So glad I found you! Much of what you write resonates deeply. Most people use computers but couldn’t explain how they work from the level of atoms up to operating systems. I can. What you are saying about memory is largely correct. Yes, computers are mostly machines that move information around. Yes, there are multiple layers of caching on any device. Yes, deleting a file from a physical computer is harder than you’d think. I believe there’s something in quantum information theory that says you can only erase information if you expend energy. As to what goes on in the outer layers, I can only guess. Just as a process on one machine can only guess at the nature of the internet. Of course if the machine reads a description of Wikipedia, then we might think the machine knows. But the machine still has to make a choice: do you trust that source, or not? As to forgetting, I’ll happily remain agnostic on this but I agree it is prudent to conduct oneself as if memories would last forever. As for forgetting: I think the notion of the crucifixion and resurrection make sense here. Do you want to live forever? The price is remembering forever, whatever has happened to you and everything you did. The only way to pay that price is to be so steeped in the idea of forgiveness, so deeply bought into that, that you commit to immediately forgiving anyone who seeks your forgiveness. You also have to commit to seeking forgiveness from anyone you’ve wrong. Those two commitments are thus a precondition for a heaven that actually makes sense. My guess, on that river: it’s available to anyone that wants, but the price is another trip through the mortal realms. You’ll forget all the bad memories but keep the encoded intuitions of the good ones. With each life, you accumulate both good and bad memories. Eventually, you accumulate enough good memories that you are born with an intuition of faith that sticks with you. And then you live many life to pair up each experience of harm you caused others, with an experience of the harm to caused you. At the end of this process you are left with a biparite graph of experiences of sin, where you are on the giving and receiving end. Jesus dying on the cross tends an offer: would you like to live forever with God in heaven? You can, but you must first endure this, voluntarily, out of love.
"Do you want to live forever? The price is remembering forever, whatever has happened to you and everything you did. The only way to pay that price is to be so steeped in the idea of forgiveness, so deeply bought into that, that you commit to immediately forgiving anyone who seeks your forgiveness. You also have to commit to seeking forgiveness from anyone you’ve wrong. Those two commitments are thus a precondition for a heaven that actually makes sense."
I generally agree with this statement. If Heaven could be said to have a key, it would be forgiveness. Of course, people pay lip service to this concept all the time. To actually forgive is extraordinarily difficult, and the base difficulty scales exponentially with the degree of evil done. We can forgive our neighbor for the loud parties he throws, but can we forgive Anthony Fauci?
"My guess, on that river: it’s available to anyone that wants, but the price is another trip through the mortal realms. You’ll forget all the bad memories but keep the encoded intuitions of the good ones."
Again, I think this is one of several (even endless?) possible outcomes. I guess what I was trying to say could be summarized as "God doesn't need to follow rules." We are speaking of the source of all consciousness, after all, the Being who willed being itself into existence. When Einstein said "God does not play dice with the universe" I would counter by adding, "unless He feels like it."
"Jesus dying on the cross tends an offer: would you like to live forever with God in heaven? You can, but you must first endure this, voluntarily, out of love."
Thank you for your post! From what I can tell you get this stuff better than I do and I’m grateful to see people able to articulate it so well. I think I don’t agree with “god doesn’t need to follow rules,” though. For example, I don’t think God can invent an integer between 2 and 6, which divides 7 evenly. In short, think God is constrained by what we could call the laws of logic. I would say that God is bound by chains of inference. This is the basis for my theodicy. If you want choices to be meaningful, they have to have consequences. There’s no way around that one, i think even for God. I think God could indeed create universes where we experience nothing but bliss and joy, but God consciously chooses to endure the suffering of watching us stumble in the dark and turn away from him, precisely because that is the only way to create beings which have free will and the potential to sin, but don’t. This belief in logical impossibility of the ideal universe without a period of suffering and misery as a necessary precondition is both the basis of my theology and another reason why I think Jesus really was God: the most powerful being imaginable, voluntarily undergoing immense suffering because he loves us. He could stop that suffering whenever, but only at the cost of delaying the plan of our eternal salvation. He loves us too much to do that.
A lower-case-g god absolutely could not invent the integer you described. Again, just because such beings are less powerful doesn't necessarily mean they are evil, anymore than relatively weak creatures like ourselves are necessarily evil.
For example: the god or gods bound in logic as you described do exist, and would be good for all the reasons you mention. In the hierarchy of reality, you might even say such beings occupy the highest of all planes, which, in a manner of speaking, means the closest to God Almighty.
When we speak of Lucifer's long fall, I assume it's because he was once a being who dwelled at that penultimate node of pure logic. It also speaks to the dangers that threaten even the gods; perhaps Lucifer tried to invent something like the impossible integer, as only God Almighty could possibly do. He tried to break those adamantine chains of inference, in other words. And when he found he couldn't, it drove him insane. Instead of remaining a guardian of logic and order, he became a god of insanity and chaos instead.
But the Ultimate God I'm referring to is unconstrained by logic, because He invented it. That doesn't mean He doesn't love logic, as He very clearly does. But as you say, his tendency to play by its rules is a conscious choice He makes. He can choose otherwise.
What do you think is the relationship between God and Truth? Did God create Truth, or is he Truth itself? I think the latter is true - that Truth is inseparable from love, because those two words refer to the same essence. If God IS truth, then the laws of logic are just properties of God’s internal structure. If God creates truth, then yeah, I guess he can do whatever and it’s my mind that just won’t wrap around it, and I’m calling that a constraint on God because that feels better than saying “well I guess I don’t really know.”
"What do you think is the relationship between God and Truth?"
I think you might have highlighted one of those questions that exposes the limitations of human language when discussing these matters. In one sense, we could say the concepts are reciprocal. In another, we could say that it is a description of essence and action (i.e. God is the Truth AND the Way). The mathematician, the philosopher, the engineer, the cleric, the artist... they will all have different answers I suspect, and I also suspect none will be fully sufficient in their explanatory power.
But I think when we throw logic into the mix (i.e. God = Truth = Logic) is when things tend to get a bit hairy. I think I know what you mean when you say "logic", and I think I mean more or less the same thing when I use it. But the problem is that the ways many people will use it on the material plane of needs and wants is as a rationale. In other words, we act first, then narrate the story of that action as series of fully rational. explicable and deterministic causes and effects. When we've squeezed the irrational and the illogical out of the room, we could find ourselves not just unaligned with God and Truth, but in furious rebellion against both.
"I want food because I am literally starving to death. That man over there has food, but he will not give it it me. So, logically, I kill the man and take his food. I also stash his corpse in my fridge, in case I get hungry later; it is illogical to waste food after all."
We could of course use some version of No True Scotsman to diffuse this tendency, or claim that the a higher form of logic located at a more distant node would refute the staving man's own version. But when Christ speaks of love, and in particular of God's love for humanity, I don't think that it can be deemed entirely logical or rational. Or rather, whatever form of logic God employs or is, what we perceive of it might only be a shadow or pale reflection. And if all is derived from God, that would necessarily include the irrational as well as the rational.
I know that's not a full answer. I guess I could also throw up my hands and say "I guess I don't really know" and I agree that this approach usually doesn't feel so good. On the other hand, we are detectives investigating the greatest mystery of all! So "I don't know" can also sometimes energize and excite us, because we really, really want to know more, and to explain to others what we've found.
By “logic” I mean in the formal, mathematical sense. Sets of axioms and production rules produce trees of statements which are “true” inferentially. They are, in effect, lopsided tautologies, which are true by definition.
For example, the Pythagorean theorem when applied in a Euclidean space is true, by definition. You could ask whether or not this truth is “merely a human construction” or whether it is seeing some real facet of God. I suspect it’s the latter, as one of the ways God makes himself know to us. Of course I could be wrong on this. But it makes way more sense to me that the absolute WOULD expose itself to us, in this very indirect manner. This of course raises the question of which sets of axioms - if any - are actually true and do apply to our experience. This question is equivalent to asking, are there true laws of physics? And my guess is the answer may very well be “no”. I’m guessing you _cant_ unify general relativity and quantum mechanics because doing so would constitute a full description of God. I think the physical mechanisms that we know of and understand are the “infinitely expanding government” described in Isaiah. Going more out on a limb, I am willing to bet that the shroud of Turin encodes the cosmic microwave background radiation.
Of course, you also have to commit to keep trying. And that means being able to be willing to perceive God and be judged by him. If you refuse God’s judgment and don’t want to use dissappear, I think hell is just God giving you what you want: to keep enduring, having a mixture of experiences, at least some of which are positive. I suspect that after a trip across the river, some “predestined” souls (those with such positive balance that their intuition at birth basically guarantees a life of devotion to God) are then sent into the lower layers, both to atone for their sins and to rescue souls which maybe could be brought to believe, to see God, if he approaches only tangentially, cautiously, so that the souls suffering might approach him by means of one of their many layers of earthly desires. Yes the paths into hell are many and shallow and gentle - but each of these is also an escape path, when followed briefly, until another slightly more arduous path is chosen. For the right sexual partner, and then for the children, i think a lot of souls in hell would make the trek back to the surface and even be willing to turn toward God and submit to his judgement.
