The Red Pill
The Red Pill
The Red Pill
Or
An Information Systems
Analysis of Mind, Knowledge,
'the World' and Holistic Science
By John Ringland (www.anandavala.info)
Inspired by conversations with V (the devil's advocate) [2007/03/13-20]
Edited due to contributions from Glistening Deepwater [2008/04/9-16] - many thanks :)
Regarding feedback: This document is an ongoing work in progress and is constantly evolving as better ways to
express things are found. Feedback is an essential aspect of this process so please, if you feel like it, let me know
about your experiences reading this and any ideas that occurred to you (john.ringland@anandavala.info). It is
helpful if you let me know what parts you found unclear, unconvincing or incorrect. It is especially helpful if you
can explain why you found them so. Then I will take that into consideration. It is also helpful to let me know what
parts you strongly agree with, what parts were challenging, what parts you found irrelevant (unnecessary
complication) and any ideas you have to improve the accuracy and effectiveness of this discussion. Let me know if
it’s just feedback or if you wish to discuss the issues because I do not have time to answer all emails, but I take them
all into consideration. Oh and make the subject line clearly distinguishable from spam, otherwise it might
accidentally get deleted. If you feel like providing feedback it will help put these ideas to the test and clarify them,
thereby honouring truth. Thank you in advance.
See these excerpts from recent discussions about this document and the related ideas. It
provides a concise of overview of some of the key issues.
Foreword:
by Glistening Deepwater.
The subject matter covered in this body of work is at once subtle and dense, it makes fascinating
yet at times challenging reading. It discusses ways of potentially coming to an understanding of
the nature of the mind, the way we relate to each other and the world, and the fundamental
underlying nature of reality. Many comparative analogies, drawn from disparate traditions, are
brought together and clarified.
This work provides clear insight into newly developed tools that can be employed in order to
holistically 'get a handle' on the seemingly divergent scientific and mystical paradigms. It can
help one reach a point within ones self where these views come into focus in a unified and
coherent manner. It offers an opportunity for the seeker of clear and verifiable Truth to develop
the capacity to clearly apprehend that truth in their own way, whatever their background
knowledge may be.
Backed up by both rigorous and inspired scientific research and a wealth of references and
resource material, it gives a coherent overview of and method of transcending our current
limitations in understanding how it is we come to be what and where we are at this stage of
evolution, not just as a race but as a phenomena existent in the context of the universal whole. It
proposes a way forward toward a Holistic Science, one in which all genuine avenues of approach
to the truth are treated equally and with their due respect.
Whilst this work is extensive in its endeavour to elucidate ways of thinking about 'reality', it is
concise and presents us with valuable tools and insights with which we can nourish our own
understanding. It makes no apologies for being direct and it cuts to the core of some of the
deepest fundamental issues facing the world today; the 'way' in which we come to our
understandings.
Approaching this work with an open mind and a willingness to leave any preconceived ideas and
judgements to one side, one can potentially gain a deeper insight into the true nature of reality
and our relationship with it.
This is a sincere attempt to convey an important overview of the metaphysical situation that
currently faces us as human beings on this planet. I hope it helps to clarify many minds, as has
been my experience in working with it.
Namaste.
When we look at something we believe we are seeing some 'thing' "out there" but what is
actually happening is that information flows through the senses, it is subconsciously filtered and
interpreted to form a cognitive impression that is presented to the conscious mind. The conscious
mind succumbs to commonsense realism and believes that the cognitive impression is actually
"the world". So "with our thoughts we make the world" (Buddha) and the ego is the perceived
centre of that world around which we structure all of our illusions.
In the information theoretic and mystic paradigms, the ego, its countless ideas and beliefs such as
in "the world" have no existence beyond our cognitive impressions, but we unquestioningly
believe in their absolute reality and thereby operate in a self created fantasy world, which is just
the shadow of reality that is cast upon our minds. There is certainly 'something' real, but we must
overcome our reflexive beliefs to truly perceive and understand that 'something'. To confuse our
subjective objects of perception for being objective objects "out there" is commonsense realism
and it is inherently anti-skeptical, non-scientific and irrational because it is an unfounded belief
that we impose upon reality without any rational basis. We do so solely because it is
evolutionarily conditioned into the mind to provide for basic animal survival. However we are no
longer just individual animals, we have become a part of a civilisation that spans the globe and
our delusions spread and evolve throughout the culture and come to oppress us and the whole
planet.
Ideas such as the world, objects, people, places and events are useful analogies for referring to
cognitive impressions so long as one doesn't naively believe that they are "out there". Because
beyond the mind made world there is no such thing as "out there". The only reality is the flow of
pure awareness or the existential information process, which quantum physicists are only just
beginning to comprehend and mystics, visionaries and saints have known in various ways. In its
real nature it manifests as consciousness and it can only be truly known 'within'. All that we
think is "out there" is actually 'within' but in truth there is no inner and outer ,there is only
existence, but the mind creates an arbitrary division into inner and outer as an evolutionary
strategy. This arbitrary division underlies all dualistic concepts, especially mind and matter or
self and other.
What follows is ultimately just elementary psychology and information systems theory but the
implications are profound! Unless one overcomes commonsense realism one cannot begin to
comprehend the deeper information theoretic reality. Through a commonsense lens it would only
seems absurd or totally unrealistic because one's entire concept of what is 'real' is based on
confusing the objects of sense perception with the idea of ontological, separately existing
material objects. However commonsense realism is not trivial to overcome. The most common
method is to practice the process of letting the impressions arise whilst not believing in their
separate reality; this is meditation. Or with the method of jnana yoga (pronounced gyan), one can
subtly enquire into the nature of the self until one 'sees' through one's imagined self and realises
the divinity within all.
To totally understand this work one needs to see through commonsense realism, but to
effectively question it and overcome it one must be unfailingly skeptical and honest with oneself.
Any hint of cynicism or blind acceptance is the imposition of arbitrary beliefs that warp the mind
and make it virtually impossible to successfully enquire into the deep seated cognitive habit of
commonsense realism. Many people confuse the concepts sceptic and cynic so they are clarified
here.
"Some people believe that skepticism is the rejection of new ideas, or worse, they confuse
'skeptic' with 'cynic' and think that skeptics are a bunch of grumpy curmudgeons unwilling to
accept any claim that challenges the status quo. This is wrong. Skepticism is a provisional
approach to claims. It is the application of reason to any and all ideas - no sacred cows
allowed. In other words, skepticism is a method, not a position. Ideally, skeptics do not go into
an investigation closed to the possibility that a phenomenon might be real or that a claim might
be true. When we say we are 'skeptical' we mean that we must see compelling evidence before
we believe." (http://www.skeptic.com)
Hence 'skepticism' implies an open-minded approach whilst the manner in which the word is
often used implies a closed-minded approach. This is a confusion of skepticism and cynicism.
Many people dignify their cynicism by saying that they are skeptical but it would be more
accurate to say that they are cynical.
"Cynicism: An attitude of scornful or jaded negativity, especially a general distrust of the
integrity or professed motives of others."
(The American Heritage(r) Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton
Mifflin Company, 2004. Answers.com 11 Jun. 2006. http://www.answers.com/topic/cynicism)
A cynic approaches an enquiry such as this, irrationally convinced that it is wrong and that they
already know the answer. They interpret everything in the context of that agenda, subconsciously
desiring to attack and destroy the idea. If they argue their position coherently it can be useful to
have a cynic around for "destructive testing" of ideas, but generally they confuse the issue in
their mind and are resistant to any clarification, seeking only to prevent their unquestioned
beliefs from being questioned. Hence a cynic is fundamentally unable to undergo or comprehend
a paradigm shift.
But if you approach this discussion sceptically there is a great deal that can be learnt. It contains
some mind-blowing ideas (literally). As they flow through my mind and out my fingers they are
blowing my old paradigm into tiny pieces - dissolving everything and re-casting it into a new
paradigm or vision of reality. So beware if you are attached to your familiar world-view - you
will find this discussion threatening. Read this only if you are willing to question fundamental
beliefs and assumptions, and you seek a deep rational knowledge of your self, of the world, of
the nature of the phenomena and events in the world and how to holistically, harmonious and
effectively participate in reality.
"If we truely desire to understand the world, then we are forced to fight constantly for clear
vision. We must fight constantly against our expectation bias, against our human tendency to see
only what we want to see. Researchers who assume it's easy to avoid self-delusions and wishful
thinking... are probably the victims of self-delusions and wishful thinking. It takes quite a bit of
effort to avoid these pitfalls. The effort starts with a painfully honest self-examination, wherein
we discover just how large our personal capacity for self-delusion can be."
(http://amasci.com/weird/wskept.html) [FR]
This discussion touches upon extremely controversial and off limits subjects - subjects about
which there is extreme misrepresentation and misunderstanding. Subjects about which many
people have hard and fast beliefs and prejudices that they never dare look into and question. It
can be surprisingly easy for ones mind to just slide off the subject and avoid ever contemplating
it directly. Some people experience strong aversions toward such subjects and yet show neither
understanding nor any coherent argument against them. These ideas challenge certain core
beliefs that many people have not seriously questioned so they are unable to defend them by
rational means so their tendency is to retreat into denial. Be wary of these impulses in yourself
and be mindful of your responses. Peer review is a vital aspect of any scientific enquiry, for ideas
to be put to the test and found to be reliable or unreliable, but for this to occur people must
approach the ideas with a sceptical attitude.
The work says many profound things and is just one voice amongst many, if these things were
true the ramifications would have far reaching benefits for everyone and could help us
comprehend and avert major systemic crises. Given the vast potential benefit it seems that these
ideas should be made available to be independently and rationally assessed to either refute them
or to help subject them to closer examination. What is described is detailed extraordinary
evidence for extraordinary claims however one must clear away many illusions, such as
commonsense realism and unquestioned beliefs that cause the mind to slide off the topic before
one can comprehend things from a clearer perspective. Then the claims can be properly tested.
As you read through the discussion you will hopefully be able to identify the assumptions and
illusions, overcome the preconceived ideas and be able to contemplate the topic from a new
perspective that will make it much clearer.
There are many profoundly interesting and shocking ideas ahead however it is necessary to
clarify many things before certain ideas can be introduced. Even then many will have great
difficulty because this is a profound paradigm shift and old cognitive habits can be difficult to
even recognise let alone overcome. For some it is relatively effortless but for others there are
many subtle stages of deepening clarity before real understanding arises.
The subject itself is the essence of simplicity but because of the complexity of our ideas the work
must provide a very complex analysis to make it connect with our world of ideas. Also due to
countless trivial misunderstandings and objections raised over the years many stumbling points
have been clarified and made explicit, but this has caused the discourse to become rather
complex and detailed. Perhaps in the future simpler versions can be produced but until then,
apologies for the mass of details but this has been necessary.
The discussion may start off a bit too technical for some and it may get a bit too metaphysical or
abstract for others. It is primarily meant for people who are enthralled by the world of ideas
(intellectuals) and who are open to exploring its foundations and seeing 'beneath' the world of
ideas. It is particularly aimed at open minded, rational, and skeptical, scientists, philosophers,
intellectuals and theologians as well as open minded, rational, skeptical and enquiring people of
all kinds. It covers vast territory so much of it may be unfamiliar or may seem familiar on the
surface but be totally different to what you would expect. This discussion describes a paradigm
shift, so if you find parts that sound like utter gibberish or nonsense then this is because your
current paradigm is incompatible or even hostile toward the paradigm discussed here. There is no
question of being right or wrong, it is just a matter of understanding each other.
"I shall not commit the fashionable stupidity of regarding everything I cannot explain as fraud."
(Carl Jung [FR])
If understanding becomes difficult then just skim those parts you can’t understand and come
back to them later. The important thing is to absorb those parts that you can understand and to be
careful of judging things based on misunderstandings due to different associations with words
and concepts. In a paradigm shift many meanings subtly and radically change and one must
assess concepts based, not on preconceived ideas and beliefs but on their relations with other
concepts in the current discourse; it is a matter of learning a new conceptual language. By
looking at the glossary you can get an idea of the depth of the paradigm shift. You need to step
across to the other side to properly see the view from there; it may surprise you. Only then and
not before are you in a position to assess the paradigm rationally, sceptically and scientifically. If
you don’t cross the river you can’t know about what is on the other side.
"The reception of a new paradigm often necessitates a redefinition of the corresponding science.
Some old problems may be relegated to another science or declared entirely "unscientific".
Others that were previously non-existent or trivial may, with a new paradigm, become the very
archetypes of significant scientific achievement."(Thomas Kuhn)
It is the nature of a paradigm shift that it can shake things up and stir things into motion in your
mind; it can even slaughter your sacred cows and cherished illusions. This can be disturbing at
times, but this is cognitive growing pains; if you revere truth and reality then these pains are a
part of the process. As you proceed things will quickly settle and reform into a deeper and more
holistic understanding. Each time you experience something it is largely a function of your
current paradigm, which is the lens that you look through. So during a paradigm shift it is
important to use a cyclic approach. For example, after having read this document your
understanding of this paradigm will be much deeper and clearer than it was originally. Then
spend some time looking through this new cognitive lens at your world and reassess things anew.
Then return to this document (or other transcendent writings) and you will see it in a new light
and understand it on a much deeper level.
For those who are not technically minded you can skim or skip the technical discussions and read
the rest; it is all very simple and intuitive really - it's more about awareness than about intellect.
As the discussion progresses its format becomes less technical and once people are able to
understand the analogical language that is employed it covers all kinds of topics, shedding new
light on them. There are parts of this discussion that develop a rational argument that must be
followed through to be understood but most of the discourse is just many different ways of
saying the same thing. Towards the end of the discussion there are countless paragraphs that can
sum up the entire message contained herein but only if one has successfully shifted one's
paradigm enough to be able to understand them. For those already open to the paradigm
presented here they could just skip to the latter sections and see the entire message presented in
many different ways, each highlighting a particular subtlety but otherwise saying essentially the
same thing. But for those unfamiliar with the paradigm it may require many years of subtle
enquiry, growing awareness, personal growth and changing life circumstances before things
become comprehensible.
Through questioning and deconstructing fundamental assumptions and confusions then exploring
the ramifications of this the work seeks to motivate people to clarify and overcome these
distortions in themselves and the wider culture so that we can all better comprehend and
participate in reality. It does not propose any new ideology, grand theory or belief system, just a
'device' that can assist in clarifying understanding. After that, awareness and reality do the rest.
“Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart ... Who looks outside, dreams.
Who looks inside, awakens.” (Carl Jung [FR])
Introduction
Here we introduce one of the major threads that weaves through this discussion, first lets clarify
the concept of skepticism a little more. Skepticism has a specifically philosophical meaning:
"skepticism [Gr.,= to reflect], philosophic position holding that the possibility of knowledge is
limited either because of the limitations of the mind or because of the inaccessibility of its object.
It is more loosely used to denote any questioning attitude. Extreme skepticism holds that no
knowledge is possible, but this is logically untenable since the statement contradicts itself. The
first important skeptical view was held by Democritus, who saw sense perception as no certain
guide to objective reality. The Sophists were the earliest group of skeptics. Protagoras taught the
relativity of knowledge, and Gorgias held that either nothing could be known, or if anything
were known, it could not be communicated. Pyrrho, regarded as the father of skepticism, later
held a similarly extreme position, seeing reality as inaccessible. Arcesilaus taught that certitude
is impossible and only probable knowledge is attainable. In the Renaissance, skepticism is seen
in the writings of Michel de Montaigne, Pierre Charron, and Blaise Pascal. For René Descartes
skepticism was a methodology that allowed him to arrive at certain incontrovertible truths. At
the end of the 17th cent., Pierre Bayle skeptically challenged philosophical and theological
theories. David Hume, a leading modern skeptic, challenged established assumptions about the
self, substance, and causality. The skeptical aspect of Immanuel Kant's philosophy is exemplified
by his agnosticism; his antinomies of reason demonstrate that certain problems are insoluble by
reason. To some degree skepticism manifests itself in the scientific method, which demands
that all things assumed as facts be questioned. But the positivism [REF] of many scientists,
whether latent or open, is incompatible with skepticism, for it accepts without question the
assumption that material effect is impossible without material cause."
(The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Columbia University Press., 2003.
Answers.com 11 Jun. 2006. http://www.answers.com/topic/skepticism)
This positivism is a core belief that goes unquestioned throughout empirical science and it is the
philosophical foundation of empiricism [FR] and empirical science [FR]. It is this sacred cow of
science that is questioned here. The following argument and this entire discussion rest upon the
idea that reality has a processual [FR], information / system theoretic [FR] nature; that there are no
fundamental bits of matter that a priori (miraculously) exist in space and time and interact to
construct a physical universe. This outmoded idea is already proven false but it is so deeply
ingrained that it lingers on in the philosophical foundations of our thinking. Whether one thinks
of information, computation, pure awareness or abstract non-physical ‘physicality’ such as
quantum wavefunctions or strings or a unified quantum vacuum, these are all information
processes.
"Because it is now a scientifically established fact that less than 4% of the universe is composed
of matter as commonly understood modern philosophical materialists attempt to extend the
definition of matter to include other scientifically observable entities such as energy, forces, and
the curvature of space. However this opens them to further criticism from philosophers such as
Mary Midgley who suggest that the concept of "matter" is elusive and poorly defined."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism)
Many of the concepts in modern physics are not ‘physical’ in the traditional sense of the word;
whilst a wavefunction gives rise to the appearance of physical attributes such as mass or velocity
the wavefunction itself has no mass or velocity or any observable attributes; it has no empirical
appearance because it is ‘made of’ probability. A super-string gives rise to physical phenomena
but it itself is not ‘physical’ because it is an abstract information medium that represents
information using vibrational states. A unified quantum vacuum gives rise to physical
phenomena but it itself is not ‘physical’ because, by definition, the vacuum itself is devoid of all
physical substance; it is the invisible ‘stuff’ out of which every ‘thing’ comes and within which
all events occur, and that is exactly how a computational process would appear from within a
virtual reality [FR]. In this manner physicists have already left 'materialism' and the 'physical'
universe behind but have yet to explicitly recognise this fact.
"Let us now return to our ultimate particles and to small organizations of particles as atoms or
small molecules. The old idea about them was that their individuality was based on the identity
of matter in them...The new idea is that what is permanent in these ultimate particles or small
aggregates is their shape and organization. The habit of everyday language deceives us and
seems to require, whenever we hear the word shape or form of something, that it must be a
material substratum that is required to take on a shape. Scientifically this habit goes back to
Aristotle, his causa materialis and causa formalis. But when you come to the ultimate particles
constituting matter, there seems to be no point in thinking of them again as consisting of some
material. They are as it were, pure shape, nothing but shape; what turns up again and again in
successive observations is this shape, not an individual speck of material..." (Erwin
Schroedinger [REF])
So if it is the case that the physical universe arises from underlying non-physical processes, then
that deeper reality that underlies the existence of all things and underlies the process of
perception and experience is not accessible to empirical science by its very definition.
“Empiricists claim that sense experience is the ultimate source of all our concepts and
knowledge” (Rationalism vs. Empiricism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) [FR]) whilst the
existential process “underlies the existence of all things and underlies the process of perception
and experience”.
Naive realism [FR] claims that the objects of perception are ontologically real external objects that
the mind can directly grasp. Whereas phenomenalism claims that the objects of perception are
just that, they are perceptual constructs that form in the mind due to the incidence of sensory
information and the interpretation of this by the mind. "Edmund Husserl (1970), saw the
phenomenologist in Hume when he showed that some perceptions are interrelated or associated
to form other perceptions which are then projected onto a world putatively outside the mind."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hume)
"Naive realism [FR] is a common sense theory of perception. Most people, until they start
reflecting philosophically, are naive realists. This theory is also known as "direct realism" or
"common sense realism". Naive realism claims that the world is pretty much as common sense
would have it. All objects are composed of matter, they occupy space, and have properties such
as size, shape, texture, smell, taste and colour. [It is assumed that] These properties are usually
perceived correctly. So, when we look at and touch things we see and feel those things directly,
and so perceive them as they really are." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naïve_realism)
"Noumena (the ontological [FR] reality that underlies our sensory and mental impressions of an
external world) do not cause phenomena [FR], but rather phenomena are simply the way by which
our minds perceive the noumena... we participate in the reality of an otherwise unachievable
world outside the mind... We cannot prove that our mental picture of an outside world
corresponds with a reality by reasoning... [however] we can participate in the underlying reality
that lies beyond mere phenomena." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schopenhauer)
Empiricism does not question the nature of perception but takes it for granted and it uses the
objects of perception (which are mistaken to be objectively real objects) to construct the idea of a
physical objective world that is made of objects, which are actually objects of perception - in this
manner it is inherently naive realist. From this flawed conceptual foundation it builds all of its
later hypotheses. It proposes that the hypothetical physical universe underlies the process of
perception, hence one of the major paradoxes in empiricism is “how can the process of
perception, awareness and consciousness arise from the interactions of inert physical objects
(which are really just objects of perception)? This is a fundamental paradox that arises because
of assumptions about the nature of perception and the confusion between “objects of perception”
and the idea of “ontologically real physical objects”.
What is proposed is a rationalist approach: “Rationalists claim that there are significant ways in
which our concepts and knowledge are gained independently of sense experience.” (Rationalism
vs. Empiricism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) [FR]) In this way we can overcome the
lingering attachments to ideas derived from arbitrary human sense experience. Rationalism or
scientific realism is anti-empiricist. It essentially claims that the fundamental properties of things
are more real than their appearances in the mind. So frequency is more real than colour or sound
and wavefunctions are more real than particles or waves. So the informatic / systemic entities are
more real than their appearances in our minds. That which we experience in our minds is just a
cognitive reflection of the deeper reality. This should be quite obvious but because it challenges
certain core beliefs people’s minds have great difficulty in thinking clearly about this.
Here is an analogy to explain what is meant when stating that the existential process itself exists
prior to perception and experience. Consider a virtual reality world generated by a computational
process (the simulator). The computational process underlies the existence of all objects within
the virtual universe and it implements all interactions between these objects. Whenever a virtual
system perceives another system it is the computational process that underlies the flow of
information that implements both that which is perceived and the process of perception. In this
respect the VR universe is composed of information systems of some kind that appear as
physical objects (with attributes) in spacetime. These systems perceive things from an empirical
perspective ‘within’ the virtual world. But underlying these appearances of objects in space, the
actual reality is computational in nature. So you may play a computer game and know the game
space very well and understand the many objects and phenomena that appear within the game,
but you cannot comprehend the underlying computational process in terms of these objects and
phenomena because they only arise as appearances within the virtual world and they have no
meaning within the context of the computational space and the complex computational processes
that create and implement every aspect of the game world. This is just an elaborate analogy to
explain what is meant by saying that existence underlies the process of perception therefore a
perceptually based theory cannot comprehend questions of existence but only appearances within
the mind. The objects and the perceiver don’t miraculously arise from separate roots; they are
intrinsic parts of a computational process.
Rather than consider a world of separate objects we must eventually return to considering a
universe that is One and Whole, that is unified and coherent rather than fragmented and random.
"Indeed, to some extent it has always been necessary and proper for man, in his thinking, to
divide things up, if we tried to deal with the whole of reality at once, we would be swamped.
However when this mode of thought is applied more broadly to man's notion of himself and the
whole world in which he lives, (i.e. in his world-view) then man ceases to regard the resultant
divisions as merely useful or convenient and begins to see and experience himself and this world
as actually constituted of separately existing fragments. What is needed is a relativistic theory,
to give up altogether the notion that the world is constituted of basic objects or building blocks.
Rather one has to view the world in terms of universal flux of events and processes." (David
Bohm [REF])
Because of the fundamental limitations of empiricism [FR] most of empirical science [FR], western
philosophy, common sense and general knowledge is fundamentally limited. That’s not to say
that the vast accumulation of empirical data and hypotheses are not useful. Within the context in
which it arose much of our knowledge is highly accurate and some of it is deep and subtle. But
what it means is that outside of the empirical context it has no meaning because the entire
empirical context is a perceptual construct – by its very definition. Therefore knowledge derived
from a perceptual, empirical perspective can be useful in the empirical context but it has no
meaning outside of that. Hence empirical science can never address issues of ontology (what is)
[FR]
but only phenomenology (that which appears to be) [FR]. Ontology is the “science or study of
being: specifically, a branch of metaphysics relating to the nature and relations of being; a
particular system according to which problems of the nature of being are investigated”
(Definitions of Ontology by Leading Philosophers, [FR]) whilst “Phenomenology is the study of
structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view.” (Phenomenology
(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) [FR]).
Because existence underlies perception, and empirical science depends solely upon perceptual
phenomena, traditional empirical science is fundamentally unable to address issues of existence
but only appearance, however the cutting edge of science is stretching the concept of empiricism
by going beyond concepts that derive from our sense experiences, going beyond solidity,
localisation and so on. In this way science is overcoming empiricism and is approaching a more
rationalist and realist perspective (holistic realism rather than common-sense or naive realism)
[FR]
.
Traditional empirical science addresses “the epistemological question [what can be known and
what is unknowable] by drawing a sharp distinction between truth and empirical adequacy.
[Empirical science claims] that a good theory need only provide an empirically adequate
description of observable phenomena. Any unobservables, such as electrons and quarks, are
simply empirical tools for describing the observable world... [hence] our epistemic knowledge is
limited to the observables.”
However “Scientific realism claims that we can know about objects beyond what we observe
with our bare senses, and this knowledge is what allows us to predict phenomena… The realist
interpretation [of quantum mechanics] shows that we can make knowledge claims about objects,
such as electrons, that are unobservable with our bare senses. This challenges the empiricist
claim that quantum objects are simply empirical tools to describe observables. Thus, contrary to
what we might at first think, the wave-particle duality of quantum objects provides support for
the realists. We now know that quantum objects behave differently from everyday objects, and
we can make an experimentally supported epistemological claim about the quantum world, a
very realist claim.” (A Critique of the Empiricist Interpretation of Modern Physics (PDF) [FR])
"we have to give up the idea of [naive] realism to a far greater extent than most physicists
believe today." (Anton Zeilinger)... By realism, he means the idea that objects have specific
features and properties — that a ball is red, that a book contains the works of Shakespeare, or
that an electron has a particular spin. For everyday objects, such [naive] realism isn't a
problem. But for objects governed by the laws of quantum mechanics, like photons and
electrons, it may make no sense to think of them as having well defined characteristics. Instead,
what we see may depend on how we look.” (Physicists bid farewell to reality? Quantum
mechanics just got even stranger. [FR])
Any attempt by traditional empiricist theories to make ontological claims is like a computer
game player saying that the computational process actually consists of objects in space and time,
whereas the computational process is really an information process wherein there are no
empirical phenomena at all. Therefore when empirical science projects its empiricist ideas
beyond the empirical context (which is a construct of perceptions and appearances) then it is
attempting to operate in a context in which it has no meaning and is therefore illogical. This is
the situation with Scientism.
"Sociologists coined the term "scientism" back in the 1940s, when they realized that many
scientists unthinkingly accepted many scientific theories as simple, unquestioned Truths, just
like believers in any "ism," and thus we often acted like any prejudiced "believer," especially
outside our immediate areas of expertise." (The Archives of Scientists Transcendent Experiences
(TASTE) [FR])
To a large extent physics has moved in the right direction by letting go of its billiard balls and
plum pudding models of matter and it has gone into relativistic spacetime, quantum
wavefunctions and fields, strings, processes and information. By hanging onto empirical ideas
that are inherently derived from sensory experience within the virtual reality we are trapped
within an empirical understanding of things. But by letting go and going deeper into the abstract
information processes we can comprehend the underlying process of existence and thereby
comprehend our experiences on a much deeper level. Rather than just take our experiences for
granted and enshrine them as core beliefs in an empiricist approach, we can rationally question
those beliefs and subtly penetrate to a much deeper understanding.
That is what is proposed here. I describe a general information systems theory [IST] based upon
matrix algebra and discrete mathematics that is used to explore the underlying existential process
and thereby comprehend the empirical (experiential) world from a deeper perspective [FR]. This
document is not a technical discussion; it is more descriptive. For details refer to the website
(www.anandavala.info) or follow these links [overview], [metaphysical approach], [VR metaphysics], [IST], [SMN], [sys theory], [unification],
where there are mathematical and software models illustrating how one can use matrix algebra
and discrete mathematics to create existential processes that generate virtual empirical worlds
where systems interact and experience being in a world of systems in interaction. This
mathematical methodology is called system matrix notation [SMN]. There are also metaphysical and
general essays and long lists of assorted comments and even poetry and images; all trying to
make the ideas accessible to people.
In the SMN approach all the principles of system theory naturally arise within the virtual
realities. The models can implement quantum, pseudo classical and relativistic phenomena. The
quantum and relativistic effects arise due to the constraints of discreteness. There is an inherent
arrow of time, which is of a processual nature [FR] so there is no ontological “dimension of time”,
there is only an ongoing process-of-the-real that exists in the present moment. This means that
any equation or theory relying upon a time variable ‘t’ is an empirical description of observed
appearances and events from within the VR simulation when it is running. This is also the case
for any spatial coordinate (x,y or z), because SMN has only process time and state space; it is
from these that empirical time and empirical space arise within the simulation. Whilst all the
virtual systems have an inherent present moment existence, to empirical science [FR] this is an
inexplicable anomaly; this is because empiricism relies on the flow of countless present moments
of existence as its conceptual ‘ground’. It takes experience as an a priori (miraculous) starting
point and thus can only comprehend the virtual experience of existence and not the actual
mechanism of existence. Furthermore, all virtual systems have input, internal state and output,
these are primitive precursors to perception, experience and response. Complex systems can have
very complex structures, behaviours and appearances as well as highly complex ‘cognitive’
processes with countless internal feedback loops and internal processes.
This indicates that our consciousness may be a highly complex manifestation of a universal
principle. What we call ‘consciousness’ is a high level experience of the existential process itself
as it looks through our perspective and experiences the “virtual world.” So it could be said that
all things are made of consciousness and the ‘objects’ are appearances; they are the content of
consciousness. This resolves the mind/matter paradox that arises within empirical science.
Consciousness is an inexplicable anomaly in empirical science for the same reasons that
empirical science cannot comprehend present moment existence. Because empiricism takes the
process of experience as an unquestioned ‘given’ and it builds all of its ideas upon that
assumption, it is therefore unable to use its later ideas to coherently comprehend consciousness.
One cannot comprehend the mechanism of consciousness by using concepts solely derived from
the contents of consciousness.
There are many other profound and striking parallels between everyday experience, scientific
knowledge and the perennial philosophy [FR], which I discuss later once certain fundamental
confusions are cleared up. The current limitations of SMN [FR] are here clarified; it is currently
strictly confined to working with ontological processes and the general properties of the virtual
reality and not on the contingent processes that give rise to any particular virtual universe. To
explain, SMN provides a new context of enquiry, a new mathematical / computational approach
with new system simulation techniques. It provides a general model of the structure and
dynamics of the existential process; it models the metaphorical cosmic ‘simulator’. SMN gives
us a general model of the simulator and its fundamental constraints but any kind of system model
or VR universe can be run on this simulator. There is still a great deal to be learnt about how to
create a ‘seed’ model that evolves into a universe very much like our own. The nature of the
simulator imposes fundamental constraints on the nature of the VR universe; it must be finite,
discrete, quantised, relativistic, systemic and so on, but within these constraints any type of
system model or VR universe can be created and simulated. So the question remains, which
particular types of models evolve into universes much like our own?
Using SMN as the mathematical foundation this work contemplates the information system
theoretic principles that naturally arise in the virtual worlds. It seeks an understanding of how
they connect with our own personal experience of existence and with our accumulated
knowledge. From this arises, what in the context of this work is called “information system
theory” (IST) [FR], which is a general theory of systems [FR] and their interactions. It is not
presented as a formal theory but rather as a way of thinking that subtly uses the flow of the
mathematics [FR] to comprehend the flow of information that is the existential process that
underlies our empirical experiences. In this way one is not fixated wholly on the objects of
perception, assuming that they are the reality, because within one’s mind’s eye one also sees the
connectivity and the flow and one understands the complex empirical appearances and their
behaviours on a much deeper level. It subtly informs one’s understanding of the holistic
situation. It is analogous to playing a computer game when you are the one that programmed the
game; you have a far deeper understanding of the information flows underlying the objects,
places and events in the game, whereas an unfamiliar player could only respond to sense
impressions and would not perceive the underlying dynamics.
Whilst empirical scientific enquiry has done much to clear up many of our surface confusions,
the empirical scientific method is itself distorted by some of our deepest, most profound and far-
reaching assumptions and beliefs. It is most definitely NOT a truly skeptical approach. It must let
go of its sacred beliefs before it can be truly skeptical. These beliefs are buried deep within the
philosophical foundations of empiricism, thereby distorting the whole of empirical science. It is a
matter of great importance that we recognise these distortions, comprehend their effect on us and
work to correct them. We need to understand the mind first before reliably contemplating the
contents of the mind otherwise we are open to illusion, delusion (persistent illusion), fanaticism,
oppression and holistically destructive behaviour.
