Consciousness Thought

@Mr Fight the Power,

Mr. Fight the Power;29028 wrote:

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.

I guess it would depend on what and how much you ingested. About 20 years ago I spent a good bit of time with a certain cactus, and euphoria was not really a big part of the whole experience. In fact, at times euphoria completely dissolved, as did anything else that remotely resembled such a transitory and mundane emotion. Although on occasion there were a few moments of complete horror.

I can't really recommend anyone follow this path. In fact, I would discourage it, as once you have set your feet upon it there is no undoing or un-remembering any of the experiences/lessons . . . not to go all metaphysical and Castaneda-ish here. I'm just sayin'.

**NOTE TO ANY MODERATORS WHO MIGHT BE READING THIS POST**
I am a little uncomfortable making this post, as the last thing I would want is for anyone to get the idea that using any form of "chemistry" in a quest for knowledge or enlightenment is a good thing. If you feel that this post might be construed as condoning, or worse, encouraging any such activity, I ask that you please delete it. It's just that MANY years ago I did take this path, and had numerous experiences that might be relevant to the discussion here. If it's okay to discuss these past experiences within the confines of this forum, let me know as I will be happy to oblige. If not, please send me a "cease and desist" notice, which I will respect. Thank you.

@withawhy,

TickTockMan, I will never think of you the same.

j/k Smile

I would actually be very interested to hear anything you learned from your experiences. That way we can learn from you instead of trying them ourselves. Are you referring to peyote?

@withawhy,

withawhy;29120 wrote:

TickTockMan, I will never think of you the same.

j/k

I would actually be very interested to hear anything you learned from your experiences. That way we can learn from you instead of trying them ourselves. Are you referring to peyote?

I will discuss these experiences, but only with moderator approval and/or moderator established guidelines. I really don't want to take the risk that my words might encourage others to "experiment." Particularly in something that is not only potentially dangerous, but also, in most places, illegal.

As a caveat, some experiences I simply can't talk about. They're just too personal and, well, too weird, to adequately express.

Hope you understand my hesitance.

@withawhy,

withawhy wrote:

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

This is a question that I have been toying with for some time now. Why do we lose the "freedom" we once had as children? I understand the onslaught of mundane everyday tasks is piled upon us at a certain age which I believe limits/restricts our consciousness. Therefore I would have to say that we are the most conscious as children, possibly infants. At this early age we have nothing to really hold back our consciousness.

We are raw emotions, inexplicable truth and honesty. Then our parents teach us to use words as a form of communication and this is where I believe we begin to lose our consciousness. Maybe not lose, so much as forget? That is to say we can reconnect with this higher consciousness later in life.

Interesting question...thanks for posting it!

@currious,

What youre saying does make sense. I guess wed have to first figure out what consciousness is. Whats your definition of consciousness?

@withawhy,

withawhy wrote:

Whats your definition of consciousness?

First I'd like to say that I'm open to discussion on this question as I am very new to philosophy. With that said...

I'm not exactly sure how to put my answer into words. I would say that consciousness is in reference to the association one makes with themselves. That is to say that consciousness is the act of being aware of who you are, what abilities you posses, as well as being connected with the outside world. Not only through the senses that we are all familiar with and use on an everyday basis, but through some (for lack of a better word) sixth sense.

I'd like to stop for a moment to apologize for stepping on any toes in my new found state of ignorance. If what comes next has already been said by another I am not claiming to be the first who said it, only that I have not as of yet read it elsewhere.

I propose that we are all born with this "sixth sense" which is indescribable by anyone today because we have already lost it by the time we are able to speak. Without this sense we lose a level of consciousness. Which is to say that we become less aware of ourselves and lose a connection with the world around us.

I hope this starts to answer your question but I believe further response from me will need discussion to help bring my thoughts into words.

@currious,

... a couple of contributions to this discussion, if I may

Mr. Fight the Power wrote:

... 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...

