@mikenz66 While it is true that mathematical principles have been very successful in fine-tuning theories at all scales, it used to not be the driving force. It could be that my perception is skewed because such purely speculative attempts and excursions usually manage to make more splash and noise than the long and tedious attempts of working only with observables.
Anyway coming back to topic, I forget which sutta it was in but I distinctly remember reading that in some realms (most likely some deva realms) some beings manage to remember their prior life and aquaintances and thereby manage to get back on the track of practicing the path. It was in connection with how do beings in these other realms manage to follow the path. My first thoughts on reading that was if anything that is the biggest advantage for such beings! Having a vivid memeroy of even a few prior incidents can have a big effect on motivation. It works within this life, how much more it would help if we could remember even small snippets of previous life! I was also wondering if this gift of remembering is limited to certain realms or not.
It depends on your point of view, I guess. Gauge theories drove development of models since the mid-20th C:
And, of course, the symmetries of electrodynamics drove the development of Special Relativity well over a century ago.
But this is getting away from the Alien topicâŠ
In this video Bob Dean (U.S. Army as a Command Sergeant Major) talks about four groups of aliens.
first group that looks a lot like humans
second group that are interplanetary
third Intergalactic group
and fourth group, multidimensional beings
Robert Orel Dean (March 2, 1929 â October 11, 2018)
Dean retired from the U.S. Army as a Command Sergeant Major after a 28-year career. He appeared on radio programs, TV documentaries and at conferences discussing the subject of UFOs and a government cover up of alien visitations to Earth.[1] Dean claimed to have viewed a classified government document called âThe Assessmentâ that allegedly discussed threats posed by alien activity on Earth, and concluded that no such threats existed.[2] Dean said he considers himself a professional UFO researcher and had âcosmic top secretâ clearance while in the military. In 1992 while employed as emergency services coordinator for Pima County, Arizona, Dean sued his employer for discrimination, saying he was treated unfairly because of his belief in UFOs, and because of his age, reportedly settling for $100,000.[3]
UFO studies is filled with lots and lots of such testimonies - from average folks to former defense minister of this or that country to cynical people who are in it only for the money. For some, just going on radio shows and a few book sales is enough. For others, it is indeed a big business because of defense contracts and contacts in power corridors. Even if what some of these people say might be true, how does it change anything? It is not like if it all comes out we all get to have coffee with some enlightened aliens the next day. If we are too primitive for some alien beings then we are also that much dispensable for them. Actually discovering advanced alien beings might turn out to be a terrible idea.
On 03/19/2021 an interview with the Director of US Intelligence during the Trump Administration, John Ratcliffe, was broadcast on Fox News TV.
Ratcliffe said there is much more information about unidentified aerial phenomena than the public knows, but some of that information will be revealed on June 1, 2021.
US intelligence agencies have 180 days to share what they know about UFOs, thanks to the Covid-19 relief and spending bill
"Monks, whether or not there is the arising of Tathagatas, this property stands â this steadfastness of the Dhamma, this orderliness of the Dhamma: All processes are inconstant.
"The Tathagata directly awakens to that, breaks through to that. Directly awakening & breaking through to that, he declares it, teaches it, describes it, sets it forth. He reveals it, explains it, & makes it plain: All processes are inconstant.
"Whether or not there is the arising of Tathagatas, this property stands â this steadfastness of the Dhamma, this orderliness of the Dhamma: All processes are stressful.
"The Tathagata directly awakens to that, breaks through to that. Directly awakening & breaking through to that, he declares it, teaches it, describes it, sets it forth. He reveals it, explains it, & makes it plain: All processes are stressful.
"Whether or not there is the arising of Tathagatas, this property stands â this steadfastness of the Dhamma, this orderliness of the Dhamma: All phenomena are not-self.[1]
âThe Tathagata directly awakens to that, breaks through to that. Directly awakening & breaking through to that, he declares it, teaches it, describes it, sets it forth. He reveals it, explains it, & makes it plain: All phenomena are not-self.â
This so called âdisclosureâ drama has happened many times before in the last 50 years. There used to be a whole institute and project named after it. What can the govt. possibly say beyond âyes there are some unidefitied crafts that seem to fly defying laws of physics. Some of them are experimental aircrafts of US airforce and hence classified. Others we donât know. We asked other nations and they said the crafts are not theirs. They are equally perplexed!â
Every few years the UFO community gets super excited thinking that some bombshell announcements about secret alien bases and treaties with alien races are going to be disclosed - never going to happen, unless someone actually lands with their giant spacecraft in broad daylight and just parks there for months like in the movie âArrivalâ.
