Mind Power

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
For the record, "mind-power" training can indeed help you improve your chess, but not in the way you might think. That is, if you pursue it for a while, it will probably help you improve as a player and increase your rating. But if you keep pursuing the manifestation methods eventually your chess ability will "plateau" because the mind--training wi ...[text shortened]... and non-attachment to outcome, since most of us will indeed be losing at least semi-regularly...

I often think of how my mind wanders when I am trying to go to
sleep, it seems a broiling froth of random events sometimes leading
to creativity but more often than not leading down random thought
patterns. My own quest, not very rigidly practicing, is to quiet my
mind so it will allow me to at least rest up for the next day's crises.
I am suprised all the time that a crotchety old fart like me can still
improve at my given tasks, like music, and actually create new songs
and tunes and work out scientific concepts by pen and pencil
independently. Like you guys said, you are your own CEO, and you
can make yourself better internally at least.
Whether that makes you more spiritually attuned is up for arguement.
I look at the animal world and see, for instance, chimps or
Bonobo's or Dolphins and when you lay their brains flat they have
a certain surface area and if you lay ours out there is supposedly more
surface area. Now do you equate spirituality to the fact that we
have more brains than a bonobo? If so the most spiritual of us
would be a big brained individual who studies Tao or some such.
It is as if we are saying in order to tap into spirituality on a deep level
we need to have a certain critical mass of brain structure, kind of
like the minimum amount of circuitry to create a working computer,
any less and its a robot. Are we really like that? Seems like maybe that
makes us more anthrocentric than anything else. You look closely
at a dolphins brain and you find its bigger than ours, so could an
arguement be made the dolphin is more spritually evolved than us?
If we can be more spiritual by arranging the thought patterns more
complex than before, does the mere added complexity alone give us
a tag to some inner dark energy force field used by spirits or gods?
Is that the presiding viewpoint of all this? We get more complex
internally and we then attune ourselves to a higher self because of
this newly found complexity in our brain?
It certainly works out for worldly abilities, like music. There is
solid evidence university trained professional musicians have
this nodule in the brain much more fully developed than amateurs
and can be seen in fast pet scans. Likewise with chess players,
the grandmaster using parts of the brain associated with long term
memory(ingrained knowledge of thousands of chess bits)
as opposed to amateurs using a differant part of the brain associated
with short term memories (we have to reinvent ourselves for each
game) So the mental training in those fields shows real gains in
specific places in the brain. So it may be just as likely some
hitherto unknown volume of the brain may be responsible for
the feeling of religiosity, that epiphany some folks feel when first
converted to whatever faith is involved. Why can't it be simply that?
A polite way of saying a hallucinagenic experience.
I am not espousing that view specifically but it has to be admitted
as at least a possiblity with more scientific validity than the current
rage against reason, creationists v evolutionists. I would imagine
the response from the spiritual community would be we are more
than the collection of the matrix of cells in our brain but isn't that
exactly what deliniates us from animals, letting us plan for the future
beyond just collecting nuts for the winter? Otherwise you have to admit
animals into the spiritual world as well just as in shamanism,
a way of life doing exactly that, not putting us above leopards or
bears but intertwining them into our souls, if indeed we have souls.
If we indeed have souls I think animals must by defintion have souls
as well and maybe even individual atoms, endowed with "soulness"
Since the universe is composed of stuff that is totally unresponsive
to our 4 percent of normal matter (the universe is composed of 96
percent of stuff other than atoms, like dark energy, something
scientists are struggling with as we speak without a clue as to what
in fact the stuff is)
Because of that it seems fair to admit the possibility there is a whole
lot more to be discovered in terms of spiritual evolution but not
requiring a god. It may be our charge to make one....

Originally posted by sonhouse
I often think of how my mind wanders when I am trying to go to
sleep, it seems a broiling froth of random events sometimes leading
to creativity but more often than not leading down random thought
patterns. My own quest, not very rigidly practicing, is to quiet my
mind so it will allow me to at least rest up for the next day's crises.
I am suprised a ...[text shortened]... d in terms of spiritual evolution but not
requiring a god. It may be our charge to make one....

Spiritual growth as better circuitry...Timothy Leary used this concept with his eight circuits. It's a big dogmatic in a Leary kind of way, but a good operating metaphor nonetheless.

Dolphins. What valid non-anthropocentric criterion for determining their intelligence relative to ours has ever been put forward?

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Spiritual growth as better circuitry...Timothy Leary used this concept with his eight circuits. It's a big dogmatic in a Leary kind of way, but a good operating metaphor nonetheless.

