Theos-Talk Archives (August 2006 Message tt00561)

Thought you might be interested in my original letter referring to my beef 
against modern scientific materialism, why I think the world is going to pot as 
a result of our selfish use of it, and what a new paradigm of science, and an 
understanding of the unity of all beings it proves, might do to change our 
mostly conditioned ideas of separateness and selfishness, to self determined 
motives of brotherhood and altruism -- so as to be better able to cope with the 
approaching debacle and perhaps help us and our descendants bring the world back 
to its natural harmony after its inevitable collapse.    Len
_____________________________


> Mark,
> 
> I have no problem with your comments about the use of the scientific method 
> to discover and advance all those positive things (medical, agricultural, 
> electrical, mechanical, technological, etc.) that make life on this planet (for 
> some relative few of us, apparently) so much better and more enjoyable.  
> However, we have to balance that with the other resultants of such progress as; 
> pollution, ecological destruction, weapons of war, terrorism, accidents, etc., 
> that makes it much worse and more psychologically and physically destructive 
> for the great bulk of us, as the world continues to increase in 
> population... Soon, to be beyond the stage where science, even with the help of more or 
> less disabled nature caused by our misuse of science and technology, may no 
> longer be able to support them all. 
> 
> Even the "Singularity" (per Kurzweil) and its future potentials of extending 
> life as predicted by some AI dreamers -- who almost religiously believe in 
> the infallibility of science and technology -- could not help in the face of a 
> world catastrophe such as a new plague, and/or accumulated natural planetary 
> disruptions that could overwhelm us all before such scientific technologies 
> can find a way to deal with them.  It's amazing to me how vulnerable we are 
> in spite of, and in some sense, because of, material science.  But, of course, 
> that's not what I was griping about.
> 
> Certainly, as a former engineer, filmmaker, fine art printmaker, CGI poneer, 
> etc. -- steeped in advanced science and technology for many years -- I agree 
> that scientific materialism has changed this world considerably.  And, I 
> have great respect for its methods and all the advantages it has brought to the 
> world.  But, what world are we talking about?  The world of the haves?  Or 
> the much greater world of the have nots -- who seems to be increasing in 
> geometric progression? How long can it be before this increase becomes so great 
> that science and its technologies can no longer support them?  Is science and 
> its technological advances that could allow only the elite, who own the 
> resources and supply the goods, to survive in the face of possible worldwide 
> depression brought on by such advances, along with the depredations of a runaway 
> economy, coupled with natural disasters that could be beyond anyone's control?
> 
> Actually, my negative attitude about scientific materialism is based 
> primarily on the fact that it isn't these physical sciences and technologies that 
> has driven the world to its present state of near destruction and possible 
> collapse due to catastrophic ecological failure, nuclear war, economic collapse, 
> etc. -- but it is the greed and selfishness, as well as irresponsibility 
> (with respect to maintaining the natural home of all humanity) of those few that 
> profit from such scientific advances and its technologies, that are 
> determined solely by their self consciousness, and in a sense, their lack of 
> conscience on the highest level of human compassion related to all of life in our 
> continually evolving and completely interdependent Nature. Is science and 
> technology then, ready to take over the roll of the God who determines the fate of 
> all mankind as well as the Earth that gave it birth, and on which it lives and 
> is nourished by?
> 
> With all this in mind, I feel that since the scientific method cannot answer 
> the hard questions of consciousness, it can never offer any solution that 
> might help us understand our own selves better, as well as determine the 
> relationship of our individual conscious selves to all other selves, and perhaps 
> offer a basis for determining the fundamental laws of universal harmony that 
> can ultimately balance consciousness and it concomitants of compassion, ethics 
> and morality with its natural relationship to the matter that surrounds, 
> influences, and also can be manipulated by it.  
> 
> If such consciousness was and is a universal aspect of fundamental reality 
> prior to and after the big bang, and in that beginning was in harmonious 
> relationship with matter, perhaps a true self knowledge of what we really are, if 
> understood by all, would begin to make each of us aware of our mutual 
> responsibility to be in harmony with the physical aspect of nature and all the human 
> and other supportive sentient beings on it. 
> 
> Since, the only way of knowing this is to know who and what we are by 
> introspective observation (directed toward our inner self or fundamental subjective 
> state of our existence) is the reason I suggested the web site of a 
> philosopher who had taken this trip that offers us a means, as well as a possible 
> answer -- which all of us can explore, to find out for ourselves what's real and 
> what isn't.