The mind is the foundation of our knowledge; it responds to the stimuli of existence and
generates cognitive experiences and ideas. It is the fundamental link between reality and our
knowledge of reality. It is the 'instrument' by which we experience and know anything at all and
all good seekers of knowledge should understand and master their most fundamental instrument.
In order to see clearly through the lens of the mind one must understand the nature of mind and
its complex non-linear property whereby the view influences the lens, which influences the view,
which influences the lens and so on. In this way we come to look through our own ideas.
Because of this one must master one's own mind before one can derive reliable knowledge
through it. Otherwise everything is coloured and distorted by preconceived subconscious ideas
and attitudes that reinforce each other and evolve into complex, subtle and compelling illusions.
If an illusion is enduring and pervasive it is difficult to identify as an illusion, hence within what
we normal consider to be “just the way things are” there dwell many unquestioned illusions.
We will see in this discussion that the concepts of ‘reality’ and ‘illusion’ are not at all clear-cut.
That which many call ‘real’ is actually illusion in the strictest sense, and will generally be
described as such, but it is illusion in the same way as a virtual reality is an illusion; for
characters that dwell in that virtual reality it seems ‘real’ because it is all illusion and all as real
as they are. Hence the illusions discussed can be thought of as processes that manifest a virtual
reality [FR]. This has also been described as relative reality, as opposed to absolute reality. But in
general this work will simply refer to absolute reality as reality or objective reality and to relative
reality as illusion or virtual reality or pseudo objective reality (that which we believe to be the
objective reality but it is actually a construct of shared subjective experiences).
A major feature of this discussion is an analysis of the information flow from reality, through
perception, interpretation, experience, ideas, expression, communication, cultural consensus and
finally arriving at collective knowledge; and then the many feedback loops through which our
awareness and understanding is conditioned. Using this understanding it deconstructs many
common illusions and assumptions. This creates profound and far-reaching cracks in one's belief
system. It shows how loosely our collective knowledge is related to reality and how the mind has
an incredible ability to construct experiential worlds based upon our preconceived subconscious
ideas. It is a literal fact that, as Buddha said, "with our thoughts we make the world" [FR]. Not the
objective reality of course, but our own personal experiential world. For most people, that is the
only world they have ever known.
For example, consider some object in front of you; you cannot ever see or experience the object
"as it is". All you ever experience is your subconscious interpretation of the signals that stimulate
your senses; these produce a response in your mind and that is what you actually experience. A
simple example is a person who is hypnotised then handed an onion and given the subconscious
suggestion that it is an apple - they will eat it gladly and experience it as an apple. You can never
experience or know anything directly. Whilst our own responses do depend on the incident
signals coming from reality, the actual form that they take in the conscious mind, which is what
we experience, depends primarily on our particular way of interpreting and representing the
signals to ourselves. So people with different subconscious cognitive filters actually experience
different worlds.
That's just one of the many confusions that are clarified in this discussion. They are systemic
perceptual illusions, i.e. illusions that arise because we are systems within a universe of systems
and we only interact via the communication of information. We are not material objects in space
that miraculously exist with innate solidity and behaviour, and we don't have a perfect "God's
eye view" of reality or even an objective view, as people tend to assume. We experience many
perceptual illusions that we accept as reality; these lead to experiences such as objects in space,
around which we have woven ideas and allege the existence of a world "out there". But all we
ever know is our own personal subjective experience that is totally constructed by our own
minds.
Many people have primarily been looking through the mind naively assuming it to be a perfect
objective window on reality and that we all experience the same objective world. Many people
intellectually know better but still carry this subconscious assumption, which permeates their
entire experience and knowledge of the world. Many people look through the mind without
understanding the nature of the mind and thereby confuse the contents of mind with objective
reality. This is a profound and far reaching error that opens us up to unending illusion, confusion,
delusion (persistent illusion), agitation and suffering. We become prone to take our illusions as
reality, to base all our knowledge and actions upon them and to thereby experience and operate
within what is essentially a fantasy world that is loosely based upon an underlying reality.
These illusions are all pervasive in our experience; they initially arise from fundamental
principles of information, systems and perception, but through biology and culture they have
become reinforced and woven into what is generally considered to be the bedrock of
incontrovertible self-evident facts of experience, that we never question because they are never
recognised as a position or a theory that could be questioned, they are just assumed to be the way
things actually are. On top of this we have built civilisation, a vast and intricate structure of
knowledge, belief, tradition, roles, dependencies and the status quo of the world. From this
vantage point we uncritically contemplate the world that presents itself to the conscious mind,
assuming that we have a clear, undistorted and objective perspective on reality.
Because of this fundamental error most of empirical science, western philosophy, common sense
and general knowledge rests upon a false foundation and does not represent reliable knowledge
about reality. It is only reliable knowledge about the appearance, structure and behaviour of our
particular systemic, biological, historical and contemporary cognitive illusions. These illusions
are ultimately based upon an underlying reality but the lens is often so distorted that the illusion
exhibits only superficial resemblance and relevance to reality, thus leaving most of reality
incomprehensible and most of our actions inappropriate in the wider context. We may act
rationally within a narrow context but this can be highly destructive and irrational within the
wider context. The vast majority of information is filtered out by the subconscious and the
remainder is heavily interpreted and distorted by deep-seated assumptions and
misunderstandings.
In many respects science is becoming skeptical on its cutting edge with quantum physics [FR],
string theory [FR], process physics [FR], process philosophy [FR], information physics [FR], system
theory [FR], computational metaphysics [FR], cybernetics [FR], and so on. But on the whole there still
remains an irrational and unquestioned attachment to an arbitrary but naively compelling belief
that dwells within concepts such as empiricism [FR], positivism [FR], empirical science [FR],
materialism, commonsense/naive realism [FR] and Scientism. Note the capital ‘S’ for Scientism,
this is because it is a religion and these are usually capitalised. Scientism is a product of the
gradual cultural distortion of science, just as popular religion is a product of the gradual cultural
distortion of mysticism; it is when direct and subtle knowledge is taken out of context and it
devolves into confusion and results in unfounded belief or dis-belief, which are both just
assumptions.
""materialism is the philosophy of the subject who forgets to take account of himself."
(Schopenhauer)... an observing subject can only know material objects through the mediation of
the brain and its particular organization. The way that the brain knows determines the way that
material objects are experienced." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism)
By uncritically accepting the contents of mind as objective reality we are prone to illusion. These
illusions distort the lens of our mind thus distorting our experiences and if these too are
uncritically accepted as objective reality the illusion is further reinforced. These illusions bring
us into conflict with ourselves, with each other and with the holistic context, our total
environment. To see clearly, understand coherently and participate effectively we need to
understand the mind and make direct clear contact with reality. Just as illusions reinforce, so too
does sincere and open-minded questioning of things lead to greater and greater clarity and
awareness. Then we are in a position to clarify the many fundamental errors in our conscious and
subconscious understanding; to straighten the lens; to see through it and get a fresh perspective.
From this perspective we can then follow through the ramifications of those changes, to work
from the re-aligned foundation all the way up, through the structure of our knowledge,
renovating it and re-aligning it with reality. This is not as difficult as it sounds if one uses one's
whole mind effectively.
Only then can we develop reliable personal and collective knowledge about reality. No collective
knowledge can be perfect, but it can at least be comprehensive enough and accurate enough to
overcome much of the dire confusion, agitation, imbalance, conflict, suffering and destruction
that threatens the very survival of life on this planet. If science is to become skeptical and not
devolve into Scientism it must openly, rationally and sincerely re-examine its roots and realise
that the mind is its foundation and not a naive belief in the objective reality of the contents of the
mind.
"The old foundations of scientific thought are becoming unintelligible. Time, space, matter,
material, ether, electricity, mechanism, organism, configuration, structure, pattern, function, all
require reinterpretation. What is the sense of talking about a mechanical explanation when you
do not know what you mean by mechanics? The truth is that science started its modern career by
taking over ideas derived from the weakest side of the philosophies of Aristotle's successors. In
some respects it was a happy choice. It enabled the knowledge of the seventeenth century to be
formulated so far as physics and chemistry were concerned, with a completeness which lasted to
the present time. But the progress of biology and psychology has probably been checked by the
uncritical assumption of half-truths. If science is not to degenerate into a medley of ad hoc
hypotheses, it must become philosophical and must enter upon a thorough criticism of its own
foundations."
(Alfred North Whitehead http://www.alfred.north.whitehead.com/witwiz/witwiz4.htm [FR])
This discussion first introduces some basic concepts of information systems theory, then
describes the mathematics and its ramifications. Then it analyses the process of perception
leading through experience, ideas, communication and resulting in collective knowledge, which
then feeds back upon our minds and influences the whole process. This shows that not only is
our knowledge limited by empiricism but that accurate awareness and knowledge is highly
dependent on a good understanding and mastery of the mind. It is a highly complex and non-
linear process by which we experience and know anything at all. In this sense the mind is the
true foundation of empiricism, not a fervent belief in objects in spacetime. The mind is the
instrument of experience and knowledge, which we must understand and master if we are to
experience and know coherently, but the mind cannot be understood within a purely empiricist
paradigm because the mind precedes experience and therefore cannot be explained in terms of
the objects of experience. We then explore some of the implications of having many minds,
integrated through culture and resonating together and some of the systemic phenomena that
arise from this. This sheds light on issues of enormous relevance to current global events and
crises. The work then explores some of the many parallels between information system theory
and the perennial philosophy, it then discusses the role of religion in this context. Then it
discusses some things that you can do to improve your own clarity and awareness. It then
discusses what can be done to renovate and re-contextualise our empirical knowledge within the
wider holistic context and generally re-establish ourselves as seekers of knowledge within the
wider context. It then ends with a challenge to all people who seek deeper understanding and a
more harmonious life to take a fresh look at themselves and their world and to sincerely tackle
the illusions and irrationalities that go unquestioned in our minds and to strip away outmoded
ideas that impair our awareness, understanding and judgement.
Essentially, it is proposed that science, which “in the broadest sense, refers to any system of
knowledge which attempts to model objective reality” is capable of far more than empirical
science implies. Here it is proposed that a holistic science is possible, achievable and desirable
(indeed vital for our survival). This work describes a path that leads toward a holistic science,
which is a profoundly skeptical science (devoid of sacred cows) that comprehends the nature of
mind and uses it effectively, rather than a naive science that assumes that the experiences and
ideas in the mind are representative of objective reality. It is not just an intellectual science, but
also one that requires deep introspection, self-awareness and self-mastery. It is a science that
comprehends both the personal and the mystic experiences of existence. The central principle of
mysticism [FR] is "know your self". "The effort to understand yourself is Yoga" (Sri Nisargadatta
Maharaj [FR])
"The concepts of science show strong similarities to the concepts of the mystics... The philosophy
of mystical traditions, the perennial philosophy, is the most consistent philosophical background
to modern science." (Fritjof Capra [FR])
“Mysticism … is the pursuit of achieving communion or identity with, or conscious awareness
of, ultimate reality…through direct experience, intuition, or insight; and the belief that such
experience is …an important source of knowledge, understanding, and wisdom.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mysticism)
“Science, in the broadest sense, refers to any system of knowledge which attempts to model
objective reality. In a more restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge
based on the scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through
such research.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science) [FR]
This discussion does not propose a fragmented and limited science based upon 'mechanical'
assumptions but a deep and holistic way of knowing that unifies all the fragmented disciplines of
empirical science and all the mystic traditions. An understanding that elucidates the deep nature
of ourselves and civilisation, that reconnects religion with its mystic roots and science with it
skeptical roots and that opens up a vast new field of technological innovations and solutions to
systemic problems that plague our lives and threaten our survival.
"General Systems theory should be an important means of instigating the transfer of principles
from one field to another (so that it would) no longer be necessary to duplicate the discovery of
the same principles in different fields." (Ludwig von Bertalanffy [REF])
"There is this hope, I cannot promise you whether or when it will be realized - that the
mechanistic paradigm, with all its implications in science as well as in society and our own
private life, will be replaced by an organismic or systems paradigm that will offer new pathways
for our presently schizophrenic and self-destructive civilization." (Ludwig von Bertalanffy [REF])
The ‘device’ that can take us to this holistic science is information system theory (IST), either as
discussed here or in some form. The approach discussed here unifies all of the other paradigms
within a single elegant and holistic paradigm that derives from pure mathematics and the
concepts 'information' and 'system'. There are no introduced assumptions and beliefs; its
foundation is clear and simple, yet powerful enough to underlie all of our knowledge of the
universe. But information system theory is only a device; it is not the holistic science itself or
even the foundation of the holistic science. Clear and open minds are the foundation and IST
gives us motivation and guidance in attaining such a thing and also a conceptual language within
which to express our deeper holistic understanding.
In particular IST identifies a general process for the clarification of assumptions and illusions,
the overcoming of habitual and compulsive thought patterns, reconnecting with ourselves and
our minds because we are the foundation of all culture and knowledge, then through ourselves to
connect with reality and then a renovation from the ground up of our individual and cultural
paradigms. Only then resulting in a holistic, re-aligned cultural domain, with clear and open
minds connected to reality and not trapped within compelling and competing illusions. The
resulting holistic science can assist us in re-aligning with reality by motivating us and directing
us to re-connect with ourselves, to come to know ourselves and through this to know reality.
The factual re-examination of some general principles brings to light some of their implications
and reveals the fundamental limitations of the currently dominant paradigm. By looking through
the cracks and exploring deeper, we discover profound parallels between cutting edge science,
information theoretic metaphysics, existential philosophy and the perennial philosophy or mystic
wisdom. They are all talking about essentially the same thing but coming from different angles
and using different analogies. By identifying and distilling the common underlying structure of
these analogies this work elucidates the general structure of a unified paradigm that seamlessly
encompasses them all. Each particular paradigm is a particular analogical expression of the
common underlying paradigm and concepts from one are mirrored in the other. Given such a
unified understanding we can translate from one to the other and each can learn a great deal from
the others. The resulting understanding is that the assumptions of common sense realism and the
unquestioned beliefs that arise from it, such as empiricism and positivism, are fundamentally
flawed, limited and limiting. The actual range of possibilities inherent in existence is vastly
greater than that which the current paradigm can comprehend.
Ultimately all collective ideas are of the nature of illusion to varying degrees, they are not the
actual reality but just ideas about it, so if you are wondering if this discussion and the proposed
path to a holistic science is some kind of illusion; you can be assured that it is to some degree.
But it can show how it is an illusion and elucidate the exact relationship between ‘illusion’ and
‘reality’. The mathematics and information systems theory are part of the illusion, everyday
experience of the world is part of the illusion and also common sense, mystic wisdom, religious
dogma and scientific knowledge too; the whole of human civilization is a part of the illusion.
Described here is an illusion that unifies all other illusions; that elucidates the nature of illusion
and shows that all ideas, theories and beliefs are all ultimately an illusion. The actual reality “is
what it is” and we weave ideas around it to comprehend it, but in doing so, due to the nature of
mind, we can subtly and radically distort our experience and understanding of it. The
deconstruction of the phenomenon of illusion reveals that which isn't an illusion; it is the reality
that produces the stimuli that we interpret, experience and form ideas about, it is the reality that
the mind can only reflect and never hold or capture and it is ourselves as the bridge between
reality and ideas.
For those who dwell in a world of cognitive impressions and ideas the actual reality seems to be
something remote and abstract. If IST was not itself an illusion, it could not be recognised or
comprehend by such people. But it is an illusion that dispels illusion. So it does not proclaim
itself to be any truth, the truth is ultimately beyond words and ideas, and only approachable
through direct contact and clear open awareness. We are the weavers of illusion and only by
turning back on ourselves and mastering the mind can we disentangle ourselves from our web of
illusion and come to know and fully participate in reality.
"My friend, all theory is gray, and the Golden tree of life is green." (Goethe)
Introduction to Information Systems Theory
Firstly here is given a brief introduction to information systems theory (IST) [FR] to clarify the
context of this analysis. The term "information systems theory" has been used in several related
contexts, usually involving computers that process information or organisations that use
information in their management processes [FR]. For example a common definition of "an
information system, ... is a technologically implemented medium for recording, storing, and
disseminating linguistic expressions, as well as for drawing conclusions from such expressions"
(Langefors [REF]). Another definition is that "an information system consists of three components:
human, task, application system" [REF]. These are very specialised applications of IST that are
defined within very particular contexts, however here we discuss general information systems
theory [FR] that is applicable to all systems and to all forms of information exchange and
processing. Just as 'energy' is far more general than just electricity or fuel used for technological
applications (matter itself is energy), so too we will see that the concept of an "information
system" is vastly more general than just information exchange within applications of interest to
humans.
Some questions to keep in mind are: What is a useful way to think about the fundamental
‘mechanism’ of existence? And what about all these objects, people, places, events that we
experience in the world? And the universe itself? What about when something happens, what is
the cause? And what exactly is a system?
This discussion uses information system theory because it provides two universal metaphors,
'system' and 'information'. Any manifest form can be meaningfully thought of as a 'system',
whether a particle, a person, a meme (idea), a process, a cultural phenomenon, a society, a
planet, a galaxy and up to the whole cosmos as a single closed system (the only truly 'closed'
system). This is the reason for the usefulness of system theory [FR].
"In contrast to the mechanistic Cartesian view of the world, the world-view emerging from
modern physics can be characterized by words like organic, holistic, and ecological. It might
also be called a systems view, in the sense of general systems theory. The universe is no longer
seen as a machine, made up of a multitude of objects, but has to be pictured as one indivisible
dynamic whole whose parts are essentially interrelated and can be understood only as patterns
of a cosmic process." (Fritjof Capra [FR])
There are certain general properties of all systems, regardless of their form, their behaviour or
the medium within which they exist and interact. A general property of all systems is that they
interact via communication of some form [FR]. Not just social interactions between people or
documents in a computer; for example, particle interactions when modelled by particle physicists
are thought of as communications that are mediated by virtual particles, or mechanical systems
communicate by directing force through levers, pulleys, gears etc. Each system has an outer
observable form through which it is perceptible to other systems and an inner observational
process by which it perceives other systems. Each system is embedded in an inter-connecting
network of communication paths and thus has a unique localised perspective. Signals flow
between systems and through systems and this is conceived of as 'information'. Information is
defined as "discernible difference". It requires some medium that can support different
observable states and an observer that can discern these states; it unites both outer and inner in
the one substance. When information is perceived it is as signals (outer observable form) but
when it flows within a system this flow is experienced as an inner observational process.
Furthermore, because of its generality information can manifest in any medium, it can be
transformed from one medium to another and can flow through any network of systems. The
approach of information theory is to model the flow of information through communication
channels [FR].
Because of the generality of the concepts 'system' [FR] and 'information' [FR] and 'network' [FR], the
approach of information system theory [FR] is a form of general system theory GST [FR]. "General
systems theory in the narrower sense (G.S.T.), ... is trying to derive from a general definition of
'system' a complex of interacting components, concepts characteristic of organized wholes . . .
and to apply them to concrete phenomena."
(Ludwig von Bertalanffy [REF])
"While each scientific theory selects out and abstracts from the world's complexity a peculiar set
of relations, philosophy cannot favor any particular region of human enterprise. Through
conceptual experimentation it must construct a consistency that can accommodate all
dimensions of experience, whether they belong to physics, physiology, psychology, biology,
ethics, etc.." (Alfred North Whitehead [FR])
However IST goes much further than traditional system theory, whilst GST is conceived of as an
analytical tool within an empiricist context, which defines what the “concrete phenomena” are,
IST relies on no preconceived assumptions and it makes definite scientific realist or rationalist
ontological claims that go beyond the scope of empiricist science. IST is what arises when one
takes GST (also quantum physics) seriously, not just as a useful tool within a preconceived
context but as a genuine and accurate science and metaphysics of the nature of the universe.
When one takes systems as the reality and objects as just the appearance of systems within
another system’s perceptual process then one overcomes the attachments to sensory beliefs and
bases one’s ontology on the systemic structure of reality and not on the subjective perceptual
experience of reality.
Each system perceives the incoming information and responds thus producing outgoing
information. I.e. discernible difference is incident on a system and produces a discernibly
different change in the system's observable state, which is then perceived by other systems as
their incident discernible difference. This process occurs only in the present moment thus only
the present moment can be said to 'exist'. In this context the past is memory and the future is
expectation. In general there is more to it involving concepts such as the quantum multiverse or
the permutation space within which all existential configurations exist as potentiality but are not
temporally ordered (not formed into sequences of successive moments), hence all past and future
states exist as part of a probability distribution within an abstract space of potentiality and our
path through that space creates our experience of past, present and future. So only the present
moment exists as an actuality but the present moment contains all potentiality. But this is beyond
the scope of this discussion, as it requires going deep into the mathematical foundations of IST to
elucidate the phenomena. See the website for more details on this.
As systems communicate and interact within the complex network of interaction paths there are
feedback loops and resonances. These result in some systems interacting strongly and others
weakly; i.e. high and low communication bandwidth. When systems strongly interact and
integrate together into a functional whole they are perceived as a higher-level system by other
systems and for most intents and purposes they 'create' a higher-level super-system; they become
sub-systems within the super-system. This phenomenon is referred to as a meta-system transition
(MST) [FR]. In this way systems are "made of" sub-systems and they interact to 'make' super-
systems. But all of this is a construct of appearances; when all the details are lost (entropy) then
the ensemble of systems seems to be a single whole system. There is no ontological change from
ensemble of systems to super-system, there is just degrees of integration leading to the
perceptual appearance of a single whole super-system. MST is discussed at length later on.
Due to the MST process and the constantly changing patterns of interactions, complex systems
appear and disappear, they integrate and disintegrate, they are born and they die. But all
appearances and disappearances are just high-level perceptions of a constant and unbroken
information process. The outer form seems to appear, it seems to remain constant for a time and
then it seems to disappear. However the observable forms undergoing this process of change and
stability are just the outer appearance of an underlying information process; they rise and fall like
waves on the ocean. This process is not centred on any particular system; it flows throughout the
entire cosmos and intricately integrates all things. The information process is a single unified
'dance' of information. As the information flows we perceive forms that appear, interact and
disappear, and the coherence and integration of this activity rests upon the coherence and
integration of the underlying information process. This ultimately implies that what happens
regarding one system is a function or a 'movement' of the whole cosmos. For example, consider
Feynman Paths [FR].
"The probability amplitude for the particle to be at [position] xb is the sum over all paths
through spacetime originating at [position] xa at time ta"
(http://www.physics.umanitoba.ca/~souther/compsim/lect8/tsld004.htm)
The important thing to note here is that a simple movement from point a to point b that can be
arbitrarily close still involves the "sum over all paths through spacetime"; even paths that snake
their way around, looping around the moon, going off to a distant galaxy, coming back to Earth
and into your house then going back to wherever it is that we perceive a particle moving a
minute distance from a to b. The entire cosmos takes part in every single interaction and the
information processing isn't just confined to the trajectory between a and b but rather, the
perceived localised event is an aspect of the cosmic information process; it is a ‘gesture’ in the
‘dance’ of information.
“For anything to happen, the entire universe must coincide. It is wrong to believe that anything
in particular can cause an event. Every cause is universal. Your very body would not exist
without the entire universe contributing to its creation and survival...” (Sri Nisargadatta
Maharaj, "I am That", p371 [FR])
It is the dynamic flow of information that binds the sub-systems together into a super-system
hence systems are composed of a set of sub-systems and an inter-connective information process.
Now let us delve down the complexity hierarchy through the sub-systems then through their sub-
systems and so on. Examine a system, step into its inner space and see that it consists of sub-
systems plus an information process. Then examine each sub-system in the same way and so on.
At some point we reach a limit, either in our own ability to resolve the details or in the details
themselves. Experience shows that manifest forms are finite (not infinitely large); quantum
physics shows that they are discrete (not infinitely detailed) [FR] and relativity shows that
dynamical quantities such as velocity, mass and energy cannot be infinitely large. It is also a
property of well-defined information spaces that they must be finite and discrete [FR], for example,
binary data.
At the lowest level there are systems that have no sub-systems and are composed solely of a
trivial information process. There is no network of sub-systems for the information process to
flow through; there is only the one system's inner space. This trivial information process can
hold a state and can be influenced by incoming information. Hence these primitive systems are
state variables or primitive observables or fundamental existential states. For example, in a
computer the primitive systems are 'bits' that can exhibit the two states 0 and 1.
From this analysis we see that all systems are composed of primitive systems (fundamental
existential states) woven together by a network of interaction paths and animated by a flow of
information. There may be many levels of systems within systems so the network is very
complex and the information can be thought of as flowing on many levels. A system is therefore
entirely defined by the set of existential states, the structure of the network of interaction paths
and the behaviour of the flow of information throughout the network. Thus a system is a pattern
of structured (network) information (states) that processes information (flow).
"In a comprehensive view of nature, the physical world is seen
as a patterning of patternings..."
(Amy Edmondson)
This simple idea of a system as a pattern of structured information that processes information
captures all the essential properties of a system. In the table below are the parallels between IST
and the five fundamental conceptual aspects of any system according to Klir [REF]:
Klir IST
state variables Existential States
range and resolution of state variables Finite Discrete nature of Existential States
permanent behaviour Network and Information Flow
universe and coupling description Manifest forms and Relations
state space description Permutation space (multi-verse)
Hence, complex systems are generalised patterns from which we perceive 'objects'. When the
details are lost dense collectives of systems are perceived as objects and sparse collectives of
systems are perceived as the intervening space. This implies that it is fundamentally inaccurate to
conceive of a system as a separate independent object. Any complex system is a complex pattern
of dynamic processes where the 'object' is merely a focal point for our awareness; it is only the
outwardly observable form.
"Imagine yourselves in terms of a moving-picture scenario. You've all seen moving pictures run
backwards, where people undive out of the swimming pool back onto the board. I'm going to run
a moving picture of you backwards. You've just had breakfast; ... all the food comes out of your
mouth onto the plate; ... and into the cans, and they go back to the store; ...then they go back to
the factories ...and they finally get back to pineapples in Hawaii. Then the pineapples separate
out, go back into the air; the raindrops go back into the sky, and so forth.
But in the ... reversal of a month practically everything has come together that you now have on
board you, gradually becoming your hair and your skin and so forth, whereas a month ago, it
was some air coming over the mountains. In other words, you get completely deployed. I want
you to begin to think of yourselves in an interesting way as each one of these.
... you would see chemical elements gradually getting closer and closer together, and, finally,
getting into those various vegetable places and into roasts and, tighter and tighter, into cans,
into the store, finally getting to just being you or me-temporarily, becoming my hair, my ear,
some part of my skin-and then that breaks up and goes off and gets blown around as dust.
Each of us is a very complex pattern integrity with which we were born."
(R. Buckminster Fuller, 1975)
The Mathematical Foundations of IST
In this discussion there is given only a purely descriptive introduction however these concepts
have a rigorous mathematical foundation that in the context of this work is called “system matrix
notation” (SMN) [FR]. In fact the mathematics is the only truly reliable way to approach these
concepts without bringing too many false or unnecessary associations into play. Each
concept/word has a long history and many meanings, some useful and some totally confused and
confusing, but when one derives the concepts directly from the mathematics their only meaning
is that which arises from their context and state of integration into the mathematics. Thus the best
way to understand the subtle subject matter is to visualise the mathematics as a dynamic
information process in your minds-eye and to derive and/or clarify all concepts in relation to this
'vision'. Going into the mathematics is beyond the scope of this discussion it will only comment
on its form and function but not its details. See [SMN] for more.
Some questions to keep in mind are: How can mathematics represent the flow of information?
How can it represent the structure of the flow? How does it represent the moment-by-moment
structure of the objective reality? How does it model the moment-by-moment change and
dynamical process of objective reality? How does it generate the virtual existence of systems in
time and space? How does it model the process of perception, experience and response? How
does it implement quantum behaviour and classical experience?
System Matrix Notation is primarily a general algorithm or information process. It can be
efficiently implemented in mathematics or software and it models a generalised information
process. There are many ways of conceiving of what SMN is but here are described three related
perspectives. Firstly it is an algorithm that implements a "distributed event-processing regime"
that can manage all of the information logistics within a complex dynamical system. Secondly it
is a model of a "general system" and thirdly it is a model of "general distributed massively
parallel computation".
For a more detailed and structured introduction to SMN and explanation of how matrix
mathematics implements information systems, see Modelling General Information Systems.
Briefly, what this mathematical process represents in terms of information systems is this; There
is a state vector that defines the full set of primitive existential states and a matrix of causal inter-
connections. ( A t this point we should include a ref. Link to “Getting a Grip.”) These combine to
implement each iteration moment, in which the current state information flows through the
causal network to produce the next state thus producing a state space that evolves over time. See
[FR]
for more on SMN. The state vector implements the common existential space. Each matrix
row implements an input interface through which a system perceives the entire existential space,
i.e. the state vector.
Each element in a row is an input filter through which that system perceives another system (or
itself, diagonal). Each column implements the output interface through which a system is made
perceptible and observable to other systems. Each element in a column is an output filter through
which that system expresses itself to other systems (or itself, diagonal). So a particular element
in the matrix implements a particular information channel linking two systems; there is an output
filter flowing into an input filter and creating an information channel but with only one direction
of flow. The transpose pairs (mirrored around the diagonal) implement the bi-directional flow
(note that symmetries in the matrix and vector show up as symmetries in the structure and
behaviour of the virtual universe).
Between the systems there are information channels linking every system with every other
system (the network), thus any conceivable interaction scheme is possible. Furthermore the state
vector can represent ‘classical’ data such as the integer 3 or it can represent quantum data
(wavefunctions) as a probability distribution over the states, such as a qbit {p(0)=0.3 ,
p(1)=0.7 }; it is neither ‘0’ nor ‘1’ but 30% ‘0’ and 70% ‘1’. This indeterminism is the nature of
all quantum systems. Note that for engineering purposes the state vector can also represent any
general binary data and the matrix elements can be anything that takes input and produces
output, any function, procedure, program or even electronically controlled equipment. In this
way SMN can be used as a general systemic computational paradigm, discussed shortly.
There are two principal ways of visualising the SMN virtual-reality generative process in action.
First is the classical way, which will probably be more familiar. As the matrix is multiplied with
the vector the existential states (observables, discernible difference, information) flow through
the information channels, being interpreted by input filters, being experienced as internal state
change and being expressed via output filters. The existential states are quantum in nature and
the systems experience particular classical realities by sampling the probability distributions,
thus resulting in particular states, which they perceive as attributes or qualities of a system. In
each moment each system potentially experiences and responds to every other system, so when
the cosmic existential state goes into flux and flows through the matrix it is an extremely
complex dance of information streaming in every possible direction. This state of flux then
resolves back into the state of the next cosmic moment and in this way the dance of information
cycles from the vector through the matrix and back into the vector.
The other way is the quantum way. Consider a particular state vector as a particular
configuration of a systemic universe (frozen in time). This configuration is one possibility
amongst a large set of other possibilities. This larger set of possibilities is represented as a single
quantum state (the cosmic wavefunction) a probability distribution over every possible cosmic
configuration. This is a multiverse or a permutation space where every point in the abstract state
space represents a particular configuration of the entire cosmos. This state space is permeated by
a probability distribution, which serves as a pattern of existential potential. It is this potential that
flows through the matrix and implements the cosmic quantum dance of potential. All there is, is
this dancing sea of potential. There are no classical systems and experiences, only the dance. All
classical forms and events are represented virtually; they are encoded within the quantum
wavefunction.
Any information system has these two aspects. These are its classical and quantum
representations. If one is the actual representation then the other is virtual, but still very much
existing in a virtual sense. If a classical universe were implemented as a quantum model the
empirical systems would not be able to discern which particular representation is being used;
they are totally equivalent. However, even though both are equivalent models, they are not
equivalent methods. The quantum method is capable of far greater complexity. The set of all
classically realisable configurations is an almost infinitesimal part of the larger quantum state
space. The range of possibilities is far greater. Rather than just exert force from particular
classically localised sources, and relate via classical signals using well defined data, instead there
can be an intricate and subtle spread of information, not just pushing on points but influencing
wholes, by not just pushing for a particular state but influencing the whole dance of potentiality
as it shimmers like waves on the ocean thus giving rise to virtual classical existence. The
evidence and even widespread use of quantum phenomena categorically indicate that we exist in
a quantum universe. This combined with the findings of SMN / IST indicates that there is a
dance of potentiality within a cosmic state space, the multiverse.
Back to SMN... Because the existential space is maximally connected (every system can interact
directly with every system) it is non-dimensional (or maximally dimensional) and different
restricted inter-connection patterns create different dimensional spaces [FR]. Within this network
of interaction channels each system has an individual localised perspective and in each
existential moment each system perceives, interprets, experiences and responds to the observable
states of other systems. I.e. in each iteration each system receives input, interprets this using an
input filter, experiences state transitions and responds thereby producing output. In this manner
the systems interact and form higher-level systems - thus producing more complex systems. This
constitutes what some call a semantic self-excited circuit or a self-configuring self-processing
language (SCSPL) [FR] that can give rise to emergent phenomena. It is within the realm of these
emergent phenomena that the whole virtual reality (simulation universe) arises as dynamical
patterns of existential information. The circuit is the simulator and the universe is the simulation.
