The Call for Debate Thread

[Kelly Jones]

An online copy here of the autobiography of Yogananada for another instance of the mistake that virtually everyone makes about spirituality.

[Carl G]

What is the mistake?

[Kelly Jones]

We wretched humans think spirit is other than what is always experienced.

[Alex Jacob]

Really, if you wanted to understand where P. Yogananda is coming from and what wares he is selling, you'd have to turn to his interpretation of the Bhagavad-Gita. In short, he presents (in his interpretation of the Bhagavad-Gita) a model in which the soul that is in man incarnated into the material sphere, and the 'yoga' that is presented in the Bhagavad-Gita---the scriptural revelation which in Indian understanding is Divine, revered and elevated---is a map or a toolbox, if you will, for putting all the process of material incarnation in reverse, so that the human soul can free itself from bondage in the material plane. We came into material manifestation through a 'condensation of spiritual energy', and to go back out of it and into or toward our 'true nature' we have to apply a reverse manoeuvre. That is yoga.

In general terms, that is pretty much Indian spirituality in a nutshell.

Oddly enough, there are materialistic schools of thought in Indian philosophy (Carvaka and others) that stand in opposition to these elaborate metaphysics, and criticize them brutally. Unfortunately though, there is very little of extant Carvaka writings because they have been destroyed by the True Believers. What is known of the Carvaka arguments, from what I have read, all come from theists and theologians who were railing against it. (I haven't read, just glossed the Wikipedia article, but have read of Carvaka in other sources.)

You wrote:

[That the 'mistake' made is that] 'we wretched humans think spirit is other than what is always experienced.'

But this is not at all correct as it pertains to Indian existential philosophy and metaphysics. You have, in fact, made a mistake, a glossary mistake. Indian philosophy is very far-reaching and pretty complex. What some Indian schools say, which is different from your interpretation, is that what we know as reality, the material reality that we know through our experience, is a portion of God's 'energy'. They do not say that it is not God, or that it is not 'spirit', they say though that there are in the creation many different 'frequencies' of God's energy, and they propose that there is also a 'spiritual world', which is to say another sort of manifestation that is less gross and less material than this one. Yet, they say, this too is material though they call it subtle-material. It is simply less dense.

So, it is incorrect to say that they think that God is not what we constantly experience---the material manifestation where we are taking place. What they do say is that human beings have unique perceptual capabilities that, if put to use, enable us to become aware of more subtle energies (what I assume you mean when you use the word 'spirit'), and that we can hone in on this subtle energy, and we do so by certain practices, or through practicing certain ethics, and also by refraining from certain activities that, they say, tend to mire us in 'God's external energy', that is, materialism. It does not say that materialism is 'bad' per se, they say that it is unforgiving and dangerous. They say that if we develop the habit of thinking of matter exclusively as our home, we lose sight of our 'true origin' in a far higher material frequency, and by seeking to fulfil ourselves in our material world, we risk exacerbating our 'karma' by getting into trouble or predicaments here, or by becoming more and more forgetful of our 'spiritual nature', and thereby losing the the keen desire to 'transcend'.

I can tell you as a pretty solid fact that Paramahansa Yogananda most definitively did not see 'spirit' as something other than matter, but always talked about the manifestation of God in all things, including the core of atoms, electrons, etc. But what he did say is that, in someone who is psychically and spiritually developed, vision and perception is sharpened, because consciousness is sharpened, purified. He once held a flower and looked at it and said to some people near him (his disciples) that most of what they saw when they looked at the flower was its material aspect, but when he looked at the flower he saw that and much, much more.

So much hinges though on prepositions, don't you think dear Kelly? It does hinge on language. In our langauge we give places to things. Our langauge separates us from things. If we write something down, something unwritable really, we are all of sudden locked into the erroneousness of our phrasing.

But really what interests me, personally, is your particular concretization of an atheistic and materialist philsophy. What it is based on, what it proposes, and what it asks of you.

I am not representaing Indian philosophy, necessarily, but neither am I representing your brand of materialist-atheistic philsophy. You are very, very adamant in communicating your view, which has absolute tones, and it is this evangelical, dogmatic expression that reveals the key elements about the underlying psychology.

St Diebert writes: (on the comments thread)

"It seems to me Alex only claims here that PY had those experiences and doesn't make claims about where those experiences were stemming from, or how subjective they were. It might be interesting for Alex to reveal why he's so sure that PY is not confabulating at any time, but it's a different discussion to question if PY's experiences were phenomenons in scientific sense, that is : repeatable, testable, observable, or some brain farts, group hypes, inner visions etc."

