₦airaland Forum

triplechoice:
@ PoliteActivist,
When you transcend the illusion of the self through contemplation according to Sam Harry, "where" do you arrive at?

You realize there is no "you" that's separate from everything else. "You" seizes to exist

triplechoice:
I have gone through the thread and cannot find any evidence that what you have been saying is the same as Sam Harry's

Well, I wrote this below. Isn't it similar to Harris?

If you don't believe there is a supernatural, then you must agree that the "self", the individual person, doesn’t exist - it is an illusion of accumulated memory. If your memory is wiped, "you" seizes to exit TOTALLY. If another person's memory is put in that body, that person becomes "you". Same applies to a dog or anything else. You are your accumulated memory, NOTHING ELSE! Without memory the individual, the "self", does not exist!

triplechoice:
Then, what's that thing we all collectively refer to as water, and what should it be called?

That's the point, we don't know. Neither do we know what are oxygen and hydrogen which make it up. We met them here and gave them those names. Quantum mechanics is teaching us everything is information, only information exists

budaatum:
Doesn't matter what he is. What matters is that he uses his head and is honest, unlike some.

I thought you said religionists don't use their heads?

Steep:
see stupidity, if the universe is not real but only in your head, then what is your head and where is your head located? Thought without thinker foolishness.

"Your head" is euphemistic. We actually mean "your thoughts", which we are NOT sure of it's true nature.
Where do your thoughts come from? Where do your dreams come from?

HellVictorinho6:
9163989689

Opay

To protect my identity, someone else will do it - tomorrow. 5K

budaatum:
His entire strategy is to get you to accept you are as ignorant as he believes he is, though he's here claiming to know what he claims he can not know.

It's a person of god strategy too. They get you to admit you can't use your own mind so they can control you, just like man was made to believe he descended from stupid ignorant Adam to slave in a garden instead of created in God's image to rule and subdue and multiply.

The white folks who brought us this religion and sold us enslaved Adam were definitely not slaves, and obviously ruled and subdued and multiplied, while we whom they brought it to have not yet realised that "from the sweat of thy brow" is not a curse but reality as it certainly surely really is.

😆 He doesn't know that the person he's talking to, Steep, is a creationist. Second time you're making a fool of yourself. You're becoming almost like Dr. Reed!
Folks please help us find out, is Sam Harris (below) a religionist? He's saying the sorta things I've been saying!
I don't know how you people reason. How can a religionist even remotely entertain the things I've been saying - that the universe could be anything at all, and could exist entirely in your head, and that the individual self is an illusion? And that our senses could be such that they don't tell us what is really there - that they could be lying to us. What sorta religionist would entertain any of those??
Result of this debate comming up soon.
Here's Sam Harris:

FxMasterz, maynman, Dtruthspeaker, Image123, DrJones109, Jesusjnr2022, LordReed, Jaephoenix, JessicaRabbit, Knownunknown, DeepSight, BBIA HellVictorinho6, SIXFEETUNDER, OkpaNsukkaisBae, Bacteriologist, FRANCISTOWN, SIRTee15, Aemmyjah, TheSourcerer, Busybrain2233, 1Sharon, TakeNigeriaBack, Botragelad, isan, MaxInDHouse, Fourthpredator, seun, hopefullandlord, bobestman, Lorrayne, HardMirror, Hahn, SlawG, albreezy4eva, Muslim, Dominique, Mrbroke, EnemyofGod2,  kkins25, Wilgrea7, A001, Maynthemayn

HellVictorinho6:
Mr or mrs bla bla bla , qed.



Till now. Not even 3k.

You can call me Mr my dear.. I try to come accross as one.
You really need 3k? Only 3k? Drop your aza

Steep:
lol ignoramus that doesnt even know what water is, what do you even know, I guess you cant even define a woman or a man.
You don't even know the difference between science and philosophy.

My friend you don't know what H²O really is, just as you don't know what this reality you find yourself in really is. Why our greatest thinkers always conclude they know nothing - Socrates, Newton. Einstein, etc

Steep:
stop projecting your ignorance on others. It is you who doesn't know what thought is, you don't know anything at all. Ask a secondary school student what water is and they would tell you. You can't have a product without a producer neither a creation without a creator, it is a self defeating logic that you exhibit.
Wipe your memory and you no longer exist?
So people without schizophrenia no longer exist?
This is the product of the work nonsense that you folks claim as enlightenment. Nonsense.

Another tantrum thrower who can't think deeply. What is water? Really, what is it? And why in that particular form? YOU DON'T KNOW! You met it here like that and called it water. Neither do you know if this reality is physically real, simulated, matrix, hell, heaven, long-running computer game, energy-generating mechanism, etc. You have NO WAY of being sure what it is or what it is all about. One thing we do know (of course, always assuming we can trust our senses) is that if the universe were reduced to size of the earth, the earth would not be visible with the strongest microscope. Scientists also tell us there are possibly hundreds of dimensions and unlimited number of universes! Bottom line: you know almost nothing!

