Actual Freedom – Mailing List ‘B’ Correspondence

Richard’s Correspondence on Mailing List ‘B’

with Respondent No. 4

Some Of The Topics Covered

the use of the words ‘real’ and ‘actual’ explained – an unmanifest, non-existent, no-thing is non-actual – use of the expression ‘non-material consciousness’ – apperception is not non-material consciousness – intention of peace-on-earth – ‘natural friendship’

January 01 2001:

RESPONDENT: Richard, I have taken the liberty of combining all the emails into one document file. That way, anybody who is not concerned with length, can download the document file in M.S. Word, or some other program which uses the document extension. It also saves bandwidth. I am also planning to drastically cut what may be redundant in our discussions, but I offer you, if you’re interested, the first opportunity to do that.

RICHARD: Okay ... it has become a trifle long. Anyway, I am already totally content with the outcome of the discussion – all of my queries have been satisfactorily answered – and am quite happy to leave it as it is, if you wish. This was my initial query:

• [Respondent]: ‘The universe is inherently limited, being only an ‘appearance’ of energy, a brief movement within the totality of consciousness’.
• [Richard]: ‘How is it that this ‘brief movement of energy’, in the ‘timelessness’ of the ‘non-material consciousness’, happens in the first place (other than Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti says it does)?
(Richard, List B, No. 4c, 24 December 2000)
• [Respondent]: ‘... nobody knows ‘how’ all this happens ...’.

I had been intrigued enough put the question as a direct result of you writing the following:

• [Respondent]: ‘Matter is what ‘stands out of’ pure energy or consciousness. It is an ‘appearance’ of non-material consciousness: Energy without boundaries, without form and function, or no-thing. In other words, matter is real but not actual, whereas, non-material consciousness is actual, forever unmanifest, non-existent ...’.

I was curious as to why you would say that a ‘forever unmanifest, non-existent ... non-material consciousness ... energy without boundaries, without form and function, or no-thing’ was ‘actual’, given that the normal or everyday meaning of the word <actual> is ‘existing in act or fact; practical; in action or existence at the time; present, current and not merely potential or possible’. However, all was made clear in the subsequent and detailed discussion, wherein you clearly explained why you have no comprehension whatsoever of the nature of the non-material energy or consciousness, which you posit as being the source of, not only all life, but the physical universe itself ... or why it does. Viz.:

• [Respondent]: ‘... for me there is no why or how when it comes to ‘why it happened in the first place?’.
• [Respondent]: ‘It is not possible to have an insight into non-material energy, as insight is what non-material energy already is’.
• [Respondent]: ‘You are quite right. I don’t know what it is ... Yes. Nothing in my singing reveals a thing about non-material energy’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... for me, the question of the nature of unobstructed energy is not significant as it is always the past, the desire of knowledge, the limited that asks that’.
• [Respondent]: ‘The question is inherently intellectual and therefore impossible to answer’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... if you really want an answer, it will not and cannot be obtained in terms of words, in terms of knowledge. It cannot be obtained in any case’.
• [Respondent]: ‘What is going to have that insight?
• [Respondent]: ‘There is nothing to be revealed because that would imply a division: Something revealed and a revealer’.
• [Respondent]: ‘The song is nothing but a tool, like a hammer. The hammer is neutral in itself, though it is real and is useful. It reveals nothing about the carpenter. It is only an extension of the intelligence of the carpenter’.
• [Respondent]: ‘No-body, no-thing, is actually there and can perceive non-material consciousness ...’.
• [Respondent]: ‘It is not a question of non-material consciousness becoming apparent to itself as non-material consciousness because that would require non-material consciousness to be divided, which is not possible’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... there is nothing to examine, as the ‘evidence’ is one’s own awareness, although, strictly speaking, it is not really ‘one’s’ awareness. It is awareness period’.
• [Respondent]: ‘The statement has been offered repeatedly that ‘awareness examining awareness’ is an impossibility’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... nobody knows how all this happens because there can be nobody that is actual and there to know anything’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... how can what is actual [non-material consciousness] be known as anything at all, including being known as having any properties?’.
• [Respondent]: ‘Some actions are beyond knowledge’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... get rid of the questioner, then the answer goes’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... I have repeatedly said ... there is no insight ‘into non-material energy’ because non-material energy is already what insight IS’.
• [Respondent]: ‘There is no insight into the nature of’ non-material energy insight’ as non-material insight is the only insight possible’.
• [Respondent]: ‘I keep saying that there can be no ‘insight into what is already insight’, and you keep asking me to provide insight into the nature – non-material energy – of what informs the song’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... you are proposing that insight – which is here being called ‘not worthless’ – is different from itself in the sense that it can have ‘awareness of its [own] nature’ ... I am saying that such a proposition is clearly impossible, as insight is one, indivisible energy whether it is without material form or is manifested as the universe, as nature, and as the human body’.
• [Respondent]: ‘There is nothing there that can have an insight into anything’.
• [Respondent]: ‘It is the ego, operating very subtly, that demands of itself the ability to have awareness ‘... as to the nature of ‘that which is pure energy, unlimited’ ...’.
• [Respondent]: ‘Whatever is there that can have insight into insight must be different from insight – which is not divisible – and, therefore, must be, by definition, that which blocks insight’.
• [Respondent]: ‘I have said from the beginning that there is no awareness into aware-ness, as awareness is not divided’.
• [Respondent]: ‘There is no insight ‘into’ anything. Insight is what you ARE when thinking-as-division has seen completely into its own nature and has, therefore, ended’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... there is nothing there that can ‘have’ an insight, as insight is already what is happening as body without ‘me’ or ‘ego’’.
• [Respondent]: ‘Of course nobody knows ‘how’ all this happens, as there is no ‘how’ offered by any-body that can penetrate the energy of that which words cannot convey’.
• [Respondent]: ‘Nobody really knows ‘how’, and anybody cannot have insight into ‘that energy which is ‘in itself’ no-thing ...’.

And, not only was I interested as to why a ‘unmanifest, non-existent ... no-thing’ would be called ‘actual’, I had intended to query what the word <real> means, in your use of language, in your ‘matter is real but not actual’ sentence ... but you have already explained that ‘real’ indicates that space and time and matter are not fact, not actual and are but illusions or concepts. Viz.:

• [Respondent]: ‘... non-material energy is not a fanciful concept, as energy is actual. It is only the manifestation of energy as materiality that I regard as impermanent and therefore as illusion, as non-actuality. Illusion is real, time-bound, ever-changing, arising and vanishing. Actuality is not real, not time-bounding, not ever changing’.
• [Respondent]: ‘When one is living as non-material consciousness unobstructedly, there is neither the fact nor concept of space, time, here, and now’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... it [this universe] is happening as impermanently manifested energy within the concept of time and space imposed by that specialization of itself which calls itself ‘human’’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... time is thought, the thinker, the ego’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... even if there was ‘chronological time’ or time as physicists portray it – which, to me is not a fact – an insightful mind would still operate without time’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... the mind that has no limits such as ‘me’ and ‘that’ has no means to prevent the self-evident nature of matter as being totally empty and transparent, and lacking both time and space’.
• [Respondent]: ‘For the mind that sees without purpose and knowledge, actually, there is only energy that also appears as this and that. Since it is not actual, it never existed to begin with. It is just non-moving energy appearing to move’.
• [Respondent]: ‘That flesh and blood body [known as Richard] was never ‘born’ at all; that flesh and blood body never lives at all (as the energy that is life is what lives that flesh and blood body); That flesh and blood body cannot die because it is not living (it is the outermost appearance of life) ... there is no ‘after its death’, as it was never independently ‘alive’’.

There is really nothing else I wanted to ask you about. I already have intimate comprehension, of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy which is ‘innocence’, which ‘itself never suffers’, which is ‘independent of its manifestations’ because the ‘me’ as soul, who was parasitically inhabiting this body, was that non-material consciousness night and day for eleven years (only ‘he’ called it ‘The Absolute’) ... so there is nothing I am not already aware of, from first-hand experience, that I could become aware of from your ‘nobody knows’ song. Nevertheless, there may be something which you wish to address – or an aspect of the previous E-Mail you may want me to respond to specifically – in which case I am only too happy to reply.

