Birth is a Rude Interruption of Eternal Consciousness

[RagAss]

I'd like to hear your thoughts on this.

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. It's a terminal disease

So far, no one has found a cure.

[FiveGoodMen]

2. I'd say that it was an interruption of eternal UNconsciousness.

And only temporary.

[Mz Pip]

3. Interesting idea

but IMHO if there were some "eternal consiousness" I would think that I would remember a few bits and pieces of it.

[RagAss]

4. Thoughts are a function of brain activity...no thoughts in pure consciousness..no brain there...

but it would be cool if there was....just to record the bliss.

[Chemisse]

6. It sure would

Half the fun of happy events during life, are the memories of them.

[Mz Pip]

8. Assuming it is bliss.

why would it have to be bliss? It could be boredom or terror. I am having a hard time wrapping my mind around the idea that there can be consciousness without thought. But then I am not particularly cosmic.

I can only hope that if there is some kind of consciousness without the body, it would be pleasant and interesting. Eternity is a long time to be bored.

[RagAss]

10. But it's thought that brings terror and boredom...awareness without thought can only...

deliver bliss. Thought is the function of a very small organ in a very small organism on a very small planet. If we confine ourselves to those limitations, we can never begin to see the truth beyond concept.....also known as Zen, Tao or Grace.

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. How do you know that "awareness without thought can only deliver bliss"?

Can you give an example of "awareness without thought"?

[RagAss]

12. Non REM sleep.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. Here's a list of non-REM parasomnias

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasomnia#NREM_parasomnias

Doesn't seem like inevitable bliss to me.

Would the (fully awake) state of, say, a dog, count as "awareness without thought"? I'd also say that a dog's life is not uninterrupted bliss. In fact, there's a saying that it isn't.

[RagAss]

15. The "arousal" is an interruption of Non REM sleep, correct?

Perhaps a better example would be for you to recall your experiences 5 years before your birth.

And I'm pretty sure a dog has some basic calculated thoughts designed to get a biscuit from me when the time "seems right". He never seems to fail.

[muriel_volestrangler]

20. Not only do I not "recall my experiences 5 years before my birth"

I don't recall my experiences 1 or 2 years after my birth either. So I'm no closer to seeing how you explain a bald statement that they were 'bliss'. I'd say the life of newborn babies isn't uninterrupted bliss either. They wouldn't cry so much if it were.

It's quite possible that being your dog is 'bliss'; but that doesn't mean it goes for all dogs, which will have as much, or as little, awareness and thought as yours. But if you don't consider that a suitable example, it's a bit of a dead-end argument anyway.

[RagAss]

30. I agree with you.

We cannot find this with mind. But we can take the words of those who most agree have reached this "turning of the mind" inward....

" Split-mind is composed of thoughts, and does not otherwise exist. Whole-mind is devoid of thoughts, and is 'real'. Therefore the splitting of the mind must be the division into two-sided thoughts, for whole-mind is the source of thoughts."

Wei Wu Wei - 1963

[Chemisse]

5. That statement would go along with a belief in reincarnation

So, just for the sake of a fun discussion, let's say we go to a different level of existence upon death, which is a pleasant state, or maybe even blissful.

Then let's say that we are reincarnated into a fetus for rebirth.

I would still disagree with the statement because, as the little brains begin to develop a consciousness - well before birth - that awareness would replace the 'eternal consciousness' and all that pre-reincarnation memory would be gone.

[RagAss]

7. And I would say we existed before the universe, as what we truly are.

identification with a separate being is the error. Duality needs an explanation - not non-duality.

[Chemisse]

9. "identification with a separate being is the error" - Exactly!

[tama]

23. Unless

remembering is the default state and brain development and linguistic conditioning is active forgetting, a way to not to remember? So that instead of just remembering also learning could happen?

Greek word for truth, a-letheia, means just that, non-forgetfullness. And if we translate 're-member' into Greek, we get 'ana-logy'. Maybe languages like Greek remember better than individuals, to remind?

Also, quantum decoherence is entropic loss of information, "remembering poorly".

[stray cat]

14. Death should be welcome then so one can go back to the "better" existence?

[RagAss]

16. Nah...enjoy the life illusion....that's where the fun is.

[darkstar3]

17. THAT is what has always scared me about afterlife believers.

The afterlife, assuming it is not reincarnation, is universally thought to be better than this life, so why not hasten the shuffling off of the mortal coil?

*shudder*

[RagAss]

18. Better and Worse ?...concepts...just thoughts. This is the Eternal. ...

You just need to see it by seeing beyond the ego of a seperate self.

[EvolveOrConvolve]

19. Huh?

Your word salad is lovely, but I didn't understand a word of it. The same goes for your OP. It's like talking about the magic unicorn that lives on a small planet in a galaxy 3 billion light years away. We can talk about it, but does it REALLY make any sense? Is that the best way to spend our time on THIS earth?