Dolphins. What valid non-anthropocentric criterion for determining their intelligence relative to ours has ever been put forward?

Valid I am not so sure of but the one test ascribed as evidence of
self-awareness is the mirror test: a dog (most dogs anyway)
looking at a mirror does not realize its himself but thinks its a
stranger and so will act out territoriality scenes.
A chimp on the other hand is fully aware the image in the mirror
is himself and will start to preen. A dolphin recognizes himself in
the mirror as well as a relative of the chimp, the bonobo.
Maybe the great apes as well but humans and those I mentioned
are the only ones to show that. You have to place any individual
no matter what species high on the list of intelligence to pass that
test. Dolphins have been known to help out swimmers in distress,
pushing them up to grab some air, pushing them to shallow water,
etc. A shark would never get past thinking of them as food. You see
where I am going with this? Objective and subjective evidence is
in about the intelligence of dolphins. Dr Lilly showed they have
a complex language we are not even close to deciphering.
Their brains are pound for pound bigger than human but
a large portion of their brains are devoted to analyzing the echo
return signals that give dolphins better than human "eyesight"
underwater. They are known for sure to be able to pick out which
of two balls differing in size by 1/8 th of an inch, say one is
2 inches in diameter and the other 2 and 1/8th inch in diameter,
dolphins can pick out the bigger one every time by echolocation
skills alone, which of course is not intelligence per se but extraordinary
sensory perception so that part of the dolphins brain probably does
not add to the overall intelligence of the individual.
If we are to prove beyond doubt the intelligence level of dolphins we
would need to establish real communications. They can be trained
to "talk" with the matrix symbolic keyboard which shows a certain
level of ability, similar to the apes trained to use sign language.
Apes BTW have been given non-verbal IQ tests and it has been
shown they come in somewhere around 85 on the human scale!
Better than a lot of other humans. They show the ability to use
simple math counting symbology skills, like being trained to
see symbols of the number of things in a box and retrieve, say,
4 and only 4 objects based on the symbols. They can do that task
but cannot do it without referance to the cards. In other words they
can do the more complex task of understanding the link between
symbols and meaning at least in terms of numbers but have
trouble getting the idea of retrieving X amount of items by simple
hand signs or spoken commands. That in itself is interesting, that
they can do what we would think of as a higher function but unable
to do the same task without visual symbology.
I think anyone would have a deep interest in communicating
with dolphins directly using technology to interpret the "words" and
getting into a discussion of its version of theology or if they would
even go down that road. It would be very instructive to humans
to get a take on our spiritual aspirations by a completely independent
intelligence, especially one right here on earth (as opposed to
decoding some alien radio broadcast ala SETI)
It may be when all is said and done that dolphins have no more
overall intelligence than apes or bonobos and therefore have no
thoughts at all of a spiritual nature but what if they did? Would'nt
that be one of the biggest discoveries of the millenium?

Originally posted by sonhouse
[...] It may be when all is said and done that dolphins have no more
overall intelligence than apes or bonobos and therefore have no
thoughts at all of a spiritual nature but what if they did? Would'nt
that be one of the biggest discoveries of the millenium?

Personally I think the shamanic view--that animals are people, or that people are animals--correct. Dolphins, although not human, should be recognised as sentient beings. In my humble opinion.

Originally posted by sonhouse
I often think of how my mind wanders when I am trying to go to
sleep, it seems a broiling froth of random events sometimes leading
to creativity but more often than not leading down random thought
patterns. My own quest, not very rigidly practicing, is to quiet my
mind so it will allow me to at least rest up for the next day's crises.
I am suprised a ...[text shortened]... d in terms of spiritual evolution but not
requiring a god. It may be our charge to make one....

It's a lot of intellectual speculation. May be, may not be, and so forth. As many of the ancient philosophers argued, there is little point in wondering about what is "out there" because we simply have no way of knowing.

A good example is with the dolphin. A common new age belief that developed in recent decades has been that dolphins (and whales) are not only as sentient as humans, but are more evolved spiritually than humans.

It's an appealing idea and helps put a bit of a dent into our collective hubris, but how are we to ever know this for sure? There is no way to confirm such a thing, unless we established a means of sharing consciousness with dolphins/whales in some way that was verifiable.

But we can take that further. How are we to know that anything actually exists, that anything is truly "real"? We can employ all kinds of objective means in "confirming" the reality of something, but in the end, we are only left with our experience of this thing, whether it be object or creature or person.

