A few things you should all read.

Now that I’m on the highest tragic plateau, I think I should say a few things:

If you’re a fundamentally healthy person, mania is desirable. The healthy manic blesses life.


Lucifer is God’s favourite angel- he is also my satyr.


Awareness is not just about noticing what’s going on around you, it’s about understanding what’s going on around you.


Something that both Yahweh and I ageree upon: having a full-strength beer is glutinous.


I must admit, ascending life has a few quirks to it. But once you understand, you realise that’s how it should be.


How could the completely exhausted body of Paul have come to any other conclusion?


Considering the benefits of immigration, new-fashioned Australian cookery is supreme. One could even justifiably call it super cookery.


To wield a battleaxe on the street (to wield a hammer whilst on fire). That would make one a god. That would be a grand attack.


Regarding ‘Deleuzian wars’, there’s no Muslim ‘pincer attack’- or is there?


Regarding this schizophrenic concept of the ‘city’- ours is going to be a lot better than the Americans’.


The chronic pain in my shoulder disappeared when I became a force majeure- unfortunately it has since returned.


‘All of you just can’t understand, how I can just kiss a man.’


‘Don’t know’ really means don’t care, doesn’t it?


I’m starting to think Jesus was a gay Persian…


You can almost imagine a kid saying: ‘It doesn’t matter if one of us dies, we don’t matter’.


In some way, space is all at one point. The Higg’s particle?


The earliest organisms- all all at war?


Of the most blessed image
If you suffer from others deeply and long enough, you’ll eventually divine them in entirety. It follows that if you suffer from decadents deeply and long enough, you will invariably become a force majeure. This is the image of the dismembered Dionysus reborn, the image that blesses life, the opposite of God on the cross.

Humanity is fed up with being tragic, this was supposed to be a new millenium 8-[

It is a new one, the problem is, we still have the old hanging around our necks.

Two replies. What a surprise. Here I am laying it down in style and all you guys can do is blink.

I like your druggy musings, Impious - but they don’t exactly lend themselves to prolonged discussion . . . and, let’s face it, once one finds oneself depressed again, all this talk of the pathos just loses its romantic lustre . . .

Is that a fact?

For the record, good work Impious.

I think Impious, in his celebration of the tragic pathos, can probably get by without such bland reassurances - “for the record”, or otherwise …

impious u so nietzsche

Eyes open at your style and at the moment, loving it. The lay down effect.

A rare moment where an online community lets me experience another based on hope and expectation of “keeping in common”, but more important, recognizing only slight differences and not being disappointed by it.

If I blink, I will peel back me eyelids.
Please keep doing the damn thing, Imp.

. . . and becomes enjoyable enough to laugh at the cruel joke, instead of just living it.

that’s a comfort which rapidly grows cold - just give it time - it helped drive Nietzsche insane eventually.

Okay, I’ll give it some time.

Or it is hanging us from our necks?

I am certain this is the case, though whether you want to call it the Higg’s or not is a practical irrelevance. You would essentially be naming God ‘Higgs’, since that point would represent the whole of all being. In any case, I hate to self-plug but I’ve written a relevant article on this topic after the jump below. Man I’m shameless… But if you’re interested, the part that shows how the universe can exist as a single particle is just a little above the middle in a paragraph that begins “The third observation…”

chris-hampton.blogspot.com/2009/ … on_16.html

Did you know that with the interference patterns in your article you give a very nice description of Maya, the Indian principle that is said to give rise to all the illusions of our world?

I wasn’t specifically thinking of that, but I am pretty well versed in Hinduism (started out as a religious studies major with Eastern focus). There are lots of things to call this phenomenon (Rupert Sheldrake calls it morphic resonance, for instance). My position, and the core of my personal philosophy, is that all possible perspectives must be taken into account to really understand something. This means that we must consider the world both as illusion and as material. The paradox is fundamental, rather than inimical. This is backed up by limits of practical application from any single perspective. To use your example, Maya is practical in meditative practice, self-abnegation, spiritual ascension and so on but not practical in daily life, and without some focus on the material world, there would never be a person born to then be dedicated to seeking the truth of Maya. The two perspectives rely on each other to exist.

