Gees

What whole? What parts? I am not sure what you are asking. Are you saying that I am trying to explain what caused reality, (the components) of the Universe, by studying reality, (the emergent) of the Universe? You mean like reality does not explain philosophy. Philosophy explains reality. I am very aware of the unawares -- I tend to call them the unconscious aspect of mind. Do you know that your hippocampus does more than hold your memories? It is kind of important to your emotion and I suspect your instincts. Do you know that the unconscious aspect of mind is reactionary because it is controlled/activated by emotion/feeling/want? I have spent a good bit of time talking to science people, who will explain to me that they know all about hormones, instincts, and how these things regulate life and keep us going. But they don't know all about these things, because they still do not understand the balance, nor do they understand what pushes and allows evolution. I want to learn about these things. I suspect that the video on quantum fields has some clues as to how that works. I haven't found anyone else that seems to have a clue about the self-balancing of ecosystems or the reasons why evolution works the way it does. I am not buying the "God" idea, the Intelligent Designer, magic, coincidence, or luck. The rookie mistake would be in disrespecting those biological processes to the point where we disrupt them. Many of us already know that the Dust Bowl that destroyed the middle of the United States was caused by killing off millions of buffalo and getting rid of the buffalo grass in an attempt to kill off the American Indian. We are finding evidence that we have disrupted many ecosystems and are trying to fix the problems. This is good, but there is more. The balance also works within species. A man goes to war and fights raising his testosterone levels. Directly after the war, he takes the first person that he can find and shoves himself into her, and creates new life. Life is taken and life is given by the same abundance of a hormone. This is not coincidence, this is balance and why rape has always followed war. When a woman has a baby, she turns from her husband. Why? Hormones -- because it is necessary to ensure the next generation. She becomes devoted to the child for the first few months -- she also doesn't get much sleep. So what turns her back to her husband? Nursing. While feeding the baby, her breasts swell, her womb shrinks, she is attractive. She feels loving as she is feeding his baby -- and the bonus is that she can't get pregnant while nursing full time. So sex is a freebee. Replace nursing with a bottle and there is more pain for her while her milk dries up, and her womb is slower to resume it's former shape, sex is scary because no one wants another baby this soon. Mom and Dad are trading off feeding the baby and no one is getting sleep. When Dad walked by Mom, she used to go "mmm", but now she goes, "Eew" because her hormones tell her that only the baby smells good. Dad takes a shower, puts on deodorant, and wonders what is wrong. Everyone is grouchy. Does it always work this way? No. All warriors do not rape, but many do, enough that it is a known phenomenon. Hospitals are trying to get women to bond with their babies and to nurse them because we are already seeing the results of the foolish decision that pushed bottles on nursing mothers in order to get them into factories in WWII. The balance also works within societies and cultures. When a baby is nursed, it actually has to seduce it's mother's body in order to get the milk flowing and does this by smiling, cooing, stroking her, and mouthing her nipple -- baby has to give to get. A bottle-fed baby only needs to yell and cry for what it wants. Think about it. After three generations, if you can't see where this has influenced our culture, you are not paying attention. It is clear to me that life could not have evolved independently. It is all connected. We are all connected. I suspect that all reality is connected. I would like to learn how. Gee

And what, pray tell, do you think that "invisible spirit" actually is? Either you know and you made an honest mistake, or you don't know and you corrupted the thread through ignorance. Which is it? Gee So it was split because of the discussion of different topics and yet you continue to introduce "different topics". Let me get this straight -- this thread is about consciousness, human consciousness, and science. Right? It is not about Nothing v Creation. So if I want to discuss that video, I will have to copy it back to the original thread? Won't you just hi-jack it again? Gee It's a good thing we are in the speculations sub-forum because your above comments are definitely speculations. Gee

