Dear All,
I have been reading the debates about “scientific“ explanation of consciousness with lot of interest. Since I do not have my own model, I can be impartial about them! First, I do like the eastern philosophical idea of universal consciousness, pansychism if you want to call it. The primitive semblance of consciousness may be present in atoms or even fundamental particles, although that may be very difficult to establish. In a way, I like Penrose-Hemeroff model (Hemeroff posted his article here recently on this website), but there are problems with it and it is also far from being established. Similarly Morrison’s model has also some interesting points.
About Jim Kowall’s holographic model, I can say much more. Although it is quite interesting from the point of view of universal consciousness, I should say; it is dangerous to build your model of consciousness on uncertain physics. I read number of physics blogs also. I find that Tom Banks’ holographic model does not have any appreciable following. Even his former student Lubos Motls does not believe in it. Holography was established by Maldacena from string theory for model of Anti-de Sitter universe where the cosmological constant (cc) is negative. Our present day universe seems to have small positive cc, thus it is de Sitter. There are attempts to extend the holographic model to positive cc and Tom Banks’ model is one of them. But Tom Banks’ model turns out to be anti-inflationary. While it is true that inflationary scenario is not experimentally established, majority consensus is still in favor of it. You might know about recent controversy in Scientific American magazine where 17 prominent physicists signed in favor of the inflation scenario. The whole field is quite controversial.
Another problem I see with Jim Kowall’ s model is that it relates consciousness to holographic screen which may be some 13.8 B light years away from us. We live for some 70 to 100 years and the consciousness we know ourselves ends with our deaths. Now it may be true that according to eastern philosophy, consciousness jumps from a dead body to a new body on rebirth, but still it is hard to relate is to some screen 13.8 B light years away. Also each of us having our own screen is troubling, since after all there is no difference in consciousness from one person to another and possibly animals who do not understand all this also may have some consciousness. I would rather relate consciousness to something in our neighborhood. It is fine for our neighborhood to be related to what happened 13.8 B years ago but that is a different matter!
Best Regards.
Kashyap
August 8, 2017
Dear Vinod and Vimal,
If you forgive me for jumping into your debate, in this case I agree with Vinod that,
“The existence of large swathes of space devoid of matter and energy/radiations”.
GR just says that matter curves (distorts) space time. It does not say that there can be no space without matter or radiation. In fact de Sitter universe keeps on expanding with no matter, just a positive cosmological constant. Forget about models of inflation, even now, there is huge amount of interstellar space where there is practically no or extremely little matter or energy. Interstellar space is practically vacuum e.g. you may run into a molecule every few miles! It is possible that I may have misunderstood your disagreement!
Best Regards.
Kashyap
August 9, 2017
...
Dear Jim,
Logical consistency generates valid deductions. But valid deductions are not sound deductions. If the premises are false the deduction may be valid but will be false. We all use logic as best we can, but it is no good if applied to false dynamics.
You seem to be making the very old error of assuming that the relation of a point of view to what it perceives is optical. This is the true homunculus fallacy - trying to explain how the optical relation of the eye to the world leads to rich inner experience by positing another optical relation. It achieves nothing.
Leibniz uses the analogy of the point with light coming from all directions as a way of explaining how experience might be rich but he knows enough to see that it is not how things actually work. And now at the fundamental quantum level we have abandoned the trajectories of Newtonian optics. A human point of view must involve some dynamic relation deep within a brain (we can show that empirically) and information does not travel usefully along optical paths in brains. So forget screens and all that. We are almost certainly looking for some sort of distributed relation of field values. I cannot see what event horizons have to do with it either, or organisms, or thermodynamics. This to my mind is just all bad physics. It is just the same old ‘conventional scientific sense’ but with false premises based on applying bits of physics in the wrong way. In my long experience of searching for solutions to tricky problems I have usually found that the answer is something mundane hidden within what you already know, not some new conception based on broad abstract ideas.
Best wishes
Jo
August 8, 2017
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/Online_Sadhu_Sanga/FB8EC733-6ABE-4453-8F79-1552B4646843%40ucl.ac.uk
Dear Whit,
I think you may be confusing the real homunculus fallacy - that you can explain the nature of experience by replacing one relation with another of the same kind (Dan Dennett’s rather Shakespearian ‘duplicate entire the talents they are rung in to explain’) - with the spurious homunculus fallacy that denies the need for an inner receiving unit.
The relation of eye to world is optical but it is not intentional because there is no image in the eye and no interpreting of information as ‘about’ anything. That comes later inside the brain. The mistake people make is to think an inner receiving self is redundant when you already have an outer one. As Descartes pointed out there is no outer self, just a machine-like body providing in focussing access route to the inner receiving unit. Organisms or people do not have experiences. Something inside them does. The signals reaching the outside of a body are not in a form that provides any knowledge about anything. Knowledge can only be achieved by differentials computed within. So the signals are not in themselves information. They are the substrate or medium through which information operates.
