Mind Expanding Things that Aren't Science

Topic

We seem to have lost the old Thought Provoking (TM) mind expansion thread, so here’s a replacement.
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Astrology:
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https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/nov/06/i-was-an-astrologer-how-it-works-psychics
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Before you scoff, there are some interesting insights in the article that you don’t have to be a believer to appreciate. Here’s a couple of extracts that made me wonder:
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I’d understood organised religion to be something between an embarrassment and an evil. Yet as Aids did its dreadful work – this was the 1990s – I watched nuns offer compassionate care to the dying. Christian volunteers checked on derelict men with vomit down their clothes. I became uncomfortably aware that New Agers do not build hospitals or feed alcoholics – they buy self-actualisation at the cash register.

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I also learned that intelligence and education do not protect against superstition. Many customers were stockbrokers, advertising executives or politicians, dealing with issues whose outcomes couldn’t be controlled. It’s uncertainty that drives people into woo, not stupidity, so I’m not surprised millennials are into astrology. They grew up with Harry Potter and graduated into a precarious economy, making them the ideal customers.

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Some repeat customers claimed I’d made very specific predictions, of a kind I never made. It dawned on me that my readings were a co-creation – I would weave a story and, later, the customer’s memory would add new elements. I got to test this theory after a friend raved about a reading she’d had, full of astonishingly accurate predictions. She had a tape of the session, so I asked her to play it.

The clairvoyant had said none of the things my friend claimed. Not a single one. My friend’s imagination had done all the work.

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And my favourite:
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I can still make the odd forecast, though. Here’s one: the venture capital pouring into astrology apps will create a fortune telling system that works, because humans are predictable. As people follow the advice, the apps’ predictive powers will increase, creating an ever-tighter electronic leash. But they’ll be hugely popular – because if you sprinkle magic on top, you can sell people anything.

Replies

Also there is a lot of difference in different regions in Islamic countries. Just as there is in all countries. I mean if you go from NYC to a little town in upstate New York I think people’s attitudes about all kinds of things in life will be quite different.

 

I have been in Morocco and in Turkey and about Morocco at least I know there is a huge difference between cities and rural areas. In big cities like Marrakech many women will go without any head covering, whereas in rural areas almost all have covered their hair. Also there are pockets in the country that have maintained a kind of folk belief different from mainstream sunni Islam, with worship of certain Islamic saints and sufis. You find this same type of folk Islam in countries like Mali where they are targeted by wahabbis who really dislike this type of Islam and call it idolatry.

 

Also countries in the levant like Syria and Lebanon are really diverse, with many different Islamic groups. They have sunni Islam, and different types of shia Islam like Twelvers, Alawites, Ismailis, and also non-Muslim groups like Christians (both Catholic and Orthodox) and Druze. And Iraq is also very diverse, also with Sunnis and Shias, and Christians, Yazidis, Zoroastrians and Mandaeans. In all these countries there also used to be a sizeable Jewish community but since the founding of Israel these communities have almost disappeared. I think in Morocco there is a tiny Jewish community with maybe 1000 or so members.

 

I’ve always been curious about Ismailism, which is a type of shia Islam different from the Twelvers which is the largest group of shias (Iranian shias are Twelvers, called that way because they believe the twelfth Imam who was born in the 9th century is still alive and hidden and will re-appear with Jesus Christ at the end of time). Ismailism believes in certain mystical teachings and “hidden meaning” of the Quran.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

in the US LGBT culture is “fabulous”, and extraverted, and shouted from the rooftops. Whereas in the Netherlands most people just don’t care about it. I think most people in the Netherlands – outside the People’s Republic of Amsterdam anyway – are somewhat conservative and don’t like overly flamboyant behavior, but they think if anybody’s gay, or transgender, that’s just their business and they wouldn’t be bothered.

Really, though, we should all be like the Netherlands. Why should anybody be bothered either way? Shouting that you’re gay is like me marching with a banner saying “TREKKIE AND PROUD”.

I get the point that Pride parades are important, as it’s a way of showing the world that “this is ok”. But surely the world that we’re all hoping for is one where it just is ok, and you don’t need to march to convince people.

Al-x wrote:

Ok… suppose you were to, instead of asking “Does God exist”, ask “Do you want God to exist?” how would you answer? Would you want a Higher power to set boundaries and regulate your life? Whether you view that original Genesis story as real or an allegory, the simple and small test of staying away from that tree was either they let “God” set the boundaries or they give Him the finger and decide to go on their own.

“Do I want God to exist?” – it makes no difference to me, as if He does exist then He has obviously given up on us and decided to be non-interventionist. He does nothing in this world to set boundaries and regulate my life.

I can’t remember the last time He smote my enemies or gave me a whole land of my own to occupy forever. Maybe that was His thing in the past, but He’s moved on.

DavidM wrote:

I get the point that Pride parades are important, as it’s a way of showing the world that “this is ok”. But surely the world that we’re all hoping for is one where it just is ok, and you don’t need to march to convince people.

I still think these kinds of affirmative demonstrations can be important, even in countries where the majority supports gay rights (or whatever the issue is). They’re about standing up for what you believe in, in the same way that pro-democracy or anti-racism demonstrations do, for example.

While it would be nice to live in a world where nobody is pushing back on stuff like this, unfortunately that isn’t the world that any of us live in – and while there is even a small minority of people who would oppose gay rights or any other similar important rights, I think parades and demonstrations serve as a worthy counterpoint.

Plus, they can be lots of fun! Our local pride parade, in common with most, is very much a celebration of gay culture in the same way that something like (say) the Notting Hill carnival is a celebration of Caribbean culture.

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DavidM wrote:

“Do I want God to exist?” – it makes no difference to me, as if He does exist then He has obviously given up on us and decided to be non-interventionist. He does nothing in this world to set boundaries and regulate my life. I can’t remember the last time He smote my enemies or gave me a whole land of my own to occupy forever. Maybe that was His thing in the past, but He’s moved on.

Yeah, the idea of a biblical god who would do something like unleash a global plague to punish humanity is just… er… ah… hmmmm.

