I don't think the question is whether you should be banned. I can tell you why you were banned though. Scientists - physicists - especially amateurish ones have to defend the status quo to prove their superior knowledge - so there's an interest in getting rid of a Questioner like you

I'd advise you to disregard the judgmentalism and looking-down-upon-ness as expressed in the replies of TimeLine and Hanover. — Sapientia

I disagree with regards to TimeLine. TimeLine may disagree with Question's choices, but it's clearly with the goal of helping him - TL at least has good intentions in this matter.

The same however cannot be said about that prick Hanover ... Who does this merely to narcissistically inflate his own ego, with total disregard for the feelings and desires of other human beings - hence why he calls Question "pathetic". I wouldn't be surprised if Hanover's "successful" children are actually not quite succesful, and Hanover doesn't have such a good relationship with them at all, hence why he takes it out on Question, seeing his own children in him. But that would be speculation and going too far. Anyway, his sort of vindictive and superior-level judgementalism is something that greatly angers me when I see it in people in general.

I notice that day by day Sappy is becoming a better politician... one day he may actually end up the Prime Minister of Britain :-O

What do you think about this quote, and how it relates to doubt and trust?

Otherwise why is it that spontaneous love is so inclined to – yes, so in love with – making a test of the love? This is just because love has not, by becoming a duty, in the deepest sense undergone the test. From this comes what the poet would call sweet unrest […] The lover wants to test the beloved. The friend wants to test the friend. Testing certainly has its basis in love, but this violently flaming desire to test and this hankering desire to be put to the test explain that the love itself is unconsciously uncertain […] But when it is a duty to love, neither is a test needed nor the insulting foolhardiness of wanting to test, because if love is higher than every test it has already more than conquered […] When one shall, it is for ever decided; and when you will understand that you shall love, your love is for ever secure — S. Kierkegaard

"You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me" — andrewk

But this has nothing to do with believing without evidence. Indeed Jesus didn't say one should believe without evidence. In fact, even if he had said "you should believe in me without evidence", that wouldn't entail that you should believe everything without evidence, only that you should believe in Jesus without evidence. But the statement doesn't even suggest that. It says that Blessed are those who believe without seeing me. It talks about their blessedness, not about their moral character or right and wrong. Second of all, "not seeing" isn't the same as "not having evidence". So it seems that the whole narrative that you built is a bit artificial, purposefully misrepresenting what is there - sorry to put it this bluntly, as I do generally appreciate your insights.

Believing without good evidence is nearly always a harmful thing to do. — andrewk

This is just false. It can be nearly always a harmful thing would be the correct way to phrase it.

I only read the first sentence, the rest seemed superfluous. — Wosret

>:O it was!

Glad that we agree with me. — Wosret

lol on what do you mean?

What could be worse? — Wosret

Could the paperwork saying something different instead of being non-existent be worse?

Probably doesn't work out that way in practice, few things do, but the principle seems reasonable to me. — Wosret

Yes the principle is indeed reasonable, but as reasonable as most other principles are (actually the owners make the most, since theoretically they are risking their capital), there are ways around it.

Or take another scenario. You're the Prime Minister, and as part of your role you can name the head of the secret service in your country. The following events happen:
1. You ask the current head whether person X has done something wrong and whether the service has any information on it. He says no.
2. In two months time, you discover that the head of the secret service hasn't followed some protocol, and you dismiss him, and name someone else who has been recommended to you.
3. You ask the new head whether person X has done something wrong and whether he should be further investigated. He disagrees.
4. In four months time, you find that there has been a suspect call between the head of the secret service and an old business friend of his. You dismiss him
5. You appoint a new head, and ask him whether person X has done something wrong and whether this needs to be investigated. He tells you that it is being investigated, and he will prepare the files to send to Court.

Have you as Prime Minister given any orders apart from dismissing folks for not being orthodox enough in their obedience to the law?

Aren't CEO's the culpable ones though, with the most real accountability? Like, aren't they the ones hauled into count to explain why their product killed all of those babies? — Wosret

Okay, first let's make some distinctions. Yes theoretically the administrator/CEO of the company is the one bearing all the accountability (unless of course there is evidence to the contrary). Practically, the CEO has a multitude of ways to pass on responsibilities to others. People are judged based on the paperwork. If the paperwork says something, then that's how it happened. CEOs are adept at mastering paperwork.

So tell me Wosret, what happens if an order is given orally, but there is no written record of it or even worse?

