This was burried from years past. Given the urgency to domesticate this site, I think it needs another hearing.
Good to hear your voice again along with your perspective.
Our collective perspectives get little airing these days outside of the waste of energy we put into it. Methinks we are a dying breed in a culture lacking meaningful right-of-passage. Moral outrage has been replaced with domestication. The emasculated male now dominates public discourse all the way from the hall ways of congress to the airwaves.
Twenty years ago, Sam Keen published an interesting essay on precisely this problem. Keen was writing from the context of the emerging “men’s movement,” essentially, an attempt to introduce rights-of-passages, so the domesticated male might reclaim the deep masculine. Survival - as I understand the concept - is the art of revering. It is the art of integrating the web of life into one’s own. It is also the art and the responsibility of making connections. Some think moral outrage is outside the pale of good manners, and that allowing someone to trample one’s psychic house is in keeping with their dysfunctional etiquette code. I think otherwise; and this thinking has kept the edge alive in my own life, where the human spirit still stands for something. I think you know what I am talking about.
Keen’s brief essay speaks to this problem forthrightly and prophetically. I’ve edited a few parts to make it contemporary:
quote: “In my pantheon of heroes the best men are spiritual warriors who are alive with moral outrage and who enter the arena to wrestle with the mystery of evil in one of its many disguises. Fierce men, rich in considered judgment, who still have thunder and lightening in them; not dispassionate spectators or cynics. Any day of the week give me the “hot” Bill Moyers, who takes risks, calls presidents liars, and gives vent to prophetic anger at secret wars and hidden government, rather than the “cool” [Thom Hartmann] who nicely reports the news and lead dispassionate discussions on every perspective in the Beltway.
One of the most troubling symptoms of our time is the absence of moral outrage in the American public. The ongoing revelations that the CIA conducted covert wars, [runs black op torture dens], arranged assassinations, trained the Salvadorian military responsible for death squads, was implicated in the deaths of thousands of Indonesians, and gave the South African government information that led to the arrest of Nelson Mandela, continue to be greeted with a yawn. It is if some invisible solvent has been leeching away our capacity for indignation. When I was first in the USSR, in the preglasnost era, I had a sense that free speech was forbidden. On returning to the United States, I was struck with how our newspapers could print any story of corruption [much like they do today] in high places but very little action resulted.
The hero’s path in the world is bound to be filled with conflict. A man who has not been morally anesthetized cannot have his eyes opened to unnecessary suffering, disease, and injustice without feeling outrage and hearing the call to arms. From deep in the gut a sense of desecration forms itself into a judgment and grows into an impulse to act. “Goddamn it, it is wrong for governments to spend billions on weapons, while children starve.” Goddamn it, it is wrong for us to pursue progress at the cost of destroying ten thousand species a year, the wetlands, the forests and the watersheds!” Goddamn it, it is wrong for a hundred million people to be homeless living on sidewalks, in garbage dumps and [shanty towns]. [Goddamn it, it is wrong for the US to sanction indiscriminate bombing in Lebanon].
The sense of vocation that is central to a heroic male identity arises when we are outraged about some specific instance of evil and become warriors in defense of the sacred. If our minds are he artful, we must be outraged by the cruelty in the world, and realize it is our vocation to become protectors of the powerless [whether they are immigrants or naturalized citizens] and healers of the broken.
To live in this wonderful-terrible moment of history and keep compassion and virility alive, a man must gird up his lions and decide where to enter the struggle against surplus suffering, injustice, and poverty, pollution, and the rising tide of population. Suffering is part of the human condition. In the best of all possible worlds, there would still be disease, accident, tragedy, disappointment, loneliness, death. And we require all the spiritual wisdom we can accumulate to accept the injuries and losses that we are powerless to change. But above and beyond essential suffering is the surplus suffering that results from psychological, economic, and political structures that we do have the power to change. The “just war” of the spirit is against the sources of surplus suffering, against the impulses of greed and insensitivity within the self, against those ideologies, institutions, corporations, bureaucracies, and government that most clearly are responsible for the desecration of the [E]arth. In this effort, the new hero must reclaim and redirect the energies and virtues of the warrior psyche – fierceness, fortitude, daring, courage, cunning, the strategic use of power – that were once used in defense of tribe and nation.
When we become spiritual warriors, it must be with the knowledge that the battle is never to be won either intellectually or politically. The existential philosopher Karl Jaspers once said that “evil is the rock on which every system shipwrecks.” There is no answer, no theodicy, no way of understanding that eliminates the insult of evil poses to the human spirit. We do not live in a world that satisfies our demand for moral explanations."
Posts: 1162 | Location: Boulder Creek Watershed | Registered: 14 February 2004
I can find plenty of outrage going around, when I go one on one. A little nurturing in a conversation, a little prodding and sure enough out it will come -- in many cases, not all. I'm not sure if that's what's not there anymore. What I suspect is that the expressions of outrage get commodified so fast, now, by the purveyors of marketing and propaganda -- such as those now allowed to be honored and protected elements of this board, it seems -- that the outrage is muted and unrecognizeable, and easily squelched and confused when it begins to appear. No one really sees it and so they feel alone, until they talk to one or two others. And then it's just felt to be the few of them. Authentic expressions are turned into familiar commodities, and disappear.
