Philosophical Speculations

Eugene I wrote: ↑Tue Mar 23, 2021 9:09 pm One more comment. Since I used to be a very devoted Christian, I very well understand the psychological motives of Christian and any other monotheistic faith and I see no problem with that. Many of us souls on our developmental path have a deep longing in our heart to connect to something much bigger than we are, to a highest-level Divinity in whom we can find the truth that we are seeking, our meanings to live and goals to achieve, who we can love and be loved, by whom we will be protected and guided. This is very understandable and it is indeed an efficient developmental spiritual path, and there are indeed such Divinities in the universe and soul communities grouped around them. And as a consequence, such souls tend to believe that the whole universe is structured so that their Divinity of choice the Core and the Creator of the Universe, such view fits very well with their beliefs and spiritual needs, and again, there is nothing wrong with that.

Yet there are other soul personalities that do not have such needs and are more free-spirited and libertarian in their character. They may be still on the path of spiritual development and ascension to higher levels, but they do it in more democratic and decentralized communities where more mature members help and provide council to less mature. Such souls tend not to believe that the whole universe is created and guided by a single universal Divinity. And there is nothing wrong with that too.

In spite of the incompatibility of their worldviews, both paths are possible and both peacefully coexist in the universe, and each soul has a freedom to choose one type of path or the other.

I don't get this one bit. Do you really think Cleric's posts reflect a person who is writing about this stuff from a psychological need for a loving personal God, as opposed to a person who is honestly attempting to articulate what he has experienced? You may disagree that his experiences reflect an actual spiritual reality, but it's beyond any reasonable doubt that they are, in fact, his experiences rather than faith-based assumptions. Perhaps a healthy dose of projection going on here...

Cleric, I would agree with most of what you said, still with the difference that, instead of the Sun in the center, whether it's the Core of the Universe, or the Self-core of the soul in each of us, I envision it as a Light of Awareness equally penetrating the whole space of the individuated fields of Consciousness as well as the wholeness of the Cosmic Consciousness. As I said before, in "my" (a-la Buddhist) scheme, there are definitely progressing levels of spiritual ascension, but they are rather sort-of vertically ascending horizontal layers rather that concentric spheres, which corresponds to the Buddhist levels of progression called "bhumis". And that is not a fantasy, but rather an analogy that comes from my own spiritual experience. So clearly we picture the structure of the world according to our spiritual experiences. It's clear that your spiritual experience is centered around your sense of Self", the "I" that you feel to be the core of your soul, and the higher is the spiritual level of your consciousness, the closer to the core it is felt. You also, like most people, feel that your "I" is your center of experience, the "experiencer", as well as the source of your volitions. This is quite understandable and absolutely normal way people experience themselves and the world. And it is also normal to feel that this same "I"-core, the "seer", is the same "I" of the Divinity of the universe, just like Meister Eckhart wrote "'The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me".

However, the spiritual experience of the advanced practicing Buddhists (and my own as well) is quite different, I hope I described it well before. And one of the hallmarks of it is the absence of any center whatsoever or any subjective perspective, the absence of the experience of any "self" or "I" to which all this experience pertains. It is just not centered around anything. And this feels and is experienced as natural as a "normal" person naturally experiences the self-centered perception of the world. One of the best descriptions of it is probably the Longchenpa "Space without Centre or Edge" . This is the experience of limitless space of Awareness filled with the Clear Light of Awareness, like a hologram. There is no central "source" of Awareness, because all of it is equally Awareness. This is not an experience of some extraordinary state that a practitioner has to get into in deep meditation, but believe or not, absolutely ordinary everyday experience for some of those people. Granted, if someone unprepared would accidentally and suddenly get into such state, it would be quite disorienting and confusing. Thus, if I would draw a cosmological scheme based on such experience, I would not draw it centered around any Core.
So, as you said

About the rest, well, to be honest, I don't see how the pictures you describe don't demand faith As we spoke, the only certain thing (considering the intellectual state up to the mystical) is the existence of consciousness with its screen (world of perceptions) and the fact that we can think about the perceptions and relate them with ideas. Everything else about the souls journeys free to do whatever they want in yonder state after death is in no way different than the belief in the Christian Heaven. The only difference is that the Buddhist Heaven has no God in the garden.

I agree, so what we both do is we just extrapolate and project our intimate spiritual experience and the way we perceive and experience ourselves and the world on the rest of the universe, and this is clearly unverifiable inference, both in your case and in my case.

And the funny (or sad?) thing is, we both hope to find out which one is true after we die. But, if we look at NDE accounts, they are notoriously inconsistent, some reporting the Core-centered and God-Source centered experience, and some other reporting the "infinite space" kind of experiences, and there is also a variety of other blends. So, even in the discarnate form we may not know the ultimate truth about the structure of the universe and the puzzle will remain unsolved. You will continue experiencing the reality in a Core/Self-centered way, meeting Christ (as many NDErs reported), seeing the astral reality structured in such "concentric" way, and will keep believing that this is the actual structure of the reality. And I will be residing in one of the Buddhis pure lands with the Buddhas and in that good company we will keep experiencing the reality as an infinite non-centered space of Awareness. And how will we know which one is the right one? May be the answer is: both are the right ones?

