Re: It’s Simply Systems Stupid…just design better ones
Posted by James on October 12, 2010 · 18 Comments
I’m no social Darwinist. But we should apply evolution to society to see what insights it offers us. My favorite cultural evolutionist: en.wikipedia.org
Video Rating: 4 / 5
Yes, I suppose it very well may be. But where do thoughts start then? And where do thoughts have any relevance to or association with “self”, which to me they most certainly seem to have? So if I go deeper, should I expect to find an absence of self? Hmmm, let’s give it a try then, but I think it will be hard to notice considering all my thoughts build from my presuppositions…
It very well may be, that what you perceived to be the self, was an elegant mental representation of the source of thoughts. Continue investigating and go “deeper” into the subtrate consciousness.
QUIS ego sum, si ego NON cogito? – Who am I, when I don’t think? Descarte was intimidated by that concept and never addressed it.
The homunculus, a little fellow who watches a TV of the senses and pulling levers supposes an infinite regress: an impossibility: homunculi within homunculi. The same occurs when thinking about thoughts. Thoughts are responsible for the sense of self. There IS NO exponential awareness,because awareness, which is almost permanent is not the same as thought,which is definitely impermanent. Grasp a thought and you can become clouded by thought. I think therefore I am, WHAT IF YOU CAN CEASE THOUGHT?
project:who the fuck am I and who the fuck are you
nice ramble
I agree about the need to try and correlate biological systems to modern human societies, though I wonder if one just doesn’t get lost in metaphor. I for one would be quite content to see the terms constraint, stasis, hierarchy, and spandrel integrated into modern economic thought as defined by their evolutionary meanings. I also wait on pins and needles, as Randites around the world, unite around Dawkin’s altruism as a survival strategy. It’ll be a great day.
Yes, all information we can gain is actually from the past. In meditation, the information is a fraction of a second old. The future is never now, the past is only a memory, yet expectations and memories can be correct. In spite of this, the present moment is the only truth. Whenever thought arises, awareness is almost always saturated. I think the self is “made” out of the same “things” as thoughts and emotions, memories, expectations. Consciousness, is truely unique, maybe even permanent.
The psyche is impermanent. Buddhist meditation sees through this self. I once thought too that there was a self, but the deeper I went, the clear everything was, the self was not separate, not even apparent. I perceievd myself as a point of awareness that was infinitely small and infinitely big at the same time, while objects also “outside” of “me” were also infinitely small and large, no thoughts were there. This is onepointed concentration called samadhi,a state within substrate consciousness.
Ah, yes. You bring up an excellent point. But here is the problem. The brain is overactive. It contradicts a key element to awareness. It creates exponential awareness. You can remove yourself and reexamine a situation from an outside perspective at any time. Why? Because the brain can’t grasp self. Just think about it…think about what that means, there is a place in your psychi where you observe a baseline self…don’t dismiss it out of hand…
Ive been reading the comments left on your videos( Holy God) ( people talk shit ) (an endless stream of platitudes-this is what comes out of the soft science’s-CONFUSED PEOPLE)
Very interesting. However, with thought arises the self, according buddhism, although, not necessarily. Current knowledge of neuroscientists have not found a source for a self, only the bulk of brain-porcesses “create” it. Any separation of the internal (“self”) and external (“objective reality”) was at first created as a thought in the head: a hologram that depicts what seems to be two separate universes, which is not the case. No matter how convincing a self seems to be,there is no separation.
and I’m not Buddhist, so I happen to not agree with some of the fundamental assumptions it stands upon.
I didn’t say awareness is a self, I implied that there is an association with one’s self that can be known simply through the ability of awareness, without life experiences, sensory input from the universe and so on. And to me it feels more like a self than a construct one clings to based off of responses/rections from one’s environment. In other words, what the world tells me I am is less convincing of self than what I understand myself to be if I just meditate and silence all thought…
Any true self that one believes, according to buddhism is not the true self. Awareness is not a self, especially because it doesn’t feel like a self.
There is a distinct association with self that is not explained by social influences, our biology/physiology, or any other factor. It get’s masked over by our need to relate and measure ourself against the external world we perceive. But I assure you it’s deep down in there, maybe you forgot. It really has nothing to do with objectivism, because it is all immaterial. It’s more rooted in awareness itself. Just think about it without restricting yourself to terminology and language
Objectivist! Not possible…;)
our ego-self is the only one self-evident objectively self, so it’s no wonder they get confused. let’s talk about systems self selfing… selfless systeming selves…. grammatically meaningless sentences for life.
god damn objectivist!!!!