Brahman is the godhead, the demiurge, from which all things flow. Every tier of being in the heirarchy beneath (from Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, through the Shaktis and down through the lesser demons, down to humans, and so on) is a part of the Brahman’s self, and it’s purpose is to achieve its own perfection, such that the goal of the universe, which is the whole of all being, which is Brahman, is to become the perfection of perfection. Perspective exists so that every smithereen of Brahman may become a perfect whole, each of which is also the totality of Brahman. That’s where the tenth dimension loops back around to zero, and how the unvariegated prime singularity can also experience differentiation and infinity. Moksa is the experience of a differentiated perspective (say, and individual human, but really any being in the universe) comes to complete realization of its nature of also being Brahman.

In ‘The Matrix’ mythos, it would be called ‘returning to the source.’ The Matrix Trilogy, btw, is really a seven hour long allegory to the Upanishads. Check it!

“The complete universe, at any moment, is fully defined as the sum-total of all Perspectives (us)!” - Book of Fudd (9:02:10)
Existence is the content of Mind; a moment of ‘enlightenment’ of ‘self-awareness’ for Consciousness…

‘Paradox’ is a sign of error, from the scientific, the critically thoughtful Perspective.

“All apparent disequilibriums are but part of the greater equilibrium of the ‘whole’.”

Mr Shambles, I’ll respond with a personal message.

A few responses to this:

  1. A sign of possible error. It’s an earmark, not a proof.
  2. Scientism and its canon is a roadblock to true understanding. Part of taking all perspectives is recognizing that science only gets you so far. What you’ve done here is piggyback ‘critically thoughtful’ onto ‘scientific’. I happen to have a pretty deep understanding of scientific thought (I’ve had a subscription to New Scientist for four years, and read it cover-to-cover weekly, as a start), but I will not follow it blindly into its myriad dead-ends (Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle?). I also happen to consider myself to be exceptionally ‘critically thoughtful.’
  3. Is this dispute a matter of different understandings of the word ‘paradox’? For instance, I do not consider it to be synonymous with ‘contradiction’. In fact, I feel that all true paradox is the opposite of contradiction (hence fundamental). The anthropic sensation of contradiction arises from limited perspective (phenomenon), not from the thing-in-itself (noumenon)

If you smell a skunk, you can be statistically founded in tentatively assuming a skunk in the area at some time. If it walks like a duck…
Wherever is paradox, is error found; whether axiomatic, or perceptual, or interpretational… there will be found error and refutation. There is no paradox to ‘truth’ (that which is irrefutable?). ‘Truth’ is unfalsifiable, which takes the term from the scientific arena into the religious.

What is “scientism and it’s cannon”?
Real modern updated ‘science’ is a Perspective, not a religion, and now has no cannon or fundamentality. No ‘certainty’.

All Perspectives are (to one extent or another) limited.
I guess that you have neither heard of jnana yoga or ‘scientific enlightenment’. Yes, ‘classical’ (prior to QM’s critical update) physics was very limited due to it’s fundamental naive platonic errors.
All ‘paths’ of inquiry “only get you so far” before all the tools and mechanisms of the ‘known’ must be abandoned in order to ‘proceed’…

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is the new face of science, the new world, far from a ‘dead-end’. It has not been refuted (yet). Nothing can be known to a certainty, ever. ‘Certainty’ is (fundamentalism) religion, not science.

Sorry, there is no exidence of any such thing as a ‘thing in itself’.
What unsupported/unsupportable nonsense… Perhaps ‘good thinking’ with the available science 2,000 years ago, but it is no more than a historical asterisk.

Namelesss, I want first of all to thank you for the challenge. Here goes…

I think I misrepresented myself here unintentionally. I should not have allowed even the ‘possible’ to enter in to this. It’s clear to me now that our definitions of paradox are entirely dissimilar, so further argument is probably not worthwhile. Paradox is not the same as ‘contradictory’, nor does it imply impossibility. Rather, it is a seeming impossibility resulting from a limited perspective. I will admit that the definition you are using is one that I held for quite some time, but then, I first heard this word circa fourth grade. The subtleties and nuance of philosophical thought have since led me to a more refined understanding of the term and its purpose.

It has a canon, most certainly. Just like the philosophical canon the relative importance of different sources is up for debate, the fringes of inclusiveness are blurry, those that are included are always subject to revision or redaction. ‘Canon’ does not mean ‘fixed and unchanging’, rather it is an indicator of a body of work that is generally accepted within the community in question (whether it be science, philosophy, religion, or some more specific field).

