Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

RESPONDENT: [...] And I had made some experiments during my actualism practice and I would appreciate to read your comments regard some facts I discovered in this adventure:

1. My health improve to much after some months of practice. But my body lost that sensibility to some foods and drinks. Today, if I eat only one piece of bread I’m feel a little dizzy. Before I had great tolerance to gluten. Now I need GF foods!

RICHARD: Whilst a general improvement to physical health, after some months of practice, may have correlation with less stress/more ease (for instance) it would be imprudent of me to endorse the practice of actualism in terms pertaining more properly to the medical health profession.

Similarly with you currently having less tolerance to gluten: as correlation is not causation – even though many anti-tobacco activists (for instance) have made a packet out of creating the public impression it is – it would be more productive to seek a cause-effect explanation.

(For what it is worth, and simply as one fellow human being to another, there has been some recent publicity of hookworms in regards to both coeliac disease and asthma).

RICK: Richard, you wrote:

[Co-Respondent]: ‘Is it good for the body to engage in regular exercise?’
[Richard]: ‘No ... what is good for the body is an absence of stress’. [endquote].

RICHARD: Yes, I replied thusly on the understanding (a) that ‘regular exercise’ referred to a regimen of artificial activity (over and above normal everyday activity) ... and (b) that, given the general thrust of the entire e-mail, it was a personal question (relating to what life is like after the extirpation, in toto, of the progenitor of stress).

Speaking of which: that stressor – the word stress is aphetised from the word distress – has, of course, a vested interest in deflecting attention away from itself.

RICK: Sorry ... What do you mean?

RICHARD: Just by way of example: that progenitor of stress – the stressor within – has persuaded an otherwise intelligent person to downplay the debilitating effect of stress and champion the remedial effect of regular exercise (along with good nutrition) by glossing over the former with the word can – ‘may possibly’ (Oxford Dictionary) – and lending legitimacy to the latter with the word is (‘have place in the realm of fact/be the case or the fact’). Vis.:

• [Rick]: ‘I have read that stress *can* be bad for the body, in that it *can* have a very negative effect (...) the general agreement among health experts across the globe *is* that regular exercise (along with good nutrition) *is* the best thing ...’ [emphasis added].

Moreover, the debilitating effect of stress was further negated by it merely being something read somewhere whilst the remedial effect of regular exercise was further legitimised by the presentation of it as being the general agreement among health experts across the globe.

In case that is still not clear: by making the body partake in a regimen of artificial activity (over and above normal everyday activity) the stressor has successfully eluded attention ... once again.

*

RICK: I have read that stress can be bad for the body, in that it can have a very negative effect on one’s immune system and thus make the body subject to many kinds of illnesses and problems. But the general agreement among health experts across the globe is that regular exercise (along with good nutrition) is the best thing to promote a healthy body.

RICHARD: Hmm ... have you ever considered a career in penning propaganda?

RICK: Nope I haven’t. I don’t think there’s enough money to be made there.

RICHARD: Golly, there are literally billions of dollars made available annually all around the world, both in government grants and commercial funding, for persons with little more than a facility for fine-sounding phrases and some letters after their name ... by way of a neat little primer into the whole pseudo-science industry I will refer you to the following booklet: https://web.archive.org/web/19970412002851/http://www.junkscience.com/sws.html

*

RICK: What evidence do you have that says that regular exercise isn’t good for the body?

RICHARD: Ha ... if your above paragraph is an example of what constitutes evidence in your neck of the woods then the following should be more than sufficient: [example only]: ‘I have read that regular exercise (along with good nutrition) can be good for the body, in that it can have a very positive effect on one’s immune system and thus make the body less subject to many kinds of illnesses and problems. But the general agreement among health experts across the globe is that stress reduction is the best thing to promote a healthy body’. [end example].

RICK: Nope, not sufficient.

RICHARD: Oh? Yet all I did was write the obverse of what you wrote.

RICK: How about some articles and quotes from credible sources? That’s the good stuff.

RICHARD: As far as I have been able to ascertain there is no such good stuff – there have been no articles from credible sources relating to what life is like after the extirpation, in toto, of the progenitor of stress – to quote from.

*

RICK: I’m curious to see where you got that information.

RICHARD: Out of nothing more than idle curiosity I have just now typed <stress number one killer> into an internet search-engine ... the Time Magazine (for example) ran a cover story, on June 6, 1983, in which it was stated that [quote] ‘In the past 30 years, doctors and health officials have come to realize how heavy a toll stress is taking on the nation’s well being. According to the American Academy of Family Physicians, two-thirds of office visits to family doctors are prompted by stress-related symptoms. At the same time, leaders of industry have become alarmed by the huge cost of such symptoms in absenteeism, company medical expenses and lost productivity. Based on national samples, these costs have been estimated at $50 billion to $75 billion a year, more than $750 for every U.S. worker. Stress is now known to be a major contributor, either directly or indirectly, to coronary heart disease, cancer, lung ailments, accidental injuries, cirrhosis of the liver and suicide – six of the leading causes of death in the U.S. Stress also plays a role in aggravating such diverse conditions as multiple sclerosis, diabetes, genital herpes and even trench mouth. It is a sorry sign of the times that the three bestselling drugs in the country are an ulcer medication (Tagamet), a hypertension drug (Inderal) and a tranquilizer (Valium)’. [endquote]. That was, of course, the prevailing wisdom in the ‘eighties ... the current flavour-of-the-month (this decade’s wisdom) is depression.

RICK: Yeah. I found when I typed <importance of exercise> into the search engine of Google one of the links that came up was to an article from Pharmabiz.com (which describes itself as ‘India’s most comprehensive pharma portal’). The article states ‘Medical researchers at Harvard and Stanford universities, who studied the habits and health of 17,000 middle aged and older men, reported the first scientific evidence that even modest exercise helps prolong life. Dr. Ralph S. Paffenbarger, the visiting professor of epidemiology ...’

RICHARD: Bingo!

RICK: ‘... at the Harvard School of Public Health, who is the principal author of the report said, ‘we have found a direct relationship between the level of physical activity and the length of life in the college men we have studied’. He added, ‘This is the first good evidence that people who are active and fit have a longer life span than those who are not’. A strong connection between hard work and healthy heart has also been convincingly demonstrated in the same study. The study showed that the less active persons ran a three times higher risk of suffering a fatal heart attack than did those who worked the hardest. Review of fatal heart attacks revealed that the less active men were also three times more likely to die unexpectedly and rapidly within an hour after the attack. Exercise increases calories output. The body fat can be reduced by regular exercise. It is therefore, useful for weight reduction in conjunction with restricted food intake. According to a study by Dr. Peter Wood of Stanford University Medical School ...’

RICHARD: It only took about three minutes to locate the following list of epidemiological studies he participated in (he has a doctoral degree in science):

http://prevention.stanford.edu/facultystaff/detail.asp?22

RICK: ‘... [According to a study by Dr. Peter Wood of Stanford University Medical School], author of ‘California Diet and Exercise Programme’, very active people eat about 600 more calories daily than their sedentary counterparts but weigh about 20 percent less. Up to 15 hours after vigorous exercise, the body continues to burn calories at a higher rate than it should have without exercise. Moderate physical exercise has been found to be accompanied by less obesity and lower cholesterol levels’. [endquote]. Sounds like they are saying that regular exercise IS good in promoting a healthy body.