Actually, it takes a lot of talking to investors. — Question

Not everyone does it by acquiring capital from an investor. There are many boot-strapped companies. Even when capital is acquired from investors, your company must already be earning quite a decent amount of money (generally) before you get someone to invest. If you're at that point, you're already successful due to your own effort, even before the investor got in - the investor merely speeds up your success.

It takes talent in recognizing efficient means to achieve a goal — Question

True

the power of persuasion — Question

True

and a whole lot of lawyers to protect, promote, and fend of competition — Question

Yeah, where do you get the money for those? It gets easy once you can get those. The hard part is getting to that point. Making that money starting from zero isn't easy at all. It takes real ingenuity.

You also need to steal a lot of ideas from competition without them noticing. — Question

No, not necessarily.

I mean technically, the most psychopathic CEO is usually the most efficient one, does that make him the smartest? — Question

That's not exactly true. CEOs typically are politically manipulative - but they're only capable within an already existent structure. They're not capable of creating something themselves.

The smartest is the one who creates something and makes it work.

What makes you say they aren't smart? I mean technically, the most psychopathic CEO is usually the most efficient one, does that make him the smartest? — Question

Managing people in a company that already works, and has a built hirearchy and a lot of resources isn't difficult at all. Even a monkey could do it. It's building that company in the first place that is actually the hard thing. CEOs typically are people who manage bureaucracies - who have been good and obedient slaves for a long time, and who are placed there precisely because they're not dangerous - they're too dumb to be dangerous. And the structure of the company governs itself - the CEO doesn't actually make it work at all. The person who founded and started the company - or the persons - they made it work, theirs is the merit, not the CEO's.

Yeah, you need to stop doing that. Ranking people based on your table of who is smart or not. It distorts your view of reality. — Question

I haven't said I rank individuals I meet on that table by virtue of them holding a certain position. I merely stated that most CEOs aren't terribly smart at all.

Really? What's with the aura around these charlatans? What's so great about Microsoft or Apple? As if the CEO of GE or Lockheed came up with all their own patents? — Question

No I haven't said I admire the CEOs at all. I said I admire

Let's not forget that there are self made people with self made jobs that only they could do — Question

People who make their own jobs - who contribute with their own value. This may very well not be the CEO (in fact it probably isn't - CEOs are typically dumb people) - it may be a nerd closed in his office who never goes out of there, and who has no other task except to come up with creative ideas in his own time. No one ever disturbs him or knows about him.

Entrepreneurs are more likely to be such people than CEOs for that matter, even though frequently entrepreneurs will also be CEOs - like Elon Musk. But simply being CEO isn't difficult at all. It's just a political thing really. Someone who is a slave for long enough will get it. There's nothing valuable in that.

Let's not forget that there are self made people with self made jobs that only they could do. — Question

Yeah, I actually admire those. But the point is there's nothing great about simply having a job. It's about your creativity, learning skills that are valuable to others, developing your character. That's what matters. If someone develops their creativity and knowledge, learns valuable skills, and develops their character I don't care at all if they have a job or not.

And I'd expect you'd even admit to the real benefit of getting out of the rut of dependency and directionlessness when you secured a challenging job. — Hanover

Hah hah! I forgot to laugh. Securing a challenging job - let me tell you, even if someone made me CEO of Microsoft tomorrow I'd refuse.

Unbelievable that there's actually people who have a brain and actually believe there's something admirable about securing a challenging job......... :-d

We live in a world where fatherhood and paternalism are shunned, as in how dare I tell a young man to dust off and get back in there. — Hanover

Oh yeah, and guess what, Hanover means by "paternalism" and "fatherhood" promiscuity and the like. He certainly didn't tell Question to go and get married. He told him to move out. To do what? Presumably to fuck around, as he vigorously recommends, publicly and without shame whenever he gets the chance, is that right? :-} That's what makes one a "real man" according to this :-x .

I moved out early, but there's nothing "great" in that. The only reason why I moved out was simply because circumstances demanded that I do so. There's literarily nothing great or admirable in moving out from your mother's flat... It's simply absurd for fuck's sake >:O Quite the contrary, someone may choose to stay with their mother to help her as she's getting older, and even bring their own wife, and future children and raise them there, in an extended family.

