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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Cherk]
    #4963838 -



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"It seemed to me culture is a shabby lie. Or at least this culture is a shabby lie. If you work like a dog, you get 260 channels of bad television and a German automobile. What kind of perfection is that?"-McKenna

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Cherk]
    #4963840 -

I just noticed this:

"eh you got tenure so that saves you from a 1, but your homophobia and immature attitude gives you a two"

Where did you get homophobia? I love fags. Look at ziddy.


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: McKennaFan200]
    #4963842 -

Thanks for that, I'm sure the row behind me loved it.

^_^


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: HELLA_TIGHT]
    #4963844 -

:rofl2:


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"It seemed to me culture is a shabby lie. Or at least this culture is a shabby lie. If you work like a dog, you get 260 channels of bad television and a German automobile. What kind of perfection is that?"-McKenna

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: HELLA_TIGHT]
    #4963851 -

I thought I had changed that a while ago.  Way to single me out :crankey:



hehehe :shineon:


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I have considered such matters.

SIKE

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Silversoul]
    #4963984 -

Quote:
Maybe you just don't get it. I'm sure he doesn't actually say those things, so maybe the fact that you infer it from the text is a reflection of your own cynical attitude towards the material. Of course, I haven't read it yet, so maybe I'm wrong here. But Markos, who seems to be too intelligent to fall for something as dumb and naive you describe the book to be, seems to be a big fan of "Be Here Now." Maybe he sees something in it that you don't. Just some food for thought.


Well, if I just don't get it, then I somehow lost something, because I used to "get it". In fact, I used to think it was brilliant. When I first got into psychedelics I thought a lot of these things were genius.

Markos likes a lot of things I don't. Just because he's intelligent doesn't mean that he doesn't attach importance to things that may not have any real insight. What does "Be Here Now" really teach us? Are the messages really insightful, or are they just obvious things we agree with? Appreciate the little things, really get in there and experience life, yadda yadda yadda. Most spiritual writing is about making really basic, simple messages sound extremely "deep" and important. People love this stuff because feeling like you've tapped into something extremely insightful and important feels GOOD. It makes you feel smart, special, and comforted.

Also, Be Here Now is badly written. He seems to think that these goofy word plays and using all kinds of hip slang is being inventive, but a lot of the time it really just comes out disjointed and silly sounding.

For example:
Quote:
NO MATTER NEVER MIND NO MIND NEVER MATTER

either way it works.

round trip

mind creates matter. the causal plane is the world of ideas that creates the universe right at the top of the causal plane is what we call the godhead its the first place into the universe of form its the first world of form its the place where the mind that is bod manifested into the universe his thought manifested into all the lower levels of the causal place all the astral planes and the physical plane and when you go back back back you go to that place where you become one with the bodhead you are GOD you are the IDEA that lies behind the universe you are literally it you?re not making believe you?re it you are it.

....

in order to become a fully realized being you must delight in the exquisiteness at every single level you must take joy in your maleness or femaleness at the same moment that you realize that you are both male and female it?s that far out!




It's just kind of that "everything is nothing, we're all one, melt into the universe and experience as it truly is, without form, yet with all form!"... the stuff doesn't really have any meaning, it's just trying to put some abstract sensations into words, and claiming that it's really important. Thinking like that can make for some very curious and exciting sensations, but that doesn't mean that it reveals any actual truths or information.

Of course, if anyone disagrees with that kind of stuff, it's because they just don't get it, right? Spirituality is the ultimate truth, and any rejection of it is the result of ignorance or foolishness, nobody who understands spirituality in any context would ever be opposed to it at all.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964001 -

Is that really from the book these people are talking about?

ahah


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964029 -

I didn't mean to be condescending with the whole "maybe you don't get it" comment. It's just that you seem very locked into this Western mode of thinking. Not that it's any worse than being locked into an Eastern mode of thinking. It's just that they're different, and your criticism of the book sounded very Eurocentric. It sounds like you're analyzing from a Western, analytic philosophical approach, when it's meant to be read from a more meditative approach. It seems like your inability to find meaning in it comes from this dichotomy of approaches.


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: HELLA_TIGHT]
    #4964063 -

HELLA_TIGHT said:
HELLA_TIGHT said:
The Book - Alan Watts


Have none of you hippies read this?


I ended up buying that book because of your recommendation in this thread.


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"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Silversoul]
    #4964245 -

Quote:
I didn't mean to be condescending with the whole "maybe you don't get it" comment. It's just that you seem very locked into this Western mode of thinking. Not that it's any worse than being locked into an Eastern mode of thinking. It's just that they're different, and your criticism of the book sounded very Eurocentric. It sounds like you're analyzing from a Western, analytic philosophical approach, when it's meant to be read from a more meditative approach. It seems like your inability to find meaning in it comes from this dichotomy of approaches.


