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Im surprised you are talking shit about epistemology, you cannot take such a stupid stance on this. Having shit epistemology will make you less effective at literally everything, because you won't know how to properly assess and or approach situations. The very reason why it was life and death, is because we collectively havent thought shit about how to approach the unknown in the context of viruses and health. - relying on being impulsive is not very smart of us, and then we are surprised why so many people die or why our global system breaks down over and over again.

In general when it comes to epistemic stuff, we want to reduce risk and reduce guessing as much as possible (unless you can somehow justify it). I would be curious if someone here could give a more reasonable epistemic process (that isn't erring on the side of caution) that could be used (as a general approach) in situations where there is a pandemic that we don't know shit or know little about. - this is one interesting philosophical question, that we should have (as a collective) thought about a long time ago.

Sounds like you are more interested in posturing than getting your point across. Now this is getting very boring. You are hardcore focused on psychoanalysis rather than on the topic itself. You are derailing your own thread by talking about who has what motivation rather than focusing on the subject matter. Making up narratives in your head and when someone doesn't understand you, you start posturing ,because your ego is probably so fragile that the possibility that what you are saying is incoherent or the possibility that you didn't explain yourself in a clear way is an impossibility for you. I asked a very specific starting question and you replied with "I won't babysit you guys", and after that it somehow makes sense in your head to call us bad faith, even though you didn't engage with a very simple and very fair question that would obviously elevate understanding. Im not interested in proving to you how im not bad faith so, im out. Good luck to everyone else who will try to further engage with your fragile ego

@ScholarThis conversation is at a depth ,where there cannot be any ambiguity with the usage of words . Its confusing because you use 4-5 different words interchangeably (random,infinity, freedom, creativity,lack of bias, patternless), to convey a meaning and each of those words have completely different connotations. You talk about us having disagreements or us being stubborn but there cannot be a disagreement if there is no real communication going on. Based on how you responded to me: 1) it seems you didn't get what I was saying and what I was trying to respond to and 2) It seems that I didn't really grasp the true meaning you were trying to convey. On my end I didn't try to debunk you or try to show how my viewpoint is better (in fact I haven't even introduced our own viewpoints on this - and the point of my example about the completely deterministic universe wasn't to introduce that as my viewpoint, but to show a possible model to answer one of your questions) I think both me and Carl are coming in good faith and we are interested in understanding . Now I think we should skip the part where we psychoanalyze each other and try to skip to the part where we talk about the subject matter. Right now I am not even sure what is the exact thing you are trying to establish.So for clarification sake: what is the actual essential claim that is being made here? That infinity can only be accessed through randomness?

Using this kind of reasoning your conclusion should never be complete about reality, because you if you go with the belief that there is always a higher level of consciousness, then your conclusion about reality can always be undermined ( and the very notion or idea that you can be 100% confident that it won't be undermined is itself a judgement from below). - this is why I criticized you few days ago, for you being 100% confident in your stance about reality.

Btw when it comes to computing random is not really random, it just seems that way, but that randomness is done in a predetermined way.

You can have a model of a completely predetermined universe, where all the possible patterns and content are metaphysically built in and when you think you actually create something new or novel - you don't really. You just discover something that was always there. That discovery process doesn't need the requirement of randomness or freedom or freewill. If what you care about is giving an explanation or creating a model to explain the notion of "How is novelty created", that case you don't necessarily need the idea of "new patterns". You can have a universe with a stagnant quantity of finite patterns and still have novelty this way: 1) put input in 2) take the generated output out 3) feed back the earlier generated output. So this way you can pick one thing and transform it over and over again and by that you can create new/novel things (assuming this fits your definition of novelty). I explained the same idea in my previous post just with different words:

You can have an infinite number of patterns that will results in an infinite number of different results, but applying the same patterns (given a specific set of restrictions or content) the same result could be generated. So if you want new things - one can do things in an infinite number of different ways (using different patterns). But also you can use the same pattern and generate new results - if you have a system,where the rules could stay the same, but the rules could change the content in a given system in a way, where applying the same rules over and over again will generate new/different results (because you apply the same rules on a changed content) One example could be evolution. Lets say you pick an organism, apply evolution and grant an infinitely long time. The pattern (evolution) can stay the same, but as time goes on and as evolution transforms that organism, the content(organism) will constantly change, even though the same rules are applied. So 2 things to solve the problem of creation of new/novel things without randomness: 1) use more/different patterns 2) Apply the same pattern but on a different or changed content.

My understanding is that pattern = following a set of rules.

I don't see either how couldn't this be based on a certain pattern rather than based on randomness. Why couldn't you receive new/novel ideas based on a pattern rather than based on randomness? Using your words: " given certain restrictions due to the nature of your mind " - those restrictions could outline the pattern by which you will receive those ideas, so why is randomness necessary there? More specifically why cant this: " you create an openness within your mind and a certain intention to "receive" an idea" happen based on a pattern rather than based on randomness? I could rephrase my question this way: What is the contradiction in receiving new/novel ideas based on a pattern rather than based on randomness?

an endpoint (God realization) is given in the metaphysical structure of reality, but how much time it takes to get there and how you get there is random(or in other words , totally free/ unbound) . Is that roughly your position or I should reread your posts?

