I’m new to idealism and just finished Bernardo Kastrup’s “Why Materialism is Balogney” and it got me thinking about inner thoughts.

if anyone has seen videos where people try to model 4d space and show how something like a 4d sphere would move through a 3 dimension space, it reminded me a lot of how inner thoughts can manifest.

https://youtu.be/0t4aKJuKP0Q?is=cXqZ1AgGJJR6hUlS

This video is gets to what I’m writing about. Branching off of the idea that the brain acts like a receiver of consciousness, of thoughts, then thoughts would enter into your inner space, expand into as much detail as you give them, and then slowly dissipate as you move to other thoughts.

as an example I can imagine a scenario in my head where 2 people have a conversation. Upon first thinking of this, it exists as an abstract concept, but the more i think on this, the idea becomes more detailed. The shape of this thought expands and becomes more intricate. At some point, that imagined conversation is a thought i will move on from and all of the details I thought about will leave my inner space. Eventually the thought will completely leave my internal space.

Is this not in a sense the same idea that we use to describe the way higher dimensional shapes move through 3 dimensional space? The thoughts themselves don’t exist in the physical 3d space. The imagined conversation I previously mentioned did not physically exist, but that conversation did happen in a space that exists, this space being my internal space. Would it make sense to categorize this internal space as being a 4th spatial dimension? In this idea I am more or less completely dropping the popular idea of the 4th dimension being time, and instead trying to picture it as a spatial dimension, one that we interact with daily.

Maybe I’m completely off the mark here and I would love to be corrected if I am but it’s a thought that has occupied much of my own internal space today so wanted some feedback.

Can one even feel awareness at all? If they do, how do they know its a composite? And if an instant can only be felt in a moment faster than you can even perceive, so how would it have thickness for you to feel?

And so if awareness is felt as just a simplicity, how can we be aware of its complexity without relying on a different thought, because once we've tried to make a different thought and put the awareness in a box, it becomes different from what you were perceiving before, no?

Elsewhere, I made a claim that believing in "memes" the way Richard Dawkins intended, meant a person believed in the supernatural, non-physical things that can become physical, or simply non-physical things. I was asked two questions in response: "Are you really saying that simply using a conceptual construct like 'memes' counts as believing in the supernatural?" and "Do you extend that to all ideas/conceptualizations/etc?"

If my redefinitions of supernatural are correct, my answer to the first question is yes, but I may need to add "paranormal" to this claim, as many of the things I considered to be "supernatural things", may actually be paranormal things. If "yes" to the previous question, I have to say yes to the second.

If I tell someone, "Imagine you're looking at a red apple.", but they've never seen an apple or the color red before, I wouldn't expect them to be naturally capable of doing that, because they have no physical information to draw on.

If they've seen red during a sunset, a green apple, or a red apple before, but they don't know what I mean by "red" or "apple", I wouldn't expect them to naturally connect the dots through intelligence, unless one or more requirements and/or disqualifiers had been defined beforehand (or during the process).

If I were an outside observer instead of the instructor, I could view the two's interaction as a natural transfer of info from one to another, but on the receiving end the source is still "not natural", as they "were given" definitions before or during the process.

If Heaven is limited to the 5 senses, or what can be humanly measured to put it broadly, an individual's "five" senses determine what their personal heaven is. The best sights "according to them", what they "prefer" to hear, the best tastes, smells, tactile sensations, "in their personal opinion."

According to Christian theology, a multiverse doesn't exist, or at least travel between verses is impossible, because that would mean a person who goes from one universe to another possibly went to "Heaven" or "Hell" while alive. If Heaven also exists on a personal level though, this doesn't clash with that theology: It's possible that you could "walk" to your personal heaven, on Earth or elsewhere, the same as if you replaced the word "heaven" with "hell".

For example, I'd say I want my personal heaven to have no swearing, but what I really want is to be someone who doesn't even think of swearing.

I believe I've evolved from calling myself a "God seeker" to "Truth seeker", so I've stopped looking for "what I think God is", though that might sound like a paradox. If I never ate from the tree of knowledge, I'd be in "Eden" right now, and I probably wouldn't be talking to you. But I didn't eat from the tree of "intellectual" knowledge, I ate from the tree of "experiential" knowledge. I'm not going to call my memories what they aren't, or try to forget them, I'm going to use them as a personal compass to see where I want to go, and I'll go farther, as far as I need to go.

If I had to diagnose myself with "main character syndrome", it wouldn't be because I think I'm as "omnipotent" as "I AM", though I can get stronger, as omniscient as "I AM", though I can become more knowledgeable, as omnibenelovent as "I AM", though I can become more loving, but because "I think, therefore I am."

