Hedge90 wrote: ↑Tue Aug 10, 2021 7:27 pm
This question was among the first that came up in me when I was first introduced to BK's ideas. This, of course, is entirely speculative, but I can't help but think, if MAL "does things" (i.e. engages in creative process), even if just instinctively, by its nature, there should probably be a goal for this - some teleological purpose TOWARDS which these instinctive creative urges drive it.
Now, if BK is right (and I'd say he probably is) in that MAL has no metacognition to begin with, then WE (and any other beings capable of metacognition) ARE its metacognition. That is to say, it's not MAL that has a plan for us, it's we who are tasked with finding a purpose for MAL. It is us who bear the responsibility of justifying existence itself, and to develop further, learning about MAl (and thus, ourselves) everything it cannot know of itself without us.
May it be that at the end of the line is a state where the instinctively creative MAL, through an unimaginably long and vast process of parsing information through ever more developed alters, becomes an intelligent, metacognitive MAL, one that mostly fits our image of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent God?
Wouldn't it fit our notion of Heaven if, after experiencing the myriad variations and possible permutations of reality, learning about what evokes joy, love and peace, and now looking at our own creation through the lens of not just the instinctive creative drive, but also all the insights we've gathered empirically, we've imagined the best possible world of all worlds into being, to lay to rest therein?
Beautiful said. I am on a very similiar way of thinking.
There are some objections to it, for which I have not yet found a good answer. Maybe you can help out Here:
1. What is the standard how to determine what MAL "likes" or "dislikes", what to focus on and what to get rid of? I mean, if love is a part of concious awareness, fear and hate is as well - first, in a complete neutral way. Is it human ethics that guide the way (which is fallible) or may there be a more objective, devine standard?
2. If there already have been higher states of consciousness and insights, like for example with Jesus, Buddha or several hindu-gurus, why is it that the majority of mankind is still living as if those insights don't exist? Why does our collective human consciousness not adapt to those insights (if they are true...) more than it does right now? Why do we have times of great destruction like during World War 1 and 2, If MAL should already know itself enough in order to guide us in a proper way?
If we can like and dislike things, so can MAL. But as I conceptualise it, MAL's likes and dislikes are way more abstract than ours - with the caveat that, with sufficiently deep deconstruction, our likes and dislikes would also become complex manifestations and tangles of very abstract likes and dislikes. I'm thinking of things like "aesthetic" and "ugly", which, at their core, correspond to certain variations of "symmetrical" and "regular". Order.
So, if "order" is the highest good, why didn't MAL just envision a perfect globe for itself and contemplate its beautiful orderliness for all eternity? Well, imo, because the MORE COMPLEX and orderly a "thing" is, the MORE SATISFACTION is brings. A song that has only three notes is orderly, and can even be good and evoke positive feelings. But can it evoke THE SAME MAGNITUDE of feelings as an intricately woven, layered symphony?
So, in cosmic terms, I'd say Good = Order + Complexity, and Evil = Chaos + Deterioration of Complexity. The reason why MAL - and also our lives - are dynamic and forever in movement because in order to find higher good than where you currently are, you will necessarily have to cross chaos (since the next, more complex order you build will require new experimentation).
As o your second question, I think we shouldn't equate our historical timeline with the order of blooming of the thought structures of MAL. Christ or Buddha wasn't necessarily "before" us from the point of view of MAL. We are just experiencing it as a chronological story, but for MAL, it's a huge whole where everything is connected to everything else.
re: Love - yes I agree (although I am not sure what is meant by "lack of emotion"), but again the fullest expression of Love is that which is freely desired and meaningfully enriched by our highest thoughts. It is not love out of naïve sentiment of connectedness with others, but Love born in the full clarity of consciousness which freely desires to be connected with all others.
I meant that I think love is the natural state of consciousness. It stems from freedom and unity, and thus the less hindrances and obstructions there are in the form of emotions obscuring it (anxiety, desire, fear, etc.), the less one can be connected to it. Maybe "the lack of any other emotion" would be a better way to put it.
Right, but I am weary of associating it with "natural state of consciousness". Because from "pure" instinctive perspective, no such Love can exist. It only comes to fruition by way of self-conscious knowing perspective who then freely seeks to selflessly raise up other perspectives by way of all 'lower' virtues. Put another way, unknowing feeling of Unity is not sufficient for fullest expression of Love. If by "natural state" we mean what has and will continue to naturally evolve from within the metamorphoses of Spirit (MAL) via self-knowing humans, then we agree.
"Most people would sooner regard themselves as a piece of lava in the moon than as an 'I'"
Hedge90 wrote: ↑Tue Aug 10, 2021 7:27 pm
This question was among the first that came up in me when I was first introduced to BK's ideas. This, of course, is entirely speculative, but I can't help but think, if MAL "does things" (i.e. engages in creative process), even if just instinctively, by its nature, there should probably be a goal for this - some teleological purpose TOWARDS which these instinctive creative urges drive it.
