some of my thoughts on the matter:

I think conscious states are all relative.  What I refer to as Cosmic Consciousness in my article, I'm well aware would be laughed at and regarded as primitive by hypothetical beings who possessed truly godlike minds and conscious states, far above what I refer to as Cosmic Consciousness.  It's all relative.  What we regard as 'highest' or 'best' can always be surpassed.

To the extent that consciousness involves representation, it may be referred to as 'illusion', even in states of 'cosmic consciousness'.

I think expanding consciousness is a very worthy goal for all who truly understand thru experience what it's all about.  That is, that our very Being is identical to our state of consciousness.  By expanding our state of consciousness, we expand what we are, we expand our Being.  It's a magnificent thing, I think.  But all-too-many people don't pay close enough attention to their own thoughts and states of mind to really notice the value and worthiness of expanding one's consciousness.

I think eastern philosophy has greatly overlooked the potential of the human mind.  With their emphasis on enlightenment (samadhi, nirvana, buddha-consciousness), they missed the point that all conscious states are relative, and that what they refer to as 'god-consciousness' or the equivalent is but a rung on an infinitely high ladder.

I am hungry of knowledge.
Teach me   (if you like.......)

Consciousness exists
Consciousness is part of our existance
We have intellectual influence on this consciousness
Our Consciousness can make us remain existant until the point of when we actually die.
Or to the point of where we want to die. (for different reasons)
Sink or swim
To exist or not to exist

Shawn is right.
You are Confined when you laze around in the Confined.
And alot of people don't seem to notice that.
They do not want to pay attention to thinking about thought at all...
it is only themselves. (a self-assert.. etc, etc,)
And not some other mental drive

Through thought we avoid problems
Rationality works for those who can listen.
When one sustains one's life (exist as a sender).. one truly sustains OUR life, mankind.

Sink or swim
to exist or not to exist
to be or not to  be?

Sounds so simple really....
I bet there is more

Conscious States are relative...
We have influence on these conscious states.
And thus the power to sustain life.

Thus... they can be divided into *which conscious state of mind can be better or not...
for it is better to live.. than to kill oneself

but that statement may be relative as well,
GAH!!

reading this post caused me to read your expanding consciousness page..

first I must ask, why should we expand our consciousness?
you say "normal" consciousness is too mundane and limiting, but it seems to work quite well for many people... at the present time our way of life seems to require this kind of consciousness.. I'll grant that (if) in 50 years or so when we can be uploaded into computers, consciousness tinkering will become easy and may become an acceptable way of life for many people, but for now I think "normal" consciousness suits us well enough

you speak of time dilation, but I wonder if it really occurs, or is just an artifact of the altered state.. I know that time estimation, or the subjective pass of time changes (similar to how as a child time seemed much slower than it does now, at least for me) but I wonder if you can actually fit in more complete thoughts.. how would you even measure that?

next, why is being able to perceive a sense of vastness good? aside from that, I think the feeling is an artificial sense of vastness.. I would wager you can no better hold a galaxy in mind while altered than you can while at baseline

in minsky's the society of mind, he says that infants have no distinction between body and environment and that it is learned over time.. just as a note
but here too I wonder what's the point of this? why should this be a goal? if you would agree that the mind only has control over things it is physically connected to (by neurons), then having a greater sense of body is no more than an illusion
have you tried the experiment by which you can alter your perception of your body? the experiment is approximately as follows, as related to me by a friend a couple years ago (so I don't remember much)..
sit at a table and close your eyes (I forget if the eye closing is necessary, but to be safe...) and have a friend sit next to you
the friend is to take one of your hands with a finger extended and tap it on the table in time with vim tapping your nose with vis own finger
alas I forget how long this must be done, but eventually you'll feel the taps on the table as if it is your nose
I did a similar experiment while on mushrooms once, but with a chair and after a while I thought to myself "my chair is getting sore"
I'd like to try it drugfree sometime as drugs are not at all necessary for the experiment and probably clouded the feeling some

the ego-death section is too new-agey for me to reply to.. I don't believe that there is a "Self" outside of the mind's conception of itself