I do not think the human subject is an illusion. It seems to me it is the most certain thing around. But it is not a person or organism. That would be illusory.
Jo
August 8, 2017
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/Online_Sadhu_Sanga/5CA8D652-64FC-4724-BF91-34205FC42366%40ucl.ac.uk
From: "Edwards, Jonathan"
Tuesday, August 8, 2017 8:17 PM
Subject: [Sadhu Sanga] Which came first, consciousness or the brain?
Dear Whit,
I think you may be confusing the real homunculus fallacy - that you can explain the nature of experience by replacing one relation with another of the same kind (Dan Dennett’s rather Shakespearian ‘duplicate entire the talents they are rung in to explain’) - with the spurious homunculus fallacy that denies the need for an inner receiving unit.
The relation of eye to world is optical but it is not intentional because there is no image in the eye and no interpreting of information as ‘about’ anything. That comes later inside the brain. The mistake people make is to think an inner receiving self is redundant when you already have an outer one. As Descartes pointed out there is no outer self, just a machine-like body providing in focussing access route to the inner receiving unit. Organisms or people do not have experiences. Something inside them does. The signals reaching the outside of a body are not in a form that provides any knowledge about anything. Knowledge can only be achieved by differentials computed within. So the signals are not in themselves information. They are the substrate or medium through which information operates.
I do not think the human subject is an illusion. It seems to me it is the most certain thing around. But it is not a person or organism. That would be illusory.
Jo
August 8, 2017
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/Online_Sadhu_Sanga/6D7543BD-217E-4CF9-A912-BF744204397A%40ucl.ac.uk
...
Dear RLPV,
As regards your tomato quiz, my impression is that there can't be any situation where the God is looking at a tomato. Thus the question is absurd and a mere word play. The following excerpt can help to make things clear.
"we may regard, describe, and realise it as Lila, the play, the child's joy, the poet's joy, the actor's joy,...of the Soul of things eternally young, perpetually inexhaustible, creating and re-creating Himself in Himself for the sheer bliss of that self-creation...Himself the play, Himself the player, Himself the playground"
[Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, p.103],
I haven't noticed you having referred to Sri Aurobindo ever. And I feel that is the reason you haven't been able to convince anyone of the soundness of your eDAM thesis.
Thanks for your patience for responding to all sorts of doubts and disagreements in this forum.
Tusar (b.1955)
August 7, 2017
...
On Tuesday, 8 August 2017, VINOD KUMAR SEHGAL wrote:
Respected Dr. Ram,
Since with our current state of consciousness, we are unable to about the cosmic consciousness of OOO-God, therefore, it is difficult for us to find exactly how a tomato is experienceable by OOO God. In view of this, your question is also ill framed the way as rightly pointed by BMP that a child trying to get hold of the moon in the lap of his/her mother.
What I replied was based on my logical understanding and not experience. Therefore, you should have also responded based upon some logical understanding.
Vinod Sehgal
Dear Vinod ji,
You may like to investigate if Swami YogeshwaraNanda ji has written something on this topic. Alternatively, you try to find some yogi who is on the highest level and able to answer my simple query. My personal guess is that there is no group experience as concluded in (Theiner & O’Connor, 2010), Therefore, God, as a group of all entities (if He is equivalent to our infinite universe), does not experience anything (I know you will disagree!). However, we (our Ātmans = God because of the Mahāvākya aham brahmāsmi) are the ones who can experience because we have necessary NNs in our mind-brain systems.
Kind regards,
Rām
August 8, 2017
...
Ram: In your OOO-God theory framework, what kind of consciousness research you expect us to do other than prayer and meditation?
BMP: First of all, it is not my theory. What do I know about God? I can only present what I have learned and understood from the literature and those before me who have some realization concerning these topics.
I am not contributing to this forum using prayer and mediation, am I? The vast literature on the subjects which I am offering are in the form of a rational scientific, systematic, philosophical and religious nature. From what i have read of your ideas, although you have obviously worked very hard to accumulate whatever knowledge you do have, I do not see the quality of insight gained from the many authors I have read and know about. So I am presenting some of those arguments for you to consider for your own benefit and development. I don't expect you or anyone else to know everything. That is one purpose for which this forum exists - to learn from one another, not only for each person's propaganda about themselves. This is the spirit of sadhu-sanga which, as others have commented, is the unique quality of this forum. We don't reject prayer and meditation, or atoms and molecules, or supernatural phenomena, or anything else within the human and divine spirit. All are subjects for consideration if there is an actual rational element being offered for common discussion in defense of such ideas. No one here is interested in dogmatic fundamentalism.
