Women, Freedom, Entrapment, Strategy

[Dennis Mahar]

Can we say a theory tries to save the appearances?

which was the instruction Plato issued to his students.

[guest_of_logic]

Maybe, I'm just not quite sure what you mean by that. I could hazard a guess, but I'd rather not preempt you - go ahead and explain if you like.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Like I said, and I will rephrase, do you agree that nothing has ever been experienced/known/seen/evidenced that isn't a direct manifestation of consciousness?

You might say these manifestations are a result of external *whatever*.

But, it still remains, that everything that has ever been experienced, known, seen to exist, that the compass of all these things, every sight, every sensation and thought, has been contained fully "within" consciousness.

Your claim is that things exist external to observation. Sadly for your claim, it can't be observed.

Yet you still make this claim, while knowing that you have no possible means to directly evidence anything external to consciousness. (Consciousness being the compass of all experience/knowing/thought, all these existing as an experience "within" consciousness)

So, what I'm doing is trying to ask you is to admit, out of sincerity, that all experiences of "external" universe, have been experiences existing "within" consciousness. I'm trying to show you something great.

I want you to repeat this in your mind until you can see truly why it is "easier", "simpler"... "Truth of Noble wisdom that nothing exists but what is seen of the mind itself" -

The two reasons you've given have been:

a) An abstract imagination of consciousness about a computer game with zero applicable use while considering consciousness.

b) That since you can manipulate/navigate/learn about your consistent experiences of consciousness, this somehow implies something external to consciousness.



Look laird, why are you assigning so much credibility to this abstract imagination, you know this thought to be a formation of consciousness in itself.

All thoughts are in fact, what a funny fact!

You agree that every single idea/thought/conceptualization is simply a mental formation of consciousness?
You agree that many of these can be simply imaginative, bearing no relation to the reality of how things work?

[Dennis Mahar]

I suppose I was going to generate the idea of 'free creations of the human mind'.

Plato's idea was a theory was no good unless it was personally transformative.

This idea of 'Human Rights' showing up in your mind born out of personal suffering looks to have been personally transformative.
It's also generous and wise because it's 'for all' and not selfish really.

In that way the appearances have been saved.

Sorry if I crossed a boundary there.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

And the way you are trying to "fit together" these "different" consciousness's is based on your conceptualization of them as being separate.

Nothing is inherently existing in itself and hence to speak of consciousness as separate or even individual is to fall into dualism and to give unwarranted credibility to the discriminations of your mind.


"Truth of Noble Wisdom that is beyond the reasoning knowledge of the philosophers as well as being beyond the understanding of ordinary disciples and masters; and which is realisable only within the inmost consciousness; for your sakes, I too, would discourse on the same Truth. All that is seen in the world is devoid of effort and action because all things in the world are like a dream, or like an image miraculously projected. This is not comprehended by the philosophers and the ignorant, but those who thus see things see them truthfully. Those who see things otherwise walk in discrimination and, as they depend upon discrimination, they cling to dualism. The world as seen by discrimination is like seeing one's own image reflected in a mirror, or one's shadow, or the moon reflected in water, or an echo heard in the valley. People grasping their own shadows of discrimination become attached to this thing and that thing and failing to abandon dualism they go on forever discriminating and thus never attain tranquillity. By tranquillity is meant Oneness, and Oneness gives birth to the highest Samadhi which is gained by entering into the realm of Noble Wisdom that is realisable only within one's inmost consciousness."


Laird, since you still retain the idea that you have control over your thoughts, free will, it's clear that you are still fully identifying with "Self".

"This am I not!" - Buddha

This is "the whole point" of meditation/wakefulness, to recognize your own "lack of ego", to be a silent observer if you will, to watch your thoughts and feelings until hopefully you can realize that thought is like the heart, it beats despite "you", it is not under your control which can be seen clearly from the way it acts/reacts.

Eeep. Man, you are on an enlightenment forum while displaying a complete lack of understanding of the basic principles given by "the enlightened guy". Either that or you are completely disagreeing with them.

