"We must next comment briefly on terminology.[3] None of the metaphors currently in circulation for the sort of picture we are advancing is very satisfactory. James’s “transmission” idea connotes faithful conveyance from one place to another, which does not fully capture what Myers had in mind. The “filter” metaphor also seems to us inadequate, although it has gained considerable historical currency and is by now the one most commonly encountered. For one thing it shares with “transmission” the notion of something entering the filter on one side and coming out faithfully on the other (albeit disentangled from other components of the input), and for both metaphors this engenders a homunculus problem (see IM, pp. 606–607). More contemporary technological metaphors picturing the brain as an antenna, a TV set, or radio receiver, or a laptop or smart phone connected to the Internet or the Cloud have similar issues. Most importantly, all are too rigidly mechanical in connoting a system somehow designed in advance to let through specific types of subliminal materials or capacities, without transformation or distortion. Myers’s picture is much more fluid and dynamic than that. He conceives the subliminal region itself as stratified in depth, but the “strata” are not quasi-geological entities, static, immobile, or rigidly separated by impassable barriers: “They are strata (so to say) not of immovable rock, but of imperfectly miscible fluids of various densities, and subject to currents and ebullitions which often bring to the surface a stream or bubble from a stratum far below” (Myers, 1892, p. 307). Note in passing that such a picture potentially explains, at least metaphorically, why material from the depths of the subliminal region often emerges in disguised or distorted form, cloaked in accretions deriving from more superficial layers.
What ultimately gains access to supraliminal consciousness is also determined by something much more complicated than simple movement up or down of a mechanical “threshold” or “barrier,” or the opening and closing of a Huxley-type “reducing valve,” something more akin to an overall change in “permeability” or “tuning,” which provides entryway or access to these normally inaccessible subliminal capacities and contents. These “openings” clearly must be tied, in ways we presently do not understand, to functional states of the brain. James’s alternative “permission” metaphor really comes closest to what we have in mind: the brain-based perspective of the early James and the more purely psychological perspective of Myers can be reconciled by thinking of dynamic alterations of brain function as somehow permitting various sorts of incursions into supraliminal conscious life from these deeper layers of the psyche, through some as yet ill-defined process of cooperation or resonance between psyche and brain. The broad consistency of such a picture with empirical realities such as psi phenomena, genius, and mystical experience should already be evident, and we will be developing it further throughout the remainder of this volume."
Beyond Physicalism . Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kindle Edition.
"The main common ingredient here, psychologically, amounts to “abeyance of the supraliminal” in Myers’s terms, or withdrawal of the mind/brain system from its customary “attention to life,” in those of Bergson (1913). From this point of view it seems natural to start by taking deep mystical-type NDEs occurring under extreme physiological conditions as the limiting case, and viewing various other conditions as approaching that limit from different directions. A recurring element from our survey above which seems to make sense in this light is the feature of variously altering, disabling, or intensifying executive functions normally associated with frontal cortex, which appears common to psi performance, creative activity, and mystical experiences induced by psychedelics, along with sleep and dreams, hypnosis, meditation, mediumistic trance, the acute phases of psychosis, and altered states induced by shamanic rituals. Note that this alternative conceptualization also potentially helps us understand the diversity of “triggers” for the ASCs [Altered States of Consciousness] of interest, for as pointed out by Paul Marshall (2005), doors can be opened by sledgehammers as well as keys, with results that are both similar and different in various ways (p. 275), and to vary the metaphor a bit, one can perhaps open a given door a little or lot depending on the amount one applies of whatever is opening it."
Beyond Physicalism . Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kindle Edition.
(2022-08-20, 11:10 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]"The main common ingredient here, psychologically, amounts to “abeyance of the supraliminal” in Myers’s terms, or withdrawal of the mind/brain system from its customary “attention to life,” in those of Bergson (1913). From this point of view it seems natural to start by taking deep mystical-type NDEs occurring under extreme physiological conditions as the limiting case, and viewing various other conditions as approaching that limit from different directions. A recurring element from our survey above which seems to make sense in this light is the feature of variously altering, disabling, or intensifying executive functions normally associated with frontal cortex, which appears common to psi performance, creative activity, and mystical experiences induced by psychedelics, along with sleep and dreams, hypnosis, meditation, mediumistic trance, the acute phases of psychosis, and altered states induced by shamanic rituals. Note that this alternative conceptualization also potentially helps us understand the diversity of “triggers” for the ASCs [Altered States of Consciousness] of interest, for as pointed out by Paul Marshall (2005), doors can be opened by sledgehammers as well as keys, with results that are both similar and different in various ways (p. 275), and to vary the metaphor a bit, one can perhaps open a given door a little or lot depending on the amount one applies of whatever is opening it."
