The Primacy Of Consciousness

[Joshpantera]

Guys and gals, this is something that I've been on the fence about for years. But this lecture seems pretty compelling IMO.

 

 

"you are consciousness, period." - Peter Russell

 

Quite a powerful delivery.

[Ravenstar]

ooooooo.. esoterics! will watch and get back.

[Ravenstar]

YES (obviously I'm a closet mystic, lol) Thank you for sharing that.

 

He just put into words all that I have suspected/sensed/experienced, extrapolated — it's the holistic understanding of all I have studied, experienced, etc...the GESTALT, for me. This is truth.

 

It has SO many implications.. wow. It explains so much that spiritual thought has tried to describe, even xianity (albeit muddled). AND it doesn't disagree with where science has been leading.... This is a minefield of discussion topics...

 

(It's strange that I can be so pro-science and logic and hold this as truth as well. I find in myself, no contradiction in that.[?])

 

Have you read the Seth Material? (i take the content 'as is', without trying to determine or evaluate the source, because whether it was 'channeled' or Jane was just a philosophy prodigy - who knows? That is unverifiable.)

[Ravenstar]

Antlerman... where are you?

[Joshpantera]

I was really taken back by this lecture too because altough I've dabbled around in eastern thought and Hindu notion that everything is consciousness (I've discussed this online with Deepak Chopra @ belief.net a few times) I've had a hard time really hammering this thing down. I've explored physics like Milo Wolff's wave structure of matter and how space can act as a medium in which wave energy can form spherical standing wave centers resulting in what we regard as particles of matter. And in the process I noted that we might consider each wave center / particle as a very primitive type of awareness. Because it's the two way motion of waves coming and going from center that explain the communication of natural laws, the distance and location of surrounding particles in space, and the transfer of energy and information. In this view, all of that void space is the primary substance of existence, something along the lines of Spinoza but more advanced. I began to suspect that consciousness may go all the way down.

 

http://www.quantumma...ddhist-thought/

Introduction.

 

The advent of the quantum theory in the years 1920-1930 brought with it the possibility of understanding the origin of consciousness. During the last decade, research on the mysterious Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) effect and "tangled quantum states" has created an added appeal that there may be a connection between consciousness and 'tangled state' quantum phenomena. This could be true. There is a phrase often spoken in hindsight after a new scientific advance, "Nature did it first!" This fact of nature suggests that the human brain during evolution, could have made use of this unique and mysterious means of communication. Now, physics research of the last five years has gone a step further and delineated the origin of quantum waves and the EPR effect (Wolff,1990-1998). They are no longer mysterious but a consequence of the matter wave structure of charged particles, particularly the electron-positron. This reality of communication in Nature, which we cannot directly sense, has implications for religious and philosophical thought...

 

...Buddhist thought is tremendously rich in the arena of human consciousness and its connectedness with nature. Notions of the interconnectedness of all phenomenon occur in many spiritual contexts. For example, there is the doctrine that all living creatures in the world have an inner or psychological being. This is based on the idea that there is one fundamental, universal substance of life. Spinoza also taught that spiritual phenomena are attributes of one underlying substance.

Scientific evidence of the origin of consciousness or the substance of life is difficult to isolate. Thus these ideas are regarded as speculative. Nevertheless, speculation is often productive, and a powerful motive force for scientific inquiry as well as a guide in religious life. However scientific results only happen when you are clever enough to create models and/or hypotheses based on one or more implications of your speculation which are capable of being tested. Caution is needed before drawing conclusions. You shouldn't write checks with your speculations, that you can't cover with your science!

 

There are other reasons for focusing on matter waves. The funded Human Genome Project ambitiously proposes to completely unravel four billion genes of human chromosomes which determine the structure of our bodies. This structure is the hardware of our body computer. Where is the software? We are born with many built-in emotions and survival mechanisms which are 'software programs'. Like consciousness, they occupy our mind but have no identified physical location. Since our unconscious brain and its peripherals are the 'CPU' of our body computer, then matter waves could be their internal communications mechanism. These waves are not limited in their range, so it becomes conceiveable that external mind-to-mind and mind-to-matter communication can also occur. Survival is the primary goal of each organism thus internal communication would be the predominant role while external communication would be rare. This may explain the greater effectiveness of meditation.

 

Although many mathematicians and scientists, including Schrödinger, deBroglie, and Einstein, have advocated a wave structure of matter, one of the more interesting was Hans Tetrode who made a prediction that upstages the EPR effect. I will tell his story and in the process describe the new Matter Wave Structure of Particles. Then it is up to the professional neuro-psychologists to make further connections with consciousness...