What we have is a broad spectrum of purveyors of nihilism, so outright steeped in it, that they project it out like beta emission particles of strontium 90 on anything around them, then see it glowing from anything and everything they come upon. So when they see someone like you -- someone suggesting dramas and rituals to revitalize that sense of outrage, someone who might try to give it a form through such rituals as one of those rites of passage you've talked about, or something as simple as going to a teacher like Tom Brown, who has the special knowledge of a nearly lost skill our ancestors took for granted -- they trivialize you and your forms immediately, slap their own projected nihilstic mental frame on your forehead thereby giving you that label, and then just go babbling off to find the next one of you to do that to. Nobody really knows what a nihilist is, they just know it's "bad." Combined with that, they feed the products of "civilization" to everyone to keep them distracted by abundant stress, phony entertainment, and plenty of work. People are easily commodified by labels it seems.
So here we are, well into the next century, a hundred years past Nietzche, the greatest crisis in human history upon us as he predicted, and we have what looks like all around us to be the attitudes of indifference towards all that goes on with the "domesticated" herd.
I personally am a strong proponent of a return to a recognition of the very real and essential forms of nature, if there is to be any morality or truth to be found. These forms are also in us, I believe, in our very DNA. I do not agree that we are a blank slate until we give the world some form, our own self-devised form imaginary form. That was a Neitzchean epistemological error, in my view of it, and led to much nonsense in the Twentieth Century. That's an logical paradox to even think that, it seems to me. Whatever imaginary forms humans come up with have to have a box of forms to begin with. With the mish mash of disconnected forms thrown at everyone in commodified form, these days, it probably does seem as if to there are no basic forms that could be considered a formative truth, and that the world is wide open to our human randomness, which may also be the interpretation some give to human "creativity" -- a potentially phony proposition of its own.
Well ren. I consider you one of the smartest persons I have met on the internet. I have to look up to you on your knowledge. You have shown your ability to get into the nuances of many issues (although not all) to such a degree that many may feel lost in it all. I have to admire your devotion to your values you practice on a daily basis.
But... if you want to get past this silly little dance (charade) we are playing, it is up to you. I will continue to point out where your logic is weak or lacking an angle that you have not addressed. Then you will be free to ignore.
If you want others to 'hang out' in secret places with you, then fine. But to suggest what 'purveyors of nihilism' are going to do or not do is purely speculative on your part. Clearly this board member chooses how he deals with others as individuals and not some homogeneous group that you can then denigrate on a continuous basis.
You should continue this dance (charade) as long as you want to. You can continue to play games all you want-this is a free country.
But seriously let me tell you the truth (IMO), that you are shallow in your personal attacks on others and lack an understanding of your presentation to others.
re, May your truth live on...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
I have been thinking a lot about "cages" and specifically, Civilization as a cage. I may write something about it, but in my research I came across this statement by Reichsmarchal Herman Goring when he was interviewed in his jail cell at Nuremburg. His words were recorded by Captian Gustave Gilbert a US Army Intelligence Specialist in his 1947 book Nuremburg Diary. Here is what Goring had to say:
quote:
Naturally, the common people don't want war; niether in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determin the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship...the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
Yes, both sides now employ the same methods. The 'cage' contains the wheel, the gerbils mount the wheel and then spin merely along, bouncing off the sides of the cage, be it a political cage, a cultural cage, or an ideological cage. The beat goes on. The names change. The killing and bloodshed define us. It is defined in the blanket acceptance of mediocrity of candidates like Clinton, Edwards, Obama, and every one of the Republican candidates. People die, the war goes on, the voice of the people silenced, ignored and rejected because the status quo knows more than we do. Talking heads look the other way. Out of one side of their mouth they condemn it, and on the other side of their mouth they endorse the very people who advocate for it.
Things really don't change much over time. Incremental change is their sacred creed...
Posts: 1162 | Location: Boulder Creek Watershed | Registered: 14 February 2004
Well ren. I consider you one of the smartest persons I have met on the internet.
Thank you, but my caveat to myself in thinking such things, is I don't know how to measure smart or what it would mean if I could. I just think I'm lucky. I have an ability to put what I "see" (image, "imag"ination) into written words, and I've been working at it most of my life. It was easy for me in grade school, it's much easier now after many years of practice.
quote:
if you want to get past this silly little dance (charade) we are playing, it is up to you. I will continue to point out where your logic is weak or lacking an angle that you have not addressed. Then you will be free to ignore.
Basically I don't pay much attention to what you do on the board until you shadow something I've written and reflect it in some distorted (to me) way. Even that I don't respond to, as you may have noticed since about mid July. They won't let me stop you from quoting me, so I've given up on that one too.
So I suspect if you were to just stop imagining there's intent towards you on my part in things I write, you'd probably discover that your sense that there's some sort of a silly dance going on would simply disappear. I think all that's going on is I play off little ideas I find, you find my play and think it's aimed at you. I like to play with ideas in patterned ways, that's basically all there is to it most of the time.
If you see some way of addressing what you see that I haven't, I would suggest you do it yourself, not expect me to in describing what I see. I am playing with what I see as best I can. I assume we see different worlds. I assume most of us see different worlds.
quote:
But seriously let me tell you the truth (IMO), that you are shallow in your personal attacks on others and lack an understanding of your presentation to others.
