Silk Road forums
Discussion => Off topic => Topic started by: TheBusiness on August 09, 2012, 02:33 am
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From wikipedia :
An entheogen ("generating the divine within")[4] is a psychoactive substance used in a religious, shamanic, or spiritual context.[5] With the advent of organic chemistry, there now exist many synthetic substances with similar psychoactive properties, many derived from these plants. Entheogens can supplement many diverse practices for healing, transcendence, and revelation, including: meditation, psychonautics, art projects, and psychedelic therapy.
SR must be a great source of inspiration for the entheogen crowd. I can't help be reminded of the history of Absinthe with the upperclass of old. With their rituals, special spoons and sugar. It was all a very high-brow way to make the imbiber feel like less of a regular alcoholic.
I hear stories about non-believers taking DMT and coming back to earth with personal revelations, visions and spiritual awaking.
Really though? How is this any different to the regular church-goer mistaking their own internal monologue for God talking to them? Or a new ager claiming their nocturnal dreams are proof of the divine?
What do you expect to happen if you take molecules that directly interfere with the brain? How is that proof of the divine? It's awe inspiring surely, but it is your brain and consciousness after all. Of course it's awe inspiring. Yes. Divine? Not necessarily. The truth? Hardly.
Not trying to knock the believers, just wanted to hear otherwise. Sometimes I feel like the entheogen crowd can make the pro-drug movement look very very bad, almost as bad as the junkies. Trust me, the government are far more likely to consider drug policy change via medical and economic and social pragmatism, not spiritual new age psyconaut babble.
As always, my 0.02 BTC.
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God is consciousness in my opinion. It can do anything. We are at the mercy of our own mind.
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I've become spiritual after experimenting with psychedelics. It really gave me a lift that I really needed in life. I was cynical as shit and hated everything and everyone.
I guess you're right it's not much different, in fact it's the exact same thing. It all leads back to the one.
It doesn't mean I'm telling people to do acid just like bible humpers attack me in public. I've found my own spirituality, what's so wrong about that?
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Totally nothing wrong with anyone having the own spirituality / religion. My post is about whether drugs are really a way to experience the divine, or if tweaking your chemistry simply leads to an interesting physiological phenomena. If your spiritually is based on drug taking, don't you think about this? Seems kinda important.
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I've certainly wondered if I'm under some sort of psychedelic-illusion, but a lot of the things I learn are reflected on a lot of eastern teachings. If I could experience the divine on such a high level in a sober state then I would totally do that instead.
I guess we'll never really know... but psychedelics to have an extreme therapeutic effect on people. Whether it's a temporary psychosis or truly the divine, I am grateful that lives are changed for the better.
It does seem kind of ironic when people get into new-age stuff way too much and attack people's egos... failing to see their own pretentious ego. Yes I've gone through that trip as well, but I was smart enough to realize this.
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Really though? How is this any different to the regular church-goer mistaking their own internal monologue for God talking to them? Or a new ager claiming their nocturnal dreams are proof of the divine?
What do you expect to happen if you take molecules that directly interfere with the brain? How is that proof of the divine? It's awe inspiring surely, but it is your brain and consciousness after all. Of course it's awe inspiring. Yes. Divine? Not necessarily. The truth? Hardly.
Your argument seems to be as follows: because the psychedelic experience is connected to the act of ingesting a foreign chemical into body, it is therefore without any merit as a revelation of spiritual truth.
Surely this is a fallacious argument. It is illogical to reject an experience as a revelation of truth simply on the grounds that you can point to a chemical cause (in this case, the ingestion of a foreign molecule) because ALL mental states are chemically conditioned. Even scientific theories are conditioned by the chemical states in a person's brain... Unless you have a developed theory showing a connection between the perception of reality and corresponding chemical changes of the brain, it is illogical to single out the psychedelic experience as an unlikely revelation of spiritual truth on the basis that you can point to chemical changes in the brain.
Psychedelic inebriation is just as much a result of neurological processes as rational thought itself, and indeed all forms of experience.
Therefore, to point to chemical causation of a spiritual state of mind, as a refutation of its claim to possess truth, is illogical and arbitrary: otherwise not even even our scientific beliefs, or our everyday waking experiences, can retain any value as revelations of reality; because every one of them without exception flows from the chemical state of the brain.
People have unraveled scientific problems whilst under the influence of LSD (e.g. the structure of DNA), but it would be absurd to point to chemical causes of the brain of scientists as a refutation of their theories.... The same is true of spiritual experiences.
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The thing that sets it apart for me is experience. Church-going types, far more often than not, believe in what they believe in because they were raised that way. If they were born somewhere else, they would believe in something else.
I've been an athiest since I was 12, and while I don't exactly know if I believe in spirits and all of that shit, I don't outright dismiss the possibility anymore. My mind wasn't changed by people hammering the thoughts into my head, it was changed by a few first-hand experiences, things I saw with my own two eyes.