I don't see where any of this denies the idea that Aquinas was instrumental in changing church doctrine that eventually opened the doors to science and learning. Augustine was first to create extensive church doctrine around 400-500 AD. He was a prolific writer. His writings shut down learning -- outside of the church. He had no love for Aristotle. He believed and taught that truth and knowledge could only come from "God", which ended up giving the church way too much power. This went on for hundreds of years and we call that time the Dark Ages. Aquinas, et al, introduced new ideas, rewrote and submitted new church doctrine that changed policy and actually threw open the doors to new ideas. Between the time of Augustine and Aquinas all knowledge was acceptable only if it came from the church -- hence the Dark Ages tag. It would be silly to assume that the above paragraph could give an accurate reflection of hundreds of years of history. So many things affect history like the plague, the industrial revolution, wars and natural disasters. I was not giving a history lesson. So what relevance does your post have to the subject of this thread; namely, Nothing v Creation? Gee

Are you moving the goal posts? I know the original thread was NOT exclusively about humans -- it was about nothing v creation. Gee

Thank you for remembering this. I know Aquinas was instrumental in helping to end the Dark Ages and throw open the doors to the enlightenment and science, but I have never read his work directly. To me it is relevant that he described "God" as an act rather than a being. Some of those old scholars were a lot brighter than people give them credit for. For myself, I study consciousness and long ago broke it up into the rational mind and digital thought that we call consciousness; and the unconscious aspect of mind, analogue emotion, that we think of as an after affect of consciousness. I don't agree with that assessment. I think that conscious digital thought is like a "noun" in a sentence as it gives the idea structure and identity; whereas the unconscious analogue emotion is more like a "verb" in the sentence and gives it action and state of being. So I see the "verb" as essential to being and to creation. I doubt that consciousness or anything else could exist without the "verb", emotion. Gee

It had a very clear definition, "Nothing and The Creation". The thread was about the source of life of consciousness of the universe of everything. This "source" was "nothing", but managed to create everything. A neat trick that has captured the imaginations of millions for millennia. I suspect that you read the words "Nothing" and "Creation", assumed that the thread was about "God" because it was in the religion forum, became offended when science was brought in to possibly validate "God", and split the thread to speculations so science could defend itself. If I am wrong, I certainly apologize. It might be worthwhile for members to remember that "God" is not an actual fact -- "God" is an interpretation. I am looking for other interpretations and so is this thread. So you think that "plant consciousness" and "human consciousness" are unequal? I suppose it could look that way even when comparing, say an elephant and a tadpole. But on the other hand both the elephant and tadpole are equally alive when compared to a rock. Most of this is a matter of perspective. I tend to have a holistic view of problems that I try to address, so when I think of consciousness, I remind myself that all consciousness is simply awareness. The differences lay in what the specimen is aware of as there are thousands of levels of awareness. While browsing in the Biology section, I found a thread about consciousness and bees. One of the members there mentioned that it could be considered that the Poles (north and south) were aware of each other as proven by the force between them. Interesting. I like this idea and accept the possibility of it -- this is just another example of the beginnings of consciousness. There is no reason to accept religion's interpretation that a fully conscious being started the Universe. It could have been force that evolved just like everything else did. Gee

No. Gee I suspect that "Maimy" had more knowledge than you are aware of -- clearly he had more understanding. I did not put the neg rep points on your post. I don't know who did. Gee

I have seen a lot of different threads on consciousness in this forum with a whole lot of definitions -- so which definition would you like? I only stated that a brain and thought were not part of a tree's consciousness, but science has proven that trees are aware, that they communicate, that they work to preserve themselves, do you need more than this? If you want me to show that trees have human consciousness, then you are being beyond reasonable as trees are not human. I didn't post the video, but would like to discuss it. It would be difficult to summarize the video as there is so much that it touches on. It explains how many of the theories of consciousness that I could not accept before, may actually have some support to them. It also seems to give a valid explanation of how ecosystems self-balance and how evolution may be actuated. I was fascinated. Gee

You don't really want an answer to this question, do you? If you actually do want an answer, then please restate your question so that I know what you are asking. Gee I did not state that Maimonides thoughts were about quantum; what I stated was that there was an "obvious comparison". I was talking about recognition -- not terminology. Maimonides equated the God of Abraham to what philosophers refer to as the Necessary Being. Federico called his study quantum physics, and I relate this concept to the unconscious aspect of mind; but we were all talking about the same thing -- recognized the same thing. Remember, Maimonides said, "that science, the growth of scientific fields, and discovery of the unknown by comprehension of nature was a way to appreciate God." Gee