How do you know that I am real? All you can truly say is that you have an experience of perceiving my words on a monitor; the rest is all assumption. But you are not assuming the existence of your own consciousness. That much is clearly evident. You are here. I may not be able to prove that in any ultimate sense, but you can via your own direct experience of the consciousness that you know as yourself.

It's from that austere philosophical premise that the entire spiritual path really begins in any legitimate way. If we want to go beyond mere faith or dogma, we have to begin with what we know "for sure". And all that we know for sure is that "I" exist. Given that, it then becomes possible to begin to do something with this consciousness -- by changing attitudes, observing our patterns, forming intentions and following through on them, etc. It also becomes more and more clear how we are not the victim of any so-called external forces because our own consciousness is actually unlimited in possibilities.

The "scarcity principle" is the idea that there is not enough energy to go around -- not enough "things" to go around. It's something that most people are deeply conditioned to believe, and keeps people from expanding in life, keeps them always holding back, playing small, feeling unworthy, etc. When consciousness is recognized as unlimited in possibilities, then we begin to get out of the effects of the scarcity principle, and to break free of the programming that tells us that moving forward in life means that someone else will suffer because, after all, there is "not enough to go around".

Originally posted by sonhouse
Valid I am not so sure of but the one test ascribed as evidence of
self-awareness is the mirror test: a dog (most dogs anyway)
looking at a mirror does not realize its himself but thinks its a
stranger and so will act out territoriality scenes.
A chimp on the other hand is fully aware the image in the mirror
is himself and will start to preen. A dolp ...[text shortened]... nature but what if they did? Would'nt
that be one of the biggest discoveries of the millenium?

Regarding the "mirror test", I'd agree that's likely the closest we can come to confirming self-awareness, but the point I was stressing is that objective reality by its very nature lacks inherent existence. Everything is brought about by a cause of something else, nothing stands alone in any isolated sense, because everything requires something else for its existence.

So if the existence of any given thing is only brought about by certain other factors, then we can conclude that all so-called objective reality is in a state of flux, change, movement, even if appearing very "solid" from the persepctive of our sensory systems. Form by its very nature is changing, and thus unreliable as any kind of barometer of what "reality" might be in any ultimate sense.

What then is "reality"? In the end, we are always returned to the one element that is consistent to our experience, that being our own consciousness, which is formless by nature, or what Buddhism calls "empty".

Such a realization may seem unbelievably bleak, but the opposite is actually the case. Glimpsing that all things in objective reality lack inherent existence is a huge burden off of us, because the entire world of the ego and its suffering is based on trying to establish itself as real in a universe of supposed permanancy. It can free us from helplessness and related states of despair, as all such negative mind states are based on the belief that something outside of us, something unqualifiably "real", is blocking or limiting or effecting our capacity to enjoy life, and so justifying feelings of disempowerment or lack of self esteem or the belief that "I just can't do it".

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
It's a lot of intellectual speculation. May be, may not be, and so forth. As many of the ancient philosophers argued, there is little point in wondering about what is "out there" because we simply have no way of knowing.

A good example is with the dolphin. A common new age belief that developed in recent decades has been that dolphins (and whale ...[text shortened]... fe means that someone else will suffer because, after all, there is "not enough to go around".

Right now there is a project I think at IBM to simulate a complex
of neurons, 10.000 I think, in a rats brain and try to understand
the interactions going on there (each of those cells have thousands
of interconnections). That is being done on a comp that can
process 22 trillion calcs per second. That comp is not even close to the
top of the computer food chain, bragging rights pass between Japan
and the US on this front, right now the top end is up past one tenth
of a PETAflop (1000 trillion instructions per second) and no end in
sight. Then there is the possiblility of quantum computers operating
in a regime inherently more powerful than silicon can ever be and
in a much smaller physical area. Ray Kurtzwiel in his book
'the age of spiritual machines' makes the case that in maybe 30 or
so years computers will achieve concsienceness so what I am alluding
to here is the possiblity of generating artificial souls. Wouldn't the
same arguements you used about our lives be then also true for
computers? We would have to deeply alter our perspective on
live and our uniqueness once again.

I suppose this is slightly off point of where thread has been going but still in keeping with the title 'Mind Power'.

On Oct 6 2003 I was diagnosed with Stage 3 Metastatic Melanoma (Skin Cancer) and given 2-5 years life expectancy. I never really believed them. I believed I had cancer but not that it would kill me. I underwent 3 surgerys to remove the lumps with margin, lymph nodes etc. I did a lot of reading and research about my condition and it's treatment.