"I suspect that after a trip across the river, some “predestined” souls (those with such positive balance that their intuition at birth basically guarantees a life of devotion to God) are then sent into the lower layers, both to atone for their sins and to rescue souls which maybe could be brought to believe, to see God, if he approaches only tangentially, cautiously, so that the souls suffering might approach him by means of one of their many layers of earthly desires."
Yes, I think this is also a possibility for some of us. But a condemned soul can also be saved on God's whim, as when Christ cleared out Hell during his katabasis before returning to flesh (and notably, with all of his memories intact).
The mystery as I see it is that memory provably isn't physical. It is structure-agnostic, and therefore isn't automatically "shed" upon departure from material. As you said, such a erasure process would require an expenditure of energy, and we have no idea how *much* energy would be required. Nor do we have any clear idea about the kind of technique that would suffice (i.e. how to target something that is non-local and immeasurable by default).
This is the trouble I've always had with theories of reincarnation. Often -- and somewhat ironically -- they seem like a fantasy or fairy tale we tell ourselves, in order to ensure that we don't think too hard about the damage we've wrought in the world, or how critically important each choice we make really is. In some depictions, it sounds like playing a video game on Easy Mode, with infinite "continues" until you reach the game's inevitable and pre-destined end.
As with atheists, the irony stems from the fact that the roles of starry-eyed child and hard-bitten realist are typically inverted. The reincarnation modelers claim that we're so in love with our egos that we've told ourselves a bedtime story about their eternal existence. And maybe that's even true for some. But I think those are the same people so wrapped up in their own delusions that they cannot even recognize their own sins, let alone how they might echo through eternity.
That's where God's infinite power and mercy comes into play. Our memories, like every other aspect of our being, are ultimately in God's hands.
Many interesting thoughts here, Mark. Allow me to indulge a rather prolix response.
There is a significant difference between breaking every rule as “antinomies” transcended by the God, and breaking them in terms of a voluntarist deity who is arbitrarily “beyond Good and Evil.” I think you are properly articulating the former, but care is necessary.
If you want to say there is a range of ontological being and various “divinities” located along that spectrum, that is possible. Indeed, traditional wisdoms generally affirm such. However, the radical uniqueness of the God, as opposed to lesser, “relative” divinities is precisely that the God cannot be located along a univocal continuum as a Supreme Being at the apex of a hierarchy. There can be an “analogy of being,” but not any kind of multiplication by infinity that could ever reach the “Cloud of Unknowing.” This is why a metaphysician like Erich Przywara asserts a dynamic rhythm that fluctuates between the known “cataphatic” and the surplus of apophatic “unknown” that is “ever greater” than the achieved clarity of the present known.
Memories as you note are complex. They are also difficult to parse. When folks think of the ego or nominalist individuals, they tend to isolate the individual from the relational context of nature, history, society, etc. But what we encounter is never an atomized individual; my own self-understanding is an action that is always both a function of decision and the accumulated result of prior actions and relations, both my own and those of others. Memory always bears the trace of these past relations, and historical being always bears implicit narratives that operate along many dimensions. The accrued weight of memory is “always already” imbued with an interpretive nexus, so one cannot reduce such simply to “facts.” Without changing the facts, the meaning can transform because “new eyes” provide a wider interpretive lens, what have you. The entire question of identity is ultimately both metaphysical and eschatological. If there is a “destruction” of memory, it may entail a separation of unique beings from penultimate realities that are “maya” only when understood in opposition to perfected ultimate realities.
Dante postulates a double action. Lethe is the renunciation of egoic memory. Memory returns in a new form, where the “possessive” individual is disabused of illusions, and a kind of communal appropriation occurs. The human thing is cosmic, embracing the totality of individual memories as participation in a form of ontological wholeness foreign to our typical biological-mechanical frames of reference. Something like this seems to me necessary, if the person is to have metaphysical meaning. Forms of selective amnesia may or may not properly engage the holistic nature of existence, and beings-in-relation. On the other hand, the “eternal return of horrors" entailed in a permanent record of every moment of cosmic existence appears both cruel and sadistic. Memory of that kind is the requirement of the permanence of evil. Such a reckoning may seem like perduring justice to some, but I think it is akin to brute determinism. The bodhisattva in Buddhist thought is a carrier of compassion who actively seeks to liberate those chained to delusion. In my view, the holiness of the Christian saint is oriented towards the healing and perfecting of the Whole. When soteriology becomes a matter of individual fates, where “the other” can be acceptably written off as separable from our own concern, something essential has been lost. The notion of forgiveness and divine “forgetting” must be more than forensic if it is to evade this destiny.
"However, the radical uniqueness of the God, as opposed to lesser, “relative” divinities is precisely that the God cannot be located along a univocal continuum as a Supreme Being at the apex of a hierarchy. There can be an “analogy of being,” but not any kind of multiplication by infinity that could ever reach the “Cloud of Unknowing."
I agree with this. See my conversation about the "gods of logic" above for my clarification. The so-called highest or penultimate plane (i.e. the one "closest" to God Almighty) is also the plane that Lucifer and all other demons inhabited before the Fall. This suggests that it is indeed not a univocal continuum in the sense that God Almighty both inhabits every level and simultaneously none of them at all. Infinite means infinite.
"But what we encounter is never an atomized individual; my own self-understanding is an action that is always both a function of decision and the accumulated result of prior actions and relations, both my own and those of others. Memory always bears the trace of these past relations, and historical being always bears implicit narratives that operate along many dimensions. The accrued weight of memory is “always already” imbued with an interpretive nexus, so one cannot reduce such simply to 'facts.'"
I think I mostly agree with this. The trouble is that the "phenomena" of memory as we experience it (i.e. the strategic state changes it facilitates upon storage/recall) appears to neither be illusory/hallucinatory nor structure-dependent. We can claim this process is egoic by default, but I suspect that such egoic memory is the same as self-deception. In other words, these are not "true memories" but are rather partial illusions.; we apply the jigsaws of our minds to the puzzle pieces, in order to produce the pictures we most dearly want to see. That's only the beginning of the trouble of course; what pictures do we want to see?
More to the point, what stories do we want to use our lives to tell, and which ones would we like to be told about us? Non-volatile, persistent memory is essentially "narrative" memory, which unspools into linear stories about causes-and-effects. The accuracy of such stories aren't always clear to us, in the clutter of this interactive layer. The world's not just a stage, but also a chaotic writer's room, with every egotistical author striving to make the story his "own." Much evil is born in such rooms, with such authors.
But as I see it, the art of storytelling has a Godly purpose too (because all things do). That means that even individual, encapsulated form of narrative memories as we experience them can be used to strategically tell the truth as well as to strategically lie. I think that's why we have them in the first place, and why they are by default impossible to destroy. They serve to reinforce the inherent logic of being, and the Divine purpose of intelligence which explores and rejoices in the beauty of God's designs. If our tales of these adventures in spacetime are told well and truthfully, then our memories are being used as God intends. But telling truthful stories is as difficult as any other paths to the Good. Lots of distractions and pitfalls, lots of egoic deathtraps and not-so-merry-go-rounds to avoid.
"On the other hand, the “eternal return of horrors" entailed in a permanent record of every moment of cosmic existence appears both cruel and sadistic. Memory of that kind is the requirement of the permanence of evil. Such a reckoning may seem like perduring justice to some, but I think it is akin to brute determinism."
This is what I was trying to explain in my analogy of the child born in a hellish situation he did not cause. At the ultimate level of being, chains of causality may become entirely irrelevant (for all we know), but here in the material these chains are the primary medium of transaction. We should rightly want to liberate the child from that situation, and employ our limited powers and gifts in that endeavor as best we can. I would suggest it's why we were given such gifts in the first place. Whether or not we rescue the child, we should strive to tell the best and truest story about it, so as to encourage others to pursue God's version of heroism. We save what we can save. The rest is up to God.
If we do succeed, the freed child may then go to explore, and to form the kinds of memories that needn't be mercifully rinsed away. These memories instead will help narrate the greatest story of all, in which the forces of mercy, forgiveness and light conquer the forces of darkness forever.
Good thoughts. There is definitely an equivocity to being that requires discernment. I would say that the vatic poet must undergo ascesis in order to separate the "wheat" from the "tares." Rabbinic lore speaks of divine fire and false fire. The sophist and the philosopher seem the same to those who judge by appearances. The difference is in the nature of the storytelling.
Yes, I think that memory is much more than the retention of a fact or event. Its significance comes with the meaning or interpretation that we make of it, and that can change over time. It seems to me that particular memories and their interpretations can be grouped together or linked in different ways, such as thematically. In this way we can stand back and maybe see a kind of fate at work. So perhaps in the end the individual memories are less important in themselves, than in their "thematic" context and interrelationships, and it is that which our consciousness takes away from this earthly life.
I think this version kind of jives with at least some of the forms of memory we experience when we dream. We will often retain some degree of narrative, persistent memory outside of the particular dream's context (i.e. recognition of faces, names, locations, etc.), while also maintaining a parallel memory of the linear or semi-linear events that transpire within the dream (e.g. that monster that chased me into the house is now trying to break inside).
But the dream version of memory also has a thematic gestalt that exists separately from either format, pertaining to that vast invisible web of interrelationships that could be said to exist non-locally in the nous. You don't lose your sense of "you-ness" during the dream, but the context of your relationship to everything else in the dream's world can shapeshift radically, and even multiple times within the same pseudo-encapsulated experience.
