Consciousness existing apart from the brain?

[Preetom]

3 hours ago, Kushu2000 said:

People have probably talked about this stuff ad nauseum, but i havent heard a good argument for thid yet... If i hit you in the head, you lose consciousness. How can you then say that consciousness exists "out there" somewhere, apart from you, and exists withour your brain?

Regarding this, I'll share few points you can check out

1) first of all, the ''ultimate consciousness" spitiuality talks about is not this mundane waking state consciousness or a dream state consciousness. That Ultimate Consciousness is neither inside nor outside the brain.

2) here is a logical point. You are saying you will go unconscious if you are hit in the head with a bat. How will you 'know' that? 

Do you see that in order to even claim unconsciousness, there has to be a knowing element present all throughout?

3) It may be the case is that brain channels consciousness. Just like a door acts as an entry point in a room which can channelize people to come in. Now would you say that the door is producing all the people coming in? Hell no! All hail the almighty door ?

The bottom line is as Rupert Spira often points out, if we start any investigation with an assumption(like matter), all our discoveries and interpretations are gonna be colored by that limitation at every step.

Instead if we start with the indubitable experience of ''i am aware or i exist'', our starting line ceases to be an assumption.

So there is really 2 ways of investigating. The way of experience and the way of beliefs/assumptions.

 

Edited July 28, 2019 by Preetom

[Consilience]

38 minutes ago, Preetom said:

Regarding this, I'll share few points you can check out

1) first of all, the ''ultimate consciousness" spitiuality talks about is not this mundane waking state consciousness or a dream state consciousness. That Ultimate Consciousness is neither inside nor outside the brain.

2) here is a logical point. You are saying you will go unconscious if you are hit in the head with a bat. How will you 'know' that? 

Do you see that in order to even claim unconsciousness, there has to be a knowing element present all throughout?

3) It may be the case is that brain channels consciousness. Just like a door acts as an entry point in a room which can channelize people to come in. Now would you say that the door is producing all the people coming in? Hell no! All hail the almighty door ?

The bottom line is as Rupert Spira often points out, if we start any investigation with an assumption(like matter), all our discoveries and interpretations are gonna be colored by that limitation at every step.

Instead if we start with the indubitable experience of ''i am aware or i exist'', our starting line ceases to be an assumption.

So there is really 2 ways of investigating. The way of experience and the way of beliefs/assumptions.

 

Beautiful

[possibilities]

@Mikael89 it will take you more contemplation to understand the scope here. 

[possibilities]

@Mikael89  

This is your belief, one in which I do not share. I am not in such opposition as to conclude that positing such a belief that you mention is a denial of value, thus feel free to believe this. Logically however, you cannot conclude that it’s truth value is only 1, it could also be zero. There is after all, enumerable rational evidence to conclude that the human brain is fallible. You do not after all create your neurons, experience does and through this unfolding development you appear to create what you believe to be a “conscious” experience, but this is merely an assumption. One in which could be backed up by “well yes here I am, this is it, look I’ve even silenced my thinking and am quite aware of my thinking and in doing so balanced in my emotional expression”, however over the other side of many hills, there was an opposing army that the village did not account for nor ever conclude for they had never been in a battle other than their fight with animals. There lives a world of unknown that likely squashing all ‘known’ existence to us. But believe away, it’s not like you’re professing that you’re demon, the belief probably helps people.

 

This comment of mine here is short handed if my previous more extended comment was excluded from this summary, the least of which, is ancillary.

 

Edited July 28, 2019 by possibilities

[Gili Trawangan]

4 hours ago, Kushu2000 said:

@Serotoninluv lol, stop avoiding the argument.. if i hit you in the head you will lose consciousnes. Yes or no? It's a simple question. 

You are mistaking concepts here. The substrate of reality is not awareness in the sense that something is always aware. It is prior to awareness, it's not even aware. No words can describe it, words appear in It. Remove the concept of consciousness, it is only confusing you. The substrate of reality is nothingness, and not even that.

