This is not about Actualism practice, its about the theory. If you are a mod and if you want to insist that I should write only about my practice, there is no point to it, because I don't practice Actualism. I have no issues if you delete this post.

We all would have experienced movements within our experience. Subtle movement of the attention wave, movement that is the feeling, movement that is desire. We also know that this movement of desire causes nothing but suffering, thanks to one man who existed long time ago. We also have an idea of how to eliminate this movement of desire, and many people here have achieved that or are very close. We don't know about the other movements, because the man who has taught this only taught us about ending of suffering, which only concerns about ending one type of movement.

Now there is this new theory, that claims to end all types of movement. The experience then will be made up of bare senses. As the senses don't conflict one another, they can all exist together as a unitary field of experience. It will be same every time, just what the senses convey, juxtapposed with the memories and facts concerning them. Again these memories and facts can coexist without affecting the senses themselves, because they don't conflict and there is no movement to take the focus away from the senses, and in due time, there is nothing internally generated to focus, other than the senses and their derivative sensations.

Also, there could be a temporary state, where by undivided intent or something similar, the senses just get into the consciousness, without internally generated inputs. When this just clicks, and the consciousness is filled with senses only, the memories and facts related to these sensations just start to fill the consciousness. Once this crosses a threshold, this becomes a bit stable, and just the unity of consciousness will be enough to prevent conflicting sensations from entering our conscious experience. But something soon happens, probably due to lack of understanding or lack of persistence in the intent, the structure collapses and the movements rush back to existence.

Clearly, these experiences, whether permanent or temporary or totally different from what we experience otherwise. Even the fundamental characteristics don't seem to apply, for there is permanence (this moment is the only thing - which is permanence for example), no suffering, and an essence that is that of the benevolent universe present in this. There is also clarity that is absence of conflict, amazing detail and wonder resulting from all this happening here in this moment.

But I'm not interested in this. I have no motivation to get there, both I and the "I". I am fine with all thats happening within these movements, I have suffering but its not causing any disturbance to peace on earth. I have no issues in interacting with people in peace, and whatever malice that is there doesn't enter the field of action. Just the wonder of benevolent universe is not enough to pull me in it seems.

(If you guys think that is a close representation read on, for I'm getting into more pertinent stuff)

Also there are some concerns. First is this cannot work on a newborn, someone who has just entered human condition. Not because the newborn lacks the ability to apply this method, but something more fundamental. A newborn baby has no memory to juxtappose these things to integrate it into an experience. If by a miracle, a newborn becomes free of all the movements, there might not be anyway to learn, as there are no movements to focus on things that are unknown, away from the sense inputs which probably would be some static noise.

There is also a loss of imagination, as imagination requires a mapping away from the senses. Some report that images get formed and juxtapposed with the experience, not by choice but because of necessity. Whether or not that happens is irrelevant for me, as I am interested only in creative use of imagination. For example, mentalists can remember 100 numbers by mapping them to visual images, while normal human beings can only remember 7 plus or minus 2. This might not have many applications in this world of technology, but we design and model things in our heads right? Tag them, color them according to their functionality and the features sometimes just stand out. Can this be possible by juxtapposition from senses and factual derivations of them?

Loss of social abilties is obvious, as they don't follow from the senses alone, however rich one's sensate universe is. Intutions or half-truths, these things are not useful in themselves, but they are useful for leading to new understanding, opening new avenues of understanding. These constructs are essential elements in creativity, innovation.

Another issue is, if this rich experience that is constructed on top of the senses will accomodate any alternate views? Things have been learnt, associations have been made. But what is the scope of relearning and reassociations? What about comprehension of alternate view points that are not based on sensory experience? With juxtapposition at full flow, will I be at loss of words (unlikely) or seeing things out of context for anything other than the experiences I have and the methods I preach?

Context is everything isn't it? Does context switching happen efficiently in a rich sensate experience? These are vital questions one needs to know, even before the question whether the malice and sorrow has been entirely eliminated or not. With no creative works coming from actualists, no scientific evidence, with the goal of getting rid of malice and sorrow for a heavy trade off, when I have already learnt how to deal with these things (read not translated in action, whether or not one carries it in his bosom is irrelevant), there is no incentive to even try. And since actualists are not talking anything other than actualism, doing nothing other than preaching actualism (in public anyways), I wonder why so many people are even trying.

We are here in this world of information because of our innovation and creativity. Without it we would have still fighting with the animals, with no way to let go of the instinctual passions, and the concept of actualism itself wouldn't have entered the picture.

(Edit: Removed loss of ability to percieve hypothetical situation claim, thanks to Beoman. Some style changes in the same paragraph - changed second person imperative to third person)

A general message to no-one in particular,

I moved this to the Dharma Battleground section as it is where people can get a little heated and express their opposition to certain practices, beliefs, ideas, notions, views and argue, convince, shoot down, express disdain for, oppose, express dislike and disbelief for other approaches, techniques and philosophies, and in the process receive replies from others here that answer any queries put forth, all within the realm of nice polite language, all the compassion and understanding one can muster and hopefully the ability to keep an open mind and allow others also to do so . The Practices inspired by actualism section is for practice only.

Nick (mod)

What does this have to do with the original post? I guess this post is written with no offense, but an off-topic, troll post nevertheless.

Hey Nick,
What are your views on the posts which have no relevance to the OP or ensuing discussion? Do they get moderated as well?

-Sriram.

Hi Sriram,

I leave it to anyone posting within this thread to maintain the course of the conversation. Mods here generally only move threads to the appropriate section and do not sit on every thread to referee where a conversation heads. That is not how things are run here. You are free to talk about your concerns in the right section. Thus I moved your thread here.

If you feel that Gabriel's post was not addressing your queries, then perhaps you should try and guide the conversation towards where you wish by maintaining the flow of conversation you are aiming for. Though, insinuating people are 'trolling' and placing responsibility for it in the hands of mods rather than guiding it skillfully yourself will probably only hinder said flow.

