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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



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Creating meaning and order.
#7473538 - 10/01/07 11:23 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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In my experience if one really wants to try for a "glimpse of reality" you need to become aware of the minds overwhelming tendency to create meaning and order out of chaos. It has taken me over 50 years to really understand this and begin to notice mind in the act of this fantasy creation of so called reality. As R.A.W. noticed, "what the thinker thinks the prover proves". This effect is subtle and most folk never become aware of it. Hence it's ability to fool us continually into believing our own stories of meaning and order.
It is very uncomfortable, especially in the beginning to resist the compulsion to create meaning out of our experience and perception or at least not fully invest belief in our personal stories. On the other side the wind blows fiercely. It's safe and warm in our cocoon of meaning. But in my experience it really doesn't exist outside of our petty, fearful, minds. The challenge here is to except ones unimportance and ignorance and then continue on to explore as far as one is able before death catches up. At first and for some time I hated and feared the fact that I couldn't be a true believer anymore. Now it's becoming really interesting as I don't know if I can really handle the challenge of where I might be going. The reason I said "glimpse of reality" is that I think we really can't come close to stopping creating meaning for ourselves most of the time. So a peek is all you get and you have to pay a price for it. You no longer get to be in the warm cocoon with all the others, unconsciously creating Gods and Cultures out of whole cloth.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
Edited by Icelander (10/01/07 02:46 PM)
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demiu5
humans, lol


Registered: 08/18/05
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7473623 - 10/01/07 11:44 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Now it's becoming really interesting as I don't know if I can really handle the challenge of where I might be going.
I'm going to need to come back and study this when I'm sober. However, that one line jumped out at me and stuck in my head.
I feel or think this way a large portion of my time. I was about to say I've just recently began feeling/thinking this way, but that's not true. I'm just now becoming more aware of it, and as I think to my childhood, I felt this way then but was even less aware of it. I somehow forget all the past 'successes' and how I've come to this point now. I always forget it when the 'struggle' starts (which 'struggles' usually seem to follow on the heels of 'successes'). Yet, one way or the other, I always come out alive, maybe battered and bruised, but alive.
-------------------- channel your inner Larry David
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Veritas

Registered: 04/15/05
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7473661 - 10/01/07 11:51 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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I recall my first awareness of what seems to be the chaotic nature of the material universe--I was lying on the ground, watching a meteor shower. I relaxed my eyes, trying to expand my peripheral vision as much as possible, so that I could take in the full "dome" of the night sky. Suddenly, I felt a nearly-overwhelming fear, as my position on the spinning globe of the Earth felt tenuous and impermanent. The immensity of the sky, the movement and bright trails of the falling meteors, the stillness and quantity of the stars, the vast unknowable depths of space, and the extreme contrast to the fragility of human life, MY LIFE, all hit me at once.
I was 8 years old, and I have come back to this flash of understanding again and again in the years since. The chaos is at once terrifying and breathtakingly beautiful. I forget it over and over, losing myself in the day-to-day meaning making of human culture. When I come back to it, it never fails to take my breath away.
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Icelander
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Veritas]
#7473793 - 10/01/07 12:21 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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The chaos is at once terrifying and breathtakingly beautiful.
I think you put your finger on the reason this challenge is worthwhile for me. The same thing that brought me to the higher doses of psychedelics. Being pushed to your limits and then trying to hang on and take a brief look that the unimaginable immensity that surrounds our cozy protective shields. This is the only thing left that can really engage my interest. This is why the idea of death holds my attention. I have a hunch that at the moment of death or shortly after our shields will dissolve and we will be face to face with the nagual. I don't want to totally freak out at that moment. I want to take a look before I dissolve back into the cosmic soup. Just for me, as it is of no importance whatsoever.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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OrgoneConclusion
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Veritas]
#7473827 - 10/01/07 12:29 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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This should help:
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demiu5
humans, lol