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Todd, DavidM

Dave wrote:

I still think these kinds of affirmative demonstrations can be important, even in countries where the majority supports gay rights (or whatever the issue is). They’re about standing up for what you believe in, in the same way that pro-democracy or anti-racism demonstrations do, for example

 

At the same time while I get that it is more a kind of self affirmation for marginalized people I wonder how effective some of this stuff is in winning hearts and minds of more conservative communities.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

At the same time while I get that it is more a kind of self affirmation for marginalized people I wonder how effective some of this stuff is in winning hearts and minds of more conservative communities.

Sometimes I think just sheer numbers can at least show how widespread community support is for these causes, and possibly change some minds (or at least encourage them to question their position).

Over my lifetime we’ve seen the UK’s approach to gay rights change considerably, including changes in legislation as well as a major shift in social attitudes, and a lot of that has been made possible through greater visibility and understanding. So I think this stuff definitely helps in a meaningful way.

Going back to David’s point I guess the question is when do you stop needing to do this. And I guess my answer is… never. I think people will always want to show support for a cause that’s important to them, even if the battle is seen as having been largely won, because it’s important to keep that battle won and not let anything erode that progress.

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I’m with Dave here really. I think mis-steps can be made but the ‘it should all just be normal’ argument is too idealistic and intellectual, it should be but it isn’t. People in ‘enlightened’ western countries have been killed in the last year specifically for being gay, I have never felt that threat for being straight.

This kind of activism, in the UK at least, probably first got mainstream traction in the 1970s and grew from there and it pretty much mirrors positive societal change but people are still not equal in many eyes.

My wife and I have a nice middle class life free of most conflict but we have been verbally abused in the street in both the UK and Malaysia because it is a mixed race relationship. Do you stand up against that? Yes I think you have to or nothing will change. It doesn’t really matter that we agree it  isn’t important as we are just human beings. We do, others don’t.

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Todd, Arjan Dirkse, Dave

Dave wrote:

DavidM wrote:

“Do I want God to exist?” – it makes no difference to me, as if He does exist then He has obviously given up on us and decided to be non-interventionist. He does nothing in this world to set boundaries and regulate my life. I can’t remember the last time He smote my enemies or gave me a whole land of my own to occupy forever. Maybe that was His thing in the past, but He’s moved on.

Yeah, the idea of a biblical god who would do something like unleash a global plague to punish humanity is just… er… ah… hmmmm.

Well, the one advantage is that we would have someone to blame for all this mess. On top of that, anybody that would create such a messed up universe is probably inherently incompetent so we could probably band together and take him out.

You actually find this point of view in old “gnostic” texts like the Gospel of Judas as well as more modern radical theologies. PK Dick’s Exegesis is full of these ideas.

Dave wrote:

Sometimes I think just sheer numbers can at least show how widespread community support is for these causes, and possibly change some minds (or at least encourage them to question their position).

Fair enough. I really don’t know enough about the subject to judge. I am not sure if pride parades are really helpful, but I wouldn’t want them to be outlawed. They have their place in society.

 

It’s kind of weird, when it comes to public displays of sexuality, I’m kind of a prude, but I also think sex becomes more of an obsession as long as many taboos about it exist. If you look at google trends for instance searches for gay sex aren’t exactly more rare in countries that outlaw it, quite the opposite.

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Arjan Dirkse wrote:

At the same time while I get that it is more a kind of self affirmation for marginalized people I wonder how effective some of this stuff is in winning hearts and minds of more conservative communities.

Related to this is the way companies are more than willing to incorporate these into their marketing and PR campaigns when there is a holiday or event involved, but then don’t do anything in regard to the actual issues for the rest of the year.

LGBTQ Pride Month: how brands turned Pride Month into a corporate-sponsored holiday – Vox

This is related to an extent to the alleged “war on Christmas” that Christian Conservatives push. The real assault on Christmas as a Christian observance is not simply that it is a secular holiday but it is actually a commercial event. This is actually where many humanist atheists and religious conservatives can find some common ground. Christmas, as celebrated in the United States, is not about Christ or a celebration of community ties; it is about money, consumption and status – selling junk to people so they can show other people that they can afford to buy junk.

If Christian conservatives really wanted to strike a blow in the war on Christmas, then they would stop participating in it. Stop putting up the lights, the trees and buying all the gift-wrapped crap. If millions of people collectively stopped participating in the Christmas sales push, that would have a palpable impact.

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Todd

DavidM wrote:

“Do I want God to exist?” – it makes no difference to me, as if He does exist then He has obviously given up on us and decided to be non-interventionist. He does nothing in this world to set boundaries and regulate my life.

I can’t remember the last time He smote my enemies or gave me a whole land of my own to occupy forever. Maybe that was His thing in the past, but He’s moved on.

That is your final answer? Ok then

Speaking non denominationally and not being preachy over here as well. The main Christian message is that the “era” Christ mentioned that Christians feel is now, is supposed to culminate in some global reckoning (thunderbolts and lightning very, very frightnening.) . He is supposed to be this king with this huge angel army and will judge. Different denominations have different beliefs ie. a rapture, some will survive and inherit the earth etc. Apparently, there is some divine timetable to settle things.

That is, if you believe.

Fwiw: McFarlane’s Spawn was about after Spawn’s time on Earth, he would lead the demon army to face Christ and his angel army.
And the Authority had a storyline that was nixed about the Authority taking on Christ and the Angel army

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Al-x wrote:

Fwiw: McFarlane’s Spawn was about after Spawn’s time on Earth, he would lead the demon army to face Christ and his angel army.
And the Authority had a storyline that was nixed about the Authority taking on Christ and the Angel army

I’m not about to base my spiritual beliefs on a comic book. After all, in Mike Mignola’s HELLBOY books the entire world lost the battle with Lovecraftian demons, and humans are now hiding out in underground caves, so….

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It is interesting how different Jesus is from the Biblical God. It stretches one’s credulity to say they are the same God.