[possibilities]

@Gili Trawangan you’re making the assumption that it’s not or is, my argument is the untenability of knowing not in the inability of being able to make a self supporting logical structure that posits a self consistent truth based on that structure. My position is that we as humans can never leave Plato’s Allegory Of The Cave, we can merely make logical guesses that we have left some parts of it, at best and simultaneously, not even.

For those monitoring I have made three formal comments in this thread that address my own position now, one being more lengthy.

[Ananta]

20 minutes ago, Gili Trawangan said:

You are mistaking concepts here. The substrate of reality is not awareness in the sense that something is always aware. It is prior to awareness, it's not even aware. No words can describe it, words appear in It. Remove the concept of consciousness, it is only confusing you. The substrate of reality is nothingness, and not even that.

Although my opinion is you are technically correct, most here won't understand what your referring too. Basically, it's like how Nisargadatta said, "consciousness AND the absolute" referring to two different things.  

Edited July 28, 2019 by Anna1

[possibilities]

All in all to me, any strongly held position is intellectual arrogance (I.e. “I am conscious!”, “there is no consciousness!”, “reality is materialistic/metaphysical!”, “I am god! Wait no, everything is God yes, yes I see it!”, “God doesn’t exist everything is meaningless!”)) but no position at all is probably the effect of stupidity (and nothing at the same time), as well as one that does not utilise the intellect as it’s means of maintaining its position. It’s a matter of probabilities not certainties to me. Certainties are the place in which mischief gets to hide behind.

 

[Aakash]

@possibilities the truth is nobody knows anything, so we have to make highest possible truths that govern directions. Therefore certainties are not to be demonized but challenged. you, yourself are talking with conviction it sounds. 

Although it amuses me the way you write and the positions that you hold, that i've read over the past week. But it doesn't sound like you actually do practices LOL you just come on here to tell people their deluded and at a shallow level of understanding as well as hold an intellectual ground. 

Your just going to go around in circles, a scientists confirms through self-validation whether thats external or internal experimentation. Lol but you demonize the position before you even give it a chance or are even skeptical about it. but yeah, this is when it comes to matters about any subject touching god. However, you give great general help information, i like that too. Overall, i think you have loads of potential to do something great to be honest ahaha. Call it a gut feeling. 

Irony is a funny thing, you will always create your own reality. So its not others who are holding positions, but always "you who are holding the position that others are holding a position about a certain position of a position"

[possibilities]

@Aakash see this is what I’m talking about, one moment you believe yourself to have reached your posting limit and BAM here you are posting! Like I said, certainties create mischief. Yes please cite my conviction, I’m sure you’ll likely find with enough introspection that said conviction is purely relative to the premise of non conviction in the face of absolutes however having degrees of conviction relative to what one can ascertain, of which is a logical thing to do. 

Read prior comments to gain perspective on what I’ve stated prior to jumping to conclusions as I have with your own. Notice how I’ve only so far addressed your claims pertaining to certainty and nothing else? 

It seems you are offended, for someone who believes themselves to be God how is such a possibility? To me it seems to be an interesting irony but shows the mischief at work in people holding certainties. 

I wish for you to believe whatever you wish about me, the only arguments I take seriously against my own are those that have logical credence, of which you’ve demonstrated non thus far. As I’ve stated to others, feel free to think I’m a spam bot, a deluded whisky dealer, a demon from outer space, a keyboard warrior, a prophet. I have no interest in seriously addressing conclusions that don’t meet my standard, so feel free.

But oh yes! Irony is a funny thing Mr. God who feels the need to parrot! 

[Aakash]

@possibilities I don't want to go off topic from the thread, so i'll say this 

I editted my post, i meant posts relating to new profound theories and insights about the nature of consciousness, not normal posts replying to people. Thanks for letting me know that people will misread it. I appreciate it. 