If not ... I do appreciate that the discussion was able to happen.

January 02 2001:

RESPONDENT: Richard, I have taken the liberty of combining all the emails into one document file. That way, anybody who is not concerned with length, can download the document file in M.S. Word, or some other program which uses the document extension. It also saves bandwidth. I am also planning to drastically cut what may be redundant in our discussions, but I offer you, if you’re interested, the first opportunity to do that.

RICHARD: Okay ... it has become a trifle long. Anyway, I am already totally content with the outcome of the discussion – all of my queries have been satisfactorily answered – and am quite happy to leave it as it is, if you wish. This was my initial query: <snip> I was curious as to why you would say that a ‘forever unmanifest, non-existent ... non-material consciousness ... energy without boundaries, without form and function, or no-thing’ was ‘actual’, given that the normal or everyday meaning of the word <actual> is ‘existing in act or fact; practical; in action or existence at the time; present, current and not merely potential or possible’. However, all was made clear in the subsequent and detailed discussion, wherein you clearly explained why you have no comprehension whatsoever of the nature of the non-material energy or consciousness, which you posit as being the source of, not only all life, but the physical universe itself ... or why it does. Viz.: [Respondent]: ‘You are quite right. I don’t know what it is ... <snip> ... [Respondent]: ‘Nobody really knows ‘how’, and anybody cannot have insight into ‘that energy which is ‘in itself’ no-thing ...’.

RESPONDENT: Yes, there is no comprehension ‘of’ non-material consciousness.

RICHARD: And with this conclusion do you thus firmly close the door on investigation ... and so all the animosity and anguish keeps rolling on down through the millennia.

RESPONDENT: The mind that is not obstructed by selfishness, that is, the mind that does not think it ‘knows’, is already itself that comprehension.

RICHARD: Hmm ... I will take this opportunity to provide a quote that may – just may – prise that firmly-shut door open a trifle:

• [quote]: ‘You can feel it in the room now. It is happening in this room now because we are touching something very, very serious and it comes pouring in (...) I don’t want to make a mystery: why can’t this happen to everyone? If you and Maria [Ms. Mary Lutyens and Ms. Mary Zimbalist] sat down and said ‘let us enquire’, I’m pretty sure you could find out. Or do it alone. I see something; what I said is true – I can never find out. Water can never find out what water is. That is quite right. If you find out I’ll corroborate it (...) somehow the body is protected to survive. Some element is watching over it. Something is protecting it. It would be speculating to say what. The Maitreya is too concrete, is not simple enough. But I can’t look behind the curtain. I can’t do it. I tried with Pupul [Ms. Pupul Jayakar] and various Indian scholars who pressed me’. [endquote]. (‘Krishnamurti – His Life and Death’; Mary Lutyens p. 160. © Avon Books; New York 1991).

The phrase ‘water can never find out what water is’ and ‘I can’t look behind the curtain’ is strikingly similar to your ‘the impossibility of ‘awareness being aware of itself’ and ‘the impossibility of ‘you’ being aware ‘of’ anything at all’ ... obviously some other process is required, non? Perhaps if I were to provide an analogy it may become clearer? You have written:

• [Respondent]: ‘A street sign points towards New York. The sign is just a sign. If somebody follows what was pointed to, and is willing to go through whatever is necessary to get to New York, he has done all the work. The sign, as a sign itself, is still useless’.

There is another ‘street sign’ which you apparently are overlooking in your haste to get to ‘New York’. It reads:

• ‘Turn Around ... You Are Going The Wrong Way’.

*

RICHARD: And, not only was I interested as to why a ‘unmanifest, non-existent ... no-thing’ would be called ‘actual’, I had intended to query what the word <real> means, in your use of language, in your ‘matter is real but not actual’ sentence ... but you have already explained that ‘real’ indicates that space and time and matter are not fact, not actual and are but illusions or concepts. Viz.: [Respondent]: ‘It is only the manifestation of energy as materiality that I regard as impermanent and therefore as illusion, as non-actuality. Illusion is real, time-bound, ever-changing, arising and vanishing. Actuality is not real, not time-bounding, not ever changing’. <snip>. There is really nothing else I wanted to ask you about. I already have intimate comprehension, of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy which is ‘innocence’, which ‘itself never suffers’, which is ‘independent of its manifestations’ because the ‘me’ as soul, who was parasitically inhabiting this body, was that non-material consciousness night and day for eleven years (only ‘he’ called it ‘The Absolute’) ... so there is nothing I am not already aware of, from first-hand experience, that I could become aware of from your ‘nobody knows’ song. Nevertheless, there may be something which you wish to address – or an aspect of the previous E-Mail you may want me to respond to specifically – in which case I am only too happy to reply. If not ... I do appreciate that the discussion was able to happen.

RESPONDENT: There would be no point to my questioning what you feel is your experience.

RICHARD: Indeed ... because it is not something that I ‘feel’ is my experience. If you arrange your question falsely you are bound to leap to a false conclusion every time, eh?

RESPONDENT: And there would be no point to my discussing the impossibility of having ‘firsthand experience’ of awareness ...

RICHARD: Why not? I certainly do not have firsthand experience as awareness – non-material awareness cannot be aware of the nature of non-material awareness – as it was the ‘me’ as soul, who was parasitically inhabiting this body, who was that non-material consciousness night and day for eleven years (only ‘he’ called it ‘The Absolute’) ... and not me.

Hence I have an intimate comprehension of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy which is ‘innocence’, which ‘itself never suffers’, which is ‘independent of its manifestations’ and so on.

RESPONDENT: ... and to my further discussing what to me is the impossibility of ‘you’ being aware ‘of’ anything at all ...

RICHARD: If by ‘you’ you are referring to ‘me’ ... then it is only impossible to discuss it with ‘me’ because the ‘me’ who was parasitically inhabiting this body altruistically ‘self’-immolated years ago. ‘He’ is extirpated, extinguished, eliminated, annihilated ... in other words: extinct. ‘He’ is as dead as the dodo but with no skeletal remains. ‘He’ vanished without a trace ... there was no phoenix to rise from the ashes. ‘He’ is finished. Kaput.

Which is why peace-on-earth became apparent in all its perfection.

RESPONDENT: ... and of discussing the impossibility of ‘awareness being aware of itself’, as I have already, and as you have summarized, gone into all that in great detail.

RICHARD: Indeed ... as I have repeatedly said in great detail: some other process is required.

RESPONDENT: I too appreciate that the discussion was able to occur. Take care.

RICHARD: Yet all is always carefree in this actual world ... there is no ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul here stuffing up the works.

January 03 2001:

RICHARD: I am already totally content with the outcome of the discussion – all of my queries have been satisfactorily answered – and am quite happy to leave it as it is, if you wish. This was my initial query: <snip> I was curious as to why you would say that a ‘forever unmanifest, non-existent ... non-material consciousness ... energy without boundaries, without form and function, or no-thing’ was ‘actual’, given that the normal or everyday meaning of the word <actual> is ‘existing in act or fact; practical; in action or existence at the time; present, current and not merely potential or possible’. However, all was made clear in the subsequent and detailed discussion, wherein you clearly explained why you have no comprehension whatsoever of the nature of the non-material energy or consciousness, which you posit as being the source of, not only all life, but the physical universe itself ... or why it does. Viz.: [Respondent]: ‘You are quite right. I don’t know what it is ... <snip> ... [Respondent]: ‘Nobody really knows ‘how’, and anybody cannot have insight into ‘that energy which is ‘in itself’ no-thing ...’.

RESPONDENT: Yes, there is no comprehension ‘of’ non-material consciousness.

RICHARD: And with this conclusion do you thus firmly close the door on investigation ... and so all the animosity and anguish keeps rolling on down through the millennia.

RESPONDENT: Let’s see if that is so. Detaching the first part of the sentence from the rest of it makes the first part seem totally arbitrary and exclusive, doesn’t it?

RICHARD: No. Plus I never did detach ‘the first part of the sentence’ as I responded to the whole of your first sentence.

