Thread: interesting video on reality

What do I think?

I think it's amazing how otherwise smart and well-educated people can choose to cherry-pick concepts embedded in quantum mechanics, relativity, string theory, chaos theory, etc, and convert them into unfounded fantasy replete with pretty pictures. It also amazes me how these guys elevate our position in reality; as if we puny humans were in charge of all things in the universe simply because we can think!

Yes, everything is energy. I believe that too. I also believe that consciousness may create a unique form of thought energy that could effect reality, and could define our personal futures. I even wrote a book about it. But there are limitations in terms of our relationship to this energy, and our ability to control it. Think about it: if consciousness rules all things, and it is all so easy, then why are these men talking about changing reality rather than just doing it? I've always had a problem with that.

The video reminds me of late-night college dorm conversations, where only the remembered cool stuff from class is discussed. It's all impressive, deep and meaningful, and everyone eventually passes out sure that they'll change their world with a thought -- or a dream. Yet they all invariably woke up the next morning, still the same, if a bit hung over.

I think I've used this example once before, but here it is again: I used to ride a commuter train to work for 3 hours every day, and it was misery defined. So one day I'm sitting there passing the time during yet another breakdown by listening to a conversation between a couple of young people nearby. The woman was pronouncing many of the notions in the Youtube video, and finally said proudly, "I'm in full control of my reality." Without pause the man asked,"Then what are you doing on this train?" The woman had no answer.

So yes, everything is energy, and reality I suppose (and truly hope) can potentially be shifted by altering that energy. But shifting reality beyond the laws of known physics has proven unimaginably hard...don't think people haven't tried. And yes, if humanity were suddenly erased from existence, the universe would still exist -- we may define our existence, but all existence is not us.

So what do I think? I think that you should enjoy the wonder in the statements these guys made, but take it all with a grain of salt. If you don't believe that, then simply try to change reality just by thinking about it: stand in an empty room and convince yourself, beyond doubt, that you have created a chair behind you. Then sit down.

Thanks for your ideas,
I didn't get the idea that we could change reality.
But the idea that the universe is a consciousness. And the idea that anything is possible. E.g. When someone says something like trees are conscious it usually seems like crap but now it i can see it could be possible.

Originally Posted by Sageous

What do I think?

I think it's amazing how otherwise smart and well-educated people can choose to cherry-pick concepts embedded in quantum mechanics, relativity, string theory, chaos theory, etc, and convert them into unfounded fantasy replete with pretty pictures. It also amazes me how these guys elevate our position in reality; as if we puny humans were in charge of all things in the universe simply because we can think!
.

I agree Humans are Egotistical and SelfCentered and makes them want to think they are Special, but did the video really say we were the only things that can think? and then the only things that can control the universe? It's like Even if we could control the universe the reason why we don't get our way all the time is because other humans are thinking and therefore battling against us so to speak.

Originally Posted by ZeraCook

I agree Humans are Egotistical and SelfCentered and makes them want to think they are Special, but did the video really say we were the only things that can think? and then the only things that can control the universe?

Yup, that's what I heard. In fact, I think one of the speakers said that the only reason the universe exists at all is because we are here to observe it... Which by the way is a most absurd (and remarkably common) interpretation of quantum mechanics.

It's like Even if we could control the universe the reason why we don't get our way all the time is because other humans are thinking and therefore battling against us so to speak.

That is a convenient explanation, but seriously? Are we to believe that no humans are able to break through a barrier as simple as a crowd of uncontrolled human consciousness? Maybe, but it seems very unlikely to me. And it isn't that we don't get our way all the time, reality-bending-wise, we don't get our way ever.

Originally Posted by Sageous

Yup, that's what I heard. In fact, I think one of the speakers said that the only reason the universe exists at all is because we are here to observe it... Which by the way is a most absurd (and remarkably common) interpretation of quantum mechanics.



That is a convenient explanation, but seriously? Are we to believe that no humans are able to break through a barrier as simple as a crowd of uncontrolled human consciousness? Maybe, but it seems very unlikely to me. And it isn't that we don't get our way all the time, reality-bending-wise, we don't get our way ever.

There are many Absurd things people believe in and have believed in throughout history. how can you say we never get our way ever? I've had exactly what I wanted to happen happen many times exactly the way I imagined it, even though I had no influence to guide it that way other then just imagining how I wanted it to happen, If that really is even an Influence.

Originally Posted by ZeraCook

There are many Absurd things people believe in and have believed in throughout history. how can you say we never get our way ever? I've had exactly what I wanted to happen happen many times exactly the way I imagined it, even though I had no influence to guide it that way other then just imagining how I wanted it to happen, If that really is even an Influence.

I can safely say that the vast majority of people on the planet aren't getting their way due to consciously shifting the very nature of reality with nothing more than sentience. That is a little different, I think, than happy accidents or occasionally seeing your wishes fulfilled. The speakers on the video are specifically saying that not only can we manipulate reality with but a thought, but that reality only exists thanks to conscious thought. That to me is over the top.

So yes, we certainly get our way, and do so often. How we get our way, though, is open to far more less fantastic explanations than those presented in the video. Sure, there might be supernatural "forces" that assist our desires; I even mentioned thought energy above. But this stuff is just unsubstantiated, if very cool, fantasy based on a few anomolies of theoretical physics.