29 minutes ago, possibilities said:

I’m sure you’ll likely find with enough introspection that said conviction is purely relative to the premise of non conviction in the face of absolutes however having degrees of conviction relative to what one can ascertain, of which is a logical thing to do. 

Just by you saying this is enough for me to know you mean it, which is good

30 minutes ago, possibilities said:

Notice how I’ve only so far addressed your claims pertaining to certainty and nothing else? 

So this is the impact you wish to have? Sorting out other peoples ideas etc is a nice thing to do. However, if you haven't experienced god lets say, what grounds can you give to justify that another person's absolute is actually not the absolute? 

32 minutes ago, possibilities said:

It seems you are offended, for someone who believes themselves to be God how is such a possibility?

offended because it comes from the materialist paradigm. Yes its a possibility for god, its impossible to question god from a materialistic paradigm. So what doubt are you putting in others? instead, of helping them progress? To doubt something, is not to think of it as absolute and to progress you need to understand the absolute is the absolute and there is nothing else

34 minutes ago, possibilities said:

the only arguments I take seriously against my own are those that have logical credence, of which you’ve demonstrated non thus far

The logic remark is this, all logic is actually illogical when viewed from an abstract perspective. As it does not fit within its own realms of logic. 

for example, if i tell you that apples are actually blue in colour 

Your logic will reject this comment, when i'm being 100% serious that apples are blue in A reality. 

How will you then go forward and try to be skeptical of this from your logic framework. It's actually impossible. You would have to build a new frame work (an illogical framework) which then if proved to be correct after experimentation will become your new referential framework 

The second piece of logic is this: 

Just as you see my blind spots, i see yours. This is the beauty of projection. The very thing that someone says is a projection of faleshood in their own mind. Which means, anything can be argued against. Anything except the absolute. So if a person arguing from the perspective of the absolute is actually not speaking from logic or falsehood. You must be skeptical of the degree of correctness, if it's higher than yours, you accept it and take it as your new absolute. If it's not, then you reject it. However, the trick is we accept/ reject something from the very paradigm we operate from ourselves. Meaning that logic will not work. On the other hand, you are not incorrect either. Nobody has disproved to you how logic is inadequate, they've merely stated it won't work. So i'll tell you directly. No words from another human being can prove your own mind wrong. You yourself must see how logic is inadequate and that can only be done by quieting the mind and having a mystical experience. To show the mind can not get you there or you have to find the limitations of logic itself. Which is the study of epistemology/metaphysics and logical positivism.  I reached the conclusion through the former as most others have, you are trying to reach the conclusion through the latter. Which others on this forum, have not studied enough philosophy to guide you to, except Leo. As a result, people suggest to you the former, which their absolutes revolves around. Therefore they aren't incorrect, they're just not giving you what you want. You want knowledge to break down knowledge and to do that you have to watch leo's main body of work, which is the entirety of all his video's put together with careful contemplation. Similarly you may look in his book list for the godel, esher and ba and this will help you. What these philosophers show is a theory as to how knowledge is incomplete. 

or if you want a shortcut without reading the books, leo has already made a video about the major implications

v 

[possibilities]

“what grounds can you give to justify that another person's absolute is actually not the absolute?”

It’s not out of the question for me, this is what needs to be understood, I am neither for nor against, I am merely saying that from the structure that I operate from, it is likely false. Differentiate.

You need to remove the assumption that just because I use logic as my tool for discourse that I do not have a quiet mind or that I always use logic. I am simply saying that anything I come to conclude which isn’t logical isn’t likely to be true relative to the structures that I’ve thus far created. You must understand that you cannot fathom what I find to be logical and what I find not to be logical, it is all down to someone’s reference frame or perhaps more specifically, someone’s contemplative reference frame.

It is therefore an illusion that you see my blind spots, this is the projection. 

