Transtemporal?

Some antitheses are clear:

unconscious/conscious;
impersonal/personal;
atemporal/temporal.

The four forces, or single unified force, of nature are impersonal and function unconsciously. Empirically, consciousness arises only in certain organism-environment interactions.

Logical and mathematical relationships are atemporal. We do not say that two plus two equals four now at 12.25 on Sunday, 22 June 2014 but might not later.

Consciousness and personality cannot be atemporal but could they be transtemporal and, if so, what would that mean? There is a qualitative difference between animal and human consciousness with different levels of each. Superhuman consciousness, again with different levels, is at least possible. We might contact or become it.

Can there be transpersonality? It would have to incorporate personality just as solids incorporate plane figures which incorporate lines, but how?

The atemporal negates time whereas the transtemporal would have to transcend but incorporate it. If we contemplate a fictitious biography, then we do not regard any moment of that biography as present although we do imagine that the fictitious character regards each moment as present while experiencing it. Thus, we transcend the fictitious timeline but not our own. How would it be possible to transcend time as such?

I think that everything has to be either conscious or unconscious. There might be higher levels of consciousness but how could there be a third category of "trans-consciousness?" 

The Lotus

The lotus grows from dark places. Consciousness and potential enlightenment grow from the memories of unenlightened actions. If, at each moment, we had no memory of any previous moment so that every sensation began and ended simultaneously and had zero duration, then we would be unconscious.

However, memories perpetuate attachments, aversions and identifications that are unenlightened responses to present awareness.

I

What is the relationship between the present subject of consciousness and the remembered self of past actions? The present and remembered selves are spatiotemporally continuous. This is the criterion of personal identity for practical, legal and moral purposes. In this sense, it is undeniable that a past action was performed by me and not by anyone else.

Spiritually, past and present selves are neither simply identical nor simply different. I did it although it was not the present I that did it. (On the other hand, the very recent self has remained capable of "wrong actions," in Buddhist terminology.)

In meditation, we approach:

acceptance of responsibility, as against attachment to guilt, by letting memories of past actions arise and pass without denying, suppressing, rationalizing or analyzing them, except when the analysis can lead to a beneficial outcome;

an awareness, realization and understanding that are deeper than feelings or emotions and that cannot be hastened by either thought or will - so we need patience.

I also need more clarity about past and present selves.

It

It has become this and us.
We contemplate this and It.

Do we need another pronoun for the Absolute? Advaita Vedantists, quoting Chandogya Upanishad, say, "Thou art That." So should I write "That" instead of "It"?

It is currently understood as energy. I think that we are It's self-consciousness.

Sri Chinmoy, using theistic language, said:

"Man said, 'I need you for my realization.' God said, 'I need you for my manifestation.'"

He also compared Hinduism to a mother who listens when one of her children meditates and says, "Mother, God is impersonal," and also when another of her children meditates and says, "Mother, God is personal." In both cases, she says, "I see, my child."

The Purpose Of Life?

What is the purpose of life?

Life was not designed but evolved so it has no purpose.

Is survival not its purpose?

It has no purpose. Some organisms survive longer than others because they are better able to survive in their environment but survival is not their purpose. All organisms die but death is not their purpose.

Why do conscious beings have purposes?

Organisms were naturally selected for sensitivity to environmental alterations.
Therefore, sensitivity quantitatively increased until it was qualitatively transformed into sensation.
Then, sensation was selected because pleasure and pain have survival value.
Therefore, survival and pleasure are purposes of conscious organisms but not of life.

So we have purposes although we do not exist to fulfill any purpose?

Yes.

What purposes should human beings pursue?

"And it harm no one, do what thou wilt."

But what needs to be done? (Lenin: What Is To Be Done?)

Self-conscious purposive individuals exist only in social relationships so the question, "What is to be done about human life?" divides into "What is to be done about consciousness?" and "What is to be done about society?"

Well, what is to be done about them, then?

Many answers are given but I think that the most helpful are Zen for consciousness and Marxism for society. Zen is practice of immediate awareness without a future goal whereas Marxist practice is purposive and aims to make itself redundant.

I am thinking of Rev W, a Zen monk, and Comrade M, a revolutionary socialist who left the organization because of problems last year. These men seem to have nothing in common and even to be opposites in many respects but both addressed the question, "What is to be done?" The logic of changing society is to change mental states and vice versa although those who approach the question from opposite ends rarely meet.