I was recently asked about introductory material to the computational paradigm and its intersections with related fields of ideas. Here's a bit of a brainstorm...  More >

A brief preliminary brainstorm on the subject of open-source social operating systems (systems of governance), from the perspective of systems theory. This is just to put down a few thoughts that immediately pop into my mind in regards to this subject...  More >

Here I discuss some basic aspects of quantum mechanics that are not often explained and are often at the heart of common misconceptions about the role of consciousness in reality and the type of reality that is implied by quantum mechanics.  More >

Ultimately, we're not made of things but of processes; we're not objects or subjects, we are happenings.

Both subject and object are complementary aspects of an experiential process. The process is fundamental whilst the subject and object are virtual appearances.

The unified cosmic process (Brahman) has subject=God (Supreme Self) and object=quantum field (spirit world).

This unified cosmic process operates 'between' moments of existence; changing the state of NOW so that it seems that there are many successive moments.

As these moments blur together there seems to exist myriad individual experiential processes (Atman), which operate 'across' moments of existence.

This is how Atman is Brahman, depending on whether we contemplate the process as operating 'between' or 'across' moments. When 'between' it is One, whilst when operating 'across' it is many.

The individual experiential processes (Atman) have subject=Jiva (personal self) and object=Maya (phenomenal world).

In this way the unified cosmic process seemingly animates myriads of virtual processes, hence the One manifests as many. Many subjects (embodied beings) and many objects (physical universe).

But ultimately there is just one unified cosmic process, which can be known as either one subject (God / Supreme Self) or one object (quantum field / spirit world).

Anyway, that is one possible English interpretation of the mathematics that I intuitively received and have been contemplating since 2000. The maths is crystal clear and very succinct but it is hard to find words to describe it because words have so much egoic / materialist baggage attached.

Hope it makes sense to you...

BTW for much more detail see System Science of Virtual Reality.

Worldly concepts, words and thought processes cannot give the mind enough traction to grasp reality. However the mind itself CAN grasp these things and the intellect can understand. Although the word 'mind' means different things to different people... Hence I'll explain a little of where I'm "coming from" in regards to 'mind'...  More >

The following is a brief overview of an information system ontology and metaphysics, i.e. those concepts, entities and processes that provide a foundation for a non-materialist, consciousness based world-view. The explanation is kind of technical because it is difficult to explain non-materialist issues in a mostly materialist language, however the understanding itself is very simple and intuitive once one shifts to a non-materialist paradigm. This explanation starts from general principles and works towards particulars.  More >

There are countless intriguing patterns that can be found within the I Ching. I don't know what they mean, but here we explore some of them... Firstly we map out the correlation between the hexagrams and the binary numbers, and then within this context we explore that patterns formed by the various pairs of hexagrams and groups of pairs.  More >

There are some who believe that only sentient beings such as humans can collapse quantum wavefunctions. IMHO this is a fallacy and it leads to a paradox, which can be resolved by developing a deeper understanding of consciousness.

The paradox is, if sentient being are required to collapse a wavefunction, then how could the classical universe exist before sentient beings evolved, and how could sentient beings evolve if the classical universe didn't yet exist? At what stage did the pure quantum potential suddenly start collapsing into particular classical actualities? How did this new ingredient "wavefunction-collapsing-sentience" arise from the pure quantum potential? There is a maze of paradoxes here...

In fact any interaction with another system will collapse the wavefunction. Any observation will do it, because whenever an observable is required by another system as part of an interaction the wavefunction must collapse to provide an observable. This approach is a natural part of an efficient simulation algorithm, which only computes the state of a virtual system when another virtual system requires an observable in order to experience and interact with it.

The sensitivity to collapse is why researchers are having so much trouble building quantum computers, they call it the "decoherence problem". In order to perform computations with wavefunctions we can't have them collapsing willy-nilly, but the slightest interaction with any aspect of the surrounding universe will collapse the wavefunction. So how can one develop a framework within which to compute with wavefunctions?

If it was only sentient beings who collapse wavefunctions then the decoherence problem would be easy to solve, just put the quantum computer in an opaque box and don't let anyone open the box until the computation has had plenty of time to complete. Then a sentient being can open the box to collapse the wavefunction and observe the final result of the computation. This is not what happens in reality.

The only way out of the quantum-sentience-paradox is to accept that not only complex systems with complex forms of awareness (such as ourselves) are involved in the collapse of the wavefunction, but even simple systems with simple forms of awareness. Hence the way out of paradox is to overcome anthropocentric concepts of consciousness and accept some form of panpsychism, such as pan-proto-experientialism.

Even a fundamental particle has its own primitive form of consciousness - nowhere near as complex and rich as ours, but it is aware nevertheless. A particle couldn't interact with other particles if it wasn't aware of their existence and their state of being. It needs to observe their state of being in order to react to them, and this observation collapses the wavefunction of the other particles.

Thanks to Tim Cumper for raising this issue and inspiring me to write this article...

Taking numbers consisting of 1's and squaring them reveals an interesting countup-countdown pattern in the resulting product.

1^2= 1

11^2= 121

111^2= 12321

1111^2= 1234321

11111^2= 123454321  More >

I was recently asked my opinion on the work and teachings of A.H. Almaas, called the Diamond Approach. This article is not a general review of his work, it is about something that I believe to be a common misconception of spirituality, particularly throughout the West (e.g. many proponents of Integral philosophy). However I found in Almaas' work a clear and succinct expression of that misconception, which has inspired me to say something about it now.

Firstly let me say that I am not familiar with Almaas or his work, however after reading an article on the core principles, written by him and an interview with him I think I can sense the gist of where he is coming from. He has many deep insights that suggest genuine realisations, hence I suspect that many spiritual aspirants could get some benefit from his fusion of depth psychology with aspects of both dualist and nondual spirituality. That is all I have to say regarding his work in general.

However, from my perspective and the perspective of Eastern spirituality, he succumbs to a critical mistake. It is this mistake that I will discuss here because it is very limiting and it is prevalent and growing in popularity throughout the West.

I am talking about a misconception of spirituality that is based on a partial realisation that is mistaken for a full realisation. The seeker attains a degree of realisation, but mainly at an intellectual level, which has not penetrated very deeply into their subconscious / unconscious mind – they are often not even aware that it should penetrate deeply or how deep it must go before one has full realisation. Hence they believe themselves to be realised and to understand the spiritual path, even whilst the bulk of their mind is unconsciously dominated by the ego and still bound within the illusory world that the ego imagines itself to inhabit and the illusory life that the ego imagines that it is living.

The partial realisation results in thinking that could be phrased as “Okay, so now I'm realised, but I'm still me, an individual person in the world - so what now? How can this realisation help me and others to lead a better, more spiritual life? That is after all what spirituality is really about.” This thinking results in the tendency to approach spirituality more as a spiritually themed lifestyle for the ego as it lives its illusory life in the world. Rather than seeking to deepen their realisation and eventually attain full and complete realisation of reality and truth, and thereby overcome the ego and all of its delusions; thus traversing the greatest paradigm shift of all and coming to apprehend and live in reality, which is radically different to what the ego imagines.  More >

I just read a very thought provoking article The Truth by Eric Gross, which I thoroughly enjoyed. In response to it something came to mind, certainly not as a criticism but simply as an extra dimension to consider...  More >