Actual Freedom – The Actual Freedom Mailing List Correspondence

Richard’s Correspondence

On The Actual Freedom Mailing List

with Correspondent No. 44


August 17 2003

RESPONDENT: It was not enough the arbitrary infinity of the universe, now we have also the unhappiness of the animals.

RICHARD: There is nothing ‘arbitrary’ about being the actual experiencing of infinitude itself ... but if that is the way you comprehend what I have to report (when I say things like ‘as this flesh and blood body only I am the universe experiencing itself apperceptively; as such this infinite, eternal, and perpetual universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude’ for example) then that is your business.

As for ‘the unhappiness of the animals’ you speak of ... I can only presume you are referring to this:

• [Vineeto]: ‘The idea that animals are innocent or happy is a myth’. (‘Re: Cosmological Clarification; Saturday 26 July 2003).

Perhaps if I were to put it this way? If you can demonstrate that animals have no instinctual passions, such as fear and aggression and nurture and desire, and thus, being always happy and innocent (aka harmless), already live together in peace and harmony I will be most surprised.

RESPONDENT: How do you know that?

RICHARD: By being born and raised on a farm being carved out of virgin forest I interacted with other animals – both domesticated and in the wild – from a very early age and have been able to observe again and again that, by and large, animals are not happy and harmless ... they are mostly on the alert, vigilant, scanning for attack, and prone to the passionate fright-freeze-flee-fight reaction all sentient beings genetically inherit.

Further to the point I was able to observe, and have maintained a life-long interest in observing, the correspondence the basic instinctual passions in the human animal have with the basic instinctual passions in the other animals ... to see the self-same feelings of fear and aggression and nurture and desire, for example, in other sentient beings renders any notion them living in peace and harmony simply ridiculous.

For some simple examples: I have seen a dog acting in a way that can only be called pining; I have watched a cat toying with a mouse in a manner that would be dubbed cruel; I have noticed cows ‘spooked’ and then stampede in what must be described as hysteria; I have beheld stallions displaying what has to be labelled aggression; I have observed many animals exhibiting what has to be specified as fear ... and even in these days of my retirement, from my comfortable suburban living room, I can tune into documentaries on this very topic: only a few months ago a television series was aired again about observations made of chimpanzees over many, many years in their native habitat and I was able to identify fear, aggression, territoriality, civil war, robbery, rage, infanticide, cannibalism, nurture, grief, group ostracism, bonding, desire, and so on, being displayed in living colour.

I have to hand a National Geographic article on chimpanzees in the wild in which Ms. Jane Goodall uses words such as ‘war and kidnapping, killing and cannibalism’ and ‘affectionate and supportive bonds’ and ‘pleasure, sadness, curiosity, alarm, rage’ and ‘chimpanzees are creatures of extremes: aggressive one moment, peaceful the next’ when describing what she observed over 20-plus years ... here is an excerpt describing cannibalism (she gave each chimpanzee a name):

• ‘Gilka had been sitting with her infant when suddenly Passion, another mother, had appeared and charged her. Gilka had fled, screaming, but Passion, chasing and attacking her, had seized and killed the baby. Passion had then begun to eat the flesh, sharing her gruesome meal with her own two offspring – adolescent daughter, Pom, and infant son, Prof. The following year Gilka gave birth for a third time. To our utter dismay, this baby met the same fate. The circumstances were more dreadful, for it seemed that Pom had learned from her mother: This time it was the daughter who seized and killed the infant. Again the family shared the flesh. A month later Melissa’s tiny new baby was killed, again by Pom, after a fierce fight between the two mothers. (...) In three years – 1974 to 1976 – only a single infant in the Kasakela community had lived more than one month’. (page 594ff: ‘Life and death at Gombe’ by Jane Goodall; National Geographic, May 1997).

The text for a photograph has this to say:

• ‘Meticulous records kept on the Gombe chimps have revealed a complex range of behaviour, including charging displays, sometimes triggered by a sudden downpour. Similarly excited by a waterfall, a male (right) assumes the upright stance and bristling hair characteristic of some displays. When angry, aroused, or frustrated, chimps also display by stamping, throwing things, and screaming. (page 600: ‘Life and death at Gombe’ by Jane Goodall; National Geographic, May 1997).

And another photograph depicting out-and-out war:

• ‘Warmongering apes mobilize on the southern border of their range in the Kasakela region of Gombe Park (left). The object of their hostility is a small number of chimpanzees who broke away from the Kasakela group to establish a separate territory in the park’s Kahama region. The warfare began in 1974 (...) By 1977 all adult males of the Kahama community had been killed or had disappeared, the first known extermination of one chimp community by another. (page 611: ‘Life and death at Gombe’ by Jane Goodall; National Geographic, May 1997).

I am only too happy to send you the full article if that would be of assistance.

RESPONDENT: Do you have an animal brain to know it?

RICHARD: If by this you mean, for example, that only a dog can experience how a dog experiences itself then we may as well stop this discussion right now.

RESPONDENT: Or you have proven that also through a PCE?

RICHARD: It does not take a pure conscious experience (PCE) to know that the other animals, just like the human animal, have also genetically inherited such instinctual passions as fear and aggression and nurture and desire.

RESPONDENT: If it is a matter of observation and logical process, why you don’t use the same observation for the infinity or finity of the universe?

RICHARD: Only recently I provided a link to the e-mail where I have explained at length how I intellectually knew, long before I experientially knew, that the universe’s space was infinite, its time eternal, and its matter perpetual – along with an excerpt from that e-mail – and if you had read it you would not be asking this question.

As you are asking this question then it would appear you have not read it ... as it was of no interest to you then, despite it being a very important topic for you on this mailing list, there is no point in reposting it once again.

RESPONDENT: So nature is completely idiot, it create unhappy humans and unhappy animals. That is what you are saying in other words.

RICHARD: No, that is what you are saying ... what I am saying is that, just as it is with other animals, blind nature endows the human animal with instinctual passions, such as fear and aggression and nurture and desire, as a rough and ready survival package and a fearful animal, for example, be it a human animal or not, is not a happy animal.

Just because I say that nature is blind – and the universe is not intelligent (except as human beings) – does not mean I am saying nature is ‘completely idiot’ anymore than I am not saying, for instance, that life is a random chance event in an otherwise empty (read mindless) universe ... I am on record as saying that the universe is far, far more than merely intelligent and that, although human beings value intelligence highly, to project this esteemed human trait onto the universe in general is anthropomorphism writ large.

Furthermore it is possibly anthropomorphism at its worst at that, as something tremendously significant is happening, and those that speak sagely of the ... um ... the mind of god, or evidence of intelligent design, and so on, are missing the point entirely and are keeping humankind in thralldom to a spirit-ridden bronze-age wisdom which is long past its use-by date.

And, perhaps, this is also an apt moment to explain that nowhere do I say that either the human animal or the other animals cannot be (relatively) happy from time-to-time or (relatively) harmless from time-to-time – and even for extended periods – but that the survival passions, and the feeling-being they automatically form themselves into, not only preclude both total happiness and harmlessness and happiness all-the-time and harmlessness all-the-time but occlude the direct experience of the meaning of life as a living actuality each moment again.

