Does idealism lead to more compassion ?

[AshvinP]

Post by bkastrup » Fri Jun 18, 2021 8:13 am

In proposing that our individual minds are mere segments, or aspects, of an all-encompassing mind, analytic idealism offers solid ontological ground for compassion. The idea that, when you and I die, I'll experience the memories of your experiences, and you of mine, is almost a definition of compassion, and certainly justifies the latter while we are alive.

I have to say... this comment really highlights the ethical bankruptcy of analytical ontology, both materialist and idealist. First, BK claims to have no idea what happens after death in terms of individuated consciousness and memory, so the above makes no sense.

I must concede that BK seems to revert to some degree of aporia here, as he continues to insist in his most recent interview that there is no evidence that any sense of some transcorporeal state of individuated selfhood persists when the corporeal expression of the dissociated alter dissolves. In which case, what is this "you and I" that experiences each other's memories when we die?

Right, but the main point is that BK, like 99% of other modern philosophers, has prevented himself from ever saying anything meaningful about the spiritual i.e. life across the threshold of physical death. Like materialism, this critical idealism has ensured that it can only seek an ethics within the physical world, such as "categorical imperative" of Kant, and all such frameworks will fall short for obvious reasons (assuming there is actually existence beyond the physical). So, for BK it is either say nothing about ethics, adopt materialist utilitarian ethics, or throw out pure abstract speculations. Those are the options and all of them are terrible ones. In that sense, this comment is half critique, half pity for BK. I don't envy a professional philosopher who cannot speak meaningfully about ethics.

[Lou Gold]

I have to say... this comment really highlights the ethical bankruptcy of analytical ontology, both materialist and idealist. First, BK claims to have no idea what happens after death in terms of individuated consciousness and memory, so the above makes no sense.

I must concede that BK seems to revert to some degree of aporia here, as he continues to insist in his most recent interview that there is no evidence that any sense of some transcorporeal state of individuated selfhood persists when the corporeal expression of the dissociated alter dissolves. In which case, what is this "you and I" that experiences each other's memories when we die?

Right, but the main point is that BK, like 99% of other modern philosophers, has prevented himself from ever saying anything meaningful about the spiritual i.e. life across the threshold of physical death. Like materialism, this critical idealism has ensured that it can only seek an ethics within the physical world, such as "categorical imperative" of Kant, and all such frameworks will fall short for obvious reasons (assuming there is actually existence beyond the physical). So, for BK it is either say nothing about ethics, adopt materialist utilitarian ethics, or throw out pure abstract speculations. Those are the options and all of them are terrible ones. In that sense, this comment is half critique, half pity for BK. I don't envy a professional philosopher who cannot speak meaningfully about ethics.

Too harsh, methinks, Ashvin. My naive view is that ethics are born out of separation. The professional general, lawyer, doctor, etc needs a code of ethics to constrain the power unleashed by separation from the integrated/instinctual mode known as the garden prior to knowledge of good and evil. Individual creativity is both inevitable and a potentially dangerous thing demanding an ongoing process known as finding balance on the slippery earth or the middle way. To approach this challenge with a profound humility (groundedness in the real) is surely not a failure.

OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not a philosopooper. Ooops, philosopher.

[AshvinP]

I must concede that BK seems to revert to some degree of aporia here, as he continues to insist in his most recent interview that there is no evidence that any sense of some transcorporeal state of individuated selfhood persists when the corporeal expression of the dissociated alter dissolves. In which case, what is this "you and I" that experiences each other's memories when we die?

Right, but the main point is that BK, like 99% of other modern philosophers, has prevented himself from ever saying anything meaningful about the spiritual i.e. life across the threshold of physical death. Like materialism, this critical idealism has ensured that it can only seek an ethics within the physical world, such as "categorical imperative" of Kant, and all such frameworks will fall short for obvious reasons (assuming there is actually existence beyond the physical). So, for BK it is either say nothing about ethics, adopt materialist utilitarian ethics, or throw out pure abstract speculations. Those are the options and all of them are terrible ones. In that sense, this comment is half critique, half pity for BK. I don't envy a professional philosopher who cannot speak meaningfully about ethics.

Too harsh, methinks, Ashvin. My naive view is that ethics are born out of separation. The professional general, lawyer, doctor, etc needs a code of ethics to constrain the power unleashed by separation from the integrated/instinctual mode known as the garden prior to knowledge of good and evil. Individual creativity is both inevitable and a potentially dangerous thing demanding an ongoing process known as finding balance on the slippery earth or the middle way. To approach this challenge with a profound humility (groundedness in the real) is surely not a failure.

OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not a philosopooper. Ooops, philosopher.

Again, it's all about taking evolution seriously...

When I avoid working against my own client's interests only because the state bar would disbar me if anyone ever found out, it's good that some moral order has been imposed for the time being, but there is hardly anything genuinely ethical about it. I am avoiding this conflict of interest out of fear of being disbarred, not out of genuine desire to avoid betrayal of my fellow man. This is why Nietzsche said "most morality is cowardice" - we will tell ourselves it is genuine desire which motivates us so that we can maintain our moral persona to ourselves and others, but we have no warrant to make that claim until we are put into a situation where there is absolutely no threat of social, cultural, economic, legal, or divine punishment, yet we still freely choose not to betray our fellow man. Who among us has been tested in that way?