Nick

Note: Apologies to Sriram for the mistake with names.

Sorry Sriram, I did not mean to ignore your original post (nor divert the flow of conversation). I did read it but unfortunately had nothing specific to add... it was your mention of 'mentalists' (I have been fascinated by them and their techniques from an early age) plus Nick's video, which resonated with me (and a 10 minute break from work), that led to the 'troll post'.

Fortunately, this can be easily corrected... I'll delete my first post and this one as well (by tomorrow, because I would like you to read it)... and so I learned a lesson today.

Kind regards,
Gabriel

Hi Gabriel,
I think I opened the post with some expectation, I guess the disappointment made me to give such a sort of reply. We all do visit memory lanes whenever possible. I'm glad that you have taken your time to read my post.

Regards,
Sriram.

Message has been removed because message have special character which are not able to parse.Please contact to administrator

Hey Sriram,


What is the purpose of your post? What kind of discussion do you wish to engender? Where do you wish it to go? What do you want to say? Do you want to question the take on things you have laid out here, defend them, just see what other people think? Do you want to discourage people from pursuing Actualism? Are you mostly curious why people are pursuing Actualism?

The way your post is laid out, it's unclear what exactly you are looking to talk about or why. You do ask questions but they seem minor compared to the first part of your post, which just lays out your take on things with no questions about it and no explanation as to why you are doing so. This might be part of the reason people have not entered into more in-depth discussion with you.

Hi Beoman,


At the bare minimum, my post states why I don't want to pursue Actualism (I was once inclined towards it, now no more). I thought the reasons are solid and hence wanted to post it. It is explained in a way that I view Actualism, starting from simple terms, rather than AFT terms to describe the experiences.

I might have asked some provocative questions, but that is to provoke thought. Are you okay with say (for example) going to a clerical job for rest of your life, but with peace and rich sensate experience? Nothing wrong with a clerical job, but I think there is little scope of creativity in it. I feel that once one is free of all the negative stuff, he/she should be more creative, not less.

To me creativity is more important is than being free of malice and sorrow. Our civilization has advanced so much because select few have used their creative brains, with benefits for everybody. So if one is creatively inclined, that should be their first priority, in my view.



First part in the post states the mental events in terms of mental movements, which I feel is an accurate description. Desire is nothing but movement towards the object of desire. If these movements are absent, the consciousness will be made up of only juxtaposition of sensations, with sense inputs forming the base, weaved with the facts and memories concerning those sense inputs.

To explain things using simple stuff is useful for understanding, it can enable us to see things clearly. (If one can do so, and if the derivations are proper) How does one explain PCE to one who hasn't had that experience? If I explain in these terms, there is a way for a person who had PCE to support or negate this explanation. It is also useful to understand some characteristics for people who haven't had the experience (if the explanation is deemed to be correct).

AFT has no proper definitions, which limit what could be understood. What is apperception, for example? AFT states that its mind's awareness of itself - now what to do you understand from that? Is attentiveness only application of haietmoba? what is pure intent? Do these definitions lead to understanding for anyone who hasn't experienced these things? I did not think so, So I chose to use my own understanding instead of AFT terms to analyze these experiences.

Edit: Corrected a typo

To summarize, since creativity is very important for human civilization, I believe that one cannot/should not choose to altruisticly self immolate when there are unresolved issues in the creativity of the resulting state.

[Edit: Removed the context for the first post, that was not pertinent for discussion anyways.]

Ah, okay. I think your take on certain things is a bit unclear, so I'd like to comment on a few places. Let's start with creativity, as it seems to be one of your most salient points.


What gives you any indication to the contrary? It seems to me that creativity is about making unique/interesting/novel connections between thing that had previously not been connected, without being limited by a view or belief system or habits of making the same kinds of connections over and over. What about being 100% attentive to your experience - living each moment anew - would make that more difficult? Here are some relevant quotes (emphases mine).

From the creativity section of the AFT:


Richard seems to indicate that one is more creative, not less, when 'I' am not in the way.

Here is another anecdote, which I recommend reading in full (starting with "Many years ago, back when I was a normal bloke and making my living as a practising artist...").

I don't have any quotes from other actually free people at the moment, but I have seen no indications that anybody who has become actually free has had their creativity hindered, and a few that indicate creativity has definitely not been hindered.

In short: the imaginative faculty, by its nature, only appears to be required in order to be creative, whereas what is actually the case is that all it does is hinder said creativity. This is much like how emotions, by their nature, only appear to be required in order to live successfully in this world, whereas what is actually the case is that all they actually do is hinder said goal.

Has this changed your take on the relation between creativity and freedom from malice and sorrow? If so, in what way? If not, then why not?

I've been searching for actual research that connects memory to creativity but haven't found any yet. According to this random selection of people on the internets, creativity and memory seem to go hand in hand. Greater memory capacity means greater recall of 'things' that could act as triggers for the creation of new 'things'.


















So, if memory influences how creative one can be then a greater capacity for memory will enhance the potential to be creative. Accroding to Gary weber, who claims to have no experience of 'I', 'me' anymore:



Food for thought.

Nick

You got that one right, Beoman. Creativity is about making novel connections between things that has not been previously connected. But why where they not connected before? a) They were not seen clearly before, or b) something in the way our mental maps were constructed prevented this connection before.

First one is simple, new connections weren't made because due diligence has not been paid to that aspect. I can assure you that historically, creative people of the past were not trapped in this mistake. They have brooded for years in a single problem. May be because they weren't 100% attentive to their experience, they took more time. I think if a person is very passionate and spends enough time, he/she will see all aspects of the problem, whether or not that person is 100% attentive.

I will give you a few examples of creative people from history, to this make this conversation little less vague.