Registered: 08/18/05
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7474074 - 10/01/07 01:41 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Icelander said: The chaos is at once terrifying and breathtakingly beautiful.
I think you put your finger on the reason this challenge is worthwhile for me. The same thing that brought me to the higher doses of psychedelics. Being pushed to your limits and then trying to hang on and take a brief look that the unimaginable immensity that surrounds our cozy protective shields. This is the only thing left that can really engage my interest. This is why the idea of death holds my attention. I have a hunch that at the moment of death or shortly after our shields will dissolve and we will be face to face with the nagual. I don't want to totally freak out at that moment. I want to take a look before I dissolve back into the cosmic soup. Just for me, as it is of no importance whatsoever.
-------------------- channel your inner Larry David
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a_guy_named_ai
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: demiu5]
#7476100 - 10/02/07 12:47 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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It sounds like what you're doing is arguing that there is no objectivity, but then how can you assert this without some foundation, objectivity to assert from. How can you conclude there is no objective reality we can perceive with our minds, but then you use your mind to assert this.
I don't understand fully what you're talking about, I do think I get some, but I tried to grasp your premises and work my way up the ladder of logic step by step, and I feel that a few rungs missing in what you said. I also don't understand fully what you mean when you're talking about the prover proving. What is this subtle effect?
It's true, you cannot escape your mind. It's always working, an reality that cannot be denied. I could say more but I'll let you respond.
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MushroomTrip
Dr. Teasy Thighs



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Quote:
It sounds like what you're doing is arguing that there is no objectivity, but then how can you assert this without some foundation, objectivity to assert from. How can you conclude there is no objective reality we can perceive with our minds, but then you use your mind to assert this.
And what exactly is there that you don't understand? Can we only reach conclusions from an "objective" point of view?
--------------------
   All this time I've loved you And never known your face All this time I've missed you And searched this human race Here is true peace Here my heart knows calm Safe in your soul Bathed in your sighs
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a_guy_named_ai
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: MushroomTrip]
#7476165 - 10/02/07 01:31 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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And what exactly is there that you don't understand?
Quote:
Can we only reach conclusions from an "objective" point of view?
it's not so much about an abjective "point of view".
It's about having an axiom to start your premises. You have to have at least one, or you cannot assert anything.
I feel sick and I'm going to bed. get back to this later.
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MushroomTrip
Dr. Teasy Thighs



Registered: 12/02/05
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Quote:
get back to this later.
I'll be waiting for an explanation
--------------------
   All this time I've loved you And never known your face All this time I've missed you And searched this human race Here is true peace Here my heart knows calm Safe in your soul Bathed in your sighs
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MyInnerChild
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Veritas]
#7476263 - 10/02/07 02:53 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Veritas said: I recall my first awareness of what seems to be the chaotic nature of the material universe--I was lying on the ground, watching a meteor shower. I relaxed my eyes, trying to expand my peripheral vision as much as possible, so that I could take in the full "dome" of the night sky. Suddenly, I felt a nearly-overwhelming fear, as my position on the spinning globe of the Earth felt tenuous and impermanent. The immensity of the sky, the movement and bright trails of the falling meteors, the stillness and quantity of the stars, the vast unknowable depths of space, and the extreme contrast to the fragility of human life, MY LIFE, all hit me at once.
I was 8 years old, and I have come back to this flash of understanding again and again in the years since. The chaos is at once terrifying and breathtakingly beautiful. I forget it over and over, losing myself in the day-to-day meaning making of human culture. When I come back to it, it never fails to take my breath away.
I never "met" anyone else who experienced stuff like that as a child..I did too. As well as the night sky I used to stare in awe at a blade of grass and wonder into it's parts and molecules etc. That was grade 6. I wasn't 8. I'm impressed with how young you were when you experienced your awesome awareness. That was way before ever smoking anything or taking anything stronger than BAYERtm children's aspirin.
I'm no genius but I've always thought deeply. Pleased to "meet" you once again but this time, I relate across the board to what you're saying here b/c we're dealing with an experience, not a theory...it was REAL! "My experience is my reality" to put it into psych terms.
MIC
Edited by MyInnerChild (10/02/07 03:01 AM)
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stellar renegade
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7476680 - 10/02/07 08:38 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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What's wrong with creating meaning and order out of chaos? Isn't that what you do with your reasoning skills? I think that to take raw material from the void and create something purposeful out of it is a way to keep ourselves from being completely absorbed into blackness. You have to have that too, but you have to have a neat balance. You travel into the emptiness of unconscious nature then come back only to create better art. I've done this continually throughout my life. 
In my experience, one cannot look into the void without arranging it into some kind of coherent or creative fashion simultaneously. To not do so would be for our minds to stop functioning. It is true that our culture has too much condensed thought that's hard to unpack, but once you do you find that your suitcase is empty and now you can put whatever you want into it. You're free! 

