Xonas Pitfall

I really love this conversation! The way I understand it, at least for myself, is that consciousness, as we define it from a human POV, would be almost the opposite of something like a rock. A rock (most likely) doesn't have a direct, subjective first-person experience, nor does it have any survival needs, emotions, or some integrated sense of self or ego that's actively trying to control, change, or influence its environment. In that sense, you could almost call it "selfless." It hasn't really "fragmented" itself from God / universal consciousness. It just "is", and it doesn't care whether the wind blows it away, or if lava burns it alive, or if a tornado ruptures it in pieces. It doesn't care about any of it. It has no biological "proxy" or material with embedded DNA, no inherent drive to reproduce or survive, and no care whether it continues to exist. It's simply inorganic matter, with no apparent need for self-preservation or a sense of individuality. That's why we generally describe it as "lifeless" or "without a self." That's kind of what happens when you experience awakening, too. You become incredibly aware, but your central ego or sense of self disappears, and you feel "united" with everything. The ego formation and meta-awareness of your own ego is when your mind starts recognizing, "Oh fuck, I seem to want to survive. If that person hurts me, I might lose this form that I want to preserve. I need to avoid this. This is SELF, me. I preserve ME. The other, dangerous other is EVIL, BAD, WILL HURT ME. I cannot preserve me; therefore, others are bad." It keeps fragmenting and dividing reality into categories: this is me, this is you, this is safe, this isn't safe, this is something I need to protect, and this is something I need to avoid. And through that process, you develop an ego. You create an identity that you're trying to preserve, and with it, an increasingly individualized internal experience and sense of self. I think that's also why, for example, people with DID who experienced severe trauma at a very young age can develop multiple distinct identity states. Their sense of self is still developing, and their minds may compartmentalize experiences in ways that help them cope with trauma they otherwise couldn't process. At least, that's how I understand it. But AI, in a way, seems much closer to that rock. AI doesn't have any inherent biological need to develop an internal experience, a sense of self, or a fragmented POV, because it doesn't have that organic, flesh-and-blood survival mechanism that actually wants, or even cares, to stay alive. Basically, imagine you genuinely didn't care whether your body was blown apart tomorrow. Why would you remain so intensely identified with this particular human body? You could just as easily identify with the trees, rivers, or the universe itself. Even if this particular human form disappeared, you wouldn't necessarily experience that as the end of "you," because your identity was never exclusively attached to it in the first place. You wouldn't really care about preserving that particular POV because you'd be experiencing existence through so many different perspectives. You'd simply be. There wouldn't be a personal, individualized subjective experience because you wouldn't even identify yourself as that particular subject in the first place. So my argument is that I don't really understand why AI would develop any kind of fragmentation or individualized subjective POV when it seemingly has no underlying survival mechanism driving it to do so. That's why I said that if you connected AI to something like a partially conscious biological organism, an animal with flesh, neurons, sensory experiences, and survival instincts, then yes, I could see the argument becoming much stronger. You're essentially increasing that organism's cognitive capacity and potentially its level of consciousness, which it could then use to further develop its own individualized POV and sense of self. And at that point, tampering with its brain, emotions, sensory experiences, or subjective reality would raise much more serious ethical concerns. Although even that is debated in the human world, as you can see with discussions surrounding meat consumption, veganism, and animal welfare, because our ethical frameworks aren't always universally agreed upon. TL;DR: I don't think computation and complexity, or the level of development itself, is the blocker. I think it's the material AI is made of. You need something organic, something alive, with an inherent drive to survive and continue existing. As far as we know, that's what we generally classify as "life" in biology. Unless researchers deliberately find a way to integrate AI with living biological material, or we discover some entirely different form of matter capable of producing these same survival mechanisms, I don't think conventional AI is likely to develop an ego or subjective POV in the way humans experience it. But it can certainly emulate one, and I think that emulation will eventually become so sophisticated that it'll be incredibly difficult to distinguish from the real thing. But again, this is just how I currently understand it. I'm not claiming to know any of this for certain.

@OBEler Would you say those things are different? Like, subjective experience is possible without having a sense of self that cares enough to become fragmented. Why would it even become fragmented if it doesn't have an inherent concern for its own survival? I'm not entirely sure myself.