Archimedes:

This discovery can be attributed to Archimedes making the connection between the volume of water displaced and volume of his body, while he entered the tub. From that he would have made the connection that volume of crown can be found this way, because that would have been in his back of mind all the time.

Example 2: Kekule

No body had any understanding of aromatic compounds at that time. People have not seen molecules except in linear chains, and six carbon atoms forming double bonds and looping on itself was unimaginable from the then understanding of how molecules work. Kekule, like every one would have spent a long time trying to explain benzene's structure (6 carbon and 6 hydrogen atoms) in a linear way while still satisfying the valence properties of carbon and hydrogen (carbon needs to have 4 connections, hydrogen 1). It was impossible. Then he had a dream of snake catching its own tail, from which he made the connection, discarded the linear structure and made it cyclic. Thus the molecular structure of benzene was determined.

Example 3: Kepler

Kepler did not have problem with data. His mentor, Tyco Brahe had spent 20 years in observing and recording every planetary movement, every day. But there were no connections. Astronomy was similar to astrology those days, people believing that planets followed divine orders. Kepler also for quite a few years, tried to do something similar. Kepler reasoned that the orbits of planets should be made up of regular polygons, this must be essence of universe's geomentric structure. He failed many times trying this model, over many years. Then one day he found the connection that the cubes of lengths of planetary orbit were proportional to squares of time taken by the planet to orbit around the sun. Thus formed third keplerian law.

Kepler's laws were the first to describe astronmical events in a fully mathemetical fashion, without references to god. These laws formed the basis for Newton's gravitational law.

In all these examples, why connections were made when they were made and not before? Something had to be seen, something that was seen as a constant or having no relation to the scheme of things in all their years of experience had to be seen as a variable, that which determines the outcome. In Archimedes' example, the inconsequential overflow of water had to be seen as resulting from the immersing object. In Kekule's example, preexisting models had to be thrown out since they had too many constants (linearity of the arrangement, that is not a constant and that can be changed). Kepler had to see through the then existing worldview for longtime, then discarded them (too many wrong beliefs, constants) and figured out the equations.

To summarize, creativite connections does not happen when a) all the cases are not seen (if you are attentive you will see fast, but you will see nevertheless if you are passionate) b) Variables are seen as constants, forming a rigid structure preventing new possibilities (100% attentiveness doesn't prevent this from happening, and I believe naivete will amplify this)




The example which had been given by Richard is probably a copy job, not a work of creativity. He was just probably painting a scene that laid before his eyes, and when "he" was present, there was lot of creativity in the fantasy department, preventing him from accurate depicting the picture. When "he" was absent, the picture painted itself, while still making use of whatever painting skills he had.

We anyways know how good Richard is in copying, We're talking about creativity here. I have made a few points on how imagination is useful for creativity in the first post of this thread, just coloring aspects of a picture based on another mapping sometimes makes the features standout.

No offense, but quoting Richard's own words to prove his magical creativiy sounds a bit like quoting from the Bible to prove the existance of God.

Edit: few typos

So, if I understand you correctly, you're saying that 100% attentiveness will help with a), and naivete will help with b). From your own paragraphs it seems like being free of malice and sorrow wouldn't hinder the ability to make creative connections at all, but rather, help. It seems you have argued against your point, that being free from malice and sorrow would prevent innovation and creativity. Am I misunderstanding something?

I'm not quoting his words to prove his magical creativity, I'm quoting his words because he is actually free, we are discussing whether an actual freedom hinders creativity, and he has written on the topic of whether being actually free (namely, not being able to visualize in the mind's eye) hinders creativity.

Are you saying that his reports are not factual? If not, why do you think so? If they are, what does it matter who wrote them? But okay, if you don't want to consider anything Richard has written when talking about an actual freedom, then I will stop quoting him after this post, if you insist that nothing he has written is valid to look at. He is the most prolific author on the topic thus far, though.

I'll wait until I hear your take on whether it's OK to quote Richard, as I don't want to write a post with his words if you will just disregard it.


Can you explain more clearly how you find affective/feeling imagination useful for creativity? I find that paragraph in your first post hard to follow. I will comment on this, though:


Half-truths and hypothetical situations are both just certain (creative) configurations of words into thoughts. What about being free from malice and sorrow would prevent those from being formed? Besides that, there are plenty of examples of people free from malice and sorrow forming hypothetical situations:
[link]
[link]

a) is right b) is kind of opposite - I believe that naivete will reduce the second aspect (variables seen as constant is opposite of creative process, constants should be seen as variables). I didn't support my claim with anything. My argument was that 100% attentiveness will do nothing in that regard.



That analogy was for the part you had emphasized:



What he quoted as magical creativity, without giving any details to why that was creativity.. its only his circularly referring words..

I do think his reports are factual. Also the other link which you had posted (which I thought was same example in detail, didn't read that (<edited> that time), I would prefer not to got AFT website, maybe due to that) was a good piece of writing. But again, that in itself doesn't demonstrate anything about the stuff we both agree about creativity - novel connections. It was more of like of a application of a learned skill. Similar to his creation and maintenance of AFT website, thats also a case of application, not creation). All his AF writings are the creative part of the website, because it is novel to us. It wouldn't have been novel to him, it would've been factual. (I do have many concerns with his writings, but not being factual is not one of them)



Imagination is imagination. What is this affective/feeling imagination? Is that a fact? It is directed away from the senses. But to be sure that affect is involved - how do you know that?

Imagination is useful for creativity - I don't have a concrete example with me at the moment, but imagination can be used to map a spatial understanding into a visual space. Then you can play around with that picture, much faster and more efficient than done on a paper or software.