The god in the bible never did anything for me, and I've never felt at home in any religious group. My experiences on psychedelics completely changed my outlook on life in just a few months. Whether there actually is a spirit realm out there that I've managed to tap into or I'm just getting really fucking high, the effect it's had on my life is absolutely real.
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Here's my challenge to anyone claiming to be spiritual:
Explain what you mean by that and why you believe it in a coherent paragraph that doesn't just have the argument "I took a psychedelics and saw and felt some stuff that I arbitrarily defined as 'divine' and now I'm spiritual." There is no logic in that argument.
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God is consciousness in my opinion. It can do anything. We are at the mercy of our own mind.
God is consciousness in my opinion. It can do anything. We are at the mercy of our own mind.
See, this. This, to me, is what ruined psychedelics, you can't even define what you mean by the word god there, or why that is your opinion, consciousnesses can't do anything, we've evolved from single celled organisms into our present form due to the influence of our environments, you think it is just completely fucking random that we have eyes, ears, a nose and other organs to sense our environment? Our bodies etc are the results of adapting to the environment over billions of years, not the other way around, so obviously consciousness cannot do anything, you didn't just wake up one day and decide that you were going to be a human being.
edit: If I wasn't completely clear here, I mean that consciousnesses are simply extensions of our animal bodies and are completely dependent on them to sense their environment or even exist at all.
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I'm a cynical old sausage and think it's all hippie bollocks. Drugs cause chemical reactions in the brain and then shit starts to fire around and make things entertaining....nothing spiritual about that.
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Therefore, to point to chemical causation of a spiritual state of mind, as a refutation of its claim to possess truth, is illogical and arbitrary
Only as illogical and arbitrary and it would be to the claim drugs do enable the perception of "spiritual truth". Moot.
I would argue that, in the absence of knowing otherwise, the jump from "we don't know" to "holy shit balls its GOD" is a fairly large leap of faith.
To say that people have discovered marvelous things on LSD isn't proof of the divine either. Only proof that humans, and brains, are awesome.
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Therefore, to point to chemical causation of a spiritual state of mind, as a refutation of its claim to possess truth, is illogical and arbitrary
Only as illogical and arbitrary and it would be to the claim drugs do enable the perception of "spiritual truth". Moot.
I would argue that, in the absence of knowing otherwise, the jump from "we don't know" to "holy shit balls its GOD" is a fairly large leap of faith.
To say that people have discovered marvelous things on LSD isn't proof of the divine either. Only proof that humans, and brains, are awesome.
Well see, for me, there was no divine in my life. No purpose. No meaning. The psychedelic experience showed me something that I had been searching for my entire life, some sort of meaning to the simple fact that I exist. It was a glimpse of the divine, and it gave me hope, meaning, and love. I brought the lessons I learned while tripping to make life a better place.
Not to mention I go to badass psyparties in the middle of nowhere and have a fuckload of positive friends.
It is hippie bullshit but it's awesome!
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"It is hippie bullshit but it's awesome!"
Well, as long as we're clear on that, honestly though just remember that mormons could use the same argument to justify their retarded religion.
edit: Well, not altogether I guess because a mormon wouldn't admit that it's bullshit.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
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"It is hippie bullshit but it's awesome!"
Well, as long as we're clear on that, honestly though just remember that mormons could use the same argument to justify their retarded religion.
edit: Well, not altogether I guess because a mormon wouldn't admit that it's bullshit.
Yeah it does say a lot about a person if they have to pin wearing boring-yet-kinky pants on God rather than just admitting the less slutty their draws the more they get turned on. The dirty whores.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
See that to me is just thinking about nature/physics/chemistry/biology etc in an abstract way. You know that is how the world works but because you are tripping balls you attach alternative meanings to it because of the abstract reality you are inhabiting at the time. I get like it when I go into a K hole but when I come out I realize that it's just the magic powder being magic. For me it's just part of the fun but I see nothing real in it. :) Like I said, Hippie Bollocks.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
Haha, ok, I won't flame you, I'll just point out what I see as assumptions.
1.For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general.
2.my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead,
I don't think you can have any evidence for these assertions.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
See that to me is just thinking about nature/physics/chemistry/biology etc in an abstract way. You know that is how the world works but because you are tripping balls you attach alternative meanings to it because of the abstract reality you are inhabiting at the time. I get like it when I go into a K hole but when I come out I realize that it's just the magic powder being magic. For me it's just part of the fun but I see nothing real in it. :) Like I said, Hippie Bollocks.
what alternative meaning am i ascribing? all i said was that i recognized that we require energy and then the conservation of energy... both are abstract ways of looking at nature/physics/chemistry/biology in an abstract, i agree, however i dont see how any of the information is tainted by hippie bollocks
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
Haha, ok, I won't flame you, I'll just point out what I see as assumptions.
