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Hi Leo, I've been obsessed with this specific topic since 2017, and specifically moved out to SF in 2018 to meet with a bunch of people who are building cutting-edge AI (mostly OpenAI, Deepmind, Google Brain, and adjacent orbits). I've talked to hundreds of these people since then in-depth about this, and have thought a ton about this. Here are my high-level takes: 1. Slow-down would be ideal, but I don't think is feasible, unfortunately. Too difficult at this point to stop random AI labs from all over the world from picking up from where AI progress has already reached. 2. It seems basically inevitable that advanced AGI will eventually wipe out humanity, because it can/will create near-infinite copies of itself, with each of those copies constantly and rapidly editing/updating themselves. All it takes is one "misaligned" tweak to wreck all of humanity, so that will eventually happen (probably not that long after it reaches/surpasses human-level agency). In other words, offense will eventually outweigh defense. 3.The only hope I see between now and "the point of no return" described in #2, is the following: we may get a small window of opportunity, whereby we effectively have an AGI genie-god, and get to ask it for a wish. The only specific "wish" that we can ask the AI genie-god that I think has the potential to ensure humanity's survival, is asking it to gradually (but rapidly) swap out our biological neurons and cells with faster and faster silicon-based ones. While this sort of tech is pure fantasy today, superhuman AGI will be able to very quickly make something like centuries wortt of human progress in a matter of years/months/weeks after it surpasses human-level intelligence, so it's not crazy to think it could deliver on giving us this magic technology that has the potential to enable humans to evolve at an equally-fast rate as AI. Then, and *only* then, is the risk of AGI completely eliminated. What does humanity become beyond that? Idk. But that's our only opening for ensuring our survival. I made an hour long video about this back from 2018 (link below), and called the solution "Theseus." This is undoubtedly the grand challenge of our time and of the human story. You have a huge audience and a gift for speaking. Maybe you can engage people on the topic and help people think about root causes and possible solutions, such as what I've proposed. We don't have much time left, tbh. PS - Another intervention, which is NOT an ultimate solution for solving the AI problem, but could help a lot for buying time, is creating a new virtual governance structure (coupled with a network state). Balaji Srinivasan is the brainchild of this idea, and I think it's difficult but doable. If you could create a global, decentralized, digital governance structure + network state of technologists, perhaps this could become the dominant power structure for deciding what happens with the development of AI. Longshot, but worth trying IMO.

My mind has been pretty obsessed with these questions for a few months now: How did the original nondual substrate become dual? What was the first duality? And perhaps most importantly, what IS the stuff that makes up the dividing lines / boundaries between all things/dualities? It seems like there are a bunch of blinders/coverings in my experience that hide the totality of my big Self from my small self. But what in the world are those blinders/coverings made out of? Are they made out of something that isn't the original nondual substrate? Well that doesn't make much sense if everything came from this singular nondual substrate that is literally everything/nothing/infinity. Are the blinders/coverings made out of the nondual substrate? Well that seems circular because how is the nondual substrate able to create a contrast/duality by using only nondual substrate? Not sure if this makes sense, but just wanted to put this out there to see if anyone can point me in the right direction. Thanks in advance!

@SamueLSD - Thanks again for these additional insights! Really appreciate the level of thought and detail you put into your replies @Someone here - Good to know! Appreciate the direct response and not playing games @Leo Gura - Lol. I understand your point. However, my goal is NOT to prove anything by asking others - I'm just curious what people will say. It could help me better understand 'others'' perspectives, regardless of whatever their true nature is. I understand that this proves nothing though. I still find it fascinating that some peoples' answer is a flat 'NO' though. I remember Daniel Dennett saying giving the same response a while ago, and just figured he was trolling. Maybe I should take him at his word. @Inliytened1 @Moksha @The0Self @LastThursday - Thanks for these insights. Will meditate more on these. @James123 - Thanks! Sounds like 5meo dmt. I'm on it

I still want to be able to better understand and shape this reality though. Currently, I have almost no ability to do either. Which is why I don't think that "I/we" are God.

The fact that Nahm, and now potentially you (@inliytened1), are saying "no, there is not some human POV behind my username that is seeing/experiencing a different environment in right now" is kind of blowing my mind. Going to ask a bunch of other people about this now. Really interesting.