RESPONDENT: Then you pretend that the part you detached and made look exclusive, is, in fact, exclusive and that, based on its exclusivity, it ‘... close[s] the door on investigation ...’. Next, you make this tremendous leap from a detached statement, which you have forced, by detaching it, to be misrepresentational, to your own conclusion that because of the likes of the detached statement which YOU detached and thus, decontextualized, ‘... all the animosity and anguish keeps rolling on down through the millennia ...’.

RICHARD: Except that I did not did detach the first part of the sentence ... let alone pretend anything, let alone make a tremendous leap, let alone misrepresent what you say, let alone take it out of context. Nevertheless, let me re-contextualise it ... here is your paragraph in full:

• [Respondent]: ‘Yes, there is no comprehension ‘of’ non-material consciousness. The mind that is not obstructed by selfishness, that is, the mind that does not think it ‘knows’, is already itself that comprehension.

It still reads of the same firmly closing the door on investigation as it did before.

RESPONDENT: What is ‘rolling on down’, not through the millennia, but through your writing, is the same old devious tricks you’ve always employed when you want to make some point which cannot be intelligently supported.

RICHARD: Except I did no devious tricks. You gave a similar kind of non-material-consciousness-cannot-know-itself type of response when I proposed an insight into the nature of the non-material consciousness (‘it is not possible to have an insight into non-material energy, as insight is what non-material energy already is’). You also gave a similar kind of non-material-consciousness-cannot-know-itself type of response when I talked of an awareness of the nature of the non-material consciousness (‘the statement has been offered repeatedly that ‘awareness examining awareness’ is an impossibility’). And you gave a similar kind of non-material-consciousness-cannot-know-itself type of response when I talked about the nature of the non-material consciousness becoming apparent (‘it is not a question of non-material consciousness becoming apparent to itself as non-material consciousness because that would require non-material consciousness to be divided, which is not possible’) as well. Further to that you are now giving a similar kind of non-material-consciousness-cannot-know-itself type of response when I propose comprehending the nature of the non-material consciousness (‘the mind that does not think it ‘knows’, is already itself that comprehension’).

Therefore, with your conclusion ‘there is no comprehension ‘of’ non-material consciousness’ (with the emphasis on the ‘of’), not only do I not misrepresent or take your statement out of context ... but you do indeed thus firmly close the door on investigation.

And so all the animosity and anguish keeps rolling on down through the millennia.

*

RESPONDENT: The mind that is not obstructed by selfishness, that is, the mind that does not think it ‘knows’, is already itself that comprehension.

RICHARD: I will take this opportunity to provide a quote that may – just may – prise that firmly-shut door open a trifle: [quote]: ‘You can feel it in the room now. It is happening in this room now because we are touching something very, very serious and it comes pouring in (...) I don’t want to make a mystery: why can’t this happen to everyone? If you and Maria [Ms. Mary Lutyens and Ms. Mary Zimbalist] sat down and said ‘let us enquire’, I’m pretty sure you could find out. Or do it alone. I see something; what I said is true – I can never find out. Water can never find out what water is. That is quite right. If you find out I’ll corroborate it (...) somehow the body is protected to survive. Some element is watching over it. Something is protecting it. It would be speculating to say what. The Maitreya is too concrete, is not simple enough. But I can’t look behind the curtain. I can’t do it. I tried with Pupul [Ms. Pupul Jayakar] and various Indian scholars who pressed me’. [endquote]. (‘Krishnamurti – His Life and Death’; Mary Lutyens p. 160. © Avon Books; New York 1991).

The phrase ‘water can never find out what water is’ and ‘I can’t look behind the curtain’ is strikingly similar to your ‘the impossibility of ‘awareness being aware of itself’ and ‘the impossibility of ‘you’ being aware ‘of’ anything at all’ ... obviously some other process is required, non? Perhaps if I were to provide an analogy it may become clearer? You have written: [Respondent]: ‘A street sign points towards New York. The sign is just a sign. If somebody follows what was pointed to, and is willing to go through whatever is necessary to get to New York, he has done all the work. The sign, as a sign itself, is still useless’. There is another ‘street sign’ which you apparently are overlooking in your haste to get to ‘New York’. It reads: ‘Turn Around ... You Are Going The Wrong Way’.

RESPONDENT: What on earth are you babbling about? I don’t care what Mrs. Lutyens or anybody else has said about this. You’re talking with me, not with Mary Lutyens, Krishnamurti, Pupul Jayakar or any of the rest of them. My statements are mine. Don’t you think it’s really cheap and whiney to try to associate my words with those of others merely to try to make them look like you want them to look?

RICHARD: Not at all ... I associated the words because what the words point to is indeed strikingly similar. Am I to take it that the quote did not prise that firmly-shut door open even a trifle?

RESPONDENT: You never did address my original statement: ‘The mind that is not obstructed by selfishness, that is, the mind that does not think it ‘knows’, is already itself that comprehension ...’ Why?

RICHARD: Because you were responding in virtually the same way with ‘comprehension’ as you did with ‘insight’ and as you did with ‘being apparent’ and as you did with ‘awareness’ (and just as you possibly will do with apperception) ... you are still persisting with the line that nobody can ascertain the nature of the non-material energy or consciousness, which you posit as being the source of, not only all life, but the physical universe itself ... or why it does.

RESPONDENT: Because you can’t, because you are that mind that thinks it ‘knows’, when all you know is your ‘matter-gone-consciousness’ theory of borrowed atheism renamed ‘actualism’.

RICHARD: If you can direct me to any atheism writings that report of living sans ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul; of living in the pristine perfection of the already always existing peace-on-earth; of living as this flesh and blood body being totally free of the human condition; of living totally free of malice and sorrow plus the antidotal pacifiers of love and compassion; of living totally free of the need for ethics and morals and principles ... then your ‘borrowed atheism’ point is valid.

RESPONDENT: So stop this elementary, power-grabbing-by-any-means-necessary twaddle as it makes your already collapsed guru facade even more transparent. What a fake.

RICHARD: Are you really suggesting that a sincere investigation into the nature of the non-material consciousness is nothing other than ‘elementary, power-grabbing-by-any-means-necessary twaddle’? Why? And what and where is the power (let alone grabbing it) anyway, in being atheistic? Atheism does away with the power supposedly granted to something non-material ... not grab it (there is no power in something that does not exist as an actuality).

Also, as the premise (‘guru facade’) is nothing but your own invention then your conclusion (‘what a fake’) is a fallacious conclusion.

*

RICHARD: And, not only was I interested as to why a ‘unmanifest, non-existent ... no-thing’ would be called ‘actual’, I had intended to query what the word <real> means, in your use of language, in your ‘matter is real but not actual’ sentence ... but you have already explained that ‘real’ indicates that space and time and matter are not fact, not actual and are but illusions or concepts. Viz.: [Respondent]: ‘It is only the manifestation of energy as materiality that I regard as impermanent and therefore as illusion, as non-actuality. Illusion is real, time-bound, ever-changing, arising and vanishing. Actuality is not real, not time-bounding, not ever changing’. <snip>. There is really nothing else I wanted to ask you about. I already have intimate comprehension, of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy which is ‘innocence’, which ‘itself never suffers’, which is ‘independent of its manifestations’ because the ‘me’ as soul, who was parasitically inhabiting this body, was that non-material consciousness night and day for eleven years (only ‘he’ called it ‘The Absolute’) ... so there is nothing I am not already aware of, from first-hand experience, that I could become aware of from your ‘nobody knows’ song. Nevertheless, there may be something which you wish to address – or an aspect of the previous E-Mail you may want me to respond to specifically – in which case I am only too happy to reply. If not ... I do appreciate that the discussion was able to happen.

RESPONDENT: There would be no point to my questioning what you feel is your experience.

RICHARD: Indeed ... because it is not something that I ‘feel’ is my experience. If you arrange your question falsely you are bound to leap to a false conclusion every time, eh?

RESPONDENT: Richard, don’t ever, ever give advice to another human being about arranging things falsely. I didn’t question you in the first place. I made a statement and it holds.

