Metaphysics

12 mostly short paragraphs and an optional 17 minute Ted Talk.

I told a few people I would write a bit about God and the Afterlife, as I think about them. “Metaphysics” is probably already a somewhat old fashioned word, but that’s kind of the world I choose to live in, the one where people wrote long thoughts in often complex sentences, because they were taking the project seriously and not trying to sell anything.

But I will argue that Metaphysics IS Physics. Anything that is a species of reality, which is to say something measurable directly or indirectly, is Science. Period. Full Stop.

This point is vital since, in the same sense that some people conflate vaccines with “science”—and health insurance with “health care” which is then conflated with health—in really stupid and nakedly manipulative ways, so too a great many people conflate 19th century concepts of Reality with Science as well. “The Science Delusion”, as Rupert Sheldrake calls it. His banned Ted Talk is worth watching:

So I will pursue three main points, in as many posts, while trying to keep a leash on my tendency towards garrulousness and distraction.

First, I will briefly discuss philosophy, which is more relevant than you might suppose, in this post.

Second, I will point out that God and the afterlife are not only not precluded by contemporary Physics, but rather seem to be logical correlates of what we think we know.

Finally, I will briefly introduce you to the VAST array of empirical evidence that exists that we survive death, and that something like God exists. I’ll point the way to ways in which you can do your own further research. In particular, I will share why purportedly honest and “scientific” explanations of Near Death Experiences are really disingenuous idiocy that is really just an outward manifestation of ignorant obstinacy.

In this post, philosophy. Here is my question: how do you know that you are not living in a Simulation, one in which the brain has been made to seem the center of all consciousness, at least on a superficial examination? How do you know, or how COULD you know, we don’t live in the Matrix?

Ideas logically precede experiences. There is of course every reason in the world to believe in the thing you stub your toe on, the heat or cold outside, and the feeling of eating good chili and cornbread. But Joey Pantoliano ate steak in the Matrix, didn’t he?

The Hindus and I think many parts of the Buddhist world do in fact believe everything we see and feel is illusory. It doesn’t FEEL illusory, but this is nonetheless the claim. Some western philosophers have made roughly the same claim, like Bishop George Berkeley, for whom the university is named (I wonder, as a graduate of Cal, how many current students there know this). And this claim can be supported to some extent empirically, by pointing out that matter is almost all space, and that our daily experience consists in the main of empty matter acting at an energetic level, to both repulse and cohere. I’ll get more into that in the next post.

The point here is not that “science” is wrong, or that we DO live in a fabricated and unreal (on some level we can’t perceive) world, but rather that the ARROGANCE of people making absolute claims about what is and is not possible is simply the result of lacking imagination, circumspection, and the modesty that all generalized claims about truth demand. To believe that the universe consists of matter, and only matter, is an act of belief that is not really warranted by the evidence. But that belief is hugely consequential.

I will leave that there. You no doubt believe me what I say I could go on and on. Next post in a few days, but if you have something you’ve been wondering about for a while, I can honestly say you won’t find a lot of people who have put more thought and research into all this than me, so ask any questions, or share any thoughts you might have. All welcome, unless you like Gavin Newsom. I don’t think I can deal with people that absurd. I find his smile creepier than that of Jeffrey Epstein, and on par with that of Bill Gates.