Theos-Talk Archives (February 2007 Message tt00217)

Below is a copy of my response to a defense of a materialistic theory of 
consciousness by a regular scientific contributor on the journal of Consciousness 
Study online forum -- with reference to a peer reviewed article recently 
published by them that I questioned earlier.   

There is much here that has theosophical and occult 
metaphysical-philosophical significance, since it closely parallels H. P. Blavatsky's take on the same 
subject over 125 years ago -- that, to this day has never been scientifically 
or logically refuted or disproved -- in direct contradiction of scientific 
materialism.  

In fact, there is no present day scientific explanation of consciousness 
(awareness, will, qualia, discernment, discrimination, discovery, determination, 
decision, etc.) that holds any water at all. Yet, String and M theories and 
some quantum field theories fully confirm the descending orders of hyperspace 
fields ("coadunate but not consubstantial fields of conscisness") that are an 
integral part of both the ABC and HPB's view of consciousness –- which is an 
integral basis of all fundamental reality (the zero-point and its abstract 
motional or angular momentum aspects of absolute "mother" space) -- which not only 
underlies and coenergetically supports, but actually creates material reality 
out of that zero-point "spinergy."

Thus, eternal, changeless consciousness is primary and rules over changing 
and changeable matter, and not the reverse -- as scientific materialism claims.  
 I suppose the world can't change for the better until everyone begins to 
realize that fundamental truth, and understands that karma and reincarnation are 
essential concomitants of the immutable law of cycles bound up in fundamental 
spin -- that surrounds each zero-point of consciousness, located everywhere at 
the center of the entire universe that we all perceive separately (thus 
illusionary) from our own particular center of individual awareness.   Therefore, 
we can say that the universe is composed of infinite particles of individual 
consciousness... N'est pas?   And, thus, it's all a creation of our combined 
consciousness as the eternal root of original spin. ;-) 

So what more is there to say? 

Lenny

********************************

Good try Mark, but no dice.    (As Einstein said, "God doesn't play" with. :-)


In a message dated 2/8/07 7:53:03 AM, mpeaty@arach.net.au writes:

> LM:
>
> "While there's no denying that discrete and
> repeatable patterns of interaction within the brain function as 
correlation's 
> of the mental objects we experience -- there certainly is no reason to 
> assume that those patterns are what is actually perceived by our individual
> consciousness quality of subjective awareness. "
>
> MP: Well, 'discrete and repeatable patterns of interaction within the
> brain' which 'function as correlations of the mental objects we
> experience' are already MORE than half the story! Because, let's face
> it, if they do not constitute the experiences in question, what other
> possible function could they have? Nothing is for nothing in life on
> Earth and for organisms like us to expend so much of our daily energy
> budget [about 20% I understand it to be] on the creation and maintenance
> of such neuronal behaviour does not make any sense unless the processes
> involved are crucial to survival. Part of the trick in understanding
> what is going on is to realise that mental 'objects', of whatever sort,
> are processes.
>
[LM] All that the correlates of consciousness in the brain are, is just that,
correlates -- like the electronic circuits in a video processor and
television transmitter.   In the brain transducer, they may be the producer 
of the
virtual 3-D and full colored image of the outer world we see in the mind and
experience in consciousness. But, they certainly (despite all your
materialistically biased arguments) aren't that virtually objective 
holographic image, nor are
they our subjective awareness or experience of it.   Thus our awareness
cannot be of any of those neural correlates of consciousness, but only of the 
3-D
holographic mind images they have electrochemically processed selectively and
reassembled out of the initial 2-D images recorded on the retinas.

Therefore, its obvious that the neural processors in the brain are nothing
more than the precursors of that virtual image in the mind which they have
processed and assembled and modulated in the overall EM field of the brain's
cortex, for coenergetic transfer to the visual aspect of the mind field at a 
higher
order frequency-energy spectrum -- that is close to the highest
frequency-energy order of the zero-point vacuum fields that empower the 
quantum particles
themselves.   How else could the interference patterns in the mind be
reconstructed by a coherent inner light so as to be seen as a perfect replica 
reflection
of the outer spherical world field of objects surrounding our head, and seen
in perfect 2-D perspective from the zero-point at its center?   Has anyone
ever shown that the light we see in our head is the same photonic light 
reflected
from the outer world objects that is detected and transformed by the rods and
cones of the retinas?  

