Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Sculptor1]

Sculptor wrote:

You seem to be a man who is proud of his dispassion or of having no passion in regard to his philosophizing. To each his own I say. One of the reasons I detest Dawkins and the rest is their show of having no emotion, whether real or not. Give me a passionate corrupt priest any day over a robot. Of course Dawkins isn't a robot, though he likes to think he is. That guy really does get upset. It would be fun to push his buttons and watch him fly into a rage.

Do you just react ? Or do you ever think before you act?

I did not write this. It was written to me.

[Belindi]

Sculptor wrote:



Do you just react ? Or do you ever think before you act?

I did not write this. It was written to me.

I'm sorry Sculptor, it was Gary Louis Smith who wrote it.

[GaryLouisSmith]

quaint [vs.] overheated display behaviour.

Overheated display behavior vs. quaintness. Yes yes yes. The name of my website is Tapatic Madness. “Tapatic” is a word I made up out of the Sanskrit root “tapas” which is the inner heat generated by meditation. The only type of meditation I do is philosophical analysis. Display is my **** nature. (That 6-letter word that starts with an f and ends with a t will probably be blocked out by this website and turned into little asterisks, which I suppose is somewhat appropriate.) I see you used the British spelling “behaviour”. Should I read something into that? Also the word “quaint” is rather British and I had some trouble with it. Anyway, here I am on the Subcontinent where I am somewhat of a mystery to people. Their main interest is to see if they can’t somehow use me to get money. Alas, I have given away more than I should have. That earthquake also shook my bank account. Also boys know that I am a easy touch. Oh well, I am enjoying life here among the poor. So now I am going to talk about the difference between the rich and the poor.

Kathmandu has a lot of money in it. A lot. Construction is everywhere. And of course corruption rains down like the monsoons. There are two main types of religion here. There is the “High Church” type among the rich and then there is village magic. The West has the same difference. The educated of course look down their noses at the superstitious village people. The educated, urban elite have science and the very rational, scientific culture of High Hinduism. They want you to know that they do not believe in country shamans. But, truth be told, they are afraid of them and when medical doctors fail to cure some disease those high people do make their way back to the village they grew up in to submit to that “witch doctor”. What magic has over science is that it is scary and one never knows for sure what is really going on. Yes, there is deception. Deception is at the heart of magic, and that deception is very very scary. Science has a hard time with deception.

The main difference between the rich and the poor is that the ground under the feet of the rich is shaky. And the poor want you to know that it is they that are causing the ground to shake. Poor people and their unscience are making the world very uncomfortable for the rich. And they are threatening to invade with waves of illegal immigration, which Trump and Nigel Farage are trying to stop. Of course, in the end, the poor will win. They always do. Because, I repeat, the rich and science can’t, absolutely cannot, understand deception.

[Belindi]

GaryLouisSmith, poor people never attain power unless they manage to wrest power from the rich. Deception characterises populist politicians who are deceivers of the poor.

[Sy Borg]

quaint [vs.] overheated display behaviour.

Overheated display behavior vs. quaintness. Yes yes yes. The name of my website is Tapatic Madness. “Tapatic” is a word I made up out of the Sanskrit root “tapas” which is the inner heat generated by meditation. The only type of meditation I do is philosophical analysis. Display is my **** nature.

Display is the subjugation of the self for the sake of making an impression. There's no law against it, but it's a sign of weakness and insecurity.

I see you used the British spelling “behaviour”. Should I read something into that? Also the word “quaint” is rather British and I had some trouble with it. Anyway, here I am on the Subcontinent where I am somewhat of a mystery to people.

I have the great good fortune of not being American, especially at a time when that culture that seems to be trying to shed it democracy.

Their main interest is to see if they can’t somehow use me to get money. Alas, I have given away more than I should have. That earthquake also shook my bank account. Also boys know that I am a easy touch. Oh well, I am enjoying life here among the poor. So now I am going to talk about the difference between the rich and the poor.

Hopefully "boys" over the age of consent ...

The educated of course look down their noses at the superstitious village people.

Indeed. Many prefer better music than that commercial pap :)

The educated, urban elite have science and the very rational, scientific culture of High Hinduism. They want you to know that they do not believe in country shamans. But, truth be told, they are afraid of them and when medical doctors fail to cure some disease those high people do make their way back to the village they grew up in to submit to that “witch doctor”. What magic has over science is that it is scary and one never knows for sure what is really going on. Yes, there is deception. Deception is at the heart of magic, and that deception is very very scary. Science has a hard time with deception.

