Consciousness As Reaction

@nameless,

"Science has taken the clumsy and erroneous notion of a 'temporally linear' notion of 'cause and effect' and 'redefined' it as the 'mutual (synchronously) arising of two aspects of One event'![/quote]

nameless, Smile

:)This last bit, "Redefined it as the mutual synchronously arising of two aspects of one event-----------------really--------that is fantastic!! Is it then agreed by at least some scientest that cause and effect are not in fact a reality??

@boagie,

boagie wrote:

nameless wrote:
"Science has taken the clumsy and erroneous notion of a 'temporally linear' notion of 'cause and effect' and 'redefined' it as the 'mutual (synchronously) arising of two aspects of One event'!

nameless,

:)This last bit, "Redefined it as the mutual synchronously arising of two aspects of one event-----------------really--------that is fantastic!! Is it then agreed by at least some scientest that cause and effect are not in fact a reality??

You betcha! The illusion of linearity is finally being seen as just that, a notion 'mutually arising' with a certain perspective (and 'believed'), naive realism's bastard child.
*__-

@nameless,

nameless wrote:

You betcha! The illusion of linearity is finally being seen as just that, a notion 'mutually arising' with a certain perspective (and 'believed'), naive realism's bastard child.
*__-

nameless,

Well that is delightful, some of my friends think its my medications , seriously, it is a difficult sell, some people act as if you have done something outrageous to them in just suggesting such a thing. Naive realism's bastard child------------love it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why I wonder, do I not find it upsetting, the idea is truely offensive to some people.

@boagie,

It is a matter of perspective right? Things are still the same way; we are just adjusting our angle. How can people find this sort of realization offense?
Well- 'how can old people hate the internet?' would have a similar answer I fear.

But I see you two looking at this idea from a dethatched perspective (by way of celebration), but what it implies for me is a realisation that choice is an illusion, depriving me of freedom!

I am but a pinball bouncing from place to place, directed by my will. Unfortunatly my will is but another reaction directed by my necessitial (personal) and obilgatory (social) responses to my needs to live and needs (personal) to co-exist (social).

Dan.

Edit: I am now seeing why 'human action' carries, so readily, connotations of independence and freedom.

Because I will never stop and act spontaneously- separate from my will, without being engaged in the train of thought that would lead me to 'test' my will, acting against my will intentionally.
It will always be that and nothing else!!! I will only ever react to my will or (if in the right frame of mind) against it intentionally, but never independently. And considering my will is driven by just about everything but 'me' (not my shell, my shell is part of my environment) I will never be free.

Edit: 'temporary linear', by taking a slice of time we reestablish the original conditions which every event is tied to as a reaction- much in the same way as a capo reestablishes the root note of a guitar, therefore transposing the song. If we look at only two immediate events in time, of course teh first one looks liek it causes the second, we have cut out the prerequisite.

But any way, the illusion of choice is developed in the same way. When I refer to myself arriving at a T-junction in the road the illusion of choice is made- I am at a T-junction, I may choose to go left or right. Prerequisite to me getting in the car and driving to the T-junction, I target a destination. And the T-junction choice will of course conform to that predetermined destination. On Boagies previous and related thread I ran a thought experiment with a man lost in his car. Again at any T-junction (choice) even without a predetermined destination, the 'choice' is predetermined by your desire to find home, or escape home.

So by error of our own perception and the desire for intense bursts of pleasure (jumping for joy), we have learnt to favor the 'now' as opposed to the past or future. This is the same temporal error that gives rise to the illusion of cause and effect, and it is the same error that gives rise to the illusion of a choice.

@de budding,

de budding, Smile

:)How free must you be, all possiabilities are before you as the world, would the defination of freedom be the more pleasing if it imbraced the impossiable, that in turn would necessarily be, unreal.

@boagie,

'all possiabilities are before you as the world'

If only I could choose to take them.

'defination of freedom'

freedom is the ability to act independently of the will, or at the very best develop your own will. This is what it means to have a 'free-will', a free-will is one which you can at the very least stop from controlling you and at the very most learn to controll.

Either way neither is going to happen.

p.s. I added another edit, can you read it please Boagie Smile

.

@boagie,

boagie wrote:

"What is it that "all" is looking at it from a human's point of view?" quote Arjen

All is looking at its body!

Allow me to rephrase:

"What is it that "all" is looking at, from a human's point of view?"

@de budding,

de_budding wrote:

'all possiabilities are before you as the world'

If only I could choose to take them.

'defination of freedom'

freedom is the ability to act independently of the will, or at the very best develop your own will. This is what it means to have a 'free-will', a free-will is one which you can at the very least stop from controlling you and at the very most learn to controll. Either way neither is going to happen.

p.s. I added another edit, can you read it please Boagie .

de budding,

It would seem you have come to the conclusion by your own defination that there is no such thing as freewill. Being independent of the will is not realistic, nor is it desirable.

@Arjen,

Arjen wrote:

Allow me to rephrase:

"What is it that "all" is looking at, from a human's point of view?"

Arjen,

Itself!