Thus, it's possible that that one of those conscious, coadunate or entangled
zero-point centers of absolute space is where our self or soul might actually
reside.   This gives us much food for thought -- when we consider what 
happens
to it after the surrounding body and brain dies?   I'm inclined to believe
that the only one alive who knows (besides myself;-) is the yogi master who 
has
been there in deep meditation and experienced it directly.   To tell about 
it,
however, would certainly be as difficult as trying to explain to another the
color of a rose without pointing to one -- which is like that same yogi 
master
explaining the sound of one hand clapping by slapping his student on her bare
ass. ;-)

As for your "mental objects" ... They are simply the wave interference
patterns of the 3-D holographic images of the outer world -- (after being
selectively processed by the brain and assembled in and transformed through 
the Brain's
EM field, to be finally carried by the mind field) -- that we can reconstruct
by projecting a coherent ray of higher order inner light from our zero-point
source of awareness-will, and poke around in selectively with our willful
directing of our eyes' saccades (on whose retinas the whole image field is
imprinted) to pinpoint any exact part of it (down to a single pixel at the 
point of
our brush) we willfully intend to touch.   (Imagine DaVinci seeing the 
picture
of his model in his mind-memory as he places the point of his brush on the
exact point on the canvas image to tickle the corner of her enigmatic 
smile.)   
All this can only be accomplished by direct coenergetic (electrodynamic)
resonance of that virtual image in the coenergetically linked brain and mind 
fields
with the analogous, and similarly linked 3-D holographic image of the body
carried by the EM body mapping field analogously produced by the kinesthetic
cortex.  

Thus, there is no need for any mind-brain calculation of vectors or
coordinates -- since this fully analog visual information transformational 
system is
electrodynamically linked by direct and instantaneous magnetic attractions
between the various fields of consciousness, integrated, perceived and 
controlled
directly through their common zero-point centers that are coadunately 
entangled
with our individual zero-point center of awareness and will.  

This implies that the mental objects themselves, are NOT processes at all,
but the final result of processes carried out by the brain's neural network,
between the sensory input and output, that produces the holographic wave
interference patterns of the image in the brain field that are subsequently
inductively transformed to the mind field -- whose higher order "light" 
frequencies are
what we perceive as the holographic image we can, as we consciously 
determine,
walk around in mentally and physically simultaneously... All, by means of
purely electrodynamic inductive resonance processes that follow all the
fundamental laws of energetics based on the cycles of ubiquitous zero-point 
spherical
spins of fundamental root space -- that underlies and supports every
quantitative particle of objective matter and facilitates every qualitative 
effective
and affective aspect of subjective consciousness.  

If such hyperspace fields exist in actuality, and are coadunate with all
other coenergetic and information carrying fields of radiant energy, why 
wouldn't
intelligent nature use them in such a simple and direct manner to link
subjective consciousness with objective matter?   If not, then what similarly
logically sound and efficient system (from an engineering POV) can material 
science
come up with that accomplishes the same purpose of linking consciousness
together with both mind and matter, and solves all the hard problems (not to 
mention
resolves every question, anomaly, paradox, inconstancy, etc., of biology,
physics, genetics, evolution, psychic phenomena, etc., etc.)?   

None of this, of course violates any of the fundamental physical laws (some
yet to be proven) describing our physical space time continuum and all the
matter fields in it -- from the most subtle invisible and physically 
undetectable
higher order hyperspace fields of both light and dark matter-energy to the
grossest fields of solidified matter throughout the cosmos -- down to the 
deepest
black hole and highest energy fundamental particle.

In any event, there's no getting around the fact that the universe, both
subjectively and objectively, is the dual offspring of one fundamental 
absolute
"mother" space that underlies and encompasses all aspects of what we call the
"space time continuum."   

And, no amount of trying to shoehorn a physical theory of consciousness into
a contrived system -- that starts out with nothing but matter as its base, 
and
relies solely on the physical correlates of consciousness -- can ever prove
to anyone (except spiritually blind scientists :-) that matter is the causal
root of consciousness.  