Then, of course, there are fully lucid dreams (which to my understanding, not everyone has). The world has changed around us, but we are fully aware of the change, and ponder it the same way we would if the waking world had shifted in such weird and dramatic ways. In these experiences, every narrative memory is retained to the extent that it doesn't even "feel" like a dream. And it's possible that it isn't one, but is a different class of experience that we have when we sleep.
That's why I suspect there is no one single way to die, just as there is no single way to live. It's symmetrical as always.
Brilliant and thought-provoking comments. I particularly liked "that vast invisible web of interrelationships that could be said to exist non-locally in the nous". Our existence is so complex and nuanced, mysterious and inspiring. I cannot understand how anyone can be a materialist, but that's just me. This discussion of dreams opens up a fascinating field of speculation. I'd love to read more in this vein.
Mark, I was wondering if you have had the opportunity to delve into Giordano Bruno's Art of Memory, as memory is a topic that piqued my interest.
Bruno held the belief that memory extended beyond mere recollection; he regarded it as a form of art and a skill that could be honed through practice.
It seems that Bruno's perspective resonates with your own understanding, acknowledging that memory is fundamental to intelligence and cannot be completely eradicated.
In the ancient era, philosophers such as Bruno held the belief that memory was a subject of great significance, deserving intensive exploration.
They regarded memory as a mysterious realm that offered countless avenues for investigation, delving into it often leading to seemingly endless discoveries.
Similarly, ancient methodologies like Bruno's approach considered memory to be a vital linkage between an individual's mind and the vast tapestry of knowledge that encompassed the world. This perspective aligns harmoniously with your statement that memory transcends physical limitations and exists beyond the boundaries of local confinement.
Bruno imparted knowledge on memory techniques, such as the utilization of visualization within designated "memory places," with the aim of enhancing one's ability to recall information.
This hands-on approach to reinforcing memory not only captivates individuals but also encourages them to delve deeper into the intricacies of memory itself.
You assert that while physical structures like the brain may contribute to optimizing memory, they do not serve as the fundamental essence or boundaries of memory.
Bruno suggested that by employing strategies like visualizing memory locations, individuals could actively train and enhance their innate memory capabilities, consequently enriching their recollection of past experiences.
Just like you, Bruno delved into the intricate web of connections that exist between memory, consciousness, and the very essence of reality itself.
By delving into the depths of his metaphysical concepts, you may uncover fresh perspectives and angles through which to explore these fascinating subjects.
Fascinating. I wasn't familiar with Bruno's work, but I will certainly look into it now. Thank you for the recommendation, Humbert.
"Bruno suggested that by employing strategies like visualizing memory locations, individuals could actively train and enhance their innate memory capabilities, consequently enriching their recollection of past experiences."
I suspect that such techniques not only exist, but have existed before in certain (largely forgotten) pockets of the past. The tools for such methods would logically be structure-agnostic as well. They would be located in the same general territory as vision quests, magic spells and the like, where the material requisites (if any) vary according to the individual. method, language, position in spacetime, etc.
Great article Mark, this is a topic I ponder quite often. From my experiences this is how I understand the combination of our memories and how they impact our souls. When we incarnate we are not born with the full energy of our souls, or higher self; we are born with a veil over the memories of our previous lives. The reason for this is our higher selves often incarnate multiple lives at the same time, i.e. I'm alive in one timeline, another part of my higher self has incarnated in the 5th century, another in the 12th, etc. This is possible due to the astral plane having no conception of linear time, or time at all; due to this events happening 1000 years ago are happening now in the astral plane. Once we die the egoic self that is me is reintegrated with the higher self along with all of the memories associated with that life. The higher self incorporates these memories into itself, some call this the collective consciousness, and learns from the experiences. What we consider to be horrid memories in the material world are looked at as learning experiences by our higher selves, what else can life be but a way to learn from our experiences?
Good stuff, Rev. Like I said, I think your version is one of several possible outcomes. I think the trouble usually arises when we suggest that there is only one universal, one-size-fits-all outcome for all soul journeys, based on some rule that even God Almighty is somehow "forced" to follow. That's when people tend to break out the bazookas and whatnot.
Strange when you think about it: why should anyone care how other people conceive of the afterlife? But not-so strange if we sprinkle evil (and especially the twin evils of envy and hubris) into the mix. The core mission of evil is to supplant God's order and authority with one's own. To question one's own theory of the afterlife is therefore to question the (false, phony, puny) Man-God himself. Blasphemy!
Meanwhile, for all we know the answer to the afterlife is similar to Burger King's slogan: "You can have it your way." But "your way" may lead to further tragedy beyond the Veil. If you ordered double-jalepeno peppers, extra sriracha, a slice of canned spam a scoop of chocolate ice cream on top... the toilets of the Underworld await your payment.
That is a great question, why are others so insistent that people take their views on the afterlife as the absolute truth? Especially when we don't have evidence that their view, or yours, or mine, are correct? My guess is that religion was so dominant for so long that it has been ingrained in the collective unconscious to insist that there is only one type of afterlife, hopefully one that doesn't involve the toilets of the underworld!! Lmao, love that line and may be stealing it. Spam is most certainly the food of hell, at least it would be in my own hell.
I think memory preservation might look somewhat different from what we may call a "higher perspective" than from our all-too human ideas. For A. N. Whitehead, for instance, God actively preserves (certain) memories - his God being very different from most theisms, however.
But what makes a memory worth preserving? I would say: it's what the memory has achieved, can achieve, and will achieve in terms of learning & growth. For instance, the direct suffering inflicted on us that we couldn't do anything about might be horrible, but once the physical and mental damage is healed, it can (and will) be forgotten.
On the other hand, our moral failings, the suffering we caused others, *once we realize it*, can haunt us for a very long time, and indeed might be the basis for a hell of our own making even after death. But eventually, we will become free of this pain by having paid for the suffering we caused by our own, voluntary suffering. Hence the memory is transformed multiple times: from an initial careless ignorance to a painful realization and "stuckness" of the memory to a sense of relief and release once you come to terms with it and paid your debt. What remains is not so much a memory, but the emotional-spiritual essence of this entire process. You have earned something, and God preserves what was earned.
It is these growth-essences that are the stuff of eternal life. Many of our trivial memories will fade and die eventually; whole lives of missed chances will fade and die. But every battle won, every essence thus birthed, will persist in eternity. God preserves such things, as indeed he must.
"But eventually, we will become free of this pain by having paid for the suffering we caused by our own, voluntary suffering. Hence the memory is transformed multiple times: from an initial careless ignorance to a painful realization and "stuckness" of the memory to a sense of relief and release once you come to terms with it and paid your debt. "
This invokes for me the notion of purgatory as a kind of journey, in which we complete whichever atonements were left incomplete in life. But interestingly, I don't think these or other forms of katabasis are possible without an intact form of narrative memory. What's required isn't to "delete" the story of your biological life, but to step outside of it and perceive it from a higher angle. We can see not only our actions as the "heroes" of our little tales, but the larger ripples and aftershocks of those actions in the wider story. That is when we ultimately understand ourselves as the villains of certain chapters and acts (and I say "ultimately" because I suspect that most people know when they've done something evil, though they may rationalize it endlessly when attached to material bodies and their various wants).
Again, this seems to relate somewhat to our experiences when we have certain kinds of dreams, (although dreaming includes many other kinds of complications and noise). So I think it's also possible that while memory cannot be destroyed, it may take on various other shapes beyond the veil. Monsters we must fight, mountains we must climb, rivers we must forge, princesses we must rescue from horrifying dungeons, etc. But if that's the case, I suspect these transformations of structured memory will likely also contain many clues about the narrative of our earthly lives, to remind us what it is we are atoning for.
That's a very nice piece Mark. A lot to think about but I can say unreservedly that I like it a lot. I was wondering if you saw more of Levin's xenobot, than we did. I didn't see anything that definitively proved to me that it was 'running the maze'. The reality of a situation is sometimes much simpler than our simplest model. We may be importing too many of our own assumptions, and giving too much credit to Levin's assertions and implications, to see what is really happening.
Regardless of any of that you hit the nail on the head with most of your points. When all of reality conspires to tell us no there remains a Father who reserves the right and power to say yes-the central truth on which all deterministic and impersonal models of the world will break.
FYI, I updated to include that link. In retrospect, your comment was incredibly important. My own experiences have likely made it seem like some of these conclusions are more "obvious" than they really are. That's why Substack is awesome. Thank you.
Again, this is something that I think experienced programmers would notice even in some of his other videos that show the collision-based learning process. But the clip above is incontrovertible evidence that I think even the layman could see.
"We may be importing too many of our own assumptions, and giving too much credit to Levin's assertions and implications, to see what is really happening."
Given the clip above (where you can clearly see the steering sans collision), I'd redirect your claim here and ask you to apply the same test: Are you sure you're not importing your own assumptions? The reason I ask is that I think the illusion of structure-dependent mind/memory runs so strong and deep that even believers can be mislead. But watch the clip again and tell me what you think it is that you're seeing, if not persistent memory.