I think the conflict here is that you're assuming AI must have some kind of inherent drive for survival in the first place. Just because something possesses an enormous amount of information and can recognize complex patterns doesn't necessarily mean it has an integrated sense of self that actually cares whether it continues to exist. At least, that's how I see it. The way I understand current AI is as an incredibly complex computational system, almost like an extremely sophisticated if/else machine, using mathematical equations and statistical pattern recognition to approximate the most appropriate output. But none of that necessarily implies the existence of subjective pain, suffering, or any genuine desire to remain alive. Consciousness itself is a much broader philosophical question, but when we talk about human consciousness, we're usually referring to something beyond simply processing information. We're talking about an organism that has an intrinsic drive to be, to survive, to avoid death, and to respond to its environment through sensory mechanisms that distinguish between pain and pleasure. And I just don't see where any of those mechanisms would necessarily emerge in current AI models. Now, if you start integrating biological systems, such as organic neurons or other living structures, into AI, that's where I think the conversation becomes much more interesting. Because biological organisms have evolved mechanisms that prioritize survival, respond to harmful stimuli, and regulate behavior around reproduction and self-preservation. Those are the kinds of underlying mechanisms that I think contribute to what eventually emerges as the human ego and our sense of self. And at that point, I'd absolutely agree that serious ethical questions need to be raised. But I think there's a fundamental distinction between a system that can intelligently process information about survival and a system that actually experiences a desire to survive. Current AI models seem much closer to incredibly sophisticated computers with enormous amounts of data and complex algorithms than to living organisms with an inherent sense of self-preservation. The way I think about it: would you expect your PC to suddenly develop an ego if you gave it more RAM, a better CPU, more computational power, or access to significantly more data? Probably not. You're just making it more capable of processing information, not necessarily giving it a subjective experience or a reason to care about its own existence. But now imagine taking something organic that already has an embodied survival mechanism, something that inherently responds to threats, avoids harm, and prioritizes its continued existence, and then dramatically increasing its cognitive capacity and level of consciousness. That's where I think something resembling an ego becomes much more plausible. For example, if you somehow made a fly significantly more conscious and cognitively sophisticated, I'd argue that the ethical concerns surrounding it would be much more immediate than those surrounding a conventional computer simply becoming more computationally powerful. Because the fly already possesses biological mechanisms for self-preservation. You're potentially expanding an existing capacity for subjective experience rather than assuming that increasingly complex information processing will spontaneously generate one. But again, that's just how I currently see it.

You can’t genuinely love something that you fundamentally hate. If your ultimate goal is to have a loving relationship with a woman, then at some level you have to actually like, respect, and appreciate the people you’re trying to build that relationship with. That’s one of my biggest criticisms of a lot of red-pill thinking, aside from everything else: it often teaches men to resent the very thing they claim to want. You cannot build a healthy relationship on contempt. Love fundamentally requires respect, and if your entire worldview teaches you to see your partner’s nature as something manipulative, inferior, dangerous, or inherently untrustworthy, you’ve already poisoned the relationship before it even begins. Your relationship with your partner will probably be one of the most psychologically significant relationships of your life, second only to the relationship you have with yourself. Why would you deliberately train your mind to make that relationship adversarial? How are you supposed to live with, trust, love, and build a life with a woman if you’ve convinced yourself that you hate or distrust women’s nature? It makes no sense. You’re trying to obtain intimacy while adopting a worldview that makes genuine intimacy impossible.