His book is a sort of huge, action-packed, spiritual comic book for the gullible. His book is the prototype in a very real sense for a whole slew of similar fantasies (Carlos Castaneda among them) that have put a huge mark on contemporary alternative spirituality, and made it into an absurd joke.

His spirituality, as he wrote, stems out of his samhadi experience, which he writes about.

[maestro]

His book is a sort of huge, action-packed, spiritual comic book for the gullible. His book is the prototype in a very real sense for a whole slew of similar fantasies (Carlos Castaneda among them) that have put a huge mark on contemporary alternative spirituality, and made it into an absurd joke.

He seems to be an attention grabber writing pulp spirituality books.

[David Quinn]

Really, if you wanted to understand where P. Yogananda is coming from and what wares he is selling, you'd have to turn to his interpretation of the Bhagavad-Gita. In short, he presents (in his interpretation of the Bhagavad-Gita) a model in which the soul that is in man incarnated into the material sphere, and the 'yoga' that is presented in the Bhagavad-Gita---the scriptural revelation which in Indian understanding is Divine, revered and elevated---is a map or a toolbox, if you will, for putting all the process of material incarnation in reverse, so that the human soul can free itself from bondage in the material plane. We came into material manifestation through a 'condensation of spiritual energy', and to go back out of it and into or toward our 'true nature' we have to apply a reverse manoeuvre. That is yoga.

In general terms, that is pretty much Indian spirituality in a nutshell.

That is only strand of Indan spirituality, or more accurately, one strand of Indian populism. Buddhism, for example, doesn't subscribe to any of the tenets above, nor do various Vedantic schools of thought, such as Advaita Vedanta. And certainly, a wise Indian would never subscribe to them.

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[Kelly Jones]

Here's Yogananda's interpretation of nirvana and rebirth. It's unbelievably silly.

The problem is, he translates poetry literally. What is so simple, a dolt like Yogananda interprets from the dark and smoky night of lunacy.

[Alex Jacob]

Yet everything that is not precisely your view of reality, and 'ultimate reality' is, eo ipso, lunacy.

I read your ideas, with the concrete wall of certainty that rides along with them, and to me it also looks a little like lunacy.

The funny thing, as I see it, is that whatever your view of 'nirvana' and 'rebirth' might be, it is still going to be a story, but your story is one that, from the look of it, provides you with an arrogant platform from which to judge all other descriptions, all other allusions. You seek for yourself a place to wield your contempt, which is palpable, and one notices a sort of fiery arrogance in your approach that could be called 'unwise'.

David has criticised the populism of branches of Indian religious practice (tantra, etc), and feels that he knows and has access to the truer of all true things. It runs through everything the TBs say and write on this forum. It is a game of 'being right', a kind of one-upmanship, but no one of you ever seems to be able to look at it, and you support each other in your game of winning, asserting your views, prevailing.

Personally, I look at all stories and first note they are stories. There is no way to describe ultimate reality in the sense of a human beings relatedness to his creation, his existence, and his relationship to meaning. And it is exactly in that spirit that I read your stories, which are so important to you, that have intense fervor.

You have so much evangelical certainty.

[Alex Jacob]

David wrote:

"Buddhism, for example, doesn't subscribe to any of the tenets above, nor do various Vedantic schools of thought, such as Advaita Vedanta. And certainly, a wise Indian would never subscribe to them."

I would say that Buddhism is born of the same mother, though. It arises from he same matrix. Buddhism represents a different thrust, a different set of flavors, that mobilizes the person differently.

Advaitists attack Dvaitists, Dvaitists attack Advaitists, and some bridge-personality comes along who represents a way of bridging the division. (Ramakrishna).

These are word-games, quite often.

[David Quinn]

Yet everything that is not precisely your view of reality, and 'ultimate reality' is, eo ipso, lunacy.

I read your ideas, with the concrete wall of certainty that rides along with them, and to me it also looks a little like lunacy.

The funny thing, as I see it, is that whatever your view of 'nirvana' and 'rebirth' might be, it is still going to be a story, but your story is one that, from the look of it, provides you with an arrogant platform from which to judge all other descriptions, all other allusions. You seek for yourself a place to wield your contempt, which is palpable, and one notices a sort of fiery arrogance in your approach that could be called 'unwise'.

