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Post by Portto on Sept 27, 2010 7:24:51 GMT -5
Porto, I don't want to play this game right now. It's a waste of time, you can't win. (I don't mean you personally, just that there is no chain of arguments that can prove what you seem to be believing in or what may be your actual experience.) What kind of choice do you have regarding playing the game?
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Post by enigma on Sept 27, 2010 10:41:44 GMT -5
I was referring to it as a pregnant dog fight in a very light hearted way really. It did seem with you claiming to feel anger at one point and using a crying emoticon in response to enigma as though there was a bit of heat though. I like the way you challenge the likes of ZD & enigma but I do wonder whether it's helping you. The debates can be very interesting but I more often than not feel as though I'm being taken away from what is being pointed to. Yeah, I agree. It's really not productive to use the reason/logic/debate style approach to nonduality, and if that means there's no interest in exploring nonduality, then that's what it is and it's fine. Mind can't help but try to fit nonduality into it's dualistic paradigm. Clarity can happen, but this isn't the same as mental comprehension. It's not clarity about the true nature of the scummy stuff floating on the surface of the pond. It's the clearing away of the scummy stuff.
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Post by question on Sept 27, 2010 19:55:04 GMT -5
Hi Enigma,
I hope we can get back to topic, which for me is: how is your version of _____, supposed to be fundamentally different, or lack any trace of, the traditional versions of God? Let me try summarise what I understand you've said:
You've defined innocence as the opposite of false knowledge in light of lack of seperation. I interpret this as knowledge by virtue of identity. Identity through oneness of creator and creation unmediated by thought. If the misidentification with thinking activates sin (removes innocence), I guess I can accept innocence as a sort of natural state.
There is mysterious part is where you write: "There is only innocence in the power behind creation. There is only ignorance in the creation itself." What is the first instance of ignorance, i.e. what is the first instance of creation?
As for intelligence, you've retracted a bit in saying that if the concept holds too many connotations for me then it's not useful. The question of intelligence however seems crucial to me. I haven't a clue how to understand the notion of intelligence as souce of creation and free of anything resembling thinking. It's not so much the absence of planning, choosing or avoiding that bothers me, it's the absence of an operator that makes it so unaccessible to me. I haven't ever encountered a theory of an intelligent system without an operator (or at least a simulated operator within a "nonpersonal" process). But you seem to be saying that an operator is first introduced within creation and that the source of creation is not an operator but still somehow retains a trace of some sort of intelligence? I don't understand how it's possible to assign intelligence to something nonpersonal. Can you please describe the content and functionality of that intelligence?
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Post by enigma on Sept 27, 2010 21:33:58 GMT -5
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Post by karen on Sept 27, 2010 22:27:59 GMT -5
Hey enigma, would you consider something like evolution by natural selection to be a reflection of that intelligence that you speak of? I've thought of it so.
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Post by enigma on Sept 28, 2010 0:07:21 GMT -5
I would say the entirety of life, perception, thought is an expression of that intelligence. Sunrise and sunset, earthquakes and cockroaches, Adolph Hitler and Mother Theresa, it's all the same intelligence in expression.
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Post by zendancer on Sept 28, 2010 4:38:42 GMT -5
Reality, which is non-dual, is the only thing that can't be learned about through the mind, so its a frustrating issue for people who think that thinking is the only way to learn. Learning through thought, however, is abstract and it only deals with imagined meta-realities whereas learning through the body is concrete and deals with the actual.
When we ask a question like "What is that?" referring to what can be imagined as a tree, we are usually asking "How may that aspect of reality be distinguished?" rather than "What is the thing in itself (sing an dich) prior to abstraction?" In the first case, we are seeking a noun, but in the second case we are seeking a verb (what IS that?). Everyone is accustomed to living in a world of nouns, but few know anything about Reality where only verbs apply.
Another fundamental problem involved in any discussion like this is that most adults cannot stop thinking at will, so they cannot enjoy a sufficient amount of silence to perceive how intelligent the universe is in the absence of thought. For those who have learned to function without thought, it is obvious that thought is a secondary and unnecessary utility for more than 95% of life's activities. For those who have not escaped the habit of thought, it is simply unimaginable that life can be lived intelligently without thought. If those people who cannot escape the mind could get up in the morning and go through half a day without thinking, they would see the vast intelligence of Reality beyond all abstraction. This intelligence is usually overlooked because the mind is chattering incessantly which creates the illusion that such chattering is necessary for intelligence to be present.
In silence and totally without reflective thought the body can go to the bathroom, brush teeth, get dressed, fix breakfast, eat breakfast, drive to work, read and understand highway signs, park a car, go to an office, and do various kinds of work. Thought can be employed whenever it might be useful and can then can be suspended whenever its usefulness has ended. Unless one is a theoretical physicist 95% of one's day would not require thought, yet the body would function intelligently throughout that entire period of time.
Speed readers know (through direct experience) that a book can be read and understood without linear verbalized thought, but a non-speed reader cannot imagine how that is possible. The same intelligence that allows a book to be understood in silence is operating everywhere, but it can't be seen or appreciated until the reflective overlay of thought is temporarily suspended. If there is no interest in going beyond thought and experiencing Reality directly, then what is being pointed to on this website will never be seen, understood, or appreciated.
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Post by Portto on Sept 28, 2010 6:48:56 GMT -5
The mystery is that one seeker will do exactly what the teacher advises. Eight seekers will do some variation of what the teacher advises and will do it for various amounts of time ranging from ten minutes to three hours per day. One student will ignore the teacher’s teaching totally. What can you possibly do if God doesn't want to wake up?