In short: if anything is ‘completely idiot’ it is to stubbornly insist that bronze-age peoples knew better than a modern-day person can.

*

RESPONDENT: Animals to my observation ARE their feelings, they don’t separate them selves from their feelings, so there is no one ‘me’ who has the feelings, and so there is no ‘me’ suffering.

RICHARD: Whilst the vast majority of animals are not self-conscious (as in aware of being conscious) they are aware of what is usually described as self and other: a dog, for example, when lifting its leg on a tree can distinguish the difference between itself (what we call dog) and the other (what we call tree) ... or can distinguish the difference between what we call dog and what we call cat (and so on for all things that are other than itself).

Plus, just as you say that animals are their feelings, they are feeling creatures as well as being aware of self and other ... thus whilst not being an ego-being they are a feeling-being, just as humans are when they are their feelings (to use your way of putting it), only more rudimentary, of course.

RESPONDENT: If I have headache and I don’t separate my self from the headache, that means I am the headache, then there is no problem.

RICHARD: Are you saying that when you, a thinking/feeling being inside the flesh and blood body, are the headache you are happy (and harmless) ... or are you saying that you, the flesh and blood body only, are happy (and harmless) irrespective of a headache happening or not?

Because if you are saying the latter it is impossible to separate oneself from the headache.

RESPONDENT: But if I separate from the headache and say how bad it is and what I shall do to end it, then begins the problem, then there is the ‘me’ the ‘I’ suffering.

RICHARD: Ahh ... then you are indeed talking of being a thinking/ feeling being inside the flesh and blood body who can separate itself from the headache (or identify with it).

As a thinking/feeling being inside the flesh and blood body cannot be happy all-the-time and harmless all-the-time – let alone totally happy and harmless – your ‘then there is no problem’ phrasing indicates a settling for second best, if that, through a sleight of hand (or, rather, a sleight of mind) called identification.

RESPONDENT: The body can take certain amount of pain, and then it faints. What is bad in that? Is a protective mechanism.

RICHARD: As I have never said there was anything ‘bad’ in that you are having a conversation with yourself here ... I am most pleased that I faint when physical pain becomes unbearable as it means that unbearable physical pain is never experienced.

RESPONDENT: They don’t think they will die.

RICHARD: There is no evidence that animals think, period ... but it is true that they are not aware they will die someday.

RESPONDENT: When they need food they hunt and if they find ok, if not they are not unhappy but still hungry and they keep searching.

RICHARD: A hungry animal is a distressed animal – just as a thirsty animal is a distressed animal – and if being distressed is not being unhappy then I would like to know what is.

RESPONDENT: And if they eat they don’t say how happy we are we eat a beautiful food.

RICHARD: There is no evidence that animals say any words, period ... but a well-fed animal is a content animal – just as a well-watered animal is a content animal – and if being content is not being happy then I would like to know what is.

RESPONDENT: They forget about it and they live in the present moment.

RICHARD: Just as very young children do and, just like very young children, when there is a drought or a famine they languish and/or die ... in distress (aka unhappily).

RESPONDENT: Until another event happen to their life and they will deal with it when it comes.

RICHARD: Entirely at the mercy of events, in other words, meaning that they are sometimes happy (aka content) when events are such that food and water are in abundance ... and sometimes unhappy (aka distressed) when events are such that there is a scarcity of food and water.

RESPONDENT: And if they are attacked by another animal that’s all they die, they don’t think about it before it happens.

RICHARD: There is no evidence that animals think, period ... but, just as the human animal is genetically endowed with the instinctual fright-freeze-fight-flee passionate reaction, they are mostly on the alert, vigilant, scanning for attack ... and being prone to feel panic, for an example of ‘flee’, can hardly be called being happy just as being prone to feeling aggressive, for an instance of ‘fight’, can hardly be called being harmless.

Now that I have responded point-by-point, to what you have just said, I will re-present it here, sans the two sentences regarding yourself, as I have an overall question to ask:

• [Respondent]: ‘Animals to my observation ARE their feelings, they don’t separate them selves from their feelings, so there is no one ‘me’ who has the feelings, and so there is no ‘me’ suffering. (...) The body can take certain amount of pain, and then it faints. What is bad in that? Is a protective mechanism. They don’t think they will die. When they need food they hunt and if they find ok, if not they are not unhappy but still hungry and they keep searching. And if they eat they don’t say how happy we are we eat a beautiful food. They forget about it and they live in the present moment. Until another event happen to their life and they will deal with it when it comes. And if they are attacked by another animal that’s all they die, they don’t think about it before it happens’.

Do you see echoes of the kind of attitude which underpins cruelty to animals?

*

RESPONDENT: There are examples from people that are attacked by tigers or lions and they survived and they said that after the attack they didn’t feel anything no fear no pain they were like in another dimension.

RICHARD: Aye ... and instances of this gave the ‘me’ who was inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago encouragement to proceed along ‘his’ path to freeing this flesh and blood body of the instinctual passions which ‘he’ was.

To explain at some length for clarity of communication: I had read an account, many years before, by a farmer’s son who was awarded a Victoria Cross for extreme bravery in the face of the enemy (the highest award, under the British awards system, for a conspicuous courage of a nature such that only 1,348 have been awarded since 1856). As I recall his platoon was pinned down by machine-gun fire from a concrete bunker and there was no way forward to keep up with the advancing line on either flank until it was knocked out. According to the citation he showed courage above and beyond the call of duty by charging single-handedly across open ground under withering fire and lobbing a hand grenade into the pill-box. His own report of the incident, many years later, gave me pause to think and consider. He said that he was no hero and that bravery did not come into it. He said that something changed in him, as he lay pinned down with his mates behind whatever cover they could find, experiencing intense fear. He said that all of a sudden he moved past fear into a super-real world of heightened awareness and absolute calm. He found himself running toward the offending enemy position with bullets whistling about his ears ... and he felt no fear at all: ‘fear did not exist here in this other world’ he said (or words to that effect). He said he did not deserve such high recognition for valour because ‘it was not me who charged the pill-box’ (or some-such words).

It is relevant at this point to mention that more than a few Victoria Crosses are awarded posthumously.

I also watched an account on television, by a U.S. naval pilot flying off carriers during the battle of Midway, and other battles that followed, where he spoke of himself and other pilots experiencing fear prior to take-off. He said that, instead of trying to overcome fear like his buddies, he would ‘go into the fear itself’ (direct quote). He would encourage it to grow and increase in intensity until, sitting strapped into the pilot’s seat as the plane catapulted down the flight-deck, the very intensity of terror would propel him into ‘another world of utter calm’ (or words to that effect) wherein all his senses were heightened and he was spontaneously super-alert ... without any effort. He was able to conduct his designated sortie with outstanding assurance, born out of the enhanced clarity of his unafraid state of being ... until he came back to the ship and – having landed safely – would slip back into the normal world and start compulsively shaking with delayed-action fear at the enormity of what he had just done. I watched intently as this now-old man described his war-time exploits that earned him his country’s foremost military decoration for ‘conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life, above and beyond the call of duty’ (the Congressional Medal of Honour, instituted in 1861, and marked ‘Valour’).

