Discuss:Ethics, Behavior, World-view:The human way...
From da Vinci Concept
The human way...
joryea - Fri Dec 19 13:16:25 2003
We have lived within a bubble of reality for many years. Our lifestyles have changed much, but the way in which we live out our lives is still very much the same. Our continued domestication within society has allowed many patters to emerge. Security, sexuality, materialism, a need for others around us filling our life with a continued interaction so we need not think of life itself and the possibilities within it. Our government (in the past it was churches and kings and such) fill us with fear of the unknown and fear of being different. In the past they burnt those who were different. Today we simply fill them with medications so they become the same once again, or... (who knows...) Our country wishes to grow, yet has grown more and more in ways many think they care for, but in their heart... Most of our lives are very materialistic, constantly hanging onto things we believe important, things that make us happy (and such). Yet we are left with a sadness, from which many end their lives here on this plane of existence (earth).
Is the human way dying... will our race continue to strive, or... do we wish to become something else.. something more beautiful, less destructive, more creative, less knowing and more understanding. I don't know, I only flow with the tide of thought that has completely overwhelmed my former state of existence. All will change (perhaps), what becomes of us is our choice. What do you yourself believe (deep inside)...
may our spirits dance freely
[ Edited ]
--joryea Fri Dec 19 13:16:25 2003
sunny - Sat Jan 3 19:36:33 2004
joryea, for the purpose of maintaining clear communication in this forum I am going to critique your writing method and content. This will be argumentative and conceptual when I have understood the point that you are making, as well as etemological when I am at a loss for understanding your use of words and concepts.
I think that you have a valid point that humans have been living in a certain fixed way for quite some time. I do not believe that this is a new state, but a very old and traditional state. It is time to change, but not time to revert to our prior aboriginal and primitive cultures. These cultures and their mystical epistemological methods create knowledge for anthropologists. This does not make their methods valid in themselves as tools for the creation or understanding of knowledge.
Domestication: To train or adapt (an animal or plant) to live in a human environment and be of use to humans.
We are the domesticators. We are human and thus we are domestic. We are not becoming more domesticated. We are becoming more industrialized and relying necessarily upon the technologies that our minds create, the means by which we live.
Humanity has not lived in a bubble of reality for many years. Humanity is emerging from a bubble of non-reality. This non-reality is the life lived by the mystic and the tribal supernatural. The human individual, through the applied use of his mind, is finally reaching reality. You have understood this backwards and should re-assess your basis for understanding.
| Security, sexuality, materialism, a need for others around us filling our life with a continued interaction so we need not think of life itself and the possibilities within it. |
| -- joryea |
I do not understand this sentence. Please explain what it means for these mostly disconnected concepts (security, sexuality, materialism, a need for others) to be filling our life with something (what is a continued interaction?) that prevents?/allows? us to NOT think about life and its possibilities.
It is clearly your lack of knowledge and your reliance on mystic principles that fills you with fear of the unknown and the fear of being different. You are frightened by the government because you do not understand its purpose. The government has little to do with your anxiety. One of the purposes of government is to prevent the types of oppressive institutions that you identified from imposing the kind of fear that you express. The overall purpose of government as an institution is to protect your individual liberties. This is a philosophical absolute and not a historical or cultural truth.
The individuals whom are different and choose to respect the individual liberties of others are usually very successful because they are able to find new and unique solutions to making a living. Only those individuals that refuse or are unable to acknowledge the rights of others end up on medications or in within institutions that place limits on their own individual liberties.
I don't understand where you are going when you trail off ... Reserve this type of writing for the creative writing forums. By trailing off I get the impression that you are trying NOT to make a point. No one can read your mind, so make your point and be clear about what you are saying.
I don't believe that materialism is the cause of depression and suicide in our society. Material possessions are, very simply, the tools and means by which we live. Because our minds are our means of survival it is in antithesis to our lives to live non-materialistically. That is, we cannot live like animals. We choose to create two types of resources; intellectual resources and material resources. These are both equally sound and often interchangeable. These things in themselves do not create depression. There are deep reasons for human sadness and despair, but the products of man's mind are not these reasons.
