Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 19 a

Quantum Reality – Time 5 – metaphysical B:

Further comparing Tensed vs. Tenseless theories of Time, we recall that the (B–series) offers only a non-temporal relation of Precedence between 2 events such as: "E precedes F". This does not change with Time for the (B–series). That contrasts with the (A–series) of "Past, Present, Future" where "E" or "F" does change with Time since the Future becomes the Present, & the Present becomes the Past. This (majority view) choice of an (A–series) can be further divided into 3 alternatives referred to as Presentism, & a Growing Block Universe.

Both of the (A–series) sub-categories just mentioned include an objective Present, but Presentism specifically assumes that only Present objects exist. The Growing Block Universe assumes both Present & Past objects exist, but no Future objects yet exist. So to the singular Present of Presentism the Growing Block Universe adds a real Past (which increases as a “growing” block), though neither accepts a reality for the not-yet occurring Future.

So while there is no objective Present in the (B-theory), there is a “friendlier” general attitude toward the Future. The (B-theory) in turn has it‘s own (not exactly contrasting or separate) over-lapping subdivisions of Eternalism  [which confusingly preceded the above (A-theory) “growing” block in being also called the Block Universe but just not “growing”]  & an also closely related 4–Dimensionalism. Without putting too fine a point on it, the essentially identical terms (B-theory) terms Eternalism & Block Universe, precede, but then were later confirmed by the 4–Dimensionalism of Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity (SR). [McTaggart & Einstein published at similar times, but the former was not yet familiar with the later.]  Einstein’s SR depicts a “static” 4-D Space-Time. Here, the Future, designated relative to a specified Observer, claims the same ontological status as some distant point in Space.

Eternalism (just prior to SR) was a philosophical approach to the ontological nature of Time. Eternalism took the view that all points in Time as equally "real", as opposed to the Presentist idea that only the Present is real. Philosophy’s Eternalism or the equivalent 4–Dimensionalism of Relativity Physics means that Time is just another dimension. Future events are "already there", & that there is no objective flow of Time. It was sometimes referred to as the "Block Time" or "Block Universe" theory, due to its description of Space-Time as an unchanging 4-D "block", as opposed to the view of the world as a 3-D Space “modulated” by a “passage” of Time. [But again, this differs from the later-named “Growing Block Universe” of the (A-theory) that is not Presentism.]

Reviewing again that (A-theory) Presentism, we note again that there are only the events & entities in the Present, along with some timeless objects or ideas like numbers & Mathematical sets. These latter additions are also taken to occur & exist in the Present. Furthermore, for Presentism, the so-called events & entities that are wholly Past or wholly Future do not exist at all.

The (A-theory) Presentism contrasts with the (A-theory) Growing Block Universe & also contrast with the (B-theory) Block Universe, more usually called Eternalism, or more clearly called 4–Dimensionalism. Cutting across both (A-theory) & (B-theory) we see that Growing Block Universe & Eternalism, respectively are the Metaphysical theories that extends to Future events. Referring back to the early centuries A.D., we saw that Augustine spoke of the Present “knife edge” between Past & Future which itself could not not contain any “extended” period of Time. Injecting that concept into pure Presentism (without a “growing” Block of the Past) would dissolve Time as essentiall un-real, according to the even more ancient doctrine of the “3-Times” described earlier.

But the “Father of Psychology” William James argued that conscious experience is naturally extended in Time, in that there is "the short duration of which we are immediately & incessantly sensible". With his own earlier form of Presentism, James further concurred that: "everything Past is unreal, everything Future is unreal, everything imagined, absent, or mental is unreal. Ultimately real is only the Present moment of physical “efficiency” which we would now call “efficacy”. The latter refers to the ability to participate on as a “cause” in Causation, Cause & Effect.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."  –  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 18