I took it all in with rapidly growing fascination and the thrilling realisation that I already knew of this unafraid state of being from my personal history where, being in a war-zone as a youth, my life became a living nightmare ... literally. I was trapped in an horrific world of revulsion and repugnance, dread and foreboding, and in order to escape from the savage barbarity of the situation my mind somehow created a new ‘reality’ built out of the extremities of animalistic fear, which hallucination I would nowadays call ‘unreality’. Thus, back then in a ‘kill or be killed’ country, I withdrew into a place where all is (apparently) placid and peaceful that was not unlike being in the centre of a cyclone – all about rages fear and hatred, anger and aggression – but in ‘there’ all was (seemingly) calm and quiet.

Thus I knew from experience that it is possible to generate an unreality (dissociate) in order to evade the grim and glum ‘real-world’ reality. 26 years later I came to realise that the ‘Greater Reality’ was nothing but another evasion – the mystical realm is a culturally revered dissociative hallucination – and that completion was already actually just here right now ... and had always been actually just here all along.

There are three world’s altogether ... the natural ‘reality’ that 6.0 billion people live in and the super-natural ‘Reality’ that .000001 of the population live in ... and this actual world. I call it actual because it is the world of this body and these sense organs only ... and nary a god or goddess or a devil or a demon to be found. Both the grim and glum ‘real world’ and the glamorous and glorious ‘Greater Reality’ vanished when ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul became extinct.

I would not – and could not – live a lie.

*

RESPONDENT: By the way I paste and copy from the internet about the Hubble’s LAW not theory. The big bang is a THEORY but the expansion of the universe is a FACT, proven with photos. [quote]: ‘The Hubble Law and Hubble Constant are the foundations of the Big Bang theory. To test the theory, astronomers attempt to make reliable measurements of the expansion rate to determine the size and age of the Universe. The evidence that stars and galaxies are moving away from us comes primarily from the red shift of the light from them. These measurements are checked against independent estimates based on the ages of the oldest stars in the Universe. Debate continues concerning the exact value of the Hubble Constant. The animation pictured is a sequence of photos (http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/gif/M100CphB.gif), taken with the NASA Hubble Space Telescope, of a variable star in galaxy M100. These variable stars help astronomers calculate distances to other galaxies. Before 1910, Harvard astronomer Henrietta Leavitt began measuring the brightness of stars in a class known as Cepheid variables, which are bright, young stars with masses 5 to 20 times our own Sun. She discovered that these stars reveal their true brightness by the way their light varies, and that this makes them reliable markers for measuring astronomical distances. Astronomer Edwin Hubble used these Cepheid variable stars to discover that the more distant a galaxy is from Earth the faster it moves away. There is a proportionality between the distance to a galaxy and its recessional velocity. This relationship is called the Hubble Law. The ratio of velocity to distance is known as the Hubble Constant. Hubble’s observations led to the realization that in a uniformly expanding universe, galaxies would have been closer together in the past. Early in the Universe, the density (and temperature) of matter would therefore have been very high. This leads to a model for the evolution of the Universe called the Big Bang theory. The theory says that the Universe began in an extremely hot and dense form and has been expanding ever since. The age of the Universe is estimated to be equal to the inverse of the Hubble Constant. One of the primary uses of the Hubble Space Telescope has been to search for very faint Cepheid variables (as shown above) in distant galaxies and to use them to determine galactic distances in an attempt to improve our estimate of the Hubble Constant. The current estimate of the Hubble Constant suggests that the Universe is between 8 and 15 billion years old’. [endquote]. I should like to add here that when we say that when we say that the distance between galaxies becomes bigger we don’t mean that the galaxies are moving, but the space is expanding. And I make the question, how can one already infinite space, as you say, expand?

RICHARD: As I do not say that space is expanding your question has no relevance to what I report ... and as there are many other ways of explaining red-shift it is not a ‘FACT’ that the universe is expanding no matter how big the letters are that you write it with.

RESPONDENT: And when you say that you know through a PCE that the universe is infinite, what exactly you mean?

RICHARD: I mean ‘exactly’ what I say and I say ‘exactly’ what I mean ... do you think I am writing poesy when I say that, as this flesh and blood body only I am the universe experiencing itself apperceptively and that, as such, this infinite, eternal, and perpetual universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude?

RESPONDENT: Do you mean it literally?

RICHARD: When I say ‘apperceptively’ I mean it literally, not fancifully.

RESPONDENT: Because if you can not know in a PCE what exist behind a door, then to say that you know what happens beyond millions of light years, then you are entering a metaphysical state.

RICHARD: No, the unmediated experience of infinitude – the apperceptive experience of boundless space, unlimited time, and perpetual matter (mass/energy) – is not a metaphysical experience ... the metaphysical experience, during the eleven years of spiritual enlightenment, was of a timeless and spaceless and formless ‘infinitude’ known as God or Truth or Ground of Being or Implicate Order and so on.

RESPONDENT: And may be that a PCE is one ASC.

RICHARD: Only in your dreams and schemes ... as I have intimate knowledge of both the on-going altered state of consciousness (ASC) popularly known as spiritual enlightenment (night and day for eleven years) and the on-going pure consciousness experience (PCE) I chose to call an actual freedom (night and day for over a decade now) you are talking to the wrong person if you plan on convincing somebody by logical argument.

In other words: actualism is experiential ... not abstract theory.

*

RESPONDENT: Finally the evolution LAW as said me Richard, not theory, does it needs human effort and methods?

RICHARD: You must be referring to this exchange:

• [Respondent]: ‘If evolution of Darwin exist, because also this is a theory.
• [Richard]: ‘Nope ... evolution is scientific fact (as evidenced by the microbial evolution, in response to antibiotics for instance, which is mistakenly called ‘developing an immunity’).

Neither did I say it is ‘LAW’ nor am I aware of any law of evolution (but I am not all that well-read on the subject) ... and I do not know of any ‘human effort and methods’ that are needed for evolution to naturally (aka blindly) take its course.

The names given to purposeful evolution are [‘selective breeding’] and ‘genetic modification’ or ‘genetic engineering’.

Editorial note: the phrase ‘selective breeding’, which preceded genetic breeding by many centuries, was added later due to an oversight at the time of writing.

RESPONDENT: As far as I know evolution of species happens spontaneously.

RICHARD: As I understand it, which understanding is quite scant, when the carrier of genetic information, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), a self-replicating material which is especially found in the chromosomes of nearly all living organisms, lays down the blueprint, so to speak, when the spermatozoa fertilises the ova a mutant blueprint (a blueprint somewhat out of the norm) can occur in the rapid shuffling of the genes. If the resultant embryo/foetus can survive and be born, and further survive to puberty and propagate, it reproduces its mutation. If the mutant species thus engendered is more fitted to the environment than the norm (aka the survival of the fittest) the mutant species prospers and becomes the new norm as the old norm, less fitted to the environment, gradually dies off.

This is what happens in the microbial evolution I referred to earlier: it is not that microbes ‘develop an immunity’ as it is rather that mutant species unaffected by the antibiotics in the first place can prosper whilst the affected microbes die off in droves ... until there is only the mutant microbes (the new norm) already resistant by accident, as it were, to the antibiotics left alive and multiplying.

Hence the necessity to genetically modify antibiotics so as to stay ahead of the game.

August 21 2003

RESPONDENT: Do you have an animal brain to know it [the unhappiness of the animals]?

