Why does God not show him/her/itself?

Originally Posted by ketzer

Hmmmm....more of an aside then anything else (i.e. not trying to contradict here) but in reading this it struck me that I can in one sense answer yes to that question. My genes are a sifted part, a test sample, of a larger gene pool that all of humanity holds "in common". Within that pool, and now within me, there are genes that came about and were selected for during that time of the cave man. That part of me, that Id that I was born with, very much does remember being a "caveman", as well as times prior to and since. We human animals are formed by both nature and nurture. That nature side of us, though like all memory becomes a bit fuzzy as the years to by, goes go way back in time, even beyond the time when I could have been called a human. Though it is old and inexact, it still plays a major role in how I as a human view and react to my world.
That too is a delicious and wondrous thing to think about! We are in a sense, the result of all of life that has preceded us, and we carry a memory of it within ourselves. God, it can be argued depending on how one chooses to relate to that word and the science, created and continues to create all life on earth. Although my memory is fuzzy and imperfect, I do remember much of that, that is perhaps one place God be seen. I am both man (nurture) and God (nature), God shows up within me. Some people may find that idea a bit fishy, but then, I was once a fish and in part still am. Which reminds me, I need a shower... or maybe I should have a bath.

It depends on what you call memory. Apparently we have genetic memory not just in the way that physical characteristics are passed on but 'actual' memories. They're supposedly locked away in what was called 'junk DNA'. The Limbic System or the so-called 'lizard brain' is responsible for the fight-or-flight mechanism and it's still 'active', and we've had it since the caveman days. It was possible it was active in you when you wrote that post, I guess you didn't see me as a threat so you decided to reply. If you had thought "Hmmm that Greeny guy looks scary" then you might not have, and so a remnant of caveman days would have affected your Spirituality. And the next time you have sex, remember that it's because of a prehistoric fish whose skeleton was found in the Shetlands, Scotland. It didn't quite work out for the fish and its branch died out completely, yet here we are.

Yes we are the 'end result' of all that has preceded us and in some ways that's pretty humbling, especially if we make comparisons between how our ancestors might have Lived then. I often go to a megalithic circle near here and wonder if my ancient ancestors built it - and why and how. Hauling over twenty tons of rock across that landscape and up that hill with muscle power took a bit of doing. I can't access those memories as much as I'd like to, but to even think that this is my 'heritage'.

Nature, nurture and us are all in a symbiotic relationship with each other and have been for a long time.

Light and dark are what Jung calls 'avatars of the collective consciousness', they're other remnants of the caveman days when light was good and dark - to not be eaten by lions and tigers and bears, oh my - was bad.

Originally Posted by Greenslade

It depends on what you call memory. Apparently we have genetic memory not just in the way that physical characteristics are passed on but 'actual' memories. They're supposedly locked away in what was called 'junk DNA'. The Limbic System or the so-called 'lizard brain' is responsible for the fight-or-flight mechanism and it's still 'active', and we've had it since the caveman days. It was possible it was active in you when you wrote that post, I guess you didn't see me as a threat so you decided to reply. If you had thought "Hmmm that Greeny guy looks scary" then you might not have, and so a remnant of caveman days would have affected your Spirituality. And the next time you have sex, remember that it's because of a prehistoric fish whose skeleton was found in the Shetlands, Scotland. It didn't quite work out for the fish and its branch died out completely, yet here we are.

Yes we are the 'end result' of all that has preceded us and in some ways that's pretty humbling, especially if we make comparisons between how our ancestors might have Lived then. I often go to a megalithic circle near here and wonder if my ancient ancestors built it - and why and how. Hauling over twenty tons of rock across that landscape and up that hill with muscle power took a bit of doing. I can't access those memories as much as I'd like to, but to even think that this is my 'heritage'.

Nature, nurture and us are all in a symbiotic relationship with each other and have been for a long time.

Light and dark are what Jung calls 'avatars of the collective consciousness', they're other remnants of the caveman days when light was good and dark - to not be eaten by lions and tigers and bears, oh my - was bad.