In my view, the reality is just the opposite.   So, in no way can the
activities of the brain be the efficient cause of our conscious experience, 
our
willful intent, or any other aspect of awareness and thought such as 
discernment,
discrimination, discovery, determination, decision, etc.
>
> Leon mentions 'proving that consciousness is an epiphenomenon of the
> brain's .... complexity'. Well I think this is misguided. The term
> epiphenomenon is simply misleading and should be expunged from all
> decent discourse for the balance of this century at least. Of far
> greater utility is the concept of *being* the processes, in other words
> accepting that some of the processes going on in the brain entail the
> construction of a first person viewpoint, a description of self in the
> world as seen from that self's bodily and social location.
>
[LM] That's just calling a rose by another name, and explains nothing.  
Since I've already explained why consciousness cannot be the processes, and 
since
you have no evidence that the processes going on in the brain entail "the
construction of a first person viewpoint" -- [Whatever that means -- since
"construction" implies that consciousness is composed of physical parts 
whether they
be solid or radiant energy?] -- I'll go on to comment, and maybe blow some
holes in the supposed whole "truths" expounded below... That, as far as I can
imagine, are nothing more than a superficial run through of the few things we
know about the neural correlates of consciousness -- but explains nothing 
about
the cause or nature of consciousness itself... That can't be conflated with 
its
correlates, its contents or its perceivable information -- whether sensory,
memory, or imaginary.
>
>     * The body image as represented in the cortex has been mapped out,
>
Yes, as I explained how, and the way it works in combination with the visual
image ...
>    
>      * the representation of the body in space has been tracked to the
>       parietal cortex,
>
Yes, this is part of the "kinesthetic field" producing aspect of the brain I
explained above.

>     * the initiation and/or rehearsal of gross bodily movements has been
>       traced to pre-frontal cortex near the 'motor' image,
>
Which explains nothing about its function or how it can produce the
awareness, or the linkage of that "'motor' image" with the visual image we 
perceive in
the mind field so as to guide us through the objective field of action... Nor
does it tell us anything about how and where that image is stored for later
retrieval by the perceptive consciousness, or how that retrieval actually 
works.

>     * the prediction and control of well practised movements has been
>       traced to the cerebellum,
>
So...   What has that to do with the consciousness (awareness, will,
discernment, discrimination, decision, intent, etc.) that actually causes 
those
movements, or explains how that learned memory contributes to them, or even 
what
that memory is and how and where it's stored?   Nor, does it explain how it 
is
accessed by the consciousness so as to be perceived and correlated with the
dynamic visual image (including the body image) in the mind?  

This understanding is very important when trying to explain how an outfielder
runs and jumps to catch a high fly ball on a random trajectory that he never
experienced before.   Such instant decision making, based on visual sight of
the ball in continuous motion, cannot be explained by the neural correlates
alone or by previous memory -- but only by the interaction of the image 
fields
that are coenergetically linked to each other as well as to the same center 
of
awareness and will -- located at the zero-point origin of the overall brain,
mind and memory fields in the center of the brain.   In such a simple and 
direct
multiple field interaction, both awareness and will would have to be point
sourced from the coadunately entangled zero-point centers of each 
participating
field, including the overall spiritual field of our individual self
consciousness.

>     * the process of comparison between the disparate visual images of
>       the world caused by the separation of the eyeballs has been traced
>       to the primary visual cortex,
>
So what?   It still explains nothing of how that comparison -- or as some
say, "Fusion" of stereo-binocular images into the 3-D hologram -- occurs in 
the
mind?   Or, how that encoded wave interference pattern enables us to perceive
an apparently perfect holographic image of the outer world in perfect depth 
and
perspective as if we were looking at it with one eye in the exact center of
our head.   Nor, does it tell us anything about the source of nature of the
inner light that we actually see.  

>     * the formation of new memories has been traced to the hippocampus,
>
So?   And, what does that explain about how such memories of visual images
come into the mind and are perceived from the same point we perceive the 
sensory
visual image -- in similar holographic depth reality -- that enables our body
to move within the objective field with absolute precision of position
(inside the 3D matrix of metric space) with relation to the physical objects 
of
perception that are coincident with the identical images we actually perceive 
in
the mind field?

>     * the evocation of strong emotions such as anger and fear has been
>       traced to the amygdala,
>
And this tells us what about how we experience those emotions both in our
consciousness (i.e., awareness of its qualia) as well as in our body as 
hormonal
excitations?  

>     * the exercise of reasonable control over these emotions and of
>       forward thinking and planning has been traced to the frontal cortex
>
Still nothing about how any of it works.