Have you ever considered it is called "awakening" because you start off not "awakened"?

"One in a million people become enlightened without the help of a teacher" - Buddha Gautama

[guest_of_logic]

John,

In those posts you return to talking-at rather than responding-to. I've explained to you at length two reasons to disbelieve your claim that external reality does not exist, and in these two posts of yours, you totally ignored those reasons and my elaborations on them other than to very badly paraphrase them in a couple of terse sentences. That's not how you convince people to accept your ideas! It seems that you either haven't yet realised, or have become temporarily forgetful of the fact, that convincing people of your ideas to a significant extent involves overcoming their objections to those ideas.

Here's how it might have gone:

OK, Laird, so, let's take your objections one at a time. For a start, you suggest that there is a contradiction in that by my reasoning, I exist in your mind yet you too exist in my mind, and that as well as being contradictory, this involves an infinite recursion. This apparent contradiction, however, can be overcome by instead thinking about it like this: [insert your comments here]. You also remind me that my contention that consciousness is not "located" anywhere involves, by my own admission, "magic" that I do not know how to explain, and that in contrast, your contention of consciousnesses located in an external reality does not require magic but instead makes use only of concepts familiar to all of us - concepts that "work". To this, I respond that [insert your comments here, one possibility being: 'even though I described the way non-located consciousnesses might work as by "magic", I have thought about it further and would now describe it in these terms which I think are concrete and "workable", and which I think you will agree are more plausible than "located" consciousnesses: [insert your explanation of your terms here]']. [Going on in this way to systematically address every objection I have put to you]

See how it works?

Dennis,

Even though I have for the reason I gave you earlier chosen to frame my terms such that our minds "access" abstract entities rather than "create" them, I'm still very much open to the idea of creativity, so I'm amenable to your suggestion that you are "generating" ideas, and that there are "free creations" of the mind. Under my terms, we might define creativity as the process by which the mind accesses and ranges over, according to its preferences, the abstract landscape of (pre-existing) abstract entities.

This idea of 'Human Rights' showing up in your mind born out of personal suffering looks to have been personally transformative.
It's also generous and wise because it's 'for all' and not selfish really.

It's true that human rights became more relevant to me when my own were violated, but they have been important to me all along, starting with my childhood in South Africa prior to the demise of apartheid, during which time my parents were active defenders of the rights of its black and "coloured" peoples.

In that way the appearances have been saved.

Hmm. I'm still not quite sure what you mean by this, and while I could still guess, I also still don't want to put words into your mouth.

Sorry if I crossed a boundary there.

Apology accepted. Like I said, I believe you did it unintentionally. In turn, I'm sorry if my response was too heavy-handed.

[Dennis Mahar]

Even though I have for the reason I gave you earlier chosen to frame my terms such that our minds "access" abstract entities rather than "create" them, I'm still very much open to the idea of creativity, so I'm amenable to your suggestion that you are "generating" ideas, and that there are "free creations" of the mind. Under my terms, we might define creativity as the process by which the mind accesses and ranges over, according to its preferences, the abstract landscape of (pre-existing) abstract entities.

Well, you know what they say,
necessity is the mother of invention.

There are ideas 'in the fringes' in a 'knowledge bank' as territory already explored by consciousness that are meaningful in pressing situations that get shared around.

If it's personally transformative and universally transformative it's good.

Apology accepted. Like I said, I believe you did it unintentionally. In turn, I'm sorry if my response was too heavy-handed.

I 'get' you understand harmonious relations and respect that and lose your way now and then.
You're not lonely in that.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

The claims I'm making requires the use of your mind, not the use of your logical thoughts per se, the aim is to watch and understand these thoughts and sensations with an empty mind, you need to observe and be wakeful, the more I explain it in detail the more you conceptualize things that it isn't and have a hard time understanding, remember it is "awakening" to the realization that "the objective world, like a vision, is a manifestation of the mind."