I probably would enjoy it as I have read some of Penrose's work, but have too much on my plate already. I will check it out later after I contend with this current project of Federico's. Most people have no idea of how massive the study of consciousness actually is. They see it as a study of the brain, maybe physics and cosmology, a little religion and a little philosophy. In reality consciousness study affects all of religion, probably 80%, or more, of philosophy, and most if not all branches of science -- a massive study indeed. Federico's theory touches on too many of these separate ideas, so my mind was reeling just trying to keep up. Then I realized that Federico probably does not even see all of these implications because he does not study consciousness and so does not realize all of the leads to other branches of science, etc. I started to take notes while watching the video, but half way through I quit as there were just too many points to address and no context for the explanations that are necessary in order to understand and address those points. In order to give context to many of those points, I would have to write a damned book -- and that book would only be about what I think I know, not what I am still trying to figure out. So I am going to select a few of the ideas to discuss that his theory clarifies or enhances. Federico starts out with a bang saying that consciousness is not in the body and compares the experience with that of using a drone. This very much aligns with my thinking. Years ago, I was corresponding with a physics professor, who explained to me that thought has no power. He said, "If you take the greatest thoughts known to man and write them down or save them on a disk then wait a day, a year, or a hundred years; when you check them, you will find that they have done nothing. Thought has no power, no force, no ability to do anything." He was right. Federico finds similar conclusions about AI. So I spent some time breaking down consciousness into parts. I found that knowledge, memory, and thought are digital, work within time and space, and are internal and private -- I know my thoughts/you know yours. But emotion, feeling (not tactile), and awareness are not digital, they are analogue/fluid (emotion does not work within time and space but actually ignores time) and these are external and shared -- unless we intentionally hide our feelings they show. This is why emotion can cause bonding, because it works between us -- it works between life. It is a force. It is external. It was not long before I realized that the digital part of consciousness was the rational aspect of mind -- what most people think of as consciousness. The analogue part of consciousness was the unconscious and it is ruled by emotion. So why did we ever decide that digital thought was consciousness? I think there were two reasons. The first is because we control thought and the rational mind, whereas the unconscious is strictly reactionary so we have very little control over it. And Descartes did not help when he stated, "I think; therefore, I am." So did that mean if I don't think, then I am not? Yes. That is exactly how it was interpreted, so infants, deaf people, the mentally handicapped, and many indigenous people (having an unknown language) were treated as though they were NOT. The reasoning here is very simple; if you do not have language, then you have no way to prove you think, therefore, you were not considered conscious. This means that all other life was also not conscious, not aware, not alive? Science has been systematically changing this belief as it proves consciousness in different species, but is not willing to state categorically that if something is alive, then it is conscious. (The thought thing again.) So to start off one must understand that Federico is not talking about thought, he is not talking about the brain, he is talking about the unconscious aspect of mind, which is ruled by emotion, feeling, and want. This is what consciousness, or awareness, derives from. Where is the unconscious? No one knows. It does not seem to have a location. We have no idea of it's size or parameters. We know that it connects to other life forms because it could not promote bonding if it did not and this is where psychic phenomenon originates and it is where "God" ideas originate. Jung could tell us some about the unconscious and "God" ideas, but Matt Blanco could tell us about the six or seven levels (stratums) in the unconscious that he discovered through math while he was looking for a logic in the unconscious. He found it. He realized that the unconscious was thought to have no logic, but this was because it ignored time. (Yes. This has been clinically proven and is the reason why childhood trauma can affect an entire lifetime and why PTSD happens.) Logic, "this therefore, that" is part of logic, and the "therefore" requires time, so this logic does not work in the unconscious. Blanco found that the deeper levels of the unconscious used another method to evaluate, but it has been a while since I read it, so I am going to have to look it up. There is so much more, but this is hopefully a good start and all I can do now. Tomorrow I will try to address some of the other points made in the video. Gee

