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The 'blaming suicide on the leader' kind of behaviour is kind of silly in my opinion, but i get where those people are coming from. But they would never ever apply the same standards to a psychologist or to a psychiatrist.

That would be the ultimate mind control tool.

This is crazy and cool and the same time.

Yeah, this is really, really interesting. I have heard about people experiencing stuff like this.

No one is above critisism and everyone can improve. When you are a central figure, your work will speak for itself, and at the end of the day, your work should defend you, from the unfounded critiques. The most valuable thing you can get as a central figure, is a well thought out, good faith, constructive criticism. Every criticism can be put on a spectrum and can be evaluated, how founded or unfounded it is. When it is backed by a lot of evidence, then it is maybe worth reflecting on. For instance, some creator get a critique that he is very dismissive of opinions, that are different to his beliefs (and never elaborates why he disagree with his student, he just dismiss everyone all the time). Lets say this teacher has 100 students and there are two scenarios. Scenario 1: 50 students can show 30 videos where you can clearly see, that the teacher is actually being dismissive, and the teacher cannot provide one video that shows, that he actually evaluates his students opinions. Scenario 2: One student can show only 2 videos when that teacher is being dismissive and the teacher to his defense, can provide 3-4 videos that showes he actually cares about other people opinions and he elaborates why he disagrees with something. There is a massive difference between scenario 1 and scenario 2. Both can be put on a spectrum based on how much evidence and information is provided, and based on how much content you actually watched about that particular person. Lets take scenario one, when half of your students give a critique to you, that is backed up by a lot of evidence, then maybe you should reflect on it, because something is most likely there. Also, there are other situations that are very clear cut. For instance, there is a critique that a teacher is abusive. Someone can provide a video evidence about that teacher literally beating up one of his students so much, that the student fall into a coma. Now, even if you take your most good faith approach to interpret that video, you will end up with the same conclusion, so not everything is up for debate or up for interpretation.

I think this is a fair critique, that you shouldn't make yourself the center of your teachings (I think even Leo could be criticized for this, because in some of his past videos, he was talking about himself and his abilities and that he went the deepest with his awakenings etc, and i don't think that helps his teachings in any way and it just make him look narcissistic and egotistical from a normal person's pov and some of the actualized members will just look up to him and put him on a pedestal and just adapt his teachings as a belief system and won't do any work).

@ZenAlex I think all of those things could be mentioned, when we are talking about actualized.org if you want to interpret things in a bad faith way. This can be interpreted about actualized.org too, when we say that people actually don't understand what Leo is talking about and what Leo is teaching about . But you can get around this ,if you actually show a high level of understanding of the teachings and then lay out why they are dangerous or bad or anything that you have a problem with . You have to show a high level of understanding first, and then after you proved yourself to that community, they will be more open to your criticisms. This can be said about actualized.org too, if you want to interpret things that way. For instance, there are some people , who say that people on actualized.org committed suicide, because of Leo and because of his teachings . Of course, if any of the actualized.org members will disagree with that or if Leo will disagree with that, they can always say "Of course they disagree, because they are a cult". You need to justify positions like that in a different way, to be more compelling. There are some claims that are hard to justify, but if your claims hold any validity at all, then you should be able to show some evidence to justify them. Teal Swan's group is not new at all, if you can't show any video or any picture or any audio about her doing some shady shit (after all these years), then it will be hard to justify your positions only using some of her members claims. Just think about it, if there is really some shady shit going on, wouldn't you have more evidence than just a few ex members saying things about her without evidence (or maybe they actually have some evidence, but it is your job to lay those out). So far your argument is not compelling imo, because of these reasons: You are laying out your opinions on her that are up for debate. The reason why your opinions about her are up for debate, because you didn't provide any tangible evidence to back them up. The only countable "evidence" you showed so far is the claim, that her ex members are fucked up and they feel they are fucked up because of Teal Swan. But even that is weak, because those are just claims without backing them up with anything. (I could myself say some shit about some group without showing any evidence, and i wouldn't be suprised, if people would disagree with me) [ Now, of course the more ex members are coming up with claims like that, the stronger you position get, but after a while there has to be something that can actually back their claims up ] So without any compelling evidence, i don't think you will be able to convince anyone here, who disagrees with you. You need to make it so that your claims are not up for interpretation.