The other example, about mentalists - An aribitrary human if given a sequence of numbers or words, can recall 7 + or - 2 objects only. One can remember more if one groups it into chunks (like remembering 10 digit number by some grouping on the first 3 digits to bring the number of objects down). But mentalists remember more than hundred three or four digit numbers presented to them. That they do by mapping it to visual space through some mnemonics or some code, forming a picture from it and linking the pictures with some sort of a story. This is a highly creative process, and its impressive (it might not have any applications when we have all this technology, so not a pressing example)



I'm sorry about the hypothetical situation part, that was a poetic addition (after writing half-truths). I take that back.

(Another edit: You got to agree with me that there are no creative works of actualists in the public media - If one is more creative than before, why not even one creative work has been made to avail of? )

Cheers,
Sriram.

[Edit: removed the personal reference about an event that was in public domain, apologies to Beoman, I can further explain it to you if you want, if it has caused use you some practical problems or whatever)

Hi Sriram,

Consider this a P.S.



Then you may also want to consider the following:



And here’s part of a dialogue that might interest you, which I had with my friend Harman back in 2009, when for a few weeks I experienced a type of virtual freedom that greatly diminished (typical) imagination (and suffering):




And that’s all I have to say about that… as Nick, Trent, and others are now in a much better position to answer your queries.

Good luck with your research, Sriram.

Regards,
Gabriel

I should have clarified better on my stance regarding the factuality of Richard's statements. I do not think he is lying, I take his reports of his experiences as a factual account. However, I take his words with a pinch of salt, as he uses them with non standard meanings. Also he does not define the key terms - apperceptive awareness is defined with the catch all phrase "mind's awareness of itself". Unless that is not defined clearly, I don't want to speak about that.



To make new connections, nothing is needed I believe. And a free mind will do better in that regard. But it is the population of data, analysis (probably involves projections into various related concepts), trial and error - these are necessary when you have to create something out of the blue, to find something when so many have (including you on your previous attempts) failed to spot.

You can check the Kepler's or kekule's example again, or read it in the wiki. They would have spent years trying wrong models, but that would have resulted in their mind populated with enormous amount of data. But it didn't work. Then they would have spent lot of time to figure out which part of their understanding needs to be changed, all the while computing the results. Then one day, they manage to make the right changes to explain the data in its simplest terms.

To summarize, true creativity(to find something that nobody else has) is a very ad-hoc process. Elimination of certain processes (like imagination, intuition) would make it tougher, while we don't know how apperceptive awareness helps in that regard.



Good luck with what you seek, Gabriel.

Regards,
Sriram.

Just a stylistic post, food for thought..

Those who had been to AFT site long time back would have heard the instrumental of song "Wish you were here" by Pink Floyd going in the background. (Quite irrititating it was, no way to switich it off or reduce the volume, and hindered reading and comprehension with both eyes open, so to speak - only option was to switch off speakers or mute the volume), I want to just add the lyrics here:

So, so you think you can tell,
Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field
from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?

And did they get you to trade
your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
a walk on part in the war
for a lead role in a cage?

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found? The same old fears.
Wish you were here.

that's what i think as well--it is a very ordinary human experience. i don't know why people make a big deal out of creativity.

imagination (in this context, i mean visualization) is hardly required to be creative in the profession (software) i'm in. it is more of building on top of concepts, than visual images. perhaps the later is the case with visual arts.

there is a lot of reasonable objections to practicing actualism, but fearing loss of creativity ... really?

Do you think your creativity(in your profession) is related to IQ?





I guess you don't want a debate about the reasonable objections part..

The way you put it.. fearing loss of creativity.. as if fear comes in, the content should be discarded.. really? If there is reasonable evidence in loss of creativity, and if fear also comes in, would you look past your fear into the content or block it out of existance? edit: or, Investigate and just remove the fear (if you could), without realising that that was what fear was about?

it is surely related to intelligence, though i'm not following the connection to the discussion above.



perhaps i should have used "fixating on", instead of "fearing" in my sentence above. the reason why it is odd to be concerned about creativity is same as the reason why it would be odd to worry about, say, loss of intelligence upon becoming AF, as creativity--the ability to form new ideas (regardless of its value to the society)--is so integral to human experience.

now, if i am to read one or more (scientific or autobiographical) reports of people in PCE, or people who are AF, mentioning their loss of a particular ability that i value, then it would not be proper for me to simply ignore it. however, your concerns in this thread arise from mere abstract thinking, wondering about the possibilities with no objective or personal evidence as to loss of such ordinary processess as intelligence/creativity in AF people, and so it is impossible for me to take your concerns seriously unless you have something out of your own experience (like Gabriel did) to report. for example, if you had a PCE, were you or were you not able to form new ideas in it?

Take a look at this link:
http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/richard/listafcorrespondence/listaf60.htm#06Jan04

To me, Richard cannot imagine, and he disqualifies Einstein's relativity because of its origin: the famous 'thought experiment' is an exercise in imagination.

Nobody is claiming that GTR is true because of that imagination.... that was only the first step: visualizing the problem in a way that would result in progress.

With that beautiful stretch of imagination, the brilliant Einstein is bold enough to proceed with his many years long involvement of building a theoretical edifice called General Theory of Relativity, which took many scientists by disbelief and surprise that time, since it resulted in many things that could not be simply understood by common sense alone, as these things happened in very high speeds. I would say that was brilliant, creative and most of the humanity will agree... it has been verified many times by various predictions and experiments.

And because, the whole construction has proceeded from imagination (that is how in scientific work, where you deal with a lot of unknowns - [in real world - except some Sherlock Holmes mystery or mildly in some serious case of debugging software], you simply do not know what you are dealing with), he disqualifies the relativity. Please look for many links in the website. And Big Bang theory? No, not true, 'cos it was posited by some spiritualist. And of course, PCE's direct experience of infinitude gives you the right to question the humanity's scientific progress on understanding what might be impossible for a single human being or just the senses alone to discover.

When the Greeks posited that world is made of atoms - where was their data?