I must also question the goal of sensing a ubiquitous "presence".. simply because a part of your brain that is being affected by psychadelics makes you fell that a presence is there does not at all make it a part of the universe, waiting to be discovered

I'd like proof of your higher-dimensional spatial thought statement if you literally mean, for instance, imagining patterns in higher dimensional spaces
I've experienced discovering patterns and connections that I hadn't noticed before, but my judgement of them at the time was that they were noticed by ignoring parts of one or both of the objects being compared and that the connections in fact weren't there, or if so were really trivial or meaningless

your goal of ecstasy reminds me of the hedonistic imperative (www.hedweb.com), a site you may want to look at if you're interested.. they take the idea quite a bit farther than sticking an electrode into your medial forebrain bundle (which really sounds like fun to me actually:))

finally, I don't understand multi-model integration I think.. aren't the modalities already integrated? isn't that what binding is? or are you talking more about synesthesia? (I can never spell that right.. I imagine that's close)

thank you, digfarenough,  for all of your excellent critical questions and comments.   I can't reply fully right now, but will take up your questions later tonight, since it's going to take me a deal of (subjective) time to compose a satisfactory reply.

take care.

I hope you don't take it as an attack on your person, I'm just very critical of such.. intangible ideas

I often find them filled with many concepts that to me are undefined so they read to me like new-age philosophy, set somewhere apart from what we've learned from science.. but (*checking your cv*) you seem to be quite educated so perhaps you can explain it

and no offense.. but mensa? the idea of that group always struck me as silly..

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I hope you don't take it as an attack on your person

no, of course not.  What is 'my person', after all?   If you believe in, experience, and/or identify with, the universality of self, the 'It' underlying the personal ego, then it's not really possible to attack one's person or identity.      

You brought up a number of excellent points that I'd like to address.  I was hoping to last night, but I got caught up in something else, so I'll have to try again later today.

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no offense.. but mensa? the idea of that group always struck me as silly

you're right, and I should probably remove it from my cv when I get around to updating it.   It's a silly group, composed largely of superficial elitists who believe they're intelligent because an IQ test told them so, but unfortunately lacking in other skills and traits, such as interpersonal skills, empathy, creativity, motivation, as well as forms of intelligence apparently not measured by whatever IQ tests they happened to take.     I left Mensa about a year ago of my own accord because I was disappointed in both what it was and what it wasn't.   I thought, if you have a group of "intelligent" people, then you should all be doing intelligent, worthy things with your time for others, and to engage in actions that act as an example and inspiration for others to emulate and, perhaps even, to surpass.   But such is not the case, or at least, I didn't see any evidence of it.   I'm sure there are some Mensans out there who love their group and will take offense to what I say, but I am only voicing my opinion here, with the understanding that other people might, and probably will, disagree with me and my judgment of Mensa......but that's ok.

hehe.. I meant that in the idiomatic sense.. I meant to say that I'm only criticizing this one idea (which if it is an integral part of your philosophy, could, I suppose, be taken as attacking everything you believe in...)

of mensa, I think that part, but not all, of the problem is that it is such a pop group of "intellectuals".. the requirements are pretty low (just like iq of 130 on a 15 std. dev. test, isn't it?) which means that people of all different sorts will join, as if being in it grants some odd status.. at one time I, myself, thought of joining one of thos socieities, but it didn't take long for me to decide against it...

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first I must ask, why should we expand our consciousness?

a member here, preacher joe, put it nicely when he said that "expanding consciousness is the only game in town".  But let me offer my own perspective:  our being consists in our consciousness.  Hence, expanding consciousness increases our being, our existence.   Assuming that all beings have an inherent desire to increase their existence and being, it follows that increasing one's consciousness is the only way to go.    Of course, you don't need to accept the before-mentioned assumption, but I would reply by modifying the before-mentioned assumption to the following: that any being that experiences a sufficiently expanded state of consciousness will endeavor, or acquire this inherent desire, to further expand one's consciousness.   Therefore, if you don't experience this desire to expand your consciousness, for me it would imply that it's because you haven't experienced a sufficiently expanded state of consciousness.   Of course, I'm not presuming anything about what you've experienced personally, but am directing my reply to people in general.

