Clay Pigeon
Gold Meritorious Patron
I don't know how COB gets away with it. I thought "recovering" Marty would prove to be "the last act of a desperate man"
Is consciousness expansion dead?
- Thread starter Veda
- Start date
Terril park
Sponsor
Notice how quickly one reacts when accidentaly
putting a hand on a hot electric stove. The reactive mind isn't
always a hindrance.
strativarius
Inveterate gnashnab & snoutband
Sounds interesting Terril. Can you clarify for me what part the 'reactive mind' plays when one puts one's hand on a hot electric stove. Thanks.
JustSheila
Crusader
I'd like to believe that too, but like HH, I also trained at research and statistics and over the years the validity of most of what you see has gone down the toilet. The majority of research is sadly compromised.
Companies that would profit from selling a certain idea or product refrain from mentioning contradictory information simply because it's bad business. If that means they throw out an entire study to do so and re-design the study to get around that, then they do that. The study is left as incomplete or invalid so never reported. Usually it's the pharmaceutical industry that is accused of this, but that industry is far more regulated than, for example, alternative healthcare. The outrageous miracle claims freely advertised for basic vitamins alone is a good example. People are gullible, they believe all research is legitimate if it goes along with their previous ideas. The only way to see if a study is any good is reading the study itself, the peer reports and reports if the study could be and was repeated by an objective party.Some universities still conduct pure research, though. Australian universities like the University of Sydney have done a lot in recent years. But others just go with whatever is politically popular or financially lucrative. University departments want grant money. It could mean millions of dollars for them, and companies and corporations are willing to award that money for a product they can promote and sell for a profit. So most research is actually profit driven.
One great example is Bob Duggan. He's a billionaire now because he got grants for a team he set up for a possible cure for cancer using niacin in some form to develop Xcytrin, but nothing at all ever came of that supposed cancer inhibitor. It was a fail that was never approved by the FDA and never made it to market. That didn't stop Bob Duggan from getting filthy rich from research grants and selling shares of it, though, before he finally sold the company. Imagine that. Filthy rich from a product that didn't even work.
"Robert Duggan was enjoying just your average Tampa vacation--a visit to the headquarters of the Church of Scientology, to which he's a major donor, and a double date with one of the world's top supermodels--when a board member at Pharmacyclics PCYC +0%, a biotechnology company he had invested in, interrupted the party with some urgent news. The board was resigning en masse in favor of his slate of directors. Duggan, who had run a cookie company and pioneered startups in Ethernet and robotic surgery--but knew zilch about running a biotech firm--would take the helm.
That was in 2008. Six years later, improbably, Duggan is a billionaire. Duggan had made the investment in large part because of personal passion. Since his son had died from a brain cancer, "I knew more about brain tumors than the average guy walking down the street, because we had to look for support in handling his condition." But the brain cancer drug Xcytrin never made it to market." https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthe...e-will-long-term-success-follow/#64e4e1935cf6
https://www.drugs.com/history/xcytrin.html
"Nicotinic acid mononucleotide. Nicotinic acid ...... from the greater celandine plant), vitaxin (anti-alphavbeta3 antibody), XCYTRIN®"
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/WO2013067710.html
(Note: Duggan was also extremely fortunate when his team accidentally came across ibrutinib (Imbruvica) which they purchased from another company to continue its research, and ibrutinib actually works to treat types of blood cancer, but the original drug that Duggan got grants for and for which he started his company did not work!)
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JustSheila
Crusader
Hi Terril! <3
Reactive mind is a poor and inaccurate term for it, since reflexes don't even involve the mind at all, they bypass it altogether by relaying information directly through nerves in the spinal cord, but yeh, lightning fast reactions to perceived threats can be a very good thing.
Mimsey Borogrove
Crusader
You know - Jung called it the unconscious, then it was the subconscious, and then the reactive mind - perhaps it's the same thing? I was reading a bit of Jung, and he was saying - if you believe neurosis stem from the unconscious, shouldn't you be delving into the patients dreams? Or, he said, if you don't believe in the unconscious, is there any reason to believe in the validity of dream interpretation?
