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% Consciousness Defined
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About "the Mind"
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================
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I'm doing something that, as far as I can tell, nobody[^nobody] in the study of
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consciousness, and this includes neuroscientists, psychologists and Buddhists,
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seems to be able to do. The first thing, clearly stated, you should be doing is
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answer this question:
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**What do you mean by "mind" (etc.) and what does it encompass?**
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[^nobody]: Ok, that's not exactly true. I've seen, for example, definitions and
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diagrams in books by (or about) Julian Jaynes and Bernhard Baars. Still, these
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models are often only meant to demonstrate how their own ideas fit together, not
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to catalog the whole phenomenology.
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Everybody and their grandmother has a theory about the mind, yet when you
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actually look at these theories, they don't just approach the issue differently,
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they even approach *different issues*. Studying "the mind" or "consciousness"
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is kinda like a physicist saying they study "stuff". Unless you have a clear,
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*explicit* idea of what you mean when you say "mind", you will at best only
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confuse yourself and think that a half-baked answer solved the problem.
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I was wrestling with all kinds of ideas about what consciousness is and how it
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works. The most important realization, and I credit Dennett for it, was that I
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didn't even know what I was talking about *myself*. I had no idea what I even
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meant when I spoke about my own consciousness.
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So I stopped all the hypothesis-making and took a good, deep look. Exactly what
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is meant by the mind, what "parts" does it consist of, which phenomena are all
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to be included? Note that I don't aim to *explain* anything. At all. Here I just
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want a complete description of what there actually is to explain. Otherwise
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we'll just end up solving wrong or non-existent problems (see: free will).
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I've also included comparisons to other models, so that you can see how my terms
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relate to concepts you may already know. (And why I consider all other models to
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be too deficient.)
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The Complete(-ish) Model
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========================
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I follow *5 simple principles*:
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# TODO Really? Don't split too much!
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1. Not everything that is a separate part in the model is meant to be strictly
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separate in reality. In fact, I am fairly convinced that some parts at least
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overlap, if they are not even identical. The distinctions are meant to help
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*you* understand what I'm talking about, not show you *how it works*.
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2. The model is not necessarily exhaustive. I may have forgotten something, but
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I have compared my model to all common views on consciousness I could find
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and searched my own consciousness for anything missing. However, if you think
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something should be there but isn't, and it's not a part of something already
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there, then most likely I personally do not have this feature. (This applies
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equally if you find something *unnecessary*[^unnecessary]. Consider that you
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may have a different consciousness.)
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3. The relationships in the model are only meant for easier classification. They
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do *not* necessarily reflect any *actual* relationships. However, I tried to
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get all important ones.
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4. Nothing is included based on "inference". Just because you think something
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*should* exist because you can only explain something else that way, doesn't
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mean it actually *does* exist. If you can't access it, it doesn't belong in
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the model.
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5. I shall not, under any circumstances, use the terms "mind", "consciousness",
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"perception", "soul" or "self". They are all so ambiguous that they will only
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confuse.
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[^unnecessary]:
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When I write that features may be "unnecessary", I mean that there is
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nothing they "do" or "influence" and can't be accessed in any way. I don't
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mean that they are "virtual", i.e. that they are the result of the
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interaction of multiple other parts. For example, "Music" is virtual, as it
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is created by the interplay of "Hearing", "Space-time" and so on. There is
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no separate "Music" thingy that is independent from the others. (See the
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first principle.) However, "Thoughts", as defined in the article, are
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unnecessary. They don't exist.
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Here we go.
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![The Model](con_def.png)
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Now some explanations.
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Senses (green)
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--------------
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It can be argued that some senses should be split further, particularly
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**Smell** and **Taste**, which is really a huge amount of very small senses, and
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**Motor-Balance**, which consists of senses of acceleration, balance and so on.
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The split I use is somewhat arbitrary, but I hope it covers every "kind" of
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sense without much overlap.
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Also, **Body Feedback** means things like heart rate or hunger. I have not split
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this because I don't think that it actually is very differentiated. This is most
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obvious to me once the **Space-time** is impaired (most distinctly via shrooms),
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such that figuring out "where" a sense is coming from is very hard. Once this
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happens, I can't tell hunger from thirst from having to pee.
