Essay: Beyond the Flat M@L

[AshvinP]

How could the experience confirm the absence of something? That is another huge difference here - Cleric's experience is confirming the positive existence of relations from the relative perspectives of idea-beings, not making negative claims about the absence of an absolute perspective. That roughly corresponds to the via positiva and via negativa approaches of Western-Eastern traditions.

Exactly, and how the absolutistic and centric experiences can confirm the absence of arguably a more encompassing non-absolutistic and non-centric perspective? It is not possible to prove or non-deniably confirm an absence of anything, neither by reason nor by experience, be it absolute perspective, non-absolute perspective or a flying spaghetti monster. That is why these possibilities always remain inconclusive and open, and I do not know if it would ever be possible to arrive to an experience or knowledge that would definitely confirm or prove only one of these two alternatives and undeniably refute the other. Because whatever experience or knowledge we gain at any point of our path, it can always be argued that here is some other more encompassing perspective or experience that we haven yet arrived to confirming the opposite perspective.

Fair enough. The problem is when you start making absolute claims like you did above - "confirming the absence of any absolute center or deity in the universe of Consciousness" - but pretend you are not making them - "we should remain open to both until the moment comes when we finally know the answer". As Cleric pointed out, you are here making the claim that we cannot possibly experience the actual relations during our corporeal existence so we must wait in expectation until death or some other future event (or just be satisfied that we may never know anything about anything). That is a very strong claim you are making and one that you should try to support if you want others to take it seriously.

Sorry, I admit that the "confirming" was too strong of a claim. I never claim that I have a proof of the non-centric paradigm. It should rather be "being evidences of the absence of any absolute center or deity in the universe of Consciousness[/i]". All our experiences and reasonings here are only evidences and arguments, and so far none of them are "confirmations" or proofs. And most likely the less limited perspective that we will gain after death will open to us more encompassing experiences and perspectives, but I'm not convinced that they will be final confirmations either, for the reasons I gave in the above paragraph. And that is why I always take into consideration the accounts and experiences of mystics and NDErs, but because they so often contradict each other and still remain limited to certain extends, I tend not to take them as revelations of the absolute truth, but only as insights and evidences of some higher-level and/or more encompassing perspectives on reality. Similarly, I have my own spiritual experiences, and of course my personal perspective on the reality is strongly shaped by these experiences and insights, but I never take them as "confirmations" or proofs of anything, but only as evidences and insights that I gain through my limited perspective and along my personal developmental path. And I take other people's experiences and insights with the same grain of salt - always open to them as possibilities but tending not to take them as confirmations or proofs of anything.

I was going to respond in more detail but Cleric captured the essence of my response in his previous post. Which is that I do not want to keep side-tracking the discussion of his essay with the usual intellectual East-West arguments which play out on this forum. There are so many interesting and profound questions we could explore in relation to his essay, but we need to consider it deeply and without a priori judgments. We need to first recognize the questions exist and we have not yet asked them. Your comments I view as saying, "good job... but everything you wrote is irrelevant to what we can actually know." That is not constructive criticism. It gets us nowhere. And we desperately need to be heading somewhere.

[Eugene I]

I don't know how you arrived at the bold text The One Idea that I speak about captures precisely the underlined text. Probably you still conceive 'idea' in the purely intellectual sense, as a concept within the local mind. By 'One Idea' I don't imply a cherry-picked idea from infinitely many but the one that encompasses the infinity of ideas as a wholeness. That's the harmony of ideas. In your language this is the One Consciousness within which any conceivable experience can exist. The reason I use the word 'idea' is to emphasize that this Consciousness experiences meaning. Every state of the Macrocosmic Consciousness is an experience of a Cosmic-scale Idea - this is what gives the cognitive essence of the state. The fact that this Consciousness can be conscious of the different paths of experience, in itself shows that it cognizes a higher-order idea which encompasses the paths in a whole. Without this higher-order idea it would be impossible for the Consciousness to know that the different idea-paths in fact exist within One Consciousness (Scott's remark) - as soon as the Consciousness experiences one of the paths it would be completely impossible to know that alternatives exist. Since the Consciousness understands that the idea-path it experiences is only one of infinitely many, this already shows that this one infinity is being cognized at least asymptotically.

