Nondualism vs Dualism

[Won2blv]

After opening my consciousness with Ayahuasca and other psychedelics, I realized why there are so many paradoxes in science and the spiritual. I don't mean "supernatural" when I say spiritual. I'm more talking about a general personal experience held by each individual that constitutes their own personal truth. Each individual has their own universal reality where the unseen and the seen weave themselves together. We're all pretty much the same creature with the same basic needs, yet we all have something about ourselves that makes us a unique person.

This is where I see the opening to the why the paradoxes exist. Its because we are one nondualistic cosmic creature. There is one divine all and we are a piece of it the same as a liver cell is a piece of a human. But we are also built by little bits and pieces of bits of pieces of bits and pieces. So of course we experience a feeling of separation from our divine union with the universe, or what I call God.

I believe that in our pre-existence (pre-bigbang) we existed as 1 solid entity built upon two perfectly symbiotic states of matter. I believe this entity held consciousness and consciously killed itself in order for more creation to spring forth. I also believe that we have the history of our making from the big bang until present written in our DNA.

Even if you think I'm full of shit, I'm curious what y'all believe concerning dualism vs nondualism. I say both

[The Grand Nudger]

After opening my consciousness with Ayahuasca and other psychedelics, I realized why there are so many paradoxes in science and the spiritual. I don't mean "supernatural" when I say spiritual. I'm more talking about a general personal experience held by each individual that constitutes their own personal truth. Each individual has their own universal reality where the unseen and the seen weave themselves together. We're all pretty much the same creature with the same basic needs, yet we all have something about ourselves that makes us a unique person.

Many things, and every single moment of our lives, really, all making us ever so slightly and cumulatively different from each other - and yet we remain within a few standard deviations after all of it.  Fun stuff.   

This is where I see the opening to the why the paradoxes exist. Its because we are one nondualistic  cosmic creature. There is one divine all and we are a piece of it the same as a liver cell is a piece of a human. But we are also built by little bits and pieces of bits of pieces of bits and pieces. So of course we experience a feeling of separation from our divine union with the universe, or what I call God.

You'd have to be more specific on this separation from what you call the divine.  My being built of bits and pieces of bits and pieces (so on and so forth) doesn't have the effect of disconnecting me from the sense of the numinous.  Perhaps some clarity on why that would "of course" lead to any such separation?  By what mechanism is the bits and pieces method of construction separating from a union with the universe?  

I believe that in our pre-existence (pre-bigbang) we existed as 1 solid entity built upon two perfectly symbiotic states of matter. I believe this entity held consciousness and consciously killed itself in order for more creation to spring forth. I also believe that we have the history of our making from the big bang until present written in our DNA.

Even if you think I'm full of shit, I'm curious what y'all believe concerning dualism vs nondualism. I say both

What do you base this belief on?

[vulcanlogician]

As far as I stand, "nondualism" has no coherent idea uniting it. Dualism has the whole "consciousness and materiality are distinct" thing uniting it. When you really think about it, consciousness and material reality ARE distinct somehow. But we've yet to figure out the nature of that "somehow." So I don't dismiss dualists right out of the gate. But they have a lot of explaining to do. Explaining they haven't really done yet.

So it's a mystery.

That's hardly cause for alarm. Many things are a mystery to us mere mortals, (What goes on inside a black hole's event horizon? Why do laws governing the quantum world seemingly conflict with relativity?) We are trying to use observation and logic to puzzle out the universe... that's not going to provide absolute answers to every question.

But what you call "god" seems like a cop out to me. It's evading the question rather than answering it.

But, I could be wrong about that. Maybe what you call "God" is the solution to the puzzle. The real question is this: why should I accept your answer of God as the solution? What evidence or reasoning supports that thesis?

[Belacqua]

I'm curious what y'all believe concerning dualism vs nondualism. I say both

I tend to agree with you.

Those spiritual writers I most admire speak of the universe as wholeness, the One, which we nonetheless perceive as the Many. 

In Chinese: the 不二 (the Not-Two) vs. the 万物 (the Ten Thousand Things). Neoplatonists and many others have referred to the One as God.