Oh please. Save the psychoanalysis. I have two well adjusted kids, both succesful. — Hanover

Yeah very succesful, I have no doubt, with a father like you, I can only imagine >:O >:O

The path to independence is not paved with constant hand holding. You have no comprehension of the infinite compassion a parent has for their child and the simultaneous suffering that occurs with their every struggle all with the understanding that the baby bird must flap his own wings in order to fly. — Hanover

Give me a break... just give me a break. Nobody beats their own wings. To beat their own wings would mean they aren't already chained by society. The fact that they have a job and pay their bills in NO SENSE means that they are independent. No, they are slaves, the worst part is that they probably aren't even aware of it. Having a job is the farthest thing from freedom, whether you're working as the CEO of Microsoft, or as your local grocery boy.

Trumpish. Funny insult. — Hanover

I realised that Hanover simply has no shame - this guy is unbelievable.......

My advice (as someone in an MA program in a related field in the humanities who has applied to PhD programs but is seriously thinking about dropping out of academia completely, even if he is accepted somewhere): you don't need a degree to be a philosopher. Find something tolerable to pay the bills, if possible, and pursue philosophy on your own time. — Thorongil

I endorse this advice fully. All my experience is congruent with this. (Y)

Maybe she [your mother] would like to have a torrid romance with the guy next door, for instance. Having an adult son in the next room cramps one's style. — Bitter Crank

Then your mother should be ashamed of herself.

This is the most horrifying thing I have read in a very long time. Quite literally. Though I understand your point [if it is attempting to speak of transcendence], the way that you have explained it in light of referencing Osho is just all wrong. You become that very 'worm' that Kierkegaard despises, as do I. — TimeLine

Yes, but in order to be more than that worm, you have to accept the possibility of being that worm. Only when fear of being that worm has been overcome - only then are you free to be anything more than that worm. Until that has been overcome - you'll always be that worm. I despise worms too :) but worms aren't created by actions and outward circumstances. Worms are created by inner disposition.

As for Osho - I don't agree with Osho but the cure, in order to ultimately reach equilibrium, needs to be greater than the disease.

but that all boils down to finding your independence and being able to ascertain what it is you genuinely what and are as an individual — TimeLine

Renouncing is not equivalent to giving up on who one is - I never renounce who I am, I renounce outward expectations of anything. I don't renounce my values. I don't change my values depending on the circumstances in order to have anything. I don't renounce my ambition - I renounce the fulfilment of my ambition - there is a very large difference there.

Then, the eternal beauty of our capacity to live, the opportunities becoming so profound, so exciting that real passion starts to form, only then will you understand life. — TimeLine

This has nothing with any outward expression of anything. I could be selling groceries for the rest of my life, or working in a nursery, or living with my mother, or anything else that you'd consider cutting your wings off. It's not outward circumstances and actions that make life profound, passionate, and intense - it's the fire inside your heart. You may outwardly be nobody - indeed you may be a caged bird - your life may be completely boring and uninteresting - and yet inward you could be richer than Bill Gates. It's your inward life - not your outer life, that is under the question. That's what brings intensity to all the moments, regardless of how they outwardly appear.

What does that say to your state of mind and being? — TimeLine

Outward things don't say anything about my state of mind and being, except superficially.

I lived with my mom for a year and a half, at 22/23, and had v bad self-esteem, and some dude who thinks its HILARIOUS to talk about how great they are telling me I was pathetic wouldn't have helped a bit. — csalisbury

Perhaps we should remind ourselves what I said to Hanover in a thread sometime ago - he frequently thinks he's at the pub talking BS with folks who can barely string two words together... And I said a few more harsh things to him back then, and even got put on notice by the mods >:O - and Hanover put me on ignore ever since, saying that I'm free to think it's because of my greatness if that makes me feel better! >:O What a loser...

I am referring to disagreement among people who do think a lot about those things; disagreement among philosophers that is. Spinozism, for example, has not become the universally accepted metaphysical system by any means, even despite the fact that Descartes is currently out of favour and we live in a scientific materialist age. — John

Do you think for example that Descartes is unfairly out of favour today?

Spinozism, for example, has not become the universally accepted metaphysical system by any means, even despite the fact that Descartes is currently out of favour and we live in a scientific materialist age. — John

Well most philosophers earn their money based on the diversity of their research. If Spinozism became the only accepted position, there'd be a lot less opportunities for publication...

Then why is there so much disagreement? — John

Because people never think about those things generally... And even when they do, many are still confused, not to mention that such things don't have much value in earning money and stuff that most people care about.

As human noted what we think is likely or plausible really comes down to mere habits of thought. — John

That's if you believe Hume. I don't find that to be the case. I find that we believe something to be plausible when it is coherent.

