Philosophical Speculations

A search of the old MS forum does't bring up any results referring to the book Thinking and Destiny by Harold Waldwin Percival, which is available as a PDF here, wherein one finds the curious idea of learning how to think without creating thoughts. So I'm curious if anyone here is familiar with it, and how it might align with other thoughts on the role of Thinking so often being expressed and debated herein.

Soul_of_Shu wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 2:59 pm A search of the old MS forum does't bring up any results referring to the book Thinking and Destiny by Harold Waldwin Percival, which is available as a PDF here, wherein one finds the curious idea of learning how to think without creating thoughts. So I'm curious if anyone here is familiar with it, and how it might align with other thoughts on the role of Thinking so often being expressed and debated herein.

I started browsing the PDF. It's hard for me to tell what to make of it or how it fits into the spiritual scientific view. The wiki says he was part of the Theosophical society and split off in 1902 to "develop his own system". Steiner took a similar path to Anthroposophy. But check out page 29-30, where he begins writing about the "machinery" of nature in relation to the "law of thought" (it won't let me copy the text). I think that sort of imagery is a warning sign of attempts to reduce rich, qualitative spiritual reality into a system of purely abstract mechanistic concepts. I would need to read more to confirm that, but that is my initial sense. A quick search for "Steiner" or "anthroposophy" gives no results, which is pretty odd if he came from Theosophy and was writing at the same time. Perhaps he viewed Steiner as competition?

I don't know, it's all speculation at this point. But, in general, IF in fact his system is accurate but also remains purely within the sphere of intellectual abstractions, this brings us to the question which only became possible to ask in the modern age - why settle for the hyper-complicated abstract thought-systems which point to modes of experience we can directly attain? Only in the last few hundred years have we convinced ourselves that it would actually be reasonable to embark on such a path. And even before we attain fully conscious higher cognition, we can at least seek out those who write about those experiences more concretely and with qualitatative detail.

Soul_of_Shu wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 2:59 pm A search of the old MS forum does't bring up any results referring to the book Thinking and Destiny by Harold Waldwin Percival, which is available as a PDF here, wherein one finds the curious idea of learning how to think without creating thoughts. So I'm curious if anyone here is familiar with it, and how it might align with other thoughts on the role of Thinking so often being expressed and debated herein.

An unrelated question: why is any average philosophical debate on YT is about 2 hours long and any average philosophical book is about 1000 pages long?

Eugene I wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 5:42 pm

Soul_of_Shu wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 2:59 pm A search of the old MS forum does't bring up any results referring to the book Thinking and Destiny by Harold Waldwin Percival, which is available as a PDF here, wherein one finds the curious idea of learning how to think without creating thoughts. So I'm curious if anyone here is familiar with it, and how it might align with other thoughts on the role of Thinking so often being expressed and debated herein.

An unrelated question: why is any average philosophical debate on YT is about 2 hours long and any average philosophical book is about 1000 pages long?

The less you know the harder it is to explain it.

Eugene I wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 5:42 pmAn unrelated question: why is any average philosophical debate on YT is about 2 hours long and any average philosophical book is about 1000 pages long?

I'm thinking it takes the creating of a lot of thoughts to learn how to think without creating thoughts.

Soul_of_Shu wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 6:14 pm

Eugene I wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 5:42 pmAn unrelated question: why is any average philosophical debate on YT is about 2 hours long and any average philosophical book is about 1000 pages long?

I'm thinking it takes the creating of a lot of thoughts to learn how to think without creating thoughts.

Also attention spans used to be longer than 10 seconds. People would spend many hours in contemplative thought. Now, if it can't be reduced to sound bites on YouTube or tweets, it's worthless.