Alternatively, to the extent that we find experience meaningful, then so will we desire to increase it's meaningfulness by expanding our consciousness.   'Truth' is not something to be talked about or explained to others, but rather something to be experienced directly.   This direct experience necessarily involves expanded states of consciousness..... states of consciousness that must be experienced to be understood.  Without the direct experience of expanded states of consciousness, verbal descriptions of their meaningfulness and justification will be empty.    The direct experience of expanded states of consciousness justifies itself to the one who experiences them.    To the one who hasn't experienced them, it's difficult to give a solid justification for endeavoring to experience these transcendent states, except to say that therein resides the answers to one's deepest questions, that therein resides the meaning of one's existence, that therein resides the divine.   The divine is not so much something to be talked about as it is something to be experienced.    

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you say "normal" consciousness is too mundane and limiting, but it seems to work quite well for many people... at the present time our way of life seems to require this kind of consciousness.. I'll grant that (if) in 50 years or so when we can be uploaded into computers, consciousness tinkering will become easy and may become an acceptable way of life for many people, but for now I think "normal" consciousness suits us well enough

if it seems to work well for many people, it is because they are ignorant of the existence and nature of expanded states of consciousness.   Of course, all levels of consciousness are relative, and no doubt the average person experiences 'ups' and 'downs' in terms of levels of consciousness, but the spectrum of levels of consciousness experienced by most people is very small indeed, and those who experience a much higher level, a much expanded state of consciousness, realize that 'normal' consciousness is far too limiting, that it is a prison, a prison that its captures don't even see because they can't see outside the confines of their 'normal' consciousness.

I don't think getting uploaded into computers is the answer.  If anything, the permanent expansion of our consciousness will likely come through combined approach utilizing neuropharmacology, stimulating electrodes, and neural graft implants.    I believe this sort of modification and expansion of our states of consciousness resides in the near future.

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you speak of time dilation, but I wonder if it really occurs, or is just an artifact of the altered state.. I know that time estimation, or the subjective pass of time changes (similar to how as a child time seemed much slower than it does now, at least for me) but I wonder if you can actually fit in more complete thoughts.. how would you even measure that?

but what is time?   Is it an objective property, is it just a measure of change, or is it intrinsically linked to consciousness or observation (consider the role of the observer in quantum mechanics in terms of collapsing the wave function).     Regarding how to measure subjective time, I think a third-person, objective way to do it would be to measure the degree of change in a certain type of neural activity that acts as the brain's "time-keeper" and that is involved in the representation of time and temporal events.

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next, why is being able to perceive a sense of vastness good? aside from that, I think the feeling is an artificial sense of vastness.. I would wager you can no better hold a galaxy in mind while altered than you can while at baseline

it's good to the extent that our being, our existence, becomes vast, or is experienced as such.  There is no comparison here with baseline.   Comparing the sense of vastness in an altered or transcendent state vs. a baseline state,  I don't think is possible.   They seem completely different experiences.   It's not just a matter concerning the degree of vastness perceived, but something more, something which must simply be experienced to be understood.   I know you won't be satisfied with this answer, but it's the best I can give.   It's like asking "what is it like to be a bat"  (from Nagel), which unfortunately, we can never know "what it's like" unless we experience it, firsthand, ourselves.

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if you would agree that the mind only has control over things it is physically connected to (by neurons), then having a greater sense of body is no more than an illusion

no.  Certainly there are many parts of your body (like your appendix) that 'you' have no control over, but you still consider it part of your body.   The experience of wholeness, of unity, of being connected with everything else, of being a part of everything else, is not an illusion.    Even physics, both classical and quantum mechanical, tells us that everything is interconnected.    Why should we not be able to experience this, and given that we experience it, why should the experience be labeled an illusion?    The ego believes it's tied down to the body, but that which lies beneath the ego, the impersonal 'It' that lies at our existential cores and constitutes our real identity and which is more fundamental than ego, knows itself not tied down to anything, and knows that the experience of being tied down to a particular body is simply an illusion.  

