Iamblichus: Taking the Shape of the Gods

Taking the Shape of the Gods: A Theurgic Reading of Hermetic Rebirth
 
This is an another paper like the earlier one Offering to the Gods: A Neo-platonic perspective which shows the supreme wisdom of the Neo-platonic philosopher Iamblichus and how he defends the art of theurgy.

People often misunderstand theurgy as an irrational shallow practice since they normally do not understand the esoteric perspective behind those practices. But Theurgy and Esotericism being a profession carried out by only elite members of a society possessing special interests is intelligible only to those who have special knowledge.

"Theurgic union is attained only by the perfective operation of unspeakable acts correctly performed, acts which are beyond all understanding, and by the power of unutterable symbols which are intelligible only to the Gods"

Iamblichus, De Mysteriis. 2,11

Strong AI is impossible without conscious machines.

RP. I can give examples of non-computational things, but it’s not obvious why they are non-computational. The one I like the best is the tiling problem. You have these shapes made out of squares glued together, things called polyominoes. You’re given a collection of these, a finite number of different sorts but an unlimited number of each sort, and you are asked: can you use these shapes to cover the entire plane without gaps or overlaps?

That is an example of a non-computational problem. That is to say, there is no computer programme which will answer yes or no for any given set of tiles: no programme where you can feed in the information of the tiles into the computer and ask it, will they tile the plane or not. Although the answer "no" can be computational, the answer "yes" is not computational. That is to say there is no way of being sure, for an arbitrary set of polyomino shapes, that they will tile the plane. It’s quite a subtle piece of mathematics to show that this is a non-computational problem. There is no computer programme whatsoever that can make this decision for any possible given set of tiles.

CC. Okay, so there are some non-computational problems. Now your argument is that there are some of these problems which cannot be solved computationally, but which can be solved by bringing in human consciousness. How does this argument go?

RP. You have to phrase the problem in the right way. In the case of the tiling problem, the way it works is like this. Suppose you were given a computer programme which would answer correctly "yes" or "no" to a set of tiles, but sometimes it will say not come to any conclusion at all (you could certainly have computers like that). Then by knowing that the computer doesn’t give you the wrong answer, from the computer’s construction you could build a set of tiles which the computer will get stuck on: a set of tiles which you know will tile the plane, and which you also know will not be able to be answered correctly by this computer.

CC. But when you say "you know" what is it about me as a conscious human being that enables me to know, what particular faculty is it that I’m applying?

RP. It’s the understanding really. It’s basically Gödel’s theorem, but you have to know that the computer doesn’t give the wrong answers. Gödel’s theorem is telling you, if you like, that the procedures we’re prepared to accept as proof cannot ever be limited to specific computational procedures: they’re never computationally limited because once you can phrase the rules of the computational system then you can see how to transcend them. So provided that you trust those rules, so that you’re prepared to count following the rules as constituting a proof, then you can see how to get methods of proof which are outside it. Our mathematical understanding, or mathematical intuition as Gödel would put it, is something outside computation.

CC. Is the open-endedness of this procedure crucial here? I take Gödel’s theorem as producing some proposition that you can’t prove, but always with a bigger system in which you can prove it. But you don’t just stay with the bigger system - isn’t the crucial point here that you can always keep going out to yet another proposition that you can’t prove?

RP. It is like that, that’s right. And in fact in our understanding we’re using this kind of procedure all the time; it’s not limited to sophisticated mathematical logic. Imagine you have some procedure at which you work away, and you think you’ve got the rules right; and then you get worried and think maybe it’s not doing everything … so you step back and you look at what it is that you’ve put into that system, and you think about what are the implications of the kinds of rules you’ve been using. This sort of reasoning ¾ stepping back from the system ¾ is doing the same thing as Gödel’s theorem, and you always have to bring your awareness in to do that. 

CC. So the insight you’re talking about is self-reflexive: looking at your own thinking in order to enlarge it ?

RP. I think that’s essentially right; that’s basically what you’re doing.