That's obviously a ridiculous example. It's a more subtle matter than that. We simply don't know what the relationship between thought, emotion, desire and so on, as subjectively experienced and neural processes is; and probably never will, because the ways the two are experienced are so different. — John

It's not ridiculous at all, it's simply the only plausible explanation for our experience as far as I can see.

Finally some good sense has befallen on this thread! Thank you Sir! :D

Finally - now that we've cleared the way, time to address your actual points instead of laugh at you and mock you as some prefer to do. They should know that feeling greater out of mocking you only shows their own shallowness, and not their own greatness. A truly great man does not belittle others and call them pathetic for no reason at all except trying to discuss something. Hanover Banover is probably the type of guy who also brags about his sexual exploits - only such a heartless moron can behave in this manner. Alas - seeing this greatly angers me. Hanover should be ashamed of himself. I would say a few more things again to him, but he's already run like a crybaby to the mods before, so perhaps I should stop now.

I'm still young enough to go back to college and get a degree in philosophy. — Question

Good - time is one's biggest asset! One should only start taking big risks when their time is running out, that's when it can start paying off. Until then, slow down with the risks - you have more to lose and less to gain.

However, I have low self-esteem — Question

Okay so that's what you have to address. Look for ways to increase your self esteem. Learn something - it can be anything - choose a skill. Learn it, and become the best in it from everyone you know. Initially you'll feel like no way you can learn it. But you can - remember your most important asset - time. You have a lot of time. You don't have to learn it today. But if you practice it every day for 2 years, you're going to be an expert, like it or not. I called myself an expert on web-development and database management before I'd even designed my own website/database! >:O Most experts out there are fakes to begin with. People put on their CVs that they speak German because they did one semester in school - they can barely speak 5 words in it. It's actually pathetic - they're all damned liars. I have a friend who is a qualified lawyer, but he's actually completely incapable on legal matters (I know because I've tried to use him, even paid him, and he's still failed me - I had to learn the law myself!). And yet he practices law >:O ! I've seen senior engineers who know fuck all about how a building works - I worked under them in fact >:O The truth is most people don't even have a clue what they're doing. It's all a show of appearances - it's not hard to start winning if you stop being tricked by the appearances. The appearances are just there to prevent you from getting involved in the activity - to make you think it's too hard. Ignore the appearances, I know it's hard.

I was thinking about getting a second job, paying off my debts and possibly returning to college once I build up a better work ethic and study habits. — Question

That's not a bad idea - however - an even better idea is learning a few skills which pay more. Anything in IT pays a lot, and you can do it from a computer :P If you don't like that, think about practical skills that you could build on that you already have. Go to evening courses - there's evening courses for how to operate gas boilers to how to sell real estate to God knows what. Focus on educating and building your skills.

I have no way of telling whether I would like it enough to go the whole nine yards with BA->Masters->PhD. By the end of it I would be naturally in deep debt, but, I suppose a very happy and proud person? — Question

I'd say get enough money, pay your debts off, and only then do it.

I do not see myself ever having a wife, although the thoughts do return and bother me on the subject. Still thinking if I can have a wife with my current lifestyle or even if I realize the dreams in the OP. — Question

"If you can have a wife" is obviously answered by yes - I've seen some pretty darn strange things that would be a lot more stranger than a man like you having a wife. I think - to be entirely fucking honest with you - that you stand to have a better wife than most men out there, because in your aloneness you have developed the quality of spirit that could attract such a soul.

That is just an opinion; you have no way of knowing that. — John

Can a thought kick a stone? No. If the two realms interacted causally, we would see a lot more expanded causation between the two.

then happiness could not cause release of serotonin, and release of seratonin could not cause happiness. — John

And indeed they don't cause it - that's precisely the point!! Thought cannot affect extension.

Release of seratonin may cause feelings of happiness as, for example, when you take certain drugs or feeling happy may cause release of seratonin, as, for example, when you are in love. — John

No there is no causation, just the pure correlation. Why do you move from the obvious truth that they are always correlated to the falsity of a cause? Their correlation has to be explained, nothing else.

As I see it you are just playing with words; you haven't explained anything. What is the the "same thing" they are two perspectives on? — John

Substance. Substance being a metaphysical category cannot be an empirical one - thus you cannot ask what is it, the way you ask what a chair is....

