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10-04-2008 , 12:56 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by kokiri
I'm a bit dubious about the bold passages.
I would kinda like to believe that rocks are conscious in some way,
and maybe even rock concert audiences , but I guess this is probably right, but:
Also, does consciousness arrive in the brain as a result of its physical structure, or of its complexity/data processing. Because if it is the former, then the complexity/intelligence seems to be unnecessary. OTOH if it is the latter, one can see how computers could be conscious, but also the London underground, etc.
I meant "human consciousness" when I said "consciousness" (I guess that highlights my assumptions, eh?), in that there are no known cases where someone smashes a rock and a person loses the ability to think. Whereas there are lots of cases where you mess with a person's nervous system and their consciousness is affected.

I definitely think it's the latter. But I don't think it's just complexity and data processing. I feel like it must have something to do with the nature of the processing, particularly that there exist a mental self-image.

Quote:
I think this answer is highly problematic and that using the word 'feel' pressuposes consciousness.
How much intelligence/reasoning/prediction requires consciousness?
I don't think feeling requires consciousness at all. I think feeling (let's say "sensing" for generality), just requires some sort of responsive system that changes in response to stimulus. That mechanism(=you) exists physically in your brain. It interprets the sensations that it receives from other parts of the brain to mean, "Hey, I must be this guy's soul!"
10-04-2008 , 01:16 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by clowntable
Does consciousness require knowledge or vice versa?
A few years ago I had a vivid dream where I was walking around some buildings in an old european city. It was super cool. I proved that I was actually dreaming by looking at a newspaper. Because it would be impossible for me to recreate the text of the articles (which turned out true). Well, I then walked past a building corner and someone jumps out and scares the crap out of me (adrenaline rush and all). I wake up soon after this.

Now my question was: How can you surprise yourself like that??? Obviously there is some part of my brain that was creating the dream world and another part that was consciously interacting in it. And then my subconscious (subsubsconscious?) decided to throw a surprise at me...

I thought the dream was fascinatingly cool.
10-04-2008 , 01:21 PM
That is a very interesting phenomenon. You can watch yourself act, then watch yourself watching yourself, and down the rabbit hole it goes. If you keep watching, maybe you can get to the ultimate Self.

I don't really think dreams are a lot more than the brain reshuffling data for storage. If you can be conscious during REM sleep, that is quite interesting and there is a whole branch of dream yoga that addresses this. Some even report being conscious during deep sleep when it's not supposed to be possible.
10-04-2008 , 01:29 PM
Quote:
A few years ago I had a vivid dream where I was walking around some buildings in an old european city. It was super cool. I proved that I was actually dreaming by looking at a newspaper. Because it would be impossible for me to recreate the text of the articles (which turned out true). Well, I then walked past a building corner and someone jumps out and scares the crap out of me (adrenaline rush and all). I wake up soon after this.

Now my question was: How can you surprise yourself like that??? Obviously there is some part of my brain that was creating the dream world and another part that was consciously interacting in it. And then my subconscious (subsubsconscious?) decided to throw a surprise at me...

I thought the dream was fascinatingly cool.
The people controlling your brain in the tank monitored the dream, saw that you try to get behind what's going on and made you dream that you woke up from scaring yourself. You're still asleep IMO.
10-04-2008 , 01:36 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by amplify
That is a very interesting phenomenon. You can watch yourself act, then watch yourself watching yourself, and down the rabbit hole it goes. If you keep watching, maybe you can get to the ultimate Self.

I don't really think dreams are a lot more than the brain reshuffling data for storage. If you can be conscious during REM sleep, that is quite interesting and there is a whole branch of dream yoga that addresses this. Some even report being conscious during deep sleep when it's not supposed to be possible.
I read true vivid dream fans would wear red LED's on their eyelids. When they entered REM sleep, someone would flash the LED's on and off. The person would be instructed to look for red flashes as a signal that they were dreaming. They would then be able to fly around, interact and do other cool stuff.
10-04-2008 , 01:44 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by clowntable
The people controlling your brain in the tank monitored the dream, saw that you try to get behind what's going on and made you dream that you woke up from scaring yourself. You're still asleep IMO.
Hey... You should make a movie (or set of movies) about this idea! You could make millions of mackerel!

