Yes, FTL action-at-a-distance is theoretically possible via quantum entanglement. Q-bit 'radios' are a handwavey tech commonly employed in science fiction, however whether or not it's science fact is hotly disputed. In the coming years it's expected experiments will be done into the quantum teleporting of not just subatomic particles, but of whole molecules and possibly even viruses!

As far as my pop science understanding goes, there is an absolute irreconcilability between superluminal stuff and subluminal stuff, and the distinction between the two is the very basis of relativity. Light, by its very nature, cannot go slower than c, and likewise no matter can exceed c. Here's a Berkeley professor to explain why...

Berkely Physics 10 - Lecture 22: Relativity

If you've never had special relativity cogently explained to you, and therefore may be unaware of just how utterly, mindbendingly insane the default mechanics of the universe are --your regular DMT habit notwithstanding-- I highly recommend sitting back and watching this lecture through.

There may be an error in this experiment but it's a great thing to ponder. Special Relativity says the mass of a particle is equal to it's rest mass times 1/SQRT(1 - v^2/c^2). As v approaches c the equation blows up to infinity and such a particle would need an infinite amount of energy to move at a speed of c. If the particle moves faster than c, this equation becomes complex but it's magnitude is no longer infinite. I'm not sure Einstein ever said particles couldn't travel faster than the speed of light, just not equal to the speed of light. I would be glad to be alive when faster than light speed was figured out. I'm hoping this turns out to be a breakthrough. It would be a big deal.

how do you take a picture of a neutrino?

Indeed. That's why I specifically referred to them as the "laws of nature as described by science". Although I strongly disagree that they can't explain a DMT experience.



I don't understand why you refute that explanation though. It is a very excellent explanation, and there is actually strong supporting evidence. It has been experimentally proven that electrically stimulating the brain causes a direct change in consciousness in the subject. What greater proof could you possibly ask for?

It seems like there is this great "taboo" against understanding or explaining consciousness, particularly in communities that are interested in the spiritual aspects of humanity, human consciousness, and the alteration thereof. What is SO terrible about understanding it in greater detail? Is it that there is some pleasure in the "mystery" of it all? I'll let you all in on a little secret. The mystery doesn't ever go away, for those who prize it so highly. The more you know, the more you can't explain! O.K. -- consciousness is activity in the neural networks of the human biology -- but where did human biology come from, anyway? How did such an incredibly complex and delicate piece of organic machinery come into existence in the first place?!

You see? If you want something TRULY mysterious, look no further than the TRUTH, in all its glorious detail!

I was reading about the experiment last night. The nutrinos traveled 454 miles between two facilities. The transit time was 60 nanoseconds less than what the speed of light travel would have resulted in.

Light travels about 1 nanosecond per foot in a vacuum (186,282 miles per second). That means that the light was about 60 feet behind the nutrino if launched simultaneously once the nutrinos had arrived at the destination. 60feet/(5280*454) * 100% = 0.0025% faster than light.

I wonder how precise the time/pulse measurement systems are? I assume that they had synchronized cesium clocks at both locations to measure the timing difference. National standards agencies maintain an accuracy of 10−9 seconds per day (approximately 1 part in 1014) so it seems that sub nanosecond precision time measurements are possible with reasonable precision.

I think this experiment has given physicists a good reason to pause and consider this data very carefully as well as to repeat the experiment to check for similar results.

..i have seen the 'super-light'
the fastest tachyon..arrived before it left..
i believe..
!


brighter than a thousand suns...
(absolute dark, neurotransmission enhanced)
.

It all depends on how you define “explain”. If we assume that consciousness is purely a product of the brain, then we can retroactively “explain” it by saying that the brain must somehow cause it. But this is far from a useful scientific explanation.

It’s a bit like noticing that the “on/off” switch on a computer causes a change in state of the computer, and then proclaiming that one can “explain” the workings of a computer.

Science cannot explain consciousness using what is currently known about the brain any more than one can explain the functioning of a computer after having observed that the “on/off” switch causes a change of state.


