The Clockwork Universe & Belief Boxes, Dreams, Reality & The Self

The Clockwork Universe - Who are You in a Deterministic, Materialistic & Reductionistic World? (HD)

And the day came when man conceived of a materialistic, deterministic, reductionistic, objectively real clockwork universe made of space, time, energy and matter governed by fixed, unchanging physical constants and laws ...

In the words of mathematician and astronomer Pierre Simon de Laplace...

"We may regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future. An intellect which at any given moment knew all of the forces that animate nature and the mutual positions of the beings that compose it, if this intellect were vast enough to submit the data to analysis, could condense into a single formula the movement of the greatest bodies of the universe and that of the lightest atom; for such an intellect nothing could be uncertain and the future just like the past would be present before its eyes."

Microscopic particles that become atoms that become molecules that become macroscopic, perceivable, concrete, tangible stuff. Randomness and disorder that transforms into order that transforms into patterns that transform into self-organisation. Simple chunks of inanimate matter that evolve into complex, organised chunks of animate matter that somehow evolve into self-aware, conscious chunks of matter that are able to think, feel, experience, share, create, communicate...

Here we have an immense, expanding material universe that came out of a space-less timeless infinitely dense point of energy that came out of nothingness. An incredibly simple universe evolving into an incredibly complex universe that does so by just following a few deterministic, immutable physical laws. A Goldilocks universe that is able to convert disorganised bits of dead matter into self-organised bits of living matter simply because the conditions happen to be just right. A universe that sprouts life and consciousness, intelligence and technology without any reason, purpose or goal. A universe that comes into existence, changes, evolves and ends up observing itself just because it was meant to do so...

But the important question is... who are you in this universe? You are basically a rather insignificant collection of interacting particles in a vast, gigantic, purposeless, meaningless universe. A collection of particles that somehow, inexplicably became self-aware; a collection of particles that became conscious, started to perceive, started to think, started to feel... These particles don't just exist but, strangely, they have acquired the ability to have an inner experience: as a collective, they appear to know, to feel, to experience what it is like to be "you". However, in this universe, this differentiated "you" can only be the result of accidents coexisting within a landscape ultimately ruled by pre-determined physical laws.

You are a unique combination of atoms, molecules and cells... which is separate from other unique combinations of atoms, molecules and cells. But your uniqueness simply originates from mutations and combinations in a process that ultimately seeks no particular goal. You came into this world thanks to a long evolutionary chain which has no reason to be, no meaning, no purpose, no direction. You are a piece of flesh not only separate from other pieces of flesh but also separate from the rest of the universe; a chunk of matter who has developed an illusory sense of self, a non-existent "I". You are ultimately nothing but a collection of particles interacting with each other and the immediate environment, a collection of particles immersed in this vast, gigantic universe which obviously exists outside of yourself.

In this kind of universe, qualia and free will are just an elaborate illusion. Even your own consciousness may be an illusion. Physical matter and energy, the fabric of space-time, the laws of physics, the external world around you; all these are of course objectively real. These are the really real things. On the other hand, your own mind, your thoughts, your feelings, your phenomenal experience, your free will and your conscious intent, all of which you experience every single moment of your life, they are just epiphenomena emerging out of material particles and their physical interactions; they are subjective secondary events, they can be illusory, and hence they are neither reliable nor primary, they are not fundamental, not objectively real.

And what about your experience of time? There is nothing that distinguishes the present, the now moment, in the deterministic, reversible, symmetric classical equations of physics. Nor there is anything in these equations that singles out the forward direction of time as the only valid one. Therefore, if neither the arrow of time nor consciousness are fundamental, your experience of the passage of time can't be real either: past, present and future are composed of physical events which must exist all at once in this mechanistic, pre-determined block universe ...

Minds From Brains or Brains From Mind? Belief Boxes, Dreams, Reality & The Self (HD)

Do you believe that mind is reducible to matter and its physical interactions? Do you believe you are an insignificant bunch of atoms in a vast, meaningless, purposeless universe? Do you believe that consciousness or free will are just an elaborate illusion? Do you believe that you are a puppet on strings, a sort of automaton with no personal agency whatsoever?

Summary:

- The Clockwork Universe. Challenging outdated models of reality. Questioning materialism, Cartesian reductionism, Laplacian determinism, classical physics and local-realism

- The Belief Box: belief systems, dogma, outdated assumptions...

- The importance of valuing subjective experience, direct introspection

- Robert Anton Wilson: reality tunnels and belief systems

- Werner Heisenberg's & Erwin Schrödinger's thoughts on reductionism vs holism, consciousness, the Self, object vs subject, reality, the mind... Science and objectivation

- Bernard d'Espagnat: philosophers & scientists need to let go of outdated modes of thinking

- New metaphors: universe as a hologram, as a virtual reality, as a giant computer, as a simulation, as information...

- What if life is nothing but a very persistent dream?

- The stuff that dreams are made on... Lucid dreaming. What is matter, sensation or perception in a dream? What is the basis of sound, vision, touch or pain inside a dream?

- Dreamed reality vs waking life. What is the difference?

- Who am "I"? What is the Self? Consciousness, awareness, sensation, qualia, information...

- Minds from brains or brains from mind?

- Objects vs Subjects. Observer and observed. Where do we draw the line? Is there a definite line??

- Reductionism vs holism. Parts and wholes

- Point of awareness. Expansion and localisation of awareness. Experiencing somebody else's life, becoming one with others, with an object, with Nature, with the Cosmos...

- Altered states of consciousness. Dreams, meditative states, psychedelics, out of body or near death experiences, extra-sensory perception (ESP)

- Aldous Huxley. The Doors of Perception. Becoming one with the legs of a chair!

- Is personal agency and free will an illusion? Or perhaps the illusion is rooted in the feeling of separateness of the self?

- True nature of the Self

- David Bohm: Wholeness and the Implicate Order. Enfoldment and unfoldment. Matter, mind, consciousness. Fragments, separation, illusion

- Objectivation of reality. How we build conceptual boundaries which we then take to be real

- Alan Watts: what do we mean when we use the word "I"? Ego, environment, psychophysical organism, false sense of identity, the real Self, mystical experiences

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