David has criticised the populism of branches of Indian religious practice (tantra, etc), and feels that he knows and has access to the truer of all true things. It runs through everything the TBs say and write on this forum. It is a game of 'being right', a kind of one-upmanship, but no one of you ever seems to be able to look at it, and you support each other in your game of winning, asserting your views, prevailing.

Personally, I look at all stories and first note they are stories. There is no way to describe ultimate reality in the sense of a human beings relatedness to his creation, his existence, and his relationship to meaning. And it is exactly in that spirit that I read your stories, which are so important to you, that have intense fervor.

You have so much evangelical certainty.

Funnily enough, this is precisely what you do, Alex. You've created a story - namely, that everything is a story - and then you have proceeded to judge others on the basis of whether they accept this story or not. And you do this arrogantly.

Having said this, your criticisms of Kelly are not without merit.

It is a game of 'being right', a kind of one-upmanship, but no one of you ever seems to be able to look at it, and you support each other in your game of winning, asserting your views, prevailing.

There are many possible reasons why a person might engage in discussion and debate - stimulation, education, dialectical discourse, inspiration, etc. Your story that it is just about one-upmanship is an impoverished one.

If you can, try not to interpret what I've just said here as me simply playing one-upmanship.

Personally, I look at all stories and first note they are stories. There is no way to describe ultimate reality in the sense of a human beings relatedness to his creation, his existence, and his relationship to meaning.

Are we to consider this as just another story? Or as a truth?

What do you think?

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[Kelly Jones]

I wrote about the dark, smoky night of lunacy, because those are the words describing rebirth in the Bhagavad-Gita, that Yogananda is giving a commentary on.

[David Quinn]

David wrote:

"Buddhism, for example, doesn't subscribe to any of the tenets above, nor do various Vedantic schools of thought, such as Advaita Vedanta. And certainly, a wise Indian would never subscribe to them."

I would say that Buddhism is born of the same mother, though. It arises from he same matrix. Buddhism represents a different thrust, a different set of flavors, that mobilizes the person differently.

Buddhism, at least in its wisest form, is a complete repudiation of everything that populist Hinduism stands for.

Given this, it doesn't really mean very much to say that it is related to Hinduism, even though it emerged within Hindu culture.

Advaitists attack Dvaitists, Dvaitists attack Advaitists, and some bridge-personality comes along who represents a way of bridging the division. (Ramakrishna).

I don't know about that story. Ramakrishna was a wise Buddhist, just as Buddha was a wise Hindu and Jesus a wise Zen Master. Bridging divisions wasn't on their agenda.

These are word-games, quite often.

They can be, but only when the spirit is lacking.

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[Kelly Jones]

You have so much evangelical certainty.

Thanks for your criticism.

I'm not perfectly wise. Flawed thinking does slip in. I can certainly improve in this area. I'd like to focus on reasoning more, but sometimes I'm not able to.

And, sometimes a person doesn't want to get out of bed. They are lost in sleep, in a very comfortable sleep. So sometimes a little bullying is necessary.

The funny thing, as I see it, is that whatever your view of 'nirvana' and 'rebirth' might be, it is still going to be a story, but your story is one that, from the look of it, provides you with an arrogant platform from which to judge all other descriptions, all other allusions.

If I do, it is because of those flaws, which I'm doing my best to abandon. I can't do more than that.

David has criticised the populism of branches of Indian religious practice (tantra, etc), and feels that he knows and has access to the truer of all true things. It runs through everything the TBs say and write on this forum. It is a game of 'being right', a kind of one-upmanship, but no one of you ever seems to be able to look at it, and you support each other in your game of winning, asserting your views, prevailing.

Well, if I know a truth that I can't falsify, then I do. Sometimes the ego generates pride over such rare knowledge. Such a flaw can only be abandoned by accessing the truth more deeply. It's a step-by-step process, really.

The ego wants something great, rare, and satisfying, in knowledge. So it has some access to knowledge that is great. If it is satisfied with the greatness of reasoning, it has some connection to truth. The more it loves reasoning, and gets a kick out of truths, the more the mind will feast on truth and reason. Fuelled like this, the egotistical mind soon starts to have insight into ego, and there begins the possibility of truthful thinking overcoming egotistical thinking. It all depends on a deep satisfaction with truth and reason, and cultivating that type of love.

Personally, I look at all stories and first note they are stories. There is no way to describe ultimate reality in the sense of a human beings relatedness to his creation, his existence, and his relationship to meaning. And it is exactly in that spirit that I read your stories, which are so important to you, that have intense fervor.

