I am speaking of it more in the evolutionary standpoint of consciousness.

Life on Earth

Single cell organisms to multicell.

Things develop senses..touch..sight.. etc.. they become aware of other life, become sexual. Still a pretty dumb consciousness however. beta 1

Things evolve, they hop out of the water, somewhere between then and chimps, they start to recognize body language, grunts, noises, facial expressions. a very basic form of communication. they are slightly more conscious as they start to have feelings, however they have no way to really communicate or ask eachother what the heck being "alive means". because of this they cannot reach 1.0. beta 2

things begin to communicate verbally. we can talk to eachother about this thing called god. this thing called life. we're cognitively aware enough to say we are conscious. consciousness 1.0!

what is the next level? on personal levels, people can pray, meditate, take drugs, realize a higher consciousness. they can reach 2.0 on their own, but without an ability to really communicate it to others to the point where they feel it or realize it too, not just "yeah i believe you", we cannot be on the 2.0 level.

The next level will be reached when we can communicate using our minds. This is slowly happening now and will be changing things very soon. Controlling a video game, a computer or a prosthetic limb will drive this technology to be released, but once we can communicate using our minds, it will change everything.

It will be treated like a drug, but technology is in so many of our lives and mind control will make things so easy that it probably wont enter a prohibition. I honestly cant imagine a society where people are shouting "i found god!" by putting on a device. oh the havoc it will create.

should be fun

There was a point in evolution where nearly human beings knew nothing of the concept of a complex language, so dont be so fast to dismiss this being the end.

Certain crabs find shells, things that arent a part of their body, live in them their whole life and have evolved differently because of this.

I'm not sure if you clicked the link I posted, but if humans used mind reading technology to communicate for long enough, our brains would eventually evolve to work differently:

New video game reads your mind - Articles - Games - Digital Life - smh.com.au

My main point (probably not communicated well) was that consciousness came about through the ability to communicate. New way to communicate = new level of consciousness.

As I see it, none of the necessary abilities that would facilitate this higher communication are present, and the simultaneous creation of them necessary cause such a change would just not happen.

Let me get this right, youre saying currently there is no easy way to give us the ability to reach this higher form of communication and the sudden creation this ability to create a higher level in communication wont happen?

Sounds like someone living 300 years ago saying "the ability to create a device the size of my hand that is connected to nothing to talk to someone on the other side of the earth is impossible, simply impossible". While this statement is true, its not thought out well. this device would seemlingly be connected to nothing, but in actuality it would be connected using things called microwaves to transmit your voice to towers and eventually across the world. Witchcraft!

...Now imagine a world where our thoughts and emotions are uploaded and you can enter the collective consciousness of the world. Okay, maybe now its getting a little too out there. :bigsmile:

I'm new here and just feeling my way around. I thought it might be a good idea to leave a few comments here and there as a way of giving others some idea of where I'm coming from. I don't have the time just now to compose a proper post. So I hope this is okay.

Okay some quick comments. I believe there is a higher consciousness. I don't believe in a religious God but I do believe there is some benevolent force running things. And it could well be us. I believe we are more than we realise and I believe we are capable of so much more than we know.

Okay my stomach says it's dinner time. Later, friends.

I think I need to see ghost in the shell :Glasses:

The mind is capable of reaching higher levels of consciousness in its current state, whether drug or meditatively/spiritually induced. what we have yet to do is experience a heightened consciousness through experiencing another's mind

As someone who is not opposed to the occasional drug use and has done what he could to educate himself on the matter, I would be very hesitant to call that state to be a "higher consciousness". The euphoria most drugs caused can easily be misconstrued for a higher state of mind while experiencing a high.

As for spiritual elevation, I am not prepared to comment.

do you believe a 1 year old child more, equal or less conscious than an adult?

What a strange question. I have never thought of someone as being more or less conscious. I suppose a one year old would have less conscious functions than an adult, but I still consider consciousness to be a you have it or you don't sort of quality.