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The Secret Histories, #1

Started by Doktor Howl, July 27, 2010, 03:42:43 PM

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Doktor Howl

Quote from: Jenne on July 28, 2010, 07:20:07 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 28, 2010, 07:17:38 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 28, 2010, 07:13:23 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 28, 2010, 07:11:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 28, 2010, 06:24:46 PM
This is one of those threads that leaves me with an uncomfortable sense of helplessness. Don't know how useful that really is.

Lots of things do that, Kai, but hiding our heads in the sand isn't going to help.  You have to look at the shit, see it for what it actually is, and then decide if you can do anything about it.  If you can, do.  If you can't, then at least you can take comfort in watching the slapstick.

It's not funny if I'm the one being slapped. It's only funny when it's happening to someone else.

Not so!

TGRR's Rule:  It's always funny when it happens to someone else.
Dok Howl's Rule:  It's even funny when it happens to you.

Wow.  Tr00f like this hurts, Dok.  Thank you, and a *whimper* at the same time.  I only have that sort of clarity when I'm outside myself (read: drunk), and this is the conclusion I usually come to.

I actually have more of a problem laughing at the plight of my loved ones.  That's my "sticks in my craw" about the universe.  I somehow am ok with my own slaps, it's the ones I see my family taking that are hardest for me to deal with.

Just wait for #2.
Molon Lube

Kai

Quote from: Jenne on July 28, 2010, 07:07:20 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 28, 2010, 06:38:37 PM
Quote from: Jenne on July 28, 2010, 06:28:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 28, 2010, 06:24:46 PM
This is one of those threads that leaves me with an uncomfortable sense of helplessness. Don't know how useful that really is.

One thing that history has taught ME, Kai, is that things have always had the same "hell in a handbasket" way about them...it's just that society sometimes has a wishful/hopeful thinking quality that seems blind to the so-called reality of things.  Trick is to keep in mind the horrific nature of the universe and accept all of it whole cloth, do as you will, and still enjoy the ride.  Somehow.

And mad props if you can help others to do the same.

Well, see, I don't find the universe horrific. I don't even find nature horrific. I just find the human capacity for irrationality contrasted with the equal capacity for rationality to be horrific. Sagan was right when he said this is "the planet of the idiots"; we have the full capacity, the neurological equiptment, to act in our best interests, form anticipation-maps of reality based upon actual evidence, and other rational qualities. I can live with the realization that the universe could send an asteroid down to the planet at any moment, because I know the universe isn't conscious, doesn't have the capacity to care either way. There's no intent involved. But humans DO, but we DON'T. That's the helpless part. I can work and improve myself to a high level of awareness and rationality, but I can't do one iota to improve any other person. That humans have doomed themselves despite this "great soaring passionate intelligence", that's the scary part.

Well, two things, I guess, popped outta my pea brain.  1) it's the eternal beauty and damning plight of humans to anthropomorphize the universe at large.  It's how we deal with and relate to it.  So seeing a bobcat rip the ribcage out of a baby rat in my backyard can make me feel empathy for the mother screaming at the top of her lungs in the dead of night.  Because we have bobcats who prey on OUR young in society as well--they just don't always walk on all fours.  And 2) we are still PART of the universe, so everything we do is not outside of it, though looking at the universe from an "outside of human" point of view might also skew how we fit and interact with it.  We are only as idiotic as the rest of where we live...plenty of other organisms act in an "abnormal" way that are "detrimental" to status quo or so-called progress...we aren't alone there.

...I have somewhere else I could go with this, but I'm distracted by work, so if I can I'll get back to it.  ...as I re-read it I sound like I'm bullshitting anyway, so I'll stop there.

It would be nice if you did continue, because I'm not sure how anthropomorphization is damning, rather than simply an unfortunate contingency. Are you referring to religion?

As for part two, I've been reading a book called Seibutsu no Sekai (The World of Living Things) by Kinji Imanishi, a sort of Japanese version of Lewontin's Triple Helix, written in 1942 right before Imanishi was sent off to fight in WWII. According to the author, humans (and all organisms) have a recognition system which at base ignores everything as not existing that does not fall within it's realm of immediate and long term needs. In contrast, everything it does recognize is seen as an extension of self.

So, humans who are not particularly self-aware treat all the things they recognize in the environment as extensions of self to be manipulated however they please, and everything not recognized essentially doesn't exist.
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Jenne

Quote from: Kai on July 28, 2010, 07:28:52 PM


It would be nice if you did continue,

Ok, I'll hash this out more when I don't have TOEFL people in my head while I'm typing...(and poke me if I forget). :)

Phineas T. Poxwattle

this has been a great discussion to read.

I have little to add. What can I say about our quickening spiral into the hole at the bottom of the toilet? It has a sort of inevitable quality. I wonder what the mood in high rome was before it got sacked and burned. Was it grim and hopeless with a dash of hope? Was there a feeling of business as usual? It makes me feel a bit helpless.