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Most importantly note that at no point do I split "external" senses from
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"internal" ones. There is no such thing as "seeing something in the world"
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compared to "seeing something in your mind". They are *the same process*. "If
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all you can know is your brain programs operating, the whole universe you
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experience is inside your head.", as Robert Anton Wilson wrote in Prometheus
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Rising. If you still think "real" sight and "imagined" sight etc. are different,
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try to observe them critically in meditation, trying to pin-point the exact
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difference. Then do the same thing within a (lucid) dream.[^constrained]
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[^constrained]: This is interpretation now, not just description. I believe that
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all perception, as it happens in the **Theatre**, is a hallucination, in the
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sense that it is *exactly* the same thing as any other hallucination. There
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is no difference in looking at a flower, dreaming a flower, imagining a
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flower or hallucinating a flower. None *at all*. There are difference in
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relationship to **Memory**, **Volition** and so on, which make these states
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distinct, but the actual **Seeing** is identical.
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At no point in time does the **Theatre** (or anything working with it) ever
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get the "real" perception. You don't see what your eyes see, not for a
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single moment. What happens instead is that the **Theatre** is wildly
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hallucinating, like a mad improv actor, but sense processes (that have
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filtered and modified "raw" data from the eyes and so on) interrupt the
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performance and correct it. There is a certain amount of feedback, in that
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specific data can be requested to fill in details, but never is the direct
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data ever used.
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Stephen LaBerge calls this "constrained dreaming", meaning that normal
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perception is simply dreaming with hard constraints on content by the
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outside world, while normal dreaming doesn't get the unchanging correction
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and so diverges.
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This explains all the problems of strong, convincing and incredibly common
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hallucinations we get and removes the fake distinction between "this is
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real" and "this is imagined". Every group event is a mass hallucination.
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You might find it controversial (or plain wrong) that I included a **Theatre**
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in the first place and that I'm trying to sneak in dualism. I'm not, not at all.
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There is very strong evidence that the **Theatre** really exists as a separate
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thing, in which senses are united and dealt with. A good scientific model of
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this is [Global Workspace] theory, but more importantly, you can directly
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experience the **Theatre**. See the section on **Presence** on how.
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[Global Workspace]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Workspace_Theory
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Volition (red)
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--------------
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There are three important aspects to **Volition** I'll have to explain. Let's
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start with **"Do It" Mode**. What I mean by this is the difference between
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experiencing something and doing it yourself. I'll just quote PJ Eby on this,
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who calls it "command mode"[^evo]:
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> Point your finger at the screen. How did you do that? Do it again. Try
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> something else. Make various motions with your body. Now just think about
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> making the motions. What's the difference between thinking it, and doing it?
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> *That's* command mode.
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>
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> -- PJ Eby, [The Multiple Self]
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[The Multiple Self]: http://dirtsimple.org/2005/08/multiple-self.html
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[^evo]: Evolutionary speaking, I think "stop pretending mode" would be a more
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accurate name. I'd imagine that at first there is a direct link between
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simulated events and actions, then later a switch is introduced so that
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events can be simulated in advance, or with different preconditions.
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The main drawback of my model is that it hides the bilateralism of the brain, as
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well as certain parallel structures. You might get the impression from looking
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at it that there is a single **Volition** center somewhere, when really, there
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are multiple ones with subtle, but notable differences. Don't think of every
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part as unique or isolated, but rather, a kind of job description that may be
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fulfilled (and competed over) by many applicants.
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Attention
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---------
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Presence
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--------
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Let me get it out of the way: **Presence** is the most important, yet hardest to
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describe part of the model. It is essentially the whole reason I wrote this in
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the first place. Almost everybody ignores (or worse, rejects!) the existence of
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**Presence**, and the few that I suspect mention it are so unclear about it
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that I'm never sure what they really mean.
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So what *is* **Presence**?
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Well, it's the *being here*. The *this gets experienced, not that*. The [quale].
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Not helping? I know. Let me instead say what it is *not*.
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**Presence** is not any kind of sense. When you observe your senses, you will
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find them united in a certain way, in what I call the **Theatre**. This is not a
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unity in **Space-time**, which is actually superimposed. That it is not spatial
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can be demonstrated by disabling it, as mentioned for example by taking shrooms.
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It is very common to feel like you are at multiple places at once or are stuck
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in a time loop and stuff like that, but the unity of the **Theatre** is
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untouched. When you concentrate further on the senses, you will find that they
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disappear. It is very much possible to observe an empty **Theatre**. At first,
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it will feel like empty, infinite space, but even the space will disappear. Only
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nothingness remains, but you are fully aware of the nothingness. (This is
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something functionalism or something like higher-order thought theory can in no
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way explain.) But if you keep on concentrating, something even weirder happens.
