Free will

Bernardo Kastrup

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Idealism as proposed by Bernardo is difficukt to argue against, seems necessarily so.

Thanks for the video I’ll have a look. I have a book (the idea of reality) by him, but I think its the wrong one - it has not been written for readers or reading, rather its a collection of his published papers on Idealism, so I have put it down until I work up some more courage.

Brain physiology (which determines my choices) are merely what my choices look like” B. Kastrup

By “look like” he means the perception provided by mind. These mental perceptions being the direct reality/experience under Idealism. The material reality “out there” being an assumption based on the direct experience.

But what appears as “me” and what appears as “the choices I am making” are not any more demonstrably real than “my brain”.

He also says that : There is nothing other than “core subjectivity” - which is a synonym to the speculative concept of “universal consciousness” - unfortunately as far as I am aware he has never demonstrated that “core subjectivity” is somehow outside the idealist worldview. I mean why is this any more real than anything else? Nor is it demonstrable that universal consciousness is more than an idea, or that it is in fact a synonym for this subjective experience.

Anyway glad everyone agrees (?) that the concept of Free will arises from confusion :sweat_smile:

Something needs to be looked at here, this idea of ‘identifying with’: this duality of a me identifying with the brain, the ego, the body…or with “core subjectivity”, etc. Maybe it’s just language but it seems misleading. Is there actually an ‘identifier’ separate from what is being ‘identified with’…or is the identifier the identified? :face_with_monocle:

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In modern idealism, all things, all experience, is arising via the mental interface.
The observing is a purely mental phenomenon. The observer and the observed are both mental experiences/projections.
Language dictates that we say that the experience of I seems to arise from what we experience as the brain.

The only thing we can say is objectively and demonstrably actually real is the mental experience.

I think therefore there is thinking. Cogito ergo cogitare
Experience proves only itself.

PS. Those that take one step over the edge say therefore… but they are being unreasonable

It strikes me that ‘ism’s are no good; that unless you discover it in yourself, for yourself, it’s just words with a fancy title?

isms are only a problem when there is identification. ie. for or against, friend or foe, true or evil.

Models (ie. isms) in the right place (when there is order K might say) are either useful or not.

Would I be going too far if I claimed that Idealism (in the form described above) is self evident via personal experience?

Two good friends in a dialogue.
Bernardo( the scientist) and Rupert Spira (a direct path teacher/potter ….who met K in 1985)

This is a good dialogue !
2.5hours