I hope that we've cleared that out. The One Idea at the Center of Deep M@L is not a single limited set of ideas but the the total infinity of ideas (corresponding to your underlined text). Here we simply hit upon the limitations of any geometrical representation. Just because the Center is presented as a point on the illustration, this doesn't mean that it is only one of infinitely many points. In reality this 'center' should be thought to permeate everything. Everything is a differentiated potential of this One infinity, which is everywhere at once.

I suppose that we agree on this one. The Center of Deep M@L points to the same potential that you refer to in the underlined text. Now where our views deviate is on the actual details of this differentiation and integration of potential.

OK, good, we cleared this point of confusion and we both agree that we are speaking about the unlimited potential and the infinity of all possible ideas. In the traditional Christian theology the set of divine logoses was limited to only "good" ones, God would not have "bad" logoses like those of evil or wrong or distorted ideas, that is why I assumed you meant some limited set of living ideas (until you clarified that, thanks).

There is still another difference between our views (which we already discussed before): it is whether we pose that in Cosnicousness there is such thing as all-encompassing and unlimited subjective perspective. We know that we experience the existence from our subjective perspectives, and also that we are conscious. Every conscious experience that we know of is always experienced from a certain subjective perspective. We also find that we can exercise the acts of volition form our subjective perspectives. Therefore we project this scenario to the wholeness of Consciousness and assume that there would be a subjective perspective encompassing such infinite wholeness of all experiences and ideas that would also possess the volitional abilities to act (and that is along description of a global subject of consciousness that we call "God"). However, we have no proof or "confirmation" that such perspective even exists, and there are arguments (that we already discussed elsewhere) that such proposition would run into certain philosophical problems, namely:
- Such proposition would imply that the global subjective perspective is simultaneously experiencing the actual infinity of all ideas and conscious experiences. But we have no experiential confirmation that the experiencing of the actual infinity is ever possible, this is only a theoretical hypothesis.
- Such proposition would assume that the global subjective perspective is encompassing and simultaneously experiencing all our subjective experiences, but such proposition runs into the famous subject combination problem. Ashvin denies that this problem is even relevant, but most modern philosophers from all camps agree that it is very much relevant and valid problem.

But of course these two problems are not sufficient to refute the hypothesis of the existence of all-encompassing subjective perspective, they only pose some challenges to it. The alternative centered-less paradigm is based on the view that there is no such subjective perspective encompassing the infinity of Consciousness, and that Consciousness, being infinite in its potential to manifest and experience any forms, always exists as a multitude of finite subjective perspectives. Such view does not face the above two problems.

In your view the threshold of death marks the demarcation between the free potential and the manifest incarnate existence. What I say is that there's a whole gradient of forms of consciousness/existence - from the most free at the Center to the most rigidly manifested at the periphery. Death is only a change of consciousness but we are still within the spiritual context of the planetary Spheres. In other words, this spiritual path that we are treading will take much much longer until it reaches the state of the free potential.

Not if you consider many NDE, regression therapy and non-dual spiritual experiences suggesting the possibility and actual occurrence of changing one's path to very different courses. Many NDE and regression accounts suggest that we, along our long chain of incarnations, incarnate into very different races and in some cases can traverse into entirely different realms and forms of existence (Michael Newton's book on regression therapy data has many accounts of this). Human form of existence is by far not the only one in the Universe. Most of us are still travelling along the common path of humanity, but we are never locked to it, and sometimes radical changes in one's spiritual state and perspective occur at some point (called "enlightenment" in the Eastern traditions) that allows to change the direction and the path. There are a plenty of evidences in the mystical experiences of the Eastern traditions that the enlightenment opens the state of liberation and free potential much earlier than it would be reached through the common gradual path of humanity. That does not necessarily mean that such enlightened souls would abandon humanity and switch to an entirely different realm or spiritual center, they still may (or may not) remain travelling along with humanity, but in a different state of consciousness.