Quantum Reality 3 (cont) – Time 4 – physics B – metaphysical A:
The previous discussion of Linguistic Tense (which also continues) compares to Metaphysical Tense in McTaggart’s A-series (mentioned below). More closely allied to his B-series are more relative than absolute references to Time. Expressions in the vein of the more relative expressions include “earlier than”, “extended”, “punctual”, :coinciding with”, occuring wholly within”, “partially overlapping with”. In this B-series there is no strict marker indicating the Present moment, but a range of Time may include the Present moment if it is currently ongoing.
To say someone “dances” [present perfect] is to locate an ongoing event in a Time period that includes the Present. To say someone danced [simple past] is to locate an event in the Past as completed. Both statements concern the Past but the former describes an event in terms of its temporal constituency: habitual, continuous, ongoing, progressive or non-progressive, having or lacking continued relevance to Present moment. In this way such “perfect” Tenses are combinations of Tense & Aspect which relates the even to some other (unstated) reference point. To say “will have been dancing” [future perfect] locates an ongoing Future event earlier than some additional reference point. To say “has been dancing” [pluperfect] locates an even in the Past, earlier than an additional reference point.
When the Aspect is concerned with internal temporal constituency (A-series) of events & also the temporal relational network (B-series) in which events & times stand to each other, then unlike Tense the expression is non-deictic. When the internal temporal constituency of event, or relation it stands in to other events & times, is independent of its Time & Tense relation (B-series) to a Present moment, then the elements of Aspect combined with elements of Tense produce an overall deictic result even though the Aspect is non-deictic. [enough of all that bewildering babble]
Now besides Grammatical Tense, there are diverse other ways of locating events in Time if different languages. Time location can be indicated with tone, adjectives, nouns with verb endings, & even hand position in some concept-based sign languages, such as British.
There are various parts of speech that express Time & temporal location, including Adjectives like past, present, future, but also: brand-new, old, fledgling, mint [condition], experimental, modern, latter-day, up-to-date, topical, traditional, ancient, bygone, obsolete, elapsed, brief, outgoing, punctual, eventual, venerable. Then there are Nouns like: date, hour, millennium, epoch, morning, day, week, year, season, etc. Some such Nouns are proper names like: January , Thursday , etc., or general notions like: tenure, period, interim, lull, interlude, adjournment, perpetuity, delay, aftermath, successor, occasion, relic, fossil. Then there are Prepositions like: during, throughout, until, up to, before, after, since; & Conjunctions like: when, whenever, while; & other items that function as Prepositions like: until, before, after, since. There are parts of words, or affixes that express Time relationships through Prefixes like: ante-, proto-, pre-, post-, ex-, fore-, re-(as in re-build), neo-, palaeo-; & also causative suffixes, such as -en (as in frighten) & -ify (as in beautify).
There are also tenseless languages like various Southeast Asian languages including Chinese. This means that in such languages the expression of the temporal relation between the event & speech act is not grammaticalized. But as we have seen, this means of referring to the temporal location of an event is but a small subset of the ways in which a grammatical Tense can be deictic, that is: involving implicit reference to the moment of utterance. Tenses can be imprecise & insensitive to degrees of pastness & futurity. Other linguistic resources, in both deictic & non-deictic terms, can provide information about the temporal contours of events & relations between them.
So much for a sketch of Grammatical Tense & its alternatives. All that must be separated from the other issue of Metaphysical Tense which concerns Quantum Reality & the Philosophy of Science in general.
Metaphysical Tense deals with temporal reality as location in the Past, Present, or Future. A simple date like “Sep 11, 2001” doesn’t pick out Tense, it doesn’t specify where “we are” temporally, in the scenario. A term like “ago” picks out Tense, referring to the Past, in a manner of “non-relational” tenses, giving properties of Pastness, Presentness, & Futurity in a less explicit way.
One key Metaphysical question surrounding these issues is regards strict Scientific Realism: “Had humans (or observers of any kind) never evolved, would threw have been an objectively Present moment, & absolute distinction between Past, Present, & Future? The Yes or No answer to that question is one way to distinguish 2 major points of view regarding Tense & Time.
Those who think Tenses are real think there would have been such a distinction, even in the absence of any perceivers to designate events as Past, Present, or Future.
Those who think Tenses are not real think that temporal reality is constituted merely by the network of temporal relations in which events & times stand to each other, with no Time being marked out as an ontologically privileged Present moment (meaning it has special status). In other words, no distinction between Past, Present, & Future is characteristic of Time; no distinction is so projected onto Time, from our perspective.
The (A-theorist) holding to an Observer-Independent distinction between Past, Present, & Future see Time flowing inexorably with respect Present moment distinction. The ontological privilege of being the objective Present moment continually passes from one moment to next. In this sense the A-series is dynamic.
Philosopher, John M. E. McTaggart’s 2-part ordering of positions in Time: into an (A-series) [with tenses & meta-time] is a Metaphysical rather than grammatical Tense distinction. Times are thereby ordered in regard to relative positions in Past, Present, & Future. The (A-series) of positions run from distant Past, through ever-less-distant Pastness, to Present, to proximate (near) Future, & on through to ever-more-remote Future, a Continuum with a distinct, though ever-shifting Present zero-point Origin in its 1-D Space.
In contrast, McTaggart’s (B-series)is less ordered, with Moments distinguished only into relative positions to each other, in a series from earlier to later. The (B-theorists) hold to no objective distinction between Past, Present, Future. For them there is no objective flow of Time. The ordinary distinction we draw between Past, Present, & Future is explained as as a Projection (what philosopher Immanuel Kant called it) with which we perceive reality from an mind–imposed temporal perspective, by which we locate events in our Past, Present, & Future. They would say we wrongly project that perspective on Time itself, mistakenly concluding that events are Past, Present, or Future, independent of our knowledge or existence. For (B-theorists) there is no associated temporal flow, no ontological privilege bestowed upon a Present moment, no such “privilege” as passes from one moment to the next for the (A-series).
The (B-theorists) admit no genuine A-properties in the World, such as: being Past, being Present, being Future, & of finer gradations between them. They do hold to the existence of analogous properties in the World that would be reducible to, analyzable in terms of B-relations such as: being earlier than , being simultaneous with, being later than. It just doesn’t work that way for the (B-theorists).
For the (A-theorists) times & events are constantly change with respect to those A-properties they possess, their futurity, which they shed to acquire Presentness, which is instantly shed to acquire Pastness. This acquiring & shedding of A-properties is, for (A-theorists), the passage of Time.
For the (B-theorists), there are no A-properties in the World. Their B-series consists only of temporal relations of Precedence, Succession, & Simultaneity.
In one modified (B-series), a “present moment” is added to the pattern of events to capture some of what the A-theory thinks Time is like. But for the (A-theorist), the (B-series) lacks their essential feature of time, the true distinction between Past, Present, & Future, so it would add this feature to the B-series to generate an A-series. Thus different kinds of linguistic expression for locating events in Time (as reviewed previously for Grammatical – Linguistic Tense) can also be used to represent Time as conceived Metaphysically by the A-theory & the B-theory, given the proper additions or subtractions.
There is thus a correlation between different kinds of linguistic expression on the one hand, & the different Metaphysical views of the nature of Time on the other hand. But this correlation cannot resolve the Metaphysical debate about the nature of Time. We previously noted that some linguistic
Expressions of temporal location were deictic – that is with reference point in Time that is dependent on context in which the expression is used. If we pick out & refer to some feature of context of utterance, [here, you, I, me, over there, that one, the next one], such can be deictic in Grammatical Tense. Such context locates the temporal event that a sentence is about. It is labeled with some time relative to the time of utterance. Thus the meaning of grammatically tensed sentences is dependent on the temporal context in which they are uttered. Those previously mentioned lexical items like now, today, yesterday, & tomorrow locate the event at a particular Time in an A-series. The infinite number of additional lexically composite expressions in an (A-series) further diversify a “tensed sentence” that is grammatically tensed.
In some sentences, however, there can be non-deictic expressions for locating events in Time, such as: after dinner, moments before, at the start of, or any kind of date. Those non-deictic expressions convey no information about (A-series) locations. But a combination of non-deictic expression with deictic expression does amount to a net deictic expression with information regarding the (A-series) location of event.