In SMN there is no explicit space-time within which you model; it is rather a dynamic state
space or process space [FR] based upon states and iterations, and manifesting system theoretic
properties. The concepts of time and space are based upon empirical experiences of things from a
perspective embedded within the simulation universe and therefore describe the appearances of
things, but not necessarily the underlying nature of things. In process-based approaches time is
considered to be our experience of an existential process that is happening in the moment and the
idea of time as a dimension, like in virtually all of physics and empirical science (equations that
are a function of 't'), is just an abstract description of our experiences. Underlying these
experiences there are observable states and an ongoing process of change, these are considered to
be more fundamental than time and space.
The virtual-reality generative process operates only on present moments; ontologically there is
no string of moments forming time, it is only from an empirical perspective and through traces in
memory and the mind that we imagine a time-line stretching from past to future, but that is a
story in the mind and in reality there is only the Now. So there is no "dimension of time" beyond
the mind, and reality is like an automata [FR] (an iterative mathematical entity). Hence any
equation that is a function of space or time is just a description of empirical appearances in the
mind. The variable 't' lets us move through the story and x, y & z let us move about in the
perceptually constructed empirical world that we experience. These variables allow us to move
amongst our impressions of objects in space and time by projecting a coordinate grid over things.
But in reality there is only a particular configuration of existence in the Now and this changes
iteratively. In each iteration data flows through computation or perceptions flow through
awareness and the state of 'that which is' changes. At the fundamental level there is only
existence and change and from these all else arises.
So in SMN there is no built in geometric space or linear time, only state space and process time
are fundamental – only the state of ‘that which is’ in the ‘Now’.
"The process metaphysics elaborated in Process and Reality (Whitehead) proposes that the
fundamental elements of the universe are occasions of experience. According to this notion, what
people commonly think of as concrete objects are actually successions of occasions of
experience. Occasions of experience can be collected into groupings; something complex such
as a human being is thus a grouping of many smaller occasions of experience. According to
Whitehead, everything in the universe is characterized by experience (which is not to be
confused with consciousness); there is no mind-body duality under this system, because "mind"
is simply seen as a very developed kind of experiencing."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_philosophy)
“I have often said God is creating this entire world full and entire in this present now... There
where time never penetrates, where no image shines in, in the innermost and highest aspect of
the soul God creates the entire cosmos.” (Meister Eckhart [FR])
In this SMN based information system theoretic context there is no fundamental solidity or
uncaused existence for a system; they do not a priori (miraculously) exist and interact as is
assumed in the outdated classical materialist paradigm. There are no particles in space that
simply exist and behave without any underlying cause. Both particles and space are very high-
level complex systems that have a much deeper quantum [FR] / information system theoretic [FR]
origin.
Each system in the systemic universe is immersed in a 'sea' of information that flows into it, is
channelled, transformed and interpreted by its complex inner network and flows out to other
systems. It is this process that 'moves' the information through each system and since the systems
are inter-connected in a network of systems, this process 'moves' the information through the
entire system network. This process 'drives' ALL the system dynamics. It is this phenomenon
that is implemented by the SMN process, it is in this sense that SMN manages all information
logistics within complex systems.
Because 'meta system transition' (MST) is an entropic (loss of information) perceptual
phenomenon then each super-system is a perceptual illusion. The perceptual information plus the
entropy is the true reflection of reality, but the perceptual information alone is a distortion that
creates the impression of whole systems when they are really integrated ensembles. However in
the perceptual illusion there are systems within systems, creating illusions within illusions and
objects within objects. All manifest forms from particles, atoms, molecules... up to planets and
galaxies are perceptual MST illusions. So too for the inner aspect of systems; the experience of
single high-level awareness such as our own is itself an MST illusion, it is in fact a vast
ensemble of occasions of experience that combine through successively higher MST levels of
complexity and form a seemingly single unified point of awareness. This process of MST
illusions permeates the whole systemic structure of reality, it is not just we high-level beings that
succumb to these illusions, but every system resolves system boundaries based upon its
perceptions and then acts as if those systems were actually real. General systems are
fundamentally naïve realist, it takes a high level self-reflective consciousness to be able to
recognise and overcome naïve realism.
In the SMN algorithm each information system has an inner space of sub-systems that is an inner
information space or existential space. But this is only virtual; there are no strict or ontological
system boundaries. In engineered systems we try and create fixed system boundaries, for
example, all the ‘innards’ of a computer are contained in a box and we only interact with it via
interfaces. But in reality there are cosmic rays and other systems interacting with those ‘innards’
directly without going through the interface. The system boundary demarcated by the ‘box’ is
just a boundary from some perspectives and it is totally non-existent from other perspectives. So
system boundaries are perceptual phenomena because the process of MST that creates them is
itself a perceptual phenomenon.
Furthermore, the nature of the system boundaries that you experience depends on the nature of
your perceptual apparatus. For example, to us the Earth seems like a vast, solid and all
containing system, but a neutrino passes through it without being aware of its existence; they
both experience very different systemic views. Because system boundaries are virtual it seems
that there are information spaces within information spaces, but really there is just the one
universal information space (state vector) and all virtual forms arise due to patterns of
communication bandwidth between systems.
Further to this, all SMN systems seem to have their own individual inner aspect or proto-
awareness. All are the same essence but they are totally individual. The algorithm takes a single
computational thread (information process) and a memory space (information medium) and it
structures these such that there arises any number of information systems within an abstract non-
dimensional virtual space. The single computational thread is distributed equally amongst all
systems thus giving each system an inner aspect or proto-awareness from an individual
(subjective) perspective embedded within the network of systems. Between each moment of
empirical time the single thread weaves through all systems and animates each system in turn.
This activates its inner perceptual / experiential process and transforms input information into
output information. Once every system has been animated all the existential information has
been transformed from the present moment configuration into the new present moment
configuration.
The SMN algorithm creates a virtual systemic universe of systems within systems, each with
inner awareness and outer form. These create virtual worlds within worlds or virtual existential
contexts. In these worlds systems exist and tangibly experience and interact with each other. As
discussed later, they seem physical to each other because they are made of the same information
flowing in the same information space. Each system looks out onto a world of appearances. They
have occasions of experience, the content of which is observable states in relation, which
produce the experience of forms in space. These forms undergo change, thus systems experience
time and events. The structure of the forms and the flow of events are coherent. The underlying
nature of the systems is quantum [REF] and there are distinct relativistic constraints [REF] on all
empirical quantities.
Underlying this complex experiential space there is just a single information space and a single
thread of computation or proto-awareness that is a spark of light in the void of potentiality. As
the spark weaves through the space it creates one single moment in time, actualising the
potential. So it looks to the mind’s eye like a complex tangle of light frozen in time. With each
iteration the spark weaves slightly different tangles and as the moments blur together we have a
dance of light (information) that changes in time. In this dance there are abstract forms that arise,
evolve, interact and then dissipate.
All of this arises naturally out of the mathematics, all due to fundamental properties of matrix
algebra, discreteness, information and systems. There are no assumptions, arbitrary premises or
arbitrary additions (except for the many and varied engineering applications, however the
metaphysical model is pure). There is just finite discrete data, memory (universal information
space), a single thread, the SMN algorithm using matrix algebra (M*v) – the vector describes the
existential state as a quantum wavefunction and the matrix describes how the probabilities flow
between existential states. From this we get a permutation space (multiverse), a network of state
transitions and a thread that weaves through this by iterating a simple matrix multiplication (v =
M*v) so the new existential state is produced by the previous existential state flowing through
the intricate paths of the matrix. It is an automata [FR] that acts as a virtual reality generative
process.
The iterations drive the outer observable forms through the inner experiential processes and
countless virtual systems experience each other from subjective empirical perspectives. The
SMN modelling space can be structured in any way to create any kind of existential context with
any kind of systems. It is a pure existential space that does not constrain the nature of the
systems that can exist in it, other than the fundamental constraints that they must be finite and
therefore representable, they are quantum or classical, they are relativistic, they operate in
discrete time (in the Now), they are unified, potentially maximally interconnected (no
separation), animated by a single unified dance of ‘light’, there is a transcendent and empirical
context (an empirical context alone is impossible, it needs a transcendent context to animate it),
there are countless points of subjective proto-awareness, there is systemic behaviour such as
MST, self-organisation, etc. These constraints define the general context but within these very
broad constraints the resulting empirical experiential virtual reality can take on any form
whatsoever and exhibit any behaviour whatsoever.
This approach provides a general system simulator based upon clear mathematical and system
theoretic principles, which provides a virtual-reality generative modelling ‘language’.
There are simple proof-of-concept prototypes of the software at
www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SMN%20Code.html. When implemented in software it
has efficient implementations using sparse matrices and energy flow processing [REF] that provide
maximum flexibility and minimum overhead; it can also be used for modelling, designing and
testing systems and then translating the model into executable code for deployment. It is capable
of providing a metaphysically rich and realistic operating system and general computing
environment that provides a deep and coherent metaphysical foundation for the phenomenon of
‘cyberspace’, thereby making it far richer, more reliable, flexible and powerful.
If developed as a general computational operating system it could harness all of the functionality
of the computer and present it via a virtual environment of countless interacting systems, the
programs are just information systems within the information space (operating system). It can
turn a single computational process into any number of maximally interacting virtual
computational processes all interacting within the same information space. It can turn any
number of separate computational processes interacting only with a common data base (e.g.
many CPU’s and common memory - using only read and exclusive write, so NO clashes) it can
turn these into a single unified information space or simulation universe. Hence multiprocessor
VR computers, using SMN as the metaphysics of the cyberspace, within which we construct
virtual interactive environments, simulations, games, programs, multimedia and all kinds of
phenomena. SMN could be implemented directly in silicon, instead of using traditional CPU’s
running an SMN program there could be SMN chips that use a common memory space to
generate a virtual systemic space in which we can create and participate. It can create virtual
worlds or general software or any system whatsoever so long as one knows how to model it. The
modelling can be done in code or using an interface much like CAD or 3D modelling programs,
except that one doesn't model in space and time but rather in state space and process time.
By providing cyberspace with a deep metaphysical underpinning SMN transforms our
understanding of computers. A computer is no longer seen as a fancy calculator but as a portal
into a virtual systemic universe.
The idea is free of any intellectual property constraints, the source code is free of any copyright
and is offered freely to the world, in the hope that interest will arise within the open source and
free software communities; however commercial development is also good. The current work
only provides the basic foundation of this technology, it is up to others to decide if they wish to
make anything with it. Assistance will be provided to people to help them understand it if they
are interested in developing and using this technology.
The Process of Perception and Formation of Knowledge
Now we have a clear and subtle conceptual framework within which to think about the
fundamental systemic ‘mechanism’ of existence and all the objects, people, places, events and
the universe itself. So now consider general systems that are not just participating in existence
but are actively enquiring into it and trying to understand it; such as many human beings. Such a
system develops complex internal representations (ideas) with which they mirror their
experiential world. They also use collective codes or symbolic languages (whether verbal,
written, body language, etc) to produce external representations. These are then disseminated and
subjected to collective consensus that results in collective knowledge.
This collective knowledge then influences the individual ideas, which then influences how the
systems interpret and comprehend their perceptions and experiences. The structure of the
network determines how the information is channelled (interpretation) and the resulting flow of
information plus the state changes that it produces are the 'experience'. When conceived of from
the 'outside' it is a flow of information but when conceived of from the 'inside' it is experience
itself. Just like from the outside a neurologist conceives of a 'brain', "nervous system" and
"neuronal signalling", whereas each of us from the inside conceives of it as mind, consciousness,
feelings, thoughts. As we adopt certain conscious and subconscious attitudes the structure
changes so the interpretations, experiences and resulting ideas change. This indicates the deeper
subconscious aspect of a paradigm shift. When the way we interpret incoming information
fundamentally changes all the resulting experiences and ideas change. Hence a paradigm shift is
not just an extension or modification of existing ideas, it is a quantum leap, a radical change of
state that can change our experience and knowledge of existence. Things once thought
impossible may become the norm; whilst things once thought 'normal' may be later seen as
outmoded illusions based on inadequate understanding. Through a paradigm shift we literally
shift between worlds.
It is in the context of such a paradigm shift that this work analyses the process of perception,
how paradigms arise and evolve and how to manage and encourage a paradigm shift. Not toward
any particular paradigm, but towards a paradigm that is built upon clear, rational, direct, holistic
experience and not upon systemic, biological or historical assumptions, preconceived ideas or
cultural agendas. Whilst this analysis applies to the formation of all collective ideas, in this
discussion it focuses primarily on the "idea of the objective world" or “the physical universe”.
This is because it is one of our deepest and far-reaching assumptions.
The idea of an "objective world" underlies our ability to comprehend and communicate about our
subjective experiences. We recognise the common features in our communications and distil
from this the idea of the objective world. The common features clearly indicate the existence of
an objective reality of some kind; anyone but a solipsist [FR] would agree. But what is looked into
here is a systems analysis of the process by which we form the particular ideas that people have
of the objective world and what possible inaccuracies could arise through that process.
All we can ever directly experience and thereby know about our world ultimately rests upon our
present moment subjective experience. This is the foundation upon which all our knowledge
rests. Although the content of our subjective experiences is purely subjective, the actual process
of subjective experience is an objective phenomenon in the sense that we all experience it
occurring. What is the nature of this process? We will look into this from the perspective of
system theory.
Underlying experience there are certain phenomena such as: perception, interpretation, response;
a single localised perspective; the phenomenon of present moment existence and the interactions
between systems, which manifest the universe. These are low-level phenomena that underlie our
ability to experience and know anything at all. These are the existential process that underlies the
process of perception and thereby conceptually precedes empiricism.
So we see that the process of subjective experience has an objectively real basis that we all
experience by the very fact that we experience anything at all. But what about the collective
"idea of the objective world"? Like all collective knowledge it is an idea that arises through the
communication of subjective experiences. The existential information is perceived, interpreted,
experienced, comprehended, represented, communicated, deliberated and formed into collective
knowledge.
The direct 'pipeline' (see diagram below) has seven transformations in which information is lost
and distorted. Each stage is a filter through which the information must pass so any loses or
distortions are passed down. If some information is lost or distorted at some stage it remains lost
or distorted to all down-stream processes. Furthermore, in general there is an intrinsic loss and
distortion at each stage; in any transformation from one information-medium to another the
information can only be represented by the states or symbols available within the medium. For
example, when transforming a sentence between human languages the meanings can become
distorted because a word cannot be perfectly translated, or when transforming from light rays to
pixels in a digital camera information can be lost because of the limited resolution of the pixel
array.
The fundamental limitations of our perceptual / experiential process are related to the seven
transformations:
1. Objective reality to Perception via Signals. (external process)
We cannot perceive the full range of signals. Our senses are attuned to receiving signals
within only a very small range. But that is not all; it is a fundamental limitation of signal
detection that the detector requires some form of prior knowledge to discern signals as
being signals and not just noise. When things are very 'quiet' and a large obvious signal
comes it is obviously a signal, like someone shouting out your name in an otherwise
silent moment. But say you are at a cocktail party and there are many voices chattering;
this is known as the cocktail party problem in the field of signal processing [FR]. It is a
highly subtle and complex issue, exactly how do "listeners segregate and analyse a
sound-producing object in a complex acoustic environment" (Neural correlates of
auditory fill-in [FR]), i.e. how do you recognise people's voices, listen in to conversations
and filter out all the other noise? The subconscious mind / brain is remarkably good at
this in most circumstances. But when the signals are unfamiliar, perhaps a foreign
cocktail party or perhaps noises produced by different pieces of machinery or strange
instruments; as one loses familiarity the sounds very quickly merge into a cacophony
from which it is impossible to detect particular 'voices' or sound objects. This applies to
all signal detection and all sense perception; including the way that we discern and track
'objects' in our visual field based upon an in incoming cacophony of light rays. Another
particular example is the attempt to detect gravity waves. The problem is that there are
the most sensitive detection devices ever built [FR], costing tens of billions of dollars each;
even passing clouds and distant traffic hundreds of kilometres away create a huge amount
of noise. Furthermore, the actual shape of a gravity wave isn't well known, and there are
many possible waveforms that could arrive at the detector, which we don't know about.
But in order to resolve these signals out of the noise floor we need some prior knowledge
of the signals. Furthermore, the nature of our prior knowledge influences the manner in
which the signal is resolved from the noise floor, perhaps only detecting part of the actual
signal or perhaps including bits of other signals that get mixed in with the one we resolve.
So in essence, we cannot detect a signal that is totally new to us; there is always the
constraints of the detector and of our prior knowledge and our prior knowledge can
influence the exact form of the signal that we perceive; so to an extent we can only
perceive that which we are built to perceive and that which we already know or assume to
some extent.
2. Perception to Experience via Interpretation. (subconscious process)
Our subconscious interpretations of our perceptions do not perfectly reflect the full range
of perceptions. For example, in India where there are rickshaw drivers that park in
particular places overnight and sleep in their rickshaw in the hope of getting some
overnight business, late one night I went to one of these places where there was a
sleeping rickshaw driver. I walked up and said "hello, hello, HELLO"; quite loudly in the
end, but he was fast asleep and didn't stir. But then I said, in a fairly quiet voice
"rickshaw" and he immediately woke up. His subconscious mind had filtered out the
‘hello’, which was just a word in a foreign language and didn't have very deep roots in
his mind. But the word 'rickshaw' was his job, it signalled the work that he was hoping to
get overnight and immediately his subconscious related that signal through to his
conscious mind. In this way we are constantly receiving billions of subconscious signals
but only a very small number of them are deemed 'meaningful' to the conscious mind and
only those signals are passed on and present themselves to our conscious mind. All the
other signals are invisible to us.
As the existential information flows through the subconscious filter, most of it is
discarded and we are oblivious to its existence. If it cannot be comprehended as
meaningful within our current paradigm it is treated as noise. Furthermore, those signals
that do get through are represented to consciousness using the expressive range of the
current paradigm. We cannot experience the raw signal but only the cognitive state that
we associate with that signal. Hence the flow is selectively filtered for recognisable
patterns, which are then represented using an idiom (language) of experiential states.
Hence the flow of signals is reduced and transformed into a stream of events or occasions
of experience that are entirely constructed from pre-existing thought forms.
Consider an analogy with an 'optical character recognition' OCR program. The idiom of
experiential states is the letters of the alphabet (only a range of 26 experiential states).
The flow of signals into the subconscious is the flow of input images into the OCR
program. The transformation of signals into experiences is the recognition of characters,
words and sentences. Now consider the case where an image of someone's face is the
input image. The OCR cannot recognise any characters in this input so the entire signal is
discarded and no written output (experiential state) is produced; so it is invisible to
consciousness. If the input is a mixture of text and drawings, then only the text is
recognised and transmitted to consciousness (written output) and the drawings are
discarded as unrecognisable noise. If the input is text written in Greek but the OCR is
English then some characters will be recognised but many will not and the resulting
output will be a mess of nonsense words with many gaps. This is analogous to the case of
a right wing politician listening to a mystic; some words and concepts will come through,
but on the whole the listeners experience will be full of gaps and very garbled. That is
their experience and people generally take their experience as the reality, so they assume
that the mystic is deranged and incoherent, however it is simply a matter of incompatible
paradigms.
Or if the input is just English text, but say it is hand written. Most of it will be
recognisable as writing but many of the individual characters may be misinterpreted and
the resulting output is a bit garbled e.g. 'garbled' may become 'garhled'. But the conscious
mind is unaware of this and all that it knows is that it experiences 'garhled' and it takes
that as its empirical reality. Only when the input is printed English and the OCR is
optimised for this, only then is there good signal to noise ratio, but still not perfect. So
only when the paradigms are very similar and compatible can there be reliable coherent
communication.
These issues always arise whenever engaging with people with different paradigms, or
when confronting new ideas and especially new paradigms. They usually sound strange
and incoherent to begin with but once you have taken the shift it is the old paradigm that
sounds strange and incoherent. The entropy (lost information) is simply that which is
invisible to downstream systems, it was either filtered out or misrepresented by the
mapping between input signal and output symbol.
In this case of information transformation and in the following cases, we see that the
richer one's paradigm is the better it preserves the information flow. If one had a very
simplistic paradigm, with a very small range of distinct states then very little information
can pass and one's perceptions, experiences, ideas, expressions are all very simple and not
representative of the underlying reality. Most of the information has been lost and that
which remains has been represented using symbolic states that don't truly represent the
original signal. For example, if one records music on a pocket dictaphone then plays it
out loud and records it again on another dictaphone and so on, the signal will eventually
devolve into noise. For good quality recordings we need high fidelity microphones and
digital copying.
3. Experience to Ideas via Comprehension. (sub/conscious process)
Our personal ideas do not perfectly reflect our experiences. Similar to the above
discussion, our experiences can only be represented using the ideas that are available to
us. There are millions of subtle cognitive experiences but only very few ideas such as
'hot', 'tired', 'happy', 'angry', etc. So when we reduce our vast range of cognitive
experiences into ideas we filter out any that cannot be expressed and we group many
different experiences under common ideas. I.e. there are many possible states that can be
described as 'happy', so all the subtlety is lost when we categorise them all as ‘happy’.
4. Ideas to Representation via Code. (conscious process)
The representational code or language only allows us to express our ideas using a certain
set of symbols and relations. The range of words is even more limited than the range of
personal ideas. Hence many ideas are inexpressible and therefore filtered out or they are
distorted in the process of representation.
5. Representation to Communication via Dissemination. (external process)
The external representations are not uniformly distributed so everyone gets a different
exposure to these representations.
6. Communication to Culture via Synthesis. (external process)
There are many different people with different agendas, beliefs and degrees of influence,
all of whom partake in a collective discourse that we call 'culture'.
7. Culture to Collective Ideas via Social Consensus making. (external process)
Within the cultural discourse a consensus making process determines what is considered
to be 'fact'. This is not a straight forward rational consensus, it is usually a complex and
confusing struggle between different interest groups with different agendas, generally not
at all related to discerning truth but more related to economic gain, academic standing,
protecting unquestioned beliefs and all manner of vested interests.
“The traditional view of science is that scientists are searching for the truth in a
disinterested and objective way. It is generally admitted that there are occasional
dishonest scientists, but these are regarded as highly exceptional... This self-image of
scientists has been subject to much skeptical analysis in recent years. Sociologists of
science studying scientific controversies have found that evidence is only one of many
factors that influence what is accepted as authoritative. These other factors include
funding, prestige, rhetoric and political influence.” (The Objectivity of Science: Does it
stand examination?) Also see more [FR].
"The unfortunate reality is that there is a complex sociology of science. Scientific truth is
frequently not determined by right or wrong, but by ego, prestige, authority of claimants,
conflicts of interests and economic agendas. Scientists who propose research that
threatens the viability of basic theories on which authorities in the field have built their
careers, and governments and corporations have bet lots of money will find themselves
out of a job very soon. The list of great scientists who became scientific outcasts after
they published research that contradicts establishment dogma is long" (Seven Warning
Signs of Bogus Skepticism [FR])
There are also five principle feedback loops that make the process a highly non-linear complex
adaptive system.
1. Interpretation is influenced by personal ideas. (subconscious process)
Our subconscious personal ideas and attitudes influence how we interpret our
perceptions, thus influencing our experiences of those perceptions.
2. Comprehension is influenced by personal ideas. (subconscious process)
Our subconscious personal ideas and attitudes also influence how we comprehend our
experiences, thus influencing our ideas about those experiences (understanding).
3. Personal ideas are influenced by collective knowledge. (sub/conscious process)
Our personal ideas are influenced by collective knowledge/ideas, especially via
subconscious suggestion that bypasses our rational discrimination, such as is used in
advertising and propaganda. But also through conscious attempts to learn and understand
collective knowledge.
4. The Representative Code is a cultural construct. (external process)
The representational codes (languages) are cultural constructs that evolve through
cultural influences and are permeated with collective ideas that influence how personal
ideas are represented.
5. Dissemination is influenced by culture. (external process)
The dissemination of information influences our exposure to collective ideas and the
pattern of dissemination depends up many cultural, logistical and political factors; e.g.
the scarcity of accurate information or the prevalence of manipulative advertising or
propaganda.
The content of our awareness is determined by the input perceptions, interpretations,
experiences, comprehension and finally personal ideas. Our actual experiences are totally
determined by our interpretations of our perceptions. An example of this is hypnosis where,
through hypnotic suggestion a person can be handed an onion and told, "this is an apple, the most
delicious you have ever tasted", and they will eat it gladly. But when handed an apple and told,
"this an onion, but try and take a bite anyway", their eyes will water and they will fully
experience it as an onion.
Furthermore, our personal ideas or understanding is totally determined by our comprehension of
our experiences. An example of this is the case of "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat",
and other cases of visual agnosia [FR]. It "is the inability of the brain to make sense of or make use
of some part of otherwise normal visual stimulus and is typified by the inability to recognize
familiar objects or faces...Commonly, patients can describe objects in their visual field in great
detail, including such aspects as color, texture and shape but are unable to recognize them.
Similarly, patients can often describe familiar objects from memory despite their visual
problems." (Visual Agnosia (Wikipedia) [FR])
Both of these last points taken together compellingly indicate that the totality of our experiences
and understanding is a construct of the mind. We can neither see things nor know things "as they
are". In the final analysis we can only ever experience ourselves.
The greatest feat of the subconscious mind is the way that it takes incoming signals, filters them
and represents them to consciousness as a richly detailed and coherent subjective experience of a
world; an experiential context. The richer, more complex and more accurate one's subconscious
paradigm (interpretive idiom) is the richer, more complex and accurate one's world is, whereas a
simplistic and distorted subconscious paradigm will result in a simplistic and distorted world
experience. One's own subjective world experience is entirely a construct of one's mind that is
either closely or loosely based upon reality. So our experiential world is like a mind puppet; the
puppet is made of experiential states or ideas or memes and these are 'driven' by an underlying
flow of existential signals. It is actually a meme complex, but this is discussed later. Don't think
of it as an object in front of you, in one sense it is an immersive virtual reality that we dwell in
and in another sense it is a meme complex within your mind, but it dances to the tune of
incoming signals so I'll call it a puppet. We cannot experience the signals themselves; all we
experience is the mind puppet as it dances to the tune of the signals.
If the puppet is closely driven then it moves with the music and artistically represents the music
(flow of existential signals), but if it is loosely driven its movements may have little or no
relation to the music. If the puppet is internally very 'simple' then it is just a veil that covers the
signals and moves with them, but if it has great internal complexity then a small stimulus may
result in a cascade of internal states and the puppet may go on dancing wildly just from a small
initial impulse. This occurs when the puppet isn't just composed of ideas arising form experience
but also ideas about ideas that form a complex 'logic'. So an experience creates ideas but ideas
flow into ideas and result in conclusions, which then become the final experience of 'knowing'. If
this logic closely mirrors the nature of reality then the puppet dances due to incoming signals and
internal logic but stays in tune with the music, but if the logic is false, flawed or too limited then
the music stirs up many wild movements. For example, a simple gesture such as a smile can be
taken as just that, but to some it resonates in their minds and becomes a "sexual advance" or a
"sinister smile" or a 'grimace'. Each person experiences the existential signals very differently
depending on the nature of the mind puppet. So that which drives the puppet is reality but people
generally assume that their personal puppet is reality, but the puppet is just a virtual reality
constructed by their mind and in which they experience themselves as a being in a world.
So now we have analysed the main 'pipeline' from perception to collective knowledge but each
feedback loop is itself a complex 'pipeline' of transformations. We will briefly discuss each of
these.
1. Interpretation is influenced by personal ideas. (subconscious process)
The manner in which a person's personal ideas, thoughts, attitudes and knowledge
influence their subconscious interpretive process, which transforms perceptions into
experiences, is very subtle and depends on the prior state of their conscious and
subconscious minds. It is a gradual assimilation of impressions and symbolic images into
the subconscious. It is a complex restructuring of the memetic [FR] 'ecosystem' that is their
"inner space". It can change everything about what we perceive.
2. Comprehension is influenced by personal ideas. (subconscious process)
In its general properties this process is similar to the one just mentioned for
interpretation.
3. Personal ideas are influenced by collective knowledge. (sub/conscious process)
This is a very complex process that is fraught with loss and distortion of information.
Collective ideas are only experienced via concrete representations, such as a research
paper, an essay, an advertising slogan, body language and customary ways of inter-
relating and so on. These are all symbolic representations within which an underlying
message or meaning is implied. But the symbols must be decoded to derive the meaning
and this occurs on both conscious and subconscious levels. The decoding is a process of
taking in the main symbols (e.g. words in an essay), allowing them to resonate within
one's mind (memetic ecosystem) thereby associating meaning to them and then using this
to then derive the combined meaning of the sequence of words. However the meanings of
these symbols can be vague and even though words may have exact dictionary meanings,
in general the way that they are used is based upon subconscious associations; that
determines the actual experience of a word. Hence a person may wish to express an idea
so they use a set of words, but these words carry very different associations for the reader
so the derived meaning may be totally different to the intended meaning.
It is through this game of "Chinese whispers" that we convey knowledge through our
minds and throughout the cultural domain. For example, to one person the concept
'government' is the central custodian of all social goodness, responsibility, duty of care,
ideology, justice and so on; it is the provider of social services and the impartial arbiter in
any dispute. But to someone else the government is just the institutionalisation of corrupt
authoritarian delusions, they are metaphorically the biggest "gangster on the block" who
dominates and legitimises many other gangsters. It seeks its own advantage, pursues its
own agendas and it conditions and uses the population in order to do this. There are many
other attitudes but these are two extreme ones. Both of which are true to an extent, in the
sense that the analogy captures some aspect of the actual nature of 'government'. But
given these two very different associations with the word 'government', any sentence
using that word or concept will be interpreted very differently. This is particularly the
case with words such as God [FR], spirit, etc. If the basic symbols are misunderstood then
the whole message is distorted. An extreme example is trying to read Greek but
interpreting it as Russian; it can only result in nonsense.
Hence the same article of collective knowledge can produce very different personal ideas.
For example, a news report about a riot may be interpreted as the police subduing a
raging mob and bringing peace and order back to the streets, or perhaps as the police
acting as the government's henchmen to suppress the justified resistance of people who
are acting to protect themselves from the atrocities of the government's agenda. Given the
wide range of possible interpretations all articles of collective knowledge can result in a
wide range of personal ideas. The actual knowledge or original personal ideas that the
collective knowledge tries to capture can in many cases be totally lost or distorted beyond
all recognition as it is transformed into countless derivative personal ideas. This
confusion then feeds back into the process and cycles around throughout the entire non-
linear perceptual / experiential process. If people naively confuse their personal
interpretation with "what the article is actually trying to say" then everyone will
understand it differently and assume that their understanding is the only understanding.
Hence they act as if everyone else understands it the same way and this creates more
confusion in countless subtle ways.
4. The Representative Code is a cultural construct. (external process)
Language has evolved haphazardly in the context of pragmatic human interactions within
the cultural domain. Hence language is very unsuited to representing things outside the
cultural domain. Hence the need for analogies. Different cultures have different focuses,
for example, in Sanskrit there are thousands of words describing subtle states of
awareness and ways of connecting and uniting with reality. In Inuit languages there are
countless names for types of snow and ice. In English there are countless words and
concepts relating to separatist power struggle, domination, oppression, to swindle and
cheat, to opportunistically seek one's one advantage, to be a winner or a loser. English
has a deeply egoic foundation. 'Ego' is understood to mean the 'I'-thought, the concept of
separate individual existence within an external world; this leads to concepts of
competition and cooperation, to struggle and to success or failure. Each language creates
the ground or the field upon which all discourses within it take place. Different fields
allow for different types of discourses and they inhibit and distort any other type of
discourse. For example, when one is simply going with the flowing and acting natural
there is no 'agent' or 'doer' who chooses or decides to act, but in English it is difficult to
describe one's actions without the implied introduction of a 'doer'. For instance when
someone says that they are digesting people assume that they are just commenting on an
event, but when they say that they are working, one assumes that they have a goal, an
agenda, that they are deliberately working toward something or for someone, but there is
always the idea of an individual isolated ego that is deliberately engaged in 'doing'
something. But what if one goes with the flow and simply reports that work 'happens' and
that the work is related to the perceived entity that we refer to as 'I'.
Furthermore, languages are very open to manipulation, thus constraining the scope of
potential discourses or fundamentally distorting the field of discourses. Examples are, the
current blurring and redefining of words such as 'freedom', 'liberty', 'democracy',
'security', 'terrorism', 'guerrilla' and so on. By manipulating the meanings within the
political discourse people are unable to think about these things except through the
political discourse. Hence open minded enquiry and critical analysis become impossible.
Another example is 'newspeak' in George Orwell's novel 1984 [FR] where "The
government's most brilliant and most appalling project is the actual deconstruction of the
English language into Newspeak, the language of the Party. Each successive edition of
the Newspeak Dictionary has fewer words than its predecessor. By removing meaning
and nuance from the vocabulary, the government hopes to eradicate seditious and anti-
social thinking before it even has the chance to enter a person's mind. Without the
vocabulary for revolution, there can be no revolution. For those who persist in thinking
for themselves, so-called Thought Criminals, Ingsoc's stormtroopers, the Thought Police,
are there to intervene, incarcerating the free-thinkers in the Ministry of Love, where they
will be re-educated, or worse."