Your first assessment of death was the correct one. If we stop striving, humans die, we stop. There will not be 'something else' just because we chose to stop striving for human endeavors. To be destructive is in conflict with mans life and therefore his mind. To be beautiful and creative and to understand what we know are all necessary for mankind to live. IF you have no knowledge there is NOTHING to understand. So it is the understanding of knowledge that brings us truth, NOT the understanding of nothing, and NOT the understanding of non-knowledge. These bring us non-truth and these non-truths destroy mankind and his means of survival, his mind.
Please read the book that I am going to send to you, Philosopher's Handbook edited by Stanley Rosen - ISBN 0375720111. It is a guide and overview of modern philosophy. It will help you develop a more diverse knowledge and understanding and may give you a broader base for your ideas and arguments. Don't just be a mystic, expand your mind into all of the avenues of human thought. Be open-minded.
[ Edited Thu Jan 08 2004, 10:04PM ]
--sunny Sat Jan 3 19:36:33 2004
charmed_quark - Thu Jan 8 16:45:00 2004
I share your confidence in rational thought. But rational thought is not the entirety of the human experience. I will not discount the possiblity that a 'mystic' perspective may have some insight or benefit that would otherwise be overlooked. Attempting a synthesis of ideas will yield better results than dogmatically supporting purely scientific views.
| The overall purpose of the government is to protect your individual liberties. |
| -- sunny |
I find this to unusually optimistic. Historically governments have been the biggest threat to liberty. Our own government has a long history of disregarding basic human rights, from the Alien and Seditions act of the Adams administration, to the internment camps of WWII, to the current conditions of the war of drugs and the war on terror. I mean, Patriot Act and the Intelligence Authorization Act of 2004, which gives the FBI the right to search bank records without a warrent, are already being abused.
| Security, sexuality, materialism, a need for others around us filling our life with a continued interaction so we need not think of life itself and the possibilities within it. |
| -- joryea |
| Most of our lives are very materialistic, constantly hanging onto things we believe important, things that make us happy (and such). |
| -- joryea |
These are the types of problems that need to be dealt with individually. If an individual chooses to be shallow, that is their right. If most of society chooses to embrace these shallow values, it won't affect any one who doesn't join in. One can be in the world, but not of the world, so to speak.
btw, sunny, what book are you refering, too?
[ Edited Fri Jan 09 2004, 04:25PM ]
--charmed_quark Thu Jan 8 16:45:00 2004
sunny - Thu Jan 8 19:43:01 2004
| Your lack of tact amazes me. Seriously, a forum moderator's job is to prevent these types of flames. |
| -- charmed_quark |
Your point is noted and I have made corrections to my statements to prevent misunderstanding of my purpose. I was unnecessarily harsh. However, I would like to note that you did not add value to the discussion by pointing out my mistep in a tactless way. In order to correct mistakes made in a method of communication your response must reflect your values and display examples of better methods. You cannot correct another's mistake by making that mistake yourself as example. This only causes propagation of the error and devalues the means of communication. Your mis-quote using unconnected statements taken out of context is innappropriate for this same reason. Please revise your response accordingly.
--sunny Thu Jan 8 19:43:01 2004
sunny - Thu Jan 8 20:30:09 2004
| I will not discount the possiblity that a 'mystic' perspective may have some insight or benefit that would otherwise be overlooked. Attempting a synthesis of ideas will yield better results than dogmatically supporting purely scientific views. |
| -- charmed_quark |
There are sound and fundamental reasons for rejecting a mystic theory of knowledge. You are correct to assume that mysticism may hold some truth that is as yet unseen by mans rational methodology. This, however, is not a result of underlying truth within the mystic epistemology, but a happenstance occurance where mystic concepts coincide with concepts based on objective reality. A study of mysticism as a cultural phenomenon is worthwhile only in its value in historical studies and anthropology. Because the basis of mystic and supernatural value systems are based upon arbitrary premises they add no value and no content to objective truth. Instead such systems of believe only serve to obfuscate the concepts that do have an objective basis and prevent a clear understanding of reality. A synthesis is thus a confusion of real and unreal, useful and destructive. Such a chimera only prevents and stifles human progress.
If mysticism is useful, where are the unquestionable examples of the success of the mystic theory of knowledge as tools for mans survival and where lies any reason to believe that they have any validity as tools. Historical point of fact, that these mysical systems of belief have existed is not proof of any usefullness or validity. The fact that many people do subscribe to these beliefs is also irrelevant as a point of argument as knowledge is not created through attrition.
