#1. Paloma's Spirituality Argument - added to June 2014

Paloma's Spirituality Argument - added to June 2014

This is copied from my Second Life notecard which doesn't have italics
[note: ITALICS (caps) is used for italics,for emphasis. I could have used *italics* but I think CAPS is easier to read ]



Paloma says
"Let's go back to the basic premise that so many hang their hats on,namely:-
The real world exists.
But does it?
And in what form?"

Reconsider Rene Descartes 'dreaming argument'
Which goes roughly like this..if my memory serves:
.The dream world seems real - is RL (and SL) just a dream?
.and that perception can be deceptive -don't trust things that deceive
.and thus ...for all I know the earth, sky, colours and all the external world could just be the work of an evil genius to ensnare me

"The brain in a vat"
The skeptic invites one to say" For all I know,I am a brain in a vat and there is no external world [prof Jennifer Hornsby - Birkbeck College]

The Matrix Movie
Cypher: You know, I know this steak doesn't exist. I know that when I put it in my mouth, the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. ...

Down at the Pub - there's always someone who kindly offers to punch the sceptic in the face and ask -
"Did that exist?"
One arises spitting teeth and contemplating a trip to the local hospital or revenge  -but after the pain has gone or killing the combatant  -one is still not convinced that reality exists!

If it's the brain -what does the brain see?
The eyes run messages to the brain's visual cortex where they are seen as images  -this we "know"
The proof of course is that scientists witnessed this using their visual cortex !
No proof at all!


So how do we expand on "the world may only exist in my mind"?

The first thing for me is to consider the 5 perceptions..yawn -they are there- we perceive the world or something that seems like the world.
But what about all the other perceptions ppl DO feel?.
 "My aunty saw a ghost". "The room went cold" . "I felt the presence of an angel and we were saved" "I remember my past lives " "I had a deja-vue" and the Shaman's everyday experience - "There is consciousness in everything - a lake has thoughts -so do the rocks, the grass, a tree, a bird -one only has to feel them or listen"
These 6th , 7th and 8th etc perceptions ARE real -in that ppl report experiencing  them. Furthermore I strongly suspect less ppl report them than actually occur -one doesn't want to be refused a drink at one's local pub because one is a "nutter" ie social constraints encourage biting one's tongue.

And what of time?
Where is the past -put it in a cup and give it to me?
So with the possibility of 'life is a dream' and 'brains in vats' and 'The Matrix movie' as theoretically possible -
Time also only seems to exist in our minds.
I have a memory of breakfast - I see the evidence,the dirty pans and dishes.. so it happened ?
More doubtful is : "My mother and I still remember and laugh about the time I lost my hat."
Even more doubtful is - "I spoke alone with the man on the train - I don't know his name and never saw him again"
Did these things actually happen in a 'real world past' or is the evidence only in our minds?

So with regards to time the next sceptical argument could be:
'Everything could have started just now. Everything that happened in the past is just there to explain ones current situation.Linear time doesn't actually exist -it exists only in our minds.
The fact that one sees ones slippers under the bed where one left them in the past, has no validity -its all smoke and mirrors.'

I put it to you that we are running around in a probable-truth of a world.
It's a convenience to run our daily lives with the car,the husband,friends and 'Nibbles' the goldfish definitely being there, and linear time ticking away merrily in the background.

We have compelling evidence that the real world exists , linear time exists and also, lest we ignore, that many see other dimensions or have a variety of "6th" senses.



So to expand upon "the world may only exists in my mind".

I would like to offer-
The world responds to our minds ...or better-
The world responds to and manifests the ideas held in consciousness(the awareness of being aware)

This IS science. The MPD (multiple personality disorder) person awakes as an astonished Beryl in Croydon and worries what Randy has been doing there! She can often turn on and off diabetes/have or not have malignant cancers/change eye colour/ and instantly sober up!

Scientists too have their reputations to consider(cultural pressure) and do not comment upon these things or feel they should ridicule and dismiss them for job and social self preservation.

Surgeons will anonymously confess that they ask anaesthetised patients on the operating table to move their blood away from the incisions and nasty bit -this often dramatically reduces blood loss.

Some quantum physicists maintain everything is connected because they have witnessed these tiny sub atomic particles behave together at great distance, seeming to communicate faster than the speed of light . And because Einstein says such communication is not possible they conclude that these 2 sub atomic thingies are actually the same thing!
From here and the holographic model the world seems to follow, they wonder if everything  is all connected really?

I maintain there is no 'truth',no understanding. No understanding, because the world we perceive seems to follow the ideas held in consciousness.
More specifically; what we hold as true is true.
What we experience is from what we believe.
Experience is based on a belief -to conclude truth from it is to presume we did not create the experience in the first place.
eg "Life is a bitch, I've seen suffering and real hardship and that's the truth"
 - I would encourage anyone to change that belief.!!! One will discover to ones astonishment that life becomes easier or one has more 'good luck'(self created).

But I can only speak for myself because I see it this way!!
If others do not, it doesn't invalidate my position
From the Matrix movie:-
Commander Lock: Dammit, Morpheus. Not everyone believes what you believe.
Morpheus: My beliefs do not require them to.