I'm repeating myself. It's undeniable that while incarnated we are within the telos of the body, humanity, Earth, Solar system. The conjecture that after death (again, assuming we've resolved our sensory attachments) we are free to switch paths (that is, we're free from the happenings within humanity and the Cosmic surroundings) rests entirely upon an assumption which by its very character can only be verified after death. This produces the dichotomy that I've spoken about and which Ashvin noted. Because of our impatience for spiritual freedom we are forced to reject any possibility of reaching truths through development of cognition, and instead we have no choice but to invent completely different rules of existence beyond the threshold of death. Yet we can only do this through the phantom ideas that we support by belief.

As I said above, it's not death but enlightenment that allows to attain the spiritual freedom, and it has nothing to do with "impatience". The death of the body does open broader perspectives (as suggested by NDE experiences), but does not radically change one's state of consciousness defined by the subconscious cognitive and behavioral patterns and limited views and beliefs (called "karma" in the Easter traditions). In fact, no one can achieve the enlightenment just because one feels "impatient" to attain it, or feel too unhappy with their ordinary human state. It happens when the time comes and when one is ready, and when it happens one will know it.

We should try and grasp the seriousness of the situation. It's pretty clear that while incarnated we have to live through every single moment of our development from child till old age. Even if we think in purely abstract way it is only logical that our perspective will develop through multiple such nested rhythms on its way towards the integration of the Cosmic potential. This is confirmed by higher cognition. There's a great difference between attaching and subduing to a deity and understanding the reality of the situation. There's difference between worshipping winter and having clear understanding that we should prepare wood and warm clothes for it. Not only that we hold on to fantastic ideas when we imagine that we'll be freed from the spirals of evolution after death, but this has harmful and paralyzing effect for development. Every thing has its appropriate time. If a child doesn't learn to speak at the right time it only becomes more and more difficult afterwards. It's similar with evolution in general. Now it is up to us to investigate what's needed for our proper development. Some children prepare their homework for the next day. Other children imagine that there's no need to do so because when they fall to sleep they'll be teleported in other worlds where there's no more homeworks. As trivial as it sounds, this is the state of affairs for modern humanity. Today we not only don't yet tackle the interesting and creative question of how to do our homework but we are arguing if this homework is at all needed or is just an act of submissive worship to some deity. It's time to reckon that in our age it's no longer a matter of spare time philosophizing, while the 'real' life happens out there. Our collective future depends in the most real sense on our proper understanding of the human being and its deep structure. And within Deep M@L this structure is only at a 'one thought distance'. There are no obstacles for the exploration of this structure except ourselves.

Most of it is true, yet, along with the gradual growth and the "quantitative" development of our human consciousness, there have been, there are and will be certain "qualitive" changes of a radical nature of our cognitive level and perspective. One of those changes was when humans attained meta-cognition, and it did not happen with the humanity overnight, but every individual soul attained it at some point along their own path. Similarly, the other qualitative step is the so-called "enlightenment", it's been slowly happening over the last few millennia only to a limited number of individuals, and it still keeps happening and will be happening. And just like meta-cognition, it is not the "final" or "ultimate" state in any way, but only a developmental gate and qualitative "ascension" to another cognitive level opening the access to previously unknown levels and paths of consciousness development.

[Eugene I]

Just wanted to summarize certain categories of views within the framework of idealism (there might be others, so feel free to add, or might be sub-variants of the ones listed):

- The Global Consciousness possesses an all-encompassing subjective perspective of the wholeness of the infinity of all conscious states and experiences, including those that are experienced by individual limited subjective perspectives (alters). It also possesses the highest level of cognition and volitional abilities to make decisions and perform actions. This is the view of the theistic objective idealism. Such view faces both the subject combination and experience of the actual infinity philosophical problems. The variants of this view that deny reincarnation (which also denies the consent of the souls to incarnate and experience suffering) also face the notorious moral "problem of evil and suffering" (because it would be unethical for the meta-cognitive global subject to expose the souls/alters to suffering without their pre-consent). Such global subject is the absolute level in the developmental and perspectival hierarchy of the individual subjects.

