FA+
Shop
A Revelation
9 years ago
It's something I'm absolutely certain none of you reading this has ever experienced anything like what I'm going through, but having revelations, epiphanies, and stark realizations about the truth of our existence happen to me almost on a daily basis. It's been happening for years now, but only in the last 3 and a half have I been able to actually remember it all (I swear I've saved humanity several times but forgot how each time...)
Anyway, this morning's revelation was the realization that throughout my entire life, I have been trying to interact with beings I believed to be the same as myself. Oh yeah, I've always "known" that I was different, but it was one of those beliefs that has no proof. Kind of like a feeling. And I have been actively trying to shed that feeling and replace it with understanding for most of my life.
But this morning, I think maybe it finally happened. I think I finally realized that I am different from you in the most profound way: I am alive, awake, and aware; whereas you are just machines, programmed by your environment including the society in which you exist and which is perfectly parallel to a herd.
You see, life, all life, is nothing but a simple program. And what is a program? A program is a set of instructions given to a machine to carry out specific functions. And in the case of life, that program is simply propagation and the machines are biological entities.
More complex beings have more complex programs. Single cell bacteria for example, only know eat and reproduce. Ants are programmed based on their role in the collective. Fish and elk and other herding animals are programmed to seek protection from the herd. And predators are programmed by nature to control the population of herds by hunting and eating their weakest members.
Humans are unique, even among social predators. We have a great deal more potential than any other living thing on this planet, and possibly in the Universe (I am of the opinion that intellligent, sentient life is far, far more rare than any SETI scientists might ever hope.) We are the only species able to recognize our existence, as well as our ability to be programmed, and also able to rise above that programming, and even create our own for ourselves.
We are also very uniquely positioned in being able to create of ourselves a type of intelligence I'm sure none of you has ever imagined. While you currently subscribe to the "herd mind," a set of intelligence quite below the potential of humans and which derives from behaving as a herd; humanity has the potential to become one single intellectual machine.
But this is a potential humankind has never had the opportunity to even attempt. And only a few modern humans have ever experienced it on a very limited basis, as when you do hallucinogens or entheogens with a friend or partner and are able to communicate without speaking. That connection is possible among all humans, and through the concept of networked intelligence (the same means by which are brains function; wherein the intelligence is not a matter of the number of neurons, but rather the connections between them, so to is human intelligence vastly more capable based on our connections rather than ourselves individually.) But, you have been programmed by society to be a herd, not self-sufficient social predators. You have lost your purpose, and therefore are not human.
You are different from me, because I am human.
And I am deeply upset that you are how you are, because between us we could be vastly more than even I am; which is by all measures, miles beyond your quite limited abilities.
The purpose here is not to insult you by the way; that you can handle quite well on your own. No, my intent here is to both inspire you to rise above and join me outside the herd, as well as to cement this revelation in my mind so that I am not tempted to mistakenly believe that any one who reads this might actually be human and capable of rising above the herd.
Yet my posting this journal seems to undermine that very intent. But in reality, I do believe it possible that there are among you others who are not part of the herd. This journal is for those people, as is indeed this entire page.
For the rest of you, just take what you will and leave.
Anyway, this morning's revelation was the realization that throughout my entire life, I have been trying to interact with beings I believed to be the same as myself. Oh yeah, I've always "known" that I was different, but it was one of those beliefs that has no proof. Kind of like a feeling. And I have been actively trying to shed that feeling and replace it with understanding for most of my life.
But this morning, I think maybe it finally happened. I think I finally realized that I am different from you in the most profound way: I am alive, awake, and aware; whereas you are just machines, programmed by your environment including the society in which you exist and which is perfectly parallel to a herd.
You see, life, all life, is nothing but a simple program. And what is a program? A program is a set of instructions given to a machine to carry out specific functions. And in the case of life, that program is simply propagation and the machines are biological entities.
More complex beings have more complex programs. Single cell bacteria for example, only know eat and reproduce. Ants are programmed based on their role in the collective. Fish and elk and other herding animals are programmed to seek protection from the herd. And predators are programmed by nature to control the population of herds by hunting and eating their weakest members.
Humans are unique, even among social predators. We have a great deal more potential than any other living thing on this planet, and possibly in the Universe (I am of the opinion that intellligent, sentient life is far, far more rare than any SETI scientists might ever hope.) We are the only species able to recognize our existence, as well as our ability to be programmed, and also able to rise above that programming, and even create our own for ourselves.
We are also very uniquely positioned in being able to create of ourselves a type of intelligence I'm sure none of you has ever imagined. While you currently subscribe to the "herd mind," a set of intelligence quite below the potential of humans and which derives from behaving as a herd; humanity has the potential to become one single intellectual machine.
But this is a potential humankind has never had the opportunity to even attempt. And only a few modern humans have ever experienced it on a very limited basis, as when you do hallucinogens or entheogens with a friend or partner and are able to communicate without speaking. That connection is possible among all humans, and through the concept of networked intelligence (the same means by which are brains function; wherein the intelligence is not a matter of the number of neurons, but rather the connections between them, so to is human intelligence vastly more capable based on our connections rather than ourselves individually.) But, you have been programmed by society to be a herd, not self-sufficient social predators. You have lost your purpose, and therefore are not human.
You are different from me, because I am human.
And I am deeply upset that you are how you are, because between us we could be vastly more than even I am; which is by all measures, miles beyond your quite limited abilities.
The purpose here is not to insult you by the way; that you can handle quite well on your own. No, my intent here is to both inspire you to rise above and join me outside the herd, as well as to cement this revelation in my mind so that I am not tempted to mistakenly believe that any one who reads this might actually be human and capable of rising above the herd.
Yet my posting this journal seems to undermine that very intent. But in reality, I do believe it possible that there are among you others who are not part of the herd. This journal is for those people, as is indeed this entire page.
For the rest of you, just take what you will and leave.
Comment posting has been disabled by the journal owner.