If I saw it collide and then collide and then make the same move without colliding it would be obvious. I want to know more about the experimental setup than what is being shared before I draw any conclusions. And I would like to see what an actual collision looks like before I buy into collision avoidance. I don't see cilia so I am assuming that this is a 'cardiac muscle motor' xenobot. Which means that it is essentially walking along the surface of that tube by sequential contractions of the muscle cells. I am not convinced that for that kind of locomotion in a round crosssection tube that collision is possible except at a tube end. I see it following the gradient of the tube.(I think it is a round crosssection and the xenobot stays in the lowest point of the crosssection but it is hard to say for sure.
We see it basically perform a 180 reverse but no indication of why. It may have as much to do with the surface of the tube or temperature or electrostatic potentials as it does with 'running a maze'. Does anything indicate that this 180 helped it get to the end of the maze? Is there an actual endpoint that is desired by the xenobot? What is there to motivate this goal seeking behavior? 'Running the maze' definitely implies more than what I see in the video. I am not convinced that this movement is goal oriented at all.
I think that this helps understand their structure and behaviors.
I definitely got the impression from Levin's TED talk that these were self-assembled in some way, not that they were embryonic stem cells stuck together with a pair of tweezers in an externally determined pattern. I don't see anywhere that the xenobot team even make real 'maze running' claims, only that some movements are spontaneous in the sense that they were not design goals.
So, to answer your question. I think that I am seeing a series of cardiac cells fire in a repeating pattern without apparent reference to external stimuli and at some point the pattern reverses. The designers can't tell you why it reverses and neither can I but it does not seem to be goal-oriented. I happen to think that you are right about memory not being dependent on physical structures but what I see in the xenobot videos does not imply memory to me at all. Speaking as an engineer, I would say that nothing is more common than for programmers to assume that something is program related when it is actually environmental.('You can change the program when the robot's movement changes but if the actual cause is a loose screw you shouldn't.' seems to be a hard lesson to learn.)
Nov 29, 2023·edited Nov 30, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone
'There can be only one' is the notion that the Highlander, through generations and eternal return, was always hunting or fighting his mortal enemy.
It's a metaphor. He fights himself, or his nemesis, his lower nature. This goes all the way back to Mesopotamia and Gilgamesh, and before them, the Bhagavad Gita with Krishna and Arjuna. It's an eternal state: man must fight his ego.
When he wins, he wins eternal life. Which is eternal PEACE. Fun fact, both Zion and Jerusalem mean 'peace'. The church has externalised everything.
(And for the record I don't insist on the Vedic perspective. It's merely one organised collections of truths (of several that I've looked in to) that I hold in great respect.)
So, I do this Bible Study thing. (I know, I'm a Graeco-Roman pagan, also kind of a Buddhist, but I also told you that I go to Church regularly ... I'm a man of many contradictions.) One of the participants, an octogenarian, is very orthodox in her interpretation of Christianity and given her level of lifelong trauma I'm sympathetic to her need to keep the walls strong and high. The group knows I have some Buddhist roots, and I've talked about it from time to time. A few weeks ago, after I mentioned reincarnation, my octogenarian friend displayed visible discomfort. I realized I needed to explain that, from a Buddhist perspective, reincarnation is not seen as a good thing: from that perspective, the world is considered a harsh realm of suffering, maybe even a hell-realm, and thus reincarnation is basically equivalent to being sent to Hell. This was a minor revelation to her, as she had not considered reincarnation from that perspective (why would she have thought much about reincarnation at all, after all). I further explained that this was my own personal reconciliation of the Christian doctrine of salvation/damnation with the concept of a loving God. The loving Father doesn't punish cruelly and "forever", but He might make you do Meatspace over again until you get it right.
"I realized I needed to explain that, from a Buddhist perspective, reincarnation is not seen as a good thing: from that perspective, the world is considered a harsh realm of suffering, maybe even a hell-realm, and thus reincarnation is basically equivalent to being sent to Hell."
I've heard it put this way before (and not strictly in the Buddhist context). And, like I mentioned, I don't disagree that this can be one of many possible journeys. I guess my only problem (though not really a "problem") is that the language with regards to concepts like "Hell" seems too malleable in that model.
That's not to say language should be entirely rigid -- without at least some flexibility, I think it would quickly turn into some worse than useless. But when we speak of Earth-as-Hell, I think maybe we're giving Earthly suffering too much weight. After all, there is beauty in the material world as well as suffering. Maybe "purgatory" would be a more useful word in that context. Dunno.
"The loving Father doesn't punish cruelly and "forever", but He might make you do Meatspace over again until you get it right."
Again, a possibility, because all that's downstream of the Source is possible. That would logically include some form of video game played with infinite continues/lives, and maybe even with a built-in "memory wipe" of some kind. But only if God wills it. And he may will that fate for some and not for others. For instance, Christ was returned to earthly flesh with his memories intact, and even ascended with his bodily structures intact. We could say, well, that's a special case exception. My theory boils down to: they are all special case exceptions, or can be.
I think the standard Buddhist pushback would be that the beauty is there as a distraction, a trap even. Obviously it's very much more complicated than that (e.g. one could argue that the distinction between Samsara and Nirvana is merely a matter of focus), and yes Purgatory may be a better description, but either way, Buddhism does not really view the standard meatspace experience as a good thing.
I agree in principle with the idea that everything is ultimately an exceptional case, but living that way is a bit of a cop-out. We incarnate in order to *do* something (even if that something is just witnessing), and the doing requires imposing some kind of regularity on the information we are perceiving, in order to navigate. This goes back to your memory essay. Yes, the models we develop are most surely wrong, but they are necessary to build if you are going to fulfill your purpose. Accepting of course that some beings may not have a purpose (God's will and all). Still, if you're contemplating these issues, throwing up your hands and rejecting all knowledge seems like it's a move backwards. Also acknowledging that it is what a Buddhist might suggest is the right move, maybe even a Christian (Tree of Knowledge leading to sin and all); but if so, it's a far more advanced practice than appropriate for most of us reading and writing on this Substack.
"Still, if you're contemplating these issues, throwing up your hands and rejecting all knowledge seems like it's a move backwards.."
Is that what I'm doing here? I think at most I was rejecting human authority, not knowledge or wisdom of any particular strain. And while the idea of "advanced practice" makes sense to me at a certain level, it also strikes me as somewhat of an argument from authority on another. We must build models, yes, because without them we can't navigate at all. But the map isn't the territory. If some Buddhist or Christian ir Satanist makes a move that's visible, we judge it according to the territory, appropriateness be damned. The real test is one of eyesight and memory, I guess.
I started drinking heavily in 1990 until 12 months ago. I did this to hide from what I saw in the world that few others see. I wanted to forget so that, like a child, or a dementia patient, everything is new again.
It didn't work. 12 months ago I stopped drinking after reading a Mark Lewis book " the biology of desire".
I have, fortunately and unfortunately, recovered all memory, including all of my 'subconscious dumps'.
Your article made me wonder about the current aversion to truth. When convenient lies colour our world, what makes people so possessive? Their subconscious dumps' must be fully septic....
Thanks, Justin! Not familiar with Lewis's work, but I will duly add it to the (growing somewhat intimidating) stack of recs y'all are giving me.
"Your article made me wonder about the current aversion to truth. When convenient lies colour our world, what makes people so possessive? Their subconscious dumps' must be fully septic."
The term "egoic memory" has been bandied about (including by yours truly), and I suspect what's ultimately meant by that is the kinds of self-deceptions inherent in the command to "live not by lies." To claim that such memories may vanish with the material body might just be another way of saying that those aren't real "memories" at all, but rather full or partial lies we tell ourselves to rationalize our worst decisions and paths through life.
The optimization layer may reinforce these lies so often and efficiently that we come to "believe" they are in some sense true. At the very least, we'll behave as though they're true, in our transactions with other souls. But yes, I don't think that we carry such false memories with us by default. And when all of the scales fall, we may be rightly terrified by the truths they were disguising.
The proposition that anyone could find themselves locked into a state of literally endless suffering seems to me to be wholly and obviously incompatible with the proposition that:
"The Self-Authoring Author of Reality loves us as a father loves his children. And as with all fatherly love, it’s the kind which must allow us to fail, so that we might grow stronger and learn to succeed."
Particularly if said Author is in the business of breaking rules, not that such a thing would be inclined to set up rules that might result in such an outcome in the first place.
As some "pagans" are fond of saying, the universe is full of God's, and all of them are subject to the creator.
I'm inclined to believe reincarnation is an option, all of our memories of all our lives are available to us on the other side, while here we only have a residual soul "instinct" about how to proceed.
‘My thoughts are mine when they become the potential source of income for another entity then there is a problem.’
Of course, if you have the processing power, the emotional tells given away by a person can be very valuable. Especially if biometrics are overlaid to this, including facial recognition.
There is a new responsibility that humans and those with power have, we need to be confident that our self is our own. I ask the the following question because I do not know.
Can AI output information about a persons thoughts to an entity that can use that to either their commercial or strategical advantage?