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*The nothingness disappears*. I'm not making this up. There is no perception,
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but also no non-perception, yet you are still conscious. In the metaphor of the
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**Theatre**, what happens is that first, the actors leave and the **Theatre**
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becomes empty, but the stage is still there. Then the stage itself is removed,
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so there's nothing in the **Theatre**, yet it is still there. Finally, we remove
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even the building itself.
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**Presence** is not attention. It is not focusing on anything, it has no
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content. It has no memory, it is not "attached" to anything going on in the
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mind. It has nothing to do with emotions or thinking or action or will. It
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doesn't make any decisions, but there is feedback. It is not epiphenomenal. It
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is also not subjective experience. **Presence** is still there during
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schizophrenic attacks, still there during deep sleep (all of which I can attest
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to). The problem is that **Presence** is not (and probably can not be) encoded
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in memory, so it's really tricky to find out if it was there in the past. You
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have to reproduce the experience and see for yourself, making a note *right
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then*, in some form or another.
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Let me give a metaphor I personally really like. Think of **Presence** as the
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sky. At first, you might think the sky are the clouds, but the clouds are really
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*in* the sky. Or you might think it is blue, but that's the light travelling
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through it, not the sky itself. It is impossible to pollute the sky. You can
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pollute the *air*, but not the sky itself. Nor can you send up a missile to
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attack it. It is untouchable, the ground on which all else is possible, but not
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directly affecting anything.
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Unfortunately, the metaphor is misleading because you might think of it as some
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kind of space. Like the mental space in which your stuff happens. This is
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conceptualization through **Space-time**, not **Presence**. If your mental
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events are reflections of a real world, then **Presence** *is* the mirror. Which
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color is it? None. Shape? None. Where is it? Nowhere. Does it still exist, can
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we still know it is there? Yes.
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[quale]: /reflections/quale.html
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Thinking
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--------
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I tried hard to figure out if "thoughts" should be here somewhere. I searched
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everywhere, but couldn't find any that very not actually heard sentences, seen
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images and so on. Therefore, there is no **Thought** in my model.
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I have united space and time as **Space-time** not because I want to brag with
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my understanding of the theory of relativity, but because I agree with Jaynes'
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assertion that time can only be spatially understood. I can't think of time
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except by treating it like space. Therefore, they are united. #REALLY?
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Comparisons
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===========
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Brahman
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-------
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There is a striking resemblance between [Brahman] and **Presence**. However, I
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am not convinced that they are really the same. Brahman is unconstrained.
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Everyone has the one same Brahman, separation is just an illusion. This *may* be
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true (in fact, I highly suspect it is and that everything, including rocks, has
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Brahman), but I don't have enough evidence for this yet. Therefore, I won't
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equate the two.
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[Brahman]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahman
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Buddhism
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--------
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In Buddhism, there are 5 canonical "senses" (seeing, hearing, smelling,
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touching, tasting) and there is additionally a consciousness *of* each of those
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senses. These 5 are generally grouped together and called "thought". This
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distinction is broken and better understood via shifting attention, as in my
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model. I have not been able to figure out what else thought is supposed to be
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than directed attention, so I did not include it. Therefore, I deliberately
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diverge from the Buddhist view here.
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Similarly, several senses and emotions (often all of them) are always grouped
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together, when they are clearly distinct. I have split as much as I could.
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One big advantage of Mahayana models is that they include **Presence**.
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Theravada rejects it, as far as I can tell. To be honest, most of the time when
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I *think* a Buddhist mystic is talking about **Presence**, they seem to start
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attributing things to it that it clearly doesn't have, like a content, so I'm
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never really sure if they are talking about the same thing or something closely
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related. And the more people "get" it, the less they seem to talk about it.
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Zennists often even outright refuse to talk about any of this. I find this
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completely unacceptable. This is the behaviour of a vulnerable child that
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doesn't want its comfortable delusions to be taken away, not that of a
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truth-seeker.
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Bicameral Mind
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--------------
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If you are familiar with Jaynes' Bicameral Mind model, then the early bicameral
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mind looked like this:
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[]
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while the subjective mind looks like this:
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[]
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Both modes fit my experience very well, which is why I included them. If you are
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not familiar with Jaynes' work, *you really should be*. I highly recommend it.