> 
> That's all I had in mind, when I posted (and later reposted) my previous 
> letter... And my only beef is that I don't believe science and technology can 
> ever know the true nature of reality -- which, by my own logical deduction, 
> starting from the zero-point of my own consciousness (found by the meditative 
> means described on the web site, and analogously and correspondingly related to 
> the zero-point of universal consciousness) -- I was able to construct, in a 
> perfectly logically visualized 3 dimensional transparent geometry (based on 
> my experience as a pioneer in the development of 3-D computer graphics systems 
> used now in Hollywood), the ABC cross sectional model of the fractally 
> involved, multidimensional "coenergetic" fields within field within fields, of 
> varying degrees of frequency/energy phase order that contain the separate 
> entities of mind and memory that exists between both universal and individual 
> consciousness, and brain, body, and all other forms of physical matter -- with all 
> objective information, available for observation (through awareness) and 
> manipulation (through will) by consciousness, carried as holographic 
> interference patterns on the surfaces of such fields ... A scientifically consistent, 
> coenergetic (electrodynamic) field structure that answers all the hard problems 
> of material science and resolves all its anomalies and paradoxes -- all of 
> which, as cutting edge scientists are just now beginning to realize (through 
> string, QFT, and holographic paradigm concepts), are dependent on the 
> existence of such transcendental coadunate but not consubstantial fields that must be 
> intermediate between consciousness and matter in order to link together, 
> both actively and reactively, in unbreakable unity throughout all of nature, the 
> two sides (objective-subjective) of the all inclusive universal reality -- 
> that always is, was and has been within the singularity out of which this 
> entire Cosmos is formed without in any way diminishing the absolute source 
> itself.
> 
> Hopefully you (and other scientist-philosophers reading this) can follow the 
> above description in all its turns and twists -- which I've tried to 
> consolidate in the most concise manner possible -- considering the counter intuitive 
> nature of such a solution to all the hard problems facing conventional 
> physical science at this stage of its evolution. 
> 
> As Chalmers inferred, it's about time for a new paradigm to take the place 
> of the former incompatible modern physics paradigms (QM and relativity) that 
> has contributed to all the technological developments of the present age.  I'm 
> certain, therefore, that the next stage of human evolution will (without in 
> any way denying the proven truths of both modern or classical physics) be 
> dominated by consciousness, and will bring psychophysics (with a salute to BB, 
> as well as Bohm, Pribram, Whitehead and others) into the forefront of 
> scientific progress from then on.
> 
> If this concept disturbs your own conceptions of fundamental reality -- 
> well, so be it.  And, I'm sorry to be the bearer of the pin that bursts the 
> bubble of the scientific materialism you believe in, and that has now become a 
> religion for some scientists left behind in the mainstream of scientific 
> progress that is now seriously being taught starting at the undergraduate levels in 
> many major universities throughout the world.
> 
> Rest assured, there is no mystical, magical, miracle, or supernatural 
> aspects to any of the ideas that I've presented with this ABC concept of universal 
> reality.  So I hope you can give the same respect to my answers to the many 
> questions asked by myself and others with respect to consciousness and its 
> relationship to mind, brain and matter, as I give to your strictly scientific 
> material presumptions and speculations on the same subject...  Both of us, 
> understandably, with no objective evidential proof behind our respective 
> theories. :-)
> 
> Best wishes,
> 
> Leon Maurer
> ABC Home Page
> How It All Began
> 
> 
> 
> In a message dated 8/12/06 6:46:51 PM, mpeaty@arach.net.au writes:
> 
> 
> 
> 
>      •     [Warning! This message is quite long; the weary and faint hearted 
> can read just the 1st, 2nd, 4th, and last couple of paras.]
> 
> 
> Leon,
> just so as you can really understand where I am coming from, let me try and 
> summarise, aphoristically as it were, the results of ME asking myself and 
> others: 'Who am I? and 'What am I?' and 'Why is it so?' and 'How does it all 
> work?'. I have been asking these questions just about every day for most of the 
> last 54 years.
> 
> The key question, pretty much the foundation of philosophy and science, is: 
> How do I know this isn't bullsh*t? The best system for answering this 
> question in relation to just about every practical problem and situation is 
> scientific method.
> 
> For me, an EX Christian, the only feasible referent the word God can now 
> have is life on Earth. Following in this vein, scientific method is the child of 
> God, if you like. That is my humorous way of emphasising the immense 
> importance of scientific method for us humans. For Christians the word 'advent' has 
> a particular meaning. Well I say that since the advent of scientific method 
> on Earth, the human species has changed and what we are now is profoundly 
> different from what we were just 400 years ago. Much of the madness we see 
> happening in the news today is the on-going fall out from the challenge put by 
> scientific method and the fruits of its application to all pre-scientific 
> traditions, philosophies and religions. Scientific method is basically the communal 
> and systematic application of principled and reasonable scepticism. There is 
> a Chinese four character idiom which sums it up: 'Shi shi qiu shi' which can 
> be translated: Seek truth from facts.