Multiple people have already mentioned this, but yeah: Just because you do something difficult that won't necessarily give you benefits. Doing hard stuff is used as a proxy to achieve the results or to get the benefits that you want. Don't confuse proxy with that actual thing you are looking for. You could make your life 1000x more harder right now: -You could cut your grass by hand picking each piece of grass one by one -You could make a decision that you will never use your eyes anymore and you will move everywhere with closed eyes -You could make the decision that you will never use your legs to get to your destination - you can only move by using your hands -You could make it so that you won't use your hands when you want to eat, you can only use your mouth ..... I could list an infinite number of other dumb stuff here and all of that combined would make your life 1000x harder ,but is that actually necessary? Or you could pick hard stuff mindfully, stuff that you know will actually bring the benefits you want.

@Phil King ??

Im not saying or claiming its impossible to have enlightenments or awakenings or that one shouldn't go for it - Im just suggesting epistemic humility which people here clearly lack - in other words be open to the possiblity that you can be wrong. Thats why you can see a lot of people here acting as teachers and all-knowers all the time rather than actually acknowledging the limitations to methods . A lof of people here are making a lot of assumptions but they try hard not to see those as assumptions even though they have to take them for granted. You can cut through a lot of bullshit by asking "why" and "how do you know that" on a loop, repeatedly to this people and you will see how even though epistemically similar their approaches are - a lot of their conclusions are different. A lot of guessing about other peoples developmental level (as if anyone would have some objective standard to go by - which people clearly don't have - they just go by self-referentiality [or in other words by the experience and knowledge that they think to be true]) There is clearly a lot of ego involved in all this which distorts everything very greatly. A lot of emotional attachment to certain methods, huge emotional attachment to the idea that one is more conscious compared to others, huge emotional attachment to 100% confidence in your core claims (people here need the feel of that psychological safetiness, otherwise they open themselves up to the possibility , where their whole world can fall apart) Notice what people argue about here all the time: "I have a bigger enlightenment dick than you" " I am more conscious than you" "your method is limited compared to mine" - when it comes to Leo , he is making a lot of claims about methods that he is guessing about at best, but he won't acknowledge that he is guessing - he will present it as if it would be absolutely true. So for instance, he will present the idea of doing meditation to reach his current knowledge as either laughable or structurally limited, even though he is using his limited understanding and logic to reach his conclusion (that meditation is structurally limited) and he hasn't gone through 40-50 years of intense meditation work - so he uses mental masturbation and inductive reasoning to make a definitive claim about something without verifying it himself through experience. He might say "okay, but no one can verify all the methods at that depth and length" - sure, but then don't make definitive claims about it and again have some epistemic humility and say: "To the best of my knowledge right now here is my take on this x method" but don't die on the hill with such claims. The time here anyone accepts infinite consciousness as a possibility - is the time, where constant recontextualization opens up, which will undermine your previous thoughts and knowledge about everything as you become more conscious. Leo will say: "no no it won't negate it , it will include it" - even in that case you should go with epistemic humility all the time , but there are things that contradicts the claim of " it won't negate it , it will include it". So for example, if there is a person who says God doesn't exist and then he becomes a person who says God does exist, in that case there is the negation of ' God doesn't exist' and the undermining of your previous thoughts and metaphysics going on rather than an inclusion. Or a different example could be a person switching a materialist paradigm to 'everything is consciousness' paradigm - that case there is a clear negation of the materialist paradigm going on there - you negate the idea that the materialist metaphysics is true. So those two examples clearly demonstrates not just the fact that greater consciousness will undermine your regular knowledge about things, but greater consciousness can undermine your ideas about the structure and nature of reality and yourself, therefore having a 100% confidence in your own metaphysics according to this - is not a good idea, because there is a possibility that it will be undermined in the future as you gain more consciousness. So the conclusion is that if you believe that 'you can always become more and more conscious no matter how conscious you are right now', then you also have to accept the possibility that your deepest ideas about yourself and about reality and about consciousness can be undermined later as you become more conscious compared to your previous self. So the idea of any of you having 100% certainty in your metaphysics is irrational and opens up you to be deluded.