Ant Sinclair; Thank you for showing us this video -- it is absolutely brilliant. Because I am no scientist, I am going to have to study the video three or four more times, so that I can try to understand how he explained his idea with science's terminology. For myself, I came to similar conclusions about consciousness by observing, using logic, and studying nature -- more of a philosopher's study. And yes, we can prove that a tree is conscious as long as one does not expect it to have a brain and thought, as that is not consciousness. The brain is what produces the rational aspect of mind and thought, which is a product of consciousness -- it is not consciousness. I don't understand why people do not see the obvious comparison with Maimonides thoughts, as I saw it immediately. Thanks again, Gee It helps me to think of the brain like I would an antenna. If the antenna is damaged or broken, so is the picture (conscious thought) that it produces. First there is conscious awareness (the unconscious aspect of mind) which feeds into the brain (antenna), then the brain produces digital thought -- the rational aspect of mind. In my understanding. I don't know this, but suspect that F Faggin understands this part. I have more studying to do. Gee

You are right! There is nothing unscientific about that. Why are you arguing about this? It's kind of silly. Gee

I bet you do. It makes you feel like you are not the only one. ☺️ I know little about science and less about math, so I did not know that. It is why I asked. Thank you for the information. You won't mind if I don't give you an up vote as you usually get them from people who are entertained by your abuse of members. I see you already have two, so I figure I don't owe you any more. The only thing you might be sorry about is that I might die and you will have one less person to abuse. Gee It is not wrong. It is just very limited. Arguing that you named and described laws of the Universe -- after the Universe came to be -- does nothing to add to this thread. Gee

These are questions that have been around forever and so far have no resolution. I agree that there is no "nothing", but when we agree to that, it opens the door to the "God" concept or to intelligent design, as it is clear that there is some organized growth in life and in the Universe. So I propose that we accept that there is something that is unknown to us -- that is immaterial -- but seems to have properties. What if we look at this backward and examine what properties would have to be present in order for the Universe to evolve? Some "time"? Time did not exist before matter and the Universe existed. You are talking about the "Invisible Spirit" as if it were some thing, or individual, or self -- this is where people come up with "God" ideas. I think it is a mistake to immediately interpret an anthropomorphized being; I prefer looking at properties. So there was never nothing; there was always something. Most people think that the "nothing" is related to consciousness, whether you call that consciousness "God" or not, but there is a problem with this. The conscious rational aspect of mind does not work outside of time, so it could not have been here before the Universe was here. Let's look at this backward. Let's reverse engineer the start of the Universe. 😁 There was no time -- so no rational mind. There was something that makes us think of "God" -- spirit? There was something that both the Laws of Physics and math are based on -- balance? There was something that had power -- a force? There was something that was self-balancing and could seek it's own level, much like water. There was something that can cause matter to form. There was something that caused things to bond together or create a oneness. All of the above are properties of emotion. Science has decided that emotion is nothing. Gee You do realize that you are posting in the religion forum and that your above comment could be used to validate the "God" idea, because it does not need to be tested or observed? And how do you make a hypothesis or prediction if you do not "observe" what you are talking about? This is the reason why science does not really study consciousness; they study the brain, and generally ignore emotion. Gee

This was your response and question: It looks like you made an assertion -- and did not give a description. In order for it to be scientific, it would have to be tested or at least observed. Yes? So did you observe "nothing" or did you test "nothing"? Gee

Dimreepr; It doesn't happen often that you help me, but the information about Maimonides was very helpful and informative. Thank you. Gee It is NOT all the same. I have wondered for a long time what the "Phi" in your name stands for as it is very clear you are no philosopher, so the "Phi" can not be short for philosophy. Will you tell me what it stands for? Gee I am going to guess that a few hundred years ago, if a person turned a cup of water upside-down, let it drain, then turned it back upright, it would be assumed to be empty. So nothing would be in it. Right? But science knows that is not true, as there is, at least, air in it. But I suspect that Trurl was actually thinking of philosophy, rather than science. Isn't it philosophy that says one can not prove a negative? Does that mean that we can not describe a negative? Hmm. I seriously doubt that "nothing" existed before the Universe. Gee