 

I had a kind of religious experience once where I believed I met Jesus Christ. He’s a nice guy. I wouldn’t want him to not exist. However Yahweh, that guy I definitely don’t want to exist.

It kinda depends on how you interpret the versions of Jesus in the New Testament. I’m more attracted to the later philosophy of Christian thinkers. While Jesus in the New Testament reminds me more of Charles Manson or Jim Jones – and they almost certainly took that influence from it as well. If you had a bunch of cult members write down what they thought of their cult leader, like ask the members of the Manson family to write about Charlie, it would read like the New Testament.

It’s a book written by authors that all think Jesus is God and are intent on convincing you of that. When you look at it objectively though, it’s a cult and a dangerous one to the peace and stability of the time. Of course, they are going to try to make the Romans and the Judeaen authorities look as bad as possible and Jesus look as good an innocent as possible, but we don’t have any outside perspectives on that (because Christians eradicated them when they came to power).

However, we do have cults today and if Jesus and his disciples were around today, we’d probably immediately recognize it as one.

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DavidM

Anonymous wrote:

While Jesus in the New Testament reminds me more of Charles Manson or Jim Jones – and they almost certainly took that influence from it as well. If you had a bunch of cult members write down what they thought of their cult leader, like ask the members of the Manson family to write about Charlie, it would read like the New Testament.

Now I’m seeing images of Jesus with a swastika carved in his forehead.

 

I see Jesus in the same league as Buddha and Laozi and Zhuangzi, maybe a little bit beyond those. He’s an incredibly inspiring figure – inspiring mostly good – who doesn’t really fit in very well with the rest of the Bible.

The primary difference is that the others provided a method for their followers and did not claim divine authority. While Jesus really left little behind except a lot of followers literally putting the words in his mouth and, finally, boiling it down to “obey me” by which they meant obey them.

still, it all ends up with a heirarchy even in the case of Taoism which ended up best remembered for its almost satirical corporate heirarchy of gods and demons.

here’s kind of a metaphor of what I mean. Though you might need some understanding of the scholarship and history to provide the context of each passage, think of it as a call from a telemarketer and the text is the script they are using to sell you a product called Jesus Christ.

You’ll quickly realize that all the attractive and valuable parts of the sales pitch, first, are childishly simple and equally childishly unattainable and second, don’t require Jesus Christ. Then, when the case is pressed, the reasons why Jesus is important turn out to be completely bonkers.

It’s a scam. Even without the organized part, religion is a scam preying upon the most common vulnerability everyone shares and once they are in it, it just gets worse… like every pyramid scheme.

The worst is that this scheme is what most people are born into. We’re thrown into the scam and grow up with it, live with it and die with it and the original scammers are long dead in any case.

 

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DavidM

Well I won’t defend the institutions of organized religion but I do think when you look at the combined body of religious spirituality there are good things in it. But a lot of bad stuff too. That’s why I defend cherrypicking.

Anonymous wrote:

The primary difference is that the others provided a method for their followers and did not claim divine authority. While Jesus really left little behind except a lot of followers literally putting the words in his mouth and, finally, boiling it down to “obey me” by which they meant obey them.

Which is interesting, because it paints Jesus as a reactionary compared with other near-contemporary Jewish teachers.

Jesus said:

The first and greatest commandment is this: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ The second is like it: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

Loving God is the first and most important of Jesus’ version of the commandments. Loving other people is relegated to second place.

In the century before Christ, Rabbi Hillel was asked to summarise the law and said:

What is hateful to yourself, do to no other; that is the whole law and the rest is commentary.

He puts people first. In fact, he doesn’t even mention the Lord your God. It appears that Judaism had moved on, but Jesus didn’t.

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DavidM wrote:

Jesus didn’t.

He couldn’t because he died.  My biblical history is spotty but didn’t he once clean house in the Temple. It is an event that gets forgotten because many of the people who worked in the church named after him became the same sort of people he kicked out.  I tend to call myself a Christian because I try to act the way Jesus would’ve but I have little use for any of the institutions named after him.

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njerry

njerry wrote:

Al-x wrote:

Fwiw: McFarlane’s Spawn was about after Spawn’s time on Earth, he would lead the demon army to face Christ and his angel army.
And the Authority had a storyline that was nixed about the Authority taking on Christ and the Angel army

I’m not about to base my spiritual beliefs on a comic book. After all, in Mike Mignola’s HELLBOY books the entire world lost the battle with Lovecraftian demons, and humans are now hiding out in underground caves, so….

Ok… What I was getting at was that some creators borrow from some of what the Bible
says regarding some supposed “2nd coming”.

I am with what @rocket said above. But in the passages he did talk to his follower Peter about
building some true congregation.

So, what is the true denomination? Where is it? Does it exist?

DavidM wrote:

He puts people first. In fact, he doesn’t even mention the Lord your God. It appears that Judaism had moved on, but Jesus didn’t.

One of my favorite bits of religious writing, is this poem by Rabia Basri, an 8th century sufi poet:

 

If I worship you for fear of hell, then burn me in it; if I worship you for my desire of heaven, please exclude me from it; but if I worship you for love of yourself alone, then don’t deny me your eternal beauty.

 

I think that is the best worship. God should not be worshipped out of fear or selfish desire, but because he or she is the epitomy of all perfect qualities, and it is natural to be in awe of that.

 

Jesus’s comandment to love the Lord with all of your might and love your neighbor can be seen as one thing, not two:  you love your fellow human beings because they are in part divine. We are not just atoms, we have special meaning, as all life does. We’re a reflection of God’s glory. Loving human beings is not really different from loving God.

Rocket wrote:

He couldn’t because he died.

Isn’t the Biblical story that he was resurrected? That would mean Jesus lives.

 

It is a bit similar to the 12th imam in Twelver shia Islam, who was born in the 9th century and never died but is hidden somewhere on Earth waiting for the end of days when he will reappear.

Al-x wrote:

So, what is the true denomination? Where is it? Does it exist?

The Church of Scientology. Obviously.

Al-x wrote:

So, what is the true denomination? Where is it? Does it exist?