Yes it is - from an epistemic standpoint it sure is. the same exact self-referentiality is taking place (therefore you are making an innate assumption that you take for granted). Not all, and from their pov they can claim that they are more conscious compared to you just the same way as you claim that you are the most conscious on earth. ... problem of relying on self-referentiality. If asking questions that you have no answer for is being dense - then sure Im dense. You try to dodge a very straightforward acknowledgment, because its more emotionally appealing to everyone and to you if you can claim something with 100% confidence. Sure you can claim it to be true with 100% confidence, but you having 100% confidence in it won't make it automatically true. A lot of people claim things with 100% confidence and they are wrong all the time. I already listed a set of things that you take for granted and you have no way of getting around them, you just assume them to be true and then somehow claim that what you claim is 100% true without any doubt whatsoever. And who cares whether something worth anything or not? Don't we aim for absolute truth here? If the absolute truth is some valueless depressing thing ,then we should be able to stomach that. "there would be no point in awakening if it didn't guarantee truth." "If it could be wrong it wouldn't be worth anything." - and there lies you guys biggest bias and fear - you want it so badly to be 100% guaranteedly true ,because the minute you acknowledge that there is any slight possible doubt about it, the whole thing and the value of your work collapses (the very same argument is used here that you use against atheists and other fundamentalists Leo).

Probably there are ways to question my own existence, but even if thats not the case - making metaphysical claims will be different than making a claim about my existence, because I have to make more assumptions in order to make that metaphysical claim. If you guys acknowledge that you guys are participating in the same self verifying epistemology (as any fundamentalist) and making certain assumptions in order to make your metaphysical claims about reality, then Im good , but in that case you guys should have some epistemic humility as well, because by the nature of you making some assumptions - you open up yourself to the possibility of being wrong. All I care about here is an acknowledgement to the possibility of being wrong. Some assumptions that you take for granted: You are not deluded You are capable of having knowledge about the fundamental nature of yourself and about the fundamental nature of reality That your memory about your awakening is correct and it actually happened That there is such a thing as an awakening and you didn't just imagine or tripped the whole thing That you having the inability to conceive of or to perceive anything outside of your consciousness is a definitive proof that there is no possibility that there is anything outside of your consciousness That reality is made of one fundamental thing rather than multiple different kind of things that cannot be reduced to each other.

Because its avoiding the hard problem with epistemology and begs the question. To me an answer to the question of "How do you know/how can you know about the nature of reality" seems to be necessary, to answer the question of "What is the nature of reality". Starting with 'What is the nature of reality' entails the assumption that you know what process/method to use to answer the question. The notion of claiming that 'this x thing is beyond worldviews' is just begging the question and makes it so that you can avoid giving an answer 'how do you know that this x thing is beyond worldviews'. You can replace your question with "Why are you confusing x with worldviews?" and create examples like - Why are you confusing the christian religion with worldviews? - Why are you confusing atheism with worldviews?

If your ultimate goal here is to show how my answer will come to the same epistemic problems that I wrote about above, then sure we can skip ahead, because I agree . But I acknowledge these epistemic problems hence why I would suggest that it is more reasonable to have some epistemic humility compared to 100% absolute confidence in a claim. Sure you can further question it by asking , but why do you care about how reasonable or unreasonable it is? But at that point I can literally create any system or worldview whatsoever and you conceding your ability to reject them on any ground - hence an infinite number of worldviews will stay on the table to choose from. The point you accept circular reasoning is the point where I can create an infinite number of other worldviews and use the same logic that you use to defend them. Fundamentalists use the same kind of logic that you use to preserve and to arrive their own conclusions. "doubt on this fundamental point is a self-deception, therefore my worldview is true " ............................................... Seems like you are suggesting that questioning and logic is too limited , but in that case - why do you talk about epistemology and about questioning things?

Sounds epistemically just as self referential and circular as any other explanation for any other worldview. Thats not to say that its not true, but epistemically it has the same fundamental problems as any other worldview. I think you would have to concede the notion that 'its reasonable to be 100% confident'. Saying "Im the most confident in this kind of metaphysics , because this makes the most sense to me for these x reasons" is different from claiming "im 100% sure that Im not wrong". Sure it will come down less badass and attractive to others, but it will come down much more reasonable.

Sounds like a 100. So the next question is this: epistemically speaking ,how can you make 100% sure that you are not deluding yourself, without already assuming that your conclusion is true?

For example that reality is a dream.

Leo on a 1-100 scale how confident you are, that you are not wrong about metaphysics?

No: "Its only a problem if its done to the guys we like". Imagine if we would use the same brainrot conspiratorial thinking to make Russel guilty:

If its your partner, then you can have a one time extensive conversation with her (especially if you two are into cnc) , where you make it extremely clear what word or act she can do that will clearly signal, that you should stop what you are doing. If its not your partner , then you shouldn't push after a no, because its just too risky and too much downside.

Thats not an answer to my question though. I asked how do you know that verbally asking for her consent is a high likely or a necessary turnoff and you replied with sometimes they say "no" when in reality they don't really mean no. Also, again why risk it? The downside is you not having sex, but the cons are so much worse. You can talk about cnc (Consensual Non-consent) type of fetish, but in that case you have to talk with your partner beforehand whether she is into it or not - you don't go steam ahead assuming it, without her consent.