Flatland, A Parable

[stardustpilgrim]

Once upon a time in Flatland, there was a non-dual mathematician/philosopher/metaphysician, M. He was correctly able to ascertain that his world consisted of two dimensions, width and depth, he was quite sure the whole of reality, All That Is, was flat and contained within these two dimensions, a plane. Within the flatness was an infinite number of lines, and within each line was an infinite number of points, so All That Is stretched to Infinity.

M's best friend, S, had this fantastic imagination, but M put up with him, put up with his wild thinking. M was sure that all the wise men of Flatland had come to know all that could be known about the whole of reality, but there was this peculiar abnormality which was seen from time to time. M knew all about circles, but periodically a small circle appeared in Flatland, and it gave the appearance of becoming bigger and bigger until it gained some arbitrary size and then it seemed to shrink again until it got very small, and then it disappeared. But of course this was merely a series of separate circles which were not actually linked in any way. And likewise sometimes tiny triangles appeared, seemed to get bigger, and then seemed to get smaller and then disappeared. When these changing circles and changing triangles appeared and disappeared, these events were called miracles. And even beyond the circles and triangles, there were also reports of fantastically shaped appearances, mind-boggling even, some of the people who reported such sightings were thought to be mentally unstable.

One day S mentioned an idea he had been pondering, what if Flatland were not the whole of reality? You know, our geometry begins with a point, a dimensionless point, and that point is extended and forms what we know as a line. And then that line is extended and becomes what we know as our world, Flatland. But what if Flatland is not the whole of reality? What if it were theoretically possible to extend a plane, just like a line is extended to form a plane? Then, hypothetically, of course, there would be a third dimension, it could be called height. Now this dimension would be invisible to us, because our senses, our body, only exists in two dimensions. But what if the third dimension actually existed, and more than that, what if there were beings that existed in this "higher dimension"? And maybe these reported "miracles", are merely 3-D objects passing through Flatland, we can only see that which corresponds to our own physiology, what our own senses can take in, we are seeing only cross sections of the 3-D world, as these 3-D objects move through Flatland. And these other odd shapes we see periodically, god only knows what they really are, that is, as seen from a higher dimension. What if these peeps called mystics are actually on-to something? What if the mystics are actually contacting this higher dimension? What if what we're calling mental instability is actually an altered state of consciousness which peeks into this higher dimension? That is, what if they are ~more sane~ than we are? What if they are seeing more of reality than the average Flatlander?

So M thought for a few minutes, and finally said to S. No, this just can't be, the 2-dimensional world is it, there can't be anything outside All That Is. You're just imagining things again, there is no 3-D world. You're trying to make 3-layer cakes again, it's all nonsense. There's no third dimension, there's no third layer. There isn't such a thing as a higher state of consciousness which can perceive the 3rd dimension, there is no 3rd dimension, period. Those mystics are just delusional. I Am 100% sure the 2-D universe is the whole of reality, the mind-body of M has been informed, thus, via nonduality.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed beings in the 3-D world, which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, and one outsider hypothesized something he called time, to explain these occurrences..........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed these beings in a 3-D/4-D world of time and space, in which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, inexplicable from the laws of physics. And one outsider hypothesized a 5th dimension which, theoretically, could explain the strange happenings.........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time, in the 5-D world...........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed 6-D beings in a 6-D world...........

[anja]

Jun 15, 2016 11:34:03 GMT -5 stardustpilgrim said:

Once upon a time in Flatland, there was a non-dual mathematician/philosopher/metaphysician, M. He was correctly able to ascertain that his world consisted of two dimensions, width and depth, he was quite sure the whole of reality, All That Is, was flat and contained within these two dimensions, a plane. Within the flatness was an infinite number of lines, and within each line was an infinite number of points, so All That Is stretched to Infinity.

