Philosophy Now Forum

Bill, you need to beat your own meat.

Socrates believed the ignorant are too busy looking down their heads stooping to the earth; their pleasures are mixed with pains mere shadows and pictures of existence and fight about the shadow of Helen at Troy in ignorance of the truth.

The mind is like seed is simple point, even through a microscope it can scarcely be seen. The simple seed like the mind is pregnant with all the qualities of a tree. In seeds are contained the whole tree, the trunk, branches, leaves, color, odor, taste, or thought is similar to seed means the simple abstract universal “I,” which is common to all, for everyone there is “I.” The most diverse of ideas, drives, desires, inclinations and thought contained a concept of all that humankind develops out of self.


Here then introduces the enormous difference ”I”, the free individual pervades and permeates all aspects of its actual being. Self within self collects all these moments into content, like the seed, keeps the whole concrete actual spirit within a determinate character of self.

This “I” is certainty of itself and the process it goes through this is their true reality.

Spirit in its totality is the immediate unity of “I” is the fundamental basis, or the pure consciousness, shut up within self, the pure self-consciousness,” I” shapes constitutes the development of ”I” perfection and complete actuality through the individual aspects.

What is this 'I' that is you? What is this 'I' that is me that is 'you' for you?

I'm sorry, your link between your Socrates reference and the subsequent post is incompresensible to me.
Please explain. Are you being the 'head down, lost in shadow person' ?

Because of lack of education they cannot keep their eyes fixed upon the whole truth are unable to calculate gazes downward dismayed and perplex.

The philosopher is derided by the uneducated always. Intelligence is formed by a method of discipline raising knowledge little by little gradually to the highest. Action and labor is conscious life. Through this comes about universal feeling and reverent devotion to one another.

Being conscious in what is outside self and truth is real world spirit rises out of the state of ignorance into the conscious universal spirit.


The starry heaven the fairest and most perfect of visible things are to be apprehended by intelligence, to be used as a pattern and with a view to that higher knowledge; any geometrician who sees them appreciates the exquisiteness but would never dream of truth of any proportion. Never can we behold the waking reality so long as we leave unexamined, and unable to give an account of the first principle, then the conclusion, and intermediate are constructed out of know not what.

Knowledge is not to be found anywhere in the field of ignorance, it is not a matter of clever allusive half utterances but an expression of openness, unambiguous, meaningful, and purposeful understanding.

The power of learning exists in the mind just as the eye is unable to turn from darkness to light without mind so too the instrument of knowledge can only be by mind be turned from the world of becoming to that of brightest and best being.

The saving grace of truth is Courage a mighty agent, under all circumstances bravery preserves, it is the mightiest of all solvents of mind.

But what makes a person virtuous is justice. No doubt justice is somewhere here: I struggle to catch sight of it, if you see it first, let me know, so that it does not slip away, and pass out of sight. There is no path for justice, little light, and if we go about looking for what we already have we look not at what we am at seeking, but what is far off in the distance and therefore we fail to recognize justice.

Justice is the only virtue that remains in society when all the other virtues, which are, temperance and courage and wisdom, have gone from society , therefore, to look for justice lower ye bucket where ye stand.

Dialectic is different, it is the strain which is of the intellect only, where the faculty of sight is found to imitate. When a philosopher starts on the discovery of dialectic by the light of reason without any assistance of the senses perseveres until by pure knowledge of good.

Dialectic is the finishing touch of the sciences Aristotle called Parmenides the inventor of dialectic. In full perfection Parmenides wrote "the way of truth" is the same as the dyers, when they want to dye wool for making the true sea-purple, begin by selecting their white color first; this they prepare and dress with much care and pains, in order that the white ground may. Whatever is dyed in this manner becomes a fixed color, no washing with lyes or without them can take away the coloration.

According to Herodotus Parmenides one of the most significant of the pre-Socratic philosophers said, “Truth is the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light in the world,” Parmenides founded the School of Elea, it was said he had wrote the laws of the city.

“The way of truth" poem by Parmenides describes the journey of a young man from darkness to light, reality as what-is is one and many , timeless, uniform, necessary, and unchanging the way of truths.”

Parmenides "the way of truth" discusses that which is real, which contrasts in some way with the argument of the section called "the way of opinion," which discusses that which is illusory. Zeno of Elea was his most important pupil of Parmenides who had a large influence on Zeno, always spoke of him with reverence. Parmenides ideas influenced the whole of Western philosophy, and perhaps most notably Plato.

Fix your eyes on what has preoccupied and disquieted humankind and culture, it has fallen into disarray that it becomes the task of philosophers to undo and re-illuminate mind.


There are two ruling principles of mind, the intellectual world and the visible world, the senses derived from knowledge, before seeing or hearing or perceiving anything knowledge of the highest virtue to pursue must be in mind shinning with radiance. In the world of knowledge, Socrates believed, the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with effort and when seen is the universal author of all things beautiful and right, the parent of light and lord of light in this visible world, and the source of reason and truth in the intellectual world; this is the power upon which must have our eyes fixed upon and act rationally in public or private life.

