Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 1:21 pm
*Putting on the dualist hat*
Lou, I don't think you're missing anything, it's just a matter how you see things.
Your reference; The notion of God; can be interpreted as there being dualistic structures present that we normally are not aware of. It doesn't invalidate dualism. (as long as we speak of the essence of dualism, not the mind/matter one).
Continuing on that thought, as you say; dualism is all around us. So, instead of starting talking about how this is not our "true way of being"; there is a "salvation in unity" "over there" (pointing just around the corner - you know - to the point which you can't see), how about this thought:
"This it it." We are already much closer to the true essence of being that we think. The veil which must fall from our eyes is exactly this: The realization that there is nothing else.
Now, before we start freaking out thinking that this is immensely depressing, lonely, and scary, just take a deep breath. It doesn't have to be. I'm not saying that we're not connected in a deeper sense (see God) , or that there is nothing else to explore and learn. I'm just suggesting that the dualism that we experience all the time is fundamental and is not going away.
Let's take an example: "structure". Is it really possible for "structure" to exist without some kind of dualism providing the groundworks for the spatiality necessary to speak of "structure" ?
Let's be clear that Hedge was asking about metaphysical dualism and you guys are speaking of something entirely different.
But the problem with the mindset expressed above is not that it's lonely and depressing, although it naturally will be over time, but that it's selfish. It deprives the entire world of whatever deep potential is living within you, waiting to be freed and manifested in the world. If we egoistically delude ourselves into thinking we are full and complete beings in that manner, there is never any motivarion to discover that potential within. It would be as a parent telling their 14 year old child the same thing. We are spiritual infants and adolescents at best, with much more growing and maturing to do.
I am absolutely speaking about metaphysical dualism. Just not mind/matter dualism. The dualism i'm suggesting runs deeper than that, and also, it is apparent right now in your immediate being. I'm talking about the interaction surface between what you are and what you aren't. I am not saying that this surface is immovable, or that there is no possiblity of change or improvement. Therefore I also dont' see how a statement like that is selfish.
You say that "there is nothing else" and therefore the dualism is "fundamental and not going away". So if we can improve, i.e. make more subconscious layers of our Being conscious, why do we suppose our current state of veiled ignorance is fundamental and not going away?
"Most people would sooner regard themselves as a piece of lava in the moon than as an 'I'"
Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 1:21 pm
*Putting on the dualist hat*
Lou, I don't think you're missing anything, it's just a matter how you see things.
Your reference; The notion of God; can be interpreted as there being dualistic structures present that we normally are not aware of. It doesn't invalidate dualism. (as long as we speak of the essence of dualism, not the mind/matter one).
Continuing on that thought, as you say; dualism is all around us. So, instead of starting talking about how this is not our "true way of being"; there is a "salvation in unity" "over there" (pointing just around the corner - you know - to the point which you can't see), how about this thought:
"This it it." We are already much closer to the true essence of being than we think. The veil which must fall from our eyes is exactly this: The realization that there is nothing else.
Now, before we start freaking out thinking that this is immensely depressing, lonely, and scary, just take a deep breath. It doesn't have to be. I'm not saying that we're not connected in a deeper sense (see God) , or that there is nothing else to explore and learn. I'm just suggesting that the dualism that we experience all the time is fundamental and is not going away.
Let's take an example: "structure". Is it really possible for "structure" to exist without some kind of dualism providing the groundworks for the spatiality necessary to speak of "structure" ?
Martin,
I may be wrong but it feels like you think I see the real as somehow out there but I see it as a dynamic co-arising, a both/and rather than an either/or. Salvation for me is to be here now. But how to speak of it with words born of dualism? Most spiritual traditions use paradox, poetry or parable to express the real. In the Old Tradition, which offered the words I referenced in the psalm, the practice is say "say, G_D" because to express the name is to fall into idolatry.
Francis of Assisi begins his "Canticle of the Creatures":
Most High, all-powerful, good Lord,
Yours are the praises, the glory, and the honor, and all blessing.
