the philosophy/history of the future

my first day of vacation… much needed…

I have been diving into Japanese philosophy…
and thinking about how we think of philosophy/history in the west…
and how to merge the two…

and right now my thoughts are not very clear, so I will be working out my
theories here, so if it doesn’t seem to be clear or organized, it isn’t…

in the west, we have many theories of philosophies… after all, the word
philosophy really means inquiry… as does the word history…inquiry…
as does the word, economics, psychology, social sciences, biology,
science… all of these are simply inquires into some aspect of the past
and present… for example we have some historians study the Enlightenment
and some study ancient Greece and some study Japan and some study
philosophical connections between ancient Greece and ourselves…
and well, frankly anything from the past can be a object of inquiry…

the study of the past and present, for that matter,
is simply a study of relationships between two or more things…

now there are two ways to study something, from the outside looking in,
which is how the west studies things and from the inside out, which
is how the east studies things…for example, a study of political science
requires us to at least notice our current system of politics in large parts of
the west, as being democracies… so, we might ask, what is a democracy?
and the west would say, a democracy is… A, W, Z… looking at it from the outside,
where the truth is, I exists within a democracy…I am inside my field of study…
so I must look from the inside out…so when I study political science, specifically
democracy, I am looking inside out…I experience democracy directly, every single
day…it impacts me, but conversely, I impact democracy…each of us impacts democracy…
with our actions, voting for example, impacts democracy… praising or attacking
democracy impacts democracy…by both our words and actions, we impact democracy…

it has been said, history is “man in time”…we are creatures who exists in time…
past, present and future… and we study that “being in time” historically,
scientifically, socially, philosophically…and we have many people studying
our “being in time” past and present, but what about that third possibility?
the future? we were, we are and we shall be…so what shall we be?

what choices and possibilities exists for us in the third possibility of the future?

we have what is praxis, actions, and we have words…and why don’t we study
the future as intensely as we do the past and present? what actions can we take
right now, the present, that will impact the future…what future are we
attempting to make, right here and right now?

this new thinking shows us why, why conservativism is a failure… conservativism
is focused on the past, and studying the past isn’t going to allow us any type
of idea of what we should we working toward… studying the future is really
a study of the choices we should be making to reach a future that allows us
human being to succeed…

so let us begin small… where do I want to be in 5 years? this is a common game
people play… where do you want to be in 5 years? at my age, in 5 years, I will
be in a far worse state then I am now…I will be 67… and health issues begin to
rack up as we go further and further into old age… I will have some significant
health issues in 5 years… as to also being deaf or close to being deaf as one can be…
and it is quite possible, that I will be dead in 5 years… I cannot discount that possibility…

so, what does this future say about my current present? what choices and practices
should I engage with now that will impact my future? I am dealing with my future
hearing loss by getting a new hearing aid, much stronger hearing aid and by preparing
for a cochlear implant…and I also see the doctor more often these days…I am by
actions, praxis, preparing for my future…I hope to be retired in 5 years… and so
by my actions today, I am working on improving my retirement money… right now,
I have enough money saved up for a big mac, fries, perhaps I can save enough up
to buy a soft drink in the future…(if your retirement planning involves winning the
lottery, like mine does, you have fucked up)

but the point is, I can see what my future will look like and I am taking actions right
now to work out those details…a study of the future for all of us, would require
the exact same thing… what is possible given where we are now? and we in
planning the future, not just for me individually, but for us collectively…
so we need to ask, where shall we be in 5 years? and what does it take for
us to reach some sort of planning to reach a collective goal?

so collectively, a study of the future becomes, what is possible for us in the future?

what can we do to reach a collectively agreed to goal in the future?

we can use the tools we have at our disposal to think about and reach
our possibilities… philosophy, history, economics, social studies,
psychology and rationality…

but recall, we are in the midst of our thinking, not outside of it…we lie
at the heart of our words and actions, not outside of them…
we lie directly in the present… we are not disengage, separate from,
dispassionate observers of the past or present, we are in the middle of the
present, and we have been impacted by the past…
to claim some sort of detachment or apathy toward the future, is a lie we cannot
afford to hold…

we are beings that exists in time… that is part of the human equation…

not the false time of the timeclock or the stopwatch, but of our passage through time…

what was, what is and what will be…

we have a strong engagement with the first two, past and present, and now
we need to engage in the third, the future…we need to begin to think about
where will WE be in 5 years, now I may be dead by then, but you won’t be…
and that understanding of where we will be, impacts us just as strongly
as the past and present impacts us today…

let us look at our actions and words in light of this possible future…

Kropotkin

the Descartes “solution” that created the mind/body problem which has plagued
the west ever since, isn’t a problem if, if you realized that in reality, in real life,
there is no thing as a mind/body problem…the reality is that we exists in
a yin-yang world, understanding of reality…

