http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJI68YgN7TY
Tom Campbell MBT Forum March 2011Part 2 of 5 1:30:46
Question: What determines what a consciousness comes in to participate in the VR. I mean some consciousnesses come in as an elephant, or a dog, or a person. What determines that?
Tom: What determines that is where it would be most likely for them to learn something valuable. I think it's what you're ready for. If what you are ready for is the decision space of a dog because you can deal with that, because you've maybe dealt with something a little less than that before. You get comfortable enough to where you can have a greater decision space you may then come in as a monkey or whatever else. Then you get to the point where your decision space - you can handle a decision space that is bigger - in other words - that it's profitable for you to have a bigger decision space then you come in as a human. So I think that basically whatever your consciousness is - if you're a computer consciousness then you're probably not going to come in as a human - because you'd act and think like a computer. You would come in at something that was more suitable to you.
Question: So we've all been lower...
Tom: Well maybe, maybe. It depends upon where we all came from - it's not necessarily that everybody started down as an amoeba and ended up here. But, yes, generally consciousness is evolving. All those consciousnesses elephants, and dogs, and monkeys, they're growing too just like the sheep that evolved morality. They make their decisions and then they live by the consequences. But it is a much slower game - a real slow game - because an awful lot of what they do is hard wired. You know it's just the way they are. Because an awful lot of that is hardwired in. That means their decision space is small. Hard wire is not part of their decision space. So they have a small decision space. A bumble bee has a small decision space. A lot of it is just hard wired. It does it because it does it because that's the way its genetic - it's evolved to do it that way. So as it can handle a bigger decision space and is likely the probability is significant that it can grow by that challenge - it moves up to that challenge.
Which is part of the reason you say we have this open system. Stuff keeps moving in from the bottom up and it keeps moving out. Yeah, it is part of a big evolutionary chain. But that doesn't mean that all of us used to be birds and then we were cats and then we were dogs and then we were monkeys. It's not like that. It's just that you end up where ever it looks like is the best potential for you to learn. If you are only used to handling a dog's decision space you don't necessarily get over whelmed with suddenly a huge decision space. You wouldn't know what to do with it. It would be frightening and overwhelming So you work your way up.
Sometimes a being that was a human might come in as a dog or a cat just to hang out with somebody. Just to experience it. You know it doesn't take much. You know you have this IUOC - how much do you have to commit to a bumble bee's life or whatever - if you think there's something there to learn. Now if you're just doing it for fun then there wouldn't be much interest. Everything must have a potential for growth. So there would have to be a reason. Maybe the reason would be to be with somebody else or whatever. It's hard to say because its not impossible. Almost nothing is impossible. When you live in a statistical probabilistic reality it's hard to say that anything is impossible. You can only say things are unlikely.
AND:
Often I have been asked whether or not animals have soul and if so, do they exist as individual souls like ours or only as a group or species soul. Such an inquiry came to me again recently; because the question of animal spirituality represents such a common interest, I thought I would post my reply here.
By definition, all sentient beings are conscious, thus all sentient beings have a non-physical part called consciousness. If one calls the non-physical part a being a soul, then all sentient beings have souls. In MBT terms, all souls reside in NPMR/TBC/AUM i.e., the larger consciousness system of which we are all a part. If you poke a clam, it will pull in its foot demonstrating its sentience (albeit at an incredibly low level), consequently, even a clam has a soul residing in TBC just as you do. The souls of conscious critters have always resided in TBC ever since there were conscious critters.
Now, though all souls are chips off the same consciousness block, they are not all the same in their awareness, capacity, functionality, or entropy (quality). There are no 'guides' guiding the day to day spiritual development of vaguely aware clams. Though individual clams have an individual non-physical part, there is so little decision-space involved that clam souls are all pretty much the same; so they can be treated, or interacted with, or ignored as a group. Because there is so little differentiation between one little clam soul and the next, individual treatment/attention/tracking would not be a good use of AUM's resources. Same for bugs and slugs and most of PMR's trillions of sentient entities. Perhaps a brilliant (relatively speaking) clam might every now and then get a little special attention, but surely that is the exception and not the rule.
Dogs and chimps and dozens or other species are different there is enough individualization there to allow the 3 sigma winners (unusually highly developed members of their species) to individually advance themselves in consciousness evolution (increase their quality, grow spiritually) while the majority of each of these species may be dealt with as a group. Perhaps a very evolved dog consciousness will one day earn the right to incarnate as a chimp or a dolphin or a human. In this way consciousness evolution flows upward individuals work their way up -- from the lowest (and slowest to grow) to the highest and speediest evolvers. All have been in TBC from their beginning and all have opportunity to improve themselves at least infinitesimally. Economics allows some of the slower changers to be dealt with in groups - group soul if you like to express it that way. Not all humans have individual guides, sometimes groups of humans (slow growers) share a single guide or have part time guides. Other individual humans have several full time guides. Here a 'guide' can be seen as rough measure of the degree of interaction with the larger consciousness system.
So the bottom line answer to this questions is that it depends on the size of the decision space of the individual (quality/potential) and of the species (capacity). Humans are not the only species that has individual members actively climbing the ladder of consciousness evolution. It is also not the only species that has members making little to no progress. Many species participate in consciousness evolution in their own fashion and at their own rate. All souls are individual but dealing with groups of individuals as if they were one -- Group mind and group soul -- is a practical matter of investing resources where they have the highest rate of return. There are sometimes exceptional individuals who stand out from their group (species) and deserve (and thus get) individual treatment. The higher up the ladder of consciousness evolution you go, the greater the number of standouts.
Animals are not random actors; they know what they are doing. They solve problems, do analysis, come to conclusions, take appropriate action based on those conclusions, use tools, communicate, and build things -- just like people-animals. The decision space they operate in (within which they exercise their free will choices) may be small but all that means is that their consciousness is simply limited by different constraints than ours. Not inferior, not superior, just a different application/configuration of the same fundamental consciousness individually defined by its own unique constraints and opportunities for personal growth (such constraints also limit growth potential). Consciousness is consciousness — AI Guy will fall under that same description. All sentient entities are conscious — each has its own decision space that it must operate within. By definition, all
Such PMR critters, including people, furry critters, and AI Guy have a nonphysical part (because consciousness is nonphysical). If one wants to call that nonphysical part a soul, then AI Guy, your dog, and even that worm you put on your hook has a soul. Of course all souls, or nonphysical parts, are not equivalent — their extent, capacity for growth, potential, and entropy are a function of each entities configuration in consciousness space (decision space, limitations, growth potential etc.)
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=125&p=251&hilit=random+actors#p251