 

So when I ran into this detailed lecture by Peter Russell from just a broad physics view, as a physicist himself, where he concluded that consciousness probably goes all the way down into the sub-atomic realm, it really got my attention. He's not even referring to the space wave physics above although he does elude to it somewhat when pointing out that even our conception of the atom as mostly void space with a little solid matter is wrong. If Wolff is correct then all of that space is the primary substance of everything we see, taste, touch, or smell and matter is merely that primary substance formed into spherical repeating wave patterns that can clump together until forms and images appear out of the very fabric of space itself, the void that is no void. In turn, repeating wave patterns can become repeating replicating wave patterns and that's essentially life and living organisms made out of space waves that we regard as matter. The Russell lecture came as new piece to the puzzle I've been exploring. And this goes directly to the analogy that Antlerman laid out recently about a continuous or unbroken cloth out of which all forms arise and return to, although I don't whether he had the physics in mind when making the analogy.

 

. It's entirely nature based too. The divine is the existence of nature itself, which, if this is correct, is pure consciousness through and through. We can be certain of one thing, that we are conscious and experiencing. And what else got my attention is how Russell explains that the consciousness is more primitive at lower levels and gains in complexity as organisms evolve and then consciousness eventually comes into more and more focus with the evolution of a nervous system and finally the emergence of creatures like ourselves capable of social evolution.

 

This was up for discussion on the Pantheist forums recently because of the "universal consciousness" implications to Pantheism. And I was considering that our current consciousness - what we're experiencing in the now - has merely arisen from primitive and pre-existing levels in nature and took a turn for a more complex application as sperm and egg met and the process of developing a central nervous system was under way. And perhaps in death the process reverses and we sort of melt back into the universal consciousness of nature underlying all of existence. In this way birth and death is illusory with respect to the eternal aspect of ourselves deep within, which has always been and will always be, along with the substance of existence which has always been and will always be. That's also something that I believe Antlerman was getting at recently about birth and death as illusory, although his wording and approach was a from a different perspective and I don't know if he linked it to any particular physics or not?

[Deva]

I viewed the video this morning. I agree for the most part, but he seems say that consciousness is the absolute, or everything is consciousness (or have I misunderstood?). I think that the absolute is beyond consciousness.

 

The best presentation I have read of the illusory nature of birth and death is contained in "I Am That" and the other written records of the talks given by Nisargadatta Maharaj. I am not saying that Campbell, Wilbur or others haven't also said it, but that seems to resonate with me like nothing else. I can read some of these books and actually "see" what he is saying.

 

The only way I can see realization of the Self happening is through meditation. Take one question and pursue it to the end. One good one is "what is death?" and another is "who am I?" Of course these questions are very related.

[Joshpantera]

^I'll have to look into your recommendation. Sounds interesting because I enjoy Campbell and others on that topic and it's good to hear about it from different presentations.

I think that the absolute is beyond consciousness.

Russell is saying that we can reduce our being to pure consciousness, because the matter + consciousness paradigm is coming into a shift. We can be certain of only one thing, we are experiencing consciousness. Everything else can be doubted.

 

But the discipline I spoke of previously on the Natural Spirituality thread about the non-dual transcendent necessarily applies to transcending the one and the many, which in the case of eternal consciousness puts consciousness as the one thing common to all, or the many. But the mystery underlying the very existence of eternal consciousness is where the question of ultimate's would lead. So I'd say you're right. Russell didn't take it down to that level. Probably because the talk was more specifically about consciousness and not the non-dual transcendent underlying the whole thing.

[Joshpantera]

This is another point that sits well with me because during the lecture I wondered if he was claiming that there is no physical reality while showing how our perception of matter just falls apart under close investigation. So it was refreshing to find these interviews that hit the nail on the head and explain that he does believe that there's a physical reality, it's just not exactly what we interpret it to be with our senses. That makes more sense. I'd say yes, physical reality is illusory in terms of being something other than what it appears to be, but something nonetheless.

[Deva]

He seems to be saying that there is a physical reality, but its not made of matter. It isn't what we think it is. What is matter? Mostly empty space and a few particles - the nature of which few if any understand.

 

He is right that our perception of the world is the most important thing.

[Antlerman]

Antlerman... where are you?