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the ego-death section is too new-agey for me to reply to.. I don't believe that there is a "Self" outside of the mind's conception of itself

have you experienced depersonalization?  have you ever just been pure awareness, without any memory of your past, without any notion of personal identity..... just pure, disembodied, free-floating consciousness?   This pure awareness, this Self, constitutes the existential core of everyone, and is one and the same Self in everyone, realized to differing degrees in individuals.   The ego is an illusion, an illusion that deludes the Self into thinking that therein resides its true identity.  But those who experience ego-death, know this to be false..... that one's true identity is not ego, but is an impersonal 'It'.    The ego is an illusion, a shell, that masquerades as one's true identity.    Ego-death is necessary to realize the falsity of ego, and as such, it constitutes an important experience on the path to greater enlightenment and greater consciousness.  Once one experiences ego death, the ego is seen for what it really is, an illusion..... sure, it has useful functions in allowing us to function in life as an individual, and in aiding towards the preservation of our 'body', but it is a false identity.    

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I must also question the goal of sensing a ubiquitous "presence".. simply because a part of your brain that is being affected by psychadelics makes you fell that a presence is there does not at all make it a part of the universe, waiting to be discovered

The experience of "presence" I spoke of involved the dissolution of the subject/object dichotomy.   As such,  I experienced myself as 'one' with my environment.   I was pure, disembodied, identity-less, expanded consciousness.....   the mystical experience of "presence" was, naturally, experienced as a part of me, of my being, and was not experienced as part of some universe that was separate from me.    What exactly does this all mean?   I don't know.    

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I'd like proof of your higher-dimensional spatial thought statement if you literally mean, for instance, imagining patterns in higher dimensional spaces

Unfortunately, there is no proof, only the experience.   I suppose, if I had been more composed, I could've tried to solve complicated mathematical problems during my experience of higher-dimensional spatial thought, and thereby produced 'proof' that I'd experienced such things, but I didn't do this, in part because I was in awe.....

Space is a construct of the mind.    It's not surprising to me that the brain should be able to constuct higher dimensional spaces.    If we were 2-D creatures, living in some 2-D world, then I'm sure all our spatial thoughts would be of a 2-D nature.   The fact that we can imagine 3-D spatial thoughts is because our brains try to model a 3-D universe, since the external universe we perceive apparently is approximately euclidean 3-D, at least locally.     The ability to experience higher-dimensional thought should therefore be seen as a latent ability of the mind/brain, a latent ability that can be realized under the appropriate conditions and/or with the appropriate 'tweaking' of the mind/brain system.

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your goal of ecstasy reminds me of the hedonistic imperative (www.hedweb.com), a site you may want to look at if you're interested.. they take the idea quite a bit farther than sticking an electrode into your medial forebrain bundle (which really sounds like fun to me actually:))

I remember that site... a great site.    How do they take the idea further?

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finally, I don't understand multi-model integration I think.. aren't the modalities already integrated? isn't that what binding is? or are you talking more about synesthesia? (I can never spell that right.. I imagine that's close)

it's closer to synesthesia, but different nonetheless.   I didn't say much about multi-model integration because there's no way to really describe it.   Imagine, if you will, that your different modalities of vision, audition, proprioception, etc..,  are like separate branches on a tree.... normally, they're very different from each other.   We experience vision, and we know immediately that it's "vision" and not "audition".   But now try to imagine that your modalities are moving from the branches to the trunk, to a single source, a single, strange type of modality, a single experience.     Now, vision, audition, and proprioception are no longer discernable as distinct modalities, but become blended into one.....  I can't explain it any better than that.   It's like, during normal awareness, our modalities are completely separate and distinguishable (in a sense, divergent), but under certain conditions, can be made convergent, in the sense that they all converge into a single modality that involves all of them, and then some.  


I hope this help answers some of your questions.   Taking my inspiration from Nietzsche, I would say that man's consciousness is but a bridge onto higher things; higher states of consciousness and higher modes of being.   We must cross this bridge, for this is where our future lies.

