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Tim (and in part: Judith):
I think you misunderstood me.
I have no squalms with the 'afterdeath' that I
leave to discuss between the Dalai Lama and the Pope<G>. What I asked
about is
the life-process of
"dying" - as definitely part of it, - comparable to the many-tackled 'beginning' vs the totally neglected
'ending' of it.
The age-old religious brainwashing (in almost
all religions) left it
to the mystery of the supernatural. Except,
perhaps for the faith of reincarnation. (We have something of that kind in the
mental (ideational) area, it is called: b o o k . <G1> see also
<G3>)
People were scared to handle this topic although
every one of us is prone to it (at least once). So they rather indulged in the
tales.
Learn to play the harp. Prepare sexually for the
huris - not knowing that those are asexual 'cus nobody has potency for
eternity <G2>.
((aside: since Christian heaven admits women,
too, not as Muslim, is there sex in Christian heaven? but never mind
that)).
So I guess your answer latently includes the
response (including Judith's reply as well): Rosen did not make a (mental) study
case of understanding the endig function of the 'life process'.
True?
It would be highly remarkable. The
closed-mindedness of the (reductionistic) biological sciences, completely
brainwashed into a selective modeling. Just as biochemistry did not start
for a long time to analyze human excrement. It only came from the medical
advancement as a feedback. (This is no criticism on physicians).
Interestingly, Jewish faith did not include the
afterworld or hell. The 'soul' (unidentified) hangs around (the grave?) as long
as people remember the person. (A tragedy: Gutenberg's invention<G3>).
So it would have been very natural if RR
made a point of the dismantling of 'living' organizations - unless he found it
so natural that any further handling seemed redundant to him.
Exectly this line was which I wanted to learn
about.
Regards
JohnM
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, November 29, 2003 11:32
PM
Subject: Re: Death and experience
I don't know of
anything in his writings regarding this topic of 'after
death' specifically.
Tim
Thanks, Tim,
you spoke my heart. Is there anyhing to this
topic in RR stuff?
JohnM
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, November 29, 2003
12:27 PM
Subject: Re: Death and
experience
JohM,
In my view,
a living organism's functional organization is lost at death. I do not
think that experience can be separated from the context of the living
organism as a context-independent structure of any kind. Therefore,
with death, so too is lost any kind of "accumulated experience" because it
no longer has a context within which to be meaningful or relevant.
I also do
not place much importance in energy as a quantity that represents anything
close to a measure of organization (including "accumulated experience") of
the organism. Particularly since organisms are not energetically or
thermodynamically closed, invoking ideas of conservation of energy or
entropy as a way to talk about continuance of some aspects of an
organism after death is a non sequitor, in my
view.
Regards,
Tim
Tim,
I am no expert in biology (the
understatement of the 3rd millennium) but tackled a bit the question of
procaryotes in the aspect of 'complicating' the living structures.
Corrections accepted.
The procaryotes are - if not necessarily
the smalles - the simplest creatures considered 'alive'. Citoplasm and
cell membrane. With most chemical procedures of cell life. Lynn Margulis
(frmr Mrs. Carl Sagan) developed the theory of symbiotic
associations - as far as I read not extended down to prokaryotes, which
I did: Assuming that there were several of them "meeting" and
"cooperating" when the 'social' contract started: the conglomerates of the diverse cells
separated the functions and all 'worked' together for the community.
Then - by permeability of the cell membranes - some slipped inside
others - keeping the functions from the inside, some became
mitochondria, others the cell nucleus. At this point the eucaryotes were
evolved, our stuff.
The procaryotes "did not die" their
simple functions did not include senescence, they underwent mitosis,
divided into two similar ones and (renewed) kept on living. All on
environmental impact. They could be destroyed by outside brute forces,
not by aging. This was before the invention of the biological clock.
Which brings me to the question I wanted
to raise for awhile, but procrastinated:
Did RR develop a conclusion of death?
Lately a friend wrote an article about "soul, that remains after death"
(not a religious theory, he is an astronomer and did not identify an
'eternal soul') just the accumulated experience bothered him - as energy
- how and where can it go when a person dies?
I have a different opinion (as
always<G>) about the phenomenon of living, we call: dying. The
living structure functions in its adjusted complexity, certain secondary
failures are repaired, yet when some substantial component gets busted,
the complexity does not function together anymore. Everything is there -
almost - just some essential factor stepped out. Now the experience: it
is not some sort of 'mental energy' as the reductionistic science
imagines which can be accounted for in some 'equilibrium' inventory. It
is a process of 'experiencing' in the atemporal mindfunction and the act
of 'remembering' is not to scratch out a stored contraption which
represents the past event, rather a 'second look' at it within the ever
changing conditions of the world (and the brain). This accounts for
'forgetfulness' and 'shaping' of memories, unknown in computers, where
the memory is frozen into matter. Erazing such frozen memory IS an
energy-application, while the "inability to take a second look" is not.
I wonder how Rosen adjusted the idea of
'death'? also I would appreciate opinions to the question. Please
do not include the eternal soul which goes into heaven and plays the
harp: it can be very boring after the first 30,000 years playing
the same hymns.
Apologizing for the moribund
question
John M
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, November 28, 2003
12:16 PM
Subject: Mycoplasma
information?
Hi
all,
A
relative was recently diagnosed with "walking pneumonia", and
wondering what that actually was, I did a little research. In the
process I came to learn some about mycoplasmas (or Mollicutes), a kind
of prokaryote bacterium (or bacterium-like) which apparently are the
smallest known living organisms. Because of this latter fact, they
intrigue me as perhaps being informative about "minimum
requirements" for an organism being alive.
I
wondered if anyone on the list was very familiar with them, or knew of
a good web resource regarding their inner workings? Most web info I
found is related to the infections they cause, rather than their
internal structure or workings.
Tim
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