I think you should get a real job so that you can support yourself and not live with your mother. Where's your father who ought to be telling you this? — Hanover

Oh yeah, this unscrupulous prick is back :-} And what are you Hanover, pray tell me? You're supporting yourself, but what use is that? There's nothing great about that - even the taxi driver does that. You have settled for a mediocre life - you'll probably never be Prime Minister, President, a great writer, a famous artist, or anything great. Just another taxi driver supporting himself ;)

It's pathetic. Let me say that again. It's pathetic — Hanover

Let me say that again, you're no different than a taxi driver. People with big ambitions aren't satisfied with petty things. What you call great - supporting yourself - is just another petty thing. I think you should be ashamed of yourself.

I don't have an explanation for it. I don't believe any one does. Do you have an explanation for it? — John

Yes - they are two perspectives of the same thing, so they are necessarily correlated. They couldn't be two perspectives of the same thing if they weren't correlated. That's why the perspectives are parallel - you cannot have element X from one without having element Y from the other.

Your lack of ambition is clear by your satisfaction in a peaceful life — TimeLine

Be careful - seeming lack of ambition can be the mask for the greatest of ambitions. The thing with great ambitions (unlike puny ambitions) is that they cannot be fulfilled very easily (and it's stupid to try when failure is guaranteed), so people having them, often seem to be doing nothing from the outside - not even attempting to do something. In Chinese culture there has always been a word for such a person - they are called sleeping dragons... silently waiting, unknown to anyone, for the opportune moment. It's not known when the opportune moment will arrive... life doesn't change gradually, life changes in bursts. One day you're a no one, tomorrow you're a God. Look at Trump - in just a second he became from clown into President, while others have been laboring their entire lives trying to do that and failing. Hitler suddenly arose out of nothing and became the supreme leader of Nazi Germany. Steve Jobs was a druggy in India, before he was CEO of Apple. Ghandi was just a simple lawyer in South Africa before he became the Father of India. Nobody heard of Jesus when he was 25! Success comes fast when it comes. And one only loses it when they rush after it.

is dangerous in the long term and would mean that you are one to never take risks and challenge or push yourself, clear by this post with your neediness of others. — TimeLine

I never did anything by taking risks. I can probably say that I've never taken a single risk in my life. People from the outside may think I took risks, but in truth, I never did. Even my driving exam, people around me were pushing me to go and take it after I finished my driving school, but I couldn't... what was the point of going and failing? I waited for one year in fact, just when my driving school was about to expire, until I finally took it. Everyone was laughing at me and calling me coward - even my mother at that time - because I wasn't like others to go and fail time and time again. But I'm the one who passed it from the first time - unlike some other people who took it even over 10 times till they passed. Only losers risk - winners never risk, that's why they never lose ;) :P

This could stay with your forever and one day you'll find yourself sitting on a couch with your elderly mother, a box of KFC chicken and a letter from your now ex-wife telling you that she's left you for Harold. — TimeLine

Yeah not to worry - in 30 years time, when I become President, I'll also write a letter to her, telling her how she left the man who was about to become the leading man of the nation. Then we'll see who the real loser is. :P

Life is about taking risks, losing everything, gaining, crying, laughing, shocking people, shocking yourself, as long as it is all within the constraints of morality. — TimeLine

I have a motto in life - it says "Forget winning, make sure you never lose" - on top of that, I have another - "Don't listen to the masses" - recovering from loss is more difficult than winning itself. Avoiding loss is always a priority over winning.

Be passionate and courageous otherwise you will never really understand philosophy and, you will never really live either. — TimeLine

Who cares? Really, who cares? Once you realise that no one cares, not even you, you can renounce whatsoever is troubling you. Really, if you never leave the walls of your house, until you die, has your life been wasted? Absolutely not - when you die, you die, that's the end, doesn't matter that you were President or you were the beggar on the corner of the street. Relax! The real secret is that only the man or woman who has completely renounced winning the world, only that man or woman can actually turn around and win it - everyone else has already lost before they've even tried. Their ambition has killed them. Only those who have conquered their ambitions can fulfil them - it's a paradox, but it is true.

Again, what do you mean? I don't understand what you are asking. — John

What is your explanation for the correlation between serotonin in the brain and happiness. Why are they correlated?

What do you mean? I'm here speaking about my own take on these matters. I don't see your point. — John

Well it seems to me that you want to talk about precisely what Wittgenstein says cannot be spoken of.