In isolation however, the deictic quality correlate with the (A-series), whereas the non-deictic correlates with the (B-series). But again, any series of temporal positions in continual transformation, imply temporal perspective of the person uttering, & thus constitutes an (A-series) ordering of events. Contrariwise, ordering a series of temporal positions by way of 2-term relations that are asymmetric, irreflexive, & transitive, such as: "comes before" (precedes) & "comes after" (follows) accords with the (B-series) of Time.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."  –  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 17 b

Quantum Reality (cont) – Time 3 – physics A - Science:

Continuing at first our previous “common-sensical” notions about Time, we note that in our every sense of it, Time “marches on” out of our control. Time “flows” & “goes by” [ as Sam played it again in “Casblanca”]. Even in Science & Philosophy, Time is put “before” the Big-Bang as potentially existent & “ready to go”, even put beyond God who is placed in Time that contains Him [like Cronos on Mt. Olypmus was given primacy & seniority, as the father of Zeus – but that common reference is not really fair because Chronos (different spelling) was Time, not Cronos].

The predictable trajectory of moving objects described by Classical Mechanics reinforces that impressions. For such simple systems, we can “predict the Future” when given initial Velocity vector & applied Force & resulting applicable Acceleration (such as, of Gravity). Physics frequently sets Time as the abscissa or horizontal Coordinate on graphs, especially since it cn be considered an extensive “independent” Coordinate [2 criteria, preferred for though neither absolutely essential for, the horizontal Coordinate].

Furthermore, Thermodynamics (though not the microscopic irreversibility of Statistical Mechanics) bestows upon Time an “arrow” –  a direction from Past on into the Future. Drop Humptey Dumptey, or any other egg, & the process will not go backwards so as to decrease rather than increase Entropy. [Science admits other “arrows” for Time, but this one for eggs, human bodies, anything, is the simplest & most “straightforward” (excuse the pun)]. Depicting 2 states of a system, we can often recognize which “came first” simply by ordering lesser to greater Entropy of disorder.

So flew the “arrow of Time” in Newton’s Absolute Space & Time [both are really “there” even when nothing else is around] until that “apple-cart” (again excuse the pun) was overturned by Einstein’s Special Relativity (SR) Space-Time continuum. In the provably truer model of SR, Space itself was replaced by the distances between objects [relative to the observer(s)] & Time was replaced by the durations between events. In other words, there really was no “Nothing”, Void between objects & events [in agreement with the Eleatic Philosophers], just the “naked measurements”.

Time in SR (like Space) could be stretched-out (dilated) or compressed in the comparison between the experience of 2 Observers with large Velocities relative to the observed event. Even the “arrow of Time” could seem to be reversed for high Velocities (& high Acceleration in General Relativity (GR) [all subject to party-pooping disclaimers about the transfer of efficacious Information].

Backing up to the moment of the Big Bang & at the Event Horizon of every Black Hole [they have been verified for a long time now] Time of course “stands still” (like in an X-men movie).

Our mundane sense & measurement of Time is often determined by uniformly repetitive motion such as in: atomic transitions, the Sun, the Moon, a pendulum, a spring ratchet, an electro-magnetic field, sand or water through an hour-glass, & so on. On the larger scale we use observed evidence to mark points in historical time. Some evergreens date back 6 millennia. Ice cores in Greenland set dates of a hundred millennia. Ice cores in Anartical set dates of a almost a ½ Million years, certain sediments to almost a Million. Certain Tidal information sets dates of a ½ Billion years.

Radioactive nuclides (isomers of various elements)  can extend the clock in ½–life increments of ¾ of a Billion years with ²³⁵U, & in 1 ¼ Billion year increments with ⁴⁰K. The more slowly decaying ²³⁸U increments are 4 ½ Billion, while those of ¹⁷⁶Lu are 36 Billion, those of ^187Re are 43 Billion, & while those of ⁸⁷Rb are almost 50 Billion.

The last practical “clock” ¹⁴⁷Sm, offers up increments of a 100 Billion years.  Of course “just” 4 ½ Billion takes us through the Age of the Earth while 14 Billion takes us back past the Big Bang. But even this limited variety of Time-measuring tools allows for multiply redundant confirmation of Geological Time estimates.

SR relative–Velocity red-shifts in the frequency (~ color) of astronomical Light, GR relative–Acceleration red-shifts, & more importantly, Inflation & other expansion red-shifts measure Space-Time intervals that combine spatial distance with temporal measurements of Time. “Standard Candle” measurements come into play at these scales also. From the Pit (black hole) to the Pendulum, through red-shifts (& blue), Big Bang, Inflation–Expansion & all that we sketch a few details at a later point [including a review of the famous 1^st 3 minutes]. But next we brave the mind-numbing perils of Philosophy to compare to our prior Grammatical/Linguistic Tense & Time to that of Metaphysics.

 The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."  –  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 17

Quantum Reality 3 (cont) – Time 2 – casual [not causal]:

Quantum Reality diverted to the topic of Time (our sense of flowing Consciousness; later for Space – fundamental analogy for Existence), & we started with Grammatical of Linguistic Time as Tense (which will continue a bit later as Metaphysical Time & Tense), & we will soon follow with the Science of Time. But for the moment, we lighten up with some casual, common-sensical ideas about Time.

We readily use hearing to measure Time as beat & sequence of sounds. Visually marking a series of positions for a “moving” object measures our Time as movement, from everyday objects to the movement of the Sun & Moon to measure Clock & Calendar Time. But in the short term, even if all our senses were prevented from functioning for a while, we could still notice the passing of Time through the changing pattern of our thoughts. But what is the “Perception” of Time ?  We do not actually perceive Time as such, but rather only indirectly infer Time from the changes or events we consider to be strung out in Time. And yet again, we do not perceive events only, but also their temporal relations, analogous to the spatial distances & relations between objects in Space (again a topic for another day).

