Defineing progress in philosophy

[Dan1 (Dan~)]

Today I will explore the question : “What is philosophical progress?”
All things are subject to progressions of change, but in a more dualistic view, there is progress then there is decent which is the opposite of progress. The only way this question can be meaningful is if we use a system of thought or paradigm in which the question would be meaningful. As such we may use a dualistic system of differenciation.

It is clear that when we ask someone “what is scientific progress?”, they will most likely answer easily that scientific progress happens when we learn new things that we did not know before. But if we ask “what is philosophical progress?”, this can have a different reply. I will say that philosophical progress partains to deeper insights into things that we already know. Science is what, and some of the how, but philosophy is an art which should refine the accute propriety of our sympathy with knowledge.

So I will say that the goal of philosophical progress, is to clarify that which is known, build deeper insight into the whole picture, and determine how we should use this knowledge. Science does not say whether or not something is bad or good, typically, but instead science says what the consiquences will be either way. Science is fairly popular as a paradigm amoung modern intellectuals. Science is all about building up allot of experiences in one subject (tests), then recording those tests or practices and relaying these tests in a summary to other people. We’ve always had science, but it has become its own class in modern society. In philosophy, we ponder something for quite a while, and learn or study aswel, then later we may write down what we have thought. This is still a science, but it is the science of the inner mind and recording how it comes and how it goes.

Philosophical progress happens when we discover things within our own mind. Philosophy is esoteric. The esoteric is simply the psychological. When we have become very experienced with thought, then we have made philosophical progress. But we can make progress in a “bad direction”, such as developing a complex religion which sacrifices babies or some garbage like that. Or we can make progress in a “good direction”, developing a philosophy about altruism and its effects on a society as a whole.

We define progress typically with that which is good. Therefor the best philosophy makes progress with our values and our morals. When we ponder the idea of a wonderful world, we come to conclusions about how to make the world better. This class of philosophy is all about improvement, even when it contradicts another idea about improvement. There can be many forms of improvement and eventualities which may not be 100% compatable, but they still might be of the same class. This is teleology.

Philosophy is more than just teleology. We can “progress” in many different directions. Philosophy means more than just a dualism or a linear purpose. This makes the question a bit difficult to answer in a single sentance.

So I have decided to say that philosophical progress, is the act of becoming experienced with thought.

[treeman]

Would this progression of thought be considered the progression from necessity to freedom?

[Dan1 (Dan~)]

@treeman

Would this progression of thought be considered the progression from necessity to freedom?

I’d say it’s from accidents to efficiency.

[finishedman]

There is nothing to be freed from. The ‘knowledge self’ or ‘thought self’ is not what you are. All that is there is a sharpened intellect. The container of the knowledge (you) does not change. The knowledge contained in thought is the same. You are using the thoughts to achieve something. For example, if you want doctor knowledge, you put that kind of knowledge in the brain and use it. if you want lawyer knowledge , put that in there and use it. The thoughts that are structured by whatever knowledge you choose does not describe your essense as a being. It only is the manner in which you use it to describe whatever endeavors you choose to use it for. The container of the knowledge does not change … the knowledge does.

[treeman]

@finishedman

There is nothing to be freed from. The ‘knowledge self’ or ‘thought self’ is not what you are. All that is there is a sharpened intellect. The container of the knowledge (you) does not change. The knowledge contained in thought is the same. You are using the thoughts to achieve something. For example, if you want doctor knowledge, you put that kind of knowledge in the brain and use it. if you want lawyer knowledge , put that in there and use it. The thoughts that are structured by whatever knowledge you choose does not describe your essense as a being. It only is the manner in which you use it to describe whatever endeavors you choose to use it for. The container of the knowledge does not change … the knowledge does.

To ask whether a man has freedom is like asking whether a man is a millionaire. He is not, but can become one. He can make it his aim to become rich; similarily he can make it his aim to become free. In his inner space he can develope a center of strength so that the power of his freedom exceeds that of his necessity. This is someone who is always exercising his power of self awareness, which is the power of freedom but not to the fullist degree, completly unmoved by any necessity. Man has inner unity but has an assembly of many different personalities each saying “I”. He can create inner unity and become a subject acting from his own inner strength and ceases to be a mere object.

[treeman]

@Dan~

@treeman

Would this progression of thought be considered the progression from necessity to freedom?

I’d say it’s from accidents to efficiency.

So all you really can do is set yourself up to get lucky?