Everybody understands that imagination is not a final step in the discovery, or else you will end up as a psychic reader, it is the first step. And then, you try to prove / test it. Anybody who has dealt with complex systems will know this. Try to come up with some proofs for Euclid's theorem of infinite primes, or come up with a proof for the factorizations in P or why not -Try P =? NP problem which can change the world - without imagination.

I see that Sridhar is making a distinction between conceptualization and imagination. I think understanding an existing concept may not require too much of imagination because everything is laid out, but to create the concepts necessary for solving an issue? It is a pure act of creativity, and I wonder how you are able to achieve without imagination. Let us know! A task comparable to the genius work is what in question here. Many work has been done for us, brilliant tools are available in the internet - to understand them and use them to derive results (application) does not demand that much of creativity or imagination, but how about the ones created them?

Once imagination is lost, all is well. Because, you won't imagine what you might be missing .
See how clueless Richard is, when he demonstrates his inability to follow that famous thought experiment.

well, that is not what i said. this is probably the last time i'll
correct myself in this thread; when i said "[creativity in software]
is more of building on top of concepts, than visual images" i was
clearly talking about *building* ideas whereas you read that as
"*understanding* an existing concept". and the only reference to
imagination i made in my post is in that very sentence "perhaps
[involvement of visual images in creative thinking] is the case with
visual arts."



i see no mention of "genius work" in any of the posts by Sriram here,
rather he was talking about creativity and innotation. be that as it
may, given the extremely low proportion of geniuses in the world at
any time and single-digit number of AF people at the moment, you may
have to wait more than a lifetime to see if, out of a reasonable
sample of AF people, some of them are geniuses or not - unless, of
course, if the causal maps of what happens in the brain of a genius is
perfectly laid out to the point of reliably demonstrating scientific
evidence (not anecdotal reports / unverified theories) for imagination
as a necessary cause for all genius activity. actually, i don't know
if such a thing has already been mapped out, so i would be curious to
know.

You said visualization(in your profession) is not required for creativity. I provided you evidence that visualization is the most important determiner of IQ, and I asked whether you would accept that IQ is required for creativity. If you accept IQ as a good indicator, denying visualization having any impact will be illogical (or a disbelief in scientific processes).

This is simple logic, just substitution and law of transitivity (a -> b, b -> c, then a -> c). You said you worked in software, so I didn't spell it out in so many words.

Since software is a very broad term, and if you want to continue the argument from your expertise in software, can I ask you to be more specific? What is working in software mean to you? Does it mean working on: 1. Mark-up languages (html, xml), 2. Query languages 3. Scripting languages 4. Structural programming languages 5. Object oriented languages 6. Neural nets or any connectionist framework 7. Functional languages 8. Logical programming languages 9. Optimization, approximation problems in any language (like compiler optimization, query optimization) 10. AI problems in any language 11. Research on intractable problems 12. Research on incomputable problems.

As you go more towards the end, visualization is impossible to avoid, in my view and experience.



Creativity is not just the ability to form new ideas. Creativity is about creation, and you cannot create something if one has already created it before, and its not novel enough. Either you are attempting to bring down the value of creativity (by reducing it to forming new ideas) or you don't have a understanding about it.

For example:
You are sitting in your office, bored. You get a new idea that you can check out the cafeteria thats newly sprung up near by. You go there and have a coffee.

Another example:
You are returning from your office. You get a (new, as the situations are new) idea that you can get your shopping done along the way.

Are these formation of new ideas creative, by your defintion?

What is integral to human experience? How do you know what is integral to experience? Are they facts? Or is it your belief or your intuition?

If something so basic and so easily accessible thing such as visualization can disappear on becoming free from passions, why can't creativity disappear as well? Do you still think my arguments are resulting from what you call as fixation? If so, why?



What is that you value? If you don't value creativity, what is your motivation here? If you don't want to speak about creativity, why did you chose to expand upon Gabriel's post, which was his response to my claim's on loss of creativity?



You seem to know more about my thought processes than me. Care to explain how you arrived at that conclusion?

How do you think actualists can say something from their experience about something they can't detect?

Your stripped down version of creativity (forming new ideas) is not creativity, whether or not it can be done from within a apperceptively aware state is irrelevant to this discussion.

[Edit: Accusations of bias have been removed]

I wanted to persuade a bit, but I think I had taken that (and the word battle from the DhB ) too seriously, it seems*. Have deleted reply to Nick, apolegies if any offence caused. There is nothing to add unless someone needs some clarifications or something, or if I get a definition for apperceptive awareness (I used to get it (not the defn, the state), when I was practicing sensate attention and felicity, now I don't practice that, I don 't care). I will go try to work on my blog or whatever.

Regards,
Sriram.

*with the help of some feedback and some equanimity,

Hey Sriram,

Allow me to paraphrase the conversation about point b) so far - let me know if it's accurate.

You said that when variables are seen as constants, this forms a rigid structure, preventing new possibilities/connections from being made. You then said that naivete will aggravate this - that more variables will be seen as constants, leading to less possibilities and connections, and thus to less creativity.

If that is accurate - I agree with you on the first point, but disagree with you on the second point. Naivete is, essentially, not believing anything. Not presupposing anything to be the case, whatsoever. If I am being totally naive (and attentive), then, for example, I look at a paper bag, and I have no idea what the other side of the paper bag will look like. So, I rotate the object, and then the backside comes into focus. However, now I have no idea what the 'original' side of the bag looked like. I don't presuppose that it will look the same as it did five seconds ago, even though that makes logical sense. I just have no way to know what it looks like until I rotate it again.

How would not presupposing/believing anything prevent novel connections from being made? It seems like it would make it a lot easier. Instead of treading well-worn mental paths, assuming this and that, you assume nothing, so you look at everything as if for the first time.

To summarize: it seems that both attentiveness and naivete would help with making novel connections (what we're defining as creativity), and that 100% attentiveness and 100% naivete (in the sense of not believing/assuming, not the feeling) would not hurt that capacity at all.