An interview with Professor Roger Penrose - Published in Network,May 2000 Interviewer: Chris Clarke

I think Penrose has made an important discovery here that in order for machines to have the capability of strong AI surpassing human intelligence they have to be conscious beings first because without awareness it is virtually impossible to analyse self-referential statements (emphasizing bold words from RP) and therefore machines without this fundamental quality in them would never be able to transcend Gödel's statements and therefore forever remain below the levels of human intelligence. It is our nature of Self awareness which helps us in our mathematical understanding and allows us to transcend Gödel's statements.

But Self awareness or the procedures of mathematical understanding itself might be something which you cannot simulate it on a computer i.e. human thought process or awareness itself might be non-computable (Penrose proves this in great lengths in his Shadows of the Mind) which in such a case the proponents of Strong AI are doomed because without conscious machines there can be no Strong AI but without a non-computable machine simulating human thought process there can be no conscious activity.

The universe is non-local, non-real and super-deterministic

The Kochen-Specker Theorem and the Measurement Problem

Experimenter's Free Will and Quantum Certainty

Quantum Physics and Free Will

Locality, Realism (Value Definiteness + Non-contextuality)  and freedom of choice all three premises should be abandoned. The Universe is 

1. Non-local - instantaneous communication is possible between the two opposite ends of the universe outside of the space-time continuum.

2. Non-real  - The universe is only a state of mind and empirical reality does not exist independent of observers.

3. Super-deterministic - Everything in the universe is predetermined and we have no freedom of choice to choose between different measurement settings or different polariser orientations without in any way affecting the prepared quantum ensembles.

We need to give up local-realism, non-local realism as well as our freedom of choice to be consistent with nature.

 

Emperor Julian and the god of the seven rays

Emperor Julian in his Oration upon the Mother of the Gods alludes us to the god of the seven rays in one of his passages.

"But if I should touch upon that unspeakable mystic science which the Chaldaean hath uttered through inspiration, concerning the "god of the seven rays" making souls ascend through him, I shall be speaking of things unknown; yea, altogether unknown to the vulgar, yet familiar unto the blessed ministers of the gods, wherefore I shall now pass it over in silence." 

- Emperor Julian, Oration upon the Mother of the Gods.

Many scholars and researchers believe that the god of the seven rays which Julian is alluding here is Mithras, the Father but I believe that Julian is alluding to the God Jupiter and not to Mithras, the Father. There are many compelling reasons to believe that the god of the seven rays is none other than the God Jupiter which can be verified through comparative mythology supporting my view.

In the Indo-Persian religion of the Aryans the God Jupiter was known as Bṛhaspati and this is what Rig Veda says about this god.

"Bṛhaspati, when first he had his being from mighty splendour in supremest heaven, Strong, with his seven fold mouth, with noise of thunder, with his seven rays, blew and dispersed the darkness."

- Rig Veda, Book 4, HYMN L. Bṛhaspati, Verse 4

As far as I know no other god in the Rig Veda is so explicitly associated with the seven rays except the God Jupiter or Bṛhaspati which adds more weight to my view. Moreover I am also a member of the Julian Society and I asked the same question there and one of the members cited this passage from Proclus commentary on Plato's Timaeus and I quote him.

"Proclus, in his Commentary on the Timaeus (1,34) says, "the educational and judicial section [of the ideal state or, by analogy, the created universe of Zeus] is analogous to the Sun, in whose domain according to the Theologians [the Chaldeans] are Justice , the Upward Leader, and the Seven-Rays ....."  Harold Tarrant, the translator, has a note in this passage that says the scholar Festugiere identifies the last two of this triad with Attis and Mithras respectively.

I don't know if that helps."

Tim

 

If Festugiere is right then Mithras, the Father is under the domain of Zeus which is absurd since King Helios-Mithras is the supreme God of all gods who resides in the intelligible realm and through him all other intellectual gods follow including Jupiter or Zeus.

The Zeus of the Greeks was the same god as the Jupiter of the Romans.

The Romans regarded Jupiter as the equivalent of the Greek Zeus,^[5] and in Latin literature and Roman art, the myths and iconography of Zeus are adapted under the name Iuppiter.

- Wikipedia

Zeus and Jupiter had many of the same qualities as gods. Both of them were the gods of the sky as well as the king of the gods. They were both also married to their sisters: Hera (Zeus) and Juno (Jupiter). Other than being the god of the sky, Jupiter was also the god of light and victory, but Zeus was not. As a result, Jupiter protected the state of war and maintained its peace and well-being even though Zeus didn't.