RICHARD: If by this you mean, for example, that only a dog can experience how a dog experiences itself then we may as well stop this discussion right now.

RESPONDENT: Yes I mean exactly this.

RICHARD: And thus does this discussion come to an end ... on to a much safer topic, such as the metaphysical, eh?

August 21 2003

RESPONDENT: I should like to ask you if you are interested for me to bring in the list a new subject, the so called, metaphysical? Is something that science can’t explain it, but they are overall phenomena. There are many frauds in this area, but this does not mean that there are not genuine ones. Science for example can not explain the reason of many illnesses, but this does not mean that the diseases does not exist. I am copying and paste a subject that I founded interesting. The first question that will arise to your brain is, what is there to be reincarnated?

RICHARD: You may find a review of the following exchange helpful:

• [Respondent]: ‘In the moment you speaks about oblivion after death ...
• [Richard]: ‘First and foremost: I report the identity in toto going into blessed oblivion whilst this flesh and blood body was still alive.
Second, with no identity in situ it is patently obvious that there be nothing whatsoever to survive physical death.
Third, hence there was, similarly, nothing which predated birth.
Lastly, physical death is, just as being anaesthetised or even each night upon going to sleep is, the oblivion of consciousness (the state or condition of a body being conscious) as well as the awareness of consciousness (the state or condition of a body being aware of being conscious) ... only never coming to or waking up again.
In other words, physical death is the end, finish.

RESPONDENT: I really DON’T KNOW, but because I don’t know I can’t reject the evidence altogether.

RICHARD: The only way to know it is experientially.

August 27 2003

RESPONDENT: I could not resist to send you one article that I found yesterday to internet. Is explaining what I tried to explain some months ago about the outer world and the way we perceive it.

RICHARD: There is no ‘outer world’ here in this actual world (there is no inner world here). You may find the following to be of interest:

• [Respondent]: ‘Around us, out there, there is one underlying reality.
• [Richard]: ‘First, there is no ‘out there’ in actuality – somehow you seem to have overlooked the main point of an actual freedom from the human condition (the absence of identity and its ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ worlds) – and how do you know there is ‘one underlying reality’ anyway as you make it quite clear that ‘we can never know what is out there per se’ (further below)?

And:

• [Respondent]: ‘What I was trying to say to you and may be I didn’t express my self well, is that we can never know what is out there per se.
• [Richard]: ‘Indeed not ... the identity within creates an inner world and pastes its reality as a veneer over this actual world ... it then calls it an outer world and, feeling separate from its own creation, seeks union with it (little realising it is its own creation of course).
Yet even those who succeed in this narcissistic enterprise say it is unknowable ... being but a delusion born out of an illusion is it any wonder why?

And:

• [Respondent]: ‘Our perception does not identify the outside world as it really is, but the way we are allowed to recognize it, as a consequence of transformations performed by our senses.
• [Richard]: ‘Where you say ‘the outside world’ again you are speaking of the reality which the identity within creates ... in actuality one does not perceive the world ‘by our senses’ as one is the senses.
The whole point of actualism is the direct experience of actuality: as this flesh and blood body only what one is (what not ‘who’) is these eyes seeing, these ears hearing, this tongue tasting, this skin touching and this nose smelling – and no separative identity (no ‘I’/‘me’) means no separation – whereas ‘I’/‘me’, a psychological/psychic entity, am inside the body busily creating an inner world and an outer world and looking out through ‘my’ eyes upon ‘my’ outer world as if looking out through a window, listening to ‘my’ outer world through ‘my’ ears as if they were microphones, tasting ‘my’ outer world through ‘my’ tongue, touching ‘my’ outer world through ‘my’ skin and smelling ‘my’ outer world through ‘my’ nose ... plus adding all kinds of emotional/psychological baggage to what is otherwise the bare sensory experience of the flesh and blood body.
This identity (‘I’/‘me’) is forever cut-off from the actual ... from the world as-it-is.

And:

• [Respondent]: ‘I copy and paste: [snip quote by Prof. Jorge Martins de Oliveira PhD].
• [Richard]: ‘I notice that Mr. Jorge Martins de Oliveira also refers to [quote] ‘the outside world’ [endquote] and not this actual world ... thus he too can never know the physical world as it actually is.
He also brings in the interpretation of sensory perception with [quote] ‘previous similar experiences’ [endquote] to make his point that [quote] ‘perceptions differ’ [endquote] ... yet sensate perception has nothing to do with previous experience as sensate perception is direct, immediate (sensate perception is primary; affective perception is secondary; cognitive perception is tertiary).
In short: sensate perception is indeed [quote] ‘naive’ [endquote].

There are other references but maybe these will do for now.

RESPONDENT: I don’t remember if I used the expression soup of energy, or soup of atoms, because I don’t keep records.

RICHARD: You will find all the e-mails you have posted to The Actual Freedom Trust mailing list in the public archives at the following URL: http://www.topica.com/lists/actualfreedom/read

And you will find this exchange in those archives:

• [Respondent]: ‘I don’t use to keep archives of my emails. I delete them after reading them and answered them. So I can not paste and copy, I am answering from memory.
• [Richard]: ‘You will find all the e-mails you have posted to The Actual Freedom Trust mailing list in the public archives at the following URL: [www.topica.com/lists/actualfreedom/read]. Speaking personally I find re-reading the original far more accurate than memory (hence copy and paste).

May I ask why you take such little notice of what your co-respondents write to you?

RESPONDENT: Is this collective subconscious? [quote]: ‘1. Introduction to Consciousness: Abstract: Experiences are physical properties of certain brain states. These brain states are given forms representing the external world by information processing in our brains. The model of the world thus created is the conscious world of our experience. It is a Map used to compute navigation for our organisms. The contextual relationships within the model give meaning to its various images. It is the intent of this paper to make it clear that experiences (qualia and sensorial consciousness) are properties of physical brain states and to show how things are given appearance and meaning. Statistics: 10 pages, 3639 words, 40kb. Published: March 29, 2000. [snipped remainder for reasons of space and copyright restrictions]. There are six more articles.

RICHARD: As the abstract for the article you posted also refers to [quote] ‘the external world’ [endquote] what it has to say has little, if any, relevance to what I report ... however this exchange does:

• [Respondent]: ‘When in a recent email I was trying to explain that the brain is co-creator of the world, and I was using the example of looking at a tree, you seemed you did no wanted to understand.
• [Richard]: ‘If you were to re-read that exchange (at the above URL for example) you will see that I do understand what you were trying to explain ... just because I do not agree with what you say does not mean that I do not understand what you are saying.
I even provided practical reasons why what you were saying was invalid – which you have chosen to ignore also – and they show that I understand.

Here is a suggestion: try taking more notice of what your co-respondents have to say ... it would not only save a lot of repetition but provide (a) a focussed reading ... and thus (b) an engaged response.

‘Tis only a suggestion, mind you.

August 31 2003

RESPONDENT: I could not resist to send you one article that I found yesterday to internet. Is explaining what I tried to explain some months ago about the outer world and the way we perceive it.

RICHARD: There is no ‘outer world’ here in this actual world (there is no inner world here). You may find the following to be of interest: [snip four quotes from previous discussions]. There are other references but maybe these will do for now.

