Actual Freedom – A Request from Konrad Swart

Personhood exists in two forms. You can have the ‘I’, and you can have the ‘Self’. The ‘I’ can be defined by ‘that part of the self that is at any particular moment the source of the actions’. The ‘Self’ is the source of all actions.

Your own Self is not experienced as a ‘person’, but is experienced as ‘World’. It is as J. Krishnamurti has said, only he has not said it clear enough. What you experience as ‘the world’, somebody else experiences as your ‘personality’, your ‘Self’. Look at you. If somebody else would describe you, then he would say: ‘Richard is that fellow who bases his entire life on actuality and fact. (not fact(s), but fact. ‘Facts are not ideological, but ‘fact’, as a general abstract term designating all and any facts is.)

Both Osho Rajneesh and J. Krishnamurti share ‘the big mistake of the East’, namely that your ‘Person’, your ‘Self’ is the source of all evil, and should be eliminated. It is the big mistake of the East, that has caused many countries following Hinduism and Buddhism and all spin-offs to become poor. For if you ‘eliminate the self’ you eliminate all of your capabilities. And with it you destroy your capability of the creation of value. And that causes poverty. The ‘elimination of the self’ is the big mistake not only of J. Krishnamurti and Osho Rajneesh alone. No, it is the big mistake of the East in general.

Now the interesting thing is this: J. Krishnamurti was able to see from his ‘Being’, which is just another name for ‘consciousness’ his ‘Self’. He could therefore see that the ‘Self’ is just another name for ‘The World’, seen from a different perspective. And since ‘The World’ is full of war, violence, crime, misery etc., he has given a ‘description’ of a ‘new state of consciousness’ from which you can ‘eliminate’ the Self.

The same applies to Osho Rajneesh. Only he worded it differently. J. Krishnamurti used the language of the psychologist, while Osho Rajneesh used the language of religion.

Now the thing that has puzzled me about both of them from the beginning was: ‘if they indeed have succeeded in eliminating ‘personhood’, as they claim, how come they are able to give such precise descriptions of how the ‘Self’, the ‘I’ functions? If they have succeeded in eliminating it years ago, then would it not be more likely that they had completely forgotten about all of the negative things about the ‘Self’? But no, they were able to describe it in much detail up to the moment of their deaths.

The only explanation that makes sense to me is: ‘they have not succeeded in eliminating the ‘Self’, despite their conviction of having achieved that’. Anybody who is able to describe the functioning of the ‘Self’ in detail is able to do this, because the Self is very much alive, present, and kicking.

And then you can ask: what particular form do their ‘Selves’ have? Realizing that the ‘Self’ manifests itself to any individual as the ‘World’ answers this. Their description of ‘the world’ is their ‘Self’. But this means, that any verbal description of the ‘world’ is in fact an ideology.

This brings me to U.G. U.G. did not have ‘the process’. Something else has happened to him. He has taken over the ‘Self’ of J. Krishnamurti. Not only that, he has brought it to its logical extreme and final conclusion, something J. Krishnamurti did not do, because he could, from ‘the process’ see the functioning of his ‘Self’. J. Krishnamurti restricted his ‘actions’ to the description of that what was happening inside of him. In other words, although you can take the descriptions of J. Krishnamurti, and change them into an ideology, this is not what J. Krishnamurti did. But U.G., not being ‘hindered’ by a process, went to a conversion, and his ‘Self’ became identical with that of J. Krishnamurti, but then without ‘the process’ being part of it.

This brings me to you. I think you are the U.G. of Osho Rajneesh. You have taken over the ‘Self’ of Osho Rajneesh, and have developed it to its logical extreme. For, as is the case with U.G., you do not have ‘the process’. You even have no ‘sense’ what ‘enlightenment’ as it exists in J. Krishnamurti and Osho Rajneesh is, for you do not know it from your own experience. However, you have gone through the same ‘conversion’ as U.G. has gone through. Only your base was not J. Krishnamurti, but your point of departure was Osho Rajneesh.

Look at the evidence. In the end, Osho said that the only thing that is relevant is ‘witnessing’. When there is ‘witnessing without a witness’, then there is only ‘the world’ as it really is.