RICHARD: Of course it sounds like that ... after all, that is the whole point of the exercise (pun intended).

RICK: Why is it you say that it isn’t?

RICHARD: Because there is no stressor whatsoever parasitically inhabiting this flesh and blood body there is no need for a remedial regimen of artificial activity (over and above normal everyday activity).

It is all so simple here in this actual world.

CO-RESPONDENT: Richard, you wrote:

[Co-Respondent]: ‘Is it good for the body to engage in regular exercise?’
[Richard]: ‘No ... what is good for the body is an absence of stress’. [endquote].

RESPONDENT No. 74: Just so that we are clear, Rick is asking: Is R.E. good for the body?

RICHARD: No, it was someone else who asked me that question (at 1:22 PM, on Thursday, the sixth of November, 2003 AEDST).

(...)

RESPONDENT: I can’t speak for a control group trial or a statistical epidemiological trial but I can speak for my own experiential evidence. I have walked 2.5 miles per day above my normal daily activity for almost three months and I have lost 15 lbs.

RICHARD: What you are really saying, by speaking for your own experiential evidence, is that it is good for the body to be fifteen pounds lighter, is it not?

RESPONDENT: Yes, I am saying it is good for my body to be fifteen pounds lighter than it was.

RICHARD: Thank you for your confirmation.

*

RICHARD: If so, and given that the same result can be attained simply by not eating so much in the first place, suppose someone on a mailing list set-up for another purpose were to ask you, having read somewhere that you walk to the CBD (because you are retired and on a pension and cannot afford a motor vehicle), whether it is good for the body to engage in regular exercise and you were to answer pithily, ‘No, what is good for the body is an absence of edacity’, then what are the odds that a couple of years after that some other person might miss the point and champion remedial regimens of artificial activity (over and above normal everyday activity) instead?

RESPONDENT: I don’t think I get your point here Richard.

RICHARD: Perhaps if I were to put it this way: an absence of esurience would render any remedial regimen of artificial activity null and void.

RESPONDENT: Yes, I agree that if I would have had an absence of esurience there would be no need for artificial activity.

RICHARD: Yet instead of attending to what is not good for the body you would rather sanction that bandaid solution (by your very endorsement of same)?

*

RESPONDENT: I was speaking of my own experience in which I was already overweight and my normal everyday activity is low.

RICHARD: I was speaking of my own experience in which there is a total absence of stress and my normal everyday activity is completely carefree.

RESPONDENT: Yes, I was aware that you were speaking of your experience without a stressor which is different than my experience.

RICHARD: Yet even so you presented your experience as an alternate proof and/or evidence that bandaid solutions are good for the body.

*

RESPONDENT: Also, I can’t speak about being without a feeler which effects my bodily condition.

RICHARD: Whereas I can ... and did (whereupon another person missed that point and championed remedial regimens of artificial activity, over and above normal everyday activity, instead).

RESPONDENT: Right, I didn’t miss your point which was why I was only speaking of my own experience.

RICHARD: And yet by speaking of your own experience in such an endorsing/ sanctioning manner you are perpetuating a factoid.

*

RESPONDENT: This is hard to admit but just yesterday and today I am dealing with another crisis situation with my mother and have become depressed and tried to make myself feel better by eating more and so I have gained back some of the weight I lost.

RICHARD: Might I suggest you undertake a remedial weight-lifting regimen, three times a week for ten weeks, as a (supposedly) scientific treatment of your depression? Vis.: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=9143068&dopt=Abstract. That way you could speak from your own experiential evidence (about what those sixteen geriatrics had to say).

RESPONDENT: I do get your point because if I had no stressor (depressor) there would be no need. However ...

RICHARD: If I may interject (before you go on with your modifier)? The point I am making here is that you are subjecting that body you are inhabiting to a regimen of artificial activity when, surely, even Blind Freddie could see that were you to attend to the issues you have with one of your biological progenitors there would be (a) no depression ... and thus (b) no eating so much in the first place ... and therefore (c) no need to punish your body for something it did not do.

Given that the last three months (January-February-March) encompass winter-autumn, in the northern hemisphere, you would rather make your body walk through mist/ rain/ hail/ sleet/ snow, on occasion, than do something substantial about your (recurring) psychological/ emotional issues?

RESPONDENT: ... [However], as a middle-aged human who has not lived with an ‘absence of esurience’ I am saying it is beneficial for this body to walk an extra 2.5 miles per day to offset what has already been done.

RICHARD: Hmm ... and, quite possibly, those credulous geriatrics might also say it is beneficial for their bodies to undertake a remedial weight-lifting regimen, three times a week for ten weeks, as a (supposedly) scientific treatment of their depression, eh?

As that is an example of scientific evidence it is no wonder (modern) science is in the parlous state it is.

*

RESPONDENT: In summary let me say that I do get your point completely that if one has no stressor/ depressor and one lives a lifestyle with normal activity then there would be no need for any extra activity.

RICHARD: Do you also get the point completely that by not eating so much in the first place there would be no need for extra activity?

RESPONDENT: Also, I agree that exercise is not a replacement for dealing with ones psychological issues.

RICHARD: Do you also agree that exercise is not a replacement for dealing with eating so much in the first place?

RESPONDENT: However, in my own situation walking an extra 2.5 miles per day is very beneficial to my physical well being.

RICHARD: Being fifteen pounds lighter is really what is very beneficial to your physical well being, is it not?

If so, and given that the same result can be attained simply by not eating so much in the first place, suppose someone on a mailing list set-up for another purpose were to persist in sanctioning a palliative regime of artificial activity (over and above normal everyday activity), by their continued endorsement of same from their own experiential evidence, would it be a fair comment to say they have completely missed the point ... albeit all the while claiming they get the point completely?

Perhaps if I were to paraphrase the pithy question-and-answer sequence which prompted this entire thread? For example:

• [Question]: ‘Is it good for the body to engage in regular exercise?’
• [Answer]: ‘No ... what is good for the body is to not eat so much in the first place’. [end example].

‘Tis such a simple point, non?

*

RESPONDENT: There would be no need for extra activity if one’s normal activity is sufficient.

RICHARD: I am only too happy to modify my query so as to take your proviso into account: do you also get the point completely that by not eating so much (such as to render one’s normal activity insufficient) in the first place there would be no need for extra activity?

RESPONDENT: Not really because one needs sufficient normal activity even if one has not eaten too much. For example, one’s muscles would atrophy without sufficient normal activity.

RICHARD: Unless a person is physically immobilised (such as being bedridden or quadriplegic for instance) then their normal everyday activity (such as getting out of bed/ making the bed, walking to the bathroom/ performing the necessary ablutions, walking to the kitchen/ preparing breakfast, sitting down and eating/ standing up and clearing away, washing the dishes/ drying the dishes, sweeping the floors/ dusting the furniture and/or going to and from and doing paid work/ remunerative service, and so on, and so forth) is entirely sufficient for the prevention of muscular atrophy.

Therefore, and before I further modify my already modified query so as to accommodate your latest proviso, I will ask you this: are you physically immobilised?

If not, then do you get the point completely that by you not eating so much (such as to render your normal everyday activity insufficient) in the first place there would be no need for you to engage in a remedial regimen of artificial activity?