Maybe what you imagine is an attack, isn't really an attack at all, and maybe it seems shallow to you because I haven't tried to make it into anything to begin with. I don't particularly enjoy attacking people. Frankly, I believe most people will do themselves in, if you just let them. Even when I defend my own thoughts it gets too messy for me. Imagine if I went around looking for ways to make things messier? No thanks. I prefer to find words to describe what I see. What I see is probably not what you see and if you don't want to see what I'm trying to describe, to imagine it, that's fine with me. I'm very happy with what I see. You are certainly allowed to see what you see, as far as I am concerned.
If you could just maybe let it go, start working with the new people that are on the board who seem to be willing to discuss your ideas with you, I suspect the tension you feel with me would release. Maybe you got off on the wrong foot, tangling with Sunrise, and what you feel is a residue of all that came from that. He's like his own self appointed psy-ops interrogator.
If your name isn't involved in something I'm writing, or others are writing, just assume you aren't being implicated, try it as an exercise. Nobody really cares. Not really. It's just a soap opera.
Originally posted by buteos: I have been thinking a lot about "cages" and specifically, Civilization as a cage. I may write something about it, but in my research I came across this statement by Reichsmarchal Herman Goring when he was interviewed in his jail cell at Nuremburg. His words were recorded by Captian Gustave Gilbert a US Army Intelligence Specialist in his 1947 book Nuremburg Diary. Here is what Goring had to say:
quote:
Naturally, the common people don't want war; niether in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determin the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship...the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
Yes, both sides now employ the same methods. The 'cage' contains the wheel, the gerbils mount the wheel and then spin merely along, bouncing off the sides of the cage, be it a political cage, a cultural cage, or an ideological cage. The beat goes on. The names change. The killing and bloodshed define us. It is defined in the blanket acceptance of mediocrity of candidates like Clinton, Edwards, Obama, and every one of the Republican candidates. People die, the war goes on, the voice of the people silenced, ignored and rejected because the status quo knows more than we do. Talking heads look the other way. Out of one side of their mouth they condemn it, and on the other side of their mouth they endorse the very people who advocate for it.
Things really don't change much over time. Incremental change is their sacred creed...
When Kate suggested that gerbil image, it struck me as a potent metaphor. I've developed it into an essay on one of my websites (which I'd rather not link here, but you probably know how to get to it if you want), and it's becoming something of a theme now. Did you ever see the movie Pi? Fascinating metaphor, Pi is an irrational number because it never finds a completion, just keeps calculating. But a "completion" would be a satisfying definition, thus a sense of a defined world, like a box. So the gerbil, running on that infernal, never ending irrational wheel inside this defined box, kind of like a box of security... Anyway, obviously you see all that.
When we get outside in the woods, off the trails, we see where we are in different ways from that. I don't know how to get that "seeing" across to those who haven't experienced it. The sensory/visual structure of a world of that nature (pun) is so utterly different from the one built from watching television and driving to little cubicles and sitting in front of computers, then driving home and sitting in front of televisions.
Just as the reverence for nature and science of ecology are very different. One is a spiritual (for want of a more definitive descriptor) sense, and the other a rational, intellectually derived scientific one. They do not necessarily have to be separated to be both experienced and understood, but at the same time they should not be confused as the same cognitive operations, if only because that confusion can be used in ways that propagandists like to use things to distort understandings. Personally, to me, they are necessarily combined, and if that's not recognized, the understanding will become schizophrenic.
If your name isn't involved in something I'm writing, or others are writing, just assume you aren't being implicated,
You two just crack me up. you two sound like you've been married for 30 years
**** Disclaimer: The information in this weblog is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights. This weblog does not represent the thoughts, intentions, plans or strategies of my owner. It is solely my own personal opinion. Inappropriate comments will be deleted at the authors discretion.***
"I stand or fall on my own words."
Posts: 7253 | Location: PORTLAND | Registered: 07 November 2005
ren, OK. Yes, we do see things differently. But if more than just a couple of people have similar views then maybe there is more truth that is hidden from your eyes than your realize. It seems similar to when children learn object permanence. They interpret the world as they are the center of the universe and everything else is either seen or it does not exist.
I am not using smart as a measure of abilities on a scale only a relative term between different items. When writing I was thinking of intelligence but beyond that to include the ability to bring your intelligence in coherent ways to express yourself.
When you talk about imagination, I also consider myself in that same vein but still devoted to different aspects than you do. That leads me to see paranoia creeping into conversations. I imagine a future better than it is now, while what you seem to write is (let me say) different.
I do feel compelled to respond to one portion of your post specifically:
quote:
If you could just maybe let it go, start working with the new people that are on the board who seem to be willing to discuss your ideas with you, I suspect the tension you feel with me would release. Maybe you got off on the wrong foot, tangling with Sunrise, and what you feel is a residue of all that came from that. He's like his own self appointed psy-ops interrogator.
I would suggest the same to you. I know that you are smart enough to know that certain things can only mean an identification of certain people. I have no tension with you at all, as you can see from this post.
If you see residue anywhere now, it is you that is seeing it. If there was any residue I felt (at any time), I left it on my blog long ago, and never looked back. It was a healing process for me to have my blog and release any such feelings. As far as Sunrise, he seems a nice chap that would be fun to have a beer with. A very informed person that has an ability to reinterpret every thing said to be something else. But that is me, looking for good in everyone and nearly everything.
Exactly it could be a soap opera, and as such maybe you could see to lighten up also. But as I said before and will continue to say, I will challenge your views on any topic that seems of interest to me also. Along the way I hope to learn and grow as an individual. (Smiley face placed here-for my edification.)
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Loganthor's remarks makes this interchange seem to be much more of a drama than it is to me.