Please make one claim right now that you believe in which isn’t logical and I will tell you how you can invent a logical structure to make it logical or rather, that said claim is either likely false or outside my reference frame of what is logical. Either way, logic has not at all been refuted by Leo here, that is merely an assumption because he hasn’t broadened his scope of logic. The position has all mad cats thrown by crazy ladies killed so I’m pretty confident (but not certain) here.

I will personally give you $10,000 if you can disprove logic. 

But, if you cannot do so, you have to give ME $10,000 and never post on this forum again.

I will however continue to post because obviously I’ll need all the help I can get to rid myself of logic!

It would be well worth the money because then I’d have a better perspective by which to glean reality.

If you choose to accept one fascinating thing I’m wondering now is how you’re going to justify any position whatsoever without logic, that’ll be interesting.

 

[Aakash]

@possibilities Yeah i'm not getting banned for having this conversation. not getting banned is worth a lot more than 10,000 sorry. I told you the answer for free. Nobody can persuade you ,except yourself. 

Bye

@Kushu2000 here's a paradox for you to solve, if you lost half of your brain, would this have changed the feeling of being alive itself? 

if you answer no, then what your saying is that consciousness itself has not changed. Therefore consciousness has nothing to do with the brain. 

Edited July 28, 2019 by Aakash

[possibilities]

@Aakash Well why don’t you prove it by private message?

Because the likelihood is that you’re full of shit. Again, likelihood. Not certainty.

Let’s remove the money if you want, I’ll share your answers with others and personally “run the risk of being banned” as you put it, thus placing the admins/moderators as a scapegoat so you don’t have to backup what you say.

C’mon, show that you’ve got some credibility! You’re the one that decided to challenge me.

I’m free for you to believe what you want but if you’re going to challenge me personally make sure you step fully into the boxing ring as opposed to merely halfway.

If not, please just fuck off and don’t waste my time (by prosletysing) with your posts.  

[Aakash]

1 hour ago, possibilities said:

Please make one claim right now that you believe in which isn’t logical and I will tell you how you can invent a logical structure to make it logical or rather, that said claim is either likely false or outside my reference frame of what is logical

This is true, yes 

what would we be debating, we would be going around in circles. 

Yes its logical

, yes it's logical ,

so that makes it illogical,

yes it's logical, but it's logical to me,

but that means it's illogical to to you and not logical to me

, then yes it's logical 

Lol this would be our conversation, and we'd end up right back in the same place 

its like i said, i don't know how to disprove logic, logically. I did it through mystical experience. The simple answer, is that if everything is logical one, you can't actually make distinctions about anything which is true. Therefore by default what has the mind actually created to base it's logic on? its based it on assumptions about there was such thing as a distinction. Also, its like inlytened1 disproved quantum physics with evidence, however you never accepted it. ahaha whats your credibility based on? experimental evidence of your experience changing, which is envoked by practice. so do the practices, contemplate .... what is logic, what is a point of reference, what is evidence, what is the assumptions science is based on, what is an atom, what is perception, what is religion, what are neurones, what is illogical, what is duality , what is non-duality, what is experience, what is credibility of professionalism based on, what is survival of a subject, what are the contradictions between different subjects, what is the history of that subject, what is understanding, what is a symbol , what is language , what is sentences ,what is bias , what is metaphysics, what is subjective , what is objective, How much is each subject subjective, what is debate, what is ideology, what is time, what is real , what is not real , what is a theory, what is actuality, what is limited perspectives effect on results, what is interpretation , what is a point, what is correlation, what is true, what is false, what is cultural warfare, what is business, what is money, what is funding for experiment, what is the point of cutting edge resources happening at university, what is journalism, what is Darwinism, what is evolution, what is differentiation in subject branches, what is occultism, what is the problems of the world, what can materialism do to solve these issues, can it solve all of them, what is happiness, what is suffering , what is desire, why can two scientist disagree on the same subjects. 

Answer all of this and find the connection between all of these, i've sliced reality into certain segments to give you a certain picture. add any other variables you feel you need to, but just use this as the core of your contemplation from scratch. Like your learning all over again, but being skeptical of its validity now. 

