Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

What is a human being? What is life? Can science give us reliable answers to such questions? The electricity of life. The meaning of human consciousness. Are we alone? Are the traditional contests between science and religion still relevant? Does the word "spirit" still hold meaning today?

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bboyer
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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:32 am

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2008 6:43 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "Solar"
smurfslappa wrote: The mind is a storm of consciousness created in the brain.

The brain is like a two way 'antenna' *through* which consciousness works. It does not "create" consciousness. It 'relays' an awareness *to* consciousness of the environment within which consciousness participates. It is a 'tool' and expression of consciousness just as is the human body. Consciousness may and can do perfectly fine without either. A process we mimic via dreamless sleep when consciousness "rest" from participation within any environment.
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:33 am

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2008 8:02 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "smurfslappa"

Riiight, that's what I meant to say. The mind interacts with the body via the brain.
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:33 am

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2008 8:22 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "arc-us"

Nice to know the heart of this thread beats still (pun intended).

:)
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:34 am

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2008 8:56 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "Solar"
@rc-us wrote: Nice to know the heart of this thread beats still (pun intended).

Smile

Nice to see you.
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:36 am

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 12:57 am Post subject: Whereya bin @rcus?... Reply with quote
OP "davesmith_au"
Solar wrote:
Quote:
Nice to see you.

I'll second that motion...

Cheers, Dave Smith.
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There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:39 am

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 11:48 am Post subject: Re: The Electricity of Life - a personal view Reply with quote
OP "Tina"
@rc-us wrote:
But aren't diametrically opposed opposites really only experienced as being "worlds apart" if we, in our misidentification of just who we are, mistake ourselves as being one pole or the other?

... what is it that holds the poles apart? And what is it that enables the coil of wire to freely spin within the center of these poles, what anchors it?

The base of the motor. The "background."

So in fact, if anything, it could be said to be a triune universe and not a duality.

.... I thank you for lending an ear to these unsatisfactory words and apologize for the length.

And bid you my best regard,
@rc-us

Well it is late and I am tired so I did not give this essay a close reading. However I have picked some points I'd like to add comment to.

diametrically opposed opposites = opposites best expressed as a physical relationship on either side of a neutral middle point s.a. number line 1/0/-1 or any positive/negative/neutral.

But most notions of "diametrical opposites" are usually conceptual rather than actual.


what is it that holds the poles apart? Again the neutral position comes into play and holds all in balance. North/south left/right up/down positive/negative - equalibrium - all determined by that middle Neutral point... actual or arbitrary.

The "background." I see the background as the point of neutrality. Anything else is just a movement away from or towards this point.

be a triune universe and not a duality. I believe that the dynamic interaction between positive/negative and neutral potentials is the best explanation for the workings of the whole universe.

Well these are my late night musings thank you for lending your ear too![/b]
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There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:43 am

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 4:18 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "arc-us"
Solar wrote:
@rc-us wrote: Nice to know the heart of this thread beats still (pun intended).

:)
Nice to see you.
and
davesmith_au wrote: I'll second that motion...

Cheers, Dave Smith.
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OT: Hey guys! Good of you to keep the home fires burning. BTW, great site and service you've put together, Dave. Good on ya.
high priestess wrote: If the everchanging ceases, ....
Tku for posting this, hp. I, for one, thought it quite appropos and enjoyed it.
Tina wrote: ....Well these are my late night musings thank you for lending your ear too!
Good musings they were, too ... thank you.
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:46 am

Posted: Mon Feb 04, 2008 10:39 pm Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "Jeff Moore"

I ran across this page whilst looking into kabbalah. There are some real interesting ideas in here; the photographs alone say volumes about the unfolding merger of scientific, religious and human understanding.

http://www.gnosticteachings.org/content/view/238/10104/

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There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:47 am

Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 1:39 am Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "junglelord"

http://www.gnosticteachings.org/content/view/238/10104/

Thats why I believe that a three field universe makes so much sense.