I'm here, but if I wish to make specific comments to this I need to make it through the whole one hour lecture first. I haven't done that yet. Preliminarily of course yes I believe Consciousness runs through all things. It's just a matter of a form's particular complexity that allows for greater depth of that Consciousness to be exposed. I reject the notion that consciousness in humans is created by the brain. It is exposed by the brain. I'll try to get through this video first.

[Antlerman]

...But I will say this before I go too far, I do not believe going the path of using physics, including quantum theory, to prove or explain spirit; to see or analyze, or objectify spirit is possible at all. Spirit is not an object. Matter is not a product of some Spirit "force". Spirit is the "Such'ness, or IS,ness of everything. Another analogy is it is like the wetness of the Ocean, no matter what part of it you are looking at, big waves, little waves, sections of the ocean, or the whole ocean itself. The wetness is the same everywhere and inseparable from it. You experience that wetness, such'ness, is'ness. You don't discover it like some particle, some 'wave', or such thing. You cannot look at it the way you as you do anything in physics. In fact you cannot look "at" it at all!

 

You cannot replace mysticism with physics. Nor can you prove mystical realization with physics. It's an old argument tried many times in different ways, and quantum mechanics is the latest attempt of the same old failed argument. Physics is not the measuring stick of reality. And that's the problem in a nutshell right there.

[Antlerman]

One last addition to this before I approach the video and add comments later to that. Regarding Quantum mechanics and mysticism, I'll share this from the introduction of Ken Wilber's collection of the mystical thoughts of these great physicists who themselves rejected physics trying to say something about Spiritual reality. These were all mystics, and familiar with Eastern mysticism, quoting from the Vedanta and the like. From Ken's introduction to the collection of writings:

 

Briefly, the critique is this. The central mystical experience may be fairly (if somewhat poetically) described as follows: in the mystical consciousness, Reality is apprehended directly and immediately, meaning without any mediation, any symbolic elaboration, any conceptualization, or any abstractions; subject and object become one in a timeless and spaceless act that is beyond any and all forms of mediation. Mystics universally speak of contacting reality in its “suchness,” its “isness,” its “thatness,” without any intermediaries; beyond words, symbols, names, thoughts, images.

 

Now, when the physicist “looks at” quantum reality or at relativistic reality, his is

not

looking at the “things in themselves,” at noumenon, at direct and nonmediated reality. Rather, the physicist is looking at

nothing but a set of highly abstract differential equations

– not at “reality” itself, but at mathematical symbols of reality. As Bohr put it, “It must be recognized that we are here dealing with a

purely symbolic procedure

. …Hence our whole space-time view of physical phenomena depends ultimately upon these abstractions.” Sir James Jeans was specific: in the study of modern physics, he says, “we can never understand what events are, but must limit ourselves to describing the patterns of events in mathematical terms; no other aim is possible. Physicists who are trying to understand nature may work in many different fields and by many different methods; one may dig, one may sow, one may reap. But the final harvest will always be a sheaf of mathematical formulae. These will

never

describe nature itself… [Thus] our studies can never put us into contact with reality.”

 

What an absolute, radical, irredeemable difference from mysticism! And this critique applies to any type of physics – old, new, ancient, modern, relativistic, or quantum. The very nature, aim, and results of the approaches are profoundly different: the one dealing with abstract and mediate symbols and forms of reality, the other dealing with a direct and nonmediated approach to reality itself. To even claim that there are direct and central similarities between the finds of physics and mysticism is necessarily to claim the latter is fundamentally a merely symbolic abstraction, because it is absolutely true that the former is exactly that. At the very least, it represents a profound confusion of absolute and relative truth, of finite and infinite, of temporal and eternal – and that is what so repelled the physicists in this volume. Eddington, as usual put it most trenchantly: “We should suspect an intention to reduce God to a system of differential equations. That fiasco at any rate [must be] avoided. However much the ramifications of [physics] may be extended by further scientific discovery, they cannot from their very nature trench on the background in which they have their being…. We have learnt that the exploration of the external world by the methods of physical science leads not to a concrete reality but to a shadow world of symbols, beneath which those methods are unadapted for penetrating”.

 

~Ken Wilber, Quantum Questions, Introduction, pp. 5,6

[Denyoz]

You cannot replace mysticism with physics. Nor can you prove mystical realization with physics. It's an old argument tried many times in different ways, and quantum mechanics is the latest attempt of the same old failed argument. Physics is not the measuring stick of reality. And that's the problem in a nutshell right there.

 

I agree.