This isn't awakening to a sentence, the same way you might try and grasp some idea about a computer program or whatever other mundane/specific topic, it requires you to better grasp your own consciousness, which is the compass of all "mundane/specific topics".

[guest_of_logic]

It's your choice, John. I really don't mind if you choose not to address my objections - in fact it makes it easier for me, because it avoids any chance that I'm going to have to radically alter my views about reality. Just be aware that you're unlikely to be able to convince me without addressing them.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

I'm just as unlikely to be able to convince you through trying to detail it, you will need to honestly investigate the extent/credibility of your own knowledge on this subject.

If you were to assess it sincerely you would see how shallow it is, and, when you have understood "not-knowing" you can then go on to assess your consciousness and it's experiences without the cloud of dogma and pre-conceived notions, "empty mind".

[Pye]

Seeker writes: nothing has ever been experienced/known/seen/evidenced that isn't a direct manifestation of consciousness?

Okay, well, the "as" is missing here, but no matter. All of your restatements of this contain the same linguistic problem which you can't see yet. This very understanding you have cannot be posited without positing a world as well which can only-exist-as, or only-be-manifested-in (or, manifestation-of). Your putting quotes around the word "universe" does not mitigate this problem.

Look as well at the aforementioned sentence and its double-negative - "nothing . . . isn't." This is a synonym for "something . . . is." You will not be able to get from 'universe' to the 'consciousness' wherein it can only arise, without assuming the universe itself wherein it arises. You can't get rid of this "it." The only way you can do this is to say simply, "there is no world," which would be tantamount to saying "nothing exists." You can't say that because you believe that mind exists. You can't even say "there is no world but what is in the mind," because now the 'world' is in it.

You've had numerous admissions - at least from me! - that we cannot exceed mind in apprehending world. But something is apprehended. Something is taken-in to consciousness to exist there. We've become conscious-of something. There's a something; not a nothing. If nothing, no world; no mind.

I think, though, that this will be my last go at this with you. You keep paraphrasing; I keep paraphrasing, and yet none of these word-jumblings eliminate the problem. I recall you saying somewhere on here that language is the problem - the limits of language make it so it cannot touch whatever 'truths' there are to be had. Unless you can transcend the aforementioned linguistic problem, then perhaps you might take the Wittgensteinian route and admit that whatever cannot be said has to be passed over in silence.

(You ever going to answer that sentiency question?)



(Tomas, thankyou and all, but there's no need to call in an administrative posse or address this as "offense," and I was sort of hoping that was made perfectly clear when I brought it up. I brought it up - it's out there - it's been disclosed. Possibilities can happen from there. And Laird, you gentle fellow, the comment you recall is not at all the species of comment to which I meant to refer. Once years ago in the heat of argument, Diebert wrote that I was a living example of why women can't think. You are not on a list of winky-sexualizers, and neither is Diebert. And that, I think, is my last go at this, too. :))

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Once years ago in the heat of argument, Diebert wrote that I was a living example of why women can't think. You are not on a list of winky-sexualizers, and neither is Diebert. And that, I think, is my last go at this, too. :))

Not so fast! :-) I was wondering how hot the argument or I was at the time so I traced it back to the discussion Women have no soul? from 2009. Normally I'm quite exact in what I write and certainly wouldn't call some visitor oozing with intelligence an example of disabled thought in any circumstance. But I did indeed wrote that you appeared to have "absorbed nothing at all, thereby almost single-handedly proving Quinn's thesis on how much is stacked against women" which I'm quite sure is what you are referring to here. Later on I explained this as my problem to "recognize your recaps the last few months as representing anything written here". Something I accused Alex of a few times as well. But instead of not being able to think I described the womanly type of thought as "surrounding, embellishing thoughts with too many alien, mysterious, unfinished, unborn possibilities".

Now although this was perhaps a bit over the top and filled with some disappointment in how you seemed to represent a couple of core issues, I'd still like to oppose your particular recap of the discussion. That said, we might still disagree on the problematic aspects of feminine flavored thought. Or the nature of soul.