@ZenAlex I think if you want to settle this, you need to make a very compelling argument why she is a cult leader, and not just appeal to people and to the documentary. You can appeal to them ,but obviously it won't be enough to make a convincing argument for people who disagree with you heavily. Make your compelling case why she is actually a cult leader, and then you guys have a ground to actually argue about.

Good one, this will be his new name .

I think the emphasis is on being physical. We only talk on this forum, we don't gather around ,we don't have a meeting place , we don't do practices together, we don't do retreats,psychedelics together etc.

I wasn't talking about sentience, i was responding to your comment about AI's understanding capacity. No, there are big differences between a human brain, and the way a current AI works. Current AI can't really grasp any abstract concept, for example what sharpness really means. Whatever you want to teach an AI to do, it needs to be super tangible, it can't be abstract because thats the way it works. There are a million things you can't train it for, because some things cannot be dumbed down to an input-hidden layer- output model, because structurally it has its own limits. A human mind don't need to be trained that way, it can grasp abstract concepts without the need to explain to it in a tangible way. Because of the limits of the model there are some stuff that are being lost when you want to convert everything down to just numbers. If you wanted to teach an AI to use its hands to write some stuff down on a paper, you would have to make it super tangible. If you ask a kid to write down the word 'abstract' it can do it without the need to tell them in what angle they need to hold their hands, what pressure they need to use on the paper, at what place they need to grab the pencil etcetcetc. The way you teach a kid how to write, and the way you teach an AI how to write stuff down are super different. But writing is just an example from many, i could mention walking and other stuff as well.

I think he is right, that it doesn't grasp the meaning, because if you were to apply some word or concept in a different context it would have a hard time understanding it correctly. But why is that? One big reason is that generally speaking, these AI-s are highly specialized and trained to do specific tasks in a specific context. These AI-s are predicting what the "best" output should be based on the model and based on the given input. The model will limit what patterns an AI will discover and understand, so if you train it with a specific data-set for a specific purpose, then it will be limited to that, and if you want to use it for other tasks, it may or may not will be applicable to do that. There are some instances, when it can be used for other tasks as well, but i don't think it is that common. So for example, if you train it to do a specific task, it will recognize some patterns to be able to do its prediction when it is asked to do so. But, if there is a different task you want to use it for, and that task requires almost the same pattern recognition that you trained the AI on, then it will be able to do that task ask well, but not because it understands, but because of the similarity in patterns.

Yeah, but there is a difference, between having an unbearable craving to eat something vs having a normal craving to eat an unhealthy food. In the second part you can rationally choose , but in the first part you are in animal mode, and your rationality isn't there . When enough rationality is involved, we evaluate (consciously or unconsciously based on our morality, and belief system) what to do and what to choose. So generally speaking intrinsic motivation is everything, because thats the thing we can have direct impact on. We can be manipulated by others. People can use our weaknesses like (instincts, cravings, needs etc) to manipulate us and to put us in animal mode, but when we are not manipulated, we will be acting based on a collective moral system, and based on our own subjective moral system and beliefs. But i agree, that it is on a spectrum. Its much much much more harder to manipulate you to kill someone vs to eat unhealthy food, so i agree with you on that. It is about how deep and centric certain beliefs and values are. So there are two things here. How can we create a society where people are less triggered and less manipulated to act based on their instincts. The second part is, how can we have a significant impact on people to help them develop and grow out of certain moral and belief systems.

Yes, but i suspect you care about not getting raped, tortured or killed. A collectively agreed upon, well thought out moral system can give you a relatively safe and a better quality of life.

Yeah i agree with you. We shouldn't be projecting other qualities onto it, just because one quality is there. But we can never know, at the end of the day.

@DefinitelyNotARobot How the fuck can we determine, if you are a robot or not ?

Yes, but to get deeper, what does a nerve made out of, that can't be replaced with dead matter?

Yes it is a mystery, thats why i don't agree with taking any strong positions here. What is the difference on a structural level between an artificial human and a 'real' human? What does a 'real' human made out of on the lowest levels, that cannot be replaced with dead matter? So how do we distinguish between dead matter and living matter, what makes living matter 'living'?

