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>Show me where in the universe magnetism and electricity do not exist? Or gravity?

You're right. They exist everywhere, but manifest as electric current or magnetic flux in special cases where certain conditions are met. In other words, these un-manifest phenomenon become manifest.

Similarly, un-manifest consciousness pervades all universe, but manifests in certain conditions, namely, a living biological body.

>The idea that consciousness requires a “biological body” only means that it requires electricity.

Certainly. Consciousness requires all the bells and whistles of the laws of universe. It requires electricity for the nervous systems. It requires fluid dynamics for continuous replenishment of nutrients via vascular system.

>How can you assume consciousness and matter are separate while claiming a non-duality philosophy.

Because we are discussing physical reality, and in this realm, you do need to break-down components to understand a model. But if you are talking about metaphysical reality, then yes, everything is consciousness. In fact, you'll not know anything besides your consciousness your whole life.

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They are all over Reddit, many Atheists are horrified by the possibility of an afterlife. As for who is morally repugnant, unfortunately there are some on both sides of the argument. As for your assertion about Earth being a testing ground for those who hang out with God, I suggest you look into some eastern religions, or even better look at the accounts from those who have had near death experiences. What they come back with is very similar to Mitchell's epiphany, a sense of oneness and love and there is judgement, but it is only of the self and does not come from a higher authority.

But what if objective reality, for what that actually means and entails to us, doesn't exist in truth? Yet I'd suggest it does in function.

I feel like because of our use of language and inherent ideas, it goes both ways. I could not agree more in the sense that I have profusely expressed that objective reality exists many many times. I still stand by those statements; but, I think I may be using the same words in two different ways.

Some kind of objective reality must exist. Clearly. Yet it is our description that functions. We don't feel we've found the answers, or have the facts, positive statements that express more than nothing, simply by knowing objective reality exists. This, by itself, is useless. True. Yet it means very little until we form a description of that reality. That description is what we then say is truth.

Yet none of our descriptions of it are provably true. More than that. What I'm suggesting is that we can never prove the descriptions. Our descriptions aren't true by this nature. What is logically true is only that there is something. Not what it is; yet, we can still know the function of our descriptions quite well.

When we think about the recursion, aren't any of our descriptions that we seek to call truth only sensible if we place them within the psychological constructs of our minds? Would our ideas mean something to anything else other than ourselves? Would something else conscious that has no use, no emotional attachment or curiosity towards, a specific construct, be able to understand what our truth means when that specific construct is pivotal to our truth? And yet a truth, objective reality, wants to say we should have agreement, in that it is the truth.

Perhaps we can say truth exists in different ways. Bare logic gives us one, which is what yields that objective reality exists. Maybe occams gives us another form of truth, one that is useful when the other form of truth isn't?

It isn't true that x description is an undeniable universally understood (beyond just humans) objectively accurate description. It is true that all we can know is that x description yields y result/functionality. It is true that yielding our description to that functionality provides the same kind of direction we seek from our concept of truth, the same sense as if it were objectively accurate in some universal way.

As a dualist I recognize the existence of phenomenal conscious experience alongside physical existence, and as a theist (not of any religion) I believe this conscious experience could persist beyond death. Consciousness is contingent on our physical bodies while we're alive but it's not a logical necessity that it must always be that way. I'm not trying to convince you of theism or dualism, I'm just stating that it's possible to believe in both an afterlife and the existence of a physical universe.

Also Nietzsche's concept of eternal return could count as a sort of physicalist afterlife, no? Provided that the universe turned out to be cyclical? You could also return as a Boltzmann brain or something. Iunno, physicalist afterlives are weird.

>I'm probably operating with different definitions than all you panpsychists.

I'm not a panpsychist.

>For me mind means 'qualia' and 'oneness' or 'unity' would imply we all share qualia.

And you'd be wrong. This is something that western philosophy and science are kind of behind on. The mind can be understood far more easily as a separate entity from consciousness.

> I've done psychedelics before and I don't think any amount of them will ever make me start seeing through other people's eyes.