I think there's hope at the two ends of the spectrum:

1. Becoming super individualized - detaching completely from the collective Me, forgetting about all the large systems I'm participating in, focusing entirely on the stuff in my immediate world. Because it's a lot easier to not give a shit about the plutonomy if all I have to worry about is my paycheck, my rent, my bullshit. One can stop watching TV, consuming news, participating in politics, and these problems will vanish too. From a certain subjective perspective.

2. Dropping this pesky individuality and identifying with the collective. All the drama we're experiencing at the personal level is just our ego. In the greater scheme of things, everything I think, do, believe, become, is just a drop of water in the ocean. It's irrelevant. It's microscopic. We can only ever hope to accomplish anything by sacrificing the self and joining a collective organism, facilitating the greater forces present in our society to work through us.


maybe!

Jenne

...too bad that pesky indiduality is what creates the best inventions, the medicines that cure and the art that amazes...

Adios

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 02:57:17 PM
this has been a great discussion to read.

I have little to add. What can I say about our quickening spiral into the hole at the bottom of the toilet? It has a sort of inevitable quality. I wonder what the mood in high rome was before it got sacked and burned. Was it grim and hopeless with a dash of hope? Was there a feeling of business as usual? It makes me feel a bit helpless.

I think there's hope at the two ends of the spectrum:

1. Becoming super individualized - detaching completely from the collective Me, forgetting about all the large systems I'm participating in, focusing entirely on the stuff in my immediate world. Because it's a lot easier to not give a shit about the plutonomy if all I have to worry about is my paycheck, my rent, my bullshit. One can stop watching TV, consuming news, participating in politics, and these problems will vanish too. From a certain subjective perspective.

2. Dropping this pesky individuality and identifying with the collective. All the drama we're experiencing at the personal level is just our ego. In the greater scheme of things, everything I think, do, believe, become, is just a drop of water in the ocean. It's irrelevant. It's microscopic. We can only ever hope to accomplish anything by sacrificing the self and joining a collective organism, facilitating the greater forces present in our society to work through us.


maybe!

Certain things are going to happen whether your head is in the sand or in a noose. That being said I prefer to die on my feet than live on my knees.

Phineas T. Poxwattle

Quote from: Jenne on July 29, 2010, 02:58:35 PM
...too bad that pesky indiduality is what creates the best inventions, the medicines that cure and the art that amazes...

is it individuals? From the collectivist perspective, no. (tautology lol!) Bear with me, I'm performing a thought experiment...

When Salk invented the polio vaccine, he was merely the focal point through which thousands of years of medical knowledge expressed themselves. If he hadn't done it, somebody else would have. Once medical knowledge had the ingredients for the polio vaccine, it was just a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

When duchamp flipped a urinal upside down and signed it R. Mutt, he also flipped the art world upside down. But the art world had been paralyzed by form and tradition, an institutionalized narrow-mindedness that became the perfect starting conditions for some madman to take art in an entirely different direction. Dada certainly did grow from duchamp's personality, but his artistic opinions were reactions to the formal art world - he wouldn't have had that specific reaction unless he was using the collective as his source of input.

Bebek Sincap Ratatosk

Quote from: Jenne on July 29, 2010, 02:58:35 PM
...too bad that pesky indiduality is what creates the best inventions, the medicines that cure and the art that amazes...

Not to mention it tends to be far more reliable than 'the collective' when the shit hits the fan ;-)
- I don't see race. I just see cars going around in a circle.

"Back in my day, crazy meant something. Now everyone is crazy" - Charlie Manson

Bebek Sincap Ratatosk

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 03:05:45 PM
Quote from: Jenne on July 29, 2010, 02:58:35 PM
...too bad that pesky indiduality is what creates the best inventions, the medicines that cure and the art that amazes...

is it individuals? From the collectivist perspective, no. (tautology lol!) Bear with me, I'm performing a thought experiment...

When Salk invented the polio vaccine, he was merely the focal point through which thousands of years of medical knowledge expressed themselves. If he hadn't done it, somebody else would have. Once medical knowledge had the ingredients for the polio vaccine, it was just a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

When duchamp flipped a urinal upside down and signed it R. Mutt, he also flipped the art world upside down. But the art world had been paralyzed by form and tradition, an institutionalized narrow-mindedness that became the perfect starting conditions for some madman to take art in an entirely different direction. Dada certainly did grow from duchamp's personality, but his artistic opinions were reactions to the formal art world - he wouldn't have had that specific reaction unless he was using the collective as his source of input.

But interacting with the Universe seems a lot different than abandoning individuality in favor of the collective.
- I don't see race. I just see cars going around in a circle.

"Back in my day, crazy meant something. Now everyone is crazy" - Charlie Manson

Phineas T. Poxwattle

Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 03:04:53 PM
Certain things are going to happen whether your head is in the sand or in a noose. That being said I prefer to die on my feet than live on my knees.