1.For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general.
2.my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead,
I don't think you can have any evidence for these assertions.
It depends how you define energy, if you are talking about your matter then no, it does not disappear. In that sense the matter that you consist of has always existed in one form or another because most of the matter in the universe was created at the big bang, this is just basic physics. If you mean energy like your soul then yeah, that ain't quite right because souls are a rather debatable topic lol.
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Here's my challenge to anyone claiming to be spiritual:
Explain what you mean by that and why you believe it in a coherent paragraph that doesn't just have the argument "I took a psychedelics and saw and felt some stuff that I arbitrarily defined as 'divine' and now I'm spiritual." There is no logic in that argument.
There are good reasons to be spiritual quite apart from the revelatory experiences of psychedelics. For example:
- There are sound philosophical reasons to regard the universe as being composed fundamentally of spirit (i.e. mind, consciousness);
- These philosophical arguments accord with modern quantum-relativistic theories (cf. Wigner);
- Metaphysical and scientific arguments for the existence of God - not all of these arguments are valid, but some of them are worth considering;
- Evidence of paranormal activity;
- Near-death experiences and out of body experiences demonstrating the existence of consciousness independently of the body (in certain cases, information has been obtained through out of body experiences which could not be obtained by the individual unless consciousness can exist independently of the body);
- lervin laszlo's concept of the PSI field (akashic field) and his connectivity hypothesis;
- david bohm's theory of holomovement;
- karl pribram's holographic theory of the brain;
- ilya prigogine's theory of dissipative structures;
- sheldrake's theory of morphogenetic fields;
- gregory bateson's synthesis of systems and information theory, cybernetics, anthroplogy and psychology;
- ken wilber's synthesis of various scientific disciplines with perennial philosophy;
- Direct personal experience such that one can no longer rationally deny the existence of spiritual realities.
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Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else...
Yes, your "energy" becomes worm food and fertilizer. :)
Energy .. this word has totally been hijacked by the new age movement. Don't get me started!
But yeh, like I said totally cool to experience / believe what you like, it's worth thinking about critically though! Otherwise you may just become that guy on the corner with a megaphone and a handwritten sign after one too many trips down the chemical rabbit hole...
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Energy .. this word has totally been hijacked by the new age movement. Don't get me started!
SO true and SO annoying.
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Here's my challenge to anyone claiming to be spiritual:
Explain what you mean by that and why you believe it in a coherent paragraph that doesn't just have the argument "I took a psychedelics and saw and felt some stuff that I arbitrarily defined as 'divine' and now I'm spiritual." There is no logic in that argument.
There are good reasons to be spiritual quite apart from the revelatory experiences of psychedelics. For example:
- There are sound philosophical reasons to regard the universe as being composed fundamentally of spirit (i.e. mind, consciousness);
- These philosophical arguments accord with modern quantum-relativistic theories (cf. Wigner);
- Metaphysical and scientific arguments for the existence of God - not all of these arguments are valid, but some of them are worth considering;
- Evidence of paranormal activity;
- Near-death experiences and out of body experiences demonstrating the existence of consciousness independently of the body (in certain cases, information has been obtained through out of body experiences which could not be obtained by the individual unless consciousness can exist independently of the body);
- lervin laszlo's concept of the PSI field (akashic field) and his connectivity hypothesis;
- david bohm's theory of holomovement;
- karl pribram's holographic theory of the brain;
- ilya prigogine's theory of dissipative structures;
- sheldrake's theory of morphogenetic fields;
- gregory bateson's synthesis of systems and information theory, cybernetics, anthroplogy and psychology;
- ken wilber's synthesis of various scientific disciplines with perennial philosophy;
- Direct personal experience such that one can no longer rationally deny the existence of spiritual realities.
You failed at my task, you didn't even define what you meant by spiritual.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
Haha, ok, I won't flame you, I'll just point out what I see as assumptions.
1.For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general.
2.my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead,
I don't think you can have any evidence for these assertions.
It depends how you define energy, if you are talking about your matter then no, it does not disappear. In that sense the matter that you consist of has always existed in one form or another because most of the matter in the universe was created at the big bang, this is just basic physics. If you mean energy like your soul then yeah, that ain't quite right because souls are a rather debatable topic lol.
you said soul. I said consciousness, which is a less debatable topic
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also, since you're listing vast amounts of theories et cetera, instead of us making us do all of the work please explain how those things prove your spirituality rather than just listing them.
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Here's my challenge to anyone claiming to be spiritual:
Explain what you mean by that and why you believe it in a coherent paragraph that doesn't just have the argument "I took a psychedelics and saw and felt some stuff that I arbitrarily defined as 'divine' and now I'm spiritual." There is no logic in that argument.