Apparently the only way out of this association he makes is for me not to be here on this board. So be it. I'll just take that for the way it is. I plan on being here on this board whenever I want to, or until I'm banned.
Ronald, if you could recognize that you have no way of knowing what I see, what I'm thinking, and that no matter how intelligent and imaginative you may believe me to be, you still cannot know my intentions or what associations may be going on in my mind when I write, then perhaps much of this speculation of yours about me would be unnecessary. Or maybe it's your way of entertaining yourself and you really have no desire to end it. You brought it up here, so while I don't know why and it's not really my concern, you show some specific concern and so I respond.
Like I said, I would never intend to stand in the way of someone developing their own views on something. I have no intent to force my views, my way of seeing, on anyone. I can't help it if I'm charming and persuasive and people buy it sometimes. I just write what I see as it happens to be at the moment, on something I'm looking at in my own mind, and sometimes I go into how I happen to speculate on how it got to be that way, which turns it into a narrative. Like many humans, I like to tell stories, and I develop narratives. Mostly I figure what we do with our rational minds is a kind of fiction, or a figment of a portion of something we "image"ine is reality. What I say is never, ever everything I see and experience, nor is it ever intended to be, no matter how good I make it sound. Putting everything I am aware of into words would be impossible for me to do.
If I don't intend anything, and you believe I do, and you tell me to "lighten up," exactly what am I supposed to do? I'm happy with who I am and what I do. I don't plan on changing it.
Loganthor's remarks makes this interchange seem to be much more of a drama than it is to me.
No drama for me. I don’t understand Ron's incessant use of Nihilist (drives me crazy) much like I do not understand your persecuted depressed postings that clearly reference people without actually referencing them by name. It strikes me as curious. To steal an analogy from you, I see you running on the hamster wheel and I cant quite figure out where you think you running to. But like Ron I will forever be curious on what insightful wisdom you choose to impart upon the community. As far as the joy of watching you two bicker. Ron being the nagging wife of course, I like to watch from afar with the occasional comments regarding my humorous interpretation.
To steal a line from Ron now:
Carry on.
**** Disclaimer: The information in this weblog is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights. This weblog does not represent the thoughts, intentions, plans or strategies of my owner. It is solely my own personal opinion. Inappropriate comments will be deleted at the authors discretion.***
"I stand or fall on my own words."
Posts: 7253 | Location: PORTLAND | Registered: 07 November 2005
To steal a line from Kate: Ignore the man behind the curtain. [Paraphrased]
ren, I would expect nothing less from you! That is that you are are on this board for as long as you want and that you present your vision of what you see in a narrative approach. But I think this gives at least myself a clue:
quote:
If I don't intend anything, and you believe I do, and you tell me to "lighten up," exactly what am I supposed to do? I'm happy with who I am and what I do. I don't plan on changing it.
First let me say, that I don't believe I used "lighten up". That sounds like something for the man behind the curtain. And notice that we both know who I am talking about without having to name names. But this to me shows your rigidity. You probably look back through all the changes in you life as traumatic events and would have preferred to not have lived them. Maybe I was lucky but nearly every change in my life was always for the better. And as I talked about before, I look forward to the journey to "The Undiscovered Country".
On occasions in my life I got to really know someone and sometimes I would discover that they are hung up somewhere in their past to their development as adults. I have them too (soggy bread and dog excrement is a couple of my hangups).
As a child develops he first explores the world around him and then at some time he understands or can empathize with others. Before that time they again are self-centered and assume the world is for their pleasure. But eventually they see others as beings with the similar feelings and desires and yes even closely to "seeing" things in the same manner.
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
“Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most times he will pick himself up and carry on.”
**** Disclaimer: The information in this weblog is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights. This weblog does not represent the thoughts, intentions, plans or strategies of my owner. It is solely my own personal opinion. Inappropriate comments will be deleted at the authors discretion.***
"I stand or fall on my own words."
Posts: 7253 | Location: PORTLAND | Registered: 07 November 2005
For some reason that expression always makes me imagine a flock of vultures picking at a carcass. Guess it's part of the nihilist's vocabulary.
Oh, that stings. Thanks a lot friend.
I see it completely the opposite. A nihilist would assume the conversation is over since what is the value in discussing an issue after he/she already pontificated on the matter. I assume that when I say it that the conversation will continue with or without my comments. I in essence am saying that "I hope I did not disturb your excellent conversations and hope you continue to explore your line of thoughts."
Let me try to help you in changing your image ingrained. A painter that gets interrupted. A salesman that interrupts a family meal. A writer that has to take a meal break. Or better yet an orchestra that gets interrupted because the lights went out for a minute.
Carry on (all those except the man behind the curtain and Freedom Loving women that start with the letter G-see no names)...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Well, Ronald, you pretty much just turned everything I said, or at least meant, inside out, upside down and backwards. But I don't much mind about that, it's really your concern to make of what I say what you will, your world to keep in order the way you want it. What I keep looking at this line from the last paragraph in your above post:
quote:
Exactly it could be a soap opera, and as such maybe you could see to lighten up also.
and I just can't figure out what these words mean to you:
maybe you could see to lighten up
if you also say something like this in your following post:
quote:
First let me say, that I don't believe I used "lighten up".
See the problem here? And then if we can't get simple little words like that to make some sort of consistent sense, how on earth do you hope to imagine what's also going on in my mind?