I think itâs a good guide to practitioners who are not full time scientists. I used to think that the limits of speculation is theoretical physics, even string theory, applied maths is good, but pure maths with no possible application is beyond my appetite. However, after reading several books on history of maths, I came to appreciate just how timely mathematicians developed a certain mathematical field, just decades ahead of what the Physicists would need to use in our theories.
Without non-Euclidean geometry, we wouldnât have general relativity. And they are less than 100 years apart!
I think for them, those poor pure mathematicians who has no faith in the teachings or no opportunity to come into the Dhamma, itâs a good contribution for them to humanity by doing their pure maths stuffs, even if we wouldnât be able to be sure if it would ever have future application in physics.
For us, we have a pure bright gem of Dhamma. For lay people at least, itâs good to keep an eye out on these speculative stuffs as we venture into the future.
As mentioned, if the general Buddhist (or any dhamma teacher) have the view that aliens must be devas, and thus humans will never discover aliens directly via our technology, cause devas are only visible via divine eye, unless they make themselves visible to certain people. Then if aliens are discovered, this might spell heavy faith crisis for those with those views, but unable to investigate which point is the wrong connection. The wrong connection to me would be that aliens need not be only devas, can be other realms, and devas need not be only aliens, could be dark matter beings, or advanced intelligence (AI), etc.
I suggest that they need a less generic label for this category. I myself am a multi-dimensional being (at least the usual 3 + 1) - itâs one of my main claims to fame!
He could have retained euclidean geometry as the mathematical model for its simplicity, which would mean sacrificing the simplicity of the scientific theory about space-time behavior.
He could adopt a more complicated non-euclidean geometry as a mathematical model, but having the benefit of formulating a simpler scientific theory.
Donât get me wrong, I like non-Euclidean geometrys as much as the next person but theyâre just languages.
@NgXinZhao I was unaware of such views in the monastic community until you mentioned it in the thread. It is not that farfetched to imagine, as you have pointed out, and as many fictional stories have created, an entire spectrum of beings who are at various stages of balance between material and spiritual progress, or still struggling with basic needs vs. never having to worry about such things for the most part. Some of those beings could very well classify as devas of various types. We can see this spectrum right here on our planet.
Have you learnt the maths of GR before? I have. Itâs really impossible to get the physics right without the right maths. Itâs now in tensorial form, using metric spaces with topology studies. Sure, maybe thereâs another way to represent the manifold, but the basic concept in maths of non-euclidean geometry is needed, or else, one cannot really predict say gravitational waves and so on with GR.
Euclidean geometry cannot bend, curve, non-euclidean geometry can bend and curve. And the basic understanding of GR is that mass-energy tells spacetime how to curve, spacetime tells mass-energy how to move.
I suggest that they need a less generic label for this category. I myself am a multi-dimensional being (at least the usual 3 + 1) - itâs one of my main claims to fame!
Iâm late to your thread, but there is a CIA and US airforce document that was declassified a few years ago, that explains that aliens they know of are interdimensional and that they come from âLokasâ and they specifically refer to the sanskrit word. I can find it from the CIA public archive and post a link here if youâre interested. Itâs under the CIA project stargate.
More documents will be declassified june and july of this year, and already two other government officials, such as Canada and Israel admitted to working with the US and these âinterdimensional aliensâ (devas). Such as Haim Eshed retired head of Israeli space agency. Haim Eshed - Wikipedia
I heard of it, downloaded the files to my phone, but never got around to have interest to read it. Haha. The files seems to be those with a lot of black blanks for redacted/ too sensitive info. Deleted it for space for Dhamma talks stuffs.
If youâve read those, itâs good to summarise for us? Thanks.
Interesting the CIA is studying something about Buddhism and Hinduism.
I read a text that speaks of CIA documents citing the astral plane and consciousness.
For the CIA Astral Plan exists and is a potential weapon of Parapolitics (in Portuguese)
But it appears that the document suggests something much bigger, in addition to the espionage missions or rescue of kidnapped officers.
