7 - Consciousness is the key
You can’t rely on dictionaries to get a clear definition of consciousness. Don’t expect anything better than:
“Despite centuries of analyses, definitions, explanations, and debates by philosophers and scientists, consciousness remains puzzling and controversial, being at once the most familiar and most mysterious aspect of our lives. Perhaps the only widely agreed notion about the topic is the intuition that it exists. Opinions differ about what exactly needs to be studied and explained as consciousness.”
In other words
“We don’t know! Use your imagination. You are trying to push the envelope. Don’t expect much help from the library.”
QUESTION6.com
We,The People, are not happy
Puberty makes us conscious of something new about ourselves. We may be very surprised to discover what people think of us. Consciousness has no shape, weight or color. It cannot be measured. It belongs to the soul’s world. It belongs to the world of freedom, feelings, harmony, ideas and many things that cannot be measured. This world could have different states of consciousness like we have different feelings and different ideas. People under hypnotism seem to be fully conscious that they are on their bicycle, pedaling in the middle of the ocean. They are in a state of consciousness disconnected from the physical world.
This consciousness mystery is opening new horizons. We can lose consciousness. Under hypnotism we can be placed in many different states of consciousness. A Near Death Experience is even more puzzling. People who are already under anesthesia could get access to an NDE. That means that it would be possible to have different states of consciousness inside one another. This is puzzling to say the least. What happens to us at night when we are asleep? Are we unconscious? That does not prevent us from dreaming. Are we conscious when we dream? We don’t carry any memory from one state of consciousness to another. Remembering a dream is a different kind of memory. We forget our dreams very easily and forever.
We may have to change the way we look at our life. It could be made of different stays in different states of consciousness. There is the one we use most of the day. Another is used only at night. Another under anesthesia and another when we dream. Without a common memory, we could be living different lives in parallel. One of them is related to the physical world. We call it being awake. Another may be disconnected from the laws of nature. We call it being asleep. There could be several more including being unconscious. No wonder that philosophers and scientists found it puzzling and controversial!
Because consciousness is not under our control does not mean that it is not at the center of our lives. There is a possibility that during our sleep we are free from the limitations of our body and can be fully conscious. This is the time to make important decisions that will be implemented ‘unconsciously’ the next day.
At night , we may be wondering “What in the world could we be doing the other 16 hours of the day? This must be a waste of time!”. We keep moving from daytime to nighttime consciousness without a clear connection between them. There could be more. We could say that we are not conscious of our different states of consciousness.
We are not conscious of
our different states of consciousness.
Let’s go back to the origin of consciousness
Consciousness appeared on earth at different levels of development.
In the very simple organisms, consciousness is limited to the experience of eating when, by chance, they get in contact with food. They are only conscious of food. Life on earth is based on digestion. Don't jump to conclusions. That does not mean that the more you eat, the more conscious you will be. It means that the simplest implementation of consciousness was related to the need for food.
At the next level, we have organisms that can move around and search for food. When they are hungry, they move. When they are not, they rest. At a higher level, some organisms use sense organs such as smelling or hearing to guide their search. Consciousness increases gradually from the simpler organism to human beings.
Robots and Artificial Intelligence could play an important role in our life. The difference between a robot and us is that we are conscious of what the robot is doing.
Judging people on their IQ may not be very smart.
We should also look at their level of consciousness.
Hypnotism
Anthony Galie is not a philosopher. He can help. He found a way to bypass consciousness by using people’s aptitude to visualize. He starts by placing a picture in the mind of the subject and transforms this picture into action. He could convince you that you are in the middle of the ocean pedaling on your bicycle. You get the impression that humans minds come in two parts like the crew of a ship. Before computers got control of everything, the crew of a ship had people above deck and people below deck. The people above deck were using the stars to decide the speed and direction of the ship. People under deck executed orders. They kept the motor running at the right speed and the rudder in the desired position. Tell them to direct the ship to an iceberg and they will send the ship right to the iceberg. No question asked.
It seems that human thinking, as we know it, comes in two parts. We have our “conscious mind” that relies on the messages received through our sense organs. It uses logic and demands proof before the information can go any further. We also have our “subconscious”. It does not need proof. It follows instructions without a need for any justification.
What is interesting is the way hypnotists look at life in society. They say that we are hypnotizing ourselves between 60% and 70% of the time. We can be driving on the freeway and thinking about something else. We are on automatic pilots. Did you ever miss your turn off? Who was driving?