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Post by question on Sept 28, 2010 8:39:51 GMT -5
I'm not an expert on 'traditional notions of God', but in most traditions I'm familiar with god is seen as a supreme being who thinks and plans and helps and such. Do you think that's what I'm saying? - I see it more from a systems-theory/cybernetics point of view and I think we can simplify all the traditional notions of God down to the notion of an 'absolute operator'. And so far I don't see how what you're saying can make any sense without an absolute operator. An operator doesn't necessarily have to be personal. In primitive religious beliefs the abs.operator is an anthropomorphic creature exercising its will over all, in primitive scientific beliefs the abs. operator is a "world-formula" knowing which would enable the knower to know and understand absolutely everything.
I don't understand the significance of the question, and I hessitate to go there. - Huge significance. If you describe the first instance of creation and ignorance, then that would equally be an explanation of the nature and function of intelligence, innocence and creation. It's like in physics, knowing the microcosm helps a lot in understanding the macrocosm.
I don't see where I retracted. It seems you define intelligence by it's expression in thought, which is fine if you see it that way, but I don't. To me, there has to be intelligence present in order to express anything. Hencely, there is intelligence prior to any expression. Intelligence, as I'm talking about it has no content. It's unactualized potential. - I don't get it. I don't even know what question to ask, since if this intelligence is unactualized expression devoid of content, you've basically announced to leave all questions about it unanswered. I still don't understand why you're using the word "intelligence".
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Post by question on Sept 28, 2010 9:53:36 GMT -5
Zendancer, to be honest, I doubt that seeing intelligence in the workings of the universe is ultimately much more than advanced projection of anthropomorphic qualities. But even if so, obviously the universe seems to be full of amazingly complex systems and structures, but these seeming appearances of intelligence are temporary events, they emerge and disappear and I see no need whatsoever to employ anything "esoteric" to justify their existence.
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Post by enigma on Sept 28, 2010 10:41:09 GMT -5
ZenKarmaPointLeader: Another fundamental problem involved in any discussion like this is that most adults cannot stop thinking at will, so they cannot enjoy a sufficient amount of silence to perceive how intelligent the universe is in the absence of thought. For those who have learned to function without thought, it is obvious that thought is a secondary and unnecessary utility for more than 95% of life's activities. For those who have not escaped the habit of thought, it is simply unimaginable that life can be lived intelligently without thought. If those people who cannot escape the mind could get up in the morning and go through half a day without thinking, they would see the vast intelligence of Reality beyond all abstraction. This intelligence is usually overlooked because the mind is chattering incessantly which creates the illusion that such chattering is necessary for intelligence to be present.
Thanks, Zen. That helps me understand why intelligence is seemingly being solely defined by it's willful expression in thought.
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Post by enigma on Sept 28, 2010 10:43:49 GMT -5
The mystery is that one seeker will do exactly what the teacher advises. Eight seekers will do some variation of what the teacher advises and will do it for various amounts of time ranging from ten minutes to three hours per day. One student will ignore the teacher’s teaching totally. What can you possibly do if God doesn't want to wake up? Maybe throw a bucket of cold water on Him?? (And then run like hell!)
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Post by enigma on Sept 28, 2010 11:21:21 GMT -5
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Post by Portto on Sept 28, 2010 22:34:59 GMT -5
Maybe throw a bucket of cold water on Him?? (And then run like hell!) That will definitely get a reaction, although it may end up with a good beating.
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lobo
Full Member
Posts: 193
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Post by lobo on Sept 29, 2010 8:13:02 GMT -5
Imagine that ten seekers go to visit the same enlightened teacher. Each seeker asks the same thing, “What must I do to find the truth?” The teacher says the same thing to each seeker; she says, “Stop and be still. Spend every waking minute interacting with the world through your senses. Look, listen, feel, smell, taste, attend, and contemplate everything that happens.” Each seeker asks for more explanation, and the teacher further explains everything in exactly the same way. The mystery is that one seeker will do exactly what the teacher advises. Eight seekers will do some variation of what the teacher advises and will do it for various amounts of time ranging from ten minutes to three hours per day. One student will ignore the teacher’s teaching totally. Each student came to the teacher in psychologically the same place, lost in the mind, but interested in waking up. One student will wake up. Several students will attain various degrees of understanding without waking up, and the rest will attain virtually no understanding and will stay lost in the mind. The initial interest is the same, the intention is the same, and the teaching is the same, but how each student will respond is a complete mystery. Who we THINK we are has NOTHING to do with how the body/mind responds to __________. Who we THINK we are is an imaginary construct. To understand how much control this imaginary construct has we can imagine a cartoon gremlin and then ask ourselves if that imaginary gremlin can lift a paper clip off of our desk. Who we THINK we are has exactly the same power to move a paper clip or control what we see the body/mind doing. The one who actually controls the body/mind is the same one who pumps blood, transmits nerve impulses, regulates hormone levels, sees, and thinks. There is no space between the see-er and the seen and there is no space between the thinker and the thought. Look around. What we see if we are not thinking is ______________, and the one who sees is also ________________. So, to sum up _______________________________________________________________________! So this is "The Mystery" to you, from your point of view. This hypothetical situation has captured your attention and engaged your mind enough to write a story about it. Why? to engage in conversation? to solve some great mystery? To show your great understanding? To appear as a spiriual teacher that knows something? Or are you trying to lead? So I am questioning your motivation here.
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