AshvinP wrote: ↑Tue Mar 23, 2021 11:56 pm I don't get this one bit. Do you really think Cleric's posts reflect a person who is writing about this stuff from a psychological need for a loving personal God, as opposed to a person who is honestly attempting to articulate what he has experienced? You may disagree that his experiences reflect an actual spiritual reality, but it's beyond any reasonable doubt that they are, in fact, his experiences rather than faith-based assumptions. Perhaps a healthy dose of projection going on here...

I have no doubt that his descriptions are based on his deep and direct spiritual experiences. I know that because, when I was a Christian, I had spiritual experiences of a similar kind. But now we are talking not only about our intimate experiences, but about the cosmology and the structure of the universe, and here is where the "faith" element comes in, because none of us actually knows the structure of the universe from our own spiritual experience, so what we do is we "project" our experience and the structure of our inner experienced space of the soul onto the whole universe, thus making non-verifiable inferences about it.

Also, when I was a Christian, I would not admit that I was driven by the psychological longing to love and to be loved. But now, looking back at many-years-ago-myself, I can clearly see it. I am not saying that every single Christian is motivated by the same longing, and may be Cleric and you are not ones of them, but I know that many of my fellow Christians in my former parish did, as they openly admitted in many cases. There is a reason Christians so often repeat this affirmation "God loves you", that is simply because they need to love and to be loved in the depths of their hearts, and I don't see anything wrong with that and don't understand why you consider it offending.

And I can openly admit that my motivation towards the Buddhist practice and the state of consciousness is the desire of freedom and liberation, this is one of my highest personal values, together with aesthetic appreciation of beauty and drive for creativity. And I do not have a longing to be loved anymore, as I used to have. I also do not need some spiritual being to define the meanings and values for me, I became self-sufficient and can define my values for myself. So I have no problem admitting that my spiritual path is psychologically driven. One of the key components of the Buddhist practice is being absolutely honest with yourself, seeing and admitting all you psychological hidden-in-the-unconsciousness motivations and desires.

Eugene I wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 12:50 am

AshvinP wrote: ↑Tue Mar 23, 2021 11:56 pm I don't get this one bit. Do you really think Cleric's posts reflect a person who is writing about this stuff from a psychological need for a loving personal God, as opposed to a person who is honestly attempting to articulate what he has experienced? You may disagree that his experiences reflect an actual spiritual reality, but it's beyond any reasonable doubt that they are, in fact, his experiences rather than faith-based assumptions. Perhaps a healthy dose of projection going on here...

I have no doubt that his descriptions are based on his deep and direct spiritual experiences. I know that because, when I was a Christian, I had spiritual experiences of a similar kind. But now we are talking not only about our intimate experiences, but about the cosmology and the structure of the universe, and here is where the "faith" element comes in, because none of us actually knows the structure of the universe from our own spiritual experience, so what we do is we "project" our experience and the structure of our inner experienced space of the soul onto the whole universe, thus making non-verifiable inferences about it.

Also, when I was a Christian, I would not admit that I was driven by the psychological longing to love and to be loved. But now, looking back at many-years-ago-myself, I can clearly see it. I am not saying that every single Christian is motivated by the same longing, and may be Cleric and you are not ones of them, but I know that many of my fellow Christians in my former parish did, as they openly admitted in many cases. There is a reason Christians so often repeat this affirmation "God loves you", that is simply because they need to love and to be loved in the depths of their hearts, and I don't see anything wrong with that and don't understand why you consider it offending.

All I am saying is, Cleric himself is saying his descriptions of the cosmology and structure of reality is based only on what he has experienced and not on any inferences beyond those experiences. The way his posts are written leave no doubt in my mind that his claim is genuine, even if I do not know whether his experiences are true because I have not experienced them myself. Put another way, your speculation about psychological motivations would be reasonable, although perhaps incorrect, if made about my posts on Christ-related stuff, because my posts are relatively short, academic, abstract and light on the details. I do not even claim they are based on direct experiences of spiritual realms that I am aware of. But the same is not true at all of Cleric's posts - there is a qualitative difference there which makes the same psychological speculations totally unreasonable.

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:04 am All I am saying is, Cleric himself is saying his descriptions of the cosmology and structure of reality is based only on what he has experienced and not on any inferences beyond those experiences. The way his posts are written leave no doubt in my mind that his claim is genuine, even if I do not know whether his experiences are true because I have not experienced them myself. Put another way, your speculation about psychological motivations would be reasonable, although perhaps incorrect, if made about my posts on Christ-related stuff, because my posts are relatively short, academic, abstract and light on the details. I do not even claim they are based on direct experiences of spiritual realms that I am aware of. But the same is not true at all of Cleric's posts - there is a qualitative difference there which makes the same psychological speculations totally unreasonable.

