not in as you said ''in the up in the air state of maybe''. but what does it mean ''to exist''? exist for whom? our consciousness (whatever that is) is the only refference we have in percieving, thinking etc. (experiencing altogether)
give up the dualism of subjective vs. objective and think about Hadit - a single point, a center of experience. it's the Qabalistic One. how can there be any-thing without the One?

"IT is only in my brain that it's a maybe, in the box it has a single definite state, and always has had that state, before, during and after the fact of by looking at it."

how, the hell, can you be so sure the thing existed before you were looking at it?
the only honest thing to do, and for that matter scientifically correct thing, is to say ''I don't know if it existed or not'.

Froclown

if we are programs in a computer, then that computer is the reality that is objective, that is, it is that which is not contingent on perception. In a sense the mind is a virtual software model run an the hardware of the brain. The brain exists even when you are not looking at it or imagining it, in fact you could not be experiencing or imagining anything without the brain. Because software is nothing more or less than patters of change in the hardware. Thus mind is changes in the brain. If the brain's existence was contingent on the mind, then the mind could not exist in the fist place, so that it could think up the brain, so that the brain could act in a way as to produce software "Thoughts". Thus we know that the brain exist in and of itself, it is more fundamental than mind. Since the brain is not a closed system, it is not isolated from the whole continuous physical universe, for example the brain is made of matter, it is made of the food stuff that is digested in the stomach and circulates in the blood. Thus the blood and organs must exist outside of and more fundamental to thoughts. Now, since the body is also made of the food eaten, that means that food must exist outside of thought as a physical stuff that creates body that sustains brain, that produces thought by it's action. The animals and plants we eat are made of soil and sunlight and water, which only exist as they do because of the location and influence of other stars and planets, etc.
Thus the universe is not created by the mind, thought does not create reality, Truth = reality as it is.

Language creates a model or representation of events in the brain, the mind which is already a model. It so much as the semantic content of a statement are structurally analogous to the actual events that happen in space-time as they might be reproduced in the mind of others who repeat the experience, those statements are said to be true. If you scrutinize them all statement have degrees of truth, and a degree of uncertainty.

"What does it mean to exist, Exist to whom" See one, things exist not TO some one the exist fundamentally, they ARE simply, because if they did not exist they would not be. There are no things that don't exist, to be is to exist. They don't exist to some one, not for some one etc. In fact a some one is merely a collection of things which pre-existed and combined into a new structure of things, (A body-brain which produces thoughts and reacts to other things that exist, which happen to bump into the body and send signals to the brain.)

Poet

@Froclown said

"1) if we are programs in a computer, then that computer is the reality that is objective, that is, it is that which is not contingent on perception.
.....

Thus the universe is not created by the mind, thought does not create reality, Truth = reality as it is.

"

That computer however exists in a higher level of reality to which we have no access to at all.
So we cannot say that our reality is objective, each creates his own subjective reality and at best we can say there is the possibility of some collectively subjective reality. But as all constituent parts are constrained by the same limitations, none can lay claim to being able to perceive it objectively.

Or another way.
Say I've taken an hallucinogen. And I hallucinate some object. To all my sense organs it appears as real as any other phenomena, I can see, hear, touch, smell, taste it and have no available other way of distinguishing its non-reality.
Its even possible for others to hallucinate exactly the same thing at exactly the same time in a shared experience.
However at no time does our experience of that reality actually create the object in yours.
Which would appear to support the idea that thought does not create reality, unfortunately however we have no way to prove that everything we experience in this universe is anything more than a shared hallucination presenting itself as real to the 5 senses - a creation of mind.

Or a dream, or virtual reality, or shadows on the cave. Take your pick.
Unless you have a way to exist outside of this universe so you can look at it objectively, you have no way to force me to accept its objective existence.
And to argue that the mind lives within the brain which lives in a physical universe (which is merely an illusion of condensed energy anyway...) is an argument for its reality makes no sense unless you can prove that that universe is other than a dream or hallucination etc. You're just moving the mythical "objective" reality back one step, which we can do to infinity.

Froclown

that computer is not an a "higher level" it is the medium in which all things are composed, like wise the brain is not a higher or lower level of reality, all images in the mind are nothing other than the brain. Just like all the different images on a painting are made of paint and paper, and all different pottery are made of clay.
hallucinogenic drugs do not work that way. The mess up the brains ability to fill in the gaps, to guess correctly at what sort of thing they data it receives might be. A man on LSD might see a hose and react to it as if it were a snake and he may think he saw a snake and even project his fear to actually see it move and stir intense fear the same as a snake. However no matter how much drugs that person is no, the hose can never bite him and he will never be effected by snake venom from the hose. He will not see some coherent object that is not there, but only mis-interprets what he is seeing. Just like how wearing kaleidescope glasses that makes one sandwich look like 30 sandwiches will not make that one sandwich feed 30 hungry kids.

Perception is not reality, it is the effect of reality. A painting is not the thing painted, other wise by altering the painting the actual fruit would change. If I change the apples to blue in the painting, they do not change blue on the table. because the actual apple is the cause of the impression formed in the paint, also you can't eat the paint even if it looks like an apple. Apples are made of apple stuff, cellulose, sucrose, that kind of organic stuff we can eat. Paint is made of latex and polymers, things that are toxic to eat.

If you smear paint so that it's structurally analogous to the bowl of fruit, that is the relative location of colors and shapes are similar to the way the colors and shapes are arranged in the fruit, it is still paint and not fruit.

The body has sense organs that take impressions, ie are effected by light colors, smells, textures, tastes, sounds etc. and the brain models them in relative space-time locations. (They are not actually stored that way, but are encoded in brain matter. just like a Jpeg Image is stored as pixel (1,1, blue) (1,0,red) etc This long string of coordinates is only structurally analogous to the 2D image when it is decoded by the proper formula. The point is there are no colors or space locations in the computer itself, only strings of ones and zeros, which are only written for humans as 1 and 0, it's actually chemical states in the Computer chips. (Actually the pixels are stored in binary, and the color in binary-hex codes. 00 = black FF=white and that's your 256 colors, for basic VGA.)

So painting is not the fruit it is chemical paste, and the Jpeg is not the fruit nor the image, it is states of chemical semiconductor waffers.

Likewise the Brain is bio-chemical matter than organizes itself in a structurally analogous way to the events that interact with it. The image does not change the thing that it represents. The brain is the image of the event in the world. The only way the brain can change the image is to use the muscles to physically re-arrange the object which is casting the impression to the brain.

Avshalom Binyamin

You're not getting it froclown.

You're arguing that there is an objective universe independent of (universally indirect/flawed) subjective perception.

But you're also arguing that subjective perception (i.e. empiricism) is the only way to perceive the objective universe.

Do you not see that you can't have both simultaneously without a taking a leap in logic?

If you're a real empiricist, than you must stick to inductive reasoning, and not make a presupposition about the nature of the universe. You must deal in probabilities (I have perceived 50% heads in this sample of coin toss, therefor I think it likely that this trend will continue).

What's funny is that it makes you human, just like the rest of us. We all have to jump between inductive and deductive reasoning when it suits us. We get more done that way. That's why robots have a harder time learning simple tasks like walking. The downside is, that whichever way you cut it, we always end up at least a little bit illogical.

You just don't know yourself yet.