Why is it possible to make distinctions?

[LastThursday]

On 10/02/2021 at 0:27 AM, 4201 said:

But why am I able to distinguish?

The thing doing the observing, is the same as the thing being observed. That's how you get something for nothing. To have something you need to be able to distinguish it from everything else.

On 10/02/2021 at 0:27 AM, 4201 said:

If you show me a page half black and half white and tell me that the distinction between the 2 is something I'm doing OK, but then if you showed me a full black page it's not like I would have even been able to distinguish between the 2.

Imagine that the full black page is able to observe itself or more accurately be aware of itself. What is its experience of awareness? Who knows. But clearly it's aware of something, because being able to distinguish something is implicit to being aware. However, the full black page has no distinguishing features, a.k.a. nothing. So the page is both the observer and the observed, both nothing and something.

Pay attention to the bold bit. Because, there is no restriction to what the black page is aware of, it is completely free to distinguish and be aware of anything it likes. And, because it's unrestricted that is an infinity right there! It is literally aware of an infinite number of somethings.

It seems like a circular thing to say that something is aware of itself, but that inbuilt relativity is what generates everything.

[4201]

On 12/02/2021 at 4:50 PM, Nahm said:

One, interpretation & stuff, are the clouds. 

You could be contemplating ‘why is it not possible to make distinctions?’ 

This second sentence still puzzles me to this day. If the what the first one is saying is "there is no interpreter", no self that does the interpretation, sure. But the second one is like saying "there is no thought" as distinctions or dualities are the basis of all thoughts. OK thoughts are not actually there, they are "thought". We can say thinking is a "false process" or that thought isn't. Perhaps Truth is the lack of those distinctions and perhaps that there is no such thing as "not truth" as those moments of being lost in thought happen exclusively in the past (we think they happened).

But then in this moment, as I look at my banana, I can clearly see it's edge. It's distinction between banana and no banana. The image that is presented to me (the appearance of the banana, before interpretation, the clouds let's say, the direct experience of sight) has the potential for distinction. Yet if I was in a sensory deprivation tank, what would appear in my direct experience would not allow for potential for distinction within itself. Sure I can use memory to compare the sensory deprivation to a normal "full of pattern" image but within the image itself. What if I am put in a sensory deprivation tank with some drug that gives me total amnesia (no memory access)? In such a case, the mind wouldn't be able to make any distinction since it has absolutely no sensory input to distinguish anything from anything. It would probably be a state of full enlightenment with no thought and pure joy.

Yet if I were to truly stop making any distinctions, it wouldn't be much different from the sensory tank experiment. There wouldn't be a distinction between "medium which allow for distinctions" and "medium which do not allow for distinction". 

When you talk about your crystal balls or your lens, you say we use a lens to focus on a specific part of ourselves (as god, as everything) and from what we see we assume to be human having our human life. But I don't see this lens. This sight of the banana peel (eaten by that time) doesn't seem complete to me. My field of view is not totally empty like a sensory deprivation tank yet it's doesn't have the maximum amount of entropy and it doesn't seem to show every thing. You could say that well, all the other stuff I think I am missing (for instance the sight of an apple) are ideas coming from memory and thus not true. But then isn't that the same thing for change? Any change to what I'm seeing happens in the future or past, so the entire universe, for all of eternity, is this sight of a banana peel and all the other stuff I see, with the stuff I hear, feel, touch etc. There has never been anything else and there will never be anything else that this? That's just hard to swallow. Especially as I can turn my head and see other stuff entering my field of view. So then what, it was never the previous scene, it always was the new scene?

I know I'm in some sort of misconception. I spent a fair amount of time on my last mushroom trip trying to "unzoom" my field of view and see what's "outside". Maybe there's a duality to be collapsed between what I see and imagine but what I imagine always seems unclear and some sort of "duality soup" than what I see in front of me (what appears as what is). What I imagine is like just ideas and not really images like consciousness is. I'm curious if you have anything to say that can give insight and I'm curious about what's the real deal with your crystal ball. At least I'm confused as to what is the lens you talk about in actuality.

Edited April 24, 2021 by 4201

[Nahm]

9 hours ago, 4201 said:

You could be contemplating ‘why is it not possible to make distinctions?’ 

 

 

[Nahm]

All distinctions are (‘made of’) what is without causation or duality. A distinction can appear and be believed, yet never actually made. 

 

[Megan Alecia]

Because the world operates through chaos and change.

Edited April 30, 2021 by Megan Alecia

[4201]

4 hours ago, Nahm said:

All distinctions are (‘made of’) what is without causation or duality. A distinction can appear and be believed, yet never actually made. 

How come it's possible for them to appear then? How is "what is" distinguishable as a "medium"?

Distinctions aren't there, they are just thought to be there or imagined. But then what is thought? How is thought? How can oneness fracture itself? It's not fractured OK, but how can it appear as fractured? "Looking at a part of oneness" implies I have some kind of limited field of view, some kind of fracture between what I can and can't see.

