Creation is Now

[methylatedghosts]

"Everything exists in this moment (now). This moment is the basis of all creation. The universe wasn't created the Biblical six thousand years ago or even the scientific fifteen billion. The universe is created right now and right now it disappears. Before you even have time to recognize its existence, it's gone forever. Yet the present moment penetrates all of time and space. In Dogen's words, 'What is happening here and now is obstructed by happening itself; it has sprung free from the brains of happening.'
In other words, we can't know the present in the usual sense because the present is obscured by the present itself and by the act of perceiving it and conceiving of it. Form meets emptiness here and now and all of creation blossoms into being."
~Brad Warner on Dogen's teachings

Do you agree with Brad Warner's consciousness-centred interpretation of reality? Why or why not? Let me know your thoughts

[Furrowed Brow]

This guys sounds like an existentialist.

I think there are variations on this theme that crop up with several philosophers. Husserl's phenomology for example. Heidegger's Being and Time another, but Hiedegger grounded consciousness in our sense of historicity. Not the now.

I'd say our "consciousness of" rises in the now, but reality is out there. whether I'm blossoming not.

[Beto]

"Everything exists in this moment (now). This moment is the basis of all creation. The universe wasn't created the Biblical six thousand years ago or even the scientific fifteen billion. The universe is created right now and right now it disappears. Before you even have time to recognize its existence, it's gone forever. Yet the present moment penetrates all of time and space. In Dogen's words, 'What is happening here and now is obstructed by happening itself; it has sprung free from the brains of happening.'
In other words, we can't know the present in the usual sense because the present is obscured by the present itself and by the act of perceiving it and conceiving of it. Form meets emptiness here and now and all of creation blossoms into being."
~Brad Warner on Dogen's teachings

Do you agree with Brad Warner's consciousness-centred interpretation of reality? Why or why not? Let me know your thoughts

I've mentioned a theory in another thread that states that the physical universe can't really exist, regarding the twin principles of energy: the conservation of energy, and the Uncertainty Principle. I'm not sure anyone here can flat-out argue against this, but I'd like to hear about it.

Anyway, the universe would exist only as a possibility in the quantum field, and it is our consciousness that chooses a possible universe and causes it to "arise" from the quantum field as a "now" or "conscious moment". This got me thinking... how can every consciousness in the world (or universe) choose what seems to be the SAME universe? We would all have to be parts of the SAME universal consciousness. Like when you observe quantum "parts" of the same particle, all "parts" being the particle, in different places at the same time. This has actually been observed. Why, than, can't I see the universe under the same principle? Especially if it doesn't exist beyond a possibility in the quantum field, thereby observing the same rules. It is the observation of the quantum event that forces the collapse of the quantum wave function. Remember the "double slit"? Does this lead to the logical conclusion that we are all part of the same consciousness, aka God to some people? I guess we would have to bare with some MAJOR assumptions.

[methylatedghosts]

All we can see of the perceived reality is the Now.

All there is, is the now, in the sense, that the past is gone, and the future is merely possibility. I could sprung into existence right this instant, this now, and all of these memories planted in me, and all I my history really does not exist. I am only in the now. I am only here. I am not in the future, the past is only inside my head. I am only here, now!

but Hiedegger grounded consciousness in our sense of historicity

But like I said, every single memory could have been "artificially" implanted right now. We can only experience the now can we not?

[Furrowed Brow]

But like I said, every single memory could have been "artificially" implanted right now. We can only experience the now can we not?

Logically speaking I would say it was always a possibility. Though I think one needs to be suffering from an acute case of scepticism to take the idea seriously. If we have just sprung into existence now, then it does not matter if I throw myself off a roof, because agency, actions, intentions, and consequences have no meaning for such an existence. In fact I can't throw myself off a roof. Because the now is not connected to the then. There would be no temporal cause and effect. No action would have a real history or a real future.

[methylatedghosts]

But like I said, every single memory could have been "artificially" implanted right now. We can only experience the now can we not?

Logically speaking I would say it was always a possibility. Though I think one needs to be suffering from an acute case of scepticism to take the idea seriously.

Well, naturally, and of course it is very hard to prove or disprove the possibility

If we have just sprung into existence now, then it does not matter if I throw myself off a roof, because agency, actions, intentions, and consequences have no meaning for such an existence.

Au Contraire! If we were to believe the bible literally, then adam and eve were suddenly sprung into existence. Although they may not have been implanted with artificial memories, the idea is the same. Simply springing into existence this instant does not decrease meaning of actions and intentions

In fact I can't throw myself off a roof. Because the now is not connected to the then. There would be no temporal cause and effect. No action would have a real history or a real future.

But do they now?

Like, right now. All you can know for 100% certainty is this very instant. And what is a "real history" or a "real future"? If, by real history, you mean that things happened, that someone, at one point, would have remembered it, that someone might have written down what happened 500 years ago, then it is merely the words of others and an internal knowledge of your own actions and perceptions. The now is merely the transition between past and future. Now is the thin line that divides the past and the future

[QED]

It's Tuesday so it must be time to talk about "brains in vats" Paul Davies points out that when contemplating the experience of conscious beings in their universe(s) it is far more likely that they are experiencing a simulation rather than a reality. In other words the number of "fake" universes would massively outnumber real ones. This is all predicated on the notion that a conscious experience is something that can be replicated algorithmically. If true then algorithms could spawn their own virtual realities ad infinitum.

Having just posted elsewhere about the "many worlds" interpretation of Quantum Mechanics it strikes me that this interpretation makes a lot more sense if our universe is some kind of virtual reality (information based simulation). Then rather than duplicate "big heavy universes" for each and every Quantum event we transform the problem into an information storage exercise.