Now, if BK is right (and I'd say he probably is) in that MAL has no metacognition to begin with, then WE (and any other beings capable of metacognition) ARE its metacognition. That is to say, it's not MAL that has a plan for us, it's we who are tasked with finding a purpose for MAL. It is us who bear the responsibility of justifying existence itself, and to develop further, learning about MAl (and thus, ourselves) everything it cannot know of itself without us.
May it be that at the end of the line is a state where the instinctively creative MAL, through an unimaginably long and vast process of parsing information through ever more developed alters, becomes an intelligent, metacognitive MAL, one that mostly fits our image of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent God?
Wouldn't it fit our notion of Heaven if, after experiencing the myriad variations and possible permutations of reality, learning about what evokes joy, love and peace, and now looking at our own creation through the lens of not just the instinctive creative drive, but also all the insights we've gathered empirically, we've imagined the best possible world of all worlds into being, to lay to rest therein?
Beautiful said. I am on a very similiar way of thinking.
There are some objections to it, for which I have not yet found a good answer. Maybe you can help out Here:
1. What is the standard how to determine what MAL "likes" or "dislikes", what to focus on and what to get rid of? I mean, if love is a part of concious awareness, fear and hate is as well - first, in a complete neutral way. Is it human ethics that guide the way (which is fallible) or may there be a more objective, devine standard?
2. If there already have been higher states of consciousness and insights, like for example with Jesus, Buddha or several hindu-gurus, why is it that the majority of mankind is still living as if those insights don't exist? Why does our collective human consciousness not adapt to those insights (if they are true...) more than it does right now? Why do we have times of great destruction like during World War 1 and 2, If MAL should already know itself enough in order to guide us in a proper way?
I agree with Hedge on #1. If we think of them tools which serve integration (desirable for knowing beings) or fragmentation (not desirable) that should help. Fear can serve integration in some cases, like healthy fear of fragmentation. None of these relations are absolute. Human ethics as embodied in societal instituions is a dim shadow of an objectively shared realm of moral intuitions, which can be developed within individual souls now but will only be fully expressed far into the future.
That addresses #2 as well, the Buddha and Christ impulses were not immediate or one time events, they are only now beginning to unfold in fully conscious ways (potentially). We should not elevate what "should" be over what is. We really must derive all ought from is. The full richness of what is will make all such concerns about what should be pale in comparison, or at least that is my informed faith which can also be verified by experience.
"Most people would sooner regard themselves as a piece of lava in the moon than as an 'I'"
dachmidt wrote: ↑Wed Aug 11, 2021 9:18 am
Beautiful said. I am on a very similiar way of thinking.
There are some objections to it, for which I have not yet found a good answer. Maybe you can help out Here:
1. What is the standard how to determine what MAL "likes" or "dislikes", what to focus on and what to get rid of? I mean, if love is a part of concious awareness, fear and hate is as well - first, in a complete neutral way. Is it human ethics that guide the way (which is fallible) or may there be a more objective, devine standard?
2. If there already have been higher states of consciousness and insights, like for example with Jesus, Buddha or several hindu-gurus, why is it that the majority of mankind is still living as if those insights don't exist? Why does our collective human consciousness not adapt to those insights (if they are true...) more than it does right now? Why do we have times of great destruction like during World War 1 and 2, If MAL should already know itself enough in order to guide us in a proper way?
Re #1: if we consider the MAL development as naturalistically driven by instincts (including instinctual "likes" and "dislikes"), the question arises - where such instincts came from and why these instincts and not any other among all possible instincts? Why MAL would "like" symmetric forms or ethical acts and "dislike" non-symmetric or unethical? It is possible that such instincts also developed naturally. My hypothesis is that in its "ground" state MAL is simply consciousness with intrinsic ability to express and experience an unlimited variety of any kinds of forms (images, instincts, perceptions, feelings, thoughts etc) and originally it does this in a random way. However, some forms among this variety of random forms become structured in a certain way (including randomly forming certain "instincts", "likes" and "dislikes"), and some of these structures become self-sustaining and self-developing, while other random structures disintegrate because they can not sustain themselves. It is sort of natural selection of conscious form-structures. Apparently we live in a huge structure formed based on a set of instincts that proved to be productive enough to create the world where we live. As an analogy, there is an infinite variety of iterative math formulas with most of them, when mapped to a picture, making random unstructured images. However, some formulas make fascinating structures, such as z(n+1) = z(n)^2 + c that makes this wonderful Mandelbrot fractal
"Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kanzas anymore" Dorothy
dachmidt wrote: ↑Wed Aug 11, 2021 9:18 am
Beautiful said. I am on a very similiar way of thinking.