You guys are a bit out of you element on this one. I am just going by the staunch difference between what Buteos and Ren are discussing, and the rather childish noises you are making.
IMO, some people on this board are far more cerebral, and deep thinking, some like the sound-bite debates, perhaps neither is more or less intelligent, it is just different. I don't feel it is a personal attack on anyone, just a variation on looking at issues and implementing discussion.
But it sure is interesting when you read a thread that illustrates both manners of communication.
"Yeehaw" is not a foreign policy!
Posts: 875 | Location: The Emerald City | Registered: 02 January 2007
As I suspected all along, the patterns of quote and quip would rear again, as I was loathe to continue that venue.
Yes, it does seem that I used in a manner that I should have been more precise about. But have you not accused me of taking one phrase out of "context" and running with it to conclusions that may not fit your "seeing" eye. So let me explore your post in depth...
quote:
Well, Ronald, you pretty much just turned everything I said, or at least meant, inside out, upside down and backwards.
Hardly, only my interpretation of what you wrote. As usual a pattern emerges that goes from a give and take dialogue to one of nit-picking.
quote:
But I don't much mind about that, it's really your concern to make of what I say what you will, your world to keep in order the way you want it.
May I say the same in return.
quote:
Ron: Exactly it could be a soap opera, and as such maybe you could see to lighten up also.
Clearly a suggestion and not a demand. My comment was directed as the second post above mine and specifically to this passage without all the quote and quip.
quote:
So I suspect if you were to just stop imagining there's intent towards you on my part in things I write, you'd probably discover that your sense that there's some sort of a silly dance going on would simply disappear. I think all that's going on is I play off little ideas I find, you find my play and think it's aimed at you. I like to play with ideas in patterned ways, that's basically all there is to it most of the time.
Things can not simply disappear by thinking them away. Thus I had to assume that you had come to a conclusion that there is a silly dance. And I was more than willing to have you step off the dance floor when you so desired. And now back to your post:
quote:
If I don't intend anything, and you believe I do, and you tell me to "lighten up," exactly what am I supposed to do? I'm happy with who I am and what I do. I don't plan on changing it.
So now we have my interpretation of lighten up that corresponded with a suggestion to yours that I interpreted as you should change your feelings on the outside world. Thus lighten up your dancing when even most others can see but not in your passion for what you believe.
quote:
See the problem here? And then if we can't get simple little words like that to make some sort of consistent sense, how on earth do you hope to imagine what's also going on in my mind?
See the problem here? You have blown my simple mistake to astronomical proportions. While yes I should be more attuned to my precise words, I have not violated my intent in my mind. How can you hope to imagine what is in my mind?
I never "hope to imagine" what is in anyone's mind. Only interpret what they say and do. And this pattern in your post is the same pattern I see repeated on many occasions. A pattern that many other third party people also note.
Anyway, carry on...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
(Now just try to imagine this in a friendly tone of voice, just talking, rambling sort of):
I don't try to; I don't want to try to. That's the only point, really. I don't imagine you are light or dark in your mind. And nit picking isn't going anywhere, either, because it never does. I can point out I said you'd probably discover that your sense that there's some sort of a silly dance going on was related to what you'd said about a silly dance going, which I am trying to share with you in my remarks, there, that I don't particularly view is going on with us. But if I do that, and all the other explanations that might be forthcoming to explain what appears to me to be an unbridgeable gap of understanding, I am convinced from my experience -- not just with you, but many others -- that it will become endless. I'd rather step off the merry-go-round. So I try to avoid that sort of thing. And that's all. You indicated you thought there was a dance, I'm saying I'm not dancing, at least not intentionally. I've actually been trying not to.
My general point is this: If I don't reference you, you are probably not even in my thoughts when I write something. But for sure if I don't reference you, you can only at most guess you might be. I'm smart enough to know that.
So my suggestion is, assume you are not "the one" being referred, if you must assume anything, rather than the other way around. Unless you actually quote me, use my name in a post, that's how I look at it. Things can "appear" by thinking them into one's mind, but telling yourself not to think something is rather impossible, since you've already thought it in order to tell yourself not to. My suggestion isn't to think them away, but to not think them into your mind in the first place. But if you can't help from doing that, try a practice of assuming it's not intended at you. Maybe that will work. Just a suggestion.
As far as turning things backwards and upside down, maybe I should try to elaborate...
I really and truly don't know why you would want to assume that I "probably" look back on a life of traumatic events that I would have preferred not to have had. I've said many times on this board I like my mind, my world, that the events I have been through have been gifts. I've always made the most of my life's changes, I feel fortunate to be living with a mind and body I thoroughly enjoy, and I now have given myself the gift I looked forward to many years ago.
Perhaps we even both see the future in a positively transformative way, I think we do, given what you've said, it's just my positive is based on a hope for a more natural world of minimalist human intervention, which I argue for, when I bother to argue for it, using such rational features as those I've gleaned from the science of ecology, and what I can see from human history, yours is one of a different order. I'm familiar with yours as well. Different futures, yes, both of us seeing something "better" though. I realize you believe yours is positive. My imaginary future world has to do with the more positive events and experiences in my life, as I can imagine does yours.
That's what I mean by your turning what I meant "inside out, upside down and backwards." Like I also said, I don't much mind about that. I actually expect it.
And, no, I haven't blown "lighten up" into a big deal, I saw it as humorous, because it's humorous to me that we don't communicate, I can see that we don't, and I don't want to go into all the reasons I can see for that, so I picked on something trivial like that. And that's just the quirky way my humor works.