Wiki: In Ancient Chinese philosophy, yin and yang (/jɪn/ and /jɑːŋ, jæŋ/; Chinese: 陰陽 yīnyáng pronounced [ín jǎŋ], lit. “bright-black”, “positive-negative”) is a concept of dualism, describing how seemingly opposite or contrary forces may actually be complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world, and how they may give rise to each other as they interrelate to one another.[1] In Chinese cosmology, the universe creates itself out of a primary chaos of material energy, organized into the cycles

K: we can think about the mind/body solution, not problem…
we must use/need both, body and mind…we cannot isolate them…
which has primacy, I don’t know and neither do you…

we cannot separate or divide the two, mind/body are two sides of the same coin,
and then with any such difference, we can finally see the mind/body problem
as being mindbody… one name for one facility…and what does this mean to us?

the division that we hold to be in the universe, the subject/object problem might
not really be the problem we think it is…if we realize that subject/object are
really two sides of the same coin, then we can make the move to think about
the subject/object problem is really just subjectobject…one topic, one subject…

if I hold that I am inside reality, not outside looking in, then I am part of reality,
I cannot divide up into two separate parts, outside and inside… we are one and the same…
I am part of what is…

I am democracy by both actions and words…my actions and words define what is democracy…
the question of what is the relationship between one person and another…
what is the relationship between the individual/me and the state?
we can see that I am inside the state… there is no difference between the state
and me…we are one…the problem has always been that those who favor dictatorships, for
some reason, never believe that they are going to be part of the dictatorship… that somehow
they are exempt or separate from the dictatorship…that they won’t be in the center of the
dictatorship… but they will be outside of the dictatorship…
and so it is easy to advocate for a dictatorship if one believes that they will
not be in the middle of the dictatorship… so to hold to a dictatorship is to
advocate that you are willing to live under a dictatorship with all its ensuing
dangers and problems…you will not have a voice in a dictatorship, you will
be a slave in a dictatorship…because the focal point of any dictatorship is
the dictator… he/she creates the rules, the agenda, the problems and the solutions…

so those who supported the Jan 6 insurrection, to make IQ45 a dictator,
must also realize that they are going to be in the center of the dictatorship
as slaves, as a disposable member of society…it doesn’t matter if IQ45
MAGA, because you won’t be part of that… you will be a member of the
invisible class that makes the dictatorship functions but you have no say or
voice or possibility to make changes…because the only voice that counts
in a dictatorship is the dictator…

we know from our body, that at any point in time, we have cells that are
not functioning… and if we only have a few cells not functional, it doesn’t affect
the body at large… but if we have many cells not functional, then the body
has adverse effects… for example, if one has a problem with the liver,
that changes how well the body functions… and if we use this analogy of
the human body to our understanding of dictatorship… by shutting down
large parts of the political body to limit functions to exists at only the top,
that will cause damage, large scale damage to the political body…

or to say it another way, if enough people are shut out of the choices in
their own lives, they will eventually shut down…check out… you lose
that mass of people who do work…and if enough people check out, shut down,
then the rest of the work force must take up the slack… in essence, this
is what happened to the Soviet Union… so many people lost interest
in the society, that they no longer put any effort into the society…
a society is exactly like a body… it needs energy to continue on…
if a society cannot get enough energy from its citizens, it will
die of entropy… as the physical body dies…a dictatorship eventually
dies of entropy because it excludes everyone outside of the upper class…

at the end, the Soviet Union didn’t have any excess energy… it died
of entropy… just as eventually we all die of entropy… that is what dying of
old age is, entropy of the body… lack of enough energy to keep the body alive…

only in democracies, does the body politic bring in enough energy to keep
the machine, society, going…

so to support IQ45 as dictator, is to make yourself a slave to that dictatorship…

just as in Germany in the 1930’s and 1940’s… it was all about the party and the country…
nothing else matter… you were disposable and expendable in regards to the party/country…
is that really what you want to be in your future? disposable and expendable?