RESPONDENT: I don’t remember if I used the expression soup of energy, or soup of atoms, because I don’t keep records.

RICHARD: You will find all the e-mails you have posted to The Actual Freedom Trust mailing list in the public archives at the following URL: [snip URL]. And you will find this exchange in those archives: [snip previous advice regarding the exact same issue]. May I ask why you take such little notice of what your co-respondents write to you?

RESPONDENT: Is this collective subconscious? [quote]: ‘1. Introduction to Consciousness: Abstract: Experiences are physical properties of certain brain states. These brain states are given forms representing the external world by information processing in our brains. The model of the world thus created is the conscious world of our experience. It is a Map used to compute navigation for our organisms. The contextual relationships within the model give meaning to its various images. It is the intent of this paper to make it clear that experiences (qualia and sensorial consciousness) are properties of physical brain states and to show how things are given appearance and meaning. Statistics: 10 pages, 3639 words, 40kb. Published: March 29, 2000. [snipped remainder for reasons of space and copyright restrictions]. There are six more articles.

RICHARD: As the abstract for the article you posted also refers to [quote] ‘the external world’ [endquote] what it has to say has little, if any, relevance to what I report ... however this exchange does:

[Respondent]: ‘When in a recent email I was trying to explain that the brain is co-creator of the world, and I was using the example of looking at a tree, you seemed you did no wanted to understand.
[Richard]: ‘If you were to re-read that exchange (at the above URL for example) you will see that I do understand what you were trying to explain ... just because I do not agree with what you say does not mean that I do not understand what you are saying. I even provided practical reasons why what you were saying was invalid – which you have chosen to ignore also – and they show that I understand.

Here is a suggestion: try taking more notice of what your co-respondents have to say ... it would not only save a lot of repetition but provide (a) a focussed reading ... and thus (b) an engaged response. ‘Tis only a suggestion, mind you.

RESPONDENT: Richard, thanks for answering.

RICHARD: You are very welcome ... I am pleased that the issue of qualities (qualia) being sourced in the properties of the object, and not in the brain as some people maintain, has finally been cleared up.

RESPONDENT: I should like to tell you, that the moment you are speaking about consciousness, PCE, etc., and that you perceive the infinity of the universe through apperceptive awareness, then you have already entered the field of metaphysics.

RICHARD: No, the unmediated experience of infinitude – the apperceptive awareness of boundless space, unlimited time, and perpetual matter (mass/energy) – is not a metaphysical experience ... the metaphysical experience, during the eleven years of spiritual enlightenment and called by some as being ‘choiceless awareness’, was of a timeless and spaceless and formless ‘infinitude’ known as god or truth or ground of being or implicate order and so on.

When I am speaking about consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious (the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun meaning a state or condition) as in being alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose), and when I am talking about pure consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious sans identity in toto – both ego-self (the thinker) and the feeling-self (the feeler) – which means that perception is bare perception (unmediated perception) ... the term ‘apperceptive awareness’ is but another way of referring to this simple perception (aka naïve perception) and being thus direct it is non-separative (not separated from the physical).

Thus there is nothing metaphysical about being apperceptive ... indeed, if anything the normal way of perception – a mediated, or indirect and thus separative, perception – being once-removed from the physical, is arguably already well on the way to being beyond time and space and form.

RESPONDENT: I define metaphysics as ‘meta ta physsika’, a Greek word meaning beyond nature and physics.

RICHARD: As the word ‘physics’ – plural of ‘physic’ from the Latin ‘physica’ from the Greek ‘ta phusika’ (‘the natural’ understood as ‘things’) – is derived from the Greek ‘phusis’ (‘nature’) it properly refers to the science of the natural world (as in knowledge of the physical world of animal, vegetable and mineral) ... thus to say nature *and* physics is to separate it [physics] from the physical.

And I am not just nit-picking over the meaning of words here as it is glaringly obvious that the late nineteenth-century/early twentieth-century physics departed from being a study of the natural world (the physical world) and entered into the realm of the mathematical world ... an abstract world which does not exist in nature.

Indeed the word ‘metaphysical’ also refers to that which is ‘based on abstract general reasoning or a priori principles’ (Oxford Dictionary) as well as the more common meaning of that which transcends matter or the physical (as in immaterial, incorporeal, supersensible, supernatural and so on).

And quantum theory, for an instance of this, is most definitely based on a mathematical device (Mr. Max Planck’s ‘quanta’) initially designed to solve the hypothetical problem of infinite ultra-violet radiation from a non-existent perfect ‘black-box’ radiator and never intended to be taken as being real (until Mr. Albert Einstein took it up for his own purposes).

RESPONDENT: You have entered in a field beyond science.

RICHARD: As science is the state or fact of knowing – knowledge or cognisance of something physical – based upon observed facts, and/or with demonstrated truths, in that it is both an intellectual and practical activity encompassing those branches of study (the natural sciences) which apply objective observation (the scientific method) to the phenomena of the physical universe, in what way is determining that the universe has boundless space, unlimited time, and perpetual matter (mass/ energy), by both intellectual reasoning and direct observation entering into a field beyond science?

As you cannot be saying that all those people with the scientific training sufficient to qualify for the title ‘scientist’, who also say the universe is infinite, eternal, and perpetual, are not operating in the field of science (and only those people with the scientific training sufficient to qualify for the title ‘scientist’ who say that the universe is finite, temporary, and depletable are operating in the field of science) it would appear that, according to your rationale, only non-apperceptive observation (a mediated, or indirect and thus separative, perception) is within the field of science and apperceptive observation (an unmediated, or direct and thus non-separative, perception) is not.

In other words, for it to be scientific, observation must be done by an entity within the flesh and blood body, eh?

RESPONDENT: You are perceiving something with other means than body senses.

RICHARD: First of all, as I am ‘body senses’ I am unable to perceive ‘with’ them – I perceive *as* them – and as there is no identity in situ inside this flesh and blood body I would be most interested to hear your theory as to what ‘other means’ you say I perceive with.

Meaning that as there is no affective faculty whatsoever operating in this flesh and blood body – thus no epiphenomenal imaginative/psychic facility – there are no other means than sensorially (and reasoning therehence).

And sensible reasoning at that.

September 15 2003

RESPONDENT: So to recapitulate, your statement is, that you or me is the universe experiencing it’s own self AS a human being not like a human being.

RICHARD: This is what I wrote in a previous discussion with you:

• [Richard]: ‘... as this flesh and blood body only I am the universe experiencing itself apperceptively; as such this infinite, eternal, and perpetual universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude’.

RESPONDENT: Is this right?

RICHARD: No (although you have got the ‘as’ part right) ... you have changed ‘itself’ into ‘it’s own self’ when I do not mean that at all. Vis.:

• ‘itself: 1. reflexive: reflexive form (indirect, direct, and after prepositions) of ‘it’, pronominal, pronoun: (to, for, etc.) the thing in question; 2. emphatic: in apposition to a noun (subjective or objective) that particular thing, the very thing, that thing alone; it, not something else; 3. (not appositional): it; not something else’. (Oxford Dictionary).

Thus there is nary a ‘self’ to be found in the sentence I wrote ... I was simply referring to the thing in question.