- The MAL is the global conscious subject, yet its experiences do not encompass the experiences of individual alter-subjects and the MAL does not embrace and experience the actual infinity of all conscious states. As even a stronger version, such MAL is even lacking an ability of meta-cognition and its activities are only governed by "instinctive will". The latter is the BK's view, in which he avoids both the subject combination and the experience of the actual infinity philosophical problems, as well as the moral "problem of evil and suffering". Since BK is not assuming reincarnation, he avoids the "problem of evil" by posing that the MAL is not meta-cognitive and therefore can not be morally accountable for its actions of exposing the alters to suffering.

- There is no global subjective perspective encompassing the wholeness of Consciousness, which means that the Cosmic Consciousness as a whole does not have a single global subjective perspective all-encompassing the actual infinity of all ideas and experiences, including the experiences of the individual subjective perspectives, as well as it does not have the capacity to perform volitional acts from such global perspective. The Global Consciousness, being infinite in its potential to manifest and experience any forms, always exists as a multitude of finite subjective perspectives. This is the view of certain Eastern and non-dual traditions, and is being developed in the modern idealistic philosophy by Miri Albahari (she calls it "Ownerless Consciousness"). Such view also avoids both the subject combination and experience of the actual infinity philosophical problems, and the "problem of evil" does not exist as a moral problem of the Global Consciousness (but only as a moral problem for the individual subjects once they attain meta-cognition).

[Cleric K]

OK, good, we cleared this point of confusion and we both agree that we are speaking about the unlimited potential and the infinity of all possible ideas. In the traditional Christian theology the set of divine logoses was limited to only "good" ones, God would not have "bad" logoses like those of evil or wrong or distorted ideas, that is why I assumed you meant some limited set of living ideas (until you clarified that, thanks).

There's no need for "bad" logoses. Good and evil is not a fundamental duality. Closer to the Center we have simply differentiated and interacting potential. Evil manifests much farther down the road when the perspectives become so fragmented that they can't trace the consequences of their activity.

Not if you consider many NDE, regression therapy and non-dual spiritual experiences suggesting the possibility and actual occurrence of changing one's path to very different courses.

As we've spoken before, NDEs are not reliable method for investigation of the higher worlds because the experiences are strongly colored by personal sensory consciousness (technically speaking - the etheric/life body). In other words, much of these experiences result into a blend between astral experiences (which include personal sympathies and antipathies) and terrestrial thought-forms.

Just wanted to summarize certain categories of views within the framework of idealism (there might be others, so feel free to add, or might be sub-variants of the ones listed):
- ...
- ...
- ...

These variants all carry the baggage of the space-oriented conception of consciousness. Thankfully, today we know that the physical Universe acts much more weirdly that previously supposed. From the perspective of the higher forms of consciousness all this physical behavior makes perfect sense.
I tried to allude to this in the metaphor. There I said that the least problematic way to make the transition from the scientific intellect into Imaginative consciousness is if we imagine that all possible states of being exist all at once, as if superimposed. Every state can be thought of as the interference of the infinite other states, much like in Feynman path integration. This also harmonizes with relativity and what I called healthy solipsism in the essay. There's no difficulty to image states of being within which more and more of the potential interferes constructively. At the same time these states interfere into our current and can be experienced in the form of Imaginations, Inspirations and Intuitions.

[Eugene I]

These variants all carry the baggage of the space-oriented conception of consciousness. Thankfully, today we know that the physical Universe acts much more weirdly that previously supposed. From the perspective of the higher forms of consciousness all this physical behavior makes perfect sense.
I tried to allude to this in the metaphor. There I said that the least problematic way to make the transition from the scientific intellect into Imaginative consciousness is if we imagine that all possible states of being exist all at once, as if superimposed. Every state can be thought of as the interference of the infinite other states, much like in Feynman path integration. This also harmonizes with relativity and what I called healthy solipsism in the essay. There's no difficulty to image states of being within which more and more of the potential interferes constructively. At the same time these states interfere into our current and can be experienced in the form of Imaginations, Inspirations and Intuitions.

That's definitely a possibility and an interesting model. One thing to note is that in the Feinman's path integral theory there is no assumption or proof that these "virtual" alternative paths actually exist as physical realities, it is only a mathematical tool that allows an alternative formulation of certain laws of physics. In fact making such assumption (that the particles or waves actually travel through all the alternative paths) would contradict many other laws of physics. Similarly, we can assume that the actual conscious experiences and ideas are a result of the infinite number of interferences of some virtual states and ideas within the interconnected fabric of the Global Consciousness. We do not know how exactly such process of interaction and manifestation works in the collective subconscious. The question is, again, whether this infinite variety of states and ideations are actually consciously experienced within some all-encompassing subjective perspective, or whether they only exist as "virtual" potentialities until they are actually experienced by some individual subjects of experience.