[Nahm]

1 hour ago, 4201 said:

How come it's possible for them to appear then? How is "what is" distinguishable as a "medium"?

‘Them’ is appearance, ‘how’ is what is. 

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Distinctions aren't there, they are just thought to be there or imagined. But then what is thought? How is thought?

Nothing, or, no thing. 

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How can oneness fracture itself? It's not fractured OK, but how can it appear as fractured? "Looking at a part of oneness" implies I have some kind of limited field of view, some kind of fracture between what I can and can't see.

‘How’ is formless, view, appearance. Seeing, seen & unseen, is illusory. 

If you and a blind person are looking at a ferris wheel, it could be said you are seeing and he is not. If there is no ferris wheel, and he is well aware and you are not, it could be said he is seeing and you are not. 

[4201]

On 30/04/2021 at 8:53 PM, Nahm said:

‘Them’ is appearance, ‘how’ is what is. 

Nothing, or, no thing. 

‘How’ is formless, view, appearance. Seeing, seen & unseen, is illusory. 

If you and a blind person are looking at a ferris wheel, it could be said you are seeing and he is not. If there is no ferris wheel, and he is well aware and you are not, it could be said he is seeing and you are not. 

OK I understood that dualities or distinctions are content (you call them appearance). Whether I identify with them is also a thought, which is also just an appearance.

If both what I see and what I think of what I see are consciousness and precisely what nothing is, it's like saying "nothing exactly is this landscape with the dualities".

I am precisely nothing, observing myself, which is also nothing but appears some sort of consciousness bubble containing

• a field of view
• feelings for vibrations in the air (sound)
• other feelings
• thoughts (dualities)

How does absolute nothingness appears as all of these things? Through dualities. But dualities are also nothing. "Dualities" are a separation I'm making within consciousness.

I just don't see how consciousness or absolute nothingness can separate itself. I am aware that absolute nothingness is not the nothingness I've been taught (the empty space), absolute nothingness includes both the empty space and the non empty space. You can say "nothingness cannot separate itself" but that's just shifting the goal post. Nothingness either separate itself or appears as separate, otherwise there would be no dream. How does it appear as separate when it's not?

I am not able to equate absolute nothingness to an infinite mind. To me a mind is a duality machine, it processes information. In the case of the biological brain, for it's survival. In AI, we can train neural network to classify information (literally the same as dualities). When it comes to absolutely nothing, I would think that absolutely nothing = no mind. I don't see how there is appearances of duality (or of anything) in the first place.

I see that with a duality machine (mind) anything can be made since all things are dualities. But I don't see how absolute nothingness in itself has this ability to subdivide or make dual. This leads me to think that this "ability to make dual" is a property of the body and therefore the body is real and if it dies I'll lose that ability forever. It probably sounds ridiculous to you, but I don't see it.

Edited May 18, 2021 by 4201

[Nahm]

2 hours ago, 4201 said:

I just don't see how consciousness or absolute nothingness can separate itself.......

It can’t, but that doesn’t stop it from talking about itself as a separate thing which can’t separate itself. 

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I am not able to equate absolute nothingness to an infinite mind. To me (1) a mind (2) is a duality machine......

And apparently a very efficient one at that, it’s work is done before it even began.

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How does absolute nothingness appears as all of these things?

It doesn’t have to appear as things, just the thoughts ‘it’ & ‘things’, and the ‘asking how’. Or, “distinctions”. 

[4201]

8 hours ago, Nahm said:

It can’t, but that doesn’t stop it from talking about itself as a separate thing which can’t separate itself. 

And apparently a very efficient one at that, it’s work is done before it even began.

How does absolutely nothing even talk? "It doesn't even talk, it appears as a talker" but then that just goes to the 3rd point.

Fair enough pointing out the idea that a mind has an ability to create dualities is my idea. But I don't see how nothingness appear as separate.

8 hours ago, Nahm said:

It doesn’t have to appear as things, just the thoughts ‘it’ & ‘things’, and the ‘asking how’. Or, “distinctions”. 

How does even anything appear?

If I asked "how does this view of the mountain appear?" someone would say "actually this view of the moutain is precisely absolutely nothing seen as multiple things (the mountains, the trees, the clouds, the sky) because you distinguish between those things with dualities".

But then how do those thoughts or dualities appear? If you use the same explanation, it just adds more appearance of thoughts to explain other apperance and that never ends.

I do get that this present moment is all there is and it's absolutely nothing. But it sure appears as if I'm dreaming, having a life, talking, typing on this keyboard. What is the trick used to make this dream with absolutely nothing? If I have dualities, I can redefine what nothing and something are and materialize anything in this nothingness. But to do that I need dualities. How do I make them appear in the first place?

[Nahm]

 

1 hour ago, 4201 said:

I do get that this present moment is all there is and it's absolutely nothing

Awesome! ??