There are good reasons to be spiritual quite apart from the revelatory experiences of psychedelics. For example:
- There are sound philosophical reasons to regard the universe as being composed fundamentally of spirit (i.e. mind, consciousness);
- These philosophical arguments accord with modern quantum-relativistic theories (cf. Wigner);
- Metaphysical and scientific arguments for the existence of God - not all of these arguments are valid, but some of them are worth considering;
- Evidence of paranormal activity;
- Near-death experiences and out of body experiences demonstrating the existence of consciousness independently of the body (in certain cases, information has been obtained through out of body experiences which could not be obtained by the individual unless consciousness can exist independently of the body);
- lervin laszlo's concept of the PSI field (akashic field) and his connectivity hypothesis;
- david bohm's theory of holomovement;
- karl pribram's holographic theory of the brain;
- ilya prigogine's theory of dissipative structures;
- sheldrake's theory of morphogenetic fields;
- gregory bateson's synthesis of systems and information theory, cybernetics, anthroplogy and psychology;
- ken wilber's synthesis of various scientific disciplines with perennial philosophy;
- Direct personal experience such that one can no longer rationally deny the existence of spiritual realities.
You failed at my task, you didn't even define what you meant by spiritual.
No, at the very beginning, in parenthesis, I defined what is meant by spirit, from which you should be able to deduce the meaning of 'spiritual', which is simply the adjectival form of the word spirit. Spirit, as I said above, means mind, consciousness. That's what it has always meant philosophically, from Plato to Heidegger. There are sound reasons, both metaphysical and on the basis of modern theories of quantum-relativistic physics, to regard the universe as being fundamentally composed of consciousness - spirit - rather than matter.
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ok so hippies, you have uncovered the great truth that humans have consciousnesses, which no one has ever debated or even considered worth talking about, congratulations.
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ok here is my attempt at summarizing how I began to think about spirituality seriously. This realization occurred during my 2nd lsd experience (out of 40 now!) and I felt that I was thinking from a very separate perspective, looking in on myself, the human race, everything. ok here it goes:
It seems that I am a lot of molecules being controlled by a box full of neurons firing. For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general. Also knowing that my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead, it seems that it must go elsewhere to fuel something else... this energy is the closest thing to "spirit" that i get down with.
im super baked right now so im hoping this all makes sense. flame me if you'd like ya queers, this is the best i've got!
Haha, ok, I won't flame you, I'll just point out what I see as assumptions.
1.For all of this to happen I need some sort of energy to create my consciousness in general.
2.my energy cannot just simply vanish once I'm dead,
I don't think you can have any evidence for these assertions.
i felt pretty concrete in the idea that i require energy to achieve perspective, but i understand.
for #2 though, what about the conservation of energy? doesnt that fully explain why my energy cannot simply vanish?
I dont think its some smoke n mirrors god or anything... really i have no idea what the fuck it is, but i believe in it!
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lol, this is what happens when you argue with hippies, you don't even know what the fuck you're arguing about because they can't actually coherently define it. I mean what do you mean by energy? Yeah, we have energy, not any energy that a goat doesn't have though, and not any energy that changes the fact that when we die we're fucking dead and that that's the end of it.
also sorry if I seem like I'm flaming you, not trying to be that much of a dick.
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Outside of the arguments of definitions going on here, I think it comes down to 2 main world views :
1. Whether the universe is physical or not.
2. Whether there is a higher power who cares a shit about you.
I think the universe is physical. It may be multifaceted, dimensional, macro and micro, and way beyond our puny human understanding, but that doesn't make it immaterial or supernatural. It's still physical.
As for higher powers, sure why not. But if you reckon DMT elves, hindu gods, the god head, yahweh etc or that any of the world religions have got it sussed you are kidding yourself. These are people who used to sacrifice babies to the sun and who most of which were obliterated throughout history.
Seriously, if there is a higher power who wants us to understand the nature of reality I'm sure it's capable of a better way of communicating with us than poisonous mushrooms.
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also, since you're listing vast amounts of theories et cetera, instead of us making us do all of the work please explain how those things prove your spirituality rather than just listing them.
You asked for a paragraph, not for vast amounts of information. I'm not really participating in this thread for the sake of arguing, though. You wanted some reasons why people are spiritual, and I gave you several.
'Proof' isn't really a scientific concept, and I don't claim that all of the theories I mentioned are absolutely proven. However, insofar as there are /good reasons/ to accept these theories and arguments, there are good reasons to believe in the existence of spiritual realities, since they are directly concerned with such possibilities.
ok so hippies, you have uncovered the great truth that humans have consciousnesses, which no one has ever debated or even considered worth talking about, congratulations.
I said that consciousness plays a central role in the universe, according to certain philosophical and quantum-relativistic theories that I find persuasive. I didn't say "humans have consciousness, therefore spirituality is valid".
