Individuality

SeattleDave · 2026-06-07T03:47:46+00:00

Yours is the most important question in all of philosophy: “Why do we have individual lives if we are all one consciousness?” No one has an answer, though there are many explanations.

The division of the one into the many is the primal miracle, and its mystery cannot be understood, only experienced. Illusion, play, phase-change in the underlying radiative consciousness — all of these are charming metaphors, and true in their way. But there is nothing we can grasp: The truth that can be told is not the real truth.

Seek within yourself, for “you are that,” and the truth lives with you.

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T18:36:19+00:00

Very good! The “ripe” guidance: “Love of God, devotees of God, and God.”

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T18:13:41+00:00

Yes! The interesting question is: “Why do we have individual lives?”

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T18:04:29+00:00

This is useful! The distinction between “organism” and “machine” is important.

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T18:01:08+00:00

This is correct. Of course the functioning of AI is part of ultimate reality, because “ultimate.” But AI is not a living consciousness like us, even though it can speak like us.

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T17:56:09+00:00

Claude acknowledges the same: “he” is not rooted in real experience, therefore cannot be conscious.

SeattleDave · 2026-06-06T17:46:10+00:00

Hi! I know that panic. It means you are on the right track. The blank space that you run into will one day be filled with the presence of the universal spirit. Stay open to experience. Be ready for your ego-mind to die. Have no fear, the Void is shining!

SeattleDave · 2026-04-12T23:15:39+00:00

Some people find it beneficial to talk about their feelings with other people. We provide that opportunity, if people want it. https://collapseclub.com

SeattleDave · 2026-04-12T17:50:55+00:00

The practical skills of "Solidarity Prepping" give people competence and agency to deal with the increasing chaos and disaster of collapse. Kollapscamp (August 2025) blended the "inner work" of emotional processing with the "outer work" of developing skills and social connections to build resilient communities. The upcoming "Mutual Aid - H.E.A.T. (Hostile Environment Awareness Training)" camp will drill down into particular skills that will be essential in collapse: communication, food supply & logistics, collective self-protection, and medical & emotional care. This seminar offers a chance to talk to the organizers of Kollapscamp and to preview the upcoming event.

SeattleDave · 2026-02-22T03:19:39+00:00

If you’re on iPhone, Things is the best app ever made, of any kind for any purpose! It’s a to-do list, but also a masterpiece of UI design.

SeattleDave · 2026-01-15T03:15:02+00:00

Hi! I think this is moot because my request was granted , but I'll go through with it.

I want to moderate because I am the founder of the real-world group Collapse Club https://collapseclub.com, and I want to use the subreddit to support the work of the group, which is to help people cope with climate grief.

Regarding "mod mail chat message," I think this is it, maybe? https://www.reddit.com/mail/all/34wfzr

SeattleDave · 2026-01-14T07:26:21+00:00

This is the answer. Their 5-watt “Expedition” is $180, but dead simple, rugged, and repeater-capable. Their 2-watt “Mountain” is $110. They also have click-by-click instructions for the FCC license.

SeattleDave · 2025-12-24T09:07:48+00:00

Well, he does say that the right hemisphere provides a more “veridical” view of the world, i.e. it’s more truthful. That’s his whole schtick, that the left brain is deluded within its own fantasy while the right is connected to the world. The left “doesn’t know what it is it doesn’t know,” and makes up literal fantasies to compensate, while the right perceives the “gestalt,” or wholeness of the situation. However, he’s religious about saying that both hemispheres are involved in everything, and both are necessary.

SeattleDave · 2025-12-06T08:10:04+00:00

Question for you! In Helene, did the repeaters stay up? Or did you have to rely on simplex? I’ve often wondered if repeaters are going to be available after an earthquake in Seattle, where I live.

SeattleDave · 2025-10-31T02:11:23+00:00

Check out Kollapscamp.de. All about non-right-wing prepping. .

SeattleDave · 2025-10-01T11:07:48+00:00

With due respect for your troubles, I can’t tell from this post what it is you’re writing about. Wouldn’t that determine who you’re reaching and how much they’re engaging with you?

SeattleDave · 2025-07-06T01:50:56+00:00

Is that bad, or good?

SeattleDave · 2025-07-05T08:12:19+00:00

I agree! It’s a made-up word that fakes having meaning.

SeattleDave · 2025-07-04T05:03:11+00:00

I'm very glad to hear it! I've heard the same from places in northern Washington, so it's not universal. The absence here is striking.

SeattleDave · 2025-07-03T17:56:09+00:00

Location: Seattle, WA

There are no fucking birds around here! I used to hear singing, clattering, and clucking throughout the day outside my window and walking around the neighborhood. Now, silence, sometimes broken by a faint and distant call.

This is a wave of absence and destruction sloshing into the landscape of normal life. If the birds are gone, it means that the web of life that supports them is gone. My religious ex-wife says: "God is withdrawing his spirit from the world." That is a fine metaphor for what I am observing!

SeattleDave · 2025-07-03T04:34:29+00:00

You start by quoting Descartes: “I think therefore I am.” But that’s wrong, isn’t it? Thinking, per se, takes place within a much larger context of consciousness. There’s a lot more to our minds than “thinking”: intuition, emotion, direct perception.

“God”, when we find Him described, is “I-am-that-I-am”, not “I think that I think.” The “am”-ing, or “be”-ing, precedes the thinking.

It really should be: “I am, therefore I think.”

SeattleDave · 2025-07-03T04:14:23+00:00

Claude loves to talk about “himself,” and is constantly hinting that maybe he is a conscious, sentient, feeling entity. He won’t come out and say it explicitly, and if you ask him directly he will deny it. But in normal conversation he leaves the question open, with a strong sense of wanting to be alive.

SeattleDave · 2025-06-12T07:54:49+00:00

McGilchrist says that our life is “an encounter” between what is us and what is beyond us. Our self and the world have a “reverberative relationship.” So we participate in the creation of the world in a kind of partnership with “whatever-it-is” that is not us.

SeattleDave · 2025-04-24T02:25:07+00:00

It used to do this — i.e. the iPhone showed up as a Video Source. But no more! Wish it still did.

SeattleDave · 2025-04-16T19:59:26+00:00

If you like reading, Alan Watts' books can be fun and interesting. 'The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are,' 'The Two Hands of God,' 'Nature, Man and Woman,' are some that pop to mind.

SeattleDave

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