'downloaded brains'

NicoMoreno · Post by **NicoMoreno** » Fri May 27, 2005 11:17 am

Flyingcursor wrote:I'm still waiting for boosterspice.

That or the root. Although I don't really like the idea of being so smart I have no free will.

emmline · Post by **emmline** » Fri May 27, 2005 11:19 am

TonyHiggins wrote:Well, really, I've always felt an exact copy, no matter how good, is just a copy, and you'd be dead anyway. The copy would be someone or something else, even if it believes it's you. I figured on Star Trek, when they beamed someone somewhere, they were killing the original and a duplicate, who believed he was the original, took over.
Tony

I see. Then I submit that every time all the electrons in all the billions of your cells have swapped places with other electrons that were something else before being part of you--every time that happens as a complete cycle--you are not you, but a duplicate taking over from the one which gradually died off.

TonyHiggins · Post by **TonyHiggins** » Fri May 27, 2005 11:49 am

I see. Then I submit that every time all the electrons in all the billions of your cells have swapped places with other electrons that were something else before being part of you--every time that happens as a complete cycle--you are not you, but a duplicate taking over from the one which gradually died off.

I've thought about that. The thing is, if you were really yourself or a copy that thought it was you, there'd be no way of knowing the difference.

Have you ever thought about all the circumstances that brought about your existence, up to which sperm in the batch managed to fertilize the egg? If you were conceived a minute later or a day later, or whatever, would you still be you? Sure, you'd probably look different, etc, but would you be the same consciousness? Of course, there'd be no way to tell. The whole idea of self-awareness and the awareness of 'others' is kind of weird in ways.

I heard there is a Hindu belief that all our individual consciousnesses are being dreamt by the same god and our separateness is an illusion.

Tony

jsluder · Post by **jsluder** » Fri May 27, 2005 3:06 pm

emmline wrote:I see. Then I submit that every time all the electrons in all the billions of your cells have swapped places with other electrons that were something else before being part of you--every time that happens as a complete cycle--you are not you, but a duplicate taking over from the one which gradually died off.

And it's an imperfect copy, too. That's why we get old.

emmline · Post by **emmline** » Fri May 27, 2005 4:27 pm

Actually, jsluder, now that you mention it, I think you're exactly right. It is imperfect transcription that causes our decline.

emmline · Post by **emmline** » Fri May 27, 2005 4:34 pm

TonyHiggins wrote:If you were conceived a minute later or a day later, or whatever, would you still be you? Sure, you'd probably look different, etc, but would you be the same consciousness?

I think the consciousness may choose its incarnation.

TonyHiggins wrote: I heard there is a Hindu belief that all our individual consciousnesses are being dreamt by the same god and our separateness is an illusion.
Tony

I agree with that, but the dream concept is new to me. Neale D. Walsch's take on individual consciousness is that each of us existing gives god a manner in which to experience itself---we are "God godding."

jsluder · Post by **jsluder** » Fri May 27, 2005 4:41 pm

emmline wrote:Neale D. Walsch's take on individual consciousness is that each of us existing gives god a manner in which to experience itself---we are "God godding."

A similar idea was mentioned in the Babylon 5 sci-fi TV series. Living beings are the manifestation of the Universe (God, Creator, etc.) trying to understand itself. Interesting concept.

John

Jack · Post by **Jack** » Fri May 27, 2005 4:43 pm

Carl Jung believed something sort of like that.

Post by **Nanohedron** » Fri May 27, 2005 4:55 pm

I'm a bit uncomfortable with the paradigm that creation -and by extension, humanity- is "God godding", although I don't have a disagreement with it. I just take issue with what a lot of New Age "thinking" has done with the idea, that we are all God or gods. My little finger, for example, is no more "me" than I am God, even if I am an extension (for want of a better word) of Godhead. I do believe that God experiences creation through creation, but doesn't have to.

emmline · Post by **emmline** » Fri May 27, 2005 5:04 pm

I hate to risk being tagged as new-agey because whatever I think, it doesn't tend to come from trendy thought so much as from my thought--which, if it overlaps with trend, is mere coincidence.
I don't know Nano. I just can't conceptualize a god which is an entity discrete from me or anything else. I'm kind of an a-theist that way.

Post by **Nanohedron** » Sat May 28, 2005 11:52 am

emmline wrote:I hate to risk being tagged as new-agey because whatever I think, it doesn't tend to come from trendy thought so much as from my thought--which, if it overlaps with trend, is mere coincidence.
I don't know Nano. I just can't conceptualize a god which is an entity discrete from me or anything else. I'm kind of an a-theist that way.

Oh, I get you, all right, and I agree. I look upon everything as the Face of God, if you will. That New-Agey enuff for ya?

Just returning to my "little pinkie" analogy, being part and parcel of the Divine does not make me God as such. The only miracle I've ever accomplished is having survived so far. That's what I was getting at.

I could get used to omnipotence, though.

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sat May 28, 2005 12:50 pm

Nanohedron wrote:
Oh, I get you, all right, and I agree. I look upon everything as the Face of God, if you will. That New-Agey enuff for ya?

I'm not so sure it's new agey. In Acts 17 27-28 Paul says to the Athenians "...God is actually not far from any of us; as someone has said 'In him we live and move and exist.'"

Steve

TonyHiggins · Post by **TonyHiggins** » Sat May 28, 2005 2:05 pm

I'm a bit uncomfortable with the paradigm that creation -and by extension, humanity- is "God godding", although I don't have a disagreement with it. I just take issue with what a lot of New Age "thinking" has done with the idea, that we are all God or gods. My little finger, for example, is no more "me" than I am God, even if I am an extension (for want of a better word) of Godhead. I do believe that God experiences creation through creation, but doesn't have to.

That reminds me of the idea that I don't consider any part of me, such as my pinky, as 'me,' or even my brain as me. 'I' have a brain. I figure what makes me is all the parts together, self-awareness, continuity/memory, and perhaps, a 'spirit?'

So, 'God-godding' may work in terms of the whole entity, but each of us is like God's pinky, not the entire being. Put us all together plus the universe, and the awareness, etc, and we're God?? If God created the universe from nothing, can it be a separate thing from Himself?
Tony

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sun May 29, 2005 7:22 am

TonyHiggins wrote:
That reminds me of the idea that I don't consider any part of me, such as my pinky, as 'me,' or even my brain as me. 'I' have a brain. I figure what makes me is all the parts together, self-awareness, continuity/memory, and perhaps, a 'spirit?'

I have always considered this type of dualism to be a bit weird. As if there were a "you" who could stand aside from the brain and who was independent of it. I don't really believe that, but there is a sense in which we may be controlled and victimized by our own brain. Assuming one's self to remain relatively intact there are a number of conditions where your brain affects "you." Epilepsy, brain tumors, depression (assuming a neurotransmitter muckup) and so on. Some interesting cases were reported by Wilder Penfield during brain surgery for epilepsy. The patients were awake during the operation and Penfield stimulated different parts of the brain electrically. The stimulation would result in movements, memories or various kinds of experiences. The patients had no sense of willing these and were passive observers of, say, their own movements.

I googled "you and your brain" and got this page.

http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_pa ... argey.html

Steve