Some stories have a lot more love of truth than others. These types of stories can reflect, rationally, on the truthfulness contained within them.


KJ

[maestro]

Advaitists attack Dvaitists, Dvaitists attack Advaitists, and some bridge-personality comes along who represents a way of bridging the division. (Ramakrishna).

IMO Ramakrishna is more hype than substance, that and his mind was configured differently from a normal human being. I find that he does not bring clarity to Advaita or Dvaita, his theatrics make the whole issue more muddled.

I am really surprised that David thinks so highly of him. Had they ever met he would have likely scolded David for his logic worship and attack of feminine and advised him to stop over analyzing and start worshiping Kali to let the divine mother's love clear his mental blocks.

[Alex Jacob]

From what I remember reading, Ramakrishna liked to bring in unlikely people to his sanga, just to stir things up, to have more contrasts, to make things more interesting.

Before my last few posts, I was looking at some [embarrassing] footage of Paramahansa Yogananda, and it made me think of something. Indian culture, almost across the board, suffers from a pretty intense inferiority complex vis-a-vis the West and of course English culture. That some of these characters mobilized to 'invade' the West, and that they played into a sort og guilt-complex of the West, enabled the more hallucinatory aspect of some of these teachings to gain a foothold. Or, perhaps as a sort of compensation, the Indians needed to embellish their religious trip with grandiose inventions, such as those that appear in Autobiography of a Yogi, in order to feel they had something to stand on. I think that Prabhupad---the Hare Krishna founder---came to this country and completely took advantage of the self-loathing of Western youth, and their youthful contempt for their own parents. The ressentiment of Prabhupad toward the core achievements of the West is totally palpable in his writings, and he seeks to place his 'Vedic Philosophy' on the top-most platform of all human knowledge, possibly because of this sense of core inferiority.

Unfortunately, if you really try to find 'real things' of 'real value' in Indian spirituality, you will search long and hard, and in vain. It doesn't really deal in substantial things, it deals with lofty insubstantial things. And yet people glom on to all this insubstantial stuff, elevate it, and really think they are on to something. This love-affair with the insubstantial and unreal is a bane in our cultures.
________________________________________________

David wrote:

"Funnily enough, this is precisely what you do, Alex. You've created a story - namely, that everything is a story - and then you have proceeded to judge others on the basis of whether they accept this story or not. And you do this arrogantly."

You don't always get it, in fact you very seldom do, but a large portion of what I write, or the way I write it, is theatrical. I may have some arrogance, that is true, but sometimes I try to create 180 degree opposite skits that reflect the surities that I discover in y'all.

I think that all things come to us as stories, David. Things happen to us, we 'see' things, we have realizations, we 'know' things, but it all is turned into a story about that. Especially when it comes to spiritual things, or 'ultimate things', everyone is dealing in story. All ideas are presented as story. You can see this in the exaggerations of story, for example elaborate metaphysics and cosmologies, or in P Yogananda's (or the Bhagavad Gita's) descriptions of 'rebirth'. You can translate that into a literal story, or a comic book, or a third-rate novel, or a very first-rate novel, or a 'sacred teaching' only for the ears of initiates, or perhaps as an allusion to things you can know only when you are experiencing them: when you have passed through death's door and are there, yourself, to 'know' what happens. Language is mediating so much of all we come to suppose about all these things, and language is story.

You are just as involved in story as anyone, and your stories have their intention (to recruit, to convince) and the recruitment has a purpose: to bring other people over to share your ethics, along with your agreements. In that, you become a community of story-tellers, who tell stories of 'truth'. The key here though is that you remain, just like all people, in bodies, going her, going there, taking a shit, paying a bill, writing a little essay on your forum, et cetera. Then slowly and surely, you begin to take leave of this world, and at a certain moment, like all of us, you will cough out your last dying breath, and cease to exist on this plane.

What happens at that moment is still very much up in the air. We will know that when we get there, and so much that people do beforehand, is just chatter and story.

I am not so sure, myself, if all of the descriptions offered by scripture is 100% illusory however. A story is a way to organize some information, to relay some information. Stories allude to things, but they are not the things themselves.

Stories are tools that 'keep conceptual pathways open, as I see things, so I would certainly not say that your stories are without merit. Your stories have relevance for me, but I rarely state that to you. What you exclude from your stories is what concerns me.
___________________________________________________

Kelly,

Stop acting like a girl! Don't make pitiful excuses for your 'ego'. Don't say you are just having a bad day! Or are only somewhat wise! Get a grip on yourself and come back swinging!