"It depends on what you call memory. Apparently we have genetic memory not just in the way that physical characteristics are passed on but 'actual' memories. They're supposedly locked away in what was called 'junk DNA'. The Limbic System or the so-called 'lizard brain' is responsible for the fight-or-flight mechanism and it's still 'active', and we've had it since the caveman days."

Is this basically what we call instinct?
Or are you talking about memories similar to the ones based on the experiences of this life (i.e. like the little movies we replay in our heads)... as opposed to the reactions that instincts create?
Similar to the dendrite networks we wire together during this lifetime....but prewired before birth?

Originally Posted by ketzer

Is this basically what we call instinct?
Or are you talking about memories similar to the ones based on the experiences of this life (i.e. like the little movies we replay in our heads)... as opposed to the reactions that instincts create?
Similar to the dendrite networks we wire together during this lifetime....but prewired before birth?

The Limbic System is instinctual, it's an automatic reaction to the perception of a threat. What's also instinct is how we tend to gravitate towards what we like and shy away from what we don't like, which can include people or beliefs. The perception of a 'negative/toxic' experience is an instinctual reaction and not Spirituality at all.

I'm going to go back to what is considered as memory. Some would say that genetics - as in you having your father's nose - is memory because your body has 'remembered' the shape. The reactions instincts create is supposed to be memory too. For others, memory is the data from the five senses, experiences, knowledge..... Or all of the above, depending on your definition. The movies we replay are 'regular' memories that we revisit, as are reactions. They are what most people would define as being memories.

The genetic memory I was talking about here is 'regular memory', as in you being able to remember how your caveman ancestors saw their world and what was in it, how they felt when they killed that bison. It's now believed that memory is stored 'externally' although it's not sure where, and that the brain is more of a read/write mechanism than storage. If you're into head science then it might be worth checking out Hamerof and Penrose, who propose that your noggin is quantum-capable due to microtubules in your brain that are 'shielded' from the electrical activity.

[Moonglow]

Originally Posted by Greenslade

Greetings Moonglow

Glad to hear that you're still alive and kicking, the planet wouldn't be the same without you.

Science used to think that we held memories in our heads, but much of that is changing. How we perceive the nature of memories themselves is also changing, because it's not thought that we hold genetic memories that go back generations. Do you remember being a caveman perchance? It's also thought that memories are not stored locally, although it's not known where they're actually stored. The brain is less of a storage medium but an a 'management mechanism'.

We are conscious of our memories and since matter is 'solid' because our consciousness makes it that way.......

The brain processes signals in various way and we become conscious not of how they are processed but the 'end product' of that processing. Light hits the back of your eye and what you see is essentially what's called a bitmap, which is literally like an image that's printed on graph paper. From there it's flattened out but it's still a 2D image. From there it's divided into three parts. One part of the brain processes motion and that's the easiest data to process - it's a survival technique and most people are instantly aware of motion before anything else. The next part that's processed as colour, then spatial awareness. Each of those processes happens in a different part of the brain and at different speeds. In time, everything is stitched together and you see a 3D image.

Much of how we perceive reality is the same way, we don't see the reality but the result of the processing. Something similar happens with experiential reality, that is also processed in various ways - initially by the Limbic System or the so-called 'lizard brain' - it has as much to do with your Spirituality as your Spirituality does. If your lizard brain perceives a piece of information as a threat, it's ignored even if it's a great Spiritual truth.

Somewhere along the line, all of that 'mechanical' process becomes subjective experience. When things that happen to us beyond our control, is that God's will or are we just looking for agency - as in 'something' that makes things happen?

We know that our thoughts affect so many things in our Lives, and people can become their illnesses. The power of the mind is so great that thoughts can actually change our physical bodies and not just on an energetic level.

All of the processes that happen to us are in a constant feedback loop with each other. Yes all those aspects of ourselves are connected but not just connected, they are in symbiotic relationships with each other. And we as a mechanism are in symbiotic relationships with other mechanisms, which is then fed into the various internal processing mechanisms. Round and round she goes and where she stops, nobody knows.

