Einstein and the Cosmic Man

[Greta]

Greta

When it comes to the Great Chain of Being or The Omega Point, I like the general concepts - who knows how far evolution can go? - but each includes speculative claims typical of the times from which they were conceived.

I'm not sure whom has higher sensibilities or what that really means, given that numerous cultures and subcultures consider themselves to be bastions of higher sensibilities. You appear to equate sensibilities that are harmonious with yours to be higher. I am not concerned with others' sensibilities, especially since I find my dog to be preferable company to many humans. I suppose this is where I, a secularist, have faith. I think nature knows what it's doing, and that we are just a part of a much larger picture.

Clearly you are unfamiliar with the Great Chain of Being. It has nothing to do with my sensibilities.

They were two separate issues - 1. the great chain and 2. so-called higher sensibilities. There wasn't supposed to be a connection between those paras.

God: existence + life + will + reason + immortality + omniscient, omnipotent
Angels: existence + life + will + reason + immortality
Humanity: existence + life + will + reason
Animals: existence + life + will
Plants: existence + life
Matter: existence
Nothingness

Angels? Why not demigods? Why not hyper-advanced life, for that matter?

For all we know there may not just be one level of Angels but a huge range of variable empowerments existing in that "angel space" between little humans and The All. I suspect that we "advanced" humans are effectively toddlers as compared with life's potentials in the universe's span. If this is as good as it gets we might as well pack it all in and get wasted.

Then again, it could be that I and others may have qualities and have enjoyed experiences that you could never understand.

Thanks to the problem of other minds it's very easy for people to assume others to be almost akin to relative philosophical zombies while only they and a few annointed others are thought to be fully sentient humans. It's solipsism, and a common misconception.

Prsonal experiences have nothing necessarily to do with respecting and furthering the inner calling to experience the inner direction inhabited by eros. You deny it and further the elimination of this calling in support of the dominance of the Great beast.

What you are saying is that subjectivity does not inhibit your capacity to claim that you perceive reality as it really is while schmucks like me and are mindless beings like insects. I beg to differ.

I think you also need to know that I do not give a fig about your Great Beast. Everyone I have ever known would find the idea of me as the bastion of conformity to be hilarious. You need a new insult.

Nick_A wrote:The world is against the need for objective truth.

Whose "objective" truth do you mean?

The Great Beast is the only truth for you. You are only concerned with “whose truth” However universal truth exists regardless of human slavery to the Beast. If Man on earth were destroyed by an asteroid, universal truth and its meaning and purpose would still exist even though you couldn’t interpret it into your truth. Objective reason begins when subjective reason stops. It never stops for the secularist.

That's a shame, you can be interesting when you are not being robotic. You were capable of chatting civilly for over a week but it appears you are having another little episode. All this Great Beast nonsense really is very lazy and your broken record approach is wearing thin.

I don't have any "truth", as such. One tries to learn throughout one's life, that is all.

What I like about the scientific method is the pooling of minds, and generally very good ones. I like the rigour. It's reliable.

The scientific method is very good for defining and experimenting with facts. However it is meaningless for answering the basic human questions concerning objective human meaning and purpose and feeling their reality. Since secularists deny objective value, they seek to destroy the efforts of those attracted to eros to further their god: The Great Beast. They are reliable in their efforts and will do their best to prevent the natural gradual conscious awakening of cave man into the Cosmic Man.

How can you say that the scientific method is meaningless when, without it, you'd be convinced that pathogenic bacteria and viruses were evil spirits? Think of all the blind alleys followed by humankind throughout history, which we would still fall into without the scientific method.

The fact is that we cannot know everything. The scientific method provides us with a fairly reliable baseline from which to base our speculations about the nature of reality - but if you ignore it then you will get things wrong, no matter how convinced you are of your rightness (at least in your current, rather belligerent mood). Note that Einstein did not refute or ignore the knowledge that he extended.

Science gives us the baseline. Spirituality gives us the ideals. Reality lies somewhere in between.

[Belinda]

Nick wrote:

Thanks for introducing this link on the "Good is an actual quality like water that we need to "drink" thread. It actually fits very well on this thread. You and Greta have been arguing for the horizontal immanentism perspective and I have been supporting the vertical or transcendent inner direction which opens us to a cosmic perspective.

Yes, I note that you have read and understood that link to the philosophy of Simone Weil. I do see that that Greta and I have been "arguing for the horizontal immanentism perspective" and you for the "vertical or transcendent.

