the day magic dies
October 4, 2008
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” — Arthur C. Clarke, “Profiles of The Future”, 1961 (Clarke’s third law)
One day technology will seem more magical than the myth of magic. In fact, the very idea of magical power will seem weak, unimaginative and one dimensional compared to what is ahead. It will be the faded equivalent of a 100,000 year old print of a hand on a wall. Things that we cannot yet imagine are just beyond the horizon.
From our current early 21st century understanding looking at future progress, physical reality itself will be the tool of choice commanded at the whim of awareness. Religion and myth will be cherished ornaments and magic will be replaced with a series of unfathomable miracles seemingly from nowhere. I could call this miracle science, math, or technology but our current ideas of what those things are will not apply; for it is something closer to what magic is supposed to be.
Only futurists, inventors and brilliant mathmeticians have been able to catch a glimpse of the coming revolution. Some have been driven mad by its implications (ted kazinski), some driven to fear the future and others call it the Singularity (Ray Kurzweil).
Technological Singularity – The technological singularity is a theoretical future point of unprecedented technological progress, caused in part by the ability of machines to improve themselves using artificial intelligence.
When the singularity comes, infinity will be our collective bitch!
September 21, 2008
If human consciousness can really leave the body and operate without a brain then everything we know in neuroscience has to be questioned. If people could really gain paranormal knowledge then much of physics needs to be rewritten. This is what is at stake. Add to that the fact that most people in the population believe in some kind of life after death, and many desperately want it to be true, then you have a strong case for this research – even if the chances of success are vanishingly small. — Susan Blackmore (guardian)
I’ve got great news!! Science now knows for an absolute fact that we are the only intelligent life in the universe (so we are the center of the known universe), there is absolutely NOTHING faster than the speed of light, we know the exact moment of the big bang, there is no God, and you have no “soul”. Isn’t that awesome! There are no mysteries!
Whoo-hoo! Now I can sleep at night. All knowledge has been acquired.. our quest it over. Charles Darwin & Einstein figured it all out so we can now build churches in their names. ha!
All sarcasm aside, as awesome as science is We (the human race) don’t know shit! We really really don’t. We don’t even know 1% of shit.
Don’t jump to conclusions, I am not a creationist and I don’t’ subscribe exclusively to any ONE religion or philosophy. I am someone who believes that there is some value in religion, philosophy and science. I respect and use each of their strengths in all parts of my life where they are relevant (i.e. I don’t use science to help me explain philosophy or religion to help me explain how light works.
The great thing about science is that is grows and evolves despite the conservative establishment that see it as some sort of dogma. What I like about science is that it gets better. The theories no matter how great continue to develop the complexity and order needed to describe more of what we do know. Intrepid mavericks like Galileo, Descarte, Newton and Einstein challenge the status quo and go off the beaten path and into the previously unknown.
I think there are a lot of unexplained phenomenon that deserves our full attention and funding. One thing that bothers me about mainstream scientists is there dogmatic response to the improbable. It makes them sound as one-dimensionally boxed in as your average religious fundamentalist.
I suppose we all have our limits of what we can accept as real. Even Einstein fought the fundamental (probabilistic) ideas of quantum mechanics that are now not only fully accepted but proven and used.
For me the mystery is the beauty of our 99.999999 percent unknown universe. The conquest of each piece of this infinity puzzle is pure orgasmic rapture.
To that unknown, I say bring it on! When the singularity comes, infinity will be our collective bitch!
No Country for Old Men: meaning?
September 8, 2008
No Country for Old Men is based on the Cormack McCarthy novel of the same name. The Cohen Brothers really add something to the gritty, dark perspective of this deep story. The whole time I watched I thought about postmodernism.
The bad guy in the movie Anton Chigurh, played by Javier Borden, is a sociopathic killer who’s been sent to retrieve drug money is a very memorable, shadowy character that is so merciless that he is more like a plot device than a character.
I really liked this movie. It was really the story line that kept asking the question, “what does your life mean?” “all the choices you’ve made have brought you to this point.. what do think about that” (or something to that effect) The killer Chigurh asks the question before he kills people and the protagonist Sheriff Ed Tom Bell played by Tommy Lee Jones is introspective about the question of why? Why is there so much violence? What was the purpose of the victims deaths? And he can’t answer it at all.