I know why they do it. But when people often say, "what you propose is magic", or "that is supernatural", one has to wonder what those people know about magic and the supernatural, or what they are hiding about their superstitious natures. For me, I see magic as something that entertains children and the supernatural as a word that is used by some to explain the unexplained -- neither term has any real meaning for me personally. I actually worked a thread in this forum, while trying to get to the bottom of the "supernatural" dilemma. So either the people who accuse others of magic and/or the supernatural in this forum are superstitious fools, or they are being insincere, insulting, argumentative, disingenuous, and royal pains. This is off-topic, irrelevant, and it looks like misdirection. Have you been studying Trump's methodologies? You missed the point. You said, "The only other options here are: life always existed, or life was the result of magic/mysticism. " This is not true. You have oversimplified something because you do not understand it. I responded with, "So I guess the only options here are to conclude that religious people think "God" started life and the science people think that magic started life?" which is also not true, which would be why I phrased it as a question. I was mimicking your rather simplistic statement, which obviously had nothing to do with truth. iNow missed the point also. Maybe he should consider some help with his reading comprehension. It was not answered. Gee

I always thought that the self balancing of ecosystems was interesting. How does it put itself back together and maintain its self-balancing nature after we mess it up or after a natural disaster messes it up? What law or principle causes all life to work so hard to maintain itself and cause life to continue? We use math to measure these principles, but I don't see how math causes them. Gee

Yes. One could make that argument. Philosophy would talk about balance, science would talk about math, and religion would talk about the "God'" plan, but they would all be talking about the same thing. Congratulations. You finally got off the Science v Religion merry-go-round long enough to think. Think about this: Spinoza lived hundreds of years ago, so what has science learned in the meantime that would support or detract from Spinoza's work? Einstein used math to make his conclusions. Quantum theories and holographic theories built on his original ideas. So is there a personal "God" concept and a universal "God" concept? Two of them? Look to psychology for an answer to the personal "God". Jung taught us about the "God" archetypes, Blanco taught us about the logic in the unconscious by explaining that emotion ignores time, psychology tells us a lot about the personal "God". Even ordinary principles are worthy of study. Gee

Asking would be a waste of time. After 12 pages, you should realize that nobody cares. I have watched members in the religion forum abuse every idea that is presented in this religion section, whether it is good or bad -- for years. They pretend interest, then gradually change the conversation to be about science, then ridicule anyone who does not agree with them. This thread was never about abiogenesis -- it is about the "God" concept, which none of the members study or understand. The members here are reasonably intelligent and capable of reading and following a thought process, so this is a bait and switch tactic. Entertainment for the forum members. Normally I would not even respond to a thread in this forum, but when you noted that there is a difference between the spiritual and religion, and you made that comment without regard to any religion or practice, I thought that you might be worth talking to. If you google abiogenesis, you are informed that the Oxford dictionary calls abiogenesis a theory. Science can study it, but they don't. They study the brain, or they study behavior, or they study societies. They do not study the mental and barely study consciousness. I have been studying consciousness off and on for decades and have come to the conclusion that some aspects of consciousness can interact with the physical. Some aspects of consciousness may actually be physical. I have asked members in other forums if they can tell me the properties of mental aspects, and they have no answer. Some aspects of the mental do have properties. But I must tell you that I have been fighting MS (multiple sclerosis), which slows me down, for about 50 years, and now I have cancer to fight also. I start my radiation treatment next week, which I have been told will make me even more tired, so I have no desire to provide entertainment for the masses. I sent you a PM with my email address so that we could continue this conversation if you are interested. I doubt that I will respond to many more posts in this thread. It is just too hard and serves no purpose. Gee

Swansont, Do you have any idea of how many times the words "supernatural", "magic", and "mysticism" have been used in this thread? The interesting part is that the words are always used by "science" people. So I guess the only options here are to conclude that religious people think "God" started life and the science people think that magic started life? It is no wonder that Luc and I are having trouble in this thread, as we don't think either of those things happened. I didn't think this thread was about abiogenesis, but then maybe it is. Gee