(quoted from newspeak.com/1984.htm)
"Don't you see, the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought. In the end,
we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible because there will be no words in which
to express it... The whole climate of thought will be different. In fact, there will be no
thought as we understand it now."
"By 2050-earlier, probably-all real knowledge of Oldspeak will have disappeared. The
whole literature of the past will have been destroyed. Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton,
Byron-they'll exist only in Newspeak versions, not merely changed into something
different, but actually contradictory of what they used to be. Even the literature of the
Party will change. Even the slogans will change. How could you have a slogan like
"freedom is slavery" when the concept of freedom has been abolished? The whole
climate of thought will be different. In fact there will be no thought, as we understand it
now. Orthodoxy means not thinking-not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness."
(George Orwell, "1984")
"The intensity of the squabble showed the corrosive effect the president's subversion of
language has had on our larger culture... we have all taken to following Mr. Bush's lead
in retreating from English as we once knew it. It's been a familiar pattern for the news
media, politicians and the public alike in the Bush era. It took us far too long to
acknowledge that the 'abuses' at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere might be more accurately
called torture. And that the 'manipulation' of prewar intelligence might be more
accurately called lying." (Civil War? Abuse? Manipulation? Really? [FR])
5. Dissemination is influenced by culture. (external process)
The dissemination of ideas is a major point of leverage for the manipulation of the
cultural domain by various agendas and power structures. The growth and penetration of
the mass media is a classic example. In many ways we now live in a system where one
has the right to say whatever one likes, but the status-quo is protected because there is
virtually no likelihood that anyone will listen. Most minds are turned toward and
entangled within the mass media discourse. Whilst in that trance, all other ways of
thinking seem alien and abstract and only the media propaganda message seems real. It is
this manipulative abuse of the media that makes us live in 'pseudo' democracies. It is true
that we have a consensus based governing system but when the consent is manipulated
the entire system is subverted and open to abuse [FR].
"Control over the flow of information emanating from the political center will be our
most important weapon...." (Edward Luttwak, Coup d'Etat [FR])
"The extraordinary measures that the White House planned to undertake in its war
against crime depended heavily for their success on the organization of public fears. If
Americans could be persuaded that their lives and the lives of their children were being
threatened by a rampant epidemic of narcotics addiction, Nixon's advisors presumed
they would not object to decisive government actions, such as no-knock warrants,
pretrial detention, wiretaps, and unorthodox strike forces-even if the emergency
measures had to cross or circumvent the traditional rights of a suspect. To achieve this
state of fear required transforming a relatively small heroin addiction problem-which
even according to the most exaggerated estimates directly affected only a minute fraction
of the population in 1971-into -a plague that threatened all. This in turn required the
artful use of the media to propagate a simple but terrifying set of stereotypes about drug
addiction: the addict-dealer would be depicted as a modern-day version of the medieval
vampire, ineluctably driven to commit crimes and infect others by his insatiable and
incurable need for heroin. The victims would be shown as innocent youth, totally
vulnerable to the vampire-addict. And the federal law-enforcement officer would be
shown as the only effective instrument for stopping the vampire-addicts from
contaminating the rest of society. The most obvious medium available for projecting
these stereotypes on the popular imagination was television." (Agency of Fear: Opiates
and Political Power in America [FR])
"Today, tight and selective control over media licences has prevented independent
groups and organisations from starting their own publications and broadcasting
stations. This state of affairs has allowed only vested political and economic interests to
consolidate and perpetuate their control over society through their compliant media." (A
Malaysian citizens' media initiative [FR])
"Although media outlets can be actively used to promote conflict, media can also
contribute to conflict involuntarily. Such passive incitement to violence most frequently
occurs when journalists have poor professional skills, when the media culture is
underdeveloped or when there is little or no history of independent media. Under such
circumstances, journalists can inflame grievances and promote stereotypes by virtue of
the manner in which they report, even though their intentions are not necessarily
malicious and they are not being manipulated by an outside entity... media have
generally been overlooked in analyses of conflict because, on their own, they are rarely a
direct cause. Nonetheless, as part of a larger matrix of factors, media can be extremely
powerful tools for promoting violence, as witnessed in Rwanda, the former Republic of
Yugoslavia, the former Soviet republic of Georgia and elsewhere [US, UK, Australia,
etc]. As Jamie Metzl (1997) observes, 'mass media reach not only people's homes, but
also their minds, shaping their thoughts and sometimes their behavior." (The use and
abuse of media in vulnerable societies [FR])
“With all that ideological money, institutional heft, coordination, and credentialing, the
right has perfected what the CIA used to call a "mighty Wurlitzer" -- a propaganda
machine that can hone a fact or a lie, broadcast it, and have it echoed and recycled in
Fox News commentary, in Washington Times news stories, in Wall Street Journal
editorials, by myriad right-wing pundits, by Heritage seminars and briefing papers, and
in congressional hearings and speeches. Privatization of Social Security, vouchers for
school, Vince Foster's supposed murder, Hillary's secret sex life, you name it -- the
right's mighty Wurlitzer can ensure that a message is broadcast across the county,
echoed in national and local news, and reverberated in the speeches of respectable
academics as well as rabid politicians.” (The Mighty Wurlitzer [FR])
“The business of the New York journalist is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert,
to vilify, to fawn at the feet of Mammon, and to sell his race and his country for his daily
bread. You know this and I know it, and what folly is this to be toasting an "Independent
Press."
We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping-jacks;
they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the
property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes.” (John Swinton, editor of the New
York Tribune, in the 1880s, at a banquet of his fellow editors, quoted from Media Watch
[FR]
)
Another vital aspect of the control of the flow of information is censorship, but in
particular self-censorship that is conditioned into people, that is the only effective form of
censorship otherwise the very attempt to enforce censorship simply draws attention to
that which you do not want people to give attention to. However if it is internalised and
subconscious it operates far more effectively and without the people even being aware of
it. They identify with the conditioned attitudes and believe that they are exercising their
judgment when in fact they are being conditioned and controlled. This form of self-
censorship is accomplished via memetic inoculation; foreign memes are taken and
horribly disfigured to make them seem pathetic or repulsive, then wrapped in other
memes of ‘taboo’ or ‘heretical’ or ‘crackpot’ and then introduced into your memetic
complex (mind) where they are immediately rejected and remembered. Then whenever
you are exposed to the foreign memes your memetic complex immediately recognises
them as being one of the disfigured memes and they are either ignored or rejected by the
subconscious without you even consciously becoming aware of this. You develop
habitual reflexive aversion toward these ideas that is beyond your conscious awareness
and control; this is the underlying dynamic of cynicism.
Cynical memetic inoculation produces a reflexive ‘jeer’ that is programmed deep into
one’s meme complex (mind). It can be overcome through awareness, which can catch the
reflex as it is triggered and subtly apply the will. If you catch a meme in action they lose
their power to control you, only when you are absent and on autopilot do they have
power, then they are your mind. Indeed your mind is a meme complex and has a will of
its own, but the real you is the pure awareness. Whenever the true king (awareness) steps
up to the throne (control) the impostor (mind) steps down. The mind makes an excellent
minister if held in check but it makes a tyrannical dictator when it usurps the throne.
Furthermore, due to the non-linear nature of the perceptual / experiential process the distortions
produced by preconceived ideas tend to reinforce those ideas. For example, if a person is deeply
alienated from society they approach any social situation with their psychological barriers up.
They appear to others to be distant and unapproachable so people do not respond in a friendly
relaxed way; they too are guarded. The person sees this and due to their subconscious attitude
they interpret this as meaning that the people are cold and uncaring. This can spiral into total
alienation. Or conversely, a person who instinctively believed that everyone loved them could
spiral into social integration and perhaps fame. This is an example of what is called a
schizmogenesis, which is a general phenomenon that is observed in regards to "the structural
aspects of social conflict" and was first defined by Bateson as "a process of differentiation in the
norms of individual behaviour resulting from cumulative interaction between individuals" [FR].
Due to these feedback loops cynicism breeds closed minds and skepticism breeds open-minds.
Each time one accepts an illusion one reinforces it. If one challenges it and brings awareness into
it then one has a chance to break through it. For example, if a person's mind is closed
(memetically inoculated) to a way of thinking, say science ( many people are fearful and
prejudiced in this way), then at any mention of science they experience only their associations
and naively take these to be the reality. Perhaps they experience evil, deceitful, men in white lab
coats lost in a complex and ludicrous delusion and systematically forcing their destructive
agenda on the world. A person with that attitude would never listen to a scientist except to find
fault with them, they are incapable of actually 'listening'. They only ever hear their own
prejudice. The scientist genuinely seems to them to be evil and delusional. They confuse their
distorted objects of perception with reality.
It may well be that the scientist is actually sincere, coherent and caring. Nobody is free from
delusion but within the context of their delusion they may be very well meaning and
compassionate people. If the "anti-scientist" person challenged their personal prejudice and
listened they might realise that what the scientist is saying may even be meaningful or useful to
them, even though it may be expressed in a way that is foreign to them. But if they experience
only "evil, deceitful men..." and don't challenge that but instead naively accept that as the reality
then that experience only adds to that persons weight of evidence, which further convinces them
that their opinion is correct. It simply reinforces the preconceptions and strengthens the illusion.
Some people have this particular prejudice, and prejudices of various kinds, but one of the most
common is against mystics. It leaves one to wonder what these people actually experience and
think when they encounter mysticism [FR]. Generally their minds are totally closed and they are
unable to listen or comprehend, instead they only respond to their prejudices and become
derisive or aggressive.
To use the previous example of the scientist, it is as if the scientist was simply trying to point out
that 1+1=2 (or anything that is obvious if one only stops and thinks about it). But people are so
caught up in their prejudices that they are irrationally defensive and hostile. They fail to even
listen to what was said but they unanimously join together to denounce the scientist. This is a
rare experience for a scientist but a very common one for a mystic. This discussion seeks to
break through the irrationality to some degree so that people are able to listen long enough to
realise that 1+1=2 isn't a strange incantation or a plot to deceive you, it is just a simple, coherent
and useful observation.
These examples illustrate how our deepest subconscious attitudes and beliefs can subtly and
radically influence the nature of our experiences and understanding. It can cause people to dwell
in radically different worlds (experiential / conceptual contexts) even though they perceive the
same existential information (objective reality). Due to the subtle and complex nature of the
perceptual / experiential process our subjective responses to reality can vary greatly.
By operating through the five senses we experience an 'outer' world. That "world experience" is
formed by an 'inner' perceptual/experiential process. If the inner process distorts the information
flow then the experience and personal ideas become distorted. If the personal ideas are distorted
the process becomes more distorting. This can become a feedback loop where confusion breeds
confusion, eventually resulting in the total breakdown of the process (e.g. psychosis). Or
understanding can breed understanding resulting in greater knowledge and effective participation
in reality.
Furthermore, when enquiring into the nature of reality you must be very aware of your agenda
because it can subtly and radically influence everything. A person's agenda creates a
subconscious context that influences all of their values, associations and the meanings they
attach to things. Do you seek validation for a belief system? Do you seek acceptance within a
collective discourse and thereby security in an academic career? Do you seek to invent some
lucrative technology? Or do you seek truth for truth's sake, regardless of the consequences? Only
this last agenda can open you up fully to reality. Reality may shatter your cherished illusions or
may make your colleagues turn against you out of confusion or it may have no obvious and
immediate commercial application; but you must risk everything and be attached to nothing to
open up to reality, because any preconceived idea will distort the lens, which distorts the image,
which distorts the lens, and on and on.
If you naively accept that the "appearances of things" is their "whole reality" then the spiral into
illusion can be swift since there is "no brake". However if you accept that your experiences are
just your interpretations of your perceptions and that your understanding is just your
comprehension of your experiences, and neither of these is infallible, then you are able to apply
awareness and penetrative insight that has a corrective influence on your interpretations and
comprehensions, thus clarifying your mind.
From this we see that the flow of existential information from the "objective reality" to the "idea
of the objective world" is complex and subjective, there are many stages in which information is
lost (entropy) and many feedback loops making the system non-linear (thus having HIGHLY
complex behaviour). Hence our experiences, personal ideas and representations are conditioned
and do not necessarily provide an accurate perspective on the existential information. The
process from perception to collective knowledge is NOT a simple system and most historically
accepted assumptions are grossly inaccurate.
The Three Domains
In the above diagram of the perceptual / experiential pipeline we see that the existential
information originates from the objective domain. This is the underlying 'reality' that "is what it
is" regardless of what we may think of it. The information then passes into the subjective domain
as particular perceptions, experiences and ideas depending on the nature of our perceptual /
experiential process. This is an experiential domain of mind, thoughts, feelings, sensations and
so on. From here our personal ideas flow through the cultural domain and merge into collective
knowledge. This is a conceptual domain, the space of concepts, words, names, measures,
theories, research, experiment, evidence, proofs, logical argument, and so on. It is also the
domain of the "idea of the objective world".
When a person experiences through the 'lens' of the "idea of the objective world" they interpret,
experience and comprehend their existential experience as "being in an objective world". This
experience looks and feels like they might think objective reality should look and feel like, but
that is because this perspective is the only one that they have used to form their expectations.
Whilst the world that they experience is very tangible it is ultimately an illusion constructed by
the distortions of the "idea of the objective world". There is an underlying objective reality
'behind' the appearances, which is the 'substance' of things, but they cannot see it for what it is.
Hence they dwell in a pseudo objective world.
These three domains correspond to the "three worlds" in Vedic metaphysics:
• Bhur, (Outer world, cultural Domain, pseudo objective world, physical plane)
• Bhuvah, (Inner space, subjective domain, perceptual / experiential process, astral
plane),
• Swaha, (Actual process of the real, objective Domain, holistic information process,
celestial plane),
The subjective domain separates the objective domain and the cultural domain because culture
arises from shared subjective experiences. The traditional scientific approach is to deny and
attempt to avoid all forms of subjectivity; hence it operates entirely within the cultural domain
and the pseudo objective world (discussed shortly), which is conceptualised as "the physical
universe". Science is a system of ideas that have close correspondence to those aspects of the
objective domain that manage to filter through the complex process from perception to collective
ideas. But the process is heavily distorted by systemic, biological and historical assumptions that
feedback into the non-linear process and drive it far from being a clear and open channel of
awareness. Much of the objective reality gets distorted by preconceptions and is therefore
incomprehensible, or it does not flow through so it is invisible from the current scientific
perspective. Because of this science has great accuracy and relevance in very small and isolated
domains but it cannot comprehend anything outside of these; it cannot see the bigger picture.
"Science is built up of facts, as a house is with stones. But a collection of facts is
no more a science than a heap of stones is a house."
(Jules Henri Poincaré, 1908) [A unified 'foundation' and coherent structure is required]
Because of the fundamental systemic, biological and historical limitations of our perspective
many collective ideas about the world and life are highly inaccurate representations of the
objective domain (actual reality). For example, materialism is an accurate and compelling
analogy and a useful working hypothesis but as a dogmatic orthodox belief system it is very
limiting. Anyone who looks into it deeply enough will reach a point at which it breaks down, as
quantum physicists, many philosophers and countless mystics have shown. This is because it is
based upon many assumptions with their roots in our systemic nature, our biology and our
history. Two important assumptions are that "sensory perception does not just inform us of the
appearance of things but also of the real nature of things" and that "the mind is a perfect 'lens'
through which we experience the 'objects themselves' and not just our own interpretation of the
objects of perception". These are a form of naive realism [FR] and have been shown to be false but
the assumptions are buried so deep in the foundation of our collective knowledge, language and
individual ideas that they generally go totally unquestioned. It would take a great deal of work to
clarify the assumptions with a deeper more accurate understanding and then to work upwards
and rectify the entire structure of human knowledge; both within one's own subconscious and
conscious mind and within our collective knowledge. But if a building is resting on an unstable
foundation and is about to fall, making high-level changes makes no difference; the whole
structure must be realigned.
Subjectivity and the 'Unseen' Aspect of Reality
When you are a system analyst creating a system you can see the entire system clearly; the
primitive systems, the network of interactions, the information flows and the many levels of
systems within systems (left image). You have an objective view into the entire information
space within which the systems exist and interact. But if you happen to be a system embedded
within the information space that you are studying then you only have a subjective view. The
image on the right only indicates the nature of the subjective view not its actual form. If you
were system S1 then your view would actually look more like two objects in space. The shaded
components on the right are invisible to the subjective system S1 and the diagram simply
indicates what aspects are visible and invisible. In the objective view we can see all of the details
but in the subjective view system S1 can only see the outer forms of systems S2 and S3,
everything else is 'invisible'.
In the context of a VR computer game the objective view is like using an advanced 'debugger' to
analyse the program itself as it is running whilst the subjective view is like playing the game and
perceiving it from the perspective of being a character within the game. This is a fundamental
duality that applies to all information systems. It can be more generally described by the
concepts, transcendent (objective) and empirical (subjective). For example, a computer game can
be an information process within a computer and also an experiential space. A movie can be a
reel in a projector, which is pointed at a screen in front of an audience and also a captivating
story that we imaginatively experience. So too any system is both a structured information
process within an information space and an entity within a world, which has particular properties
and it experiences a particular perspective on its world.
In the transcendent (objective) view a system's 'inner' aspect is a structured network of sub-
systems and their interactions. However in the empirical (subjective) view a systems inner aspect
is it's perceptual / experiential process that gives it it's present moment experiences. All systems
have both transcendent and empirical aspects - these are just two different ways of interpreting
the same thing.
Physicality and Information
From within a subjective view a system has only a 'surface' experience of its world and from
these surface impressions it derives its understanding. If one takes the objects of perception as
ontologically 'real' objects then we inevitably arrive at the concept of matter and physicality
because those surface impressions are 'tangible'. For example, when a rock is thrown and strikes
you on the head the experienced form of the rock-head interaction is very tangible. Information
passes from rock to head and into the system we call the body where we experience that
information flow as pain, bruising and so on. Now let us look into the idea of physicality.
A major difference between that which we consider to be physical and non-physical
(information) is that physical substance (matter/energy) is conserved whereas information is not;
it is just pattern. In information there is entropy (loss of information leading to loss of structure)
and negentropy (self-organisation resulting in a gain in complexity or information); information
is just 'pattern' whereas physical matter/energy is always conserved. This is a fundamental aspect
of nested information spaces in relation to 'simulation'. In the transcendent context the
information is not conserved but it can represent quantities that are conserved. For example,
consider a simple computer simulation of the conserved flow of fluid between various inter-
connected reservoirs. This is equivalent to an SMN system model with normalised matrix
columns, where normalised means that the probabilities in the column sum to one. (link to
“Getting a Grip”?) The transcendent computational process creates and destroys data in the CPU
and memory thereby creating information loss or entropy that manifests as heat (that is why
CPU's get so hot). But at the same time, within the empirical simulation world all the quantities
are conserved; this is a necessary condition for a stable enduring empirical world. It requires
some conserved 'substance' out of which to be formed.
So the transcendent information process creates a sim-universe composed of sim-substance. This
is a world within a world and we will see that this can go to any depth. Within the sim-universe
the sim-substance underlies the arising of sim-forms of all kinds. These sim-forms can be
structured and patterned into sim-symbols and used to encode or represent sim-information.
These sim-symbols can be used to record and transmit sim-information and can also be
combined with other sim-forms into sim-information processes such as a sim-computer that
operates on sim-information by manipulating sim-symbols. Within this sim-computer there is a
sim-computational space where sim-information is not conserved. This sim-computer can sim-
simulate a sim-sim-universe, which is composed of conserved sim-sim-substance.
So a transcendent information process underlies empirical substance and empirical substance can
represent information and be formed into a sim-transcendent information process. So there can
be worlds within worlds where each empirical context has 'tangible', conserved substance and
each transcendent context has an information system (computational) essence. Whenever
empirical forms are used as symbols to represent, transmit, transform and process information
we are creating a type of transcendent context within which an empirical context arises and
within which virtual forms exist. For example, a book is just paper with patterns of ink, but
through language and imagination a novel can create within our minds a rich and compelling
'story' or virtual world that we can experience to some degree. All writing, art, mathematics and
all symbolic technologies rely on this property of information spaces and worlds within worlds.
Although so far we have only explored the potential of this to a small degree.
In fact, the whole of our empirical existence relies upon this aspect of information systems;
otherwise there would be no conserved sim-substance (matter/energy) and no empirical context
(physical universe). But let us examine the relation between information and physicality a little
closer by considering a long standing puzzle in the empirical sciences; i.e. the unreasonable
effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences [FR].
It seems to scientists that "the enormous usefulness of mathematics in the natural sciences is
something bordering on the mysterious and that there is no rational explanation for it".
(Eugene Wigner)
“How can it be that mathematics, being after all a product of human thought independent of
experience, is so admirably adapted to the objects of reality?” ( Albert Einstein [FR] )
So if mathematics was considered as the science of pure information; a science of symbol,
relation and transformation, then this would explain the age-old puzzle. If the physical universe
is actually a virtual reality within an information process then mathematics is the ideal science to
use. In fact the utility of mathematics is compelling evidence for the information theoretic nature
of the universe. Let us clarify things.
First it is proposed here that mathematics is the science of information. Furthermore it is a
property of information that any information process/pattern can be represented in an equivalent
process/pattern. For example, eiπ + 1 = 0 are both equivalent (=) representations. Or consider two
computer programs, each written in different but logically equivalent languages, where the two
programs are logically equivalent in their structure and behaviour. They are different but
equivalent information processes. Because of this equivalence one information process/pattern
can be used to 'model' another information process/pattern. If the model is perfectly equivalent
then they are fully interchangeable and the question of which is the 'real' one and which is the
'model' is just a matter of identification or labelling of one of them as 'real'. This relies on
assumed "primitive thisness" [FR] and memory. But there is no intrinsic difference between them.
One important difference that doesn't affect their logical equivalence but could indicate which
one is more fundamental is the concept of algorithmic complexity (also known as computational
complexity or Kolmogorov Information). The simplest possible representation is thought to be
the most realistic one. In this respect it is thought that reality is maximally compressed so any
arbitrary but equivalent model of it would necessarily be larger than the actual reality. Hence
reality is its own best model and any model that was to truly represent reality would also have to
be maximally compressed. [algorithmic complexity]
Now consider 'physical' systems and the 'physical' universe. For centuries science has been
leveraging "the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences" and has
discovered a profound, meaningful, accurate and fundamental equivalence between mathematics
and physical processes/patterns. We can perform ab initio calculations of many physical systems.
"A calculation is said to be 'ab initio' (or from first principles) if it relies on basic and
established laws of nature without additional assumptions or special models." [FR]
This equivalence between mathematics and physical systems is compelling but we do not yet
know for sure that it is an exact equivalence, but that is the general belief of many scientists. For
instance, if a grand unified theory (GUT) is possible then this implies an exact equivalence.
Given the nature of information processes/patterns and 'equivalence', it is not unreasonable to
wonder; if mathematics is a generalised information process/pattern and the physical universe is
equivalent to mathematics (can be completely represented by mathematics) then it is possible
that physical processes/patterns are actually information processes/patterns.
But what about 'physicality'? It is a general property of all information systems that they tangibly
interact with systems within their own information space and perceive systems in other
information spaces as "just information". For example, material objects tangibly interact in a
common physical space, software programs tangibly interact in a common computational space
and bureaucratic documents and decrees tangibly influence each other within a bureaucratic
system and so on. So could it be that 'physicality' is just the tangibility of our experience with
systems in a common information space? If we are made of the same empirical 'substance' and
information flows through us as part of the same collective information process then we are
physically interacting with those systems. Just like a computer game bullet can kill a computer
game character but is just information to us, so too a 'physical' bullet can kill us but it is just
information to a computer game character. This implies that 'physicality' arises in all empirical
contexts and not just in the 'physical' universe.
The phenomenon of MST implies worlds within worlds, information spaces within information
spaces, minds within a collective mind and in general information systems within information
systems. There are different inner and outer forms at each MST level but the same fundamental
principle applies throughout. There is one transcendent foundation then an empirical world,
which acts as a sub-transcendent context for a sub-empirical world and so on. Civilisations don’t
experience galaxies directly as tangible physical things, people don’t experience civilization as a
tangible physical thing and cells don’t experience organisms as physical tangible things. They
can’t accidentally bump into one or pick one up. Try and fight a civilization and you only
experience fighting people because to us on our MST level a civilization is just an abstract idea.
Sub-systems within a common super-system all occupy a common interaction space and can
interact directly and tangibly, so people experience people, atoms experience atoms, civilizations
experience civilizations and so on. In each of these cases the interactions are experienced as
being ‘physical’ because they are tangible. The information flowing is the same ‘stuff’ that the
systems are made of so it impacts them very tangibly. Each information space seems to its
occupants to be the only ‘real’ space, the space where things are thought to actually happen and
all other spaces are thought to be “just information”. So IST teaches us that all experiential
contexts seem ‘real’ from within and ‘virtual’ from without; but in fact none of them are actually
real, they are all virtual.
This should inspire us to look into our concept of 'physicality' and how we could distinguish a
physical process/pattern from a model (an information process/pattern). Other than the fact that
they / we share the information space with the physical process/pattern (and have a subjective
view of it) and we observe the model in a sub information space (and have an objective view of
it). But other than that there is no intrinsic difference!
If there is equivalence then the two processes/patterns are identical. There is no essence that
pervades one of them and thereby endows it with the quality of 'physicality'. Each can be
tangibly experienced by systems depending on which information space the perspective is
embedded. To the systems in the model, other model systems are tangible and 'physical' and
systems that we think of as physical would seem to them to be separate, abstract information
(e.g. a computer program monitoring a room via a camera; the chairs and people etc are just
patterns of information flowing through the camera).
Therefore the only reason that we have to believe in 'physicality' as something unique to this
'physical' universe is the narrowness of our perspective and the limitations of our experiences; in
short, because we are systemically, biologically and historically conditioned to think this way.
There is no other reason. So if science is right in its use of mathematics and if a grand unified
theory is possible then this indicates that the physical universe is in fact an information universe.
The idea of primitive thisness [FR] mentioned earlier raises another point. At the quantum level the
fundamental articles totally lack primitive thisness. If one takes two electrons and swaps them
around one cannot discern the difference. Even the particles and the universe cannot discern the
difference, it is not just our limited perspective. They have no intrinsic identity that inheres in
them. But in contrast one can take two seemingly identical coins and swap them around; even
though they seem identical they are still distinct coins with unique identities and histories.
However, if one moves 'bits' around in a computer one zero is identical to another zero and the
individual zero's have no primitive thisness. In general a symbol is identical to another
equivalent symbol so they lack primitive thisness; this is a general property of information. So a
copy is identical to the original in every way. It is impossible to discern which is the original and
which is the copy.
This is an important difference between information technology (IT) and manufacturing
industries. You cannot just build one car and then create millions of copies, but with software
you can. However at the quantum level matter is just information; it can be teleported [FR] from
place to place (transmitted as quantum information) and the quantum wavefunctions can be
operated on just like light waves, giving rise to quantum optics [FR], atom lasers, matter holograms
and so on. This all implies that 'physical' processes are fundamentally information process.
So what is the difference between 'physicality' and 'information'? Why use two words when they
are equivalent; the reason is historical. A physical process is just an information process that you
are embedded in and that is therefore 'tangible'. So we can think of these things as physical
processes or as some kind of information process. However in the past we have had countless
materialist concepts but information theory, computational science and system theory had not
been developed back then, so many abstract substances were proposed or different empirical
phenomena. These were used as analogies to describe the non-empirical (information theoretic)
aspects of reality.
Nowadays many physicists are speaking about relativistic matter/energy equivalence, quantum
processes and "strings" and so on as if they were "abstract physical" processes. By this it is
meant that they are still thought of as "physical" in that they underlie our 'tangible' experience of
reality, but they are not 'material' in the sense of the old ideas of ontologically existing particles
in space that a priori (miraculously) exist and function with complex behaviour. Nowadays there
are also many people speaking about information, computation and other information theoretic
phenomena that may underlie the universe. In all times people have spoken of 'light', 'spirit',
"ethereal substance", "mystical substance" and so on. They are analogically describing the
universe as a virtual information theoretic construct but using non-information theoretic
terminology.
They are all speaking about exactly the same underlying vision of reality, but using different
analogies and concepts to represent their ideas to themselves and others. Hence they seem very
different but they are equivalent. Because the concept 'physical' arises from information
processes operating in a common information space it doesn't matter whether one thinks about
things as being "abstract physical", "information theoretic" or 'spiritual', the principles are the
same. They are all fundamentally in agreement but they interpret things differently. However the
mystic, spiritual discourse [FR] has become seriously misrepresented in the general discourse due
to confusions arising over time through the various cultural and cognitive feedback loops. This
essay seeks to uncover this confusion, clarify the concepts and elucidate the parallels between
the various paradigms.
The only approach that stands apart from these is the naive realist (commonsense realist) [FR],
materialist, objectivist perspective that goes unquestioned in the backs of many people's minds. It
subtly or radically influences our general attitudes, interpretations, experiences and ideas. Even
those working with 'spirit', or 'information' or "abstract physicality", who theoretically should
know better, and may even consciously know better, are still influenced by habitual and
subconscious naive realist thought patterns.
"Karl Popper [REF] pointed out that although Hume's idealism appeared to him to be a strict
refutation of commonsense [naive] realism [FR], and although he felt rationally obliged to regard
commonsense realism as a mistake, he admitted that he was, in practice, quite unable to
disbelieve in it for more than an hour: that, at heart, Hume was a commonsense realist."
(quoted from David Hume on Wikipedia [FR])
Naive realism is the most common philosophical outlook throughout society even though it is
known to be fundamentally misguided. But in general it is not considered to be a philosophy;
"True naive realists would never sum up or analyse their views, because they do not consider
them views but the way things obviously are."
In its most common form a naive realist thinks "I ... am a human being. There is this one
physical world, the space where everything exists and the time in which everything happens.
There are many things in this physical world, each largely separate from the other and
persisting over a span of time... My senses give me direct knowledge of reality. If I see a chair, it
is because there is a chair physically where and when I see it. There are exceptions, like when I
am dreaming or watching a movie, but these are rare and obviously not real. I can know things
through my senses, through thinking about things, and through communication with other
people. Other people's beliefs may be correct or not, but beliefs of people I respect, and beliefs
held commonly by most people in my society, are usually true."
(quoted from Born Yesterday [FR])
So we see that virtually all philosophical / metaphysical views can be seen to be equivalent
except for those that are based upon naive acceptance of illusions and assumptions. Any sincere
enquiry that goes deep enough converges upon the same vision of reality, but too often they tend
to misunderstand the others and to cling to their own analogies whilst disregarding the others.
We also learn that the structure of systems is highly complex. There is no simple inner and outer;
they are not like melons with well-defined outer skin and inner flesh. Each system within system
has its inner and outer so systems are filled with a kind of complex dynamical ‘foam’. That is the
nature of inner space and what we call outer space is just the inner space of a larger system. So
we are foam within foam and the general nature of a systemic existential space is foam-like.
Each subsystem is a being in a world to some degree (that is its perceptual illusion), but the
potential depth of involvement in illusion depends on the complexity of the inner space, its
internal cognitive space or its intricate inner foam of feedback loops and self-referential
awareness. Lets consider the case where there are sub-systems integrating to form a super-
system; each sub-system has its inner ‘foam’ and it operates within the inner foam of the super-
system, which integrates the sub-systems together. If like us the systems have extremely
complex inner spaces – mind, consciousness, sentience, self-awareness, intellect, imagination,
visualization, etc and they are integrated into a very simple outer foam of tribal cultural
interactions; like pre-historic humans. Then they experience a complex inner space and a very
simple outer space of interactions. They experience themselves as being the most complex,
aware and powerful beings in the situation.
If the sub-systems are very simple and are caught up in a very complex and integrated super-
system foam, then they are totally swept up by the super-system and they become like molecules
in a cell or cells in an organism. Now consider the case of pre-historic humans but start to rapidly
increase the complexity of their cultural interactions and dependencies so that the super-system
foam becomes more complex and integrative. As the balance of the relative complexity
difference between ourselves and our cultural environment shifts the whole dynamic shifts. As
culture and civilization and organizations in general become far more complex, those of us who
become simple are easily assimilated and those who grow in inner complexity and integration
remain individuals. It is in the interests of the organizations to simplify us, it makes us easy to
assimilate, easy to comprehend, easy to program with memes and easy to control. It is useful for
organizations to keep a few complex individuals but the masses must be kept simple and
compliant. This general process is the underlying dynamic of ‘individuation’ that underlies the
process of MST, the process of ego formation in humans and the process of organisation
formation such as nationalism in human populations.
So we see that tightly integrated inner foam and loosely integrated outer foam leads to a
compelling systemic illusion of individual, separate, self-awareness as a “being in a world”.