The latter perspective is a light in the darkness of this world. It is so good, that I think we have to be aware that we who are attracted to it may be deceiving ourselves. Nevertheless the "vertical or transcendent" perspective is , besides being reason for hope, in itself harmless. The bad thing is that transcendent perspectives have been taken over by those power hungry institutions called religions. So the problem is not the perspective itself but greedy men who tell lies base upon distortions of the transcendent perspective. Simone Weil seems to have been aware of those lies that we tell ourselves.

Simone Weil believed that beauty is the way for us to access the good transcendent. I reckon then that broadly based and liberal arts education is most important.

PS I tried to find an English translation of what Emmanuel Macron quoted from Simone Weil.My French is not good enough.

[Belinda]

...I don't understand how the God-belief survives in this modern time when there is a better alternative.

Belinda, what exactly is the “better alternative”?

The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Preamble
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,

Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,

Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,

Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,

Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,

Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,

Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,

Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.

Can that be used as a prayer for the dying?

Is that what you would recite to a grieving mother in her darkest hour after losing a child?

Is that what you would use to comfort a frightened little girl with a terminal illness who asks you – “...what’s going to happen to me when I die?...”?

The United Nations’ human rights declaration, although highly laudable, is in no way, shape, or form, an alternative to the “God belief.”

If anything, it is a reinforcement of what most believers assume to be the way that God wants us to treat each other while on earth – a kind of usurping and elaboration of the “golden rule.”

In fact, in your insistence that humans should find an alternative to the “God belief,” aren’t you contradicting the U.N. declaration where it states: “...the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of...belief...”?

And lastly, the “God belief” is not just limited to the idea of there existing a Supreme Being presiding over the universe, but also includes the hope (held by billions of humans) that we and our loved ones will continue on after death.

In which case, how is what you have suggested a replacement for that?

Now if what you are really getting at is that we need a replacement for the silly mythological concepts of God handed down to us from ancient minds, then I’m right there with you, B.
_______

I agree with most of what you say, Seeds. Which is why I am glad to have read and understood that link to the philosophy of Simone Weil.

[Nick_A]

Greta

For all we know there may not just be one level of Angels but a huge range of variable empowerments existing in that "angel space" between little humans and The All. I suspect that we "advanced" humans are effectively toddlers as compared with life's potentials in the universe's span. If this is as good as it gets we might as well pack it all in and get wasted.

That list is just basic. Of course the Great chain of being is further divided. For example, the difference in the quality of being between conscious humanity and cave humanity on earth is more than between plant and animal.

I think you also need to know that I do not give a fig about your Great Beast. Everyone I have ever known would find the idea of me as the bastion of conformity to be hilarious. You need a new insult.

Your opinion of yourself is not the issue. If you are, like me, a creature of reaction attached to the shadows on the wall, then you are in Plato’s cave. It doesn’t matter how you have adapted, the conditioned slavery is the same. Our difference is that I am willing to admit it and open to the third dimension of thought leading to freedom from slavery to attachments.

The Great Beast is the only truth for you. You are only concerned with “whose truth” However universal truth exists regardless of human slavery to the Beast. If Man on earth were destroyed by an asteroid, universal truth and its meaning and purpose would still exist even though you couldn’t interpret it into your truth. Objective reason begins when subjective reason stops. It never stops for the secularist.

That's a shame, you can be interesting when you are not being robotic. You were capable of chatting civilly for over a week but it appears you are having another little episode. All this Great Beast nonsense really is very lazy and your broken record approach is wearing thin.

I don't have any "truth", as such. One tries to learn throughout one's life, that is all.

You don’t believe in the relationship between knowledge and opinion as described by Plato. You believe all we have are opinions which are created as we move along in life. From that perspective, the cosmic man can only be a fantasy.

How can you say that the scientific method is meaningless when, without it, you'd be convinced that pathogenic bacteria and viruses were evil spirits? Think of all the blind alleys followed by humankind throughout history, which we would still fall into without the scientific method.

How does the knowledge that water is one part oxygen and two parts hydrogen explain the meaning and purpose of human life? It can’t nor should it. Science deals with the “how” but not the “why.”

The fact is that we cannot know everything. The scientific method provides us with a fairly reliable baseline from which to base our speculations about the nature of reality - but if you ignore it then you will get things wrong, no matter how convinced you are of your rightness (at least in your current, rather belligerent mood). Note that Einstein did not refute or ignore the knowledge that he extended.

Science gives us the baseline. Spirituality gives us the ideals. Reality lies somewhere in between.