The story was so compelling that It makes me want to read the book & and buy the movie. Because I’ve been plagued by the same questions my whole life. An like the story, I’ve got no answers… just questions and reflections.
In the end, the view is left with the killer not merely getting away but succeeding in killing and innocent protagonist victim. It’s a “pull the wings off of a fly” moment, but the killers reasons are that he “made a promise”. The kicker is that as he is driving away from the victim’s house he broadsided by a station wagon. He is hurt badly. He’s got a compound fracture with a bone sticking out of his arm. He pays a couple of kids to shut their mouths about seeing him walk away from the accident.
For me, this was a powerful scene because it underlines that NOBODY is exempt from mortality and seems to be the authors way of saying that violence has no explanation, it just happens. Even the Anton Chigurh’s existence as a merciless killer, it just happened. I don’t know if I completely agree with that, but it is a very interesting perspective on reality.
spiritual meaning of numbers
February 5, 2008
Those who subscribe to religion, occultism and metaphysics have assigned spiritual values to numbers. For example:
1 = strong will; unity, purity
2 = duality, harmony (Yin/Yang)
3 = magic, intuition (Holy Trinity)
4 = stability, grounded (nature)
5 = travel, adventure, journey
6 = Sincerity, love, truth
7 = magic, mystery, enlightenment
I have always believed that meaning is defined within the context of a person experience. So although 7 might mean good luck to you, it may mean hate and lust to me because of my experiences with that number.
Each culture attributes meaning to numbers: Chinese numerology
More examples of spiritual meaning of numbers
THE NUMBER 7 IS EVERYWHERE
NUMEROLOGY:
Life path number – signifies intellect and an introspective, analytical mind. Considered to be a spiritual, sacred, and this is evidenced by the fact that there are seven days in the week, and ancient texts propose that the earth was formed in seven phases.
BIBLE:
In the Hebrew, seven ([b’v, – Sheh’-bah) is from a root word meaning to be complete or full.
It is known as the number of God’s seal.
Example: in Revelation 1:16 — “and He had in His right hand seven stars, ” alluding to the seven churches of Asia.
It is used throughout the Old and New Testament repeatedly with deliberate pattern.
The metaphysical use and meaning of numbers are completely at the mercy of interpretation. As such, it is all over the place with little practical application. That is a shame (as with all metaphysics) its talks around some of the most critical aspects of reality but fails to nail anything down. It is easy to see the influence of culture on the meaning attributed to numbers. The tragedy is that the imposed meaning ends up telling us more about the people and/or culture than the subject they are talking about. Here is a new system that relies less on prescribed meaning, focuses exclusively on the actual perspective of the person which in turn give meaning an absolute path.
Here is an Entirely Different Take on the Spiritual Meaning of Numbers.
We are the numbers. Our point of view, our perspective is the equation, the function through which constant values are passed to produce various results, or meaning.
Essentially, meaning is relative to perspective.
Out of western psychology, eastern spirituality and postmodern philosophy there is a new way to use numbers as a way to navigate awareness itself, the cradle of meaning. How much more enhanced is our meaning if we know its source? Its called Integral Mathematics of Primordial Perspectives. To be fair, it less about numbers than it is about perspectives, so numerology is forever safe.
Integral Mathematics of Primordial Perspectives
Oversimplified description:
Created by philosophical genius Ken Wilber, Integral Mathematics of Primordial Perspectives, we’ll call it integral mathematics, is a comprehensive method of referring to natural points of view that we all have. For example, my first-person perspective would be written as 1p (1-p). 1p = my, 1-p = first-person perspective, but there are other perspectives that I can have from my point of view: 2p = your perspective, 3p = his/her/it perspective.
So, from my perspective, I see that you have a first-person perspective:
1p(1p) x 2p(1-p)
I can also be aware of you from a third person perspective:
1p(1-p) x 1p(3-p) x 2p(1-p)
This means I’m observing your from an objective perspective, this could mean I’m using some theory or some measure or book like the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) to evaluated you.