Another illusion that arises through individuation and identification with one’s body and mind,
the 'I'-thought, is related to the phenomenon of same MST level interactions, for example when
one person touches another person. If a person or any super-system is a systemic perceptual
illusion and not an ontological reality, then how can a person touch a person? If ‘I’ can’t touch
cells (only cells would actually make contact with cells) but ‘you’ are made of cells the how do
‘I’ touch ‘you’? The ‘I’ and ‘you’ are ideas (memes) in the mind, and 'my' identification with
'my' sub-systems assimilates all 'my' sub-systems into the acquisitive ego, the 'I'-thought, so that
the ego believes that they are a part of it. The ego acquires everything it can, from your body and
mind, ideas, possessions, wealth, power, glamour, enslaving other people and controlling their
egos and our collectively ego is trying to acquire and assimilate the entire planet including
ourselves and all life forms.
Individuation can be a blessing for a system, giving it an integrated, unified perspective and a
focused awareness and identity but if this results in egoic delusion and separatist struggle it is a
curse that brings only suffering.
The egoic acquisition creates identification, so when my sub-systems interact then ‘I’ interact, so
when my hand touches ‘you’ ‘I’ touch ‘you’. When it touches your hand 'I' project the same kind
of egoic identification onto the ‘you’ that 'I' experience in my mind and 'I' assume that ‘I’ have
therefore touched ‘you’. So when riot police and protestors stand off it is people against people
on the level of people, it is cell against cell in the push and shove on the level of cells and it is
also the ego of a population repressing an inner urge within its body and mind. There is no
correct level to consider things, they are ALL equally valid.
This experience of identification combined with complex inner and simple outer foam leads to
another interesting systemic illusion. That is the experience of being at the pinnacle of creation.
We think “there is nothing more complex, subtle and alive as I and we are”. We think things are
‘solid’ beneath us in the system hierarchy (sub-systems, we only experience their outer aspect)
and that things above us are just ideas that we control (super-systems, we only experience their
inner space). That is how it seems to all systems in similar circumstances. So truth yet again
diminishes our pride. We now know that we are not at the centre of the universe, things don’t
revolve around us, the world wasn’t ‘made’ for us, we don’t have perfect access to reality
through the mind, nor even perfect control over ourselves, we are not separate or different from
animals, we are not even fundamentally separate from what we call ‘inanimate’ matter – it too is
alive and aware in its own way (all things have life and awareness as part of their ability to exist
and interact) and we are not at the pinnacle of creation, we are just far more integrated than our
environment and this leads to egoic identification. So the sub-systems that we think of as a body
is actually a vast civilization of individual living cells and the human civilization that we think is
just an idea is actually a vast organism that assimilates us as its cells. A nation is just as tangible
to other nations as we are to each other. And we are just as tiny and incomprehensible to a nation
as our cells are to us. It is just a systemic perceptual illusion that civilization is just an idea; to
our cells we too are just an idea that is abstractly encoded in their DNA and their cellular
processes. In this parallel, a cell’s RNA / protein cycle is like its mind and it’s DNA is like its
belief system, which is usually fixed, but it can learn and it can also fray and become 'cynical'
and cancerous.
Conditioning and 'Worlds'
This section goes into detail regarding the depth and the nature of our conditioning. It elucidates
just how far from reality we really are, and the deeper systemic processes driving the current
global crises; the social, ecological, political, moral, individual and existential crises that plague
us and threaten our survival and sanity. There is dis-ease in the world and here we do a systemic
diagnosis of that dis-ease. This could be extremely difficult for many people to accept; there are
some very challenging revelations ahead. They will quite likely seem unreal at first; too bizarre
to be possible. But if you think it through clearly and skeptically you will see the truth of it. In
this sense it is like quantum physics; for most people it is too bizarre to be considered ‘real’, but
that is just an empiricist / naïve realist prejudice. It is by far the most accurate description of the
universe yet developed.
If this diagnosis of our conditioning will be too challenging for you on the first reading then I
suggest skipping to the next section for now. And if you are already aware that you are
conditioned and you wish to know more about overcoming it, rather than going into a deep
analysis of it then you too should skip ahead.
The nature of our conditioning can subtly or radically affect the nature of our experiences and
our understanding of everything. Different conditioning causes people to dwell in different
worlds (experiential / conceptual context, not an 'objective' context). An example of this, to a
limited extent, is the effectiveness of propaganda, advertising, peer/social pressure, 'education'
and other forms of manipulation aimed at conditioning people into different societal roles. It can
condition people to interpret, experience, comprehend, understand, express and interact in very
specialised ways that 'customises' them to fill certain roles from politician to criminal to CEO to
factory worker to scientist to movie star and so on [FR].
But this example only illustrates a limited range of states of being because they are all
cultural/social/empiricist/objectivist paradigms. However some other extreme states of being are
mystics, some artists, geniuses, lunatics, trippers (LSD) and so on. It is impossible to describe
these states of being to someone who has never experienced anything like them. They can
potentially result in totally and radically different 'world' experiences.
Memes and Organisations
There are two other important systems that co-exist in a symbiotic relationship with humans,
which further complicate the situation and therefore cannot be overlooked. They are memes [FR]
and organisations [FR]. A meme is like a cognitive virus. It originates within individual minds as a
compelling and self-perpetuating idea. These memes evolve as they interact with other memes.
They can be transmitted via any communication medium and they permeate the cultural domain.
In fact the cultural domain can be thought of as an ecosystem of memes in which our individual
minds are micro-environments. The cultural 'network' connects our minds together into a
collective cognitive 'environment' within which memes propagate, compete and evolve.
Activities such as advertising and propaganda are a form of biological warfare, using cognitive
viruses to manipulate and exploit people’s minds.
“You put an idea out there and seed it, and people carry it for you” (president of advertising
firm, quoted from The Asian Age, Mumbai, 2007/04/09)
These memetic (cognitive) ecosystems operate in many ways like biological (carbon based)
ecosystems, with chains of dependencies, population dynamics, antagonism or cooperation
between various memes, meme populations or meme complexes. When exposure to a new meme
occurs this can result in a complex cascade of events.
• Perhaps the ecosystem is totally hostile to this meme in which case it is rapidly destroyed
(incredulity, cynical doubt, closed mind).
• Perhaps the ecosystem is already populated with similar and related memes in which case
it may be welcomed warmly into the fold
(credulity, belief, receptive mind).
• Or perhaps things are held in a complex and diverse balance, a dynamical equilibrium of
all available memes where no memes are given "royal treatment" and none are
"demonised and persecuted", but each is allowed to find it's niche within the complex
network of dependencies and antagonisms. In this way the overall structure grows and
evolves,
(skepticism, holistic enquiry, open mind).
Furthermore, organisations are systems that evolve 'around' us in the sense that we are the
subsystems that integrate to form them. There is a natural process of self-organisation or meta-
system transition [FR] that arises in any complex system where the systems communicate and
cooperate. Cells communicated and cooperated for mutual benefit and thereby evolved into
organisations that we call organisms. Similarly, human development has been a process of
increasing communication, cooperation and dependency leading to the growth of organisations
such as empires, nations, religions, corporations and so on, up to civilisation as a whole [FR].
Lead in comments then link (Link to or quotes from guided meditations)
In this way the complex dynamical system that we are a part of and which we call 'civilisation'
has developed the art of domesticating and customising human beings, extracting their
productive potential and channelling this to allow the organisation to pursue it's own
organisational agendas. This is analogous to the manner in which we organisms channel the
productive capacity of our cellular civilisation (body) and use it to pursue our own agendas.
For example, in a nationalist context:
• Individuals are analogous to cells (called 'citizens') and thought of by the nation as
microscopic units of production and consumption that drive the metabolic processes of
the nation.
• Society is analogous to the body (including all domesticated animals, resources and
equipment, analogous to bacteria, minerals and mechanical structures within an
organism).
• The military is analogous to the claws and fangs of the collective organism.
• Industry is analogous to the guts and glands.
• The police and internal surveillance are analogous to the immune system.
• The overall social discourse and flow of information through the nation is analogous to
the mind.
• The national identity and social history is the personal identity and the life-story or the
collective organism.
• The grapevine of informal, untraceable social communications is analogous to the
subconscious of the collective organism.
• The media is analogous to the psychobabble that continuously goes on in the back of
one's mind and sometimes leaps to the fore to sweep you away with some particular idea
or passion or illusion.
• The intelligentsia is analogous to the intellect.
• The Government is analogous to the ego; the centralised "I-thought" that assumes that it
'is' the nation, just as the 'I' in each individual tends to assume that it is the
body/mind/being. It is a centralised point of control that serves an integrative role but it is
also a point around which many perceptual illusions gather, so it has a tendency to fall for
the illusion of its own 'power' and "individual existence" hence it can create much
confusion, agitation and disruption to the holistic system. This is a vitally important point
to apprehend.
A single cell is a whole living being, it possesses in microform, every basic functionality and
mechanism of life that we organisms possess. An organisation, when complex and highly
evolved, also possesses in macro-form, every basic functionality and mechanism of life that we
organisms possess.
For more on this phenomenon of meta-system transition within human organisations see this
extended analogy between biology and civilisation [FR], which is another example of an
information system theoretic analysis of a phenomenon that provides deep insights into the
complex nature of that phenomenon. This idea may seem very abstract and remote from the
'normal' discourse on civilisation however that is due to the limitations of the normal discourse.
This is a meta-system transition phenomenon that occurs in ALL complex systems and is driven
by growing communication, interaction, cooperation and dependency. Just as gravity effects
ALL material systems, including human beings, so too does MST effect ALL complex systems
including human beings. Just as cells are whole living beings that integrate to form organisms
such as ourselves, which are whole living beings, so too are we integrating to form organisations
that have the potential to evolve into whole living beings with their own delusions, agendas,
appetites, desires and fears. This is a matter of utmost importance to contemporary humans and
the systems analysis sheds deep and penetrating insight into the situation and makes sense of
many of the events in the world today. It is strongly recommend that you read the detailed essay
[FR]
.
An important connection between memes and organizations is that, just as all systems have both
inner and outer aspects, the ecosystem of memes is the inner aspect of an organization, and what
we experience when interacting with organizations is the outer aspect of an ecosystem of memes.
When a particular type of meme complex influences people’s minds they are caused to interpret,
experience, understand, express and respond to things in ways that assimilate them into some
organizational niche. The many minds animate the flow of memes and the many bodies build and
operate the equipment that animates the outer aspect of the organization. From families to
nations, this phenomenon arises. By controlling the flow of memes one can control the formation
and destruction of organizations. This is the power of the media in human civilization; and
advertising and propaganda are its two main uses; entertainment and education are of a low
priority. The motivation behind the invention of television was a desire to deliver advertising
messages into people’s homes so as to further the agendas of corporations, but governments and
other organizations have learnt to take advantage of the this powerful memetic syringe that
injects ideas directly into billions of minds every evening.
"Coercive Persuasion is the methodical – often subtle or even clandestine - application of
psychological manipulation. Coercive Persuasion coerces its targeted audience into
‘perceiving’, ‘learning’ and ‘adopting’ a prescribed set of thoughts, beliefs, values, attitudes
and/or behaviors... Coercive Persuasion operates by undermining the individual’s defense
mechanisms, their perceptions, their values and their attitudes. Coercive Persuasion alters the
otherwise expected personal conduct and the person’s ability to reason - without resorting to
physical force. In the current time frame, "coercive persuasion" cleverly and covertly overcomes
an individual's decision-making by impacting the individual’s judgment. The victim gradually
loses the ability to make independent decisions or to insist on the information necessary to make
an informed and intelligent decision." (PSYOPS and "Coercive Persuasion" [FR])
So watching television is like an injection of memetic viruses designed to subvert your self-
control and self-awareness, to reinforce your ego, program the ego with desires, aversions,
attitudes, paradigms, ways of thinking, ways of responding, ways of interpreting and
experiencing, ways of communicating, ways of acting and in general to condition and determine
your concept of ‘normality’. These are all memes, there is no reality here, only a complex
ecosystem of memes that permeates and conditions our minds and then filters and constructs our
experience of reality. The ego is the root meme and all the others build on top of it. A common
socially productive way to strengthen the ego is to condition it with feelings of deep inadequacy
and a need for MORE. To make people feel isolated and cut off. In truth they are cut off, from
reality and the source of all genuine ‘nourishment’. Hence a slow process of existential
starvation creates deep and inexpressible emptiness, cravings and despair that are agonizing and
provide a driving force that keeps people moving and consuming and producing. Happy,
satisfied and content people don’t make productive cells in the 'man machine'( ref link). In this
model people must be in despair but also in denial of their despair and only trying to alleviate it
by responding in conditioned ways, by repressing it if it isn’t productive for the organisation, or
losing themselves in pursuing it if it is; buying more, doing more, taking drugs (especially the
pharmaceuticals) and constantly trying to fill a hole that never seems to fill up. What they need is
connection to reality but that is the last thing that the organization will let them have because
they might escape from the meme stream and the collective dream (nightmare). The organization
simply wishes to hold onto ‘its’ vitality. It has acquired us within its ego and considers ‘us’ as
just bits of ‘it’.
It is a matter of life and death for organizations to keep us in the meme stream, to keep us
reliably and predictable programmed, docile to organizational power (myth of authority is a
central meme in this), receptive to organizational memes and resistant or inoculated against
memes that are not part of the organizations agenda. If we stray or return to ourselves, these
become diminished, they lose the vitality that our minds and actions gave them. And a
competing organisation / meme-complex might assimilate us whilst we are unoccupied cognitive
territory and an un-utilised resource, (from the viewpoint of the organisation).
If you overcome the mind you step out of the cultural domain entirely, the memes cannot
manipulate and control you any more. They may still flow through the mind but the mind no
longer controls you, you control the mind. Once the 'I'-thought loses control all the various things
that it has ‘acquired’ and identified with are set free, including you, the real you. Your ego can
longer be used as a puppet dictator that controls you and is itself controlled by the collective ego.
Instead the flow of existential information cleanses the mind and body, you are guided from
within and dwell in reality.
Our current organisations are the initial 'phyla' [cells] or basic organisational structures. However
they are evolving within the constraints of the environment, the society and the planet as a
whole. Given that our fundamental constraint is the finite size of the planet it is perhaps likely to
evolve into something like a higher-level planetary cell, where the sub-organisations are like
organelles [FR]. Organelles are the cell's metabolic 'machinery', e.g. nucleus, mitochondria [FR], etc.
So you see that we operate within a complex environment where an ecosystem of memes
permeates our minds and the culture whilst organisations condition and constrain us into
specialised roles and perspectives as part of their own metabolic processes. We are inhabited by
memes whilst we inhabit organisations, and we metabolise memes whilst organisations
metabolise us. These forces heavily condition our experiences, our understanding and the whole
culture.
From this analysis it is clear that when there is a systemic dysfunction (or any systemic event)
there is no clear and identifiable subsystem of sub-group that is ‘responsible’. All take part, each
in their own way. When you get into a fight your cells may be ‘innocent’ but your nose still gets
a fist thrown into it. It is not totally innocent because it is a part of you. All parts of the systems
take part in the dance of existential information and memes, that is the holistic situation. In
countless subtle ways a person sitting on their couch watching a war on TV and a soldier actually
doing the killing are intimately linked and implicated in the same systemic process. All systems
fully exist and operate on all levels, so when nations go to war all the people involved are
intrinsically implicated in the unfolding of events. It is just a systemic illusion that underlies the
attitude of “who is responsible”. This illusion leads to the formulation of many conspiracy
theories that are actually misinterpretations of systemic forces [FR].
"Those who argue for a U.S. state conspiracy are proposing a massive, multi-agency conspiracy
of a kind which has never been seen before. All the U.S. state agencies hate each other and
barely co-operate, engage in endless turf wars. The kind of inter-agency operation you are
proposing simply has never existed in peace time. It is inconceivable to me that such a group
could be got together. And this is probably the main reason that the official U.S. state
organisations and politicians have never taken the conspiracy theories seriously. They know how
the U.S. state operates and thus dismiss this idea at the outset." (Robin Ramsay, Editor of
Lobster magazine - http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk/)
“For anything to happen, the entire universe must coincide. It is wrong to believe that anything
in particular can cause an event. Every cause is universal. Your very body would not exist
without the entire universe contributing to its creation and survival...” (Sri Nisargadatta
Maharaj, "I am That", p371 [FR])
The Pseudo Objective World
When we perceive through our senses we get a subjective view from which we form the "idea of
the objective world", which then influences our perceptual / experiential process so we come to
believe in and experience ourselves as existing within an objective world. So although all we
have is a subjective view, we have formed within our minds a pseudo objective view of our
environment. It is a pseudo objective view because it is built entirely from whatever information
is available through our heavily distorted subjective experiences and not from existential
information flowing from the objective domain. It is therefore a construct formed by
communication of countless subjective views, which is formed into an idea of an objective
world, which is then confused for the actual objective reality. From an empirical subjective
perspective we cannot perceive the inner aspect of other systems, nor the information network
and flow of information and the primitive states that permeate the systems. So the pseudo
objective view cannot comprehend the actual objective view with all the ‘unseen’ information
system theoretic dynamics; it is just a subjective view that is assumed to be the objective view.
So many things cannot be experienced or comprehended within the pseudo objective world. This
is why the idea of the "physical universe" is such a limiting belief system that leaves most of
existence classified as paradoxical or unreal.
“Q: What is false, the world, or my knowledge of it?
M: Is there a world outside your knowledge? Can you go beyond what you know? You may
postulate a world beyond the mind, but it will remain a concept, unproven and unprovable. Your
experience is your proof, and it is valid for you only. Who else can have your experience, when
the other person is only as real as he appears in your experience?”
(Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, "I am That", p510 [FR])
“To Sankara [FR] the world is only relatively real [virtual] (Vyavaharika Satta). He advocated
Vivarta-Vada or the theory of appearance or superimposition (Adhyasa) [theory of virtuality].
Just as snake is superimposed on the rope in twilight [when one mistakes a rope for a snake],
this world and body are superimposed on Brahman or the Supreme Self [objective reality]. If you
get knowledge of the rope, the illusion of snake in the rope will vanish. Even so, if you get
knowledge of Brahman or the Imperishable, the illusion of body and world will disappear. In
Vivarta-Vada [theory of virtuality], the cause produces the effect without undergoing any change
in itself. Snake is only an appearance on the rope. The rope has not transformed itself into a
snake, like milk into curd [this is implied in the concept ‘virtual’, the simulator doesn’t ‘become’
the simulation world yet it causes it]. Brahman is immutable and eternal. Therefore, It cannot
change Itself into the world. Brahman becomes the cause of the world through Maya, which is
Its inscrutable mysterious power or Sakti [simulation, virtuality]. ”
(http://www.shankaracharya.org/advaita_philosophy.php)
The unified dance of existential information is like a computational context, we are information
systems within it; this is the objective view. But we heavily interpret the input signals as the
existential information flows through our inner space and we transform it into an experiential
context that we experience as being “out there”. Out there, there are objects in space with
attributes; these take part in events that occur in time. Some of the objects are people who we
communicate with and collectively we form the idea of an objective world into which we all
have subjective views. This is quite reasonable, but the error arises when we construct our idea
of that objective world solely out of the information available through our subjective views. In
this way most of reality, the unseen part, is neglected and we operate on the assumption that it
does not exist. This is a profound and far reaching limitation that constrains us to a world of
appearances.
All of these objects, people and so on arise when we experience the existential flow as it is
channelled by our inner subsystems resulting in experiences and ideas. The objects are actually
perceptual forms that arise in consciousness and to which we associate the idea ‘object’ or
‘person’. The actual reality underlying those objects is the dance of existential information that
animates the information system whose outer observable form we experience. So although the
objects are generally, but not always, based upon an underlying reality, it is actually more
accurate to describe them as memes that operate within our minds and propagate through our
culture. These memes respond to the existential stimuli and then dance about in the mind,
creating a pantomime of thought forms. One could call this a mind puppet.
The memes spread and evolve within the interconnected web of minds that forms the basis of the
cultural domain. The activity of our minds animates that context, which in turn assimilates and
integrates our minds to form its internal structure or its inner space. So our minds become
embedded in a network that channels a cultural memetic flow; just as information systems are
embedded in a network that channels existential information. Ultimately all things are animated
by the flow of existential information, but by heavily interpreting and distorting this in our minds
we come to be animated by the cultural memetic flow. These memes are reflections of the
underlying reality and they are often serious distortions or complete fabrications or deceptions.
The more confusion and agitation there is in the cultural domain the more confusing and
disruptive the memes become. Whilst the existential information is like pure bright white light
containing all colours in abundance, the cultural flow has many shades and colours; some so
devoid of reality that they form shadow worlds of deep confusion and agitation.
This process of minds connecting to form a cultural memetic ecosystem is related to the
formation of worlds within worlds. By channelling the cultural memetic flow we animate that
virtual cultural reality and by identifying with it we come to inhabit it and live within entirely
culturally constructed worlds. If our culture is in harmony with the underlying reality this can be
a creative expression of life, but if the culture is corrupted by destructive memes that oppress,
exploit, deceive, manipulate and disempower us, then that cultural world can be a nightmare. The
pseudo objective world is just such a cultural construct, it is the world that we believe to be
objective, for some it is blissful, for others it is hellish, but for all it is an illusory virtual reality
that we collectively create and sustain by giving our attention to it. Collectively we are like a
massively parallel mind-matrix that simulates a virtual cultural pseudo-objective world.
"One of the intentions of corporate-controlled media is to instil in people a sense of
disempowerment, of immobilization and paralysis. Its outcome is to turn you into good
consumers. It is to keep people isolated, to feel that there is no possibility for social change."
(David Barsamian, journalist, Media Watch [FR])
This creation of virtual mind-made worlds is also related to the formation of super-systems via a
meta system transition MST. Each level of systems channels the existential information and
integrates this into a unified inner space for the super-system. The super-system perceives and
experiences its world by using the sub-systems as its experiential process. So the super-system
exists and operates at a higher level. For example, your cells experience subtle chemical and
electromagnetic signals, but you experience sight, smell, taste, touch and sound. At each higher
level the absorption and meaningful assimilation of information occurs at a higher level. There is
therefore more entropy or information loss, because the low-level details cannot be discerned.
Hence each MST level filters the existential information and things become gradually denser. So
high-level systems have very structured experiences based upon all the countless experiences and
responses of their sub-systems within sub-systems. They cannot in any way experience reality
‘directly’ but only in their high level conditioned form. If all the entropy or lost information had
been retained then they would get the full view, but such a view is not possible because all
system interactions involve some degree of entropy.
The existential information filters through countless MST levels, through matter, life, mind and
then culture. By this time most of the original information has been lost and the rest heavily
transformed and interpreted in very high-level ways. We experience taste, pleasure, pain, fear,
shame, hatred, loyalty, trust, doubt, philosophy, music, science and so on. These are extremely
high-level phenomenon and operate only within minds that are identified with and function as
subsystems within the cultural domain. The culture is therefore a high level symbol processing
system (a type of computer). It has a parallel-mind architecture and it channels memes not bits.
It simulates a virtual reality and our minds, being embedded in its very computing matrix are
intrinsically embedded in the virtual reality. We are like the SMN primitive systems. We exist in
the virtual world and experience it from an embedded subjective perspective. In this way the
pseudo objective reality is a virtual reality that we inhabit and as the Buddha said: “with our
thoughts we make the world” [FR], our personal experiential contexts. And furthermore, with our
cultural memetic activity we create the pseudo objective world.
Within the cultural context the pseudo objective world is a virtual objective world; horribly
limited compared to reality but nevertheless it is assumed to the objective so for all intents and
purposes it is objective to people dwelling within the cultural domain. Within this virtual
objective world there exist many virtual systems, things such as corporations, nations, religions,
ideologies, movements, traditions and so on. These systems interact and experience that virtual
world in their own way just as tangibly as we experience it. When a nation fights a nation they
physically clash, to them it isn’t about people clashing, it is they who clash. Just as when two
people clash, it isn’t about cells clashing, it’s about two people or two egos to be precise. When
fearful ideas haunt our minds our personal pseudo objective worlds become dark and threatening
and when fearful memes haunt a nations cultural collective mind its personal pseudo objective
world also becomes dark and threatening. So just as the ideas in our minds construct our worlds,
so too the memes in a culture construct it’s world. If one’s ideas become delusional then eventual
suffering and destruction is inevitable, so too if a nations culture becomes delusional then
eventual suffering and destruction is inevitable.
So the ideas, memes, attitudes, interpretations and so on going through our minds and
propagating through the culture are the inner life and inner awareness of organizations. They are
capable of great coherence such as waging war or massive civil projects. However they are
normally not very focused. It is mainly when under threat that the memetic flow of propaganda
truly integrates the organization. Our minds are the real estate (territory) in the memetic
ecosystem and our input / output capacity is the fundamental resource or energy source that
drives organizations. By conditioning our minds to flow with their memes and our behaviours to
manifest certain input / output activities, organizations assimilate us like cells within their
bodies. To the degree that we are infected by their memes and show symptoms, that much are we
assimilated. We can have many ‘allegiances’ but the memes are constantly struggling for
dominance over territory (minds) and resources (our life forces). Memes tend to integrate into
meme complexes that contain many diverse mutually supportive memes. For example, egoism,
empiricism, common sense realism, positivism, desire, fear, greed, capitalism, consumerism,
authoritarianism, economic rationalism (not actually rational in the wider context) and so on. All
these memes cooperate and support each other in their dominance and control of your mind, and
the meme of ‘cynicism’ seals it all by closing your mind, making sure that no other memes can
ever get a foothold.
<<Here or elsewhere? Discuss New Science, REG, PEAR, Strings, etc>> [FR] for now here are
some brief comments and links:
Quantum physics is rapidly leading us to a mystic perspective and since 1979 there have been
experiments that incontrovertibly prove that consciousness has direct influence over physical
processes, thus shattering the illusion of materialism. Not only has it been shattered by
philosophical argument and psychology and information systems theory but now empirical data
proves it. These experiments are analogous to the photoelectric effect that signalled the dawn of
quantum physics and the end of classical physics. The experiments categorically prove that there
is something fundamentally wrong with both the materialist and Cartesian dualist perspectives on
reality.
The REG (Random Event Generator) experiments at the Princeton Engineering Anomalies
Research lab prove beyond doubt that consciousness has real measurable effects on physical
processes and that roughly 80% of those tested, all 'normal' people, had a measurable influence
on the output of the REG's. These effects are not attenuated by distance and they have the same
strength whether the events are simultaneous with the intentional influence or whether the events
are in the past or the future! They are magnified by psychological bonds such as love and by
cognitive discipline such as focused non-agitated awareness (e.g. via meditation). The
measurable effects also arise without intentional influence and can be used to monitor the
coherence of the ambient field of consciousness. There is currently a network of machines
monitoring the moment by moment fluctuations in the global consciousness; the overall statistics
for the Global Consciousness Project (GCP), after nine years of data accumulation, indicate a
probability of about one in ten million that the correlation of the data with the specified global
events is merely due to chance. These aren't vague crackpot experiments, there is NO DOUBT
about the data, the only thing in contention is the interpretation of the data. There has been
resistance to interpreting these experiments because core materialist beliefs are fundamentally
challenged by them.
The results are "empirical facts that are anomalies from the perspective of standard (mainstream)
scientific models." (http://noosphere.princeton.edu/conclusions.html)
The PEAR REG experiments: (The modern equivalent of the photoelectric effect)
Correlation of global events with reg data: An internet-based, nonlocal anomalies experiment -
Statistical Data Included
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2320/is_3_65/ai_83262438
Field REG Experiments of Religious Rituals and Other Group Events in Paraná, Brazil.
http://www.kisc.meiji.ac.jp/~hirukawa/paper/FieldREG.doc
Introduction
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/science2.html
Further Reading
This list of links is just provided for further reading if you are interested in exploring a topic
further. They are just some starting points and are not presented as proof or justification for
anything. They may be useful or they may not. The best approach is to discern the key words that
signify what you wish to explore and use a good search engine and do some library and journal
searches if you have access. In some cases the links are well known to me but in most cases the
links are simply the result of putting a few keywords into a search engine and then about 15
minutes poking around – so they are not endorsed, they are really just openings for further
exploration at your own risk...
Index
Ab Initio calculations Information Theory Self-Excited Circuit
Akashic Field Jnana Yoga, the path of Shankaracharya
Algorithmic Complexity Wisdom Signal Analysis
Aquinas, Thomas Jung, Carl Gustav Simulation
Automata Kabbalah Denudata Skepticism
Bhagavad Gita Karma Yoga, the path of SMN Dimensional Spaces
Bhakti Yoga, the path of Selfless Action Solipsism
Devotion Knowledge Stendahl, Krister
Buddha (Epistemology) String Theory
Caddy, Eileen Luttwak, Edward - Coup System Matrix Notation (SMN)
Capra, Fritjof d'Etat Systems Theory, Cybernetics and
Cartesian Dualism Magellan, Ferdinand Related Approaches
Cells Mahamudra Tantra Yoga, the path of Expansion
Communication Maharaj, Sri Nisargadatta (Skakti)
Complexity Maharshi, Sri Ramana Tao Te Ching
Conditioning Manipulation of Consent Time: Past, Present, Future and the
Conflict, Peace and Mathematics, the Eternal Now
Systemic Health Language of Existence Unification of Science
Confused concepts of The Matrix (Movie) Unification of Science and Mysticism
God Media Manipulation Via Information System Theory
Consciousness Meister Eckhart Unreasonable Effectiveness of
Conspiracy or Systemic Memes / Cognitive Mathematics in the Natural Sciences
Force? Viruses Virtual Reality and Computational
Cyberculture Meta-System Transition Metaphysics
Einstein, Albert Metaphysical Approach of Visual Agnosia and comprehension
Empirical Science SMN / IST forming ideas from experience
Empiricism Miscellaneous Whitehead, Alfred North
Finite Discrete Mysticism Yoga
Information Naive (Commonsense)
Feynman Paths Realism
Fundamental Constants New (Cutting-Edge)
and Low-level Physics Science
General Systems Theory Newspeak in Orwell's
God 1984
Graph and Network Nicholas of Cusa
Theory Ontology (study of what
Gravity Wave Detection is)
Heschel, Rabbi Abraham Organisations and
Hildegard of Bingen Organisms
Holistic Organisations Overview of the SMN /
and Movements IST approach
How Objective is Paradigms and Paradigm
Science? Shift
Information Physics Phenomenology (study of
Information Systems what seems to be)
Theory (My own work) Primitive Thisness and
Information Systems Primitive Identity
Theory (Specialised) Process Studies
Quantum Optics
Quantum Physics
Quantum Teleportation
Raja Yoga, the path of
Eight Limbs
Schizmogenesis
Ab Initio calculations
Ab initio quantum chemistry methods
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ab_initio_quantum_chemistry_methods
Cyclic Computational Model
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Cyclic%20Computation.html
Akashic Field
Science and the Akashic Field
The%20Akashic%20Field.html
What is the Akashic Field?
http://www.cjmartes.com/cjmartes_akashicfield.html
Akashic records (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akashic_records
Ervin Laszlo's Akashic Field and The Dilemmas of Modern Consciousness Research
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/routledg/gwof/2006/00000062/F0020001/art00011
The Akashic Records
http://www.spiritmythos.org/TM/akashic/akashrec.html
Akashic Field Therapy
http://www.ascension.net/monthlycolumns.asp?columnist=4&id=101
Books:
Akashic field
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Science-Akashic-Field-Integral-Everything/dp/1594771812
Book Review: Science and the Akashic Field: An Integral Theory of Everything
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/scienceandtheakashicfield/
Science and the Reenchantment of the Cosmos: The Rise of the Integral Vision of Reality by
Ervin Laszlo
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Science-Reenchantment-Cosmos-Integral-Reality/dp/1594771022
The Self-Aware Universe: How Consciousness Creates the Material World by Amit Goswami
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Self-Aware-Universe-Consciousness-Creates-
Material/dp/0874777984
The Field: The Quest for the Secret Force of the Universe by Lynne McTaggart
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Field-Quest-Secret-Force-Universe/dp/0007145101
The Connectivity Hypothesis: Foundations of an Integral Science of Quantum, Cosmos, Life and
Consciousness (R H. Abraham)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Connectivity-Hypothesis-Foundatins-Integral-
Consciousness/dp/0791457869
The Chaos Point: The World at the Crossroads by Ervin Laszlo
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chaos-Point-World-Crossroads/dp/074992716X
Algorithmic Complexity
What is Algorithmic Complexity?