To You alone, Most High, do they belong,
and no human is worthy to mention Your name.
Rumi ends his "Great Wagon" poem:
Come to the orchard in Spring.
There is light and wine, and sweethearts
in the pomegranate flowers.
If you do not come, these do not matter.
If you do come, these do not matter.
The Tao Te Ching says:
The name which can be named is not the Eternal Name.
You say:
"This is it." We are already much closer to the true essence of being than we think. The veil which must fall from our eyes is exactly this: The realization that there is nothing else.
Now, before we start freaking out thinking that this is immensely depressing, lonely, and scary, just take a deep breath. It doesn't have to be. I'm not saying that we're not connected in a deeper sense (see God) , or that there is nothing else to explore and learn. I'm just suggesting that the dualism that we experience all the time is fundamental and is not going away.
It surely seems fundamental in the incorporeal survival ego state but "before we start freaking out thinking that this is immensely depressing, lonely, and scary, just take a deep breath. It doesn't have to be", which why Jesus, in the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas says:
"If they ask you,'What is the sign of your father in you?', say to them, 'It is movement and repose.'"
So, yes, "just take a deep breath."
Last edited by Lou Gold on Tue Nov 16, 2021 3:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Be calm - Be clear - See the faults - See the suffering - Give your love
Let me put this a different way (given that hat I'm currently wearing for this conversation)
* In the sense that there is only one sun, and we're all interconnected rays of this sunlight, i am not dualist.
* In the sense that the singular sun operates in a surrounding darkness, i am dualist.
Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 4:38 pm
Let me put this a different way (given that hat I'm currently wearing for this conversation)
* In the sense that there is only one sun, and we're all interconnected rays of this sunlight, i am not dualist.
* In the sense that the singular sun operates in a surrounding darkness, i am dualist.
Might it be that the Truth is not arguable?
Be calm - Be clear - See the faults - See the suffering - Give your love
Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 4:38 pm
Let me put this a different way (given that hat I'm currently wearing for this conversation)
* In the sense that there is only one sun, and we're all interconnected rays of this sunlight, i am not dualist.
* In the sense that the singular sun operates in a surrounding darkness, i am dualist.
Might it be that the Truth is not arguable?
Let's just say that it we seems to get lost very quickly if you we try.
Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 4:38 pm
Let me put this a different way (given that hat I'm currently wearing for this conversation)
* In the sense that there is only one sun, and we're all interconnected rays of this sunlight, i am not dualist.
* In the sense that the singular sun operates in a surrounding darkness, i am dualist.
Might it be that the Truth is not arguable?
Let's just say that it we seems to get lost very quickly if you we try.
Lost in the duality?
Be calm - Be clear - See the faults - See the suffering - Give your love
Martin_ wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 8:13 pm
By the way; nice picture.
Thank you Martin.
To give my creative intention a more 'analytic' flavor, let me describe my process using the tools of Photoshop. I converted a full color photo into black and white. The tool allows the isolation and manipulation of separate color values. In this way I converted green tones to white tones associating in my creative intention the living tones of green with the life-giving tones of light (plant intelligence excelling in converting light to life). My intention was to create somehow a non-ordinary visual object evoking the "mysteriousness" of a landscape loaded with emergent life.
I enjoy the visual games because of the way they can evoke the paradox as a "mysteriousness" to "understand", to "stand under", to "behold", to appreciate and explore and to lovingly embrace and represent.
Of course, as far as parsimony and analytic philosophy go, Magritte did it better...
Be calm - Be clear - See the faults - See the suffering - Give your love
Hedge90 wrote: ↑Mon Nov 15, 2021 12:53 pm
Tbh I don't find the first issue (how the mental can affect the physical) to be much of an issue, because the answer could very well be: it cannot. You just feel like it's you running the show, but hard determinism is actually correct, and you are just watching stuff unfold from 1st person perspective.
You are describing epiphenomenalism, which is a form of materialism, not substance dualism. Substance dualists assume consciousness does affect matter. They just can't explain how.