M's best friend, S, had this fantastic imagination, but M put up with him, put up with his wild thinking. M was sure that all the wise men of Flatland had come to know all that could be known about the whole of reality, but there was this peculiar abnormality which was seen from time to time. M knew all about circles, but periodically a small circle appeared in Flatland, and it grew and grew until it gained some arbitrary size and then it began to shrink again until it got very small, and then it disappeared. And likewise sometimes tiny triangles appeared, got bigger, the got smaller and then disappeared. When these changing circles and changing triangles appeared and disappeared, these events were called miracles. And even beyond the circles and triangles, there were also reports of fantastically shaped appearances, mind-boggling even, some of the people who reported such sightings were thought to be mentally unstable.

One day S mentioned an idea he had been pondering, what if Flatland were not the whole of reality? You know, our geometry begins with a point, a dimensionless point, and that point is extended and forms what we know as a line. And then that line is extended and becomes what we know as our world, Flatland. But what if Flatland is not the whole of reality? What if it were theoretically possible to extend a plane, just like a line is extended to form a plane? Then, hypothetically, of course, there would be a third dimension, it could be called heigth. Now this dimension would be invisible to us, because our senses, our body, only exists in two dimensions. But what if the third dimension actually existed, and more than that, what if there were beings that existed in this "higher dimension"? And maybe these reported "miracles", are merely 3-D objects passing through Flatland, we can only see that which corresponds to our own physiology, what our own senses can take in, we are seeing only cross sections of the 3-D world, as these 3-D objects move through Flatland. And these other odd shapes we see periodically, god only knows what they really are, that is, as seen from a higher dimension. What if these peeps called mystics are actually on-to something? What if the mystics are actually contacting this higher dimension? What if what we're calling mental instability is actually an altered state of consciousness which peeks into this higher dimension? That is, what if they are ~more sane~ than we are? What if they are seeing more of reality than the average Flatlander?

So M thought for a few minutes, and finally said to S. No, this just can't be, the 2-dimensional world is it, there can't be anything outside All That Is. You're just imagining things again, there is no 3-D world. You're trying to make 3-layer cakes again, it's all nonsense. There's no third dimension, there's no third layer. There isn't such a thing as a higher state of consciousness which can perceive the 3rd dimension, there is no 3rd dimension, period. Those mystics are just delusional. I Am 100% sure the 2-D universe is the whole of reality, the mind-body of M has been informed, thus, via nonduality.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed beings in the 3-D world, which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, and one outsider hypothesized something he called time, to explain these occurrences..........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed these beings in a 3-D/4-D world of time and space, in which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, inexplicable from the laws of physics. And one outsider hypothesized a 5th dimension which, theoretically, could explain the strange happenings.........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time, in the 5-D world...........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed 6-D beings in a 6-D world...........

I utterly enjoyed that book, Flatland, some decade ago, when I read it. Cool sheit, indeed.

Thanks for sharing!

[stardustpilgrim]

The mystic dudes of the 3-D/4-D world experienced and surmised that just as time is the movement of the 3rd dimension, if one extends the 3-D/4-D world (IOW, time is required to move a 3-D object from here to there), that 5th dimension becomes a record of every event that actually occurs in the 3-D/4-D world, and that would be called eternity.

So what would the 6th dimension be? If the 5th dimension is what actually occurred (in the 3-D/4-D world), the 6th dimension would be what didn't happen, but could have happened, that is, past possibilities not actualized (but in a very real sense, still real, see Seth-Jane Roberts and possible selves).

So what would the 7th dimension be? The movement of now, the seeming movement of now becoming past and now moving into the future gives a ~dividing line~ separating past from future, and so the future ~contains~ all possible alternate futures, so the 7th dimension is the dimension of all possibilities, all future possibilities. Now, just consider, as in Flatland the movement of a sphere into Flatland gave the appearance of a small circle increasing in size, reaching a maximum that then seemed to get smaller until it disappeared, maybe time in and of itself isn't ~real~, but maybe the seeming change we see is merely the movement of the 7th dimension into our 3-D/4-D world (in a likewise manner that the sphere moving in Flatland appeared as a series of circles increasing and then decreasing in size). Maybe we don't really understand how change occurs in our 3-D-space/4-D-time world, maybe we don't really understand the concepts cause and effect. Maybe change is not a factor of time at all. Just as the past exists as a record in the 5th dimension, and what could have happened exists as the 6th dimension, maybe the future already exists as the 7th dimension. So does that mean everything is determined? No, all possibilities exist, that is, what could or might happen, so what happens is not determined.