You have taken this as your personal gospel, and developed it to its logical extreme. For if there is only ‘witnessing’, then, so do you conclude, the word ‘reality’ already implies an ideology. There are only facts and there is only actuality. In other words, your ‘actualism’ is just the ultimate logical outcome of that what Osho Rajneesh already said. Only he spoke from ‘the process’, (which he called ‘the inner sky’) and therefore he had no need for any redefinitions of terms. But if you take his words as the base of a new way of looking at the world, this very ‘base’ is an ideology. An ideology, that uses ‘actuality’ and ‘fact’ as its most basic terms, and that consists of all of the logical consequences from these terms, and only all logical consequences from these terms.

I remember that you subscribe to the demand that everything has to be logical to be acceptable. I have seen you refute many things just on the base that it is not logical. But logic as a tool is basic for the development of ideologies. A total network of logical conclusions from certain basic terms is exactly what an ideology is. So anybody who insists on logic and brings forward a new way of approaching the world, brings forward a new ‘Self’, and therefore a new ideology.

So you are the U.G. of Osho Rajneesh. Just like U.G. claimed to have passed beyond J. Krishnamurti, you claim to have passed Osho Rajneesh. Both claims are false Although you speak of the Eastern Enlightened One’s in general, it is only Osho Rajneesh you mean by them. Since Osho Rajneesh asserted to be the embodiment of all Eastern Masters, you think that your ‘going beyond’ Osho Rajneesh is the same as going beyond all Eastern Masters.

I can quote Rajneesh also. How about this?

<snip eight paragraphs from ‘The Book of Secrets’, page 1109 to 1112 for copyright reasons>

So Rajneesh also makes an implicit distinction between ‘I’ and ‘Self’., and aims at moving beyond both. He sees the ego as ‘something created within the self’, i.e., part of the self.

<snip three paragraphs from ‘The Book of Secrets’, page 1109 to 1112 for copyright reasons>

Up till now everything Rajneesh said was identical with your Actualism. But in this last sentence there is a difference. Rajneesh asserts that there can be emotions without a Self. You assert, that when the Self is gone, emotions are gone also. Which of you is right? I have shown Vineeto that he is full of emotions. At that very moment he withdrew his correspondence with me. It became too clear that he is wrong. Let us continue with Rajneesh.

<snip sixteen paragraphs from ‘The Book of Secrets’, page 1109 to 1112 for copyright reasons>

Compare the beginning of the above with: [Richard]: ‘It is the belief in ‘me’, the identity as Self or Soul or Spirit, as being what I actually am which is at fault. I am not an identity ... I am me as this flesh and blood body only’. (Article 10, ‘I am not an identity ... I am me’; page 72, ‘Richard’s Journal’ © The Actual Freedom Trust 1997).

‘This flesh and blood body only’ is an identity. As I said, what for you is ‘the world’ is the same as that what somebody else calls your ‘person’. And that is the same as the ‘Self’.

[Richard]: ‘The rudimentary self, transformed into an identity, must be extinguished in order for one to be here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity ... as this flesh and blood body only I am living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’. (Article 35, ‘This actual world is an ambrosial paradise’; page 234, ‘Richard’s Journal’ © The Actual Freedom Trust 1997).

Except for your assertion that with the Self emotions disappear, while Rajneesh contradicts this, I do not see any difference. Your vision is just the next logical step of the part of Rajneesh’s description in ‘The Book of Secrets’.

But what about your quotes?

With the teachings of Osho Rajneesh it is like the teachings of the Bible. Or of the Koran, or of the Bhagavad Gita etc. For any statement, you can find many statements that asserts the very opposite. It is a quality of a full-fledged religion. Besides, it is very clear in the above, that what you say is much like what he has said. You are only more extreme. (I just pulled one of the books of Rajneesh arbitrarily from my book shelf.)

Let me introduce you to a totally new way of approaching the world, developed within science in the last decennia, and as a result of computers. We already had mathematics. That is already about 2500 years old, beginning with Euclid. Maybe Euclid was the first true mathematician. We have physics, which is not so old. You could say that Newton was the first real physicist, who lived from 1642 to 1727. So physics is about 300 years old now.