 

After rejecting Christianity and everything that went with it, I eventually had to face the fact that spirituality is the primordial reality, whether I like it or not.

 

But how do you get a materialist to recognize this? This is what these guys are trying to do. Since an "intelligent" person will only listen to you if what you say can be scientifically proven, then I see why physics keeps being used to prove the existence of the non-physical. Yeah, it gets tiresome after a while, you just want to slap the materialist in the face and say "Why can't you see it, damn it!"

 

I like it when he says that consciousness is the only thing we cannot deny (the fact that we are experiencing something), everything else can be doubted. As we look for something solid to build our lives on, it's ironic to realize that the only thing "solid" is the fluid (I like your "getting wet" analogy). I think this is what was meant by "build your house on rock, not on sand." As consciousness is the only solid truth, then real life won't start until we are able to admit this truth.

 

Becoming aware of consciousness is really what being spiritual is all about. To realize that the nature of reality is spirit is a mind-boggling experience, which I don't mind calling being born again. It's just the beginning. The first step into freedom. How do you go back and tell your friends and hopefully get them to see what you see is... frustrating to say the least.

[Joshpantera]

Antlerman, that's all quite sound with respect to what Peter Russell is getting at, especially in the two interviews. There's a physical reality but we do not perceive it directly as it is, we aren't viewing the thing in itself. And from the parts that we do see he deduces that consciousness runs all the way down to the mystery level where the mind stops off. He's saying that consciousness runs from the mystery level of physical reality up through the levels of visibility where our mind interprets physical reality as space and particles, colors and so fourth.

 

I think it's safe to say that physical reality is some type of energy that has wave characterists which causes the 'appearence' of discrete point particles floating in space. My look into Wolff's wave structure of matter goes beyond what Russell is describing about probability waves in the atom. It's another level deeper where a newer type of wave based physics can solve some of these particle / wave duality problems and paradoxes and enters the arena. Russell is referring to the arena of unsolved paradoxes where the uncertainty is not viewed against the wave structured electron. So there's some more depth to the problem that Russell is exploring about the uncertainty principle.

 

But either way, the mystery of the existence of anything at all, any energy consciousness pervading all things, is beyond the reach of physics and cosmology regardless of the wave structured electron model. So I'm disciplined enough to understand that factor while investigating scientific claims and data. What we'd call the spiritual, or the wetness of the ocean, applies to the cosmology of space as a vast cosmic sea full of wave energy that can form what we perceive as matter. The "is-ness" of the whole realm is the deeper issue which science can not deal with. I just like to link what we can know of existence down to the non-dual transcendent mystery level where thought stops off.

 

But Peter Russell is also into that, he's an advanced meditator and his views on the primacy of consciousness grain into his meditation practice:

 

 

And here's some insight into his style of practice itself:

 

[Antlerman]

What we'd call the spiritual, or the wetness of the ocean, applies to the cosmology of space as a vast cosmic sea full of wave energy that can form what we perceive as matter. The "is-ness" of the whole realm is the deeper issue which science can not deal with. I just like to link what we can know of existence down to the non-dual transcendent mystery level where thought stops off.

With great respect to where you are reaching towards, which is ambitious, something still sticks with me as 'not quite' clicking right. I'm having a hard time putting a finger on it, but I think it is still rooted in trying to see it linked to the physical, or more appropriately, to the objective.

 

I am hearing from your link to the quantum mechanics quote, to referring to wave-particles, thought, and consciousness, is that there is presumably some bridge between the subjective and the objective that occurs at this 'deep level' and results in the material world from the immaterial. This is where I have an issue, and where it appears to be trying to explain that area with the subject and object merge into nonduality. It's still a materialistic explanation. And I think this is where I have an issue with pantheism in general as well.

 

If you go down to this 'spooky level', I'll call it, that what and others are trying to look at (as good as all that may be), at best you reach the Prana or life-force, not Spirit. Subject does not cross over into object here. It's still object. And the misuse of quantum mechanics applied to collapsing wave particles, interpreting this as the subject creating the object is a popularized misunderstanding of it, that the physicists who pioneered this themselves reject.

 

Quoting from blog discussion with Wilber on this topic:

 

#1: Your consciousness does not create electrons. Unlike Newtonian physics, which can predict the location of large objects moving at slow speeds, quantum physics only offers a probability wave in which a given particle, like an electron, should show up. But here's the funny thing: it is only at the moment that one makes the measurement that the electron actually does "show up."