I have some casting ideas if you need them.
10-04-2008 , 04:52 PM
As long as we don't have a wooden lead we should be fine and even then the idea is so good that we can probably cast a total kook.
10-04-2008 , 04:53 PM
What actor/actress isn't a total kook?!

EDIT: I did briefly consider an acting career.
10-05-2008 , 02:53 PM
Is Sarah Palin a Bimbo?


Original and fun post coming soon comparing Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac to the Bailout.
10-05-2008 , 05:10 PM
im posting from my phone but when I have a computer i'll have a lot to say about stuff- building 7, consciousness

right now I want to talk about lucid dreaming

i've had lots of them and its something im trying to get back into- to start, set yourself to find your hands in your dreams
10-05-2008 , 05:14 PM
dreams = pants?
10-05-2008 , 05:34 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by DustinG
set yourself to find your hands in your dreams
I see you have read Casteneda.
10-05-2008 , 06:12 PM
carlos who?

yeah- lucid dreaming came very easy for me after reading just a little bit about it. I know it isn't that way for everyone but everyone is certainly capable

bobman- what about the %95 of the universe that is supposedly dark matter?
10-05-2008 , 06:21 PM
The 25-Point Platform of the Nazi I mean Democrat I mean Republican Party - Amplified Version

Quote:
1. We demand the unification of all Germans in the Greater Germany on the basis of the right of self-determination of people.
2. We demand equality of rights for the German people in respect to the other nations; abrogation of the peace treaties of Versailles and St. Germain.
3. We demand land and territory (colonies) for the sustenance of our people, and colonization for our surplus population.
These first three points of the platform are designed to address the painful state of Germany after WWI. The treaty of Versailles was a ridiculous and crushing document that destroyed all trade and autonomy in Germany for decades to come. The hyper-inflation resulting directly from this doomed punishment of the German people created the soil in which National Socialism prospered. When you need wheelbarrows of cash to buy groceries, anything starts to sound plausible, any way out becomes a lifeline to grasp. Hitler’s strange personal magnetism and hateful statist ideology could never grow in a prosperous society. The requisites of tyranny are fear and pain. In Hitler’s case these were fear of Jews and the pain of wrecking poverty. In 2008 America, we have Terrorists (we are under constantly increasing societal pressure to consider all Muslims as terrorists) and a currency which is under direct attack by the Federal Government.
Quote:

4. Only a member of the race can be a citizen. A member of the race can only be one who is of German blood, without consideration of creed. Consequently no Jew can be a member of the race.
5. Whoever has no citizenship is to be able to live in Germany only as a guest, and must be under the authority of legislation for foreigners.
6. The right to determine matters concerning administration and law belongs only to the citizen. Therefore we demand that every public office, of any sort whatsoever, whether in the Reich, the county or municipality, be filled only by citizens. We combat the corrupting parliamentary economy, office-holding only according to party inclinations without consideration of character or abilities.
7. We demand that the state be charged first with providing the opportunity for a livelihood and way of life for the citizens. If it is impossible to sustain the total population of the State, then the members of foreign nations (non-citizens) are to be expelled from the Reich.
8. Any further immigration of non-citizens is to be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans, who have immigrated to Germany since the [2 August 1914], be forced immediately to leave the Reich.
Well this sounds familiar. Replace Jew with Mexican or Muslim and we’re almost there. No one can actually voice the thoughts in points 4, 5, and 6 since Americans above all cannot stand to hear people telling the truth. Racism in this country has gone underground. Any white Americans reading this know what it’s like to be in a conversation with someone when they get that sideways look in their eye as if to check if any coloreds are around and conspiratorially whisper how those people are dragging the country down, or how ******s are ****ing up the country or how we have to help the poor struggling people, the content depending on the latitude of origin and socialist tendency of the speaker.
The ideas in 7 and 8 are main stream. Mexicans are constantly excoriated in the press as interlopers on our beautiful land of freedom. The peaceful and moral religion of Middle Eastern people has been demonized to the point of caricature, based on the teachings of a few outlier spokespeople, like characterizing the Christian religion according to the teachings of David Koresh and Jim Jones. Republican contestants ran on a platform which included building a Great Wall to keep out the barbarian hordes. Ridiculous, racist, and destructive.