>     * many other relatively discrete kinds of activity or perception
>       have been traced to relatively well defined characteristic areas
>       or combinations of cortical areas.
>
No comment, since your entire list is nothing more than a smoke screen that
has no relationship to the hard problem or in any way proves anything about 
the
cause or mechanisms of consciousness, and particularly, "Self Awareness."
>
> The fact that correlations as mentioned above have been discovered does
> not mean they are the only correlations occurring at the relevant times,
> just that they are most likely the easier processes to detect.
>
> Another significant aspect of experience is that it is very often much
> less than we assume it to be. For example we are normally not aware that
> we are, from moment to moment, only focussing visually on a very small
> region/visual angle of the world around us. We assume and act as if we
> are looking at just about the whole scene in front of us. The seeming
> wide angle of focussed attention is achieved by the eyes fixating at
> point after point in the visual scene - saccades - and our perception of
> each scene we inhabit is built up by the accretion of information from
> each static fixation. But the scene we are aware of is a memory, always
> a memory, which is constructed and updated, and the same is true of all
> other avenues of perception including proprioception and emotional
> awareness. The much cited experiments of Benjamin Libet point strongly
> to our consciousness of the world around us being about 0.4 seconds or
> more behind the 'real' world. Yet video recordings of accomplished
> players of many sports - e.g. action replays - and calculations of the
> velocities of tennis balls, cricket balls, racing cars, and so forth,
> all show that the sports people in their respective contests are
> responding much sooner than 4 tenths of a second. In fact in most cases
> the athletes and drivers are responding by means of predictions
> occurring unconsciously and yet flexibly on the basis of wordless
> analyses of their unfolding situations.
>
Nit picking obfuscation's (although there's no denial of their observational
truth) --possibly to cover up that you know absolutely nothing about the
causes, actions, or experiences of consciousness and have no idea how 
consciousness
links to the brain-body through the mind and memory fields.   I say "fields,"
because these aspects of the mechanisms of consciousness must be the medium
of both sensory and memory images, that, as pure information, must be in the
form of wave frequency modulations of radiant energy on varying orders or
dimensions of hyperspace...   Implying, incidentally, that these fields must 
react
at higher order time frames that would appear as if instantaneous in our 
metric
space-time measure.   Thus, explaining your sports and drivers rapid response
comment -- which cannot be explained by any physically based theory of
consciousness that has no means of instantaneous transfer of image 
information
stored electrodynamically as inductively resonant holographic wave 
interference
patterns that are immediately accessible to consciousness, both by awareness 
and
by will.
>
> Yet another important feature of our experience becomes understandable
> when we recognise that the 'discrete and repeatable patterns' have
> status as things. That is to say: while they are occurring, they
> influence the world around them. Mostly the 'world' in this case is the
> brain, but it is a fantastically dynamic place. These interaction
> patterns are composed of vast numbers of neural impulses -
> depolarisations - traversing particular brain regions, so many in fact
> that their bulk or mass action manifests as waves spreading around the
> brain and entails all manner of interference and standing wave effects.
> It seems highly likely that the transient put potent stability achieved
> by such neural networks - cell assemblies - comes about because of the
> emergence of wave like interactions arising as peeks and troughs in
> numbers of impulses as well as more generalised effects of oscillating
> trans-neuron electric fields emerging as the bulk overall aggregation of
> smaller scale electric field effects.
>
Apparently, you see very clearly what is happening in the brain, but none of
it suggests that all those correlates of consciousness are in any way the
cause of consciousness nor does it explain how consciousness perceives the 
3-D
holographic images ultimately produced by all that fantastically complex
electrical tumult in the brain.   Certainly, it's understandable that the 
brain has to
process those images from input to output electrodynamically -- but what has
that to do with explaining the hard problems?
>
> Then all that remains to understand is that what we call consciousness
> and fondly imagine to be somewhat more than it really is, is in reality
> the process of updating of the models, the guidance system that
> registers 'where I am' - which of course refers to both
> ecological/physical world location AND  location within one's social
> networks. In order for the models to be of any use at all, they must
> exhibit three elements: representation of sufficient significant
> features of the world for location to be meaningful, representation of
> sufficient currently significant features of 'self'  AND, last but not
> at all least, representation of currently significant relationships
> between oneself and one's world. These composite representations or
> models, are made out of 'mind stuff' - the dynamic logical entities
> composed of active cell assemblies - and therefore are inextricably part
> of the brain namely a significant proportion of its activity at any
> given moment. It is the fact of their being ABOUT self in the world that
> endows meaning and it is the fact of the on-going updating of this model
> of self in the world that constitutes the wordless accounting which is
> physical experience and the language based on-going description which
> constitutes our life story.
>
Very interesting and perfectly in accord with the actual explanation of how
those images get to, are formed in, and how we perceive them directly in the
mind from our separate point of visual consciousness... But, none of the 
above
assertions explains anything about the actual mechanisms of consciousness 
that
enable us to see those images holographically from our individual point of
visual (and aural) consciousness at the center of our head located exactly
between the eyes and the ears, designed to enable us to perceive perfect
3-dimensional holographic images (both visually and aurally) that enable us 
to
analogously compute, instantaneous positional information -- and respond to 
it
physically in perfect spatial coordination without any rational thought 
whatsoever.  
Show us how that can be done by the processes described above, without the
intermediate fields of mind and memory that are separate entities from but
coenergetic with the brain's EM information carrying field, and maybe some of 
your
pre conceptual conclusions that consciousness is caused by the neural 
complexity
of the brain or its functions, might make some sense.   It might also help if
you could explain what your "mind stuff" is made of, and what constitutes
"self in the world"?  
>
> What I have proposed here answers Leon's questions sufficiently to show
> that there is a 'materialist' explanation that is adequate but which is
> in the process of being fleshed out in ever greater and more pervasive
> detail. Some careful thought about this will show that our experience of
> life as such is inherently paradoxical, because the experience that we
> call consciousness is actually what it is like to be a description, or
> rather the updating of the description, of self in the world, rather
> than 'being' the noumenal self in the noumenal world. But that's it!
> Tough but true.
>
That is, if it is really true -- which, as far as I can see, you haven't in
any way proven or even explained adequately.   The truth of consciousness, 
nor
the solution to the hard problems of qualia and brain-mind binding cannot be
arbitrarily in the physical details of the neural correlates, no matter how 
far
it gets "fleshed out."  