Certain writers and theorists have thus suggested that human intentionality actually creates reality on a quantum level

. The most popular version of this idea can be found in the movie What the Bleep Do We Know?!, in which we "qwaff" reality into existence.

 

Ken suggests

this is both bad physics and bad mysticism

. As for the former, in his book, Quantum Questions, Ken compiled the original writings of the 13 most important founders of modern quantum and relativistic physics, to explore their understanding of the relationship of physics and mysticism.

Without exception, each one of them believed that modern physics does NOT prove spiritual realities in any fashion. And yet each of them was a mystic, not because of physics, but in spite of it

. By pushing to the outer limits of their discipline, a feat which requires true genius, they found themselves face to face with those realities that physics categorically could not explain.

 

Likewise, none of those founders of modern physics believed that the act of consciousness was responsible for creating particles at the quantum level. David Bohm did not believe that, Schroedinger did not believe that, Heisenberg did not believe that. That belief requires the enormous self-infatuation and narcissism, or "boomeritis," of the post-modern ego, and Ken goes into the possible psychology behind all of that.

 

#2: Quantum vacuum potentials are not unmanifest Spirit. The immediate problem with the notion that certain "unmanifest" or "vacuum" quantum realities give rise to the manifest world, and that the quantum vacuum is Spirit, is that it immediately presupposes a radically divided Spirit or Ultimate. There is Spirit "over here," manifestation "over there," and it's only through these quantum vacuum potentials that Spirit actualizes manifestation—with Spirit set apart from manifestation.

 

As the great contemplative traditions agree, true nondual Spirit is the suchness, emptiness, or isness of all manifestation, and as such leaves everything exactly where it finds it. Nondual Spirit is no more set apart from manifestation than the wetness of the ocean is set apart from waves. Wetness is the suchness or isness of all waves.

By identifying Spirit with quantum potential, you are actually qualifying the Unqualifiable, giving it characteristics—"and right there," Ken says, "things start to go horribly wrong, and they never recover. These folks are trying to give characteristics to Emptiness. They therefore make it dualistic.

And then things get worse from there...."

 

#3: Just because you understand quantum mechanics doesn't mean you're enlightened.

Physics is an explicitly 3rd-person approach to reality, whereas meditative, contemplative, or mystical disciplines are explicitly 1st-person approaches to reality.

Neither perspective is more real than the other, but each perspective does disclose different truths, and you cannot use the truth disclosed in one domain to "colonize" another. The study of physics, as a 3rd-person discipline, will not get you enlightenment; and meditation, as a 1st-person discipline, will not disclose the location of an asteroid (or an electron).

The "content" of enlightenment is the realization of that which is timeless, formless, and eternally unchanging. The content of physics is the understanding of the movement of form within time, i.e. that which is constantly changing

. And if you hook Buddha's enlightenment to a theory of physics that gets disproved tomorrow, does that mean Buddha loses his enlightenment?

 

Ken goes on to suggest that what might be influencing quantum realities is not Suchness per se, but bio-energy or prana, which may be the source of the crackling, buzzing, electric creativity that so many theorists have tried to explain at the quantum level. Of course, it remains to be seen exactly what further research does and does not support.

 

I think what I am struggling with is that looking at Pantheism, trying to identify the place of Consciousness, or Spirit (in the nondual, Absolute sense) in the manifest domains, or at their origin will do exactly what Wilber identifies. It makes the Unqualifiable, qualifiable. It makes the nondual, dualistic. It makes it not "That". It defines God. Pantheism, defines God. (However I do note your use of it is more as I see things, so I really wonder is pantheism the appropriate term for you?). Hearing references to wave particles, brings this all right home into that very thinking I see as flawed, using physics and science to look at God, or Spirit.

 

There is only one way to look at that, and that is not with the eye of flesh (empiric-analytic sciences), or the eye of mind (philosophy, psychology, reason), but with the eye of spirit (contemplative, meditative inquiry). This is all eye of flesh. It looks at the external world and analyzes it with reason in an objective manner. And as such, it will only every see something it is not.

 

Am I missing something?

[Ouroboros]

“The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.

The name that can be named is not the eternal name.

The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.

The named is the mother of ten thousand things.

Ever desireless, one can see the mystery.

Ever desiring, one can see the manifestations.

These two spring from the same source but differ in name;

this appears as darkness.

Darkness within darkness.

The gate to all mystery.”