I feel the universe, I feel the galaxies swirling and the earth turning underneath my feet at the criss-cross between cosmic worlds of experience. I speak but it's not my own words as the energy of unconscious matter vibrates my throat and moves this primate tongue in glorious expression of the unknown. This, this everything, is my father, and I am merely the humble product of its vast expansiveness.
-------------------- "I threw a small stone down at the reflection of my image in the water, and it altogether disappeared. I burst as it shattered through me, like a bullet through a bottle... and I'm expected to believe that any of this is real!" -mewithoutYou
 "To believe in the wide-awake real, through all the stupefying, enervating, distorting dream: to will to wake, when the very being seems athirst for godless repose: these are the broken steps up to the high fields where repose is but a form of strength, strength but a form of joy, joy but a form of love." -George MacDonald
Edited by stellar renegade (10/02/07 11:51 AM)
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



Registered: 03/15/05
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Quote:
jonathan_206 said: It sounds like what you're doing is arguing that there is no objectivity, but then how can you assert this without some foundation, objectivity to assert from. How can you conclude there is no objective reality we can perceive with our minds, but then you use your mind to assert this.
I don't understand fully what you're talking about, I do think I get some, but I tried to grasp your premises and work my way up the ladder of logic step by step, and I feel that a few rungs missing in what you said. I also don't understand fully what you mean when you're talking about the prover proving. What is this subtle effect?
It's true, you cannot escape your mind. It's always working, an reality that cannot be denied. I could say more but I'll let you respond.
Just in case you are really addressing this to me.;)
I don't know if there is objective reality or not so I would not assert that. As far as RAWs quote. As the mind creates meaning and order out of chaos/whole cloth, whatever we think sounds good to us we will consciously or unconsciously look for validation for it. Like buying a Volvo and then seeing Volvos all over the road where before you didn't notice. You pick out the things that validate what you want to believe in and ignore what doesn't fit.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7477020 - 10/02/07 10:49 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Volvos are for stodgy, security-minded, old... Never mind. *tiptoes away quietly*
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Edited by OrgoneConclusion (10/02/07 10:54 AM)
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