In fact as we measure the Time between positions along the length of a perceived object we thus estimate that length in terms of the Time of our scan. In this way, our visual sense creates 1-D Space from the Time of the visual scan. The same in a perpendicular directions widens the 1-D length (with the help of similar width) to 2-D area. Repeating the same again in a 3^rd mutually perpendicular direction adds depth & thickens our 2-D area to 3-D volume & thus 3-D Space. Tactile senses roughen up & ultimately fill out that visually perceived 3-D with a sense of substance. Thus we use the sense of Time to project the sense of Space with the Senses.

But when we turn the Senses at Time & seem to perceive one event following another, what we actually perceive is each Moment as the Present Moment in its own Time. We then mentally apply Memory & Anticipation to stretch out the infinitesimal Present into Past-Present-Future Time. But what we actually perceive, we perceive as Present – as what is going on right Now.

But can we perceive a relation between 2 events without also perceiving the events themselves ? No we cannot, but we perceive both events as Present, in which case we must perceive them as simultaneous, & so not as successive after all. There is thus paradox in the notion of perceiving an event as occurring after another. When we perceive B as coming after A, we have, surely, ceased to perceive A. In that case, A is merely an item in our memory. Now if we wanted to construe “perception” narrowly, excluding any element of memory, then we would have to say that we do not, after all, perceive B as following A.

If we were to construe “perception” more broadly, we would need to include a wide range of experiences of Time that essentially involve the Senses in a wide manner of perceiving a variety of temporal aspects of the World. In the late ‘70’s, Ernst Pöppel enumerated “elementary time experiences” like: (i) duration,  non-simultaneity, order, past & present, change, & the passage of Time. Non-simultaneity, for instance, is the same as the experience of Time Order when 2 events occur very close together in Time. We can be aware that they occur at different times without being able to say which one came first. The perception of Order depends on the distinction between Past & Present. In a subsequent segment we continue to contrast the experience of Tense (discussed previously in linguistic terms) & this experience of order  (McTaggart’s A-series versus B-series).

Like the “meditation on the 3 Times” (found both in Vedanta & Augustine of Hippo) Memory is an essential mental construct in the (either or) any Time series. All taking up that contemplation recognize that Past & Future exist only in the Mind.

One alternative remedy to compare with the role of Memory is the “specious Present” of  William James, “the prototype of all conceived times” which is “the short duration of which we are immediately & incessantly sensible.” In that conjecture, James psychologically quantized Subjective Time, stipulating some temporal “width” for the Present moment. “We are constantly aware of a certain duration – the specious present varying from a few seconds to probably not more than a minute, & this duration (with its content perceived as having one part earlier & another part later) is the original intuition of Time” –  such was the insight of William James.

 The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."  –  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 16

Quantum Reality 3  – Time 1 – linguistic::

Time is discussed in terms of grammatical Tense, & in terms of Metaphysical Tense. With grammatical Tense, such as seen in verb vowels & endings  & auxiliary words (sank, sink, will have sunk; did, have done, am doing, do, will have done, will do), we also consider a somewhat overlapping category of Linguistic Tense, where Tense appears in modifications of verb form, adverbs, adjectives, & nouns.

Tense as modifications of verb form includes simple tenses: Past, Present, Future & “Perfect” Tenses: Pluperfect, Present Perfect, Future Perfect.

Aside from Tense, grammar includes Mood (or Modality, either way expressing a degree of necessity, obligation, probability, ability, & sometimes evidentiality) such as Indicative, Subjunctive, Conditional, Optative, Imperative, Jussive, Potential, Inferential, Interrogative, & related Exclamatory Interjection. Some consider the Future Tense to be merely a variant of Mood, due to uncertainty surrounding an occurrence that has not yet come to pass (as in comparing “will” with “would”).

The auxiliary verbs will (+ the present tense) with the simple infinitive as in:  I will go to compares to combinations of verbs such as: to be going to, to be about to & also modal auxiliary (subjunctive) verbs: must, should, can, may, might which elements of uncertainty.

Linguistic Tense includes “lexical” items like: now , today , yesterday,  presently. There are also “lexically composite” expressions such as: moments before, after dinner, 3 weeks hence, during, ago.  These lexical & lexically composite expressions include grammatical categories of both Tense & Aspect. This Aspect provides context to extend the range of Tense & / or to add specificity.

Linguistic Tense is a grammaticalised expression of location in Time that is comparatively insensitive, whereas lexically composite expressions can locate in Time with a higher precision, using words like: after & ago. Simple Verbal Tense is unable to locate events in Time with as much specificity, being unable to distinguish degrees of remoteness in the Past or Future. Tense is relatively limited for locating events in Time, compared to other linguistic expressions. There are inherent constraints on the range of expressions of location in Time that can be grammaticalized. Some constraints in grammatical Tense are tied to the notion of a deictic center reference point relative to which events are located in Time. Typically, events are located in Time relative to the moment of speech which often serves as a temporal reference point.

Many lexical & lexically composite expressions for locating events in time are also deictic [specifying identity/spatial/temporal location from the perspective of participants in speech or writing, in a context or external situation or surrounding discourse, as in: we, you, here, there, now, then, this, that, the former, the latter]. The same holds for 1 wk ago , 3 min hence, yesterday, today, [or not] & also 1 hr after the start of the session, at noon, during the ceremony, …).

Only Tense is constrained in this way since Tense locates the time of an event relative to time of utterance. In these & other issues of “context”, Aspect (of which some 40–odd types are describe) is a feature of language concerned with “internal temporal constituency of situation”.