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the impersonal 'It'

I don't understand why you conceive being as impersonal or 'it' (or maybe I do, but let's let the devil speak   ).  I feel to be completely Me, not some kind of 'it'! don't you?   ???

btw, I really am interested in these unmentionable and enigmatic experiences of yours (drug or not) from which you appear to have derived some form of 'esoteric' direction/meaning.  C'mon, you can trust me!   ;D


8)

that's quite a bit to respond to, and it's late, but I'll give it a shot anyhow

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our being consists in our consciousness

I'm not sure exactly what you mean here.. but allow me to misinterpret it:
a very great deal of what we do are things we are not conscious of, and of the things we are conscious of, we aren't always conscious of our reasons
there's a great quote from orson scott card's children of the mind:
"I find out what I really want by seeing what I do," said Ender. "That's what we all do, if we're honest about it. We have our feelings, we make our decisions, but in the end we look back on our lives and see how sometimes we ignored our feelings, while most of our decisions were actually rationalizations because we had already decided in our secret hearts before we ever recognized it consciously."

for a small-scale example, the other day I found myself washing the dishes when there was really no need to... as I washed them I pondered why I was doing it and could come up with no good reason, simply part of my brain decided to do them

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any being that experiences a sufficiently expanded state of consciousness will endeavor, or acquire this inherent desire, to further expand one's consciousness.

I think it's a somewhat accepted fact that there is a degree of animal consciousness, especially in our close relatives, like chimps... it's also known that chimps won't self-administer hallucinogens... I think everyone who has tried lsd would agree that it meets many of your consciousness expanding ideas, but here we have a being who, given it once, has no desire to get it again

hypothetically (for I am unsure of legalities:), let us say I've dabbled in lsd, dxm, and mushrooms.. each of which is quite a different experience and, especially in the first two cases, each causes a significant change in consciousness.. in this case, I would have first-hand experience of what you describe

I have a friend who attaches great spiritual significance to such experiences.. where he sees spirits and demons, I see stimulation from exogenous chemicals.. perhaps it is my different viewpoint at this fundamental level that makes the experience different for me, for I see the conciousness change as artificial

however, that being said.. as I think about it, that probably doesn't matter.. the interpretation of the change doesn't matter as much as the change itself, so I will continue..

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Of course, all levels of consciousness are relative, and no doubt the average person experiences 'ups' and 'downs' in terms of levels of consciousness, but the spectrum of levels of consciousness experienced by most people is very small indeed, and those who experience a much higher level, a much expanded state of consciousness, realize that 'normal' consciousness is far too limiting, that it is a prison, a prison that its captures don't even see because they can't see outside the confines of their 'normal' consciousness

can I call you morpheus?
I understand what you're saying here..
it's like me telling someone who perpetually exists in that "just waking up state" that there is a whole higher realm of consciousness, where one is capable of much greater thoughts
but you claim there is a higher realm still where everone should stay...
have you read any greg egan? he has his volunatry autists in distress, and in another book I haven't yet read, his dream monkeys (if I correctly recall the term).. in both cases they are groups of people who voluntarily destroy parts of their brain to live a simpler life, far below our "normal" consciousness
in distress there is a great monologue about the danger in calling someone's decision like this "unhealthy" that I already have typed in so I can put it up here if you like

but my main concern is purpose.. the appropriate level of consciousness depends on what you're trying to do... if you're designing a bridge there's a certain reasonable level.. or do you feel even feats of engineering are better done with a greatly expanded consciousness?
I don't think the higher levels are entirely without purpose.. the main one that comes to mind is entertainment, it can indeed be fun at that level

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consider the role of the observer in quantum mechanics in terms of collapsing the wave function

I believe it's actually the role of the measurement, not the observer verself (you'll have to pardon my gender-neutral pronouns:), I'm not a fan of everything penrose says, but I like his one graviton theory..

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I think a third-person, objective way to do it would be to measure the degree of change in a certain type of neural activity that acts as the brain's "time-keeper" and that is involved in the representation of time and temporal events.

definitely a good idea, assuming the brain works this way.. as far as I know no one knows much about how the brain handles time perception

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It's like asking "what is it like to be a bat"  (from Nagel)

yeah, I think that's a great idea he came up with.. I've wondered on occasion about it myself.. those quazy qualia..
of vastness, I see what you're saying here.. I don't know that the conception I have in my mind of this consciousness expansion is the same as yours, but I'm beginning to understand what you're saying, in my own way.. but that's how all language works

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Certainly there are many parts of your body (like your appendix) that 'you' have no control over, but you still consider it part of your body.