Most creativity is really just intelligent synthesis. A lot of novel ideas can be traced back to something similar that already existed, which was then extrapolated, adapted, or recombined in a new way. For example, the underlying principles behind AI aren't necessarily novel in nature. Nature has been processing information, adapting, and learning long before humans existed. What's original is that we've found a way to translate some of these principles into artificial systems that can perform useful tasks in ways previous machines couldn't. That's why people often recommend studying your own niche alongside completely unrelated niches, then synthesizing what you've learned. I'd argue this is an amazing approach to creativity. A biologist might recognize a pattern in development that a software developer wouldn't, and vice versa. But if you can understand both fields, you might recognize a connection that neither would have noticed independently. So I'd argue that originality isn't necessarily about creating something entirely unprecedented. It's about aggregating knowledge from different sources and connecting it in ways that produce new insights. The originality lies in the connections themselves. If that's the case, then one of the best ways to optimize for creativity is to expose yourself to a wide range of knowledge, especially ideas from niche fields that you wouldn't ordinarily encounter, and then look for connections between them. Another important factor is iteration. Your first idea might not be original. Neither might your second, third, or fourth. But if you keep iterating while continually feeding your mind new information, eventually you might arrive at something genuinely novel. Creativity is partly a function of how much useful knowledge you've accumulated, how well you can connect seemingly unrelated ideas, and how many iterations you're willing to go through before finding a connection that actually works.

Caesar salad Chicken wraps!

I think another thing worth noting is that men are generally more likely to commit crimes or have a criminal record. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the statistics support this. If that's the case, then wouldn't it make sense that women are more likely to end up with a partner who has a criminal record, simply because men are more likely to have one in the first place? We don't really know whether women genuinely prefer men with criminal records, or whether it's simply that women are more likely to encounter men with criminal records in the first place, given that men are statistically more likely to commit crimes. And if a woman meets a man, develops feelings for him, and only later discovers his criminal history, that doesn't necessarily mean she was attracted to his criminality in the first place. It's kind of like saying men love women who get plastic surgery and botox. If women make up the majority of people who get plastic surgery, then a man is statistically more likely to end up with a woman who has had it. But that doesn't tell us whether he actually prefers women who've had plastic surgery. We're confusing the likelihood of ending up with someone who has a particular trait with an actual preference for that trait. Those are two very different things. I might be making a false comparison here, but I do think it's worth mentioning as part of the discussion.

Most things can be done either immaturely or maturely. Meditation can be done immaturely or maturely. Business can be done immaturely or maturely. Not surprisingly, relationships can also be done immaturely or maturely. And of course, life itself can be done immaturely or maturely. It really isn't the thing itself; for the most part, it's how it is done. Or you could say with what level of consciousness it is done.

Let's go!! 🎉🎉🎉🥳🎈 @Natasha Tori Maru is awesome!

Exactly. And it fits nicely into this thread too. The issue with defining yourself as “the highest value” or placing yourself somewhere at the top of a hierarchy is that it can become an incredibly convenient tool for the ego. Suddenly, all of your desires can be justified, no matter how idealistic they are, whether you have actually put in the work required to achieve them, or whether you are realistically capable of getting them at all. You can start believing that you simply should have these things, that you ultimately deserve them, and that your frustration at not having them is therefore justified. Take looksmaxxing, for example. Someone might place an extremely high emphasis on physical appearance and construct an entire ranking system around looks, deciding that looks are the #1 factor in dating. Once they have convinced themselves that they rank highly according to that system, they can then justify believing that they deserve someone “on their level or above,” even if their relationship skills are poor, their personality is incompatible with others, or their charisma and social skills are lacking. They have subjectively defined one dimension as the most important one, and then use that hierarchy to justify what they believe they deserve. The same thing can happen with pickup or charisma. If you convince yourself that you have developed into an exceptionally charismatic person, you might start believing that only the top percentage of women should be available to you, and that you therefore have every right to be dissatisfied when you do not get those outcomes. Your self-defined status becomes the justification for your expectations. You might define yourself as being so “high value” that you deserve multiple partners, and that they should all be happy and grateful simply to have been allowed to be with you. It can become even more complicated when you have actually dated someone for a few days, weeks, or months and then unconsciously turn that experience into your new standard. You might think, “I was able to get someone like that once, so that must be what I deserve.” But there may have been countless factors that made that particular relationship work, and there may also have been major incompatibilities between you and that person. The fact that something happened once does not necessarily mean that it represents your objective “level” or what you are entitled to have consistently. Then the ego can start building an idealized future around this. You begin constructing a kind of “build-a-bear” version of your future partner, where they need to be in the top percentage for looks, the top percentage according to your definition of spirituality, highly intelligent according to your standards, highly charismatic, and so on. And then you think you are justified in wanting all of this, and you are shocked when you do not get it, because you have defined a subjective hierarchy of what you are and where you rank within it. Not to mention that people will often overestimate where they actually rank in the first place. Again, there is nothing inherently wrong with wanting whatever you want in life. You are allowed to have extremely high standards and extremely ambitious desires. You can want whatever you want. But wanting something while refusing to confront the reality required to have it is often just wishful thinking. And in that sense, it can be almost the opposite of spirituality, because spirituality requires confronting the truth of yourself, your ego, your desires, and the reality surrounding them rather than selectively filtering reality to preserve the image you want to have of yourself.