*

RESPONDENT: Richard, I got it. While eating as I was driving along in my auto this evening it dawned on me that if I did not eat so much in the first place there would be no need for extra activity.

RICHARD: Exactly.

Over the years when I was working for a living – such as when running my own business and working 12-14 hour days 6-7 days a week – I ate three large meals a day (often with second helpings) ... and then some.

Now that I am retired and on a pension – with a lifestyle so far past being sedentary as to be best described as indolent – I eat only one meal a day (with maybe a handful of nuts or a few crackers with a little cheese for supper) ... and sometimes even skip a day.

I would have to be pretty silly to spend my declining years engaged in remedial regimens of artificial activity, day in and day out, just so that I could continue eating the prodigious amounts I consumed in my workaday life ... plus I have far, far better things to do than living a pigging-out/ working-out lifestyle.

Things like sitting back with my feet up watching comedies on television.

RESPONDENT: Richard, what would be the cause for over-eating and obesity in your experience?

RICHARD: As the cause of obesity is (obviously) over-eating then what you are really asking is why eat so much in the first place, is it not? If so, and as you have specifically asked about my experience, I will first draw your attention to the following word:

• ‘hyperphagia: a condition in which somebody compulsively overeats over a long period’. (Encarta Dictionary).
• ‘hyperphagia: gluttony; overeating’. (Stedman’s Medical Dictionary).
• ‘hyperphagia [also called polyphagia]: excessive eating; gluttony’. (Dorland’s Medical Dictionary).

Then to this:

• [Respondent No. 94]: ‘Do you experience hunger?
• [Richard]: ‘No (all appetitive desires are null and void).
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘If you don’t eat for a day or two, there would be certain sensations in your body which are usually classified as hunger by normal humans.
• [Richard]: ‘The bodily sensation of an empty stomach is not what is usually classified as hunger by normal humans – and it does not take a day or two of not eating anyway but only a few hours – as what is usually classified by normal humans as hunger is a feeling of being hungry which arises from that sensation ... which feeling desists (in normal humans) when replaced by a feeling of satiety which arises from the sensation of a full stomach after having eaten.
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘This is certainly new to me.
• [Richard]: ‘Laboratory tests have shown that stimulation of the lateral nucleus of the hypothalamus (known as the ‘feeding centre’) activates feeding in animals – whereas lesions of the lateral nucleus abolish all desire to eat (aphagia) – and that stimulation of the ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus (aka the ‘satiety centre’) inhibits feeding ... whereas lesions of the ventromedial nucleus can lead to compulsive eating (hyperphagia).
Incidentally, it has been found that opiates also stimulate the ventromedial nucleus (hence the use of amphetamine for control of obesity)’.

RESPONDENT: And why this all-mighty trend to tackle the effects and not the causes when dealing with various problems?

RICHARD: To paraphrase my initial response in the original thread: the progenitor of compulsive eating – the glutton – has, of course, a vested interest in deflecting attention away from itself.

RESPONDENT: Is it because it is easier, they are more obvious or maybe because you’re left with no choice when the unpleasant effects arise?

RICHARD: You are indeed left with a choice (and at each moment again as well) ... to wit: not eating so much.

RESPONDENT: Richard, I was wondering if you have experientially noticed whether or not your body responds more favourably towards certain foods. It would seem common sense to me that if one is serious about becoming free one would want all the vitality possible in order to fuel this pursuit.

RICHARD: I have indeed noticed whether or not I respond more favourably towards certain foods (in terms of being able to have all the vitality possible in order to become actually free from the human condition) .... else I would never have written the following:

• [Richard]: ‘The words and writings promulgated and promoted by The Actual Freedom Trust explicate the workings of an actual freedom from the human condition and a virtual freedom in practice in the market place. There is no meditating in silence or living in a monastery shut away from the world. There are no celibacy or obedience requirements. There are *no dietary demands* or daily regimes of exercise. No one is excluded by age or racial or gender origins. There are no prescribed books to study ... upwards of maybe two million words are available [in the year 2000] for free on The Actual Freedom Web Page. There are no courses to follow or therapies to undergo or workshops to endure. There are no fees to pay or any clique to join ... there are no rules at all’. [emphasis added].

I expressly mentioned what provides all the vitality possible (‘energises’ = ‘vitalises’) only the day before you posted this e-mail I am responding to:

• [Richard]: ‘If there is no vital interest in peace-on-earth, or were that vital interest to fade away such that the pure intent to attain to one’s destiny dissipates, then the actualism method would fail, or begin to fail, like any other action done within the human condition as it is the end which energises the means (and which is why the means needs not to be dissimilar from the end) (...) the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago had that magic elixir (so to speak) by the bucket-load for the meaning of life had become stunningly apparent in that 1980 PCE which set the entire process in motion ... peace-on-earth is a fringe-benefit, a side-effect, of living in this actual world’.

And the following has been re-posted twice this week by others (‘vivacity’ = ‘vitality’):

• [Richard]: ‘(...) To live a virtual freedom one knowingly and deliberately imitates the actual inasmuch as is possible given that one is still human. It is the pure intent to ingenuously live the actual that imbues virtual freedom with its feeling of perfection and subsequent delight and joy. To be without this connection betwixt naiveté and the perfection of the infinitude of this very material universe, then any freedom loses its dynamism, its lustre, its brilliance, its vivacity ... ’.

RESPONDENT: One thing that I have found is it is indeed ‘pure intent’ that makes the difference between ‘stunning success’ and ‘so-so success’ in my practice of the actualism method.

RICHARD: The pure intent to ... to what?

RESPONDENT: Sometimes my intent is a bit grey.

RICHARD: Why is your intent sometimes a bit grey ... is it because of having lapsed from a [quote] ‘whole foods’ [endquote] diet into eating processed meat and pasteurised/homogenised dairy products (for instance) or is it because it has waned-declined and/or flagged-deteriorated and/or faded-degenerated and/or decayed-disappeared through the lack of having that ‘magic elixir’ (one’s destiny) inexorably drawing one on, like a moth to a candle, in the first place?

(...)

RESPONDENT: I am surprised that your body seemingly is equally vital, no matter what you ingest (that is what I gather from your above requotes).

RICHARD: I never said that I was equally vital (seemingly or otherwise) no matter what I ingest ... I was speaking in terms of an identity having [quote] ‘all the vitality possible’ [endquote], in order for an actual freedom from the human condition to come about, as I was answering your query to that very effect.

To explain: the identity in residence all those years ago had me ingest all manner of different diets (such as vegetarianism, veganism, and fruitarianism, for instance), in place of the common or garden variety of omnivorism prevalent in mainstream western societies, and it made absolutely no difference – none whatsoever – in regards to ‘him’ having [quote] ‘all the vitality possible’ [endquote] so as to bring about an actual freedom from the human condition for me.