I have to wonder if individuality is not actually the noose -- a rope tying us to consumerism, ephemeral political movements, and anchoring us to pleasure and operant conditioning

the modern concept of individuality is an invention ... it has not always been this way...


Quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everyday_life#HistoryFurthermore, individuals in many ancient cultures primarily viewed their self-existence under the aspect of a larger social whole, often one with mythological underpinnings which placed the individual in relation to the cosmos.[8] People in such cultures found their identity not through their individual choices—indeed, they may not have been able to conceive a choice which was purely individual. Such individuals, if asked to describe themselves, would speak of the collective of which they were part: the tribe, the Church, the nation.[9]


food for thought, at least

Adios

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 03:05:45 PM
Quote from: Jenne on July 29, 2010, 02:58:35 PM
...too bad that pesky indiduality is what creates the best inventions, the medicines that cure and the art that amazes...

is it individuals? From the collectivist perspective, no. (tautology lol!) Bear with me, I'm performing a thought experiment...

When Salk invented the polio vaccine, he was merely the focal point through which thousands of years of medical knowledge expressed themselves. If he hadn't done it, somebody else would have. Once medical knowledge had the ingredients for the polio vaccine, it was just a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

When duchamp flipped a urinal upside down and signed it R. Mutt, he also flipped the art world upside down. But the art world had been paralyzed by form and tradition, an institutionalized narrow-mindedness that became the perfect starting conditions for some madman to take art in an entirely different direction. Dada certainly did grow from duchamp's personality, but his artistic opinions were reactions to the formal art world - he wouldn't have had that specific reaction unless he was using the collective as his source of input.

It still requires an individual to rise above the humdrum and accomplish something.

Adios

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 03:10:00 PM
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 03:04:53 PM
Certain things are going to happen whether your head is in the sand or in a noose. That being said I prefer to die on my feet than live on my knees.

I have to wonder if individuality is not actually the noose -- a rope tying us to consumerism, ephemeral political movements, and anchoring us to pleasure and operant conditioning

the modern concept of individuality is an invention ... it has not always been this way...


Quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everyday_life#HistoryFurthermore, individuals in many ancient cultures primarily viewed their self-existence under the aspect of a larger social whole, often one with mythological underpinnings which placed the individual in relation to the cosmos.[8] People in such cultures found their identity not through their individual choices—indeed, they may not have been able to conceive a choice which was purely individual. Such individuals, if asked to describe themselves, would speak of the collective of which they were part: the tribe, the Church, the nation.[9]


food for thought, at least

You seem to be confusing personal choices with individualism. I see an individual as not being afraid to look at things from a different perspective, one who is willing to risk failure in order to achieve success.

Bebek Sincap Ratatosk

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 03:10:00 PM
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 03:04:53 PM
Certain things are going to happen whether your head is in the sand or in a noose. That being said I prefer to die on my feet than live on my knees.

I have to wonder if individuality is not actually the noose -- a rope tying us to consumerism, ephemeral political movements, and anchoring us to pleasure and operant conditioning

the modern concept of individuality is an invention ... it has not always been this way...


Quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everyday_life#HistoryFurthermore, individuals in many ancient cultures primarily viewed their self-existence under the aspect of a larger social whole, often one with mythological underpinnings which placed the individual in relation to the cosmos.[8] People in such cultures found their identity not through their individual choices—indeed, they may not have been able to conceive a choice which was purely individual. Such individuals, if asked to describe themselves, would speak of the collective of which they were part: the tribe, the Church, the nation.[9]


food for thought, at least

True, seeing ourselves as part of a tribe has brought us the wonders of dogmatic belief, Us vs. Them and the resulting religions and wars... all sorts of great stuff.

- I don't see race. I just see cars going around in a circle.

"Back in my day, crazy meant something. Now everyone is crazy" - Charlie Manson

Phineas T. Poxwattle

in my ear right now, millions of white blood cells are fighting millions of bacteria. A few days ago, the war against the ear infection was won, though smaller battles would continue until all the bacteria has been purged.

Perhaps one of these white blood cells was there at the tipping point, perhaps it performed some heroic act of self sacrifice which tipped the scales against the infection. Perhaps its particular tactics were instrumental in victory. But I do not thank that individual blood cell for its contributions to the war.


Adios

Quote from: Phineas T. Poxwattle on July 29, 2010, 03:18:14 PM
in my ear right now, millions of white blood cells are fighting millions of bacteria. A few days ago, the war against the ear infection was won, though smaller battles would continue until all the bacteria has been purged.

Perhaps one of these white blood cells was there at the tipping point, perhaps it performed some heroic act of self sacrifice which tipped the scales against the infection. Perhaps its particular tactics were instrumental in victory. But I do not thank that individual blood cell for its contributions to the war.



That is incredibly weak.