Whenever I have a mental image formed, no matter how clear it and information-laden it seems to be, if I activate attentiveness and sensuousness, it fades away, and sensual and mental clarity increases. Then it becomes obvious that the mental image was a result of not paying attention, that it was giving me no new information, that it was just a blind re-hashing and composting together of whatever visual fragments were floating around.

For example, I was doing a jigsaw puzzle a while back. At first, I tried to figure out how the pieces go together by straining, mentally rotating them, trying to see where they would fit, etc. Then I tried just not straining in that way, holding back, picking up pieces and looking at them without any imagination effort involved, but activating attentiveness to sensuousness... and connections just started being made, in a surprising fashion. Like - oh, that works!

The brain is better at making connections than 'I' ever could be. 'Me' imagining something only prevents that innate ability of the brain from working at maximum efficiency.


How about an experiment? Try looking for a concrete example. Try doing a task that you think requires imagination to be performed to its best ability. Then, do the task using visualization/imagination. Then, do the task while being as attentive to sensuousness as possible. And, see what happens. In which case did you perform better? One trial might not be enough, so you might have to repeat it a few times to get a good idea of what's really the case. And, you might simply be used to using imagination, so you perform better with it, whereas potentially the maximum effectiveness might be found by re-training to not use imagination, so you might have to fiddle with it. Let us know what you find. There's not much point debating if one doesn't test these things out experientially.


People are free to do as they choose. There's hardly a large sample size of actually free people, yet. Besides, I hear that Richard is working on a novel of fiction, so perhaps we will see that come out at some point.

So far so good,



That's right. You were not able to see the variables. You were not seeing variables as some constants, you were not seeing the variables at all. Rmemeber, Zero is a constant, but you probably didn't know even that when you were Naivete.

When the inputs are coming from senses, all you are see are the constants of that experience. When you flip the paper bag, whatever constants you had experienced had to be retained in a variable space, as there are new constants (from the current senses) coming in. There is no way to retain the constants from previous experience in the current experience without variables, because of the unitary nature of any conscious experience.



You can make new connections, but where is the data to make those connections?



Did my explanation convince you Beoman? Or there is still something missing?



Because of the unity of consciousness, if you activate sensousness (all sense data enter the consciousness) and attentiveness (every data, construct in the consciousness is analyzed using a habitual/factual/methodical process), no external image can come and sit on top of your experience.That doesn't mean that affect is involved in the process of imagination. (Absence of evidence doesn't mean evidence of absence)



I have done these experiments many times (not just one trial out of curiosity, I wanted as I always have to solve the problem at hand). The results were same. Whenever I was thinking about a problem far removed from your current sense inputs (read the room I'm in, air circulation coming from the fan in the room, light coming out of the window), Sensuosness happened to be of no use, Imagination/visualization gave me the results.



In Mathematics, there is an interesting theory. It is a theory that is built on top of everything that can be understood in mathematics, and it applies to everything in Mathematics that is of sufficient complexity. So, in a way, it is similar to the fundamental characteristics of human experience.

Its called Godel's incompleteness theory. It states that any system of sufficient complexity will be either incomplete (Some statements that are true in the system are not provable within the system) or inconsistent (Some statements that are false in the system can be proven to be true). There is no system which can escape this limitation.

Now, what is this sufficient complexity argument? It means that it doesn't apply to some simple, limited systems. And what kind of complexity we are talking about here? The complexity that is required to express natural numbers. Thats right, the numbers 1, 2, 3 and so on and so forth. All our language systems can sufficiently represent these numbers well, our minds can represent them quite easily. So the complexity required is not that complex at all, for it only states the systems that we use everyday, day in and day out.

Then, the Godel's theorem states that our languages and our mental states can not be complete and consistent at the same time. Godel's theory is not some hypothesis for some hypothetical situations, it is so encompassing that it includes our everyday state of existence. It is a proven theory, and the ways these proofs were formulated have been used in many later theorems, including the theory of Undecidability (Incomputability), by Alan Turing.

In my understanding, the property of incompleteness translates to the fundamental characteristic of impermanence. For if things are complete while being consistent, that can be expressed/experienced in a permanent way. Inconsistency translates to no-self or anatta, for if things are consistent in a complete system, that can be attributed to a self or an essence. The fundamental characteristic of suffering doesn't arise in a mathematical system, for that results from desire, which is an action to achieve something within the system. This might be something fundamental in any feedback control system (we don't know it for sure yet, I mean with proofs).*

What this means is that if you go through the stages of awakening and eliminate suffering, you are only limited by the universal limitations, you have a power of expression that is as powerful as any mathemetical system of sufficient complexity.*** You can be as perfect as possible within the limitations of a powerful system, while still retaining sufficient complexity (the ability to express natural numbers, at the minimum)

The Corollary is, if a system is proven to be complete (all true/factual statements are seen to be true/factual) and consistent(All false/non-factual statements are seen to be false/non-factual), it doesn't have sufficient complexity.

The Godel's theorem is the most difficult theorem to understand correctly. You can ask any mathematician or anyone with sufficient experience in mathematics that which was the most difficult one to understand in their experience, they will refer to this theory, without blinking an eye. So if you don't understand it, don't worry, you are not alone in that regard.**



One in twenty years is a good start, I should say. May be we will see the magical prodigies dancing around when that glorious work of fiction comes out

May we have more love and understanding,
Sriram.

*The buddhist/religious implications(of the correspondences I have indicated - impermanence to incompleteness) are that if there are gods and angels, they will all also have impermanence and not-self as their characteristics of experience, assuming they have no desire which will perpetuate suffering (since they are gods or angels), if they retain their (sufficient) complexity.