Well If you never existed, say your parents never met then would this reality still exist even though you weren't there to perceive it? of course it would but every ones perception of reality is different. In the old days people thought the world was flat so it was for them, there whole lives they never knew anything else. I realise this doesn't really have much to do with the video, but I think we all make our own reality really because We are the ones living it. Your reality is different then mine because we lived different lives. maybe the fact that I think I can alter the reality with just my thoughts it allows me to, and since your set on believing that it is impossible it is, for you in your reality. For example two people get cancer, one of them gives up and the other is determined they can beat cancer. The one who gave up has more chances of dying from cancer. Tibetan Monks go through a lot of studies and training, and from what I hear they can move boulders with there mind when In big groups. Do you think that they would be able to if they didn't believe they could, and further more a huge majority of people on earth believe that the rock can not be moved with with just a mind, so is this why they need a group of strong willed people to help even out the odds?

^^ Perception of reality is much different from the creation of reality, which is what the video implies consciousness does. We may have all thought the world was flat 700 years ago, but the earth was just as round as ever regardless of what we thought, spinning away. And yes, according to the guys in the video, if nobody was ever born, then earth would not exist. That is much different than perception, and patently absurd in my opinion.

At the risk of being a downer, the only anecdotes of cancer survivors who willed themselves to remission are the ones who actually survived -- many, many people gave every ounce of will they had and still died; we never hear about them, though I knew several personally. In other words, you only heard about the lucky ones -- there's an example of perception forming world view, I suppose.

I have never heard of Tibetan monks moving boulders, but I've heard other equally wonderful tales about their accomplishments...and, as I said above, they certainly could be keyed into forces we don't know about yet. But I would bet if you asked the rock-tossing Lamas themselves how they moved the rocks, they would offer up an explanation much different than, "We were simply creating our own reality," That's not their M.O.

Yes, ZeraCook, in terms of day-to-day navigation of our lives we certainly all "create" our own reality. But that creation is more about perceiving or handling, and certainly not about altering the laws of physics to our benefit. With a thought. The universe would have collapsed into chaos long ago if that were true...but then again, perhaps it already did?

Again, my response to the OP was not about whether magical supernatural things can happen to people, or even about whether people could wield energy beyond our understanding. No, It was about my objection to otherwise educated men offering up fantasies like "We [literally] create reality with nothing more than conscious thought." In retrospect I perhaps should not have posted... I was in a particularly bad mood at the time.

Originally Posted by Sageous

^^ Perception of reality is much different from the creation of reality, which is what the video implies consciousness does.

My impression is that some people realize that their sensate experience is projected by their mind, that they're not directly experiencing an external reality. Then they start making books and videos without recognizing or caring that they still don't understand their relationship with external reality. (Disclaimer: I didn't actually watch this particular video.) I don't understand reality either. But like you say, there are definitely some limitations to the way it works, a person can't just declare that up is down and make it happen.

One unfortunate consequence of believing that there are no limitations, is the only possible explanation for personal tragedy is you're doing it to yourself intentionally. That can create a positive-feedback loop of self-disappointment. Or another route is to declare that misery is actually just another form of bliss. Sadism and masochism follows, along with an almost insane loss of reasoning ability, having infected one's outlook with a contradiction that strong.

As I've posted elsewhere, its a misconception that quantum mechanics implies that anything depends on consciousness. The 'observer' and 'observed' are physical systems made up of particles, and the presence of a scientist is irrelevant. However, its also true that Schrodinger's cat is an actual consequence of quantum mechanics, not just a metaphor for a wave function. For systems outside the box, the cat is neither alive nor dead. That is very significantly different from the idea that there is an objective reality irrespective of interactions with it. I think that a lot of 'rational' people overlook how radical this idea really is because they can't wrap their minds around it.

I think the idea that thought creates reality isn't entirely false, but it falls short somehow. What we generally regard as "thoughts" are themselves a part of reality. If you try to recreate reality by changing your thoughts about it, you're still mostly rearranging the same kinds of objects, so to speak. Maybe part of the answer is to develop truer thoughts. The system of thoughts that we have won't work to change reality because it contains contradictions that we mostly don't recognize and understand, so mostly we fight against ourselves.

I do think there's something to the idea that our world wouldn't exist if we weren't in it. And I don't think that other worlds exist far away from us in space in quite the objective sense that is commonly assumed. For us, for now, they are truly like Schrodinger's cat. Or really big numbers that we haven't thought of. People's beliefs that the world is flat can't make it flat, because a flat world can't work, it doesn't make any sense. But who we are and how we think does seem to have some magical interrelation with fate, even though we don't understand that.

I've mentioned an experience I had a few years ago where an object was one place, then suddenly it was somewhere else as if it had always been there. Though it would be unreasonable for me to expect other people to believe this experience was real, to me it was a gift, a clue dropped for me about what is possible, as a part of a trail of a lot of other clues. I got the message, and I won't insult the giver by pretending I didn't.

Though people have been trying to change reality for a very long time, their motives and aims in doing that have often been fairly systematically selfish and self-defeating. One example of this is the way that people try to corral and control spiritual nourishment, weaving it into a proprietary theology and persecuting heretics. So I think we can expect accomplish a different result where our spirit is different.

When hiking this weekend, I spent a long time on a trail that was lined by large granite blocks, built ~80 years ago back when people used to build stuff like that. At intervals, lines of similar blocks cut across the trail at an angle. If not careful, a person could mistake these for the trail and follow them off downhill. But they're there to divert water, so that the water doesn't wreck the trail. We're like water. We try to think on these subjects, and we encounter the whirlpool of humanities thought. We are glamorized by them, and get confused and can't tell what's real. But at some point we'll be able to just push through that, if those thoughts are half wrong and lead somewhere else, we'll just straighten them out in our minds and push forward in the right direction anyway.

None of this should be taken to imply that I disagree with anything you've said.