The document also discusses the concept of consciousness as energy trapped in a three-dimensional space in which the entire Universe would present itself as a hologram. However, this energy belongs to the âAbsoluteâ (âThe Absoluteâ) an original and infinite state that would transcend the different holograms by which each reality is represented on each vibrational level of the Astral Plane.
The goal would be to expand consciousness until it reaches the dimension of the Absolute in which no hologram is generated on itself. Without more time / space restrictions, consciousness would reach the âfociâ from 15 to 21 - the journey of consciousness in time from the past to the future.
But the curious thing is one of the final conclusions of the document that open up for possible future research: intellectually preparing astral projectors for âpossible encounters with forms of intelligent and non-bodily energies when space and time limits are exceededâ.
Originally they started Project Stargate to use remote viewing to spy on the Russians, what they found was aliens instead lol. They also describe planes of existence just like the suttas, except they call it focus levels.
The image you linked is from a project stargate and the Monroe Institute which uses binaural audio to synchronize both hemispheres of the brain which leads to remote viewing and out of body experiences. Itâs called the Gateway Tapes, I tried it and itâs very similar to meditation, getting you to relax without falling asleep, etcâŠ
5 - Human (manussa loka): Birth in this plane results from giving and moral discipline of middling quality. This is the realm of moral choice where destiny can be guided. The Khana Sutta mentioned that this plane is a unique balance of pleasure and pain. It facilitates the development of virtue and wisdom to liberate oneself from the entire cycle or rebirths. For this reason rebirth as a human being is considered precious according to the Chiggala Sutta. Buddhist cosmology - Wikipedia
The Characteristics of Humans may well be the Characteristics of Some Species of Aliens.
Humans (Homo sapiens) are a species of highly intelligent primates. They are the only extant members of the subtribe Hominina andâtogether with chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutansâare part of the family Hominidae (the great apes, or hominids). Humans are terrestrial animals, characterized by their erect posture and bipedal locomotion; high manual dexterity and heavy tool use compared to other animals; open-ended and complex language use compared to other animal communications; larger, more complex brains than other primates; and highly advanced and organized societies.[3][4] Human - Wikipedia
some recluse or a brahmin, by means of ardour, endeavour, application, diligence, and right reflection, attains to such a degree of mental concentration that with his mind thus concentrated, [purified, clarified, unblemished, devoid of corruptions], he recollects his numerous past lives: that is, (he recollects) one birth, two, three, four, or five births; ten, twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty births; a hundred, a thousand, or a hundred thousand births; many hundreds of births, many thousands of births, many hundreds of thousands of births. (He recalls:) âThen I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose there. There too I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose here.â Thus he recollects his numerous past lives in their modes and their details.
âŠ
a certain recluse or brahmin, by means of ardour, endeavour, application, diligence, and right reflection, attains to such a degree of mental concentration that with his mind thus concentrated he recollects his numerous past lives: that is, (he recollects his past lives throughout) one aeon of world-contraction and expansion (expansion and contraction of the Universe) , throughout two, three, four, five, or ten aeons of world-contraction and expansion. (He recalls:) âThen I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose there. There too I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose here.â Thus he recollects his numerous past lives in their modes and their details.
This quote can also be used to explain many types of births on other planets and alien families
(He recalls:) âThen I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose there. There too I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance; such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such my span of life. Passing away thence, I re-arose here.â Thus he recollects his numerous past lives in their modes and their details.
There are reports of past lives on other planetsâŠ
20-year-old Russian Man Named Boriska Mipriyanovich Says he Lived on Mars Before Being Reborn on Earth
He further said that the Martians can execute interstellar travel. His mother said that the man used to talk about aliens when he was a child and nobody taught him about Mars.
FBI report: Nikola Tesla, inventor of wireless technology, an alien from Venus
For those who claimed to be from another planet in their past lives, it might be more convincing if they can actually show the tech from those planets which we donât have here.
Or the martian guy can help the Mars rovers to find exactly the site of those ancient cities of Mars, just let them hit jackpot then itâs very convincing if the source is from him.
Ok, fine, now I understand why some other people are naturally skeptical when I presented past life evidences (from earth to earth, human to human).
