I actually don’t think talking about yourself in such abstract socially cold terms is useful for anything. If one of us were to write something like this you would go all playing to the gallery about up in the clouds, abstract language, serious philosophyers, what are we to make of this incredulously asking for ‘help’…
Why not for a month try talking like a person.
You wake up on a Tuesday and what? You are not sure how to resolve conflicting approaches to abortion? Did this happen during breakfast?
Now I am being a bit facetious here, but bear me out. How is this actually arising in your day to day life?
To me that was one of the least grounded ways of speaking of yourself. What would you say to a friend, instead of this abstracted refied mish mosh? A specific example. Like how this fracturing and fragmentedness arises during a specific moment in a day. Perhaps with some kind of feeling words in there.
I started thinking about my brother and his wife and their fight about X and I feel terrible cause I can see both sides of…
I mean, what are you really talking about in this abstract, up in the clouds self-desription? What is the actual problem, the real one, a specific example? And how is it a problem, for you, as an individual? How does this actually happen?
Before you got online and engaged in THE TOPIC, how did this problem actually show itself? In concrete terms. Today. Not years ago when there was an actual abortion issue for you personally. Today, how did this fractured and fragmented issue arise? What are some of the things you do when it arises? Concrete examples. (concrete examples of this could include things like ‘I called a friend.’ ‘I walked in the woods’. Concrete examples of the problem arising would deal with what you were doing when this fractured ‘i’ and the problem of conflicting goods specfically arose and how it felt?
Yes, I have commented on this. One would think that if one is truly fragmented and fractured one would have a variety of reactions to a single instance of criticism. Like, thinking the other person is right, for example, never, ever seems to arise. Incredulity at all accusations of being rude, for example, is steady as she goes, sir. Despite being fractured and fragmented he never once seems to, none of his various parts ever seems to, think the other person has made a good point about what he wrote or did. That never happens. Over years of posting, this supposedly fractured and fragmented self has a radically consistent reaction to criticism. Supposedly he is all over the place regarding morals, his different fragments presumably having differing opinions. But when it comes to evaluations of his own behavior, utter consistancy.
That said, I am not quite focused on that issue. I am more wondering what we are actually talking about here. He is so quick to accuse others of being abstract, it’s easy to miss sometimes how abstract his core statements are.
What is he actually talking about, when he refers to his state of mind/being, with the sentence I quoted?
What actually happens in a specific day?
What is he calling fragmented?
A lot of people could be not sure of an answer but not experience themselves as fragmented and fractured. That is very dramatic speech. A dramatic yet highly abstract self-description.
Well, my point is that in regard to “I” at the existential intersection of identity, value judgments, conflicting goods and political power, any context will do.
Here “I” am fractured and fragmented given the points I raise about human interactions in my signature threads.
All I can then do is to note the arguments of those who construe themselves instead as moral and political objectivists. In either a God or a No God world. How in their interactions with others [in which their own value judgments come into conflict] are they not fractured and fragmented.
Or, with KT, embedded in his own rendition of pragmatism, how does he not seem nearly as fractured and fragmented as I have thought myself into “feeling” here and now?
But either way, I would prefer that others choose the context. One that is of particular importance to them. One they have a stake in such that they will dive down deep into it in defending their own point of view.
A “depth of conviction” I am no longer able to embody myself. But one I clearly remember given all the years that I was myself a passionate objectivist.
KT asked what this means in concrete, day to day, down to earth terms. And you didn’t answer.
Are you indecisive? Do you delay decisions? Do you seek out more and more information? Do you change your mind after the fact? Do you try to reverse your actions?
What are the manifestations of this fragmentation?
If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then every time I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might have gone in the other direction…or that I might just as well have gone in the other direction. Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it all together. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.
There is how this resonates with me [subjectively/subunctively] “here and now” at the existential intersection of identity, value judgments and political economy; and how I once felt as an objectivist – God/No God – myself. No longer being able to think myself into feeling a “real me” in sync with “the right thing to do”. Always being drawn and quartered in confronting reasonable arguments able to be made by both sides – by many sides – given any particular issue. Recognizing just how thin the line can be between moral nihilism and living one’s life wholly in sync with that which is deemed [existentially[ to be in one’s own selfish interest.
Beyond that, this can only be more fully explored in a discussion of our reactions to a particular context in which behaviors come into conflict over our understanding of how identity, values and political power are intertwined in our own particular “I”.
we answer our own questions with language that we
have grown up with or have adapted over the years…
but our answers may not be your answers… and there is the
rub…
we ask questions and sometimes the answers we get, don’t
fit into our own understanding of the question…
we often expect others to answers questions with the same
language or the same way as we would answer the same question…
and this is simply not true…
Iam is answering his questions with his understanding, with his
language and it might not be the way you would answer it,
nor the way I would answer it, but that doesn’t invalidate
his answer…….
