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How Could Consciousness Transcend the Brain?

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
It would also mean we're just a bunch of meat robots and doesn't explain how we're aware of anything or where our sense of "I" separate from others comes from.
Saint, why do you think we are any different? All animals are a bunch of meat robots.
Why? What stops robots from being aware? A door would read your face and according to its record, it will decide if it should allow you to enter or not.

@SalixIncendium , The Wikipedia page of Dr. Andrew Newberg tells me that he was previously an Adjunct Professor of Religious Studies. I have not studied the whole page, but this may indicate that he has a bias. There are many scientists and psychologists who have religious bias, being born and brought up in a Christian environment. A bias many a times helps them in getting jobs or research assignments. I am sure you are aware of all this.
 
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SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
@SalixIncendium , The Wikipedia page of Dr. Andrew Newberg tells me that he was previously an Adjunct Professor of Religious Studies. I have not studied the whole page, but this may indicate that he has a bias. There are many scientists and psychologists who have religious bias, being born and brought up in a Christian environment. A bias many a times helps them in getting jobs or research assignments. I am sure you are aware of all this.

Of course he has a bias. Most people do.

I'm not saying that he's right, but he certainly raises some good points.

What it boils down to is this. No one knows with absolute certainty where consciousness originates or if it, indeed, needs a brain to exist, though as @sayak83 alluded to earlier in the thread, it does need a medium in order to be observed in transitional reality.
 

gnostic

The Lost One
I think you underestimate the intelligence of students of scripture, first of all the passage is symbolic, and yes, the word "like" in this context means similar. Concerning the meaning of the symbolism, it is meant to convey to the student that human perception of the passage of time is relative and appropriate for their temporary existence, a human life span and/or human perception of seemingly long periods of time otoh are but a moment in the vastness of eternal existence.

I have never counted the hours or days spent poring over translations of ancient texts, reading and researching materials for my websites (Timeless Myths & Dark Mirrors of Heaven, which I had started 1999 and 2006, respectively).

They include myths, legends, folklore, prose and poems, hymns, scriptures, and I was active for the first 11-12 years building Timeless Myths...

...so Ben, I think I would recognize symbols, similes and motifs when I read them.

And I also know that when people start interpreting similes, literally, they really don’t understand the meaning of texts they are reading.
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
You tell me... what is your evidence?
  1. I laid down in my bed before I went to sleep.
  2. I awakened several times during the night and found I was in my bed each time.
  3. I awoke in my bed in the morning.
  4. By bed was made when I entered my bedroom last night; but appeared slept-in when I got out of the shower.
    1. The doors to the apartment were locked when I went to sleep and when I stepped out to do laundry, so that is evidence that no one entered while I was in the shower to unmake the bed.
  5. My keys were in the exact same spot this morning that they were when I set them down when I came home from work last night.
It appears to me that the above is evidence when proving to myself that I slept in my bed and didn't go out on some sleep walking escapade during the night while I wasn't in waking consciousness. This evidence is subjective.

If there was a murder last night, I would, unfortunately have no objective evidence that I was at home in my bed last night, as there was no one around to observe or verify the evidence above but me, so it is therefore, not objective evidence. So I have no verifiable alibi.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
@SalixIncendium , The Wikipedia page of Dr. Andrew Newberg tells me that he was previously an Adjunct Professor of Religious Studies. I have not studied the whole page, but this may indicate that he has a bias. There are many scientists and psychologists who have religious bias, being born and brought up in a Christian environment. A bias many a times helps them in getting jobs or research assignments. I am sure you are aware of all this.


If you read the first paragraph in the link, you'll see that the dude's research consists of studying brain scans to get an understanding of how brains create religious experiences.

This tells me that he, just like every other neuroscientist, works from the premise that brains are the material underpinnings of the mind. Why else would he study brain scans to try and understand what religious experiences are all about?
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
  1. I laid down in my bed before I went to sleep.
  2. I awakened several times during the night and found I was in my bed each time.
  3. I awoke in my bed in the morning.
  4. By bed was made when I entered my bedroom last night; but appeared slept-in when I got out of the shower.
    1. The doors to the apartment were locked when I went to sleep and when I stepped out to do laundry, so that is evidence that no one entered while I was in the shower to unmake the bed.
  5. My keys were in the exact same spot this morning that they were when I set them down when I came home from work last night.
It appears to me that the above is evidence when proving to myself that I slept in my bed and didn't go out on some sleep walking escapade during the night while I wasn't in waking consciousness. This evidence is subjective.

If there was a murder last night, I would, unfortunately have no objective evidence that I was at home in my bed last night, as there was no one around to observe or verify the evidence above but me, so it is therefore, not objective evidence. So I have no verifiable alibi.

Yep. You have nothing verifiable. You have no evidence.
All you have are claims and beliefs, as shown in points 1 through 5. All those are claims.
 

Thief

Rogue Theologian
so...7billion copies of a learning device
and it all ends in dust

not one chance....in billions....
someone will survive the last breath

and so.....Man is a mystery
with no resolve

extinction pending

as if we never lived
 

Saint Frankenstein

Wanderer From Afar
Premium Member
Saint, why do you think we are any different? All animals are a bunch of meat robots.
Why? What stops robots from being aware? A door would read your face and according to its record, it will decide if it should allow you to enter or not.
I don't believe we're meat robots, or that non-humans are, either.