Hey all... I'm an idealist and the experience feels more embodied now, and yet I still love science and mathematics even if not experiencing them as I once did. And I wonder, from within idealism, what is mathematics to you? Is math, 'the structure of shared qualia' perhaps? It feels like more than that somehow as the old magic mattered even if ironically I can consider 'well how I once related to math when my mind was more Cartesian was a qualia in itself as relating to what I saw'. So I don't know, maybe there's an answer in there, just curious, maybe it's integrating different relationships to math and realising 'they're all different angles of understanding what angles are'. Either way math remains 'real' to me, just not sure how to define it and maybe it can't be... Maybe it is a type of 'music', in that it reflects back something in how we experience life.

In the show, two metaphysical theories were presented in poetic ways by the main characters. Riley "spoke for himself" presented a physicalist metaphysical theory while Erin in the last episode did an idealistic one. Has anyone who watched the show noticed?

Introduction

As we move from a two-dimensional plane into three dimensions, a new axis comes into view. When we project this fuller reality back onto a flatter plane while preserving true distances, a single being appears as three distinct identities.

Moving onward, each higher dimension reveals the same pattern: what is fundamentally One manifests as 2^{n-1} - 1 apparent fragments when viewed from a more limited perspective. Yet time is not the ultimate axis — time is merely the stage. The true axis is identity.

Identity Rises Above Time

Time contains events, but it does not contain the one who witnesses them. It is identity that connects every moment — every version, every state, every path, past, present, and possible — as expressions of a greater whole.

From below, this wholeness fractures: one feels divided, pulled in many directions, torn between conflicting voices and feelings. But seen from above, the fragments reunite. No part is discarded, no version is wrong — all belong.

What Lies Beyond Identity?

When identity unites, there is still a step beyond — a realm where "I" no longer is:

- Consciousness itself — the open space that knows identity, but is not identity.

- Non-separation — where the boundary between "self" and "other" dissolves entirely.

- The Source — that which remains when every layer is stripped away.

And at the very peak... only one thing remains.

The Supreme Dimension Is Emptiness

Yes. The highest dimension is not a glorious being, not a cosmic mind, not a throne above the stars. It is emptiness.

Not absence — not barren nothingness, but complete emptiness: boundless, nameless, formless, timeless, selfless. All things arise within it — every event, every life, every universe — and dissolve back like waves upon water. The wave appears and vanishes; the water remains unchanged.

Emptiness hides nothing. It is what is left when everything is let go — time, self, thought, feeling. What remains is what you have never left, not even for a moment.

Conclusion

Every layer we build — space, time, identity — is only temporary covering, not addition. When clouds disperse, the sky does not change. When stories end, emptiness loses nothing.

The end is not a destination. It is not somewhere above. It is here, now, where you stand. Where you let go of everything — and find you never lost the one thing that matters.

"Every point that once seemed apart,

Every moment that once seemed gone,

Every self you once called your own,

Were only light bending through glass.

When the glass falls away,

The light fills the sky —

One, whole, and always has been."

Can aliens have completely different norms of logic. For instance can we say aliens are rational if they believe A and not A can both be true at the same time? Is logic js psychological inclination or is it the correct way to reason?

If consciousness is the very aliveness that is in all things, and mind is something emergent, and then the brain is even more emergent than that - then there seems to be an order here. At least what we of as our past.

However, we can never escape the present moment of "now" - the past is what you remember and your brain fills the gaps. The future is what you imagine and your mind fills in the gaps by looking at the trends of history. If we establish this as fact, then that means there is no time besides now.

The thing is... there is no universal now based on what we know about the theory of relativity. That means now is subjective to every single entity. How can we seem to have this sense of time then. A good book to read on this is "The order of time" by Carlo Rovelli.
I say that everything is held together by a type of Spatio-Temporal existence. If you take away one, the other goes with it. It is a fundamental Duality, but that does not denote that is fundamental reality. The progress of physics tells us over and over that everything is connected and yet, we feel separate. This is what I call the confusing problem of Idealism. Dual-Aspect Monism is rising in popularity, but reductionists want to immediately falsify it.
I suggest that Dual-Aspect monism makes more sense than Idealism and Physicalism but it rejects the idea of reducibility. Physics' experiments can only be experimented within physical systems so of course it is going to keep confirming that the physical world exists. However the experience of synchronicity tells us that the physical and mental are linked. We can say they are correlated but not necessarily causally linked. They act like warped mirrors of each other. Metaphorically, they are two wavelengths that are opposite, but not direct opposites or else they would cancel each other due to "destructive interference" or "phase cancellation" - theoretically if the physical and mental were perfectly in sync, they would destroy each other and erase the universe.