That last is an astute observation! A great example is political polling. In the Anglosphere polls consistently underestimate the conservative/reactionary vote. This is supposed to be some great mystery when Rupert Murdoch owns huge chunks of the Anglosphere's media and has been changing election results since the 1950s - back then, in those more innocent times, he used to open brag about his ability to control election results. So, in the last two weeks before any election Murdoch's media goes into overdrive and their threats, false fears and general gaslighting always achieves a late conservative swing. Meanwhile, the "experts", now allowed to point out this obvious gaming of the system, treat the polling innaccuracies as a mystery.

It's true, when it comes to deception in the west, theism has secularism thoroughly beaten. However, shift focus to China and you will find that secularism is capable of just as much deception.

The main difference between the rich and the poor is that the ground under the feet of the rich is shaky. And the poor want you to know that it is they that are causing the ground to shake. Poor people and their unscience are making the world very uncomfortable for the rich. And they are threatening to invade with waves of illegal immigration, which Trump and Nigel Farage are trying to stop. Of course, in the end, the poor will win. They always do. Because, I repeat, the rich and science can’t, absolutely cannot, understand deception.

Nope. The scared and doomed ones are the middle class.

Most likely the rich will increasingly separate themselves from the poor eventually create a parallel society that is increasingly unconnected and different to the societies of the poor. The rich will have extraordinary technology and will live as humans while the rest of us in relation to them will be animals - largely either the rich's chattel or vermin. Ultimately, humans will speciate.

[GaryLouisSmith]

Display is the subjugation of the self for the sake of making an impression. There's no law against it, but it's a sign of weakness and insecurity.


Hopefully "boys" over the age of consent ...



Nope. The scared and doomed ones are the middle class.

The boys here have nothing to worry about with me. I am too old to partake, except that I do devour some with "lust of the eyes". Still they all know the art of seduction. It comes naturally. Like Freud, I do not believe in the innocence of the young.

As for the Western middle class, their doom is close. Everyone knows that. Oh well, what to do?

Yes, you are right about political deception. We have all known all about that for a long time. My interest is the deception that has overtaken the intelligentsia, the bookish crowd. They believe in science. They think it has found a way around deception. It is objective. But it's not true. Science is just much deception as is Las Vegas magic. Bruno Latour has written extensively about it in his books on the Philosophy of Science. Academic "display" is egregious. Science seems unable to look at itself. Reflexivity lands one in paradox and then the paranormal beckons, that monster to be avoided at all costs. As for you statement that my display is a sign of weakness and insecurity, isn't that more than a bit homophobic?

[GaryLouisSmith]

GaryLouisSmith, poor people never attain power unless they manage to wrest power from the rich. Deception characterises populist politicians who are deceivers of the poor.

Hello Belindi, I somewhat disagree. The frightfulness of religion, whether village magic or Western fundamentalism, wields a lot of power. So many in the West are terrified, paranoid, of Islamic terrorists. And atheists are genuinely afraid that religious people are going to try to kill them. That is the power of nightmares as Adam Curtis put it. I will go farther. I think many rich people are secretly afraid of their gardener and their cook and their delivery boy and the technicians that they have to consult. And maybe for good reason. The poor are deceptive and sneaky. They steal and cause trouble. The rich simply do not understand the art of deception, which the poor naturally know well.

[Sy Borg]

As for the Western middle class, their doom is close. Everyone knows that. Oh well, what to do?

Yes, you are right about political deception. We have all known all about that for a long time. My interest is the deception that has overtaken the intelligentsia, the bookish crowd. They believe in science. They think it has found a way around deception. It is objective. But it's not true. Science is just much deception as is Las Vegas magic. Bruno Latour has written extensively about it in his books on the Philosophy of Science. Academic "display" is egregious. Science seems unable to look at itself. Reflexivity lands one in paradox and then the paranormal beckons, that monster to be avoided at all costs. As for you statement that my display is a sign of weakness and insecurity, isn't that more than a bit homophobic?

Nah, now you're being paranoid. You must really freak out when you encounter actual phobes!

I am simply an annoying born-again rejecter of display behaviour. One day I saw it. I wasn't always being me, rather a cipher of the person I was trying to convince others I was.