So is there an 8th dimension? Yes and no. The 8th dimension is where the Absolute and the dimensionless point merge. {In Hebrew and the Jewish Kabbalah, ayin means nothing (which would be [the] void). Ayin = Ein in Ein Sof. So Ein Sof is simultaneously everything and nothing}. Seven dimensions complete an (ascending) octave, do-re-mi--fa-sol-la--si-- (or a descending octave; do--si-la-sol-fa--mi-re--), the circle comes back to itself, and we have the ouroboros, the snake eating its tail (everything and nothing [zero]). So either an ascending octave or a descending octave comes back to do [doe]..... do-re-mi--fa-sol-la-si--do (thus, octave, eight, the doubling of vibrations, or halving of vibrations, depending whether ascending or descending).

[stardustpilgrim]

This idea of dimensions has a long history called The Great Chain of Being. It's found in Plotinus and the Kabbalah (The Tree of Life), Theosophy (The Planes), Seth-Jane Roberts, elsewhere. Octaves are found in many places, the musical scale, the I Ching (64 hexagrams), the chess board (8 x 8 = 64), maybe even in DNA. Of course, 7 days in a week, the 8th day is the beginning of a new octave, a new week. And then the whole universe is constructed by a series of triads (and you find these three forces everywhere, the three gunas for example).

[stardustpilgrim]

………….bumped for inavalan……….

Jun 15, 2016 11:34:03 GMT -5 stardustpilgrim said:

Once upon a time in Flatland, there was a non-dual mathematician/philosopher/metaphysician, M. He was correctly able to ascertain that his world consisted of two dimensions, width and depth, he was quite sure the whole of reality, All That Is, was flat and contained within these two dimensions, a plane. Within the flatness was an infinite number of lines, and within each line was an infinite number of points, so All That Is stretched to Infinity.

M's best friend, S, had this fantastic imagination, but M put up with him, put up with his wild thinking. M was sure that all the wise men of Flatland had come to know all that could be known about the whole of reality, but there was this peculiar abnormality which was seen from time to time. M knew all about circles, but periodically a small circle appeared in Flatland, and it gave the appearance of becoming bigger and bigger until it gained some arbitrary size and then it seemed to shrink again until it got very small, and then it disappeared. But of course this was merely a series of separate circles which were not actually linked in any way. And likewise sometimes tiny triangles appeared, seemed to get bigger, and then seemed to get smaller and then disappeared. When these changing circles and changing triangles appeared and disappeared, these events were called miracles. And even beyond the circles and triangles, there were also reports of fantastically shaped appearances, mind-boggling even, some of the people who reported such sightings were thought to be mentally unstable.

One day S mentioned an idea he had been pondering, what if Flatland were not the whole of reality? You know, our geometry begins with a point, a dimensionless point, and that point is extended and forms what we know as a line. And then that line is extended and becomes what we know as our world, Flatland. But what if Flatland is not the whole of reality? What if it were theoretically possible to extend a plane, just like a line is extended to form a plane? Then, hypothetically, of course, there would be a third dimension, it could be called height. Now this dimension would be invisible to us, because our senses, our body, only exists in two dimensions. But what if the third dimension actually existed, and more than that, what if there were beings that existed in this "higher dimension"? And maybe these reported "miracles", are merely 3-D objects passing through Flatland, we can only see that which corresponds to our own physiology, what our own senses can take in, we are seeing only cross sections of the 3-D world, as these 3-D objects move through Flatland. And these other odd shapes we see periodically, god only knows what they really are, that is, as seen from a higher dimension. What if these peeps called mystics are actually on-to something? What if the mystics are actually contacting this higher dimension? What if what we're calling mental instability is actually an altered state of consciousness which peeks into this higher dimension? That is, what if they are ~more sane~ than we are? What if they are seeing more of reality than the average Flatlander?