[RagAss]

28. HUH?

A far greater mind has tackled this question

http://www.weiwuwei.8k.com/wllxvii.html

[Mz Pip]

22. I have no idea

if there is a cosmic consiousness or any kind of before life or after life existance. I have no evidence that there is and no evidence that there isn't.

If there is, I hope I will be pleasantly surprised.

If there isn't, well, then that's that.

[RagAss]

25. There will be no "you" to be pleasantly surprised. The ego dies in this life.

[Mz Pip]

27. Too bad.

I like "me." So I'd like to think the "me" that has taken a lifetime to develop won't be gone in a flash.

[RagAss]

29. There will be no "me"..but there will be a YOU...You as what you truly are.

the undivided consciousness you came into the world with before you were "schooled" that you were a separate entitiy..and saw all other entities as separate and apart.

[iris27]

31. Meh, no thanks. Maybe it is petty and small of me, but if there's no "me"

that I can recognize as such, that retains the memories of my time on earth, then for all intents and purposes, "I" am dead.

[RagAss]

33. ...actually You were never born.....there was a misidentification with a body(object).

[iris27]

34. Makes no difference to this

misidentification.

[iris27]

21. I think none but a very cracked few (heaven's gate etc) REALLY think it's better, at least not

enough to overcome fear of death for. But that's why the Catholics made suicide a mortal sin...*just in case*, right?

[tama]

24. Fears

Overcoming fear of individual death is relatively easy, happens quite naturally for most parents who most naturally are ready to sacrifice their lives for their children. Old age and finding your peace does that too, etc.

Fear of eternal cycle of birth and death with all the suffering that never ends is bit harder to overcome. Eastern philosophies and religions are keen on facing and overcoming this fear.

Then there is also fear of power, of being too powerfull, too all-knowing etc., which is relatively common in "psychoses". It's the cure for magical power tripping when siddhis start to manifest, but of course some get lost in that trap for their while.

And fear of being alone, driven from the pack or tribe. Fear of not being loved. The cure for that fear may be not expecting love but transforming into love.

But what do I know... :)

[Silent3]

26. There's a big difference between momentarily overcoming...

...fear of death, and not having that fear at all. There's also a difference between acting so quickly and instinctively that you simply don't have time to think about what you're doing and its possible negative consequences to yourself, and not fearing death.

Parents might suddenly leap to grab a child running into the street and simply be unaware that they are about to be hit by a car because their focus is on the child and a different car, not the car bearing down on them. Noble though that might be, that's not a lack of fear of death, it's a lack of awareness of personal danger, and a fear of death where the death could be the child's death.

Parents might find their house on fire, be afraid their child is inside, and run into the blaze to try to save their child. Those parents are most likely quite afraid of death, and of living with pain and disfigurement as well, for both themselves and the child, but desire to save the child is simply stronger than the fear of personal risk.

It's the cure for magical power tripping when siddhis start to manifest, but of course some get lost in that trap for their while.

You know, you always use the dodge of talking about "possibilities" as if everyone who expresses doubt is adamantly dismissing "possibilities" (and oh, how you love to play that you're the one being truly "scientific" and rational because you're so "open").

Yet here you talk about "when siddhis start to manifest" as matter-of-factly as someone else would talk about "when the salmon swim upstream". This is clearly not merely entertaining a "possibility" that there is a real thing such as a "siddhi", it's going about your life as if it were a manifest fact that siddhis exist.

[tama]

32. siddhis are bitches

My analytical mind likes to make distinction between life preserving instincts and egoic fead of ego death. They are not the same but interlinked.

Whats the real problem with possibilities? Taking others into consideration. Are you solitary island?

It does not get easier, for the individual secluded "whatever". We are as we happen, feelings and all.

[Silent3]

35. And there you go again, matter-of-factly going on about "siddhis"

Rather than provide any evidence that they are real, you talk about what a "burden" they are. That's so convincing. :eyes:

Whats the real problem with possibilities?

No problem whatsoever. What's the real problem with some possibilities being rated as incredibly unlikely such that they don't earn the status of being matter-of-factly discussed as if their existence is established fact?

Taking others into consideration.

I'm taking you, and what you say, into consideration right now... and I'm finding what you say extremely lacking. A lot of puffery dressed up in bits of esoterica with little substance underneath, held together by wishful thinking, and spiked with disgust for much of modern life.

Are you solitary island?

No, I'm a salt water marsh.

[tama]

37. May I remind you

that after all, this is still the R%T forum, not private playground of materialistic atheists and skeptics of anything but materialistic ideology.

I do my best to build bridges of communication between spiritualism and science in dedicated threads, but could use a break sometimes from the most tiresome aspects of those discussions. Hope you understand. :)

[onager]

36. Birth is a rude interruption of oblivion.

But we go right back into oblivion after death, so no problem.