The study and knowledge of consciousness was already accomplished long before you or modern science ever came on the scene. If you are not willing to accept that and think you have the only valid means of understanding the concept of consciousness, for me that would disqualify anyone that I would consider a scientist. [...]
We may not want to hear that there are other conceptions of reality that differ from our own. But we are here together to work out what consciousness may actually mean, and all are trying to contribute their insights as well as critiques as to what may or may not be a valid way to proceed. Humility, tolerance and respect are requisite in such a process. That's all we can expect from honest men/women with good will, along with some prayer and mediation that a proper conception may arise from our sincere endeavors in that spirit.
Thank you for your scholarly and gentlemanly attitude here.
Sincerely,
B Madhava Puri, Ph.D.
Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute
BHAKTI VEDANTA INSTITUTE – of Spiritual Culture & Science
August 6, 2017
...
inUth.com-9 hours ago
Sister Nivedita was not only a great nationalist but also a great human being. She made India her home after meeting Swami Vivekananda and dedicated her ...
The Shillong Times-18 hours ago
We must remember what the Mother (spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo) said about fear, ~ “Fear is always a very bad adviser.” We can only manage a crisis ...
NYOOOZ-07-Aug-2017
Using Upanishads and more contemporary poetry by Tagore, Rumi and Sri Aurobindo, she draws parallels between the story of Savitri and how we look at ...
[HTML] Milojevic's Educational Futures
I Milojevic
... spiritual has been leached from the curriculum. The discrepancy arises because Milojevic draws heavily upon Indian thinkers such as Krishnamurti, Sri Aurobindo, Tagore, Gandhi and Sarkar. These men taught and wrote much ...
Vernacular architecture as an idiom for promoting cultural continuity in South Asia with a special reference to Buddhist monasteries
S Ghosh, A Goenka, M Deo, D Mandal - AI & SOCIETY
... for the something intangible it has to express; the spirit needs all the possible help of the material 'body to interpret itself to itself through the eye, yet asks of it that it shall be as transparent a veil as possible of its own greater significance” said Sri Aurobindo, India's renowned ...
[PDF] Lexical, Stylistic and Cultural Issues in the select poem of Bharathidasan: A Translation Study
TXB Arockiaraj
... Sir Aurobindo says that there are two ways of translating poetry; 'one to keep it strictly to the manner and turn of the original and the other is to take its spirit, sense and imagery and produce them freely so as to suit the new language (432)'. To Aurobindo, the second method of ...
[PDF] Importance of Mahabharata–A Brief Overview
R Jairam - Imperial Journal of Interdisciplinary Research, 2017
... The earliest commentary that has come down is that of the great philosopher Sankaracharya. Outstanding modern commentaries are those of BGTilak, Sri Aurobindo, Mahatma Gandhi, Vinoba Bhave and Dr. S. Radhakrishnan. Influence of Mahabharatha - ...
[PDF] Anuradha Publications
PDRBAL KAMBLE
... The Ideology of Indian Foreign Policy: The Indian foreign policy is influenced by the non-violence principle of Mahatma Gandhi and spiritual principle of Aurobindo Ghosh and Rabindranath Tagore. The same thought process resulted into India's attitude towards world politics. ...
[HTML] Pironneau-femInFluids. pdf
O Pironneau
... 13 7 ... The Unseen grew visible to student eyes,
Explained was the immense Inconscient's scheme,
Audacious lines were traced upon the void;
The Infinite was reduced to square and cube.
Sri Aurobindo Savitri. Book 2, Canto XI FOREWORD. ...
Oct 15, 2013 - the square always indicates to me [Sri Aurobindo] the Supermind: it is a perfect shape... It might have been already ... The Infinite was reduced to square and cube. ||71.29||. Arranging symbol and ...
Jul 14, 2017 - (Note: The personal and "who" pronouns within Savitri lines are marked in bold and the possessive pronouns are marked in bold and italics. ... The Infinite was reduced to square and cube ...
And in Rohit Mehta's The Dialogue with Death we read: "In the epic of Savitri, Sri Aurobindo deals exhaustively with the Yoga of Aswapati, which indeed is the Yoga of ..... The Infinite was reduced to square and ...
Talavane Krishna - 2001 - Art
Audacious lines were traced upon the Void; The Infinite was reduced to square and cube. ... Sri Aurobindo, SavitriYANTRA IS A TOOL OR A SYMBOL conceived as a form pattern used to represent a deity or a cosmic ...
No comments:
Post a Comment