RESPONDENT: So you and me and everybody else IS the universe.

RICHARD: No ... the universe is experiencing itself as this flesh and blood body, and as that flesh and blood body, and as any flesh and blood body (which includes as a cat and as a dog and so on).

RESPONDENT: Then you say after the death of this body there is oblivion, which to my logic is a contradiction, because you have said that the universe will continue, but the body will go to oblivion.

RICHARD: I have not said ‘the body will go to oblivion’ at all ... what I have said is that consciousness (the state or condition of the body being conscious) goes into oblivion and that the body breaks down into its constituent parts (just as it sheds bits of itself moment-to-moment all the while it is alive).

RESPONDENT: How is that possible the universe to continue, and the human being to go to oblivion?

RICHARD: Simply because the human being is not the universe ... to say that ‘you and me and everybody else IS the universe’ is what you have made of my words.

*

RESPONDENT: Another point is that you are saying that the universe always was existing. So you are speaking about something that has not being created but although always existing.

RICHARD: Yes, the universe is a veritable perpetuus mobilis.

RESPONDENT: So you reject the law of cause and effect for the first time in human logic.

RICHARD: Ha ... Mr. Werner Heisenberg, of the uncertainty principle fame, for just one instance, dispensed with causality (cause and effect) before I was even born:

• ‘The law of causality is no longer applied in quantum theory’. (page 88, ‘Physics and Philosophy, the Revolution in Modern Science’, by Werner Heisenberg; ©1966 Harper and Row, New York).

RESPONDENT: Not even something create it’s own self, because this is absurd, for something to create it’s own self must exist prior of it’s own creation, which is absurd.

RICHARD: What has this got to do with what you said (further above)? Vis.:

• [Respondent]: ‘So you are speaking about something that has not being created but although always existing.

The words ‘always existing’ not only indicate ‘not being created’ but also indicate ‘not creating itself’ ... the words ‘always existing’ means no creation, period.

RESPONDENT: Do you understand what it means ALWAYS existing?

RICHARD: Yes ... do you?

RESPONDENT: Means trillion of trillion of years, and even that is nothing in front of ALWAYS.

RICHARD: Yep, forever is a long, long time ... beginningless and endless time, in fact.

RESPONDENT: THAT ALSO MEANS THAT LIFE WAS ALWAYS EXISTING, dna/rna, amino acids, etc.

RICHARD: As it is entirely reasonable to assume that wherever the conditions are ripe some life-form has been, is now, and will be, existing then ... yes (although as to whether it would necessarily be ‘dna/rna, amino acids, etc.’ is another question).

RESPONDENT: Life consciousness was always existing.

RICHARD: If by this you mean the condition of a life-form being conscious – which does not include viruses for example – then again it is entirely reasonable to assume that at some place, at some time, there was, is now, and will be, some-such creature ... meaning that if a human creature does not get it act together it makes no difference to the universe per se.

It makes a lot of difference for that human, however.

RESPONDENT: Where is space for oblivion then?

RICHARD: Hmm ... oblivion is not a place: the expression ‘going into oblivion’ is a way of describing what happens, for example, upon being anaesthetised, being knocked-out, fainting, or in any other way being comatose (unconscious) ... even each night upon going to sleep (unless there be dreaming).

RESPONDENT: You accept oblivion ...

RICHARD: If I may interject? Have you never been anaesthetised, knocked-out, fainted, or in any other way been comatose (unconscious) ... even each night upon going to sleep? Or, to put that another way, have you been conscious, night and day, for the 50+ years you have been on this planet?

Only if it be the latter can you truly say you have no idea of what oblivion is.

RESPONDENT: ... but from the other hand you accept that life that is all that exist has no beginning and no end.

RICHARD: I do no such thing ... I clearly say that the universe has no beginning or end (either spatially, temporally, or materially) and that a life-form, by being born and then dying after living for x-period of time, does have a beginning and end.

RESPONDENT: Are you noticing a contradiction and one conundrum here?

RICHARD: No ... and that is because there is none. What I do notice is that you are determined to make one, or the other or both, out of what I have to report (presumably so as to have something to refute) no matter how convoluted or silly it may be.

What I have to say is actually very, very simple ... and sensible.

*

RESPONDENT: I should like to tell you, that the moment you are speaking about consciousness, PCE, etc., and that you perceive the infinity of the universe through apperceptive awareness (...).

RICHARD: (...) When I am speaking about consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious (the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun meaning a state or condition) as in being alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose), and when I am talking about pure consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious sans identity in toto – both ego-self (the thinker) and the feeling-self (the feeler) – which means that perception is bare perception (unmediated perception) ... the term ‘apperceptive awareness’ is but another way of referring to this simple perception (aka naïve perception) and being thus direct it is non-separative (not separated from the physical).

RESPONDENT: The feeler, can be eliminated, but why the feelings?

RICHARD: Contrary to your (intellectual) assertion there cannot be feelings sans the feeler – ‘I’ am ‘my’ feelings and ‘my’ feelings are ‘me’ – and the elimination of the one is the elimination of the other.

RESPONDENT: Is as you want to eliminate the senses too.

RICHARD: This is just a waste of a sentence.

RESPONDENT: You told me that you can not perceive through your senses because you are the senses.

RICHARD: Yes, what I am (what, not ‘who’) is these eyes seeing, these ears hearing, these nostrils smelling, this tongue tasting, this skin touching ... whereas who ‘I’ was looked out through ‘my’ eyes as if looking out through a window, listened through ‘my’ ears as if they were microphones, and so on.

In short: what I am is this flesh and blood body only being apperceptively aware.

RESPONDENT: Agreed. But you still have sensorial awareness.

RICHARD: Even though you may say ‘agreed’ it is evident you do not comprehend what you are agreeing with ... I do not ‘have’ sensorial awareness I *am* that. For example:

• [Richard]: ‘With the end of both ‘I’ and ‘me’, the distance or separation between both ‘I’ and ‘me’ and the sense organs – and thus the external world – disappears. To be living as the senses is to live a clean and clear and pure awareness – apperception – a pure consciousness experience of the world as-it-is. Because there is no ‘I’ as a thinker (a little person inside one’s head) or a ‘me’ as a feeler (a little person in one’s heart) – to have sensations happen to them, one is the sensations. The entire affective faculty vanishes ... blind nature’s software package of instinctual passions is deleted.
Then there is nothing except the series of sensations which happen ... not happening to an ‘I’ or a ‘me’ but just happening ... moment by moment ... one after another. *To live life as these sensations, as distinct from having them*, engenders the most astonishing sense of freedom and magic. One is living in peace and tranquillity; a meaningful peace and tranquillity. Life is intrinsically purposeful, the reason for existence lies openly all around. It never goes away – nor has it ever been away – it was just that ‘I’/‘me’ was standing in the way of the meaning of life being apparent. Now the universe is experiencing itself in all its magnificence as an apperceptive human being. [emphasis added].

I do realise that there is an enormous amount of words on The Actual Freedom Trust web site ... but I would have considered that someone who professes to be interested in what I have to report – even if only to refute what I have to say – would, at the very least, have read the home page on my portion of the web site.

It, more or less, says it all.

RESPONDENT: Why the same can not be applied to the feelings?