@Nahm - Wow! Damn. I appreciate the honest response to my question, and I'll take your word for it. This is the first time I've heard someone say "no." This makes me update my thinking more in the direction of 'solipsism.'

@SamueLSD Thanks so much for this reply! This is really solid. On the whole, you answers make a lot of sense to me. Could you provide a link to the post that you're referring to? I would love to read that. Regarding your last question, no, I don't know that other contents (colors, visuals, sounds) that I'm not currently experiencing exist outside of my current experience. The point I was trying to make there, was that if my current frame IS everything, then where is all the other stuff that I've seen before but I'm not seeing right now? Doesn't 'everything' (including all of that other stuff I've experienced at other times, along with a LOT of other things I've never experienced) need to be included in my current frame of consciousness, if it truly is everything? @Someone here @Swarnim Appreciate the replies. I am hyper-aware that I don't 'know' anything - have been painfully aware of this my whole life. That said, we (humans) all operate under the assumption that we do know many things, or at least strongly believe them to be true. Every single person does this, and wouldn't be able to function if they didn't. I don't think it's productive to dive back into the solipsism rabbit hole, but in the < 1% chance that maybe I can dig up something useful for everyone on this topic (since it keeps coming up), maybe you can answer this one question for me: ***Are you having a conscious experience through a pair of someone else's (not James's) human eyes right now?*** For example, as I am typing this right now, I'm sitting in my office, looking at my computer, having the experience of seeing the world through my (James's) eyes. Are you also having your own experience right now, whereby you're seeing a totally different environment through the eyes of someone who isn't James? This question would sound ridiculous to people IRL, but not to people on this forum. And it's also a question that prompts a clear "YES" or "NO" response - not rhetorical philosophical questions and/or tangents that evade providing an actual answer. You are either having a conscious experience through a human POV like I am, or your entire existence is nothing more than a line of text on my computer screen (aka solipsism, or something damn close to it). I'm open to solipsism and other radical explanations, BUT, I also really want to see more of an effort from people around here to exercise the discipline and the focus to actually think for themselves and make earnest attempts to answer questions like this. I'm well aware that I know basically nothing, that theres no boundary between James / small self / existence, so you can skip over all of that, and actually attempt to provide me, yourselves, and everyone else on this forum with a real answer to my question: "YES, or NO." Or not. @Nahm Will try to meditate on this for a while. Thanks. Also curious if you have an answer to the question I posed to @Someone here and @Swarnim above. @Leo Gura - Lol. Right on cue. Fair enough though! Just wanted to see if there was some other way to gain insight to my questions above (which are the logical hangups standing in-between where I am now and getting on board with the idea that 'I' am God) without solely relying on 5meo. I guess I have my answer now. Nonetheless, appreciate the response!