Pathology: Perspective Mathematics
Consider multiple personality disorder (aka Dissociative Identity Disorder). This would be me objectively looking at your multiple personalities:
1p(1p) x 1p(3-p) x (2p(1-p)/n)
n = number of personalities
This may be written wrong, but what I’m trying to express is my first-person perspective (1p(1-p)) view of an objective perspective (1p(3-p)) of your first person view that is (2p(1-p) that is divided by “n” personalities. The slash maybe wrong because Wilber uses “/p” to define something else. By interacting with each of the fractional parts of your first perpective, I can better understand why it has been partitioned. What are you protecting yourself against? What is the common ground of the personailities? One can also explore each personalities perspectives on itself and relationships to the world around it. The end equation could end up looking like the most beautiful monster you have ever seen.
Lucid Dream & Altered States: Integral Math
I had a lucid dream in which I was trying to fly years ago. Once I was aware of my being in a dream, I became peripherally aware of my body. I was able to hold the heavy feeling of my body at bay while I continued my lucid dream. In integral mathematics I would describe it like this:
1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p(3/p)
I (1p(1p)) had a first person perspective (1p(1-p)) of my body (3p(3/p)). The equation strip away my personal meaning and allows you to put it in your own contexts although you can still understand the mechanics of the perspective. I’m seeing the body as a separate object the same way I might see a tree or my coffee cup, but perhaps (since the body actually holds the perspective) it should be written like this:
1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p{(1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p {…}}
Which is to say, I had a first person perspective of my body which contains a my first person perspective of my body which has a first person perspective of my body…. And so on. So it becomes like two mirrors facing one another. The only way to maintain the stability of my lucid dream perspective was to minimize my awareness of my body.
Out of Body Experience
In his book, Astral Dynamics, Robert Bruce talks about similar experiences. But he takes it a step further because his theory is that the body itself continues to dream and have its very own perspectives while the subtle body has its very own experiences. He attributes the relatively low number of the phenomenon to loss of memory caused by the body “overwriting” the “shadow memory” of the subtle body.
So it would look like this…
Sleep & Dreaming mind/body seeing objects in the dream: 1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p(3-p)
Subtle body experience/altered state of consciousness seeing the sleeping body: 1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p{1p(1p) x 1p(1-p) x 3p(…)}
Traditional science tends to attribute OBE to some sort of brain anomoly hallucination (despite actual evidence of nonlocal consciousness), but for the purposes of this post we are only concerned with perspective. And the perspective is my first person perspective of the body with a first person perspective of the body… Whatever meaning that Robert Bruce, you or I attribute to this phenomenon should be put in its “own box” so to speak. And with Intergral math, that is easy to do.
Post Modern Art Mistaken for a Murder
June 19, 2007
When everything is a decaying symbolic copy of a copy, it becomes natural to be apathetic toward everything because nothing is real.
The Flesh Colored Crayon of Reality
May 30, 2007
The first box of Binney & Smith crayons, produced in 1903, sold for a nickel and contained eight colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown, and black (wiki).
Over the decades, Crayola expanded into many other colors including colors like Indian Red and “flesh” colored. These two colors were fine through the 1950’s. The multi-cultural movements of the ’60s changed everything.
In 1962, Binney & Smith chose to change the name Flesh to Peach in response to the Civil Rights Movement, since not all people are the same skin color. In 1999, the name Indian Red was changed to Chestnut because children wrongly perceived the color to be that of Native Americans, when in fact “Indian Red” had its roots in a dye from India (wiki).
When it comes to interpreting life, we tend to color our experiences with the tools we have. It makes sense, really. Afterall, we can’t use something we don’t have and we can’t use information we don’t know.
That is an over-simplified explaination of postmodernist view on science and philosophy. Postmodernist ask: How can scientists, philosophers and saints know anything when their culture dilutes what they call reality? These philosophers, and saints and scientists are essentially coloring reality with their flesh colored crayons. Now, the extreme postmodernist jump straight off of a nilhist cliff and says there is no meaning at all. I agree with some of what the post moderist have to say, but there is no need to be ridiculous.
It is important to at least realize the cultural bias we use to interpret our Gods, our facts and our reason. Without that internal check we will be blinded by the very things that are supposed to free us.
Further, it is important to realize that every word spoken and written and every concept thought or otherwise expressed are merely symbols. In the case of “God” or “Jehovah” or “Allah” we should note that the words we used to describe the subject of our worship, love, devotion and adoration are only symbols.
