Musing Our Existence

One of my blog readers wrote:

Do you actually believe in God? That amazes me. It’s a myth. There is no factual basis to the whole argument.

Here is my response:

For the record, there is no factual basis that anything exists. The world that you are experiencing is all happening inside your brain. You may think it is happening outside but that is an illusion. You have been “tricked” to think that. Everything that you think that you are seeing and hearing on the outside is really occurring on the inside. Your brain is the “creator” of the whole thing.

Since everything you are experiencing is internal, that means your world is 100% dependent on the condition your brain. Basically, the world is as your brain is. If you are depressed, your experience of the world is viewed through lenses distorted by depression. If you are paranoid, you perceive fear at every turn. If you are happy, your world is bright and cheery. If your brain is asleep, you miss the whole thing.

There is no factual proof that the world is nothing more than a figment of your fertile imagination.

Assuming the universe does exist, before we can know who its Creator is (or if He/She/It exists), there is one question that must be answered first. Who are you? Most people don’t have a clue who they are.

At first you may say that you are the left fielder for the Cleveland Indians, a fervent Republican who wears ugly plaid pants on the golf course, and a rabid eater of salami slathered with grape jelly. But that definition uses objects that are separate from yourself – the Cleveland Indians, the Republican Party, ugly pants, salami, etc. are not you.

My question is more basic.

Who or what is that which is at the basis of your knolwedge but is separate from those objects? What is the nature of that which experiences thought, feeling, sights, sounds, and the playing of left field? Most people are so caught up in the thinking, feeling, and perceiving, they don’t know who they are apart from all that activity. Most people go through life completely ignorant of their own essential nature.

Before you can even begin to understand who God is, you must start by knowing who you are. You must know the nature of your own consciousness. However, it is very rare that a person experiences his own consciousness when all mental activity ceases and, instead of being conscious of some thing, his consciousness becomes conscious of its own self. That experience is crucial to gaining complete self knowledge. (This is one wonderful reason why someone would meditate – to gain complete knowledge of his own self.)

When you have the experience of that pure consciousness (consciousness becoming conscious of its own self), you begin to realize that the basis of your individuality is actually cosmic. Consciousness (or one’s own self), it turns out, is universal. What you are at the basis of all thought and perception is an unbounded ocean of consciousness. When you fully realize your own self (Self) in this way, only then can you begin to know God. Only then would you be able to fully appreciate the personal aspect(s) of God and only then would you be able to merge with the impersonal aspect of God.

Until then, any knowledge someone may think he has would be based on ignorance of his own self. And ignorance, by definition, makes a weak foundation for any other knowledge.

www.lazyway.net

Comments

[Adrian Savage]

Hmmm. This is a familiar argument, but it hinges on the belief that there is something separate from our physical bodies that is also "us." A recent article in The New Yorker showed there's no evidence to support such a belief, though it's extremely common.

Of course nothing is provable in any absolute sense, but some things are plenty real enough for all practical purposes. Try not believing in the force of gravity! The essential difference between a belief (including any religious belief) and a "fact" is this: facts are supported by directly observable evidence that can be repeated at will. Beliefs are ideas people espouse without such evidence. Some, in time, are either confirmed (and become "facts") or disproved (and become "myths"). Most stay as they are: things people accept without evidence because they want to.

Does God exist? Who knows? Those who say He (or She) does cannot produce evidence on demand to prove it; those who say God is a myth cannot produce conclusive evidence to refute belief. In the end, it's a pointless question, as is whether or not human beings have souls.

[Mike]

Reminds me of this:

http://psyphz.psych.wisc.edu/web/News/Time_Jan06.html

"How to Get Smarter, One Breath at a Time -
Scientists find that meditation not only reduces stress but also reshapes the brain"

[Archana Bahuguna]

"Who or what is that which is at the basis of your knolwedge but is separate from those objects?"

