Essay: Symphony of Minds

[Lou Gold]

So I was wondering if a text-based forum biased our discussions and asked Google "Where did the philosophers debate in the time of Plato?"
It answered, "The palaistra was a wrestling school that was used as the scene for Plato's Euthydemus. It served three functions: a training area, an area for cult activity, and a meeting place for philosophical discussion."

Another intriguing question that's emerging in my contemplations is whether AI can connect with the Ideal intents of the prompter if the prompts are written in the old language?

[Cleric K]

This question you ask here does not address my point in prior post above. However, to address your question: an analogy - - - A character in a dream is a process of thinking, sensing and perceiving. It would be a misdiagnosis for the dream character to think of itself as an entity, as the thinker. The dream character is not a self, is a localization of the Dreamer.
We do not do the thinking, sensing and perceiving; we are thinking, sensing and perceiving.
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-Also-
If we grant God with Infinite capacity, if we grant an Agent with Infinite non-ending Will . . . then no finite mind can be spoken of as having a will. Simple geometry/math - an infinite vector overshadows and makes irrelevant any finite vector(s).

Well, what you say, in itself explains why after two years, there's still no notion of what spiritual activity is.

In your view, reality is split into two aspects. Consciousness (1) is seen only as a completely passive visualization of the Dream process (2), constituted by God's Will, the mechanical laws of the Dream, or whatever they may be called.

So the Dreamer, in its localized perspective, with much effort multiplies two numbers and then says "It's an illusion to conceive that I'm doing anything. What I experience is only the visualization of the Dream process. Even these thoughts that I now think, which rationalize the experience, are only a visualization of the Dream process."

The Dreamer has consciousness of the Dream process but that process is in itself non-consciousness. It lies on the other side of consciousness and the latter only passively visualizes the activities that happen in the non-consciousness Dream process.

When the Dreamer beholds the experience through the coloring of this ideological lens, the term 'spiritual activity' simply makes no sense. The true nature of 'activity' (whatever makes the dream 'tick') belongs to the non-consciousness aspect of the Dream process. That's where the true causes of the dream flow belong. Any feeling that the Dreamer is consciously active, is only an illusionary visualization raising as smoke from the true activity on the other side of consciousness.

We can only understand what 'spiritual activity' implies if the Dreamer realizes that in its intentional activity, it is one and the same with the activity (the 'ticking') of the Dream process.

If the Dreamer in your localized perspective desires to feel itself only as a strict spectator of the conscious visualization of the Dream process, that's fine. I'm just trying to explain that as long as this is held as unquestionable dogma, not two, but two thousand years from now, things will be as elusive as ever. Things can only be approached if we at least allow for the possibility that there might be something of the 'ticking', within conscious experience and not outside of it. To be spiritually active implies realizing that lucid intuitive inner activity is what the 'ticking' of the Dream process is 'made of'.

I'm not trying to convince you (the Dreamer in your localized perspective) in anything but hopefully next time, instead of saying that our explanations don't make any sense, you can at least object in a more direct way: "I sense where you try to go with this. You try to bring the 'ticking' of the Dream process inside consciousness, make it willful, intuitive activity, which causally steers the Dream process. This is not my cup of tea, though. I prefer to behold conscious experience as pure visualization of the mysterious Dream process. Any attempt to feel as if the Dreamer in us can have any intentional causative role, is an illusion, quest for the golden calf. The Dreamer only has true understanding of its reality if it conceives that whatever makes its experience 'tick' lies on the other side of its conscious existence. I reject the possibility that this other non-consciousness side can be consciously experienced. The conscious Dreamer can only rest blissfully within the maternal embrace of its non-conscious causative source."

[Cleric K]

Cleric,
you shared the law of shrinking a couple times in the forum.
Is it to deconstruct certain ideas ( like the subject object split for example) and to experience how our own activity is shaped trough the physical plane?

And is there any specific reason to concentrate at a point in our head?

In the most general sense, we shrink in order to become conscious of this 'wiggle room' that our spirit operates through. Our body, temperament, character, etc., are normally like a tightly fitting mask. We feel to be the mask. As explained many times, consciousness expansion is not achieved in the proper way by inflating our ego and imagining that the world is created as if imagining planets and dolls within a mind-container. This would be like expanding the mask while we are still completely merged with it.

Here shrinking should be grasped qualitatively, not strictly geometrically. In all cases, it is the Divine spark that should find the freedom to creatively express its moral ideals through the contextuality within which our existence is embedded.

[lorenzop]

Well, what you say, in itself explains why after two years, there's still no notion of what spiritual activity is.

I'm not sure how you are using the term 'spiritual activity' as it seems to be applied to just about everything. It looks like the dream metaphor got way out of hand - a life of its own. : )

[AshvinP]

Well, what you say, in itself explains why after two years, there's still no notion of what spiritual activity is.

I'm not sure how you are using the term 'spiritual activity' as it seems to be applied to just about everything. It looks like the dream metaphor got way out of hand - a life of its own. : )

Lorenzo,

The way you phrase things, it sometimes sounds like you only object to using a certain word(s) to describe inner experience, such as 'spiritual activity'.

If we go back to Cleric's math example, you multiply two numbers. What should we call the experience of doing this? Here are some options:

- Intentional activity
- Math activity
- Willful mathematizing
- Multiplying activity

You can also make up your own label to characterize the experience.

Furthermore, do you differentiate between the experience of this activity (whatever we call it) and the explanation of the activity, i.e. "We do not do the thinking, sensing and perceiving; we are thinking, sensing and perceiving."? Do you see how the latter is an explanation of the activity, which may or may not be correct, but the experience of doing something in multiplying two numbers (vs. just staring at two numbers) remains no matter what the explanation?

