Download or read book The Self Illusion written by Bruce Hood and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-06-15 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most of us believe that we are unique and coherent individuals, but are we? The idea of a "self" has existed ever since humans began to live in groups and become sociable. Those who embrace the self as an individual in the West, or a member of the group in the East, feel fulfilled and purposeful. This experience seems incredibly real but a wealth of recent scientific evidence reveals that this notion of the independent, coherent self is an illusion - it is not what it seems. Reality as we perceive it is not something that objectively exists, but something that our brains construct from moment to moment, interpreting, summarizing, and substituting information along the way. Like a science fiction movie, we are living in a matrix that is our mind. In The Self Illusion, Dr. Bruce Hood reveals how the self emerges during childhood and how the architecture of the developing brain enables us to become social animals dependent on each other. He explains that self is the product of our relationships and interactions with others, and it exists only in our brains. The author argues, however, that though the self is an illusion, it is one that humans cannot live without. But things are changing as our technology develops and shapes society. The social bonds and relationships that used to take time and effort to form are now undergoing a revolution as we start to put our self online. Social networking activities such as blogging, Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter threaten to change the way we behave. Social networking is fast becoming socialization on steroids. The speed and ease at which we can form alliances and relationships is outstripping the same selection processes that shaped our self prior to the internet era. This book ventures into unchartered territory to explain how the idea of the self will never be the same again in the online social world.

Download or read book The Illusion of Money written by Kyle Cease and published by Hay House, Inc. This book was released on 2022-08-16 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Times best-selling author and comedian-turned-motivational speaker, Kyle Cease, shows how your obsession with money is actually preventing you from living the life of your dreams. "I can't afford that." "Now's not the right time . . . I need to save up." "Quit my job? Are you nuts?!" Sound familiar? Money is one of the biggest excuses we make to not go after what we really want. Our fixation with money--the desire for more of it, and the fear of not having enough of it--is often really just a longing to feel safe. But this obsession with money is coming at a much bigger cost: our sanity, our creativity, our freedom, and our ability to step into our true power. This book is about eliminating the need to seek safety through the illusion of money, and learning to see ourselves for the perfection that we are--so that we can bring our gifts to the world in an authentic way, and allow ourselves to receive massive, true abundance as a result. Kyle Cease has heard excuses like the ones above countless times at his live events, and he has shown people how to completely break through them. In The Illusion of Money, he shares his own experiences as well as practical tools to help readers understand their ingrained beliefs and attachments to money, and how they can tap into our infinite assets and talents. "After 25 years as a successful comedian, actor, transformational speaker, author and junior-league amateur bowler, I've experienced many times how chasing money is not an effective way to create an abundant and fulfilling life. The most alive I've ever felt was after I left my comedy career at its peak to become a transformational speaker. I left tons of guaranteed money and so-called security for a complete unknown. It was terrifying--but what was on the other side of that terror was a completely different life that is not only more abundant financially, but has more freedom, more ease, more passion, more impact and more joy." -- Kyle Cease