[finishedman]

@treeman

To ask whether a man has freedom is like asking whether a man is a millionaire. He is not, but can become one. He can make it his aim to become rich; similarily he can make it his aim to become free.

When you say “He can make it his aim to become…”, there is a ‘He’ there that is choosing to become something. What is the condition of this ‘He’ that it should make it an aim to be something other than what it is?

Was it something better before and it is making it a goal to return?

Was it nothing up until a point where it discovered there is something it did not know and is now making that its aim?

How can the creation of an aim requiring effort (like in the millionaire’s case) bring freedom? The goal of it prevents the freedom that is there.

Did an idea about freedom come along? Where did the idea come from? If it was not the case that the desire to become free began from something that he came to know about ‘freedom’, then there would be no consideration of it.

[treeman]

@treeman

To ask whether a man has freedom is like asking whether a man is a millionaire. He is not, but can become one. He can make it his aim to become rich; similarily he can make it his aim to become free.

When you say “He can make it his aim to become…”, there is a ‘He’ there that is choosing to become something. What is the condition of this ‘He’ that it should make it an aim to be something other than what it is?

Curiosity.

Was it something better before and it is making it a goal to return?
How can the creation of an aim requiring effort (like in the millionaire’s case) bring freedom? The goal of it prevents the freedom that is there.

Did an idea about freedom come along? Where did the idea come from? If it was not the case that the desire to become free began from something that he came to know about ‘freedom’, then there would be no consideration of it.

For creatures endowed with consciousness there is time only in the sense of experience, but experience is confined to the present except where the past is made present through memory and the future is made present through forsight.

Was it nothing up until a point where it discovered there is something it did not know and is now making that its aim?

He is pursuing a purpose. Its is rediculous to answer any of your questions without recognizing the level of being of the person on which the phenomena occurs. To deny teleological action at the human level would be as foolish to impute it at the material level

[finishedman]

This is a material life. What else do you propose that it is?

[treeman]

@finishedman

This is a material life. What else do you propose that it is?

I propose life is invisible, inner and intimate as well as visible, external and less intimate. The more interior a thing is the less visible it is likely to be. The powers of life, consciousness, and self-awareness are all wholly invisible-without color, sound, taste or smell and also without extention or weight. What I mean is, we can see another persons body directly, we see the lips moving, the eyes opening and shutting, the lines of the mouth and face changing, and the body expressing itself as a whole in action but the person himself is invisible. All our thoughts, emotions, feelings, imaginations, reveries, dreams, fantacies, are invisible. All these things constitute oneself. Most people do not grasp this, that we live in a world of invisible people. Life is a drama of the visible and the invisible. There is the external world, i.e., directly accessible to our senses; and there is “inner space”, where things are invisible, i.e., not directly accessible to us, except in the case of ourselves.

[Peachy_Nietzsche]

Contributions to philosophy are really just additions in the evolution of language.

[finishedman]

@treeman

All our thoughts, emotions, feelings, imaginations, reveries, dreams, fantacies, are invisible. All these things constitute oneself.

All those are composed of the knowledge you have of them creating those experiences. You can modify the knowledge, you can change it. But you stay basically the same because after they settle down, after they dissolve into themselves, are absorbed, you are once again back in state where life is peacefully and intelligently taking care of itself without interference from what thought is demanding at that moment.

There is no inner and outer. There is a feeling, there is a demand, that there is something more interesting that you can do with yourself, more meaningful, more purposeful than your existence presently is. That’s the demand. That’s why there’s this restlessness. You become restless because of this drive which is put in there by some outside source like society or culture or the OP, that makes you feel that there is something more interesting, more meaningful, more purposeful that your life can be than what it is now. Your naturalness is destroyed by that demand which is put in there, You become impatient and annoyed by situations that aren’t interesting. But the problem is not really the restlessness. You’re dealing with something that’s not there. You’re not conscious of the existence of it either on the conscious level of your thinking or on the conscious level of your existence.

[finishedman]

@Peachy Nietzsche

Contributions to philosophy are really just additions in the evolution of language.

and language is a reflection of the imposition of your society which in turn perpetuates itself through the establishment and continuity of its members who have the illusion that they are individually creating there own purpose for themselves.

[treeman]

@finishedman

@treeman

All our thoughts, emotions, feelings, imaginations, reveries, dreams, fantacies, are invisible. All these things constitute oneself.