So glad I found you! Much of what you write resonates deeply. Most people use computers but couldn’t explain how they work from the level of atoms up to operating systems. I can. What you are saying about memory is largely correct. Yes, computers are mostly machines that move information around. Yes, there are multiple layers of caching on any device. Yes, deleting a file from a physical computer is harder than you’d think. I believe there’s something in quantum information theory that says you can only erase information if you expend energy. As to what goes on in the outer layers, I can only guess. Just as a process on one machine can only guess at the nature of the internet. Of course if the machine reads a description of Wikipedia, then we might think the machine knows. But the machine still has to make a choice: do you trust that source, or not? As to forgetting, I’ll happily remain agnostic on this but I agree it is prudent to conduct oneself as if memories would last forever. As for forgetting: I think the notion of the crucifixion and resurrection make sense here. Do you want to live forever? The price is remembering forever, whatever has happened to you and everything you did. The only way to pay that price is to be so steeped in the idea of forgiveness, so deeply bought into that, that you commit to immediately forgiving anyone who seeks your forgiveness. You also have to commit to seeking forgiveness from anyone you’ve wrong. Those two commitments are thus a precondition for a heaven that actually makes sense. My guess, on that river: it’s available to anyone that wants, but the price is another trip through the mortal realms. You’ll forget all the bad memories but keep the encoded intuitions of the good ones. With each life, you accumulate both good and bad memories. Eventually, you accumulate enough good memories that you are born with an intuition of faith that sticks with you. And then you live many life to pair up each experience of harm you caused others, with an experience of the harm to caused you. At the end of this process you are left with a biparite graph of experiences of sin, where you are on the giving and receiving end. Jesus dying on the cross tends an offer: would you like to live forever with God in heaven? You can, but you must first endure this, voluntarily, out of love.
"Do you want to live forever? The price is remembering forever, whatever has happened to you and everything you did. The only way to pay that price is to be so steeped in the idea of forgiveness, so deeply bought into that, that you commit to immediately forgiving anyone who seeks your forgiveness. You also have to commit to seeking forgiveness from anyone you’ve wrong. Those two commitments are thus a precondition for a heaven that actually makes sense."
I generally agree with this statement. If Heaven could be said to have a key, it would be forgiveness. Of course, people pay lip service to this concept all the time. To actually forgive is extraordinarily difficult, and the base difficulty scales exponentially with the degree of evil done. We can forgive our neighbor for the loud parties he throws, but can we forgive Anthony Fauci?
"My guess, on that river: it’s available to anyone that wants, but the price is another trip through the mortal realms. You’ll forget all the bad memories but keep the encoded intuitions of the good ones."
Again, I think this is one of several (even endless?) possible outcomes. I guess what I was trying to say could be summarized as "God doesn't need to follow rules." We are speaking of the source of all consciousness, after all, the Being who willed being itself into existence. When Einstein said "God does not play dice with the universe" I would counter by adding, "unless He feels like it."
"Jesus dying on the cross tends an offer: would you like to live forever with God in heaven? You can, but you must first endure this, voluntarily, out of love."
Beautifully put. Thank you.
Thank you for your post! From what I can tell you get this stuff better than I do and I’m grateful to see people able to articulate it so well. I think I don’t agree with “god doesn’t need to follow rules,” though. For example, I don’t think God can invent an integer between 2 and 6, which divides 7 evenly. In short, think God is constrained by what we could call the laws of logic. I would say that God is bound by chains of inference. This is the basis for my theodicy. If you want choices to be meaningful, they have to have consequences. There’s no way around that one, i think even for God. I think God could indeed create universes where we experience nothing but bliss and joy, but God consciously chooses to endure the suffering of watching us stumble in the dark and turn away from him, precisely because that is the only way to create beings which have free will and the potential to sin, but don’t. This belief in logical impossibility of the ideal universe without a period of suffering and misery as a necessary precondition is both the basis of my theology and another reason why I think Jesus really was God: the most powerful being imaginable, voluntarily undergoing immense suffering because he loves us. He could stop that suffering whenever, but only at the cost of delaying the plan of our eternal salvation. He loves us too much to do that.
A lower-case-g god absolutely could not invent the integer you described. Again, just because such beings are less powerful doesn't necessarily mean they are evil, anymore than relatively weak creatures like ourselves are necessarily evil.
For example: the god or gods bound in logic as you described do exist, and would be good for all the reasons you mention. In the hierarchy of reality, you might even say such beings occupy the highest of all planes, which, in a manner of speaking, means the closest to God Almighty.
When we speak of Lucifer's long fall, I assume it's because he was once a being who dwelled at that penultimate node of pure logic. It also speaks to the dangers that threaten even the gods; perhaps Lucifer tried to invent something like the impossible integer, as only God Almighty could possibly do. He tried to break those adamantine chains of inference, in other words. And when he found he couldn't, it drove him insane. Instead of remaining a guardian of logic and order, he became a god of insanity and chaos instead.
But the Ultimate God I'm referring to is unconstrained by logic, because He invented it. That doesn't mean He doesn't love logic, as He very clearly does. But as you say, his tendency to play by its rules is a conscious choice He makes. He can choose otherwise.
What do you think is the relationship between God and Truth? Did God create Truth, or is he Truth itself? I think the latter is true - that Truth is inseparable from love, because those two words refer to the same essence. If God IS truth, then the laws of logic are just properties of God’s internal structure. If God creates truth, then yeah, I guess he can do whatever and it’s my mind that just won’t wrap around it, and I’m calling that a constraint on God because that feels better than saying “well I guess I don’t really know.”
"What do you think is the relationship between God and Truth?"
I think you might have highlighted one of those questions that exposes the limitations of human language when discussing these matters. In one sense, we could say the concepts are reciprocal. In another, we could say that it is a description of essence and action (i.e. God is the Truth AND the Way). The mathematician, the philosopher, the engineer, the cleric, the artist... they will all have different answers I suspect, and I also suspect none will be fully sufficient in their explanatory power.
But I think when we throw logic into the mix (i.e. God = Truth = Logic) is when things tend to get a bit hairy. I think I know what you mean when you say "logic", and I think I mean more or less the same thing when I use it. But the problem is that the ways many people will use it on the material plane of needs and wants is as a rationale. In other words, we act first, then narrate the story of that action as series of fully rational. explicable and deterministic causes and effects. When we've squeezed the irrational and the illogical out of the room, we could find ourselves not just unaligned with God and Truth, but in furious rebellion against both.
"I want food because I am literally starving to death. That man over there has food, but he will not give it it me. So, logically, I kill the man and take his food. I also stash his corpse in my fridge, in case I get hungry later; it is illogical to waste food after all."
We could of course use some version of No True Scotsman to diffuse this tendency, or claim that the a higher form of logic located at a more distant node would refute the staving man's own version. But when Christ speaks of love, and in particular of God's love for humanity, I don't think that it can be deemed entirely logical or rational. Or rather, whatever form of logic God employs or is, what we perceive of it might only be a shadow or pale reflection. And if all is derived from God, that would necessarily include the irrational as well as the rational.
I know that's not a full answer. I guess I could also throw up my hands and say "I guess I don't really know" and I agree that this approach usually doesn't feel so good. On the other hand, we are detectives investigating the greatest mystery of all! So "I don't know" can also sometimes energize and excite us, because we really, really want to know more, and to explain to others what we've found.
By “logic” I mean in the formal, mathematical sense. Sets of axioms and production rules produce trees of statements which are “true” inferentially. They are, in effect, lopsided tautologies, which are true by definition.
For example, the Pythagorean theorem when applied in a Euclidean space is true, by definition. You could ask whether or not this truth is “merely a human construction” or whether it is seeing some real facet of God. I suspect it’s the latter, as one of the ways God makes himself know to us. Of course I could be wrong on this. But it makes way more sense to me that the absolute WOULD expose itself to us, in this very indirect manner. This of course raises the question of which sets of axioms - if any - are actually true and do apply to our experience. This question is equivalent to asking, are there true laws of physics? And my guess is the answer may very well be “no”. I’m guessing you _cant_ unify general relativity and quantum mechanics because doing so would constitute a full description of God. I think the physical mechanisms that we know of and understand are the “infinitely expanding government” described in Isaiah. Going more out on a limb, I am willing to bet that the shroud of Turin encodes the cosmic microwave background radiation.
Of course, you also have to commit to keep trying. And that means being able to be willing to perceive God and be judged by him. If you refuse God’s judgment and don’t want to use dissappear, I think hell is just God giving you what you want: to keep enduring, having a mixture of experiences, at least some of which are positive. I suspect that after a trip across the river, some “predestined” souls (those with such positive balance that their intuition at birth basically guarantees a life of devotion to God) are then sent into the lower layers, both to atone for their sins and to rescue souls which maybe could be brought to believe, to see God, if he approaches only tangentially, cautiously, so that the souls suffering might approach him by means of one of their many layers of earthly desires. Yes the paths into hell are many and shallow and gentle - but each of these is also an escape path, when followed briefly, until another slightly more arduous path is chosen. For the right sexual partner, and then for the children, i think a lot of souls in hell would make the trek back to the surface and even be willing to turn toward God and submit to his judgement.
"I suspect that after a trip across the river, some “predestined” souls (those with such positive balance that their intuition at birth basically guarantees a life of devotion to God) are then sent into the lower layers, both to atone for their sins and to rescue souls which maybe could be brought to believe, to see God, if he approaches only tangentially, cautiously, so that the souls suffering might approach him by means of one of their many layers of earthly desires."
Yes, I think this is also a possibility for some of us. But a condemned soul can also be saved on God's whim, as when Christ cleared out Hell during his katabasis before returning to flesh (and notably, with all of his memories intact).