[Pretty heavy going, for such is the lay of the land. But its sometimes good to see what we’re up against. We speak casually about Time, but it’s all not so easy if you want to be careful & precise. (too be continued)]  

 The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."  –  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 15

Quantum Reality 2:

Classical Physics aspired to be strongly objective, assuming that it could be interpreted as a description of mind-independent reality. But right from the start, when Galileo began to quantify “speed” in simple terms like (∆x/∆t), Western Science took a big step out of a Sense–Perceived World onto a page of Mathematical formulas. Instead of mind-independent reality, the focus, all the way through SR [special relativity], GR [general relativity], QM [quantum mechanics], QFT [quantum field theory], QED [quantum electro-dynamics], QG [quantum gravity] & String Theory shifted to a mind-created reality of Mathematical models. But only Quantum Mechanics, especially in the standard Copenhagen II Convention admitted explicitly to Consciousness-created Quantum Reality. Even so Quantum Mechanics claimed to be weakly objective in that “real” phenomena (if not real entities) were inter-subjectively valid, (shared experiences of many observers), but still referred to operations of the Mind that participated in an observed phenomenon or measurement. Delayed-Choice Double Slit, Quantum Erasure, & various Bell’s Theorem – related experiments may occupy us another day, but suffice it to say for now, that such as these contradict any strongly objective descriptor for Quantum Mechanics.

What Quantum Mechanics did retain was the “Gold Standard” of Science Models, the ability to Predict previously unobserved or unmeasured phenomena. But conventional Scientific Realism remained denied by Quantum Mechanics, so that Hidden-Variable, Many-Worlds, Decoherence, & many other Realist alternative formulations have been adhered to now by a majority of leading Physicists – though not justifiably so. These Realists cling with strong Metaphysical bias for Realism that smacks of pseudo-religious fervor. Similarly, the Multi-Verse is fantastically held up as denial of any Strong Anthropic Principle explanation of the extreme Fine Tuning of our Universe. These Realist movements ceased being Science & have long become ideological, pseudo-political, pseudo-religious, metaphysical bastions of intolerance of any alternatives or opposition. Ad hominem put-downs of nay-sayers, non-funding, non-tenuring, non-hiring freeze-outs coral even Instrumenalist Anti-Realism, not to mention Quantum Idealism into the same academic prison-camp reserved for Young-Earth Creationists, Astrologists, Para-Psychologists, & so on.

The Scientific Realist swears to the objective reality of a RWOT real-world-out-there & even their invisible invented– entities like Electrons, Quarks, Strings, Branes, & so on. The Quantum Idealist, for one, established that such a Realist proposition is unprovable. At the same time all admit that the fact that a proposition can not be proven is not a proof that it is wrong.

Lines of force, action at a distance, various fields, & even “inertia” can neither be directly experienced or proven. More significantly, alternate interpretations always remain unexamined, even for Quantum Mechanics where dozens of interpretations have already been studied. Science, as we know it, amounts to (mathematically synthesized) relations between observed phenomena. Predictive & Prescriptive principles, of themselves, are not strictly objective.

In fact, Immanuel Kant, a defender of Realism in the end, still found “Time & Space” to be mental constructions that we project onto an otherwise real World. Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas & medieval Western Philosophers echoed, neo-Platonists, Plato, & the Eleatic Philosophers (Parmenides, Zeno, Melissus) in questioning the Reality of Time, as we conceive it. While “time” for instance, is a side-issue in Quantum Reality, we will divert to that discussion, in brief, if only because it is so accessible. Cause & Effect, Perception, & similar issues previously introduced here will also see the light of day before we finish with Quantum Reality.

For the moment we end for now with a quick review of the “3 Times” principle found throughout Eastern Philosophy for millennia & echoed again in the above mentioned Eleatic Philosophers, Plato, neo-Platonists, medieval philosophers, Kant, McTaggart, etc. What amounts to a Presentism (& beyond) goes as follows.

In the simplest Time Line with an infinitesimal Zero-Point Origin at “Now”, the entire ray to the negative left-side of this 1-D space of Time is the Past which is gone forever & no longer has any reality. The entire ray to the positive right-side of this 1-D space of Time is the Future which has not yet come to be does not yet possess any reality. The so-called Present is an ever shrinking, thin slice between an unreal Past & an unreal Future. We can imagine this supposed slice of Present time to be vanishing to an infinitesimally short duration, bracketing & then merely consisting of the infinitesimal Zero-Point Origin of “Now”, & then it’s gone. Even one Planck Quantum of Time, ~ ½  x  10^–43 sec, back into the Past is that which is gone forever.  Even one Planck Quantum of Time forward into the Future is that which has not yet come to be. The Present vanishes as what Augustine called a “knife-edge”, while some Eastern Philosophers referred to it as one version of a “razor’s edge.” It’s gone, all with the Past, the Future, & Time itself. Non-Dual Absolute Reality is Timeless.

Consilience of Inductions

“Consilience of Inductions” was a quaint term coined by William Whewell in his 1840 Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences.  Newton's term vera causa  “true cause”  supposedly lies at the center of the very best kinds of scientific theories. Some, the Empiricists held that a true cause is something that we ourselves experience directly. We know for instance that a force [Gravity] is pulling the Moon toward the Earth, because we have had direct experience of the tug of a string  [tension] as we are whirling it around with a weight tied to its end.  But Whewell was a Rationalist who characterized a true cause as something that is adequate to explain the empirical facts. Such a cause has tot be at the center of a scientific explanation, explaining all of the facts & in turn being explained by them. If such a cause can predict & explain new & unexpected facts, then so much the better. Such a fanlike construction, with the Cause at the apex, was a "Consilience of Inductions".  Occam's Razor, that it be as simple as it is possible for a theory to be, suggests that a "true cause" is also marked by being the most economical of explanatory forces, with many parts being reduced to one fundamental mechanism.

The gravitational attraction within Newtonian mechanics, the wave theory of Light from Christiaan Huygens & Thomas Young’s explained the Double-Slit experiment while Light Particles could not. Whewell’s arguments impressed the young Charles Darwin, whose  vera causa became Natural Selection.  For Geologists, it became Plate Tectonics.