From the experiential point of view, all states and ideas we ever have are actually consciously experienced from our subjective perspective. We do not know if it is possible for any conscious states or ideations to actually "exist" while not being experienced from any subjective perspective. Obviously, we can not experience such virtual ideations, because the very act of their experiencing by us will make them to be "actual experiences", so we can neither prove nor disprove experimentally that such virtual ideations may exist or not. We again come back to the question of the validity of the Platonic paradigm: are all potential ideas exist as some actualities/realities even when they are not consciously experienced by any conscious subjects, or are they simply "theoretical" potentialities with no actual existence until they become experienced within some actual subjective conscious experience. Your phrase "if we imagine that all possible states of being exist all at once" suggests that you assume the Platonic answer to this question, unless you also assume the existence of the global all-encompassing subjective perspective that consciously experiences all such possible states of being in their infinite variety all at once. In the latter case it's not a Platonic view anymore, but still a view based on the assumption of the existence of the all-encompassing global subject of experience.

I need to mention that your view "There I said that the least problematic way to make the transition from the scientific intellect into Imaginative consciousness is if we imagine that all possible states of being exist all at once" is actually very problematic, it runs into multiple mathematical paradoxes, such as a possibility of the existence of the set of all sets (does the state of all states includes itself as a state? - we run here into the Russel's paradox), and the hypothesis of a possibility of the experiencing of the actual infinity. This is a danger of using imagination without discretion and of abandoning the ground of the actual conscious experience (because in our actual conscious experience we never experience the actual infinity or the state of all states, we can only imagine such things as ideal abstractions). Once we start imagining we can imagine almost everything (including Santa Clauses, flying spaghetti monsters, actual infinities or the global subjective perspective), the power of imagination that consciousness has is fascinating and unlimited, and there is nothing wrong with it. The problem becomes when we start believing without doubts and discretion that our imaginations represent the actual truths and realities. As opposed to such slippery imaginative approach, in the subjective idealism it is posed that only those things actually exist that can be actually consciously experienced, and they actually exist only when they are actually consciously experienced by at least one subject of experience. This does not mean that we would refuse to use our imagination, it just means that we would use it use it carefully and with discretion, with understanding that it is too easy to fool ourselves into believing in the truths of our imaginations.

[Cleric K]

That's definitely a possibility and an interesting model. One thing to note is that in the Feinman's path integral theory there is no assumption or proof that these "virtual" alternative paths actually exist as physical realities, it is only a mathematical tool that allows an alternative formulation of certain laws of physics.

Of course. This holds true for anything. Can we 'prove' that particles exist? When they pass through the double slit are their particles or waves? All we have are our thoughts about perceptions. This is the only self-proving thing.

I need to mention that your view ... is actually very problematic, it runs into multiple mathematical paradoxes, such as a possibility of the existence of the set of all sets (does the state of all states includes itself as a state? - we run here into the Russel's paradox), and the hypothesis of a possibility of the experiencing of the actual infinity.

I'm perfectly aware. That's why I stress that it's a metaphor and should in no way be turned into an intellectual model of everything. We can never build reality out of abstract thoughts. We can map between abstract models and perceptions but can't convert them.
In our time we're in a peculiar situation. We can't really overcome the habits of mind that keep snapping back to the abstract sensory thinking. Science simply doesn't consider the possibility for any other mode of cognition besides the abstract model building. Mysticism reaches only to the threshold, where cognition ceases and all that is left is nebulous feeling - it doesn't continue beyond the threshold where cognition is found again in a higher form.

This is a danger of using imagination without discretion and of abandoning the ground of the actual conscious experience (because in our actual conscious experience we never experience the actual infinity or the state of all states, we can only imagine such things as ideal abstractions).

