river-wind said:
for those doubters who pride themselves on knowing science, and not believing any of this pseudo science crap, answer this question, and I will be very impressed:
Not sure I fit the bill, but I'll give it a whirl.
river-wind said:
You are consious (I think therefore I am, right?).
Correct.
river-wind said:
you are made up of a mixture of matter and energy, in 3-D space.
Mostly correct. Matter and energy are really different states of the same
thing. Energy is uncompressed matter and matter is compressed energy:
E=MC^2
M = E/C^2
respectively. One important difference between energy and matter is that
matter can be arranged in incoprhensibly complex ways while energy has
not been observed to share this behavior.
Our universe seems to have far more dimensions than 3 (m-theory shows 11).
river-wind said:
What is special about that combination that allows for life?
Good question. I am not sure enough knowledge exists to answer it fully;
however, I would say that at a high level it generates change, complexity,
and adaptation.
river-wind said:
All living things have slightly different ratios of energy/matter in them, and that level changes over each individual lifetime, indeed on a daily basis.
Correct. Energy has to be used for mass to produce work.
river-wind said:
So we can have consious matter/energy at your ratio, why not consious matter/energy more heavily balanced toward the "Engery" end of the spectrum?
I woud assert that energy lacks the complexity to result in conciousness.
Ex. photons and heat simply don't result in structure. Perhaps undiscovered
forms of energy could result in such compexity, but this is wishful thinking
IMO.
river-wind said:
Why do we assume that Energy-based life is impossible, when we don't even understand yet why it is that we exist?
Same reason as above.
river-wind said:
On Topic: I have seen a "shadow person" once in my life, and I see shadow animals all the time. However, I don't know how to classify these sorts of things.
Hypnogigic hallucination perhaps?
river-wind said:
Because the occurance of sightings tend to increase dramatically, I tend to chalk them up as "most likely a tired mind finding patterns that aren't really there".
I am in full agreement with the second part of that statement.
river-wind said:
I think this is supported by the fact that you can really only see them out of the corner of your eye, or for a breif second. IMO, these things are more likely than not just in our minds.
Hypnogigic hallucinations can last many seconds in some cases. When
my brain was exceptionally tired one day, I saw and heard a dog (it
was not a shadow... but looked like a real Yorkie type of dog). Then it
just vanished *poof* no smooth transition. Fortunately I have had enough
hypnogigic hallucinations (usually after first waking up) to be able differentiate
between them and what's really there.
river-wind said:
However, my good friend/next-door neighbor who is very well versed in Souix lore has corroberated my one "Shadow person" event; telling me without prompting that she saw a "thunder spirirt" in her bedroom (the very same night I saw a tall, winged thing standing over me as I was coming out of meditation). Apon hearing her description of a 5-6' tall dark shadow humanoid with hawk-shaped wings, I decided that I'm going to have to keep my mind open.
I've seen dragons, demons, spiders (LOTS OF SPIDERS), worms, multi-colored
clouds, light streaks, etc. But they are all generated by my mind, they are
not what's really there. A video camera could be used to validate this if there
is any doubt (ever wonder why this kind of stuff NEVER ends up on camera)?