And now there is the new science of computics. You could say that physics tries to capture regularities we can find in the world in mathematical form. Likewise, computics tries to capture regularities, and even irregularities in the form of the, as it seems now, more powerful tool of computer programs. It is therefore an essentially new way to understand the world. It is an invention of Stephen Wolfram, who first succeeded in capturing almost all of mathematics in one single computer program. (Mathematica).The success made him ask the following question: if all of mathematics can be captured in even one single computer program, is it also possible to do the converse? Is it possible to capture all of computer programming in mathematics? He demonstrated that this is very likely not possible. But if this is not possible, then mathematics can be seen as a subset of computer programs. This makes computer programs are a more versatile and powerful tool to get a grip on the world. This led to, what he calls: ‘a new kind of science’. I call this ‘computics’.

With computics you can have a totally new way of looking at things, and discover totally new things. You can, for example, understand the phenomenon of religion in a new way. You can even make a clear distinction between religions and sects

Every religion, I suspect, has the property of universal calculability, also called universality. The very interesting book of Stephen Wolfram: ‘A New Kind of Science’, shows how you can use computics to explain this phenomenon, and why this is so. Any teaching that is based on certain surprisingly simple principles which nevertheless satisfy the ‘universality criterion’ as explained by Stephen Wolfram, can generate a complex whole that contains every possible structure that can exist. With this ‘structure of structures’ at your disposal, (which can be generated in many ways) you can place every pattern into existence somewhere within the whole generated by these simple rules.. To see what I mean, I include a simple computer program I have written based on Stephen Wolfram’s book. It contains only 8 lines of code. It nevertheless is able to generate straight lines like rule 2, rule 4 or rule 20. It is able to generate simple patterns like rule 7. Or it is able to generate lines and patterns, like in rule 15, rule 121

It is also capable of generating simple fractals, like in Rule 18, 22, 26, 90.

But it is also capable of generating structures of far greater complexity. It is even able to create a structure of such tremendous complexity, when extended indefinitely, that it can be proved that every pattern that can exist, no matter what its particular form can be found in it at some spot. So you can put any structure in a 1-1 correspondence with some part of this pattern! And all of this with the same 8 lines of code!

With the simple program consisting of these 8 lines, up till now, only Rule 110 has been proved to have universal complexity, meaning that it contains every kind of structure as its consequence. (It is very difficult to prove.) Stephen Wolfram suspects that Rule 30, Rule 45, and Rule 86 also have this property. But, as I said, only Rule 110 is proved to have this property. The amazing thing is that such a complex pattern, yes every one of the 256 rules is the result of a very simple computer program containing only 8 lines of code! And this very fact has far reaching consequences, which Stephen Wolfram tries to explain in his book.

[Richard]: ‘It is the belief in ‘me’, the identity as Self or Soul or Spirit, as being what I actually am which is at fault. I am not an identity ... I am me as this flesh and blood body only’. (Article 10, ‘I am not an identity ... I am me’; page 72, ‘Richard’s Journal’ © The Actual Freedom Trust 1997).

This ‘flesh and blood body only’ is an identity. As I said, what for you is ‘the world’ is the same as that what somebody else calls your ‘person’. And that is the same as the ‘Self’.

[Richard]: ‘The rudimentary self, transformed into an identity, must be extinguished in order for one to be here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity ... as this flesh and blood body only I am living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’. (Article 35, ‘This actual world is an ambrosial paradise’; page 234, ‘Richard’s Journal’ © The Actual Freedom Trust 1997).

These statements contain what I have observed about your approach. These statements implicitly take the vision of the East to its extreme conclusion. This is the big mistake of the East, which you have taken over from Rajneesh, and have amplified to even more extreme proportions than he did. (You have added the denial of emotions to it.) Being extreme is not necessarily wrong. For if you are extreme, and right, you are extremely right. But if you are extreme, and wrong, you are also extremely wrong. In this last case it might be impossible to escape from the trap you have set for yourself.