The best on offer is a drug called Interferon. It's success stats were so slightly better than no drug at all that I had never any faith in it. The usual course is a year the 1st 4 weeks of which are in hospital. I did them and another 2 weeks of self injection after. It made me very sick and depressed.

The chemo did, NOT the cancer or diagnosis. I really only agreed to it at all because of my wife who felt I should try everything but I convinced her that even if I was to die then I'd perfer to be healthy first rather than chemo-ed up then die anyway.

I am still within the time frame for a reacurrance and odds are still against me statisically but I KNOW I'm grand. They never found my primary so I tell myself it fell off the mole early.

Optimism is a form of mind power. Believing things will turn out right and living your life with that assumption helps things to turn out right.

Originally posted by malinga
I suppose this is slightly off point of where thread has been going but still in keeping with the title 'Mind Power'.

On Oct 6 2003 I was diagnosed with Stage 3 Metastatic Melanoma (Skin Cancer) and given 2-5 years life expectancy. I never really believed them. I believed I had cancer but not that it would kill me. I underwent 3 surgerys to remove the l ...[text shortened]... gs will turn out right and living your life with that assumption helps things to turn out right.

Very pertinent post, thanks--mind may cause and heal disease. Visualise yourself having won the battle, your body radiant with health--you will be healthy (but don't forget to eat your broccoli). The placebo effect is well documented after all.

I'm told the Ivy League universities are now incorporating visualisation techniques as part of med-school training. Something I'd like to know more about.

Good health to you Malinga.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Right now there is a project I think at IBM to simulate a complex
of neurons, 10.000 I think, in a rats brain and try to understand
the interactions going on there (each of those cells have thousands
of interconnections). That is being done on a comp that can
process 22 trillion calcs per second. That comp is not even close to the
top of the computer ...[text shortened]... computers? We would have to deeply alter our perspective on
live and our uniqueness once again.

It seems to depend on one of two angles -- either we see consciousness as an emergent property of the brain, which is the empirical view, or we see consciousness as the Ground, the matrix, if you will, of everything -- a sort of ultimate substratum, which is the perennial wisdom view.

In either case, an argument could indeed be made that a computer could become conscious.

If consciousness is an emergent property of localized intelligence (as in brain matter, for example), then there is nothing to argue that such consciousness must be particular to brain matter only. Consciousness seems related to intelligence, not necessarily carbon-based biology. So yes, silicon-based consciousness doesn't seem out of reach -- unless consciousness is only an emergent property of carbon-based intelligence, which we have no proof of because we have no other reference points other than life as we've known it thus far.

The other view, the perennial wisdom view -- that consciousness is in fact the substratum of existence, the Primal Material behind all -- could also be used to argue for the possibility of computers with self-awareness. If self-aware consciousness -- as in the expression of a "soul" -- is in fact attracted to particular life forms that exhibit a high enough level of intelligence (primates, cetaceans, humans), in some way like an "ensoulment" of the life form possessing such intelligence, then there's nothing to say that self-aware consciousness would not be attracted to a silicon-based intelligence either.

But despite both of those angles I have my doubts. I tend to suspect that the force behind our creation, whether that be supernatural or millions of years of natural selection, to be so extraordinarily complex as to render anything we've created so far via our technology to still be very primitive in contrast. Computers may be able to beat humans at chess, but this is a very small piece of the human universe.

However in terms of the Buddhist and Advaita angles I was mentioning, yes, the same argument could be made that we'd have no way of truly invalidating the "self-aware" consciousness of a machine anymore than we could be completely sure of the inherent existence of anything. So once again, we are left with our own consciousness as verifiably real via our direct experience of it. The further step is the relinquishing of the "my" consciousness, leaving just consciousness itself. Or as the famous Advaita expression has it, "only consciousness is".

Originally posted by malinga
I suppose this is slightly off point of where thread has been going but still in keeping with the title 'Mind Power'.

On Oct 6 2003 I was diagnosed with Stage 3 Metastatic Melanoma (Skin Cancer) and given 2-5 years life expectancy. I never really believed them. I believed I had cancer but not that it would kill me. I underwent 3 surgerys to remove the l ...[text shortened]... gs will turn out right and living your life with that assumption helps things to turn out right.

No question about the power of optimism, and gratitude. Best wishes for continued healing. 🙂

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
It seems to depend on one of two angles -- either we see consciousness as an emergent property of the brain, which is the empirical view, or we see consciousness as the Ground, the matrix, if you will, of everything -- a sort of ultimate substratum, which is the perennial wisdom view.