In other words, ‘he’ could have put me on a bread-and-water diet (as in solitary confinement in some insalubrious penitentiary) and yet, because there was that ‘magic elixir’ energising the means, ‘he’ would still have had all the vitality necessary – bucket-loads of it in fact – in order for an actual freedom from the human condition to come about for me

Put simply: ‘you’ are not the body ‘you’ are inhabiting – never have been and never will be – despite any and all attempts to identify as same.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

P.S.: Just so that there is no misunderstanding:

• [Richard]: ‘I am having so much fun here at the keyboard. I have arrived at my destiny and am already always here (...).
• [Co-respondent]: ‘If you have arrived at your ‘destiny’ you should know that you have arrived at the height of your self-invented illusion.
• [Richard]: ‘May I ask? Are you of that school of thought that says that the journey is the thing ... that one never arrives?
• [Co-respondent]: ‘Destiny? What is that?
• [Richard]: ‘Destination, of course. Which is here ... now. Where one is living at this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space one is experiencing the purity and perfection of the infinitude of this very actual universe. One is this universe’s experience of itself as a sensate and reflective human being. This is one’s destiny’.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

RICHARD: (...) it is impossible to either imagine or form images where there is no identity (the affective faculty in its entirety – which includes its imaginative/intuitive facility – has no existence whatsoever in this flesh and blood body).

RESPONDENT: This is what I don’t understand: What does imagination have to do with intuition or affective feelings?

RICHARD: First of all, where I say ‘imaginative’ I am not meaning conceptive and where I say ‘intuitive’ I am not meaning insightful ... plus where I say ‘the affective faculty’ I am not referring to only the affective feelings but all of it in its entirety (complete with its epiphenomenal psychic ability).

Indeed, by ‘the affective faculty in its entirety’ I am referring, all-inclusively, to the human psyche itself.

Here in this actual world, where there is no psyche, the ability to imagine/envision/hallucinate is non-existent (the difference between imagination and hallucination is a difference in degree and not of kind) ... just as the facility of believing, of being delusional, is not extant either.

*

RESPONDENT No. 94: Do you experience hunger?

RICHARD: No (all appetitive desires are null and void).

RESPONDENT: If you don’t eat for a day or two, there would be certain sensations in your body which are usually classified as hunger by normal humans.

RICHARD: The bodily sensation of an empty stomach is not what is usually classified as hunger by normal humans – and it does not take a day or two of not eating anyway but only a few hours – as what is usually classified by normal humans as hunger is a feeling of being hungry which arises from that sensation ... which feeling desists (in normal humans) when replaced by a feeling of satiety which arises from the sensation of a full stomach after having eaten.

RESPONDENT: This is certainly new to me.

RICHARD: Laboratory tests have shown that stimulation of the lateral nucleus of the hypothalamus (known as the ‘feeding centre’) activates feeding in animals – whereas lesions of the lateral nucleus abolish all desire to eat (aphagia) – and that stimulation of the ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus (aka the ‘satiety centre’) inhibits feeding ... whereas lesions of the ventromedial nucleus can lead to compulsive eating (hyperphagia).

Incidentally, it has been found that opiates also stimulate the ventromedial nucleus (hence the use of amphetamine for control of obesity).

*

RICHARD: I have quite often gone without food for twenty four hours or more yet have never, ever, experienced hunger.

RESPONDENT: Okay, what did you experience?

RICHARD: In terms of the hunger-satiety pleasure/pain complex ... nothing.

RESPONDENT: If your blood sugar level goes down due to a 24 hour (or more) long fast, would you not feel (or experience) weakness ...

RICHARD: On those occasions where I have gone without food for twenty four hours or more, without ever experiencing hunger, I have not experienced weakness.

RESPONDENT: ... some kind of nausea ...

RICHARD: On those occasions where I have gone without food for twenty four hours or more, without ever experiencing hunger, I have not experienced some kind of nausea.

RESPONDENT: ... certain sensations in the gut which indicate an emptiness ...

RICHARD: The bodily sensation of an empty stomach occurs within a few hours.

RESPONDENT: ... certain acidity which indicates non-use of the digestive secretions etc.?

RICHARD: Having no pleasure/pain centre to be triggered no complex mechanism involving glucose, fats, amino acids, and so on, in plasma has been able to induce a feeling of hunger via the lateral nucleus of this brain’s hypothalamus (nor satiation via the ventromedial nucleus either).

RESPONDENT: Why classify only the affective feeling of hunger as hunger?

RICHARD: Mainly because the bodily sensation of an empty stomach is not what is usually classified as hunger by normal humans – what is usually classified by normal humans as hunger is a feeling of being hungry which arises from that sensation – which feeling desists (in normal humans) when replaced by a feeling of satiety which arises from the sensation of a full stomach after having eaten.

*

RESPONDENT: Appetitive desires are something different.

RICHARD: On the contrary, hunger *is* an appetitive desire.

RESPONDENT: I’m not at all sure.

RICHARD: Here is what a dictionary has to say about the word ‘appetitive’:

• ‘appetitive: characterised by appetite [a desire to satisfy a natural need, esp. for food or for sexual pleasure; an instinctive craving; capacity for food, sexual activity, etc.]’. (Oxford Dictionary).

As my co-respondent asked me about experiencing hunger immediately after enquiring about sexual libido (from the Latin meaning ‘desire’, ‘lust’) there was no reason to assume they were wanting to know if this flesh and blood body still experienced the bodily sensation of an empty stomach.

‘Twould be a rather trivial question, no?

RESPONDENT (to Vineeto): I have written this in my diary this morning and was wondering if you could show it to Richard to see if his interpretation of AF is the same: ‘... there are 3 things that I can be compared with a computer in terms of my functioning: [1] When I am asleep, my senses are on HIBERNATE and take a longer time to come online. [2] When I am awake and not thinking then my senses are on STANDBY. [3] When I am functioning and doing a task because of discomfort of the body, or out of necessity, then my senses are ON. And my hypothesis is when my senses are off – either they are not functioning (e.g. to be blind) or I am dead. The only thing is that to get from STANDBY to ON is only necessary when I need something’.

RICHARD: Your analogy, of a computer’s power-saving modes, is not all that much assistance in conveying how you are currently functioning as the only essential difference between ‘off’ and ‘hibernate’ (for a computer) is what transpires after the computer is manually switched back on – to either the default desk-top or to the desk-top as it was (with previously selected programmes running) – and the only difference between ‘on’ and ‘standby’ is that some devices (such as monitors and hard disks) are switched off, by the absence of key-stokes/mouse-movements, until being switched back on by a key-stoke/ mouse-movement.

Furthermore, whether awake or asleep, thinking or not thinking, the senses are functioning anyway – all it takes to bring this flesh and blood body into wakefulness, when asleep, is an unexpected/ unusual touch (the cutaneal sense), or smell (the olfactory sense), or sound (the aural sense), or light (the ocular sense), or taste (the gustatory sense), or posture (the proprioceptive senses) – so it does not follow that the senses can be hibernating, standing-by, or switching-on ... they are always on, so to speak, for as long as a body is alive and not dead.

Thus it would appear that what you are referring to, via your computer analogy (it is not entirely unhelpful), is the processing of sensation – be it either cutaneous, ocular, aural, olfactory, gustatory, or proprioceptive sensation – in terms of such processing being deliberated evaluation (for whatever reason) ... and (1) while asleep such an appraisal is in suspension and, for you at least, takes longer to be mobilised than (2) when awake but inactive and thoughtless (where such purposeful assessment is also in suspension) ... whereas (3) when you are active (as in performing a task) and thoughtful (as distinct from thoughtless activity), it is, of course, concurrently in action.