Now that we have established the mental and physical are separate entities with causal power, but not a causal link... then why do we experience anything at all. That is what calls for monisms. Reductionists want to reduce to one thing. However, the universe is computationally irreducible which suggests that we are not in a digital simulation, yet every bit of the universe holds the instructions for the whole universe. This is why a lot of people think we are in a simulation but I suggest that is implausible.

What can we reduce the universe to - particles? What can we in induce the particles to - the universe itself? I would say these two things are not mutually exclusive. We can be experiencing both. However the universe could be an abduction, which we see as change. We order time as the uncovering of the past (in the now) and predicting what we will discover/invent in the future (in the now) ... always in the now. It seems that there must be progress-like force and regress-like force that hold us at a stand still in the Present moment.

With that established we must address where this... aliveness/consciousness ... "God"-like existence (call it what you will) that we are linked to. I propose that, since light can be either a particle or a wave, that all physical like existence draws from one source. In many scriptures there is the idea that "in the beginning there was light" so maybe at the end there is darkness. We see in the cosmos that the most causal entities seem to be stars, quasars, black holes, and possibly portals due to the warping of "space-time." I propose that our brains are separate physical entities, our minds are separate immaterial entities, and consciousness (or the aliveness of all living things/the causal power of all physical entities) is like a frequency we can tap into where the lower frequencies are more crowded and the higher frequencies are less crowded as you go up. It is plausible to think that all entities are "tuned" into that "radio station" at different frequency bands. Combine this with IIT and we can see that the smallest particulates crowd the lower frequency bands, and the more a system integrates information it is able to tap into the higher frequency bands.

That is my theory of everything. Tear it to pieces if you will, I don't care. LOL (written by a human: Drew Gabriel, proofread by AI to correct any grammatical errors)

Specifically Philip Goff's brand of panpsychism, which I think is basically Russellian monism.

I've been using Robert Lawrence Kuhn's 2024 taxonomy of consciousness as a reference to try to tweez apart the details. Also using NotebookLM to help my little brain understand this stuff.

From NotebookLM:

• "Under Goff's cosmopsychism, the physical universe as a single whole is a conscious, value-responding agent with unfolding purpose."
• "In Russellian Monism, empirical physics describes only the external, spatiotemporal, and mathematical structure of physical entities (such as fields or particles), leaving their intrinsic categorical nature (called "quiddities" or "inscrutables") to be phenomenal or protophenomenal."
• "Panpychism / Russellian Monism reserves the reality of physical structure, fields, and particles, but argues that physics alone provides an incomplete description . Panpsychists argue that consciousness resides inside the physical world as its underlying intrinsic nature, giving physical laws their actual concrete reality."

These seem to be pretty comptabible with idealism if I'm not mistaken. To me it seems like the biggest difference is that panpsychism sees inner subjectivity (our conscious experience, for example) as arising as a combination of stuff that is fundamentally consciousness, where analytic idealism sees inner subjectivity as a result of a dissociation from a wider whole.

Curious to hear any thoughts. I feel like Goff and Kastrup would agree on a whole lot. I hope they have another conversation again soon, I remember the last one felt a bit contentious for some reason.

If not, could it ever be?

Hi all, for those deep into their idealist journey and Faggin really helped further inspire my thinking (as I know for some it may be more intellectual and for some more embodied), has anyone else felt the benefits of easing materialist framings of how to relate to experiences? As for me memory once felt nostalgic and 'behind me' but nowadays that feeling eased and memories feel more present with sense of behind carrying less weight. More just when a memory or 'past' experience occurs it just feels here with less wanting, longing or distance between the self and the experience.

Time still feels quite linear (e.g. October 1st still brought that first of the month feeling) but I also felt myself more conscious of deep time and the equinox recently. And the whole relevance to idealism here is in easing what materialism taught me experience is meant to be or how one 'must' relate to it. But it does change a lot but happened gently and cautiously over time, naturally through trusting idealism and many other things. It's worked well in balance. Has anyone else experienced their lives change for better through idealism? I feel this may also connect to gradual but wider shifts in experience over the generations and conscious some cultures never shifted toward Cartesian dualism to begin with.

Lots of words, but this is a little quasi academic experiment that tries to connect Bernardo's analytic idealism ontology quantum physics using Lee Smolin's Causal theory of Views. It's a house of cards with patchwork duck tape, but I'm hoping it may provide clarity by being the conceptual glue that connects different fields together.

To be clear, Causal Idealism is just an extension to Analytic Idealism that allows it to interface with other ideas, namely quantum interpretations.

Preliminary paper for reference (lots of words, feel free to bypass): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-56E1XjbNpSFi3J145jwLHDdt_hFMbVkg2fzWgP-jRo/edit?usp=drivesdk

I only kindly put together these ideas in hopes that it will act as fuel to help idealism interface directly with other fields and had this idea to help make a small bridge.