Who do you think can answer that question?

 

It can’t be answered. That said, the answer is Latvian Orthodox.

 

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Isn’t the Biblical story that he was resurrected? That would mean Jesus lives.

Rather than Jesus died, we could say that Jesus left. From the Biblical account, he did die, was resurrected, spoke to his followers, and then ascended to heaven and has been gone since then. Whether Jesus is dead or just gone is a bit of a semantic argument as the important thing is that he is not here to tell us anything.

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Arjan Dirkse

NOTE: JESUS DIED ON THE WAY BACK TO HIS HOME PLANET

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Uncle Retrospective, Tom Cat, Arjan Dirkse, Dave, Todd

Jesus was Patient Zero of the zombie apocalypse.

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Tom Cat

Am I religious? Somewhat.

Do I believe in God? Maybe not completely as described in some of
those religious books. (ie. Do angels really need those wings to fly?)
I just don’t quickly rule out a higher form of life.

I say that because life to us is an organic carbon based life form (circulatory system etc.)
It is hard to conceptualize outside of that like an energy being.
Also, we only conceptualize 3 dimensions and speculate time as a 4th one.
(We only have it in our imagination in sci-fi shows and comic stories
of energy beings living in other dimensions but I digress…)

I say if you spoke to those “undereducated” people on some observed natural phenomena
like the size of the electron, how big the galaxy is and the universe, how hot the sun
is, etc. They might say that is all “bovine excrement” because they can’t picture it.
(They can’t even picture what doctors and scientists tell them now about Earth.)
So I feel that if I were to quickly dismiss some things, I would be no better than them.

lorcan_nagle wrote:

NOTE: JESUS DIED ON THE WAY BACK TO HIS HOME PLANET

He’s like god, only more proactive

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Tom Cat, Todd, lorcan_nagle

Dave wrote:

lorcan_nagle wrote:

NOTE: JESUS DIED ON THE WAY BACK TO HIS HOME PLANET

He’s like god, only more proactive

I don’t know who’s face he was in, but it wasn’t mine.

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Tom Cat, Dave

lorcan_nagle wrote:

Dave wrote:

lorcan_nagle wrote:

NOTE: JESUS DIED ON THE WAY BACK TO HIS HOME PLANET

He’s like god, only more proactive

I don’t know who’s face he was in, but it wasn’t mine.

You’ve heard the expression “let’s get busy”? Well, this is a prophet who gets biz-zay. Consistently and thoroughly.

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Tom Cat, Todd, lorcan_nagle

I feel we should rastafy Jesus by about 10%

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Tom Cat, Todd, Dave

Tom Cat wrote:

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Isn’t the Biblical story that he was resurrected? That would mean Jesus lives.

Rather than Jesus died, we could say that Jesus left. From the Biblical account, he did die, was resurrected, spoke to his followers, and then ascended to heaven and has been gone since then. Whether Jesus is dead or just gone is a bit of a semantic argument as the important thing is that he is not here to tell us anything.

Thanks, I guess I missed that last part when he ascended to heaven. I always assumed he was resurrected and then just disappeared out of sight without explanation.

It’d be good if he just said ‘see you later lads, I’m just off to the shops’ and he never returns. He’d be like Elvis then with random sightings in Gran Canaria and Salford.

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Todd, Dave

garjones wrote:

He’d be like Elvis then with random sightings in Gran Canaria and Salford.

Or like the A-Team, existing in secret and popping up to help in times of need.

If you have a problem – if no one else can help – and if you can find him; maybe you can hire: Jesus

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Todd, Arjan Dirkse

Al-x wrote:

So I feel that if I were to quickly dismiss some things, I would be no better than them.

Just having a better education, or believing science, doesn’t make you better than anyone else. People with little education can be some of the best people on this planet.

 

Honestly, I think there’s a lot of education that can really screw you up.

garjones wrote:

It’d be good if he just said ‘see you later lads, I’m just off to the shops’ and he never returns. He’d be like Elvis then with random sightings in Gran Canaria and Salford.

The father of Christianity goes out of a pack of cigarettes and just keeps on driving.

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lorcan_nagle, Todd

There are countless talks by Terence McKenna online and first I was like “hmmm…interesting” but really he’s quite a bullshitter. “We need to shamanize the world!”

Time Wave Zero is just like Timecube but made by a person who can form coherent sentences.

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Arjan Dirkse

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

There are countless talks by Terence McKenna online and first I was like “hmmm…interesting” but really he’s quite a bullshitter. “We need to shamanize the world!”

I need to get back to Terence McKenna one of these days. I always found him interesting, but it’s kinda pointless as long as you don’t have access to psychedelic drugs.

Christian wrote:

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

There are countless talks by Terence McKenna online and first I was like “hmmm…interesting” but really he’s quite a bullshitter. “We need to shamanize the world!”

I need to get back to Terence McKenna one of these days. I always found him interesting, but it’s kinda pointless as long as you don’t have access to psychedelic drugs.

I thought about using psychedelics for a while, but I decided against it, for the time being at least. I have had psychotic breakdowns and apparently for schizophrenics and people who are prone to psychosis, it can heighten the danger of an episode. In other words, I’m crazy enough even without using the drugs to hallucinate. ;)

 

I’ve listened to some of those McKenna talks on youtube, but I’m not sure it is all that profound, outside of the liberal hippie ethos. He seems to think DMT puts him into contact with alien intelligences, but those intelligences don’t seem to offer him anything that is tangible. I mean what is the big revelation he brought back from that other dimension?

 

I’ve had two really weird, transcendental experiences in my life, without the use of drugs. I don’t think I really need psylocybin or DMT.

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Christian

There’s this common trope that X’s music [insert avant-garde band of choice] sounds better if you’re high/stoned/tripping.

My take is, I already think X’s music sounds pretty much perfect, what’s wrong with you if you need drugs to realise that?

 

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Todd

DavidM wrote:

My take is, I already think X’s music sounds pretty much perfect, what’s wrong with you if you need drugs to realise that?