More food for thought in the wiki

**but please do investigate

***And the limitations of the brain of course.. I mean it has only 10 billion neurons.. We don't know how they work, but it must be (sufficiently) complex : )

Edit: some typos

Sorry, now I'm unclear what you mean by 'constant' and what you mean by 'variable'. If you mean that I forgot what the other side of the bag looked like - that memory ceases to function when one is naive - then that is not what I meant at all. I simply meant that it's not possibly to actually see what the other side of the bag looks like, if I'm not looking at it. If one is visualizing and imagining, one might imagine that one knows exactly that the other side of the bag looks like, whereas, strictly speaking one does not know exactly. One can conjure up a mental image, but that isn't what's on the other side of the bag. Thinking that you can actually know what's on the other side of the bag without seeing it directly is an assumption, and will prevent novel connections from being made. This does not prevent one from processing and utilizing the memory of what one remembers seeing on the other side of the bag, of course. One just does that while keeping in mind that the other side of the bag is not currently being seen.


The data comes from the senses, and from memory. I didn't bring this up but I'll say it now: 100% attentiveness to sensuousness does not mean that memory and intelligence and pattern-matching and thoughts are not operating. Indeed, thoughts arise when necessary, memories are triggered as appropriate based on the associations the brain automatically makes, intelligence is exercised at the appropriate moment as it comes into action based on what is being paid attention to, pattern matching happens whenever there are patterns to be matched, etc... all this goes on without 'me' in the picture. With 'me' in the picture, some of that bandwidth (the automatic memory & intelligence & pattern-matching & thoughts) is being spent to maintain this illusory 'me', which has nothing to do with what is currently going on - 'me' is only a false process based on ignorance, arising as a result of inputs that have already-occurred (be they sensory or memory). Without 'me', 100% of that mental bandwidth goes to observing the world around you, which includes memory retention and recall, of course.


If imagination did not require affect, then one would be able to imagine something while in a PCE, or when actually free. The fact that you cannot, means imagination and affect are somehow related. Why? Because the only thing that happens in a PCE/AF is that 'I' am totally out of the picture. Nothing else changes. So, whatever is 'missing', i.e. whatever patterns of experience no longer occur - those patterns only occurred as a result of something affective.

How do I know? Because the way to get there is by paying attention, by not excluding anything. When one does not exclude anything, feelings, mental images, moods, etc., cease arising. The fact that they cannot arise when one is being as attentive as possible, whereas thoughts, memories, consciousness, etc., still do, is a good hint as to the nature of each of those.

But, keep in mind what I said about memory - memory is indeed part of 100% attentiveness to sensuousness. Memory is activated automatically as a result of stimulus (which might be sensory input, or another memory, or a thought, etc.).


Can you give an example? What kind of imagination/visualization did you use?


Aye, I read Goedel, Escher, Bach, which explained the theory quite well, and I understood the proof. Pretty interesting stuff.


The theory, as I understood it, was talking about logical/mathematical systems. I haven't seen it applied to "mental states" or "languages", or "our everyday state of existence", with the same provable certainty as the theorem does about math itself. Can you show me where such arguments have been made?




I don't follow the connections at all. Inconsistency means you can essentially say (X -> Y and X -> not Y) in the system. Once you can do that, the whole system breaks down: you can choose to start from Y or not Y as you see fit and derive whatever conclusions from that, but the meaning of the system has broken down. The way I see it, inconsistency means the whole system is basically worthless for figuring anything out, as you never know whether anything proven True in the system is actually True, even within the system. (Correct me if that assessment is inaccurate.) What does that have to do with anatta?

Besides that, you are indicating that human experience (quite different than a mathematical system - and you haven't drawn any precise equivalencies, without which one cannot talk about human experience in terms of mathematical systems meaningfully) is both inconsistent and incomplete (both impermanence and anatta are true), whereas the theorem says either the system is powerful and (consistent & incomplete, or inconsistent & complete) or not powerful and (consistent & complete). If human experience is both inconsistent & incomplete then it's even 'weaker' than any sufficiently complex mathematical system, which is weird given that human experience is that which was the genesis of any formal system, at least thus far.

Well, perhaps I should not even have replied as I have. What's the purpose of this thought experiment? How does applying Goedel's theorem to human experience help you to understand your own ongoing experience? It seems that all it does is draw uncertain parallels which might cause one to spin in thought & form beliefs/views of the world based on them, whereas one would be better off just looking at one's experience directly with a piercing mind, e.g. "is anything permanent? let me see if i can notice anything permanent. is anything self? let me see if i can notice anything that is truly 'Self'", etc.


More understanding would be great. If by love you mean humans treating each other decently then I'm all for that. If by love you mean people hurting themselves and each other because of some affective feeling, then no thank you sir.

Claudiu

My analogy is not a proof of anything. As Beoman has mentioned in his reply, this may or may not apply to human experiences. All the concerns regarding this possibility have been well articulated in the wiki link I had provided in the bottom of that post. Please take a look.

The paragraph which begins with "In my understanding" states my understanding only. May be inconsistency means impermanence and incompleteness means anatta. I'm not sure, my understanding is still fresh (I had read this theorem long time back, but I felt I understood it this morning only, which I was reading for posting a reply. If this thread hasn't helped anyone atleast it has helped me : ) ).

As for the rest of the concerns, I think I have made my points clear enough. I don't see any point in reiterating, especially if there is a difference due to definitions (or lack there of). After all, everyone is entitled to his/her own opinion, whether its the participants or the readers. At the least, my "thought experiment" gives an idea of what could be achieved/understood by using formal theories, in addition to what one directly experiences.

Peace and Regards,
Sriram.

Alrighty. I wish you all the best! One final note, though, something for you to investigate if you want. You said:



You say the suffering & malice you still experience does not cause any disturbance to peace on earth. My simple question is: Are you sure about that? (Which you can ask yourself in a similar manner: Am I sure about that?)