Download or read book IT S ALL AN ILLUSION A KARMIC ONE written by Adrian Gabriel Dumitru and published by Adrian Gabriel Dumitru. This book was released on with total page 117 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Telling that the life itself it’s an illusion, might sound so damn … weird … and most probably … even like a depressive thought. But … you see … there are so, so many moments in life when the life itself just… sucks … and we ask ourselves … what the hell have i done that i deserve that?! And that was the moment when the karmic idea came into my mind … starting to believe that all the lessons of life, sometimes very difficult to handle … could be defined as karmic. All those abstract situations … which totally annoy us … and make our lives miserable… are repeating on and on and on. Believing we are the victims of circumstances … everything it’s never the way we want to be … or even worst. The funny thing that i tried all the time when i was in those weird abstract stories, having the impression that it was the end of the world … i was repeating to myself “It’s all an illusion … and it’s not what it looks like”. My karmic stories … being in fact my stories … and feeling them in such a powerful way … were … Well … don’t even know how to define them, but all i wanted was to get out of those situations and also get rid of the karmic people that i hated so much. And i tried everything … and nothing worked expect smiling … or even laughing in front of those illusions. Deciding to call them … simple … illusions … was probably the best idea i could come with. But the karmic illusions … were powerful messages i had to understand … and i was pretending i could not see behind the abstract. I actually love the abstract, but not when it was part of my life. It was all related with the concept of understanding the meaning of life … and even if i spent lots of time meditating over the subject … when i was on the scene of the real life, i was acting like a football player that studied all the strategies had been ever written about this sport … but … never practiced and in fact never tried to practice it in a good way. So … even if i knew theory … i acted like someone that never heard about spirituality … or about the forces behind reality. In fact …. in the real life, in so, so many karmic moments … i acted like an … idiot. I knew that all i had to do was just to smile in front of those illusory situations … cause there is no other way of fighting. But guess what?! Each time … i was failing. The only progress i made over the years … was that after a while … meditating over what happened … i somehow understood what … illusory … meant. …. that i had to react in a different way. … that was not what it looked like and the lesson of life had to be seen, understood deeper and deeper. But again … theory was so easy and i was failing tests all the time. On and on and on … I was such an idiot not applying all what i knew about life … on the scene of my own life. … and i was paying the price … of living a … miserable life … Everyday something happened and i was fucking my vibe … not realizing there were tests given to me by the Universe. Life was beautiful … and i thought it’s so … ugly. Hahaha … such a silly perspective. Well … it was all a decision of … changing my perceptions … and realizing that anything it could happen it was all a decision of the Divine Intelligence … God … Allah … or however we could name that entity that is everything it exists …. and it was all for our good. The fact that the karmic situations were repeated … was because i was not passing the tests … and i really had to pass those tests. It was all about … my awakening … and i had to start the … process.

Download or read book Free Will written by Sam Harris and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-03-06 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the New York Times bestselling author of The End of Faith, a thought-provoking, "brilliant and witty" (Oliver Sacks) look at the notion of free will—and the implications that it is an illusion. A belief in free will touches nearly everything that human beings value. It is difficult to think about law, politics, religion, public policy, intimate relationships, morality—as well as feelings of remorse or personal achievement—without first imagining that every person is the true source of his or her thoughts and actions. And yet the facts tell us that free will is an illusion. In this enlightening book, Sam Harris argues that this truth about the human mind does not undermine morality or diminish the importance of social and political freedom, but it can and should change the way we think about some of the most important questions in life.

Download or read book The Mathematical Reality written by Alexander Unzicker and published by . This book was released on 2020-01-29 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alexander Unzicker is a theoretical physicist and writes about elementary questions of natural philosophy. His critique of contemporary physics Bankrupting Physics (Macmillan) received the 'Science Book of the Year' award (German edition 2010). With The Mathematical Reality, Unzicker presents his most fundamental work to date, which is the result of years of study of natural laws and their historical development.The discovery of fundamental laws of nature has influenced the fate of Homo sapiens more than anything else. Has modern physics already understood these laws? Many puzzles formulated by Albert Einstein or Paul Dirac are still unsolved today, in particular the meaning of fundamental constants. In this book, Unzicker contends that a rational description of nature must do without any constants.A methodological and historical analysis shows, however, that the underlying problem of physics is deep, unexpected and fatal: the concepts of space and time themselves, the basis of science since Newton, could be fundamentally inappropriate for the description of reality, although-or precisely because-they are so easily accessible to human perception.A new understanding of reality can only arise from mathematics. By exploring the three-dimensional unitary sphere, which could replace the concepts of space and time, the author presents a mathematical vision that points the way to a new understanding of reality.