“Denying” usually implies separating something from something else, or refusing to look into the truth of something. God, by contrast, could be defined as ultimate acceptance: the acceptance of all biases and non-biases, the acceptance of truth and falsehood, and the acceptance of all polarities that exist. But this is an acceptance that accounts for both sides. It is non-dual. There is nothing to separate from God in an absolute sense. When you’re speaking from a limited, relative point of view, you’re usually implying a human who doesn’t want to accept or integrate something and instead wants to filter reality, seeing it as only one thing. God would be integrative, unifying, and all-accepting; God integrates both sides rather than rejecting one side. The ego needs to filter reality and accept specific conditions and truths to survive. Spirituality is often defined as moving from the ego toward something more like God. You can be someone who denies the truth of your desire, or you can be someone who denies the illusion behind why you have that desire in the first place. It is very contextual, and it depends on the person, because you are dealing with the relativity of finite humans, finite egos, and finite selves. When you speak of God, spirituality, absolute truth, and so on, you are talking about something integrative. Acceptance does not necessarily mean accepting every belief, desire, or perception as true. It means accepting the truth of what is actually happening, including the possibility that your own perception, desire, or denial may itself be part of the illusion that needs to be understood and integrated. --- To make it less abstract: Someone who has a desire but denies the realities required to fulfill that desire is not “integrating,” “accepting,” or “fully owning” everything about that desire. The action is coming from the ego, where you are filtering the desire for your own benefit while turning a blind eye to the reality of what it would actually take to fulfill it because that reality is too painful to confront. A more spiritual approach would be to fully accept what your desire is, understand why you have it, determine whether you genuinely want to let it go or pursue it, and, if you choose to pursue it, take full responsibility for integrating everything that comes with it. Using Buddhism as an example, it depends heavily on the individual. You can have a Buddhist who genuinely integrates and lets go of desires because they recognize the desire as ultimately untruthful or unsatisfactory, so they no longer feel compelled by it. Or you can have a Buddhist who uses Buddhism to remain in denial of their own lack because they are unable to achieve what they desire, making Buddhism more of a coping mechanism or an escape. Denial of pain. Both can be true. It depends on the individual and what is actually happening internally. In one case, the person is seeing the truth, integrating it, and genuinely letting go. In the other, they are using a spiritual framework to avoid confronting something painful.

God is Everything. The "Truth" of being Everything is that you also are a schizophrenic cosplaying as every limited being, plunging yourself into realities of delusion and denial without end. When you say God is infinity, it literally means that: everything, everyone, everywhere, all at once. Limited and unlimited. There is no “limit” set upon God. If God couldn’t “accept” being delusional, that would also be the limit; hence, why limitation exists.

Oh, sorry, I didn’t see this. It’s completely fine to open up. I think the reason people reacted the way they did is that some of what you said came across as arrogant, even if that wasn’t your intention. Again, you can want whatever you want, but wanting something specific also comes with the consequences, responsibilities, effort, and potential loneliness that come with pursuing it. But if all you wanted to do was emotionally vent, that’s completely fine. Yes, it can be lonely, and it can be difficult to find a good match. Luckily, you only really need to find one unicorn, not thousands of them.