The trouble is that humans have limited perception and can't perceive the One. For us, we must divide and compare in order to understand. 

In Japanese, the character 分 means both "divide" and "understand." 

Some people say that in special circumstances we can perceive that we are not divided from the One, but I haven't had this chance.

[The Grand Nudger]

IDK if the circumstances have to be all that special.  The sudden and unexpected sense arise and subsides.  It's more of a ritualists thing to ascribe particular circumstances or actions that could manufacture it.

Never, though? Most of the time it's referenced as a ubiquitous aspect of human being. We had a great convo about it, maybe a few years back, true to form, there wasn't anyone unaware of it. Most of the people here just don't call it a god. We could probably replicate those results in this thread.

Anybody else experience the sense of the numinous? In what context?

[Alan V]

The problem with thinking different consciousnesses form a unity is that they are all discrete. They are not privy to each others' internal states.

Similarly, even individual consciousness is a composite rather than a unity. For instance, our consciousness when dreaming is missing a few pieces it has access to in waking, due to certain parts of our brains being deactivated.

I held out hope for dualism until I read more about brain science. Now I think it's pretty obvious that consciousness is not a being but an emergent property of a functioning brain. In other words, I'm not my consciousness, I'm my body which is sometimes conscious. We just get confused because the only times we are conscious of ourselves is when we are conscious at all.

I like the way dream researcher Allan Hobson clarifies the issue of apparent dualism. To paraphrase: "The mind is the subjective experience of having an objective brain." He calls his approach "dual-aspect monism."

[brewer]

Nondualist. I exist as a physical whole and rarely (if ever) consider my thoughts/perceptions/whatever as something separate. The fact that you took a physical substance that effected your perception/thoughts should indicate something. If you have a lobotomy I doubt you'll care about this at all. 

But, if you send me some of what you've been takin I'll give it a try, however past experience tells me that I'll just end up wandering around in the woods and giggling, a lot.

[Peebothuhlu]

Hello Won2blv !



Uhm... given your innitial posting I'd say my ideas/veiws etc are 'Non-dualistic'.

All the best,

[Acrobat]

After opening my consciousness with Ayahuasca and other psychedelics, I realized why there are so many paradoxes in science and the spiritual. I don't mean "supernatural" when I say spiritual. I'm more talking about a general personal experience held by each individual that constitutes their own personal truth. Each individual has their own universal reality where the unseen and the seen weave themselves together. We're all pretty much the same creature with the same basic needs, yet we all have something about ourselves that makes us a unique person.

This is where I see the opening to the why the paradoxes exist. Its because we are one nondualistic  cosmic creature. There is one divine all and we are a piece of it the same as a liver cell is a piece of a human. But we are also built by little bits and pieces of bits of pieces of bits and pieces. So of course we experience a feeling of separation from our divine union with the universe, or what I call God.

I believe that in our pre-existence (pre-bigbang) we existed as 1 solid entity built upon two perfectly symbiotic states of matter. I believe this entity held consciousness and consciously killed itself in order for more creation to spring forth. I also believe that we have the history of our making from the big bang until present written in our DNA.

Even if you think I'm full of shit, I'm curious what y'all believe concerning dualism vs nondualism. I say both

Sounds like a pretty good high, and I kind of wanna know what you were on? 

I took some pot a few weeks back, and I had a similar experience, though perhaps less intense. I was high and drunk, and the effect was a feeling of being drunk and sober at the same time. And I started picturing it as alternating between mutliple universes, a universe in which I'm sober,  and one in which I'm drunk, one in which my I was sober, and my friends were drunk, and vice versa. And I thought of how all this is conceivable mentally, but not necessarily physically. Then I had a nagging thought, what if it's all mental. That world and everything in it, is just a product of some grand consciousness, and we're just a part of that vast thought in his mind. Rather than everything being reduced to the physical, perhaps it's ultimately all reducible to the mental. The world we conceive in our minds, being very much such a world.

Needless to say it was a good high, and a bit intense.

[Rahn127]

Perhaps you could put this post in the form of "This is what I believe and here is the supporting evidence for that belief."

That would be so helpful

Thanks in advance.