We tend to feel threatend by someone else’s interpretation of reality when in wisdom all interpretations should strengthen us as they tell us more about ourselves as individuals and as a species. An atheist (for example) shouldn’t be disgusted by a Pentacostal speaking in tongues but be awakend to the spectrum of reality that the human condition can accept. Reality does not have a cookie cutter approach. What I see, is not completely what you see.
Though we should not praise ALL perspectives (they are not all healthy and contructive) we should definitely respect them enough to deal with them properly. Just like a criminal profiler, they must understand and get into the mind set of a killer in order to predict the predators next move and motive. In the same way, should we understand our enemies and those who seek to despitefully use us. It does no good to simply marginalize and use stereotyping beyond what is necessary.
Another example is George Bush saying of Al Quaeda, “they hate us because of our freedom” may be bit oversimplified. The more we understand the terrorist, the child molester, serial killer, the rapist, the dirty politician, the better chance we have to overcome and subdue them. A game of Chess is won by paying attention, thinking three steps a head of your opponents most probable movements.
In the latter part of the 19th century after two world wars and an precedented population explosion, we found ourselves in the waiting arms of multiculturalism and globalism. Its forced us to live in a world of dying closed homogenious cultures and vanishing nations.
As with the mythological phoenix, the new firebird will rise out of the ashes of old. Now we are forced to draw reality not only in new colors but in different dimensions.
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (entrainment 2.0?)
May 7, 2007
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation is the next step in the evolution of entrainment. Instead of using sounds to influence brainwaves, it uses noninvasive electromagnetism.
Sound entrainment has been used to coax brainwaves into a certain pattern.
If a tuning fork designed to produce a frequency of 440 Hz is struck (causing it to oscillate) and then brought into the vicinity of another 440 Hz tuning fork, the second tuning fork will begin to oscillate. The first tuning fork is said to have entrained the second or caused it to resonate. The physics of entrainment apply to biosystems as well. Of interest here are the electromagnetic brain waves. — Science of Binaural Beats Brainwave Entrainment
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) is the application of variable magnetic fields to the brain — Open-rTMS
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation is a VERY effective way to induce states of consciousness:
BBC article on Dr. Persinger’s TMS helmet
How does Dr Persinger induce artificially religious experiences in his patients?
Dr Persinger has designed a helmet that produces a very weak rotating magnetic field of between ten nanotesla and one microtesla over the temporal lobes of the brain. This is placed on the subject’s head and they are placed in a quiet chamber while blindfolded. So that there is no risk of ‘suggestion’, the only information that the subjects are given is that they are going in for a relaxation experiment. Neither the subject nor the experimenter carrying out the test has any idea of the true purpose of the experiment. In addition to this, the experiment is also run with the field switched both off and on. This procedure Dr Persinger claims will induce an experience in over 80% of test subjects.
What sort of experiences do subjects report?
This is very dependent on the belief system of the individual subjects [ADDED Wilber-Combs Lattice]. Dr Persinger talks about his subjects feeling a ‘sensed presence’ – feeling that somebody was in the chamber with them. Subjects who are strongly religious are likely to interpret this presence as god. Whereas, atheists may also report a ‘sensed presence’ but attribute the phenomena to a trick of brain chemistry, perhaps comparable to when they have taken drugs in the past.
TMS is so effective that “Among more sensitive individuals, tests show that their skin will turn red if they believe a hot nickel has been placed on their hand. That’s a powerful psychosomatic effect of the brain on the body. Suppose we could make it more precise?” — This is Your Brain on God, Wired.
TMS is currently in the hands of reductionists who believe that ALL mystical experiences can be summed up by electromagnetic disturbances. Mass sightings up UFOs and other strange phenomenon are simply chemicals in our brains being influenced by electromagnetism.
Perhaps inducing certain electromagnetic frequencies allows our biominds to access a perspective of reality we would not have otherwise been privy too without years of meditation. Like devices that allow us to see infrared (frequencies that are beyond our normal domain of visible light), perhaps getting to certain states of consciousness allow us to “see” things we are normally oblivious too.