Genuine ethics is a hope to look forward to, just like peace and freedom, not a fixed reality which has existed from time immemorial. It is born from the integration of the physical (separated plane with self-consciousness) with the spiritual (unified plane of moral intuitions). If a philosopher, scientist, or just the average Lou cuts out one half of that equation (the concrete spiritual), then they cannot be surprised when their "ethical" philosophy leads nowhere fast. It is all self-imposed predicaments we have put ourselves in this manner, so I don't think it's too harsh at all to simply point this out. If his lack of genuine ethical philosophy was due to some intrinsic quality of his that he had no control over (like one's ethnicity, nationality, gender, culture, etc.), then it would be harsh to critique him over it. But it's not due to any of those things, only to the decision to stop philosophizing once he reached his desired destination of Schop critical idealism.

We have all exhibited that same prejudices throughout our lives in our own ways, and it's a safe bet that we are all still doing that to some extent in our own ways.

[Lou Gold]

Genuine ethics is a hope to look forward to, just like peace and freedom, not a fixed reality which has existed from time immemorial. It is born from the integration of the physical (separated plane with self-consciousness) with the spiritual (unified plane of moral intuitions). If a philosopher, scientist, or just the average Lou cuts out one half of that equation (the concrete spiritual), then they cannot be surprised when their "ethical" philosophy leads nowhere fast. It is all self-imposed predicaments we have put ourselves in this manner, so I don't think it's too harsh at all to simply point this out. If his lack of genuine ethical philosophy was due to some intrinsic quality of his that he had no control over (like one's ethnicity, nationality, gender, culture, etc.), then it would be harsh to critique him over it. But it's not due to any of those things, only to the decision to stop philosophizing once he reached his desired destination of Schop critical idealism.

If a philosopher, scientist, or just the average Lou cuts out one half of that equation (the concrete spiritual), then they cannot be surprised when their "ethical" philosophy leads nowhere fast.

I'm wondering if you feel that when Ramana Maharshi said, "I see God in a tree because I see a tree as a tree" that he was somehow ignoring the concrete spiritual?

My way in my nowadays elderhood in to watch scenes like this and realize that I can not imagine not wanting to protect and defend it.



I do like your statement "Genuine ethics is a hope to look forward to, just like peace and freedom, not a fixed reality which has existed from time immemorial. It is born from the integration of the physical (separated plane with self-consciousness) with the spiritual (unified plane of moral intuitions). "

I personally would eliminate the adjective "moral", not because it's wrong, but because it carries such heavy cultural baggage that the spiritual intent is easily missed and often is. If you mean by "moral" simply "well-integrated" or "whole" I would tend to agree that it applies to spiritual/material, Physicalist/Idealist, theist/atheist, etc.

[AshvinP]

Genuine ethics is a hope to look forward to, just like peace and freedom, not a fixed reality which has existed from time immemorial. It is born from the integration of the physical (separated plane with self-consciousness) with the spiritual (unified plane of moral intuitions). If a philosopher, scientist, or just the average Lou cuts out one half of that equation (the concrete spiritual), then they cannot be surprised when their "ethical" philosophy leads nowhere fast. It is all self-imposed predicaments we have put ourselves in this manner, so I don't think it's too harsh at all to simply point this out. If his lack of genuine ethical philosophy was due to some intrinsic quality of his that he had no control over (like one's ethnicity, nationality, gender, culture, etc.), then it would be harsh to critique him over it. But it's not due to any of those things, only to the decision to stop philosophizing once he reached his desired destination of Schop critical idealism.

If a philosopher, scientist, or just the average Lou cuts out one half of that equation (the concrete spiritual), then they cannot be surprised when their "ethical" philosophy leads nowhere fast.

I'm wondering if you feel that when Ramana Maharshi said, "I see God in a tree because I see a tree as a tree" that he was somehow ignoring the concrete spiritual?

My way in my nowadays elderhood in to watch scenes like this and realize that I can not imagine not wanting to protect and defend it.

Lou,

I am not sure where you got "not wanting to protect and defend" trees from my post.

If that's all Maharshi said, then yes he was ignoring the concrete spiritual which is the living energy coursing within the tree, but I have a feeling he said more.

[Lou Gold]

Lou,

I am not sure where you got "not wanting to protect and defend" trees from my post.

If that's all Maharshi said, then yes he was ignoring the concrete spiritual which is the living energy coursing within the tree, but I have a feeling he said more.

I didn't get not wanting to defend and protect trees from your post. My point is that a simple direct contemplation of nature (without an explicit moral philosophy) makes me want to protect it.

Why in the world would you suspect the possibility of Ramana looking at a tree and NOT seeing "the living energy coursing within? Can you contemplate a tree and not see that energy?