How would a "medidtative" approach really change things? I mean that question sincerely. What *is* a medidtative approach?

If I'm "locked into" Western thinking... why aren't you? Has deciding to adopt and appreciate eastern thought actually reversed your entire experience in western culture?

From what I can gather, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like a "meditative approach", as it would apply to Be Here Now really means just allowing yourself to experience the sensations that the metaphors and things he discusses bring up.

Take the phrase "everything is nothing". It's something that's not unpopular amongst spiritual types. Does it mean anything? I'm not sure, it's obviously contradicting itself, and attempting to conceptualize what it means is a bizarre experience. Our minds can't quite grasp it, it's both frustrating and exciting... it feels like there is some kind of intangible truth in the words, that it's just so all-encompassing and difficult to visualize that it is just barely out of our grasp. Now, under the influence of psychedelics, we often get the sensation of actually visualizing these concepts. Thinking about them can actually create the sensation that we HAVE reached and understood them. Same, I imagine, with deep meditation.

Basically, by playing games with our minds, we can take words that have impossible or contradictory meanings, and imagine that we have tapped right in and figured them out, seen them as they are.

Ram Das writes in a very sloppy stream of conciousness way. He describes a bunch of emotions and experiences. A bunch of things he thought and felt at moments, things that tied together and became very exciting experiences for him. But exciting experiences that create feelings of insight aren't necessarily insightful. The strength and power of an experience is not relative to its insightfulness, meaning, or importance. If this were true we'd be able to figure out which religion was right by measuring how firmly and intensely its believers followed it.

Western or Eastern, I don't see how the book's ideas get any more intelligent, or the writing gets any more eloquent. Ram Das was a celebrity who had a bunch of followers. That's why his book sold, not because he's a talented poet or particularly insightful.

Quote:
SEE: if you get far enough IN, you can see.....karma. you can see patterns unfolding, (of which this life is only a part, part of a mosaic) BUT: in order to do that you have to have left THE GRAVITATIONAL FIELD of TIME AND SPACE (as a matrix) you can't think in time and space. You can't be in ....your thoughts any more! Because: your thoughts are still in time and space and you can't get out of time through them. you've got to be outside that. you've got to be in the place where you see your own.


He writes in circles. What does he mean with "we have to have left THE GRAVITATIONAL FIELD of TIME AND SPACE (as a matrix)"?

How do we leave it? What's the difference between leaving it, and leaving it as a matrix? Words like "gravitational field" and "time and space" evoke a lot of emotions and sensations. The feeling I get when, say, I'm watching a documentary or reading something about quantum theory, the size and nature of the universe, etc... is powerful and exciting, and I think most people would agree. What does it really mean though? Obviously it's not actually possible to step outside the "gravitational field of time and space"... the phrase doesn't really mean much of anything, it's just like "everything is nothing". When you ponder it, it seems so enormous, exciting, and impossible... but under the right conditions you can create the sensation of understanding it.

It's an exciting sensation... but what is there *really* to learn from it?


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964289 -

Quote:
How would a "medidtative" approach really change things? I mean that question sincerely. What *is* a medidtative approach?


A meditative approach is where you stop trying to analyze these things logically in the way that you're doing, and try to focus on the deeper meaning of it. If you're familiar with zen koans, it's a similar approach. You try to break the bounds of logic, and understand the more transcendental meaning behind it.

Quote:
If I'm "locked into" Western thinking... why aren't you? Has deciding to adopt and appreciate eastern thought actually reversed your entire experience in western culture?


I haven't really "adopted" eastern thought so much as I've simply expanded my horizons to include it alongside Western thought. I love Western philosophy and the wisdom that philosophers like Nietzche, Locke, Kant, Mill, Hume, and others have imparted onto our society. But the approach they take is simply one method of understanding, and it is not generally useful when trying to read texts which take a different approach(such as "Be Here Now").


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Silversoul]
    #4964386 -

Quote:
A meditative approach is where you stop trying to analyze these things logically in the way that you're doing, and try to focus on the deeper meaning of it.


Is it a deeper meaning, or allowing yourself to explore emotions and sensations? Are you actually exploring ideas, or are you just sitting there letting your imagination wander?

"Another method of understanding" or "A method of forcing your mind to generate feelings of insight no matter the value of the input"?

Lots of intelligent people love this "other method of understanding", of course they do, it feels good. Feels like you're smarter, more understanding, more in tune with the universe. But I don't see how it's about understanding at all. Seems to me it's all about feeling.