Beyond Physicalism . Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kindle Edition.
I thought this quote was interesting as it held the mystical NDE as the transcendent/apex case, but I think this hierarchy may be flawed as I'm not sure how one fits reincarnation into this. It seems to occur in the normal course of a child's interactions, for example in this case:
Quote:William had birth defects that were very similar to the fatal wounds suffered by his grandfather. In addition, when he became old enough to talk, he began talking about his grandfather’s life. One day when he was three years old, his mother [Doreen] was at home trying to work in her study when William kept acting up. Finally, she told him, “Sit down, or I’m going to spank you.” William replied, “Mom, when you were a little girl and I was your daddy, you were bad a lot of times, and I never hit you!”
Tucker, Jim B.. Before (p. 2). St. Martin's Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
And in his past life, when he was a cop, William promised then daughter Doreen and now mother that
"No matter what, I'm always going to take care of you." (A phrase the now son continually says to his now mother.)
This suggests that the body/brain relationship to the psyche/soul is not simply the brain limiting a transcendent consciousness as it seems William was not in some altered state when he talked about his past life.
Also it seems to be the kind of love of one individual to another that brings the grandfather back as his daughter Doreen's son William, which IMO yet again challenges the idea that the individuals are illusory. One can claim these two souls bonded by personal love are themselves illusory, but this seems like a just-so story that IMO doesn't match the data as given?
(2022-08-21, 01:36 AM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]I thought this quote was interesting as it held the mystical NDE as the transcendent/apex case, but I think this hierarchy may be flawed as I'm not sure how one fits reincarnation into this. It seems to occur in the normal course of a child's interactions, for example in this case:
And in his past life, when he was a cop, William promised then daughter Doreen and now mother that "No matter what, I'm always going to take care of you." (A phrase the now son continually says to his now mother.)
This suggests that the body/brain relationship to the psyche/soul is not simply the brain limiting a transcendent consciousness as it seems William was not in some altered state when he talked about his past life.
Also it seems to be the kind of love of one individual to another that brings the grandfather back as his daughter Doreen's son William, which IMO yet again challenges the idea that the individuals are illusory. One can claim these two souls bonded by personal love are themselves illusory, but this seems like a just-so story that IMO doesn't match the data as given?
That seems to generally be the case with young child (approximately 2 1/2 - 5 yrs. old) cases, which are apparently the majority. Any good brain/spirit interaction model needs to take that into account, and it seems clear also that any good model of this must necessarily be somewhat complicated. It seems as if in these cases the spirit has brought over many memories of the previous life embedded in the structure of its immaterial "self complex", and the intricate body/brain/spirit interface mechanism is allowing certain of them through into conscious awareness. Or at least that is the kind of model that suggests itself to me.
Does any of the paranormal data bear on this? The Wilder Penfield epilepsy operation data seems to indicate that memories are at least mediated by if not actually stored by physical brain structures, since specific detailed memories (of the current life anyway) were found to be easily evoked by electrical brain stimulation of certain points on certain neural structures. Such memories are, according to that evidence, at least mediated by brain structure. I think they are probably actually stored in them for easy access by the conscious mind embedded in body.
My reasoning on this: in cases of stroke and senile dementias of various kinds (and even simple age-related minor memory loss) the patient typically can lose some or almost all memories. This could either be explained as decay or destruction of spirit/brain mediating interface structures in the brain, or of the memories themselves as stored in the brain. The Penfield data indicates that specific memories are evoked from specific localized spots on the brain, which implies that the data is probably actually stored in these structures.
In the young child past life memory cases generally the child is in a normal state of consciousness and awareness. So that would indicate that in these young child past life memory cases, the past life memory data carried by the spirit that merged with the child's brain and body was probably automatically transferred (or downloaded to use a rather crude analogy) to specific physical brain structures which could then send the data out into enveloping embedded consciousness using the normal in-body interface mechanism.