Also yeah i only assume i know what you know because that's the only way to communicate with people LOL , i can't ever know 100% of what you know, i can at best only guess. 

Edited July 28, 2019 by Aakash

[possibilities]

@Aakash Yes I already know this which is why I knew you were likely full of shit. End of discussion.

You need to realise that even in your “mystical experience”, which you shouldn’t assume that I haven’t had one, you’re still perceiving x and creating intuitions about it which have a logical structure.

You can’t get out if it by simply stating “mystical experience”, it isn’t an argument, in fact it’s the exact opposite given to experience anything you have to be able to perceive patterns in experience and if you’re perceiving patterns in experience what are you also simultaneously doing? Perceiving logic.

Perception predicates the capacity for logic, even for a mentally handicapped person. 

This is the fatal flaw in most persons who try to defeat logic, they don’t fully comprehend that it’s directly opposed to the capacity to experience anything at all. 

Game set and match. 

Now let’s just get back on topic then shall we.

Edited July 28, 2019 by possibilities

[Kushu2000]

@possibilities @possibilities awesome comment, @Jed Vassallo @Jed Vassallothanx. Yeah, i've come to these conxlusions myself. In the end, you have to be your own authority, everything else is just a pointer towards that very destination/food fir though.

Btw, how do you delete @possibilities or @jed vassallo?? This is annoying

[Aakash]

@possibilities Lol we've literally just said the same thing, 

I put it in an illogical way to disprove your logic and you put it in a logical way to disprove your own logic LOL 

So if you've disproved your own logic,  then why argue with logic if you know its illogical under any circumstance

LOL yeah i'm done with this aswell 

you win, you disproved logic by proving logic is illogical

congrats 

it truly was game set and match

Edited July 28, 2019 by Aakash

[possibilities]

No problem and not sure @Kushu2000, I just hope we can encourage that line of thinking because these prosletysers piss me off because that’s exactly what they subtly do, pretend to be an authority to others and replace their capacity for critical thinking and doubt on the “authorities” proclamations. External authority creates a lot of problems in the world, as to its opposite it would be interesting to see what kind of world would be created with everyone thinking well and for themselves, the next step potentially around the idea of getting good at communicating viewpoints from our reference frames as opposed to what we believe to be absolutes, that’s just how I see it though. Peace out

@Aakash you clearly haven’t understood my comments. If you believe you have please quote the exact text I speak of then try to refute it accordingly as opposed to continuing to make mindless statements pointing to nothing designed to merely mislead.

Edited July 28, 2019 by possibilities

[Aakash]

@possibilities Nah i'm not about long arguments about logic, i want to debate other consciousness matters LOL so i'll stick to my proselytising. 

Your trying to disprove my logic frame of reference and i'm trying to disprove your logic frame of referencing. Your saying your right and i'm saying i'm right. That itself shows that logic is relative. However, your taking it one step further. By arguing the relevance of logic, nobody here is disputing that logic is relevant. and that so called authorities are trying to brain wash people, by making them lose their frame of reference by saying logic is not needed. To defence such a position, is itself relative. The inherent problem with relativity is, its pointless from both ends.  The only adjudication is which is more conscious? which is something you dislike people taking on blind faith. To which my rebuttle is to do the practices instead of wasting your time arguing online about so-called authority figures trying to brain wash other people on this forum with their delusion. Authority is only there to help if its quote on quote good. An echo chamber can be a positive thing, and parroting is needed for anybody who isn't enlightened. it doesn't matter how hard you try.. if you defend a viewpoint. That viewpoint means something to you. Still i sympathies with you, because you remind me of myself. Now i'm on the receiving end, i can't blame you for not trying to shift your relativity. As it should be. So good luck really

Its like i said in my other post, there are only two highest truth's at the end of the day. All other's are practically illusory but neccesary to realise the two truths themselves. It's a process

Edited July 28, 2019 by Aakash