“My life is a story of the self-realization of the unconscious.” —C.G. Jung
"At the end of his life, C.G. Jung dictated to his secretary an extraordinary autobiography, “Memories, Dreams, Reflections,” whose first sentence we cite above. Earlier he had observed how human nature resembled the twin sons of Zeus and Leda: “We are that pair of Dioscuri, one of whom is mortal and the other immortal, and who, though always together, can never be made completely one. ... We should prefer to be always ‘I’ and nothing else.”
Here's the Buddhist view of it:
"The seventh type of consciousness (manas in Sanskrit) is described by Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh: “It is the number one discriminator, whose speciality is to say ‘This is me. This is mine. This is not mine.’ It creates belief in a self and distinguishes self from other.” Manas usually keeps a tight grip upon the eighth type, alaya (the All-base or Storehouse consciousness). A key feature of the alaya is that it stores seeds of delusion and habitual reactive tendencies, which can manifest dynamically in manas consciousness. In contemporary terms, we could describe manas as the “self-module” and alaya as the unconscious mind."
Maybe Terril is not so wrong after all......
MImsey
“My life is a story of the self-realization of the unconscious.” —C.G. Jung
"At the end of his life, C.G. Jung dictated to his secretary an extraordinary autobiography, “Memories, Dreams, Reflections,” whose first sentence we cite above. Earlier he had observed how human nature resembled the twin sons of Zeus and Leda: “We are that pair of Dioscuri, one of whom is mortal and the other immortal, and who, though always together, can never be made completely one. ... We should prefer to be always ‘I’ and nothing else.”
Here's the Buddhist view of it:
"The seventh type of consciousness (manas in Sanskrit) is described by Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh: “It is the number one discriminator, whose speciality is to say ‘This is me. This is mine. This is not mine.’ It creates belief in a self and distinguishes self from other.” Manas usually keeps a tight grip upon the eighth type, alaya (the All-base or Storehouse consciousness). A key feature of the alaya is that it stores seeds of delusion and habitual reactive tendencies, which can manifest dynamically in manas consciousness. In contemporary terms, we could describe manas as the “self-module” and alaya as the unconscious mind."
Maybe Terril is not so wrong after all......
MImsey
programmer_guy
True Ex-Scientologist
Heather Berlin: The Neuroscience of the Unconscious (45 minutes)
BTW, this is not like DMSMH.
BTW, this is not like DMSMH.
ThetanExterior
Gold Meritorious Patron
In the Hawaiian practice of Shamanism, named "Huna" by Max Freedom Long, the unconscious mind is known as the low self. The thinking person (thetan) is the middle self and there is a high self outside of this reality watching over us.
I've also heard the "unconscious" being called the "body intelligence" which seems to me to be a much better term than "reactive mind".
I've also heard the "unconscious" being called the "body intelligence" which seems to me to be a much better term than "reactive mind".
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Yes, I have similar opinions on this. Taking it as given that Scientology produces Clears and OTs, I always thought that Hubbard made a big mistake broadcasting the fact widely. If you can produce them, then you have no choice but to turn it into a secret society, and then recruit good, kind-hearted people with the right kind of attitude to others, simply by encountering such people, testing them out a bit to see if they are right for the group, and then clandestinely recruiting them. Standing on a street corner with personality tests is a recipe for getting taken over and closed down, if you can produce OTs.
I know Hubbard went on about not keeping it secret, the only way to ensure it continues is to broadcast it broadly, etc. That's fine in the short term, but it will lead to infiltration of the group, followed by a slow corruption of the materials, in the long run.
JustSheila
Crusader
When I studied Jung in the 70s, I really enjoyed his ideas, but he died in 1961, long before neuroscience had the capability of mapping out the brain and nervous system. That project is far from complete, but when neuroscience states it is a fact that reflexes don't even go through the brain but just the spinal cord, I accept that as a fact. That much, at least, isn't up for debate. Reflexes are part of the body's shell, it's machinery, so to speak, set up to have an automatic response to physical threats to survival. You wouldn't address reflexes with thought because they don't involve thought and never did.