As humans we have basic questions that we don't even know we have, and sometimes people find ways to address those questions. "Who am I?" "Why am I here?" "What is my place in this Universe?" If you look at Spirituality, sometimes you'll see one or more of those questions coming through because they are fundamental to Spirituality. Yes people are talking about ideologies and theologies but there's something underpinning all that. Are they trying to understand themselves - and that question is very relevant to the question of who/what is God. Our relationship with God is a reflection of the relationship we have with ourselves.

Delicious, quite delicious.

Hi Greenslade,

Yes, we have the physical processes that go on through the interactions between our physical (body) and suggest energenic body Which seem to form with in oneself a sense of the environment and perspectives, as well as perceptions.

The interesting parts, for me, in how experiences of these interactions with the environment and others are store with in our makeup. Which may be defined as memories. That memories are not only stored with in the brain, but with in the body and energy field of our make up as well. Some may be inheirited through ones make up as well. Still being explored.

This mind, body, spirit connection is well reflected when looking at/studying and experiencing work done through such modalities as Massage Therapy, Reiki, Shiatsu, and other body/energy work/therapy. Whether one "buys" into these as being "real" or effective seems based upon how familiar one is with these practices and personal experience, IMO.

None the less evidence is there. Personal testimonies as well as studies. Even some health care facilities are using some of these modalities.

So what does all this have to with God? To me, the experience and/or belief in a God or similar relationships not defined as God, may well be not only mental thoughts/memories, but physical and energenic as well, IMO But, the way it is coming to me is this God aspect with in us, belief and possibly knowing of a connection with our being to something beyond just our thought may well be with in our makeup as human beings. As you brought our genes, but also some things held with in our energenic field as well. Not sure, just proposing some personal thoughts here.

Just can not fully define or explain it. felt just the same in some manner and with in our makeup.

Yes, the mental thoughts being a by product or ways to process the information.
The sensation of God or however titled, is still there, still felt without any thought given, as well. Call it consciousness, life force, or whatever makes sense in this regard.

Yes, the relationships with God, everything, life here, the perspectives, and perception are affected by the relationship with oneself. It is all interrelated.
For me can not have one without the other. There is more then I may notice or be aware of going on. Even these have there affects and influences.

So, yes exploring God, the Universe, Spirit, and such, is also exploring ourselves.
To me, it is natural to ask questions at times? It shows interest and wonder. Right or wrong are perspectives and decisions made to evaluate possible answers and ways. Sometime it is merely exploring possibilities and different ways of viewing the same picture (so to speak).

What we find with in, reflected without. What is found with out, reflected with in.

Thank you

Originally Posted by Greenslade

The Limbic System is instinctual, it's an automatic reaction to the perception of a threat. What's also instinct is how we tend to gravitate towards what we like and shy away from what we don't like, which can include people or beliefs. The perception of a 'negative/toxic' experience is an instinctual reaction and not Spirituality at all.

I'm going to go back to what is considered as memory. Some would say that genetics - as in you having your father's nose - is memory because your body has 'remembered' the shape. The reactions instincts create is supposed to be memory too. For others, memory is the data from the five senses, experiences, knowledge..... Or all of the above, depending on your definition. The movies we replay are 'regular' memories that we revisit, as are reactions. They are what most people would define as being memories.

The genetic memory I was talking about here is 'regular memory', as in you being able to remember how your caveman ancestors saw their world and what was in it, how they felt when they killed that bison. It's now believed that memory is stored 'externally' although it's not sure where, and that the brain is more of a read/write mechanism than storage. If you're into head science then it might be worth checking out Hamerof and Penrose, who propose that your noggin is quantum-capable due to microtubules in your brain that are 'shielded' from the electrical activity.

I tend to believe that all events "exist", past present and future, within the block universe (basically similar to the Akashic records) and are equally real in the present moment. So in that sense they are stored "externally" for lac of a better word. We don't really create these events but download the story line and experience the branches we choose to become aware of within our consciousness. We more or less choose which of Everett's many worlds we will become aware of as we tune into the signal within the quantum wave function. The wave doesn’t really collapse, but it seems to for us as we lose awareness of the probability function and become aware of only one outcome...again and again as we read through the story making choices in the branching storyline along the way. So perhaps our fuzzy memories are just us looking backward at the collapsing wave and trying to figure out what got us to here. Which of course due to Planck's constant and Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, that looking back is never going to be completely reconstructable. We can never completely reconstruct our past from memories because we can never completely accurately recreate that past even if the accurate records exist in the block universe / Akashi records. In that sense it is not just our future that remains indeterminate from our point of view, but also our past.