The mystery as I see it is that memory provably isn't physical. It is structure-agnostic, and therefore isn't automatically "shed" upon departure from material. As you said, such a erasure process would require an expenditure of energy, and we have no idea how *much* energy would be required. Nor do we have any clear idea about the kind of technique that would suffice (i.e. how to target something that is non-local and immeasurable by default).
This is the trouble I've always had with theories of reincarnation. Often -- and somewhat ironically -- they seem like a fantasy or fairy tale we tell ourselves, in order to ensure that we don't think too hard about the damage we've wrought in the world, or how critically important each choice we make really is. In some depictions, it sounds like playing a video game on Easy Mode, with infinite "continues" until you reach the game's inevitable and pre-destined end.
As with atheists, the irony stems from the fact that the roles of starry-eyed child and hard-bitten realist are typically inverted. The reincarnation modelers claim that we're so in love with our egos that we've told ourselves a bedtime story about their eternal existence. And maybe that's even true for some. But I think those are the same people so wrapped up in their own delusions that they cannot even recognize their own sins, let alone how they might echo through eternity.
That's where God's infinite power and mercy comes into play. Our memories, like every other aspect of our being, are ultimately in God's hands.
Wow. One of those pieces on Substack that permanently change the way I look at things.Thanks a lot
No problem!
Many interesting thoughts here, Mark. Allow me to indulge a rather prolix response.
There is a significant difference between breaking every rule as “antinomies” transcended by the God, and breaking them in terms of a voluntarist deity who is arbitrarily “beyond Good and Evil.” I think you are properly articulating the former, but care is necessary.
If you want to say there is a range of ontological being and various “divinities” located along that spectrum, that is possible. Indeed, traditional wisdoms generally affirm such. However, the radical uniqueness of the God, as opposed to lesser, “relative” divinities is precisely that the God cannot be located along a univocal continuum as a Supreme Being at the apex of a hierarchy. There can be an “analogy of being,” but not any kind of multiplication by infinity that could ever reach the “Cloud of Unknowing.” This is why a metaphysician like Erich Przywara asserts a dynamic rhythm that fluctuates between the known “cataphatic” and the surplus of apophatic “unknown” that is “ever greater” than the achieved clarity of the present known.
Memories as you note are complex. They are also difficult to parse. When folks think of the ego or nominalist individuals, they tend to isolate the individual from the relational context of nature, history, society, etc. But what we encounter is never an atomized individual; my own self-understanding is an action that is always both a function of decision and the accumulated result of prior actions and relations, both my own and those of others. Memory always bears the trace of these past relations, and historical being always bears implicit narratives that operate along many dimensions. The accrued weight of memory is “always already” imbued with an interpretive nexus, so one cannot reduce such simply to “facts.” Without changing the facts, the meaning can transform because “new eyes” provide a wider interpretive lens, what have you. The entire question of identity is ultimately both metaphysical and eschatological. If there is a “destruction” of memory, it may entail a separation of unique beings from penultimate realities that are “maya” only when understood in opposition to perfected ultimate realities.
Dante postulates a double action. Lethe is the renunciation of egoic memory. Memory returns in a new form, where the “possessive” individual is disabused of illusions, and a kind of communal appropriation occurs. The human thing is cosmic, embracing the totality of individual memories as participation in a form of ontological wholeness foreign to our typical biological-mechanical frames of reference. Something like this seems to me necessary, if the person is to have metaphysical meaning. Forms of selective amnesia may or may not properly engage the holistic nature of existence, and beings-in-relation. On the other hand, the “eternal return of horrors" entailed in a permanent record of every moment of cosmic existence appears both cruel and sadistic. Memory of that kind is the requirement of the permanence of evil. Such a reckoning may seem like perduring justice to some, but I think it is akin to brute determinism. The bodhisattva in Buddhist thought is a carrier of compassion who actively seeks to liberate those chained to delusion. In my view, the holiness of the Christian saint is oriented towards the healing and perfecting of the Whole. When soteriology becomes a matter of individual fates, where “the other” can be acceptably written off as separable from our own concern, something essential has been lost. The notion of forgiveness and divine “forgetting” must be more than forensic if it is to evade this destiny.
"However, the radical uniqueness of the God, as opposed to lesser, “relative” divinities is precisely that the God cannot be located along a univocal continuum as a Supreme Being at the apex of a hierarchy. There can be an “analogy of being,” but not any kind of multiplication by infinity that could ever reach the “Cloud of Unknowing."
I agree with this. See my conversation about the "gods of logic" above for my clarification. The so-called highest or penultimate plane (i.e. the one "closest" to God Almighty) is also the plane that Lucifer and all other demons inhabited before the Fall. This suggests that it is indeed not a univocal continuum in the sense that God Almighty both inhabits every level and simultaneously none of them at all. Infinite means infinite.
"But what we encounter is never an atomized individual; my own self-understanding is an action that is always both a function of decision and the accumulated result of prior actions and relations, both my own and those of others. Memory always bears the trace of these past relations, and historical being always bears implicit narratives that operate along many dimensions. The accrued weight of memory is “always already” imbued with an interpretive nexus, so one cannot reduce such simply to 'facts.'"
I think I mostly agree with this. The trouble is that the "phenomena" of memory as we experience it (i.e. the strategic state changes it facilitates upon storage/recall) appears to neither be illusory/hallucinatory nor structure-dependent. We can claim this process is egoic by default, but I suspect that such egoic memory is the same as self-deception. In other words, these are not "true memories" but are rather partial illusions.; we apply the jigsaws of our minds to the puzzle pieces, in order to produce the pictures we most dearly want to see. That's only the beginning of the trouble of course; what pictures do we want to see?
More to the point, what stories do we want to use our lives to tell, and which ones would we like to be told about us? Non-volatile, persistent memory is essentially "narrative" memory, which unspools into linear stories about causes-and-effects. The accuracy of such stories aren't always clear to us, in the clutter of this interactive layer. The world's not just a stage, but also a chaotic writer's room, with every egotistical author striving to make the story his "own." Much evil is born in such rooms, with such authors.
But as I see it, the art of storytelling has a Godly purpose too (because all things do). That means that even individual, encapsulated form of narrative memories as we experience them can be used to strategically tell the truth as well as to strategically lie. I think that's why we have them in the first place, and why they are by default impossible to destroy. They serve to reinforce the inherent logic of being, and the Divine purpose of intelligence which explores and rejoices in the beauty of God's designs. If our tales of these adventures in spacetime are told well and truthfully, then our memories are being used as God intends. But telling truthful stories is as difficult as any other paths to the Good. Lots of distractions and pitfalls, lots of egoic deathtraps and not-so-merry-go-rounds to avoid.
"On the other hand, the “eternal return of horrors" entailed in a permanent record of every moment of cosmic existence appears both cruel and sadistic. Memory of that kind is the requirement of the permanence of evil. Such a reckoning may seem like perduring justice to some, but I think it is akin to brute determinism."
This is what I was trying to explain in my analogy of the child born in a hellish situation he did not cause. At the ultimate level of being, chains of causality may become entirely irrelevant (for all we know), but here in the material these chains are the primary medium of transaction. We should rightly want to liberate the child from that situation, and employ our limited powers and gifts in that endeavor as best we can. I would suggest it's why we were given such gifts in the first place. Whether or not we rescue the child, we should strive to tell the best and truest story about it, so as to encourage others to pursue God's version of heroism. We save what we can save. The rest is up to God.
If we do succeed, the freed child may then go to explore, and to form the kinds of memories that needn't be mercifully rinsed away. These memories instead will help narrate the greatest story of all, in which the forces of mercy, forgiveness and light conquer the forces of darkness forever.
Good thoughts. There is definitely an equivocity to being that requires discernment. I would say that the vatic poet must undergo ascesis in order to separate the "wheat" from the "tares." Rabbinic lore speaks of divine fire and false fire. The sophist and the philosopher seem the same to those who judge by appearances. The difference is in the nature of the storytelling.
Yes, I think that memory is much more than the retention of a fact or event. Its significance comes with the meaning or interpretation that we make of it, and that can change over time. It seems to me that particular memories and their interpretations can be grouped together or linked in different ways, such as thematically. In this way we can stand back and maybe see a kind of fate at work. So perhaps in the end the individual memories are less important in themselves, than in their "thematic" context and interrelationships, and it is that which our consciousness takes away from this earthly life.
I think this version kind of jives with at least some of the forms of memory we experience when we dream. We will often retain some degree of narrative, persistent memory outside of the particular dream's context (i.e. recognition of faces, names, locations, etc.), while also maintaining a parallel memory of the linear or semi-linear events that transpire within the dream (e.g. that monster that chased me into the house is now trying to break inside).
But the dream version of memory also has a thematic gestalt that exists separately from either format, pertaining to that vast invisible web of interrelationships that could be said to exist non-locally in the nous. You don't lose your sense of "you-ness" during the dream, but the context of your relationship to everything else in the dream's world can shapeshift radically, and even multiple times within the same pseudo-encapsulated experience.
Then, of course, there are fully lucid dreams (which to my understanding, not everyone has). The world has changed around us, but we are fully aware of the change, and ponder it the same way we would if the waking world had shifted in such weird and dramatic ways. In these experiences, every narrative memory is retained to the extent that it doesn't even "feel" like a dream. And it's possible that it isn't one, but is a different class of experience that we have when we sleep.