In other words, normally while in-body the spirit has to use this physical brain "portal" and storage system to access memories. In some altered states of consciousness but while still in body, the spirit can directly access soul memories held in the soul or spirit (for instance in some hypnotically induced past life regressions, when true past life memories are evoked). And something like this may also be what is happening in the rare cases of terminal awareness. Of course, when the spirit has left the body in the form of its immaterial mobile center of consciousness, the spirit can directly access memories, as stored in its own immaterial structure.
(2022-08-21, 05:00 PM)nbtruthman Wrote: [ -> ]That seems to generally be the case with young child (approximately 2 1/2 - 5 yrs. old) cases, which are apparently the majority. Any good brain/spirit interaction model needs to take that into account, and it seems clear also that any good model of this must necessarily be somewhat complicated. It seems as if in these cases the spirit has brought over many memories of the previous life embedded in the structure of its immaterial "self complex", and the intricate body/brain/spirit interface mechanism is allowing certain of them through into conscious awareness. Or at least that is the kind of model that suggests itself to me.
Does any of the paranormal data bear on this? The Wilder Penfield epilepsy operation data seems to indicate that memories are at least mediated by if not actually stored by physical brain structures, since specific detailed memories (of the current life anyway) were found to be easily evoked by electrical brain stimulation of certain points on certain neural structures. Such memories are, according to that evidence, at least mediated by brain structure. I think they are probably actually stored in them for easy access by the conscious mind embedded in body.
My reasoning on this: in cases of stroke and senile dementias of various kinds (and even simple age-related minor memory loss) the patient typically can lose some or almost all memories. This could either be explained as decay or destruction of spirit/brain mediating interface structures in the brain, or of the memories themselves as stored in the brain. The Penfield data indicates that specific memories are evoked from specific localized spots on the brain, which implies that the data is probably actually stored in these structures.
In the young child past life memory cases generally the child is in a normal state of consciousness and awareness. So that would indicate that in these young child past life memory cases, the past life memory data carried by the spirit that merged with the child's brain and body was probably automatically transferred (or downloaded to use a rather crude analogy) to specific physical brain structures which could then send the data out into enveloping embedded consciousness using the normal in-body interface mechanism.
In other words, normally while in-body the spirit has to use this physical brain "portal" and storage system to access memories. In some altered states of consciousness but while still in body, the spirit can directly access soul memories held in the soul or spirit (for instance in some hypnotically induced past life regressions, when true past life memories are evoked). And something like this may also be what is happening in the rare cases of terminal awareness. Of course, when the spirit has left the body in the form of its immaterial mobile center of consciousness, the spirit can directly access memories, as stored in its own immaterial structure.
Do you think computers store memories? Or just 1s & 0s that have to interpreted by an actual mind?
It would seem that the same issue would be the case with our own brains storing memories?
As you note in terminal lucidity the person is amazingly able to work around the brain's deterioration. It just seems redundant and even against the filter/transmitter model to consider that memories are physically stored?
(Admittedly there's also a philosophical argument against memories
being stored in brains by Stephen Braude and even the atheist neuroscientist Raymond Tallis...but I realize this sort of "abstract" argument has to be backed by data like terminal lucidity, deceased loved ones in the NDE, and children retaining memories of past lives + in between state to be convincing in this thread...)
It just seems to that reincarnation suggests a penetration from the spirit world to the mundane one. That said there does seem to be some kind of 'filter' mechanism as the children often seem to forget these incredible memories as they grow older.
(2022-08-21, 05:40 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]Do you think computers store memories? Or just 1s & 0s that have to interpreted by an actual mind?
It would seem that the same issue would be the case with our own brains storing memories?
As you note in terminal lucidity the person is amazingly able to work around the brain's deterioration. It just seems redundant and even against the filter/transmitter model to consider that memories are physically stored?
(Admittedly there's also a philosophical argument against memories being stored in brains by Stephen Braude and even the atheist neuroscientist Raymond Tallis...but I realize this sort of "abstract" argument has to be backed by data like terminal lucidity, deceased loved ones in the NDE, and children retaining memories of past lives + in between state to be convincing in this thread...)
It just seems to that reincarnation suggests a penetration from the spirit world to the mundane one. That said there does seem to be some kind of 'filter' mechanism as the children often seem to forget these incredible memories as they grow older.