RICHARD: I have no interest whatsoever in being enlightened again (even if I could which I cannot) as I experientially found it to be wanting.

RESPONDENT: There is not feeler, but you are the feelings.

RICHARD: When the feelings become a state of being – as in the altered state of consciousness (ASC) popularly known as spiritual enlightenment – one no longer has feelings one is the feelings ... ‘being’ instead of ‘becoming’ (to put in a way you might be more familiar with).

In other words one is nothing but the feeler ... the feeler is the state of being.

This is because ‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being is ‘being’ itself (quite often capitalised as ‘Being’ upon self-realisation) ... any god or goddess is affective by its very nature.

RESPONDENT: As you have sensorial awareness, why not to have feelings awareness without the feeler?

RICHARD: Simply because who ‘I’ am, at root, is ‘my’ feelings – ‘me’ and ‘my’ feelings are one and the same thing – and the elimination of the one is simultaneously the elimination of the other.

*

RESPONDENT: ... and that you perceive the infinity of the universe through apperceptive awareness, then you have already entered the field of metaphysics. (...) You have entered in a field beyond science.

RICHARD: As science is the state or fact of knowing – knowledge or cognisance of something physical – based upon observed facts, and/or demonstrated truths, in that it is both an intellectual and practical activity encompassing those branches of study (the natural sciences) which apply objective observation (the scientific method) to the phenomena of the physical universe, in what way is determining that the universe has boundless space, unlimited time, and perpetual matter (mass/energy), by both intellectual reasoning and direct observation entering into a field beyond science?

RESPONDENT: I accept the above of yours ...

RICHARD: Good ... I am pleased that this issue (that the apperceptive awareness of pure consciousness experiencing is not metaphysical) has finally been cleared up.

RESPONDENT: ... but why not to apply it also in the supernatural phenomena?

RICHARD: As it was the scientific method (such as applying objective observation and determining facts for example) which, amongst other things, enabled me to break free from the supernatural clutches of the massive delusion known as spiritual enlightenment, I can thoroughly endorse such a course of action being most definitely conducive to helping deliver the goods so longed-for by humankind for millennia.

RESPONDENT: Like ectoplasm mediums that communicate with dead persons, documented with scientific observation?

RICHARD: You may find a review of the following exchange helpful:

• [Respondent]: ‘In the moment you speaks about oblivion after death ...
• [Richard]: ‘First and foremost: I report the identity in toto going into blessed oblivion whilst this flesh and blood body was still alive.
Second, with no identity in situ it is patently obvious that there be nothing whatsoever to survive physical death.
Third, hence there was, similarly, nothing which predated birth.
Lastly, physical death is, just as being anaesthetised or even each night upon going to sleep is, the oblivion of consciousness (the state or condition of a body being conscious) as well as the awareness of consciousness (the state or condition of a body being aware of being conscious) ... only never coming to or waking up again.
In other words, physical death is the end, finish.

Put succinctly: there is nothing which survives physical death for ‘ectoplasm mediums’ to communicate with.

RESPONDENT: There are many frauds, yes, but are also documented phenomena.

RICHARD: The few times I have looked-up the subject of scientifically observed psychic phenomena – and there are plenty of instances to look at – it has always turned out to have been a fraud ... as I have no expertise on the subject, nor have any intention of gaining any, you may find the following to be of interest:

• [Richard]: ‘... there is a reward in excess of $1,000,000, offered by the James Randi Educational Foundation, for the first person who can conclusively demonstrate any paranormal phenomena. Vis.: www.randi.org/research/index.html
In case you do not get to access that web page the most pertinent part is this: [quote]: ‘All tests are designed with the participation and approval of the applicant. In most cases, the applicant will be asked to perform a relatively simple preliminary test of the claim, which if successful, will be followed by the formal test. Preliminary tests are usually conducted by associates of the JREF at the site where the applicant lives. Upon success in the preliminary testing process, the ‘applicant’ becomes a ‘claimant’. *To date, no one has ever passed the preliminary tests*. [emphasis added].
There is also 100,000 rupees offered by Mr. B. Premanand, of the Indian Sceptic, for ‘any psychic, supernatural or paranormal ability of any kind’. Vis.: www.indian-skeptic.org/html/rules.htm
And the Australian Sceptics offer $100,000 ... Vis.: www.skeptics.com.au/features/challenge.htm
Plus, if my memory serves me correctly, there was a society in the U. K which offered something like 20,000 pounds or thereabouts some years ago ... and nobody ever claimed it.

And there are many other people, who have also made it their business to investigate the ‘documented phenomena’ you speak of, as well.

*

RESPONDENT: You were for 11 years in one enlightened state. For sure then you had eliminated already the ego, the self, but not the me, the soul, as you defining it. Was only the absolute, God, Soul, truth, whatever name. Now 10 years ago you made a shift to AF.

RICHARD: If by ‘you made a shift to AF’ you mean that the identity within – ‘the me, the soul’/‘the absolute, God, Soul, truth, whatever name’ – altruistically ‘self’-immolated for the benefit of this body and that body and every body then you are correct ... though going by what you have to say below it would appear that this is not what you mean.

RESPONDENT: I think the only difference is that you eliminated the me, as being, as soul.

RICHARD: As ‘the me, as being, as soul’ was ‘the absolute, God, Soul, truth, whatever name’ I do look askance at your ‘the only difference is’ phrasing ... it is an enormous difference with far-reaching implications and ramifications.

RESPONDENT: But from the other hand seems to me that now the absolute is the universe.

RICHARD: No, the universe has always been absolute ... what happened was that the identity within, who had arrogated this property for its own devices (narcissistic ‘self’-aggrandisement and a spurious immortality), ceased to exist and that which is actual became apparent.

RESPONDENT: What difference does it make to say God was existing always and created the universe, or if we go one step further and say the universe was existing since ever?

RICHARD: Try putting it the other way around: why go one step further, than the universe being always existent, and propose an always existent god/goddess creating/ destroying the universe?

I suggest this because what cosmogony does (not to be confused with what cosmology does) is shift the issue of infinitude into the realm of creation/discreation fantasies ... such as believing in a ‘Creation’ ex nihilo/ ‘Destruction’ ad nihil, if one is a religious cosmogonist, or believing in a ‘Big Bang’ ex nihilo/‘Big Crunch’ ad nihil, if one is a scientific cosmogonist, for example.

In other words (‘ex nihilo’ is Latin for ‘out of nothing’ and ‘ad nihil’ is Latin for ‘to nothing’) the issue of infinitude has been shifted onto a non-temporal (timeless) and non-spatial (spaceless) and non-material (formless) and therefore non-existent, and thus metaphysical, nothing or nothingness ... which posited nothingness, or non-existing void, is further proposed as being both the source, or origin, of all things physical (all time, all space, all form) and the eventual destiny for all its (supposed) manifestations.

In short: it bespeaks of credulity stretched to the max.

RESPONDENT: Is god any obstacle to AF?

RICHARD: As there are no gods or goddesses here in this actual world then any god you may instinctually know, feel, and thus think yourself to be is but an obstacle to your freedom and your freedom alone ... I only get to meet flesh and blood bodies here.

RESPONDENT: AF is a method to live in peace, harmless, etc., so if god was existing should it be any difference?

