Carl-Richard

Oh no, don't rob the New Agers of their only speciality! ?

You should re-read what I wrote above about Neo-Advaita. There are benefits to conceiving of things the way you're doing right now, but it's just another language game. If you recognize that it's just a language game, you can subscribe to other language games as well without problems. In other words, you can describe things as a process and also not a process. Because there is utility to both descriptions. It's not for no reason that people talk about enlightenment as a process (with a start and an end result), and you do understand that reason: people meditate and learn various things that give them insights, shifts in perspective, and which eventually lands them in a place which we call "enlightenment". Is it the same for everyone? Is there a mandatory step by step recipe you need to follow? No, but these are things people do and that we associate with enlightenment, which can be conceived of as a process with a start and an end result. If you want to be thoroughly consistent in your skeptical approach to describing reality, you should go all in and not say anything, because that is already "delusion" from the perspective of the Absolute (and you save yourself the performative contradictions). But again, you want to say things, so you need a language game, and I'm saying you might as well use multiple language games in a way that is rational and not get religiously stuck on just one.

To get you a certain result, in this case being enlightened, which is preferable to not being enlightened. You do understand this.

I think very few people become enlightened without ever having engaged with various technologies or tools that were available. Even Sadhguru meditated regularly in his early years, even though his first awakening was rather spontaneous. Besides, whatever you're providing here in this conversation can be thought of as a tool as well. Science is just one way to provide better tools over time. I think this is the very definition of Neo-Advaita: "there is no tool, no knowledge, no practice, no path that can take you there — only direct knowing of Yourself." It's of course a performative contradiction, because the very utterance of Neo-Advaitan words is a tool for making you gain insight into something, words said with a purpose to illuminate a path. In reality, Neo-Advaita is only a particular language game that can help to prime certain insights in certain contexts for certain people, but if you take it as something more than a language game, you shouldn't be surprised if you find yourself stuck with no insights, no progress. There are many language games, many tools, and they can be helpful for different people at different times.

You think meditation is not a technology or tool? Psychedelics? Transcranial magnetic stimulation for inducing flow states?

Haha if you guys still don't think Neil is a narcissist, watch this: Even his own people can't deal with him But like seriously, see how he leans into contextual things like incessantly interrupting people, shouting, waving his hands, even running up towards the person he disagrees with? Even when done half-jokingly, it's still frame control, and a specific kind which normal people don't dare to counter. You really have to be a narcissist to do these things, and the other people on the panel are not that, so Neil takes advantage of it (and you can see the mix of genuine distress and the "oh Neil" smirk on their faces, because again, it's not normal behavior). You know who does exactly the same things? Alex Jones. Don't tell me you don't see the similarities.

Please elaborate a little bit more than that.

Interesting. Your bad trip might be due to your intestinal issues influencing the gut-brain axis (and also sleep deprivation). Why did you expect to sleep on a psychedelic? (especially LSD analogues which are dopaminergic).

Let's also do science and make technologies and tools that help people become enlightened.

The addiction rates for cocaine are not that much worse than marijuana, certainly not alcohol.

Sometimes

You think we're enlightened or something?

I do too. Alright, so if enlightened humans exist here in physical form, they presumably also have a brain, and this brain looks like something. Now, it just so happens that a part of the brain called the Default Mode Network works as a good indicator for whether a person is enlightened or not. This shouldn't be a hugely problematic issue. It's just like looking at other behaviors we think are correlated with enlightenment. For example, how enlightened you are correlates with how many Rolls Royces you have

Are there enlightened people or not?

Scientists know very well how to control for these things. Still, I said "generally". I'm not referring to any specific study. Maybe she could've had a PhD in mathematics if she wasn't small. You don't know that

Nope. You don't have to think that the brain comes first in order to talk about the brain. Notice how I'm using the word "correlation", not "causation".

It changes your environment too, your local community, your society

Unless you want to say there are no enlightened people, these people have a brain, and their brains do look a certain way. You can test how their brain is different by performing experiments such as those presented in the video, and you'll end up with findings such as the persistent deactivation of the DMN being a neural correlate of enlightenment.

Different evolutionary niches produce different levels and types of intelligences. But also, brain size generally correlates with intelligence, even within our own species. Yeah, and how few neurons can you have before you become functionally retarded? How small can an individual neuron be before complicated things like ion channels (which certainly can't be infinitely small in order to work) take up too much space relative to other structures? What if the genes that code for small size also make you more prone to certain diseases or other unwanted things? It's not easy to play God when your creation is a super complex system.

What — you're just gonna ban insects, birds, everything that isn't human, from interacting with humans? That is probably practically impossible unless you want us to live in Matrix pods or caves underground. Besides, dominating the entire Earth this way takes more resources than whatever we got going on now, so if your concern is reducing resource expenditure or environmental disaster, maybe leave the bugs alone.

The Default Mode Network (DMN) is a known neural correlate for mystical experiences (a.k.a. "awakening"), and "enlightenment" (or persistent non-dual awareness) correlates with a persistent deactivation of the DMN when the subject is not doing anything (there is a graph in the video). The DMN is associated with the feeling of self, self-referential thinking, etc.

Shrink ourselves so that we'll get predated on by ravens, seagulls and yellow jackets ? I think if you take an existing creature and reduce its size, it will be less intelligent. But that doesn't mean you can't have a different creature of a smaller size which is more intelligent.

Yep. Awakening literally changes your brain.

It's normal religious- sorry, "spiritual" behavior.