Go to a store and ask the clerk: "Do you have paint that can be used on an outside deck that is always in the shade?" Chances are that you will be asked to repeat the question. The clerk was somewhere else on automatic pilot. He needed time to come back. Start by saying "Good morning. What a beautiful day" and he will understand your question the first time. What could be our motivation to hypnotize ourselves 60% of the time? Could life be more enjoyable on the other side? Would it be possible that we want to include in our time awake some possibilities that we have during our sleep?
Advertising can use “subliminal advertising”. A very brief message is inserted into the video. The idea is to introduce in the subconscious of the viewer some idea that he is not even conscious of. This practice is banned in most countries (but is still legal in the US).
Do you want to make a horror movie? Imagine that the Martians know how to bypass human consciousness. They have us under control. They treat us like a herd. They are using us like we use the cows. Sometimes they make humans fight one another and watch the fighting, just for fun, like we watch cock fighting. How could we blame them for treating the level below them like we are treating the level below us?
We should treat the levels below us like
we want to be treated by the level above us.
Consciousness and thinking.
We become conscious of the stars by looking at them. To this observation, we add thinking and energy and make telescopes. The use of telescopes increases our awareness of the stars. We start by observing nature and think about what we see. Consciousness feeds on thinking. Today, the purpose of education has shifted. Through his computer, the student has access to all the knowledge accumulated by humanity. The question for the student is: “What do you want to become conscious of?”
Consciousness feeds on thinking
Consciousness and thinking help each other. Thinking increases our consciousness and a higher level of consciousness triggers more thinking. One question remains: Why did we wait more than 200 000 years to start walking on those two legs?
Our consciousness must change.
Our life starts with a vision of the world limited to a narrow range between red and violet. Thinking and experimentation made us discover the infra-red and the ultra-violet. They expanded our consciousness of the world. That was only the beginning. We also became conscious of electricity, microbes and particles so tiny that we will never be able to see them. Our conception is limited to their mass, their speed and their electrical charge. Someday, a new experiment could reveal a different ‘thing’. This ‘thing’ sometimes acts like a particle… or two. Many concepts may have to change. The last development came with the discovery that our material world is only 5% of reality. We should push the envelope of human consciousness, until we may reach the limits of the human brain.
Human history is a story of consciousness. Two thousand years ago, humans were members of a tribe or a small village in the forest. Later, they became aware of belonging to a country or a religion. Today, they identify with the eastern or the western civilization. They have not yet reached the level where the consciousness of being Homo sapiens is predominant.
We are living a time when countries are building fortresses to defend themselves. A higher level of consciousness would bring more maturity. Let’s keep in mind that we all come from the same Big Bang. The same atoms keep circulating between the trees, the oceans, and our bodies.
We have a ‘need to belong’. We need to be aware of other people. This goes beyond noticing their presence. It involves being conscious of their feelings, their joys, and their sorrows. This is where you find ideas, freedom, love, harmony and what is important in our lives.
After developing our level of consciousness in the physical world, we must explore the immaterial world. After learning to swim, we should venture to the deep end.
Consciousness in the immaterial world.
Our consciousness is not limited to the objects in our environment. We are also conscious of feelings. A soul may be able to perceive the feelings of another soul like we see other bodies during the day. At night, we may be directly conscious of each other’s feelings, love, stress and energy. No need to say, ‘I love you”. It shows with all the details and intensity.
That could explain why our souls do not have sense organs. They don’t need them.
Consciousness as a filter:
Have you had an oculist check your eyesight? He makes you read letters on the wall. We could compare each test with a different consciousness. You can see some of the letters but there is a limit. The oculist is looking for what is best for you. He could also make you glasses that would show only half of the world. Different glasses introduce you to different states of consciousness. You are only conscious of one at a time. Each one has its limits. When wearing one, you cannot imagine wearing another. During the day we see the world through one consciousness. At night we see the same world through another filter.
The oculist knows that the same world can be filtered in many different ways. When people talk about consciousness, they mean their way of seeing the world in their personal state of consciousness.
Every human being could be going through life wearing different glasses. Our view of the world can be limited by different ideologies, different religions, different preconceived ideas.
We are looking at the same world, but only conscious of a limited part of the world. The same consciousness that makes us discover the world could keep us prisoner of its limitations, like our eyesight keeps us limited between red and violet.