- Roman and Greek Mythology

King Helios-Mithras is a Sun God of many rays and not a god of just seven rays. The triads in Proclus commentary should be interpreted as the qualities of Zeus or Jupiter and not as three individual gods corresponding to Justice, the Upward Leader and the Seven rays respectively. If one interprets them as qualities of the god Zeus or Jupiter then it adds even more weight to my original claim that the God Julian is alluding to in the above passage is none other than the God Jupiter himself and not Mithras, the Father. Also there is nothing in that passage of Julian which gives us any clue to make us believe that he is talking about the God Mithras here but if you read his previous passages before this passage he was frequently discussing the theology and the nature of God Jupiter.

More evidence supporting my view.

In ancient Greek mythology, Zeus takes the bull-form known as Taurus in order to win Europa. Taurus is also associated with Aphrodite and other goddesses, as well as with Pan and Dionysus. The face of Taurus "gleams with seven rays of fire."

 On the contrary side.

In all of the tauroctony iconography in Mithraism, Sol Invictus/Helios is always depicted as wearing a crown of seven rays. 

May be both Helios-Mithras and Jupiter emit seven rays.

"On this account, it appears to me that Plato delivers a twofold generation of the Sun; one indeed, in conjunction with the seven governors of the world, when he fashions the bodies of them, and inserts them in circulations; but the other according to the enkindling of light, through which he imparts to the Sun supermundane power. For it is one thing to generate the bulk of the Sun itself by itself, and another in conjunction with a ruling characteristic, through which the Sun is called the king of every visible nature, and is established analogous to the one fountain of good. For as this fountain, being better than the intelligible essence, illuminates both intellect and the intelligible, thus also the sun being better than a visible nature, illuminate both that which is visible and sight. But if the Sun is beyond a visible essence, it will have a supermundane nature. For the world is visible and tangible, and has a body. Hence, we must survey the Sun in a twofold respect; viz. as one of the seven planets, and as the leader of wholes; and as mundane and supermundane, according to the latter of which he splendidly emits a divine light. For in the same manner as The Good luminously emits truth which deifies the intelligible and intellectual order; as Phanes in Orpheus sends forth intelligible light which fills with intelligence all the intellectual Gods; and as Jupiter enkindles an intellectual and demiurgic light in all the supermundane Gods; thus also the Sun illuminates every thing visible through this undefiled light. The illuminating cause too is always in an order superior to the illuminated natures. For neither is The Good intelligible, nor Phanes intellectual, nor Jupiter supermundane. In consequence of this reasoning therefore, the Sun being supermundane emits the fountains of light. And according to the most mystic doctrines, the wholeness of the Sun is in the supermundane orders; for in them there is a solar world, and a total light, as the Chaldean Oracles assert, and which I am persuaded is true. And thus much concerning these things." 

- Proclus on the Timaeus of Plato

Quantum Mechanics does not apply to me

I have repeatedly stated that Science cannot give an objective account of reality because Quantum mechanics proves that Scientific realism is false. While the sadist alternative is to resort to solipsism there is still one optimism for realists like me which is Platonic Realism which has withstood the test of times.

In this 1939 paper London and Bauer question the validity of scientific objectivity and claim that consciousness or our "faculty of introspection" is a distinct property possessed by systems like us who can treat ourselves as alien external observers who can modify the Schroedinger's wavefunction without ourselves being subjected to it.

Consciousness is the only true measurement apparatus and leads to mind over matter. The fact that physicists cannot solve the measurement problem even after eight decades proves that non-physical minds exists and quantum mechanics even gives us a clue that the evolution of such non-physical minds should be non-linear or even non-computable as Penrose argues.

The Theory of Observation in Quantum Mechanics by Fritz London and Edmond Bauer (1939)

SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY AND OBJECTIVITY

At first sight it would appear that in quantum mechanics the concept of scientific objectivity has been strongly shaken. Since the classic period, the idea has become familiar that a physical object is something real, existing outside of the observer, independent of him, and in particular independent of whether or not the object has been subjected to measurement. The situation is not the same in quantum mechanics. Far from it being possible to attribute to a system at every instant its measurable properties, one cannot even claim that to attribute to it so much as a wave function has a well-defined meaning, unless referring explicitly to a definite measurement. Moreover, it looks as if the result of a measurement is intimately linked to the consciousness of the person making it, and as if quantum mechanics thus drives us toward complete solipsism.