*

I have read through the remainder of your e-mail, which Vineeto forwarded to me, and in regards to where you asked if I would sit, with eyes closed, touching a porcelain cup without thought operating (so as to provide a comparison with what occurred when you did likewise) I can provide the following information:

1. It is quite the norm for this flesh and blood body that, on a daily basis, thought is often not operating – I tend to call it ‘mind in neutral’> – yet apperception (the mind’s perception of itself) still occurs regardless.
2. To close the eyes is to mask but one of the senses – touch, smell, taste, hearing, and proprioception, remain unmasked – thus, at the very least, subliminal processing of those sensations is still occurring and, consequently, a below-the-threshold-of-conscious-awareness sensitivity of being alive right here, in space, just now, in time, is in operation.
3. To sit, thoughtless, touching a porcelain cup (presumably only with a fingertip) is to be cutaneously feeling something, even though it is not being recognised, just as the (seated) buttocks and thighs are also cutaneously feeling something – if only pressure – therefore it cannot be faithfully said, without dissociating, that there are no sensations/ that there is no experience.

Although all there is to go by is what you chose to write, and given you did report that you could not tell [quote] ‘that there were sensations’ [endquote] and that [quote] ‘there was no experience’ [endquote], there is sufficient indication that dissociation *was* taking place and, moreover, as you also report you felt that you were not different from anything in the whole universe – not in terms of material but in terms of something indescribable – it is more than likely that some trance-like affective state of being was occurring.

It is not, therefore, at all surprising that you then go on to write about how you are not sure that Richard saying he is the body is actually it.

Whereas, where any affective being whatsoever is absent – either in abeyance in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) or extinct upon an actual freedom from the human condition – it is patently obvious that what one is (‘what’ not ‘who’) is the flesh and blood body being apperceptively aware ... whether thought is operating or not.

And, as a flesh and blood body is not separate from that which it forms itself with, one is the infinite and eternal and perpetual universe experiencing itself apperceptively ... as such it is stunningly aware of its own infinitude.

And this is truly wonderful.

RESPONDENT: What interests me most about this ‘condition’ is how life is actually experienced. In your case, you have expressed some hints about the bodily functioning. You say that you have no libido, yet you can engage in sex. The obvious question arises: Do you become ‘aroused’ without any mental component (i.e. do you find yourself with an erection when a partner expresses some desire to engage in sex) or what?

RICHARD: Here in this actual world it is impossible to ever be hedonic as the affective pleasure/pain centre in the brain – as in the pleasure/pain principle which spiritualism makes quite an issue out of yet never does eliminate – is null and void.

You may find the following self-explanatory:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Is it correct to say that ‘actual sex’ is non-erotic?
• [Richard]: ‘As the word ‘erotic’ usually means ‘of or pertaining to sexual love; amatory, esp. tending to arouse sexual desire’ (Oxford Dictionary) ... yes; where the word ‘erotic’ means erogenous – ‘of a part of the body: sensitive to sexual stimulation; capable of giving sexual pleasure when touched or stroked’ (Oxford Dictionary) – then ... no’.

And:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘... if you are making sex where come these erections, out of the blue?
• [Richard]: ‘No, engorgement of the genitals comes from tactile stimulation’.

RESPONDENT: Do the sensations of sexual congress have a different quality than previously in the entity state?

RICHARD: As sensations are physical they are no different than when an identity inhabited this flesh and blood body all those years ago ... the experience of same, being direct, is vastly different.

RESPONDENT: Would the idea of masturbation ever arise?

RICHARD: Having lived with a female companion since 1992 there has been no occasion where, being but a substitute for the real thing, it would ... there is (presumably) no reason why it would not, though, were the situation to be different.

RESPONDENT: Do you experience hunger?

RICHARD: No (all appetitive desires are null and void).

RESPONDENT: When you eat do you have preferences in food?

RICHARD: If there be a choice ... yes.

RESPONDENT: When it is time to go to sleep do you ‘feel’ sleepy?

RICHARD: No ... sleepiness as an actuality indicates that it be time for sleep.

RESPONDENT: Or do you experience sleeping as a restful but ‘awake’ state (i.e. awareness never sleeps)?

RICHARD: No ... to sleep is to be unconscious.

RESPONDENT: Do you dream?

RICHARD: No (there is only unconsciousness).

RESPONDENT: Do sights and smells have an intensity greater than in the self state?

RICHARD: As sights and smells are physical they are no different than when an identity inhabited this flesh and blood body all those years ago ... the experience of same, being direct, is vastly different.

RESPONDENT: Do certain smells ever ‘remind’ you of a past experience?

RICHARD: Yes ... this flesh and blood body has a lifetime of physical memories.

RESPONDENT: Do you ever experience any revulsion with either taste, smell or other sensory experience (i.e. does dog shit stink)?

RICHARD: No ... revulsion/ repugnance (disgust) disappeared right along with desire (allurement/ enticement).

RESPONDENT: Richard, you have said that caffeinated coffee sets off a psychotropic experience for you. Can you elaborate please?

RICHARD: As I understand it, and I am not a pharmacologist, caffeine is a chemical cousin to cocaine (having never ingested the latter I cannot provide an experiential comparison) in that its chemical sum formula is similar:

• caffeine: (chem.) a crystalline alkaloid, C8H10N4O2, which is found esp. in tea and coffee plants and is a central nervous system stimulant; caffeinism: n. headache, sleeplessness, and palpitations caused by excessive intake of caffeine.
• cocaine: an alkaloid, C17H21NO4, which is present in the leaves and other parts of the coca shrub and is used as a local anaesthetic and as a stimulant; cocainism: n. (the condition due to) excessive use of or addiction to cocaine. (Oxford Dictionary).

A psychiatrist (who, unlike a psychologist, has a medical degree) once explained to me that my on-going day-to-day experience is because of an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors – similar to the effect cocaine or amphetamine or lysergic acid diethylamide produce – hence my understanding is that to ingest caffeine on top of this moment-to-moment experiencing is somewhat similar to overdosing on those substances ... primarily the main symptom is a saturated sensuosity of such brilliance and vividity (as in psychedelic), which satiation can be likened to a television set receiving 4 or 5 channels all at once (inasmuch thought, and thus speech, is unable to keep up with the resultant cacophonic ‘white noise’), that the brain cells themselves undergo a non-volitional (chemical) excitation of such a magnitude as to be almost impossible for awareness to sustain itself (as in too much to bear).

It is altogether unpleasant, to say the least.

Some peoples I have spoken to about this have initially been rather envious (given that having a cup or two of strong java, then, is the equivalent of dropping a tab of acid (or snorting a line of coke) until I explain that to OD on LSD (aka ‘have a bad trip’) on maybe a thrice-daily basis is not a particularly pleasant way of living a life.

As I have not taken either amphetamine nor methamphetamine, which are also classified as central nervous system (CNS) stimulants, I cannot make an experiential comparison there either but I have read, for example, that methylphenidate (such as ‘Ritalin’) – also a CNS stimulant – is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor ... which means that it increases the level of the dopamine neurotransmitter in the brain by partially blocking the transporters that remove it from the synapses. Consequently I have found the following to be of interest as I am also hypersensitive to adrenaline:

• dopamine: an amine that occurs esp. in nervous and peripheral tissue as a neurotransmitter and a precursor of noradrenaline, adrenalin, and melanin. (Oxford Dictionary).