DeepSight:
I am done with this subject as I said.
Have a good day/ week.

Thanks 4 participating. See u around

Steep:
you have it backward, "thinking" is an action performed by another, a thinking being is a being that is self aware and capable of self reflection. Just like songs and singing, songs do not exist without a singer.

first of all define thought?

EXACTLY: first of all, what is thought?! You are not sure! Just as you don't know what is water. Just as you don't know any of the stuff you met here or why they are the way they are or what this reality is all about!
As far as thoughts, we know dead people who came back said they were thinking while dead. Possessed people, dreams,,etc. People who were no longer there but thinking still going on!
Bottom line: we don't know the true nature of thoughts or where thoughts truly come from.
Also, define you. You is your memory - thought! Wipe your memory and you no longer exist. Put another person's memory and they become you. You are thought!

Steep:
How can you have thought without a thinking being? Do you even live in reality? Thought is solely an attribute of a thinking being.

Here's what I wrote b4:

Describe the "thinking being". You can't. The only describable attribute of the "thinking being" you're sure of is thinking - thinking is the "thinking being"!

Can't you see that it's possible only thoughts really exist and everything else an illusion.
So it's the other way round: thoughts can exist without thinking beings but thinking beings can't exist without thoughts.
Ponder: where do your thoughts come from?

Naija the great!

kkins25:
Oh, PoliteActivist, when I saw you decided to play the role of both "for and Against" I knew you'd end up In a wormhole. However, an exciting idea---- not knowing you exist. I just concluded an anime titled "Monster." It's a 100/10 masterpiece, so deep that Dostoevsky would be stunned.

It shares a similar theme; the 74-episode saga is too long to put down here. But it tries to intrigue the viewer's mind by steering the viewer to question their own existence. It does this throughout the entire plot, but even more, it is a psychoanalysis of one's self. Who are you? Are you what you are because you are? Or are you what you are because others say you are? How can you know what and who you are? Even if you say "I am," do others see you as "I am"?

Furthermore, is "I am" all there is to you? Or are you "I am" today and "I am becoming I am" tomorrow? This philosophical dilemma and the struggle for self-identity are narrated in one of the metafiction stories in the Monster series.

[center]
"Once upon a time, in a land far away, there lived a nameless monster. The monster was dying to have a name. So he decided to set out on a journey to find his name.
But the world was a large place, so the monster split into two on his journey. One monster went to the East. And the other went to the West. The monster who went East came to a village. "Mr. Blacksmith, please give me your name."
"You can't give someone a name."
"If you give me your name, I'll jump into your stomach and make you strong in return."
"Really? You'll make me stronger? Okay, you can have my name."
And the monster went inside the blacksmith's stomach.
The monster became Otto the blacksmith. Otto was the strongest man in town. But one day, "Look at me, look at me. The monster inside me has grown this large."
Munch-munch, chomp-chomp, gobble-gobble, gulp. The hungry monster ate Otto from the inside. He went back to being a monster without a name.
[/center]

[center]
He jumped into the stomach of Hans the shoemaker, but Munch-munch, chomp-chomp, gobble-gobble, gulp. He went back to being a monster without a name.
He jumped into the stomach of Thomas the hunter, but Munch-munch, chomp-chomp, gobble-gobble, gulp. And once again he was a monster without a name. [/center]

[center] The monster went to a castle to look for a wonderful name.
"If you give me your name, I'll make you strong."
"If you'll heal my sickness, I'll give you my name." The monster jumped into the boy's stomach. The king was delighted.
"The prince is well. The prince is well."
The monster liked the boy's name. He liked living in the castle. So even when he was hungry, he stayed put. Every day he was so hungry, but he stayed put.
But one day he was just too hungry. "Look at me. Look at me. The monster inside me has grown this large," said the boy. The boy ate the king and and all the servants. Munch-munch, chomp-chomp, gobble-gobble, gulp.
[/center]

[center]One day, the boy came upon the monster who had gone west.
"I have a name. It's a wonderful name," said the boy.
The monster who went west replied, "You don't need a name. You can be happy without a name. Because we are nameless monsters."
The boy ate the monster who went west. Even though he had finally found a name, there was no one left to call him by it.

What a wonderful name it was, Johan......
[/center]

You see, Johan is the antagonist of the series. He believed himself to have been experimented on in a research facility by a psychologist and writer, Franz Bonerparta.