―

Lao Tzu,Tao Te Ching

[Ravenstar]

This may not make sense... as language itself is a form of sculpting consciousness, and it is sometimes a poor method for conveying truth. but I see religion, mysticism, mythology, mathematics, even science as different languages to describe different aspects of the absolute. Matter is just the interpretation by our (local) consciousness of spiritual experience/events.. we bracket these events (and our SELVES) in space and time (and 'physicality'), but on the level of absolute reality they are not discreet.. all is here, now.

 

You are correct that true quantum 'matter' are only mathematical probablities - they exist in the abstract... so do we.

 

Matter is not separate from consciousness, it's a metaphor for spiritual reality - how that actually works.. I don't know.

[Antlerman]

Sorry I'm so late in getting through this video. I'm 34 minutes in, and so far so good. Find very little that I don't agree with. Much to discuss once I get through it...

[Antlerman]

I finished it. Alright, yes I agree with everything he speaks about regarding the mystical experience. I know through my own experiences in both peak experience, and in regular deep meditation, that sense of timelessness, divine light, divine mind, infinite I, etc described in mystical experience the world over and throughout time. But... as I was picking up before going into it, he is making that very mistake I went at length to address already regarding trying to tie mystical realization with physics. Everything in the video 43 minutes on up to his conclusion about mystical experience, was to try to tie that to what science is showing us, drawing off those errant understandings of quantum physics outlined in those 3 points in my previous post above.

 

I do not disagree with him about consciousness all the way down, I simply don't believe he should, or anyone should, try to show that what mystical experience has said all along is now being corroborated by science, which is what he is in fact doing in this presentation. To point to that, at 52 minutes he says, "By the way, there's another connection here between light and consciousness". He makes a direct connection between the no-space and no-time of light with consciousness, thus attempting to tie physics with mystical realization. He states, "Mystical experience, yoga sutras, stilling of mind stuff, you arrive at timeless." He further states at 55 minutes, "Light isn't part of the physical world, the world of space time and matter. It's the first manifestation of the absolute. In deep levels of conscious comes light, divine light, seeing the light..." Light isn't part of the physical world? That seems an odd statement, but more to my point, again, this is in fact doing exactly what those mystical physicists themselves did not see justifiable to do!

 

His points about mystical experience and deep meditation however, I fully agree with. Everyone should move into that within themselves. I embrace him as a fellow mystic in this regard. I just see this whole trying to justify spirituality this way to be making the same mistake as any modern religious person does in trying to say, make Jesus historically verifiable to give it credibility. The credibility in mystical experience comes one way, and one way only. Perform the experiment yourself. Take the inner journey. Take notes. Compare the results. In other words do the science of meditative practice. I don't believe that physics and mystics will ever see each other on the same field of science. They can't. The Unqualifiable cannot be qualified in order to examine it like this.

 

I don't mean to discourage looking into this, but to be careful about building that house on 'shifting sand'. Buddha's enlightenment is not tied to any understanding of science of the natural world. It transcends all understanding, all qualifications. It's fun to see possible similarities, but...........

[Antlerman]

but I see religion, mysticism, mythology, mathematics, even science as different languages to describe different aspects of the absolute.

I see mysticism as direct, unmediated awareness of the absolute. It is dissimilar to math and science this way which are symbolic representations. I will say though, that in various stages of meditation, you do encounter symbolic representation, namely the subtle stages with various archetypal forms. Beyond that, all such symbols dissolve into emptiness and final awakening as That. No symbols exists at that stage. It is simply Unqualifiable Awareness. The Absolute.

 

Metaphysics on the other hand, are in fact imperfect languages, just as math and science are. Fingers pointing to the moon, not the moon itself. Seeing the moon itself, being the moon itself is the mystical experience, or mysticism.

[Joshpantera]

You did understand the point about light, from it's own perspective, not experiencing time and space right? That's all he was pointing out as I understood it. And I thought it was an interesting way of looking at it.

 

But further along, you seem to not be tuned into the spirit / matter no separation doctrine which is the logical conclusion of turning away from duality, right?

Hearing references to wave particles, brings this all right home into that very thinking I see as flawed, using physics and science to look at God, or Spirit.

 

To suggest anything other than spirit / matter no separation, which is the highest possible level of enlightenment as I understand it, is necessarily a dualistic suggestion - we have two (dual) things on the table, on the one hand this mysterious thing we call spirit and on the other hand this thing we observe as matter and we're to favor one over the other.

With great respect to where you are reaching towards, which is ambitious, something still sticks with me as 'not quite' clicking right. I'm having a hard time putting a finger on it, but I think it is still rooted in trying to see it linked to the physical, or more appropriately, to the objective.