All those are composed of the knowledge you have of them creating those experiences. You can modify the knowledge, you can change it. But you stay basically the same because after they settle down, after they dissolve into themselves, are absorbed, you are once again back in state where life is peacefully and intelligently taking care of itself without interference from what thought is demanding at that moment.

There is no inner and outer. There is a feeling, there is a demand, that there is something more interesting that you can do with yourself, more meaningful, more purposeful than your existence presently is. That’s the demand. That’s why there’s this restlessness. You become restless because of this drive which is put in there by some outside source like society or culture or the OP, that makes you feel that there is something more interesting, more meaningful, more purposeful that your life can be than what it is now. Your naturalness is destroyed by that demand which is put in there, You become impatient and annoyed by situations that aren’t interesting. But the problem is not really the restlessness. You’re dealing with something that’s not there. You’re not conscious of the existence of it either on the conscious level of your thinking or on the conscious level of your existence.

The avverage individual posses only a limited degree of self-knowledge. What is not know exists and your assumptions serve to cover up the true facts of the case. The ego only knows its contents but not the facts that are hidden. The individual is an exception and an irregular phenomenon. It is not the universal and regular that charaterises the individual but rather the unique, the individual cannnot be known or compared with anything else. If you want to know an individual you must lay aside all scientific knowledge of the average man and lay aside all theories in order to adopt a completly new and unpredudiced attitude. Knowledge of man presupposes all sorts of knowledge of man in general. In order to understand an individual person you must leave all theoretical assumptions behind you. You must turn a blind eye to scientific knowledge. Because there is knowledge on the one hand and understanding on the other. In the case of the individual, knowledge works to the disadvantage of understanding. The individual is unique and is the real object of investigation. To look at the individual from the outside is absurd when talking about value or meaning of the individual. A man who looks outside has lost meaning and quails before the battalions and has no resource to combat the evidense of his senses and his reason. The individuals psychic attitude is the only thing that really enables him to exersise his judgement and real power of decision. Statistical reality is not the only reality. The individual is extramundane. It is the existence of the evidence of the inner that protects him from submersion into the mass. The individual is a heretic.

[finishedman]

@treeman

The individual is unique and is the real object of investigation. To look at the individual from the outside is absurd when talking about value or meaning of the individual. A man who looks outside has lost meaning and quails before the battalions and has no resource to combat the evidense of his senses and his reason. The individuals psychic attitude is the only thing that really enables him to exersise his judgement and real power of decision. Statistical reality is not the only reality. The individual is extramundane. It is the existence of the evidence of the inner that protects him from submersion into the mass. The individual is a heretic.

This is very much a futile exercise. It is an effort to try and find an entity that is there in thought – an all pervasive locus. But thought cannot be observed by something other than thought itself. There is barrenness or no self when thought is absent. When thought starts itself and proceeds forth, there is the idea of the appearance of ’self’ there whose existence and endurance is framed by thought. What is thought? How is thought observed? There is no entity there, separate from thought, that can look at thought without the use of thinking. All there is thought about thought. And without the ability to think, there is no consciousness.

@treeman

The individual is unique and is the real object of investigation.

and is the subject that is investigating.

To look at the individual from the outside is absurd when talking about value or meaning of the individual.

The value or meaning is something that is operating there already and no ‘looking’ or thinking in any which way can capture or experience that. Nor can understanding due to the fact that thought is the only instrument there is to utilize for understanding.

A man who looks outside has lost meaning and quails before the battalions and has no resource to combat the evidence of his senses and his reason.

Suppose meaninglessness is all there is, all there can ever be. What can be done? The goal is responsible for the dissatisfaction and meaninglessness. An idea has been rumored that there is meaning, that there must be a meaning to life. The notion of the meaningful creates the feeling that life has no meaning. If the idea of the meaningful is dropped then meaning is there in whatever is done.

The individuals psychic attitude is the only thing that really enables him to exercise his judgment and real power of decision.

yes, there must be something that is the guide so as to be able to have a sane and rational existence and relationship in all situations.

Statistical reality is not the only reality.

true, yet it provides a makeshift sphere of knowledge within which we may function.

The individual is extramundane.

That outlook prevents living in harmony with the things in the physical world, which in essence, is the only reality.

It is the existence of the evidence of the inner that protects him from submersion into the mass.

There can be the use of an invented ‘reality’ for functional purposes and the simultaneous understanding that there is nothing that can be done to experience the reality of anything.

The individual is a heretic.