RICHARD: How? Here is your statement: ‘there would be no point to my questioning what you feel is your experience’. How can it hold that you can possibly know that what I experience is what I ‘feel’?

RESPONDENT: I see no point to my questioning what you feel is your experience. If you don’t think it’s a feeling, that’s up to you.

RICHARD: It is not a case of what I ‘think’ either ... it is patently obvious it be not a case of what I ‘feel’. You are way out of your depth, here.

RESPONDENT: I DO think it is a feeling because of your proclivity towards dishonest verbal inter-change, as well as your ‘if you’re talking about me’ paranoia which I had to address twice in our recent communications.

RICHARD: I am well aware that it is what you ‘DO think’ is happening ... yet what you ‘DO think’ is happening has as much validity as this ‘paranoia’ diagnosis you also have running.

*

RESPONDENT: And there would be no point to my discussing the impossibility of having ‘firsthand experience’ of awareness ...

RICHARD: Why not? I certainly do not have firsthand experience as awareness – non-material awareness cannot be aware of the nature of non-material awareness – as it was the ‘me’ as soul, who was parasitically inhabiting this body, who was that non-material consciousness night and day for eleven years (only ‘he’ called it ‘The Absolute’) ... and not me. Hence I have an intimate comprehension of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy which is ‘innocence’, which ‘itself never suffers’, which is ‘independent of its manifestations’ and so on.

RESPONDENT: Yes. ‘And so on’, and on, and on. It’s the same old memorized speech. You have nothing of the sort.

RICHARD: Yet, despite your mind-reading abilities telling you it be not so, it remains so that I certainly do have an intimate comprehension of the nature of the non-material consciousness or energy ... and which is most definitely not the innocence it makes itself out to be for it indeed does itself suffer.

RESPONDENT: You have some second-hand, reworked, atheistic – now actualistic – system of belief that forces the poor brain to mimic silence in order to pretend that it is aware.

RICHARD: I will say this much: when you get a theme running you certainly do run with it ... irregardless of its accuracy.

*

RESPONDENT: ... and to my further discussing what to me is the impossibility of ‘you’ being aware ‘of’ anything at all ...

RICHARD: If by ‘you’ you are referring to ‘me’ ... then it is only impossible to discuss it with ‘me’ because the ‘me’ who was parasitically inhabiting this body altruistically ‘self’-immolated years ago. ‘He’ is extirpated, extinguished, eliminated, annihilated ... in other words: extinct. ‘He’ is as dead as the dodo but with no skeletal remains. ‘He’ vanished without a trace ... there was no phoenix to rise from the ashes. ‘He’ is finished. Kaput. Which is why peace-on-earth became apparent in all its perfection.

RESPONDENT: The only thing I see immolated is sanity. The other 99% is SELF, speaking so vain-gloriously and loudly that it will never hear or see that it is still there shouting about its absence.

RICHARD: As this unsolicited character analysis is entirely inaccurate there is nothing of substance to respond to.

RESPONDENT: I don’t believe you.

RICHARD: Good ... I always advise against believing (and trusting, having faith, hoping and so on).

RESPONDENT: Why do you keep posting this stuff about yourself, trying to make people believe it?

RICHARD: You have asked me a similar question before ... and I cannot improve upon my response to you back then:

• [Richard]: ‘I do not want any one to merely believe me. I stress to people how important it is that they see for themselves. If they were so foolish as to believe me then the most they would end up in is living in a dream state and thus miss out on the actual. I do not wish this fate upon anyone ... I like my fellow human beings’. (Richard, List B, No. 4, 20 November 1998)

RESPONDENT: Only a fool would believe it because people watch what you DO, your tricks, how you tend to beat up on people when you feel they are intellectually weaker than you are, and how you twist the words of others to disguise your inability to meet those words adequately.

RICHARD: Hmm ... again this ‘you feel’ diagnosis of yours is as inaccurate as the conclusions you draw. Plus, experience has shown that when the other starts telling me that I am twisting their words it usually indicates that they have nothing of substance to say ... and that the discussion is about to be terminated.

‘Tis only a generalisation, though.

RESPONDENT: Either you are stone nuts or you are sinister.

RICHARD: I am well aware by now that anyone proposing peace-on-earth, in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body, is considered to be ‘stone nuts’ (my condition has been officially diagnosed as a severe psychotic mental disorder) ... but this ‘sinister’ analysis of yours intrigues me (‘sinister’: menacing, ominous, evil, baleful, creepy, threatening). Especially since you have previously told me that I am ‘a scoundrel’ , ‘a deceiver’, ‘a liar of the worst kind’, ‘a vulture’, ‘a buzzard’, ‘a mamba snake’and that it is ‘a shame to have all that verbal ability and to use it so nefariously’ (‘nefarious’: wicked, evil, despicable, immoral, reprehensible, disreputable).

And you say that it is I that displays ‘paranoia’, eh?

*

RESPONDENT: ... and of discussing the impossibility of ‘awareness being aware of itself’, as I have already, and as you have summarized, gone into all that in great detail.

RICHARD: Indeed ... as I have repeatedly said in great detail: some other process is required.

RESPONDENT: I know: Your process of actualism, right?

RICHARD: No ... only apperception reveals the nature of non-material consciousness. The ‘process of actualism’ you refer to is the method whereby apperception is enabled.

*

RESPONDENT: I too appreciate that the discussion was able to occur. Take care.

RICHARD: Yet all is always carefree in this actual world ... there is no ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul here stuffing up the works.

RESPONDENT: Of course not. It’s stuffing up the body and stuffing up the mouth.

RICHARD: I rather fail to see the point you are making here.

January 04 2001:

RESPONDENT: Take care.

RICHARD: Yet all is always carefree in this actual world ... there is no ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul here stuffing up the works.

RESPONDENT: Of course not. It’s stuffing up the body and stuffing up the mouth.

RICHARD: I rather fail to see the point you are making here.

RESPONDENT: The few paragraphs above didn’t seem worth replying to so I didn’t reply. Whatever you are, or think you are, is up to you. I’m not interested in your self-testimonies.

RICHARD: So I have noticed ... what you do seem to be interested in is singing the song that you sing irregardless of the fact that you cannot ascertain the nature of non-material consciousness (yet still persist in ascribing properties, such as ‘innocence’, to that which you say is the source, of not only all life, but of the universe as well). You even say that the non-material consciousness is independent of its manifestations – and that it itself does not suffer – as if this somehow exonerates it from ‘standing out’ in the first place in its manifestation (on this planet at least) as maliciously and sorrowfully as it does.

RESPONDENT: My only interest has been to discuss the topic in as great detail as possible.

RICHARD: What detail? You have made it quite clear that the nature of the non-material consciousness cannot be ascertained by anybody ... let alone in detail.

RESPONDENT: It seems to me that that is unlikely with you because of your tendency to distort and misrepresent what is said. I don’t even believe that you realize you are doing it.

RICHARD: If you can successfully demonstrate where I have distorted or misrepresented what you have said and that the nature of the non-material consciousness can be ascertained after all I would be very pleased to discuss the properties of that nature, the qualities of those properties, and the values drawn from those qualities in the most minute detail with you.

After all, this is what my initial question to you was ... and still is.

RESPONDENT: You seem to have only one intention that I have noticed, and which keeps repeating itself: To try to debunk whatever does not fit your theory of actualism.

RICHARD: My intention is, as always, to usher in peace-on-earth, in this lifetime as the flesh and blood body, for anybody and everybody. What is your intention?

RESPONDENT: And when you can’t do that successfully above board, you will try to do it indirectly. For example, in a letter you sent to No. 19 yesterday, I noticed that you distorted my phrase, ‘non-material consciousness’, by adding to it, with abandon, any meaning you chose, in order to portray it in the manner that you desired. <snipped>

RICHARD: I explicitly said ‘any non-material consciousness’ (thus specifically indicating that it be not your usage of this generic term by doing so) ... and I particularly stated that I was speaking ‘generally’ and not exclusively (there are too many variations on the theme to make an all-inclusive summary). Viz.:

• [Richard]: ‘Maybe it would be of assistance if I were to clearly delineate the difference between what any ‘non-material consciousness’ generally has to say and what this flesh and blood consciousness says? Viz.: <snip>. (Richard, List B, No. 19e, 2 January 2001)

If you wish to take my sentence ‘what any ‘non-material consciousness’ generally has to say ...’ to mean that the examples I gave prove your theory that I have ‘a tendency to distort and misrepresent what’ what you have to say and that I ‘will try to do it indirectly’ then there is nothing I can do but to say that you are either mistaken or have overlooked the word ‘generally’.

