snowleopard

I've never read it; I'm waiting for the movie ... Oh wait, I am the movie Seriously, it's good you're checking out some ideas, and if that inspires deeper inquiry, then all the better.

Mozart was working so furiously hard he wrote The Symphony No. 1 in E♭ major as an 8 year old ... little prick !

@BjarkeT You asked what was the problem with materialism, and you've been given several avenues to investigate ... Now go into it with an open mind, and reach your own conclusions. No-one else can give you answers in lieu of your own inquiry.

@BjarkeT I don't think the problem is with the scientific method, per se, the problem is that it has failed to resolve the materialist assumption that consciousness is an emergent epiphenomenon of matter (the very premise of materialism as an ontological model), when quantum physics has never found any so-called 'matter' that hasn't been reduced to probable wave functions in a void of potential. So if that is not an example of the problem with materialism -- about which you asked in the title of your post -- and you can't see that, then I'm really not sure what one can possibly say to convince you otherwise.

Gotta love watching materialist scientists conceding that when it comes to consciousness, they are indeed baffled.

@BjarkeT The point is that if a hardcore materialist scientist became skeptical about materialism's inability to explain what has been called the 'hard problem of consciousness', then why not investigate and posit possible alternatives, instead of having blind faith in the materialist paradigm? It does no good to just keep referencing information from those who are indoctrinated into that paradigm, when clearly it doesn't provide all the answers.

@BjarkeT Kastrup was a hardcore materialist scientist working as a computer engineer at CERN, where state-of-the-art particle physics investigation is being done, who has been published in Scientific American, and other well-known scientific journals, so if you're not going to give him credibility, then who are you going to give credibility?

@AleksM Well, it wasn't really a serious conjecture ... Anyway, relieved to hear I'm not a stoned angel !

I know little about the guy, but as usual, in the dualistic scheme of things, there is another side to the story ... for what it's worth

Then again, maybe the human condition is what a higher dimensional being experiences when they take their equivalent of a psychedelic trip

@Lauritz Being in The Netherlands, I suspect he has some experience with psychedelics, but if so, he hasn't revealed that in his writings -- at least not that I'm aware of. However, whether or not psychedelic-related, he has revealed having some paranormal and transpersonal experiences.

@Lauritz Love that poem -- and that musical accompaniment -- from Kastrup's More Than Allegory, a wonderful book IMO -- especially Part 3, wherein he explores a possible futuristic take a how psychonauts may someday journey, revealing insights from an entity called 'The Other'. I still wonder if that poem may have been dictated by such a Daemon

@AleksM Oh right, I forgot about that !

Quite simply the seeming duality of a segregated self-identity vs a world 'out there'.

@jse I feel there could be other interpretations of panpsychism, which don't necessarily deny the primacy of consciousness, however it's still a kind of dualism, and I agree that it is very different from nondual Idealism. And so, by definition, as ontological models, they can't be reconciled. Bernardo Kastrup, who leans toward nondual idealism, elaborates upon this theme, which may be pertinent here ...

I can't speak specifically about panic attacks while using psychedelics -- having only ever tried mescaline -- but I did go through a panic attack phase when younger, for which I was prescribed tranquilizers ... of course just a band-aid solution. The real solution was delving into some shadow issues, and the fear related to those issues, most especially the fear of death. So it doesn't seem that psychedelics are going to bypass that stuff. Indeed, as @Nahm points out, being the plant medicines that they are, they may actually be revealing exactly what needs to be revealed, and the lesson that facing this fear can't be avoided indefinitely.

@Nahm Hey, I can even love the Donald ... albeit, I'm in Canuckistan

@Nahm lol ... who knows, maybe there's some method to this madness. Let's all support Trump ! Thank you Donald for being the perfect shadow projection of what egoic delusion looks like, and being yet another encouragement to WTFU !!

Once upon a time, I dreamed up such a sad story too. And it took much inquiry to realize that one wasn't born with a story -- although, of course, the indoctrination into a story starts very early. Not being a child anymore, at least the story-making is optional. But whatever the story, it is constructed: like a chain, link by link by link, until it is an entanglement; like a wall, brick by brick by brick, until it is a confinement; like a belief system, thought by thought by thought, until it is an entrapment. Eventually it can be unraveled, but meanwhile, adding to it just makes it all that much more inquiry to do. Why wait?

@John Iverson Wow, what a sad story you just dreamed up. If you must dream up a story, can't you dream up something more upbeat than that?

@AleksM What else could possibly be channeled through this body-form, other than That which one is in essence ... However, it appears to have an unlimited amount of identity flexibility

@How to be wise That's a curious belief ... How so?

@AleksM Yeah, I try to keep an open mind about such phenomena ... I've experienced far too many inexplicable paranormal events, to just simplistically dismiss it all as naive nonsense. Thanks for the links, will definitely check them out.