Hey CF and Forgotten Purpose,

Hi MisterJingo

1) So the mind is the connection between the collective unconscious (i.e. god) and the practitioner, and through that
connection magic is performed?

In such philosophies, the mind, the collective unconscious and the practitioner are all borne of the same conscious stuff. Why consciousness takes such a fractured form is explained differently depending upon the philosophy or belief system.

2) So the limitations to magic are only what the practitioner and the collective unconscious put on it?

A better way of seeing this is that reality is the limitation enforced by some form of collective consciousness. Magic in such terms would be anything conceivable (or not) outside of this reality construct. Keep in mind that even concepts themselves, such as reality, are part of the construct.

4) How does magic have little or no effect other then transformation of the practitioner? If reality is a construct of the mind
then shouldn't things the mind alters effect everyone involved in the construction of reality?

In my previous post I mentioned either reality is a total construct of the mind (in which science has no reality outside of collective belief), or that the mind is a product of some external reality which we perceive through internal reconstruction based upon our limited sensory input. In this later view, only our internal experience of reality is a product of the mind, external reality would be independent. In such a view, magical belief would simply be a means of altering ones view of the world, rather than altering the actual world. In the other view (reality being the stuff of consciousness), magical belief would allow for (perceived) external reality to be changed.

5) So you are saying why use magic when you could accomplish your desires just as easily by physical means?
   or using illusions to accomplish goals the way Chris Angel amazes audiences?

Forgotten Purpose

As above, it’s more a case of reality is what created us, or we are what created reality. If we created reality, then there’s no reason why we shouldn’t use this creative belief to alter reality. But if didn’t, then we could spend a lifetime hoping for things which would never come . The problem is, how do you determin the nature of reality to allow you to chose one belief or the other?

An agnostic simply doesn't make any decision regardless of the presented evidence. An atheist decides that the probability of a god existing is incredibly small based upon the currently available evidence, but doesn't discount the possibility of a god existing entirely. For example, a Christian would be considered atheist in regards to ancient Gods such as Thor and Zeus.
An anti-theist disbelieves in the existence of any god. people usually confuse atheism with anti-theism.

At our current time and place, time is pretty much constant, it simply changes relative to the observer. Time does not speed up or slow, your perception of it does.
Something interesting to note is the area of the brain which is used for time perception degrades as we get older. It means we becoming less accurate in our estimate of times passage, and explains why when we're younger, even ten minutes seems an age, yet when we get older, time seems to speed up. Time remains at our childhood rate, we simply become less able to experience it accurately. This gives the effect of time speeding up as we age.

Hey Embodied Words,

Spiritual evolution is usually more than positive thoughts - it also implies a refinement of mind, consciousness and even EGO. Likewise, devolution would imply a reduction of these things - digressing into a simple, more basic, state of mind.
Regarding negative or black thoughts, I’d say it’s generally a good thing to follow them rather than repress them – but only as long as you don’t feel a compulsion to act on them. It’s a fine line between working through something and wallowing in something.
When I was younger I’d generally see a lot of messed up things if I lay with my eyes closed, demons, death, that sort of thing. The source of it seemed to be my mind was uncontrolled and so kept throwing up things I felt I didn’t want to see, or feared to see. By facing it, I eventually came through the other end with more control over my mind, and whatever issues were throwing up such images resolved.

makes me want to be sick!
All that putrid "i'll never look into your eyes again" blah yak!
The only thing that separates us is the width of an electron..hahahaha
u r a MAX plank

And with that, you miss the entire point of the poem.
It's not about "never looking into eyes again"; it's about the ephemeral nature of experience.
It's about how those people or objects closest to us are only ever experienced through our own sensory interpretations. Such as touching your lover or being touched: your body simply interprets a stimulated nerve ending which is combined with visual and auditory input, creating an experienced which is filtered entirely through ones own experience to date.
We have a brief respite from the void, non-experience, death, and even in this time we are totally and utterly alone – all contact and experience is ourselves experiencing ourselves, and then we are gone: on the longest timeline, even gods die.

I’ll try answering your questions based upon my past experience with ceremonial magick of various sorts.

1) What is the source of magic and in what way is it controlled?

The traditional source of magic was/is the mind. The world view of a system which incorporates such beliefs usually sees the mind and reality as indistinguishable. More often than not, objective reality is some form of cohesive group creation in the greater spectrum of consciousness. With this view, the mind – with intent, could effect change in physical reality. Ceremonial objects, incantations, and ceremonies are usually a means of moving the mind into a specific receptive state – which will allow the intent of the magic to manifest in reality.