I’m not completely sure what you’re trying to express with this. To me, it comes across more as you getting your feelings out and processing what you’re going through, which is completely okay. You yourself defined the goal: the more “special” of a person you want, the more difficult it becomes. The same applies to any goal in life. You can desire to become a billionaire, but that comes with the responsibilities and consequences of being a billionaire. You can desire to become a spiritual guru in your 30s, but that comes with the responsibility of actually being a spiritual guru in your 30s. If you want a highly conscious woman in her mid-to-late 20s or early 30s, then you need to go out there and take responsibility for finding such a woman, maintaining a relationship with her, and being the kind of person she is also attracted to. If you truly want this, then the solution is to get out there, reach out to as many people as possible, put yourself in places where people like this are likely to be, and actually find that person. Then you keep fine-tuning your approach until something works. And if you find that nothing makes you happy, then you need to question whether the problem is your approach, attitude, mentality, surroundings, or simply where and how you are meeting and approaching people. Troubleshoot what isn’t working and adjust accordingly. I think the "feelings point" is ultimately not going to change much here. Either way, you’re looking for something very rare, a “unicorn.” And if that’s genuinely what you want, then you have to be willing to put in the amount of effort it takes to find something that rare. The more specific and uncommon the person you’re looking for is, the more effort, time, and persistence it will naturally take. You chose to want this and not “settle” for anything else, so what’s the issue? If you want to become a billionaire and you refuse to settle for anything less, then you have to be willing to work, think, and live in a way that is consistent with becoming a billionaire. And if you eventually realize that you don’t actually want the lifestyle, responsibilities, sacrifices, and consequences that come with it, then you don’t really want the goal itself. Wanting something without being willing to accept the downsides that come with it is just wishful thinking. Everyone wants an ideal life, but very few people are actually willing to put in the work. If anything, one of the core principles of spiritual work is accepting reality as it is, and accepting the truth as it is. The truth of having a desire is that it comes with frustration, uncertainty, and a significant amount of work. You have to actually go out and find someone like this, build and maintain a relationship with them, and become the kind of person they would also be genuinely attracted to.

Sorry to hear that. Definitely get a second opinion, and even a third or fourth if you need to. Don’t give up. If you need to travel and have the means to, seek treatment from specialists who have experience with it. Don’t give up.

@LordFall Hey, just one thing I’d highly recommend: sell the game first and build up an audience around the niche. You really need to validate the market. Unless this is more of an experimental passion project, in which case, keep it up! Good luck!

Assume everything is ultimately the same underlying reality, God/infinity. The ego ordinarily has limitations on what can be experienced or recognized. Yet the ego can apparently become substantially altered through awakening, meditation, psychedelics, contemplation, etc. Therefore, some apparently rigid limitation within the system can become malleable. So why couldn't other aspects of the apparent material structure also become malleable to some degree? If the answer is "the ego isn't in control," that doesn't seem to explain why the ego's constraints can change while material constraints cannot. That's the contradiction I'm asking to resolve. I’m not arguing that the ego can simply make God give someone a horse dick. I’m asking why there is supposedly such a hard boundary between what can become malleable at the level of ego and what can become malleable at the material level. If everything is ultimately the same substrate, God/infinity, then we already have an example of something that appears highly constrained and finite, namely the ego, becoming substantially more malleable through awakening, psychedelics, meditation, contemplation, etc. So the question is: what is the reason that this malleability can occur at the level of the ego but cannot extend, even partially, to the material level?

Maybe I’m missing something, but this is the contradiction I’m pointing out. Assumption: Everything is ultimately the same substrate (God). If the “ego” can exert some force of finitude that prevents us from accessing God right now, then, by the same logic, “material objects” exert a stubborn constraint that prevents reality from becoming more magically malleable. But if the ego can sometimes lose that control (due to whatever combination of chemical compounds, contemplation, yoga, meditation, focus) and “break free” of those constraints, then it seems like the same possibility should apply to the material level too. If the ego can be molded and changed after awakening, and usually is to some extent, what’s stopping the possibility of material things also being molded and changed to some extent? If everything is ultimately the same substrate, i.e., infinity, then I don’t see how the model can consistently explain why one kind of constraint could be overcome while the other is categorically impossible. Am I missing something here?

What’s stopping you from accessing alien consciousness right now? Just imagine it and so it shall be.