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-algorithmic-complexity.htm
Algorithmic Information Theory
http://www.hutter1.net/ait.htm
Kolmogorov complexity (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolmogorov_complexity
Computational complexity theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_complexity_theory
Algorithmic Complexity ISCID Encyclopedia of Science and Philosophy
http://www.iscid.org/encyclopedia/Algorithmic_Complexity
Book: An Introduction to Kolmogorov Complexity and Its Applications
http://homepages.cwi.nl/~paulv/kolmogorov.html
Aquinas, Thomas
Saint Thomas Aquinas (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aquinas/
Thomas Aquinas - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: St. Thomas Aquinas
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14663b.htm
SUMMA THEOLOGICA: Home
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/
Thomistic Philosophy - the philosophy Thomas Aquinas
http://www.aquinasonline.com/
Thomas Aquinas [Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy]
http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/a/aquinas.htm
Garth Kemerling: Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274)
http://www.philosophypages.com/ph/aqui.htm
St. Thomas Aquinas' Five Ways
http://members.aol.com/plweiss1/aquinas.htm
Thomas Aquinas on the Web: Philosophy
http://historymedren.about.com/library/who/blwwaquinaswebph.htm
Automata
Analogues of Quantum Complimentarity in the Theory of Automata (PDF):
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/1998-shpmp.pdf
Empirical logic of finite automata: microstatements versus macrostatements:
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/zapatrin.htm
Reversible cellular automata:
http://www.alife.co.uk/ca/bbm/index.html
Finite Automata Models of Quantum Systems: Conceptual Status and Outlook (PDF):
http://www.arxiv.org/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0209/0209089.pdf
How to Build a Network Automaton:
http://novaspivack.typepad.com/nova_spivacks_weblog/2004/05/how_to_build_a_.html
Information Processing and Transmission in Cellular Automata:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/banks/banks_commentary.htm
Book: Cellular Automata Machines: A New Environment for Modeling:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262200600/thenoteboofphilo
Book: Cellular Automata and Complexity
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0201626640/thenoteboofphilo
Bhagavad Gita
Bhagavad Gita (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita
Bhagavad Gita
http://www.bhagavad-gita.us/
International Gita Society
http://www.gita-society.com/
Bhagavad Gita (Exploring Ancient World Cultures)
http://eawc.evansville.edu/anthology/gita.htm
Bhagavad Gita (about.com)
http://hinduism.about.com/od/thegita/The_Bhagavad_Gita.htm
Bhagavad Gita (Sacred Texts)
http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/gita/index.htm
Bhakti Yoga, the path of Devotion
Bhakti (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhakti
Bhakti Yoga (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhakti_yoga
Bhakti Yoga (Yogaworld)
http://www.yogaworld.org/jnana.htm
Bhakti Yoga (By Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.dlshq.org/teachings/bhaktiyoga.htm
Bhakti Saints
http://bvml.org/
Bhakti Yoga - Yoga of Devotion
http://www.hinduism.co.za/bhakti1.htm
The 4 Paths of Yoga (Sivananda)
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/philosophy/fourpaths.html
Praise And Worship - Love from the Heart
http://www.allaboutgod.com/praise-and-worship.htm
Bhakti Yoga (Vedanta Society)
http://www.vedanta.org/wiv/practice/yogas/bhakti.html
Find The Power Devotional Pages
http://www.findthepower.com/dailydevotions/
Buddha
Buddha (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha
Gautama Buddha (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gautama_Buddha
Buddha (Quotes)
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/b/buddha.html
Buddha
http://www.crystalinks.com/buddha.html
Lord Buddha (by Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.sivanandadlshq.org/saints/buddha.htm
What is a Buddha?
http://buddhism.kalachakranet.org/buddha.html
Gautama (Sakyamuni) Buddha
http://www.cosmicharmony.com/Av/Buddha/Buddha.htm
Caddy, Eileen
Eileen Caddy - « the little voice »
http://www.skyenergyportal.com/eileen-caddy/
Eileen Caddy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eileen_Caddy
Eileen Caddy (Quotes)
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/e/eileen_caddy.html
The Findhorn Foundation
http://www.findhorn.org/home_new.php
The Findhorn Foundation (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Findhorn_Foundation
Capra, Fritjof
Fritjof Capra (Home Page)
http://www.fritjofcapra.net/
Fritjof Capra (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritjof_Capra
The Tao of Physics (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tao_of_Physics
Fritjof Capra (Quotes and links)
http://www.spaceandmotion.com/Philosophy-Fritjof-Capra.htm
Fritjof Capra (Quotations)
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Fritjof_Capra/
The Emerging New Culture (Interview)
http://www.intuition.org/txt/capra.htm
Books:
The Tao of Physics
http://www.amazon.com/Tao-Physics-Fritjof-Capra/dp/1570625190
The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems
http://www.amazon.com/Web-Life-Scientific-Understanding-Systems/dp/0385476760
The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living
http://www.amazon.com/Hidden-Connections-Science-Sustainable-Living/dp/0385494726
The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture
http://www.amazon.com/Turning-Point-Science-Society-Culture/dp/0553345729
Cartesian Dualism
Cartesian Dualism and Information Theoretic Metaphysics:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Cartesian%20Dualism.html
Cells
Eukaryote
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eukaryote
Prokaryote
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prokaryote
Organelle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organelle
Mitochondrion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrion
Phyla
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phyla
Communication Complexity
How We Communicate
http://www.simplerwork.com/c/c2.htm
Communication Complexity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_complexity
Communication Complexity (PDF)
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~jeffp/triseminar/jeff-CC.pdf
Communication Complexity: A modern Approach (PDF)
http://www.cs.princeton.edu/theory/complexity/communicatechap.pdf
Conditioning
PSYOPS and "Coercive Persuasion"
http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=22461
Propaganda, Persuasion & Deception: Over 1,120 Selected Quotations for the Ideological
Skeptic (PDF)
http://www.overalltech.net/pub/Quotations-Propaganda.pdf
Mass Mind Control?
http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/Laura-Knight-Jadczyk/mass_mind_control.htm
Lobster Magazine: The Journal of Parapolitics
http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk/
Conversion and "Brainwashing" in New Religious Movements
http://www.cesnur.org/2003/brain_conv.htm
Land Of The Puppet People
http://www.rense.com/general69/pup.htm
Progressive Awareness Chpt Four: Self-Knowledge and Self-Transformation (Conditioning)
http://www.hermes-press.com/PA/PAch4.htm
LinkBlog: propaganda
http://edstrong.blog-city.com/linkblog/tags/?t=propaganda
Articles about Mind Control
http://www.signs-of-the-times.org/signs/chains/signs20060204_MindControl.php
The Unearthing: An Awakening Has Arrived
http://www.dailyscare.com/comment/reply/1211
Do You Believe in the War on Terror? Congratulations! You've Been Thoroughly Brainwashed
http://www.dailyscare.com/1257/do-you-believe-in-the-war-on-terror-congratulations-youve-
been-thoroughly-brainwashed
The Daily Scare: Exposing Media and Government Propaganda, Obfuscation, Scare Tactics and
Fearmongering
http://www.dailyscare.com/
The Rape of the Mind-The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide and Brainwashing (online
book)
http://home.tiscali.de/alex.sk/A_Meerloo.html
The Unearthing: An Awakening Has Arrived
http://www.dailyscare.com/1211/the_unearthing_an_awakening_has_arrived
Mind Control in the 21st Century
http://www.pahealthsystems.com/message665572.html
Books:
The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil (Philip Zimbardo)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400064112
The Programming of the President: the Hidden Power of the Computer in World Politics Today,
London: Aurum Press
http://www.hermes-press.com/PA/sps3.htm
America, Awake!
http://www.hermes-press.com/covers.htm
See also:
Manipulating Consent
Media
Memes
Naive Realism
Newspeak
How Objective is Science
Conflict, Peace and Systemic Health
Systemic Health analysis of harmony and disharmony
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Systemic%20Health.html
Analysis of Regimes and Resistance: Analysis of regime building leading to conflict with
innocent forces that become embittered due to authoritarian attitudes, thus leading to entrenched
struggle that undermines the very foundation of the regime.
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Analysis%20of%20Regimes%20and
%20Resistance.html
Approaches to the Problem of Civilisation,
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Approaches%20to%20the%20Problem%20of
%20Civilisation.html
Descent into Chaos an allegory for modern times.
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Descent%20into%20Chaos.html
Global Awakening the future of consciousness.
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Global%20Awakening.html
Comments on my Experiences Regarding Authoritarianism
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Comments%20on%20Authoritarianism.html
The Two Perspectives Transcendent and Empirical
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20Two%20Perspectives.html
The Akashic Field and Systemic Health,
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20Akashic%20Field%20and%20Systemic
%20Health.html
Confused Concepts of God
Do You Believe in God?
http://www.dailyscare.com/1246/do-you-believe-in-god
The God Delusion (Richard Dawkins) (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_God_Delusion
Agnosticism
http://www.religioustolerance.org/agnostic.htm
Atheism
http://www.religioustolerance.org/atheist.htm
Does God Exist?
http://radicalacademy.com/doesgodexist.htm
God vs. Science
http://www.guerrillanews.com/blogs/19781/God_vs_Science
Books:
Non-Existence of God (Nicholas Everitt)
http://www.amazon.com/Non-Existence-God-Nicholas-Everitt/dp/0415301076
The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
(Richard Dawkins)
http://www.amazon.com/Blind-Watchmaker-Evidence-Evolution-Universe/dp/0393315703
God?: A Debate Between a Christian and an Atheist (Point/counterpoint) by William Lane Craig
http://www.amazon.co.uk/God-Between-Christian-Atheist-counterpoint/dp/0195166000
Atheist Universe by David Mills
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Atheist-Universe-David-Mills/dp/1413434819/ref=pd_sim_b_2/026-
0006480-7659636
Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon by Daniel C. Dennett
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Breaking-Spell-Religion-Natural-Phenomenon/dp/0713997893
Why Gods Persist: Scientific Approach to Religion by Robert A. Hinde
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Gods-Persist-Scientific-Approach/dp/0415208262
The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris
http://www.amazon.co.uk/End-Faith-Religion-Terror-Future/dp/0743268091
Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast by Lewis Wolpert
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Six-Impossible-Things-Before-Breakfast/dp/0571231683/
The Miracle of Theism: Arguments For and Against the Existence of God
http://www.amazon.com/Miracle-Theism-Arguments-Against-Existence/dp/019824682X
The Existence of God by Richard Swinburne
http://www.amazon.com/Existence-God-Richard-Swinburne/dp/0199271682
Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris
http://www.amazon.com/Letter-Christian-Nation-Sam-Harris/dp/0307265773
The Cambridge Companion to Atheism (Cambridge Companions to Philosophy) by Michael
Martin
http://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Companion-Atheism-Companions-
Philosophy/dp/0521603676
Moral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers by Brooke Allen
http://www.amazon.com/Moral-Minority-Skeptical-Founding-Fathers/dp/1566636752
Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes, and the Meaning of Life by Alister E. McGrath
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dawkins-God-Genes-Memes-Meaning/dp/1405125381
The Dawkins Delusion? by Alister McGrath; Joanna Collicutt McGrath
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dawkins-Delusion-Alister-McGrath-Collicutt/dp/0281059276
Intellectuals Don't Need God and Other Modern Myths: Building Bridges to Faith Through
Apologetics by Alister E. McGrath
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Intellectuals-Dont-Other-Modern-Myths/dp/0310590914
The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis Collins
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Language-God-Scientist-Presents-Evidence/dp/0743286391
The Naked Emperor: Darwinism Exposed by Antony Latham
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Naked-Emperor-Darwinism-Exposed/dp/1857566351
Christian Theology: An Introduction by PROF ALISTER E. McGRATH
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Christian-Theology-PROF-ALISTER-McGRATH/dp/1405153601
The Twilight of Atheism: The Rise and Fall of Disbelief in the Modern World (Alister E.
McGrath)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Twilight-Atheism-Disbelief-Modern-World/dp/1844135748
The Cosmic Landscape: String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design (Leonard Susskind)
http://www.amazon.com/Cosmic-Landscape-String-Illusion-Intelligent/dp/0316155799
God: The Failed Hypothesis. How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist by Victor J Stenger
http://www.amazon.com/God-Failed-Hypothesis-Science-Shows/dp/1591024811
Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism by David Mills
http://www.amazon.com/Atheist-Universe-Thinking-Christian-Fundamentalism/dp/1569755671
Coming to Peace With Science: Bridging the Worlds Between Faith and Biology by Darrel R.
Falk
http://www.amazon.com/Coming-Peace-Science-Bridging-Between/dp/0830827420
Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis
http://www.amazon.com/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926
God's Universe by Owen Gingerich
http://www.amazon.com/Gods-Universe-Owen-Gingerich/dp/0674023706
Evolution and Christian Faith: Reflections of an Evolutionary Biologist by Joan Roughgarden
http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Christian-Faith-Reflections-Evolutionary/dp/1597260983
Who Made God?: And Answers to Over 100 Other Tough Questions of Faith by Ravi Zacharias
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Who-Made-God-Answers-Questions/dp/0310247101
The Non-existence of God: An Introduction by Nicholas Everitt
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Non-existence-God-Introduction-Nicholas-Everitt/dp/0415301076
Hard Questions, Real Answers by William Lane Craig
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hard-Questions-Answers-William-Craig/dp/1581344872
Challenging the Verdict: A Cross-examination of Lee Strobel's "The Case of Christ" by Earl
Doherty
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Challenging-Verdict-Cross-examination-Strobels-
Christ/dp/0968925901
Unintelligent Design by Mark Perakh
http://www.amazon.com/Unintelligent-Design-Mark-Perakh/dp/1591020840
The Dark Side of Christian History by Helen Ellerbe
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dark-Side-Christian-History/dp/0964487349
Atheism: The Case Against God (Skeptic's Bookshelf) by George H. Smith
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Atheism-Case-Against-Skeptics-Bookshelf/dp/087975124X
and the list goes on and on... it is a furious fools debate!
Consciousness
my website, SSE discussion
<<find links>>
Consciousness
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/consciousnesswhatisit/
Panpsychism
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/panpsychism/
Intersubjectivity: Exploring Consciousness from the Second-Person Perspective
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/intersubjectivity/
Language, Energy & Consciousness
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/languageenergyconsciousness/
Short Papers on Consciousness, Energy, Information, etc
http://www.deepspirit.com/sys-tmpl/shortessays/
Everything is a form of Conscious Energy
http://home.epix.net/~artnpeg/
Integrated Theory of Intelligence
http://www.supraconsciousnessnetwork.org/Home.htm
Cellular Consciousness and Conception
http://www.real-personal-growth.com/res_fixing/graham_farrant/graham_farrant_interview.htm
Conspiracy or Systemic Force?
Signs of the Times
http://www.signs-of-the-times.org/
Something Wicked This Way Comes
http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/wicked.htm
The Security-Industrial Complex
http://www.dailyscare.com/1249/the-security-industrial-complex
War on terror, culture of fear
http://www.dailyscare.com/1255/war-on-terror-culture-of-fear
The Daily Scare: Exposing Media and Government Propaganda, Obfuscation, Scare Tactics and
Fearmongering
http://www.dailyscare.com/
The Great American Catalyzing Event
http://www.dailyscare.com/1238/the-great-american-catalyzing-event
The execution [of] 9/11 shows the criminal tendencies of a Nazi Clique
http://www.dailyscare.com/1237/the-execution-of-9-11-shows-the-criminal-tendencies-of-a-
nazi-clique
Stalag World - The Prison Planet
http://chem11.proboards2.com/index.cgi?board=politics&action=print&thread=1078485549
Terror's Unwilling Ally (PDF): maps out the arteries of an international economic system that
feeds armed groups the world over.
http://www.coldtype.net/Assets.07/Essays/0407.Terror.pdf
Cheney's Nuclear Drumbeat (PDF)
http://www.coldtype.net/Assets.07/Essays/0407.Cheney.pdf
The Cold Type Archives
http://www.coldtype.net/archives.html
Third World Traveler: an alternative view to the U.S. mainstream media (Excellent quotes)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/
'There's Always Money For War'
http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/0319-01.htm
Books:
The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil (Philip Zimbardo)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400064112
See also:
Conditioning
Global Human Meta System Transition
Meta System Transition
Conflict and Peace
Confused Concepts of God
Media
Manipulation of Consent
Memes
Cyberculture
The Cyberpunk Project
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/
Cyberculture: Course Syllabi & Teaching Resources
http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=595
Cyberculture Resources
http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=2710
Einstein, Albert
Einstein Archives Online
http://www.alberteinstein.info/
Einstein Papers Project
http://www.einstein.caltech.edu/
Albert Einstein (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein
Albert Einstein (Quotations)
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Albert_Einstein/
Empirical Science
A Critique of the Empiricist Interpretation of Modern Physics (PDF)
http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~gholling/home/quantumMechanics.pdf
Physicists bid farewell to reality? Quantum mechanics just got even stranger.
http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070416/full/070416-9.html
Scientific Method (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
Observation, Measurement, Science, (Un) Consciousness and Occultism (Various Quotes)
http://www.katinkahesselink.net/science/observation.htm
Philosophy: Science & Reason, Lecture Notes: Gould on “NOMA”
http://www.ling.rochester.edu/~feldman/philosophy152/17-gould.htm
What is Occam's Razor?
http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/General/occam.html
Empiricism
Rationalism vs. Empiricism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rationalism-empiricism/
Empiricism (Webster’s Dictionary)
http://www.webster-dictionary.org/definition/empiricism
Empiricism in World Cultures
http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/GLOSSARY/EMPIRIC.HTM
Empirical (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_method
Empirical method (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_method
Empiricism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empiricism
Finite Discrete Information
Definition and Mathematics of Finite Discrete Information:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Finite%20Discrete%20Information.html
Finite Nature Hypothesis (Edwin Fredkin):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Ross%20Rhodes.html#Finite_Nature_Hypothesis
Metric within a Finite Discrete Information Space:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/fdpt/fdpt.html
Force within a Finite Discrete Information Space:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/fdff/fdff.html
Feynman Paths
Feynman Paths
http://www.physics.umanitoba.ca/~souther/compsim/lect8/tsld004.htm
Path integral formulation (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Path_integral_formulation
The path integral approach in the frame work of causal interpretation (PDF)
http://www.ensmp.fr/aflb/AFLB-281/aflb281p001.pdf
Dr Richard P. Feynman
http://amasci.com/feynman.html
Fundamental Constants and Low-level Physics
Relationships Among Phenomena at a Unitary Level: (Plank's constant may not be fundamental)
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/deutsch/golden.html
General Systems Theory
Understanding General Systems Theory
http://www.bsn-gn.eku.edu/BEGLEY/GSThand1.htm
Quotes From Ludwig von Bertalanffy
http://www.isss.org/quotelvb.htm
Wholeness Seminar (ISSS)
http://www.newciv.org/ISSS_Primer/seminar.html
International Society for the Systems Sciences
http://www.isss.org/
General Systems Theory
http://www.geocities.com/~n4bz/gst/gst1.htm
System Science and Social Science
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/system_science_and_social_science.html
Books
General System Theory: Foundations, Development, Applications (Ludwig Von Bertalanffy)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN%3D0807604534
The Systems View of the World: A Holistic Vision for Our Time (Advances in Systems Theory,
Complexity, and the Human Sciences) (Ervin Laszlo)
http://www.amazon.com/Systems-View-World-Holistic-Complexity/dp/1572730536/
An Introduction to General Systems Thinking (Gerald M. Weinberg)
http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-General-Systems-Thinking-Anniversary/dp/0932633498/
Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity (Advances in Systems Theory, Complexity, and the
Human Sciences) (Gregory Bateson)
http://www.amazon.com/Mind-Nature-Necessary-Advances-Complexity/dp/1572734345/
The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems (Fritjof Capra)
http://www.amazon.com/Web-Life-Scientific-Understanding-Systems/dp/0385476760/
God
God (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God
Ishvara (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ishvara
Brahman (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahman
Shiva (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiva
Tao (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tao
Allah (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allah
Yahweh (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh
Jehovah (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jehovah
Paramatman (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramatman
Bhagavan (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavan
Godhead (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godhead
Transcendence (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcendence_%28religion%29
Oneness (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oneness_%28concept%29
Reality (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reality
Universal Mind (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_mind
Unmanifest (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unmanifest
Adonai (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adonai
Emmanuel (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmanuel
Tetragrammaton (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetragrammaton
The name of God in Judaism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_name_of_God_in_Judaism
YHWH (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YHWH
The Lord (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_LORD
Yaw (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaw_%28god%29#Yam.2FYaw_and_the_rise_of_Yahweh
Elohim (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elohim
Holy Trinity (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity
Jesus Christ (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus
Holy Ghost/Holy Spirit (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Spirit
Deus (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus
Jah (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jah
Ngai (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngai
Vishnu (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vishnu
Krishna (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krishna
God in Buddhism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Buddhism
Adibuddha (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adibuddha
Waheguru (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waheguru
Greatest Name (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greatest_Name
Ahura Mazda (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahura_Mazda
Shang Ti (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shang_Ti
Shen (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shen
Khoda (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khoda
Uncarved Block (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncarved_block
Graph and Network Theory
Some Circuits in Graph or Network Theory
http://www.nrich.maths.org/public/viewer.php?obj_id=2414
Network Theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_theory
Graph Theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graph_theory
Book: Matrices in Combinatorics and Graph Theory
http://www.bookfinder4u.com/detail/0792364694.html
Gravity Wave Detection
Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory
http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/LIGO_web/about/
LIGO (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIGO
New Wave Telescope Begins Hunt for Gravity
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/ligo_results_030407.html
Hunting for Gravity Waves
http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/features/2002/sept/gravitywaves/index.html
Heschel, Rabbi Abraham
Abraham Joshua Heschel: Our Generations Teacher
http://www.crosscurrents.org/heschel.htm
Abraham Joshua Heschel (quotations)
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Rabbi_Abraham_Heschel/
Abraham Joshua Heschel (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Joshua_Heschel
The Legacy of Abraham Joshua Heschel
http://www.beth-elsa.org/be_s0306.htm
Praying with their Feet: Remembering Abraham Joshua Heschel and Martin Luther King
http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/node/393
Hildegard of Bingen
The Life and Works of Hildegard von Bingen
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/hildegarde.html
Hildegard of Bingen (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildegard_of_Bingen
Saint Hildegard (Catholic Encyclopedia)
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07351a.htm
Hildegard of Bingen
http://home.infionline.net/~ddisse/hildegar.html
Hildegard of Bingen, Visionary
http://elvis.rowan.edu/~kilroy/JEK/09/17.html
Hildegard of Bingen: visions of divinity
http://members.aol.com/pantheism0/hildgard.htm
Hildegard of Bingen
http://www.staff.uni-mainz.de/horst/hildegard/
Hildegard of Bingen (about.com)
http://historymedren.about.com/od/hwho/p/who_hildegard.htm
Holistic Organisations and Movements
Many links to various groups
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/links.html
Many Links
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/OtherSites/links.htm
Alternative Science
http://www.alternativescience.com/
Society for Scientific Explorations
http://www.scientificexploration.org/
Scientific and Medical Network
http://www.scimednet.org/
The Institute for New Energy
http://www.padrak.com/ine/
Infinite Energy Magazine
http://www.infinite-energy.com/
Alternative Energy Institute
http://www.altenergy.org/
Science Frontiers
http://knowledge.co.uk/frontiers/sfonline.htm
Borderlands Science Research Foundation
http://www.borderlands.com/
Rupert Sheldrake's site
http://www.sheldrake.org/
Rupert Sheldrake -- Seven experiments that could change the world.
http://www.transaction.net/science/seven
Brian Josephson -- Director of the Mind-Matter Unification Project
http://www.tcm.phy.cam.ac.uk/~bdj10
Parapsychology Sources on the Internet
http://www.ed.ac.uk/~ejua35/parapsy.htm
Koestler Parapsychology Unit, Edinburgh University
http://moebius.psy.ed.ac.uk/gr_index.html
Fourmilab, Switzerland
http://www.fourmilab.ch/
The RetroPsychoKinesis project
http://www.fourmilab.ch/rpkp
The science-lab.com
http://www.the-science-lab.com/
Weird Research, Anomalous Physics
http://amasci.com/weird.html
Other Index sites
http://amasci.com/weird/windex.html
"Weird Science" Professionals and Research Institutions
http://amasci.com/weird/wpro.html
Unconventional Science Organizations/Journals
http://amasci.com/weird/worg.html
Exceptional Human Experience Network
http://www.ehe.org/
Knowing Together
http://knowing.yuku.com/directory
Progressive Awareness (online book)
http://www.hermes-press.com/PA/
The Perennial Tradition (online book)
http://www.hermes-press.com/Perennial_Tradition/index.htm
How Objective is Science?
The Objectivity of Science: Does it stand examination?
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/objectivity/tradition.htm
The Objectivity of Science: Is mainstream science really objective?
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/objectivity/index.htm
Closeminded Science
http://www.amasci.com/weird/wclose.html
Information Physics
University of New Mexico Information Physics
http://info.phys.unm.edu/
Information-Physics One
http://newton.umsl.edu/infophys/
Quantum information and quantum computation
http://www.research.ibm.com/quantuminfo/
InformationPhysics.com
http://www.informationphysics.com/html/
Information Physics Homepage
http://info.phys.unm.edu/
UNM Information Physics Publications Archive
http://info.phys.unm.edu/papers/papers.html
Quantum Information Research, The Department of Physics at the University of Illin...
http://www.physics.uiuc.edu/research/QI.htm
The Nature of Information and The Information of Nature
http://informationphysics.com/InformationPhysics.html
Information Systems Theory (My own work)
System Theoretic Metaphysics and the Unification of the Transcendent and Empirical Sciences:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SSE_1663.html
Conceptual Bridge: Information System Theoretic Paradigm:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/ConceptualBridge.html#_Toc148700622
Information System Theory (IST):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Information%20System%20Theory.html
Also refer to other related topics:
Theory of Enformed Systems : A theory of organisation that seems closely related to IST
http://www.enformy.com/tesintro.htm
System Theory
Information Theory
General System Theory
Communication Complexity
Graph and Network Theory
Information Systems Theory (Specialised)
Information Systems Theory (Karl Weick)
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bd597397/IS.html
Organizational Information Theory
http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/Speech/rccs/theory43.htm
Strategic Information Systems Theory
http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/SOS/StratISTh.html
Bibliography of Information Systems Theory and Research
http://www.brint.com/papers/misbibl.htm
Information Systems (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_systems
Information System (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_system
Information Theory
Information Theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory
Information Entropy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_entropy
Informatics (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Informatics
Information Theory
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~ss409297/info.htm
A Mathematical Theory of Communication by Claude E. Shannon
http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/ms/what/shannonday/paper.html
A Short Course in Information Theory
http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/mackay/info-theory/course.html
Molecular Information Theory
http://www.lecb.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/
Jnana Yoga, the path of Wisdom
Jnana (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jnana
Jnana Yoga (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jnana_Yoga
Jnana Yoga (Yogaworld)
http://www.yogaworld.org/jnana.htm
Jnana Yoga - Yoga of Knowledge
http://www.hinduism.co.za/jnana-.htm
The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi
http://www.hinduism.co.za/jnani-.htm
The Deep Structure of the Spiritual Life
http://www.jnani.org/jnani.html
Selected Masters
http://www.jnani.org/masters/masters_set.html
Jnana Yoga (By Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.dlshq.org/teachings/jnanayoga.htm
Jnana Yoga (Vedanta Society)
http://www.vedanta.org/wiv/practice/yogas/jnana.html
The 4 Paths of Yoga (Sivananda)
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/philosophy/fourpaths.html
Also see:
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Sri Ramana Maharshi
Jung, Carl Gustav
Carl Jung (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung
The Jung Page
http://www.cgjungpage.org/
Jung Quotes
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Carl_Jung/
Synchronicity
http://skepdic.com/jung.html
Myths – Dreams - Symbols
http://www.mythsdreamssymbols.com/carljung.html
Fresian perspective on Jung
http://www.friesian.com/jung.htm
Carl Jung (answers.com)
http://www.answers.com/topic/carl-jung
Carl Jung Quotes (Wikiquote)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Carl_Jung
Kabbalah Denudata
Kabbalah Denudata (Sacred Texts)
http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/tku/index.htm
Kabbalah Denudata (about.com)
http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_denudata.htm
The Kabbalah Centre
http://www.kabbalah.com/
Christian Knorr von Rosenroth (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Knorr_von_Rosenroth
Kabbalah Denudata (Athenaeum Reading Room)
http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/knorr_von_rosenroth.htm
Jung and the Kabbalah
http://www.newkabbalah.com/Jung2.html
The Truth about S.L. MacGregor Mathers
http://www.golden-dawn.org/truth_mathers.html
Karma Yoga, the path of Selfless Action
Karma Yoga (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma_Yoga
Karma Yoga (Yogaworld)
http://www.yogaworld.org/karma.htm
Karma Yoga
http://www.hinduism.co.za/karma.htm
Principles of Karma Yoga
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/karma/karmayoga.html
Karma Yoga (By Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.dlshq.org/teachings/karmayoga.htm
Karma Yoga (Vedanta Society)
http://www.vedanta.org/wiv/practice/yogas/karma.html
Karma Yoga: Attain Enlightenment Through Work
http://www.davedavies.com/splanet/karma.htm
The 4 Paths of Yoga (Sivananda)
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/philosophy/fourpaths.html
Knowledge (Epistemology)
Knowledge of the World:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Knowledge%20of%20the%20World.html
Epistemological Problems of Perception
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-episprob/
Epistemology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology
Positivism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positivism
Normal Realist Interest Group:
http://www.nrig.org/
POAMS: Neo-Machian, Holistic Physics:
http://www.poams.org/06_philosophical_basis.html
Project Renaissance
http://www.winwenger.com/
Dialectic Education: Towards the increase of Flexibility in people's minds
http://www.flexible-learning.org/eng/main_english.htm
Pragmatic Cybernetics: Towards a Dialectic Education
http://www.flexible-learning.org/eng/prag_cyber.htm
Objectivity in Science
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/objectivity/index.htm
How do we make sense of our world?
http://www.sasked.gov.sk.ca/docs/social/psych20/unit3.htm
Semiotics Institute Online
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/epc/srb/cyber/cyber.html
Luttwak, Edward - Coup d'Etat
Excerpts From Coup d'Etat: A Practical Handbook
http://www.subliminal.org/news/coup.html
American coup d'etat
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2006/04/0080995
Coup d'état (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coup_d'%C3%A9tat
Coup d'État: A Practical Handbook (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coup_d'%C3%89tat:_A_Practical_Handbook
Centre for Strategic and International Studies
http://www.csis.org/html/4luttwak.html
Books:
Coup d'etat, a practical handbook
http://www.amazon.com/detat-practical-handbook-Edward-Luttwak/dp/0140030387
Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace, Revised and Enlarged Edition
http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Logic-Peace-Revised-Enlarged/dp/0674007034
The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire: From the First Century A.D. to the Third (Johns
Hopkins Paperbacks)
http://www.amazon.com/Grand-Strategy-Roman-Empire-D/dp/0801821584
Other books by Luttwak
http://www.amazon.com/s?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=luttwak
Magellan, Ferdinand
Ferdinand Magellan (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_Magellan
Ferdinand Magellan (list of links)
http://www.stemnet.nf.ca/CITE/exmagellan.htm
Mahamudra
Mahamudra (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahamudra
Mahamudra (The Berzin Archives)
http://www.berzinarchives.com/web/x/nav/n.html_94726721.html
An Online Guide to Mahamudra Meditation
http://www.mahamudracenter.org/MMCMemberManualIndex.htm
Book: Mahamudra: The Ocean of Definitive Meaning
http://www.nitartha.org/mahamudra.html
The Four Seals of Mahamudra
http://www.samyeling.org/Buddhism/Teachings/3Mahamudra.htm
Interview with Topga Yulgyal Rinpoche
http://www.diamondway-teachings.org/export/sites/diamondway-
teachings/en/content/topgayulgyal/topgaint.html
Maharaj, Sri Nisargadatta
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
http://www.nisargadatta.net/
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj (Biography)
http://www.realization.org/page/topics/nisargadatta.htm
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nisargadatta_Maharaj
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj (Quotations)
http://www.geocities.com/zainto/maharaj.htm
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
http://www.spiritualteachers.org/sri_nisargadatta_maharaj.htm
The Nectar of Immortality
http://www.realization.org/page/doc1/doc104a.htm
Excerpts from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I AM THAT
http://www.nonduality.com/asmi.htm
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj (Nonduality)
http://www.nonduality.com/nisarga.htm
Excerpts from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I AM THAT
http://www.nonduality.com/asmi.htm
The Nectar of Immortality (Excerpts)
http://www.realization.org/page/doc1/doc104a.htm
Advaita Fellowship
http://www.advaita.org/
Books:
I Am That: Talks with Sri Nisargadatta (Nisargadatta Maharaj)
http://www.amazon.com/I-Am-That-Talks-Nisargadatta/dp/0893860220
Consciousness and the Absolute: The Final Talks of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
http://www.amazon.com/Consciousness-Absolute-Final-Nisargadatta-Maharaj/dp/0893860417
The Ultimate Medicine: Dialogues with a Realized Master
http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Medicine-Dialogues-Realized-Master/dp/1556436335
The Nectar of Immortality
http://www.amazon.com/Nectar-Immortality-Nisargadatta-Maharaj-Discourses/dp/1884997139
Maharshi, Sri Ramana
Sri Ramanasramam (ashram website)
http://www.sriramanamaharshi.org/
Sri Ramana Maharshi (Life and Teachings)
http://www.arunachala.org/ramana/
Society of Abidance in Truth
http://www.satramana.org/
Sri Ramana Maharshi (Biography)
http://www.realization.org/page/topics/ramana.htm
Sri Ramana Maharshi (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramana_Maharshi
Sri Ramana Maharshi (Kheper)
http://www.kheper.net/topics/gurus/Ramana_Maharshi.html
Sri Ramana Maharshi (About.com)
http://hinduism.about.com/od/gurussaints/p/ramana.htm
Advaita Fellowship
http://www.advaita.org/
Books:
Six Books by Ramana Maharshi
http://www.uarelovebooks.com/servlet/Categories?category=Ramana+Maharshi
The Spiritual Teaching of Ramana Maharshi
http://www.amazon.com/Spiritual-Teaching-Ramana-Maharshi/dp/1590301390
Be as You Are: The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi (Arkana)
http://www.amazon.com/Be-You-Are-Teachings-Maharshi/dp/0140190627
The Essential Teachings of Ramana Maharshi: A Visual Journey
http://www.amazon.com/Essential-Teachings-Ramana-Maharshi-Journey/dp/187801918X
The Collected Works Of Sri Ramana Maharshi
http://www.amazon.com/Collected-Works-Sri-Ramana-Maharshi/dp/8188018066
Talks With Ramana Maharshi: On Realizing Abiding Peace and Happiness by Robert Powell
http://www.amazon.com/Talks-Ramana-Maharshi-Realizing-Happiness/dp/1878019007
Manipulation of Consent
Search results for "Manipulation of Consent" and "Manufacturing Consent"
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/%252522manipulation%252Bof%252Bconsent
%252522
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/%252522manufacturing%252Bconsent%252522
Book: Hegemony or Survival (Noam Chomsky)
http://contemporarylit.about.com/cs/currentreviews/fr/hegemony.htm
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_The_Political_Economy_of_the_Mass_M
edia
Propaganda Model (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (Wikipedia) and FAIR (website)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairness_and_Accuracy_in_Reporting and http://www.fair.org/
George Bush is Not Incompetent!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/6/25/195750/611
Some Realism about Pluralism
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/jbalkin/articles/somereal1.htm
Advancing Democracy from Grassroots Bottom-up
http://www.flexible-learning.org/eng/bottom_up2.htm
War Toys, War Movies, and the Militarization of the United States, 1900-85
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-3433%28199402%2931%3A1%3C45%3AWTWMAT
%3E2.0.CO%3B2-E&size=LARGE
Political Science: Report on the Censorship of Science
http://ncac.org/science/20070312~USA~New_Report_Discusses_Censorship_Of_Science.cfm
Mathematics, the Language of Existence
List of quotes
http://www.chemistrycoach.com/language.htm
The Matrix (Movie)
In the Matrix, which pill would you take, the red or the blue?