[Lou Gold]

Check out this brief video of our friend Heitor, a much loved Italian missionary in Acre State of Western Brazil who spent 57 years defending the plants, critters and peoples of the Amazon forest.

[AshvinP]

Lou,

I am not sure where you got "not wanting to protect and defend" trees from my post.

If that's all Maharshi said, then yes he was ignoring the concrete spiritual which is the living energy coursing within the tree, but I have a feeling he said more.

I didn't get not wanting to defend and protect trees from your post. My point is that a simple direct contemplation of nature (without an explicit moral philosophy) makes me want to protect it.

Why in the world would you suspect the possibility of Ramana looking at a tree and NOT seeing "the living energy coursing within? Can you contemplate a tree and not see that energy?

Yes, I can look at a tree, contemplate it, and not see that energy. Most people who are honest with themselves will say the same thing. Perhaps you and Ramana are the rare cases, which means you are very fortunate. The rest of us perceive everything from trees to the very dimensions of space and time abstractly, bereft of their living qualitative essence. What I am saying, though, is that there is still a tangled thread of Spirit which runs through all of these now abstracted phenomena and we can unravel it through our clear and precise cognition. That is the thread which BK denies, for no other reason than his philosophy dictates, from the outset, that this thread cannot exist. So he never thinks to even look for the thread. The same exact sort of denial holds true for materialists. Until we unravel that thread back to its spiritual origins, we can only expect to remain in the sort of world devoid of genuine ethical interactions with nature and with others that we have today. At its deepst core, it is not a national issue, a racial issue, a gender issue, an agricultural issue, or any sort of sociocultural issue, but a spiritual issue.

[Lou Gold]

Lou,

I am not sure where you got "not wanting to protect and defend" trees from my post.

If that's all Maharshi said, then yes he was ignoring the concrete spiritual which is the living energy coursing within the tree, but I have a feeling he said more.

I didn't get not wanting to defend and protect trees from your post. My point is that a simple direct contemplation of nature (without an explicit moral philosophy) makes me want to protect it.

Why in the world would you suspect the possibility of Ramana looking at a tree and NOT seeing "the living energy coursing within? Can you contemplate a tree and not see that energy?

Yes, I can look at a tree, contemplate it, and not see that energy. Most people who are honest with themselves will say the same thing. Perhaps you and Ramana are the rare cases, which means you are very fortunate. The rest of us perceive everything from trees to the very dimensions of space and time abstractly, bereft of their living qualitative essence. What I am saying, though, is that there is still a tangled thread of Spirit which runs through all of these now abstracted phenomena and we can unravel it through our clear and precise cognition. That is the thread which BK denies, for no other reason than his philosophy dictates, from the outset, that this thread cannot exist. So he never thinks to even look for the thread. The same exact sort of denial holds true for materialists. Until we unravel that thread back to its spiritual origins, we can only expect to remain in the sort of world devoid of genuine ethical interactions with nature and with others that we have today. At its deepst core, it is not a national issue, a racial issue, a gender issue, an agricultural issue, or any sort of sociocultural issue, but a spiritual issue.

"Yes, I can look at a tree, contemplate it, and not see that energy. Most people who are honest with themselves will say the same thing. Perhaps you and Ramana are the rare cases, which means you are very fortunate. The rest of us perceive everything from trees to the very dimensions of space and time abstractly, bereft of their living qualitative essence. "

Ashvin,

With total respect for your honest statement of personal perception, I would like to challenge it. Can't you look at a house plant and instantly see whether it is dead or alive? Perhaps it may be harder with a deciduous tree in the winter but surely not with an evergreen. And, in general, don't you quickly see/feel/sense the difference between a living being and a corpse. This is the "living qualitative essence" energy that you suggest that you don't "see". Are you the one who is so caught up in an abstraction that you are expecting something more spectacular? Can you really not see the extraordinary ordinariness of the "living qualitative essence" ???

[idlecuriosity]

I have to say... this comment really highlights the ethical bankruptcy of analytical ontology, both materialist and idealist. First, BK claims to have no idea what happens after death in terms of individuated consciousness and memory, so the above makes no sense.

I must concede that BK seems to revert to some degree of aporia here, as he continues to insist in his most recent interview that there is no evidence that any sense of some transcorporeal state of individuated selfhood persists when the corporeal expression of the dissociated alter dissolves. In which case, what is this "you and I" that experiences each other's memories when we die?

Right, but the main point is that BK, like 99% of other modern philosophers, has prevented himself from ever saying anything meaningful about the spiritual i.e. life across the threshold of physical death. Like materialism, this critical idealism has ensured that it can only seek an ethics within the physical world, such as "categorical imperative" of Kant, and all such frameworks will fall short for obvious reasons (assuming there is actually existence beyond the physical). So, for BK it is either say nothing about ethics, adopt materialist utilitarian ethics, or throw out pure abstract speculations. Those are the options and all of them are terrible ones. In that sense, this comment is half critique, half pity for BK. I don't envy a professional philosopher who cannot speak meaningfully about ethics.

We won't know for sure what he meant until he deigns to come here though. It's a shame he didn't grace us with an elaboration on what he specifically meant