I think you may have misread what I said there..
I agree with this, of course.. my claim was more like, if you experience a chair as being part of you, in a sense it doesn't matter, because you can't move the chair like you could a finger... of course, that doesn't matter because it isn't what you're getting at at all..

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The experience of wholeness, of unity, of being connected with everything else, of being a part of everything else, is not an illusion.    Even physics, both classical and quantum mechanical, tells us that everything is interconnected.    Why should we not be able to experience this, and given that we experience it, why should the experience be labeled an illusion?

I agree that at a fundamental level we are all the same stuff, energy.. and we all exist in the same spacetime, and who knows, maybe energy is crystalized spacetime.. but either way, there are indeed sense in which we are all connected
but just because my phone and your phone are both connected, in a sense, doesn't mean that I can pick mine up and call you if it isn't plugged in...
the phone has no way to utilize that interconnectedness.. I think it's the same with us, we can experience the "true" interconnectedness because we have no sensory device for it..
to use an analogy.. if you're in a planetarium and look up at the ceiling you can see stars, there really are stars out in space, but that doesn't mean what you see projected on the ceiling are the real stars.. they're an illusion.. you experience seeing stars all right, just not the real ones that exist elsewhere

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The ego believes it's tied down to the body, but that which lies beneath the ego, the impersonal 'It' that lies at our existential cores and constitutes our real identity and which is more fundamental than ego, knows itself not tied down to anything, and knows that the experience of being tied down to a particular body is simply an illusion

now.. you kind of lose me here
my problem may be the I'm only familiar with the concept of the ego from freud, and I don't believe in that ego, superego, and id thing, so I don't know how to understand your use of ego.. I prefer to think at a level as close to the brain that I can, can you translate the ego and the impersonal "It" to such a level for me?

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have you experienced depersonalization?  have you ever just been pure awareness, without any memory of your past, without any notion of personal identity..... just pure, disembodied, free-floating consciousness?   This pure awareness, this Self, constitutes the existential core of everyone, and is one and the same Self in everyone, realized to differing degrees in individuals

I have experienced such moments very briefly during meditation before.. I think not enough is known about consciousness to talk about them on my preferred level.. but they feel like a temporary stop of everything but some basic quality of consciousness itself.. perhaps this is what you mean by the Self
do you mean this that I just said by your claim that this is the existential core of everyone?
the claim seems to be unprovable, I don't mean to get all science-y on you, but how could you prove this is true?
I may or may not understand what you mean when you talk of ego-death.. if my above understandings are correct then I think I see what you're saying..

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What exactly does this all mean?   I don't know

hehe, sorry, but I guess that makes two of us

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I suppose, if I had been more composed, I could've tried to solve complicated mathematical problems during my experience of higher-dimensional spatial thought, and thereby produced 'proof' that I'd experienced such things, but I didn't do this, in part because I was in awe

when I first read your claim of being able to do this higher-dimensional spatial thought, I considered posing math problems that would require such thought.. then I realized I would need to be able to think that way to propose them.. alas my four-dimensional spatial abilities are only so/so (better than most people I'd wager though.. I still can't tie a knot in a plane without resorting to starting from a 3-d knot, but I can intersect two planes at a single point without problem...)

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If we were 2-D creatures, living in some 2-D world, then I'm sure all our spatial thoughts would be of a 2-D nature.   The fact that we can imagine 3-D spatial thoughts is because our brains try to model a 3-D universe, since the external universe we perceive apparently is approximately euclidean 3-D, at least locally.     The ability to experience higher-dimensional thought should therefore be seen as a latent ability of the mind/brain, a latent ability that can be realized under the appropriate conditions and/or with the appropriate 'tweaking' of the mind/brain system

for my undergrad thesis, I did a project on visualizations of four-dimensional objects, so I'm somewhat in my element here.. such as the flatland reference there
with extensive training, one can learn to think four-dimensionally.. I can't recall the fellow's name, but at least one person managed to do this, and even wrote a book on how to do it, I can provide the information easily if you want it, it just isn't at hand at the moment
for the most part though, it takes a lot of work.. and as for visualization, as in creating a mental image, we're stuck entirely to three dimensions, we can't even do two.. so four is kind of out of the question, at least in my opinion

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How do they take the idea further?

an excellent question that I could answer if I had read it recently.. unless I was wrong in making that claim
but I do recall they had more ideas than just stimulating plasure centers.. especially as experience has shown that rats pretty quickly die when given that ability..

