love of thought

A person’s mind is usually considered the person.
If he has his mind, but looses an arm, he is still that person.
But when someone’s mind deviates away from their core values,
it is as if the person was lost.

Philosophy is love of thought, but thought is expression of being and humanness.
Thoughts wouldn’t exist without hosts for them to reside within.
If you don’t like thinking, you don’t like human existence, or nature for that matter.
Love for thought is love for ego.
Ego is not evil.

However, ego doesn’t mean that in ordinary usage. So, you are making us dyspeptic with ambiguity. Ego means something more like vanity, arrogance, and the reasons feminists call for the castration of Donald Trump. Yet, there are numerous more secretive forms of ego. For instance, the pride in the power of wealth. It seems to me, ego, as the “I”, does not mean “ego”. It could mean the one who is coexistence with inner talk. Or, the one who is annoyed at discomfort. Or, the judgment, in cases of choice. Or, something else. Now, what exactly is this supposedly easy peasey thing? The “Ich”, in point of reality, it is a new invention, and not coeval with human existence. It is radically unphilosophical. It is Locke’s formula: happiness is the power to get the things that bring happiness, in potentia. Ergo, the densest most viral self-conceit as sheer isolation from the others and strange plunging into the waters of the will. Ergo, the ego is the will.

Dictionary “a person’s sense of self-esteem or self-importance.”
Love of ego is just another way of having self-esteem.
You can say the ego is will,
but do you really want to redefine our own language?
Doesn’t that achieve nothing?

The whole person is its body, mind and spirit all working in synchrony but with certain weightages.
Example body [20%], mind [75%] and spirit [5%].
This is why if one loses an arm, it does not significantly effect the integrity of the person.

Philosophy-proper is the self [ego] optimal generation and application of thought to ensure the well being of the individual[s] and the collective.

Thought is not equal to the ego.
Thoughts are filtered and expressed via the ego into ideas, concepts, actions, etc.

If the ego is managed by philosophy-proper, then the consequences are Good.
But if the ego is influenced by lack of philosophy-proper, i.e. no modulation of basic instinctual impulses, then the ego [self, I] would be expressing and acting evil.

Good insight, I haven’t read much worthwhile from you for a very long time, good to see this comment though. I disagree with the rest. But, it is interesting how somebody who changes-face, changes political parties, changes their mind, etc. can be said to be a “different person”, or a different person “entirely”. So how people identify each-other, has a great deal (or most) to do with thoughts, beliefs, and values, all of which are not superficially apparent.

I would simplify it all to a matter of Sociology “you’re on my side, sharing my values-beliefs, or, you’re not”. And when people “change their mind”, it’s like changing their person-hood. This becomes complicated, and interesting, when people are proven wrong through logical rigor and philosophy. If your old self is ‘dead’, and your new self has learned from being wrong, then what are the implications?

To learn about existence, means that you necessarily betray the lies and falsity that you are brought up with? That to increase your wisdom in life, means isolation, individuality, and turning away or against all those who took part in your beliefs and values, and some earlier point in time.

Food for thought… no response needed.

Dan:

Why does he have to be considered as being lost?
Minds can remain in flux, people change.

One can just as easily say that the person who never examines or re-examines his core values is the one who is lost or fixed or frozen in time.
One can easily say that the thought within that mind changing is the butterfly leaving the cocoon.

Are you using the phrase “love for ego” here to mean the Self’s love in the seeking of conscious awareness?

Evil is a very strong word. That would depend on the individual to which that ego is attached; for instance, a despot.
The ego which allows us to literally fight for our lives and survival is certainly not evil; it is natural.

So what you’re saying, to which I agree, is that the person is best defined as that persons core values.

I can think of thought as something like a forest planet. It is an endless fertile realm where everything can be found, as well as planted and grown.

One can find a thought like a moonlit forest pond and just sit there, other thought is like a windswept tree speaking in chaotic clacking of branches against each other and it is hard to discern what is being thought.

Of course thought can also consume the whole forest planet in a giant flame.

This is the worst and most idiotic thread I’ve encountered yet. Though, I did learn the tedious lesson that’s it’s a waste of time to talk with “Dan”. It attracted quite a few commentators’ dear interests, further blacking this forum with the stain of sub-thinking mediocrity.

Why? What’s so idiotic about what i said?
Love of thought is love of ego and love of living.
That is as basic as saying the sky is blue.

“Sub-thinking?”
You just made that up.

Most people will agree with me when we talk in person.
The people that don’t know what I’m even saying, the straw men, tend to get upset and insulting. They are clueless.

He who dwells in willful ignorance liveth in death and it shalt be their food.

No disrespect intended, but this is not an argument, it is preaching.
There’s a conspicuous amount of unwarranted assumptions, though I can’t tell which ones you are making or not making. Nevertheless… some must be there.
“I” as substance, thought as a predicate of “I” (slave to the grammar), some implicit definition of what ‘thought’ is, and, regardless, philosophy can’t help loving just about any thought (and, actually, there must be also some definition of ‘love’)… Not to mention this old comforting idea that mankind only is capable of thought.

It could be rephrased as something like:

  • There is a substance, some ens realissimus, which is ‘ego’
  • ‘Ego’ is the only host of ‘mind’
  • Mind (and mind only) produces thoughts (and All thoughts are good)
  • As a philosopher, you have to love all thoughts
    ergo: as a philosopher, you have to love mind and then ‘ego’.

Well, maybe not. Philosophy could also be that thing that puts question marks after all those premisses and see how one can unmake them - not much, in my view. Moreover, why if someone does something good, you have to ‘love’ everything about that someone? Isn’t that some gimmick to pretend to provide a foundation to a preconceived unconditional (and morally driven) love for ‘humaness’? (which, btw, looks very much like some platonic idea, eternal and unchangeable).

Regardless, there are inherent vices.
Even positing that «thoughts wouldn’t exist without hosts for them to reside within», you don’t get to narrow these thoughts down to one single host, to individuals - unless, again, you already assumed that.
Then, I confess that I don’t really understand the what «when someone’s mind deviates away from their core values» means. Anyway, the argument begs the question: if one loses one’s mind, does one stop being human?