Posted inConsciousness

Everybody’s brain is producing a kind of hallucination

Today I finished reading the final pages of Anil Seth's book, "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness." Here's a provocative passage from the Epilogue. Everything in conscious experience is a perception of sorts, and every perception is a kind of controlled -- or controlling -- hallucination. What excites me most about this way of thinking is how far it may take us.  Experiences of free will are perceptions. The flow of time is a perception. Perhaps even the three-dimensional structure of our experienced world and the sense that the contents of perceptual experience are objectively real -- these may…
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Posted inBooks Consciousness

“Beast machine theory” explains consciousness well

Hate to break this to you, if you're a firm believer in immaterial consciousness, but we humans are animals. Specifically, mammals of the primate variety, close relatives of chimpanzees, gorillas, and such. In his book, "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness," Anil Seth lays out his well-informed view of consciousness. (He's a professor of cognitive and computational neuroscience at the University of Sussex.) Seth gave a TEDx talk about his beast machine theory.  Here's some of what Seth has to say in his book about the beast machine theory. The beast machine theory grounds experiences of world and self…
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Posted inFree will Meaning of life

Free will is part of the human mind, not the universe

Free will as people almost always understand it is an illusion. There's little or no doubt about that, as I noted in a recent post.  Here's an idea that is well worth pondering. I've enjoyed doing just that as I go to sleep, letting my mind wrap itself around an intriguing notion. So far as we know, we humans are the only entity in the universe that doesn't exist in full accord with determinism -- causes and effects operating in a lawful, orderly manner. Oh, but what about randomness? Sure, randomness is real. Every programmer knows about random number generators.…
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Posted inFree will

Spooky free will is an illusion

Everybody believes they have unfettered free will, yet almost certainly nobody does. This is just one of the illusions that Anil Seth debunks in his captivating book, "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness." I'm fascinated by free will. Of course, I don't have a choice in this. Seth makes a strong case for being skeptical about our ability to choose actions, thoughts, emotions, and such by somehow stepping outside of all influences other than...  That's what's so difficult to come up with. What could possibly reside in human consciousness that produces the "free" part of free will?  If something…
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Posted inPersonal/Stories

Health problems are a window into how our minds work

Yesterday I got a probable diagnosis of glaucoma, an eye disease. I wrote about this in a post on my HinesSight blog, "Not so fun day: I probably have glaucoma." One bit of good news is that this was detected in an early stage, since I get an annual eye exam because I wear contact lenses and am severely nearsighted. Another aspect of getting the likely diagnosis is that it's given me an opportunity to observe how my mind has been dealing with the news. Which really is just another way of saying, How I have been dealing with the…
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Posted inAtheism God Religions

What if God hates religions?

I'm an atheist who likes to imagine how God thinks. What allows me to do this is the same reason anyone is able to make a claim about God. Since there's no convincing evidence that God exists, every person has an equal opportunity to imagine what this non-existent entity is like -- in much the same way that anyone can come up with a fictional story about characters they conjure up in their mind. So I enjoy visualizing how irritated God is at religious people. God is fine with people who use drugs, drink too much, watch porn all the…
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Posted inBooks Consciousness

The teletransportation paradox gives us clues about the “self”

Here's an excerpt from Anil Seth's book, "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness." I found it fascinating, even though it echoes ideas Derek Parfit wrote about in one of his books. But Seth describes this thought experiment in an intriguing way. After the excerpt, I'll share some observations about it. Let's begin our exploration of the self with a quick trip into the future. A century or so from now, teletransportation devices have been invented which can create exact replicas of any human being.  Just like the machines in Star Trek, they work by scanning a person in exquisite detail…
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Posted inPersonal/Stories

Risk-taking is largely a personal decision

Writing a few days ago about how walking on the edge of a roof is great mindfulness training got me thinking in a couple of related directions. One is that how risky something is usually is a combination of objective fact and subjective interpretation. The other is that the first thing I did after coming up with the name for this blog back in 2004, was decide on a subtitle. Preaching the gospel of spiritual independence The two ideas are related, in my own mind at least. I want people to make an informed decision about what sort of spirituality,…
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Posted inPersonal/Stories

Walking on the edge of a roof is great mindfulness training

Even though lots of people believe otherwise, we are physical beings living in a physical world. (If you disagree, share your factual evidence in a comment on this post. Hey, maybe a Nobel prize awaits you if you're able to prove that we're non-physical beings living in a physical world, or maybe two Nobel prizes if you can prove we're non-physical beings living in a non-physical world.) One reason I enjoy Zen Buddhism so much is that Zen is deeply rooted in physicality. Chop wood, carry water. Focus on the breath while keeping the spine straight in meditation. Students getting…
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Posted inBooks Consciousness

We’re conscious because we are beast machines

I'm enjoying Anil Seth's book, "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness." Consciousness is fascinating. Without it, we are nothing. Without it, we know nothing. Without it, we experience nothing. So, yeah, consciousness is pretty damn important. Here's passages from the Prologue. They offer a good feel for the approach Seth takes in his book, which is based on a solid grasp of modern neuroscience.  The book jacket says: "Anil Seth is a professor of cognitive and computational neuroscience at the University of Sussex, and codirector of the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science." This book is about the neuroscience of…
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Posted inDeath/Rebirth Delusions God