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But now try to imagine that your modalities are moving from the branches to the trunk, to a single source, a single, strange type of modality, a single experience.     Now, vision, audition, and proprioception are no longer discernable as distinct modalities, but become blended into one.....  I can't explain it any better than that.   It's like, during normal awareness, our modalities are completely separate and distinguishable (in a sense, divergent), but under certain conditions, can be made convergent, in the sense that they all converge into a single modality that involves all of them, and then some

I believe I understand what you mean, at least in some sense... it sounds like an abstraction of the idea of a modality.. hm.. maybe more like a superclass of which each you mentioned is a subclass.. perhaps it's best left stated as you did, actually


your claim that consciousness is the future may be correct.. it's clear the evolution uses its creations of one generation as the tools for its next improvements... kurzweil thinks intelligence is the tool for the next generation.. perhaps consciousness is actually the tool, more likely it's both together..

I think a roadblock will be the law though... for the past, oh.. 70 or 80 years (I forget), playing with consciousness has been looked down on... things may be slowly changing, only time will tell on that one.. I, for one, hope that they do change..

interesting topic. So the question is not IF there are higher consciousness states, since many people have experienced them, but HOW to turn them on and control them

You don't control them.
Because the ego lives on the surface of formlessness it cannot take its kingdom into the realm where rules do not apply.

Mt 19:24 And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

Mk 10:25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

Lk 18:25 For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

The meaning of the phrase quoted by Matthew, Luke and Mark, refers to riches as the objects of physical sense. It doesn't matter what you value in the physical world whether its money of bananas, you can't take it with you beyond the confines of a world built on beliefs.

The clue in the message of the sage Jesus that refers to the scriptural quotes above was when he said,"I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands." He was saying the physical body being the temple built by the hands (senses) would be destroyed and then would he raise the body that was built of higher conscious awareness, one that is not limited by the identification with the world and one that is not mortal, but immortal.

The eye of the needle represented the rock in the desert which lay in the path between two points of travel where the travelers with their camels whould have to take everything off of the backs of the camel and have it get down in its knees and crawl through the fissure to pass through.

The reference applies to any human belief system which is bound by limitation of identity and programming which is called "Ego".

Control is motivated by the belief that there is no freedom to manifest or create without pitfalls that are created by the opposing thought streams.
All that is created is manifest through thought or desire and the universe does not hear negatives.

The human belief system is similar to packing ideas onto a constantly moving entity, not unlike the camel packed with all of the travelers belongings. In order for the human to evolve it must pass through a fissure of refinement that does not allow for anything other than the soul to pass. Not the soul and all of its beliefs. The ego identifies with enlightenment "AND", it believes in itself as separate from all the things it values rather than seeing itself in all that it values. The only way one can have what they want is to realize what they want is inside of them rather than outside of themselves.

From the ego the intellect approaches reality from the outside looking in, where as the enlightened approach the reflection of reality from the inside or the formless as it moves outward into manifestation.

There is only the concept of control from limited awareness.

There is no limitation to the human condition other than those that are self imposed.

He was very poor at straight talking wasn't he? A bit like some contributers to this forum. Notwithstanding that, so where are we with respect to what he said?

Can you give particular examples?



people mean different things by control. Perhaps in a higher level of awareness than you have experienced, Joesus, you will rediscover the concept of control, viewed in a new light. Why would you assume I meant to attach the everyday meaning to my use of the word?

Understanding is always relative to clarity of the mind. He also said, "Those that have the eyes to see and ears to hear know what I say."


We?

Sure


I didn't assume anything, I simply answered your question.