It's not that there isn't any subconscious, just that reflexes are a mechanism apart from conscious or subconscious thought. They're just part of your body's function, a built-in mechanical reaction.
Programmer Guy, that video you attached looks intriguing and I can't wait to watch it, thanks! 45 minutes, though! I'd love to discuss it with you after I watch it but I won't get to it until later today or tomorrow.
Terril park
Sponsor
I haven't studied medicine or much biology. My
main input in this area is Hubbard who described it
as a stimulus response reaction, and said the same about
the reactive mind. He wrote that before later reseach
appeared to clarify this. PTSD is a mental reaction as
opposed to a physical reaction.
George Layton
Silver Meritorious Patron
How you going to sell it if you keep it quiet? I think hubbard understood the passion, vanity and built a system that enhanced a person's vanity but hid it's nature by espousing the necessity of saving humankind.
Which is the more arrogant, believing you have supernatural powers or believing you are a savior of humankind?
strativarius
Inveterate gnashnab & snoutband
Yes, and we all know what a learned man he was.
And I suppose the answer to my question is, no, you can't.
Yes, indeed. I was scratching my head (figuratively speaking) the whole time I was in Scientology, thinking "why did he design things THIS way". Of course, now I can paraphrase Hubbard's own lectures to explain why it didn't make sense (does anybody remember his lecture where he says that you would have a hard job understanding the government policy of a U.S. President who REALLY wanted to be piccolo player?). It didn't make sense because the goals that I ASSUMED Hubbard had for his church weren't his ACTUAL goals.
In fact, for a while when I was in Scientology I was half-expecting to receive a tap on the shoulder at some point, with my invitation into the REAL Scientology, now that I'd demonstrated that I was in it for the right reasons. The nonsense that went on in the church couldn't be the REAL Scientology - there must be a real, hidden version of it somewhere, by invitation only. Evidently not.
Also, if it's the reactive mind that's doing it, then a Clear would presumably burn their hand on the stove.
JustSheila
Crusader
I think I get what you're saying. Hubbard certainly promoted our being the elite and the only ones who understood the mind and the only ones who would be free of the trap, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. Naive as we were, we bought the propaganda at the time.
Then what you saw was a bunch of ordinary folks and you figured there was some clandestine super-group somewhere and were waiting for your invitation. Some people actually got those sorts of invitations from Hubbard and were thrilled to be some of the "chosen" for the original Sea Org.
Hubbard could sell. He talked big, made people feel like they were in a secret, esteemed group privileged with secret information and he created mystery - always with the carrot at the end of the stick.
Even in the 70s and 80s, people worked hard to get to Flag because they thought that's where the super powerz and the super beings would be.
All just a come on. Slick advertising. No super powerz at Flag or anywhere else in Scientology. What folks got from it they probably would have gotten in their lives without it, because that's how life is. It presents us with challenges and obstacles to overcome and if we don't get it the first time, we get it eventually. Or we don't.
Mimsey Borogrove
Crusader
I just started in on the video by Heather Berlin - I am about 10 min in and she has been showing some of those pictures like where you see a drawing of a an ornate goblet, or two faces looking at each other, her point being you can see one or the other but not both at once. I am wondering where her talk will lead, since this seems like left brain activity - the constant labeling of what we see.
Mimsey
Mimsey
strativarius
Inveterate gnashnab & snoutband
I know I've posted stuff like this before, but when I saw close friends of mine returning to London Org. from being aboard the Apollo or Diana (or whatever ship it was) in the late 60's looking confused and distressed instead of how I'd imagined they'd be, that is, enthused and gung-ho, I was quite confused myself. Of course, now that I've read about Hubbard's temper-tantrums and the overboarding of miscreants and the awful living and working conditions in the Sea Org it's not surprising that they seemed deflated, but I suppose I had all these 'hidden standards' about how things would be in the vicinity of Hubbard, with everything running smoothly and OT's zapping around the place making everything go right. Pie in the sky!
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Mimsey Borogrove
Crusader
Getting back to the question - is matter conscious - something occurs to me.