Ren, yeah Ive been following those threads. As to why this morphed - again - into something else goes to the debate about left brain hegemony and those who kill the right brain. For those of you who don't know, right brain awareness is the creative side of human potential discovered in poetry, art, eros, and numerous other human qualities that make this life worth living...
Oh, well, let the gerbils spin away...
Posts: 1162 | Location: Boulder Creek Watershed | Registered: 14 February 2004
ren, I appreciate you putting so much effort into some of your recent posts. You surely have a way with words.
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(Now just try to imagine this in a friendly tone of voice, just talking, rambling sort of):
I always do until proven otherwise. Just as I ASSUME posts are not about me until otherwise proven in a distinctive pattern.
But I am sorry that I do not believe you even if you repeat it all 100 times. To avoid self centered reading of posts, I first try to read it in the third person and then I rely on third parties to see if I have missed something. In the discussions "off line" or even observing other interactions we can see that I am not the only one to see your actions.
Even recently your use of Eddie Haskell with creatively coupled with the discussion of Gerbils was even easily spotted by Loganthor. Sue has also noted your pattern. And others that have told me similar observations.
Even if you do not do the direct slimming you carry on the conversations that directly imply me. And thus your actions only reinforce the implications that already made.
Do you consider your time in Veit Nam not traumatic? Do you see it as a positive effect on your life? A close relative lived through that era (66-68) and does not consider it positive in his life.
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I'm familiar with yours as well.
Yes, that sums it 100% from your perspective. Well I am glad that you already have the answers in life.
It is more than likely you missed the PDF on Cooperation and Competition, so this is has been my cooperative mood lately...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Do you consider your time in Veit Nam not traumatic? Do you see it as a positive effect on your life?
Vietnam was a wake up experience. I woke up intellectually and in other ways there. It's had what I consider a very positive effect on my life. For instance, I began to see beauty and the preciousness of being in the moment in very different forms after that. Ideas became translucent.
"Eddie Haskell" is a concept. It's recognized as such in the Urban Dictionary, but even if it wasn't, it would be/could be used as a concept. It can apply generally to certain types of behavior. If you find it fits, wear it. If it doesn't, don't. Patterns are metaphors, or vice versa, however you want to look at it. they can be applied if they fit to a lot of different things, that's how literature works, how poetry works, how propaganda works, that's how marketing works. Intention isn't even necessary. People will take patterns and forms and make them fit. It's a natural human process.
That the two of you (Loganthor and you) make such a big thing of the gerbil play only offers an opportunity to play it. It doesn't identify anyone's intentionality or any truth. People did play it after they saw you respond. I have played it. But the concept itself was to me an interesting metaphor, juxtaposing the effort to enclose, to be "de"finite, along with the irrational number pi inside, spinning, never to be finally defined. It struck me immediately for some reason, the cage and the wheel inside, spinning. I saw it in a flash for an image of the whole discussion that evolved out of the movie Pi and the binary opposition concept I was messing around with in thinking about it, and I continue to find it useful as a transformative structural concept. I don't know about anyone else, but that's how my mind clicks on things. If you want to take it personally, as you seem to, that's your choice. You needn't if you don't want to. You needn't have. Had you not it would have been nothing to you. What I'm doing with it isn't about you or anything personal, although as a play on it, yes that can come in, surely, but that takes your enabling actions for it to happen. I can't speak for anyone else.
You are not the focus of my thoughts or what I'm interested in on this board. I'm sorry if that troubles you, but that's just the way it is. I don't really think of the board in terms of cooperation or competition between others and me, not that it doesn't seem to occur, though it's impossible to know for sure. I honestly don't see how anything this disconnected and abstract can be anything at all, other than what one wants to imagine it to be.
You know, the idea you expressed that I have "the answers" to life is really something that expresses more about how you see things than anything at all about me. It implies you believe in something like "answers to life." You imply by saying something like that about me that you think I would also be inclined to believe it. What if someone doesn't even think in those terms? Isn't that possible? What might that be like?
ren, Thanks for the good answer to many of the issues that came up in our talks. Sorry but may have to a little bit of cutting in this post to address specific issues.
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If you find it fits, wear it. If it doesn't, don't.
You have used this on several occasions and as such let me address it. I recall you "wearing some shoes" also. The 10,000 members sticks out in my mind. But anyway if you can not see your actions or that you excuse them away, then you are no better than those that use the simplistic BO of Us vs. Them.
There are subtle implications and then you have on occasion 'carried the water' for others that have defined the concept and thus you are just as guilty as the children.
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You are not the focus of my thoughts or what I'm interested in on this board. I'm sorry if that troubles you, but that's just the way it is.
Not by a long shot for me also. But like children some choose to run around and squawk. I can play either game, so I always leave the choices up to you.
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I don't really think of the board in terms of cooperation or competition between others and me, not that it doesn't seem to occur, though it's impossible to know for sure. I honestly don't see how anything this disconnected and abstract can be anything at all, other than what one wants to imagine it to be.
I know, a concept that seems to elude you. Yes imagination is great. And you could say the same about a lot of things, but then why do you defend it so much?
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You know, the idea you expressed that I have "the answers" to life is really something that expresses more about how you see things than anything at all about me. It implies you believe in something like "answers to life." You imply by saying something like that about me that you think I would also be inclined to believe it. What if someone doesn't even think in those terms? Isn't that possible? What might that be like?
Yes, it could be... But considering you seem to know my answers while I don't even claim to know the answers seems beyond my grasp.
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...using such rational features as those I've gleaned from the science of ecology, and what I can see from human history, yours is one of a different order.
And this creates the BO without bothering to look at the wider analysis that I believe is needed. Seems that shows plenty of yourself expressed. Just because someone may choose to not think a certain way does not mean that 'truth' does not exist. The little people gossiping around here is just as real anything in real life so ignoring does not make it disappear. I guess the answer to your questions is 'you'...
I think unless you have more words of wisdom for me... I have learned enough from this exchange and your continuing style of posting that I should just enjoy myself and not worry about you...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Do I? or is that an illusion you have bought into, possibly one you have created without any effort on my part?
Am I trying things on for play, or am I taking them seriously?
You don't know, but you speak as if you do.
That's what makes it look like you are trying to trap things in a box all the time. It would make you less obvious if you could tell the difference between what you can know for certain and what you can't.
Do I? or is that an illusion you have bought into, possibly one you have created without any effort on my part?
Am I trying things on for play, or am I taking them seriously?
You don't know, but you speak as if you do.
That's what makes it look like you are trying to trap things in a box all the time. It would make you less obvious if you could tell the difference between what you can know for certain and what you can't.
That's all I have for you.
Yes, let us go back to the conversations about what we can know. Nothing. Yes, your actions have shown a consistent pattern, especially with Moral Rights. Effort or no effort really matters little does it? I mean if I spent the last day thinking it out does it make any difference to you?
Yes in the rational thinking we create a logical BO. We can consider inside the box one status and outside the other. I actually prefer T charts. You start with certain assumptions and then they either go in one column or the other. If one is in the wrong one you switch it.
Yes may you be less obvious and notice the difference between what you can know-which is nothing- and what you can't-everything.
Hell, I am just getting started. That is unless you want to "get off this merry-go-round" and wait out this dance?
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
With what, more rational, linear processes, this time in cascading lines?
Maybe, maybe not. Unlike you, I like to try new techniques.
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What I do you can't share.
And it appears you can not share either. Spock also had that problem with Bones.
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You have to do for yourself.
Truly. And you will have to do it also...
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Sorry to leave you with something like that.
No reason to be sorry among friends.But if it makes you feel better then I accept it.
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When you know for certain what you can know, and what you can't, you'll have some semblance of respect to work with. As I consider respect.
No, I just use confidence intervals to consider the known and unknown. I only wonder about your ability to know anything with so many discussions seeming to flourish out of some sense of not knowing.
As far as respect, how can we as animals know even what respect is? Do you know what respect is? And how can you present it so others will know what you mean?
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
You can know that? You can accurately make that comparison?
No I cannot share what I do. I can only give you a map of the results.
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Truly. And you will have to do it also...
Perhaps I've already crossed that barrier of understanding, and that's why I could suggest the notion?
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No, I just use confidence intervals to consider the known and unknown. I only wonder about your ability to know anything with so many discussions seeming to flourish out of some sense of not knowing.
Like I said...
Respect? Yes, I know which of the many versions I mean.
Behavior presents it. Reciprocation and showing regard, or consideration, allowing the other to be of their own volition.
You can know that? You can accurately make that comparison?
Yes sir.... It is called a mind with memory.
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To Believe
To believe Is to believe
I believe
To Love Is to Love
I Love
To live Is to live
I live
To hope Is to hope
I hope
...
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No I cannot share what I do. I can only give you a map of the results.
Yes, seems like a Spock like response. We have an interpretation of the results so not sure the reason for a map. But clearly you have created a black box concept. Thus it is unlikely that so called 'primitives' can learn how the engine works by examining the results.
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Perhaps I've already crossed that barrier of understanding, and that's why I could suggest the notion?
Sorry you are not the Übermensch. Which by deductive reasoning makes you...
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Like I said...
Respect? Yes, I know which of the many versions I mean.
Behavior presents it. Reciprocation and showing regard, or consideration, allowing the other to be of their own volition.
But how can you truly know what your mind even tells you. Maybe it is just a chemical reaction like a simple blinking button on Star Trek (original).
So you consider it 'own volition' when you ask people if they are 'neocons'? Do you beat your wife anymore?
And the beat goes on...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Memory's not what it takes. You have to know something you can't know about me to make that comparison. You can't do it with your remembered assumptions. You'll just be guessing.
Like I said, when you know for certain what you can know, and what you can't...you'll be on your way to being respectful. And to insist you know something you can't know about me, well, that's not respectful. That's more along the lines of impositional. But most people seem to know that, so it seldom comes up.
It appears I've wasted my time trying to explain that.
"A Spock like response"... so tell me, do you suppose that you can actually be in my mind with me doing what I do with it? That's a phenomenological existentialist problem I've suggested, hardly a rational left brained Spock response. I've posed a problem, I guess you don't see the problem. Seems to be an impenetrable barrier to communication there.
Yes, beyond that palm at the end of your mind is a lot of black boxes. The only option to figure out how any of them work is to examine the results from the black boxes and compare them with your own workings. Show me another option.
If I suggest something to you, and you suggest the same thing back to me, that's a closed loop. Chances are you probably didn't need to suggest something back was the point I tried to make. Obviously you understood it well enough to mirror it back. Hardly anything to do with Ubermensch.