If it’s not worth doing on drugs, it’s not worth doing.

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DavidM, Todd

DavidM wrote:

My take is, I already think X’s music sounds pretty much perfect, what’s wrong with you if you need drugs to realise that?

Not everyone might have your ear for music, or perfect is boring, nothing is perfect, or any other concept regarding that word so it can always be enhanced or experienced in a new way.

Anonymous wrote:

DavidM wrote:

My take is, I already think X’s music sounds pretty much perfect, what’s wrong with you if you need drugs to realise that?

If it’s not worth doing on drugs, it’s not worth doing.

I look at listening to the music on drugs as performing your own cover of the song in your head.

Anonymous wrote:

If it’s not worth doing on drugs, it’s not worth doing.

Like piloting a passenger airplane during a storm, or trying to defuse a bomb, or performing delicate brain surgery…

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Dave

njerry wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If it’s not worth doing on drugs, it’s not worth doing.

Like piloting a passenger airplane during a storm, or trying to defuse a bomb, or performing delicate brain surgery…

I would 100% fuck either of those things up regardless of whether I was on drugs or nah, so I might as well enjoy myself.

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Arjan Dirkse wrote:

I’ve listened to some of those McKenna talks on youtube, but I’m not sure it is all that profound, outside of the liberal hippie ethos. He seems to think DMT puts him into contact with alien intelligences, but those intelligences don’t seem to offer him anything that is tangible. I mean what is the big revelation he brought back from that other dimension?

Yeah, I think this may be a case of, to paraphrase Alan Moore, It’s all real as long as you realise it’s also all in your head.

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Arjan Dirkse

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” – PK Dick

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Rocket, Todd

I like the more elaborate answer better though.

It was always my hope, in writing novels and stories which asked the question “What is reality?”, to someday get an answer. This was the hope of most of my readers, too. Years passed. I wrote over thirty novels and over a hundred stories, and still I could not figure out what was real. One day a girl college student in Canada asked me to define reality for her, for a paper she was writing for her philosophy class. She wanted a one-sentence answer. I thought about it and finally said, “Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” That’s all I could come up with. That was back in 1972. Since then I haven’t been able to define reality any more lucidly.

But the problem is a real one, not a mere intellectual game. Because today we live in a society in which spurious realities are manufactured by the media, by governments, by big corporations, by religious groups, political groups. . . . So I ask, in my writing, What is real? Because unceasingly we are bombarded with pseudo-realities manufactured by very sophisticated people using very sophisticated electronic mechanisms. I do not distrust their motives; I distrust their power. They have a lot of it. And it is an astonishing power: that of creating whole universes, universes of the mind. I ought to know. I do the same thing. It is my job to create universes, as the basis of one novel after another. And I have to build them in such a way that they do not fall apart two days later.

[…]

But I consider that the matter of defining what is real — that is a serious topic, even a vital topic. And in there somewhere is the other topic, the definition of the authentic human. Because the bombardment of pseudo-realities begins to produce inauthentic humans very quickly, spurious humans — as fake as the data pressing at them from all sides. My two topics are really one topic; they unite at this point. Fake realities will create fake humans. Or, fake humans will generate fake realities and then sell them to other humans, turning them, eventually, into forgeries of themselves. So we wind up with fake humans inventing fake realities and then peddling them to other fake humans.

For some reason, all of this sounds very relevant to our times…

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Uncle Retrospective, Rocket, Todd, Dave, DavidM

Anonymous wrote:

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” – PK Dick

I have no respect for reality as soon as it is acknowledged as such. I am interested in what I can do with unacknowledged reality.
– Elias Canetti

The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think.
– Søren Kierkegaard

Reality is an illusion that occurs due to lack of alcohol.
– Anonymous

Todd wrote:

The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think. – Søren Kierkegaard

This is practically the dao de jing/tao te ching. Describing that which, by its very essence, can not be described.

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Todd

I think people instinctively understand what reality is. (Of course not everybody agrees on what reality entails, like a schizophrenic, a Christian and an atheist all believe in different things they see as part of reality, but we know how to use the concept.) However descriptions are always kind of tautological. “Reality is what is and not what is not”. It’s often something like that. Language games really.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

I think people instinctively understand what reality is.

Or isn’t!

 

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Todd

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Arjan Dirkse wrote:

I think people instinctively understand what reality is. (Of course not everybody agrees on what reality entails, like a schizophrenic, a Christian and an atheist all believe in different things they see as part of reality, but we know how to use the concept.) However descriptions are always kind of tautological. “Reality is what is and not what is not”. It’s often something like that. Language games really.

The challenge is that we ourselves are not a part of reality. Our personalities are made up of things that are not real like memories and words. When asked to describe yourself, you have to essentially step out of yourself and take a look at various aspects to come up with that description but who are you when you are observing or analyzing yourself? The thing we think we are becomes something like a car or clothes and honestly it is increasingly commodified. Not so much you are what you eat, but you are what you consume.

there is the concept of the Atman in Buddhism and Hinduism that is a separate “self” from the mind – more like a soul divorced from the conscious self or any specific perception of self. Similar to Leibniz monad or the unconscious of psychology. However, is that more real than our own perceived identity? It is in essence a thought that can’t be put into words or communicated even to the self,

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Todd

I imagine at this point Miqque would ask:

Are you for real?

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Rocket

Anonymous wrote:

The challenge is that we ourselves are not a part of reality. Our personalities are made up of things that are not real like memories and words. When asked to describe yourself, you have to essentially step out of yourself and take a look at various aspects to come up with that description but who are you when you are observing or analyzing yourself? The thing we think we are becomes something like a car or clothes and honestly it is increasingly commodified. Not so much you are what you eat, but you are what you consume.

 

How are we not a part of reality?

I think we are part of reality. Our thoughts, the words in our heads, are real. Language is real, although it is an imperfect tool to describe things. Our conceptualization of what we are may be false, but that does not mean it (or ourselves)  are not real. Even a lie is real, it’s a real lie.

