One book which has been instrumental in my journey in understanding the universe has been "The holographic universe" by Michael Talbot. This book was written decades ago and yet is still considered cutting edge as far as the material presented. The principle of the hologram is simple, any part of the whole contains all the information of the whole. How Does does this apply to the universe and life? Watch the video!
Monday, September 19, 2011
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Distinguishing the vital body from the physical body
I am currently reading "Physics of the soul" by Dr. Amit Goswami. In the chapter I am reading he mentioned something I felt worth sharing. In trying to give his readers a good grasp on what the vital body was and how it is separate, yet still connected to the physical body, he used the example of how newtonian laws can be used to understand the movement of the planets and other non-living objects but not the vital body.
For example if we wanted to know what Jupiter's location will be in reference to earth in 10 years we can use mathematics and newtonian science to figure it out. Now, what about where YOU will be in 10 years? Amit points out that, where you will be is, amongst other things, dependent on your thoughts and feelings. A thought or feeling cannot be measured by mathematics or newtonian science. A thought or feeling is essentially like a program for which the physical body follows. From here he equates that, because of this fact we can see the connection between how the physical body is governed by the vital body. He also discusses the possibility of us having a "mental" and "supramental" body. All together these various bodies can fall under the general category of "subtle body".
Many term's have been used to describe the subtle body. Dr. Rupert Sheldrake uses the term "morphogenic field" to describe the field to which the physical body organizes itself to. I for one agree with Amit and Rupert regarding the existence of these type of fields. The only reason the general scientific community isn't in full agreement regarding these fields is that there is no hard science to prove their existence, only logical deduction and theories. This is one thing I feel as though will change, hopefully within the next decade.
For example if we wanted to know what Jupiter's location will be in reference to earth in 10 years we can use mathematics and newtonian science to figure it out. Now, what about where YOU will be in 10 years? Amit points out that, where you will be is, amongst other things, dependent on your thoughts and feelings. A thought or feeling cannot be measured by mathematics or newtonian science. A thought or feeling is essentially like a program for which the physical body follows. From here he equates that, because of this fact we can see the connection between how the physical body is governed by the vital body. He also discusses the possibility of us having a "mental" and "supramental" body. All together these various bodies can fall under the general category of "subtle body".
Many term's have been used to describe the subtle body. Dr. Rupert Sheldrake uses the term "morphogenic field" to describe the field to which the physical body organizes itself to. I for one agree with Amit and Rupert regarding the existence of these type of fields. The only reason the general scientific community isn't in full agreement regarding these fields is that there is no hard science to prove their existence, only logical deduction and theories. This is one thing I feel as though will change, hopefully within the next decade.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Final destination of the soul: heaven or hell? But how....
Although I always found myself questioning the nature of existence through out my life, I didn't seriously start to consider the issue until I was living by myself during grad school in the fall of 2008. It was then I actually started to try and confront an issue that had always bugged me (and i'm sure everyone at various points in their lives), what the heck happens when we die?
What was different about me attempting to answer this question from previous times was that I had come to the realization that, pretty much anything that has ever been told to me regarding this topic has been from the mouth of another human. The problem here is humans manipulate things for reasons which are obvious and reasons which are... not so obvious. Not to mention information lost in translation or simply disregarded. What I wanted to do was try and attack this question outside of everything I had been told and look at it specifically from pure life experience.
At this point in my life I was still very much operating my brain under OS christianity 2.0 so my thinking went immediately to, "ok so we go to heaven or hell, but how do we get there?" (so much for attacking this question from pure experience!) I kept trying to think about how life experiences on earth would dictate this type of separation process. I imagined that if we did "good" or "bad" that our souls would continually undergo a type of magnetism process which would charge them to a certain degree, thus when we die we would be naturally be attracted to our post life destination. Then I thought, "well ok, good and bad are vague terms, what decides good from bad?" Being raised a catholic of course god came into mind, but then how does he (because of course god is masculine) decide? I first thought about how there had been times in my life when I did bad or good things. Then I thought about other people, how there are reports and stories of other humans doing horrid things and amazing things. I thought about humans when placed in desperate situations will do desperate things. Then a situation came into my mind. I thought about the life of someone much less fortunate then me, someone who constantly had negative things happening to them, and there whole life maybe just for the way they looked or spoke or whatever it may be they were tortured by other humans beings.
What if due to them coming up at the short end of the gene pool and not being born with suitable living characteristics among other human or simply they were born into a not suitable living environment and all these things lead them to not believe in god, because of course if god was so good why would he subject someone to that type of torture. According to catholicism they would not go to heaven and be cast off to hell. For the logical thinking person immediately you should think, "well thats not right", although i'm sure there are those of you out there thinking, "damn right he shouldn't go to hell!" Regardless, once I came to the realization that not every life is born into the same genetic and living conditions therefore there can never be a universal good or bad, right or wrong I decided that at that time I was just not ready to tackle issues of how and what determines where the soul goes in the afterlife.