[Kelly Jones]

I'm not making excuses for my attachments, Alex. I was just thanking you for pointed to a flaw in my psychology. It reminded me of one rather painful example of a fit of religious fervour, while having lunch with Dan, Sue and David. I am glad to be reminded of that error, and to think again of why it happens and how to correct it.

[David Quinn]

IMO Ramakrishna is more hype than substance, that and his mind was configured differently from a normal human being. I find that he does not bring clarity to Advaita or Dvaita, his theatrics make the whole issue more muddled.

I am really surprised that David thinks so highly of him. Had they ever met he would have likely scolded David for his logic worship and attack of feminine and advised him to stop over analyzing and start worshiping Kali to let the divine mother's love clear his mental blocks.

One of Ramakrishna's main dictums was that "women and gold" are the main barriers to God-awareness.

He also talked about how there are two main paths to God - jnana (intellectual) and bhakti (devotion) and that the former was the superior path. I differ from him in that I stress that a combination of jnana and bhakti is the greatest path of all. That is to say, a whole-hearted love of truth.

-

[David Quinn]

I think that all things come to us as stories, David. Things happen to us, we 'see' things, we have realizations, we 'know' things, but it all is turned into a story about that. Especially when it comes to spiritual things, or 'ultimate things', everyone is dealing in story. All ideas are presented as story.

So is what you say here a mere story? Or is it the truth?

It doesn't really mean anything to say that "everything is a story", if this statement is itself presented as a truth.

If such a story can speak the truth, then why not other stories as well?

Surely, you can see where this is going. It doesn't take much to realize that the whole idea of converting everything into stories is completely meaningless. It is an irrelevant smokescreen.

When are you going to start being honest and acknowledge that all of your theatrical writings, all of your sociologcial/postmodernist analysies, rest, not on stories, but on what you believe to be true?

Unfortunately, if you really try to find 'real things' of 'real value' in Indian spirituality, you will search long and hard, and in vain. It doesn't really deal in substantial things, it deals with lofty insubstantial things. And yet people glom on to all this insubstantial stuff, elevate it, and really think they are on to something. This love-affair with the insubstantial and unreal is a bane in our cultures.

To the degree that a person's level of insight extends no further than the cataloguing of sociological artifacts, this will always be the case for him.

Have an insubstantial mind and everything will seem insubstantial in return.

-

[Kelly Jones]

Alex's latest objection says that everything known to consciousness can be summed-up as some sort of story. The stories "allude to things, but they are not the things themselves".

Can consciousness know things themselves? If not, nothing about things can be alluded to. Even stories may never be known as stories, since stories are also things. So this idea of Alex is unworkable.

What is the underlying psychology that makes such an idea?

[Alex Jacob]

Kelly asks:

"Can consciousness know things themselves? If not, nothing about things can be alluded to. Even stories may never be known as stories, since stories are also things. So this idea of Alex is unworkable.

"What is the underlying psychology that makes such an idea?"

You know, of course, the anecdote about the perceiver and the thing perceived? You have an object in front of you, you are seeing it, but whatever you are seeing is 'translated'---the light that is reflected off of it---into impulses or chemical reactions that ultimately are registered on your retina, and what you perceive is 'assembled' by your brain. All the things that we see (and of course feel, tacitly) are perceived in similar ways.

Can consciousness know things themselves? It is really a good question.

It is exactly toward this question-problem that I direct my comments. I would say---as a measure of safety---that what we perceive is in a real sense an allusion to the thing itself, but is not the thing itself.

Now, it gets quite a bit more complex, as I see things, when we are dealing with human conceptual, religious, philosophical and metaphysical interpretations of life and existence. If there is uncertainty about what precisely we 'see' when we perceive a simple object, how much more complex do things become when we deal with interpretations of 'ultimate reality'.

I recognize that this issue of uncertainty and the limits of your reasoning is likely deeply unsettling to you, and to your religious fervor, to the evangelical conclusions that are your fire, the energy of your arguments.

But, that is not my fault, and it is certainly not 'post-modernist' that this is so. I am not in a position of having a responibility of protecting you from the way things are, or the diccidulties associated with precise knowledge. I can set you on the road toward liberation but I cannot do the work for you. ;-)

As to 'underlying psychology' I would say it is rooted in 'realism', a certain level of humility, a pragmatic awareness of our perceptual limitations, with just a touch of possession by Satan but not so much that it gets in my way, generally speaking.