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% On Dukkha
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I experience no dukkha.
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=======================
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What is dukkha? It is one of three marks of existence, according to Buddhism. It
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means unsatisfactoriness or suffering, in the sense of an axle of a horse cart
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chaving against a poor hole, which is the origin of the word. Overcoming it is
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the whole idea of Buddhism, experiencing it is why the Buddha started his quest
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in the first place.
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I am not using a semantic trick. It is not an exaggeration, not a koan, nothing
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like this at all. I mean it, straightforward. **I experience no dukkha**.
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This is extremely weird. If I followed some common descriptions of
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enlightenment, then achieving it ends dukkha. Thus, if I do not experience it, I
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must be fully enlightened. I, however, do not agree with this and decided to dig
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deeper.
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Maybe I'm just mistaken? The other two marks of existence, anatta (no-self) and
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anicca (impermanence) are easy to misunderstand, too. So I got myself the
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Visuddhimagga, the (perhaps) greatest scholarly work on Buddhism, written by
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Buddhaghosa around the year 430. It describes, essentially, everything there is
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to the practice. All teachings and methods presented in a systematic
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fashion, including all the details and proper sources. I worked through the
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whole thing, memorized everything of merit, tested it against other people.
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I understand what dukkha is. I see it in other people, quite clearly. I cannot
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find it in me.
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The teachers cannot help me anymore.
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Not By Happiness
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================
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> In the Dhammapada it is suggested that, in order to achieve deliverance, we
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> must be rid of the double yoke of Good and Evil. That Good itself should be
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> one of our fetters we are too spiritually retarded to be able to admit. And so
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> we shall not be delivered.
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>
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> -- Emil Cioran, De l'inconvénient d'être né (english translation)
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Of all the things I believe or consider reasonably likely, one thing stands out
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as being extremely unusual. It is not [Trivialism], the [3 Jewels] or
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[Nondualism]. Those all have respected proponents or, at least, worthy arguments
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going for them.
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Tibetan Buddhists make me sick. Their culture is infested by messages of love
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and happiness. That which they call enlightenment is mindful heroin. It
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extinguishes their mind, leaving them, as the Actual Freedom folks call it,
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"happy and harmless". This is the worst state to be in.
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Let me illustrate the point. They are wrong about the meta-physical nature of
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the world. Choosing between love and hatred is like argueing whether it would be
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better to be eaten by Nodens, the Lord of the Great Abyss, or Nyarlathotep, the
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Crawling Chaos. It misses the point completely that *you are fucked either way*.
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Believing in any moral value misses the point that the universe is fundamentally
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empty and uncaring, that it has no goal, no judge and no purpose. If you care
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about happiness, piety, dignity, justice or freedom, then you fail to realize
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*where* you are! You are like the pagans living in Dante's Limbo, living quite
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happy lives, maybe not even aware that they are *missing the point of Creation*!
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Clinging to a life, no matter how happy, traps you further in Samsara.
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> I've yet to have an experience of any kind - game playing, sexual, food,
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> travel - where I said, 'This is the most fun I could ever possible have in my
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> entire life. I couldn't imagine, for one second, this being more enjoyable.' I
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> never said that.
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>
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> -- Gabe Zichermann, talk on Game Design
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I actually did. I managed to do exactly this, multiple times in fact. The last
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time I reproduced this, when I put down a video game controller and felt as
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happy as I ever could possibly hope to be, yet still unsatisfied, I knew it
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wasn't just a fluke. There's an upper limit to happiness, I can reach it any
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time and it still doesn't make the sucking stop.
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This was the turning point for me. I realized that I couldn't just "solve my
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problems" and live a happy life. I realized that it was fundamentally impossible
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for me to do so. Not officially, not consciously, but psychologically, I became
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a Buddhist this day.
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This feeling, this essential unsatisfactoriness, which Buddhists call dukkha, is
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what I think makes some people get the idea of enlightenment and others not. If
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you never felt it, you will not understand what it's all about. I don't know
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what actually makes the difference, what is necessary to feel it. Maybe you need
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to have lived a carefree and fulfilled enough life for long enough to max out
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your personal happiness (like the Buddha or I did) or maybe you need a special
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kind of mind to have the patience to actually optimize for happiness and fail,
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and have the clarity to realize it. I see no reliable pattern in the kinds of
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people to feel it, but if you do, welcome to the path. May it be your last.
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The best prisoner is the one that loves their chains.
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