Reflecting back on my thoughts then it is interesting to see all the pitfalls I encountered when trying to breach this topic.The main thing I got hung up on then was the concept of good or bad. We've all been taught it but never understood it in its entirety and this is because, there is no entirety. As far as life is concerned there is no universal "good" or universal "bad". The main reason being concepts of good and bad vary from person to person, tribe to tribe, city to city, country to country, etc. I know your probably thinking, well this is bologna, there has to be some inherent feeling of good or bad, because I can FEEL it when I do something either good or bad.
Ignoring the effects that one's subconscious mind has on our feelings and actions, I will agree that yes there does exist those type of feelings in all of us but its not specifically the feelings of good or bad but more correctly its the feelings of what supports and is conducive to the continuity of life's existence or what is negative and harmful to the continuity life's existence. Every thought or experience you have ever had IS some variation of the two. Wouldn't it make sense? You are in fact life therefore shouldn't the measuring stick be what either supports or harms ur existence? Shouldn't the measuring stick be what suports or harms other living things existence?
If one accepts this notion (if you don't please offer a rebuttal) then you can understand, if you yourself are the measuring stick, if life itself is the measuring stick, the need for an outside judger is not needed. The mechanism for judging is already built into the system, for example if all life decided to not suport its existence guess what, it wouldn't exist! I wouldn't even be here to ponder these thoughts. If life decided to continually support its existence by living in harmony with all itself, well then we'll wind up where we are now. Humans are the greatest expression of life supporting its own existence. (this is of course ignoring the hypotheses that life on other plants exist, which is another post in and of itself.)
The obvious question's here are, how would this life supporting or life harming information be stored? Why would life support or harm itself? What then happens to life which does or doesn't support itself? these questions will be discussed in another post but at this point I hope we can agree that the universal measuring stick for life existence is how much it supports or harms itself.
What was different about me attempting to answer this question from previous times was that I had come to the realization that, pretty much anything that has ever been told to me regarding this topic has been from the mouth of another human. The problem here is humans manipulate things for reasons which are obvious and reasons which are... not so obvious. Not to mention information lost in translation or simply disregarded. What I wanted to do was try and attack this question outside of everything I had been told and look at it specifically from pure life experience.
At this point in my life I was still very much operating my brain under OS christianity 2.0 so my thinking went immediately to, "ok so we go to heaven or hell, but how do we get there?" (so much for attacking this question from pure experience!) I kept trying to think about how life experiences on earth would dictate this type of separation process. I imagined that if we did "good" or "bad" that our souls would continually undergo a type of magnetism process which would charge them to a certain degree, thus when we die we would be naturally be attracted to our post life destination. Then I thought, "well ok, good and bad are vague terms, what decides good from bad?" Being raised a catholic of course god came into mind, but then how does he (because of course god is masculine) decide? I first thought about how there had been times in my life when I did bad or good things. Then I thought about other people, how there are reports and stories of other humans doing horrid things and amazing things. I thought about humans when placed in desperate situations will do desperate things. Then a situation came into my mind. I thought about the life of someone much less fortunate then me, someone who constantly had negative things happening to them, and there whole life maybe just for the way they looked or spoke or whatever it may be they were tortured by other humans beings.
What if due to them coming up at the short end of the gene pool and not being born with suitable living characteristics among other human or simply they were born into a not suitable living environment and all these things lead them to not believe in god, because of course if god was so good why would he subject someone to that type of torture. According to catholicism they would not go to heaven and be cast off to hell. For the logical thinking person immediately you should think, "well thats not right", although i'm sure there are those of you out there thinking, "damn right he shouldn't go to hell!" Regardless, once I came to the realization that not every life is born into the same genetic and living conditions therefore there can never be a universal good or bad, right or wrong I decided that at that time I was just not ready to tackle issues of how and what determines where the soul goes in the afterlife.
Reflecting back on my thoughts then it is interesting to see all the pitfalls I encountered when trying to breach this topic.The main thing I got hung up on then was the concept of good or bad. We've all been taught it but never understood it in its entirety and this is because, there is no entirety. As far as life is concerned there is no universal "good" or universal "bad". The main reason being concepts of good and bad vary from person to person, tribe to tribe, city to city, country to country, etc. I know your probably thinking, well this is bologna, there has to be some inherent feeling of good or bad, because I can FEEL it when I do something either good or bad.
Ignoring the effects that one's subconscious mind has on our feelings and actions, I will agree that yes there does exist those type of feelings in all of us but its not specifically the feelings of good or bad but more correctly its the feelings of what supports and is conducive to the continuity of life's existence or what is negative and harmful to the continuity life's existence. Every thought or experience you have ever had IS some variation of the two. Wouldn't it make sense? You are in fact life therefore shouldn't the measuring stick be what either supports or harms ur existence? Shouldn't the measuring stick be what suports or harms other living things existence?