I always like it to be very clear, whenever I generalise, that I am speaking in broad terms.

RESPONDENT: Now, If I’m wrong you may point it out with proof, but I haven’t seen anybody else use the term non-material conscious-ness, and especially recently here, but me.

RICHARD: Okay ... it only took the search-engine a few seconds to come up with the following URL’s. If these examples do not satisfy you then I suggest that you do your own research, from now on, before sending such an E-Mail as this one you have sent. Viz.:

• [quote]: ‘Science has difficulty in trying to explain consciousness in terms of natural phenomena because ‘they’ are looking in the wrong place. Consciousness is non-local, it can not be found in space and time. Natural science is concerned with events in local space and time, that are coordinates of perception in the realm of extension. Non-material consciousness is closely linked by its inputs and its outputs to a material brain which is linked to the physical universe’.
http://members.aol.com/rick3in1/nature/mindcons.htm
• [quote]: ‘The freedom of non-material consciousness for Sartre echoes the Cartesian theological tradition regarding mind-body dualism. That is, there is no way to give a satisfactory account of how a non-extended substance can be causally acted on by an extended substance. While Sartre’s construction of consciousness as a sui generis upsurge is the foundation for his theory of freedom and therefore, responsibility (which is his main concern) the non-materiality of Sartrean consciousness also differentiates it from a physical human body. Indeed, consciousness in Sartre’s sense is even differentiated from the ego of Descartes’ Meditations which in Sartre’s (Husserlian) analysis becomes an object of conscious reflection’.
www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/Cult/CultZack.htm
• [quote]: ‘The Sautrantikas in general also believe in smallest particles and instances of consciousness, but they say that objects cannot be perceived directly via the sense faculties because a connection between that non-material consciousness and the material world in not possible. They assert a substance, an image of which is only perceived by the sense consciousness’.
www.diamondway.org/bt/budterms2.htm
• [quote]: ‘Similarly in arguments on the subject of the supernatural, religion, god etc. I believe that the much simpler set of assumptions about the nature of the world is one without mysterious supernatural forces, whether god or gods, spirits, magical powers, or whatever. And I believe that a more basic position to begin an exploration of the nature of things similarly would be one without the assumption of mysterious non-material consciousness stuff, one way or other. I know that Chalmers’ dualism, to the extent that is such, isn’t really a substance-dualism’.
http://207.138.41.133/message/dennett-dialognet/100
• [quote]: ‘Thus we come to Bishop Berkeley. His claim to fame was the feat of standing Locke on his head. He thought that since ideas, according to Locke, represent universals, and since ideas are not identical to the things they represent, just as words are not, and since (according to Berkeley) we can never make the exact connection as to how – or even if – these ‘perceived’ ideas correspond or relate to the things themselves, that is to the objective reality outside of us, then we can’t know if they (the objects) exist. His famous conclusion was: ‘Being (existence) is perception.’ In other words, objective reality is nothing but our perception of it. Thus he turned empiricism into its opposite, and gave it its present bad reputation. And with the help of Descartes’ idea of the prior certainty of consciousness, which claimed that the only thing we can’t doubt is our own non-material consciousness, while we can doubt material (objective) reality, empiricism came to be thought of as no more objective than rationalism or idealism. Objective verification became, by implication, subjective, that is, ‘only in our mind.’ Subsequently, Hume and Kant made further inroads into this trend (which ultimately becomes a ‘critique of reason’ itself), but we can go no further into them here’.
www.monadnock.net/summa/peirce.html
• [quote]: ‘I guess what I’m trying to get at is that once you are willing to accept such a phenomenon like remote viewing (like Global Mind Change argues, and Jonathan poses as a ‘what if’) you’ve started to go down the rabbit hole into the realm of high weirdness. If it is possible to project your perception in space (and time ... so much for no facts about the future ...) then what? It would seem to entail a non-material consciousness (a soul?) just for starters, and the rest of the implications are rather immense to imagine’.
www.fortunecity.com/victorian/barchester/1341/mindchange.htm

A little research saves a lot of unnecessary to-ing and fro-ing of E-Mails.

*

RESPONDENT: None of the statements you attributed to ‘any non-material consciousness’ are statements I have ever made.

RICHARD: Not those statements in those specific arrangement of particular words, no (I made it very clear that I was generalising as there are too many variations on the theme to make an all-inclusive summary) ... but I decline to become involved, any more than I already am, in one of your hide-and-seek definition chases. For a person who maintains, in some form or another, that the word is not the thing you do become quite particular about how others read (or, rather, misread) your words time and again ... as in the water cannot know what water is example I provided as being another’s words pointing to the same thing as your awareness cannot know what awareness is phrasing.

RESPONDENT: So, in using a particular phrase I’ve used a lot recently, you’ve managed to attach your own point of view to them, that is, to distort them, and, by association with my words, to make it seem as if I actually think those things.

RICHARD: Those examples I gave are not me attaching my point of view to the generic term for the bodiless consciousness (or disembodied energy or incorporeal intelligence by whatever immaterial name) that is held to the source of, not only all life, but the universe as well ... they are attributes that are generally held by religionists, spiritualists, mystics and metaphysicalists the world over for at least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (let alone maybe 50,000 years of oral tradition).

RESPONDENT: And then you safely deposited your distortions into your ever-increasing bank of non-actualistic writings which you denigrate by referring to as ‘god by any name’. You can’t be more devious and dishonest than this.

RICHARD: If you see being up-front and out in the open – calling a spade a spade – as being ‘devious and dishonest’ then so be it.

January 06 2001:

RESPONDENT: Whatever you are, or think you are, is up to you. I’m not interested in your self-testimonies.

RICHARD: So I have noticed ... what you do seem to be interested in is singing the song that you sing irregardless of the fact that you cannot ascertain the nature of non-material consciousness (yet still persist in ascribing properties, such as ‘innocence’, to that which you say is the source, of not only all life, but of the universe as well). You even say that the non-material consciousness is independent of its manifestations – and that it itself does not suffer – as if this somehow exonerates it from ‘standing out’ in the first place in its manifestation (on this planet at least) as maliciously and sorrowfully as it does.

RESPONDENT: You will never see it, Richard. I see that now. I am hereby acknowledging the impossible. You deeply believe that matter gives rise to consciousness, and that this matter-derived consciousness can be aware of itself as consciousness. To me that is patently absurd no matter how consciousness came into being – even if it was possible for consciousness to come into being – because consciousness, as consciousness is not divided. Being undivided, consciousness cannot be conscious of itself. It is a contradiction in terms. It is consciousness associated with matter as ego that thinks that.

RICHARD: Perhaps if I put it succinctly: I do see that non-material consciousness cannot be conscious of itself.

*

RESPONDENT: My only interest has been to discuss the topic in as great detail as possible.

RICHARD: What detail? You have made it quite clear that the nature of the non-material consciousness cannot be ascertained by anybody ... let alone in detail.

RESPONDENT: There is this huge mental block that is simply impenetrable. Why does non-material consciousness need to be ascertained?

RICHARD: The nature of the non-material consciousness does not ‘need’ to be ascertained at all – it has been successful in ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully for a least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (and perhaps 50,000 years of pre-history) and may very well continue to do so off into an indeterminate future – unless the human beings it is ‘standing out’ as want to live happily and harmlessly.

RESPONDENT: And by whom?

RICHARD: It needs to be an open question.

RESPONDENT: You?

RICHARD: This is a closed question.

RESPONDENT: But ‘you’ aren’t there, are you Richard?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: Then what is going to ascertain anything, since Richard is self-immolated and is no more?