Atheists more likely to believe in paranormal than religious people

Just in time for Halloween, a few days ago the New York Times had a story, "Many Americans Say They Believe in Ghosts. Do You?" No, I don't. I also don't believe in God. But lots of atheists do believe in paranormal phenomena, according to the story. There are a number of different ways to quantify belief among Americans in so-called paranormal phenomena. One way is to ask a selection of people representative of the population if they believe in ghosts. In a 2019 IPSOS poll, 46 percent of respondents said they did. Another is to ask what they fear.…
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Posted inBooks Buddhism Radha Soami Satsang Beas

Great Zen advice: be natural, not intentional

During the 35 years I was an active member of an India-based spiritual organization, Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), I observed a lot of unnatural behavior.  I did this myself, though not to the degree that I observed in many others. They would put on what they thought was a virtuous demeanor, though from what I could see, it just looked fake, artificial, pretentious.  The RSSB teachings decried the "five deadly sins" of lust, anger, greed, attachment, and egotism. So some members of the group took this to mean that they should look as if they had overcome these supposed…
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Posted inAwareness Happiness

Know that you know a lot less than you think you know

I subscribe to The Atlantic, so I'm going to take the liberty of copying in a great piece from the online The Atlantic, "How to Know That You Know Nothing."  (Maybe it's available to non-subscribers, but not knowing for sure that it is, I thought I'd take the advice put forth in the piece and realize that since I'm not confident that I know, I might as well share it this way.) This shows that Harvard psychology professors can sound a lot like Zen masters. Which isn't really all that surprising, since Zen possesses a lot of psychological wisdom. Enjoy.…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Genuine spirituality is very simple. Not like religion at all.

Here's what I've come to realize after over fifty years of searching for spiritual truth. For most of that time, I had things completely backward, because I didn't understand how simple genuine spirituality really is.  I've got lots of company in that regard.  At first, almost everyone approaches spirituality, or religion, like everything else in life. It's viewed as something to be desired, then worked for, then hopefully attained. This is how we get a college degree. This is how we get our first real job. This is how we get married. This is how we have children. This is…
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Posted inBuddhism Meaning of life

U.G. Krishnamurti and Zen have quite a bit in common

As noted a few days ago, I'm taking another look at U.G. Krishnamurti through his book, "Mind Is a Myth." I read a few pages every morning, along with a Zen book by Shunryu Suzuki I'm re-reading, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind" -- the title of which shows that Krishnamurti and Zen aren't totally in sync.  But there's definitely some commonalities.  They both can be outrageous.They both aren't afraid to defy conventional ways of thinking.They both focus on the physical world.They both have no interest in supernatural fantasies.They both advise to live in the present moment. Zen, at least in its…
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Posted inAtheism Books

I take another look at U.G. Krishnamurti

Back in 2009 I wrote a blog post about U.G. Krishnamurti, calling him intriguing, irritating, inspirational. That was based on reading some of his Mind Is a Myth book, which has an appealing copyright notice. My teaching, if that is the word you want to use, has no copyright. You are free to reproduce, distribute, interpret, misinterpret, distort, garble, do what you like, even claim authorship, without my consent or the permission of anybody. The book is still available online. But recently I got a paperback copy after being reminded of the book when a passage was quoted in something…
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Posted inBooks Buddhism

“Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind” is a classic that I like a lot

Recently I wrote about how always trying to improve yourself is foolish. Since this makes a lot of sense to me, I'm attracted to Zen Buddhism because it shares that perspective, by and large. This attraction is long-standing.  One of my favorite Zen books, The Supreme Doctrine, has been in my hands since 1969, when I couldn't bear to return it to the San Jose Public Library while I was going to San Jose State College. Another favorite is Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. I have the 1973 first paperback edition. A few days ago I started re-reading it after a long…
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Posted inReality Science

The chance that you know something others don’t is very small

After over fifty years of pursuing spirituality in one form or another, I've come to one firm conclusion. I'm nothing special. And neither are you. Nor is anybody else. Now, I'm not saying that everybody is the same. Obviously every person is different. We all have different thoughts, emotions, talents, likes and dislikes, appearance, and so on. What I mean is that we're all material beings living in this material world, to sort of quote Madonna.  So whatever we know about the world, almost certainly other people possess the same knowledge. Most of us like to think that in some…
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Posted inBooks Miracles

A Bayesian argument against miracles

For quite a while I've been interested in Bayesian reasoning/statistics, even though I've never understood this subject very well. Now I'm reading Steven Pinker's new book, "Rationality." It has a chapter on Beliefs and Evidence that focuses on Bayesian reasoning. Which is, basically (this is an introduction to an online tutorial): Bayes' rule or Bayes' theorem is the law of probability governing the strength of evidence -- the rule saying how much to revise our probabilities (change our minds) when we learn a new fact or observe new evidence. "Prior probability" in the Bayesian perspective is our credence in an…
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Posted inMeaning of life Personal/Stories

Always trying to improve yourself is foolish

This morning I meditated, as I always do. Via my iPhone I also listened to a Buddhist speak about Buddhist teachings, as I sometimes do.  What surprised me, sort of, is that afterwards I felt somewhat worse. It was as if trying to improve myself led to me feeling like I'd temporarily gone backward on the improvement front.  As soon as I went back to simply living my life -- having lunch, going grocery shopping, listening to CNN and MSNBC as I drove around in my car -- my mood improved. For quite a while I've been toying with the…
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