Computers (and it seems, brains) physically store data that is ultimately just 1's and 0's, that to become "memories" has to be accessed and interpreted by mind. This raw data then acquires meaning and becomes what has been termed functional complex specified "information" (FSCI). For stored data to become memories and consequently FSCI, it must be linked to and be processed by consciousness
. The term "memories" inherently implies conscious awareness, knowing, mind, i. e. something remembered and known from the past; a recollection.
With terminal lucidity, the spirit may just have bypassed the physically damaged or destroyed neural memory storage, and accessed the knowledge directly from its own structure, as may happen with successful past life regression hypnosis during which the inductee is in an altered state of consciousness.
Maybe the truth about the nature of memory is only partially what is contended by Braude and Tallis - memories are both entirely and immaterially stored in the soul or spirit, and at the same time are selectively and partially physically stored as encoded data in the brain for easy instant access by the embodied consciousness. Braude and Tallis probably don't even consider the dualist sort of spirit/brain interface model I suggested.
(2022-08-21, 06:13 PM)nbtruthman Wrote: [ -> ]Computers (and it seems, brains) physically store data that is ultimately just 1's and 0's, that to become "memories" has to be accessed and interpreted by mind. This raw data then acquires meaning and becomes what has been termed functional complex specified "information" (FSCI). For stored data to become memories and consequently FSCI, it must be linked to and be processed by consciousness. The term "memories" inherently implies conscious awareness, knowing, mind, i. e. something remembered and known from the past; a recollection.
With terminal lucidity, the spirit may just have bypassed the physically damaged or destroyed neural memory storage, and accessed the knowledge directly from its own structure, as may happen with successful past life regression hypnosis during which the inductee is in an altered state of consciousness.
Maybe the truth about the nature of memory is only partially what is contended by Braude and Tallis - memories are both entirely and immaterially stored in the soul or spirit, and at the same time are selectively and partially physically stored as encoded data in the brain for easy instant access by the embodied consciousness. Braude and Tallis probably don't even consider the dualist sort of spirit/brain interface model I suggested.
But why are there two memory storage mechanisms, one in the brain and one in spirit?
(2022-08-21, 09:01 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]But why are there two memory storage mechanisms, one in the brain and one in spirit?
I think it is made essential by the high degree of intricate embedding of spirit in the brain structure during physical life. This intricate intertwining and embedding in the neuronal structure is so extensive that under these conditions the conscious mind, a combination of immaterial spirit and brain-generated data processing, is unable to directly access immaterial memory information which is part of the mobile center of consciousness. Or, at least, the psyche embedded in the brain can't access this immaterial spirit information instantly enough for the needs of physical life. So the overall design includes neural data storage probably in the cerebral hemispheres, as a sort of fast access memory store. At least a working hypothesis.
Cases of severe hydrocephalus where there is only a thin layer of neural matter despite retaining almost normal consciousness, would be where the embedded spirit has partially withdrawn itself from the body, but still maintains the spirit/body interface through neural plasticity. In these cases memory would mostly be maintained via the spiritual memory store.
Quote:Of the six, māyā, the sense of duality, is the most difficult to overcome, as it forms the foundation of the other five limitations. In practical terms, the subtle body is important here, because it functions as a vehicle for the partial release of the limitations, precisely because the subtle body, that component which transmigrates, is less closely bound by the five limitations than the physical body. Yet even though the subtle is not bound so tightly by time, for the subtle body māyā remains operational. So Abhinavagupta tells us that the subtle body “is like the physical body, but it does not have limitations in terms of its spatial dimensions” (ĪPVV 306). It also is not bound by ordinary time as the physical body is.