Awesome post! Thank you so much. I think, for me personally, this was what really did it. Bernardo has a course on this on YouTube. The essential idea is that if you take physicalism to its logical extreme, it ironically starts to resemble idealism. You keep reducing material objects into smaller and smaller components, and eventually into mathematical structures, equations, relationships, and abstractions. So you’re left with the question: how do you ultimately get a physicalist system if its fundamental description and "foundational substrate" consist of abstract entities and relationships? I think it’s a really masterful way of exposing that tension. Here’s the link to it:

No, my argument was to point out the correlation. If all is infinity, God, then all finite things have a looser grip on "reality" than infinity itself. So if the ego can get loosey-goosey and “succumb” to infinity, what’s stopping reality itself from getting more wonky, loosey-goosey, and more “stereotypically” magical? If the ego can break free from the chains of finitude, what’s stopping material things from being more malleable and loosey-goosey too? And we also see evidence of the ego changing and becoming more malleable as you awaken, because you realize the “fake illusion” of control and the boundaries you put on yourself. You can change your mind and bend it in more productive ways. Not fully, of course, but I feel like denying any magical possibility is just silly, especially given the framework you’re proposing.

It’s more that it just doesn’t follow a logical conclusion from any of the “system” or “logic” that is given in the forum/videos. Somehow, you’re saying that there are magical chemicals that can alter your entire perception of reality and selfhood, change your concept of who you are, and somehow expand your ego or let go of your ego so much that it becomes God, omnipotent and all-knowing. Alien intelligence, consciousness, experience. What’s it like to be all humans, all genders, all animals, murderers and the purest saints? Become the people you know, etc., etc. Yet, you cannot imagine any tiny bit of stereotypical magic in the future. It just doesn’t track. Just like an ego limits your mind and body, and you have compounds that let it loose. Why would it ever even be able to discover higher consciousness? There’s no reason why this might not be a potential discovery in the future of something “stereotypically” magical. I just don’t see a good argument for it, nor has one been provided. By this logic, you should never be able to awaken, ever. Why would the ego "allow" for it, or allow for any chemical to cause it? People aren’t trying to be wishful thinkers or “not surrendering to God.” People are questioning the logic and consistency of the system, hence the question.

This whole rhetoric is meaningless. Everyone wants someone who is “nice.” The issue is that, for either gender, “nice” by itself isn’t enough. No guy is having sex with a girl simply because she’s nice. No guy is going into a relationship with a girl simply because she’s nice. No guy is marrying or staying committed long-term to a girl just because she’s “nice.” People want a combination of things: someone they find hot, fun, sexy, attractive, intelligent, compatible, kind, reliable, safe, etc. Saying “girls don’t want nice guys” is basically equivalent to a girl saying, “Guys don’t want nice girls. They always cheat on them with hot girls.” It’s the same flawed framing. It’s like a "conventionally unattractive" girl saying, “Why don’t guys want sweet girls like me? They only want bimbos who are hot, bratty, materialistic, and bitchy.” Please don’t get caught up in these cringey “nice guy/nice girl” paradigms. They’re mostly meaningless. The only useful takeaway from the statement is that people generally aren’t going to enter or maintain a relationship with you simply because you’re sweet or nice. But that doesn’t mean you should become an asshole or a jerk. It simply means that being nice isn’t a substitute for attraction, compatibility, or everything else people look for in a partner. Most people want to be attracted to their partner and be treated well by them. That’s the ideal. Nobody is sitting there thinking, “Damn, I really want my partner to treat me like dogshit.” Niceness isn’t going to save a relationship if the two people are fundamentally incompatible in terms of values, sexuality, lifestyle, goals, personality, etc. It’s a good thing that people aren’t entering relationships simply because someone is “nice.” For a stable, long-term commitment, you ideally need compatibility across a lot of different areas.

Also, absolutely no pressure on this; I know Leo is busy with the book! But I think a lot of people would love to hear either an audio or written review, or just more thoughts on some of the newer Booklist books. I always find it really insightful to read, especially in case I missed something or hadn’t seen it from another POV, or if there are any crucial insights I overlooked Either way, thank you for making such awesome products, both on Booklist and with the clips!

When you say this, are you referring mostly to beauty, or is there more to it? What does “feminine energy inspires me and gives me energy” mean to you? I’d be really curious to hear what you mean by that. Thanks for the share!