All that added detail does is increase our knowledge of the complex
electrochemical dynamic processes that go on in the brain in order to create 
simple
holographic replicas of the outer world that we can experience and directly
interact with through our self conscious perception -- i.e., our individually
singular point of self consciousness located in the center of our head that 
is
entirely separate from the brain and all its electrochemical activities -- 
yet not
separate from the same fundamental space that the brain-body and all its
formative and derivative fields of electrical activity are also in and are a 
part
of.  


For, what else is there that holds this entire universe together, and is also
its eternal source of manifestation and its eternal resting place between its
endless cycles of life and death?   Or, do you think that this universe comes
into existence only once out of nothing?   If so, then it's material science
and its materialistic bias that forces such a belief in magic by all its
practitioners.
>
> There is no room for magic [other than romance and wonder] or the
> supernatural and manifestly no need for wild speculations about quantum
> gravity in the brain, indeed quantum mechanics at any level is basically
> irrelevant to the 'classical' scale processes and events of significance
> in our brains. Darwinian selective pressures have caused massive
> remodelling of the human brain from its simian ancestral form guided by
> the tremendous utility of being able to copy the behaviours of others
> and communicate opinions and desires about other people and the
> situations we find ourselves in. The solutions to life's practical
> problems come about as the results of brains making muscles move in the
> correct way.
>
I agree with you completely that there is no room for magic   or the
supernatural or even the speculations about quantum gravity or any other 
quantum
theory with respect to consciousness and the electrodynamic activity in the 
brain
that leads to holographic images perceived in the mind by our zero-point 
center
of consciousness however I question your assertion that the brain "makes" our
muscles move -- which implies that the brain thinks and has a will of its own
independent of individual consciousness.   This, to me, is like saying that a
computer thinks independent of its programmer.   I'm sure that the brain is
nothing more with respect to consciousness or perception of sensory images, 
and
willfully responding to them, than are the electronic circuits of a
television system, between camera and TV receiver, are to the images and 
stories it
shows and tells us.   As Einstein said, God (i.e., the spirit of nature) 
doesn't
play dice (and as I add) nor does it design systems that are any more complex
than the television systems we create.   

> Here endeth the lesson!  :-)
>
Which is about as enlightening to me as was the science lesson I got in the
fifth grade (1935) that attempted to explain how a radio broadcasting system
works.  

But thanks anyway -- since it's nice to know how those apparent;ly
imtelligent people (some of them accredited scientists with PhD's) who think 
they have
brains that think and feel for them, try to tell us how they think they 
work.  
</;^)~

God save us from the pundits of physical phenomena who can't see the forest
for the trees and think consciousness and matter are identical or that
consciousness follows matter ontologically.   Such materialistic thinking, if 
it stays
predominant, will eventually bring his whole social and economic system, if
not the entire ecosystem, down around our ears.   ;-(

Best wishes,
Leon Maurer, DABC

http://www.tellworld.com/Astro.Biological.Coenergetics/
http://users.aol.com/uniwldarts/uniworld.artisans.guild/chakrafield.html
>
> Regards
> Mark Peaty  CDES
> mpeaty@arach.net.au
> http://www.arach.net.au/~mpeaty/
>
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]