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I'll just respond to one part of your post which is
also, since you're listing vast amounts of theories et cetera, instead of us making us do all of the work please explain how those things prove your spirituality rather than just listing them.
'Proof' isn't really a scientific concept
ok so hippies, you have uncovered the great truth that humans have consciousnesses, which no one has ever debated or even considered worth talking about, congratulations.
I said that the universe, at least according to certain philosophical and quantum-relativistic theories which I find persuasive, is composed at its most fundemental level of consciousness. I didn't say "humans have consciousness, therefore spirituality is valid".
and respond with: lol
Anyway, as a general rule the first person on the internet to mention quantum physics in an argument is just trying to impress you with big words. You haven't defined what you mean by spiritual, or if you think you have, please do it again, my question was sincere, that doesn't mean I can't debate something after asking it.
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and respond with: lol
Right, you're not arguing in good faith. You're trolling. That's becoming very clear now.
Anyway, as a general rule the first person on the internet to mention quantum physics in an argument is just trying to impress you with big words. You haven't defined what you mean by spiritual, or if you think you have, please do it again, my question was sincere, that doesn't mean I can't debate something after asking it.
I've already defined 'spiritual' for you. Twice. I'll just quote my previous answer:
"I have already defined what is meant by spirit, from which you should be able to deduce the meaning of 'spiritual', which is simply the adjectival form of the word spirit. Spirit, as I said above, means mind, consciousness."
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Well, actually I guess you sort of did, my bad I quit reading after proof isn't really a scientific concept, could you give me a link to a page on quantum relativistic theories that argues that matter is composed of consciousness? preferably by a respected scientist?
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I like you Jackofinthebox, you are a funny fucker. :P
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I like you Jackofinthebox, you are a funny fucker. :P
Haha, thanks man, he seemed to strangely shut up and sign off once I called his bluff. I was kind of intrigued and actually was hoping he could produce a web page for that to be honest.
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Well, actually I guess you sort of did, my bad I quit reading after proof isn't really a scientific concept, could you give me a link to a page on quantum relativistic theories that argue that matter is composed of consciousness? preferably by a respected scientist?
Well, I already cited Eugene Wigner, a 'respected scientist' who laid the foundation for the theory of symmetries in quantum mechanics, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics. On the basis of quantum measurement, he argues that consciousness plays a central position within material reality and even precedes material reality. He writes:
"When the province of physical theory was extended to encompass microscopic phenomena, through the creation of quantum mechanics, the concept of consciousness came to the fore again: it was not possible to formulate the laws of quantum mechanics in a fully consistent way without reference to the consciousness. All that quantum mechanics purports to provide are probability connections between subsequent impressions (also called "apperceptions") of the consciousness, and even though the dividing line between the observer, whose consciousness is being affected, and the observed physical object can be shifted towards the one or the other to a considerable degree, it cannot be eliminated. It may be premature to believe that the present philosophy of quantum mechanics will remain a permanent feature of future physical theories; it will remain remarkable, in whatever way our future concepts may develop, that the very study of the external world led to the conclusion that the content of the consciousness is an ultimate reality. "
Eugene Wigner - (Remarks on the Mind-Body Question, Eugene Wigner, in Wheeler and Zurek, p.169)
Eugene Wigner further argues that this proves the existence of what he called a "cosmic consciousness" or God. Wigner speaks of the elementary quantum phenomenon as not really having happened unless it enters the consciousness of an observer. Wigner's logic is that nothing physical can collapse the wave function; since anything physical must exist in a state of superposition, according to quantum mechanics, it must be collapsed by consciousness. Prior to the Big Bang, when the universe was smaller than an electron, there would have had to have been a conscious observer for anything to have happened, according to Wigner. Thus, consciousness not only must permeate the universe, but must have existed before the Big Bang, setting everything into motion.
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Well, alright, fair enough I guess.
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Honestly I guess we really aren't going to change each others opinions, the vast majority of scientists who study that field and other fields don't come to that conclusion and after reading a bit of his theories they don't really seem to be based upon actual evidence or equations, but more just a philosophical line of thought that doesn't make any sense to me, or seemingly most other scientists, but my opinion is of limited value there because I don't understand quantum mechanics. I guess that's why they call it a theory though, so I can't complain. Personally I will just stick to saying I don't know and leave spirituality based on widely unaccepted theories to others.
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Seriously, if there is a higher power who wants us to understand the nature of reality I'm sure it's capable of a better way of communicating with us than poisonous mushrooms.
If there is a higher power, it doesn't follow that it necessarily cares about humanity, or wants us to understand the nature of reality. But there are good reasons to suppose that such a higher power exists, whatever its nature, e.g. Eugene Wigner's theory of cosmic consciousness, Godel's ontological argument, etc.