Mr FTP hit the nail on the head, I believe. To me, it's far more reasonable to suppose neuron malfunction is more often than not mistaken for the sublime, connections to <whatever> and so forth, than anything real (outside the mind). Sensations that are beyond our immediate understanding have, for millenia, served as a basis for superstitous belief.

currious wrote:

I would say that consciousness is in reference to the association one makes with themselves.

i.e., self-awareness. ?

currious wrote:

I propose that we are all born with this "sixth sense" which is indescribable by anyone today because we have already lost it by the time we are able to speak.

Very interesting. Would you say this is something that you believe, you know or you hope for? Also, whichever the case may be, what precisely would you say this sixth-sense consists of?

Thanks

@Khethil,

Khethil wrote:

i.e., self-awareness. ?

Awareness in general I suppose. Awareness of oneself as well as the world around you. But then the question will only become what is awareness. Not to say that it is impossible to put a decent definition to consciousness, but we are attempting to describe a word with more words. Obviously we all have an understanding of what these words mean, but they are just that, words.

khethil wrote:

Very interesting. Would you say this is something that you believe, you know or you hope for? Also, whichever the case may be, what precisely would you say this sixth-sense consists of?

I can not say that this is something I know as I am not in touch with such a sense which leaves me with the other two options which seem to carry a heavier connotation because while we're describing words; what does it mean to believe and hope? I will answer by choosing both. I believe that we posses such a sense as the lives of children compared with the lives of adults are so different. I also hope it is true because I would like to think that someday the human race will have the ability to carry this sense into adulthood.

What the sixth sense consists of is something I've been attempting to contemplate all day. This is what I have so far but will probably contradict myself in the near future: This is the ability to communicate with the outside world without words or body language. Someone will have to help me with facts but for example; the connections between mother and child is a bond credited to "mother's intuition". This is to say that a mother knows when their child is hungry or needs a change or burp. I propose the opposite, that the child is telling the mother, telepathically if you will, that they are hungry etc. I think this sense is what allows us to connect with people (our imaginary friends) that no one else can see. Which does not exactly have to be people. My imaginary friend as a child was a squirrel that would run along side me, mostly when in the car.

I don't want to keep going off on this topic without further thought so I'll leave it at here for now.

@currious,

Hi all!!

My premise is that consciousness is reaction, is effect of stimulus, the development of this, I mean the development of stimulus response[consciousness] is dependent upon experience, the infant, the child is limited in its responses to the physical world, often responding inappropriately to said stimulus. Our history of experience is an on going thing which determines how we precieve future stimulus, we are our experience, and our experience is our consciousnes, is our identity. As identity involves the embrace of object, in the absence of object there is no consciousness. :a-thought:

@currious,

currious wrote:

Awareness in general I suppose. Awareness of oneself as well as the world around you. But then the question will only become what is awareness. Not to say that it is impossible to put a decent definition to consciousness, but we are attempting to describe a word with more words. Obviously we all have an understanding of what these words mean, but they are just that, words.

No need to take it any further, you answered my question well. Thank you

currious wrote:

I can not say that this is something I know as I am not in touch with such a sense which leaves me with the other two options which seem to carry a heavier connotation because while we're describing words; what does it mean to believe and hope? I will answer by choosing both.

Very nice; someone by my friend here a drink!

currious wrote:

What the sixth sense consists of is something I've been attempting to contemplate all day. This is what I have so far but will probably contradict myself in the near future: This is the ability to communicate with the outside world without words or body language...

Thank you, good clarification and I'll join you in this hope. Whether or not such a thing exists, I too don't know but I'll say this: If such an ability to communicate without words were ever to be discovered and/or developed, I'd dance the jig of a thousand years with all the lot of ya!

Thanks again, nice response.

@Khethil,

I think conscience is self-awareness, that is, being capable of making decisions and observing why you are making then. This means its pointless to wonder whenever other people are conscient or not because conscience is only relevant to yourself, you cannot be fully aware of other's decisions and the reason they are making those decisions.

As for the mind communication thing, I believe that incomplete understandement of others is what allows for individuality, after mind communication is created and evolves to perfection all minds will start working as one, situation called "hive mind". Then hive mind is achieved there will be a single mind, that is, we will be back to the starting spot.