Probably it is beyond you, but what I have come to realize recently, thanks to my dialogue with you, and thinking about it from the Computics perspective, is that even if you suppose that the ‘Self’ is a ‘rudimentary entity’ as you call it, it is nevertheless capable of being developed into a storehouse of every understanding, every skill, every possible structure. If the ‘Self’ is based on rules as rudimentary as Rule 110, this does not mean that the result has to be simple, or even primitive. No, it is possible that it might be as complex as anything that exists, and even more so.

Where do emotions fit into this picture? Whenever a structure of a complexity equivalent to Rule 110 has been generated having a size of practical use, it is our emotions that allow us to jump to exactly that pattern within that whole, that is best suited to dictate our actions. This can be wrong, when this structure is too underdeveloped.

Based on a simple program that is equivalent to a fractal. This means that you have not a general structure at your disposal, but you have a ‘one track mind’. This is essentially how a sect can be distinguished from a religion.

Nevertheless, it is as Ayn Rand has said. Emotions are manifestations in consciousness of automatised processes of thought. It is the function of emotions to represent complex skills that go too fast to be dissected by consciousness in its details to be recognized. Probably this is not true. I think that emotions are distinct from those automatised thought processes. I think that emotions are a capability on top of the thought-process. It is some capability that allows us to jump to the correct automatised part of the structure generated by simple rules that are nevertheless universal in their logical consequence.

Or, to say it differently, our current computers are equivalent to thought. The next generation of computers, the quantum computers, are probably equivalent to emotions. For this ability to jump to the correct structure is exactly how the quantum computer differs from the classical computer. This also means, that if the wrong thoughts are present within the self, the emotions can only jump to these wrong thoughts, and in this way they only translate your wrong thinking into wrong actions. So the emotions, and the emotional mechanism is not to blame, but the thinking that took place before emotions entered the picture is to blame.

Whenever a mind has found some principle that is capable of generating something like Rule 110, it can extend its ‘self’ in such a way, that any pattern in existence can be automatised, and thus being represented by the ‘Self’. Every religion has this property. Your ‘Actualism’, being just a sub-set of Rajneesh teachings, does not allow for every structure, and therefore lacks the criterion of universality. Therefore it is not a religion, but clearly a sect. For you adopt certain parts of Rajneeshism, but deny other parts. Although you extend the parts you have adopted, you still make statements to the effect that you must not be confused with Rajneeshism. You think it is possible that he is wrong. Logically speaking, Rajneesh cannot be wrong. For it is one of the consequences of logic, that whenever a system contains even one contradiction, everything can be derived as a consequence of that system. It is therefore more proper to say, that Rajneesh talks a lot, but he does not say anything specific.

With you this is different. You distinguish between ‘fact and fiction’. So your basic approach is that some statements about you are right, and others are wrong. This means that you are, logically speaking, a defender of a consistent whole. And that is, exactly, how a sect can be distinguished from a religion.

I have put this new approach of computics into practice. I am studying playing the organ from memory. I set myself the task to play complete pieces from memory. For a beginner it is too difficult to play Bach’s preludes and fugues right from the notes on paper, even when it is written in the notation of Klavarskribo. Only if a vast amount of experience has been accumulated through intense study taking at least 10 years of 5 to 8 hours study a day is somebody capable of playing directly from a score. For only then a structure of playing comparable to Rule 110 of any practical use has been erected within the Self. For most people, not having this extensive training, to be able to play from memory you have to analyse a piece first, decompose it in all of the movements needed to play it, and forge it into one consistent logical whole.

This ‘forging it into one consistent whole’ is done by recalling how the piece sounds. What then happens is that the piece activates this vast storehouse of experience and technical analyses, a pattern that is part of that generated by some equivalent of Rule 110, and makes the hands move. This is done through feelings and emotions. Emotions cause the piece to ‘jump to the right part’ of the ‘play-structure’. Without making use of feelings and emotions it is impossible to play pieces from memory which have a complexity beyond a certain point. If you do not believe this, try to play something like the 2nd fuge of Das Wohltemperiertes Klavier, part II of Bach. Or ask anybody who is capable of doing this, and asking him to discard his emotions. It cannot be done.