Here is an example of what dopamine can do in a normal person:

• Dopamine in the basal ganglia plays a critical role in the way our brain controls our movements. Thus, shortage of dopamine is a cause of Parkinson’s disease, in which a person loses the ability to execute smooth, controlled movements. In the frontal lobes, dopamine plays a role in controlling the flow of information from other areas of the brain. Dopamine disorders in the frontal lobes can cause incoherent thought and even schizophrenia. One of the most effective treatments for schizophrenia is the use of antipsychotic drugs which act as antagonists at dopamine D2 receptors. Shortage of dopamine in the frontal lobes may lead to poor memory. Dopamine also acts in the limbic system, which controls our emotions. Overabundance of dopamine in the limbic system is believed to cause paranoia. In addition, dopamine is involved in the chemistry of pleasure. Release of dopamine into that part of the limbic system known as the ‘pleasure centre’ (an area just below the thalamus) causes pleasure. Although meant to reward vital activities such as eating and sex, this same mechanism is responsible for the craving connected with addiction to drugs, cocaine for example. Dopamine is also a hormone released by the hypothalamus. Its main function is to inhibit the release of prolactin from the anterior lobe of the pituitary. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dopamine).

As there are no emotions/passions operating in this flesh and blood body – no affective faculty at all – there is no ‘pleasure centre’ (which should read ‘pleasure/pain centre’) for dopamine to act upon hedonistically ... thus there is no craving whatsoever such as to occasion addiction.

RESPONDENT: Is this true for all humans?

RICHARD: Not that I am cognisant of ... the normal symptoms of caffeine intoxication are restlessness, nervousness, excitement, insomnia, flushed face, diuresis, gastrointestinal complaints, muscle twitching, rambling flow of thought and speech, cardiac arrhythmia, and psychomotor agitation.

• Caffeine (...) causes the release of the hormone epinephrine, which in turn leads to several effects such as higher heart rate, increased blood pressure, increased blood flow to muscles, decreased blood flow to the skin and inner organs, and release of glucose by the liver. In addition, caffeine, similar to amphetamines, increases the levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain. (...) Caffeine intoxication can lead to symptoms similar to panic disorder and generalized anxiety disorder. (http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine).

Some years ago, whilst undergoing caffeine intoxication, I attended an out-patients clinic and had all the vital signs tested – blood pressure, pulse rate, and so on – all of which were found to be normal and nor were there any palpitations, agitations, and so on, either ... let alone anxiety and/or panic.

Caffeine, of course, is also present in brewed tea (2.5-3.5mg per ounce), cocoa/hot chocolate (0.5mg per ounce), caffeinated soft drinks (3-8mg per ounce), Guarana, (2.5mg per ounce), Yerba Mate (280-425mg per ounce), sports/energy drinks (10mg per ounce), and chocolate (25mg per ounce) ... and, as a matter of interest only, chocolate is very mildly psychoactive since, as well as caffeine, it contains theobromine, tryptophan, and small quantities of anandamide (arachidonylethanolamine), an endogenous cannabinoid compound found in the brain of mammals (the name anandamide is taken from the Sanskrit word ananda, which means ‘bliss’).

An affective reaction, in other words, is the main attraction.

RESPONDENT: Richard, regarding the cerebral agitation you experienced after waking up from enlightenment: Was it caused by excess dopamine ...

RICHARD: Yes (although I do not describe it as waking up).

RESPONDENT: ... or was it caused by not knowing how to interpret what had happened to ‘you’?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: Did the elevated dopamine subside to a more manageable level over 2 years ...

RICHARD: Yes.

RESPONDENT: ... or did the agitation quickly subside when you were able to make sense of what had happened?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: I remember(?) reading that you experienced something like this in 1981, but it was only a passing reference. Have you written about it in detail?

RICHARD: Yes.

RESPONDENT: If so, where can I read about it?

RICHARD: Here is one instance:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘... what ‘process’ was going on for six months in 1981 and thirty months in 1993-4 when you were ‘unstable as all get out’?
• [Richard]: ‘The medical diagnosis was that there was an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors ... an excitation of the brain cells, which was happening of its own accord irregardless of events, and thus not under voluntary control.
These days I am in agreement with that determination as some considerable light was thrown upon it all a few years ago when I drank three cups of strong coffee (I only drink decaffeinated coffee nowadays) in a two-hour period and it set-off a psychotropic episode lasting 5-6 hours ... an episode indistinguishable from what was occurring in 1981 and 1993-1994.
I have since found out that caffeine is a chemical cousin to cocaine (chemical not biological) ... and, as a similar episode occurred a couple of years ago as a result of having a dental injection to anaesthetise the jaw, I now make sure the dentist uses a procaine mixture which does not contain adrenaline, which most such mixtures do, because its effect is also psychotropic.
I am also hypersensitive to alcohol ... even a liqueur chocolate has a deleterious effect.

Before the incident with the caffeine overdose here is an example of how I described the 1993-94 experience:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘How did you experience the mental anguish from the perspective of actual freedom?
• [Richard]: ‘As a severe cerebral agitation ... it all happened only in the brain cells. There was perfect sensate experiencing: the direct, startlingly intimate sensuousness of the eyes seeing, the ears hearing, the skin feeling, the nose smelling and the tongue tasting all of their own accord (deliciously unfettered by a ‘me’ or an ‘I’) yet the cognitive faculty was face-to-face with the stark fact that it had been living a deluded dissociative state for eleven years ... and that religion – fuelled by its spirituality and mysticism – was nothing short of institutionalised insanity. That this disconcerting perplexity was only cerebral was evidenced by no sweaty palms, no increased heartbeat, no rapid breathing, no palpations in the solar plexus ... none of those things connected with the existential angst of being a contingent ‘being’. If I were to look in a mirror during that period and ask ‘who am I’ there was no answer – not even ‘the silence that speaks louder than words’ that had been experienced for eleven years – yet the answer to ‘what am I’ was patently obvious and undeniable ... I am this flesh and blood body.
In psychiatric terms the neurons were agitated: energised and excited with an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors, described as being similar to the effect of amphetamines, cocaine or LSD ... yet nothing could be done about it with psychiatry’s extensive arsenal of anti-psychotic drugs. Initially I had no alternative but to seek resolution in terms of either ‘the known’ (psychiatry) and/or ‘the unknown’ (mysticism) ... and I knew from eleven years experience that no mystic could be of any assistance whatsoever. I was truly on my own. The mental anguish was in determining the validity of uncharted territory – 5,000 years of recorded history and perhaps 50,000 years of oral tradition made no mention of this dimension of human experience – for I was irreversibly plunked fair-square in the midst of either ‘insanity’ (the psychiatric model) or ‘the unknowable’ (the metaphysical model) ... which is something else entirely. In the context of metaphysical human experience this condition is only achievable after physical death: the Buddhists call it ‘Parinirvana’ and the Hindus call it ‘Mahasamadhi’. (...).
It was extremely uncomfortable and very disconcerting, perplexing and bewildering. It was also distressing for my companion and caused considerable disturbance in her ... she was a constant witness to my endeavour to come to grips with what had happened and what was going on. Despite the fact she was a qualified nursing sister this was beyond her ken and altogether too much to handle in the first few months. I must emphasise the immediacy and urgency of the dilemma: how could I be right and 5.8 billion peoples then currently alive (and maybe 4.0 billion once living) be wrong? This was an outrageous supposition to contemplate – as I remarked in my previous E-Mail I thought that I had lost the plot – yet all about people were hurting and being hurt: bickering, quarrelling, arguing, fighting and then applying band-aid solutions such as the cycle of guilt, remorse, repentance, forgiveness, empathy, trust, compassion through to love ... until next time.
There were all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides and the such-like to account for ... and all the Gurus and the God-Men, the Masters and the Messiahs, the Avatars and the Saviours, and the Saints and the Sages and the Seers, did not have peace-on-earth on their agenda. Obviously someone had to be the first ... and this fact was thrilling to the nth degree. It meant that an actual freedom from the human condition, here on earth in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body had been discovered and could be demonstrated and described ... no one else need ever take that route again (and I would not wish upon anyone to have to follow in my footsteps and run that full gamut of existential angst to break through to what lay beyond).