No. Socrates in his apology offers the baseline necessary for realistic speculations about the nature of reality and human meaning and purpose within it.

: "This man, on the one hand, believes that he knows something, while not knowing anything. On the other hand, I—equally ignorant—do not believe [that I know anything]."

I know this is offensive and suggests that objective truth if it exists, is not a product of transient opinions regardless of credentials. The person of real knowledge begins with recognition of their ignorance. That is the foundation from which the cosmic man can evolve.

[Nick_A]

Nick wrote:

Thanks for introducing this link on the "Good is an actual quality like water that we need to "drink" thread. It actually fits very well on this thread. You and Greta have been arguing for the horizontal immanentism perspective and I have been supporting the vertical or transcendent inner direction which opens us to a cosmic perspective.

Yes, I note that you have read and understood that link to the philosophy of Simone Weil. I do see that that Greta and I have been "arguing for the horizontal immanentism perspective" and you for the "vertical or transcendent.

The latter perspective is a light in the darkness of this world. It is so good, that I think we have to be aware that we who are attracted to it may be deceiving ourselves. Nevertheless the "vertical or transcendent" perspective is , besides being reason for hope, in itself harmless. The bad thing is that transcendent perspectives have been taken over by those power hungry institutions called religions. So the problem is not the perspective itself but greedy men who tell lies base upon distortions of the transcendent perspective. Simone Weil seems to have been aware of those lies that we tell ourselves.

Simone Weil believed that beauty is the way for us to access the good transcendent. I reckon then that broadly based and liberal arts education is most important.

PS I tried to find an English translation of what Emmanuel Macron quoted from Simone Weil.My French is not good enough.

All the great traditions initiating with a conscious source gradually become secularized producing much of what you've described. Their conscious verticality is lost to secular pragmatism. This is why the original traditions remain hidden and often communicated as an oral tradition.

I feel sorry for these young female students who are being indoctrinated into secular philosophy as political pawns. They are being influenced to believe that philosophy for them consists of arguing about gender and abortion rights. They are feminists rather than human beings. That should determine how a woman votes. If just one young woman learns of Simone from anything I've posted and realizes she is not a political pawn or a slave to pop psychology but a human being attracted to the same quality of questions motivating the great male philosophers it will have been worth it.

[Belinda]

This is where you are wrong, Nick. If you'd had the acumen and lucidity of the professor of philosophy who wrote that article I'd have understood Simone's philosophy. I'd not have waded through all your nonsense about secular schools.

You are quite difficult, as there is some truth in your criticism. You simply lack enough knowledge about education to do a proper critique of it. You would do yourself a favour if you shut up about it.

[Nick_A]

This is where you are wrong, Nick. If you'd had the acumen and lucidity of the professor of philosophy who wrote that article I'd have understood Simone's philosophy. I'd not have waded through all your nonsense about secular schools.

You are quite difficult, as there is some truth in your criticism. You simply lack enough knowledge about education to do a proper critique of it. You would do yourself a favour if you shut up about it.

What is the essential purpose of education that will further the natural transition from cave man acquiring a cosmic perspective and finally into conscious man? Here is a hint.

https://academiccommons.columbia.edu/catalog/ac:176152

The concern of this study is the loss of the meaning or purpose of education and the instrumental view of education as its corollary. Today, education is largely conceived of as a means to gain social and economic privilege. The overemphasis on school children's test scores and the accountability of teachers and schools is evidence that education has lost its proper meaning. In such a climate, we observe general unhappiness among teachers, school children, and their parents. Society as a whole seems to have given up on education, not only school education but also the very idea of educated human beings. There is an urgent need to reconsider what education is and what its purpose is. However, these questions—once being the primary concerns of philosophers of education—are barely discussed today. I intend to energize the discourse of the aims of education by examining Simone Weil's thesis that the sole purpose of education is to nurture attention...................

."Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity. It is given to very few minds to notice that things and beings exist. Since my childhood I have not wanted anything else but to receive the complete revelation of this before dying." ~Simone Weil

[Greta]

I don't see why taxpayers should have to pay for your style of education, Nick. All we pay for is the grooming of a child for work in the adult world.

Where is parental responsibility in the shaping of their children's character? Why do you seem to think that this responsibility should this be devolved to the state? Would your man Trump approve of such theistic socialism?

[Belinda]

Nick linked to an Education student's essay on Simone Weil and education.

from the linked essay:

Today, education is largely conceived of as a means to gain social and economic privilege.