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I thought you liked Vulva's?
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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a_guy_named_ai
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7477569 - 10/02/07 02:10 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Quote:
Quote: jonathan_206 said: It sounds like what you're doing is arguing that there is no objectivity, but then how can you assert this without some foundation, objectivity to assert from. How can you conclude there is no objective reality we can perceive with our minds, but then you use your mind to assert this.
I don't understand fully what you're talking about, I do think I get some, but I tried to grasp your premises and work my way up the ladder of logic step by step, and I feel that a few rungs missing in what you said. I also don't understand fully what you mean when you're talking about the prover proving. What is this subtle effect?
It's true, you cannot escape your mind. It's always working, an reality that cannot be denied. I could say more but I'll let you respond.
Quote:
Just in case you are really addressing this to me.;)
I don't know if there is objective reality or not so I would not assert that. As far as RAWs quote. As the mind creates meaning and order out of chaos/whole cloth, whatever we think sounds good to us we will consciously or unconsciously look for validation for it. Like buying a Volvo and then seeing Volvos all over the road where before you didn't notice. You pick out the things that validate what you want to believe in and ignore what doesn't fit.
Here's what I have noticed. You recognize your mind as a valid tool to come to conclusions, but you do not recognize the presupposition, the axiom that is required to accept this tool as valid. Your mind exists in this world. Not only this but to come to any conclusion accurately you must first accept that your mind is a valid to to begin with.
Doubting your ability to judge value or your ability to to perceive reality is unfruitful, because then you have to scrutenize your entire thinking and feeling capabilites, and there's really no way to do that since the only thinking and feeling capabilites you would use to scrutinize your thinking and feling capabilites are the ones you already have, and those would be in question. And even if you had back up thinking and feeling capabilites, these would necessarily come under question as well. You would come to a dead end and very likely turn to nihilism, but really this can't even be a sure thing for you since your judgement skills you used to turn to nihilism could be faulty too. Things really just go downhill from there but ultimately you must either face or deny yourself.
Whether you choose to deny yourself or accept your own existence, either way proves that someone or something made the choice to do it - you. Therefore since you do exist, you can be absolutely sure that this much of your judgement skills is practical. You may now proceed to gain your own trust of reality.
If you don't like or trust having personal convictions or having value judgment skills then too bad, there's nothing you can do about it. It's built into you and the only thing you can do if you don't like it or trust it is to tell yourself it's all in your head and live in hipocrisy by using those judgement skills in your day to day life.
Or you can be reasonable and just accept that it is reasonable and practical and wonder how such magnificent sentient manifestations such as love, virtue,courage, beauty,compassion, patience, charity, honesty etc. could be manifested by anything but another sentient being.
In any case, you are thinking and you exist and the same perception you perceive yuor own existance you also observe the outside world and everything in it according to human reasoning which cannot be evaded the universe and things in it are just as real as you.
But as far far as constructing order out of chaos, that's a very difficult topic, because it requires accurate representations of the physical world. If talking scientifically, science observes order, randomness, and specified complexity. We don't call order randomness and we don't call randomness order. There is no way for you to externally analyize this supposed order constructed mentally from chaos without recognising chaos and order yourself, and then you just recognise the differentiation that is observed by natural science.
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Icelander
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Great post.
If you don't like or trust having personal convictions or having value judgment skills then too bad, there's nothing you can do about it.
It's not that I don't like these things it's that I know they are subjective and so only apply to my personal desire and belief and that doesn't make them true. I know there's nothing I can do about how I'm built as a human.
Or you can be reasonable and just accept that it is reasonable and practical and wonder how such magnificent sentient manifestations such as love, virtue,courage, beauty,compassion, patience, charity, honesty etc. could be manifested by anything but another sentient being.
Why when people make this argument do they almost always leave out, hate, death, deceit, suffering, murder, rape, parasitic infestation, Cancer, etc?
There doesn't have to be sentient thought behind any of this. It's possible, I know it is, but it's not a certainty and that's what I'm debating.
I realize the difficulties involved in trying to understand all this on so many levels and you accurately brought some of them to light. So I suspend judgment when it comes to proclamations of truth. I choose my own version of truth as a path with heart and follow it as far as I am able.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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MyInnerChild
EveryMum



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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7477784 - 10/02/07 03:15 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
I choose my own version of truth as a path with heart and follow it as far as I am able.
That's all any of us can do man...
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My inner child runs with scissors but plays nicely with others! Sometimes the light's all shine'in on me, Other times I can barely see. Lately it occurs to me, What a looong strange trip it's been! ~ Truck'in
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Icelander
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: MyInnerChild]
#7477802 - 10/02/07 03:23 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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That's exactly correct IMO. That is all we can be somewhat sure of. Humanity is in a cul-de-sac of denial and death anxiety. If we ever emerge we will have taken one giant step towards peace on earth.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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druglord
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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7478278 - 10/02/07 05:57 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Icelander said: The chaos is at once terrifying and breathtakingly beautiful.
I think you put your finger on the reason this challenge is worthwhile for me. The same thing that brought me to the higher doses of psychedelics. Being pushed to your limits and then trying to hang on and take a brief look that the unimaginable immensity that surrounds our cozy protective shields. This is the only thing left that can really engage my interest. This is why the idea of death holds my attention. I have a hunch that at the moment of death or shortly after our shields will dissolve and we will be face to face with the nagual. I don't want to totally freak out at that moment. I want to take a look before I dissolve back into the cosmic soup. Just for me, as it is of no importance whatsoever.
Hey Icelander, this post really captures my own thinking. The key definitely is pushing your (and I emphasize "your") limits--making it a habit to do it. Our fears and aversions prevent us from facing the whole of reality unorganized by our conceptual understanding. Breaking free of this is my only real interest too. I think it's all about making the shift from organizing and judging things as good and bad (an approach rooted in fear) to simply perceiving them with a sense of awe, realizing that what you consider bad now can just as easily be interpreted as good. This includes pain, suffocation, puking, brussel sprouts, ugly people with bad breath, whatever you fear (whatever repulses you). We have an unlimited ability to interpret things in whatever way we choose. It just takes practice to actually change our interpretations and incorporate those changes into our habitual way of thinking. I also have a feeling that death will force me to confront reality in its entirety so I'm preparing for it by pushing myself towards fearlessness and total acceptance, little by little.
I remember reading something out of an Andrew Harvey book, saying how in India, he once saw a naked man sitting on a pile of cow shit and eating it in a state of bliss. And he was considered a very holy man in his culture.
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stellar renegade
explorer ofmetaphysicaldepths