Quote:
9. All citizens must have equal rights and obligations.
You had me up until obligations. Equal rights are a myth, a propaganda tool, and a holster for the weaponry of imagined freedom, but declaring the all citizens must have equal obligations is horrific and is absolutely the common intellectual currency of the day. Every time you hear this talk about the Social Contract or your obligation to help those in need, or how much of your paycheck has to go to maintaining the lifestyle of old people, load your weapons and run like hell because the people attempting to extricate the product of your labor in the name of helping others are the ones who will be driving the tanks over your face.

Quote:
10. The first obligation of every citizen must be to work both spiritually and physically. The activity of individuals is not to counteract the interests of the universality, but must have its result within the framework of the whole for the benefit of all Consequently we demand:
Now that we have you committed to the idea that you are born into obligation to Our God the State, you go to work. Obama will put your children into a youth-enforcement corps as soon as mandatory national service is enacted into law. There must be 0% unemployment so that all subjects are generating revenue for the State.

Quote:
11. Abolition of unearned (work and labor) incomes. Breaking of rent-slavery.
The meaning of this might not be readily apparent. Unearned labor is capital gains. They should be maximally taxed, upon death most of one’s estate should revert to the state through taxation. Rent should be controlled; free markets cannot be allowed to operate. We see this every time politicians talk about “rolling back the Bush tax cuts.” They are not rolling anything back, they are decreasing the percentage of money they will allow you to keep.
Quote:

12. In consideration of the monstrous sacrifice in property and blood that each war demands of the people personal enrichment through a war must be designated as a crime against the people. Therefore we demand the total confiscation of all war profits.
War is the health of the state. No private citizen may be empowered to conduct any operations outside of the complete control of the government. War makes the state big and strong, it’s like milk, it does the corpus good. Please stop supporting war. Stop supporting bombings in Middle Eastern countries, stop supporting military installations around the globe, stop trying to force democracy on unsuspecting people. Stop killing civilians by the stadium-full. Stop raping Americans for cash to murder people with.
Quote:

13. We demand the nationalization of all (previous) associated industries (trusts).
14. We demand a division of profits of all heavy industries.
This has been superseded by a technological breakthrough in nationalization. It is no longer necessary to nationalize every industry individually; the US Government has nationalized credit. The government owns the title to your house, the lien on your business, the capital to stock your shelves.

Quote:
15. We demand an expansion on a large scale of old age welfare.
How much ****ing larger could the old age welfare of the United States possibly be? Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security account for 40% of the US budget. The question is, why did the Nazis think this was so important? The answer begins with pacification, cradle to grave dependence on the state, redistribution of wealth, and mind control that the product of your labor does not belong to you.

Quote:
16. We demand the creation of a healthy middle class and its conservation, immediate communalization of the great warehouses and their being leased at low cost to small firms, the utmost consideration of all small firms in contracts with the State, county or municipality.
17. We demand a land reform suitable to our needs, provision of a law for the free expropriation of land for the purposes of public utility, abolition of taxes on land and prevention of all speculation in land.
Not only does your paycheck belong to the government, all the land under the monopolized violent control of the state is at all times subject to seizure. We have seen in recent years Supreme Court decisions affirming the right of the US Government to seize any and all properties they deem necessary to improvement for any reason whatsoever.

Quote:
18. We demand struggle without consideration against those whose activity is injurious to the general interest. Common national criminals, usurers, Schieber and so forth are to be punished with death, without consideration of confession or race.
Perhaps you saw last week the YouTube video of a prosecutor mentioning that his office would be pursuing convictions on those seen to be misrepresenting Barack Obama’s views. Protestors have been herded into cages far from the site of any political activity. George Bush causes entire cities to be cordoned off and shut down whenever his Imperial Presence is required, in order to awe the populace, and ensure that no dissent is heard.

