Please see An Introduction to the Mind
There are no external and internal worlds. There is only awareness surrounded by a thought universe and a physical universe.
You are like the awareness at the center of the universe that is made of layers of thought, energy and matter.
As awareness, you have no internal structure. You simply notice the thought, energy and matter surrounding you, and your natural impulse is to bring order to their chaos.
There never was a Garden of Eden. It has always existed only in your dreams.
There never was a fall of Man. Man has always been evolving, slowly but surely, with ups and downs.
The question is not “Who or what am I?” The question is, “Who or what am I identifying with?” “Am I living someone else’s life?” “Am I thinking like somebody else?”
It is an identification with someone or something that is usually the problem.
There is nothing wrong with being; but there is everything wrong with thinking that, in some manner, you are permanent or eternal. As awareness you are always changing and evolving. Of course, when you are not aware you do not know that, because there is nothing to be aware of.
Even when everything is changing, the dynamic goal is to have harmony in thought, energy and matter—in postulates, emotions and effort. That is the North star. That is where the bliss of existence is found.
When harmony does not exist there are anomalies. This is where mind enters the picture.
The purpose of mind is to resolve anomalies.
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Comments
So beautiful to look at this expression.Thank you.It really zeroed me in on the absoluteness of NOW in the now…..WOW!
What is neat too is when one forgets the concepts of you and me that stems from identification and separation the present becomes the heaven on earth or where ever and all activities are independent cycles with purpose so the anomalies are not being created through the mind…..the optimum climax or staircase to glory.
Oh so good! I see! when one is not aware…..he is the thing and the thing or mind routes him through the maze in bewilderment of his own confusion.
Questions:
1. “There is only awareness surrounded by a thought universe and a physical universe.” Are “thought universe” and “physical universe” truly a binary? I can certainly imagine analytically differentiating between the 2, but in practice, as I sit here responding to this post, I am only experiencing and reacting to a universe, and the distinction between inner and outer seems to be a product of mind.
2. “[T]here is everything wrong with thinking that, in some manner, you are permanent or eternal.” What makes it “wrong?” Is it that suffering is the result of this misidentification, and presumably, suffering is unwanted? Something else?
3. “[T]hought, energy and matter”: Is this sat-chit-ananda by another name? Existence (sat) = matter, consciousness (chit) = thought, and bliss (ananda) = energy?
4. “The purpose of the human mind is to resolve anomalies.” What do you mean by “purpose”?
I’m understanding “purpose” as “awareness of ‘voluntary activity'” (as per Rosenblueth et al, https://sites.evergreen.edu/arunchandra/wp-content/uploads/sites/395/2018/05/teleology.pdf). But that’s one definition. I like it because it doesn’t presuppose a purposeful conscious awareness that set the purpose at the start of a chain of causality, but only requires that an awareness, wherever it may have arisen, has become aware of the “voluntary activity.” The voluntariness need not be absolute and no statement is made about when the voluntariness began.
Deists might ascribe ultimate “purpose” to god as the causeless cause. But from what I’ve read of your work, I suspect that is not what you mean.
Let me answer your questions first.
1. In my framework there is only one universe made up of Thought, Energy and Matter that impinges on awareness. The division into spiritual and physical universes, or into inner and outer universes, is arbitrary.
2. By “wrong” I mean “inconsistent with reality.” Religions talk about soul being eternal. The idea, “I am eternal” is inconsistent with reality.
3. No. “Thought, energy and matter” are simply the three categories of substance. In my framework, substance is anything substantial enough to be sensed. I view “sat-chit-ananda” as “substance-awareness-oneness.”
4. I am using the word “purpose” in the regular dictionary sense. According to Google, “Purpose” means the reason for which something is done, created, or exists, as well as an aim, goal, or intended result.
I shall respond to the rest of your post separately.
1. I believe we’re in agreement on the arbitrariness of a division into inner and outer universes. The division makes some discussions easier, but it isn’t reflective of the ultimate state of what is. How can we know that the universe if made up of these 3 things: Thought, Energy and Matter? Why is that division not arbitrary?
2. How does one make the judgment that something is inconsistent with reality? Logic may be a tool for excluding some possible states, but is observation a tool as well? I tend to mistrust the senses and mind as relaying unadulterated reality to awareness. I ask not to challenge, but to understand. If pressed to say what I know to be True, all I can confidently assert is that “there is an experience.” Whether the experience belongs to a “me” is another question. I suspect my epistemology is the culprit.
3. I asked about this above, but are these objective categories, in that they are real, or are they categories of convenience useful for dialogue?
4. Does purpose require a source? In other words, who has the purpose? I initially wanted to phrase the question as “Does purpose require a sentient purpose-holder?” But I feel like too much is loaded in that phraseology.
As I wrote in my book POSTULATE MECHANICS,
“Our entire knowledge of the universe — every science, every philosophy, every map, every recipe — is ultimately built on what the body registers from the outside world.”
“Every act of understanding begins with a postulate — a foundational assumption taken as true, from which everything else is derived.”
Einstein equated energy with matter with his famous equation E = mc^2. This creates a similarity between energy and matter. As I understood that similarity in terms of sensing it, I realized that thought could also be a substance. At that time I was searching for an interface between Physics and Metaphysics. Suddenly, I found myself looking at the answer. Lot of things that I was puzzled about start to make sense. So, I adopted the following as a postulate.
“Substance is anything that is substantial enough to be sensed.”
This definition of SUBSTANCE does not exist in Physics, or anywhere else, but I wrote my first book on it.
You may access my book here.
Book I: Postulate Mechanics (Text Book)
Hopefully, this will answer your first question.
I think your questions 2, 3 and 4 are also answered in the book above.
Reading Postulate Mechanics certainly did answer all my questions. From what I can tell, we’re in agreement on many, if not most points. Thanks for pointing me that direction!
I shall like to know the points you don’t agree with. I may have something to learn there.
Excited to engage! I’ve never met someone who, like me, is equally steeped in Hinduism, Buddhism and Scientology, with some western philosophy thrown in as well. All have had a major impact on my spiritual life, but I wouldn’t identify as belonging to any of them.
To me, Hinduism, Buddhism and Scientology contain knowledge that I have to bring into harmony for myself.
I like the paper you cited. The authors define purpose as a present, physical organization of behavior toward a specified end state. I agree with that.
I’ve been diving into Cybernetics, of which that paper is an early example. It’s a powerful thinking tool.
Truth is relative. The criterion of truth is absence of anomalies. An anomaly (in its most basic sense) is a violation of harmony. Harmony is the ultimate state of the Universe.
So, the ideal scene of Truth is a state of complete harmony. You can sense that state. It is inherent to you.
We are in agreement far more than I realized. Your language sounds at first like certainty and objectivity, but I see that I’ve misunderstood. My take on Hubbard has always been that he professed absolute certainty, and I have generally ignored his certainty and asked myself whether his ideas are workable. I wonder whether I’ve misunderstood Hubbard in the same way I misunderstood you!
There is nothing wrong with having certainty; but there is everything wrong with ignoring anomalies. There is no certainty until all anomalies in an area are resolved.
As regards Hubbard, you just look at the anomalies he left unresolved, and then make an effort to resolve them.
I am interested in knowing what anomalies do you see in my work. That always helps me.
I have simplified an elaborated this post with the help of AI.