Anonymous wrote:

there is the concept of the Atman in Buddhism and Hinduism that is a separate “self” from the mind – more like a soul divorced from the conscious self or any specific perception of self. Similar to Leibniz monad or the unconscious of psychology. However, is that more real than our own perceived identity? It is in essence a thought that can’t be put into words or communicated even to the self,

Hinduism has different views on what atman is, but in the non-dual school atman is indistinguishable from our “I-ness”, our separate individuality. Common mortals are just unaware of it. it takes practise to come to atman-knowledge, to realize the union of ourselves with the universe.

 

Buddhism doesn’t believe in atman. They don’t believe in an unchanging self, instead one of the main tenets of Buddhism is anatman/anatta, or non-self. For instance, in tantric Buddhism, you can unite your mindstream with a deity, but that deity is still subject to change.  This is connected to the principle of shunyata, or emptiness. Everything is empty of an unchanging self, or inner essence.

 

(Although some versions of Buddhism smuggle the atman back in.)

Todd wrote:

I imagine at this point Miqque would ask:

Are you for real?

I miss Miqque…

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Todd

Al-x wrote:

Todd wrote:

I imagine at this point Miqque would ask:

Are you for real?

I miss Miqque…

I do too.

I watched this video the other day and am fascinated by it. In a very mind blowing way, it shows you time on micro and macro scales.

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Arjan Dirkse

[Rocket]

Todd wrote:

Are you for real?

and then he would take a long puff off his pot pipe, and go Ahhh and say “Well?” prompting you for an answer. Despite his propensity for rants, in person at least, he was a person eager to hear what you had to say and how you defend it.

I always miss him and am very grateful to have spent time with him. He was a very thoughtful, compassionate and generous man.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by Rocket.

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DavidM, njerry, Todd

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

I think we are part of reality. Our thoughts, the words in our heads, are real. Language is real, although it is an imperfect tool to describe things. Our conceptualization of what we are may be false, but that does not mean it (or ourselves)  are not real. Even a lie is real, it’s a real lie.

Then by what context can it be a lie?

Essentially, it is the difficulty of temporality. We are thrown into existence and provided the ready made tools of the present but even those are contingent. The vast majority of our lives are spent in an artificial world. Even in the countryside, the woods have been managed and maintained by human intent. Our personalities are stories we tell ourselves, but who is the teller and the audience in that narrative? Even then, one change of perspective can throw all the underlying assumptions of who a person is into disarray.

It’s not that there is no objective position to prove reality available, but that the subjective position is just as questionable. No one has a singular point of view even when alone. It’s always mediated by internal perceptions and impulses that are impossible to isolate and observe.

More to the point, the question is not what is not real, but what can even be real. The point is not that it “doesn’t mean that it is not real,” but that it is impossible from a human position to conclude that anything is real.

Well a lie is a linguistic statement about reality that isn’t true, but that doesn’t mean the lie doesn’t have an existence, or reality. To deny a lie is real is like saying a traffic sign that points you in the wrong direction isn’t real.

 

In the end we can’t be sure of anything specific being real. I can pet a cat, but I can’t be sure the cat is real. The only thing we experience of reality is our senses, and our thoughts. I know my brain is showing me the cat and I am feeling the cat, so the thoughts and sensations in our brains are real, but I can’t be 100 % sure what I am seeing has material reality. So the cat could be a hallucination. So that could lead you to becoming a skeptic like Pyrrho, or a solipsist who thinks only their own existence is real, or you do what 99.99999 % of all people do and make some unsure assumptions about reality.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Well a lie is a linguistic statement about reality that isn’t true, but that doesn’t mean the lie doesn’t have an existence, or reality. To deny a lie is real is like saying a traffic sign that points you in the wrong direction isn’t real.

However, the question becomes what makes it real and why does it matter if it is real. My point is that if a lie is “real” then it indicates reality doesn’t really mean anything. A thing is false because it is not real, but even if it is false it is really false so it is real. That’s not a convincing argument.

Which goes back to the original point – our experience is so unreal that it makes discerning reality nearly impossible. For reality to matter, then there have to be things that are not real. A falsehood is false because it is not real and it matters that it is not real.

Anonymous wrote:

However, the question becomes what makes it real and why does it matter if it is real.

It’s real because it exists. But that if of course a tautological statement.

 

That’s what I said earlier, it is probably impossible to define reality in other terms, but we feel instinctively what reality is. Anders said like the Dao it can’t really be caught in words. This problem with definining is a linguistic process that might not work for the concept of “reality” at all.

I think reality however if you take it linguistically can have at least two meanings, absolute reality and conventional reality. Conventional reality is what we deal with in everyday life, like we treat a car on the road as real because if we think it isn’t real and we cross the road without paying attention to it the car might kill us. It’s our image of the world in how we deal with it.

 

Absolute reality, what is it that really exists, is probably undiscernable. I think Kant called this the noumenon.

 

I guess this is similar to the two truths in Buddhism:

 

Two truths doctrine – Wikipedia

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

It’s real because it exists. But that if of course a tautological statement.

It doesn’t exist. That’s why it is false.

You’d be claiming something imaginary is real. Imagination is not real. You wouldn’t say fictional characters are real simply because a book is made out of real paper, would you?

Which simply goes back to the answer to your original question “<span style=”color: #222222; font-family: Raleway, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;”>How are we not a part of reality?”</span>

So much of our experience is imaginary that distinguishing real from unreal is a basic human challenge. However, engaging falsely or truly with reality is consequential. If you drive along and see a sign that says “Copenhagen 20 Km,” the meaningful reality of that sign is contingent upon traveling 20 kilometers and discovering if you are in Copenhagen or not.

Anonymous wrote:

You wouldn’t say fictional characters are real simply because a book is made out of real paper, would you?

I would. Superman is very real. He’s not an actual kryptonian who is super strong and who lives in our world, but he exists as a character, an archetype even. He exists in the imagination of billions of people. He inspires, he forms part of our emotional landscape. That’s real as far as I’m concerned.