[Pye]

No worries, Diebert. It was a quickly gathered comment of mine and you've located exactly where it was, and we could quibble over gist & context again, but I'd just as soon that sleeping dog ('womanly thinking') be left laying. I am glad, however, that you pointed others to it (if they care) for clarity and context.

[guest_of_logic]

I am glad, however, that you pointed others to it (if they care) for clarity and context.

I care, as much for the clarity and context as for the entire thread, which you owned, in the same way that Alex will own a thread in the deconstruction of the house philosophy. You guys take totally different approaches but they're both so incisive and eloquent. Aside from the perfection of your critique of the gender philosophy of the house, I was taken by this post which does a number on its hard determinism. I have a feeling I've pointed you in his direction before, but I am indebted to another philosopher for helping me see through the false dilemma of hard determinism - not that I was ever beguiled by the notion itself, rather by the predicate on which it is based, the apparent impossibility of reconciling free will with determinism. That philosopher is Professor Norman Swartz, and the page that first clued me in to his way of thinking is his Lecture Notes on Free Will and Determinism. I'd be interested in your thoughts if you ever end up reading it.

[Alex T. Jacob]

But the awakened and knowing say: body am I entirely, and nothing else; and soul is only a word for something about the body. The body is a great reason, a plurality with one sense, a war and a peace, a herd and a shepherd. An instrument of your body is also your little reason, my brother, which you call 'spirit'--a little instrument and toy of your great reason. 'I', you say, and are proud of the word. But greater is that in which you do not wish to have faith--your body and its great reason: that does not say 'I', but does 'I'.

---Nietzsche

Possibilities can happen from there. And Laird, you gentle fellow, the comment you recall is not at all the species of comment to which I meant to refer. Once years ago in the heat of argument, Diebert wrote that I was a living example of why women can't think. You are not on a list of winky-sexualizers, and neither is Diebert. And that, I think, is my last go at this, too.

The gentle ones get the Pye but they rarely get the pie. The lesson: never allow a woman to corral you. She'll then insist you piss while sitting down on the toilet. Youll become a fixture in her little ordered world. It is woman's grand achievement to mind-fuck men so they reengineer without intervention their own thinking, their seeing, to accord with a politically correct vision of reality. It is another extension of romantic, Rousseauesque thinking-impositions.

You people have so terrorized me that I woke up at 3 am imagining retorts. 'Mom's Apple Pie' (the image) tells a fundamental truth about women, about the yoni, about the vagina. And every 'fact' in this world points directly and honestly to a group of truths that do not accord with the politically correct overlay. That yoni, when activated, is simply another creature altogether and no one, or few, have the fortitude to see the facts.

I am wondering now if one of the great achievements in life for men is not domination of the yoni in a spiritual sense, or perhaps metaphysical sense (?) It is true that most all men are in a 'loopy' relationship to the yoni and I am asking what is the realistic alternative? Man's mastery of himself has to come about through 'mastery' of the female principal, which means knowing what it is and what it isn't. We can never really see what women are because there are just too many layers of imposition: it is so highly politicized and charged that one is almost better off avoiding the subject altogether!

In any case, for me for awhile, I leave you-all to get it all worked out. A great deal of what we talked about here has given me a lot to work with! Will be seeing you on the next go-round.

[Dennis Mahar]

Yoni's upmarket from asses so that's an improvement.
Can't wait for belly buttons.
we can run thru' the chakras.
With bated breath.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I care, as much for the clarity and context as for the entire thread, which you owned, in the same way that Alex will own a thread in the deconstruction of the house philosophy. You guys take totally different approaches but they're both so incisive and eloquent.