RICHARD: Apperception.

RESPONDENT: So, since you are already awareness, you are also already non-material consciousness, since that is what I call awareness.

RICHARD: Except that I am not ‘already awareness’ (since what you call ‘awareness’ is ‘non-material consciousness’).

RESPONDENT: What then, as awareness, is there to ascertain?

RICHARD: As I said: I do see that non-material consciousness cannot be conscious of itself (non-material awareness cannot be aware of non-material awareness).

RESPONDENT: So what wants to ascertain non-material consciousness unless it is ‘you’?

RICHARD: The flesh and blood body.

RESPONDENT: But it couldn’t be you because you are self-immolated already.

RICHARD: Indeed.

*

RESPONDENT: It seems to me that that is unlikely with you because of your tendency to distort and misrepresent what is said. I don’t even believe that you realize you are doing it.

RICHARD: If you can successfully demonstrate where I have distorted or misrepresented what you have said and that the nature of the non-material consciousness can be ascertained after all I would be very pleased to discuss the properties of that nature, the qualities of those properties, and the values drawn from those qualities in the most minute detail with you. After all, this is what my initial question to you was ... and still is.

RESPONDENT: The treadmill continues. Demonstrate to me the nature of your self-immolated mind, please. Demonstrate to me the ‘fact’ that consciousness arises from matter. And demonstrate to me that consciousness is aware of its own conscious-ness. Can’t do it? It’s ok. I wouldn’t presume to demonstrate anything to you as that would not be possible, since the existent body that would presume to demonstrate something so non-existent as non-material consciousness, would first have to explode out of its state as mass, then explode out of its state as universal energy. Since this is not possible as an act of will, non-material consciousness says to the body, ‘hey, just sing my song ... if the actualists are tone deaf, it’s their problem ...’ .

RICHARD: All I was asking was that you substantiate your allegation that I have a ‘tendency to distort and misrepresent what is said’ by demonstrating where I have distorted or misrepresented what you have said and that the nature of the non-material consciousness can be ascertained after all.

That is all I am asking.

*

RESPONDENT: You seem to have only one intention that I have noticed, and which keeps repeating itself: To try to debunk whatever does not fit your theory of actualism.

RICHARD: My intention is, as always, to usher in peace-on-earth, in this lifetime as the flesh and blood body, for anybody and everybody. What is your intention?

RESPONDENT: I have no concept of peace on earth. There are enough people already who are peddling that concept to ‘anybody and everybody’. I have learned well from the narcissists of the 20th and 21st centuries.

RICHARD: As I have no interest whatsoever in ushering in a ‘concept’ of peace-on-earth the following two sentences are a contrived irrelevance.

RESPONDENT: I have nothing to give. Having nothing to give or to usher in to people, I can simply be friends to all, and perhaps, in that friendship and caring, there is the silent transmission of what belongs to none of us, and is not ours to either give or usher in.

RICHARD: What is this that ‘belongs to none of us’? What is it that is being silently transmitted, perhaps, in your ‘friendship and caring’? Do you want to find out? Are you ‘caring’ enough to discover what that ‘silent transmission’ is? Or is being ‘friends to all’ more important? Has ‘friendship’ a priority over and above peace-on-earth?

*

RESPONDENT: In using a particular phrase I’ve used a lot recently, you’ve managed to attach your own point of view to them, that is, to distort them, and, by association with my words, to make it seem as if I actually think those things.

RICHARD: Those examples I gave are not me attaching my point of view to the generic term for the bodiless consciousness (or disembodied energy or incorporeal intelligence by whatever immaterial name) that is held to the source of, not only all life, but the universe as well ... they are attributes that are generally held by religionists, spiritualists, mystics and metaphysicalists the world over for at least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (let alone maybe 50,000 years of oral tradition).

RESPONDENT: Isn’t that the point? Whatever is said by anybody who is not an actualist will be consigned to the trash bin of actualist-decreed and defined metaphysics. So why should I be excluded? After all, you are the only one living and who has ever lived, who knows the truth, or at least who has actually attained freedom of ego, that is, who has ‘self-immolated’.

RICHARD: Not just ‘I’ as ego ... ‘me’ as soul as well (the identity in toto is extinct).

RESPONDENT: Naturally then, by virtue of your self-testimony, which must be a fact because you testified to it, you must be right and all those people of history and of today must inevitably have been wrong. After all, you did read their words, and from their words you determined, from your 21st century awareness, that all of them – nobody excluded – were definitely entrapped in various levels of ‘alternate states of consciousness’. There simply is no non-material consciousness because you say matter gave rise to consciousness, and, of course, matter has always been here. You know that because, obviously, you were here before matter was in order to know that. Right?

RICHARD: No ... I was not here ‘before matter was in order to know that’.

RESPONDENT: Or, at least the flesh and blood body knows it because, since it has become aware, it also has become aware of what happened before it arose from ordinary, instinctive, blind-nature consciousness, which itself arose from matter, which is beginningless and endless, because self-immolated consciousness says that it is.

RICHARD: The matter that is this flesh and blood body is the very matter of this universe – the matter that is this flesh and blood body did not come from ‘outside’ the universe – therefore the matter that is this flesh and blood body is as old as this universe is.

January 09 2001:

RESPONDENT: Whatever you are, or think you are, is up to you. I’m not interested in your self-testimonies.

RICHARD: So I have noticed ... what you do seem to be interested in is singing the song that you sing irregardless of the fact that you cannot ascertain the nature of non-material consciousness (yet still persist in ascribing properties, such as ‘innocence’, to that which you say is the source, of not only all life, but of the universe as well). You even say that the non-material consciousness is independent of its manifestations – and that it itself does not suffer – as if this somehow exonerates it from ‘standing out’ in the first place in its manifestation (on this planet at least) as maliciously and sorrowfully as it does.

RESPONDENT: You will never see it, Richard. I see that now. I am hereby acknowledging the impossible. You deeply believe that matter gives rise to consciousness, and that this matter-derived consciousness can be aware of itself as consciousness. To me that is patently absurd no matter how consciousness came into being – even if it was possible for consciousness to come into being – because consciousness, as consciousness is not divided. Being undivided, consciousness cannot be conscious of itself. It is a contradiction in terms. It is consciousness associated with matter as ego that thinks that.

RICHARD: Perhaps if I put it succinctly: I do see that non-material consciousness cannot be conscious of itself.

RESPONDENT: Of course you see it that way, because you see non-material consciousness as ‘soul’, which disqualifies it, making it irrelevant in terms of your actualism.

RICHARD: No ... I am in agreement with you. And I have been in agreement all the way through (which is why I keep on asking how you can say that non-material consciousness is this or that and so on when its nature cannot be ascertained). I even provided a quote (‘water can never find out what water is’) which, if you had not been so quick to dismiss as being another’s words and not yours, you would see is essentially pointing to the same thing. Therefore, your ‘you will never see it, Richard. I see that now. I am hereby acknowledging the impossible’ is incorrect.

That I am saying apperception will reveal all does not negate my agreement that non-material consciousness cannot be conscious of itself ... the issue of apperception is a separate (and contentious) issue.

*

RESPONDENT: My only interest has been to discuss the topic in as great detail as possible.

RICHARD: What detail? You have made it quite clear that the nature of the non-material consciousness cannot be ascertained by anybody ... let alone in detail.

RESPONDENT: There is this huge mental block that is simply impenetrable. Why does non-material consciousness need to be ascertained?

RICHARD: The nature of the non-material consciousness does not ‘need’ to be ascertained at all – it has been successful in ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully for a least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (and perhaps 50,000 years of pre-history) and may very well continue to do so off into an indeterminate future – unless the human beings it is ‘standing out’ as want to live happily and harmlessly.

RESPONDENT: I can understand that belief as one of the tenants of your philosophy of actualism.

RICHARD: Where is the ‘belief’? It is an historical fact, documented on stone plaques, clay tablets, wood carvings, parchment, paper and latterly in pixels, over a 3,000 to 5,000 year period. As for the perhaps 50,000 of pre-history, my use of ‘perhaps’ indicates that it is not a belief but merely a reasonable hypothesis, based upon myths and legend, and readily discarded in view of any new evidence being forthcoming.