Conclusion...does the world exist? Here's my answer

There is plenty of evidence that we make it all up as we go along. I think there is more evidence that the world is a malleable playground than a fixed world of separate obstacles that you bang your knee on.

 
Newtonian physics is being overrun.
Cause: the apple was too heavy for the tree and gravity took over -
Effect: it hit Newton's head.
Myself and many Quantum Physicists  would say:-
Cause: Newton believed sitting under apple trees gave him an outside chance of being hit on the head by an apple, he believed in the reality of the world out there, and gravity, and his body, and the being-there-after-lunch-sitting-down-under-the-tree thing.
Effect : ouch!

I have implied that we and Newton have an infinite potential - I am suggesting he created the whole world for the apple to fall on his head.

Our person in the Pub would argue:-
  "That's totally ridiculous -how can I create all the World, all of Reality?? Reality just IS !!!"
LOL - it does sound a bit like "Let there be light" doesn't it?

I feel there is lots and lots of scientific and metaphysical spooky stuff as compelling evidence that we have a potentially infinite capacity

And to be infinite in potential is to be Everything really and believe one is not Infinite.
Where Everything is in 'the mind of God'
(infinite awareness/the universal mind/The Tao)
The persona or identity -the Jane Doe would be a belief system - a creation within the whole, possibly just for the fun of it! 

This is called 'oneness' atm. We are 'waves in the sea' . 'Bubbles within infinite awareness'
(....The mathematical analogy is 'we are sub-sets of God'.)


added June 2014
One of the first things us spiritual types discovered was that the world can be made mutable and plastic by thought. Thoughts are things and these things can physically change the world. If you are "successful" in your life you will almost certainly agree. I have spent time in the company of the very wealthy and they seem most odd in their inherent positive expectancy. One man seemed to have an elastic band tied around his waist and the other end was nailed into his goal or desire -it was only a matter of time before he got there. The penny fails in the slot machine arcade game and it may bounce around hitting numerous pins for a while or it may go "pling, bing, plunk" and drop almost straight through - this is the way the successfully minded seem to conduct their lives -their expectancy made their desire only a matter of time. I don't think all of them understood the process or cared, but one fellow would often marvel how the "little people" (ouch) were so negative. The classic negative and positive thinking does seem to have a direct and statistically significant correlation to getting what one wants. Successful artists, musicians , painters and so forth and athletes also employ this method and the process here is more interesting as while their starting idea manifests in the physical world, they often spend the creative time without a thought. Odd. It becomes less odd when one invesigates where all creative thoughts come from and where,  the creative and successfull person are, as it were, "dwelling", during their ...magic. 

This is currently called "The Law of Attraction" should you wish to pursue it - and it is a good place to start though it really is the Theory of Attraction as it does not represent the complete view that it sometimes claim it does, in my humble opinion - which is why when used as a desire manifesting tool doesn't seem to work all of the time. Is anything likely to be a complete view -The Truth?

Though these things have been understood by the ancients and earlier primitive and backward (!) collections of humanity, it was deleted from group consciousness or social acceptable average common sense in the 19th century. Science and Philosophy decided that the world was a dead artifact created by chance and Darwin. And they decided this with the certainty and arrogance that only, ironically, God should have. Even the Theologians decided God was something separate from themselves. All of this is a polite way of me saying "you have been indoctrinated". That's actually the good news because being aware of this possibility we can re-educate ourselves or at least ask "what do I really know?" and begin afresh, along a line of personal enquiry.

So when a Zen monk tells you "All is mind" you might hit the pause key and wonder whether his ideas might at least be understood before being rejected. Otherwise people become "Meditation? Never tried it - Don't like it".

Thus there is a danger with rational thought! How much of our day to day judgments are socially pressured or conditioned? Things that are "obvious and obviously true" to us nowadays would not be if we were born in another time. So what is The Truth , The Timeless Truth?

Only a few of us can be bothered to look for a Timeless Truth. And while we do all we ask is that those not looking have the decency to keep their 21st Century regurgitations directed elsewhere. Or help us and add!  Due to the peculiarities of the world often the most unlikely become really successful in a spiritual pursuit.
...

Final conclusion: Paloma's Spirituality Argument


The truth people hold is often just a version of belief systems held in that Century as fashionable. Currently; religion is out and God with it and Newtonian physics is in -though spirituality is having a dramatic come back and sits at the humble start of the geometric explosion it is sure to have. Some of Einstein's more "alarming" spirtual outbursts, for example, are being pounced upon by Quantum Physicists who have found some extremely non-Newtonian things. The "cause and effect" model of the world is being questioned and attacked with increasing confidence and ferocity these days, and from all corners.



My most favoured mantra has been and remains "What is your truth?".
Please do not accept anything that is not true in your experience, including everything written here by me.
Research for yourself , should you wish to, and belief anything you like but let it be true for you and not from an "authority" or "expert" which or who after all,  is only as wise as the elevation you assign them.
What is your truth?
What other truth is there?
 

Below , I use the word 'Spirit' as the consciousness of myself and others within this Infinite Everything Thingie

Spirit is the Law  - and that's the only law there is.

What is your truth?






Huggerliewuggerlies
Paloma Porta

PS Having written all that -it's tooo much thinking -one must feel
26th August 2011