 

Stories are real. Imagination is real. Hallucinations are real. DMT trips are real. How can they not be? Imagination probably forms our experience to a large extent. Something that is “real” doesn’t have to exist out of tangible atoms.

 

Compare it to an emotion like hate or love. Are they real? We experience them, they exist in our mind, in that sense they exist. They may not be a solid thing that can be grasped or measured or quantified, but they have reality. Maybe they’re more real than anything else. Likewise for all our other thoughts. I may think of a pink elephant, the elephant may not exist physically in the outside world but the thought, the experience is real.

 

In a way this discussion reminds me of the “simulation” debate. “Reality isn’t real, we live in a simulation!” Yeah maybe, but the simulation exists as a part of reality.

Anonymous wrote:

However, engaging falsely or truly with reality is consequential. If you drive along and see a sign that says “Copenhagen 20 Km,” the meaningful reality of that sign is contingent upon traveling 20 kilometers and discovering if you are in Copenhagen or not.

Isn’t that mixing “truth” with “reality”? If the sign says Copenhagen 1 million lightyears, the sign is still real, however it is not true.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Isn’t that mixing “truth” with “reality”? If the sign says Copenhagen 1 million lightyears, the sign is still real, however it is not true.

However, it is not a real sign. That’s the point of the form – to indicate the way to a location. If it does not indicate the way to a location it purports to then it is not real in the context it would be intended. But we wouldn’t know that until we tested it so it is another layer of disconnection from reality.

The context of this discussion is that you asked how we are disconnected from reality, and your points demonstrate that. The differing contexts of what we experience – emotions to imaginary characters demonstrates the immediate disconnection from any basic reality. A character in a book can seem as real as a person we know – or more real even, but we also know that it is imaginary. Then there is the level where we can never essentially determine if anything is real until it leads to an outcome. We can’t know the sign to Copenhagen is really a sign to there until we reach Copenhagen. Or it even could have really been a sign to the city, BUT we took a wrong turn and ended up in Amsterdam so it was a real sign but we think it was fake.

So even as our experience happens, we can’t be sure what we perceive to be happening is actually happening until there is some consequential conclusion as we are always projecting into an imaginary future or poorly remembered past to provide a context for the present experience.

 

Anonymous wrote:

emotions to imaginary characters demonstrates the immediate disconnection from any basic reality.

Oh I completely disagree with that. i think it’s real more than anything else perhaps.

 

Don’t you think what is in our heads is real? Psychosis is very real for instance. If it wasn’t real, we wouldn’t have patients in mental hospitals suffering from it.

Perhaps consciousness is the lie. Reality exists objectively. It is what it is. But consciousness seeks to stake its dominance over reality and institute its own layer of “reality” over the objective one.

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Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Don’t you think what is in our heads is real? Psychosis is very real for instance. If it wasn’t real, we wouldn’t have patients in mental hospitals suffering from it.

No – it is almost by definition imaginary, but I think that is yet again a demonstration of our natural condition. Our nature is to be disengaged from reality.

For human beings, the perception of reality is a mediated experience filled with uncertainty. It is mediated by our limited physical senses, our faulty memories and our imaginations. But things are only real when they have an effect in action on external relationships.

Like the line from THE DARK KNIGHT – “It’s not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me.”

You asked how I can say that human beings are disengaged from reality, but then give the examples of thoughts, dreams and lies as if they are real which are immediate demonstrations how people remain disengaged from reality. It doesn’t matter what you read, think, plan or imagine until it has some manifest effect in action.

We certainly don’t put people into mental hospitals until they take some action to warrant it.

Anonymous wrote:

It doesn’t matter what you read, think, plan or imagine until it has some manifest effect in action.

Mm, well I disagree with this. I cant see how you can come to this conclusion, it is a kind of sophistry I think. What we read and imagine definitely has influence on our minds and thus our reality.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

Mm, well I disagree with this. I cant see how you can come to this conclusion, it is a kind of sophistry I think. What we read and imagine definitely has influence on our minds and thus our reality.

Sophistry – or solipsism – is what you are proposing. It’s the idea that reality is inside us somehow, but that is my point. Our experience is locked in separate from reality – or the world. Locked in and doesn’t matter a bit.

Again, go back to your original question: How are we not a part of reality?

Reality is what we do – the actions we take, the effects and consequences they have and those taken upon us. However, our experience is mostly internal and imaginary separate from those actions.

It’s not sophistry to point out that whatever you think, imagine or plan isn’t real until it leads to consequential action. It’s fairly obvious and basic.

However, many are willing to live in their heads and not affect the world at all no matter what goes on in their minds. We are easily satisfied with our imaginations rather than action in the world.

Anonymous wrote:

Reality is what we do – the actions we take, the effects and consequences they have and those taken upon us. However, our experience is mostly internal and imaginary separate from those actions.

What is internal isn’t reality? Fine, we just have different definitions of reality then. What is in my head is “unreal”.

 

A lot of this is just quibbling about definitions.

 

You’re the opposite of a solipsist or a mind-only Buddhist, for whom only what goes on in their minds is real.

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I’m not just real…I’m hyper real! Just like Disneyland or the intarwebz.

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Christian

Exactly, what goes on in the mind is not real. It’s psychological or imaginary. What you do in the world outside of your thoughts is real.

however, the problem is that we only perceive with our minds so it dominates our view of reality. However, the distinction between thought and action or mind and the world is very important as your thoughts don’t do anything but your actions are everything.

”I used to think the human mind was the most amazing thing in the universe… but then I thought ‘look what’s telling me that.” – Emo Phillips

 

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Rocket, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

Exactly, what goes on in the mind is not real. It’s psychological or imaginary. What you do in the world outside of your thoughts is real.

You’re insane. The thoughts are real. Emotions are real. I can prove it by thinking. I don’t have shit to prove to you. You’re the on claiming my thoughts aren’t real. Prove me wrong. Example: I’m claiming you are insane. I have proof: You think what goes on in the mind isn’t real. Ta-da.

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Christian

Hehe…honestly I think Johnny is just being contrarian. I think it’s self evident our thoughts and minds are real.