Secular Humanists hope for a “Consilience of Inductions” combining Human Cooperation with Environmentalism.  True Non-Duality, underlying all that is positive, is the only Ultimate.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

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Duplicates have been available on:

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[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 14

"Quantum Reality" refers to interpretations of Quantum Mechanics, in terms of what it has to say about our understanding of the World.  One major bone of contention between competing interpretations concerns the issue of Quantum Mechanics being deterministic or not. Other issues include the objective "reality" of entities described by Quantum Mechanics. Many settle for the outstanding experimental success of the mathematical formalism of Quantum Mechanics without regard for the physical meaning of the mathematical entities in the theory.

One such entity is the "wavefunction" & matrix representations of the same.

Schrödinger associated the wavefunction with the Electron as a an electric Charge Density, a physical field spread out over infinite Space [though very thinly outside the conventional "size" of the Electron.

On the other hand, Max Born interpreted the same wavefunction as a Probability Distribution (more specifically – complex, in the Math function sense, Probability Amplitude whose mathematically real squared absolute value renders Probability).

Adding the now-so-controversial Wigner-Neumann Consciousness-created Quantum Reality to Born's Probability interpretation, the long-time, nearly unanimous "Copenhagen" (home of Quantum Mechanics committee chairman Neils Bohr) interpretation initially "competed" with some initially-unpopular Realist versions by David Bohm & Louis de Broglie, & others that followed in that vein. Also increasing have ever been the Instrumentalist positions that ignored all explanation & the accepted abstract mathematical structure of Hilbert spaces & Quantum Mechanical operators.

The culture of Science veered away from the Copenhagen Quantum Idealism in parallel with 2 inspirations to do so, One was the Analytical Philosophy that succeeded Logical Positivism (which had some idealist roots), with the former dedicated to annihilate the reigning Idealism of the previous century. The other was a aversion to fundamentalist religion & a dominant "sophistication" of Atheism among Scientist (to a degree contrasting with prior generations, including the Copenhagen group). Atheist Pragmatist Philosophy's dominance in higher education was instrumental in this shift.

[Steve Martin's 2^nd comedy album included a skit were he dies & is shocked to find himself at some Last Judgment before the Pearly Gates. He complains: "but in college they said all this was bullshit."]

Grasping for any Realist alternative, over the same decades up through many Modal wing-clipped theories of Quantum Mechanics, decades in which Darwinism fought "Armageddon" with Creationism, one fantastic Realist alternative that gained majority standing was Hugh Everett's Many-Worlds interpretation, considered now by Max Tegmark & Michio Kaku to be 1 of 4 "levels of Multi-Verse".

Recognition of Anthropic Fine Tuning of the Universe & studies of Quantum Entanglement & Delayed-Choice Quantum Eraser Double-Slit experiments have themselves exerted 2 opposing influences. On the one hand, they have hardened minority Quantum Idealist  positions such as the Wheeler–Stapp Participatory-type Universes. At the same time those advances & others in Particle theory & Big-Bang Fundamental Forces issues have encouraged majority Realisms that are increasingly "unrealistic". The latter include String Theory, the Multi-Verse & also other complex Mathematical sleight-of-hand like Quantum Decoherence, Ensemble, Relational, Transactional, & Stochastic approaches, as well as Computational or Hologramic Universes (not that similar to David Bohm's earlier Holoverse Realism). Objective collapse theories attempt to "split the difference" by upholding Realism while including Idealist–like indeterminism without hidden-variables.

Somehow, nearly everyone honors the original Mathematical formalism but then scatter into a Tower of Babel chaos of a hundred different theories of interpretation. Advaita Vedantins find the original Copenhagen Consciousness-created Reality most interesting while understandably remaining disappointed in the limited objective understanding of "consciousness" & the at-least-Idealist RWOT retained. Not driven to the far hills by desperate Atheism, any more than to the 4 levels of Multi-Verse "antidote" to Anthropic fine Tuning, the Vedantins applaud Schrodinger, Bohr, Heisenberg, Dirac, Born, Wigner, von Neumann, Feynman & Wheeler (including both Idealists & Realists in that mix), yet maintain that all is Consciousness & the World is unreal.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

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[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 13

Janaka & Ashtavakra:

A wandering Sage Ashtavakra, appearing as a vagrant had been abused by some citizens of the kingdom. The aged traveler was rescued when the king, Janaka extended his hospitality & protection. Later on, Janaka questioned the Sage about how “suddenly” could “sudden Enlightenment” possibly occur? In response, Ashtavakra declared that Enlightenment can happen in less time than it takes, having put one foot in the stirrup, to swing over the other leg & place the other foot in the 2^nd stirrup. A bit dubious, the King continued by asking for Liberating Teaching that could result in such Enlightenment. Janaka in turn is questioned by Ashtavakra: “What customary offering will you give over that is worthy of this gift of Liberating Instruction?” Such a gift was traditional since renunciation of the Ego would include rather than exclude lesser renunciations, such as the giving over of some valuable treasure by an aspirant capable of such a gift. Enlightenment takes every drop of our Energy, not a bit less, but not a bit more. Any of that Energy misdirected as identification with the unreal Mind, Body, Possessions, & the rest of the World could better to be redirected toward the Supreme if one is to realize oneself to be one with that Supreme Absolute. The traditional offering made sense in the context of complete giving over of all delusion rooted in the Ego, surrendering all to the Absolute. The Guru would have no need for the offering or anything else in the World. Compassionately, he assists the disciple in complete giving over of illusory Ego identity.

As it happened, Janaka offered a succession of increasingly princely gifts. But the Sage Ashtavakra rejected each small fortune as insufficient for Janaka’s offering. Increasing & increasing the value of offered treasure, Janaka eventually felt that he must offer his entire Kingdom & to his shock & amazement, Ashtavakra accepted. But again, accepting that much, the entire Kingdom, the Sage indicates that this is still not enough. Ashtavakra sees that he the Safe has surpassed Janaka’s imagination. So he asks specifically for Janaka’s family, wife, children, & finally; & finally Janaka’s own Body & Mind. Absorbing his shock at this request for literally everything he had, Janaka remained determined & eager for Instruction, Janaka agreed & gave over ownership of all that he could call his own. Ashtavakra smiled & accepts this now complete offering.