2) What uses does magic have? Both good and bad?

If you believe in magic, it can literally do anything you desire – although with the above world view, one must first counteract the accumulative beliefs of the other minds in this reality structure. This is usually the reason given for people not seeing miraculous things on a daily basis.
I’d also make the point that magic in this sense would purely be change, any good or bad labels would be relative to the observer.

4) Is there a large difference between science and magic, or is magic just another branch of science?

This is the crux of a very big problem. Either reality is a mind construct, which would render science as just another belief system. Or reality has some objective basis (whatever that might be), and the reason magic isn’t prevalent is because it has little to no effect outside transformation of the person evoking the magic.
The fact the mind is geared to decipher reality based upon internal desires – to the extent that falsehoods can actively be believed and seen, makes this an area which is very difficult to reach any conclusions on.

Life can be distracting at times (I'm currently going through such a time myself!)

Welcome back .

An atheist shouldn't disbelieve in a second life, they should simply view the probability - based on current evidence - of such a thing existing as being extremely small. A seasoned atheist would also not view one or two personal experiences (in seclusion) of astral projection as conclusive proof, due to the many unknown factors in the experience, how it occurred and our current knowledge of mind and brain. It's perfectly possible to project and be an atheist, it simply means you remain open minded and don't buy into any particular belief system regarding what AP is.

Hey rygoody,

i'm not sure that magnetism as we currently understand it can explain gravity, as magnatism has very specific effects on only specific local materials/particles. The graviton is also only one hypothesis of gravity, but with all things in QM, there is no such thing as an absolute particle due to wave-particle duality. We can find remnants of energy which suggest the big bang, but nothing is still flowing from the big bang itself. At the point of the big bang, no matter existed, and forces (and energies) as we know them now (including magnetism) either didn't exist or behaved differently than they do now.

Regarding Magnetoencephalography (MEG), this technology simply detects the magentic fields produced by electrical activity in the brain i.e. focused will is the result of the activity rather than the cause. All electrical activity causes a magentic field (electromagnetism). Findings produced by MEG are challenging our views of consciousness and are progressively explaining how consciousness (as we understand it) could arise from the brain alone.

 

How can we explain culture and the development of different languages in organisms with the same DNA and brain structure?

One way of looking at this is that the brain has a predisposition to communicative methods, the methods themselves are irrelevant, but societal and cultural conditioning would give preference to what those methods are.
 Interestingly, research has also shown that areas of the brain used for language generation and comprehension have a very small window of development, such as children who haven’t learnt to speak by a certain age will never be able to produce fluid sentences. They might be able to use words, but the ability to string them together into a narrative will forever be beyond them. Most of the research was developed from ‘wild children’ who had no contact with humans during their childhood.
As an aside, it’s also been shown the various personality traits also require specific stimulus for the brain areas responsible for them to develop correctly. Such as the absence of one parental figure during a child’s life has been shown to have effects on developing brains, and there are now increasingly evident links between certain mental illnesses and such parental absence.

How do we explain Elizabeth Loftus' work on false memory implantation where nothing physical in the subject is changed? So not only physical means can effect our perception of reality but mental ones also.

Agreed, research has shown that neuroplasticity (the ability of the brain to restructure itself) can occur from thought alone. But when we look at a thinking brain with technology such as Magnetoencephalography, we can see the initiation and cascading of thoughts throughout the entire brain. So while the metal seems separated from the physical, it’s hard to actually draw a dividing line.

I think we have reached a point where trying to explain everything by physical means is simply not adequate enough.

And this is where ambiguity sets in. By the very definition of ‘physical’ we cannot ever experience something ‘non-physical’. Every experience, memory, emotion has it’s roots in physical matter. Some might argue that such roots are products of some energetic (soul) interaction, but for such an interaction to occur, that energy/soul etc must have a way of interacting with physical matter. This renders it physical too (by definition), but as yet, simply undetected.

Most people are dualist's nowadays. What's needed in monism and dualism is a discovery that identifies how these two worlds interact with one another. What else can ended the debate? There must be some medium.

Agree with you fully. Any spiritual experience must have means to interact with the physical for it to become known or experienced. I think there is a lot of ‘fuzzy thinking’ in spiritual philosophies which make finding such mediums a lot more difficult.

Unless of course it's all an illusion created by mind, which the transcendental solipsists would have you believe.