@boagie,

[quote=boagie]de budding,

It would seem you have come to the conclusion by your own definition that there is no such thing as freewill. Being independent of the will is not realistic, nor is it desirable.[/quote]

Take the time as you read to consider doing something truly random and spontaneous (As if you really going to do it) and then recap that it is not random or spontaneous in this context, merely responsive- if you did it now it would be a reaction to the current train of thought, an act against the will, but none the less concerned and therefore controlled by the will. So then at what point could this act of spontaneity and randomness occur... never! Your actions will always be rendered reactions by the pre-existence of will. I will never randomly lay down in the street, I will only ever lay down in the street to prove a point to myself.

Do you not feel the burn? You could never accomplish that act of randomness and worse still is that it not possible because choice is an illusion.

Whether it is unrealistic or not to detach myself from the will, it would be the only way to be truly free but, none the less, it is still impossible, so I resorted for a while to other tactics concerning choice. And then today I realized, through the same error that 'cause and effect' was invented, 'choice' has been invented too.

If it is impossible to detach from the will, and impossible to choose we must endeavor to find other ways to set us free. If it truely impossible I will then resort to lifestyle as a potential cure, but I think that will lead down the road of existentialism again.

@Arjen,

Allow me to rephrase:

"What is it that "all" is, looking at it from a human's point of view?"

Smile

@de budding,

de budding,

Take the time to explain to me if you will, just how choice is an illusion, an invention. To speak of escaping the will is not possiable, for at the centre of ones being, is the will to live. It is out of this will that life is thus manifeast in the world.

@boagie,

[quote=boagie]de budding,[/quote]

boagie wrote:

Take the time to explain to me if you will, just how choice is an illusion, an invention. To speak of escaping the will is not possiable, for at the centre of ones being, is the will to live. It is out of this will that life is thus manifeast in the world.

For the exact same temporal reasons why cause and effect is illusionary.

When I take the time to explain to you a past 'choice' I made, what I do is take a slice of time with an invented start and end (the real start is the beginning of time the real end is never hear, time is continuous).

Ex1- I stopped at a T-junction yesterday and chose to go left.

Ex2- before I left yesterday I chose to go to the beach, hence why I went left at the aforementioned T-junction.

Ex3- I was being served school dinners when the dinner lady asked 'peas or carrots?'

Are we faced with a genuine choice? Both are healthy, I don't like either and the physical properties of both don't do anything for me. So I told the dinner lady to surprise me! The choice was given up!? No, the choice didn't exist, if there is no predetermination (preference, obligation etc.) by which to defend an option the choice doesn't exist. We will often in these situations say 'I don't know' or try to get some one else to influence us.

I wish I could explain it better than with anecdotal examples, but just keep asking questions and I will get round to explaining it properly.

Dan.

Edit: No human action, means no human initiation, therefore no choices.
Also I been thinking about the properties that 'choose' for us and the order of importance.

First our will to live, secondly other's will to live.
Then social obligations, like promises or jobs.
Then Personal preference, developed in earlier life. (memories of reaction)

The above examples are all example of 'reactory' traits and variables inserted into us via reaction to external stimuli. We don't choose any of the above, so when they make our desicions for us it is false to think 'we' are.

@Arjen,

Arjen wrote:

Allow me to rephrase:

"What is it that "all" is, looking at it from a human's point of view?"

Arjen,

It is all.

@Arjen,

Arjen wrote:

Allow me to rephrase:

"What is it that "all" is, looking at it from a human's point of view?"

Everyone and everything except themselfs?

@de budding,

What if this all is a paradox from human perspective?

@Arjen,

To me it is becoming quite apparent that it is somthing of the sort. Or perhaps simply a lingual problem.

@de budding,

de_budding wrote:

To me it is becoming quite apparent that it is somthing of the sort. Or perhaps simply a lingual problem.

The lingual problem is derived from our logic, which is derived from our "Knowledge-appartus" (<--literal translation from Dutch, I hope to learn the English variant).

From the moment you realise the above on the problem gets much harder because what we percieve as a paradox is in reality "(all-)one". What then is the shape of this thing-in-itself, what then, is the shape of human beings?

@boagie,

boagie wrote:

nameless,

Well that is delightful, some of my friends think its my medications , seriously, it is a difficult sell, some people act as if you have done something outrageous to them in just suggesting such a thing. Naive realism's bastard child------------love it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why I wonder, do I not find it upsetting, the idea is truely offensive to some people.

It is a matter, I find, of 'belief'.
If we 'threaten' a person's 'belief', symptoms appear; a rain of red herrings, ad-hominums, sometimes physical attacks, denial, denial, denial... reaction!
People identify with their 'beliefs'; there is a huge egoic/emotional thing going on. 'Belief' is not open to logical discussion, as it is emotionally/egoically based.
Obviously, you host no 'beliefs' on the matter, so you may discuss rationally, logically.
A person's 'beliefs' (belief virus infection), their 'world-view', is not to be trifled with without inviting whatever horrors come with the defending and propagation of the 'belief' virus by the host.
Capisce'?

@Arjen,

Arjen wrote:

What if this all is a paradox from human perspective?

Arjen,

Lay the paradox out for us! Wink

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