The Sage, now ruler of the Kingdom, gives orders saddling of 2 of the former king’s horses, that are now his own. Ashtavakra then says that he needs Janaka to ride along & guide him in a survey of his newly owned kingdom. With no other words spoken, the 2 are about to ride off. Remaining otherwise silent, the Sage begins to mount up, placing his 1st  foot in a stirrup to do so. But at that moment, Janaka finally lost his patience & asked: “When do I get the Teaching?” Ashtavakra response was: “You have given over to me your Mind, so you have no right to ask questions.” Taking in, finally, the completeness of his surrender, Janaka is suddenly Liberated. He notices that this has occurred in the blink of an eye, before the Sage’s 2^nd swinging foot could make it into other stirrup. Amazed that the Sage’s previous prediction for Sudden Enlightenment  came true, but primarily grateful, in his sudden joy, Janaka thanks Ashtavakra for the most precious gift of guidance beyond all other values. Ashtavakra promptly gave back family & Kingdom, Body & Mind into Janaka’s hands for “safe-keeping” Stewardship. Nominally holding all in trust for his Guru, Janaka remained thus unchanged in is relative circumstance. Absolutely, Janaka was unchanged in Renunciation, internally now, regardless of the external situation. He remained free & blissful without any Attachment or Misidentification.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

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http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

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Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 12 b

Ramana Maharshi would tell the Vedanta parable of the 10^th:

Hiking the hills & needing to cross a raging snow-fed river in Spring, 10 traveling Fools made of themselves a human chain to safeguard their passage. Given the slippery stones underfoot & unexpected high water level & onrushing force, there was natural concern that they all had made it the other shore. The first one to think of it began a head count, pointing at each, calling out as he wagged his finger: “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.” Suddenly upset the poor Fool cried out: “That’s it, only 9. Omigosh! Who did we lose?”

In horrified disbelief, another Fool repeated the head count: “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.” & so did another, & another, until everyone on shore gave it a try, all confirming the original tragic announcement. The confusing part for them, of course, was that no one could figure out who was the missing one. Easy for us, we aren’t shivering & wet with freezing river water, exhausted & frightened. But then again, it was kind of silly. Given that they all followed the misguided example of the first, pointing only at other heads as they counted. If only one of them had kept track & counted the number of counts called, they would have be reassured when the full 10 counts were listed.

Their luck soon changed when just then an eminent spiritual master & teacher, a Guru much revered in the region, came walking down their shore, having seen the pantomime of their plight from the distance as he approached, not needing to be within earshot get the picture. But upon listening patiently & trying in vain to explain the proper Arithmetic to them, he decided to quickly demonstrate after kindly letting them off the hook, saying that many people experience confusion like this, as when told that such & such will occur in 10 days. some will ask: “Does that 10 count today, or do we start counting tomorrow as 1?” “But practical experience is best, so here we go” he said, & continuing: “when I tap your head with my staff, you the first one call out 1 & next 2 & so on until I’ve tapped the last one.”

And so he did, & they called out, a bit nervous as they got to 9. But sure enough, they distinctly heard one last hollow bonk of the staff on a head & the call 10. There he was smiling & laughing with relief, the one the Guru had arranged to be last, the same first one the Guru saw start the counting, recognizing him now as had seen him from a distance. Smiling with kindness the Guru concluded for him: “Yes, Thou Art the 10^th.”

When equating the Non-Dual Self with Absolute Reality Brahman, the most authoritative Upanishads repeatedly intoned the Mahavakya or Great Proclamation “Thou Art That”, with Absolute Reality, Brahman understood to be “That.”

In “Thou Art the 10^th!” the actual number 10 has no particular significance there other than in helping recall of the Parable. What matters is that each essentially makes the same mistake when failing to count himself, or more to the point, take himself into account. The remedy is to Inquire “who am I” in order to know oneself. Self-Knowledge, the direct result of Self-Inquiry, is also known as Self-Realization, Enlightenment, Liberation, & in the original languages: Moksha, Nirvana, Mukti, & so on. That is the ineffable Reality itself, ever inexplicable & beyond words. In that same Dream, the Maharshi continued to respond to a succession of questions about Self-Knowledge that were winding down-level to issues of their being two ways one forgets to take into account oneself. Both kinds of self-amnesia are modeled in slightly different ways by analogy based on the Parable about the 10^th.

Robert Heinlein's hero in Stranger in a Strange Land drew from the same scriptures, without direct reference, when his planet-colony "visitor" was asked about the that colony's understanding of "God". Confused at first, that character, Michael Valentine, hesitated, pondered, & then realized what was being asked. Shaking his head in denial of the basic premise of the question, one about some separate super-being, the extra-terrestrial visitor responded: "Thou art God!" (Of course the "thou art" would not have been used unless the Mahavakya was being referenced. Thou Art …  –  Tat Tvam Asi, That Thou Art, is the one Mahavakya out of the tradition of 4 that is typically rendered in the archaic English thou and art to lend a “biblical” significance to the 3 short words. With far less understanding of the very deepest meaning, we can note sci-fi written at the close of the 1950’s and published in the next decade by Robert Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land, in which another version of that Mahavakya appears. That story’s Alien is seeking to decipher the earthling word “God” but is met with a confusing array of poorly conceived answers, as would still be the case. Only very slightly parallel to our own Alien, the old sci-fi version finally gets the drift of their stammering and he is stunned that they don’t already know. He utters: “Thou Art God”  – a nice honoring or the Mahavakya for the American 1950’s even if Heinlein exhibits no further understanding of the Proclamation, in terms of Self-Knowledge, the primary concern. As for the partial equivalence of the word “God” compared to the assumed Brahman in the Mahavakya, it is worth noting that Meister Eckhart came closer with the term Gottheit “Godhead”. Written in the late 1950's & then published in '61, this was pretty "far out" for an American sci–fi author.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

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Duplicates have been available on:

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[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 12

Some more verses from a great Sage:

Advaita does not deal with opposites. When it says "non-objective", it does not mean "subjective" [in E-books here we have coined the term "trans-subjective"]. Negatives can never subsist independently, by themselves. They want a positive something, as their background – Absolute Brahman.