I do recall reading about the microtubules and Hameroff & Penrose's ideas a while back. Didn't Hameroff have those cartoons on youtube where he was Dr. Quantum (or something like that),
I think this guy is based on Hameroff, but I am not sure...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXvHfCeXd5U
There are a ton of these Dr. Quantum subject vids out there, most are pretty good actually.

Anyway I have not kept up with it, but I recall thinking it was an interesting idea to bridge the gap between the "non-physical" reality of the quantum wave function, and the apparent physical reality that we experience post decoherence. One would think there has to be some sort of 'receiver' that filters out the information from the superimposed entangled quantum wave function to extract the one 'reality' we perceive in the present moment. I thought microtubules were a strange candidate at the time due to their other defined roles as structural components during cytosis and for cell locomotion. On the other hand, we once used vacuum tubes to filter information from radio waves and television signals to create those illusory realities, so perhaps it is fitting that we are creating and using microtubules as virtual receivers to filter info from quantum waves to create this virtual reality.
Next question I guess would be what do we use for a virtual transmitter as shared realities seem to imply feedback to the “reality stream“ data server?
I have not thought about this concept for some time, I will have to look into it and see where it has gone.

Originally Posted by ketzer

I tend to believe that all events "exist", past present and future, within the block universe (basically similar to the Akashic records) and are equally real in the present moment. So in that sense they are stored "externally" for lac of a better word. We don't really create these events but download the story line and experience the branches we choose to become aware of within our consciousness. We more or less choose which of Everett's many worlds we will become aware of as we tune into the signal within the quantum wave function. The wave doesn’t really collapse, but it seems to for us as we lose awareness of the probability function and become aware of only one outcome...again and again as we read through the story making choices in the branching storyline along the way. So perhaps our fuzzy memories are just us looking backward at the collapsing wave and trying to figure out what got us to here. Which of course due to Planck's constant and Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, that looking back is never going to be completely reconstructable. We can never completely reconstruct our past from memories because we can never completely accurately recreate that past even if the accurate records exist in the block universe / Akashi records. In that sense it is not just our future that remains indeterminate from our point of view, but also our past.

I do recall reading about the microtubules and Hameroff & Penrose's ideas a while back. Didn't Hameroff have those cartoons on youtube where he was Dr. Quantum (or something like that),
I think this guy is based on Hameroff, but I am not sure...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXvHfCeXd5U
There are a ton of these Dr. Quantum subject vids out there, most are pretty good actually.

Anyway I have not kept up with it, but I recall thinking it was an interesting idea to bridge the gap between the "non-physical" reality of the quantum wave function, and the apparent physical reality that we experience post decoherence. One would think there has to be some sort of 'receiver' that filters out the information from the superimposed entangled quantum wave function to extract the one 'reality' we perceive in the present moment. I thought microtubules were a strange candidate at the time due to their other defined roles as structural components during cytosis and for cell locomotion. On the other hand, we once used vacuum tubes to filter information from radio waves and television signals to create those illusory realities, so perhaps it is fitting that we are creating and using microtubules as virtual receivers to filter info from quantum waves to create this virtual reality.
Next question I guess would be what do we use for a virtual transmitter as shared realities seem to imply feedback to the “reality stream“ data server?
I have not thought about this concept for some time, I will have to look into it and see where it has gone.

The "hard question" in the scientific study of consciousness is how does a mechanical process become subjective experience? Events are mechanical, in that they happen physically. From there the senses send signals to the brain and the brain chemically and electrically processes those signals. That's common sense. We have a memory of those physical events happening, which is the storage of the facts - I give you the finger - and your perceptions - Greeny did it because he's an idiot and you've had an emotional reaction.