Science and religion used to fully subscribe to a flat earth the was the center of a static universe. We have found the complete opposite to be true. Modern mainstream scientists now agree that we are likely the only sentient life and there are no subtle spiritual type energies and all spiritual experiences are completely the product of the human brain. All of that seems just as ridiculous as a “flatworld” theory. A neo-atheistic reductionism is fine as belief systems and religions go, but what I don’t like is how science marginalizes anyone outside of their mainstream belief structure.
I love science but its champions seem to have fallen prey to a dogma that is similar in close minded stagnancy to that of some religious denominations.
TMS links:
This is your Brain on God, Wired. 7-11-1999
God Helmet, Shakti
Postmodern Mythology
April 4, 2007
New myths are being created today.
Some say that the creation of myth comparable to those found in the great traditions (Christianity, Islam and others) is impossible because these days every one has a camera. So if Moses, for example, claimed to parted the Red Sea today no one would believe it without evidence (and even if it were on camera it would be in question).
Are we now doomed to be without wonders and miracles in today’s skeptical, camera and Internet globalized, postmodern world?
No. I believe that miracles and unexplained phenomenon are happening at an even greater rate than our ancestors experienced. Only now, we catch them on our digital cameras and have creditable eye witness accounts.
UFOs, aliens and parapsychology are the new postmodern mythology. To be clear “myth” doesn’t always mean “untrue”.
myth: 2. A real or fictional story, recurring theme, or character type that appeals to the consciousness of people by embodying its cultural ideals or by giving expression to deep, common felt emotions. – Webster II New Riverside University Dictionary
Unlike prehistoric to promodern times, postmodernism allows you to believe and say whatever the hell you want because absolute truth has been annihilated.
Lets take a look at the evolution of “truth”.
Prehistory – Truth is given by stories passed by word of mouth via elders, shaman, tribe leaders and magical sources. (predates written history)
Ancient history – Truth is from belief in divine sources (leaders are conveniently god)
Beginning of written history (began about 33 Century B.C. as far as we know).Premodernity – Truth is derived from authority. Authorities (royalty, priests) have divine right (500 A.D. – 1400 AD).
Modernity – Truth is dominated by science based on repeatable, physical evidence. Science chips away at religious/traditional ideas (i.e. world is flat, Earth is the center of the universe, religious wars and purges killed millions of people). Modernity is marked by creation of the printing press in 1400s in which more people had access to knowledge. Religious power began to fade. Science and technology begin to dominate. The modernity and unimpeded advancements of science saves millions from early death, disease and famine AND kills millions in conflicts, genocide and world wars.
Postmodernity – “Truth” is a matter of perspective. Postmodernity is marked by globalization. The cross breeding of traditions, sciences and religions make it obvious that our interpretations of reality have everything to do with cultural bias (i.e. Mahatmas Gandhi, a man who influenced peace around the world, hated black people, modern nations killed millions of people).
What we call “myths” today was considered a reality to the people of ancient history. The Spartans considered themselves the actual descendants of Hercules. We are taught today that Hercules was not real, but to those ancient people he and all the other gods were absolutely real.
Many of the myths of ancient people were based on some truth. The Great Flood is a myth that is repeated in Judaism/Christianity, Sumerians texts, Greek myth of Deukalion’s flood and others. The floods that they spoke of might have been different local floods that were equally cataclysmic that happened at different times. But for them it there was an actual great flood.
Scientists have put out their data unmoved by the trappings of religious dogma, and that is good. Modern science tends to throw out all information when a fraction is wrong. But then they go a step further by attempting to ridicule and marginalize anyone who entertains the thought that they believe they have just completely disproved. Their hypotheses and theories then become the very thing they have dismantled, dogma and religion. Richard Dawkin’s neo-atheist, scientism is very similar to intolerant and defensive attitudes seen in religious fundamentalism.
Groups (religious, scientific or national) all over the world attempt to reduce all knowledge to fit into their world. Whatever can not fit is thrown out, belittle, and demonized. Postmodernism points this out. It is like a five year old that blabs about the fattest person in the room, “MOM, SHE IS FAT!” Postmodernism is calling religion and modern science fat. And questioning all those claiming absolute truth. In this way it is dangerous. But at the same time it makes room for all the things that religion and science have tag teamed.
Things like parapsychology and ufology have room in postmodernism because it recognizes that truth has perspectives.