In either case, an argument could indeed be made that a computer ...[text shortened]... ust consciousness itself. Or as the famous Advaita expression has it, "only consciousness is".

This perennial wisdom view concept, are you saying under that
theory the universe itself is conscious? Then that god IS the
universe? Maybe I am reading more into it than is there but thats
what it sounds like. If thats what is meant then wouldn't it follow
that there should me many more forms of life self-aware? Instead
of being limited to just humans, primates and cetaceans?
It should be in that case a thread of conscousness in wire or
engine oil or protons, etc. Are they making that case?

Originally posted by sonhouse
This perennial wisdom view concept, are you saying under that
theory the universe itself is conscious? Then that god IS the
universe? Maybe I am reading more into it than is there but thats
what it sounds like. If thats what is meant then wouldn't it follow
that there should me many more forms of life self-aware? Instead
of being limited to just huma ...[text shortened]... case a thread of conscousness in wire or
engine oil or protons, etc. Are they making that case?

Not that the universe itself -- the universe of matter -- is conscious, rather that consciousness is the irreduceable reality of the subjective domain.

For example, if we break matter down into its parts, we end up with pure energy -- or pure space, take your pick.

If we break a human being down, we end up working through the various elements of the body until we reach the subjective experiences...sense experience, emotions, thoughts, and finally pure consciousness. Anyone who practices even a little bit of meditation can easily see that thinking is not required for consciousness, that is, you can be perfectly aware if the mind falls quiet for a moment. So it seems clear that consciousness precedes thought, is prior to thought or feeling or sensation.

In terms of the objective domain, pure energy or empty space are both good symbols for consciousness, having the qualities of light and emptiness (void) respectively. Both these qualities are often used to describe the Absolute in Eastern teachings. Buddha often described the self as fundmentally "empty" and on his death bed made reference to light when he said, "be ye lights unto yourselves". The Bible also makes reference to light and space ( "the Earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep" ), followed by "let there be light..."

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
Not that the universe itself -- the universe of matter -- is conscious, rather that consciousness is the irreduceable reality of the subjective domain.

For example, if we break matter down into its parts, we end up with pure energy -- or pure space, take your pick.

If we break a human being down, we end up working through the various elements of ...[text shortened]... i], and darkness was upon the face of the deep" ), followed by "let there be light..."

I like that, 'Be ye lights unto yourselves" Sounds like my kind
of philosophy, don't depend on spiritual interlopers to tell you what
you should or should not think about god. Thats one of my gripes
about christianity, islam, jews, they all profess to offer up a heirarchy
of spirit, with the upper ranks privaleged to tell you what god thinks
what god knows what god says to you what you should say to god,
whether god wants worship, if so, when, how, etc. I can have a
sense of spiritual wonder about the universe all by myself thank you
very much, don't need prodding to perceive what little I can of the
universe directly. Don't need to be told how much further I would be
if only I did such and such, prayed in this X Y Z way, get water thrown
on me in such and such a way, behave in such and such a way
so as not to piss off god or to get on his A list. What a load of crap.

Originally posted by sonhouse
I like that, 'Be ye lights unto yourselves" Sounds like my kind
of philosophy, don't depend on spiritual interlopers to tell you what
you should or should not think about god. Thats one of my gripes
about christianity, islam, jews, they all profess to offer up a heirarchy
of spirit, with the upper ranks privaleged to tell you what god thinks
what go ...[text shortened]... in such and such a way
so as not to piss off god or to get on his A list. What a load of crap.

Yes, one of the main strengths of Eastern spiritual teachings is that the focus is mostly on simply undertaking certain practices (like meditation), with the aim of realizing one's natural wisdom and clarity.

No Eastern teaching exhalts its founder or chief deity as the "sole God", or the "only true God", etc. The Buddha is regarded as an Awakened man who merely mirrors our own highest potential. Brahman (the "Absolute" in Hinduism) is regarded as a mirror reflection of Atman, or the personal soul of each person. Thus Eastern paths seek for a total unity with the Absolute. Western paths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) all involve a relationship with their form of the divine such that separation and subordination remain in place. As you suggest, it becomes very easy for this subordination to get played with human priestly intermediaries.

Eastern approaches do have their pitfalls too, one of which can be becoming too dissociated from the world via excessive contemplation/meditation. But because Eastern paths are much less inclined to missionary-ism, they are much less inclined to imposing themselves aggressively or arrogantly onto others. And this is largely because they do not claim any sole grip on the "one true God". That automatically frees them from the whole conqueror's mindset, whether that be on political or philosophic levels.