Yes, but what is the substance that allows you to experience things, what creates the ego? That is what we are essentially talking and debating about. Because a lot of people assume here, that an ego can only be created by a biological structure, but why assume what? We don't know how an ego is created, we don't know what substance and characteristics are needed to create an ego. We should be open to the possibility that an ego can be created in other ways. The problem here, even if it is possible to create an ego in an aritifical way, because of the assumption 'that it is impossible to create a real ego in an aritifcal way' it will be interpreted just as a simulation. The real problem here, that it cannot be tested, so whether you believe it is simulating or you believe it is real, it will be true for you, based on what beliefs you have. How do you safely determine if a computer is simulating it or not? Lets say, it passes all your behaviour tests, whats next?

Dreaming the only thing we can do. Even though this is all true from the absolute pov, doing the things what we do here, can have practical utility from the relative pov. Our collective moral system is mostly based on assuming things being sentient and conscious. Even though all of that is an illusion from the absolute pov, we still play a game and still use it for the sake of our collective and individual survival. You might argue, that all of this is just a distraction and you want us to focus on the real work, but at the end of the day, we do a lot of stuff thats just about fun (and this section of the forum is more about thinking, than consciousness work). We can consciously play these games, so that we are aware that it is all just an illusion at the end of the day. But at the same time, being too conscious all the time can ruin the fun. If we plan on continuing to play this game called life, then thinking about stuff like this can be useful and fun. We are attached to survival, that's why we are still "here". At the end of the day, threads like this, can be a place for collective discourse or for collective contemplation about certain topics.

Yeah i agree, but still, even to determine what has sentience it will be based on a certain set of assumptions, but i agree that it is more tangible than free will. When you wrote this, i started contemplating what pain actually is, and i have no fucking clue. What is the structure of pain or in other words what is pain is made out of? (not talking about the senory inputs, because yes thats part of every feeling, but in an of itself is not sufficient enough to create any feeling) I cannot define , and i cannot pin down what pain actually is. I want to give you two examples, just to see where you draw your line. Example 1: Lets say, if there is a person who can't feel any external pain (like if you stab him with a sharp tool he won't feel anything, or if you burn his body, he won't feel anything), but he has the ability to feel internally (like having the ability to feel love, being depressed, being sad, feel joy etc) would you consider him sentient or not and why? Example 2: The other example could be similar but a little bit different, there is a person who can't feel external pain, and doesn't have the ability to feel internally, like the same person in the first example, but not being able to have any internal emotions, its like blank. The same question here, would you consider this person sentient or not and why? @axiom Lets say we drop the free will part, and we only go with the ability to feel pain part. How the fuck can we create a thing that can actually feel pain, and in a structural way 100% similar to a human having the ability to feel pain . I think its impossibly hard to answer this question. Basically this question could be made in a different way: How the fuck can we create someting that has the ability to feel pain? What does having the ability to feel pain even means on a structural level?

Imo, it doesn't matter if biological complexity or mechanial complexity gives rise to an ego, and i agree that the current level of AI is not at the free will level yet (the reason why it doesn't matter to me, is because i think generally we will mostly care about the free will part when we are talking about a conscious being/thing). You might be right , that it may be impossible to recreate anything 'real' in a mechanical way. Because things just impossibly complex and i think we can say that things are complex not in a finite way. So to make your side stronger, you could argue, that because everything is infinitely complex, because of that, nothing can be created in a mechanical way that can truly represent any real thing ( and i think i would agree with that, but from a pragmatic standpoint, if we only care about the expresiveness of free will, then in the end it doesn't really matter).

I wouldnt disagree with this, however, i would make a distinction between human consciousness, and human ego, i am mostly focused on ego. What is structurally speaking about human neurology that cannot be replaced mechanically ? Or this question could be asked this way. Speaking about biology what gives the 'free will' part to humans, that cannot be replaced mechanically? Just to not waste your time, i think our convo can be boiled down to this question: Do you think that human ego (not human consciousness) is material, because if you think its material , then i don't see how we wouldn't be able to recreate it in a mechanical way. Not even focused on the human ego part. Do you think that any kind of ego can be created mechanically?(when i say ego, i imply free will)

I don't think the biology part is the deciding factor here, but you might say that it is a requirement. A mechanical body could be created, that can have certain senses (which would be sensors) , which it can use to get its own inputs from the world. Examine your own process, when you want to decide if one thing is conscious or not, how do you actually decide that, based on what characteristics, and what is or are the main factor(s)? If you were to chat with a complex AI and then after that with a human being, i don't think you would be able to tell which one was the human and which one was the AI.