Hahahah! Thanks for making me laugh, Laird. Of course I totally understand your desired misreading but from my perspective it's like hearing during or after a quarrel (thread) in kindergarten having one of the nippers comment on so and so owning the whole 21-story building. You know, I don't see myself arguing for a certain opinion but I know that, somewhat imperfectly, it's nevertheless representing thinking which has been around as long as there were humans and is shared by great thinkers from all disciplines and religions. It's not something to take apart lightly. And the moment anyone seriously tried (lets say Nietzsche in his time) he ends up falling in line instead. So all what's left for me is rephrasing, responding and maneuvering while lining up better with what's greater than anything I'd ever imagined.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

The lesson: never allow a woman to corral you. She'll then insist you piss while sitting down on the toilet. Youll become a fixture in her little ordered world. It is woman's grand achievement to mind-fuck men so they reengineer without intervention their own thinking, their seeing, to accord with a politically correct vision of reality. It is another extension of romantic, Rousseauesque thinking-impositions.

Does this mean you have broken up with her?

[guest_of_logic]

Well, to even it out a little, I think you owned in this thread with this comment:

A typical male issue, the all too sexualized but at the same time overfamiliar talk when it's thought to be a woman at the other end. It's playing for the audience actually, staking out positions while hardly meant for the female involved (even when no audience is actually there).

It's refreshing after your earlier comments in a different thread that oh how surprising to see Laird popping up in support of women and puppies - to know that you are, after all, capable of a generous spirit towards our sisters.

[Tomas]

John, Here's how it might have gone:

OK, Laird, so, let's take your objections one at a time. For a start, you suggest that there is a contradiction in that by my reasoning, I exist in your mind yet you too exist in my mind, and that as well as being contradictory, this involves an infinite recursion. This apparent contradiction, however, can be overcome by instead thinking about it like this: [insert your comments here]. You also remind me that my contention that consciousness is not "located" anywhere involves, by my own admission, "magic" that I do not know how to explain, and that in contrast, your contention of consciousnesses located in an external reality does not require magic but instead makes use only of concepts familiar to all of us - concepts that "work". To this, I respond that [insert your comments here, one possibility being: 'even though I described the way non-located consciousnesses might work as by "magic", I have thought about it further and would now describe it in these terms which I think are concrete and "workable", and which I think you will agree are more plausible than "located" consciousnesses: [insert your explanation of your terms here]']. [Going on in this way to systematically address every objection I have put to you]

See how it works?

Very good, Laird. You win a cookie.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Tomas, neither of them have cookies, they are both on the incorrect side of the argument. Are you?

Listen, this is an enlightenment forum, enlightenment is about recognizing the objective world is a manifestation of the mind and that nothing exists but what is seen of the mind, then acting accordingly.

I'm not telling you guys an idea trying to say why my idea is a good one.

I'm telling you guys a fact, a fundamental realization of awakening, trying to make you guys come to the same realization.
It's a different situation.

Pye

"You've had numerous admissions - at least from me! - that we cannot exceed mind in apprehending world. But something is apprehended. Something is taken-in to consciousness to exist there. We've become conscious-of something. There's a something; not a nothing. If nothing, no world; no mind."

You did it again, you implied that the things "in" consciousness, the conscious-of, must exist externally to consciousness for consciousness to be conscious-of them.

But this isn't a valid point, seeing as we have already proved objects can be "in" consciousness, consciousness can be conscious-of things, without those things existing externally or as anything more than imaginative experiences like a dream.

Whatever you said about "as" and specific words, this still remains a fact:

Everything ever experienced/seen/known/thought of/conceptualized have all been experiences of consciousness.

Existing within the scope of mental formations/thoughts/ sensations etc.

Nothing ever experienced/seen/known/thought of/ or conceptualized has not been an experience of consciousness. (They all have been, every thought)

You know this, you only try to add an "extra", that the things we are seeing of the mind are sourced externally from the mind.

I'm trying to show you why this reasoning is faulty, but that doesn't work with language only, it requires wakefulness of your own experiences, non-judgmental observation, and it requires you to stop identifying with your Self, to watch your thoughts rather than "believe" them.

Your sentiency question was the same as the conscious-of question, the things your conscious-of are also manifestations of mind.