So M thought for a few minutes, and finally said to S. No, this just can't be, the 2-dimensional world is it, there can't be anything outside All That Is. You're just imagining things again, there is no 3-D world. You're trying to make 3-layer cakes again, it's all nonsense. There's no third dimension, there's no third layer. There isn't such a thing as a higher state of consciousness which can perceive the 3rd dimension, there is no 3rd dimension, period. Those mystics are just delusional. I Am 100% sure the 2-D universe is the whole of reality, the mind-body of M has been informed, thus, via nonduality.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed beings in the 3-D world, which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, and one outsider hypothesized something he called time, to explain these occurrences..........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed these beings in a 3-D/4-D world of time and space, in which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, inexplicable from the laws of physics. And one outsider hypothesized a 5th dimension which, theoretically, could explain the strange happenings.........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time, in the 5-D world...........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed 6-D beings in a 6-D world...........

[stardustpilgrim]

Jun 15, 2016 11:34:03 GMT -5 stardustpilgrim said:

Once upon a time in Flatland, there was a non-dual mathematician/philosopher/metaphysician, M. He was correctly able to ascertain that his world consisted of two dimensions, width and depth, he was quite sure the whole of reality, All That Is, was flat and contained within these two dimensions, a plane. Within the flatness was an infinite number of lines, and within each line was an infinite number of points, so All That Is stretched to Infinity.

M's best friend, S, had this fantastic imagination, but M put up with him, put up with his wild thinking. M was sure that all the wise men of Flatland had come to know all that could be known about the whole of reality, but there was this peculiar abnormality which was seen from time to time. M knew all about circles, but periodically a small circle appeared in Flatland, and it gave the appearance of becoming bigger and bigger until it gained some arbitrary size and then it seemed to shrink again until it got very small, and then it disappeared. But of course this was merely a series of separate circles which were not actually linked in any way. And likewise sometimes tiny triangles appeared, seemed to get bigger, and then seemed to get smaller and then disappeared. When these changing circles and changing triangles appeared and disappeared, these events were called miracles. And even beyond the circles and triangles, there were also reports of fantastically shaped appearances, mind-boggling even, some of the people who reported such sightings were thought to be mentally unstable.

One day S mentioned an idea he had been pondering, what if Flatland were not the whole of reality? You know, our geometry begins with a point, a dimensionless point, and that point is extended and forms what we know as a line. And then that line is extended and becomes what we know as our world, Flatland. But what if Flatland is not the whole of reality? What if it were theoretically possible to extend a plane, just like a line is extended to form a plane? Then, hypothetically, of course, there would be a third dimension, it could be called height. Now this dimension would be invisible to us, because our senses, our body, only exists in two dimensions. But what if the third dimension actually existed, and more than that, what if there were beings that existed in this "higher dimension"? And maybe these reported "miracles", are merely 3-D objects passing through Flatland, we can only see that which corresponds to our own physiology, what our own senses can take in, we are seeing only cross sections of the 3-D world, as these 3-D objects move through Flatland. And these other odd shapes we see periodically, god only knows what they really are, that is, as seen from a higher dimension. What if these peeps called mystics are actually on-to something? What if the mystics are actually contacting this higher dimension? What if what we're calling mental instability is actually an altered state of consciousness which peeks into this higher dimension? That is, what if they are ~more sane~ than we are? What if they are seeing more of reality than the average Flatlander?

So M thought for a few minutes, and finally said to S. No, this just can't be, the 2-dimensional world is it, there can't be anything outside All That Is. You're just imagining things again, there is no 3-D world. You're trying to make 3-layer cakes again, it's all nonsense. There's no third dimension, there's no third layer. There isn't such a thing as a higher state of consciousness which can perceive the 3rd dimension, there is no 3rd dimension, period. Those mystics are just delusional. I Am 100% sure the 2-D universe is the whole of reality, the mind-body of M has been informed, thus, via nonduality.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed beings in the 3-D world, which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, and one outsider hypothesized something he called time, to explain these occurrences..........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed these beings in a 3-D/4-D world of time and space, in which, on occasion, some strange happenings occurred, inexplicable from the laws of physics. And one outsider hypothesized a 5th dimension which, theoretically, could explain the strange happenings.........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time, in the 5-D world...........

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time there existed 6-D beings in a 6-D world...........

Thought inavalan might be interested.