Category: Spirituality

09/15/15

Questions and speculations on Consciousness

I think, I am, I have a sense of self, and my observations shape reality. There is an apparent intentionality in my actions. I believe I possess the power rebel against existing order, tear it apart and construct a new one. I am a member of a lucky species that has attained a certain degree of consciousness.

But what is that thing we label consciousness. Is it simply and emergent phenomena of an advanced sensory system that is combined with the complex arrangement of neurons and synapses? Is it inevitable that conscious being such as humans should exist in the universe? Are we truly “At home in the Universe”, as Stuart Kauffman would put it?

Is the quality of consciousness intrinsically tied to being human? I am not so sure.

Is it a field that permeates space seeking a suitable medium to express itself? I am happier with that thought, though I have no way to prove it…yet!

We might one day set in motion a process that would create increasingly more advanced mediums of consciousness. We may one day surpass ourselves and hand the baton to nobler and superior beings. There should be joy in that; no fear or shame. It will be just then that we would have fulfilled the ultimate purpose of our species.

12/8/13

Real Stress

Taking a break on the approach to the summit, freezing winds howling fiercely, my youthful partner remarks “I am stressed!”. I shot back with some anger and exasperation “This is nothing! There are levels of stress you have yet to experience!”. My partner stares at me, his face ashen cold and with a pained expression asks “But what on earth could be more stressful than this?”. I answer “Watching a noble dream sublimate into nothingness… and digging deep for the will to live…and learning once more to hope again and to dream again”. We continue our accent…silently.

02/18/13

The praying machine

I watched as he prayed, listening those ancient utterances that had been handed down by the merciful God. 
Words that conjure a beautiful world, in my mind, bringing forth the noblest of human aspirations.
Living words that take on new meaning as I understand more about the universe and its laws, as I tread gently on a path of self discovery.
Words unbound, and unchained by literal views and historical precedents.
Words that animate matter and spirit and shapes reality in a creative act of seeing.

Foolishly I thought that such words bind us.
Foolishly I thought that we prayed to the same God.

The god he worshiped was of made of adulterated matter. Made of  fears, hopes and social constructs.  It was a dominating and dogmatic  god, like he was.
A useful god that cleared for him a road to power and domination over feeble and base minds that continue to worship the Nietzschean dead god of their illusions. The wretches!

Meanings of holy Words, copied from generation to the next without spiritual transubstantiation. Meanings that with time become confused for the Words of God. As cells proceed unto death by making copies, and then dying, those meaning having moved through generations making ever more erroneous copies in minds until DEATH!

Now I know that he is dead! His thoughtless utterances only affirm that he is a machine devoid of spirit.  Motivated by an evolutionary imperative to spread death and stasis in the minds of humanity. He replicated himself through a viral meme, mustering all the resources and powers in his path. What meme? You man ask? Well… he fashions pocket sized gods for the miserable and lost.

I turn to the Source, I reach out for the infinite, the uncontained, the unfathomable, the grandest mystery.  The spectacle of the praying-machine haunting me.