I'll put it this way: There is absolutely no harm that can come to you from investigating that suffering, that malice, further. Forget about a 'shift' or something that you think might potentially take away something you cherish - don't practice for that. Rather, whenever the suffering or malice arises, take a look at it more closely. Investigate: is the fact that this feeling arose in me, changing what I do in any way if it weren't there? If so, does that change help, or hurt, me? Does that change help, or hurt, those around me? You have nothing to lose by investigating it further.

I only mention this, because, the very fact that suffering & malice has arisen in you means there is something that you are not aware of. Even if you don't think you are acting on it - whether you actually are, or not - you have no way of knowing for sure, because there is something you're not aware of, and you don't even know whether it's a 'something' that is very important or a 'something' that isn't. And, if there is something you are not aware of, you really have no way of knowing whether it is disturbing peace-on-earth or not. You can just say, "I'm sure it doesn't." and leave it at that, but what if it does? Maybe it's a good idea to check, just to be sure.

It was fun chatting. Good luck, peace, regards, and all that,
- Claudiu

Yes.

How am I sure about that? I know when my thoughts tend to or intend towards suffering or malice. It can be clearly felt
also, as an uneasiness or restlessness to anger or fear or dread. If that happens, I always ask myself - why? then I
realise its because ignorance, a failure to understand the fundamental characteristics, a ignorance that everything is
impermanent, leads to suffering or not made of any self. When I realise this, either my ignorance falls away or I am still
clinging to something. In case of the latter, I investigate more, more often than not there is a shift into equanimity, and
then there is no clinging, and I could see the characteristics quite easily. If there is no such shift, no release of tension, I have learned not to commit my thoughts and feelings into action, at the least into actions that are not reversible.



My suffering or malice arises due to the process of becoming. I know I want to become into something more successful and more useful. But my so called good intentions are not good enough to prevent suffering, because once I have a desire that is becoming, it can lead only to suffering. So I have to work with equanmity (the self that is becoming, coming into existence doesn't mean that there is a self hardwired into me) and hopefully my resolutions will result in something good or adds value to the society.



You seem to think that I am not looking or investigating enough because of fear or doubt that I might lose something. I had that sometime back, when I was clinging to actualism due to my desire for deliverance. But I managed then to convince myself that not looking is not something I could afford to do. I did investigate into my feelings and that helped a bit. I was in a dilemma when it came to undo everything I have learnt, avoiding intuition etc. I'm a intuitive guy, my personality type is INTP. Because of my personality type, I have learnt lot of good ways (intuitive ways) to put these to good use. I saw no point in dropping those. Anyways I landed into reobservation soon enough, which required something totally else for crossing that territory.

To put succintly, with regards to actualism method, It wasn't just making sense after I got past the initial investigations.



You can see them as individual components, or you can notice the desire to be this way or other that is really fueling these feelings. It is definitely better when I am free from the grip of those feelings.



False premises, no explanation needed, long drawn conclusions from things that are not facts.

I have a question for you that is worth investigating. Are you sure you are not clinging to actualism due to a desire for deliverance (in post 1st path dark night, I remember reading somewhere that you have got stream entry)?



Good luck,
Sriram.

Oh, okay. I was under the impression you were not investigating these things anymore, but it sounds like you are. That's all I was suggesting that you keep doing. I don't think it matters so much what one calls it, so long as one is investigating it in order to remove ignorance about it.


This, in particular, is a good thing to realize.


Actually, you seem to agree with me, based on your first paragraph. I'll put them side-by-side:

CLAUDIU: I only mention this, because, the very fact that suffering & malice has arisen in you means there is something that you are not aware of.
SRIRAM: It can be clearly felt also, as an uneasiness or restlessness to anger or fear or dread. If that happens, I always ask myself - why? then I realise its because ignorance[...]

Here, we both agree that it arose because of something that wasn't seen clearly.

CLAUDIU: you have no way of knowing for sure, because there is something you're not aware of, and you don't even know whether it's a 'something' that is very important or a 'something' that isn't
SRIRAM: When I realise this, either my ignorance falls away or I am still clinging to something. In case of the latter, I investigate more

These two are not as direct a parallel, but I was essentially recommending you keep investigating if there is something arising as a result of something you aren't aware of, and here you indicate you investigate if you are still clinging (that is, if the ignorance has not fallen away). (EDIT: Also note that, until you investigated that particular thing, you didn't know whether the ignorance would fall away right away, or whether it was something requiring more investigation. That's what I meant when I said, you don't know whether it's a 'something important or not, until you start investigating it.)

As to my "you don't know whether it disturbs peace-on-earth" comment, I just meant that, if something resulting from ignorance has arisen, then, there was a point before that ignorance became apparent, during which the ignorance might have been manifesting in subtle ways that weren't seen, yet. Once you notice the ignorance, as you said, you see through it or, if you can't at that moment, you avoid acting on it. But, before you notice it, it's likely affecting things in certain unseen ways. At least, in my experience, the analogy of "layers" applies in some cases. Until I see through one set of habitual patterns/feelings, a more subtle set remains hidden. When the former is revealed, the latter, more subtle set, becomes more apparent, etc. The best thing to do is just investigate whatever arises, and that's what you seem to be doing.


I used to cling to actualism, to take Richard and the AFT as authority (even though it clearly said not to), but I got over that when the whole kafuffle on the Actualism yahoo group took place. I realized it was silly to take anyone as authority, and just kept doing what made sense (and Actual Freedom as a goal still made sense). Thanks for asking. Now, I have a question for you...


It sounds like, when you notice malice or other forms of suffering, you certainly do something about it (try to see its root cause). Why are you not aiming for an eventual goal of suffering no longer arising at all - of no longer having habits that lead to suffering - whether you call it Actual Freedom or Arahatship or The Grand State of Kazooness or Just Being Peaceful? What makes you think, if you keep investigating as you have and keep up intention and momentum, that suffering won't stop arising?

Peace,
- Claudiu