Franz wrote the poem quoted above. To others, it's a story, but to Franze, it's a tool that can strip any human of their identity. He tested this out in his experiments, which were somewhat successful because Johan, a subject of the experiment, was without memory and identity. However, Johan was a creation Franz had not anticipated. Instead of a monster, Johan turned out to be a demon- a demon capable of eating monsters.

But Johan, like the monster, faced the same challenge, "am I a monster?" He asks.

Johan believes the experiments carried out on him during his childhood robbed him of his memories and shaped him to become the "Monster" that he is. This experiment smeared Johan's perception of himself as a monster needing an identity. This monster has no name. This monster searches for its name. This monster sees its own reflection as a monster. Thus, the monster journeys to discover its identity and name.
[/b] Thus, the Monster is left without a name or identity. If no one knows its name, how could it be sure it existed?

Now, to go back to your thought experiments, if there is no one to call the "monster" by its name, does the monster exist? Of course, the monster exists. However, what I think would make more sense for your arguments would be if it were not leading towards existence itself, but to a personality profile, so to speak.

Thanks for your response. Quite entertaining and lots of food for thought.
Bottom line is, we are NOT SURE the true nature of reality and existence. Same way, we are not sure the true nature of thoughts. We are not sure where thoughts come from. So we should look askance at statements like "there is thinking, therefore I am"!

budaatum:
Who or what is it that thinks your thought above if you do not exist to think it?

Who or what is it that thinks my thoughts that differ to what you think if I did not exist to think it and write it for you to read and think about?

You are assuming that for your thoughts to exist there has to be a separate entity called "you". Well, we are not sure the true nature of thoughts and we are not sure where thoughts come from. The ONLY describable attribute of "you" we are sure of is your thoughts.
YOUR THOUGHTS ARE YOU!
Which is why you can't override your thoughts, as I've pointed out earlier

budaatum:
Please don't let that dishonest Politeactivist pit us against one another. I'm certain your arguement with him is unrelated to the one I have with him, and he's only dragged you here to fuel his nonsense.

Please point out what part of the below is dishonest
And also what unrelated arguement was I having with you?

Disregarding that the statement is faulty in itself {It should have been: "there is thinking, therefore I am"}
Here's the logical sequence of events:
1) There is thinking (this we are fairly sure about)
2) Therefore there must be a thinker (we have no way of knowing this unless we claim we know the true nature of existence, which we don't! Also, the only describable attribute of the thinker is thinking - thinking is the thinker!)
3) That thinker must be "I" (obviously not true)

There's clearly all sorts of thinking going on in a dream, and while "I" is unconscious or possessed, or even dead (as narrated by people who came back), who is doing the thinking? As with many things about existence, we don't know the true nature of thinking

budaatum:
That "I", is a flaw in Descartes thinking. He does not think therefore he exists, but he first exists as a recognisable "I", and then he, that "I", thinks. The fact that he did not recognise that implies he never doubted his own existence to begin with, and nor did he doubt that he thought.

And the reason it's an important distinction is that it has the potential to mislead the likes of Politeactivist who has been promoting Descartes here as evidence of his own non-existence and the existence of only his thought, as if his thought appears out of thin air.

Please don't let that dishonest Politeactivist pit us against one another. I'm certain your arguement with him is unrelated to the one I have with him, and he's only dragged you here to fuel his nonsense.

I just don't know where you got the idea I was promoting Descartes. I just was kind to NOT tell u what u were saying (like it was a great new discovery) was discussed long ago. It's because you joined in the middle of the threads. DeepSight was the first to cite Descartes as proof of his own existence. And I was the first and only person to tell him Cogito was disproved. Upon which he threw a tantrum that it was impossible to disprove, and then he was full of "pedantic"!

DeepSight:
Can't you see that what you pointed out is nothing but a worthless point on the arrangement of words? That's why I said Politeactivist is indulging in pedantic semantics. Wasting time with the fact that the first word in the sentence was "I."

Every serious thinker understands what is being said - to wit - thought requires the existence of a thinking being. The sentence could be re arranged in any number of ways and the fundamental point would remain the same.

Wasting what time? My friend philosophers agree that Cogito is fundamental flawed, and not only because it is falaciously worded.
And you keep moronically repeating "thought requires the existence of a thinking being." like a slowpoke. Describe the "thinking being". You can't. The only describable attribute of the "thinking being" is thinking - thinking is the "thinking being"!

budaatum:
But explain to me how and why you keep promoting this Descartes nonsense here if you know it was flawed and had been proven wrong as we've repeatedly argued it was.

I've made it bold so you can't ignore it as you ignore all questions you are asked.

I never promoted Descartes AT ALL, not in the least. What happened was that I was being too kind to you. You were saying Cogito was flawed like it was a big new discovery of yours. I didn't want to burst your bubble by telling you I already thoroughly disected that on another thread

DeepSight:
It's worse than saying we have no way of knowing that speech implies a speaker

PoliteActivist
So why not just say "I speak, therefore I am"?
Or "I poo, therefore I am"

You didn't answer this question

DeepSight:
In all instances you are talking about a person.