There are spiritual texts that are well written, contain engaging stories, and are very exciting to read. But unless you've already got faith in the idea that Be Here Now is going to grant you some exciting new insight, it's hard to get past the babbling word play that sounds more like schizophrenia than poetry, run on sentences and chanty repetitions.

Quote:
You try to break the bounds of logic, and understand the more transcendental meaning behind it.


Could you tell me what the difference between doing this would be, compared with the process of letting a nonsensical statement create an emotional response, as I described in my previous post?


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964444 -

It's not just a feeling. It is an understanding derived from a feeling. Feelings can be a form of knowledge, too. But it's an understanding that can't be conveniently packaged into the language of analytical philosophy. It doesn't play by those rules. You seem to have what some Zen masters call "the philosopher's disease." That is, you can't accept any knowledge as legitimate if it doesn't play by the rules of traditional Western logic. As I am not a Zen master, I can't tell you how to cure this "disease," but the point is that your understanding of these kinds of texts seems to be inhibited by it. I'm not asking you to like texts like "Be Here Now." I'm simply pointing out that you seem to be missing their point by approaching them in a manner in which they are not meant to be approached.


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Silversoul]
    #4964629 -

Quote:
I'm simply pointing out that you seem to be missing their point by approaching them in a manner in which they are not meant to be approached.


The manner in which they are meant to be approached is blind acceptance. You're approaching them from the position that they contain some kind of deeply insightful knowledge, and anyone who doesn't appreciate this knowledge doesn't understand it, and essentially has an incomplete way of seeing the world around them.

Have you really explored the idea that maybe such spiritual sensations are more connected to psychology than to the deeper meanings they claim to be tied to? I see absolutely no evidence that suggests that such sensations have any relation to reality, and it is impossible to try to involve yourself in spirituality without becoming biased in its favor. Faith isn't something you can just try out, in order to explore it you have to abandon rationality.

Claiming that there's something called "the philosopher's disease" sounds pretty much like fundamentalism. The belief that those who differ in their outlook are flawed. A lot of people, especially in the west, have the "grass is greener" belief that eastern religion is more noble and reasonable than western religion, but this is a prime example showing they have the same arrogant dogma as anyone else.

Quote:
It's not just a feeling. It is an understanding derived from a feeling. Feelings can be a form of knowledge, too. But it's an understanding that can't be conveniently packaged into the language of analytical philosophy. It doesn't play by those rules.


Of course it doesn't play by those rules, because it's not really an understanding. It's a feeling of understanding. To the person who is experiencing it, a feeling of understanding, and an actual understanding are identical. It's only when you take a step back and try to actually quantify what you have that you can tell the difference. But you aren't allowed to do that, thinking is "the philosopher's disease".

You're not explaining a single thing here. You're stating what you believe. Feelings can create some powerful memories, but they aren't usually knowledge. Do the kind of feelings you get from pondering phrases like "everything is nothing" have any kind of benefit? Will it make you a better person? Wiser? How?

As soon as I ask any questions though, I've got a nasty case of the "philosopher's disease". The only cure is to stop thinking, and just accept that guru's and old men with white beards who talk in rhyme understand everything better than the rest of us.

If you can get someone to blindly believe it, you can smear your own shit on the wall and tell them that it's the most insightful piece of art in all human history.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964699 -

Phluck said:
The manner in which they are meant to be approached is blind acceptance.


I don't believe that, and I don't believe you're being fair to them by saying that.

Quote:
You're approaching them from the position that they contain some kind of deeply insightful knowledge, and anyone who doesn't appreciate this knowledge doesn't understand it, and essentially has an incomplete way of seeing the world around them.


Absolutely not.  I'm saying that they are meant to be read in a meditative frame of mind, in which you let the message sink in an concentrate on it.  It can still be poorly written, even if it's written with that approach.  My point is simply that you don't seem to be familiar with that approach, so your judgement of it is rather biased.

Quote:
Have you really explored the idea that maybe such spiritual sensations are more connected to psychology than to the deeper meanings they claim to be tied to? I see absolutely no evidence that suggests that such sensations have any relation to reality, and it is impossible to try to involve yourself in spirituality without becoming biased in its favor. Faith isn't something you can just try out, in order to explore it you have to abandon rationality.


You seem to have the misconception that taking a non-rational approach means blind acceptance.  They're not the same thing.  I'm talking about meditation.  Soft focus.  If you don't understand what that means, then I can't help you.

Quote:
Claiming that there's something called "the philosopher's disease" sounds pretty much like fundamentalism. The belief that those who differ in their outlook are flawed. A lot of people, especially in the west, have the "grass is greener" belief that eastern religion is more noble and reasonable than western religion, but this is a prime example showing they have the same arrogant dogma as anyone else.