There are some objections to it, for which I have not yet found a good answer. Maybe you can help out Here:
1. What is the standard how to determine what MAL "likes" or "dislikes", what to focus on and what to get rid of? I mean, if love is a part of concious awareness, fear and hate is as well - first, in a complete neutral way. Is it human ethics that guide the way (which is fallible) or may there be a more objective, devine standard?
2. If there already have been higher states of consciousness and insights, like for example with Jesus, Buddha or several hindu-gurus, why is it that the majority of mankind is still living as if those insights don't exist? Why does our collective human consciousness not adapt to those insights (if they are true...) more than it does right now? Why do we have times of great destruction like during World War 1 and 2, If MAL should already know itself enough in order to guide us in a proper way?
Re #1: if we consider the MAL development as naturalistically driven by instincts (including instinctual "likes" and "dislikes"), the question arises - where such instincts came from and why these instincts and not any other among all possible instincts? Why MAL would "like" symmetric forms or ethical acts and "dislike" non-symmetric or unethical? It is possible that such instincts also developed naturally. My hypothesis is that in its "ground" state MAL is simply consciousness with intrinsic ability to express and experience an unlimited variety of any kinds of forms (images, instincts, perceptions, feelings, thoughts etc) and originally it does this in a random way. However, some forms among this variety of random forms become structured in a certain way (including randomly forming certain "instincts", "likes" and "dislikes"), and some of these structures become self-sustaining and self-developing, while other random structures disintegrate because they can not sustain themselves. It is sort of natural selection of conscious form-structures. Apparently we live in a huge structure formed based on a set of instincts that proved to be productive enough to create the world where we live. As an analogy, there is an infinite variety of iterative math formulas with most of them, when mapped to a picture, making random unstructured images. However, some formulas make fascinating structures, such as z(n+1) = z(n)^2 + c that makes this wonderful Mandelbrot fractal
I am curious to see the "random unstructured" image - could you provide an example? On a purely philosophical-scientific basis, I have a hard time with the "randomness" aspect. I don't see how once posited at the "beginning", it can be evolved out later. I think the material Darwinist may have the same issue, but they just keep extending "time" out long enough to make it seem like "random" mutations, which are going to be mostly deleterious to survival, will not be a problem in sufficiently evolved biological systems. It almost seems as if the materialist has an easier time encompassing true randomness, though, because it is strictly bottom-up process with individual entities. The idealist who says MAL can have truly random ideations opens the door for entire worlds being wiped out by one such random ideation. Maybe I am wrong about that... I am not really sure. But the Mandelbrot fractal shows how we can have inner lawfulness from the "beginning" and still generate true novelty without complete predictability. So we can still have completely natural selection and evolution without true "randomness" of 'mutations' in the ideations.
"Most people would sooner regard themselves as a piece of lava in the moon than as an 'I'"
dachmidt wrote: ↑Wed Aug 11, 2021 9:18 am
Beautiful said. I am on a very similiar way of thinking.
There are some objections to it, for which I have not yet found a good answer. Maybe you can help out Here:
1. What is the standard how to determine what MAL "likes" or "dislikes", what to focus on and what to get rid of? I mean, if love is a part of concious awareness, fear and hate is as well - first, in a complete neutral way. Is it human ethics that guide the way (which is fallible) or may there be a more objective, devine standard?
2. If there already have been higher states of consciousness and insights, like for example with Jesus, Buddha or several hindu-gurus, why is it that the majority of mankind is still living as if those insights don't exist? Why does our collective human consciousness not adapt to those insights (if they are true...) more than it does right now? Why do we have times of great destruction like during World War 1 and 2, If MAL should already know itself enough in order to guide us in a proper way?