And before the incident with the caffeine overdose here is an example of how I described the 1981 experience:

• [Richard]: ‘I had a constant pressure-pain in the base of my skull for six months after my 1981 experience (and for thirty months after my 1992 experience). This pressure-pain waxed and waned in intensity and would produce a convulsive jerking of my left leg for periods varying from five minutes to an hour. I have had flashing lights ‘zapping’ in front of my eyes; I have had ‘rushes’ of energy surging up through my diaphragm; I have had intense tingling sensations on the surface of my skin; I have had liquid sounds ‘gurgling’ through my brain; I have had singing in my ears; I have been telepathic; I have been telemetric; I have accessed the ‘Akashic Record’; I have ... the list goes on and on.
They all amount to nothing in the end – they are but physical, emotional, mental and psychic adumbrations that indicate merely that a ‘process’ is going on. It is important to not get hung up on these manifestations and to go with what is happening to the very end.

I see that I expanded upon this list in an e-mail to you last month:

• [Richard]: ‘... I had many bizarre things happen such as electrical bolts of lightning dazzling on the eyeballs; pressure-pains in the base of the neck; surges of power travelling up the spine and up over the back and the top of the head down to the forehead; convulsive twitching of limbs; energy surges from the pit of the stomach up through the diaphragm into the chest cavity through to the throat producing intense nausea; a vivid blue light, an internal blue of rapturous bliss, behind the eyebrows; an all-knowing cyclopean eye in the sky watching my every move and many, many other weird things – none of which are important in themselves (some people get caught up in them, and manifest psychic powers, thus never proceeding to the final goal) as what is important is to take them only as a sign that a process is underway and thus proceed with all dispatch via one’s active consent.

Given the part dopamine plays in the chemistry of felicitous feelings you may find the following to be of related interest:

• [Richard]: ‘... What the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom is on about is a virtual freedom wherein the ‘good’ feelings – the affectionate and desirable emotions and passions (those that are loving and trusting) are minimised along with the ‘bad’ feelings – the hostile and invidious emotions and passions (those that are hateful and fearful) – so that one is free to be feeling good, feeling happy and harmless and feeling excellent/perfect for 99% of the time. If one deactivates the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ feelings and activates the felicitous/ innocuous feelings (happiness, delight, joie de vivre/ bonhomie, friendliness, amiability and so on) with this freed-up affective energy, in conjunction with sensuousness (delectation, enjoyment, appreciation, relish, zest, gusto and so on), then the ensuing sense of amazement, marvel and wonder can result in apperceptiveness (unmediated perception).
Delight is what is humanly possible, given sufficient pure intent obtained from the felicity/ innocuity born of the pure consciousness experience, and from the position of delight, one can vitalise one’s joie de vivre by the amazement at the fun of it all ... and then one can – with sufficient abandon – become over-joyed and move into marvelling at being here and doing this business called being alive now. Then one is no longer intuitively making sense of life ... the delicious wonder of it all drives any such instinctive meaning away. Such luscious wonder fosters the innate condition of naiveté – the nourishing of which is essential if fascination in it all is to occur – and the charm of life itself easily engages dedication to peace-on-earth. Then, as one gazes intently at the world about by glancing lightly with sensuously caressing eyes, out of the corner of one’s eye comes – sweetly – the magical fairy-tale-like paradise that this verdant earth actually is ... and one is the experiencing of what is happening.
But refrain from possessing it and making it your own ... or else ‘twill vanish as softly as it appeared.

RESPONDENT: Richard, I recall you having mentioned once that you were in need of very little sleep. After a certain point you said that at times you were just ‘dozing off’ with the remote control still in your hand. As you also mentioned that usually a ‘sleeping break’ would last not longer then some 5-6 hours, it seems to be correct to conclude that you have a not so conventional so to speak ‘biorhythm’. I.e. you might fall asleep at 3 ‘clock in the afternoon to wake up at say 8’ clock in the evening to next ‘doze off’ 1 o’clock at night and then wake up again at 6/7 o’clock in the early morning next day and so on. Is this a more or less accurate description of how you ‘cycle’ throughout the week/month/year?

RICHARD: No ... I have previously said I sleep 3-4 hours per night: if I were to fall asleep at 3.00 PM and wake at 8.00 PM, as in your example, then that would be it for the next twenty four hours or so ... I would still be awake, not only at 1.00 AM and through to 6.00 AM, but for the remainder of that day (sleep being a circadian rhythm).

As for dozing off in front of the television: apart from it being typical, as one gets older, to nap during the day dozing off during a non-interactive event has been a feature throughout my life ... I would fall asleep during an educational movie as a child at school; I would nod off at the movies as a youth (I had to watch ‘Lawrence Of Arabia’ five times to see all of it for example); I would drop off during an art film as a young adult in college; I would sleep through many a television programme in my thirties and forties.

It is an idiosyncrasy of this flesh and blood body ... and it is for reasons such as this that I would like to read about/hear about another flesh and blood body (not some hypothetical/fictitious entity) that is also free from the human condition so as to compare notes and more reliably determine what is common to the species at large.

RESPONDENT: I’m asking this because as I understand it is commonly understood that sleep is a means to re-vitalize the body such as that it is enabled to get to work in order to sustain the flesh and blood body (aka supplying it the necessary nutrients and liquids; as it appears to be fairly dependent on those).

RICHARD: My experience – with nightly sleep being the average 8 hours or so per day back when both normal and abnormal – shows that the emotional/passional identity consumes an inordinate amount of calorific energy ... so much so that only 3-4 hours (sometimes 4-5 hours) of sleep are needed for revitalisation these days.

RESPONDENT: Lately I have considered: what if – though this ‘waking-state’ is assumed to in someway a person to provide the <reason/ meaning/ goal> for life it is not. And thus that perhaps <reason/ meaning/ goal> for life actually may only become apparent while sleeping.

RICHARD: As sleep is indistinguishable from unconsciousness for me (I once had a general anaesthesia as a youth so I can compare) then the ‘<reason/ meaning/ goal> for life’ could only be oblivion under your proposition.

RESPONDENT: I wonder if in your case actualism is a form of ‘sleeping’ with both eyes open, while dreaming you have a ball behind the key-board? Naturally this dreaming is a 180 degree opposite of what is generally considered to be such activity.