I see that my descriptions of Imaginative consciousness are confused for unleashing the powers of ordinary imagination (fantasy). I tried to emphasize on this in the essay. Let me try in another way. Science considers that our consciousness is only the final output of the biological processing of the brain, similarly to the pixels of a screen, which tell us nothing about the actual currents running through the hardware, which precede the activation of the pixels. Science strives to build a model of the hardware which itself lives as pixels on the screen. That's why reality is always off-limits, even if we build a successful model it will still be only a model in the pixels and the actual processes behind will forever remain unknowable as the 'thing in itself'. Mysticism goes a step further and succeeds in de-identifying with the pixels and at least experience the 'screen' as something more fundamental. Yet this screen is taken as the ground reality which forces the mystic to consider everything that lights up as pixels only as floating images without any underlying causes and structure.

Gnostic meditation leads us beyond the threshold of the screen into the cognitive experience of the processes that precede the lighting up of the pixels. Science rejects this as impossible. The mystic rejects this because he considers that he has already reached the ground reality at the screen and anything more than this can be no more that buildup of fantasies. Imaginative consciousness has nothing to do with fantasizing abstract explanations. I stressed on this in the essay: "Here's the place to dispel any doubts that what we are describing has anything to do wild fantasy. It's the exact opposite of fantasy. In fantasy we impose our will against reality. Here we use our will to touch and feel reality. We are only interested in our activity as far as it can confront something real." In this sense we're not interested in lighting up pixels in the ordinary thinking and imagination but explore how they come to be by becoming cognitively conscious within the deep 'hardware'. When we think or even fantasize we surely observe the output pixels but we are also in position to go 'meta' about. Materialism and mysticism alike consider any cognitive experience of processes that precede the pixels on the screen to be a taboo. But even superficial view already shows that we can go deeper. For example I may be thinking that I have to go buy bread - that's a thought pixel on the screen. But I can go deeper than this. I can understand many thing about why I have that thought, it's not just a pixel appearing out of a black box. The feeling of hunger, the fact that I have to provide for my family, the idea of the way the biological organism works, the higher needs for keeping me alive, such that I can accomplish certain other tasks and so on. This is a trivial example but we can go in the depths for anything. Most importantly for things as we are discussing here. The difficulty is that the habits of thinking today fiercely refuse to even allow for the possibility that such depths can be known in any other way than abstract speculating (in the Freudian psychoanalytical sense) - that is, still as pixels of a model of the depths, and no real experience of the depths. I tried to hint at the principle way in which we attain to this other mode of cognition, in my other essay that I posted here. I won't spend much more time on this because it is useless unless it's not allowed at least as a possibility that having actual fully conscious cognition of the deep layers of M@L can be an option. If anything that I say immediately snaps back into "well, that's just abstract pixels on the screen" we are still in the grips of Flat M@L.

From the experiential point of view, all states and ideas we ever have are actually consciously experienced from our subjective perspective. We do not know if it is possible for any conscious states or ideations to actually "exist" while not being experienced from any subjective perspective. Obviously, we can not experience such virtual ideations, because the very act of their experiencing by us will make them to be "actual experiences", so we can neither prove nor disprove experimentally that such virtual ideations may exist or not. We again come back to the question of the validity of the Platonic paradigm: are all potential ideas exist as some actualities/realities even when they are not consciously experienced by any conscious subjects, or are they simply "theoretical" potentialities with no actual existence until they become experienced within some actual subjective conscious experience. Your phrase "if we imagine that all possible states of being exist all at once" suggests that you assume the Platonic answer to this question, unless you also assume the existence of the global all-encompassing subjective perspective that consciously experiences all such possible states of being in their infinite variety all at once. In the latter case it's not a Platonic view anymore, but still a view based on the assumption of the existence of the all-encompassing global subject of experience.