And if solipsism held any kind of truth, such discussions as these are pointless !

I suppose it comes down to hardware software debate. The soul/mind/mental universe acting as the software and the body/physical universe acting as the hardware. If the computer breaks down or dies, can the information on it be transferred or stored on the internet? Likewise when the body dies, does consciousness move into something bigger that connects us all?

But to be stored, there has to be a medium to store it on and a mechanism to allow such transference. And even so, we have to ask if information can be stored, what of the operating system that run it? Without such a thing, would information be anything more than mindless symbols only intelligible to a still living human mind/brain?

Atheism is not antitheism, a-theism simply means that based upon the current body of evidence available, the likelihood of a God existing (theism) is quite improbable. It implies nothing else about life, or death, or what happens after death. If more evidence comes to light, then a current atheist might change their stance. In fact, unless people in this thread believe in all Gods from Odin, to Thor, to Yahweh, then all are atheist (or for fence sitters agnostic) in regards to certain Gods.
Regarding materialism, unless one wishes to forsake all else but personal desire for specific beliefs regardless of contradictory evidence, we cannot make any definite claims on this area. As physical beings, we interact with a physical world, our mind is affected by physical mediums (from neurotransmitters, to hormones), regardless of our beliefs on mind, damage to the brain produces specific changes in all who experience the same damage. This implies that at the least personality, moral outlook, and even interpretation of logic and reality have a basis in the physical brain. A person who is happy, sad, in religious or spiritual rapture is feeling the effects of physical mediums on a physical brain. Does anything exist outside of material? It all depends on the definition. Energy has a material basis, and so if the spiritual realms have any true reality, they must have a mechanism of action to affect the physical (else we wouldn’t be able to interact with such realms/energies with our physical bodies), this also means they have a basis in the material.
I think the crux of all this for most people is, is there any reality after brain death? This is something we can’t truly answer right now (one can happily hold faith held belief but that is restrictive), but we can at least make a few predictions. Going off neurological discoveries, it seems much of what we identify as human, id, ego, personality, is linked to a meat brain, and damage to specific areas can have drastic effects on the individual involved. Literally a saint can be turned into what society would label a deviant. This has serious implications for reincarnation, karma, and various other spiritual beliefs. It also has implications on what would survive the decay of the brain, and if something did, would it actually be aware of anything, or have any form of personality? Such arguments as energy not being destroyed are pretty simplistic in regards to this area as on the quantum level energy is generated and destroyed continually, and even if we ignore this, burning a leaf and scattering it’s ashes to the wind does not maintain anything of the original leaf. Likewise, a decaying brain might destroy all traces of the individual, or the electrons which hold together consciousness might simply fade away.
For one to claim absolute knowledge of this either way is closing oneself off to all possibilities (even those which do not taste too pleasant).

Hey Mustardseed,

I havent got time to reply to you right now, so I will later . I've got housework to do .

I dont have a negative attitude towards science, but i think alot of scientists are like alot of religious people, they believe what they want to believe, they will see this POSSIBLE explanation and accept it.

This is a great misunderstanding about science; it does not believe what it wants to believe, it believes what the weight of empirical evidence points to, and what has been backed up in repeated experiments by other people (which shows that whatever phenomenon is the core of the research is repeatable and hence has an objective reality outside of the cultural and scientific constructs used to study that phenomenon).
This discounts they accept possible explanations and that’s that. Also keep in mind that science will update its world view based upon new research, such as Newton’s laws of motion being replaced by Einstein’s laws of relativity.

This attitude is increasing in science these days...  Some people claim to have already proved life after death exists with real facts.  But science ignores them as if there facts was accepted it would change alot of science we currently consider fact.  In other words it would shake the foundations of modern science.

If there was anything objective about such facts, science would study them. Most claims of life after death are irrational or can no way be backed up or studied. A belief does equate to a truth or a fact.

Anyway, these guys didnt trigger a proper OBE.  But they did create some of the feelings and sensations.  But the articles ive read about it say clearly "they didnt trigger a OBE".

They never claimed to have triggered an OBE.

I think its good that there trying to learn about this, it would be nice for some more background on these scientist teams.

Have they ever experienced a real OBE themself?  Have they studied people who have?

Read into Charles Tarts papers regarding his studies on people who claimed to be able to induce OBEs at will (he even included Robert Monroe in his experiments).

OBE's are real....  This experiment doesnt tell us much.

