Which came first? matter or mind?

Which came first, matter or mind?

Video-
video.google.ca...

If we want to understand the relationship between matter and mind, perhaps it would be useful to examine a related issue, which came first message or form.......

Which came first, DNA or RNA?
exosci.com...



So maybe intelligent design was right all along? It is mind that existed first, and divine mind which creates all life.

reply to post by Hollywood11

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Considering the simple fact that "matter" is actually vibration, oscillation, patterns of energy... it makes sense.

Don't waste your precious time on doubt.
Harness that tremendous energy that we have access to.

(I hope it doesn't sound patronising, that was certainly not my intention.)




[edit on 13-5-2008 by Vanitas]

Fo sho. That's true.



Oh not at all, that was good advice, don't worry.

Mind came first or energy. Energy combined with purpose creates other forms of energy culminating in matter. Matter also consists of energy, just a more dense form of it.

When you look at the alternative explanantions for evolution than we see that life at Lemuria looked water-like, people from Atlantis got a more dense form but still were highly spiritual. In our bodies today the energy is so far materialised that a lot of us have forgotten what it was like to be a spiritual being.

Now for me that's what 2012 might bring, back to the pure energy form we shall return and see what happens next! Exciting huh?

(sorry, English is not my native language)

reply to post by Hollywood11

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Matter existed first. A mind is made up from matter. Saying this has any bearing on the theory of evolution only serves to highlight your ignorance of said theory, nothing more. Sorry if that sounded rude - it just gets difficult wading through nonsensical claims on this board

Sometimes it appears the only ignorant ideas are the ones we as individuals do not have the wisdom or the knowledge to perceive. Ignorance, then, is always an option when presented with a choice since we can acquire knowledge.

When one believes in an eternal soul, mind/awareness exists without matter.

Perhaps it would be better for you to simply inform people of their mistake and let things be - thereby avoiding the accusation that a person is ignorant.

Which is most uncivilised, i'm sure you'll agree.

reply to post by garyo1954

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No, if someone asks which came first - the mind (an electrochemical reaction localised in the brain, and to a lesser extent the various knots of nerves present throughout the human body) or matter (which makes up the mind, and has obviously existed before the first mind was ever created), then of course I'm going to call them ignorant. Just as if someone came in here and asked "which one came first - 1999 or 2004?" you'd call them ignorant, too, as they are obviously ignorant about something - be it physics and biology in Hollywood11's case, or how numbers work in my example.

reply to post by Anti-Tyrant

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Uncivilised? Hardly! Informing someone of their ignorance is a great gift to the person being informed. Being ignorant is only offensive if your ego is so pumped up that you think you know everything. Not a single person has ever existed, or will likely ever exist, that knows everything, so calling someone ignorant is about as far from an insult as you can get. It's like me calling the fella a human being. I'm merely pointing out something that might affect the discussion at hand - that he's ignorant about what he's talking about, and that it's probably in his best interest to do some research on the matter, as he's getting confused.

No dave420, I wouldn't call them ignorant. I would say they had a different viewpoint on the issue, as you have.

You equate the mind with nothing beyond the electrochemical reactions and the knots of nerves present in the body. However, there are those who accept the mind as having a distinct and separate presence beyond that which is displayed in the body.

When we examine spirits or ghosts acting of their own accord we see the possibility of mind transcending death. We may hear a voice or see a form acting with cognizance yet there is no material body as we would understand it.

Would you agree?

reply to post by dave420

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I appreciate what you're saying, and your opinion that matter came before the mind. But it's just as flawed as the opposite belief.

Bottom line, we simply can't trust our senses because they are products of our physical bodies. They give us insight as to the physical world around us. But since our minds dictate what we see and how we experience reality, we're limited.

I've read an awful lot about Random Event Generators and the research they've done at Princeton. I've read about how these machines that churn out the most random results possible are apparently influenced in a specific direction when a person is thinking in that specific direction. These instruments, based on the fundamentals of quantum mechanics, have also measured statistically significant changes in the results of these machines in the hours leading up to major world events such as 9.11 or the death of Princess Diana.