I'm not saying the grass is greener.  I'm saying that you're comparing grass to bushes.  It's not that the Eastern way is more correct.  It's that it involves a different approach which you are dismissing entirely due to a culturally biased misunderstanding.

Quote:
You're not explaining a single thing here. You're stating what you believe. Feelings can create some powerful memories, but they aren't usually knowledge. Do the kind of feelings you get from pondering phrases like "everything is nothing" have any kind of benefit? Will it make you a better person? Wiser? How?


Such phrases help you transcend the bounds of duality, to realize the oneness of things.  And yes, understanding this oneness has helped make me a better, wiser person.  Transcending the illusion of separation has helped make me a more compassionate, understanding person, in ways which I couldn't arrive at simply by rational analysis.

Quote:
As soon as I ask any questions though, I've got a nasty case  of the "philosopher's disease". The only cure is to stop thinking, and just accept that guru's and old men with white beards who talk in rhyme understand everything better than the rest of us.


Questions are good, but they can get in our way sometimes.  First, try to meditate on what the author is trying to convey.  Then see if you agree with it or not.

Quote:
If you can get someone to blindly believe it, you can smear your own shit on the wall and tell them that it's the most insightful piece of art in all human history.


Now that was just low. :thumbdown:


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Edited by Paradigm (11/21/05 05:57 PM)

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: dblaney]
    #4964709 -

dblaney said:
HELLA_TIGHT said:
HELLA_TIGHT said:
The Book - Alan Watts


Have none of you hippies read this?


I ended up buying that book because of your recommendation in this thread.


Did you like it?


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Phluck]
    #4964752 -

Phluck said:
Claiming that there's something called "the philosopher's disease" sounds pretty much like fundamentalism.


I think it has to do with him making things up. I've read a lot about Zen Buddhism and I've never heard of it.


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Re: Recommend some books [Re: HELLA_TIGHT]
    #4964841 -

oops, Alan Ginsberg... that's right, not Alan Watts...


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http://www.myspace.com/sarasotafnb
http://www.wcwtampa.com

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: Silversoul]
    #4964859 -

Quote:
Absolutely not. I'm saying that they are meant to be read in a meditative frame of mind, in which you let the message sink in an concentrate on it.


Ok... but that's not going to make it mean anything unless you blindly accept the idea that your resulting emotions, and not what's being said, are the message. What does "Letting message sink in" mean? Does it mean thinking about what's actually being said, or abandoning thought, and letting your feelings take over?

Quote:
You seem to have the misconception that taking a non-rational approach means blind acceptance. They're not the same thing. I'm talking about meditation. Soft focus. If you don't understand what that means, then I can't help you.


You're still assuming that you're absolutely right, and anyone who actually gets this stuff will think it's wonderful and important. I don't think it's difficult to appreciate this stuff on a spiritual level. Like I said, I ate this shit up when I was first getting into psychedelics. I thought Leary and McKenna were neat guys who were really onto something.

I'm saying that after reflection, after thinking about what these things really say, they don't have much meaning or depth. They definitely create emotions of meaning and depth, but that's not the same thing at all, and like I said, when you're experiencing these emotions, there is absolutely no way to distinguish between the two.

If I wanted to read something just for the experience of reading something that gave me interesting images and ideas, I'd read fiction, which generally does a much better job, and doesn't come at you with the self-aggrandizing assumption that it contains the answers to the mysteries of the universe.

Quote:
Questions are good, but they can get in our way sometimes. First, try to meditate on what the author is trying to convey. Then see if you agree with it or not.


Exactly, forget any kind of validation, hell, who cares what the guy is actually even trying to say. What does it feel like he's saying? Do you like it? You should, you invented it yourself, loosely based off of something else you read. If like it, then it's true!

Quote:
Now that was just low.


If it weren't true, Battlefield Earth would have never been made.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

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Re: Recommend some books [Re: dblaney]
    #4964909 -

Orson Scott Card's Ender Series:

Ender's Game
Speaker for the Dead
Xenocide
Children of the Mind.

Can't recommend these enough.  They're high-action, suspenseful, entertaining reads, but they make you think so much at the same time. 

I first read these books when I was pretty young, and now I'm re-reading them.  Its amazing to discover just how much of my worldview came from the ideas expressed in those books.  Especially Xenocide.  What a book. check em out :thumbup:


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_______________________________________________________________
namaste said:
no flamz in da ODD, if you got nothing to contribute then keep yo lips zipped
_________________________________________________________________

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