The 'hard question' is how does the mechanical process - from me giving you the finger to the chemical/electrical signals in your brain - become the subjective experience of Greeny being an idiot? Your memories are the observable fact that I gave you the finger and your own subjective experience of it.

The other problem is what is reality? Does reality still exist if we're not observing it or does it only exist because we observe it? Donald Hoffman says we create our realities as we observe it, and if we turn our heads the reality that was there at first ceases to exist = at least from a cognitive science perspective anyway. So the question now is did I give you the finger or did you create a reality in which I did? You certainly created your own subjective experience of it.

What Donald Hoffman also says is that we don't see reality as it is, we see a metaphorical icon on the desktop of reality. You look in the mirror and see a representation of yourself as seen through your own eyes, but that representation says nothing about your character, your dreams, your dislikes.... Everything that makes you 'you' is hidden. Similarly with reality.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY&t=601s

Staying with the science, all of time is happening all of time, so that means past and future are happening right here, right now, right aqlong with the present. And all of time affects all of time all of the time, so we're also talking about loops both backwards and forwards in time as we perceive it. Each individual moment is unique in 'history'. While we have a linear timeframe Spirit doesn't, Spirit can 'navigate' time and extrapolate timelines.

Perhaps the question is what came first, physical reality or consciousness? Does physical reality exist because of consciousness or are we conscious because of physical reality? If you think about dreams - which are 'pure' consciousness and haven't been 'filtered' - what we actually perceive is not the literal meaning but an avatar or a representation that is used to convey consciousness. You dream of a bird and it means you have a longing to soar high and be free. And the dream feels 'real and solid' at the time. Consciousness itself has no colour or shape, but now you are conscious of that subconscious longing.

The European Robin has quantum-capable receptors in its eyes that act as a compass, the earth's magnetic field causes fluctuations in the receptors and tells the Robin which direction it's heading in. We have a sense of smell dues to quantum interaction with our noses and what we're smelling. Nature has already put the mechanisms in place for shared/quantum entangled realities. According to Nassim Haramein we are in a consciousness feedback loop with the Universe, and if you think about it that's just what's happening already.

Is intuition and Gnosis (knowing without knowing how you know) quantum entanglement? Where did the ancients who 'built' especailly the Eastern religions get their knowledge?

Originally Posted by Greenslade

The "hard question" in the scientific study of consciousness is how does a mechanical process become subjective experience? Events are mechanical, in that they happen physically. From there the senses send signals to the brain and the brain chemically and electrically processes those signals. That's common sense. We have a memory of those physical events happening, which is the storage of the facts - I give you the finger - and your perceptions - Greeny did it because he's an idiot and you've had an emotional reaction.
The 'hard question' is how does the mechanical process - from me giving you the finger to the chemical/electrical signals in your brain - become the subjective experience of Greeny being an idiot? Your memories are the observable fact that I gave you the finger and your own subjective experience of it. . .. …

Sorry this response is getting so long but you are touching on some of my favorite subjects to discuss. It seems I am somewhat of a motorhead when it comes to this “reality” subject. I will take this in chunks, chuck one below, the rest will follow as time allows.

Consciousness is a “hard question” to answer from a materialism point of view. From the idealism point of view, mind and consciousness is the common sense starting point and the physical just becomes ideas within the mind. We do know that there is consciousness and mind, and we do know that everything we experience as physical is really only our experience of the idea of those physical things within mind. The materialist can't really prove the existence of anything material outside of mind. It bases the assumption of this external independent physical world on the common experience of the ideas of physical things reported by multiple consciousnesses. Even if it assumes the existence of the material, it cannot explain how the interactions of those materials can explain consciousness and mind (that hard problem you mentioned). These are some of the reasons I abandoned materialism for idealism a while ago.

That, and also because so many of the implications of relativity and quantum mechanics that seem so incomprehensible from the materialist point of view, become no big deal under idealism. I can create hypotheses and theories of reality under the idealism paradigm, including those that include space time and matter, much more consistent with scientific theories and observations than I can under materialism. Now of course idealism has its own problems as it can’t say where or how consciousness is or arises from either, all it can say is it is, which is true. Consciousness is taken as the given in idealism and everything else has to be explained as emergent. But it seems to me that quantum mechanics is starting to show that not only does matter (the what) arise into realized experience from potentiality because of (and within IMO) the conscious observer, but spacetime (the where) itself arises similarly as well.