We know what happiness is intuitively by feeling it, Deep truths are deeply felt; if you deny this then you deny the reality of the non-discursive truths inherent in poetry. music, in aesthetic, ethical and religious experience. If you want to deny the importance of feeling truth, then that is not something we can really argue over; it comes down to personal taste. As Wittgenstein said the most important things lie outside the world, they consist in that of which we cannot speak and must remain silent. I take him to mean that we cannot speak of these 'things' and must remain silent about them only in the discursive or propositional sense of 'speaking', he is not referring to poetry and the other arts. — John

So then, what are you doing around here trying to speak of them?

That the two are often correlated is what we know. That happiness just is seratonin in the brain is merely an inference. — John

Why are they correlated?

I have no idea what this means. It seems like empty word play to me. Can you explain it to me? — John

I think Spinoza would say we clearly do understand this, as there is no mind/body problem at all. The mind is the body seen under the attribute of extension, and the body is the mind seen under the attribute of thought. — Agustino

You could take a million examples. Feeling happy is serotonin released in the brain seen under the attribute of thought. Serotonin released in the brain is feeling happy seen under the attribute of extension.

How can we know anything from perspectives that are not possible for us? — John

You don't know anything more by knowing the feeling of happiness than you do by knowing serotonin is released in the brain and so and so organism behaves in so and so a way after that. You know the same thing from two different perspectives. Another perspective on top of that would add nothing to your knowledge - it would just be another perspective on what you already know. Sure you don't know that perspective - but that's only an empirical matter, because metaphysically you do know the substance underlying it, since it's just the same substance that underlies what you already know through thought and extension.

LOL Why my penis?! :-O

I don't think we can understand even how extensa and cogitans can be "perspectives over the same thing". — John

We do know, that's why we established the reality of the One Substance. The attributes cannot but be two parallel perspectives, since underlying them is One Substance. The attribute parallelism is derived by Spinoza from the One Substance metaphysics. To use the example from the video - serotonin in the brain just is a feeling of happiness. One doesn't cause the other, rather they are always correlated with each other, because they are simply two different perspectives on the same underlying reality.

We don't really understand at all how they ultimately 'fit together' (Mind/Body Problem). How much less could we understand how the infinitely many other attributes of God could fit with our experience when we cannot experience them. — John

I think Spinoza would say we clearly do understand this, as there is no mind/body problem at all. The mind is the body seen under the attribute of extension, and the body is the mind seen under the attribute of thought.

But if you are using 'transcendent' and 'immanent' in some different way than I am, then we could, for sure, just be talking past one another. — John

Well to me, One Substance means immanence.

Either way the fact remains that there is much (an infinite amount according to Spinoza), which will always remain not only unknown, but unknowable, to us. — John

Nothing is unknowable according to Spinoza, only unknown. Unknown simply because we can never know every empirical thing that is possible for God.

After that I never experienced it, but have continued to experience the 'obsessive compulsive' half sleep state, and I also sometimes dream restlessly through the night in a kind of obsessive compulsive way, turning over something I can never quite grasp. — John

I have another one which may be similar which happens to me whenever I don't sleep for a night, and then go to sleep. I half-wake from sleep still largely unconscious, trying to solve a problem which I cannot solve because it is irrational - it has no solution - a problem which is often related to my activities the day before and is somehow tied to my life. But the problem is very trivial and yet is made irrational by my mind. For example, I used to work in engineering, so when it happened after returning from visiting some friends late at night on a weekend, and going to sleep in the morning, I woke up in that half-awake state after about 1 hour of sleep, got up sweating in absolute fear, while I thought "the beam doesn't fit" - thinking and feeling as if the beam was my body :-O And I was trying to figure out how to make the beam fit lol, as if I was being suffocated by it.

So in a little while my mind clarified a bit more, and I realised that my mind was simply functioning by itself - I had no meta-cognitive sense, and no real awareness of who I was at all - no sense of self, and the mind was desperately trying to grasp after it. I had a vague sense of self I mean - objects weren't very clearly not myself anymore though. So I gave in to it, and waited, doing nothing. I remember in those moments as if I were begging from something to be given, something that could only be given from the outside - I was powerless. And slowly, as if something had been granted to me from outside, the sense of self came back, and things started to clarify - and I felt grateful. I could never identify the cause of the extreme fear and anxiety that I felt, as it was irrational - it had no cause. So my mind couldn't figure out why it felt so anxious, even though it was trying desperately trying to do it. And despite knowing that the fear was irrational - for my mind knew that - it still kept compulsively searching for a cause.