This particular function of emotions is denied by you. The result: the storehouse of skills, whose development is the centre of all Western effort is denied. This results in a denial of value-creation, which in its turn leads to poverty on a vast scale. This results in the following: the more Eastern and meditative a country is, the poorer it becomes.

You have secularised this practice. Your vision is just the extreme logical outcome of that what the East has begun. It is new in its radicalism, but it is not new in its generating principles. So your vision is just a more extreme version of the Eastern approach to existence. It has its denial of the ‘I’ and the ‘Self’ in common which is the hallmark of the Eastern religions.

Conversely, the West denies the ‘experiential’ part found in the East.

[Richard]: ‘The rudimentary self, transformed into an identity, must be extinguished in order for one to be here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity ... as this flesh and blood body only I am living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’

In this passage you are, in essence, denying ‘unconsciousness’. Again, I refer to the understanding: what you see as ‘the world’, somebody else sees as ‘your person’. What you call your ‘experience of being here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity … as this flesh and blood body only, living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’ , is seen by an outsider to be a statement of how your consciousness functions. It is equivalent by stating that you think that we should be as conscious as possible. This means, that consciousness is implicitly declared to be the highest goal attainable, and even the only aim worthy of attainment. This is consistent with Rajneesh’ s vision.

Your verdict about the ‘rudimentary self, transformed into an identity’ is, that it must be extinguished to be able to ‘experience of being here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity … as this flesh and blood body only, living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’. So it is the ‘experience of being here and now’ beyond anything else, i.e., being totally conscious that is considered to be the ‘all and everything’ of what life is about. By stating this, you take the vision of the East to its most extreme logical conclusion. It is therefore the most extreme denial of the Western orientation on the Self that is imaginable.

What is needed is not a denial of the Self to arrive at ‘full experience of here and now, up to the point of everywhere and everywhen’, and also not a total basing your-self on only the Self as the West does. No, what is needed is a fusion between these two visions, whereby the mistakes of either one are eliminated. So we need consciousness as a ‘tool for construction’. But it is a mistake to consider consciousness to be the all and everything of happiness, and to be conscious all of the time as the purpose of our existence. In fact, the way we function shows this. We fall into a dreamless sleep every night, wherein consciousness is totally absent. This state happens every night for every healthy person, and persists for about ½ to 1 hour.

Sometimes it pays to be unconscious, even when you are awake. Stronger, you can only function as a creator of worth when you are able to ‘switch off’ consciousness, and rely on your skills’. Consciousness is a function of construction only. But construction for constructions’ sake, even when it is taken to its logical extreme, ‘continuous construction of the here and now’ as is your ideal is an empty endeavour.

We need the ability to construct. We need consciousness. Butt if the construction has been made, consciousness can be an actual hindrance for the functioning of the constructions thus created. When you are too conscious, too aware of the world, you are unable to play complex music from memory. You are unable to design buildings. You are unable to design computers, televisions, rockets, planes, radios, radar etc. You are unable to perform very complex surgical operations. You are unable to apply mathematics, physics, chemistry, technology. In short, you are unable to do the things that make us, human beings, viable. To be able to conduct complex automatised actions you have to be totally in your ‘Self’, and as a consequence, being almost unconscious. You should not declare this as an illegitimate endeavour.

Western training is directed at the elimination of consciousness, and to let skill take its place. It is the major discovery of the West. The result? Production and the creation of wealth! Being unconscious is the source of the wealth of the West. Even Rajneesh saw this connection in the above passage, when he referred to the businessmen. Only he, like you, condemned it. He declared businessmen to be mediocre.

What both he and you do not realize, is that through wealth creation we survive by adapting our surroundings to ourselves. By just ‘being here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity ... as this flesh and blood body only, living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’ one eliminates one’s powers to create wealth. You transform yourself into a parasite on those, who do create wealth. You make others to take care of you, through their donations, through welfare, and through other parasitical means. What was the ‘occupation’ of Buddha? He was a beggar, and therefore a parasite. J. Krishnamurti also had a life-long allowance from some rich lady. This ‘lazy dog’ did not have to take care of himself! And what about Rajneesh? He didn’t do anything either, except for his lecturing. Others transformed his lectures into books, and thus did the wealth-creation for him. So he was just as parasitical as the rest.