Like I've said, in all those instances the "I" is missing.
Also, the only describable attribute of the thinker is thinking - thinking is the thinker!

DeepSight:
In all instances you are talking about a person. Do chairs and tables get posessed, dream or have thoughts? I dont even wish to address how silly the NDE example is.

This is such stupid nonsense I will say nothing further to it. You suffer severe reasoning limitations. Good night.

You'll say nothing further my dear because you have no argument. That's why instead of reasoning you are throwing tantrums. You're arguing nonsense. You simply don't reason deeply enough.

In all those instances the "I" is absent. Also, you have to understand the content of Cogito. Descartes said he'd doubt anything he could conceivably doubt. Then he forgot to doubt the real likelihood that he as "I" didn't exist - that only thoughts existed and that "I" is also merely thought/memory.

DeepSight:
It's worse than saying we have no way of knowing that speech implies a speaker

So, why not just say "I speak, therefore I am"?
Or "I poo, therefore I am"

DeepSight:
I have seldom read more empty dribble than this vacant wash.

I repeat, if you can't show an instance of the occurrence of thought absent a being, go and sit down.

Falacy of avoiding the issue. Already gave you instances where there are just thoughts and nothing else - when people are dead, possessed, people one meets in dreams, etc.
Ultimately it's possible this our reality is just thoughts and nothing else!
"I" possibly does not exist - just an illusion of memory/thoughts!

DeepSight:
Just go and fetch me an instance of thought occuring without the existence of a being. If you can't do that, go and sit down.

The rest is pedantic semantics for shallow thinkers.

I ALREADY TOLD YOU!
How many people who totally died and came came were busy thinking all the while they were dead??
And how many people get taken over by a spirit.
WE DON'T KNOW WHERE THOUGHTS COME FROM!!
Where do YOUR thoughts come from?

LordReed:
Tell him you are a clueless phony? I sure will.

Budaatum, PoliteActivist is a clueless phony. Bwahahahahaha!

Below is my final QED on DeepSight about this topic. Read it carefully. It summarizes everything:

Disregarding that the statement is faulty in itself,
Here's the logical sequence of events:
1) There is thinking (this we are fairly sure about)
2) Therefore there must be a thinker (we have no way of knowing this unless we claim we know the true nature of existence, which we don't! Also, the only describable attribute of the thinker is thinking - thinking is the thinker!)
3) That thinker must be "I" (obviously not true)

There's clearly all sorts of thinking going on in a dream, and while "I" is unconscious or possessed, or even dead (as narrated by people who came back), who is doing the thinking? As with many things about existence, we don't know the true nature of thinking.
QED

DeepSight:
Just go and fetch me an instance of thought occuring without the existence of a being. If you can't do that, go and sit down.

The rest is pedantic semantics for shallow thinkers.

This is too easy. FIRST, you have no way of knowing if a thought requires a thinker because you are not sure the true nature of thought - just as you are not sure the true nature of the rest of reality!
SECOND, even if we allow the above, you are not sure the thoughts are from "I". We basically don't know where thoughts come from.
Oh you asked for an instant - people who died and came back were thinking while dead

LordReed:
LMAO! budaatum knows who the clueless phony is and is certainly not me. Bwahahahahaha!

Buda, below is what I wanted ODB to tell you, because he was there. I wrote it to deepsight on Feb 16 on my last thread (Einstein):

As for cogito, I was expecting you to ask how when I told you it was disproved but you kept mute. It was proved wrong not long after Descartes expounded it. Here goes. You can't prove the existence of something by starting with the assumption that the thing already exists. Thus the statement should be: "There is thinking therefore I am", which of course doesn't make any sense.

LordReed:
Everyone tell the clueless phony their own post saying Descartes was a solipsist is inescapable.

Wow, talk about someone needing spoonfeeding!!
Even if I didn't say it I meant Descartes made himself a solipsist to write "On Method". BUT I ACTUALLY SAID IT!!!

LordReed:
Tell him you are a clueless phony? I sure will.

Budaatum, PoliteActivist is a clueless phony. Bwahahahahaha!

No, tell him I have been saying that since forever.
He already knows you're a "clueless phony". You don't have to tell him that

LordReed:
Bwahahahahaha! You clearly wrote Descartes was a solipsist and even doubled down with a post from Quora. Then tripled down trying to prove Quora is better than Reddit. Dumdum you are just a duplitous phony.

Folks please help me tell ODB (Obtuse Dr. Reed) (funny how it can also mean "Old Dirty Bastard" ) only a retarded person cannot see what is meant in the screenshots below