> 
> The contrast between the modern world and the pre-scientific universe is s
> ymbolised for me by the hideous and utterly despicable treatment meted out upon 
> Giordano Bruno in February 1600. His 'crime', essentially, was to be a 
> sceptic and to question the tenets of Catholic faith, For this he was stripped 
> naked and publicly vilified in the town square, cruelly tortured and then 
> finally burned alive by order of the Catholic church hierarchy. As far as I am 
> concerned there was not then, nor can there ever be, any justification for this 
> kind of treatment of a human being, or any other animal for that matter. I 
> will never be satisfied or able to respect Catholicism until I see a Pope, on 
> his knees in that very same town square in Italy, begging forgiveness - in 
> plain ordinary Italian or whatever - for that abomination on behalf of all his 
> predecessors, their henchmen and all the rest of so called Christians. Of 
> course the Ayatollahs and mullahs preaching intolerance and jihad in the name of 
> 'Peace' - for is that not the meaning of the word 'Islam'? - are on a par with 
> the killers of Gordano Bruno, as are the Israeli 'settlers' who dream of a 
> 'Greater Israel' stretching from the Mediterranean to Mesopotamia. Likewise 
> the fundamentalist Protestants, Hindus, followers of Shinto and so forth. All 
> of them, when you get to the bottom of it, are preaching a fundamental message 
> that ignorance is not just necessary but inherently good. Well I don't buy 
> it. I've been there, done that, and it doesn't answer the real questions, nor 
> does it meet the real needs of people.
> 
> Leon, if you think that somehow you can escape from the 'material' of the 
> universe then good luck to you! But how about YOU asking yourself the question: 
> How DO I know this which I believe isn't a load of BS? Fact is, whether you 
> like the word 'material' or not, if you think that you exist, then you are 
> confronted with the existence of the whole universe, and all the thousands of 
> millions of other people on this planet. Yes, FACT. A form of words that is 
> about something other than the words and sentence structure themselves. 
> Questions about the world are very necessary and very often fruitful. It is 
> hypocritical to defame scientific materialism when your health and well-being, your 
> very life in fact, all depend on the fruits of its application in years gone 
> by. This is true of all of us; at least half the people now on the planet 
> would not exist if scientific method had remained hidden and undiscovered, and 
> most of the rest would be living in some form of serfdom or slavery.
> 
> If is thanks to the advent of scientific method that we can now truthfully 
> say: 'The human universe is always potentially infinite, so long as it exists 
> and we believe it to be so.' This doesn't mean that any of us is going to 
> live for ever. Of course not; I am going to die and so are you. What it does 
> mean though is that subjectively, i.e. within our brain/mind, we have the 
> capacity to imagine virtually anything and thus visualise alternative outcomes to 
> our current situations. It means also that, objectively, we can work on the 
> world around us. Particularly it means that working in cooperation with others 
> we have the potential to transform our world into a more human and humane 
> place. Thanks to scientific revelations of the workings of the unseen worlds of 
> the very small and the very very large, we humans now have the capacity to 
> live in peace and reasonable prosperity for all on the planet.
> 
> Life on planet Earth for human beings now no longer HAS to be a zero sum 
> game in which the powerful few amass to themselves the vast bulk of the wealth 
> created by the labour of the many. Nor is it necessary for nations to invade 
> the lands of others to find 'living space' for themselves. If powerful men are 
> still trying to do these things it is because they have not yet understood 
> that their experience is constructed by their own brains, that consciousness 
> is what it is like to be the updating of a certain brain's model of 
> self-in-the-world. When one realises the truth of this and what it implies, the truly 
> awesome potential of human creativity becomes clear.
> 
> It is necessary for people who wish to achieve things with their lives to 
> realise this truth about our experience of being here now. For one thing, it is 
> the only really feasible explanation of unconscious projection: people who 
> don't realise it is happening deny things about themselves in order to feel 
> good about conforming to their social norms. The unacknowledged features of 
> ourselves don't cease to exist just because we deny them, they become attached 
> to other people, animals and symbols which become fearsome and horrifying. In 
> this state of mistaken awareness, we can be manipulated by those who know how 
> to 'push our buttons'. What the manipulators do not realise is that as they 
> treat other people as things, so they themselves are reduced - they degrade 
> their own experience of life and become less capable of experiencing their own 
> authentic human nature.
> 
> There you go! That's enough for now ... more next time  :-)
> Regards
> 
> Mark Peaty
> mpeaty@arach.net.au
> http://www.arach.net.au/~mpeaty/
> http://eiffel.dcc.ufla.br/focus/index.php
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 



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