That's a shame, isn't it? Empathy is how you remove differences between each other, not by simply stating a premise. It's not that psychedelics won't show you this, but you are so conditioned to not give any credence esoteric ideas.

>Sure, we're all united in that we all experience qualia, we're all living beings, whatever, but that's a pretty meaningless statement.

I find it ridiculously humorous that you just brush away the oneness as being a matter of fact, when in fact a direct experience of this oneness is what changed an astronaut forever. It isn't just a meaningless statement, it means that all the distinctions that we can draw up amongst humans, animals, or any living being for that matter, are completely subjective.

>Furthermore, I don't see why everyone thinks having an ego is a bad thing. It's not synonymous with being selfish.

Ego isn't bad, it is just unruly and often compels you to do things that are counterproductive to your life. What is recommended is that you grow out of your egoic habits/thought patterns.

>I'm a dualist and a theist and to be totally honest panpsychism seems like hippie nonsense even to me.

I'm not a panpsychist, so I don't know why you keep referring to it. What seems like hippie nonsense is the same nonsense Buddha spouted. I'm sure he was heck of a hippie. And it doesn't end there. Stoicism has a metaphysical aspect that sounds almost like the same hippie nonsense that offends you. Perhaps Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius should have taken notes from reddit. > I value independence and see no compelling reasons why I ought not.

You have no idea how encumbered you are by the weight of your ego. True independence is not being bogged down by the vagaries of your mind. And who ever told you that by giving up your ego, you are giving up your freedom of being an individual?! It is called liberation in spirituality for a reason. It is a liberating experience.

>The intense feelings of love and unity and 'ego death' that people get from psychedlics - and being an astronaut, apparently - seems to me like a form of manic delusion caused by an overwhelming flood of emotion.

There are instructions in Buddhism on how to cultivate this all encompassing love. it isn't a manic delusion I can assure you. It is a controlled practice where you can remove layers of your identity until you reach the same Oneness that psychedelics can induce. Samadhi is a very well know stage of deep meditation.

>It's like religious ecstasy and people thinking they've spoken to God. It's just, iunno, unbecoming. I mean absolutely no disrespect by my phrasing by the way, I'm just not sure how else to put it.

Unbecoming would be an excellent word to describe it. You undoing the knots of your identity until you stand face to face with what is in you.

There's observables, upon which we build all of our technology and engineering, because they are not a product of our subjective beliefs or imagination. While it is absolutely possible that everything we know about chemistry and biology is completely wrong, and genetic engineering, all medicine, toxins, etc work by sheer coincidence between what we think we observe, and what actually is there, we can at least say, the more stuff works, and the more we can build upon what we think we see, the more likely that what we see is what's actually there. And, given the extraordinary body of observables, and derived technologies in medicine and biology, the likelihood we've made accurate observations is extraordinarily high, and grows every day we don't see any falsifying data.

Is reality exists then truth exists, so it depends on whether you (the observer) thinks reality exists or not.

While uncertainty in physics is a fact, it could be that this reveals more about the state of human knowledge than it does what’s seen as uncertain.

The act of observing at the smallest of scales is accomplished by interfering, so it very may well be that the interference is what is impacting results. I won’t say what is possible or impossible with regards to future technology because what we have today was considered impossible not that long ago. These dilemmas currently do not have solutions.

> So what's your point, precisely?

The study measures ability to avoid temptation in children at one point in time, it doesn't measure how this ability changes over time. So it doesn't make sense to make any claim about an adult's ability to improve temptation avoidance, because the study doesn't measure that.

You could measure the ability to walk in a set of toddlers, but that doesn't imply that it doesn't bode well for our ability to walk as adults.

I mean this earnestly — I don’t think what you’re describing is necessarily an irrefutable certainty, at all. Look at existence in the first place, we are sentient beings on a rock existing in a vast expanse of nothingness. That doesn’t make any logical sense. Our scientific understanding of the world around us is beyond primitive. You don’t need religion to think that there’s more to this than what we can physically observe.

Almost complete change of subject, but I don't see Popper as unsullied by Kuhn et al's work.