How would you describe the psychology that operates in you?

[Kelly Jones]

If there is uncertainty about what precisely we 'see' when we perceive a simple object, how much more complex do things become when we deal with interpretations of 'ultimate reality'.

Would you mind taking this up in the debate thread? It may help if you distinguished between defining ('all things that are perceived in the field of awareness are absolutely defined as simple objects') and perceiving ('what identity does this simple object have, other than simple object?').

See the first of the two arguments in my most recent debate-thread response, to see that we are already discussing this topic right there.

And, maybe you can think about how you define uncertainty and certainty. This would probably make a great deal of difference to your arguments.

[Alex Jacob]

I have a stop-over in Tasmania next week, can't we just talk about it over dinner and drinks?

[Kelly Jones]

I think Tasmania is a stop-over for Flinders, King, Maria or other islands within the Antarctic Circle, so you must be trying evasion through humour. I'm sorry, Alex. I know you need a bit of a joke to help make reasoning palatable, but I'm not experiencing Tourette's syndrome today.

As I mentioned, it can be reasoned deductively that consciousness is bounded by non-consciousness. I define consciousness as 'things are happening'. So I can define consciousness as 'things not happening', even though it's not logically possible for things (what exists, what happens) not to be happening. The category of non-consciousness can't be known, in the sense of being experienced. All these definitions do, is point out that consciousness can be defined absolutely as what it is, relative to a logical impossibility ('things not to be happening'). That's all we're trying to do here: create an absolute and certain definition.

And, in a way, we are certainly finding something out about consciousness as well. That is really has no defining characteristics, since everything we might say about it is relative, and therefore meaningless.

[Alex Jacob]

I have important business on those islands, if you must know. If you don't wish to meet, though, I will accept your decision. I can't really disguise my hurt feelings though...

"That's all we're trying to do here: create an absolute and certain definition."

Believe me, I do understand that. It is plain for anyone to see. If I say that I take issue with that, or parts of that activity, it will follow that you will want me to get on the same plane with you, to engage in the questions in the same way you do, to hash it out. Time and time again I have observed this---what I call a 'game'---as you-plural 1) concretize your own views, 2) work out agreements between yourselves, and 3) attempt to unify yourselves as against others, and 4) destroy the positions of those you are arguing against. Even if you utterly fail in nullifying other positions, none of that matter at all, since it is not really 'reasoning' that you are interested in, but sharing your certainties.

I see this and so do many others...

In this case, because I seem to resist playing by the rules you have established, you must see me as evading. In order for you to comment on what I wrote above, you need me to write it out in a specific place, all in a certain style. If you had something to say about it, why didn't you just say it?

I am still at this point:

"Now, it gets quite a bit more complex, as I see things, when we are dealing with human conceptual, religious, philosophical and metaphysical interpretations of life and existence. If there is uncertainty about what precisely we 'see' when we perceive a simple object, how much more complex do things become when we deal with interpretations of 'ultimate reality'."

Mostly, as you well know (and it seems to be an interest you share) I have questions about the 'psychology' that underpins your views. Obviously, I have this core question about QRS and you seem a part of that gang. You even eat with them in posh restaurants. You associate to work out your agreements, and from your agreements come ethical praxis. In that, you-all are no different from any religious or social group. Ah! But you have one advantage, Absolute Truth. There can be no argument with you, and to be quite truthful there is NO POINT IN ARGUING. Kelly, you must know this! Religious fervor functions like this, but I can only suggest this to you, leave you with it, and let you work out the details---or not.

But as a tag-on, you surely must know and you do seem to know that I employ inductive processes, that are indeed distinct from deductive ones, the ones you favor. This induction is deeply problematic, I admit it, and can only be challenged by deduction. Meaning, I most certainly need to challenge my own 'inductions', and I try to do that. Yet similarly, deductive processes also seem to have their flaws. To my way of understanding, and it is a choice and it also leads to a praxis, I stand between these two methods, and avoid absolute conclusions. In that, I don't have the advantage of an absolute conclusion. Having absolute certainty is a powerful thing in the life of a person, it can give one a strong pillar around which to organize everything, and all activities, one's entire raison d'etre.

[maestro]

I have a stop-over in Tasmania next week, can't we just talk about it over dinner and drinks?

Looks like Alex is putting the moves on Kelly.