The reason you think they are sourced externally is because of particular experiences of mind, such as seeing your body/brain and thinking it is the source of your consciousness.

When in reality, your seeing of body is a result of consciousness which already was.

The world is an illusion of consciousness, it's just how things are, it is not at first agreeable, but you can never learn this or progress while your trying to fight for old views, abandon them!

Just recognize when you see objects in a dream(in your mind) , you don't think or assume they are "real objects". ( You know they are just imaginative experiences)

Then, while experiencing the same sensations, you see objects in waking state and then going on to say they are "real objects". (You think they are something other than simply imaginative experiences)

And your only reason is because you saw them. Seeing the flaw yet?

How are you distinguishing between what is "real" and what is only of the mind?
You agree that a lot of what you experience is only of the mind, (dreams, imaginings) then go on to say that other things experienced aren't only of the mind, that they are "more" real, how are you making this distinction?

Haven't you realized you are only saying this because you are "here" now, being bias? You think it is what is real because you are experiencing it now.

[guest_of_logic]

Because Alex has bid his adieu, I won't address this post to him, but it is in response to his leaving post.

There's an idea in it that I've seen and heard elsewhere, especially from Skip when he visited Kevin personally, but also in MRA and PUA material. It's this idea that has different expressions: that women are out to "betafy" men, to "pussy whip" us, to turn us into "manginas", to "feminise" us, to turn us into "politically correct robots", etc etc. As questionable as this idea is, even more questionable is that it is typically presented as being such a detrimental thing for a woman to do to a man, and for a man to have done to him by a woman, because it is a reversal of the rightful roles: it's an unashamedly (Alex owned a very similar word in his second post to this thread) patriarchal view. It unhelpfully perpetuates a notion of gender warfare in a particularly ugly way: that not only is it men's role to dominate women, but that, if women were to fight back against this domination (a word that Alex uses explicitly in a related context in his last post) and attempt to reverse the roles or simply to neutralise the perpetrator's power, the correct response would be to "squash them down again", to put them back in their places.

In its uncharitableness towards women it assumes that women would want to perpetuate the unequal power dynamics, or at least the de-potentiation, to which they have historically been subjected, if only they had the upper hand this time: that the experience has not taught them how unjust that whole schema is (if they were ever in doubt). With respect to the specifics of Alex's post, I don't feel in the slightest bit "corralled" by Pye, her most egregious attempt at "feminisation" has been to suggest that I re-examine some of the things that Dennis put to me, hardly an imposition - but then, for a woman to even make a suggestion like that to a man might be seen by some as usurping that man's personal authority: that a woman's judgement might ever surpass a man's, even on a single occasion, is anathema to some (I don't necessarily include Alex in this, I don't know that his view is that extreme; I suspect that it's not). I actually feel that the opposite is true, that Pye gives people the space to be who they are and want to be.

Are there women who do attempt to dominate or illegitimately de-potentiate men in this way? I'm sure there are, just as you can find the expression of any kind of pathological behaviour you care to imagine somewhere on the planet, but this, in my experience, is not typical; instead, in my experience, women seek relationships of cooperation and mutual support, which is not to say that they don't expect or want men to take the lead at appropriate times, but nor do they expect to be led at all times, nor to be blocked from taking the lead on occasions where that, too, is appropriate; acknowledging that I'm generalising and that individual men, women and relationship dynamics vary (and why not?).

The response of the PUA to observations like this is generally, "You just haven't seen through the illusion yet, you're still being fooled". In this sense, it's very much like a conspiracy theory: there is an unexpected, unintuitive "truth" about the (women of the) world of which only those who have "seen through the lies" are aware, and with respect to which those who don't see it are living in delusion. There are plausible conspiracy theories, but this is not one of them.

[Dennis Mahar]

John,
Pye is saying you have to be somebody before you can be nobody.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Didn't catch that point, you can't be nobody while you still think you are somebody.

It doesn't seem that they have realized that there is no somebody yet.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

Laird, you haven't seen through the illusion yet, you're still being fooled.

:D