That's why I suspect there is no one single way to die, just as there is no single way to live. It's symmetrical as always.
Brilliant and thought-provoking comments. I particularly liked "that vast invisible web of interrelationships that could be said to exist non-locally in the nous". Our existence is so complex and nuanced, mysterious and inspiring. I cannot understand how anyone can be a materialist, but that's just me. This discussion of dreams opens up a fascinating field of speculation. I'd love to read more in this vein.
Mark, I was wondering if you have had the opportunity to delve into Giordano Bruno's Art of Memory, as memory is a topic that piqued my interest.
Bruno held the belief that memory extended beyond mere recollection; he regarded it as a form of art and a skill that could be honed through practice.
It seems that Bruno's perspective resonates with your own understanding, acknowledging that memory is fundamental to intelligence and cannot be completely eradicated.
In the ancient era, philosophers such as Bruno held the belief that memory was a subject of great significance, deserving intensive exploration.
They regarded memory as a mysterious realm that offered countless avenues for investigation, delving into it often leading to seemingly endless discoveries.
Similarly, ancient methodologies like Bruno's approach considered memory to be a vital linkage between an individual's mind and the vast tapestry of knowledge that encompassed the world. This perspective aligns harmoniously with your statement that memory transcends physical limitations and exists beyond the boundaries of local confinement.
Bruno imparted knowledge on memory techniques, such as the utilization of visualization within designated "memory places," with the aim of enhancing one's ability to recall information.
This hands-on approach to reinforcing memory not only captivates individuals but also encourages them to delve deeper into the intricacies of memory itself.
You assert that while physical structures like the brain may contribute to optimizing memory, they do not serve as the fundamental essence or boundaries of memory.
Bruno suggested that by employing strategies like visualizing memory locations, individuals could actively train and enhance their innate memory capabilities, consequently enriching their recollection of past experiences.
Just like you, Bruno delved into the intricate web of connections that exist between memory, consciousness, and the very essence of reality itself.
By delving into the depths of his metaphysical concepts, you may uncover fresh perspectives and angles through which to explore these fascinating subjects.
Fascinating. I wasn't familiar with Bruno's work, but I will certainly look into it now. Thank you for the recommendation, Humbert.
"Bruno suggested that by employing strategies like visualizing memory locations, individuals could actively train and enhance their innate memory capabilities, consequently enriching their recollection of past experiences."
I suspect that such techniques not only exist, but have existed before in certain (largely forgotten) pockets of the past. The tools for such methods would logically be structure-agnostic as well. They would be located in the same general territory as vision quests, magic spells and the like, where the material requisites (if any) vary according to the individual. method, language, position in spacetime, etc.
Great article Mark, this is a topic I ponder quite often. From my experiences this is how I understand the combination of our memories and how they impact our souls. When we incarnate we are not born with the full energy of our souls, or higher self; we are born with a veil over the memories of our previous lives. The reason for this is our higher selves often incarnate multiple lives at the same time, i.e. I'm alive in one timeline, another part of my higher self has incarnated in the 5th century, another in the 12th, etc. This is possible due to the astral plane having no conception of linear time, or time at all; due to this events happening 1000 years ago are happening now in the astral plane. Once we die the egoic self that is me is reintegrated with the higher self along with all of the memories associated with that life. The higher self incorporates these memories into itself, some call this the collective consciousness, and learns from the experiences. What we consider to be horrid memories in the material world are looked at as learning experiences by our higher selves, what else can life be but a way to learn from our experiences?
Good stuff, Rev. Like I said, I think your version is one of several possible outcomes. I think the trouble usually arises when we suggest that there is only one universal, one-size-fits-all outcome for all soul journeys, based on some rule that even God Almighty is somehow "forced" to follow. That's when people tend to break out the bazookas and whatnot.
Strange when you think about it: why should anyone care how other people conceive of the afterlife? But not-so strange if we sprinkle evil (and especially the twin evils of envy and hubris) into the mix. The core mission of evil is to supplant God's order and authority with one's own. To question one's own theory of the afterlife is therefore to question the (false, phony, puny) Man-God himself. Blasphemy!
Meanwhile, for all we know the answer to the afterlife is similar to Burger King's slogan: "You can have it your way." But "your way" may lead to further tragedy beyond the Veil. If you ordered double-jalepeno peppers, extra sriracha, a slice of canned spam a scoop of chocolate ice cream on top... the toilets of the Underworld await your payment.
That is a great question, why are others so insistent that people take their views on the afterlife as the absolute truth? Especially when we don't have evidence that their view, or yours, or mine, are correct? My guess is that religion was so dominant for so long that it has been ingrained in the collective unconscious to insist that there is only one type of afterlife, hopefully one that doesn't involve the toilets of the underworld!! Lmao, love that line and may be stealing it. Spam is most certainly the food of hell, at least it would be in my own hell.
I think memory preservation might look somewhat different from what we may call a "higher perspective" than from our all-too human ideas. For A. N. Whitehead, for instance, God actively preserves (certain) memories - his God being very different from most theisms, however.
But what makes a memory worth preserving? I would say: it's what the memory has achieved, can achieve, and will achieve in terms of learning & growth. For instance, the direct suffering inflicted on us that we couldn't do anything about might be horrible, but once the physical and mental damage is healed, it can (and will) be forgotten.
On the other hand, our moral failings, the suffering we caused others, *once we realize it*, can haunt us for a very long time, and indeed might be the basis for a hell of our own making even after death. But eventually, we will become free of this pain by having paid for the suffering we caused by our own, voluntary suffering. Hence the memory is transformed multiple times: from an initial careless ignorance to a painful realization and "stuckness" of the memory to a sense of relief and release once you come to terms with it and paid your debt. What remains is not so much a memory, but the emotional-spiritual essence of this entire process. You have earned something, and God preserves what was earned.
It is these growth-essences that are the stuff of eternal life. Many of our trivial memories will fade and die eventually; whole lives of missed chances will fade and die. But every battle won, every essence thus birthed, will persist in eternity. God preserves such things, as indeed he must.
"But eventually, we will become free of this pain by having paid for the suffering we caused by our own, voluntary suffering. Hence the memory is transformed multiple times: from an initial careless ignorance to a painful realization and "stuckness" of the memory to a sense of relief and release once you come to terms with it and paid your debt. "
This invokes for me the notion of purgatory as a kind of journey, in which we complete whichever atonements were left incomplete in life. But interestingly, I don't think these or other forms of katabasis are possible without an intact form of narrative memory. What's required isn't to "delete" the story of your biological life, but to step outside of it and perceive it from a higher angle. We can see not only our actions as the "heroes" of our little tales, but the larger ripples and aftershocks of those actions in the wider story. That is when we ultimately understand ourselves as the villains of certain chapters and acts (and I say "ultimately" because I suspect that most people know when they've done something evil, though they may rationalize it endlessly when attached to material bodies and their various wants).
Again, this seems to relate somewhat to our experiences when we have certain kinds of dreams, (although dreaming includes many other kinds of complications and noise). So I think it's also possible that while memory cannot be destroyed, it may take on various other shapes beyond the veil. Monsters we must fight, mountains we must climb, rivers we must forge, princesses we must rescue from horrifying dungeons, etc. But if that's the case, I suspect these transformations of structured memory will likely also contain many clues about the narrative of our earthly lives, to remind us what it is we are atoning for.
That's a very nice piece Mark. A lot to think about but I can say unreservedly that I like it a lot. I was wondering if you saw more of Levin's xenobot, than we did. I didn't see anything that definitively proved to me that it was 'running the maze'. The reality of a situation is sometimes much simpler than our simplest model. We may be importing too many of our own assumptions, and giving too much credit to Levin's assertions and implications, to see what is really happening.
Regardless of any of that you hit the nail on the head with most of your points. When all of reality conspires to tell us no there remains a Father who reserves the right and power to say yes-the central truth on which all deterministic and impersonal models of the world will break.
FYI, I updated to include that link. In retrospect, your comment was incredibly important. My own experiences have likely made it seem like some of these conclusions are more "obvious" than they really are. That's why Substack is awesome. Thank you.
Hi Jon. Thanks for this.
"I didn't see anything that definitively proved to me that it was 'running the maze'."
You can see it very clearly here:
https://youtu.be/XheAMrS8Q1c?t=870
Again, this is something that I think experienced programmers would notice even in some of his other videos that show the collision-based learning process. But the clip above is incontrovertible evidence that I think even the layman could see.
"We may be importing too many of our own assumptions, and giving too much credit to Levin's assertions and implications, to see what is really happening."
Given the clip above (where you can clearly see the steering sans collision), I'd redirect your claim here and ask you to apply the same test: Are you sure you're not importing your own assumptions? The reason I ask is that I think the illusion of structure-dependent mind/memory runs so strong and deep that even believers can be mislead. But watch the clip again and tell me what you think it is that you're seeing, if not persistent memory.
