The Shocking Truth

[Summerlander]

I've never taken acid so I wouldn't know. I've done magic mushrooms and salvia divinorum so perhaps I have an idea.

I would like to share a link here:
https://youtu.be/IZefk4gzQt4

Professor Daniel Dennett spends the first few minutes of this Google seminar talking about the tree of life, the exorbitant evolutionary expenditure and anthropic design. 'Evolution may be slow and costly, but it is brilliant,' he says after pointing out that 99% of all the living organisms that have ever existed died 'childless'. He also makes a striking comparison between Gaudi's architecture and a termite castle---noting that the former comes about through 'top-down' intelligent design whilst the latter emerges from 'bottom-up' mindless building. (But a colony of clueless termites does not differ from a conglomerate of mindless neurons as much as we might intuitively think!)

Dennett also touches upon the irony conveyed by Darwin's and Turing's 'strange inversions of reasoning'. (You can get great designs in nature out of complete natural ignorance and a computer can be efficient without knowing how to do arithmetic.) In other words, competence can emerge without comprehension and mind (consciousness, understanding) is the effect, not the cause. Our intuitions, it seems, have been mistaken all along. The professor describes to us how a termite-colony brain can produce a Bach-like mind ...

[Summerlander]

Another interesting debate---'The Hereafter'---which somewhat pertains to this topic:

http://www.world-of-lucid-dreaming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=18832

[Summerlander]

In what way do you feel it complicates the reality of life? Can you be more specific? I'm open to criticism and counterarguments ...

Here's another shocking truth which is backed by evidence:

http://www.world-of-lucid-dreaming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=19464

Do yourself and favour and do your homework ...

And to those who confuse OBEs/astral projection/lucid dreams, read this:

http://www.world-of-lucid-dreaming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=19196

[DesertExplorer]

Gotta love Summer..

[Summerlander]

I love it.

[Summerlander]

I found a t-shirt on Facebook which definitely resonates with me. It says:

'Existentialist: (adj. & n.)
Optimistic nihilist
"Just because we're all doomed,
doesn't mean we can't have a good time."
~anonymous existentialist'

In fact, besides all the fun we can have whilst existing, our demise need not be defined as some kind of doom if we accept the way things are. We are not separate from a world that, as Heraclitus pointed out, is in perpetual flux. And mindfulness can help us reach a kind of henosis where boundaries cease to perceptually exist. (We are merely parts of the whole.)

By no means am I subcribing to Leibniz's system of monads, much less the process towards deification believed in Eastern Orthodox Christian circles when I mention 'henosis'. Henosis is more about the tabula rasa that we can all achieve through meditation as pointed out by Plotinus---a state which is so prevalently mentioned in Buddhism which entails anatta (the non-self state).

Henosis is a term which, in this context, is less about pantheism and more about what is neurophysiologically permissable as a means to get the most out of life with less despondence and more joy.

I'd love to wear that t-shirt!

[DreamerMan99]

I don't think hedonism would be too horrible. However, I feel like the ego inflation would probably be it's worst aspect. So maybe utilitarian hedonism?

[Summerlander]

That's why I tend to recommend a mixture of the useful aspects of Epicureanism and Buddhism---both purely as instructive philosophies. The latter encourages you to derive pleasure from life given the opportunity and the latter advises you to remain unattached and cultivate equanimity when things don't go your way. Seems to me a healthy balance especially when it promotes everyone's wellbeing. I guess you could call that utilitarian hedonism. Beware of ego inflation for sure ... it is certainly problematic.

[DreamerMan99]

Nothing wrong with cherry picking the nicest parts of all the beliefs.
Whether or not we believe that we are the prime, most important thing in the universe with the biggest ego or we are aware we are nothing, product of chaos and nature's natural tendency towards consumption of power and simply along for the ride, does it matter? The way you think or feel is completely irrelevant to reality; it all ends the same!

What is your opinion on the ego? Beneficial to humanity as a whole, or only the human possessing it? Can you truly be "enlightened" if you have an ego? Maybe it's a tad egotistical for people to run around saying they're enlightened.

Summerlander, you've talked of your experience with psilocybin mushrooms. Did you experience any form of ego death or ego loss? I've always wondered if this is complete dissociation from the ego, or simply just intense psychosis brought on by the shrooms.

[Summerlander]

I think ego can be beneficial and egoless behaviour in a world such as ours can sometimes be impractical. But if you are planning to live in seclusion, perhaps in a Buddhist monastery, cultivating an egoless personality will definitely be subjectively rewarding.

Shrooms certainly warped my perception of reality, and I certain had moments of being 'at one with the universe' as some might say, but I don't think the ego was completely eradicated.

I have only ever experienced a noticeable sense of transcending the self on a couple of occasions during meditation. I wasn't even looking for such states at the time. The first time, I experienced the loss of identity and a profoundly pristine cognition for only a fraction of a second before thoughts come flooding in again to 'weigh' me down.

It's hard to describe such subjective states but the clarity and peace were undeniable. Once I returned to normal, I thought I had discovered what the Buddha meant by being 'enlightened'. In some ways I felt light as a feather because I was truly free of worry. If it was temporary psychosis then I want more of it. I was truly happy even if for a brevity.