Honestly I guess we really aren't going to change each others opinions, the vast majority of scientists who study that field and other fields don't come to that conclusion and after reading a bit of his theories they don't really seem to be based upon actual evidence or equations, but more just a philosophical line of thought that doesn't make any sense to me, or seemingly most other scientists, but my opinion is of limited value there because I don't understand quantum mechanics. I guess that's why they call it a theory though, so I can't complain. Personally I will just stick to saying I don't know and leave spirituality based on widely unaccepted theories to others.
Wigner's conclusions follow inescapably if you accept certain widely accepted interpretations of quantum phenomena. There are, of course, competing theories, e.g. the 'many worlds' interpretation, but his position isn't any more controversial than the others. Many other eminent physicists, e.g. von Neumann, also agree that consciousness causes the collapse of the wave function, and therefore precedes material reality.
I don't rest my argument solely on this one theory. It's just a very plausible argument, among others, that spirit (in the sense of consciousness) is the fundamental reality of the universe, rather than matter.
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Wigner's conclusions follow inescapably if you accept certain widely accepted interpretations of quantum phenomena.
Wigner didn't conclude shit.
"The full meaning of life, the collective meaning of all human desires, is fundamentally a mystery beyond our grasp. As a young man, I chafed at this state of affairs. But by now I have made peace with it. I even feel a certain honor to be associated with such a mystery."
Just sayin.
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Wigner's conclusions follow inescapably if you accept certain widely accepted interpretations of quantum phenomena.
Wigner didn't conclude shit.
"The full meaning of life, the collective meaning of all human desires, is fundamentally a mystery beyond our grasp. As a young man, I chafed at this state of affairs. But by now I have made peace with it. I even feel a certain honor to be associated with such a mystery."
Just sayin.
Yes, but he isn't commenting on the validity of his theory of cosmic consciousness, but talking more generally about the meaning of life. Even if the existence of cosmic consciousness could be irrefutably proven, it wouldn't tell us anything about the ultimate meaning of life. The universe would still be a mystery beyond our understanding. I agree with him.
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In the above quote he isn't commenting on the validity of his theory of cosmic consciousness, but talking more generally about the meaning of life. Even if his theory is true, it wouldn't tell us anything about the ultimate meaning of life. The universe would still be a mystery to us. As I recall, it was soon after he wrote that that he converted to Hinduism.
Unless he wrote a peer reviewed paper that was deemed worthy enough for further discussion by his scientific peers and research his views on spirituality are mere opinion and speculation (as he admits in the quote).
Citing it as evidence for a non-physical world is fine, but holds as much water as me citing Francis Collins (human genome scientist and christian) as evidence for a juedo-christian worldview.
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In the above quote he isn't commenting on the validity of his theory of cosmic consciousness, but talking more generally about the meaning of life. Even if his theory is true, it wouldn't tell us anything about the ultimate meaning of life. The universe would still be a mystery to us. As I recall, it was soon after he wrote that that he converted to Hinduism.
Unless he wrote a peer reviewed paper that was deemed worthy enough for further discussion by his scientific peers and research his views on spirituality are mere opinion and speculation (as he admits in the quote).
Citing it as evidence for a non-physical world is fine, but holds as much water as me citing Francis Collins (human genome scientist and christian) as evidence for a juedo-christian worldview.
Yeah, you have excellent points there.
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Unless he wrote a peer reviewed paper that was deemed worthy enough for further discussion by his scientific peers and research his views on spirituality are mere opinion and speculation (as he admits in the quote).
In the above quotation, Wigner isn't talking about his theory of cosmic consciousness; he is talking about the purpose of life and the mysteriousness of the universe. He considers his theory of cosmic consciousness not as spiritualistic conjecture, but as grounded in his interpretation of quantum phenomena, according to which consciousness causes the collapse of the wave function, thus preceding material reality. And yes, Wigner's original papers on the subject did appear in respected scientific journals.
Citing it as evidence for a non-physical world is fine, but holds as much water as me citing Francis Collins (human genome scientist and christian) as evidence for a juedo-christian worldview.
I'm more concerned about the strength of a person's arguments than his religious affiliation. Wigner's interpretation of quantum phenomena furnishes us with a good reason, though not the sole reason, to suppose the existence of a cosmic consciousness pervading the universe. It's a sound argument even if there are competing theories.
What I am arguing is that the spiritualistic worldview is intellectually plausible, not that it is irrefutably proven. I would add, however, that the burden of proof is on the materialist to show that the universe is composed fundamentally of matter, since we have no experience of the physical world as existing independently of our consciousness. Logically speaking, materialism is not a 'default position' that you accept until proven otherwise. I have yet to see a convincing argument for the primacy of matter over consciousness.
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Spirituality, to me, is simply the feeling that there is something more in this world than what we can perceive with our five senses. It is an inkling that there are secrets in the universe that man may never discover, let alone be able to prove with a theory.