Quote:Abhinavagupta understands that the physical body is intimately connected with a deeper template, that of a subtle body that we possess. This subtle body, the sūkṣma sarīra, is a very fine body, an outline of a body, a mere template. He tells us, “in fact, this very subtle body is a mere sketch. The gross body is placed upon it, filling it out” (ĪPVV 336). So our physical bodies fill in what is a somewhat indeterminate template of a body, a very subtle noncorporeal body. This is in keeping with a pervasive principle in Abhinavagupta’s cosmology, an appreciation of the homologies between the material and the mental. The form that the physical takes is predicated on a prior, less determinate form. This element of indeterminacy, a kind of fuzzy existence, is an essential feature of the “subtle.” The subtle has a greater plasticity, a capacity to take on different forms because the indeterminate nature of subtle existence allows it a greater freedom to express a range of potentialities. As the body becomes less subtle, more gross, it becomes more fixed, less capable of the kind of plasticity that allows for siddhis, powers that demonstrate the supernormal capacity of human bodies, for instance, the power to fly or to read others’ thoughts (keeping in mind that for an Indian model, another person’s thoughts are the workings of manas, “mind,” which is a form of matter). This Tantric model, we should note, is not so far from a model presented later in the present volume (Weiss, Chapter 13)**. A great deal of Tantric practice is designed to bring focused attention to the subtle body, with the goal of using the subtle body’s greater plasticity to generate or exercise these powers, these siddhis.
Quote:The physical body is the abode of nonmaterial forces; it entails energies and deities, with particular psychological signatures. Especially the idea of deities as nonmaterial forces is not inappropropriate here—Abhinavagupta tends to gloss deities in this text as psychophysical functions, even with a fundamentally panentheistic theology. Brahmā, for instance, presents a fundamental creative capacity that humans can demonstrate (ĪPVV 308).[8] And again, what happens on the subtle level, in this case on the level of particular forces like the creative force that is Brahmā, is replicated in this mundane lump of flesh we think of as the body. The body functions as the material instantiation of particular forces. So, the creator God Brahmā is located in the heart, because the heart is understood by Abhinavagupta as the place in the body where we create ideas, and so on, with different signature functions making a ladder, both physically and metaphysically in the body. These several cakras lining up along the spine allow our physical bodies to manifest the energies of various archetypal forces or intentions in the cosmos, and they focally demonstrate the link that enables us to express heightened capacities, for instance, an extraordinary creativity by focusing attention on the cakra in the heart.
-Loriliai Biernacki, from Beyond Physicalism . Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kindle Edition.
**For more on Weiss' metaphysics,
see this thread but here's a sample ->
Quote:Up to this point, we have approached the topic of a new metaphysics from the bottom up—beginning with a definition of actual occasions and then seeing how to build an understanding of reality that not only includes the physical world familiar to science but also explains the existence of transphysical worlds. In this chapter, I will approach the subject from a different perspective—starting from our everyday waking experience and discussing what we call common sense.
In the modern era, conditioned by the ideas of the European enlightenment, the standard view of reality is based on two basic and, for the most part, unquestioned assumptions. First, that the physical world is the whole of the actual world; and second, that the physical world is vacuous—that it is not conscious, has no aim, and has no value for itself.
Following Whitehead, I reject both of these assumptions as fundamentally incoherent, mainly because they impel modern philosophy and science into the impasse of the mind-body problem and the quicksand of modern epistemology. If we view the world through the lens of those two metaphysical assumptions, we are effectively forced to conclude that we can never truly know anything about reality. Consciousness, and with it, knowledge, becomes incomprehensible at best and impossible at worst.
Clearly, we need a new set of basic metaphysical assumptions. And that is what we are exploring in this book.
From the apparently unaccredited summarization of Weiss's teaching about reality (at
https://psiencequest.net/forums/thread-e...it-aspects):
Quote:"One of Weiss’s central points in his presentation was that each of us lives in an imaginal body right now! We never leave our imaginal bodies even when we are awake. The way we see the physical world (which is, according to science, nothing but energies in a void) is the same way that we see things when we are dreaming – as a colorful, significant scene. Thus, we are already seeing the physical world from our astral bodies. When we die to the physical body, we find ourselves in the astral body, which we are already occupying before death. A simple way to get a sense of this is to reflect on the fact that when we day
dream, we can completely give our attention to it (we might even fall asleep). In this way we are accessing the subtle worlds just by shifting our attention. Thus, we are not leaving this world and traveling some where else so much as just shifting our attention to a world that we are always already embedded in. Likewise, when we dream at night, we just release into the subtle body that is always here all the time. We are already in it right now. When we die, we die into our various subtle bodies by letting go of the physical one."
Interestingly, this seems somewhat to parallel my cruder thoughts on the interface between spirit and brain and body, which were arrived at through reasoning from the paranormal data combined with intuition.