All these thoughts refer to the pixels on the screen. This is another form of snapping back to the old patterns of thought. We are contemplating the pixels of a stone and wonder: is this real, is it virtual, is there anything besides the sensory pixels? We can't tell. But the fact is that I can bump my foot in the stone and experience real pain. So it's not about conjuring up some thought out explanations of reality but exploring the actual relations between the elements of experience. All talks about potentialities, who, when and how experiences them, simply weigh us down with abstract baggage. We're acting like a learned man that insists that we should take food only when we have a complete and consistent model of the digestive system and the molecular structure of the food. Luckily we're not doing that, otherwise humanity would have been long extinct. It's not the problem that we want to know something about these things. The problem is that we insist to know them only in the framework of thought that we are comfortable with. It's similar in our discussion. We refuse to acknowledge the possibility of states of being which interfere in a much more encompassing way with other beings because it doesn't fit well in our current mode of consciousness. We imagine that this would be too overwhelming. We can barely take the burden of our own consciousness, what's left for a perspective that takes the burden of many other perspectives. But it's not up to our elementary thinking to decide if this is possible or not. If it was up to us, many thinkers would also imagine that the existence of the stone is implausible because it requires some mystical 'space' in which the stone should exist and so on. Yet this philosophizing doesn't at the least change the fact that the thinker can bump his foot in the stone. We should take a similar stance in regards to higher knowledge. We start with the facts, the interactions that we experience. What we fantasize behind these interactions doesn't change much. Before passing judgment on the higher beings we should recognize the ideas, prejudices, opinions, etc. that we bump into all the time and which format our intellectual cognition and desires. The more we do this, the more we understand what is it for the Spiritual activity to be locked into certain patterns of thoughts, emotional loops and so on. The more we liberate from these, not by closing our eyes for them but by actually comprehending them from a higher perspective, the more we'll find it quite natural to comprehend also other spiritual perspectives.

[Lou Gold]

There's no need for "bad" logoses. Good and evil is not a fundamental duality. Closer to the Center we have simply differentiated and interacting potential. Evil manifests much farther down the road when the perspectives become so fragmented that they can't trace the consequences of their activity.

Can you name something that does not have an opposite?

[Eugene I]

I stressed on this in the essay: "Here's the place to dispel any doubts that what we are describing has anything to do wild fantasy. It's the exact opposite of fantasy. In fantasy we impose our will against reality. Here we use our will to touch and feel reality. We are only interested in our activity as far as it can confront something real." In this sense we're not interested in lighting up pixels in the ordinary thinking and imagination but explore how they come to be by becoming cognitively conscious within the deep 'hardware'. When we think or even fantasize we surely observe the output pixels but we are also in position to go 'meta' about. Materialism and mysticism alike consider any cognitive experience of processes that precede the pixels on the screen to be a taboo. But even superficial view already shows that we can go deeper. For example I may be thinking that I have to go buy bread - that's a thought pixel on the screen. But I can go deeper than this. I can understand many thing about why I have that thought, it's not just a pixel appearing out of a black box. The feeling of hunger, the fact that I have to provide for my family, the idea of the way the biological organism works, the higher needs for keeping me alive, such that I can accomplish certain other tasks and so on. This is a trivial example but we can go in the depths for anything. Most importantly for things as we are discussing here. The difficulty is that the habits of thinking today fiercely refuse to even allow for the possibility that such depths can be known in any other way than abstract speculating (in the Freudian psychoanalytical sense) - that is, still as pixels of a model of the depths, and no real experience of the depths. I tried to hint at the principle way in which we attain to this other mode of cognition, in my other essay that I posted here. I won't spend much more time on this because it is useless unless it's not allowed at least as a possibility that having actual fully conscious cognition of the deep layers of M@L can be an option. If anything that I say immediately snaps back into "well, that's just abstract pixels on the screen" we are still in the grips of Flat M@L. ...