Come rise out of the leaden weights attached to life dragging us down and turning our minds upon the things that are lowly, come release these impediments and turn the opposite direction: As being is to becoming, so is pure intellect to opinion. And as intellect is to opinion, so is science to belief, and understanding to the perception of shadows.

Feeling the supreme wealth of existence simply means being in communion with self. Everything is reduced to feeling; it is a high privilege, which can show outwardly feelings, the general senses of the skin: taste is the muscle of the tongue, which connects itself to the mouth, is feeling. The noise feeling organ smell is connected with the principle of air and breathing. Hear is pure self-affirming voice as universal, expressing pain, desire, joy, contentment, every animal suffering has a voice and declares feelings.

Feeling is carried out by entirely specific actions, such as sleep to rest the body and wake to gather food and build shelter is as far as animals are determined a practical relationship. Waking and sleeping, the migration of animal, fishes to seas is a sharing in the like of nature. This is why we feel, we sentient creature contain a relationship with the outside nature and this excites us to feel. The mechanical sphere of feeling is the faculty of perception has two fold; principle of sight and hearing.

Feeling shuts out the outside world over against it, but in such a way that the connection between in the two have independent ends, appears mutually opposed at the same time incorporated, and instinctual. In a state of tension, feeling is simply a way of offering resistance to outside world.

The mechanical sphere of feeling is determined in the two senses, sight, and hearing. In sight, we see things with two eyes but one vision, only or more so, one point at a time. In sight it is the unity, it is possible to see an object and at the same time give attention to your finger, you become aware of your finger without changing the course or direction of your eyes and see both objects at once.

Zeno proclaimed that beginning and end are the extreme of everything. In that case is eternal. But then, that which contains two cannot suffer both at once; or one will be no longer one, but two.


Zeno argued that if one moves from one point in space
to another, one must first traverse half the distance. But before it can do that, it must traverse a half of the half, and so on ad infinitum.

For example Zeno used the race in which the tortoise has a head start,
and the swifter-running Achilles can never overtake the tortoise. Before he
comes up to the point at which the tortoise started, the tortoise will have
got a little way, and so on ad infinitum.

His very hypothesis of one and two, and the consequences to two in relation to one, are the hypothesis of the being and other, but also to each other. The same holds good of motion and rest, of generation and destruction, and even of being and not-being. In a word, when you suppose anything to be or not to be, or to be in any way affected, we must look at the penalty in relation to the thing itself, and to any other things which we choose-to each of them individually, to more than one, and to all; and so of other things, we must look at them in relation to self and to anything else which we suppose either to be or not to be.

The notion of the arrow at rest. Zeno argued, at any given moment
it is in a space equal to its own length, and therefore is at rest at that
moment. So, it's at rest at all moments. That the sum of an infinite
number of these positions of rest is not a motion. Now suppose there are
three arrows. Arrow B is at rest. Suppose A moves to the right past B, and
C moves to the left past B, at the same rate. Then A will move past C at
twice the rate.

Love of knowledge that is requisite above all to establish certainty in philosophy. Also consider this endeavor is important and attained by pulling from mind all the wrong opinions, to cultivating reason, and advancing in the knowledge of the truth.

Knowledge is the instrument of reason comes on the scene liberates and carries out reason. Truth is the idea and the idea alone grasps truth, exalts knowing the ultimate absolute truth means to exercise reason

Little by little, raise your mind. Truth is framed by the mind, tested by the senses and we sentient creatures have a beginning and an end, but mind can neither be destroyed nor begotten.

Freethinking is pure knowledge and because pure knowledge is the ultimate absolute reason there can be nothing so remote that you cannot reason. Everything has reason is the requisite of knowledge consider reason the most important thing in the entire world.

Don't underestimate the influence of not-knowing and how to (differently) deal with that compared to knowledge of more certainty (info-gap theory).

In the early nineteen sixties I dressed like a beatnik all in black went to only foreign movie, smoked European cigarettes and hung out in jazz clubs.

My father many times said to me about my race that when you step out side in the world you are representing your race. I think every kid should follow that and they will grow into good citizen.

If a child knows nothing it starts with a clean slate. I was one infected only by sensuous phenomenons all duties, rights, maxims and views roved wild unfettered fancies.

I excepted anything at all given to me as knowledge. All around me self seeking interests until philosophy’s gentle hand came to my aid and lifted me up to the sciences.

I was entangled in aims and enjoyments all sensuous, my mind was literally buried in dreaming and slumbering in life; Much like the youth of any "today", lost , dimmed or oppressed by want, and hard in driven by life youth gets lost by other pursuits but is re-illuminated.

Seems superfluous to give rise to philosophy without giving some suitable historical sketch of what knowledge is.

Turn back to the epoch of philosophy which took place thousands of centuries ago. A revival as such is recommended specially of the ancient philosophy of Platonism, Aristotelian and Epicurean, they were not self-seeking, their cravings of self want must have disappeared and strength, elevation, and fortitude must have appeared, their passions subdued and consciousness so far advanced.

You cannot isolate knowledge from its socio-cultural bathwater.

You can try.

You are right. You can try but must remain aware of possible mismatches and keep testing for validity and reliability of your knowledge, to make it robust against the socio-cultural changes that it emerged from.