[lorenzop]

Well, what you say, in itself explains why after two years, there's still no notion of what spiritual activity is.

I'm not sure how you are using the term 'spiritual activity' as it seems to be applied to just about everything. It looks like the dream metaphor got way out of hand - a life of its own. : )

Lorenzo,

The way you phrase things, it sometimes sounds like you only object to using a certain word(s) to describe inner experience, such as 'spiritual activity'.

If we go back to Cleric's math example, you multiply two numbers. What should we call the experience of doing this? Here are some options:

- Intentional activity
- Math activity
- Willful mathematizing
- Multiplying activity

You can also make up your own label to characterize the experience.

Furthermore, do you differentiate between the experience of this activity (whatever we call it) and the explanation of the activity, i.e. "We do not do the thinking, sensing and perceiving; we are thinking, sensing and perceiving."? Do you see how the latter is an explanation of the activity, which may or may not be correct, but the experience of doing something in multiplying two numbers (vs. just staring at two numbers) remains no matter what the explanation?

I'd call it doing math, I'd hesitate to call it spiritual activity at the risk of the word 'spiritual' losing all meaning or use. Just as I wouldn't call it 'astronomy activity' because I was standing under the stars when I did the math.
If all inner activity is spiritual activity then why not simply refer to inner activity as inner activity . . . and how about the movement of the planets - is this also 'spiritual activity' as you and Cleric use the term . . . since the planets are beings?

[AshvinP]

I'm not sure how you are using the term 'spiritual activity' as it seems to be applied to just about everything. It looks like the dream metaphor got way out of hand - a life of its own. : )

Lorenzo,

The way you phrase things, it sometimes sounds like you only object to using a certain word(s) to describe inner experience, such as 'spiritual activity'.

If we go back to Cleric's math example, you multiply two numbers. What should we call the experience of doing this? Here are some options:

- Intentional activity
- Math activity
- Willful mathematizing
- Multiplying activity

You can also make up your own label to characterize the experience.

Furthermore, do you differentiate between the experience of this activity (whatever we call it) and the explanation of the activity, i.e. "We do not do the thinking, sensing and perceiving; we are thinking, sensing and perceiving."? Do you see how the latter is an explanation of the activity, which may or may not be correct, but the experience of doing something in multiplying two numbers (vs. just staring at two numbers) remains no matter what the explanation?

I'd call it doing math, I'd hesitate to call it spiritual activity at the risk of the word 'spiritual' losing all meaning or use. Just as I wouldn't call it 'astronomy activity' because I was standing under the stars when I did the math.
If all inner activity is spiritual activity then why not simply refer to inner activity as inner activity . . . and how about the movement of the planets - is this also 'spiritual activity' as you and Cleric use the term . . . since the planets are beings?

Great, inner activity. Sounds good.

Actually, if we look at the essay on this thread, we find:

Consider what we do with our inner activity when we tell a story to a friend or sing a song. If we look at it broadly, we can say that in these acts we have a certain intuitive understanding of the way the existential movie unfolds. We don’t make calculations and predictions but we live in some intuitive intent that ‘explains’ the order of words. If I listen to someone else talking, I may not know where their story is going, but in my first-person case, the idea that I want to express explains the sequence of thought forms.

There is no reference to 'spiritual activity' in the essay. The word 'spiritual' is only used once in the last paragraph, second to last sentence.

So, with that clarified, do you understand the distinction being made in the quote above, how there is a qualitative difference between our experience of phenomena that proceed from our inner activity, such as the thoughts/words when we're telling a story, and those that we confront passively, such as the words we hear when listening to someone else's story?

[Lou Gold]

Personally, I'm currently preferring a simple distinction between esoteric science and exoteric science.

About naming the arithmetic, another possibility is to simply perform the answer spontaneously. One might call it, "Being the Answer"

[lorenzop]

So, with that clarified, do you understand the distinction being made in the quote above, how there is a qualitative difference between our experience of phenomena that proceed from our inner activity, such as the thoughts/words when we're telling a story, and those that we confront passively, such as the words we hear when listening to someone else's story?

The separate self will gladly take credit for the speaking and the listening, for the creation of music and for the appreciation of another's music. The separate self will take ownership in the eating of a strawberry.
So in this sense there is no difference.
With compassion and politeness, we don't squash the separate self, we integrate Unbounded Being.

[Cleric K]

Personally, I'm currently preferring a simple distinction between esoteric science and exoteric science.

About naming the arithmetic, another possibility is to simply perform the answer spontaneously. One might call it, "Being the Answer"

Such spontaneity is indeed possible in Rainman-like cases. But the question is whether when you tried to multiply a pair of two-digit numbers, the answer spontaneously popped up and you were the answer? Or you had to intentionally and effortfully work your way toward it? (if you tried it at all)

If the answer didn't appear spontaneously and instead you had to effortfully do something to reach it, then we have at least one example of something in our existence that can only happen if accompanied by the conscious experiences of meaningful intent and will.

Could it be that there are also other things in our existence that would never spontaneously happen unless they are effortfully worked toward with meaningful intent and will? Is it blasphemy to conceive that maybe, just maybe (or as you say - perhaps), our collective future depends on such activities that are unlikely to just happen spontaneously, but instead have to be worked toward with meaningful intent and will? If this could be the case but we nevertheless choose to sit and wait for a spontaneous miracle while things keep going from bad to worse, whose fault will that be?

These are very simple questions. Child-level, no degree needed.