There is no way anyone can directly experience the structure of reality of the whole universe. All we experience are only the phenomena of our own private conscious experience. You can not experience my qualia, and I cannot experience yours, and none of us can experience God's. We can only communicate them to each other, perhaps even telepathically, but even when they are communicated, they are still always experienced privately. Therefore, all our claims about the structure of the universe are always extrapolations of our private experiences that we either project into beliefs or into assumptions and inferences. But I would better let Cleric speak for himself here

Eugene I wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:18 am

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:04 am All I am saying is, Cleric himself is saying his descriptions of the cosmology and structure of reality is based only on what he has experienced and not on any inferences beyond those experiences. The way his posts are written leave no doubt in my mind that his claim is genuine, even if I do not know whether his experiences are true because I have not experienced them myself. Put another way, your speculation about psychological motivations would be reasonable, although perhaps incorrect, if made about my posts on Christ-related stuff, because my posts are relatively short, academic, abstract and light on the details. I do not even claim they are based on direct experiences of spiritual realms that I am aware of. But the same is not true at all of Cleric's posts - there is a qualitative difference there which makes the same psychological speculations totally unreasonable.

There is no way anyone can directly experience the structure of reality of the whole universe. All we experience are only the phenomena of our own private conscious experience. You can not experience my qualia, and I cannot experience yours, and none of us can experience God's. We can only communicate them to each other, perhaps even telepathically, but even when they are communicated, they are still always experienced privately. Therefore, all our claims about the structure of the universe are always extrapolations of our private experiences that we either project into beliefs or into assumptions and inferences.

Well, that ties right back into the reason I started the thread. Is that an undeniable truth baked into the structure of reality OR is it perhaps an ontological and/or epistemic limit you take on faith? Not just you, of course, but almost everyone for the last few centuries, including many idealist philosophers. Nietzsche's insight was that those metaphysical divisions and limits are not just a matter of academic philosophical debate, but have deep implications for our perspective on life and spirituality. How can we truly relate to and empathize with others and God if we can never experience their perspectives?

But I would better let Cleric speak for himself here

I don't really see how he could make his rejection of your above assumption more clear than he already did... but OK sure.

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:38 am How can we truly relate to and empathize with others and God if we can never experience their perspectives?

That's the problem, we can't. We don't even know if others and if God exist at all. We can make assumptions (and adopt beliefs) that they do to avoid solipsism or atheism, but those are only assumptions, unverifiable, unfalsifiable. We are imprisoned in our private spaces of experience, at least until we die.

Eugene I wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:52 am

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:38 am How can we truly relate to and empathize with others and God if we can never experience their perspectives?

That's the problem, we can't. We don't even know if others and if God exist at all. We can make assumptions (and adopt beliefs) that they do to avoid solipsism or atheism, but those are only assumptions, unverifiable, unfalsifiable. We are imprisoned in our private spaces of experience, at least until we die.

Might it also be true that the individual is but the appearance of what 'we' feels like? Does anyone think the feeling of bellyache-ness is radically different for others? Consider a situation where a friend is speaking of the memory of a trauma injury and you feel a shiver of pain. Imprisonment or empathy? Feelings can be the appearance of connectivity.

Lou Gold wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 2:11 am

Eugene I wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:52 am

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:38 am How can we truly relate to and empathize with others and God if we can never experience their perspectives?

That's the problem, we can't. We don't even know if others and if God exist at all. We can make assumptions (and adopt beliefs) that they do to avoid solipsism or atheism, but those are only assumptions, unverifiable, unfalsifiable. We are imprisoned in our private spaces of experience, at least until we die.

Might it also be true that the individual is but the appearance of what 'we' feels like? Does anyone think the feeling of bellyache-ness is radically different for others? Consider a situation where a friend is speaking of the memory of a trauma injury and you feel a shiver of pain. Imprisonment or empathy? Feelings can be the appearance of connectivity.

Yeah, it's truly terrifying to think genuine empathy is not possible because the only other possibility is perpetual war. It's no wonder people today feel more alienated and isolated than ever when the best we have to offer them is, "you are imprisoned in your private space of experience until you die".

AshvinP wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 3:02 am

Lou Gold wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 2:11 am

Eugene I wrote: ↑Wed Mar 24, 2021 1:52 am
That's the problem, we can't. We don't even know if others and if God exist at all. We can make assumptions (and adopt beliefs) that they do to avoid solipsism or atheism, but those are only assumptions, unverifiable, unfalsifiable. We are imprisoned in our private spaces of experience, at least until we die.

Might it also be true that the individual is but the appearance of what 'we' feels like? Does anyone think the feeling of bellyache-ness is radically different for others? Consider a situation where a friend is speaking of the memory of a trauma injury and you feel a shiver of pain. Imprisonment or empathy? Feelings can be the appearance of connectivity.

Yeah, it's truly terrifying to think genuine empathy is not possible because the only other possibility is perpetual war. It's no wonder people today feel more alienated and isolated than ever when the best we have to offer them is, "you are imprisoned in your private space of experience until you die".

Perhaps I mean it differently. Not as evidence of individual empathy with others but as the collective appears empathically as an individual?