ScientISM is the religion of science, its adherents, its propaganda, proselytizing, and so on. The church is not unified, and the followers do not necessarily proclaim themselves as such (most are terrified of anything resembling religion and will vomit upon any descriptors that will hold it to be in common with it). This is somewhat ironic, given that scientISTS are so laughably disorganized as a result of their fear of resembling in any way their sworn enemies. Yet, they do preach, and they will to everything short of conquistador conversion to ‘fix’ the ‘addled’ perspective of other religions. You say that religion is a perspective, and of course you are right. Where you are wrong in in the fact that ‘religion’ and ‘perspective’ are two different things. They are synonymous. (Or more precisely, religion is the word applied distinctly to humans, where rocks or supernovas or viruses or cold fronts can have perspective.) Ultimately, there are about 6.7 billion human religions on this planet, one for each of us. All of your beliefs and understanding of the world are distinctly your own, and have never been held by another. This is your religion.

The problem with Scientism is the same problem that any other macro-religion has (where I am here defining macro-religion as congruent belief-sets that are held by groups of people). Scientism believes that it is the one true way, the final truth, that no other can usurp it, best it, refute it, supersede it, or otherwise come out on top. Scientism operates within a hegemony of perspective. It is distinctly patriarchal, bureaucratic, and isolationist. Scientism does not need god on its side. It’s got better than all those namby-pamby spirit-slingers. It’s got measurements! and Equations! And Logic! Never mind that the deeper science delves the more it discovers that it doesn’t have a clue what’s going on down there at the bottom of things, at least it doesn’t believe in miracles (god forbid).

As a matter of fact, I have NOT heard of Jnana Yoga, however, as with most things I encounter, I am now inclined to go find out for myself. Now, are you going to stand there all day flinging terminology at me to show how big and strong you are? It would be far more constructive to, I don’t know, say something about Jnana Yoga? It’s worth a shot anyway. I could probably rattle off a list of things you’ve never heard of, but I’m incredibly bored with this little ego game.

Scientific Enlightenment, yes, heard of it. As an addition to all I’ve said above, true enlightenment wouldn’t require the ‘scientific’ qualifier because it would take account of all perspectives, including those that are not scientific. I find it confusing that you are able to simultaneously argue that all individual perspectives are limited, but that Scientism is the only perspective that matters (because you see, you are one of those undeclared ScientISTS, you just don’t realize yet that you’ve read all their pamphlets and are now one of them).

One of the other great tricks of Scientism is to keep to itself only that which has been rationally ‘proven’. Anything that is unexplained or little understood has nothing to do with Science. Even questions regarding them are considered unscientific because the entire field is unscientific. People that study these things are in no way scientists. However, the moment they prove anything with replicable experimentation, they are welcomed with open arms as if they were part of the family all along, and then suddenly Science has grown just a little more true, thanks to the works of those (former) outsiders. I want to thank you for providing me with a perfect example of this. You bring up classical physics and its ‘naivety’ and ‘limitations’ as if they were simply your quaint and humble ancestors. Do you have no appreciation for the fact that they basked in the glory of their ever-broadening understanding of the world just as scientists do now? Do you realize that a hundred years from now you will be seen as just as quaint? The disparity (which you’ve posited to be modern interpretations of quantum mechanics) is contained precisely within the works of the fringe-thinking yahoos that were, at one time, shunned by the scientific community, and lookee now, they’re family! Now everyone can play nice together!

I’ll be perfectly honest and say that the last line of the above quote, I have no clue what you meant to say.

Read your own words above. Are you still going to argue that paradox=error?

You’ve not refuted a thing here, only waxed polemic. It would be simple for me to point out that the ‘thing-in-itself’ is defined precisely by those qualities it holds for which we cannot gather measurable “exidence”[sic], but I think it would be more interesting for you to consult your Science pamphlets for me on this: When we see a supernova through a telescope with our eyeballs and our visual cortex, we are seeing all that a supernova is, True or False?

Is our perception the whole of reality? Or could it be that there is something greater? Something we might call perhaps the thing-in-itself?

Whew, that was fun.

[edit] for the record, I’m done with this particular thread as it has strayed WAY beyond the original poster’s intentions. If someone else would like the final word they can have it. If anyone wishes to keep debating these tangents we’ve gone on, start a new thread and PM me where I should throw my hat in the ring.