is that 99% of people go through their daily routines, and never think about consciousness, reality, or why we are here.  Society and expectations have been built up and that is all there is to many.  I recently spoke with an old friend, a neurosurgeon with a brilliant mind (no joke intended) who I've known forever.  I am convinced that if souls travel, than our friendship has done so, but I digress.  Anyway, he was over at an informal party and we got into a conversation on spirituality, the existence of a "soul or spirit," the nature of consciousness.  His belief was conventional but rigorously grounded in biology, physics and chemistry.  That our mind, is a product of the brain.  That our thoughts our biochemical products only.  That there is nothing after we die.  All of the rest, all of my arguments and discussions could not be proved.  However, here was a friend who had been every bit as interested in consciousness as myself.  He simply based it in conventional biology, medicine and anatomy and dismissed the spiritual.

But I saw something interesting under the surface.  Although he wanted to "trump" me with his intellect, and disprove the notion of consciousness existing outside of the brain, part of him wished it were so.  I said to him, just between us (because I wanted to get through the BS), so do you really discount the possibility that your consciousness will go on.....and he thought for a minute, and said he thought he would cease to be, but if he did continue on, he'd deal with that when the time came.

Amazing to me, that our close friends and loved ones can be so oblivious to examining consciousness and the soul, thinking outside the box (as my fellow explorer Alysia mentioned in another post), and trying to do more than achieve standard success in the Western world.

I vow though that my three year old son, the apple of my eye, will know my interest, and these ideas one day.  He may do with them what he will, but as I love him, I could not bear if he did not at least get exposed to these concepts, and possibly take them farther than I could.

Matthew

Matthew, that's good that your son is so young and you can help to shape his future. I'm sure that's why he chose you as his father.

I work with my grandchildren ages, 12, 16 and 20, but don't get anywhere...........they know it all at those ages. But I do have my 1 1/2 year old great grandson that I hope to help to love nature and spiritual/metaphysical stuff when he's old enough.  

Love, Mairlyn

It troubles me that sooo many people are stuck in C1.

It's hard trying to have a discussion about the Afterlife with those in C1. They look at you like you're insane - a wishful thinker that needs to join the 21st century of science and evolution theory.

Tis a shame that people do not realise their potential. I'm sure there would be alot more happiness in the world if people knew the truth.

Hi Matthew-
For some reason, people are unwillingto admit of more than a single viewpoint at a time. Thus, if we are members of the Big Bang Gang, then we force out thinking into a matter-dominated idiom, and pray to Friedman and Lemaitre to explain it.

However, science makes no such impositions upon us. The scientist's job is to describe, and by consistency, to predict. thus answering the "what" of the world. That does not, in fact, prevent numerous alternative descriptions of the same phenomena, each arising from a different viewpoint.

The case is rather like a social psychologist iving your lifespan close scrutiny and coming up with an airtight explanation for your personality, that expains perhaps 90% of the variance at alpha less than 1%. This is possible, and it would be considered good science. But it does not preclude your ability to review the same lifespan in terms of  your own intrapsychic drives, deep feelings and values, and thus the valid creation of a very diferent explanation using different terms. While both explanations are different, they are also valid, and a full understanding would require both perspectives to be considered,

Because these ideas are approaching the same event, our present Now, from opposite directions, they appear different. Like the left and right hands clapping. Yet our hands are part of a larger unity (connected through our shoulders), as are otherwise disparite explanations (connected through a larger logical space).

My impression is that we cling tenaciously to what we prefer because we are afraid that if we lose that we'd be lost in a sea of anomie, a terrible existential quandry, as Descartes might put it, "a sense of being cast into the midst of a sea so profound that we can neither touch our feet to the bottom, nor rise again to the top". That's not good science. The good scientist would seek the meta-persppective through which the "rantings of airey fairey freaks" could be contained as another perspective on the same topic, otherwise explained by "cold facts of scientific positivism".

Denial is a very primitive defense mechanism. Coupled with projection of an exclusively scientific reality, it locks us into a wilful blindness, while protecting us from nothing more dangerous than superior understanding.

Maybe the underlying threat associated with having an open mind, is that we would be called to be responsible for our actions. It might be nice to have a nation of deeply spiritual scientists, those willing to see both objective and subjective explanations of reality as valid. Such a nation would probably be less willing to bomb their neighbors. Since we already are born into a world of hatred and dissonances, it's probably easier to "go with the flow", and accept the economic benefits of killing, torturing and so on. As scientists, we don't need to worry.

More to the point, as exclusively materialistic scientists, we are not morally obligated to seek a better way to live. Business as usual is thus justified. Preemptive nuclear strikes are simply good business. Etc.

Were we to adopt the idea of an afterlife as a valid, well supported and extensively documented condition, then we'd have to make some changes. I don't think we're ready as yet - at least not on a national level. But that might simply reflect my own biases. There may be another side to the story. I'm willing to learn.

dave

I think a world where the afterlife is fact and accepted more where we also communicate openly with is like a dream to me lol. But i don't think that'll happen in any of our lifetimes, i do agree whats been said here the world's not ready to just drop everything, people will still on gugdes and seek revenge and people will still want to stay in control and earn loads of money etc but it'll happen its got too, people are changing in this direction more and more and more its inevitable.