RESPONDENT: It is equally understandable how what doesn’t fit your philosophy of actualism would be considered as malicious.

RICHARD: No. What is malicious (and sorrowful) is the feelings that peoples have been feeling for a least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (and perhaps 50,000 years of pre-history) ... the presence of those feelings in peoples, and the ‘Tried and True’ way of dealing with them, has nothing to do with what you call the ‘philosophy of actualism’.

RESPONDENT: That feeling has also occurred historically and presently when belief has encountered either resistance or unacceptance.

RICHARD: Well, then ... what has the presence of malicious (and sorrowful) feelings for a least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (and perhaps 50,000 years of pre-history) have to do with ‘what doesn’t fit’ into what you call the ‘philosophy of actualism’ (further above). You negate your own argument here.

RESPONDENT: What informs your actualism is believed by you to have been derived from the ‘flesh-and-blood-body-awareness’ which you claim is actual, ‘compared’ to the awareness of others which you claim is not.

RICHARD: No, what informs me is historical facts, documented on stone plaques, clay tablets, wood carvings, parchment, paper and latterly in pixels, over a 3,000 to 5,000 year period. As for the perhaps 50,000 of pre-history, my use of ‘perhaps’ indicates that it is not a belief but merely a reasonable hypothesis, based upon myths and legend, and readily discarded in view of any new evidence being forthcoming.

RESPONDENT: It amounts then, to claims by you and claims by ‘them’ – of history and of today.

RICHARD: No, it was you who claimed that the non-material consciousness was ‘standing out’ as this material universe ... I simply point out that it is ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully (on planet earth at last), instead of ‘standing out’ happily and harmlessly, and ask how come. Historical records show that it has been successful in ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully over a 3,000 to 5,000 year period.

RESPONDENT: And like them of old and of today, whose awareness, as you say, has not produced harmlessness and happiness in the world, that same harmlessness and happiness, as the product of your ‘flesh-and-blood-body-awareness’, seems also to be ‘remarkably unforthcoming’.

RICHARD: As the likes of ‘them of old and of today’ (what I call the ‘Tried and True’) has had at least 3,000 to 5,000 years to demonstrate its efficacy in curing all the ills of humankind – and I only went public in 1997 – just what point is it you are making? And, as a matter of interest ... what point are you making in this entire paragraph? The nature of the non-material consciousness does not ‘need’ to be ascertained at all – it can go on ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully for another 3,000 to 5,000 years (or more) – because it has been successful in ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully for a least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (and perhaps 50,000 years of pre-history).

It is only human beings who can care enough to have it cease ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully and have it start ‘standing out’ happily and harmlessly instead. But in order to do so the nature of non-material consciousness needs to be ascertained so as to see how come it is ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully, rather than ‘standing out’ happily and harmlessly, in the first place.

This has been my question from the very beginning of this thread.

*

RESPONDENT: [Why does non-material consciousness need to be ascertained?] And by whom?

RICHARD: It needs to be an open question.

RESPONDENT: Open it then, please.

RICHARD: Simple: do not ask ‘by whom?’.

RESPONDENT: You?

RICHARD: This is a closed question.

RESPONDENT: Open it then.

RICHARD: Again: do not ask ‘you?’.

RESPONDENT: But ‘you’ aren’t there, are you Richard?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: That is a closed statement.

RICHARD: No ... it is an accurate report of the condition of this flesh and blood body (just as ‘this computer monitor has no chewing gum inside it’ is not a ‘closed statement’ either).

RESPONDENT: Then what is going to ascertain anything, since Richard is self-immolated and is no more?

RICHARD: Apperception.

RESPONDENT: Right, apperception. And how might that occur since apperception is already awareness, and, as I am suggesting, awareness cannot ascertain awareness?

RICHARD: No ... apperception is not ‘already awareness’ (since what you call ‘awareness’ is ‘non-material consciousness’).

*

RESPONDENT: So, since you are already awareness, you are also already non-material consciousness, since that is what I call awareness.

RICHARD: Except that I am not ‘already awareness’ (since what you call ‘awareness’ is ‘non-material consciousness’).

RESPONDENT: Of course. You are the apperceptive body. And the apperceptive body has declared that what is not apperception is ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as ‘soul’, which makes it ‘unawareness’.

RICHARD: No, it only makes it ‘non-apperceptive’ ... all sentient beings are aware to some degree or another.

RESPONDENT: So then, what is the ‘fact’ for your apperception means, by definition, that it is THE fact, and that all other ‘facts’ which are not apperceptively derived are derived from the condition of human ignorance, which is characterized by human entrapment in the reactions, ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as ‘soul’?

RICHARD: No ... there are many facts ascertainable by anybody. However, the fact that maybe 6.0 billion human bodies alive today (and maybe 4.0 billion once alive) are possessed by an ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul can only become apparent, as an actuality, apperceptively ... then the nature of both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul is plain to view.

*

RESPONDENT: What then, as awareness, is there to ascertain?

RICHARD: As I said: I do see that non-material consciousness cannot be conscious of itself (non-material awareness cannot be aware of non-material awareness).

RESPONDENT: I see, because non-material consciousness is not apperception, right?

RICHARD: No ... it is because ‘non-material consciousness’ can not be apperceptively aware (apperception is a way of seeing ... not a ‘thing’).

RESPONDENT: Or at least it doesn’t occur since is it not apperceptively derived.

RICHARD: No ... it is because ‘non-material consciousness’ can not be apperceptively aware (apperception is a way of seeing ... not the source of everything).

RESPONDENT: That certainly proves to the apperceptive body that its statements about this are absolutely correct. Closed systems are inherently ‘self-correct’ – to themselves.

RICHARD: This immeasurably vast universe is not a ‘closed system’.

*

RESPONDENT: So what wants to ascertain non-material consciousness unless it is ‘you’?

RICHARD: The flesh and blood body.

RESPONDENT: The flesh and blood body. You are saying that the flesh and blood body, which is already aware, desires or ‘wants’ to ascertain non-material consciousness, which it already knows is the ignorance of ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as ‘soul’. How can it ascertain what it already has declared to be false, and why would it ‘want’ to, being awareness and, therefore, being free of want, that is, of a ‘you’ that could want?

RICHARD: The normal flesh and blood body is possessed by an identity, a parasitical entity, which forces the normal flesh and blood body to commit malicious acts, in word and deed, upon its fellow human beings (and other animals and even vegetation) as well as forcing the normal flesh and blood body to develop sorrowful psychosomatic illnesses, for an example ... if not forcing it to commit the ultimate sorrowful (and malicious) act: suicide.

Of course the flesh and blood wishes to be rid of this pernicious and insidious entity.

RESPONDENT: But it couldn’t be you because you are self-immolated already.

RICHARD: Indeed.

RESPONDENT: Naturally.

RICHARD: Oh, no ... what happened was very, very unnatural. What is natural is to be a malicious and sorrowful entity balanced by being a loving and compassionate entity.

*

RESPONDENT: You seem to have only one intention that I have noticed, and which keeps repeating itself: To try to debunk whatever does not fit your theory of actualism.

RICHARD: My intention is, as always, to usher in peace-on-earth, in this lifetime as the flesh and blood body, for anybody and everybody. What is your intention?

RESPONDENT: I have no concept of peace on earth. There are enough people already who are peddling that concept to ‘anybody and everybody’. I have learned well from the narcissists of the 20th and 21st centuries.

RICHARD: As I have no interest whatsoever in ushering in a ‘concept’ of peace-on-earth the following two sentences are a contrived irrelevance.

RESPONDENT: Of course what we don’t agree with is irrelevant. However, unless ‘peace-on-earth’ is objective, that is, unless it is an object that has mass and weight, and can be ‘ushered in’ as such, there is little doubt that it is not more than a concept. The flesh and blood body is a flesh and blood body and nothing else. The attribute of peace-on-earth is a self-attribute made by that body about itself and what it has conceptualised as its ability to deliver or ‘usher in’.