Quote:
19. We demand substitution of a German common law in place of the Roman Law serving a materialistic world-order.
The greed of Wall Street is responsible for the failure of banks. Capitalism may not be allowed to flourish under any circumstances. All business must be regulated lest evil money-loving men prey upon the poor dumb proletariat. Regulate everything, from the size of your toilet tank to the plants you can grow in your garden to the efficiency of your furnace. Relax, we’re from the government and we’re here to help you, to make every decision for you. Better living through death.

Quote:
20. The state is to be responsible for a fundamental reconstruction of our whole national education program, to enable every capable and industrious German to obtain higher education and subsequently introduction into leading positions. The plans of instruction of all educational institutions are to conform with the experiences of practical life. The comprehension of the concept of the State must be striven for by the school as early as the beginning of understanding. We demand the education at the expense of the State of outstanding intellectually gifted children of poor parents without consideration of position or profession.
How well we understand this. Mandatory government education was one of the very first institutions of the Industrial Tyranny. From the time children can read they are fed the Pledge of Allegiance, the deification of Presidents, the fundamental reliance on government in all its forms. The idea of the state is driven into minds from birth. Simple semiotics the serfs can grasp and display on their pickup trucks and lapels like the flag. The eagle of war clutching arrows of death. The pyramid with its all-seeing eye. The symbol of this country used to be Liberty. A Lady, carrying a torch to light the way to freedom in one hand, and the olive branch of peace in the other. This is the only true symbol of American freedom and the only image that belongs on any of its coinage.

Quote:
21. The State is to care for the elevating national health by protecting the mother and child, by outlawing child-labor, by the encouragement of physical fitness, by means of the legal establishment of a gymnastic and sport obligation, by the utmost support of all organizations concerned with the physical instruction of the young.
Nationalized health care. Check
Quote:

22. We demand abolition of the mercenary troops and formation of a national army.
The people cannot be trusted with arms. The right of the people to keep and bear arms SHALL be abridged. It must be done slowly, and while convincing the people that weapons are dangerous and the government monopoly on the use of force is supreme.

Quote:
23. We demand legal opposition to known lies and their promulgation through the press. In order to enable the provision of a German press, we demand, that: a. All writers and employees of the newspapers appearing in the German language be members of the race: b. Non-German newspapers be required to have the express permission of the State to be published. They may not be printed in the German language: c. Non-Germans are forbidden by law any financial interest in German publications, or any influence on them, and as punishment for violations the closing of such a publication as well as the immediate expulsion from the Reich of the non-German concerned. Publications which are counter to the general good are to be forbidden. We demand legal prosecution of artistic and literary forms which exert a destructive influence on our national life, and the closure of organizations opposing the above made demands.
The major media outlets are of course owned by the same plutocracy which owns both political parties and distributes the message it wants you to hear. The voices of dissent that you will hear will be on the Internet, whispered in closed rooms, and relegated to those few who are already awake from the nightmare of oppression and seeking more information.

Quote:
24. We demand freedom of religion for all religious denominations within the state so long as they do not endanger its existence or oppose the moral senses of the Germanic race. The Party as such advocates the standpoint of a positive Christianity without binding itself confessionally to any one denomination. It combats the Jewish-materialistic spirit within and around us, and is convinced that a lasting recovery of our nation can only succeed from within on the framework:
Wait for it...
Quote:
The good of the state before the good of the individual.
There it is, in all its naked wretchedness.

Quote:
25. For the execution of all of this we demand the formation of a strong central power in the Reich. Unlimited authority of the central parliament over the whole Reich and its organizations in general. The forming of state and profession chambers for the execution of the laws made by the Reich within the various states of the confederation. The leaders of the Party promise, if necessary by sacrificing their own lives, to support by the execution of the points set forth above without consideration.
May God help us all.