OBEs are real in the sense we can subjectively experience them, or because we can objectively observe them?

[believe]

The article claimed that scientists triggered an obe in the volunteers not that they were able to trigger sensations of an obe. I think there is a distinct difference. As I've admitted and said earlier I have created some sensations in which I felt I was out but wasnt really.

As you state, the article said:

"Experts have found a way to trigger an out-of-body experience in volunteers."

This is the article writers (mis)interpretation of the research; the researchers have not actually claimed this.

The research itself (not a reports poor interpretation) states:

Two teams used virtual reality goggles to con the brain into thinking the body was located elsewhere

The visual illusion plus the feel of their real bodies being touched made volunteers sense that they had moved outside of their physical bodies.

Operative word here is ‘sense’.

The volunteers reported that the sensation seemed to be caused by the pen on their virtual back, rather than their real back, making them feel as if the virtual body was their own rather than a hologram.

Even when the camera was switched to film the back of a mannequin being stroked rather than their own back, the volunteers still reported feeling as if the virtual mannequin body was their own.
And when the researchers switched off the goggles, guided the volunteers back a few paces, and then asked them to walk back to where they had been standing, the volunteers overshot the target, returning nearer to the position of their "virtual self".

Dr Ehrsson said: "This experiment suggests that the first-person visual perspective is critically important for the in-body experience. In other words, we feel that our self is located where the eyes are."

"Scientists have long suspected that the clue to these extraordinary, and sometimes life-changing, experiences lies in disrupting our normal illusion of being a self behind our eyes, and replacing it with a new viewpoint from above or behind."

The above talks about sensations of being out of body, no claims that they actually reproduced an OBE. To back this up further, the report also states:

the two teams, from University College London, UK, and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, believe there is a neurological explanation.
Their work suggests a disconnection between the brain circuits that process visual and touch sensory information may thus be responsible for some OBEs.

I’ve made bold the important words above. The research itself simply reproduced sensations of being out of body, the researchers themselves make no claims that this proves anything about OBEs, although the reporter himself does. That’s a huge difference: Scientists in the article make no claims or predictions, it simply states the results of the experiment. It doesn’t dismiss, or even claim to have proven anything about OBEs other than the sensation of being out of body could have its cause in this visual disconnection between body and perspective. Is this different from OBE techniques which ask people to visualise various things, or stare into the darkness (until the body is asleep and visual sensation would be disconnected from body sensation)?

It was an observation that people who have had what most on this forum would consider a real full blown obe, does change most peoples opinions on the matters of life and death. Im sure perhaps there have been a couple who perhaps it didnt or a few that it scared more than actually helped. Lets say a group of 10 people have obes. Normally around 7 would walk away changed in a huge way (this is assuming that all ten werent too freaked out by it)

I agree it is usually a changing experience. What I personally would love to see is that people didn’t immediately draw conclusions on the meaning of the experience (i.e. survival after death simply because they perceived themselves separate from their body), and that they research all angles and kept an open mind. For many, having an OBE or feeling vibrations somehow justifies an entirely new world view consisting of energy bodies, chakras, astral planes, reincarnation, and life after death. This does not follow from the experience, however exciting and mind opening it might be.

The article is assuming the reason in which people in their experiment felt as if they were out of body is the same reason those that do actually get out feel as though they are out.

The researchers suggest there might be a connection; it was the article writer who assumed. A suggestion is not a decision either way, it simply opens possible avenues of future research.

Each and everytime my body itself has been asleep. According to sleep professionals while the body is asleep you can not consciously feel physical sensations. At least that is what they used to claim. To be a purely physical illusion such as you suggest my physical body would have to be awake, would it not? In the experiement the volunteers were completely awake and capable of feeling physical stimulis. In my obes my physical body is asleep, paralyzed, and Im not capable of consciously feeling anything physical.

When one is asleep, one can still feel physical stimuli, generally though internal stimuli (dreams) are more dominant than the physical stimuli which gets filtered by the subconscious. Some of this can make it to dreams, such as an alarm clock integrating itself into a dream, or even things like nova-dreamer. This is a device which detects rem movement and then flashes a light into the eyes, through reality checking, one will notice the incorporated flashing and use it as a cue to become lucid.

 Its not my intention on arguing though. If you dont agree with anything I have to say thats fine. I know a lot of what I have to say usually seems abstract. There are times I admit though the way I word things is wrong, sorry about that. I dont have anything against science, without it the world would still be in the dark ages.