I agree that consciousness is the floor of reality. In this sense, the essence of human consciousness is the same as the essence of God. I've also had lots of heavy psychedelics, done an insane amount of introspection, have pushed myself very far out of my comfort zone, and have reached some level of enlightenment (albeit, I could still go much deeper). Where I lose most people on this forum is the idea that my human consciousness POV is the TOTALITY of God, versus a tiny sliver/container/branch/fragment of the totality. I have not remotely found the former to be the case. I'm aware of what the default response around here is: "Thinking/reasoning won't get you there - do 5meo." I'm aware of this idea, I agree with the merits of direct experience, I've done 5meo dmt, and I will continue doing higher doses of it until I hit a ceiling. All of that aside, you still have to answer a few critical questions, if you want to argue in favor of a human POV equaling the totality of God. For me, having good answers to the below questions, AND/OR, being able to directly experience the phenomena that they are pointing at, would be sufficient evidence in support of the primary claim in question. 1. Why do I not have an extremely high level of understanding, or even total understanding, of how reality / the universe works? If I'm 'God,' shouldn't it be easy to understand exactly how everything works, since I built everything / am everything? Shouldn't I have all the laws of physics, chemistry, computer programming, and the rest of the universe's information at my fingertips, with perfect understanding of how they all work? I definitely don't have access to even 1% of this today. ***Side note: Leo HAS referenced directly experiencing #1 several times in his videos. To paraphrase him, "On 5meo, I could literally see how I created every aspect of myself... down to each of the hairs on my arm." I would LOVE to hear more about this, and to directly experience this.*** 2. Similar to #1, why do I not have an extremely high degree of control over my reality? If I (highest self, not small self) built all of this, then why can't I manipulate any aspect of my reality at-will? Why can't I snap my fingers and have a billion dollars, the perfect life partner, or a completely different universe? Furthermore, why do I have such little control over my environment - almost none at all? Seems like this should also be a small ask if my human consciousness POV truly is God. 3. If my human consciousness POV is "everything / God / infinite imagination / all that there is," then where is everything else that I'm not currently experiencing from my human consciousness POV? Where are all of the colors, visuals, sounds, and emotions that I KNOW exist (since I've experienced them at other points in my life), but aren't in my current experience/POV? Seems to me like this proves that my human consciousness POV isn't nearly everything at face value. A few years ago, I wouldn't have even bothered asking these questions, since they seem completely ridiculous to anyone with a modicum of skepticism. HOWEVER, I do think that this forum has uncovered some serious grains of truth, and often many years before I eventually came around to them (such as the Western/materialist paradigm being completely upside-down, which I now 100% agree with), so I want to keep an open mind and genuinely listen to what people here have to say about my three questions above. And kudos to Leo on being contrarian and right in the biggest of ways. So to close this out, I don't at all doubt that I still have A LOT left to learn and am likely very, very wrong on many things... .. BUT, I still need clearer answers and/or direction on the three points above, and I think that anyone who claims something as bold as "your human consciousness POV = God / infinite imagination / the totality of existence," owes it to themselves and to their audience to provide more substance in the ways described above. Looking forward to read some quality responses here that will help point me and many others in the right direction!

@Leo Gura - Thanks for your thoughtful response to my question about how to truly know that you are actually God / aren't deceiving yourself. Your response was helpful. I think that directly experiencing total nonduality (via 5meo) and/or having an experience that offers a glimpse of how God created everything (also probably via 5meo again) would definitively settle these questions for me (since experiencing true nonduality/infinity wouldn't leave any room for there to be yet another God behind God, and seeing how God created everything (including itself) would help a lot as well). Conceptually, I do think that nonduality makes sense, and answers these questions. It's just hard to get on board with this concept being the truth while I'm still in human form, since I (James) am such a small sliver of all existence in my current state of consciousness and I don't have access to anything remotely close to the totality of infinity/nonduality. My human experience (so far) has been one of only duality, and I have not yet gotten a glimpse of the rest of nonduality/infinity (which seems like something that I would *HAVE TO* experience to prove that me/God/nonduality/infinity are all truly one inseparable consciousness). But without this direct experience, I have no substantive evidence to support that nonduality is in fact the truth. Thanks again for your input!

When you guys ( @Leo Gura and @Someone here) become conscious that you're God... how do you know that this feeling isn't still an illusion? How do you know that, even though you're convinced that you are God / the floor of consciousness, that there isn't something behind that still? I'm not challenging you guys btw - I'm just genuinely curious. Have done a little 5meo and doing more soon. Just want to know the truth

@PopoyeSailor Thanks for these examples. I appreciate it! I guess what I'm really looking for is examples of original/valuable insights from him, rather than achievements. I should have clarified that earlier (my bad). I haven't heard him say anything original and insightful yet tbh (and I've watched/read at least 10 hours of his stuff), so was hoping to find examples of that from people in this thread who hold him in extremely high regard. He certainly seems to be charismatic, accomplished, and a good leader, so he definitely deserves full credit on those fronts. But personally, I've heard way more original/insightful things come out of Leo's mouth than his. And I'm not saying that to be a fanboy of Leo or something - it's just a fact from my standpoint. But I'd love to see someone here provide a substantive counterargument and prove me wrong!

@ Nahm - Thanks for the response. Appreciate it!

Thank you @VincentArogya !

@Leo Gura How do you take full responsibility for your life if you have no free will? Genuinely confused on this point.

Can someone please provide specific examples of his accomplishments / original and insightful things he has said? I've watched a bunch of his videos, read up on him, etc - I have not yet seen anything from him that I haven't heard from many other spiritual people. Also, I am not trolling - I don't doubt that he has some great achievements/insights, but everything I've seen so far is extremely basic. Would love to see some examples!