Campbell spoke in favor of the deeper insight and it's stuck with me every since which tends to affect my view of the material world. And it's coming from an Advaita Vendanta perspective where everything, everything is Brahman. Everything is God. Everything is this energy consciousness, and everything is grounded in deep mind transcending mystery. Every bit of it is God, not just stillness.

 

The spirit of that God is everywhere regardless of the experience. It is what we perceive as matter in day to day life as well as what we experience in deep meditation. I hold that anything less is a dualistic perspective presenting itself as non-dual when it clearly draws a line in the sand between the material world ( a ) and the spiritual ( b ) like Gnosticism or something to that effect. My Pantheistic mysticism is about the unity between any perceived pairs of opposites (spirit and matter?) and the mystery underlying the existence of it all. I associate the term mystical as addressed to the mystery and we're always riding on that mystery.

[Joshpantera]

but I see religion, mysticism, mythology, mathematics, even science as different languages to describe different aspects of the absolute.

I see mysticism as direct, unmediated awareness of the absolute. It is dissimilar to math and science this way which are symbolic representations. I will say though, that in various stages of meditation, you do encounter symbolic representation, namely the subtle stages with various archetypal forms. Beyond that, all such symbols dissolve into emptiness and final awakening as That. No symbols exists at that stage. It is simply Unqualifiable Awareness. The Absolute.

 

Metaphysics on the other hand, are in fact imperfect languages, just as math and science are. Fingers pointing to the moon, not the moon itself. Seeing the moon itself, being the moon itself is the mystical experience, or mysticism.

You mean like going into deep dreamless sleep, awake?

 

Consciousness, but consciousness of no specific thing?

[Ravenstar]

I did an exercise once... it was deep meditation with the intent to follow the "I am-ness" to it's source after asking the self.. 'who am I?'... this is beyond the point in the 'answering' where the query becomes non-verbal - then deeper still.

 

first the sinking, then the expansion, space and time become meaningless - as do limits or boundaries... and for those who meditate - you will understand the quality of gentle amusement... pure safety/peace. Fear does not exist, never did, even it's possibility is...not.

 

There was nothing there, and everything was contained in that nothing.

 

There is really no language to describe that experience - but it was an experience that convinced me of the concepts of 'infinite' and 'eternal'... as being the true reality.

 

All speculation and philosophy aside... I am convinced that there is no thing as 'spiritual' - not as outside of existence.. we just are and all we perceive is a mirror of consciousness itself.

 

I disagree that we can't find out anything about the absolute through science... but are in our infancy there as well. Don't know if we will get closer in my lifetime but I suspect that science and mysticism will meet at some point - because reality is - and mysticism and philosophy and science have the same ultimate goals - to discover truth. They just approach this goal from different perspectives and methodology.

[Antlerman]

You did understand the point about light, from it's own perspective, not experiencing time and space right? That's all he was pointing out as I understood it. And I thought it was an interesting way of looking at it.

Yes I did understand it. I thought it was quite cool, actually. Like I said before, it says something, but...... I hold it with a grain of salt in trying to say it indicates some God or Spirit property.

 

But further along, you seem to not be tuned into the spirit / matter no separation doctrine which is the logical conclusion of turning away from duality, right?

Herein is the crux of the matter. Before I begin, I sincerely hope you don't take my direct manner to be expressing disregard for your thoughts. I don't at all, and think very highly of your thoughts. You challenge me, and have helped me to see things. That says a lot I hope you understand.

 

What you are doing here is is taking the nondual and trying to make it monism. There is a difference between the two a lot of people do not recognize. Monism is a scientific understanding of the 'substance' or nature of everything as being all one thing, the same substance. This is what I hear in saying 'no separation', that at this deep level spirit and matter are the same, and in fact all matter is spirit, or Consciousness itself. That's monism. Not nonduality.

 

Nonduality embraces monism and duality simultaneously. Here's an interesting dialog with a Buddhist teacher and his apprentice I think might help explain:

 

Yes I have been calling monism “not-duality” because it seems to be the first place spiritual people like to go when departing from duality. In an effort to get away from the limitations of dualistic paradigms, they flee to the limitation of monism. It is prettier, but it is still a partial description of reality.

Not-duality and non-duality are not the same things.

Not-duality obliterates duality, which is actually only dualism disguised in self-denying tendencies.