To use the over-used analogy of a television receiver and the radio waves that it receives: A change in the receiver will produce a change in how the radio waves are perceived/interpreted, but obviously this doesn’t mean that the radio waves originate from within the television receiver!

In the absence of knowledge about radio waves, you would claim that if a change in the receiver causes a change in the behavior of the television (which it does) then this is “proof” that television content originates from within the television.

And you would ask "What greater proof could you possibly ask for?"

There’s no “taboo” against explaining consciousness. If you have a scientifically useful explanation for consciousness, then please share it. I’m sure the scientific community would love to hear it even more than Nexus members!

Remember, part of your explanation must include how chemical reactions – movement and reorganization of atoms, electrons, and molecules, none of which are conscious – give rise to consciousness. Let’s hear some specifics!

You say “consciousness is activity in the neural networks of the human biology” as if that is an established fact. It isn’t. And it certainly isn’t an explanation.

..explanations (of conscious perception) are difficult..i've a few times known more than one person to report the same entity (on ayahuasca, decribed after experience), at the same time, moving in the same way, in pitch blackness..no cues..
the 'explanation' of this, to me, would either be telepathy, or, i think forms of energy not usually visible..
tryptamines in the dark got me thinking about tachyons originally...

True, but I don't think we can explain anything in the universe much better than that. I'll elaborate.



There is a great difference between finding the origin of something and simply explaining something. If you search for the true origin of anything in the material world, you'll eventually trace it back to the singularity known as the big bang, and, depending on your theological or spiritual stance, you could debate as to whether that was the true beginning, or whether it was God, or some other divine force. Or you could argue that the universe was created when someone somewhere took a huge rip of DMT, and first their brain cells were created, then their body, then their pipe and lighter and the rest of the room, then everything else rippled outward from that center, and after a long while, eventually all the energy of the universe coalesced at some point into the big bang singularity as an aftereffect (something I've actually thought about in the past, haha).

So, if you require knowing the origin of something to accept it as having a valid explanation, then you're going to have a really tough time finding anything you can explain. However, if you simply want to know what causes something, which is usually what we're asking for in an "explanation", then I don't think you have any greater problem explaining consciousness than you do explaining the fact that when I let go of something it falls to the ground. The on/off switch DOES, in this sense, explain the fact that a machine works, in a simple way, because it causes the machine to function. The difficulty of the explanation is just a matter of how complex an explanation you want. An explanation can always become even deeper, and eventually you'll hit a wall explaining anything, because you'll get into the most fundamental subatomic particles known to man, and after that you can't break things down any further.

What I think you're looking for in an explanation of consciousness, is a sort of an idealized explanation that doesn't and can't exist for anything in the world, it seems. And it's not very much use to even refer to this at all.

They don't give rise to consciousness -- they are consciousness. Consciousness is just a word we use to refer to certain material, biological processes that we can directly observe.

You see, this explanation is just like the explanation for a magic trick! You observe a magic trick and demand an explanation. Why? Because you think you see something that defies the laws of nature as you understand them. There is a conflict between what you perceive and how you understand the world to work, as in the conflict between the "levitating" object and the law of gravity. Now, to resolve this conflict, one of two things must occur. Either you must change your understanding of what happened during the magic trick, or you must change your understanding of the fundamental laws of nature.

When the trick is explained with the tiny invisible string attached to the "levitating" object, you no longer believe it to be a levitating object, and your understanding of the magic trick changes, and no longer conflicts with the law of gravity. Just as, if you accept my explanation for consciousness, you no longer believe it to be an immaterial thing, and so it no longer conflicts with your understanding that an immaterial thing cannot be caused by a material process.

Nobody knows exactly how counsciousness arises. Theory's aren't facts.

Yes we do. MY consciousness arises when I wake up from a nap. That's just one way in which I KNOW consciousness arises.

You have explained nothing.