How do you incorporate the idea of an afterlife with the reality we're part of an unbroken lineage of self assembling carbon chains? Have you constructed a theory of afterlife which is compatible with this basic fact, or are you ignoring it?

Bahahaha

“That’s completely incorrect”. Show me where in the universe magnetism and electricity do not exist? Or gravity? The idea that consciousness requires a “biological body” only means that it requires electricity. How can you assume consciousness and matter are separate while claiming a non-duality philosophy.

I've yet to meet any of these people. Also, the people who seem most sure the meaning of life is some sort of testing ground to see who gets to hang out with god, are the most arrogant, morally repugnant people I know. I get the strong impression they don't actually believe it, else they'd probably spend more time helping the needy, and less time policing other peoples sex lives.

That's super interesting. Thank you

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or openness paradoxically lessens fragmentation. Likely due to openness allowing for many more potential "cohesion moments" than would a closed system.

Travel can be a good time to gather your thoughts. Travel is sticky. People have written books about being on the road. Identity in movement, not so much state.

I disagree. Truth exists, but it get complicated when we add levels of consciousness and conceptual purity to the mix. If objective reality exists, then so does truth.

Hmmm, we use the razor to eliminate false ideas quickly. It doesnt actually assist in selection so much as it narrows down criteria that we might otherwise spend time verifying. Like all ideas, this has advantages and disadvantages. The Razor is not always true, some things are naturally complex and oversimplification can cause problems.

Truth has to do with alignment, specifically being aligned with actuality: what is actually there, and not just an idea. The complexity of that alignment isnt really a factor in the truth, but it is certainly a matter of how we relate the truth.

I'm probably operating with different definitions than all you panpsychists. For me mind means 'qualia' and 'oneness' or 'unity' would imply we all share qualia. I've done psychedelics before and I don't think any amount of them will ever make me start seeing through other people's eyes. Sure, we're all united in that we all experience qualia, we're all living beings, whatever, but that's a pretty meaningless statement. Furthermore, I don't see why everyone thinks having an ego is a bad thing. It's not synonymous with being selfish. I value independence and see no compelling reasons why I ought not.

I'm a dualist and a theist and to be totally honest panpsychism seems like hippie nonsense even to me. The intense feelings of love and unity and 'ego death' that people get from psychedlics - and being an astronaut, apparently - seems to me like a form of manic delusion caused by an overwhelming flood of emotion. It's like religious ecstasy and people thinking they've spoken to God. It's just, iunno, unbecoming. I mean absolutely no disrespect by my phrasing by the way, I'm just not sure how else to put it.

Thinking on this topic I've landed at this thought that truth, as we try to define it, doesn't exist. Epistemic uncertainty is always possible. The greatest minds in logic and epistemology tried to solve it and arrived effectively at a stalemate. In physics, we end up with uncertainty as a fact as well. In a nutshell, when you get down to a fine enough view, the act of observation becomes relatively large to the observation, enough so that the act of observing impacts the results, making a true observation simply impossible. These dilemmas, I reckon, don't have solutions. There isn't a new thought, method or technology that will fix it. It is impossible.

Yet occams then gives us a new definition of truth. Perhaps our old idea of it simply doesn't exist. It's not that we haven't found the truth; but, that the truth doesn't exist. The razor doesn't point at the truth. It points at function. Truth then is functionality. Which shows true in everything.

Take consciousness, the problem of the other, and all the metaphysical models. Like these topics, I feel we cannot find those answers. And I reckon occams is a decent compass there too. We can find "truth" in the absence of such a thing (as we like to think of it) by focusing on functionality.

Just some random thoughts. What you said was interesting and got me thinking this.

>Personality, behaviour, habits etc... are not static.

Correct, and please note that no one here said they are.

Simply put, childhood oft influences people well into and beyond adulthood. If you don't believe that, cool - you're not interested in that discussion.

No one is saying, or implying, that people can't change. So what's your point, precisely?

Temptation to say yes is different than temptation to actually do something. If I feel pressured into volunteering my time but I actually don't want to, then if I do it, I will be in a state of dissonance. If I really want to volunteer my time, then I volunteer my time with no dissonance.