How about you? Who pays for your ‘being here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity ... as this flesh and blood body only, living in the paradisiacal garden that this verdant planet earth is’? It either is so that you have become financially independent by selling your paintings, or, which is more likely, you live on the pocket(s) of others. And if you do not live like this, I suspect that many of your followers will. Your vision leads to so many more beggars. It cannot be otherwise, because it is the logical social consequence of your vision.

Maybe it is not your intention, but if the whole world has turned into beggars they are going to ‘struggle for existence’, and will unleash even more wars than are unleashed now. So think again! War has always been more likely when countries were more poor! If all countries are poor, then there is only war. So you aim for world peace, but you will be a source of more wars, when taken seriously, than we have seen in the past.

To return to the subject. All this, understanding both the possibilities and the limitations of the Self, and also understanding both the possibilities and the limitations of consciousness is, I think, truly something new. It is the fusion between Eastern and Western thinking, without the mistakes of either of them.

I ignored this, because an analysis of this statement would require a deep understanding of how, exactly, ideas and reality are related. To mention just a few problems. How, exactly, is it possible that mathematics gives us the ability to make computers, houses, bridges, planes etc? These are questions you do not ask yourself, because you are not a mathematician and physics professional, as I am. So any response of me would be beyond your ability to grasp.

*

You say: ‘This, and Mr. Mohan ‘Rajneesh’ Jain’s depiction of himself as being a spiritual entity hovering around the body, is why I said that comparing me to either Mr. Mohan ‘Rajneesh’ Jain or Mr. Uppaluri Krishnamurti was indeed an exercise in futility ... but your response shows that you are apparently unable to grasp this simple fact and instead choose to introduce all manner of things extraneous to the subject at hand and wax eloquent about them as if it were meaningful to do so’.

Not so. The text I mailed to you shows clearly, that Rajneesh has also said the very opposite of your statement. It was just as much a quote from him as your quote. That is not fiction, but fact.

To be precise: you have made the implicit assumption that Rajneesh’ teachings are logically consistent. And when that is so, when Rajneesh says that he is a ‘spiritual entity hovering around the body’, he cannot say something entirely different. But since Rajneesh’ teachings are not logically consistent, he allows himself to say something in one book, and the very opposite in another book. I sent you that text to show you, that he also denied himself to be a spiritual entity. He denied even the very existence of such spiritual entities, and declared that if you believe that, it is just one huge mistake. That is not a fantasy of mine, but that is a fact.

Since you assume logical consistency, you are not aware of the fact that, you select only those parts of his teachings that are in contradiction with those of yours, and think that is enough to try to demonstrate that you are saying something entirely different. Apparently you cannot imagine somebody to be logically inconsistent in the degree Rajneesh is. Probably that is why he knows ‘the process’, and you don’t.

That text I sent you from ‘The book of Secrets’ is almost identical to your Actualism. That is not fiction, but fact. Read it, and you will see that this is so. There is only a minor point where he deviates. He asserts that you can be without a Self and still have emotions. You on the other hand, assert that without a Self there are no longer emotions. This only means that you do not say anything different from him, except of being more extreme, and being more selective. Basically your ‘observations’ are exactly in the same direction as that text in ‘The Book of Secrets’ I quoted. You and he even agree on the point, that thoughts stand in the way of ‘seeing the world as it is’.

*

You say: ‘Of course, if you wish to continue to invent things about me – and then criticise your own inventions as if you are in fact criticising me – then that is your business. I would like to make it clear, however, that I decline to be drawn into your fantasy world’.

Since it is not I, but you who are denying facts, who is the one who lives in a fantasy world? I consider the above just to be a form of projection. You accuse me of doing that what you yourself are doing. You can check for yourself, that the pages in ‘The Book of Secrets’ contain the text I have sent you, by just getting that book somewhere, and looking up the page numbers I have mentioned.

It is clear, that you are unable to follow my arguments. It is the easy way out to blame me for your own inability to grasp what I am saying.

Indeed. Discussion is futile. A discussion is only possible when there is a degree of comparable development. And when you show more openness to facts.

I suspected that much.