RICHARD: The descriptive phrase ‘peace-on-earth’ is an accurate description of what is already always occurring, as is evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE), and is most certainly not a concept. Thus no body has to either conceptualise it or believe me ... in fact I advise against conceptualising (or imagining, visualising and so on) and believing (or trusting and having faith and hoping and so on).

*

RESPONDENT: I have nothing to give. Having nothing to give or to usher in to people, I can simply be friends to all, and perhaps, in that friendship and caring, there is the silent transmission of what belongs to none of us, and is not ours to either give or usher in.

RICHARD: What is this that ‘belongs to none of us’? What is it that is being silently transmitted, perhaps, in your ‘friendship and caring’? Do you want to find out? Are you ‘caring’ enough to discover what that ‘silent transmission’ is? Or is being ‘friends to all’ more important? Has ‘friendship’ a priority over and above peace-on-earth?

RESPONDENT: What belongs to none of us is the energy of awareness which IS all of us, that is, when the dream of ‘me’ is finished. What is being transmitted silently is that energy which is the absence of malice.

RICHARD: Is that ‘energy which is the absence of malice’ the same-same energy which is ‘standing out’ maliciously and sorrowfully (on this planet at least) as maybe 6.0 billion human beings ... or is it some other ‘energy’?

RESPONDENT: That energy is what caring IS. There is no need then, to find out what is already actional. When there is no malice, that is already what friendship is; therefore, it is not a question of what is ‘more’ important.

RICHARD: Okay ... has that energy, which is ‘what caring IS’ and which is ‘the absence of malice’, ever been ‘transmitted silently’? If so, has that person henceforth ceased being malicious and sorrowful for the remainder of their life? That is, they are no longer subject to, nor display, for example, anger or anguish ... as has been documented regarding various saints, sages and seers?

RESPONDENT: Lastly, friendship is the natural state of mind, of the body that has no malice, that is, no sense of separation as ‘me’ and ‘that’, which would invite contention based on identification.

RICHARD: What is the nature of this ‘natural friendship’? That is, is it characterised by the feeling of affection, for just one example?

RESPONDENT: So, there is no need to conceptualise harmlessness and absence of malice as ‘peace-on-earth’, and to pursue ‘that’.

RICHARD: ‘Twas you who conceptualised it ... I am describing the actual absence of malice and sorrow.

RESPONDENT: The body itself is what the concept ‘peace-on-earth’ is trying to convey, and its very existence is its own transmission as what you would metaphorically call ‘peace-on-earth’ and what I would metaphorically call ‘love’.

RICHARD: No, I am not ‘metaphorically’ saying ‘peace-on-earth’ ... I am describing actual peace-on-earth. If you want metaphoric love to be silently transmitted to your friends then that is your business ... but you can include me out of your conceptualisations

*

RESPONDENT: In using a particular phrase I’ve used a lot recently, you’ve managed to attach your own point of view to them, that is, to distort them, and, by association with my words, to make it seem as if I actually think those things.

RICHARD: Those examples I gave are not me attaching my point of view to the generic term for the bodiless consciousness (or disembodied energy or incorporeal intelligence by whatever immaterial name) that is held to the source of, not only all life, but the universe as well ... they are attributes that are generally held by religionists, spiritualists, mystics and metaphysicalists the world over for at least 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history (let alone maybe 50,000 years of oral tradition).

RESPONDENT: Isn’t that the point? Whatever is said by anybody who is not an actualist will be consigned to the trash bin of actualist-decreed and defined metaphysics. So why should I be excluded? After all, you are the only one living and who has ever lived, who knows the truth, or at least who has actually attained freedom of ego, that is, who has ‘self-immolated’.

RICHARD: Not just ‘I’ as ego ... ‘me’ as soul as well (the identity in toto is extinct).

RESPONDENT: Yes. Of course. You’ve expounded that theory before. It still awaits demonstration.

RICHARD: Indeed ... I invite people to make a critical examination of all the words I advance so as to ascertain if they be intrinsically self-explanatory ... and only when they are seen to be inherently consistent with what is being spoken about, then the facts speak for themselves. Then the other will have reason to remember a pure conscious experience (PCE), which all peoples I have spoken to at length have had, and thus verify by direct experience the facticity of what is written.

Direct experience is the only ‘demonstration’ worthy of the name.

*

RESPONDENT: Naturally then, by virtue of your self-testimony, which must be a fact because you testified to it, you must be right and all those people of history and of today must inevitably have been wrong. After all, you did read their words, and from their words you determined, from your 21st century awareness, that all of them – nobody excluded – were definitely entrapped in various levels of ‘alternate states of consciousness’. There simply is no non-material consciousness because you say matter gave rise to consciousness, and, of course, matter has always been here. You know that because, obviously, you were here before matter was in order to know that. Right?

RICHARD: No ... I was not here ‘before matter was in order to know that’.

RESPONDENT: I’ll take your word for it, as that seems plausible, considering what we know about the unlikelihood of time-travel. However, what is it you ‘know’ when you consider that knowledge is not awareness, and when you consider that awareness, being what knowledge is not, cannot know itself?

RICHARD: I know this: after 3,000 to 5,000 years of recorded history there is still as much mayhem and misery now as back then: therefore the ‘Tried and True’ has failed. I know this: for eleven years I lived that ‘Tried and True’ solution to all the ills of humankind – thus I have intimate knowledge of all its nooks and crannies – therefore I know why the ‘Tried and True’ is the ‘Tried and Failed. I know this: I know what will enable the already always existing peace-on-earth to be apparent ... because the identity (the ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul) parasitically inhabiting this flesh and blood body enabled it by ‘his’ altruistic sacrifice.

There is, of course, more that I know ... but this will suffice for now.

RESPONDENT: And in case you say that the body knows it, how can that be when you say that the body is already whatever awareness is – even discounting what you don’t believe is non-material awareness?

RICHARD: This flesh and blood body is not ‘already whatever awareness is’ ... this flesh and blood body is the very matter of this universe.

*

RESPONDENT: Or, at least the flesh and blood body knows it because, since it has become aware, it also has become aware of what happened before it arose from ordinary, instinctive, blind-nature consciousness, which itself arose from matter, which is beginningless and endless, because self-immolated consciousness says that it is.

RICHARD: The matter that is this flesh and blood body is the very matter of this universe – the matter that is this flesh and blood body did not come from ‘outside’ the universe – therefore the matter that is this flesh and blood body is as old as this universe is.

RESPONDENT: There seems to be an unintended misrepresentation regarding your substitution of the word ‘outside’ for the term, ‘arising from’, or the term ‘manifestation’.

RICHARD: Yet you have already informed me that the source of matter is independent of matter. Viz.:

• [Respondent]: ‘thought... cannot know that which is creative and independent of materiality’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... wholly independent of its manifestation’.
• [Respondent]: ‘Awareness ... is, in itself , totally independent of all knowledge’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... non-material energy ... itself never suffers, as it is, itself, independent of its manifestations.
• [Respondent]: ‘Awareness is wholly independent of its manifestation as material energy of any state’.
• [Respondent]: ‘... I’ve said all along that the source of materiality is independent of its manifestation as materiality’.

If it be not ‘outside’ the universe then where is it? If it is ‘inside’ the universe, how come it ‘itself never suffers’? Is it detached, dissociated and aloof from the very ‘manifestation’ which is ‘arising from’ its (supposedly) non-diseased nature?

RESPONDENT: It is obvious to me that the flesh and blood body is the very matter that is the universe; otherwise one could not account for it’s being materially existent.

RICHARD: Good.

RESPONDENT: That does not render untenable that the material universe, of which the body is an aspect, is a manifestation of energy which is non-material in itself, but which includes materiality as an aspect of its nature as creative energy and which is – notwithstanding the natural divisions that language imposes – one energy.

RICHARD: I will put it this way: it is not ‘untenable’ that unicorns exist – or a One-Eyed One-Horned Flying Purple People-Eater for that matter – but I preferred to stick with facts and actuality.


CORRESPONDENT No. 04: (Part Seven)

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