Dualism is the belief that we are constituted of two parts - mind - brain or soul - body the material - immaterial. When you think about consciousness - is it a result of synapses, neurons etc. interacting ? Or is the mind an immaterial thing that influences the brain?
Materialists argue the first, dualists the second, however they have a devil of a time explaining the immaterial portion, since it can't be measured. Hence the materialists seem to have won the day. But is that a false win?
If there are examples of the dualistic nature of man, would you believe them? Would you accept that as proof of the existence of the immaterial?
When you feel someone staring at you, and you turn to look at them, is that an example of materialism, or dualism?
Lets look at quantum mechanics.
Quantum mechanics shows that the observer can effect the outcome of the observed. Is that not dualism? What physical / mechanical connection is there?
How much of your day are you conscious? Unconscious? A vast part of your day is habitual. When you walk - do you think: I am going to put my right foot forward, and lower it onto the ground. No, you just walk. It's a habit. Virtually every thing you do during the course of the day is unconscious habits. What are habits? Unconscious repetitive patterns of action.
What about animals? Are they conscious or animatrons? Is your dog or cat conscious or a complicated machine made of flesh and blood? What about that fly trying to land on your breakfast? Could it be conscious, or is it an unconscious bundle of habits, choices innate within it, passed down through generations of flies? Could it make a conscious decision the bacon is better suited to it's needs over the eggs? Do all flies make the same choices of food to land on? Are they creatures of habit?
if we look at smaller and smaller divisions of mater, at what point does this ability to choose cease?
When an electron is attracted to one thing or another is that a choice or a habit? The materialistics would argue - no - there is no choice there - but yet quantum mechanics argues the opposite. They do appear to have a choice.
Hence, perhaps the stapler does have feelings of some rudimentary kind...
Mimsey
Dualism is the belief that we are constituted of two parts - mind - brain or soul - body the material - immaterial. When you think about consciousness - is it a result of synapses, neurons etc. interacting ? Or is the mind an immaterial thing that influences the brain?
Materialists argue the first, dualists the second, however they have a devil of a time explaining the immaterial portion, since it can't be measured. Hence the materialists seem to have won the day. But is that a false win?
If there are examples of the dualistic nature of man, would you believe them? Would you accept that as proof of the existence of the immaterial?
When you feel someone staring at you, and you turn to look at them, is that an example of materialism, or dualism?
Lets look at quantum mechanics.
Quantum mechanics shows that the observer can effect the outcome of the observed. Is that not dualism? What physical / mechanical connection is there?
How much of your day are you conscious? Unconscious? A vast part of your day is habitual. When you walk - do you think: I am going to put my right foot forward, and lower it onto the ground. No, you just walk. It's a habit. Virtually every thing you do during the course of the day is unconscious habits. What are habits? Unconscious repetitive patterns of action.
What about animals? Are they conscious or animatrons? Is your dog or cat conscious or a complicated machine made of flesh and blood? What about that fly trying to land on your breakfast? Could it be conscious, or is it an unconscious bundle of habits, choices innate within it, passed down through generations of flies? Could it make a conscious decision the bacon is better suited to it's needs over the eggs? Do all flies make the same choices of food to land on? Are they creatures of habit?
if we look at smaller and smaller divisions of mater, at what point does this ability to choose cease?
When an electron is attracted to one thing or another is that a choice or a habit? The materialistics would argue - no - there is no choice there - but yet quantum mechanics argues the opposite. They do appear to have a choice.
Hence, perhaps the stapler does have feelings of some rudimentary kind...
Mimsey
strativarius
Inveterate gnashnab & snoutband
I just want to pick up on what you said about cats and dogs.
Well, it's both isn't it Mimsey? Why do you think one would preclude the other?
I don't draw a distinction between humans and other animals. Practically all mammals follow the same body type - a head with an ear on either side of it, a pair of forward-facing eyes below which is a nose and then a mouth. They all have a body encasing a tube which runs from the front end to the back end through which food is taken in, processed and excreted etc. etc. By the same token, neither do I see see humans as being in any way unique as far as intelligence is concerned, it's just a matter of degree and environmental necessity.
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