Desirelessness is the goal of all desires.

The Witness makes you selfless or egoless.

The Body does not exist, either when you stand separate from the Body,

or when you think about the Body.

Science starts upon the basic error of giving independent existence to the World of objects, leaving the True Subject & the thing nearest to it — the Mind — un-examined.

When an Object is perceived, the Object is not there & you are ever in the same "place".

The World is the One appearing as many.

The Guru takes you from phenomena to the Absolute Brahman.  Disciples need not wonder what the Guru is doing for them.  Disciples can never understand the real significance. They need only know that Love becomes Divine when Ego is not present.

In Deep Dreamless Sleep, no Mind exists. no Self ever leaves.

Mind & Senses are only names of mis-identified functions of Sat, Chit, Ananda —

manifested as Life, Thought, & Feeling.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

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Duplicates have been available on:

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Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 11

Some more verses from a great Sage:

When Brahman is visualized as Ultimate Truth, the World is reduced to mere appearance — making Brahman’s title of destroyership literally significant.

Space begets objects, & objects beget Space.  Science wants to establish oneness outside in objects perceived. But Vedanta wants to establish oneness inside, outside & everywhere.

When the thought that you are Atma [Self], the Reality, becomes as strong as your present thought that you are the body, then alone are you free.

Worldly knowledge is nothing other than giving a name to the unknown & dismissing it immediately from your mind.

Consciousness is the light of lights. Therefore Consciousness is self-luminous.  Self-luminosity is the particular prerogative of Consciousness alone.

He who has destroyed the Ego in him knows neither doing nor non-doing.

Witnessing is silent awareness. Do not try to make it active in any way.  Your knowership is objectless & can never be objectified.  You should never try to know that you are the Knower.

The disinterested Witness alone enjoys the "picture" [of a World],

Spirituality replaces the Object by the Subject.

No amount of effort, taken on your own part, can ever take you to the Absolute.

The basic error is the false identification of the “I” with the Body, Senses or Mind — each at a different time. This is the pivot round which our worldly life revolves.

Personality rests with body, senses & mind. If you think you are impersonal, if you feel you are impersonal & if you act knowing that you are Impersonal, you are Impersonal.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

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[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]

Essay outside of the NMT (No-Me Teaching) series 10

Some of Master Nome's earliest aphorisms about the unreality of a World:

There has never been a single objective thing. (1.3)
The World is unreal.  (1.16)
All that is objective is illusion. Illusion is that which is not. (1.34)
All things change. that which is not a thing is immutable. (1.63)
There is no World (any objective thing), & there is no one to experience or know it. (1.94)
It is you who say that anything is real. the object does not declare its own reality. to known the Reality, know yourself. (2.54)
Any object of experience has no more existence separate from the Self than printed letters from a page of paper, or waves from water. (3.24)
It is better to say the World in you than you are in the World. (3.42)
An unreal body performs unreal actions in an unreal World. (3.50)
Do not be afraid to let go of a World that does not really exist. (3.57)
Know the World to be unreal and yourself as not a character in it, & the dream is over. (2.93)
Regard all manifestation as an hallucination or as a daydream lasting but a moment. (3.30)
Regard all thought as an empty echo and the World as a dream. (3.67)
Ego, manifestation, form and ignorance: these are like an optical illusion, a mirage, a dream without substance, the life-history of a fictional character. (3.96)
The conception of space requires misidentification with the body.  The conception of time requires misidentification with thought.     The Self is neither the body nor thought. It is spaceless and timeless. (1.37 )
As space is endless, clear, formless, embracing all, bound by none, all-pervading, ungraspable, & has no within or without, so it is with the Self. (1.61)
The World, time, space, life, death, objective things, the mind, ignorance, bondage, & an experiencer of these are just concepts. Concepts are unreal. Absolute Being alone is. (2.55)

Spiritual notes of a great Sage 2

Reality remains unchanging states of Mind — Waking, Dream, & Deep Dreamless Sleep. Look to the common sense of Existence in all 3 States.

In every experience, the changing expression is the objective part, while the un changing Background is the subjective Consciousness part, which is the changeless Reality.

Bodies seem to be born & die, while the subjective Self transcends both.

Knowledge alone can know Knowledge, Brahman alone knows Brahman.  That in you which knows you exist is Brahman.

Each is already Liberated, & he has only to know it.

Whatever you assume yourself, the Atma [Self] to be, so you will see the World "outside" you.

If you want Suffering, be attached to the World.  If you want Happiness, be spiritual.

The vanishingly narrow "razor" of the "Present" moment is only a word representing the conceptual joining of a remembered, long-gone Past & an imagined, not-yet existing Future.

After Realization you may outwardly live exactly as before in terms of Objective appearance; but you cannot fail to know the Subjective transformation you have undergone.

Liberated Knowledge that dawns on the subsidence of the Ego can never cease to be.

Realization consists in becoming deeply aware of the fact that you have never been in Bondage.

Because Realization can never happen, it can never occur in Time.  Only timeless self-awareness of the always-so Reality becomes vivid.

Self-Realization is not a case of understanding at all, but of being one with the Truth.  Merging identity is a better hint at the inexpressible than any kind of thinking.

He who wants to get to the Truth does not crave for the fulfillment of individual desires.

The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:  

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

or with Caps-sensitive:

http://sdrv.ms.YPOgkX/

Duplicates have been available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]