←back to thread

What is it like to be a bat?

(en.wikipedia.org)
180 points adityaathalye | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.328s | source
Show context
anon-3988 ◴[] No.45122250[source]
If you are a secular person, it should follow that you are a non-dualist. Yet that is not so common. There's no "whats its like to be a bat". Because that invokes a sense of a "soul" or "spirit" or "self" being transferred from one being to another.

There is only is and its content. That's it. The easiest way to see or get a sense of this is to replace any "I am ..." with "There is a ....". For example, instead of "I am thinking of writing of using stable sort", replace it with "This person have a thought of using stable sort".

This is much closer to the actual reality underneath. Even attachment itself can be put in this term. "There's a feeling that this person own this" or "There's a sense of I".

After doing, perhaps this is mental illness, I already see glimpse of the sense that everything is everything at the same time. As there are no real difference between this rock and the other rock behind the mountain that I can't see. There should be no difference between my thoughts, senses, feelings, emotions etc and that of other people. Now your sense of self captures the entirety of the universe. If you die, the universe dies for all you know. I think this is what the ancient books have been talking about by rising and being a God.

replies(5): >>45122514 #>>45122735 #>>45122998 #>>45123007 #>>45123493 #
1. selcuka ◴[] No.45122514[source]
> If you are a secular person, it should follow that you are a non-dualist.

It depends on your definition of "dualism". If you define it as "having a soul that was created by a higher being", then yes, they are mutually exclusive.

On the other hand, one can also define dualism as being purely evolutionary. David Chalmers [1], an Australian philosopher and cognitive scientist, has some interesting ideas around how dualistic consciousness may relate to quantum mechanics.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Chalmers