I know a lot of Catholics, so if you are indeed a practicing Catholic, then you know a lot more about Catholicism than you do about the "God" concept. It is also likely that you have been trained in your beliefs since childhood, as that is a policy of the Catholic church. Thank you for going out of your way to prove my point. As far as the Pavlov's dogs comment. I would like to thank the members who went out of their way to repeatedly downvote my post and provide evidence for my guess that rep points are used to discourage opposition to the science forum's agenda. I went back and looked. I did not see where Luc Turpin misrepresented abiogenesis. I did see where he questioned it, but that is not misrepresenting. The only thing that I could find him guilty of is intelligence as he would not accept as fact something that has not been proven as factual. You, on the other hand, may have misrepresented the worth of the abiogenesis methodology? process? hypothesis? Please provide evidence of Luc Turpin's misrepresentation. So you think that he used misrepresentation in order to introduce "very ill-defined concepts"? Do you know what this thread is about? One could honestly state that the "God" concept is the big daddy of "very ill-defined concepts". Is it your intent to be humorous? You can't honestly believe that you or science have an answer to the concept of "God". There is nothing wrong with that logic. Yes, science progresses, but science can not progress beyond science because then it would stop being science. Science uses a methodology that tests the physical -- that is science!!! Science can not use that methodology on the spiritual or even on the mental. You can't slap god down on a lab table to study, so you either have to use philosophy or you have to use religion or you have to be clueless. Just like we can not use religion to study the physical as there is no way to validate and test what we think we know using the methodology of religion. The same is true for philosophy, which is why we created science in the first place. This is what is called a no-brainer. Luc Turpin was not the only one that brought up alternate hypothesis, so your complaint seems excessive. I will tell you that I bought the book, The Holographic Universe, read it, and still can't explain "WTF that means", so I don't know why you would complain that Luc can not explain it fully in a post in this thread. I can tell you that in the back of that book are hundreds of references from page 303 to page 327 -- way too much information for me to absorb. Science can't do it alone. Some of life gets kind of "wooly and vague". Years ago, I looked up the posts and comments that were made when this forum was creating, or maybe recreating, itself. A lot of the members did not want to have a philosophy section or a religion section, so why is there one here? Because it was discovered that it was needed. No matter why it was needed, it became clear that it was needed. Science can't do it all alone. Gee

Luc Turpin, I have very much enjoyed reading your posts in this thread, and find it amazing that you have managed to receive only 13 down votes in nine pages of comments. You actually seem to understand that there is a difference between spirituality and religion, and yet know that these concepts are related. You have been very tactful and very careful to try to gain information without implying that science may not have the ability to know all of the answers. I would never be able to accomplish that as I have a tendency to tell people exactly what I think. Everybody here knows that science does not study the "God" concept, so they are generally clueless about it. Mostly the science members will call it imagination or nonsense or something similar, and yet there are hundreds of posts in this thread, many of which are from science people, who are obviously relaying the information they received in childhood regarding the subject matter. Go figure! As far as people calling you "crackpot", etc., do not take it personally and use the brain in your head. This is a science forum. It's purpose is to promote science. So if member (a) comes to the Religion/Philosophy section and finds a comment that is not 100% pro science, they can make a derisive comment and down vote that person, which is quite likely to cause someone to up vote member (a). Am I saying that this is a game for the purpose of establishing reputation? Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. You are not going to learn much about the "God" concept, religion, or spirituality from these people, as they do not know and are not teaching -- this is about training, like Pavlov's dogs, only they use rep points instead of treats. A "willingness to reconsider ideas" is not fundamental to science -- it is fundamental to philosophy. Science studies the physical, philosophy studies the mental, religion studies the spiritual (emotion). We are physical, mental, and spiritual beings so we need all three disciplines to understand ourselves. Do you think I will get a downvote or two for this post? Maybe. Gee

The members of this forum are seriously biased against religion and even philosophy, so I don't know why you posted in this forum. I suppose you read that this was the philosophy forum so you thought it would be OK. No. The members of this forum believe that science is the beginning and end of knowledge. This means that if the information did not come from science, then it can not possibly be knowledge. It could be imagination, speculation, or maybe garbage, but it is not knowledge. But I found your thoughts interesting. You still need to do some work on your ideas, but I doubt that you will get any help here. Gee

Yes it is. Philosophers study truth and lies, so it is probably a bad idea to lie to a philosopher. You probably don't want to know this, but the lie is very obvious -- so I am not the only person, who caught it. I am just the only person, who said something about it. Sorry about this. I am not used to this program that combines posts. Gee