RICHARD: Ha ... you mean I am going to wake-up one day, in an abandoned cow-paddock 10 kilometres northwest of here, and find I am still enlightened and have been dreaming, for this last eleven years, that it is possible to be actually free from the human condition? If so, why not have it that I am going to wake-up, in an old farm house 2,000 kilometres to the south of here, and find that I am still normal and that it was all a dream?

Better yet: why not go the whole hog and have it that at physical death I will wake-up and find that I am ‘Brahma’ dreaming I am a flesh and blood body and the universe does not actually exist?

RESPONDENT: [Would you have claimed to be] free from concepts, illusions and delusions [during this 30+ months]?

RICHARD: Free from illusion and delusion ... yes; concepts are another matter, however, as many of them were fed in from an early age (the sun, for instance, being a giant ball of nuclear fusion ... or, for another example, tobacco use being the cause of various illnesses).

RESPONDENT: You took time to evaluate these concepts in that duration then?

RICHARD: No ... it did not occur to me it was a concept, and not a fact, that the sun was a giant ball of nuclear fusion until about five years ago; it did not occur to me it was a concept, and not a fact, that tobacco use was the cause of various illnesses until about two years ago (which is why I said that concepts are another matter).

Incidentally, there are many other factoids masquerading as facts ... those two are but examples.

*

RESPONDENT: And if done, though they [MRI or relevant brain scans] haven’t located the self, would you think you will be aiding the research?

RICHARD: In what way would a brain scan be an aid ... and an aid to what? For example: what do you mean by ‘relevant’ and what do you mean by ‘the research’ (as in relevant to what specific research)? I only ask because, as far as I have been able to ascertain, nobody has ever contemplated – let alone conducted research – on there even being a possibility of becoming actually free from the human condition ... it is a blank area in human consideration (let alone in human experience/human history).

RESPONDENT: Maybe measure the amygdala activity?

RICHARD: Presuming there is any such activity to measure ... in what way would that be an aid (and an aid to what research)?

RESPONDENT: As a supplement to the conjecture that the amygdala (the reptilian brain or the limbic system) is the source of the psychic self?

RICHARD: As no researchers, for all of their RI scans (Radio Isotope), CAT scans (Computerised Axial Tomography), CT scans (Computed Tomography), NMR scans (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance), PET scans (Positron Emission Tomography), MRA scans (Magnetic Resonance Angiography), MRI scans (Magnetic Resonance Imaging), and fMRI scans (functioning Magnetic Resonance Imaging), have been able to locate either ‘I’ as ego (the psychological self) or ‘me’ as soul (the psychic self) in what way will any such scans of the amygdalae in a person sans both the psychological self and the psychic self be a supplement to any such conjecture?

In other words: as no self has been located with such scans how will those same scans determine the absence of a self?

RESPONDENT: And an actual freedom from the human condition results in a reduced amygdala activity or even ends it?

RICHARD: If I may ask? Why the focus upon the amygdalae (two almond-shaped organs in from and just to the back of and below the ears) when I specifically report that the pressure-pain happened in the base of the brain/nape of the neck?

*

RESPONDENT: I don’t know much about the scans, but I thought since you are a singular case, some such measurements can provide some pointers to those (just like the brain circuitry examples in the writings).

RICHARD: Presuming there is any such measurement-pointers to those (presumed) activities ... in what way would that be an aid (and an aid to what research)?

RESPONDENT: Furthering the neuroscientific basis for the actual freedom and the diagnosis of the ills of the humankind?

RICHARD: Presuming there is any such measurement-pointers to those (presumed) activities of the amygdala: in what way would that (a) further what neuro-scientific basis for an actual freedom from the human condition ... and (b) further the diagnosis of the ills of the humankind?

I only ask because, as far as I have been able to ascertain, nobody has ever contemplated – let alone conducted neuro-scientific research – on there even being a possibility of becoming actually free from the human condition ... it is a blank area in human consideration (let alone in human experience/human history).

*

RESPONDENT: Do you think comparing scans of normal being like myself with yours reveal useful information?

RICHARD: Again ... in what way would such a comparison reveal useful information? Or, to put that another way, what is it that you know about ‘MRI or relevant brain scans’ which prompts you to ask these questions? What I have found, when people ask this question/suggest this course of action (including the professional already mentioned), is that they know very little about what brain scans can or cannot reveal ... if anything at all.

RESPONDENT: I am not sure of what use they might be ... just thought that as a supplement to the DSM IV, maybe.

RICHARD: The DSM-IV (the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders – fourth edition – the diagnostic criteria used by all psychiatrists and psychologists around the world for diagnosing mental disorders) is only about illness, not wellness.

RESPONDENT: Yes, viewed from the normalcy, it appears to be an illness; but the scans are objective data which can show an objective difference between a ‘normal’ brain and a brain that has transformed itself radically.

RICHARD: And just what ‘objective difference’ would that be you are referring to? Or, to put that another way, what is it that you know about brain scans which prompts you to make such a statement?

What I have found, when people make these statements/suggest these courses of action (including the professional already mentioned), is that they know very little about what brain scans can or cannot reveal ... if anything at all.

*

RESPONDENT: Just to take a snapshot with all those parameters alpha, beta etc. Maybe in the future there might be enough understanding to make sense of the data.

RICHARD: Make some sense of the (presumed) data for what purpose, though?

RESPONDENT: At this stage, it is simply curiosity.

RICHARD: I see ... I am to have all manner of brain scans so as to satisfy the curiosity of someone writing to me on the internet, eh?

RESPONDENT: The purpose to make sense of the data is what exactly has happened to Richard’s brain using the neuroscientific knowledge we have now.

RICHARD: I will ask it again for emphasis: as no self has been located with any brain scan how will such brain scans determine the absence of a self?

RESPONDENT: As such, only your subjective experience of the pain which tells you that something happened in the brain.

RICHARD: Not in the brain ... in the brain-stem (situated at the base of the brain/nape of the neck).

RESPONDENT: What exactly has happened will only be revealed by measurement, no?

RICHARD: What exactly has happened is that both an illusion (the psychological self) and a delusion (the psychic self) no longer hold sway in this flesh and blood body ... in what way can objective brain scans reveal the absence of a subjective illusion/delusion?

RESPONDENT: What has changed subjectively since then, we have your report.

RICHARD: Aye ... and a very detailed report it is: it is so detailed that anybody actively recalling a pure consciousness experience (PCE) knows ... um ... exactly what it is that I am reporting.

RESPONDENT: Just probing ... with curiosity.

RICHARD: Let me sketch out a scenario for you: I make an appointment with a local doctor (called a GP in Australia) in this seaside village I currently reside in and when the GP asks how they can help me I explain that someone writing to me on the internet wants me to have various brain scans done, which they neither not know much about nor are sure what use they will be, so as to satisfy their curiosity ... and when the GP asks me what the person writing to me on the internet is curious about, and I say that person wants objective proof of my report that both the illusory psychological self and the delusory psychic self no longer hold sway in this flesh and blood body, do you really think the GP is going to refer me to a specialist so that all manner of expensive brain scans can be made for you to look at and somehow (as yet unexplained) make sense of all the (supposed) data?