If I saw it collide and then collide and then make the same move without colliding it would be obvious. I want to know more about the experimental setup than what is being shared before I draw any conclusions. And I would like to see what an actual collision looks like before I buy into collision avoidance. I don't see cilia so I am assuming that this is a 'cardiac muscle motor' xenobot. Which means that it is essentially walking along the surface of that tube by sequential contractions of the muscle cells. I am not convinced that for that kind of locomotion in a round crosssection tube that collision is possible except at a tube end. I see it following the gradient of the tube.(I think it is a round crosssection and the xenobot stays in the lowest point of the crosssection but it is hard to say for sure.
We see it basically perform a 180 reverse but no indication of why. It may have as much to do with the surface of the tube or temperature or electrostatic potentials as it does with 'running a maze'. Does anything indicate that this 180 helped it get to the end of the maze? Is there an actual endpoint that is desired by the xenobot? What is there to motivate this goal seeking behavior? 'Running the maze' definitely implies more than what I see in the video. I am not convinced that this movement is goal oriented at all.
I think that this helps understand their structure and behaviors.
https://youtu.be/js6uTRT8KO4?si=810ukl_vvD8pMLfk&t=123
I definitely got the impression from Levin's TED talk that these were self-assembled in some way, not that they were embryonic stem cells stuck together with a pair of tweezers in an externally determined pattern. I don't see anywhere that the xenobot team even make real 'maze running' claims, only that some movements are spontaneous in the sense that they were not design goals.
So, to answer your question. I think that I am seeing a series of cardiac cells fire in a repeating pattern without apparent reference to external stimuli and at some point the pattern reverses. The designers can't tell you why it reverses and neither can I but it does not seem to be goal-oriented. I happen to think that you are right about memory not being dependent on physical structures but what I see in the xenobot videos does not imply memory to me at all. Speaking as an engineer, I would say that nothing is more common than for programmers to assume that something is program related when it is actually environmental.('You can change the program when the robot's movement changes but if the actual cause is a loose screw you shouldn't.' seems to be a hard lesson to learn.)
'There can be only one' is the notion that the Highlander, through generations and eternal return, was always hunting or fighting his mortal enemy.
It's a metaphor. He fights himself, or his nemesis, his lower nature. This goes all the way back to Mesopotamia and Gilgamesh, and before them, the Bhagavad Gita with Krishna and Arjuna. It's an eternal state: man must fight his ego.
When he wins, he wins eternal life. Which is eternal PEACE. Fun fact, both Zion and Jerusalem mean 'peace'. The church has externalised everything.
(And for the record I don't insist on the Vedic perspective. It's merely one organised collections of truths (of several that I've looked in to) that I hold in great respect.)
So, I do this Bible Study thing. (I know, I'm a Graeco-Roman pagan, also kind of a Buddhist, but I also told you that I go to Church regularly ... I'm a man of many contradictions.) One of the participants, an octogenarian, is very orthodox in her interpretation of Christianity and given her level of lifelong trauma I'm sympathetic to her need to keep the walls strong and high. The group knows I have some Buddhist roots, and I've talked about it from time to time. A few weeks ago, after I mentioned reincarnation, my octogenarian friend displayed visible discomfort. I realized I needed to explain that, from a Buddhist perspective, reincarnation is not seen as a good thing: from that perspective, the world is considered a harsh realm of suffering, maybe even a hell-realm, and thus reincarnation is basically equivalent to being sent to Hell. This was a minor revelation to her, as she had not considered reincarnation from that perspective (why would she have thought much about reincarnation at all, after all). I further explained that this was my own personal reconciliation of the Christian doctrine of salvation/damnation with the concept of a loving God. The loving Father doesn't punish cruelly and "forever", but He might make you do Meatspace over again until you get it right.
"I realized I needed to explain that, from a Buddhist perspective, reincarnation is not seen as a good thing: from that perspective, the world is considered a harsh realm of suffering, maybe even a hell-realm, and thus reincarnation is basically equivalent to being sent to Hell."
I've heard it put this way before (and not strictly in the Buddhist context). And, like I mentioned, I don't disagree that this can be one of many possible journeys. I guess my only problem (though not really a "problem") is that the language with regards to concepts like "Hell" seems too malleable in that model.
That's not to say language should be entirely rigid -- without at least some flexibility, I think it would quickly turn into some worse than useless. But when we speak of Earth-as-Hell, I think maybe we're giving Earthly suffering too much weight. After all, there is beauty in the material world as well as suffering. Maybe "purgatory" would be a more useful word in that context. Dunno.
"The loving Father doesn't punish cruelly and "forever", but He might make you do Meatspace over again until you get it right."
Again, a possibility, because all that's downstream of the Source is possible. That would logically include some form of video game played with infinite continues/lives, and maybe even with a built-in "memory wipe" of some kind. But only if God wills it. And he may will that fate for some and not for others. For instance, Christ was returned to earthly flesh with his memories intact, and even ascended with his bodily structures intact. We could say, well, that's a special case exception. My theory boils down to: they are all special case exceptions, or can be.
I think the standard Buddhist pushback would be that the beauty is there as a distraction, a trap even. Obviously it's very much more complicated than that (e.g. one could argue that the distinction between Samsara and Nirvana is merely a matter of focus), and yes Purgatory may be a better description, but either way, Buddhism does not really view the standard meatspace experience as a good thing.
I agree in principle with the idea that everything is ultimately an exceptional case, but living that way is a bit of a cop-out. We incarnate in order to *do* something (even if that something is just witnessing), and the doing requires imposing some kind of regularity on the information we are perceiving, in order to navigate. This goes back to your memory essay. Yes, the models we develop are most surely wrong, but they are necessary to build if you are going to fulfill your purpose. Accepting of course that some beings may not have a purpose (God's will and all). Still, if you're contemplating these issues, throwing up your hands and rejecting all knowledge seems like it's a move backwards. Also acknowledging that it is what a Buddhist might suggest is the right move, maybe even a Christian (Tree of Knowledge leading to sin and all); but if so, it's a far more advanced practice than appropriate for most of us reading and writing on this Substack.
"Still, if you're contemplating these issues, throwing up your hands and rejecting all knowledge seems like it's a move backwards.."
Is that what I'm doing here? I think at most I was rejecting human authority, not knowledge or wisdom of any particular strain. And while the idea of "advanced practice" makes sense to me at a certain level, it also strikes me as somewhat of an argument from authority on another. We must build models, yes, because without them we can't navigate at all. But the map isn't the territory. If some Buddhist or Christian ir Satanist makes a move that's visible, we judge it according to the territory, appropriateness be damned. The real test is one of eyesight and memory, I guess.
Great read thanks Mark!
I started drinking heavily in 1990 until 12 months ago. I did this to hide from what I saw in the world that few others see. I wanted to forget so that, like a child, or a dementia patient, everything is new again.
It didn't work. 12 months ago I stopped drinking after reading a Mark Lewis book " the biology of desire".
I have, fortunately and unfortunately, recovered all memory, including all of my 'subconscious dumps'.
Your article made me wonder about the current aversion to truth. When convenient lies colour our world, what makes people so possessive? Their subconscious dumps' must be fully septic....
http://www.scifimoviezone.com/imagespaceopera/fifthelement369.jpg
https://www.scifimoviezone.com/imagespaceopera/fifthelement152.jpg
Thanks, Justin! Not familiar with Lewis's work, but I will duly add it to the (growing somewhat intimidating) stack of recs y'all are giving me.
"Your article made me wonder about the current aversion to truth. When convenient lies colour our world, what makes people so possessive? Their subconscious dumps' must be fully septic."
The term "egoic memory" has been bandied about (including by yours truly), and I suspect what's ultimately meant by that is the kinds of self-deceptions inherent in the command to "live not by lies." To claim that such memories may vanish with the material body might just be another way of saying that those aren't real "memories" at all, but rather full or partial lies we tell ourselves to rationalize our worst decisions and paths through life.
The optimization layer may reinforce these lies so often and efficiently that we come to "believe" they are in some sense true. At the very least, we'll behave as though they're true, in our transactions with other souls. But yes, I don't think that we carry such false memories with us by default. And when all of the scales fall, we may be rightly terrified by the truths they were disguising.
What I think you are saying alligns on a biological level. -Crystallization of neural pathways... Actual inability to change.
Maybe egoic memory causes hallucinations if they are embedded and repeated for long enough... "The illusion of the illusion".
The proposition that anyone could find themselves locked into a state of literally endless suffering seems to me to be wholly and obviously incompatible with the proposition that:
"The Self-Authoring Author of Reality loves us as a father loves his children. And as with all fatherly love, it’s the kind which must allow us to fail, so that we might grow stronger and learn to succeed."
Particularly if said Author is in the business of breaking rules, not that such a thing would be inclined to set up rules that might result in such an outcome in the first place.
As some "pagans" are fond of saying, the universe is full of God's, and all of them are subject to the creator.
I'm inclined to believe reincarnation is an option, all of our memories of all our lives are available to us on the other side, while here we only have a residual soul "instinct" about how to proceed.
Thank you, Mark.
‘My thoughts are mine when they become the potential source of income for another entity then there is a problem.’
Of course, if you have the processing power, the emotional tells given away by a person can be very valuable. Especially if biometrics are overlaid to this, including facial recognition.
There is a new responsibility that humans and those with power have, we need to be confident that our self is our own. I ask the the following question because I do not know.
Can AI output information about a persons thoughts to an entity that can use that to either their commercial or strategical advantage?