From: diener@namu01.gwdg.de (Immo Diener)
Subject: Re: Free will or Can Life After Death be Proven
Organization: Georg-August-Universitaet Goettingen, Germany
	<DIENER.92Sep30180952@namu14.gwdg.de> <183691@pyramid.pyramid.com>
Distribution: sci.philosophy.meta
Date: 1 Oct 92 15:22:40

In article <183691@pyramid.pyramid.com>
pcollac@pyrnova.mis.pyramid.com (Paul Collacchi) writes: 

> (Immo Diener) writes:
> |> |> torstein@itekiris.pvv.unit.no (torstein hansen) writes:
> |> >    ...
> |> >   1) Human brain activity (human thinking) is a result of
> |> >     (electro-)chemical reactions in the brain. 
> |> >    ...
> |> 
> |>   Nobody can proof that thinking "takes place" in the brain. Thinking
> |> is accompanied by brain activity.
>
> Nicely said.  More accurately, thinking is "believed" to be accompanied
> by brain activity...
>
> |> But THINKING
> |> is a process you do not know. You just do it, but you do not observe
> |> what you do when you think. As long as you know nothing about the
> |> process of thinking, you apply a process (thinking) about which you
> |> know nothing. So you know nothing about the relations between your
> |> observations and the results you get by thinking about them.
> |> 
> |>   All human knowledge is obtained via obvservation and thinking.
> |> So, if you want to know about thinking you must apply these to
> |> processes to the process of thinking. This seems to be recursive
> |> whitout end, but is is not.
> |> 
>
> Good point.  I thought we'd never get here.  Meditation is, among other
> things, the observation --better, awareness -- of the thought process.
> In meditation, awareness centers on thought and its motion which is 
> consciousness.  It is not recursive because "awareness" is not "thought".
> Thought arises within awareness -- thought thinks, awareness is aware.

I was talking about THINKING not about THOUGHT. Thoughts become aware
as the result of an (inner) observation and a priori (on the level
of pure observation) have the same relevance as any other observation.
The basic characteristic of a perception (which appears as a result of
an observation) is that it appears in a ready form, that one has no
part in its accomplishment.

> |>   All science is illusion as long as the process of thinking has not
> |> been clarified - simply because an unknown process is applied and thus
> |> leads to results which have no known relation to the starting points.
> |> 
> |>   Whom do you call I, what is life, free will, intelligence, etc, etc.
> |> None of these questions can seriously be attacked before clarified the
> |> above point - because we apply an unknown process...
> |> 
>
> When "awareness" is differentiated from "thought", identity shifts
> away from its attachment to discursive thought processes, and can just
> as easily identify with the complement of thought, empty space, as with
> thought.  With this shift, one becomes "the observer", and much can be seen
> about the movement of mind and thought.  It also produces a good deal
> of tranquility, since one is not compelled to apply energies to resist or
> redirect thought processes -- one does not enter into conflict with the
> content of one's consciousness.  In fact, its just as easy to "open" to the
> space between thought as to the thought between space.

I don't understand what you mean. Please explain.

> When thought is taken as the object of observation, it can be penetrated 
> and seen for what it is -- the arbitrary motion of consciousness continually 
> arising.  

Again, I was talking about thinking (the process) not thought (the
result of the process). "...the arbitrary motion of consciousness continually 
arising." - is this the result you got by applying the method I
suggested? Certainly not.

> Thought itself can never be clarified, it is always motion, 
> but awareness is freed more and more to stand in direct perception to any 
> alleged "objects"...

Ok, "clarified" might not have been the right word (although, again, I
was talking about thinking not thought!) 

> When the seeming relationship between "objects" of awareness and thoughts 
> which arise coincidentally is severed, thought is then understood to be
> irrelevant to phenomena.  Form loses meaning, and becomes "empty".  Why? 
> because meaning is thought which arises in relationship to the particular 
> form.  In Eastern systems this perception of emptiness is called "shunyata".

Pure speculations. Results of applying an unknown process... (see above)

> As a practice in observation, meditation elevates Science to mysticism.
> Thus the alleged quip that whenever Science climbs to the top of another 
> mountain it always finds a mystic already there, deep in comtemplation.  
> You may understand this mystic as a  seeker of truth, who took the tools 
> of Science, observation and thought, and introspectively turned them back 
> onto themselves, and apparently never needed to return to the "external" 
> world again.

What do you denote by the word "mysticism". Conventional science is
mysticism. As I tried to show, real science which provides true
insight into what man and nature are would first have do comprehend
the process of thinking.

By the way, my native language is german, and I find it very hard to
express exactly what I mean in english. The most important words don't
seem to have exactly matching translations. Can someone tell me what
in english comes closest to the german words:

Begriff, Wahrnehmung, Erfahrung, Erkenntnis, Verstand, Vernunft,
and Bewusstsein?

Immo Diener

--
Immo Diener, +49 551 394518                                     __o   
Institut fuer Numerische und Angewandte Mathematik,           _`\<,_  
Lotzestrasse 16-18, Georg-August-Universitaet, 	             (_)/ (_) 
D-3400 Goettingen, Germany
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta