The Futility of Reason

[Lacewing]

Lacewing, I’m not being critical of you but have only pointed out that we begin with different premises.

If I do not subscribe to your framework and conclusions, then this can only be how YOU are interpreting and assigning your own ideas onto who/what you think I am. It does NOT represent any kind of reality for me. It is your trip, Nick. You are placing people in boxes with your judgments. How can there ever be any TRUE exchange of ideas when you limit everything/everyone to a certain belief system that YOU have? You do not know me, and you do not correctly define me, because I do not fit within the confines of your belief system. WHY WOULD YOUR VIEW OVERRIDE MINE IN REGARD TO ME??? Such is only in your imagination of who you think I am (or must be) based on whatever structures/limitations YOU believe in and define by. Your stuff. And, yes, it's offensive that you keep spewing this on people.

You're just one more person (of countless) who thinks they see the whole picture and how everyone fits into it regardless of what anyone else themselves is telling you.

[Nick_A]

Lacewing wrote: If I do not subscribe to your framework and conclusions, then this can only be how YOU are interpreting and assigning your own ideas onto who/what you think I am. It does NOT represent any kind of reality for me. It is your trip, Nick. You are placing people in boxes with your judgments. How can there ever be any TRUE exchange of ideas when you limit everything/everyone to a certain belief system that YOU have?

I’ve written primarily on is how I’ve come to understand the human condition and how people like Simone Weil have responded to it by inwardly verifying that they live as Plato described. That is my premise and the logic of human conscious evolution is built upon the need to deal with the human condition. You wrote this in the Edge thread:

I always find it so strange when people think that NO ONE ELSE has experienced or heard anything about "greater awareness" and "divine connection" and "ultimate being", etc. That somehow we don't know about these concepts of which they speak, regardless of the words that are used. Every one wants to be the enlightened explorer that brings back ultimate truth for the masses. But it makes no sense... when we can truly respect and see the magnificence of the other souls that are around us, then we could GUESS that they might have travelled similar paths, or considered similar concepts MANY, MANY, MANY times.

Greater awareness IMO is just imagination when it is a product of sleep in Plato’s cave. Greater conscious awareness consists of partial truths combined with imagination. If there are any magnificence souls around us they are few and far between. It takes humility to admit that we are asleep in Plato’s cave with the conscious potential of awakening to a higher level of reality and develop consciously towards a higher level of being worthy of the name Man. IMO that is the first essential greater awareness providing a foundation which can be built upon.

Are you familiar with the life of Milarepa. He became a dark magician but in order to reflect the reality of the dharma he had to cleanse his inner life. Not a pleasant endeavor for a talented person who had become dirty inside. The darkness on the inside that had become part of him didn’t want to die. The point is that only through enlightenment did he become aware of his condition and struggle for inner freedom. Over time I have become increasingly aware of how important the awareness of the human condition is for those exploring any sort of inner work. So rather than considering our collective magnificence I prefer to discuss why we are in Plato’s cave and what is necessary to leave it.

[Lacewing]

Greater awareness IMO is just imagination when it is a product of sleep in Plato’s cave.

Your belief system, your judgments, your definitions.

Over time I have become increasingly aware of how important the awareness of the human condition is for those exploring any sort of inner work.

You're not the only one who is doing this... and your way is not the only way for everyone else to do it. Your definition of what the human condition is, is part of your belief system.

So rather than considering our collective magnificence I prefer to discuss why we are in Plato’s cave and what is necessary to leave it.

So you're placing people within the definitions and constructs of your belief system, when they are not in agreement with it at all. In doing so, you are saying that your viewpoint is the only correct/valid viewpoint to have, and that you know better about others than they know about themselves. And you can invalidate people's alternative viewpoints (which you do not understand) by telling them they are asleep in the cave. Is that correct?

[Dalek Prime]

Plato's cave, brain in a vat. I'm not in a cave, or in a vat.

And if I am, just pull the plug, and turn out the lights. Because I still have preference, and this isn't my preference.

[Scott Mayers]

Plato's cave analogy was about showing merely how our interpretation of reality may not be as it is presumed to be by some fixed default interpretation. It was also trying to show how we can infer something indirectly about his idea of 'absolutes' to which he interpreted as a generalization about logic but of which most assume by default is unreal as many interpret numbers. As such, the idea is not to dismiss reason but to suggest that reality was BASED on reason as 'form' or generalized factor that is not easily to grasp but is nevertheless rational except for our internal capacity to understand the whole because we are a logical PART of it preventing us from being able to see the whole.

[Scott Mayers]

Plato's cave analogy was about showing merely how our interpretation of reality may not be as it is presumed to be by some fixed default interpretation. It was also trying to show how we can infer something indirectly about his idea of 'absolutes' to which he interpreted as a generalization about logic but of which most assume by default is unreal as many interpret numbers. As such, the idea is not to dismiss reason but to suggest that reality was BASED on reason as 'form' or generalized factor that is not easily to grasp but is nevertheless rational except for our internal capacity to understand the whole because we are a logical PART of it preventing us from being able to see the whole by perspective only.

[Nick_A]

L

acewing wrote: ck_A wrote:Greater awareness IMO is just imagination when it is a product of sleep in Plato’s cave.

Your belief system, your judgments, your definitions.

Quite true. It is my premise.

Nick_A wrote:Over time I have become increasingly aware of how important the awareness of the human condition is for those exploring any sort of inner work.

You're not the only one who is doing this... and your way is not the only way for everyone else to do it. Your definition of what the human condition is, is part of your belief system.

Yes, my belief in the human condition has been personally verified by me through efforts to “Know Thyself.” I am always interested in the experiences of others concerning the human condition from efforts to acquire impartial self knowledge and techniques that were used to avoid imaginary self justification.

Nick_A wrote:So rather than considering our collective magnificence I prefer to discuss why we are in Plato’s cave and what is necessary to leave it.

So you're placing people within the definitions and constructs of your belief system, when they are not in agreement with it at all. In doing so, you are saying that your viewpoint is the only correct/valid viewpoint to have, and that you know better about others than they know about themselves. And you can invalidate people's alternative viewpoints (which you do not understand) by telling them they are asleep in the cave. Is that correct?

I begin with a premise suggested by Plato and also within all the great spiritual traditions that we live in imagination. If you would rather write of the Buddhist parable of the Burning House it is really the same thing. The whole point is that we don’t know ourselves but rather imagine ourselves. The only way to verify it one way or another is through conscious attempts to “know thyself” It isn’t a matter of arguing who is right and wrong but rather what can be consciously verified. There is nothing critical or nasty about striving for conscious self knowledge. There is no good or bad about it. If our situation were really hopeless and just a cycle of dust to dust then why worry about self knowledge? It is better just to satisfy oneself through imagination. But if there is something within a human being Plato called soul knowledge perhaps some can remember it as they pursue their need for the truth of the human condition.

So if someone has a better premise that can be built upon so as to reveal human meaning and purpose if it exists, I’m anxious to read it.

[Nick_A]

Scott Mayers wrote: Plato's cave analogy was about showing merely how our interpretation of reality may not be as it is presumed to be by some fixed default interpretation. It was also trying to show how we can infer something indirectly about his idea of 'absolutes' to which he interpreted as a generalization about logic but of which most assume by default is unreal as many interpret numbers. As such, the idea is not to dismiss reason but to suggest that reality was BASED on reason as 'form' or generalized factor that is not easily to grasp but is nevertheless rational except for our internal capacity to understand the whole because we are a logical PART of it preventing us from being able to see the whole.

I agree. Binary reason is incapable of grasping higher wholeness. Yet we do have a rudimentary quality of consciousness which can understand what is beyond the limitations of dualistic reason. The ancients used pondering to open the mind. In these times we use Oprah. It's not working very well.

[Greta]

I agree. Binary reason is incapable of grasping higher wholeness.

If "binary reason" is inappropriate then it's conjecture, not reason.

"Higher wholeness" is relative. We are a "higher wholeness" than the individual organisms and colonies of our microbiome, which are a "higher wholeness" of their chemicals, which are a "higher wholeness" of their atoms, which are a "higher wholeness" of subatomic particles. Meanwhile our families are a "higher wholeness" than our individual selves. Societies are a "higher wholeness" than families. The biosphere is a "higher wholeness" than humanity, the Earth a "higher wholeness" of the biosphere, and so forth, on and on.

As for the the Big Kahuna - the total wholeness - I have no idea how big reality is or "how far the rabbit hole goes" so I have no opinion.

[Dontaskme]

Lacewing, I’m not being critical of you but have only pointed out that we begin with different premises.

If I do not subscribe to your framework and conclusions, then this can only be how YOU are interpreting and assigning your own ideas onto who/what you think I am. It does NOT represent any kind of reality for me. It is your trip, Nick. You are placing people in boxes with your judgments. How can there ever be any TRUE exchange of ideas when you limit everything/everyone to a certain belief system that YOU have? You do not know me, and you do not correctly define me, because I do not fit within the confines of your belief system. WHY WOULD YOUR VIEW OVERRIDE MINE IN REGARD TO ME??? Such is only in your imagination of who you think I am (or must be) based on whatever structures/limitations YOU believe in and define by. Your stuff. And, yes, it's offensive that you keep spewing this on people.

You're just one more person (of countless) who thinks they see the whole picture and how everyone fits into it regardless of what anyone else themselves is telling you.

Lacewing...the fact is that people do actually awaken to the truth of reality. Nick has...and it's plainly obvious he has, so has Reflex ...this knowing is easy to spot in another simply by what they write about.....I know, because it's happened to me also. I too am awakened to truth.

Nick knows there is no individual self, and that the individual self is an illusion appearing in the only self there is and that is one self...the self without other is all there is...other selves are that which arise and fall in the one Self...

The fact that you are getting offended is because awakening has not happened to you yet. If it had you would know that individuated mind content does not belong to any other one other than the one self...and that the contents are pure and simply not separated from the one mind. There simply are no individual minds....there are many ideas about reality....but all ideas are sourced in oneness.....the LW, the Nick and the Dam are all ideas arising in oneness....ideas differ, but their source is one having no bias, prejudice, or preference, it is impartially undivided wholeness in which all thoughts, feelings and ideas are known to it...and it alone... no other one owns their thoughts feelings emotions, beliefs, ideals, or sensations....these belong to the one...and what comes out of the one is that same one appearing different that's all....

What comes out of the one... ie: ideas, beliefs....etc.... have no actual substance or reality....

LW does not have a reality...reality is just an idea, a belief...and the you that you believe to be you ..is oneness being you...as and through a body...that you believe to be you..

Does Dam know LW? ....no, how can Dam know LW ..you are an idea appearing in me...which means you are not separate from me...because without me there is no you....and it's same for you...without you there is no me. Our minds can never meet because we are the same mind expressing different opinion....which are as empty as the mind itself...

But your never going to believe any of this while you believe you are the label LW...even though a label cannot know anything, it will still believe it can.

[Dontaskme]

Plato's cave, brain in a vat. I'm not in a cave, or in a vat.

And if I am, just pull the plug, and turn out the lights. Because I still have preference, and this isn't my preference.

That's right, you are not a brain in a vat, neither are you in plato's cave.

The You that you think you are is simply NOT you.

So, who are you?

Can the plug be pulled on that one, and who's going to pull it?

[Dontaskme]

I agree. Binary reason is incapable of grasping higher wholeness.

If "binary reason" is inappropriate then it's conjecture, not reason.

"Higher wholeness" is relative. We are a "higher wholeness" than the individual organisms and colonies of our microbiome, which are a "higher wholeness" of their chemicals, which are a "higher wholeness" of their atoms, which are a "higher wholeness" of subatomic particles. Meanwhile our families are a "higher wholeness" than our individual selves. Societies are a "higher wholeness" than families. The biosphere is a "higher wholeness" than humanity, the Earth a "higher wholeness" of the biosphere, and so forth, on and on.

As for the the Big Kahuna - the total wholeness - I have no idea how big reality is or "how far the rabbit hole goes" so I have no opinion.

There are no relationships or paradoxes in reality. All descriptions are purely conceptual...not real.

An aggregate of trees appear to make a forest ...but there is no forest in reality... only trees. The forest can never be reached by adding more trees, the forest will just get bigger and bigger and further and further away..never quite catching up with itself.
The more it tries to catch it self... the further it recedes.


Also...any thought about a doughnut hole has to be about the doughnut...there is no relationship there.

[sthitapragya]

So if someone has a better premise that can be built upon so as to reveal human meaning and purpose if it exists, I’m anxious to read it.

No, you are not. You are waiting for someone to give you some crap which you are psychologically capable of handling. You are incapable of mustering up the courage to even consider that there is no meaning and purpose to your life. You want to leave Plato's cave without physically leaving because you cannot handle the separation.

You just want to talk big. You cannot handle the truth. That is all.

[Dontaskme]

You just want to talk big. You cannot handle the truth. That is all.

And you'd KNOW what that is ...would you?

If so...please engage with others who are ALSO discussing it... instead of being THE ignoramus YOU ARE and ignoring other people.

ARE YOU ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN YOU KNOW WHAT THE TRUTH IS ??

Don't accuse others of not being able to handle truth if you cannot explain what it is YOURSELF....if you know what it is.... then start a new thread about it...if I don't see a new thread started by you...then I know you are only bluffing about it...don't claim that others can't handle the truth until you can provide some data on what it is.

And please exhibit a professional approach to your visiting guests. In other words don't ignore them if they do not adhere to your model of what constitutes TRUTH.

Let's discover....together as a team not as individual egos playing the ''you lose'' - '' I win'' game...which is so pathetic.

[Greta]

There are no relationships or paradoxes in reality. All descriptions are purely conceptual...not real.

An aggregate of trees appear to make a forest ...but there is no forest in reality... only trees. The forest can never be reached by adding more trees, the forest will just get bigger and bigger and further and further away..never quite catching up with itself.

That's basically reductionism, a denial of emergence. It reminds me of Margaret Thatcher claiming that there is no society, only individuals. Nope. There definitely are individuals, but the collective is greater than the sum of its parts. Humans can't go to space. Plenty of us can't tie their own shoelaces. But humanity can land a space craft on a comet travelling half a billion kms way that's travelling at 38k per second. By the same token, your internal bacteria and individual cells can't write posts on philosophy forums, but you can.