Certain drugs help us change our perception enough that they "lift the veil" and let us realize that our "reality" is not so real after all. Drugs alone did not make me spiritual, but they definitely gave me the hint that there could be something supernatural going on around us that we do not have the ability to perceive.
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Psychedelics for me are just fun. Nothing deeper really. I've experienced ego death but it didn't change anything about my regular life. It was simply a drug induced phenomenon.
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Couldn't help but respond to this thread... I've been a strong atheist most of my life. Why? Two reasons: 1) My family had the good sense to not teach me anything about religion at all. They didn't tell me to believe in the Christian faith (even though some were and are now Christians) and they didn't tell me not to either. It just wasn't something that was important. So my first proper exposure to organised religion led to point 2) After growing up with no religious background whatsoever someone tried to tell me that a chick got pregnant without being boned, gave birth to someone who can walk on water, who later died and came back as a zombie. Not going to hate on people who believe this, but seriously, for me that isn't in the slightest way believable.
So when I sought out LSD for the first time after hearing about these mystical experiences people had I was sadly disappointed. God didn't come and speak to me, the universe didn't open up and show me it's secrets. No, instead I just tripped balls and thought in a more abstract way for 8 hours. Not taking away from LSD, I love the experience and find it does wonders for my mental health, but because I'm not the least bit spiritual myself, neither was the experience. Set and setting and all that really does make a difference, as do one's personal biases and prejudices.
So basically, IMHO, if you are inclined to be spiritual already you're likely to find a spiritual experience waiting for you with drugs. If you're not, then you probably won't. I don't see this as good or bad really, just the way it is.
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lol, this is what happens when you argue with hippies, you don't even know what the fuck you're arguing about because they can't actually coherently define it. I mean what do you mean by energy? Yeah, we have energy, not any energy that a goat doesn't have though, and not any energy that changes the fact that when we die we're fucking dead and that that's the end of it.
also sorry if I seem like I'm flaming you, not trying to be that much of a dick.
name calling is nothing but belittling your own point. I never said anything about the after life. you're arguing with yourself. all i said is that there is energy powering us (just like the goat that you mentioned). youre actually agreeing with my energy statement, but arguing with other stereotypical "spiritual" points that I never presented. check yo self before you wreck yo self!!! :) lol i actually really love discussing stuff like this because as an Introverted intuitive thinking perceiver I require as little faith based thinking in my life as I can stand, so I frequently try to present my own ideas to intelligent people to help me work out holes. obviously agnosticism is the only appropriate response to all of these questions however
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I don't really understand why people are even arguing. To me it seems like we're all seeking the same thing, through different routes that are absurdly interconnected and ironically the same, despite their "separateness".
I don't understand why we can't all just embrace each other's beliefs and smoke a joint at the same time. 8)
I appreciate Christians, Mormons, Terrence Mckenna People, Atheists, etc. It all boils down to the person and whether they are an asshole or not, not what they believe in. I enjoy discussions but as soon as people start getting butthurt it just becomes funny in my opinion. Tiny specks in a vast universe arguing over something that nobody will ever fully comprehend. LOL.
Hence my username, TheAbsurd. Reality is absurd. It's also simple, and complicated, heaven, hell, full of meaning or no meaning. Do whatever the fuck YOU want.
Peace. Love. And pizza motherfuckers.
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I think just seeking experiences beyond our current understanding should be enough for each of us. I mean, some of my psyc experiences have been awesome and beyond my normal way of perceiving the world. It could be my mind opening to some part of reality we can't perceive, or it might just be a transmission of information involving chemicals. Either way, isn't the fun part the exploration?
I just don't see the need to try and antagonize what other people want to believe if it makes them happy. Explore whatever you want and see what you find. If you don't find anything, doesn't mean somebody else can't go on the same journey and find something. The nature of reality is tenuous and individualistic in many ways anyhow.
Cheers
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Psychedelics for me are just fun. Nothing deeper really. I've experienced ego death but it didn't change anything about my regular life. It was simply a drug induced phenomenon.
This.
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Psychedelics for me are just fun. Nothing deeper really. I've experienced ego death but it didn't change anything about my regular life. It was simply a drug induced phenomenon.
This.
I think you two are either dosing too low, not using these substances to their potential, or not using yourselves to your potential.
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Psychedelics for me are just fun. Nothing deeper really. I've experienced ego death but it didn't change anything about my regular life. It was simply a drug induced phenomenon.
This.
I think you two are either dosing too low, not using these substances to their potential, or not using yourselves to your potential.
This.
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I think you two are either dosing too low, not using these substances to their potential, or not using yourselves to your potential.