Download or read book It s All an Illusion written by Raveena Nash and published by Totalrecall Publications. This book was released on 2009-03 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is for all those who are searching for meaning in life. For those who are trying to make sense out of a seemingly meaningless world. For those who ask themselves: What is it all about? This book is also for those who have picked up the self-study course entitled A Course in Miracles (ACIM) and then put it down because what it is saying is just too difficult for them to believe, because what it is saying is unsubstantiated by other belief systems. In writing this book I am hoping to show the reader that the teachings of ACIM are not that inconceivable or far-fetched and that there are many sages around the world whose teachings are very similar. I am a student who has spent many years searching, studying and groping in the dark for a light to switch on that would make it all clear to me. I found that light not so long ago when I began to study A Course in Miracles. If I am able to share some of that light with others then I will be honoured and joyful and my life will finally begin to make sense to me. So this book is about shedding a little light on what to me is the only thing that does make sense in this world around us - illusion! It's All An Illusion! is a comparative study of the topic of illusion as expounded in A Course in Miracles, Buddhism, Hinduism and other belief systems. In the book I explore the topic of illusion in great detail and have included numerous quotations from other books and scriptures. I have also included interviews with a Hindu teacher, two Buddhist monks and ACIM teacher I would classify It's All An Illusion! as a self-help/MBS book and it is aimed at people who may have picked up ACIM and thought that it was all too far-fetched to believe. It is also aimed at people who are interested in MBS books but who may know nothing about ACIM. I also think it would be useful to ACIM followers because the teachings of ACIM are simplified and explained in the book.

Download or read book The Last Illusion written by Porochista Khakpour and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2014-05-13 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A kaleidoscopic tale inspired by a legend from the medieval Persian epic "Book of Kings" follows the coming-of-age of a feral Middle Eastern youth in New York City on the eve of the September 11 attacks. By the award-winning author of Sons and Other Flammable Objects. 25,000 first printing.

Download or read book Impossible is an Illusion written by Paul Semendinger and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2019-03-26 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Impossible is an Illusion is a collection of Dr. Paul Semendinger’s motivational writings on many topics including hard work, determination, positivity, family, and love. Using his experiences in education as a teacher and school leader as well as his knowledge of history, sports, running, and human nature, Dr. Semendinger delivers a book that will inspire readers to set goals and work hard to achieve them. Dr. Semendinger truly believes that anything is possible . . . after all, impossible is an illusion.

Download or read book Just an Illusion The B Side written by D. Kelly and published by Dee Kelly . This book was released on 2017-03-28 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Three life-altering months … That’s how long it’s been since Amelia Greyson joined the Just an Illusion Tour with Bastards and Dangerous. She’s made new friends, embraced her past, and even found love. Back on the road … Following a tragic situation, Amelia is determined to hit the road, put her life in order, and finish the book she was hired to write. Mel’s not the only one affected by what happened; the men of BAD are all trying to move forward, not wanting the past to ruin the remainder of their farewell tour. Brother vs Brother … Tensions are high on the Weston brothers’ bus. As each brother settles into their role in Amelia’s life, secrets threaten to rip their relationship to shreds. Can Noah and Sawyer find a way to save the brotherly bond they share? Or will the woman of their dreams end up tearing them apart for good? The B Side is the second book in The Illusion Series

Download or read book Just an Illusion EP written by D. Kelly and published by Dee Kelly . This book was released on 2017-06-19 with total page 463 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lives are turned upside down … Everything was perfect before life came to a screeching halt. When devastating loss flips Amelia’s world on its axis, she loses her spirit. Mel isn’t the only one hurting, though; the members of BAD are also struggling to find their way after that tragic night. Life goes on … Amelia’s friends move heaven and earth to help ease her sadness. Knowing she’s on a dangerous precipice, they fight through their own pain to bring her safely to the other side of her grief. Love can conquer … Amelia knows bottling up her feelings isn’t helping anything. With love at her fingertips, all she has to do is reach for it. Mel’s loved ones desperately hope she can once again find her way to happiness. Can Amelia overcome her fears to let love in again, or will she let the weight of that night continue to drown her in sorrow? Just an Illusion – EP is book three in The Illusion Series

Download or read book Are You an Illusion written by Mary Midgley and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-09-28 with total page 126 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an impassioned defence of the importance of our own thoughts, feelings and experiences, the renowned philosopher Mary Midgley shows that there’s much more to our selves than a jumble of brain cells. Exploring the remarkable gap that has opened up between our understanding of our sense of self and today’s science, Midgley argues powerfully and persuasively that the rich variety of our imaginative life cannot be contained in the narrow bounds of a highly puritanical materialism that simply equates brain and self. Engaging with the work of prominent thinkers, Midgley investigates the source of our current attitudes to the self and reveals how ideas, traditions and myths have been twisted to fit in, seemingly naturally, with science’s current preoccupation with the physical and material. Midgley shows that the subjective sources of thought – our own experiences – are every bit as necessary in helping to explain the world as the objective ones such as brain cells. Are You an Illusion? offers a salutary analysis of science’s claim to have done away with the self and a characteristic injection of common sense from one of our most respected philosophers into a debate increasingly in need of it. This Routledge Classics edition includes a new Foreword by Stephen Cave.