All these thoughts refer to the pixels on the screen. This is another form of snapping back to the old patterns of thought. We are contemplating the pixels of a stone and wonder: is this real, is it virtual, is there anything besides the sensory pixels? We can't tell. But the fact is that I can bump my foot in the stone and experience real pain. So it's not about conjuring up some thought out explanations of reality but exploring the actual relations between the elements of experience. All talks about potentialities, who, when and how experiences them, simply weigh us down with abstract baggage. We're acting like a learned man that insists that we should take food only when we have a complete and consistent model of the digestive system and the molecular structure of the food. Luckily we're not doing that, otherwise humanity would have been long extinct. It's not the problem that we want to know something about these things. The problem is that we insist to know them only in the framework of thought that we are comfortable with. It's similar in our discussion. We refuse to acknowledge the possibility of states of being which interfere in a much more encompassing way with other beings because it doesn't fit well in our current mode of consciousness. We imagine that this would be too overwhelming. We can barely take the burden of our own consciousness, what's left for a perspective that takes the burden of many other perspectives. But it's not up to our elementary thinking to decide if this is possible or not. If it was up to us, many thinkers would also imagine that the existence of the stone is implausible because it requires some mystical 'space' in which the stone should exist and so on. Yet this philosophizing doesn't at the least change the fact that the thinker can bump his foot in the stone. We should take a similar stance in regards to higher knowledge. We start with the facts, the interactions that we experience. What we fantasize behind these interactions doesn't change much. Before passing judgment on the higher beings we should recognize the ideas, prejudices, opinions, etc. that we bump into all the time and which format our intellectual cognition and desires. The more we do this, the more we understand what is it for the Spiritual activity to be locked into certain patterns of thoughts, emotional loops and so on. The more we liberate from these, not by closing our eyes for them but by actually comprehending them from a higher perspective, the more we'll find it quite natural to comprehend also other spiritual perspectives.

OK, we finally arrived at the most interesting and key topic: can we penetrate into reality any further beyond the ground-base "pixels" of the direct perceptional experience and beyond our rational and intuitive thinking and imaginations with which we always strive to extrapolate the reality beyond the pixels? I do not know any other ways to know other than the direct experience of phenomena and cognition (that includes rational and intuitive thinking and imaginations). I can't claim that this is all that can be available to conscious beings. You seem to claim that you possess some other mysterious experiential-cognitive faculties that allow you to acquire deeper knowledge of the world of ideas/causes behind the "screen" of perceptions, and I admit that I do not have such abilities. Since I have no confirmation of such faculties based on my own experience, I have no grounds to believe you, but on the other hand, have no grounds to prove you wrong either, so my only option is to remain agnostic and indecisive about it. But of course, being a long-time meditator, I always observe and try to get insight into the origins, root causes and interconnectedness of the thinking and perceptional phenomena of my direct experience, I always try to push the boundary and look behind the screen using my intuition. But being honest with myself, I never fully believe that my intuitions are fully true. I'm aware of the interconnectedness of all things in the universe, but honestly do not know and never claim to know how exactly this interconnectedness works "behind the screen" of thinking and perceptions. In Buddhism this is simply called "dependent co-arising of phenomena". We can always trace causal patterns in our stream of phenomena (using our intuition of scientific models), nevertheless I can not know for sure how exactly this patterns are produced - whether it's a result of a super-computer simulation, or some natural forces, or a process of ideations in the divine mind.

[Lou Gold]

But being honest with myself, I never fully believe that my intuitions are fully true. I'm aware of the interconnectedness of all things in the universe, but honestly do not know and never claim to know how exactly this interconnectedness works "behind the screen" of thinking and perceptions. In Buddhism this is simply called "dependent co-arising of phenomena". We can always trace causal patterns in our stream of phenomena (using our intuition of scientific models), nevertheless I can not know for sure how exactly this patterns are produced - whether it's a result of a super-computer simulation, or some natural forces, or a process of ideations in the divine mind.

YES! Which is why we have the ongoing process of trial-and-error. Way-finding versus truth-seeking is the basis of much debate but, in-process, when you know, you know. Until you don't.

[AshvinP]

There's no need for "bad" logoses. Good and evil is not a fundamental duality. Closer to the Center we have simply differentiated and interacting potential. Evil manifests much farther down the road when the perspectives become so fragmented that they can't trace the consequences of their activity.

Can you name something that does not have an opposite?

Can you name a 'thing' which does not reveal more about itself upon closer examination? For one, a 'thing' always becomes a process upon examination. Good is the process of knowing integration while Evil is the process of fragmentation as Cleric said. The latter allows us to be deceived into thinking we are not being harmed when harming others, because we cannot "trace the consequences". Otherwise, we would always desire to act in concert with the integrative forces of Reality.

As for that which does not have an opposite - how about existence? Or consciousness? Claims to non-existence or phenomenal non-consciousness are immediately self-defeating.