Book Club: Poker Without Cards

[Cain]

That too, yeah.  Have to remember the reference to PKD at the start, the control of language as the control of conception and communication.

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

I was just thinking on the concept of "poker without cards", that is, understanding emotions and power relations to your advantage. This really seems to me an actualization of second circuit emotional intelligence. Indeed, when we look at people that claim to have psychic abilities (and do things like cold reading or other similar things), it seems to just be high functioning 2nd circuit intelligence.*







*Stuck in Angel Tech maps right now. May or may not apply with anyone.

[Phosphatidylserine]

Just finished it.

Quick notes:
- he seemed to use 'vin-dit' to refer both to memebombs and their effects. I am unsure if we have a good term for the sensation of a memebomb working, so maybe 'vin-dit' may be good for adopting? It does feel like an appropriate sound.
- anybody else pick up on the use of filters? There was HC, a transcriber who was a major filter, and an editor.
- Mass Wild Guessing: Did Richard Wiseman actually exist? Seems like a setup for HC <---> Fink psychoanalysis.
- "Do what you want 'cause a pirate is free" has new meanings.

[the last yatto]

HOW ABOUT IF YOUR NOT DONE WITH THE BOOK STOP READING THIS THREAD...
or we could just wake the full two weeks

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

Just finished it.

Quick notes:
- he seemed to use 'vin-dit' to refer both to memebombs and their effects. I am unsure if we have a good term for the sensation of a memebomb working, so maybe 'vin-dit' may be good for adopting? It does feel like an appropriate sound.
- anybody else pick up on the use of filters? There was HC, a transcriber who was a major filter, and an editor.
- Mass Wild Guessing: Did Richard Wiseman actually exist? Seems like a setup for HC <---> Fink psychoanalysis.
- "Do what you want 'cause a pirate is free" has new meanings.

I believe Richard actually existed in the story. Here we have three individuals, each at different stages of passing through Chapel Perilous. Howard has previously passed through his shock and realizations and come out whole, while Richard is stuck (he asks Howard to explain for him). But I think the real story is about Dr. Fink, which is a contrary opinion. Here we have a person who is comfortable with his life, and over the course of the novel he is slowly thrown out of that discomfort into chapel perilous. We see the progression of a person from stable to completely unstable in new realizations, which I think is even more interesting as a characterization than Howard or Richard.

[Unayko]

Are we a-o-kay with spoilers? If not: Stop reading!
I'd be interested in a interpretation on the "number system / six (+1) structures of energy). He lost me partially there because i do not see the connection between Williams answers and the different 'steps' or am I giving this too much (or as it seems 'not as much as required') of a thought?

Snippets from the book 'explaining' the number system:

One, an ambiguous answer.  We explored existentialism.  You can hang in ambiguity.  You have begun to see the
power structure and you can flip between seeing power as either a duplicitous thought with elites and lessers, or as one,
meaning universe.


Two, a duplicitous thought.   - There isn’t anything wrong with the system, because the universe is not a system

Three, a solid thought. - the base to an idea

Four, solid structure of a thought

Five, a thought prone to persuasion. Accepting that there are frames of mind to which you do not have access.

Six, a working system / Acceptance of the system.

There is no seven. Life is perpetual motion.  Life is a system we can never understand.  Life is feeling precarious.

[Phosphatidylserine]

I am unsure whether it correlates to the 8 circuit model, physical dimensions, or just some personal numerology of his.

[Triple Zero]

OK, so who hasn't finished yet?

I'm a few pages in the "forward". I hope I get to finish befoer the 27th.

[Corvidia]

Finished up last night.

His comments about bipolarism on page 117 were rather interesting, aside from the "two spirits in one body" bullshit. The idea that a biploar shifts from attacca to nacirema as their mood shifts is something I've noticed, too.

Also, did anyone catch the fact that nacirema is "american" spelled backwards?

[Phosphatidylserine]

I didn't, but I felt like calling bullshit on the association between nacirema/attacca and mania/depression. I didn't do so, because I'm not bipolar, however I felt as though the inverse would be more accurate, given that manics typically construct systemizations, which seems to be a logical rather than an emotional thing to do.

[Corvidia]

Ah. Well, I am and it's something I've noticed in myself and my sister who also has it. I kinda like the Briggs-Meyers personality tests and I swap between ENTP and ENTJ results, depending on my current state. ENTP (nacermia) correlates with my baseline and hypomania. ETNJ (attacca) correlates with my depressions.

Edited to add a thought: It's not a perfect analogy. Nacermia implies a lack of systems, which doesn't quite work for bipolar people (like Enki pointed out) but it's still somewhat true.

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

Finished up last night.

His comments about bipolarism on page 117 were rather interesting, aside from the "two spirits in one body" bullshit. The idea that a biploar shifts from attacca to nacirema as their mood shifts is something I've noticed, too.

Also, did anyone catch the fact that nacirema is "american" spelled backwards?

No, didn't get that. Thanks.

[Elder Iptuous]

of course, when he mentioned Attacca and Nacerima, and said 'they are made up, don't bother looking them up', i immediately went and looked them up:

Nacerima:
Various anthropologists and sociologists have used the term Nacirema to examine (with a degree/pretense of anthropological self-distancing) aspects of the behavior and society of American people—citizens of North America. Nacirema offers a form of word play by spelling "American" backwards.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacirema

Attacca:
attack, or go on; i.e., at the end of a movement, a direction to begin (attack) the next movement immediately, without a gap or pause
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attacca#A

do you think these words were chosen with existing definitions in mind at all?

[Phosphatidylserine]

Probably. He wouldn't have said not to look them up if he didn't want us to look them up.

[Elder Iptuous]

that's what i thought, but they didn't fit without a shoehorn....