 

Monism is the way of looking at everything as if it is all the same, it is all one, it is all bliss, it is all Shiva, we are all one, religions are all one, everything is all one. Many new-age religious people and lots of Indian traditions go the direction of Monism. It is all one, but that is only ever a partial description of reality. It is also two, and three and four. Holding to both the oneness and multiplicity of existence takes greater spiritual maturity; it requires being present with the moment with all it's paradox and radicalness. Experiencing both the bliss and sorrow of existence takes greater spiritual maturity, it requires us to be present to the entire situation of existence, our own and all others. In terms of our tradition, we describe this as the dance between emptiness and form and our path as the willingness to experience both and their mutuality. The main emphasis of our path is to show up wakefully to the play of emptiness and form, to allow ourselves to enter fully into their exp

ression in the moment, in what we are, in circumstance. When we allow ourselves to experience non-duality, we access a much more simpler mind-state: we are no longer struggling against the nature of reality, the five poisons of the mind are not necessary.

 

From here: http://yogicbuddhism...not-non-duality

 

My point is that Spirit, the Absolute, Consciousness, is nondual. It is both emptiness and form. It is not a 'thing' on the other side of matter, which if we look hard enough we can make all matter that, thus eliminating duality. That is monism. That is what pantheism is actually. It is monism - not that that is wrong of course, just partial.

 

Hearing references to wave particles, brings this all right home into that very thinking I see as flawed, using physics and science to look at God, or Spirit.

To suggest anything other than spirit / matter no separation, which is the highest possible level of enlightenment as I understand it, is necessarily a dualistic suggestion - we have two (dual) things, on the one hand this thing we call spirit and on the other hand thing we observe as matter.

No, not in nonduality. In nonduality you have monism and duality. It's a paradox. In "not-duality" or monism, it's as the Rinpoche says above, "Not-duality and non-duality are not the same things. Not-duality obliterates duality, which is actually only dualism disguised in self-denying tendencies." It is both Formless and Form. It is not a matter of simply boiling everything down to that single substance. The rock is the rock, the tree is the tree, I am me, and I am God. I-I. I exist as Keith. I see God. I see myself. I see myself as God. I am God and I am me. At once. Not one, not two. There is no one or the other. If all is Spirit, there is then only One. There is the One and the Many.

 

BTW, this is impossible to penetrate with reasoning, as the entire framework of form is dualistic. Saying its all of one substance, is likewise dualistic. It's one, not two, not three, not four....

 

Campbell spoke in favor of the deeper insight and it's stuck with me every since. And it's coming from an Advaita Vendanta perspective where everything, everything is Brahman. Everything is God. Everything is consciousness, and everything is grounded in deep mind transcending mystery. Every bit of it is God, not just stillness.

And this is true.

 

The world is an illusion

Brahman alone is real

Brahman is the world

 

But I am still me, the rock is still the rock, the tree is the tree. These exist as themselves. They are the many, and the One.

 

 

The spirit of that God is everywhere. It is what we perceive as matter as well as what we experience in deep meditation. I hold that anything less is a dualistic perspective cloaking itself as a non-dual when it clearly draws a line in the sand between the material world ( a ) and the spiritual ( b ) like Gnosticism or something to that effect. My Pantheistic mysticism is about the unity between any perceived pairs of opposites and the mystery underlying the existence of it all. I associate the term mystical as addressed to the mystery.

Theism draws the line in the sand between the material and the spiritual. I think what you don't see about nonduality is that it includes duality. You are hearing duality expressed, as well as monism. Don't mistake that as cloaking a dualistic perspective. It rightly embraces it, but itself is not dualism.

[Antlerman]

but I see religion, mysticism, mythology, mathematics, even science as different languages to describe different aspects of the absolute.

I see mysticism as direct, unmediated awareness of the absolute. It is dissimilar to math and science this way which are symbolic representations. I will say though, that in various stages of meditation, you do encounter symbolic representation, namely the subtle stages with various archetypal forms. Beyond that, all such symbols dissolve into emptiness and final awakening as That. No symbols exists at that stage. It is simply Unqualifiable Awareness. The Absolute.

 

Metaphysics on the other hand, are in fact imperfect languages, just as math and science are. Fingers pointing to the moon, not the moon itself. Seeing the moon itself, being the moon itself is the mystical experience, or mysticism.

You mean like going into deep dreamless sleep, awake?

 

Consciousness, but consciousness of no specific thing?

That's the causal state, emptiness. Nonduality the state beyond that and becomes awareness of all things arising as themselves, as itself. I have experienced that several times. That, is seeing Life as it is.