It means, on some "statistically significant" scale, the human consciousness is able to reach out and influence physical reality, if even only on the quantum scale.

But how can this be? Isn't it possible that there is no distance between things, that everything exists in the very same place and our senses only percieve locality? Perhaps this computer in front of me is nothing more than an illusion painted by my eyes and my sense of touch.

Maybe the collective consciousness, the only thing that really exists, has created this reality for the sake of experience.

Tool said it best. Today, a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed into a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. There's no such thing as death, life is only a dream in which we imagine ourselves.

We have learned to ignore ourselves in this modern age.

reply to post by garyo1954

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I'm afraid I can't agree with you. The viewpoint I expressed is one constructed over the last 100 years by medical science. It's not a guess, as the OP's opinion is, but backed by actual, real evidence. Equating the two is doing science a massive disservice indeed.

As for talking about spirits and ghosts - we don't have any evidence they even exist, so trying to bring them into a scientific discussion is pointless. They prove nothing. Absolutely nothing.

reply to post by The Cyfre

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Simply, correlation != causation. They don't know if they've discovered anything yet, so using their findings as some sort of argument is fatally flawed.

Check here for some evidence which shows that the mind is not a product of the brain and can work independently of it.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by TheBandit795

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Those videos are very interesting, but there's no actual evidence there. Videos do not constitute evidence - independent scientific research, including multiple subjects, does.

Do you have any articles about OoBEs being accurate? I'm genuinely interested.

reply to post by dave420

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Dave cmon,

I've posted the evidence for NDE's a long time ago. And you know this.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I have an interesting big-picture perspective on this which may or may not make much sense (it does to me at least).

First there was frequency and wave creating interference patterns starting with a single point of light, splitting into more points over time.

Then there was thought (see Goldbach's conjecture and apply that to the geometric forms created within the interference pattern). When splits in the math happen, the "machine" is forced to make a choice.

Then there's matter (which is just a slowed down perception of the above) which sounds like what Vanitas is saying.

You could think of this frequency/wave coming from above or below. Mathematically it doesn't matter. If you existed on the outside or the inside of an infinite sphere, would you notice a difference?

Anyway that's just how I see it. At the fundamental level, the universe is as simple as it can possibly be. Forget the details and look at the big picture. Then all the details become just that, details.

Frequency and vibration, that's all you need really.

So first person accounts don’t count as evidence?
Nor do tape recordings?
Or photos (electronic voice phenononmina rium nmium)?
CCTV?

I suppose even scientific reports-studies don’t count as evidence…
news.bbc.co.uk...
And healing power of prayer revealed.
news.bbc.co.uk...

All I can say is that if I was facing court for a crime in a place I had never even existed in, and if somehow the prosecution still had the above evidence against me, then I would be pissing myself. Unlike fairies at the bottom of my garden, doorways to another universe, or Santa clause there’s a surprising amount of evidence for something that (apparently) doesn’t exist.

But I suppose there’s nothing like a bit of old fashioned BBC reporting when it sticks to simply what the professionals have done, and think about what they’ve found!!!

Your problem (like everybody else’s) is that there’s evidence for anything and everything (including cheese on the moon!!).

To say “science proves the lack of evidence for” something is a propagandistic use-abuse of sciences reputation. The reason is all science has ever done is show us the evidence for things. Ultimately it’s a matter of either common sense, or statistical analysis (both being essentially the same thing) to come to a conclusion from the evidence that science presents us.