Bugger that. I'd rather people have a clear run to think anything they want to think without song and dance by me trying to sway their opinions. It's one of the advantages of being a senior citizen - to break out of the dark forest of human opinion into the relative clarity an intellectual and emotional savannah. (BTW, I am not so stodgy as to be against playful display, just attempted social positioning).

Your idea of science is rather immature. Science simply came about because of conflicting opinions. Whose opinion is right? So some people tested to find out. That is science. What you are speaking about is the political frisson between:

- those more inclined to believe the thorough testing of experts who have studied the topic all their lives over centuries

- ideas made up on the spot by Iron Age people from the Middle East who were considerably less sophisticated than those in Europe, the subcontinent and east Asia at the time.

Re: the middle class. What can they do? Either scrabble for the high ground or make new lives for themselves amongst the poor.

The paranormal is not to be avoided, just doubted until proved. You make a very common mistake of assuming that those who love science believe it to be The Truth, just as you believe arcane religious gumbo to be The Truth. Some supposed science fans do treat it as though it's the absolute truth, but the researchers do not.

The "truth" that science finds is provisional, a conservative baseline that says - "This is what we are pretty sure is true. Other things may be true, but they are yet to be proved".

The moral of the story? Science is a tool, not a gospel or a way to live your life. It only competes with religions in disproving its literally thousands of wrong and manipulative claims. Consider Giordano Bruno, tortured and killed by the Catholic church for claiming that the universe was infinite. Science allowed some societies to put a check on this kind of corruption of spirituality. Some, such as in the Middle East, are still more subject to such religious tyranny.

[GaryLouisSmith]

As for the Western middle class, their doom is close. Everyone knows that. Oh well, what to do?

Yes, you are right about political deception. We have all known all about that for a long time. My interest is the deception that has overtaken the intelligentsia, the bookish crowd. They believe in science. They think it has found a way around deception. It is objective. But it's not true. Science is just much deception as is Las Vegas magic. Bruno Latour has written extensively about it in his books on the Philosophy of Science. Academic "display" is egregious. Science seems unable to look at itself. Reflexivity lands one in paradox and then the paranormal beckons, that monster to be avoided at all costs. As for you statement that my display is a sign of weakness and insecurity, isn't that more than a bit homophobic?

Nah, now you're being paranoid.

Bugger that.

Your idea of science is rather immature.

Charles Manson said that the coyote is the most aware creature there is ... because he is completely paranoid.
Paranoia is just reversed telepathy. You said that you are waiting for the paranormal to be proven before you believe in it. It cannot be proven for the same reason that no psychological (or parapsychological) theory can be proven. All such theories require the separation of experiment and experimenter, which is impossible. The one doing the experiment will ALWAYS be a participant in the experiment. It's the same in the physical sciences. Objectivity is not to be had. It's always a tangled web. Every theory has its debunkers and then the debunkers of the debunkers and on and on. There is no Savannah to stand in. Paradox and paranoia loom. And it is in that looming that the paranormal exists, never proven, never disproven. Since you are a Gothic Romantic Materialist you should love that dark vision.

[Belindi]

GaryLouisSmith, poor people never attain power unless they manage to wrest power from the rich. Deception characterises populist politicians who are deceivers of the poor.

Hello Belindi, I somewhat disagree. The frightfulness of religion, whether village magic or Western fundamentalism, wields a lot of power. So many in the West are terrified, paranoid, of Islamic terrorists. And atheists are genuinely afraid that religious people are going to try to kill them. That is the power of nightmares as Adam Curtis put it. I will go farther. I think many rich people are secretly afraid of their gardener and their cook and their delivery boy and the technicians that they have to consult. And maybe for good reason. The poor are deceptive and sneaky. They steal and cause trouble. The rich simply do not understand the art of deception, which the poor naturally know well.

Your experiences regarding " the frightfulness of religion" is certainly interesting. However religion in general is an indispensable part of any culture and its culture is an indispensable part of a society.

I myself am the cook, the delivery person, the gardener, and the technician who have worked at all those and other manual and technical jobs, and have been a member of "the poor" for many years of my life. Some of my friends and neighbours are poor. Some of my neighbours are hard working Muslims. Poor people are not remarkable for theft, troublemaking, deception and sneakiness. Maybe in your corner of the world this is so, but I'd want better than one man's possibly biased impressions before I believe you.

[GaryLouisSmith]

Your experiences regarding " the frightfulness of religion" is certainly interesting. However religion in general is an indispensable part of any culture and its culture is an indispensable part of a society.