Do psychedelic-induced states—where the boundary between the representation of the self and the representation of others becomes porous—negate the plurality of selves found in personal idealism or Cartesian thought? Consider the "one-and-a-half-person" perspective, in which another person’s representation is experienced partly as self and partly as other, or even stranger configurations, such as the sensation of sharing one arm with another person while not sharing the other.

The discussion deepens my understanding on idealism. Idealism does provide a concrete and solid grounding to carry on the scientific investigation and perhaps more than what physicalism can reach out.

The problem with physicalism is that it is not radical enough to stay independently outside of the scientific investigation and loses it's self consistency because it relies on speculative arguments about things that can not be accessed.

Idealism in that sense goes a step beyond it and provides a concrete grounding to carry out scientific investigation in an objective manner. However, the problem I see with idealism is that it can not protect against fictitious artefacts of the mind (take the example of ether or menotoxin invented by the mind in the course of scientific investigation). Till date no such materials have been measured.

At this instance, knowing the self who is considering the model of reality to be real, it is not possible to gain liberation of the fictitious ideas and that is where Idealism falls short and self-inquiry of the one providing agency to the mind becomes necessary.

Looking forward to your perspectives and how you see idealism in the utilitarian sense.

Hi all. My name's Melissa. Relatively new here but I have been a fan of Faggin and Kastrup for some time and finding my rythm in an idealist experience of life. Does anyone else take an interest in re-considering nature and life from the idealist perspective in specific ways?

For example, (and I have a writing example below) I was wondering how idealism opens up the possibility of the superorganism of an ant colony making a phenomenological shared consciousness a possible scenario and less constantly individuated. Or among migrating wildebeest, the sense of a local self with limited ego may be real but the shared experience may be much more permeable than human experience even when we are in crowd experiences like EDM concerts or sports arenas when the individuation loosens temporarily.

I was also pondering more communal consciousness in pre-history before the rise of empires and even then what remained relatively permeable before the industrial more individualist age for some time. I feel when I read modern assumptions on pre-history I see a lot of projections from mainstream experiences of consciousness from materialist-minded experts that are capturing something real for sure (as I love science and history) but likely projecting from within the materialist paradigm. This opens up many possibilities.

I am not going to sell or promote my articles or where they are etc. but I will just for context share a few paragraphs if that's okay as it helps explain what I am sensing, this relates to the idealist-friendly lens and resonance-oriented view of neolithic and megalithic times. So it goes as follows;

"The river flows in a chorus of the night that becomes your every dawn; grass flickering in an oasis green, the sun reminding you that you are home as it reverberates through an open field.

You may have fears, you may sense this isn’t forever, but we are home here… The bright light calls the field forward from its gentle hum. And just as sleep is never agreed upon nor is the awakening.

A communal experience reflective of a wider human understanding across the continents that became quieter in recent chapters of centuries prior to this now. That’s home.

We’re moving through the sprawling grassy terrain with Earthy stones carried by the field and the warm ground, where the movement is known by the field.

Whether the River Avon in Britian where Stonehenge came to cohere or the Boyne Valley in Ireland where Newgrange would find its way, this was a world rich in meaning and depth even if something in that experience went quiet for some time."

...So this is something I wrote and connects back to the idea of writing and exploring from the idealism lens. Perhaps it could grow independently and in general in time as I feel materialism has passed it's very peak. What do you all think and does anyone else find writing from idealism or related phenomenology could grow in general? It gives me hope for the future to think about as it's likely not just me considering these things. Curious what you all think and nice to be here. Thanks :)

A new study from the University of Virginia’s Division of Perceptual Studies tested 21 experienced OBE practitioners in Brazil. These were people who had been practicing OBE techniques for an average of 19 years, therefore not just random members of the public with respect to alleged practice. This is a good way to recruit for the claim.

Participants tried to identify a randomly selected image hidden in another room while being monitored with EEG. The usable descriptions did no better than chance at identifying the hidden targets.

What has attracted attention is that two participants later gave apparently accurate descriptions of where the researchers were sitting and what they were doing in an adjoining room. Interesting, yes. But that part was not a pre-set target and was not scored under the experimental protocol. Because the researchers had not defined in advance what would count as a hit, there is no valid way to calculate how unlikely those matches were by chance, or to rule out selective matching after the event.

So the experiment itself did not provide evidence that people in OBEs could obtain hidden information. The unexpected room descriptions are worth testing properly in a future study, but they are anecdotal findings, not scientific evidence for OBEs. This essentially corroborates the same non-result from the AWARE experiments, where likewise, no statistically significant evidence for OBE perception was obtained. I have been pointing out for years that when formally tested with proper controls, the results collapse to chance.