I found this little article on the vortex of the brain.
http://coe.bri.niigata-u.ac.jp/coedoc/V ... _ch1_1.pdf
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There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:48 am

Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 2:44 am Post subject: Reply with quote
OP "StefanR"
ENDLESS CONSCIOUSNESS
A scientific vision on the near-death experience
Pim van Lommel, cardiologist

According to our current medical concepts, it is not possible to experience consciousness during a cardiac arrest, when circulation and breathing have ceased. In 1988 we started a prospective study of 344 consecutive survivors of cardiac arrest in ten Dutch hospitals with the aim to investigate the frequency, the cause and the content of a near-death experience (NDE). We studied patients who survived cardiac arrest, because this is a well-described life threatening medical situation, where patients will ultimately die from irreversible damage to the brain if cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is not initiated within 5 to 10 minutes. It is the closest model of the process of dying. In our study eighteen percent of the survivors of cardiac arrest reported an NDE. We additionally performed a longitudinal study with taped interviews of all late survivors with NDE 2 and 8 years following the cardiac arrest, along with a matched control group of survivors of cardiac arrest who did not report an NDE. This study was designed to assess whether the loss of fear of death, the transformation in attitude toward life and the enhanced intuitive sensibility is the result of having an NDE or just the result of the cardiac arrest itself. Our study was published in The Lancet in 2001.

In four recent prospective studies in survivors of cardiac arrest in The Netherlands, USA and UK the authors had to conclude that during the period of cardiac arrest, during the period of unconsciousness, patients could sometimes report clear memories of impressions during a special state of consciousness (NDE). During this period of clinical death the function of the brain has been reversible depressed, the nervous tissue remains viable, and it is still recoverable although the brain is temporarily inactive because of anoxia caused by the cessation of cerebral blood flow. From induced cardiac arrest during implantation of internal defibrillators we know that the electroencephalogram (EEG) becomes flat within an average of 15 seconds, and also the function of brainstem stops. During this period of unconsciousness with flatline EEG patients may report the paradoxical occurrence of heightened lucid awareness, with cognitive functions, with emotions, with memories from early childhood, and sometimes with perception out and above their lifeless body. A clear sensorium, enhanced mental functioning and complex perceptual processes during a period of apparent clinical death challenge the currently accepted concept that consciousness is exclusively produced and localized in the brain. How is consciousness related to the integrity of brain function? Scientific study of NDE pushes us to the limits of our medical and neurophysiologic ideas about the range of human consciousness and mind-brain relation. Is there a start or an end to consciousness?
http://eindeloosbewustzijn.org/index_eng.html
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There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by bboyer » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:49 am

- 30 -
There is something beyond our mind which abides in silence within our mind. It is the supreme mystery beyond thought. Let one's mind and one's subtle body rest upon that and not rest on anything else. [---][/---] Maitri Upanishad

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by Grey Cloud » Tue Apr 15, 2008 9:59 am

I've only just noticed this thread as I have only now had the wit to scroll down on the topic index page.

The subjects being discussed here are just those which need to be addressed in the thread I have been mainly involved with, i.e. 'The Origins of Myth'.
One of the points I made there in my opening post (A Cautionary Note) was basically they are seeing dragons behind every tree in that they are treating every mythical story are pertaining to plasma phenomena in space. I am arguing that unless you take into account what I, for convenience, call the Ancient Wisdom, then you will not understand what the myths are saying (allegorically) and will be merely projecting your own assumptions etc back onto the ancient peoples.
I categorise myths into 3 basic groups:
1. Creation stories
2. The human condition (basically Alchemy)
3. Other, e.g. stuff happening in the sky.

Group 2 is the largest. Dave Talbot and Plasmatic wont have it.
I feel that they are conflating, for instance, several goddesses into this Mother goddess and ditto this warrior-king 'archetype'.

I posted an iterpretation of the myth of the abduction of Persephone to try to illustrate the point re the mother goddess and an interpretation of the Perseus and Andromeda story re the warrior-king. You can check them out but basically the Persephone describes the souls descent into the material realm and Perseus (Everyman) is battling the material in order to gain Enlightenment, Andromeda in this case playing the part of the soul. I made the point that in these type of hero myths, the hero is generally a demi-god, with a mortal mother (of Earth) and the father is a god (of the heavens). 'I am a child of Earth and the Starry Heavens...' as the Orphic prayer has it. Another clue is that the hero is generally helped (in Greek myth at least) by Athena and sometines and/or Hermes. Both of these are associated with intelligence and mind.
Needless to say they somehow still see these two stories as referring to celestial catastrophic events.

I think it was arc-us in his opening post who mentioned a triune world? I couldn't agree more. This in Alchemy, and the Ancient Wisdom generally, is the Law of Three. In the I Ching it is expressed thusly:

From Dao, One arises.
From One, two.
From two, three.
Three becomes the ten thousand things.