Agree. I had similar thoughts after being exposed to Vipassana meditation. When we sit for Vipassana and gradually take our attention to various parts of our body, we begin to feel subtle vibrations/sensations in our body all over due to increased awareness - those which we never feel during our normal day because of the low levels of consciousness we tend to have about ourselves. After I started feeling those sensations, the next question that came to my mind was - Who are you? Is it that you can only feel sensations on your part of the body because you are "separate" from "others"? or is it because your level of consciousness is so low that you cannot feel the "others" and in reality "they" and "you" are much the same. And lots of such questions ...

[Philip Stanley]

"...hinges on the belief that there is something separate from our physical bodies that is also "us." "

Adrian, try: "it" is also our physical bodies!

[Passerby]

Interesting. It could be that we are actually being manipulated by many other scientists, informing us, using us for experiments. However, that could also be something of an overavtice imagination, lol. Just wondering, what motivates you to live?

[Evelyn]

You're begging the question.

"Assuming the universe does exist, before we can know who its Creator is (or if He/She/It exists), there is one question that must be answered first."

You belive in God because you belive in God.

It's irrational for you to claim anything else, no matter how much dust you can raise.

[Rachel]

It's tempting for me to copy and post Robert Fritz's latest e-newsletter (he authored 1989's The Path of Least Resistence; Learning to Become the Dominant Creative Force in Your Own Life). But I imagined the correspondence back and forth with robertfritz.com people and, being studiously lazy, decided against it.

I'll just invite readers to check out www.robertfritz.com and read his latest e newsletter (you may have to susbscribe if it's not readily posted - it's free and worth it). It is quite pertinent to Fred's thread here and includes a fascinating JFK quote which I can insert:

"The artist, faithful to his personal vision of reality, becomes the last champion of the individual mind and sensibility against an intrusive society and an offensive state."

JFK

The rest of his post causes me to wonder if Fritz is a Fred fan. In a good way.

This way, I won't step on anyone's toes with cut and copy.

[Andre in LA]

Fred, man... God is a very personal matter. I doubt it was meditation practitioners who invented the notion of God. I agree that practicing meditation gives me a glimpse of an experience of "It" - Self/Consciousness/Bliss. But I know that this experience is a part of the human condition, not despite of it. I believe that non-practicing human beings also get a chance to experiencing their higher Self, experiencing higher love, experiencing "It."

The practice is just a proven method for the more committed of us. But the "knowledge" is not reserved for "the chosen" - it is built in us - live, human, beings.

In my world God is more like gravity, or the very fabric of the universe, or, maybe, the consciousness we channel fro and through our physycal bodies. Still, others get to choose their experience. We can say that "I am my mind" - type people refuse to look/listen for "It." - thus choosing a certain kind of existence, a certain kind of life.

The mind's intellectual constructions and logical take on this phenomena are useless, a waste of time, I would even say, poisonous to living the phenomena... I get to either choose to attempt an experience or choose to not attempt it - talking / thinking about it is not and never will be the experience.

You know, like, practice - pain, anger, grief, fear, joy or love. In this moment.

Cheers -- Andre

[Nolan Eakins]

> For the record, there is no factual basis that
> anything exists. The world that you are
> experiencing is all happening inside your brain.

You just proved yourself wrong right there. You are invoking something on the outside, the brain, to prove that the outside does not exist.

I suggest you pick up Leonard Peikoff's book on Objectivism to correct your argument. Chances are the rest of this article will fall into place just fine.

I also suggest Gerald Edelman's "A Universe of Consciousness". It should eliminate some of the points that appeared in the other comments.

[rangarajan]

There is a related question; Why is it always NOW? There is a theory that life is like a movie and you are seeing the present scene. But why is that scene what you see now and not what might have happened ages ago or in future some time? Can you clarify from your meditations?

[perianwyr]

When you've learned how to fool yourself, you're in a pretty dangerous place.

[John]

How do you know that you know yourself?
How do you know that one cannot know anything?

[Pho]

Fred, you're smart guy. This kind of pseudo-philosophical babble is below you.

[Jack's Customized Fat Loss]

we just have to stick with our belief and forget about those people who questioned that belief, it is not for their own good it's for my own

- Jack Leak