Now admittedly all we have done is take the issue of how does the subjective experience arise from the mechanical and turn it around. Consciousness, with its subjective view of concepts, is already there. The question now becomes how does the illusory mechanical/physical arise within consciousness to represent those subjective experiences. That is something that we(science) are much closer to explaining, if not already there. Of course, we still have not explained the origin of consciousness, it seems to arise or exist outside of the physical system of experience that consciousness is currently creating and experiencing. This is generally the point where the philosopher will point to Gödel's incompleteness theorem and say, "perhaps such a complete understanding is not possible looking from within the system". I say, "IDK, but that seems like a pretty good place to punt from to me."

So, as far as explaining that hard question and its subjectivity, it remains a question in either idealism or materialism. But I think approaching it from idealism is a much more productive point of view. How does consciousness arise from matter? It doesn’t, matter arises with consciousness (along with spacetime).

As far as Greeny or anyone else flicking me the bird goes. These days I hardly even notice, maybe I am an A hole, maybe they are, more likely we both are……eh, whatever.

[davidsun]

Originally Posted by ketzer

So, as far as explaining that hard question and its subjectivity, it remains a question in either idealism or materialism. But I think approaching it from idealism is a much more productive point of view. How does consciousness arise from matter? It doesn’t, matter arises with consciousness (along with spacetime).

Maybe what is viewed as being 'physical' (or 'objective', or 'mechanical') is just what is intersubjectively 'agreed upon'.

According the Jane Roberts' Seth. TIME and SPACE are 'root assumptions": "Your idea of space and time is determined by your neurological structure. The camouflage is so craftily executed and created by the inner self that you must, of necessity, focus your attention in the physical reality which has been created. The psychedelic drugs alter the neurological workings, and therefore can give some slight glimpses into other realities." (quote from http://settheory.net/seth-creation - there's more interesting stuff there).

From Seth Speaks:

"Root assumptions are those built-in ideas of reality of which I spoke those agreements upon which you base your ideas of existence. Space and time, for example, are root assumptions. Each system of reality has its own set of such agreements. When I communicate within your system, I must use and understand the root assumptions upon which it is based. As a teacher it is part of my job to understand and use these, and I have had existences in many such systems as a part of what you may call my basic training; though in your terms my associates and I had other names for them."

and

"The entity, or the soul, has a far more creative and complicated nature than even your religions have ever granted it. It utilizes numberless methods of perception, and it has at its command many other kinds of consciousness. Your idea of the soul is indeed limited by your three-dimensional concepts. The soul can change the focus of its consciousness, and uses consciousness as you use the eyes in your head. Now in my level of existence I am simply aware of the fact, strange as it may seem, that I am not my consciousness. My consciousness is an attribute to be used by me. his applies to each of the readers of this book, even though the knowledge may be hidden. Soul or entity, then, is more than consciousness."

I recommend reading the whole book (free pdfs may be found online)

This 'view' presented suggests that The entirety of Existence/Creation is subjective - all perception and experience is subjective - there is no 'hard' problem or question, IOW.

Originally Posted by davidsun

Maybe what is viewed as being 'physical' (or 'objective', or 'mechanical') is just what is intersubjectively 'agreed upon'.

According the Jane Roberts' Seth. TIME and SPACE are 'root assumptions": "Your idea of space and time is determined by your neurological structure. The camouflage is so craftily executed and created by the inner self that you must, of necessity, focus your attention in the physical reality which has been created. The psychedelic drugs alter the neurological workings, and therefore can give some slight glimpses into other realities." (quote from http://settheory.net/seth-creation - there's more interesting stuff there).