So if atheists (or anyone) would actually make a logic proofed statement about what the nature of the universe tells us about the chances of an afterlife; then they would need to resort to statistics (because unlike science they really do deal with the probabilities against things, rather than simply for them).
However the first problem is….
1. That knowing how to assemble these statistics is probably up there (in difficulty) with the quest for a Unification Theory of Everything.
2. The second problem is that any formulas would have to take into account a value for “what we don’t know”. This might be equally as impossible.
3. The third problem is that whatever this second value is, it would detract from the first value, thereby giving us a total uncertainly value.
4. Dare I suggest whatever (this final figure is) it may be about equal to what most peoples brains already compute about the entire afterlife question!!! I mean it’s probably going to have a margin of error so wide that in one interpretation it backs religious fundamentalism, and in another militant atheism.

If so the great news is that the power of the human mind saves us from a lot of calculating, for something that’s not that useful.
The bad news is that a potentially powerful persuasion tool has failed to materialise from what we know.

The good and bad news about that is we have propaganda in its place!!! Therefore both atheists and creationists can enjoy arguing how “science” proves the other is wrong (but with clever use, of easy to pick up thoughts; no actual reference to how this is actually so).
Well at least not beyond this statement
“One thing (out of a universe filled with millions of known and unknown things) seems to point this way i.e. in favour of my argument”.

Sadly that’s not actually proof but hay since when did that bother the converted?

Regarding the First Subject…
I think matter came first because the mind cannot exist without matter. And according to evolution (in order to evolve) matter (of some sort) would have been needed.

However I doubt chemicals released by the earths rocks managed to create an organism that then went on to found all others.
The problem is that the first life on earth would have needed food. And that appears to have been that plankton like creature that (inadvertently) made the first oil reserves (all from H2O, CO2 and Nitrogen). At the time the earth’s atmosphere was almost completely CO2 and nitrogen.

All I'm saying is that to go from a chemical soup (that doesn’t evolve), to an organism with your own solar panel, and organic chemistry set, is quite a freakish achievement.

I guess it’s possible (like everything’s possible) but in order for it to happen it might take probabilities less than those used in bible code!!! (Could be wrong, but it’s not even like our earth is very old (unlike the universe).

Qu: Anyway getting energy from the sun is quite simple, what’s the argument it’s simpler to get it from some other energy source, what is that source?

Don’t get easily confused with crystals…
Crystals can “reproduce” (in a sense) and can also emerge from (and survive in) a chemical soup (even when it’s massively diluted with either ocean or fresh water). However the potential of crystals is always finite because they will always use their food source up. They cannot evolve because they always react as best as they can, to whatever they can (in their local environment).
Therefore they lack opportunity for survival of the fittest (it has no opportunity to ever begin!!!). This is not because crystals are perfect, but because they’re already busy doing something (if they’ve got any hope of doing anything at all) and what they’re doing is always determined by chemistry itself i.e. they’re about as alive as boiling water, or soot collecting inside a chimney smokestack.
“Change” is the only word like evolution; and which best describes the path of crystals (and all other non living things).

Spontaneous life from watery rocks? What about bank notes?

reply to post by Hollywood11

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Replying to the OP....

As Homer Simpson answered his son Bart's question.....

"What is Mind? Doesn't matter.

What is Matter? Nevermind...now, go to bed, boy!!!"

Here is Dean Radin talking about this issue
www.youtube.com...

reply to post by Liberal1984

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Scientific evidence. Not your average everyday 'evidence', like finding 'evidence' the cat took a dump in your shoe, but actual evidence gained through rigorous scientific experimentation in a controlled environment.

reply to post by TheBandit795

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I know It still doesn't amount to much - actual large-scale experimentation needs to be conducted before we know. As it is, science is fairly certain that the mind is contained in the brain, as we can directly measure the brain's activity when the mind is working. The NDE evidence I've seen is sketchy at best, which until they legalise (temporarily) killing hundreds of people in clinical trials, is not going to be improved.

It should be very easy to research NDEs if we can get away with (temporarily) killing hundreds of people. Just put them on a table, and in a seperate room put some items to be viewed. Perform the whole test double-blind, so the interviewer doesn't know what's in the secluded room, and see how many people can get the right answer. The beauty of these intelligence-persisting-outside-the-body claims is they are so very easily tested (once you get past the killing-test-subjects part, that is).