we can create our own futures… by the choices we make today… we are limited
by the choices already made in the past, but we can now challenge or define or
change those choices by making new choices…

I can decide what kind of human being I can be with the choices I make today,
but I am limited by past actions and choices… I cannot choose to hear, I have
lost that possibility due to actions taken in the past… but I can work out new ways
to hear with the choices available to me, that is by better hearing aids or a cochlear
implant…I can make a better future for myself given my current situation… I have
choices within those limitations…but to make that work, I must have a philosophy
of the future… what are my goals? what are my possibilities in the future?

I am not outside looking in at my hearing loss, I am in the center of my hearing loss,
looking out…as I exists in time, I am a being in time, my thoughts and actions,
refer to a possible future that I can choose…again given the limitations of my
hearing loss… and possible, in the future, loss of all of my hearing…

so to understand and create the future, we must become part of the future…
we are not looking at the future from the outside, we are looking at the
future as part of the inside of the future…we are in the center of the future…

the future become personal to me…I have a stake in creating a better future…
a future where I can communicate with my fellow human beings… and that is what
is at stake with a hearing loss, an inability to communicate with my fellow human
beings…I have seen the future and it is a silent one unless I make my choices today to
change that…

what future do you see?

what is your role in that future?

what is your relationship between the current you and the future you?

what choices do you need to make to insure a future that you have a voice in
and a say about who you are and who you want to be in the future?

you are a being in time…a human being… so what about the future?

Kropotkin

where is the starting point of philosophy and religion?

as a way of life: from the inside looking out…we are beings in time and thus
we must react to life, within time…

far too many see philosophy and religion as spectator sports, not from the inside,
but from the outside looking in…an example, is I read about existentialism…
and how do I react? from within the principles of existentialism or outside of
existentialism? we suffer from being:

“whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take Arms
against a Sea of troubles”

or do I just read the stuff and go on with my life, not disturbed by
the crisis that is brought on by the reality of existentialism, as a way of life,
instead of being a passing fancy…

if the issues of existence, the alienation, the disconnection, the fear, the “ANGST”
and the loneliness of existence, don’t bring about any feelings or thoughts, then you
are just playacting at life, at existence…it is not a way of life, as it should be, but
simply a subject to study and at the end of the day, you return to your own life…

too many take existence and philosophy as spectator sports… watch but don’t engage with,
to be safe and protected from what life has to offer is non-engagement with existence…
and that is how most people react to life… with non-engagement…

“as for living, my servants can do that for us”…

if a Christian won’t act upon their beliefs, such as given by the
“Parable of the good Samaritan” then why be a Christian?
what is the point? Either you live your beliefs or you are simple
playacting at them…

and it is my belief that 99% of all Christians in this country are simply playacting at
being Christian… they don’t live their beliefs, and their beliefs are not
“a way of life”…so why call oneself a Christian? Pride, vanity, ego, shame?
it isn’t from belief that they hold the values of Christianity… so it must be by
a path specifically rejected by Jesus that they hold these beliefs…

to be a Christian is to hold Christian beliefs as a way of life…
and that is how we must engage with Philosophy… as a way of life…
as the Japanese engage with their religion/philosophy… as a way of life,
not as a spectator sport…in which afterwards we can go home and return to
our chosen lifestyle… in which we can mix and match the way we live…
and we can claim to be Christian and still support Abortion and the death
penalty…and be Christian and hate immigrants and hate anyone who isn’t
my race or creed or color or sexual orientation… for hatred is Anathema
to Christianity… for what did Jesus say was the way…

“Jesus said to him: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart,
and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind… and the second
is like this: Thou shall love they neighbor as thyself. On these two
commandments dependeth the whole law and the prophets.”
Mathew 22: 35-40…

and where within this key statement does hate enter?

and friend, you say you are not Christian… Great, then tell me,
how do you hold to a way of life with hate as its center?

how do we make philosophy as a way of life… instead of a spectator sport?

by taking it seriously for a change…life and philosophy are not games to be played
but ways of life… how do you take philosophy as a way of life?

Kropotkin

East/West, right brain/left brain–more yin/yang?