Last edited by amplify; 10-05-2008 at 06:29 PM.
10-05-2008 , 06:45 PM
I'm pretty sure we need to shut down the Internet now. Amp has broken the cardinal rule of Internet debates - he compared something to the Nazi's without sounding like a crackpot.
10-05-2008 , 07:09 PM
Link to the un-amplified version?
10-05-2008 , 07:12 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by well named
Link to the un-amplified version?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Socialist_Program
10-05-2008 , 07:18 PM
oh ok, I'm kind of slow. nicely done.
10-05-2008 , 09:35 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by bobman0330
My thoughts:

but that would never affect the physical world in a way that makes its existence obvious..
you mean except for the fact we are able to move and stuff?
10-05-2008 , 09:46 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zurvan
I think some of the major complaints about building 7 are easily proven false.



res ipsa loquitur

Quote:
Originally Posted by amplify
I really am not up on this stuff but are these like the only steel buildings in history to collapse from being on fire?
yes
10-05-2008 , 09:51 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zurvan
And, one of the main points that conspiracy theorists bring up about building 7 - and the towers - is that the jet fuel couldn't have gotten hot enough to melt steel. Which is true, and that's not what investigators have said. What they say is, it was hot enough to damage the tensile strength of the steel and concrete, which left it too weak to hold up the buildings.
Zurvan,

Please watch this video- i forget what this footage is from but its from some sort of documentary that was being made I think

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4p6UuGE0plk

So there was molten metal. The question is what caused it?

Quote:
And in the case of the towers, the planes smashing in to them didn't help the structural integrity.
According to the official story, the damage done by the actual impact would not have been much (in terms of the amount of columns being severed). And one of the lead designers (I forget his name) said prior to 9/11 in an interview that the building would be able to withstand multiple impacts from jet airplanes- they were designed with that in mind. What is important about the impact according to the official story is the amount of fireproofing that would have been dislodged- which is of course vitally important to their story. You don't want to know what test NIST did in order to show that the fireproofing would be dislodged.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2GIAlV3inM
On towers being like a screen netting

Last edited by DustinG; 10-05-2008 at 10:05 PM.
10-05-2008 , 10:06 PM
I haven't read anything in this thread and probably won't ever, but tomorrow is the last day to register to vote in Texas.

That is all. Commence your POG politics discussion.
10-05-2008 , 10:22 PM
bobman0330,

please report to this thread, borodog is responding to your Man, Economy and State criticisms.

amp
10-06-2008 , 12:40 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by DustinG
carlos who?

yeah- lucid dreaming came very easy for me after reading just a little bit about it. I know it isn't that way for everyone but everyone is certainly capable

bobman- what about the %95 of the universe that is supposedly dark matter?
Smacks head... Yes yes yes Lucid dreaming (not vivid duh)!

Being able to fly is so so so awesome.

So what's the deal with looking at your hands?

BTW, my BEST lucid dreams are during afternoon naps... I would also sometimes wake up paralyzed, unable to move. This would last for about 30 sec's....
10-06-2008 , 12:46 AM
Don Juan Matus taught Carlos Casteneda to lucid dream by reminding him to look at his hands. One of the keys to lucid dreaming is something that will remind you that you are dreaming. The next step is to find the level of control where you can stay asleep yet act purposefully. This is the part I always have trouble with as I try to control things too much and wake myself up. Also, sex stuff pops in and distracts me.

The paralysis is a mechanism of the body so that you don't flail and damage yourself acting out dreams. A while back I wrote about an antidepressant that I was taking which had the terrifying side effect of eliminating this mechanism. I would wake up trying to crawl up the wall and things. One morning, I was having a dream where I punched a guy in the face and I punched the **** out of my bedside table, opening my hand up to the bone and requiring stitches. I stopped taking the drug and haven't taken an antidepressant since. My doctor had never heard of this side effect but I found an obscure reference online which confirmed it.

Last edited by amplify; 10-06-2008 at 12:53 AM. Reason: still imperfect

      
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