Download or read book Venusia written by Mark Von Schlegell and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2005-08-05 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A novel about life under enlightened totalitarianism in the twenty-third century and the efforts of a mild-mannered junk dealer to change the human condition. Primitive literacy is redundant. Mere words are expelled. We inaugurate a world of pure presence. The mind, that intrudes itself between ourselves and those memories too terrible to know, must keep us moving beyond the grasp of their claw. To control the flow, it will be necessary that political order be imposed always temporarily. The state shall enjoy direct, creative access to the real. It's the end of the twenty-third century. Earth has violently self-destructed. Venusia, an experimental off-world colony, survives under the enlightened totalitarianism of the Princeps Crittendon regime. Using industrialized narcotics, holographic entertainment, and memory control, Crittendon has turned Venusia into a self-sustaining system of relative historical inertia. But when mild-mannered junk dealer Rogers Collectibles finds a book about early Venusian history, the colony—once fully immersed in the present—begins losing its grip on the real. With his Reality-V girlfriend Martha Dobbs, neuroscop operator Sylvia Yang, his midget friend Niftus Norrington, and a sentient plant, Rogers wages a war to alter the shape of spacetime, and in the process, revisions the whole human (and vegetable) condition.

Download or read book The Knowledge Illusion written by Steven Sloman and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017-03-14 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The Knowledge Illusion is filled with insights on how we should deal with our individual ignorance and collective wisdom.” —Steven Pinker We all think we know more than we actually do. Humans have built hugely complex societies and technologies, but most of us don’t even know how a pen or a toilet works. How have we achieved so much despite understanding so little? Cognitive scientists Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach argue that we survive and thrive despite our mental shortcomings because we live in a rich community of knowledge. The key to our intelligence lies in the people and things around us. We’re constantly drawing on information and expertise stored outside our heads: in our bodies, our environment, our possessions, and the community with which we interact—and usually we don’t even realize we’re doing it. The human mind is both brilliant and pathetic. We have mastered fire, created democratic institutions, stood on the moon, and sequenced our genome. And yet each of us is error prone, sometimes irrational, and often ignorant. The fundamentally communal nature of intelligence and knowledge explains why we often assume we know more than we really do, why political opinions and false beliefs are so hard to change, and why individual-oriented approaches to education and management frequently fail. But our collaborative minds also enable us to do amazing things. The Knowledge Illusion contends that true genius can be found in the ways we create intelligence using the community around us.

Download or read book Ego written by Alan Watts and published by . This book was released on 1975 with total page 72 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Guns N Roses Use Your Illusion I and II written by Eric Weisbard and published by Continuum. This book was released on 2007 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Guns 'N' Roses and their 1991 album, Use Your Illusion.

Download or read book Grande Illusions written by Tom Savini and published by Imagine (PA). This book was released on 1983 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Empire of Illusion written by Chris Hedges and published by Knopf Canada. This book was released on 2009-07-28 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pulitzer prize–winner Chris Hedges charts the dramatic and disturbing rise of a post-literate society that craves fantasy, ecstasy and illusion. Chris Hedges argues that we now live in two societies: One, the minority, functions in a print-based, literate world, that can cope with complexity and can separate illusion from truth. The other, a growing majority, is retreating from a reality-based world into one of false certainty and magic. In this “other society,” serious film and theatre, as well as newspapers and books, are being pushed to the margins. In the tradition of Christopher Lasch’s The Culture of Narcissism and Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death, Hedges navigates this culture — attending WWF contests as well as Ivy League graduation ceremonies — exposing an age of terrifying decline and heightened self-delusion.