Your definition is more akin to “awareness” or “wakefulness”. You’ve simply re-defined consciousness to suit your purposes, without considering the implications of your re-definition. From a philosophical standpoint, you’re considering consciousness to be an epiphenomenon of biological complexity.

If consciousness arises entirely from biological processes, and if (at least in theory) a computer can accurately simulate biological processes, then you’re claiming that such a computer would be conscious.

We could make all of the elementary logic gates of a digital computer using plumbing pipes, valves, and pumps. We could go on to construct a digital computer from these parts. If the “plumbing” computer is sufficiently complex, it too could accurately simulate biological processes. So what you’re claiming is that a collection of plumbing pipes, pumps, and valves, when properly arranged, become conscious.

We don’t even need actual logic gates to simulate a digital computer. The state of each logic gate could simply be written on a Post-It note, and as the state of logic gates changes, either people (or machines) erase the values on affected Post-It notes and write in the new state values. So it’s possible to simulate any digital computer using a pencil and Post-It notes, and a sufficiently complex computer can simulate biological processes, so you are claiming that a collection of Post-It notes, if arranged in a sufficiently complex manner, exhibit consciousness.

You are claiming that consciousness arises out of particular complex systems, yet you have no explanation for how this might occur.

Yep. And I've got no qualms with that.



Again, I am not claiming that it arises out of the complex systems, I'm claiming that it IS the complex system. So there's no need to account for any gap between the two.

Well, you still haven’t explained anything.

You claim that Post-It notes, if arranged in a particular complex pattern, are conscious. Yet I don’t think you’re suggesting that any arbitrary arrangement of billions of Post-It notes is conscious.

So you’re saying that some complex systems are conscious, but others are not. Without explaining what makes one complex system conscious and another not conscious, you haven’t explained consciousness.

All you’ve done is declared that “some complex systems are conscious if we define consciousness to be a property of some complex systems”. This is a circular definition, not an explanation.

Well, I would argue that simply identifying it as a "property of some complex systems" is a rudimentary explanation, it's simply not the best we can imagine. BUT, I don't think that even your own high standards for "explanation" are unattainable.

Of course I certainly couldn't tell you what exactly separates the conscious and subconscious neurological processes, but you must admit that it is theoretically possible to identify this characteristic, given the right scientific instruments. We know exactly what processes to look at: those that are identified as being "conscious" by the subject. For the sake of argument, let's say we find that "conscious" neural activity all meets at some sort of crossroads in the brain -- a region within which all neural activity is consciously perceived. In this case, this brain region would serve as the defining characteristic of consciousness. Which satisfies your definition for an "explanation" of consciousness.



See how you can just delve deeper and deeper in the attempt to explain something, though? If I could somehow provide you with the defining characteristic of conscious neurological processes, what would stop you from going further, and asking for the spatial position of every little quark and bozon and what-have-you in each instance of one of those processes? There's no "complexity" of explanation that suddenly makes it a "true" or "legitimate" explanation. What's wrong with my simple explanation?

Defining something is not the same thing as explaining it. For example, defining “sunrise” and “sunset” doesn’t explain either phenomenon. A definition is not an explanation.

You say that given the right scientific instruments we can identify consciousness in the brain. This really doesn’t make sense. Human beings have something we call “intelligence”, yet you’re not going to find an “intelligence center” in the brain, no matter how hard you look and no matter how sophisticated your scientific instruments happen to be.

You believe that matter “creates” consciousness. An alternative belief is that consciousness “creates” matter. There is no scientific test to prove if either of these beliefs is correct. (And it’s quite possible that neither is correct.)

No, but I think that there are certain patterns in brain functioning that will ultimately manifest during all instances of intelligent thinking. And these patterns would constitute "intelligence" on a material level.



Neither can create one another if they are equivalent to each other. One is just a subset of the other.

Not that this is any basis for a good argument, but one of my most tangible "insights" on DMT was that everything was ultimately of the same fundamental sort -- that the entirety of reality is woven by a single common thread, whether you want to call it consciousness, matter, God, or hyperspace.