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So you consider it 'own volition' when you ask people if they are 'neocons'? Do you beat your wife anymore?
Huh? I had to reread what I said:
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Respect? Yes, I know which of the many versions I mean.
Behavior presents it. Reciprocation and showing regard, or consideration, allowing the other to be of their own volition.
I can't figure out why that's a question for you. Seems fairly clear. I consider whatever you consider yourself to be, to be of your of own volition, your own choice. If you say you don't consider yourself to be a neocon, that's cool. You called me a troll, maybe you actually thought I was, maybe you didn't, I know I'm not a troll. I thought it was funny. And I left you alone with your thoughts. About a month after that you wanted to talk to me. Apparently you see the neocon issue along different lines? I can't possibly know that. In some societies, wife beating is expected. In this society, lots of neocons are proud to be neocons. Lots of wife beaters are proud to be wife beaters. If you want to beat your wife but don't want anyone to call you a wife beater, that's ok too. You are stuck with who you are, not me. I don't need to call you a neocon. Whether I want to associate with you, that's maybe a different matter.
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But how can you truly know what your mind even tells you.
What my... mind... even... tells me... Strange way of forming what ever you might mean. If I told you, would you know? Why ask me? You can't possibly imagine you are actually going to puzzle me with something that rudimentary, can you? Have you actually made any effort to go beyond that Wiki article on Ubermensch? On into the Twentieth Century? Phenomenology? Existentialism? It doesn't really seem as if you've explored these problems all that far.
If you say you don't consider yourself to be a neocon, that's cool. You called me a troll, maybe you actually thought I was, maybe you didn't, I know I'm not a troll.
Who is putting who in the box? You sure acted like the shoe fit. How do you know anyway? As we discussed before only 'victims' get to determine your actions.
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Pedro, now that was funny, wasn't it? And you were banned at the time. Odd you can't seem to forget that one.
Yes, yes yes. I knew we would end up back at the beginning again-as usual. But you can't seem to forget troll also, no? And UET and Lebanon and India and Bhopal...
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What my mind even tells me... Strange way of forming what ever you might mean. If I told you, would you know? Why ask me? You can't possibly imagine you are actually going to puzzle me with something that rudimentary, can you? Have you actually made any effort to go beyond that Wiki article on Ubermensch? On into the Twentieth Century? Phenomenology? Existentialism? It doesn't really seem as if you've explored these problems all that far.
Why ask why? And you thought that BO was something beyond rudimentary? And you thought you could analyze my family life with a few posts to evaluate it with? And have you gone past that two articles on Neoliberalism? Have you studied the Washington Consensus, Polak, Ronald McKinnon, failures of Development process for the 50s, 60s, 70s,80s, and 90s? Have you gone beyond Noam in your understanding of how exchange rates work? So maybe when I get Spock responses, I can only wonder the rationality of such individuals.
Nihilism strikes again...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
Like I said, when you know for certain what you can know, and what you can't...you'll be on your way to being respectful. And to insist you know something you can't know about me, well, that's not respectful. That's more along the lines of impositional. But most people seem to know that, so it seldom comes up.
It appears I've wasted my time trying to explain that.
Maybe. I would just say follow your own subscriptions Doctor.
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"A Spock like response"... so tell me, do you suppose that you can actually be in my mind with me doing what I do with it? That's a phenomenological existentialist problem I've suggested, hardly a rational left brained Spock response. I've posed a problem, I guess you don't see the problem. Seems to be an impenetrable barrier to communication there.
Wrong conclusion to what I am thinking. It refers to the requirement that two people must have experienced the same event or information to be able to converse.
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Yes, beyond that palm at the end of your mind is a lot of black boxes. The only option to figure out how any of them work is to examine the results from the black boxes and compare them with your own workings. Show me another option.
Simply describe with these things we call words and see if it correlates with others that may have experienced similar situations or knowledge.
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If I suggest something to you, and you suggest the same thing back to me, that's a closed loop. Chances are you probably didn't need to suggest something back was the point I tried to make. Obviously you understood it well enough to mirror it back. Hardly anything to do with Ubermensch.
But just enough in regard to "crossed that barrier of understanding".
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I can't figure out why that's a question for you. Seems fairly clear. I consider whatever you consider yourself to be, to be of your of own volition, your own choice. If you say you don't consider yourself to be a neocon, that's cool. You called me a troll, maybe you actually thought I was, maybe you didn't, I know I'm not a troll. I thought it was funny. And I left you alone with your thoughts. About a month after that you wanted to talk to me. Apparently you see the neocon issue along different lines? I can't possibly know that. In some societies, wife beating is expected. In this society, lots of neocons are proud to be neocons. Lots of wife beaters are proud to be wife beaters. If you want to beat your wife but don't want anyone to call you a wife beater, that's ok too. You are stuck with who you are, not me. I don't need to call you a neocon. Whether I want to associate with you, that's maybe a different matter.
Another one of your box thinking process. I must either be inside your box (neocon) or outside. And you definitely placed my in the box with your dialogue (as I read it). But I am neither in the box or outside the box. I can not accept either status as most correctly to what I understand and value. I did say that PNAC had some interesting articles on Taiwan and China. You never could answer what your position was or any clue to how you see the two independent countries there.
OK, all the droppings here have been cleaned up... Carry on...
Posts: 7939 | Location: Santa Barbara | Registered: 19 July 2005
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you two sound like you've been married for 30 years