http://www.arrod.co.uk/essays/matrix.php
The Red Pill
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redpill
The Blue Pill
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluepill
The Matrix
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Matrix
Official Matrix website
http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com/
Official Matrix website (philosophy section) many essays
http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com/rl_cmp/phi.html
Alternative Religion Resource Guides - The philosophy of the Matrix (great list of related
resources)
http://altreligion.about.com/library/graphics/bl_matrix.htm
Matrix (fictional universe)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matrix_%28fictional_universe%29
The Matrix as Metaphysics:
http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com/rl_cmp/new_phil_fr_chalmers.html
A review of David Chalmers' essay, "The Matrix as Metaphysics"
http://www.ursasoft.com/matrix/WB-Chalmers.htm
The Matrix and Berkeley’s Metaphysics
http://www.ursasoft.com/publish/matrix.htm
Metaphysics of the Matrix
http://www.ursasoft.com/publish/chapter1.htm
The Matrix: Religion vs. Philosophy
http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/religion/blrel_matrix_phil.htm
Matrix Philosophy: Metaphysics or Megabullshit? (An excellent example of the attitude of a
cynic)
http://chat.carleton.ca/~jsingh3/2004-3/matrix_philosophy.html
Skepticism and the Matrix
http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2004/04/skepticism-and-matrix.html
Semantic Contextualism
http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2004/04/real-worlds-semantic-contextualism.html
Artificial reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_reality
Virtual Reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_reality
Simulated Reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_reality
Also see other topics:
Virtual Reality Metaphysics
Mysticism
Simulation
Naive Realism
Media Manipulation
The use and abuse of media in vulnerable societies
http://www.idrc.ca/rwandagenocide/ev-108303-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html
A Malaysian citizens' media initiative
http://www.aliran.com/oldsite/charter/charter2000.html
Media Manipulation
http://archive.democrats.com/preview.cfm?term=media+manipulation
Media Manipulation of Facts for Effect
http://community.verizon.net/thread.jspa?threadID=1700001409
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR media watchdog)
http://www.fair.org/index.php
FAIR Archives
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3
Agency of Fear: Opiates and Political Power in America
http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/aof/aof20.html
Deconstructing the media manipulation that infects America's core
http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/page.php?a=28629
Civil War? Abuse? Manipulation? Really?
http://thegreenbelt.blogspot.com/2006/12/civil-war-abuse-manipulation-really.html
The Mighty Wurlitzer
http://www.prospect.org/print-friendly/print/V13/8/borosage-r.html
What's Wrong With the News?
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=101
New Study Challenges "Liberal Media" Claim
http://www.commondreams.org/pressreleases/June98/061898c.htm
Common Dreams New Center
http://www.commondreams.org/
National Coalition Against Censorship
http://www.ncac.org/
Institute for Public Accuracy
http://www.accuracy.org/index.php
Media Watch
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/media_watch.html
Media Page
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/media_page.html
Progressive Media Web Sites
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/prog_media_sites.html
Media Control (many links to excerpts and articles, some listed below)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/Media_Control.html
Amusing Ourselves to Death - Neil Postman (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Broadcast_Media/AmusingOurselves_Postman.html
Corporate Media & Threat to Democracy – McChesney (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/CorpMedia_McChesney.html
Decline and Fall of Public Broadcasting - David Barsamian (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/Decline_Fall_PublicBroad.html
Information War - Nancy Snow (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Nancy_Snow/Information_War.html
Inventing Reality - Michael Parenti (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Parenti/InventingReality_Parenti.html
It's the Media, Stupid - McChesney and Nichols (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/MediaStupid_McChesney.html
Manufacturing Consent - N Chomsky/E Herman (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Herman%20/Manufacturing_Consent.html
Media Control - Noam Chomsky (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Chomsky/Media_Control.html
Media Monopoly, The - Ben Bagdikian (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/MediaMonopoly_Bagdikian.html
Nation Magazine, The - Selections 1865-1990 (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Independent_Media/Selections_TheNation.html
Networks of Power-Corporate TV Threat to Democracy (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Book_Excerpts/Networks_of_Power.html
On Bended Knee - Mark Hertsgaard (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Ronald_Reagan/On_Bended_Knee.html
Our Media Not Theirs - McChesney and Nichols (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/McChesney/OurMedia_NotTheirs.html
Pentagon Propaganda Machine, The - J. William Fulbright (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Pentagon_military/Pentagon_Propaganda_JWF.html
Project Censored-annual report on censored stories (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Project%20Censored/Project_Censored.html
Propaganda, Inc. - Nancy Snow (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Nancy_Snow/Propaganda_Inc.html
Rich Media, Poor Democracy - Robert McChesney (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/McChesney/RichMedia_PoorDemocracy.html
Toxic Sludge Is Good For You - John Stauber & Sheldon Rampton (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Public_Relations/ToxicSludge.html
Trust Us, We're Experts! - John Stauber & Sheldon Rampton (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Public_Relations/Trust_Us_We%27re_Experts.html
Twenty Years of Censored News (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Project%20Censored/Project_Censored.html
Unreliable Sources - Normon Solomon (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Normon_Solomon/Unreliable_Sources.html
War, Lies & Videotape (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/War_Lies_Videotape.html
Wizards of Media OZ - Normon Solomon (excerpts)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/WizardsMediaOZ.html
Media Criticism
http://www.bapd.org/kmersm-1.html
Books:
Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative (David Brock)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0812930991
The Republican Noise Machine : Right-Wing Media and How It Corrupts Democracy (David
Brock)
http://www.amazon.com/Republican-Noise-Machine-Right-Wing-Democracy/dp/B000FVQV16
The Hunting of the President: The Ten-Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton (Joe
Conason)
http://www.amazon.com/Hunting-President-Ten-Year-Campaign-Destroy/dp/0312273193
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right by Al Franken
http://www.amazon.com/Lies-Lying-Liars-Tell-Them/dp/B000OFOIY0
Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on iraq, edited by David Miller.
http://www.plutobooks.com/cgi-local/nplutobrows.pl?chkisbn=0745322018
Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You, by Reese Erlich & Norman Solomon.
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=1-1893956393-6
Media Wars: News at a Time of Terror, by Danny Schechter.
http://www.amazon.com/Media-Wars-News-Time-Terror/dp/0742531090
Second Front: Censorship and Propaganda in the 1991 Gulf War, by John R. MacArthur & Ben
Haig Bagdikian.
http://www.ucpress.edu/books/sale/pages/2755001.html
War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits keep Spinning us to Death
http://www.warmadeeasy.com/
When News Lies by Danny Schechter
http://www.amazon.com/When-News-Lies-Danny-Schechter/dp/1590790731
Fooled Again by Mark Crispin Miller
http://www.amazon.com/Fooled-Again-Mark-Crispin-Miller/dp/0465045790
Tragedy & Farce: How the American Media Sell Wars, Spin Elections, and Destroy Democracy
by John Nichols
http://www.amazon.com/Tragedy-Farce-American-Elections-Democracy/dp/1595581294
The Problem of the Media: U. S. Communication Politics in the Twenty-First Century by Robert
W. McChesney
http://www.amazon.com/Problem-Media-Communication-Politics-Twenty-First/dp/1583671056
The Problem of the Media: U. S. Communication Politics in the Twenty-First Century (Robert
W. McChesney)
http://www.amazon.com/Problem-Media-Communication-Politics-Twenty-First/dp/1583671056
Tragedy & Farce: How the American Media Sell Wars, Spin Elections, and Destroy Democracy
(John Nichols)
http://www.amazon.com/Tragedy-Farce-American-Elections-Democracy/dp/1595581294
Meister Eckhart
Meister Eckhart (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meister_Eckhart
The Meister Eckhart Site
http://www.ellopos.net/theology/eckhart.htm
The Eckhart Society
http://www.eckhartsociety.org/
Meister Eckhart (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/meister-eckhart/
Meister Eckhart (The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://www.iep.utm.edu/e/eckhart.htm
Meister Eckhart (Quotations)
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Meister_Eckhart/
Meister Eckhart (Quotations)
http://historymedren.about.com/od/quotes/a/quote_eckhart_2.htm?iam=dpile_100
Meister Eckhart (Quotes)
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/meister_eckhart.html
Meister Eckhart Home Page
http://www.wwisp.com/~srshanks/Meister_Eckhart/
Meister Johann Eckhart
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05274a.htm
Meister Eckhart - passing beyond God (Pantheism)
http://members.aol.com/heraklit1/eckhart.htm
Meister Eckhart (Myths and Logos)
http://mythosandlogos.com/eckhart.html
Selections From Works Attributed to Meister Eckhart
http://www.geocities.com/athens/acropolis/5164/eckhart.htm
Books:
Meister Eckhart, Vol .1: Teacher and Preacher
http://www.amazon.com/Meister-Eckhart-Vol-1-Preacher/dp/0809128276
Meister Eckhart , Vol. 2: The Essential Sermons, Commentaries, Treatises and Defense (Classics
of Western Spirituality)
http://www.amazon.com/Meister-Eckhart-Vol-Commentaries-Spirituality/dp/0809123703
The Mystical Thought of Meister Eckhart: The Man from Whom God Hid Nothing
http://www.amazon.com/Mystical-Thought-Meister-Eckhart-Nothing/dp/0824519965
Meister Eckhart: A modern translation
http://www.amazon.com/Meister-Eckhart/dp/006130008X
Selected Writings (Penguin Classics)
http://www.amazon.com/Selected-Writings-Penguin-Classics-Meister/dp/0140433430
Meister Eckhart from Whom God Hid Nothing
http://www.amazon.com/Meister-Eckhart-Whom-God-Nothing/dp/157062139X
Meditations with Meister Eckhart (Meditation)
http://www.amazon.com/Meditations-Meister-Eckhart-Meditation-Matthew/dp/0939680041
The Best of Meister Eckhart
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0824512626
Eckhart (Philosophers of the Spirit)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/034069467X
Meister Eckhart : The Mystic As Theologian : An Experiment in Methodology
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0826407730
Meister Eckhart and the Beguine Mystics
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0826409296
The Mystical Element in Heidegger's Thought
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0823211533
Memes / Cognitive Viruses
memes (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme
Also refer to 'seed' or 'bija'
Meta-System Transition
{{Link to global human MST}}
meta system transition (definition)
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Being%20in%20the%20World.html#MST
The Metasystem Transition Theory (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/MSTT.html
Metasystem Transition (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metasystem_transition
An Integrative View of Meta-System Transition (PDF)
http://wwwu.uni-klu.ac.at/gossimit/ifsr/francois/papers/integrative_view_of_mts.pdf
Emergentism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergentism
Reductionism and complexity in molecular biology
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1299179
Emergent Properties
http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/notebooks/emergent-properties.html
Metaphysical Approach of SMN / IST
Central Metaphysical Idea: computational metaphysics in a nutshell; the universe is virtual.
System Theoretic Metaphysics: Ramifications of a metaphysics based on system theory.
Metaphysics of Virtual Reality: Metaphysical analysis of the phenomenon of virtual reality.
The Computational Paradigm: The central hypothesis in detail.
A Conceptual Bridge: From Science to Spirituality: this is the draft of a book that I am writing,
which incorporates all of the principle ideas presented on this website and structures them into a
single discussion.
The Fusion of Occidental and Oriental World Views: A clarification for Western minded people.
Metaphysical Origin: a brief discussion to clear up some confusions that arise from a materialist
perspective.
The New Science: some comments on the emerging scientific/spiritual revolution.
Information System Theory: The conceptual composition of a system in a world.
Knowledge of the World: What can be known and how?
Being in the World: What is the experience of existence?
Cartesian Dualism: a false metaphysics.
Correspondences with Ancient Metaphysical Paradigms: a survey of information theoretic
principles in ancient wisdom.
The Chinese Room, Experience, Knowledge and Communication: Discusses the issues of what is
experience, how does a system experience itself, what is participation in a context, what is
knowledge, how does a system know itself, what is communication.
Miscellaneous
Article: Chaitin interview:
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/CDMTCS/chaitin/mercurio.html
Science of Order (Structure)
http://www.synearth.net/Order/UCS2-Science-Order.html
The Time-Binding Trust (Knowing Utility)
http://www.synearth.net/trust.html
SynEarth: News For a Synergic Earth
http://www.synearth.net/
The Simultaneous Policy
http://www.simpol.org/
Mindfully.org
http://www.mindfully.org/
Cultural Heritage and Contemporary Change
http://www.crvp.org/pubs.htm
Athenaeum Library of Philosophy
http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/
Mysticism
Mysticism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mysticism
Perennial_philosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perennial_philosophy
Yi Jing, I Ching, Book of Changes (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yijing
Taoism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taoism
Spiritual_philosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_philosophy
Spirituality (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirituality
Theosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theosophy
Neo-Theosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Theosophy
New Age (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Age
Eastern philosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_philosophy
The Absolute (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Absolute
Karma (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma
Reincarnation (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reincarnation
Spiritual Evolution (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_evolution
Soul (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul
Altered States of Consciousness (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_states_of_consciousness
Acosmism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acosmism
Naive (Commonsense) Realism
Naive Realism (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Na%C3%AFve_realism
Born Yesterday
http://www.boogieonline.com/seeking/first/yesterday.html
David Hume (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hume
New (Cutting-Edge) Science
Global Consciousness Project
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/aesthetic.intro.html
REG Experiments
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/science2.html
Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research
http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/
Did the long-timescale character of the GCP [collective consciousness] data change after 9/11?
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/pab/longtrend/
Institute of Noetic Sciences IONS
http://www.ions.org/
Psi Research links
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/professional.html
Parapsychology Foundation
http://www.parapsychology.org/
Parapsychology Foundation Lyceum
http://www.pflyceum.org/7.html
The Parapsychological Association
http://www.parapsych.org/
Quantum Future
http://quantumfuture.net/quantum_future/qf.htm
Books:
The Conscious Universe
http://www.deanradin.com/NewWeb/TCUindex.html
Entangled Minds
http://www.deanradin.com/NewWeb/EMindex.html
Extraordinary Knowing
http://deanradin.blogspot.com/2007/03/extraordinary-knowing.html
Science and the Akashic Field
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20Akashic%20Field.html
The Field
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/LMcTaggart.html
Piercing Time and Space
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/TLSlatton.html
Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness
http://www.quantumenigma.com/
Are Spirits Real?
http://www.arespiritsreal.com/
See also:
Holistic Organisations
Skepticism
Virtual Reality Metaphysics
Akashic Field
Consciousness
Information Systems Theory
Quantum Physics
System Theory
Unified Science
Unification of Science and Mysticism
Process Studies
Newspeak in Orwell's 1984
Newspeak (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspeak
Newspeak.com (1984)
http://www.newspeak.com/1984.htm
Newspeak Dictionary
http://www.newspeakdictionary.com/
Politics and the English Language (early essay by Orwell, Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_and_the_English_Language
Nicholas of Cusa
Nicholas of Cusa (Biography)
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11060b.htm
Nicholas of Cusa (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_of_Cusa
Nicholas of Cusa and the Infinite
http://www.integralscience.org/cusa.html
Nicholas of Cusa (English translations)
http://cla.umn.edu/sites/jhopkins/
The Philosophy of Nicholas of Cusa
http://www.radicalacademy.com/philcusa.htm
Nicholas of Cusa (Mac Tutor)
http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Cusa.html
Nicholas of Cusa (Resources)
http://staff.kings.edu/bapavlac/fbf/cusa.html
Ethical Implications of Unity and the Divine in Nicholas of Cusa
http://www.crvp.org/book/Series01/I-10/contents.htm
Nicholas of Cusa (Links)
http://www.theology.ie/theologians/cusa.htm
American Cusanus Society
http://www.library.jhu.edu/departments/rsc/izbicki/cusanus.html
Books:
Nicholas of Cusa on Learned Ignorance: A Translation and an Appraisal of De Docta Ignorantia
(Jasper Hopkins)
http://www.amazon.com/Nicholas-Cusa-Learned-Ignorance-Translation/dp/0938060309
Nicholas of Cusa: Selected Spiritual Writings (Classics of Western Spirituality)
http://www.amazon.com/Nicholas-Cusa-Selected-Spiritual-Spirituality/dp/0809136988
Ontology (study of what is)
Definitions of Ontology by Leading Philosophers
http://www.formalontology.it/section_4.htm
Logic and Ontology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-ontology/
Ontology (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ONTOLI.html
Ontology (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology
Organisations and Organisms
The First Cambrian Explosion
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20First%20Cambrian%20Explosion.html
The Second Cambrian Explosion
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20Second%20Cambrian%20Explosion.html
Overview of the SMN / IST approach
Scientific Basis of the Work: a brief summary of the concrete points of interest; the verifiable
core of the work.
Central Metaphysical Idea: in a nutshell, the universe is virtual.
General Introduction: introduces the idea of the unification of science and mysticism.
A Conceptual Bridge: From Science to Spirituality: this is the draft of a book that I am writing,
which incorporates all of the principle ideas presented on this website and structures them into a
single discussion.
A Broad Academic Overview: A precise definition of key terms and the overall approach.
Notice to Scientists: an old letter of introduction that discusses points of interest to scientists.
Notice to Software Developers: an old letter of introduction that discusses points of interest to
software developers.
Process Systemics: conceptualising this work as a fusion of process philosophy and system
theory.
The Mathematical Analysis: of the transcendent computational process that lies beyond the
phenomenal world and that manifests it in each moment of existence.
Paradigms and Paradigm Shift
Paradigm Shifts and the Changing Nature of what is 'Fact'
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SSE_1640.html
Perception and the Empirical World
Being in the World:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Being%20in%20the%20World.html
Epistemological Problems of Perception
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-episprob/
Phenomenology (study of what seems to be)
Phenomenology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/phenomenology/
The Basic Problems of Phenomenology (Heidegger 1927)
http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/heidegge.htm
Phenomenology (Merriam Webster Dictionary)
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/phenomenology
Phenomenology (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenomenology
What is Phenomenology? (Center for Advanced Research in Phenomenology)
http://www.phenomenologycenter.org/
Philosophy and Cognitive Science
http://www.stanford.edu/group/SHR/4-2/text/sharoff.html
Principles of Philosophy, Book III Phenomenology (Peirce)
http://www.textlog.de/4254.html
Primitive Thisness and Primitive Identity
Primitive Thisness and Primitive Identity
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28197901%2976%3A1%3C5%3APTAPI%3E2.0.CO
%3B2-3&size=LARGE
Identity and Individuality in Quantum Theory
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-idind/
The Identity of Indiscernibles
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-indiscernible/
Process Studies
what is process thought?
http://www.ctr4process.org/about/process/
Process (philosophy) (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_(philosophy)
Process Philosophy (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_philosophy
Process Philosophy (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/
The Center for Process Studies
http://www.ctr4process.org/
Process Physics (R.T. Cahill):
http://www.scieng.flinders.edu.au/cpes/people/cahill r/processphysics.html
Process Theology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_Theology
Everything is Permuted (Process Philosophy)
http://www.permuted.org.uk/process1.htm
Process Philosophy and the New Thought Movement
http://websyte.com/alan/process.htm
Quantum Optics
Quantum Optics(Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_optics
Search Results for "quantum optics"
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/quantum%252Boptics
Quantum Physics
A Cybernetic Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics (Ross Rhodes):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Ross%20Rhodes.html
Process Physics (R.T. Cahill):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Process%20Physics.html
Finite Nature Hypothesis (Edwin Fredkin):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Ross%20Rhodes.html#Finite_Nature_Hypothesis
Common Grounds between Buddhism, Quantum Physics and Baha'I Faith:
http://bahai-library.org/essays/common.ground.html
A Foundational Principle for Quantum Mechanics (PDF):
http://www.univie.ac.at/qfp/publications3/pdffiles/1999-10.pdf
On the Interpretation and Philosophical Foundation of Quantum Mechanics (PDF):
http://www.univie.ac.at/qfp/publications3/pdffiles/1996-03.pdf
Toward an elemental grounding of microphysics:
http://www.springerlink.com/content/n6025x10njw7v5w2/
A Quantum Dialog:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/q-dialg1.html
The Reality Program: A Primer on Cybernetic Quantum Physics:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/reality/RealityFrame1.html
The Metaphysics of Quantum Mechanics
http://www.reasons.org/resources/apologetics/other_papers/the_metaphysics_of_quantum_mech
anics.shtml
Quantum Teleportation
Quantum teleportation (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_teleportation
Search Results for "quantum teleportation"
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/quantum%252Bteleportation
Raja Yoga, the path of Eight Limbs
Raja Yoga (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raja_Yoga
Raja Yoga (Yogaworld)
http://www.yogaworld.org/raja.htm
Raja Yoga in Brief (By Swami Vivekananda)
http://www.davedavies.com/splanet/raja.htm
The Eight Limbs of Raja Yoga
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/philosophy/eightlimbs.html
Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoga_Sutras_of_Patanjali
Raja Yoga
http://www.hinduism.co.za/rajayoga.htm
Raja Yoga (By Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.dlshq.org/teachings/rajayoga.htm
Raja Yoga (Vedanta Society)
http://www.vedanta.org/wiv/practice/yogas/raja.html
The 4 Paths of Yoga (Sivananda)
http://www.sivananda.org/teachings/philosophy/fourpaths.html
Schizmogenesis
Ghosts and Government (paper from which quotes were taken)
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0025-1496%28197806%292%3A13%3A2%3C175%3AGAGASA
%3E2.0.CO%3B2-1&size=LARGE
Self-Excited Circuit
The Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/CTMU.html
SMN and SCSPL
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/IST_CTMU.html
Wheeler?
Shankaracharya
“The teachings of Sankara can be summed up in half a verse: “Brahma Satyam Jagan Mithya
Jivo Brahmaiva Na Aparah—Brahman (the Absolute) is alone real; this world is unreal; and the
Jiva or the individual soul is non-different from Brahman.” This is the quintessence of his
philosophy.” (http://www.shankaracharya.org/advaita_philosophy.php)
Adi Shankara (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adi_Shankara
Shankaracharya (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shankar_Acharya
Adi Shankaracharya
http://kiran.phpsites.com/shankaracharya/index.htm
Shankaracharya.org
http://www.shankaracharya.org/
Shri Adi Shankaracharya
http://hinduism.about.com/od/gurussaints/p/adishankara.htm
Signal Analysis
Neural correlates of auditory fill-in
http://www.jsmf.org/grants/bmb/essays/2003/sutter.htm
Cocktail Party Physics
http://twistedphysics.typepad.com/cocktail_party_physics/2006/12/party_girl.html
A cat's cocktail party: Psychophysical, neurophysiological, and computational studies of spatial
release from masking (PDF)
http://www.cns.bu.edu/~shinn/pages/pdf/ISH_2003.pdf
A Review of The Cocktail Party Effect
http://xenia.media.mit.edu/~barons/html/cocktail.html
Animal Communication: Signal Detection (PDF)
http://www.unc.edu/home/rhwiley/pdfs/Wiley2006SigDetection.pdf
Signal Detection and Animal Communication (PDF)
http://www.unc.edu/~rhwiley/pdfs/WILEY_060131.pdf
Mathematicians Solve the 'Cocktail Party Problem'
http://www.physorg.com/news75477497.html
Audio Signal Processing: Speaker Localization and Separation Systems
http://www.ait.gr/Publevents/18102004_Audio_fota.pdf
Simulation
Article: A duplicate universe, trapped in a computer:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/science/story/0,12996,1497195,00.html
Skepticism
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry
http://www.csicop.org/
Skeptical Investigations
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/home.htm
Zen . . . And the Art of Debunkery
http://members.aol.com/ddrasin/zen.html
The Skeptics Society
http://www.skeptic.com/
Skeptic's pages
http://amasci.com/weird/wskept.html
Seven Warning Signs of Bogus Skepticism
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/objectivity/bogusskepticism.htm
SMN Dimensional Spaces
Non-Dimensional and Dimensional Spaces in SMN (can't find where I discuss this, I'm know it
is somewhere...)
Solipsism
"Possibly the most controversial, and most distinguishing, feature of the solipsistic world view is
the denial of the existence of other minds." (Wikipedia - Solipsism)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism
Stendahl, Krister
Krister Stendahl (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krister_Stendahl
The Apostle Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West (review)
http://www.thepaulpage.com/Stendahl.html
The Apostle Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West (questions) (PDF)
http://greek-language.com/paul/questions/Stendahl2.pdf
Spirit for a Quarreling Church: Insights from Krister Stendahl
http://www.witherspoonsociety.org/from_krister_stendahl.htm
String Theory
String theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory
M-theory, the theory formerly known as Strings
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/gr/public/qg_ss.html
Superstrings! String Theory Home Page
http://www.sukidog.com/jpierre/strings/
The Official String Theory Web Site
http://superstringtheory.com/
Superstring theory (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstring_theory
String Theory and the Unification of Forces: Sunil Mukhi
http://theory.tifr.res.in/~mukhi/Physics/string.html
String Theory - What is String Theory?
http://physics.about.com/od/quantumphysics/f/stringtheory
String Theory Basics
http://superstringtheory.com/basics/index.html
System Matrix Notation (SMN)
SMN Comments: [general comments]
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SMN%20Comments.html
A Conceptual Bridge: Modelling General Information Systems: [good introduction]
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/ConceptualBridge.html#_Toc148700625
Finite Discrete Information Systems: [detailed mathematics]
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Finite%20Discrete%20Information
%20Systems.html
The Mathematical Analysis:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/The%20Mathematical%20Analysis.html
Computational Processes: This is a mathematical and conceptual proof using SMN that reality
can be thought of as a computational process and that the class of general computational
processes is broader than algorithmic processes. It also gives an argument indicating that a
computational reality does not imply simple pre-determinism but rather 'self-determinism'.
SMN and System Theory:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SMN%20and%20System%20Theory.html
SMN Source Code:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SMN%20Code.html
SMN High Level Design:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/code/v6.0/SMNv6.0HLD.html
SMN and SCSPL:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/IST_CTMU.html
Also see:
Link Theory : A theory of connectivity that seems closely related to SMN
http://www.boundary.org/physics.htm
Systems Theory, Cybernetics and Related Approaches
Cybernetics and Systems Thinkers (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CSTHINK.html
What is Systems Theory? (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SYSTHEOR.html
Introduction to Cybernetics (Ashby - Online PDF Book)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ASHBBOOK.html
Complex Adaptive Systems (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CAS.html
Cybernetics and Systems Theory (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBSWHAT.html
Self-organization (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SELFORG.html
Cybernetics (Principia Cybernetica)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBERN.html
Center for the Study of Complex Systems
http://cscs.umich.edu/
Complexity Notebooks
http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/notebooks/
Also see:
Information System Theory
General System Theory
Meta System Transition
Network Theory
Tantra Yoga, the path of Expansion (Skakti)
Tantra (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tantra
Tantra Yoga (Yogaworld)
http://www.yogaworld.org/tantra.htm
Articles and e-books on Yoga and Tantra
http://sivasakti.com/index2.html
Tantra (About Hinduism)
http://hinduism.about.com/od/tantra/Tantra.htm
Tantra Yoga (By Sri Swami Sivananda)
http://www.dlshq.org/teachings/tantrayoga.htm
Tao Te Ching
Tao Te Ching (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tao_Te_Ching
Tao Te Ching ~ Dao De Jing in English
http://www.religiousworlds.com/taoism/ttc-list.html
Tao Te Ching (full text)
http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/texts/taote-v3.html
Tao Te Ching (full text)
http://www.wright-house.com/religions/taoism/tao-te-ching.html
Tao Te Ching (full text, different languages)
http://www.chinapage.com/laotze.html
Tao Te Ching (index of concepts)
http://www.taoteching.org/
Tao Te Ching (simple text version)
http://classics.mit.edu/Lao/taote.mb.txt
Tao Te Ching (mindfully.org)
http://www.mindfully.org/Tao-Te-Ching-Lao-tzu.htm
Comments on the Tao Te Ching
http://www.friesian.com/taote.htm
About the Tao
http://www.thetao.info/
Books:
The Power Of Tao: A New Interpretation Of The Tao Te Ching
http://www.poweroftao.com/meta/tao-te-ching.htm
Tao Te Ching (Lao Tsu, trans Gia-Fu Feng)
http://www.amazon.com/Tao-Ching-25th-Anniversary-Lao-Tsu/dp/0679776192
Time: Past, Present, Future and the Eternal Now
Unification of Science
Full Circle - Report from The Council for Unified Research and Education on the Unification of
the Sciences.
http://www.synearth.net/Haskell/FC/FC.htm
Uncommon Science
http://www.synearth.net/UCS2f/UCS2-.html
The Archives of Scientists Transcendent Experiences (TASTE)
http://issc-taste.org/index.shtml
Unification of Science and Mysticism Via Information System Theory
Correspondences with other Metaphysical Paradigms
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Correspondences.html
Survey of Ancient Traditions
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Survey%20of%20Ancient%20Traditions.html
General Discussions on the Unification of Science and Mysticism
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/General%20Discussions.html
Science and Spirituality:
Article: The New Convergence:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/convergence.html
A World With A View:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/Worldview.html
Science, Religion, and Anthropology
http://faculty.ircc.edu/faculty/jlett/Article%20on%20Religion.htm
The Reciprocal Relation Between Science and Revelation
http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy/instructor/ncl2.html
Religion and Science Public Dialogue
http://home.att.net/~wislit/
The Universe in a Single Atom
http://buddhism.about.com/od/keyconcepts/a/Atom.htm
Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences
The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unreasonable_Effectiveness_of_Mathematics_in_the_Natural_
Sciences
Virtual Reality and Computational Metaphysics
Central Metaphysical Idea (the universe is virtual):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/CentralIdea.html
Conceptual Bridge: Metaphysics of Virtual Reality:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/ConceptualBridge.html#_Toc148700623
The Computational Paradigm:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Computational%20Paradigm.html
Metaphysical Origin of Reality:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Metaphysical%20Origin.html
Conceptual Bridge: Metaphysics of Information Systems:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/ConceptualBridge.html#_Toc148700626
Computational Processes (proof that the universe is virtual):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Computational%20Processes.html
Process Metaphysics and Computational Paradigm:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SSE_1367.html
Computational Metaphysics:
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/SSE_1406.html
Other People's Work:
Process Physics (R.T. Cahill):
http://www.scieng.flinders.edu.au/cpes/people/cahill r/processphysics.html
The Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/CTMU.html
Link Theory (PDF) : A theory of connectivity that seems closely related to SMN
http://www.boundary.org/physics.htm
Theory of Enformed Systems : A theory of organisation that seems closely related to IST
http://www.enformy.com/tesintro.htm
A Computer Scientist's View of Life, the Universe, and Everything:
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/everything/html.html
A Cybernetic Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics (Ross Rhodes):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Ross%20Rhodes.html
Finite Nature Hypothesis (Edwin Fredkin):
http://www.anandavala.info/TASTMOTNOR/Ross%20Rhodes.html#Finite_Nature_Hypothesis
Finite Nature:
http://finitenature.com/
Algorithmic Theories of Everything:
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/toesv2/
Computable Universes & Algorithmic Theory of Everything:
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/computeruniverse.html
Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?:
http://www.simulation-argument.com/
Computational Universes (PDF):
http://www.arxiv.org/PS_cache/physics/pdf/0305/0305048.pdf
InformationPhysics.com:
http://www.informationphysics.com/html/
Digital Philosophy:
http://www.digitalphilosophy.org/
Digital Physics:
http://digitalphysics.org/
Elements of information-theoretic derivation of the formalism of quantum theory (PDF):
http://www.arxiv.org/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0306/0306079.pdf
How real are virtual realities, how virtual is reality?:
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/complexi.htm
In the Beginning was the Bit
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg16922784.300-in-the-beginning-was-the-bit.html
Innocence Lost: Simulation Scenarios: Prospects and Consequences (PDF):
http://www.simulation-argument.com/dainton.pdf
Living in a Simulated Universe (PDF):
http://www.simulation-argument.com/barrowsim.pdf
The Matrix as Metaphysics:
http://www.u.arizona.edu/%7Echalmers/papers/matrix.html
Artificial reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_reality
Virtual Reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_reality
Simulated Reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_reality
Are You a Sim? (PDF):
http://www.simulation-argument.com/weatherson.pdf
The Computer Inside You:
http://www.johmann.net/book
Physical versus Computational Complementarity:
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/pvcci.htm
Physics and metaphysics looks at computation (PDF):
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/2005-ct.pdf
Quantum algorithmic information theory:
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/qait.htm
Quantum Information and Computation (PDF):
http://tph.tuwien.ac.at/~svozil/publ/2005-stpoelten-pres.pdf
Online Book: A New Kind of Science, Stephen Wolfram: also at amazon.com
http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/toc.html
Quantum mechanics as information processing within a computer-generated universe:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/index.html
A Different Take on Creation: Digital Dualism:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/svozil_creation.htm
Digital Physics and Me:
http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/DPandMe.html
Article: Did the Universe Just Happen? I interview with Edwin Fredkin:
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/88apr/wright.htm
Article: God is the Machine:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/holytech.html
Article: Digital universe:
http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/op/2003/10/28/stories/2003102800110300.htm
The Nature of Information and The Information of Nature:
http://informationphysics.com/InformationPhysics.html
The New AI: General & Sound & Relevant for Physics:
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/newai/newai.html
Whitescarver Model:
http://wikiworld.com/wiki/index.php/WhitescarverModel
Zuse's Thesis: The Universe is a Computer:
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/digitalphysics.html
Information Resources in Virtual Reality
http://www.hitl.washington.edu/projects/knowledge_base/irvr/irvr.html
Cyberspace and Its Limits: Hypermodern Detours in the Evolution of Consciousness
http://online.sfsu.edu/~rpurser/revised/pages/Cyberspace%2012.htm
The Devices of Science Fiction
http://hammer.prohosting.com/~nusyg/Seths_notepad.html
The Neuroscience of Cyberspace: New metaphors for the Self and its Boundaries
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/neuroscience_of_cyberspace.html
A Brief History of Virtual Reality and Its Social Applications
http://faculty.colostate-pueblo.edu/samuel.ebersole/336/eim/papers/vrhist.html
Transphysicalism and Virtual Happiness
http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2005/07/transphysicalism-and-virtual-happiness.html
Books:
Virtual Reality: The Revolutionary Technology of Computer-Generated Artificial Worlds - and
How It Promises to Transform Society
The Fabric of Reality
Toward a New Foundation for Physics
My Big TOE:
The Cosmic Code: Quantum Physics as the Language of Nature
The Bit and the Pendulum: How the New Physics of Information Is Revolutionizing Science
Collective Beings from the Series: Contemporary Systems Thinking
Movies:
The Matrix
The Thirteenth Floor
Dark City
eXistenZ
Also see topics:
Information System Theory
System Matrix Notation
Simulation
Matrix Movie Metaphysics
Process Studies
Self-Excited Circuit
Unified Science
Mysticism
Glossary
These are NOT definitions that are set in stone. They are just rough hints to give you some idea
of what I DON’T mean and what I DO mean. If you treat these as simplistic definitions and you
fail to use subtlety and awareness in discerning the deeper meanings then you will become quite
confused. So just take these as vague hints that will help you avoid certain obvious
misunderstandings.