People stereotype this kinda of side and i hate it (even though we stereotype almost everything which i don't like either), to be honest i don't know much of this new age stuff and haven't heard much about it, once or twice maybe.

Also going back to the actual topic of this thread lol i think from what I understand and have read sometimes people go through this life in C-1 conciousness only and wont even think about another life purly because if they did this would ruin their lessons set to be learnt here. Does that sound right? I'm no expert oviously! but get this impression which seems to make sense i think lol.

Ryan

Hi All-
With Matthew,  I'm also amazed that we are so little involved with the nature of consciousness, since the nature of the "Self", in psychological terms, is the result of self-referential inspection. That is, the sense of being an individual is based on consciousness of ourselves as extended in the reality around us, and is thus a factor derived from consciousness.

The only formal areas that actually look into this fundamental area are metaphysics and genetic psychology. The rest of the world presumes the primacy of matter, rather than the primacy of awareness through which we conclude the nature of matter. Big difference. Maybe not such a good thing.

I get the image of a whole lot of people beating on each other who suddenly become aware that the guy next door is me, and we is God.  Ooops.

I hope the epiphany brings the joy you mention, Alycia, and not  a sense of guilt and depression for our errors. I just had a major case of flu that led me to question my mortality, bringing a little more conservative attitude, and I suspect that the same kind of thing is needed to get others to look into their own inner selves. The Gulf storms and disasters elsewhere, may be the actual means of enlightenment of the masses, rather than allowing us to float away on pink clouds.

I'm up for pink clouds myself.

Kary Mullis? - Nah. I dunno.

As for how to get along, we do what seems appropriate, and we think in terms that ultimately will bring it together with what's real. On a good day, we may even get it right, and everything almost comes out even. But, as Matthew pointed out, there's not much interest in the method, but only in the use of it.

Most of us live in our heads, an airey stance (hence airheads?), and in doing so we forget that our feet are rooted in a common clay. The commonality of our origins carries responsibility to one another, which actually equates with the ability to respond, but it's easier to overlook. Oh well ...
-d

*****************
But I saw something interesting under the surface.  Although he wanted to "trump" me with his intellect, and disprove the notion of consciousness existing outside of the brain, part of him wished it were so.
*****************
The part of him that wanted to "trump you" is most likely his conscious half... his "spirit."
The part of him which was inarticulate, but clearly present, and wanted it
to be so... was probably his UNCONSCIOUS mind, or "soul."
In essence, we are most likely TWO persons, cohabiting in the same body! (Their interplay forms the illusion of the "ego" during life.) One goes on to reincarnate (the conscious spirit, which then becomes somebody else independent from you) and the unconscious soul goes onto a robotic, dream-like existence in heaven or hell (most often hell, unless the person's most vivid memories - which he'd constantly be reliving throughout eternity - were GOOD ones. If they were BAD ones, the memories would strengthen and get worse and worse, and the soul would lack the ability to make choices... mindlessly digging itself deeper and deeper into misery.) The existence of the excarnate soul would be similar to the confused, muddle-headed existence one experiences in dreams, or upon awaking from a deep sleep (when the conscious mind is still disengaged.) This muddle-headed state would exist in HEAVEN as well as hell... so how could one truly enjoy heaven?
I TRULY hope I'm wrong about this theory... it would indicate that we will have no free will in the next life (if the conscious and unconscious divide at death, and go their separate ways... and the part that is YOU is the "soul!")
Alternately, if the part that is "you" is the REINCARNATING SPIRIT, then your memories ("soul contents") are discarded between lives, which would also suck like a hull breach on the USS Enterprise. You'd lose all your hard-won knowledge (and memories of all your friendships and loves!) between lives. Although, I'd greatly prefer this to the FIRST option (that is, the "soul" is you and only lives once.) At least you'd have freedom (of a sort.)
This theory reconciles traditional Eastern and Western ideas about the afterlife, and is extremely ancient and widespread amond disparate peoples (the ancient Egyptian, Hebrew (that's right!) Caananite, Greek, Mayan, Aztec, Inca, Chinese, and Hawaiian cultures, to name just a few from all around the world, believed in it... and most (if not all) of them HATED the implications, devising complex theologies and rituals to try to unite the two halves of the mind... take the national obsession ancient Egypt had with funerary practices! One can only guess if any of them were successful...)
Furthermore, modern scientific studies of the mind appear to vindicate these ancient insights... that we  are, indeed, BINARY beings! (Think about the division of our brains into a "right-brain functions" - i.e., emotions... and  "left-brain functions" - i.e., logic.)
I'd hope that your friend's materialistic interpretation of consciousness is correct, if I were you. (And it may well be so... the fracture of the mind into two halves would result in the death of the ego... and if the EGO is the "fundamental you", then your friend IS for all intents and purposes correct. At least I hope he's right for his sake, and mine, yours and everybody else's!)

Chumley