we, each of us, understand and see things differently…
either from our childhood indoctrinations and/or
from our experiences we have as we have gotten
older… my answers at 61 is vastly different then my
answers at 21 or 31 or even 51… I am a different person
because I exists in a different place now……
at 51, retirement wasn’t a thing… at 61, retirement looms
large in my life… but seeing how my 401K plan has
gone to nothing, I don’t have much to retire on anymore anyhow…
but hay, that is the way the game is played…
each of us ask different questions and we answer them differently…
because of our education, upbringing, experiences and environment…
my questions and answers are different then your questions and answers…
I am as much a “victim” of my past as you are…
the questions becomes… how do we overcome our indoctrinations
and upbringing and experiences and environment… to become who
we are… to become the people that is possible for us to become…
to find our possibilities as human beings and then become those
possibilities… but in your path, your answers, your questions
the idea of exploring one’s possibilities might never even occur to
you… and all I am doing is making you aware that possibilities
exist for you and for me…
and in the language of Iam… he too is exploring his possibilities…
he is just saying it in a different way and we must try to hear him
as we must try to hear you…….his message isn’t your message
and that is ok…does his message have value?
Yes, yes it does… all we have to do is listen…
and take it seriously…
This is off-topic. If you don’t want to answer my question, fine. But this is not yet another place for people to satisfy your criteria and answer your questions.
I am asking you to bring…
down to earth.
I have seen you refer to abstract scenarios relating to a number of conflicing good situations. What I am asking for here is to find out how this fracturedness and fragmentation arises in a specfic day. Preferably today or yesterday.
After you wake up, how do you notice this F & F state of mind/self? What triggers it? What do you do about it? What concrete situation does it relate to? You hear something on the news? You get a letter from a friend? What exactly happens?
Actually I asked Iambiguous to answer a question using the criteria he asks of us. I really don’t know how you could possibly have missed that after years of each of you participating in the same forum AND you are coming to his defense. He often chastizes people for being abstract, for not being concrete, for not ‘bringing things down to earth’. I am now asking for him to explain this fragmentedness and fracturedness he experiences in the concrete. How does this arise in his day.
Apart from the fairness of this - since he is hypercritical of precisely the kind of language he is using here - it is also a genuine question on my part. What is he talking about?
Nothing you wrote here has anything to do with the request I made in the OP, nor does it show any understanding of Iambiguous’s OWN criteria for clear communication.
Notice that he continues to assume the idea of fracturedness and fragmentedness is coherent and clear and asks others including me to explain why we are not as fragmented and fractured as he is.
In order to give us a chance to do something like that - in another thread where it would be on topic -
doesn’t it make sense that he try to clarify what that means in experiential terms?
Or are we just supposed to make up stuff guessing at what his extremely abstract formulation refers to?
What the heck are you defending?
You’re actually getting in the way of his project.
K: as you have made several post, I shall answer in one… in the post you referenced,
I did in fact answer your question and, and spoke clearly about the answer
IAM wrote…
To IAM, the language he uses is his language and his understanding of his
experiences…he has explained it as best he can with that language
and his understanding…he has answered your question, but with
a language and understanding that you don’t understand…
an example of this can be taken from my life in two parts…
I am hearing impaired… I was born with a severe hearing loss…
so, I say to you, I am hearing impaired… now you might think
that you know what it means, but trust me, you don’t…
for me, it is clear and understandable because I have lived it
all my life… I cannot reduce it down anymore for it to make sense
to you…to a hearing person, life has certain basic fundamental
experiences, but to a hearing impaired person, I don’t have those
basic fundamental experiences and thus, I cannot know what you mean,
no matter how you describe it…and no matter what language you use…
I simply don’t have the knowledge or experience to know what you are talking
about and you cannot know what I am talking about in regards to my hearing loss…
that experience of a hearing loss cannot, cannot be reduced to some basic
level of understanding that can be communicated to others… it must
be experienced to be understood…
IAM has a certain understanding of the world based upon his
knowledge, experiences, both practical and theoretical…
he has explained it as best he can with the language and experiences
he has…if you don’t understand, that isn’t his fault… you don’t
have his language or experiences to understand his issues…
just as you don’t have the language or experiences to understand
what it means to be hearing impaired…you cannot possible know…
we human have certain experiences that allow us to be able
understand each other… we, each of us, have needs that everyone
has and we can understand each other based on everyone having those
needs…but what if we don’t have certain common experiences…
how does one explain to another that doesn’t have the same experiences?
for example, a soldier can try to explain to me, a firefight he
had in Iraq with the Taliban soldiers… I have no experiences
with guns or being in a gun battle… no matter what words he
uses, no matter how basic he gets, how down to earth he gets,
I will never grasp what he is talking about because I cannot
ever experience that…
experiences and knowledge are, personal… they are unique to each of
us… sometimes we can explain those experiences and knowledge
because they are experiences and knowledge available to everyone…
being hungry, wanting love, having dreams, needing safety/security…
everyone on planet earth has these needs and these experiences…
I can explain that to anyone and they will get it…
but how do I explain my hearing loss and have them understand it?
To IAM, what he is saying is quite clear and obvious, to us, it isn’t
because we don’t have his experiences or knowledge or his language…
he has brought it down to earth as best he can given his
experiences and knowledge…… sometimes, sometimes
we just don’t have the language, experience or knowledge
to know what others are talking about…