I do hold a reservation in this matter. In addressing any system of belief or tradition we should refrain from outright rejection without some initial critical assessment. This is an assessment that each of us as individuals must make. We should not lose the historical and cultural knowledge that form the basis of these systems. The fact that a system exists within the entirety of human knowledge and culture likely means that it does have some rational basis. These systems have value to humanity in themselves only when their rational components are seperable from arbitrary and irrelevant portions. This extraction of knowledge through study is unlikely to occur within the minds of mystical followers however, but it is inevitable within studies of cultural anthropology.
--sunny Thu Jan 8 20:30:09 2004
charmed_quark - Fri Jan 9 13:42:43 2004
I mirrored your wording as a stab at irony, perhaps I missed. Also, I didn't intend to quote out of context, those two phrases just seemed the harshest. I have edited my statements accordingly. I genuinely thank you for deally with this politely, it bodes well for the success of this program.
The final paragraph of your post is exactly what I had in mind when I mention a synthesis of mysticism and science. Mythical beliefs will not teach us anything about the physical world, but they can provide a wealth of information about applied psychology.
--charmed_quark Fri Jan 9 13:42:43 2004
joryea - Sun Jan 25 19:04:57 2004
it is done =) er.. kinda.. if you would like, we can continue to discuss all of the above and below topics.
[ Edited Wed Jan 28 2004, 03:47AM ]
--joryea Sun Jan 25 19:04:57 2004
joryea - Sun Jan 25 19:16:30 2004
My dear brother sunny, do you not learn truth from the experiences of your life, as I do? Do you not see through your eyes upon the world around you, just as I see through my own? We are not so different, we simply look at the same thing, and see it through the experiences of our lives.
You continue to believe I read books, think of them as truth, and share that truth with others. This is not false, but it most definitely isnít true. I do read books. I read mostly fantasy though. I have no need to read anything mystical, for that I only need to look within myself. If I wished to study a culture or a set of beliefs, I would do so, but never would they simply take the place of my own, which has been created through the experience of life itself (not a book). Books can help us to understand, but it is within the experience of understanding that we perhaps find the truth we seek.
Yes, we domesticate all manner of creatures. We train them to do what we wish, how we wish it, and when we wish it done. We have done this for many years, and are quite talented in the art of domestication. We are so good at it that we have taken the art and used it to control the masses in a much more complex, but perhaps even more efficient way of domestication. We might not even know we do it. Our family trees all come from some kind of society, where all the people within those societies were taught certain things generation after generation. They were taught how to go about thinking about things, how to go about expressing ones self. Just about everything they knew, was something passed on from their own parents, schools, societies, and those close to them. Our parents taught us in very much the same manner. And through their actions, we learned to do as they do. As we grow up, certain patterns of thought and such become ingrained in our way of thought and action. We are taught what schools wish us to learn, so we may continue this pattern and teach our own children. So we may work the many jobs that are opened from our education. So we may continue our societies progress and sustain that which it is made from.. us.
We do live in a bubble of reality. Yes, I would agree that this bubble has expanded greatly, but it is a bubble never the less. You disagree? Do we have boundaries that we cannot pass? Do we have fact we know as truth (until it changes of coarse)? Our race, is exactly that, with a specific definition that says exactly what we are. Our capabilities are laid out before us. This is what we can do, this is what we canít. This is a possibility, that is not. Of coarse, we are expanding our.. ìlimitations,î but the limitations exist still, and have a great affect on our lives. We do live in our little bubble of reality. Hell, just a little while ago, most of our country didnít believe an alien race even exists. Even today many believe we are the only true intellectuals of the known universe. And I'm sorry to say it, but until you accept that at least some of what I speak with you about might actually have relevance, I will continue to know that your bubble needs some expansion, along with the rest of the human race. Being open to ideas and not labeling them immediately is a start. Obviously Iím somewhat intelligent. Giving me the benefit of the doubt might actually change the outcome of what you read. Most things I talk about have logic. Many ideas I share I know as truth, so... maybe they really are. Our perspective always has and always will have a dramatic affect on the outcome of lifeís experiences.
I don't rely on mystic principles, I rely on the experiences I've lived through and come to know as truth. All I believe in, is quite sound. Much of it is more logical than much of the ìhuman wayî as I like to call it. This is why my principles are different, because Iíve chosen them to be that way. Because they make more sense than the principles I knew as truth before those experiences in life changed them. And if there is ever a better way, for the whole of our race and planet, then I donít see why it should not be embraced. We would never evolve if we simply dismissed our revelations. Share, express, and do not fear the criticism that we know all comes from those who have lived a certain way all their lives, and do not know of such change.