From Seth Speaks:

"Root assumptions are those built-in ideas of reality of which I spoke those agreements upon which you base your ideas of existence. Space and time, for example, are root assumptions. Each system of reality has its own set of such agreements. When I communicate within your system, I must use and understand the root assumptions upon which it is based. As a teacher it is part of my job to understand and use these, and I have had existences in many such systems as a part of what you may call my basic training; though in your terms my associates and I had other names for them."

and

"The entity, or the soul, has a far more creative and complicated nature than even your religions have ever granted it. It utilizes numberless methods of perception, and it has at its command many other kinds of consciousness. Your idea of the soul is indeed limited by your three-dimensional concepts. The soul can change the focus of its consciousness, and uses consciousness as you use the eyes in your head. Now in my level of existence I am simply aware of the fact, strange as it may seem, that I am not my consciousness. My consciousness is an attribute to be used by me. his applies to each of the readers of this book, even though the knowledge may be hidden. Soul or entity, then, is more than consciousness."

I recommend reading the whole book (free pdfs may be found online)

This 'view' presented suggests that The entirety of Existence/Creation is subjective - all perception and experience is subjective - there is no 'hard' problem or question, IOW.

Thx DS

I have some links set up to some of the Seth stuff and have been slowly working through them. It says a lot of stuff I agree with, but I like the stuff that doesn't make sense right away. Most of my views just take the science and play with it and project it a bit beyond what it says. But that is limited so it is good to hear some of this type of material and wonder what it might be telling me or what direction it might be pointing toward.
As far as neurological structure determining our ideas of spacetime and matter, I would agree with that. However, neurons are made of matter and when we look at quantum mechanics it would seem that matter arises within consciousness to begin with. So perhaps what is occurring is that consciousness (or in Seth's terminology the entity that is conscious) is creating the matter that the neurological structure is composed of and shaping that matter into the neurons and dendritic networks of the human brain that shape the thoughts, feelings, and perceptions that we experience. Function arises from the forms and the forms arise within the consciousness of the entity/soul. From the perspective of soul, the human mind and its functions are just one more thing it observes along with the other forms it is creating within itself, only it is perceived as self where everything else gets perceived as other.

Originally Posted by Greenslade

What Donald Hoffman also says is that we don't see reality as it is, we see a metaphorical icon on the desktop of reality. You look in the mirror and see a representation of yourself as seen through your own eyes, but that representation says nothing about your character, your dreams, your dislikes.... Everything that makes you 'you' is hidden. Similarly with reality.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY&t=601s

I think I did run across Hoffman’s stuff at one time or another, or something like it. The idea that we did not evolve to see reality as it is, when you think about it, is sort of (un)common sense. The brain's job is to keep us alive, what it cares about is what gives it the best results expending the least amount of required energy. It must represent what it needs to, without wasting more energy on extraneous data and unnecessary resolution, than the amount of energy it is likely to take in through guiding the organism to find food…. while not becoming food. It is a question of the efficient use of neurons to utilize the energy needed for thought and perception.

As far as memory goes, it is a similar game for the brain. How to efficiently store lessons from past experiences to be used again if need be. Memory is not so much a recalling of facts, but the creation of a story to reobserve a past event and withdraw its subjective moral. What matters to the brain is the moral or message in the story. It need not store the facts that are extraneous to the point of the story for the long term as it can just make up those parts of the story on the fly. Over time the 'facts' of what happened keep getting switched out and replaced with similar facts as the brain recreates the event, making up the not so important parts that may have faded over time, and then storing those made up parts as the new ‘facts’ of the story. If you check out the series 'The Brain with David Eagleman' there is a segment where a researcher is actually able to plant a memory of an entire fictitious story in the mind of grad students by convincing them it is something that did happen but they must have forgotten and asking them to try to remember. So they go home and try their best to remember what happened, imagining it and filling in the details (facts) as they do. Eventually, that imaginary story they create to try to remember this event everybody else is telling them happened, ends up becoming the ‘memory’ of a ‘real’ event, complete with the facts that they imagined might have been that are now 'remembered' details. It is not as simple as I make it sound, she has to enlist family and friends in the conspiracy, but the point is that memory is just stories we keep telling ourselves so as not to forget the moral and its useful life lesson. The 'facts' just need to fit that story and illustrate that moral. This is what the subconscious is doing when we dream, this is what consciousness is doing on a far grander scale when we are awake. Making up stories with space, time and things, out of nothing, to explore the subjective morals of those stories through the experiences of life.