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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7479265 - 10/02/07 11:14 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Icelander said: It's not that I don't like these things it's that I know they are subjective and so only apply to my personal desire and belief and that doesn't make them true. I know there's nothing I can do about how I'm built as a human.
I'm going to try to take this slow and make this simple this time for the sake of proper discussion. What do you think makes a thing 'true'?
-------------------- "I threw a small stone down at the reflection of my image in the water, and it altogether disappeared. I burst as it shattered through me, like a bullet through a bottle... and I'm expected to believe that any of this is real!" -mewithoutYou
 "To believe in the wide-awake real, through all the stupefying, enervating, distorting dream: to will to wake, when the very being seems athirst for godless repose: these are the broken steps up to the high fields where repose is but a form of strength, strength but a form of joy, joy but a form of love." -George MacDonald
Edited by stellar renegade (10/02/07 11:36 PM)
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a_guy_named_ai
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It's true that ultimately our understanding comes down to a matter of heart. But I find that when it comes to this, it is where I find the most ultimate truth of all.
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: druglord]
#7482727 - 10/03/07 08:56 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



Registered: 03/15/05
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Quote:
stellar renegade said:
Quote:
Icelander said: It's not that I don't like these things it's that I know they are subjective and so only apply to my personal desire and belief and that doesn't make them true. I know there's nothing I can do about how I'm built as a human.
I'm going to try to take this slow and make this simple this time for the sake of proper discussion. What do you think makes a thing 'true'?
I don't know what ultimate truth is so I don't know. I only know what my subjective guess is based on my own investigation would be. But there would be no way to know if it was true.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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stellar renegade
explorer ofmetaphysicaldepths



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Re: Creating meaning and order. [Re: Icelander]
#7483609 - 10/04/07 02:07 AM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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Okay. I want to narrow down on that last statement:
But there would be no way to know if it was true.
Again, what do you mean by this? How would it be true or not? Do you simply mean that you are uncertain about your judgments, or that you're measuring them against a certain objective standard? Even if you're uncertain there's an indication that you're measuring your speculations against something.
Hm. I think you may have misunderstood my question in the first place. When I asked, what makes a thing true? I wasn't asking which worldview validates your thought process, but what kind of dynamic you measure your thoughts against. There's internal justification, empirical verification, societal standards, etc. I'm just trying to figure out what kind of dynamic you think makes a thing 'true' or not so I can possibly discuss the topic further with you.
-------------------- "I threw a small stone down at the reflection of my image in the water, and it altogether disappeared. I burst as it shattered through me, like a bullet through a bottle... and I'm expected to believe that any of this is real!" -mewithoutYou
 "To believe in the wide-awake real, through all the stupefying, enervating, distorting dream: to will to wake, when the very being seems athirst for godless repose: these are the broken steps up to the high fields where repose is but a form of strength, strength but a form of joy, joy but a form of love." -George MacDonald
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery



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Quote:
stellar renegade said: Okay. I want to narrow down on that last statement:
But there would be no way to know if it was true.
Again, what do you mean by this? How would it be true or not? Do you simply mean that you are uncertain about your judgments, or that you're measuring them against a certain objective standard? Even if you're uncertain there's an indication that you're measuring your speculations against something.
Hm. I think you may have misunderstood my question in the first place. When I asked, what makes a thing true? I wasn't asking which worldview validates your thought process, but what kind of dynamic you measure your thoughts against. There's internal justification, empirical verification, societal standards, etc. I'm just trying to figure out what kind of dynamic you think makes a thing 'true' or not so I can possibly discuss the topic further with you.
I wonder how many times I will have to repeat this before someone hears? My brain is finite, the Universe looks to be infinite. There is no possible way I can definitively know truth. So all my truth is subjective and therefore suspect. I use the same criteria that all other humans use to determine subjective truth. I am just not under the illusion that that is any kind of final truth or even correct at all. This only makes sense to me rationally.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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