We have to accept the reality as it is imposed on us by the society only to the extent that we see it as essential for us to function in this world intelligently and sanely. If we don’t accept that reality, you are right, we are on our own and lost in the jungle. I’m not saying anything against it.

[treeman]

@treeman

The individual is unique and is the real object of investigation. To look at the individual from the outside is absurd when talking about value or meaning of the individual. A man who looks outside has lost meaning and quails before the battalions and has no resource to combat the evidense of his senses and his reason. The individuals psychic attitude is the only thing that really enables him to exersise his judgement and real power of decision. Statistical reality is not the only reality. The individual is extramundane. It is the existence of the evidence of the inner that protects him from submersion into the mass. The individual is a heretic.

finishedman wrote:

This is very much a futile exercise. It is an effort to try and find an entity that is there in thought – an all pervasive locus. But thought cannot be observed by something other than thought itself. There is barrenness or no self when thought is absent. When thought starts itself and proceeds forth, there is the idea of the appearance of ’self’ there whose existence and endurance is framed by thought. What is thought? How is thought observed? There is no entity there, separate from thought, that can look at thought without the use of thinking. All there is thought about thought. And without the ability to think, there is no consciousness.

Nothing can be observed not even the physical world except other than thought itself. Therefore knowing is a form of false consciousness. One cannot come to this conclusion without serious self examination.The world is not an ideology nor a scientific institution, nor is it even a system of ideologies; rather, it is a structure of unconscious relations and symbiotic processes. Therefore human beings never know what they are doing. Since being by definition is greater than knowing. Human beings embody a domain structured by opposites by thinking one thing and doing another. For example hatred is a form of attraction through which we become what we hate. Nature is neither a place nor a state of being; it is a human abstraction that we set up through cultural activities. The conscious purpose of science is to control nature; its unconscious effect is disruption and chaos. A person who has no interest in examining the process of their own thought are those who cannot see the evil and unenlightenment in themselves, in their own conditions of suffering, project it outwards and inflict their goodness on others, turning a disconnected and uncommpassionate virtue into an abstract kind of cuelty. This is what Carl Young calls The Undiscovered Self

@treeman

The individual is unique and is the real object of investigation.

finshedman

and is the subject that is investigating.

Me.

To look at the individual from the outside is absurd when talking about value or meaning of the individual.

finshedman

The value or meaning is something that is operating there already and no ‘looking’ or thinking in any which way can capture or experience that. Nor can understanding due to the fact that thought is the only instrument there is to utilize for understanding.

And you came to this conclution how?

A man who looks outside has lost meaning and quails before the battalions and has no resource to combat the evidence of his senses and his reason.

finishedman

Suppose meaninglessness is all there is, all there can ever be. What can be done? The goal is responsible for the dissatisfaction and meaninglessness. An idea has been rumored that there is meaning, that there must be a meaning to life. The notion of the meaningful creates the feeling that life has no meaning. If the idea of the meaningful is dropped then meaning is there in whatever is done.

Its the differnce that we set up that constitues meaning or non meaning. The universe is driven by differences; light dark growth decay life and death. In other words, these processe which appear as the foundations of living beings, result from a sort of collaboration of what one has the habit of calling life and death, can only exist if its never a question of simply collaboration, but one of radical opposition and negation.

The individuals psychic attitude is the only thing that really enables him to exercise his judgment and real power of decision.

finishedman

yes, there must be something that is the guide so as to be able to have a sane and rational existence and relationship in all situations.

And what do you think this guide might be?

Statistical reality is not the only reality.

finishedman

true, yet it provides a makeshift sphere of knowledge within which we may function.

Yes makeshift but dependent on the whims of cultural changes.

The individual is extramundane.

finishedman

That outlook prevents living in harmony with the things in the physical world, which in essence, is the only reality.

Values are not objects but very much a part of our human reality

It is the existence of the evidence of the inner that protects him from submersion into the mass.

finishedman

There can be the use of an invented ‘reality’ for functional purposes and the simultaneous understanding that there is nothing that can be done to experience the reality of anything.

The only reality we can experience is that of our fellow human beings. Even though it may take one of our fellows to point out what you have been hidding from yourself.

The individual is a heretic.

finishedman

We have to accept the reality as it is imposed on us by the society only to the extent that we see it as essential for us to function in this world intelligently and sanely. If we don’t accept that reality, you are right, we are on our own and lost in the jungle. I’m not saying anything against it

I do not suppose that society imposes on us a sane and intelligent reality.