RICHARD: As an actual freedom from the human condition is not ‘a method’ to live peacefully and harmoniously, but actually being peaceful and harmonious in this actual world of sensate delight where there is nary a god or goddess to be found, then any god you may instinctually know, feel, and thus think to be ‘existing’ will only make a difference to your life ... and, of course, to any gullible peoples you come into contact with.

Such as impressionable children, for example.

RESPONDENT: Somebody could blame god then, for everything wrong, but even now somebody can blame the universe and blind nature.

RICHARD: Sure, but as it is an exercise in futility to blame blind nature, for continuing to provide the instinctual survival passions which were necessary all those thousands of years ago, what is the point in doing so?

Now that intelligence, which is the ability to think, reflect, compare, evaluate and implement considered action for beneficial reasons, has developed in the human animal those blind survival passions are no longer necessary – in fact they have become a hindrance in today’s world – and it is only by virtue of this intelligence that blind nature’s default software package can be safely deleted (via altruistic ‘self’-immolation in toto).

No other animal can do this.

RESPONDENT: What exist exists independently of our belief in it.

RICHARD: The pristine purity of this actual world is beyond belief ... it is unimaginable, inconceivable, and incomprehensible, to a normal person, that such peerless perfection could exist.

I walk around in constant amazement and wonder that it does.

RESPONDENT: The universe is or finite or infinite, independently of what I think.

RICHARD: Not when the infinitude, which this universe indubitably is, is apparent in all its wondrous amazement – as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – for then this infinite, eternal, and perpetual universe is stunningly aware of its infinitude ... and thus thinking, on occasion, how enormous infinitude is.

Because nothing comes bigger than that.

RESPONDENT: What good is for me, if is infinite or finite?

RICHARD: When its space is (experientially) known to be infinite, its time (experientially) known to be eternal, and its matter (experientially) known to be perpetual, the ‘good’ for you is blessed oblivion ... and the benefit for the body you are inhabiting is, not only peace-on-earth in this life-time, but to be living the meaning of life as an on-going experiencing (plus making it more likely for other people to emulate).

A win-win situation, in other words.

RESPONDENT: The agnostic is in better position, because he does not loose energy for things that will not make him better.

RICHARD: As a person who is agnostic is still experiencing self-induced suffering, just as anyone else trapped in the human condition is, the question of anyone being in a better position or not is moot.

RESPONDENT: Now to eliminate the self the ego, is not so difficult I think. Is a matter of logic. Nobody is inside my skull to see through the eyes that I call my eyes. I think the self is only a matter of language. I eat, you eat, he eats, etc. And a matter of identification, with whatever I call mine. My house, my wife, etc.

RICHARD: Thus in one fell swoop you have (logically) solved the problem of why 99.99999% of the population never become enlightened, eh?

RESPONDENT: The problem is with the feelings. The me as soul. Not all the so called enlightened people are teaching necessarily with the concept of higher self, or atman, etc.

RICHARD: As none of them deny an after-death state of being it is just a matter of disagreement amongst them as to what name-description that after-death being should go by ... none of them speak of physical death as being the end, finish, oblivion.

RESPONDENT: The thing that bothers me is the oblivion.

RICHARD: Why does it bother you if, as you say, not all enlightened people teach necessarily with the concept of a higher self (by whatever name) ... for surely, if what you are implying were to be true, then their higher self (by whatever name) has gone into oblivion too?

RESPONDENT: As I see AF is a mix of materialism, spirituality (in a good way, no nonsense), atheism, and nihilism.

RICHARD: Hmm ... materialism, as a generalisation, typically holds that life is a chance, random event in an otherwise empty (meaningless) universe; spirituality, as a generalisation, typically holds that life is a purposeful manifestation by or of the supreme being who created or creates the universe; atheism, as a generalisation, typically holds that, as there is no such supreme being, ethical considerations and human love and/or compassion – instead of moral dictates and divine love and/or compassion – are the way to live (somewhat) peacefully and harmoniously; and nihilism, as a generalisation, typically holds that life is whatever one makes of it and, as it is all pointless anyway, the only true philosophical question is whether to commit suicide, or not, and if so, then whether now or later.

As actualism is none of the above (bearing in mind that they are all generalisations) then whatever ‘mix’ it is that you are seeing it has nothing to do with what is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site.

RESPONDENT: Atheists are of two types, the one that care about humanity and the others that are caring only about their selves.

RICHARD: Yet whatever caring they do it is still an affective caring ... and a feeling of caring is not actually caring.

RESPONDENT: I am beginning to see the whole universe like one atom. Scientists does not know what is happening in this atom, but the atom knows.

RICHARD: So as to keep with this analogy I will put it like this: when this infinite, eternal, and perpetual universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude, as a flesh and blood body only being apperceptively aware, it can experientially know what is happening ... as distinct from an atom which, not being either sensate or reflective, can never know what is happening.

RESPONDENT: I don’t want to continue like this persona I have now ...

RICHARD: If I may interject? Try saying it thisaway:

• [example only]: ‘I don’t want to continue as this persona I am now ...’.

Those two little words – as/like and am/have – make a world of difference.

RESPONDENT: ... but I cannot intuitively accept oblivion.

RICHARD: Ahh ... back to the topic of the higher self (god by whatever name) even if obliquely, eh?

RESPONDENT: I think there is only one consciousness, only one being.

RICHARD: As in the god you instinctually know, feel, and thus think yourself to be, by another name, perchance? This intuitive ‘only one being’ thought is why I oft-times say that ‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being is ‘being’ itself (quite often capitalised as ‘Being’ upon self-realisation) ... as in ‘I’ am ‘my’ feelings and ‘my’ feelings are ‘me’.

For to intuitively know something is to instinctually know it ... all gods/goddesses are affective by their very nature.

RESPONDENT: And this consciousness seems to me impossible to go to oblivion. Is rather pessimistic to think so.

RICHARD: Why? When god/goddess ceases meddling in human affairs (via altruistic ‘self’-immolation in toto) peace and harmony prevails and the meaning of life becomes apparent as an on-going actuality.

RESPONDENT: You say that in the moment the self does not exist any more, and the soul, the being, does not exist any more, then there is nothing to survive physical death.

RICHARD: Yes, indeed I do ... and that includes any consciousness, being, presence, mind, god, goddess, truth, ground of being, implicate order, and so on, by whatever name.

RESPONDENT: May be there are other phenomena unknown, the science is still primitive with comparison with what will be in a 100 years for example.

RICHARD: As you have already indicated being 50+ years old that would make you 150+ years old ... and suffering all the while, whilst waiting for some people in white coats in a laboratory somewhere to come to your aid, into the bargain.

RESPONDENT: May be the mind is different from the brain, or outside the brain.

RICHARD: Hmm ... and next you might very well be saying something like this:

• [example only]: And this mind seems to me impossible to go to oblivion.

RESPONDENT: Somewhere, I don’t remember where, I read in your scripts that mind is the brain in operation.

RICHARD: Yes, and to project the brain in operation onto the universe at large and/or beyond it is, just as the same-same projection of intelligence is, anthropomorphism writ large ... this universe is much more than merely a mind.

Much, much more.


CORRESPONDENT No. 44 (Part Five)

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The Third Alternative

(Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body)

Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one.

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