A robot is just running on a computer program. It's not alive and has no consciousness.
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
A robot is just running on a computer program. It's not alive and has no consciousness.
You land / run into problems here, Saint. Is Coronavirus living? It is just a string of RNA (not too sure, will need to check). It is just a conglomerate of molecules. Sure, it has been seen to mutate fast. Where is the line when something can be termed as live?
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
so .. 7billion copies of a learning device
and it all ends in dust
extinction pending
as if we never lived
Ah, the 7.854 billion egos! Each bigger than the other. But then, none bigger than those of prophets / sons / messengers / manifestation / mahdis of Abrahamic religions.
Yeah, like so many other species, extinction pending. Did dinosaurs ever lived?
If not earlier because of environment, then surely by expansion of the sun in a billion years.
Where is the mystery? That is what has always happened.
 

rational experiences

Veteran Member
The belief consciousness transcended my own purpose human. A thinker. A theist. No science.

Science never existed.

Created did
Natural.did.
Man human one self multi same agreement. Group large one man principle imposed by the group.

Why brotherhood of man owns a self taught evil concept the thinker of and for artificial design. Machine. Machine reaction.

You put thoughts where thought never existed. Into human inferred concepts.

No longer conscious. Balanced. Self aware. Aware of real balance.

Your choice destroyer human man X Multi selves.

No explanation. You chose it.

So effect recorded man voices X Multi. Recorded man image.

You invented a double life.

Once taught as evil.possession.

Against human consciousness.

Man psyche now says I owns two lives.

Never ever were you owner of two different human bodies.

Where your mind is today. Lying about ownership.

Ever wonder why ship and own was explained in one word.

Due to cause science UFO ship. Doubling effect.

You caused it.

Ask why a human keeps claiming that a human is something else then goes about trying to group coerce that belief?

Because they personally own science subject life destroyer.
 

Ben Dhyan

Veteran Member
I have never counted the hours or days spent poring over translations of ancient texts, reading and researching materials for my websites (Timeless Myths & Dark Mirrors of Heaven, which I had started 1999 and 2006, respectively).

They include myths, legends, folklore, prose and poems, hymns, scriptures, and I was active for the first 11-12 years building Timeless Myths...

...so Ben, I think I would recognize symbols, similes and motifs when I read them.

And I also know that when people start interpreting similes, literally, they really don’t understand the meaning of texts they are reading.
Gnostic, the interpretation of said passage is elementary, why are you even raising it? Do you really think there is any student of scripture here who imagines that it is literal?
 

gnostic

The Lost One
Gnostic, the interpretation of said passage is elementary, why are you even raising it? Do you really think there is any student of scripture here who imagines that it is literal?
You would be surprised by just how many believers and biblical “scholars” do take Peter’s verse literally.

Hence my points from the 1st reply.
 

Saint Frankenstein

Wanderer From Afar
Premium Member
You land / run into problems here, Saint. Is Coronavirus living? It is just a string of RNA (not too sure, will need to check). It is just a conglomerate of molecules. Sure, it has been seen to mutate fast. Where is the line when something can be termed as live?
We're unsure. Bacteria and fungi are definitely living creatures, though.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
This seems to be a fantasy. If not, please provide evidence for this claim.

Please provide evidence it doesn't exist.

You do understand there are clusters of nerves called "ganglia" all over the body. People simply have a "one way valve" called the medulla that sends digital signals to the entire body but blocks or interprets those returning. While these signals are blocked they still affect the brain in various ways. Much of the function of these "remote brains" is to effect what we call "muscle memory". But the entire organism acts and reacts in tandem and there are probably a very large number of ways to experience this. There are none I'm willing to post for the nonce.

Perception and reality are two different things.

If you are mad. Otherwise reality exists and is exactly the same for everyone on the planet. We merely have different perspectives and different beliefs.

There are no answers forthcoming. I guess this means no souls exist then.

Really!?!

In the poetic abstract sense only.
Which is not the topic.

You call it poetry but humans are an aggregate of many things and we all have at least some personality and some poetry in us. If there is a soul I'd wager it sticks around until nobody remembers.

Your beliefs and my wagers are irrelevant. The simple fact is that we can no more address the issue of whether a soul is dependent on a brain without knowing the nature of consciousness than a rabbit can deduce the speed of light by gazing at the moon. Such questions are necessarily in the realm of speculation and belief. I try to tie my speculation to knowledge and logic. I simply don't know.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
There are none I'm willing to post for the nonce.

I suppose the experience of catching a very hard hit line drive between the third baseman and the short stop would almost qualify as an example of the mind/ body working in tandem. One doesn't experience thinking about it or the ball would be in the outfield before you even moved. There are numerous other ways, no doubt but I know only a very few which I won't post.

Any time you do something and don't know how or know something and don't know how it's quite likely some input came through the medulla. Every organism is complete and every part of the organism plays a role in every process and event.
 
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