I never said I feared the government, and neither do I feel anxiety from the thought of it. I was only mentioning that when something is different on a more dramatic scale, creating perhaps a dramatic change in their pattern, they suffocate it however they may and however they can. You can disagree with this all you want, but look at our brother. I agree that it has helped him, but it also has very much held him back. They believe his views completely crazy (too different to fit into any kind of society), so they fill him with medication to keep him away from those thoughts and feelings that differ. If they were not afraid of such change in people, they would learn from them. Where do they find these thoughts, and what can we do to help them accept them. I know myself, that Tahoe is not insane, quite the opposite really. After years of discussion with him, I came to the conclusion long ago, that he simply had a hard time dealing with the truth which he found so many years ago. Science, instead of learning from this, dismisses it as loss of sanity and suppresses it. I hope one day Tahoe will be able to overcome the challenge of not only accepting the truth he found those years ago, but also break through the bonds of his medication, allowing himself his true potential once again.
On your last statement I would agree and disagree, as usual. It is the experience of that understanding that we come to know things. Not from simply reading and understanding that knowledge. Valid truth, is truth found, and experienced.
Thank you for your reply. I apologize it took me so long to respond. My responses were about this long every time, but were erased all three times I sent them. I now use copy and paste. =)
I do enjoy getting the brain a-ticken.
P.S. I know you will say it, and I agreed long ago, as I still do. All of our bubbles could use some expansion.. perhaps even some popping, including my own. We are those who create the barriers upon our reality.
[ Edited Wed Jan 28 2004, 03:45AM ]
--joryea Sun Jan 25 19:16:30 2004
joryea - Mon Jul 26 14:35:59 2004
hehe.. hmm.. that last reply, although perhaps with some truth.. to serious.
The problem here, is easy to recognize
First of all, I had no sense of human history. and without this,.. well, then I would have a hard time even backing up what I stated. Sure, we can see what's going on, what the problems are, but, without a historic sense of identity, I'm to conclude that nothing truly significant will be brought out of such a dialogue.
About the governing bodies. It's not the government that suppresses people. It's the individual. Now, if you happen to have an individual, or a grouping of individuals, running your organized economic and social structure that have no sense of historic identity, and think, like charmed_quark stated:
"These are the types of problems that need to be dealt with individually. If an individual chooses to be shallow, that is their right. If most of society chooses to embrace these shallow values, it won't affect any one who doesn't join in. One can be in the world, but not of the world, so to speak."
This, is delusional. It is one reason why governing bodies become corrupt. They think of themselves, and they definitely don't think of the world, or the effect they as individuals have, worldwide.
Ever herd of the idea of "The General Welfare"? These people I speak of above, well.. it's alien to them.
| The overall purpose of the government is to protect your individual liberties. |
| -- sunny |
This, my friends, is true. And not just your liberties, and not just for individuals. The governing body is... well.. hell.. just read the Declaration of Independence. In case you might be to lazy, or don't understand it though, I'll briefly summarize four basic concepts:
The Pursuit of Happiness (not shareholder value), as defined by such peole as Gottfried Leibniz, in his New Essays of Human Understanding. (for works on Leibniz, under Classics: www.wlym.com )
The National Soveriegnty of a People. non-suppression of individual rights, and liberty, of individual human minds.
For The General Welfare</b> the common good. Plato's Sacrates and the Apostle Paul's Corinithias I-I3. Without which, a government is completely and uterly illegitamate.
The Progress of Posterity. economic development. growth, infrastructure, education, healthcare, these kind of things... growth within the universe, to sustain, and progress, human life. Without which a people are not acting in accordance with natural laws of the universe.
As you can see, a governing body is a good thing.. er. that is. if they study the founding of this nation, and what principles it's based upon. Like I stated earlier, yet not only I, but all of you as well, have no sense of universal history, humane historic identity, from what I have come to understand.
The rest should be self explanitory. I look forward to further discussions upon these kinds of topics. Defy the ideas if you wish to as well, that will add to the dialogue, and intellectual development.
[ Edited Mon Jul 26 2004, 02:38PM ]
--joryea Mon Jul 26 14:35:59 2004