If one accepts this notion (if you don't please offer a rebuttal) then you can understand, if you yourself are the measuring stick, if life itself is the measuring stick, the need for an outside judger is not needed. The mechanism for judging is already built into the system, for example if all life decided to not suport its existence guess what, it wouldn't exist! I wouldn't even be here to ponder these thoughts. If life decided to continually support its existence by living in harmony with all itself, well then we'll wind up where we are now. Humans are the greatest expression of life supporting its own existence. (this is of course ignoring the hypotheses that life on other plants exist, which is another post in and of itself.)
The obvious question's here are, how would this life supporting or life harming information be stored? Why would life support or harm itself? What then happens to life which does or doesn't support itself? these questions will be discussed in another post but at this point I hope we can agree that the universal measuring stick for life existence is how much it supports or harms itself.
Monday, September 12, 2011
First Post
"Star stuff contemplating the stars", a line from the late great Carl Sagan, represents my sentiments towards life's desire and ability to understand itself and its place in the universe.
This blog is meant to be a chronicling of thoughts and ideas I encounter or cognize in my quest of discovering the true nature and interwoven relationship of the universe, life and consciousness.
I would like to believe that the ultimate purpose of life's existence is to figure out.. life's existence! I think many, if not most, human beings will in some point in their life ask themselves the question, why am i here? How did all this happen? Why am I, me? What happens to me after I die? Is there an afterlife? Etc.
Upon encountering these type of questions the majority of people will either a) Turn to religion b) Turn to mechanistic science or c) simply conclude that they are not capable of obtaining any of these answers. Not to say any which one of these ways is wrong but I personally have always felt unfilled in life upon coming across these questions and trying to answer them within the framework of a through c. This I feel is mainly because there are too many contradicting notions that exist within these frame works.
Where is the location of afterlife places such as Heaven or Hell? There are tons of religions which all say different things, which one is right? Does it just come down to which one you are born into? If are bodies are just molecules connected to each other giving rise to consciousness, upon death and the deterioration of these networks of molecules wouldn't that mean there would be no consciousness after death? What determines a good or bad person? If an all powerful merciful god exists why would he send people to hell? I can keep going but these are questions that arrise when one operates there existence on operating system religion 2.0 or Newtonian science 2.0.
If history has taught humans anything its that, with time comes answers. What was previously unthinkable yesterday is common place today. I do feel like all questions are answerable because of the nature that they arouse in the first place. In order to tackle some of these questions I have been on a personal journey that has involved a lot of reading, thinking, observing, reflecting and theorizing. Some idea's I encounter may come from other like-minded individuals, while others may come from my own personal cognizations. When appropriate I will make this distinction on my posts.
Ultimately, I would like to use this blog as a means for me to reflect back on thoughts and ideas I have found particularly interesting and pertinent. If any of my posts are able to invoke a type of intellectual conversation I would also view that as a bonus. We are all truth-seekers and ultimately regardless of what I, or anyone for that matter, thinks or feels, the truth will always prevail and present itself.
This blog is meant to be a chronicling of thoughts and ideas I encounter or cognize in my quest of discovering the true nature and interwoven relationship of the universe, life and consciousness.
I would like to believe that the ultimate purpose of life's existence is to figure out.. life's existence! I think many, if not most, human beings will in some point in their life ask themselves the question, why am i here? How did all this happen? Why am I, me? What happens to me after I die? Is there an afterlife? Etc.
Upon encountering these type of questions the majority of people will either a) Turn to religion b) Turn to mechanistic science or c) simply conclude that they are not capable of obtaining any of these answers. Not to say any which one of these ways is wrong but I personally have always felt unfilled in life upon coming across these questions and trying to answer them within the framework of a through c. This I feel is mainly because there are too many contradicting notions that exist within these frame works.
Where is the location of afterlife places such as Heaven or Hell? There are tons of religions which all say different things, which one is right? Does it just come down to which one you are born into? If are bodies are just molecules connected to each other giving rise to consciousness, upon death and the deterioration of these networks of molecules wouldn't that mean there would be no consciousness after death? What determines a good or bad person? If an all powerful merciful god exists why would he send people to hell? I can keep going but these are questions that arrise when one operates there existence on operating system religion 2.0 or Newtonian science 2.0.
If history has taught humans anything its that, with time comes answers. What was previously unthinkable yesterday is common place today. I do feel like all questions are answerable because of the nature that they arouse in the first place. In order to tackle some of these questions I have been on a personal journey that has involved a lot of reading, thinking, observing, reflecting and theorizing. Some idea's I encounter may come from other like-minded individuals, while others may come from my own personal cognizations. When appropriate I will make this distinction on my posts.
Ultimately, I would like to use this blog as a means for me to reflect back on thoughts and ideas I have found particularly interesting and pertinent. If any of my posts are able to invoke a type of intellectual conversation I would also view that as a bonus. We are all truth-seekers and ultimately regardless of what I, or anyone for that matter, thinks or feels, the truth will always prevail and present itself.
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