Correct. Your own biases, beliefs, personality, etc., can determine much of what you experience on psychedelics. When I was still an atheistic materialist in my world outlook (i.e. only 5 months ago), I didn't get anything spiritual out of psychedelics either. But a few months ago I had a spontaneous religious experience without the use of drugs, and now I experience things on psychedelics that I would never have thought possible before. Sometimes you have to have an open mind before you can experience spirituality
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Correct. Your own biases, beliefs, personality, etc., can determine much of what you experience on psychedelics. When I was still an atheistic materialist in my world outlook (i.e. only 5 months ago), I didn't get anything spiritual out of psychedelics either. But a few months ago I had a spontaneous religious experience without the use of drugs, and now I experience things on psychedelics that I would never have thought possible before. Sometimes you have to have an open mind before you can experience spirituality
I've been lurking around here for a while, but with all this discussion of quantum mechanics and spirituality in general, I couldn't resist the urge to post since I know no one with a reasoned, thoughtful opinion to discuss this with in real life. I know it was mentioned that as soon as someone mentions quantum mechanics in an online discussion, it is an attempt to appear intelligent, as though their having a greater knowledge in that area would make their arguments unassailable, but I see why Psychedelic would drag out that branch of physics in the course of this discussion, for in many ways it is very relevant, at least for some of us. While I am still studying physics myself, it was the questions raised by quantum mechanics that made me doubt the certainty of my own atheism. I was raised by two agnostics who thought that arguing over supernatural questions was an exercise in arrogance, because of the failure of many people to phrase the question in such a way that no ambiguity would result in a fair consideration of the evidence.
Psychedelic thoroughly addressed the collapse of the wave function, as evidenced by experiments where it seems that from nothing more than the passive observation, whether it be by human scientist or a soulless high-speed camera, of photons before passing through two vertical slits cut into a piece of metal. What is it about the observation that causes the photons to behave as particulate matter, passing through one slit or the other, and impacting the wall in two vertical columns? When unobserved the photons will impact the wall in several vertical bands, suggesting that they appear to behave as a wave, not a particle, and are able to pass through both slits at the same time, which seems odd considering this suggests a photon was in more than one place at a time which seems to our daily experience to be impossible. Furthermore, subsequent experiments which have benefited from advancements in technology have made it possible to observe the photons after they have passed through the slits but before impacting the wall. Strangely enough, even though the photons have already passed through the slit, presumably behaving as a wave and not a particle, will always impact the wall in two vertical columns. This is remarkable because the observation came after the photon would have passed through the slit, suggesting that somehow the observation influences the behavior of the photon before the observation itself actually occurred!
What is it about quantum particles that enables them to seemingly circumvent the strictures of time imposed on all of us in the macroscopic world? By what means does an observation, occurring either before or after the fact, influence the behavior of a quantum particle, even though no direct physical means of doing so was in evidence? That's the question that made me doubt the solid conviction (though some would call it arrogance) that we know enough to be certain there is nothing spiritual, supernatural, divine, etc., which many atheists seem to have. I was such a one before I learned of this study. However, it left me with more questions, and I never seem to be satisfied sufficiently on the evidence, especially in matters of spirituality. For on the one hand it could be suggested that these results do indeed support the primacy of consciousness over matter, while at the same time it begs the question, namely, of how can a camera, which most people would agree is not a thing possessed of inherent consciousness, be said to support the primacy of consciousness over matter through the effect of its observation? Admittedly, I just began studying quantum mechanics this year, but I would like to hear the opinions of others, if they are sufficiently interested by these questions.
Psychedelic, you know much more about other areas of study in physics than I do, and while I do not believe that I am possessed of enough knowledge to be able to say that I am anything more than agnostic (though my experiences taking psychedelics could certainly be classified as spiritual), I would benefit from any insight or knowledge you have on the support, or the lack of it, from what the other disciplines have to say about the dynamic between consciousness and matter. My own studies have humbled me, and having read the opinions of great thinkers both in support of and against atheism, I simply don't see evidence sufficient to confidently sway my own beliefs in support of one side or the other. The vertical slit experiment is not the only study I have read that made me doubt my own atheism, but I have gone on long enough. I just have one more thing to add. I read someone earlier suggesting (sorry, the quote is too far down to include with the automatic quoting function) that quantum mechanics was probably properly classified as a theory. While I may have mistaken their intended meaning, this seemed to me to suggest that they interpreted the word theory to mean hypothesis, whether than an organized set of ideas on a certain subject, and that in some way this fact may discredit the use of conclusions drawn from quantum mechanics to support the idea that there is some evidence to support the primacy of consciousness over spirituality. If I am mistaken about the intended meaning behind their statement, I apologize. Having seen Creationists question the validity of conclusions drawn from the study of evolution based on it being called the "theory of evolution," and knowing this to be a misunderstanding of the difference between one usage of theory and hypothesis, I would hate to see the same argument (however ironic its use) trotted out to support the notion that we may be no more than well-ordered molecules and nothing more.