I myself am the cook, the delivery person, the gardener, and the technician who have worked at all those and other manual and technical jobs, and have been a member of "the poor" for many years of my life. Some of my friends and neighbours are poor. Some of my neighbours are hard working Muslims. Poor people are not remarkable for theft, troublemaking, deception and sneakiness. Maybe in your corner of the world this is so, but I'd want better than one man's possibly biased impressions before I believe you.

Like you I am a member of "the poor". I agree with you that the poor are for the most part not trouble makers. BUT there is always the suspicion that they are being duplicitous. Many people think they can't quite be trusted. And that is their power. They are ambiguous. What they do must be interpreted. Pure change and accident is more common than predictability. And their religion, as seen by the unbelievers, is scary. They believe in prayer and ritual, which is magic. And their sexuality is slightly threatening. The poor are "from the other side". In my life as a writer/philosopher people have always treated me gingerly. They were nice to me, but they somehow hesitated. They just weren't sure. I used that to get what I wanted and needed. Here in Nepal, where I study Tantra and Shamanism, that low-level deception is everywhere. I enjoy playing the game. Look at my blog where I write all that. Don't expect academic propriety. I am as ambiguous there. And close to taboo. https://tapaticmadness.wordpress.com/

[GaryLouisSmith]

However religion in general is an indispensable part of any culture and its culture is an indispensable part of a society.

Here's an excerpt from the book The Trickster and the Paranormal by George P. Hansen, a book I highly recommend if you want to understand religion.

Freud, Durkheim and Otto all recognized the importance of the numinous; they understood that religion established the foundation for many cultures. Holy dread, taboo, and the numinous were the religious phenomena that served to uphold and stabilize societies. These were the fundamental source of religious power. Incredibly, the matters are given almost no discussion today. Otto was particularly perceptive and noted: “with a resolution and cunning which one can hardly help admiring, men shut their eyes to that which is quite unique in the religious experience, even in its most primitive manifestations. But it is rather a matter for astonishment than for admiration!” These words are even more true now than when they were written eighty years ago.

Today we read only sociological theories about the origin and meaning of religion. NO ONE in the scientific community writes about Holy Dread, the paranormal or Taboo. Writing about such has instead become taboo. That, I suppose, does speak to its truth and power.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Today we read only sociological theories about the origin and meaning of religion. NO ONE in the scientific community writes about Holy Dread, the paranormal or Taboo. Writing about such has instead become taboo. That, I suppose, does speak to its truth and power.

There are several trends:
1)We have science (at least its groupies) thinking they know pretty much all the main stuff and conclude that anything not demonstrated via science does not exist.
2) We have tech solutions for everything. In face we solve non-problems with tech, which is why we have people out with their kids and the whole family is walking slowly staring into cellphones
3) We have a sense of self that is based on surfaces - social media being the main outlet for this. I am what I present myself as, and I present surfaces.
4) We have a culture of distraction.
5) The religions themselves are critical of exploration outside certain areas. IOW they tend to be against spirituality, or magic type exploration, or shamanism, etc. This is not new, but part of the mix.

This soup is not supportive of deep experiences, emotional experiences, not being in control, cognitive dissonence, exploratory processes, dealing with the unknown or knowledge via the self.

The great shallows are here.

[GaryLouisSmith]

Today we read only sociological theories about the origin and meaning of religion. NO ONE in the scientific community writes about Holy Dread, the paranormal or Taboo. Writing about such has instead become taboo. That, I suppose, does speak to its truth and power.

There are several trends:
1)We have science (at least its groupies) thinking they know pretty much all the main stuff and conclude that anything not demonstrated via science does not exist.
2) We have tech solutions for everything. In face we solve non-problems with tech, which is why we have people out with their kids and the whole family is walking slowly staring into cellphones
3) We have a sense of self that is based on surfaces - social media being the main outlet for this. I am what I present myself as, and I present surfaces.
4) We have a culture of distraction.
5) The religions themselves are critical of exploration outside certain areas. IOW they tend to be against spirituality, or magic type exploration, or shamanism, etc. This is not new, but part of the mix.

This soup is not supportive of deep experiences, emotional experiences, not being in control, cognitive dissonence, exploratory processes, dealing with the unknown or knowledge via the self.

The great shallows are here.

So aside from all that how do you personally find the depths? Or do you think it's hopeless?

[Karpel Tunnel]

So aside from all that how do you personally find the depths? Or do you think it's hopeless?

In the shamanistic, ´+past life, more emotional based practices.