Re #1: if we consider the MAL development as naturalistically driven by instincts (including instinctual "likes" and "dislikes"), the question arises - where such instincts came from and why these instincts and not any other among all possible instincts? Why MAL would "like" symmetric forms or ethical acts and "dislike" non-symmetric or unethical? It is possible that such instincts also developed naturally. My hypothesis is that in its "ground" state MAL is simply consciousness with intrinsic ability to express and experience an unlimited variety of any kinds of forms (images, instincts, perceptions, feelings, thoughts etc) and originally it does this in a random way. However, some forms among this variety of random forms become structured in a certain way (including randomly forming certain "instincts", "likes" and "dislikes"), and some of these structures become self-sustaining and self-developing, while other random structures disintegrate because they can not sustain themselves. It is sort of natural selection of conscious form-structures. Apparently we live in a huge structure formed based on a set of instincts that proved to be productive enough to create the world where we live. As an analogy, there is an infinite variety of iterative math formulas with most of them, when mapped to a picture, making random unstructured images. However, some formulas make fascinating structures, such as z(n+1) = z(n)^2 + c that makes this wonderful Mandelbrot fractal
I am curious to see the "random unstructured" image - could you provide an example? On a purely philosophical-scientific basis, I have a hard time with the "randomness" aspect. I don't see how once posited at the "beginning", it can be evolved out later. I think the material Darwinist may have the same issue, but they just keep extending "time" out long enough to make it seem like "random" mutations, which are going to be mostly deleterious to survival, will not be a problem in sufficiently evolved biological systems. It almost seems as if the materialist has an easier time encompassing true randomness, though, because it is strictly bottom-up process with individual entities. The idealist who says MAL can have truly random ideations opens the door for entire worlds being wiped out by one such random ideation. Maybe I am wrong about that... I am not really sure. But the Mandelbrot fractal shows how we can have inner lawfulness from the "beginning" and still generate true novelty without complete predictability. So we can still have completely natural selection and evolution without true "randomness" of 'mutations' in the ideations.
I guess it's very difficult for us to distinguish between randomness and patterns we simply do not know yet. According to Jung, even quarks and photons within quantum fields manifest themself according to concious archetypal patterns and synchronicity. We just have no overview of the quantum field in order to detect those patterns. The same might be true for evolutionary biology, where quantum changes also play a significant role in DNA development.
A MAL with entirely random instincts would not have any way to structure its mental processes. It would be pure chaos, with every possible variation of its thought patterns existing at the same time. Now, this is theoretically not impossible, and we may just happen to live within a particularly well-structured ideation (which, if MAL extrs truly randomly, may end any moment, mind you). So given that we live in an internally pretty consistent reality, that can be very well described by mathematical equations, I'd deem it much likely that MAl "likes" regularity and simmetry.
Also, as I said, the potential of every emotion we feel has to be present within MAL in its pure form, albeit unmanifested. So the very fact that we find joy in aesthetic things tells me that MAL does, too. Also, music. No evolutionary explanation on why the vibration of air in particular patterns can make you feel emotions so strong that they can be reasonably described as transcendental. And, surprise surprise, music is also based on mathematics: the notes we use are regular dividends on a scale (sorry, English is not my native language and that's the best I can do in terms of maths), and rhtytms also fit mathematical patterns.
To Ashvin and Hedge: I'm basically hypothetically posing that there might be different scenarios of the MAL/universe evolutionary process:
1. The "random multiverse" bottom-up scenario: there are no built-in "instincts" or "laws" that govern the unfolding of the MAL ideations, and because of the absence of such laws, the ideations unfold randomly in an unlimited variety of laws, instincts, forms and structures, with the "spaces" occupied by these structures not necessarily overlapping with each other and possibly isolated, sort of like semi-autonomous realms of conscious structures. Because they are random, most of them disintegrate, but some of them that have the laws appropriate for maintaining self-sustainable structures and protecting them from the surrounding chaos will survive and further evolve and develop. The advantage of this scenario is that no explanation is needed for the pre-existence of a specific set of instincts or laws.
2. The consciousness universe with built-in laws/instincts - the BK's version. This is still a bottom-up scenario where more evolved higher-cognitive-level structures develop based on the more primitive instincts. This scenario still has an explanatory gap: where did these instincts/laws come from, and why these particular laws and not any others? Is it because the MAL tried different ones and failed (which would essentially bring us to scenario #1), or is it because these particular laws/instincts are "just there" and could not be of any other kind?
3. The top-down "theistic" scenario where the MAL is a highly developed and meta-cognitive Mind that (for some reason) creates the universe of alters and guides its evolution based on pre-meditated set of laws.
4. A little crazy scenario where both #2 and #3 (and may be even #1) are true - it is where the evolution of MAL "in time" unfolds according to #1 or #2, but "beyond time" the "instinctual state" and "omniscient state" co-exist simultaneously and it is impossible to say which one caused which.
Any other scenarios?
I'm actually not personally biased towards any of those scenarios, but, as a curious amateur philosopher and a "possibilian", still want to explore all of them as possibilities and know their pros and cons.
"Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kanzas anymore" Dorothy
I wouldn't exclude the random universe scenario you've described in point 1. However, in that case, I think it would be reasonable to assume that while ontologically we have a perfectly neutral and random MAL, the level of dissociation that constitutes our universe - so, a sub-MAL - has the characteristics that I have delineated in my version.
I think both scenarios are theoretically possible, and here I'll just go in the direction I intuitively like more, and will assume that MAL has certain built-in archetypes and instinctual drives. I like my MAl to have just a little bit of an antropomorphic-teleological flavour, thanks