The other problem is what is reality? Does reality still exist if we're not observing it or does it only exist because we observe it? Donald Hoffman says we create our realities as we observe it, and if we turn our heads the reality that was there at first ceases to exist = at least from a cognitive science perspective anyway. So the question now is did I give you the finger or did you create a reality in which I did? You certainly created your own subjective experience of it.

So we are back to Greeny and his belligerent finger.
I get to decide whether Greeny gets to flick me the bird and Greeny gets to decide whether he flicks me the bird. Greenys bird is no different than Schrodinger's cat. Prior to my observation of it, the state of the universe in which Greeny’s bird is flicked is superimposed with the state of the universe in which Greeny’s bird is not flicked. If Greeny and I are entangled in our reality and he flicks me the bird, fearing crocodiles more than Greeny, I may observe his bird and remain entangled and so we go on taking turns co-creating a shared reality. On the other hand, maybe I am a bit of a sensitive baby and decide not to observe his bird, in which case, we can only both be right in two separate worlds, and so our entangled realities must split. Perhaps in the next moment, in my world I see Greeny crushed by a stray asteroid striking the earth conveniently on Greeny’s head. Not only does Greeny get what he deserves, but he is now no longer a conscious entity in the world (reality) that I am in. On the other hand, perhaps in Greeny’s world it is I who suddenly get eaten by a crocodile as Greeny holds out his finger and laughs. Point is, there are many worlds branching from each moment in time and our spirits need not follow the same branch.

All that said, the question remains, what is the underlying reality. The only sensible answer to that question that I can make up is, 'yes'. Whatever your consciousness is creating within itself is as real as anything else. Time, space, and matter, are all virtual realities constructed by your own consciousness interacting with the quantum field. Encoded within that field is all of that time, past present and future, that block universe, that as you say is happening all of the 'time'. It is the great virtual reality server that you put in your calls to and download the point in the 'present moment' that you wish to experience. You use that information to construct the 'reality' of space, time, and matter in your consciousness that you explore and believe to be ‘physically real’. It is very similar to what you do in your dreams, only you are creating this dream using the more complex data set you download by 'tuning into the signals within the quantum field'. If you, I, and enough others tune in the same signal at the same ‘time', ‘downloading’ the same information, then we say it is repeatable and consistent, so it must be scientifically real. Swap out our TVs for Matrix quality virtual reality simulators, and we would draw the same scientific conclusions about that experience, it must be real as we all agree on what we are experiencing. And like dreams, the information you download and the physical reality you construct is designed to represent underlying abstract subjective concepts your consciousness is exploring. The 'things' and 'events' that we experience in life are created as symbols and metaphors of wider underlying principles and concepts.

Where is the quantum field with its waves? IDK, but not in what we call physical reality, as the field is where the information consciousness uses to create physical reality comes from. At best one could say it 'exists' as an infinitely complex quantum wave equation in an imaginary place called Hilbert space. There, if one can use the word ‘there' in this case, it is 'outside' of our constructed reality system. The quantum field is just another thing constructed within our consciousness by solving that equation with respect to the variable of time. A representation of the solutions of the equation that we use to construct reality.

Under an idealism paradigm, where consciousness is fundamental, and spacetime and matter are not fundamental but emergent, the double slit experiment, including the delayed choice, and quantum eraser variations make perfect sense. This seems to me to be the conclusions of many of the great scientific minds of the 20th century, only you find them in their philosophical writings not in their scientific ones, because these conclusions fell and perhaps still fall outside the boundaries put in place by the scientific method.

Neils Bohr - ‘Everything we call real is made up of things that cannot be considered to be real.’
Einstein - ‘Time is an illusion, albeit a persistent one.’ ‘The field is reality.’
John Wheeler - 'It from bit.'
Erwin Schrödinger - “Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else.”

As I have said in other posts, in the end Willy Wonka was right, it really is a world of pure imagination.