Actually, however, we know that the relations between physicists have undergone practically no change since the discovery of quantum mechanics. No physicist has retired into a solipsistic isolation. Physicists use the same means of scientific exchange as in the past and are capable of cooperation in studying the same object. Thus there really exists something like a community of scientific perception, an agreement on what constitutes the object of the investigation, and it is this that still has to be looked into.

First of all, it is easy to recognize that the act of observation, that is, the coupling between the measuring apparatus and the observer (see our example in §11), is truly a macroscopic action and not basically quantal. Consequently one always has the right to neglect the effect on the apparatus of the “scrutiny” of the observer. Tracing things back in time, one will obtain definite conclusions about the state of the apparatus (or the photographic plate) and consequently the state of the object before the observation (but of course after the coupling is turned off). Moreover, nothing prevents another observer from looking at the same apparatus; and one can predict that, barring errors, his observations will be the same. The possibility of abstracting away from the individuality of the observer and of creating a collective scientific perception therefore in no way comes seriously into question.

It might appear that the scientific community thus created is a kind of spiritualistic society which studies imaginary phenomena—that the objects of physics are phantoms produced by the observer himself. In classical physics, one can picture a system at every instant in a unique and continuous way by the set of all of its measurable properties, even when it is not subjected to observation. It is exactly the possibility of this continuity of connection between properties and object that has ordinarily been considered as proof that physics deals with something “real,” that is, having in principle an existence “independent of all observers.” In quantum mechanics an object is the carrier, not of a definite set of measurable properties, but only a set of "potential" probability distributions or statistis referring to measurable properties, statistics which only come into force on the occasion of an effective well-defined measurement. If one abstracts away from all acts of measurement, it is meaningless to claim these measurable properties as realized; the very mathematical form of the statistics does not allow it (see §8).

But that does not keep us from predicting or interpreting experimental results. Theory fixes the rules. It teaches us first of all how to filter an object to get a pure case —that is, reproducible conditions, then it suggests how to make measurements, either to check theoretical predictions or to discover new empirical regularities. The theory adapts itself truly marvelously to the realities of experiment. It gives answers on all desired details and is silent on hypothetical questions with out experimental meaning.

In present physics the concept of “objectivity” is a little more abstract than the classical idea of a material object. Is it not a guarantee of “the objectivity” of an object that one can at least formally attribute measurable properties to it in a continuous manner even at times when it is not under observation? The answer is No, as this new theory shows by its internal consistency and by its impressive applications. It is enough, evidently, that the properties of the object should be present at the moment they are measured and that they should be predicted by theory in agreement with experiment.

In the limiting case of macroscopic phenomena, quantum theory rejoins classical theory. Thus it justifies the use of the “naive” concept of “objectivity” and at the same time specifics the limitations of this concept.

What has just been said relates to an important philosophical problem that we cannot enter into here: the determination of the necessary and sufficient conditions for an object of thought to possess objectivity and to be an object of science. This problem was perhaps posed for the first time in any general way by such mathematicians as Malebranche, Leibniz, and especially by B. Bolzano. More recently Husserl (1901, 1913; see also the rather similar ideas in Cassirer, 1910, 1936) has systematically studied such questions and has thus created a new method of investigation called Phenomenology.”

Physics insofar as it is an empirical science cannot enter into such problems in all their generality. It is satisfied to use philosophical concepts sufficient for its needs, but on occasion it can recognize that some of the concepts that once served it have become quite unnecessary, that they contain elements that are useless and even incorrect, actual obstacles to progress. One can doubt the possibility of establishing philosophical truths by the methods of physics, but it is surely not outside the the competence of physicists to demonstrate that certain statements which pretend to have a philosophical validity do not. And sometimes these “negative” philosophical discoveries by physicists are no less important, no less revolutionary for philosophy than the discoveries of recognized philosophers.