Big brain theory: You are just an illusion

A New Series Of Calculations Paint A Bizarre Picture That Rattles The Field Of Cosmology

Dennis Overbye

It could be the weirdest and most embarrassing prediction in the history of cosmology, if not science.

If true, it would mean that you yourself reading this article are more likely to be some momentary fluctuation in a field of matter and energy out in space than a person with a real past born through billions of years of evolution in an orderly star-spangled cosmos. Your memories and the world you think you see around you are illusions.

This bizarre picture is the outcome of a recent series of calculations that take some of the bedrock theories and discoveries of modern cosmology to the limit. Nobody in the field believes that this is the way things really work, however. And so there in the last couple of years there has been a growing stream of debate and dueling papers, replete with references to such esoteric subjects as reincarnation, multiple universes and even the death of space-time, as cosmologists try to square the predictions of their cherished theories with their convictions that we and the universe are real.

The basic problem is that across the eons of time, the standard theories suggest, the universe can recur over and over again in an endless cycle of big bangs, but it’s hard for nature to make a whole universe. It’s much easier to make fragments of one, like planets, yourself maybe in a spacesuit or even — in the most absurd and troubling example — a naked brain floating in space. Nature tends to do what is easiest, from the standpoint of energy and probability. And so these fragments — in particular the brains — would appear far more frequently than real full fledged universes, or than us. Or they might be us.

Alan Guth, a cosmologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who agrees this overabundance is absurd, pointed out that some calculations result in an infinite number of free-floating brains for every normal brain, making it “infinitely unlikely for us to be normal brains.” Welcome to what physicists call the Boltzmann brain problem, named after the 19th-century Austrian physicist Ludwig Boltzmann, who suggested the mechanism by which such fluctuations could happen in a gas or in the universe. Cosmologists also refer to them as “freaky observers,” in contrast to regular or “ordered” observers of the cosmos like ourselves. Cosmologists are desperate to eliminate these freaks from their theories, but so far they can’t even agree on how or even on whether they are making any progress.

If you are inclined to skepticism this debate might seem like further evidence that cosmologists, who gave us dark matter, dark energy and speak with apparent aplomb about gazillions of parallel universes, have finally lost their minds. But the cosmologists say the brain problem serves as a valuable reality check as they contemplate the far, far future and zillions of bubble universes popping off from one another in an ever increasing rush through eternity. What, for example is a “typical” observer in such a setup? If some atoms in another universe stick together briefly to look, talk and think exactly like you, is it really you?

New York Times News Service

Hierarchy of Knowledge

Dr. Deepak Ranade's another exceptional article was published in TOI Speaking Tree. I'm so lucky and happy that he had sent me a copy before it got published, and I was pretty moved by it's content.

Here it is, "Hierarchy of Knowledge":

The brain is ever endeavoring to learn, comprehend, understand. It is being flooded with information at maybe the rate of a million MB per second. It processes the data at an even more astonishing speed.

Processing data implies prioritizing the data. To assign meaning to incoming data
is a very important aspect of intelligence.

Interpretation of the data is a a very highly developed intelligence.
Data is ubiquitous. Right from the radio-waves emitted by celestial bodies from a few million light years away, to the feel of our clothing against our bodies, we are being bombarded by data.
Intelligence is the skill and speed to scan the incoming data, compare it with the existing database , discard the unimportant part (like the feel of our clothes against our skin) and also store the useful new data for future reference.

Apples fell even before Newton discovered gravity, but Newton processed the same data witnessed by others in a different paradigm. He discovered a force which till then was not known to mankind, no parallel, no tangible units of measurement and was embellished in abstraction. This realization or flash of comprehension was abstract intelligence at a sublime level, where his conclusion was not a mere deduction, or just analysis. Analysis would be a synthesis or jugglery of already known facts but where the summation leads to a greater than phenomenon that is where awareness transcends intellect, analysis and reasoning.

Science is essentially related to a spatio-temporal grid. It is seemingly restrained by the confines of cause and effect. Any theory has to be reinforced by experimental verification and then to be ratified by adding the attributes of repeatability and predictability. This verification is mediated by measurable parameters, which again are the slaves of the tangibles governed by the senses.
The boat of the sense organs can navigate the intellect only within the waters of the tangible. Once it touches the shores of the intangible the sense organs are powerless and defunct. The realms of the intangible may be dwelled into only by awareness, which is supra-sensory and out of the spatio-temporal Cartesian grid. This intangible is out of bounds for the intellect which is defanged when depraved of sensory inputs. That is the reason why this aspect of knowledge is termed as “Realization”. Realization implies knowledge which is already there but which we are unaware of. The knowledge of the form shifts focus to awareness. Awareness is independent of subject object bifurcation Reasoning, deduction and investigation are meaningless tools which only obfuscate and serve to the detriment of the user.

The knowledge of the manifest is a stepping stone to enhancing awareness. By knowing what I am not is a very potent principle to know what I am. If I cannot fathom the manifest, then I cannot even dream of the unmanifest. The journey to realization involves traveling over a diverse terrain. Each distinct terrain requires a commensurate vehicle. The vehicle of reason used to traverse the terra firma of tangibility needs to be abandoned when one has to take to the aerial journey of enhanced awareness. For this journey one has to travel very light, against the gravity of reason, logic and sensory perception into the realm of space of consciousness. The only navigation system being the guidance of the Guru. Most perceive the Guru to be in a particular form and person. But actually the Guru is a tatva (principle). It could manifest in any form. It only requires the disciple to be in a state of preparedness or conditioning before it reveals itself.

The entire journey is beyond the realm of consciousness. As consciousness involves duality, i.e. someone is conscious of something, the subject object dichotomy still lingers.
When one transcends consciousness, there is only awareness, a sense of “I am”.
Consciousness can be conditioned and adulterated by desires, vasanas. But awareness supercedes all and is the dwelling or source of the supreme being. This awareness is bliss, joy bereft of any duality, form and shape. In this state all derivatives of consciousness like space, time form and appearance melt into just “I am” .

Somewhat akin to the Bose- Einstein condensate of matter. The inability to communicate this state of awareness using the parameters of the conscious state leads to the mysticism of spiritual knowledge. But this knowledge is of the highest order and really ceases to be knowledge also as knowledge is implicit with a “knower” which again is a state of duality.

The Brain is what makes you believe

Vilayanur Ramachandran, a Neurologist, gave an astounding talk on how our brain acts as the only bridge to believe the relational aspects of mind and matter. His series of experiments, meticulously performed and impeccably explained in this video, reveal some amazing concepts.

Can we imagine due to brain damage, some people associate every number with a color? Some patients will fail to recognize their mother by her face, but recognize her voice! Take a look at this really mind boggling lecture.

The video is around 20 minutes in length, so please let it download first. Press 'play' and then 'pause' to let it load fully.



Credits: Geeksaresexy