A nice way to observe hive mind is to play an RTS (Real Time Strategy). Then one unit detects something relevant all units in the same team become aware of that in the same moment than the unit itself, and start doing whatever automatic reactions they are programmed to do in the same moment than the unit itself. Reason is because all units are actually senses and tools of the single AI that controls then.

@withawhy,

Happiness is remembering the moment more quickly than normal. Time is a concept that doesnt actually exist, its a perception of how quickly you live through change. If you remember something more quickly, it feels good and time goes faster, unfortunately. Realizing life, that's another subject. Remembering is happy. Love is remembering. Remembering is consciousness. Without memory, we could not exist.

I am conscious. I am aware. What happens when we die is everything in your head meeting everyone else. We are all in this together.

I cant speak of certainty, just of truths I've felt.

@withawhy,

I wouldnt say time doesnt exists, but rather that its true form is not what we believe.

Indeed memory is a good definition for conscience.

As for death, I would like to point out two things. First, can you imagine your conscience ceasing to exist? I can not, and therefore I believe conscience is immortal: then I die in this world my mind will continue to exist until it awakes again in another form. This is my idea of afterlife.

The second is just really an interesting thing I imagined: our senses are what allow us to sense the passage of time. In death, my senses will cease to fuction, and if I cannot fell the passage of time, time does not passes at all... that is: I am immortal because time cannot pass beyond my death.

@manored,

manored;30389 wrote:

I wouldnt say time doesnt exists, but rather that its true form is not what we believe.

Indeed memory is a good definition for conscience.

As for death, I would like to point out two things. First, can you imagine your conscience ceasing to exist? I can not, and therefore I believe conscience is immortal: then I die in this world my mind will continue to exist until it awakes again in another form. This is my idea of afterlife.

Do you think your mind, which continues to exist until it awakens in another form, will still be your mind upon waking?

Or will your consciousness be totally different and based upon the form in which it awakens later, with no memory of the you that is conscious in this now?

@TickTockMan,

TickTockMan, Smile

What consciousness is, is it is anonymous, something like what is stated in the Upanishads, "The self in one, is the self in all." What the Dawkins is this about, well, if Dawkins is correct and we are products of our genes, vehicles for them to get themselves around with, then the illusion is this personal identity which we so tightley hold onto. Is it not so, that what we precive as who and what we are, is our experience, which makes our ultimate reality of identity a highly functional illusion. If one woke up one morning with no memory of ones past, the formation of identity would begin all over again. If the context of that life was highly different than that which formed the first identity which was lost, then certainly the waking individual would become a different identity, a different person. What you are then, is that which can experience, and you identify with your experience of life, thus the experience of context supplies the clothing of identity for that which is in truth, anonymous consciousness. In a sense then, I could be you, but for our differences in experience.

@boagie,

boagie;32116 wrote:

TickTockMan,

If one woke up one morning, with no memory of ones past, the formation of identity would begin all over again. If the context of that life was highly different than that which formed the first identity which was lost, then certainly the waking individual would become a different identity, a different person.

Question #2:

If you woke up one morning with no memory of your past, how would you know?

@TickTockMan,

TickTockMan wrote:

Question #2:

If you woke up one morning with no memory of your past, how would you know?

TickTockMan, Smile

I would not!! Am I missing something here? I do not believe if you read my previous post, that I inferred that one would, but that because of the loss of memory the process of identity formation would start all over again.

@boagie,

boagie;32120 wrote:

TickTockMan,

I would not!! Am I missing something here? I do not believe if you read my previous post, that I inferred that one would, but that because of the loss of memory the process of identity formation would start all over again.

Nope. You're not missing a thing.
I was actually just kind of asking in a rhetorical sense.

What troubles me, about the whole memory thing, is that if I cannot know that I've lost my memory of my past, how can I possibly know now if I am who I started out as?

@manored,

When/why/how did consciousness begin? Where does it go from here?

@TickTockMan,

TickTockMan;32121 wrote:

What troubles me, about the whole memory thing, is that if I cannot know that I've lost my memory of my past, how can I possibly know now if I am who I started out as?

This is the beauty of reincarnation. We all get a clean slate (and collect $200) each time we pass "Go!".

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