As my previous post, I am not arguing as such, I just saw everyone misreading the article and then attacking science as a bad thing. Most spiritual forums I belong to are very anti-science, and yet, I see the people most rabid are usually those without a true understanding of scientific principles. So scientists in their eyes become closed minded sceptics who seem to go out of their way to disprove the occult and similar areas, when in truth, scientists would happily research these areas given sufficient cause. Science never dismisses anything as it doesn’t deal in absolutes.

  As a matter of fact in school it was my favorite subject and there was a year or two where I went without making one single mistake on any of the tests,quizzes or homework. I also dont think people should take what others say as fact until they experience it for theirselves.  All I ask is to let the possibility intrigue you, and a willingness to give it a try. I had some friends who have thought of me as being crazy, gave what I suggested a few tries and then admit to me they were succeeding and it scared the sh*t out of them. To me its fine if science never acknowledges obe's as a real thing, that is okay. It's also part of why it is so special. A good majority thinks it does not exist yet it still does, to me that's a special thing and why I feel so honored to have been able to do it as much as I have. I still remember when sleep professionals said that what some termed lucid dreaming was impossible because in sleep the conscious mind could not possibly become active.

Keep on learning in all areas and keep an open mind to all possibilities (which you seem to be doing), and really, that’s all we can ever do .

[THE]

I believe that they will try to use this as the "final word" when it comes to obes though. If they dont thats great if they do then its laughable.

What grounds have you got to believe this? Why do you actually believe this? Don’t you see you are doing exactly what (groundlessly) you accuse science of doing?

That is why I say that imitating something or duplicating an effect does not verify nor deny its reality.

Can you post any examples of things where shared repeatable experience does not prove the reality of those things?

Also it does not mean that the way you created the effect is how the effect is always created.

Agreed, but I’ve not seen anyone claim such a thing.

There are always different paths you can take to the same destination as someone else, and either one could not be considered the right or wrong way as you both ended up at the same place.

Once again, agreed, but I don’t see anyone denying such logic.

Having said that a quote from the paper mentioned: "It gives you a very strong sensation you're sitting somewhere else" Okay Ive had a strong sensation I was some where else that did not mean I had a obe, once again its laughable.

A recorded observation is laughable because? The article is talking about out of body sensations, not THE out of body experience. Sensations in which one perceives themselves to be removed from their body is different from the perception of actually believing one is removed from their physical body.

A good example was sitting in a chair staring at a full length mirror for an extended period of time, concentrating on the fact that perhaps I am not where I think I am to be instead I could be the person staring at me from inside the mirror. This was an exercise I thought of to practice consciousness/awareness placement or displacement. A good 20 minutes of this and with a little zoning off I was no longer sure which me was me. Sure it was a weird and confusing sensation but it was not life changing, truth be told I forgot about that exercise till just now when I was thinking of a close example.

Did you also laugh when you experienced this? Why has an experience got to be life changing oto have any merit or use?

  It certainly felt as though I was the other person in the mirror and sure it confused me. Such as the experiment mentioned confused the experiencer but I am sure they will not walk away from this with a life changing attitude.

Why has the experiencer got to walk away with anything to make the experiment useful? Data was gained, insight into our body perception was gained, so it was a success.

The main point was it was an physical illusion they witnessed. Now how many people who have had a full blown obe walked away from the experience completely changed especially in the way they view life?

Why the obsession with changing ones view of life? If I huff a load of chemicals which causes brain damage my view of life will be changed. Does that make it a good thing?
Also, how can you be so certain that your OBEs have not been a physical illusion? I mean really, how can you ‘know’?

Probably around 90 percent and the others are scared to death but never-the-less changed lol, after all that is what motivates me to record my experiences and what keeps me here to talk about it with others to help them to achieve what I have, so that they too can be changed in this way.

To quote yourself:

That is why I say that imitating something or duplicating an effect does not verify nor deny its reality.

If you truly believe this, why bother keeping a log or sharing your experiences? You admit doing such things does not in any way verify their reality. You are honestly open to the fact that OBEs might be brain induced? Or is the quoted comment wrong?


Once again, I’m not focussing on you, but I get dismayed when I see people being so openly biased about something they either know little about or purposefully misinterpret that thing. Most people in this thread seem to be attacking their own misreading of the experiment. Such things make me lose hope that people are actually looking for any kind of truth, rather than happily wallowing in their own beliefs regardless of any new knowledge or facts.