The ten thousand things carry yin on their backs
and hold yang in their arms.
Existence depends on the two.

Men hate to be orphaned, bereft, unworthy,
yet this is how the noble man describes himself.
Loss is gain, gain is loss.

I teach what has always been taught:
"A fervent man is surprised by death."
I see this as the foundation of my teaching.

I Ching 42, trans Bart Marshall.

Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu; Mercury, Salt, Sulphur; Body, Soul, Consciousness. Two opposites and an intelligent principle.

I have been a serious Seeker for a year or so (I have picked up Ariadne's thread; I have heard the song of the Siren) but I have been blundering about for several decades.

Quote:
The universe and I exist together, and all things and I are one. As all things are one, there is no need for further speech. But since I just said that all things are one, how can speech be not important?...Behind the divisible there is always something indivisible. Behind the disputable there is always something indisputable. You ask: What? The wise man carries it in his heart.
CHUANG-TZU


Peace people.

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If I have the least bit of knowledge
I will follow the great Way alone
and fear nothing but being sidetracked.
The great Way is simple
but people delight in complexity.
I Ching, 53.
If I have the least bit of knowledge
I will follow the great Way alone
and fear nothing but being sidetracked.
The great Way is simple
but people delight in complexity.
Tao Te Ching, 53.

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by junglelord » Tue Apr 15, 2008 2:33 pm

I do not discount all that was said but I still think that Chariots of the Gods could have been real events as well. Not as published but the basic concept. Thats my two cents.
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Casting Out the Nines from PHI into Indigs reveals the Cosmic Harmonic Code.
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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by David Talbott » Tue Apr 15, 2008 2:44 pm

Gotta keep this reasonably brief, though many thoughts come to mind.

Grey Cloud, we're still in the phase of "initial misunderstanding" here, partly because it's essential to separate out the original events of the myth-making epoch from the "Great Analogy" that followed. Within every culture there was an explosion of ritual, political, military, and artistic expression. All pointed back to the same intense provocation, drawing endless analogies from the archetypal forms and events, and taking them into every layer of collective activity. But this fact in no way rationalizes or diminishes the respect we can pay to particular expressions of human insight that followed.

Profound instances of "wisdom" emerged from reflections on received mythical traditions. But one inverts the historical process if one insists that archetypal mythology emerged from wisdom. The natural events came first, then came the raw and urgent human response, then came the progressive expression of deeper human insights catalyzed by the Great Analogy (the revered, unified primeval forms and events considered to be exemplary and true by all of the cultures). The great archetypes (using my own concrete definition here) are not expressions of spiritual vision. They are expressions of the intensely experienced events that provoked human imagination across many centuries. And human imagination, so provoked, did indeed reach inward toward a greater appreciation of our true identity and a larger spiritual connection. In the "wisdom" traditions you call us to acknowledge, the raw archetypes will be there, but something has been added by human reflection which, like all human activity, may either move the mind closer to the truth of life, or pose obstacles to such movement. Wherever the purely mythological content demands reverence, it is an obstacle.

A thought to consider. Is it possible that the greatest spiritual teachers, though working within cultural habits and traditions that did indeed trace to the foundations of myth, actually freed themselves from the historic inertia of myth? In their own terms, the myths typically presented themselves as divine--the word of God, or a god, speaking to them. Inherent in this was the image of an angry man in the sky, an inescapable mythical character that none of us would be pleased to call "dad."

To me, it is awe-inspiring to realize that the core teachings of Jesus or the Buddha (however one might view historical origins or contexts) are virtually free from mythology. And I'd say the same thing about the most impressive teachers in the world today. It's a somewhat arbitrary choice, but consider the Dalai Lama. This visionary and teacher of simple virtues is neither a product of mythology nor a missionary for mythology. The same could be said of many others of extraordinary insight around the world, all of whom, following their own paths, came to remarkably similar views. And it is not unreasonable to see their teachings as the purest of human insights, entirely liberated from mythology.

David Talbott

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Re: Recovered: The Electricity of Life - a personal view

Unread post by Plasmatic » Tue Apr 15, 2008 3:58 pm

To me, it is awe-inspiring to realize that the core teachings of Jesus or the Buddha (however one might view historical origins or contexts) are virtually free from mythology
Yes but the mythical charachters words where not free from contradiction. :)
"Logic is the art of non-contradictory identification"......" I am therefore Ill think"
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"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."
Aristotle

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