 

Reality for me simply means everything that exists, everything that is. I’m pretty sure thoughts and minds exist. To deny this would be the ultimate kind of gaslighting. “Your thoughts are not only wrong, they don’t even exist!”

Anonymous wrote:

Exactly, what goes on in the mind is not real. It’s psychological or imaginary. What you do in the world outside of your thoughts is real.

Going back to the street sign, “Copenhagen” is not real by your definition. What we call “Copenhagen” is an accumulation of people, building and history that gains the identity of “Copenhagen” only by the sum of the thoughts of the people who live their, by their identifying this accumulation as “Copenhagen” and recognising its history and present identity. If everybody stopped doing that, “Copenhagen” wouldn’t exist anymore. It would become something else. However, that does not mean that the buildings and people would suddenly disappear – factual reality doesn’t just go away. However, it would be changed. In this case, for example the street signs would change if people all decided to call it “Fartcity” instead of “Copenhagen”.

Put a different way, everything you do in the world outside of your thoughts is first informed by the world of your thoughts.

So, yeah, like Arjan said, different definitions. I mean, there obviously is a difference between imagination/fiction and factual external reality. But that doesn’t mean that what happens in your head isn’t real, it’s just real in a different way.

The trouble starts when you can’t tell the difference anymore – that’s called a psychosis.

Well, or alternatively it’s where the fun starts. That’s called psychedelic drugs and/or being a shaman/Alan Moore.

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Arjan Dirkse

Anonymous wrote:

The thoughts are real. Emotions are real.

actually they only become real when they create actions or words. Reality is tangible. Thoughts are not tangible. Like I said, they can affect reality through speech or action but if they stay in your mind(which they shouldn’t, imo) at best they can become imagination.

 

 

Your mind has dangerous places and the longer a thought stays in your mind the more likely it can be affected by these dangerous places (subconscious, neuroses, psychoses, deceptions, fake news, etc…)

Rocket wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The thoughts are real. Emotions are real.

actually they only become real when they create actions or words. Reality is tangible. Thoughts are not tangible. Like I said, they can affect reality through speech or action but if they stay in your mind(which they shouldn’t, imo) at best they can become imagination.

 

 

Your mind has dangerous places and the longer a thought stays in your mind the more likely it can be affected by these dangerous places (subconscious, neuroses, psychoses, deceptions, fake news, etc…)

I don’t need to listen to you, because you’re not real. You’re not tangible. Regardless of what you say, if you don’t appear in my room and prove to me you’re tangible, you’re not real. Sorry.

Anonymous wrote:

I don’t need to listen to you, because you’re not real. You’re not tangible. Regardless of what you say

but you are listening to what I say and that does make me tangible. You replied to my post and therefore acknowledged me.

Rocket wrote:

but you are listening to what I say and that does make me tangible. You replied to my post and therefore acknowledged me.

This post isn’t real. It’s not tangible.

Christian wrote:

What we call “Copenhagen” is an accumulation of people, building and history that gains the identity of “Copenhagen” only by the sum of the thoughts of the people who live their, by their identifying this accumulation as “Copenhagen” and recognising its history and present identity. If everybody stopped doing that, “Copenhagen” wouldn’t exist anymore. It would become something else.

This sounds like how Putin’s thought processes work.

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Christian

According to Kiri-kin-tha’s First Law of Metaphysics; “Nothing unreal exists.”

It’s kind of erasing the concept of consciousness to say it isn’t “real”. Basically you deny its existence. That kind of solves the hard question of what consciousness is, just deny it exists.

 

You could cut reality in two, the direct experience of subjective reality that happens in the mind, and the “real world” of hard, tangible, measurable stuff out there. I can see why you might be tempted to throw out “meaningless thoughts” that only happen in our mind because they’re unquantifiable. In Zen and some other schools of Buddhism it’s the reverse, the only reality is the direct subjective experience of the moment.

 

I think Christian said it perfectly, “Copenhagen” only exists because it exists in our mind. The concept of Copenhagen exists of our thoughts about it. That is basically the idea behind the mind-0nly schools of Buddhism.

If you dive into economics, you realize that money, stocks, bonds, etc have value is because everyone has tacitly agreed that it does. The entire financial structure of the world is based on belief.

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Arjan Dirkse

Anonymous wrote:

This post isn’t real. It’s not tangible.

But is it fungible?!

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Todd

Todd wrote:

If you dive into economics, you realize that money, sticks, bonds, etc have value is because everyone has tacitly agreed that it does. The entire financial structure of the world is based on belief.

Again I ask: IS IT FUNGIBLE!??

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Todd

njerry wrote:

Todd wrote:

If you dive into economics, you realize that money, sticks, bonds, etc have value is because everyone has tacitly agreed that it does. The entire financial structure of the world is based on belief.

Again I ask: IS IT FUNGIBLE!??

Only if you believe…

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Arjan Dirkse

njerry wrote:

But is it fungible?!

And is it fuckable?

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Todd

Christian wrote:

njerry wrote:

But is it fungible?!

And is it fuckable?

Everythings fuckable at least once.

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Christian, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

Everythings fuckable at least once.

Like…a female praying-mantis?

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Rocket, Todd

What gives life meaning? What is the reason for existing? I was born and raised as an atheist, never got any kind of religious message in my youth. I think in modernity human beings are often viewed as soulless entities, bags of flesh, and I kinda hate that idea now. During my life growing up I more or less believed in some kind of Epicurean ideal, ataraxia, a life of simple pleasures and minimization of suffering. I am not sure if I still believe in that, although the idea is still there.

 

On the other hand, the Christian (or Paulist) idea of ultimate depravity is toxic. It’s a kind of abuse really, being told over and over how evil you are by some authority figure. (And we see that too in some modern political movements, on the right and the left.) And of course groveling before some God and sacrificing your life for him. In Advaita Vedanta on the other hand there is complete unity between the divine and everything that exists.

 

Of course if you ask the question what gives life meaning the counter question is what is the meaning of meaning. There does not need to be any meaning at all, probably. Existing in itself could be the meaning.