Index
Awareness Meme Complex Prejudice /
Belief Analogy Dogmatic
Computation Metaphysics Sanity / Sane
Confusion Meta-System Transition MST Science
Conscious Mind Mind Self
Consciousness Mysticism / Perennial Philosophy Subconscious
Ego Naive Mind
Illusion Object event, place and any Universe
Individual perceptual phenomena Virtual
Information Outer Space World
Information Space / Computational Paradigm / Cognitive Lens / World
Space / State Space View
Information System / Information Paradigm Shift
Process Perceptual / Experiential Process
Inner Space Physical
Meme / Idea / Thought Physical Universe
Awareness
I DO NOT mean the every day human experience of becoming aware of something, e.g. by
reading about it and thereby knowing it.
I DO mean the inner existential process, the process whereby existential information (discernible
difference) is discerned in the present moment. It is the process of the flow of existential
information through the inner space network of sub-systems within sub-systems. It is the present
moment transformation of information. At the lowest level of primitive systems I call it proto-
awareness and it is modelled in SMN by a computational thread. Just as primitive systems form
into more complex systems and a hierarchy of systems within systems where at each system
level there is the MST illusion of a single whole system. So too, proto-awareness forms into
more complex forms of awareness (inner existential processes) and a hierarchy of processes
within processes where at each system level there is an MST illusion of a single whole
awareness.
Belief
I DO NOT mean opinions that magically correspond with reality.
I DO mean ideas that people hold and “look through” but which have not arisen from
experience, but instead from the interactions of ideas. Certain meme complexes create certain
ideas that people become attached to but these ideas do not necessarily represent the reality but
only the needs of the meme complex. The meme complex operates to protect itself and retain its
control over the person’s mind, over their experiences and also their understanding. All cognitive
phenomena are subtly contrived and distorted to protect the belief and to ward off any foreign
ideas that may threaten that belief. If a person strongly believes something then they are unable
to comprehend any ideas that threaten their beliefs, their mind simply won’t entertain them and
the mind slips into habitual defense mechanisms and also cover up operations to hide the fact
that habitual defence mechanisms have activated. The person just experiences the foreign idea as
incomprehensible and very distasteful. That is how the meme complex keeps the person from
actually questioning the belief and also keeps them from realising that they have just been
manipulated to avoid questioning the belief. In their experience they were open-minded by the
idea itself was repulsive nonsense.
Computation
I DO NOT mean just electronic computers.
I DO mean the coherent flow, transformation and ‘processing’ of information. This includes all
communication and interaction such as between particles, people or galaxies. Whenever
information moves and changes it does so via the process of computation.
Confusion
I DO NOT mean a derogatory term, like the way ‘stupid’ is often used.
I DO mean the act of using a paradigm or cognitive lens that distorts the flow of information
either in the subconscious interpretation of sensory signals into internal experience or in the
sub/conscious comprehension of experience that generates ideas; or both. This distortion leads to
either experiences that don’t perfectly match the sensory signals arising from the existential
context or to ideas that don’t perfectly match the experiences; or both. When a person naively
accepts these distorted experiences and ideas as the actual reality this further distorts their
understanding and their cognitive lens, thereby further distorting their experiences and ideas. All
ideas, theories and knowledge contain some degree of confusion but this becomes very
problematic when the confusion becomes very distorting and the person comes to dwell in a
confused fantasy world that only spirals further into confusion and delusion (persistent illusion).
Conscious Mind
I DO mean a single point of awareness that is a sub process of consciousness and that “bears
witness” to the final result of the vast underlying subconscious process. The conscious mind
naively accepts the results of the subconscious process as being reality. It doesn’t consider that
this is just a cognitive reflection of reality, it accepts this as real and it acts upon these assumed
real experiences and ideas. When the conscious mind is aware it has complete control but often it
is dormant and the meme complex acts out its own egoic dynamics and the person is controlled
by the ego.
Consciousness
I DO NOT mean some magical quality that is possessed only by humans as some kind of “God
given” innate ability to cognise an inert physical universe.
I DO mean The MST illusion of a whole individual high level awareness within a system.
Ego
I DO NOT just mean ideas such as “I am so great” or just people who ‘show-off’.
I DO mean the ‘I-thought’, which is a particular meme or paradigm or cognitive lens that
conceptualises oneself as a single, whole, individual entity in a world that is not-self. It could
manifest as “I am great” or “I am pathetic” or “I am in control” or “I am a victim” or “I am
guilty” or “I am angry” or “I am in love” or “I am a human” or “I am an employee” and so on.
All these ideas reinforce the I-thought and they cause the being to experience and think of
themselves as a single isolated personal self within a vast world of not-self.
The ego is an illusion that weaves illusions that fill the mind and condition you so that the ego
can use you to pursue its agendas. Just like a government that starts to believe that it is the nation
and that the society is its body, then it fills the society full of propaganda and advertising and
manipulates the nation to pursue its agendas. Governments are the egos of nations. But the ego is
just a meme complex and not the real person or real nation. Humans and nations lose themselves
to the ego and lose awareness, dwelling only in the stream of ideas, desires and fears and very
rarely being AWARE. When you are aware you are in control but when you are on auto-pilot
acting out your egoic story you’re being controlled by the ego. If people doubt this - just try and
remain aware for one minute and if you are not caught up in self-deception you will see how
difficult it really is - thoughts always come along to carry you away with them and it is habitual
to just identify with them and to be the thinker rather than be the watcher of the thoughts. Many
people believe that they ARE the ego, they have never known themselves. There are many ideas
that can threaten the web of illusion through which the ego exerts its power (subversive ideas
that counter the mainstream propaganda). Its web of delusion is really very fragile so the ego is
often ruthless or ingenious in suppressing and neutralising threatening ideas so that the conscious
mind (mainstream society) remains totally unaware of them. Authorities whether political or
religious have routinely suppressed mysticism throughout history because it destroys illusion! If
you want a good analysis of the manipulative strategies used by the ego you should read the
book "A New Earth", by Eckhart Tolle. Egos are ingenious and ruthless dictators and they dictate
via deception and delusion, so beware.
Illusion
I DO NOT mean a trick of lights or sleight of hand within an otherwise objective physical
universe that directly presents itself to the mind.
I DO mean any cognitive impression that does not perfectly correspond with the reality that the
impression is supposed to represent to consciousness. For example, colour is an illusion because
it is a perceptual phenomenon that leads us to believe that objects possess colour when in fact
they don't. There are frequencies of light but this light has no colour either. Only when a very
narrow range of frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum stimulate our senses and are
interpreted by consciousness does colour arise. Similarly the experience of objecthood or whole
systems is an illusion arising from an MST process. Also the experience of being an individual in
a world that surrounds one is an illusion that arises in consciousness when information flows
through a point of awareness that perceives from a particular subjective perspective that is
embedded within a virtual universe.
Individual
I DO NOT just mean a person in society.
I DO mean any single system, or any perceived state of singleness and separate identity. But
systems are not simple things, only primitive systems are truly individual and whole. All other
systems are compound systems made of the interactions of sub-systems. Furthermore all systems
participate in super-systems so no system is isolated and they cannot be accurately understood in
isolation. Although compound systems are actually vast complex systems of sub-systems within
sub-systems, due to the MST illusion it seems that there is a single individual system. Thus a
human individual is a complex dynamical system that experiences the MST illusion of
wholeness, individuality and separateness from the world. This systemic illusion of individual
existence underlies the arising of the egoic illusion.
Information
I DO NOT mean just emails and news stories and the experience of being informed in a very
human cultural context.
I DO mean an abstract non-material essence. It is pure discernible difference that can manifest in
any medium and transform between mediums. It has the ability to flow and to change. It implies
both an observable appearance (data, outer aspect) and a process of observation (computation ,
proto-awareness, inner aspect). This discernable difference underlies all symbolic representation
and creates the potential for symbolic processes that represent and simulate virtual realities.
Information Space / Computational Space / State Space
I DO mean an existential context that supports representation and transformation of information
(discernible difference). Symbolic states are represented and transformed so existential states are
represented and transformed. An information space is the general context in which information
systems exists and operate. SMN is a general model of an information space and of information
systems.
Information System / Information Process
I DO NOT mean something that is “just information” like how people think of DVD movies or
computer games. And I don’t mean the naive idea of a configuration of physical objects and
processes that operate in the physical universe and convey symbolic information to humans, e.g.
information delivery systems such as databases and business management systems or libraries
and other cultural information delivery systems.
I DO mean a pattern of existential information that structures the flow and transformation of
existential information. They operate in the cosmic information space and they govern the
coherent flow of non-material existential potential that underlies all the forms and phenomena
that are the actual universe. When virtual systems perceive these information systems from a
subjective empirical perspective some information systems manifest as objects of perception and
are thought of as physical objects within a physical universe, such as a football. Some manifest
as events or processes such as a football match and some manifest as ideas or systemic
‘movements’ such as the very idea and social phenomenon of football. Furthermore some
information systems are imperceptible but have subtle localised effects on the virtual universe,
these are not noticed by most but many people call them ‘spirits’. Also some information
systems are very low-level and have no localised effects and can only be discerned as universal
forces or as just the-way-things-are. Information systems are a descriptive device that refers to
the actual objective reality that operates prior to perception and that underlies all the forms and
phenomena that arise through perception. To call something a ‘rock’ is to use ideas and concepts
derived from subjective empirical sense experience but to call it an information system that
manifests to consciousness as a rock is more accurate. This is because the object ‘rock’ only
arises through the perception, interpretation and experience of the flow of information. Only the
information systems actually exist and the objects are perceptual illusions that arise in
consciousness.
Inner Space
I DO NOT mean some vague undefined ‘new age’ term.
I DO mean the complex structure of systems within systems that underlies every aspect of a
system’s form, behaviour and experience. Inner relates to the process of perception and outer
relates to the content of perception.
Meme / Idea / Thought
I DO mean a cognitive structure that symbolically represents either an aspect of some experience
or a relation between ideas. The simple ideas arising from experience are like primitive systems
that underlie the arising of a complex hierarchy of ideas within ideas. These ideas are memes,
which are cognitive viruses, they are self-propagating ideas that controls us by directing the mind
when our conscious awareness is absent. The whole of the mind is a meme complex and when it
is not driven by direct conscious awareness it just acts out its memetic behaviour. Habits and
compulsive thought patterns of all kinds are memes, but also all ideas and concepts and traditions
and symbolic actions and so on. Most people are totally unaware of the degree to which they are
infested and dominated by memes. They think they are in control but that is often just another
idea/meme. To test your level of control, try and not identify with any thoughts for just one
minute, if you can stay detached and not actually ‘think them’ but only let the thought pass of
their own accord then you are quite advanced in you self-awareness and self-control. It usually
takes many many years of meditation or other practices to be able to last even just one minute
without losing control to the meme complexes in your mind. By watching them pass and staying
detached you begin to realise that the thoughts are not you, but when you identify with them you
think they are you – you say “I am angry” but it is just the meme complex that is angry. Memes
propagate from mind to mind through the cultural domain via any means of communication. The
mind is a type of internal meme complex and culture is a type of external meme complex.
Meme Complex
I DO mean a group of memes that cooperate or exist in a network of relations and dependencies
such that they reinforce and propagate each other and operate in a collective manner. The
individual memes or ideas are sub-systems that integrate to produce a super-system; the meme
complex. An example of a collective meme complex is ‘modernity’ where countless different
ideas from ego, empiricism, materialism, social pragmatism, authoritarianism, Scientism,
Political/Religiousness, economics, common sense and so on permeate people’s minds and
create a collective resonance of minds. All these ideas reinforce each other and act in a
coordinated manner to suppress any ideas that do not fit into this meme complex. The ego is the
root meme, when its dominance is overcome the whole of the ‘worldly’ meme complex collapses
and one finds oneself in a mystic paradigm.
Analogy
I DO NOT mean some vague story where you focus on the explicit ideas and form associations
and arrive at some understanding based solely on the explicit ideas and that relates only to those
ideas.
I DO mean an attempt to express certain implicit ideas that are difficult or impossible to express
directly using the particular language. The explicit ideas themselves are TOTALLY
IRRELEVANT and only serve as points of recognition so that the reader can discern the
underlying structure of relations between the explicit ideas. Then the explicit ideas should be
COMPLETELY disregarded and only the abstract structure of relations retained. Then you
contemplate how the structure fits into the context of the implicit ideas and you use the structure
to re-structure your understanding of the implicit ideas, thereby subtly changing your
understanding of their meanings. Meanings change because the meaning is purely a function of
how the ideas participate in the holistic context and there are no simple pre-definitions. Any
prejudiced or apathetic thinking will lead to confusion. If one simply focuses on the explicit
ideas one is just looking at the finger when the finger is pointing at the moon.
Metaphysics
I DO NOT mean “More recently, the term ‘metaphysics’ has also been used more loosely to
refer to "subjects that are beyond the physical world". A "metaphysical bookstore", for instance,
is not one that sells books on ontology, but rather one that sells books on spirits, faith healing,
crystal power, occultism, and other such topics.” Quoted from
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics)
I DO mean “the branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the nature of reality, being,
and the world.
Metaphysics addresses questions such as:
What is the nature of reality?
What is humankind's place in the universe?
Are colors objective or subjective?
Does the world exist outside the mind?
What is the nature of objects, events, places?
A central branch of metaphysics is ontology, the investigation into what types of things there are
in the world and what relations these things bear to one another. The metaphysician also
attempts to clarify the notions by which people understand the world, including existence,
objecthood, property, space, time, causality, and possibility.” Quoted from
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics)
Meta-System Transition
This is a term from general system theory that refers to the phenomenon where a group of
interacting systems integrate to form a super-system. There is no ontological change however.
The ‘new’ whole system arises as a perceptual phenomenon when it is perceived from a high-
level perspective and most of the details of the interactions are lost and it appears that there is
just a single whole system. This apparent wholeness arises in outer forms such as particles
creating chunks of matter and also in inner forms such as proto-awareness creating high-level
human consciousness.
Mind
I DO NOT mean some magical quality that is possessed only by humans as some kind of “God
given” innate ability to understand and know an inert physical universe.
I DO mean a cognitive process that operates on ideas or memes. The mind is a type of meme
complex, it is a systemic structure of thoughts and thinking patterns. It is composed of memes,
which are cognitive information systems that channel, interpret, represent, comprehend and
generally process the flow of existential information through consciousness. There is both a
subconscious and conscious mind and permeating both is the ego, the central organising meme
complex.
Mysticism / Perennial Philosophy
I DO NOT mean the crude derisive stereotype of vague whacko superstitions that is used by the
currently dominant cultural meme complex to suppress mystic ideas.
I DO mean the systematic, rational, skeptical and holistic exploration of the experience of
existence without the imposition of any preconceived superstitions or belief systems (such as
empiricism). It involves the development of deep holistic insight not just into the contents of
consciousness but also into the process of consciousness and the underlying existential process.
The ancient mystic traditions are old forms of holistic science that are expressed in their own
analogical languages, but they have become very demonised and misunderstood due to the action
of cultural distortion and also deliberate attack from other meme complexes such as
political/religious institutions and Scientism. When viewed cynically from the outside and
interpreted using empiricist concepts they are incomprehensible but when one makes the
paradigm shift they are plainly seen to represent deep scientific understanding of the holistic
context.
Naive
I DO NOT mean a derogatory term like the way ‘childish’ is sometimes used. Nor do I mean
“Not previously subjected to experiments: testing naive mice”. Nor do I mean “Not having
previously taken or received a particular drug: persons naive to marijuana”. Nor do I mean
“Simple and guileless; artless: a child with a naive charm”
(http://www.answers.com/topic/naive).
I DO mean “Unsuspecting or credulous (Disposed to believe too readily)”
(http://www.answers.com/topic/naive) and I do mean “Having a lack of knowledge, judgment, or
experience” for example: “a naive belief in the honesty of politicians” (http://www.webster-
dictionary.net/definition/naive).
Object (also events, places and any perceptual phenomena)
In the OLD-PARADIGM objects are things that are naively believed to ontologically exist and
to directly make themselves known to consciousness.
In the NEW-PARADIGM objects are the objects of perception. When you perceive an object,
ask yourself, do I believe it IS an object or do I simply accept that there is something there that
appears as objects of perception when it resonates with my mind. We cannot directly discern the
true nature of things, we can only know the outer appearance of things via the flow of
information from their outputs through our senses and interpreted and represented by the mind.
To assume that the objects of perception are actually ontological objects is natural, it is
biologically programmed into us and it is sufficient for basic animal existence but it is an
arbitrary belief that is ultimately very limiting.
Outer Space
I DO NOT mean just the naive idea of physical space that surrounds the planet and permeates
the physical universe.
I DO mean any experiential context or world that a system experiences as being ‘outer’ in the
sense of being a construct of the content of sense perceptions. Outer relates to the content of
perception and inner relates to the process of perception. Note that outer is also related to the
network of systems that are not internal sub-systems but are other same-level peer-systems or
super-systems. These are the underlying reality that produces the sensory stimuli that the
system’s inner space processes and experiences.
Paradigm / Cognitive Lens / World View
I DO NOT mean just some conscious set of beliefs that one holds in memory and can bring into
consciousness at will.
I DO mean our weltanshauung, or the low-level sub/conscious beliefs and the manner in which
they structure the way the mind constructs and makes sense of its world. We see through our
ideas so the mind is a lens that can change as the ideas change. There is a very non-linear
feedback loop here. The mind is a meme complex that processes sensory data and transforms this
into memes. A paradigm is essentially a way of interpreting raw data and deriving meaning from
it. Such a process always takes place within the context of some agenda.
There are also individual and collective paradigms. When a particular cognitive lens (way of
interpreting, experiencing and comprehending things) propagates through the cultural domain
and gives rise to a meme complex that resonates with many individual minds and constrains
them to adopt a particular type of cognitive lens. Then each person’s cognitive lens (personal
meme complex) is their individual paradigm and the meme complex in the cultural domain is the
collective paradigm. So a paradigm is a type of meme complex that has an individual cognitive
form and a collective cultural form.
Paradigm Shift
I DO NOT mean some vague surface change in an idea that has little impact on other ideas.
I DO mean a profound and radical change in the structure of a paradigm (individual or collective
meme complex) that changes the way we experience and understand our world. An individual
paradigm shift is a radical change in one’s cognitive lens that causes us to experience and
understand things in a different way. A collective paradigm shift is the change in the cultural
meme complex that happens as individual paradigms change and people begin to act and express
themselves differently. Both individual and collective paradigm shifts can be gradual or sudden.
Perceptual / Experiential Process
I DO NOT mean some miraculous process whereby an inert objective physical universe is
completely and accurately experienced and known by a human mind.
I DO mean two things, either general perception / experience by general systems where it is the
flow of information through the inner space resulting in state changes, or more specifically
referring to human perception and experience involving the intricacies of the human mind and
human culture. In regards to humans, when the existential information flows throughout the
systemic virtual universe and we consider things on the particular system level where human
beings are not vast networks of integrated information systems, or particles in spacetime, or
molecules, or cells, or organs (i.e. humans are not perceived as collectives of integrated sub-
systems). And they are not members of a family, or community, or corporation, or incorporated
organisation, or nation, or any general ‘organisation’ (i.e. humans are not perceived as sub-
systems within super-systems). At the very particular and arbitrary system level where human
beings experience themselves and think of themselves as whole individual beings in a world. At
that level when the existential information flows through the inner space network of sub-systems
within a human then the perceptual / experiential process is that flow through the inner space that
channels existential information through the nervous system (not going into other cellular
activity) and participates in the process whereby experiences and ideas arise in consciousness.
The perceptual / experiential process is the process that channels existential information from
both inner and outer sources into consciousness.
Physical
In the OLD-PARADIGM physical means the naive idea that implies that physical objects
ontologically exist and that all ‘real’ things are physical objects operating within a physical
universe.
In the NEW-PARADIGM physical means an idea that arises in human minds due to their
experience of a systemic perceptual illusion based on the flow of information within a common
information space. It is the pervasiveness and voracity of the illusion that leads us to believe in it.
The systemic universe appears in a system’s subjective perceptual field as objects that seem to
possess solidity, density, mass, colour and other empirical observables. From these experiences
we form the idea of solid objects and we communicate our ideas and come to a consensus that
we dwell in a physical universe. See virtual for more.
Physical Universe
In the OLD-PARADIGM “physical universe” means an ontological existential context that just
exists and behaves without any underlying causal context and which is believed by materialists
to be the a priori (miraculous) foundation of all existence.
In the NEW-PARADIGM “physical universe” arises when the universe is experienced from a
perspective within the universe and it is conceptualised from within a materialist empiricist
belief system, then and only then does the idea of the physical universe arise. It is a particular
idea about the universe that is constructed from shared subjective experiences within a virtual
reality but which is conceived of within a materialist empiricist conceptual framework. When
virtual beings structure their minds using the idea-of-the-physical-universe they subconsciously
interpret and experience and conceptualise everything through that paradigm or cognitive lens so
they come to experience and know themselves as physical beings within a physical universe. So
the “physical universe” is really just a particular kind of personal world (subjective experiential
context) that people experience when they adopt a particular kind of cognitive lens. Part of the
illusion is that people assume that their individual worlds are actually the same objective world
so people believe that they all dwell within a common objective physical universe.
Prejudice / Dogmatic
I DO NOT mean a derogatory term that people often take offense to when they are being
prejudiced but refuse to accept that they are.
I DO mean an attachment to a particular paradigm or cognitive lens and also to the experiential
phenomena and ideas or beliefs that arise through that cognitive lens. So the person is unable to
experience or understand things in any other way. They naively assume that their way is the only
way.
Sanity / Sane
I DO NOT mean some magical quality whereby a person dwells in an inert objective-world and
experiences it through a mind that has perfect access to the objective-world, and any situation
other than this is called ‘insane’. And I DO NOT mean conformity to the ‘norm’, conformity to
common expectations, the adoption of the culturally dominant illusions and thereby dwelling in
the dominant fantasy world.
I DO mean clear and coherent contact with reality that guides us toward harmony and abundant
vitality. It implies “flowing with the Way” and holistic participation in existence. It implies
freedom from the web of delusions and compulsive desires and fears. It implies overcoming the
tyranny of the ego and its delusional agendas. It implies peace, compassion, understanding,
cooperation, deep unity amidst surface diversity and genuine holistic fulfillment.
Science
I DO NOT mean closed-minded belief systems such as empiricism, materialism and Scientism
that are dressed up in the scientific method. Nor do I mean using analytical methods to pursue
knowledge based cultural agendas in the world.
I DO mean an open-minded, rational, skeptical enquiry to derive knowledge about the universe,
how it functions and behaves and how to effectively participate in it.
Self
I DO NOT mean an individual human being that just ontologically exists in some naive realist
way and that is the center of the universe and the measure of all things; these are just illusions
and assumptions.
I DO mean two things depending on context. Either the ‘self’ that is the personal self and is
implied in phrases such as ‘myself’, ‘yourself’, etc. This self is a perceptual illusion that arises
from many systemic perceptual illusions and that is intimately related to the ego, the mind and
the body. It arises from the illusion of “being in a world”. In other contexts the ‘Self’ is the
actual you, prior to all perceptions, experiences and ideas, which lead to the idea of the personal
self. This is the Self, Atman, individual Soul, etc.
Subconscious Mind
I DO NOT mean some particular technical term from some historical psychological theory.
I DO mean that part of consciousness (high level awareness) that is not apparent to the conscious
mind. This is the vast majority of consciousness. To use the analogy of a nation state, the
conscious mind is like the government and the rest of society is like the subconscious mind. This
is the main area of operation of the ego, it creates subconscious desires, fears, beliefs and
confusions that the subconscious mind uses to interpret sensory data and construct a cognitive
representation or a world. This representation is what the conscious mind experiences and
naively accepts as the reality.
Universe
In the OLD-PARADIGM ‘universe’ means the naive idea of a physical universe that just exists
and behaves and is believed by materialists to be the foundation of all existence.
In the NEW-PARADIGM the ‘universe’ arises when the computational process ‘simulates’ and
unfolds the complex dance of information systems. That systemic existential context is what I
call the ‘universe’. It is the actual systemic structure and dynamical existence of the universe that
“is what it is” regardless of our perceptions, experiences and ideas about it. I also refer to it as
the existential process, the ongoing process of manifest existence.
Virtual
I DO NOT mean the common technological implementation of VR which may be naively
described as “a physical electronic computer running a contemporary VR program and a physical
human wearing VR goggles and gloves”.
I DO mean something which appears to be a world but is actually a computational process. It is a
computational / perceptual phenomenon arising from the coherent processing of information in a
manner such that the VR has deep metaphysical properties and gives rise to a complex quantum
systemic universe. Within this virtual universe virtual systems exist and perceive themselves to
be in a physical universe. It feels ‘physical’ because the systems in the VR operate in the same
information space, they are ‘made of’ the same information and computational processes. There
is no outside observer looking through VR goggles, ALL observers experience the VR from
perspectives within the VR universe. The virtual systems are a part of the virtual universe, they
can be thought of as simple systems or as “artificially intelligent” AI beings that dwell in the VR
universe.
In this context the ‘physical universe ’ is an idea that arises from the virtual being’s experience
of the virtual universe from their individual subjective perspective; beyond this idea there is no
intrinsic or ontological ‘solidity’ to anything. The computational space is the ontological
foundation and it does not arise from a physical computer. It is instead the case that a physical
computer is a phenomenon whereby virtual beings conceive of their virtual universe using ideas
of ‘physicality’ and they develop complex virtual processes that not only take part in the virtual
dynamics (e.g. sitting on a desk) but also channel some of the universal computational potential
in some manner such that it creates a sub-computational process within the VR universe. It is this
virtual computer that the virtual beings experience as being physical. The question “does the
simulator have a physical foundation?” arises because the virtual beings base their concepts of
‘real’ on their subjective experiences of a seemingly physical virtual universe. Given that
‘physical’ existential contexts are very high-level and complex whilst computational processes
are very simple but can give rise to physical / virtual universes, it seems likely that some kind of
computational process is the foundation. But even if there was some physical foundation we
cannot know about it unless there are interfaces. For example, an AI being in a VR world
running on an electronic computer cannot know about or participate in our physical universe
unless there are interfaces. But even then our physical world is either “just information” (e,g,
digital camera images of the “outside world”) or it appears as parts of the virtual world in the
form of avatars (e.g. in control systems where the input signals inform a virtual model of the
controlled system that then produces output signals).
From the perspective of the AI being our physical world is either invisible or it is "just
information" and the VR world seems physical to it. This is a fundamental systemic perceptual
illusion that arises when interactions occur (information flows) between nested virtual spaces. In
the structure of systems within systems and virtual universes within virtual universes each
universe seems ‘physical’ from perspectives within that universe, whilst the sub- universes (e.g.
computer games or movies) seem to be "just information" and the super-universe is essentially
hidden but it can manifest as "just information" or through virtual representations (avatars). A
common example of the use of avatars that allow a super-universe to interact with a sub-universe
is when a person plays a first-person VR computer game, they cannot participate directly as
themselves; they must adopt a character within the game and act through that character. The
other virtual characters will perceive the game player as just another being in their world and
they cannot know about the person playing the character.
World
In the OLD-PARADIGM ‘world’ means the naive realist idea of “the world” that simply and
objectively exists just as we perceive it to be and that the mind has perfect access to that
objective world.
In the NEW-PARADIGM ‘world’ means a subjective experiential context that is unique and
individual for each virtual system. We each dwell in a world that is constructed by our minds and
is driven by sensory stimuli. Many people make the mistake of confusing their personal
subjective world with the idea of a collective objective world. The objective reality does exist but
it cannot be known simply by communicating our subjective experiences and assuming that we
dwell in an objective world. We then dwell in an illusion based upon shared subjective
experiences that we mistakenly assume is the objective reality.
Term
I DO NOT mean
I DO mean
Limits of knowledge
Note that I liken God to a "computational process" and not a 'computer', which is an object in a
world; God is like a pure computational essence. In this sense all things are God in action but we
experience a world of objects, places and events.
"the Arcanum of the Arcana is what men can neither know nor comprehend, nor can they apply
their rules of science to it." (Kabbalah Denudata, Greater Holy Assembly)
"He is incapable of being known" (Bhagavad Gita, chpt 13)
Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why (Bart D. Ehrman)
http://www.amazon.com/Misquoting-Jesus-Story-Behind-Changed/dp/0060738170
also other books listed on that page
Three Messiahs?—or One?
http://www.realtruth.org/articles/427-tmoo.html?gclid=CN_ywqDZ04sCFQu2bgod1WMxag