Is too sweeping. There are many educationists who agree with Simone Weil's recommendations as set out by Simone Weil. Teachers generally are taught according to the need for children to learn to pay attention to other people, and what is in our environments. Science and mathematics are "things in our environments" and can be paid attention to and respected.

I gather that the abstractions which Simone Weil abhorred were ideologies which take precedence over individuals. The former are abstract but individuals exist. Society is a collective of individuals.

Good link, thanks Nick.

[Nick_A]

I don't see why taxpayers should have to pay for your style of education, Nick. All we pay for is the grooming of a child for work in the adult world.

Where is parental responsibility in the shaping of their children's character? Why do you seem to think that this responsibility should this be devolved to the state? Would your man Trump approve of such theistic socialism?

You believe the purpose of education is to indoctrinate a student into becoming an indoctrinated atom of the Great Beast and Simone emphasizes the need to allow the student to become human.

The main reason humanity is largely inhuman is the loss of the ability to retain conscious attention. We live in states of acquired imagination. The efforts to regain the the ability for conscious attention enables a person to experience life as it is rather than as imagined or indoctrinated to believe. Secularism wants indoctrinated atoms of the Great Beast while some others want to allow the student to acquire a necessary attribute to acquire the conscious perspective of the cosmic man. From the link:

Like Plato, Weil considers education to be the conversion of the soul to the Good, while attention is the orientation of the soul to the Good (or God). As we turn to see the contradictions between the transcendent Good and the reality in this world, we need to contemplate the without losing the love of the Good in life's bitterness and confusion. By learning to contemplate, reading better, and changing perspectives, one could learn to love better. Weil claims that this should be the sole purpose of education. This grand vision of education may re-kindle the meaning of education and suggests a compelling alternative to the now dominating instrumental view of education. It might then save the downcast situation of education observed in teachers, school- children, their parents, college professors, and our society as a whole.

Greta sees societal indoctrination as the primary purpose of education while I believe it to be regaining the lost attribute of conscious attention which keeps a person attached to the shadows on the wall and incapable of the conscious experiences necessary to regain their humanity and begin on the path to becoming a cosmic man.

Arising was demanding to know what I would teach. Conscious attention isn't taught, its value is experienced. A person has to open to experience it before becoming capable of it. Modern education prefers Greta's approach of societal indoctrination. People like Einstein and Simone were ahead of their times. They understood the potential for human psychological awakening into a cosmic perspective. The indoctrinated world reacts against it and is powerful enough now IMO to assure only a relative few will acquire conscious attention and have the need and courage to witness themselves and the world as it is in order to become worthy of the name human.

[Arising_uk]

...
Arising was demanding to know what I would teach. ...

Actually I was just asking.

Conscious attention isn't taught, its value is experienced. A person has to open to experience it before becoming capable of it. ...

So what does that mean in practice?

.... People like Einstein and Simone were ahead of their times. ...

Weil was a product of her times and a very bad example to set given she pretty much killed herself.

Einstein was a university professor fer fuks sake!! He taught and lectured in the academic establishment and would have no truck with what you propose, if that is what you propose is to teach a religious pantheistic metaphysic as fact.

They understood the potential for human psychological awakening into a cosmic perspective. The indoctrinated world reacts against it and is powerful enough now IMO to assure only a relative few will acquire conscious attention and have the need and courage to witness themselves and the world as it is in order to become worthy of the name human.

And yet according to you only a few will be able to achieve such a thing in the first place? So the main reason why your version of the 'cosmic perspective' won't arise is because it is not applicable to the great bulk of us and this is why it is mainly toss invented by the bitter at their failure within the education system and at the education system for not recognising their indoctrination as the truth.

[Belinda]

Arising-UK wrote:

And yet according to you only a few will be able to achieve such a thing in the first place? So the main reason why your version of the 'cosmic perspective' won't arise is because it is not applicable to the great bulk of us and this is why it is mainly toss invented by the bitter at their failure within the education system and at the education system for not recognising their indoctrination as the truth.

The main tenor of Nick's messages is that educators should teach 'emotional intelligence', and aesthetic appreciation. Simone Weil starved herself to death as a sort of protest about the conditions experienced in Nazi-occupied Europe. I can see past a petulant mood, it matters not a lot, what matters is the idea.

Children should not be starved of reality. Of course children should be spared lurid details if they are not old enough to cope with those, and certainly children should be spared lurid details for the sake of the sensations.

Nick has over-emphasised the mysticism of Simone Weil and under-emphasised the fact that she is/was against authority, in the tradition of Nietzsche, and she promotes what should be the practice of government ministers for education. She was one of the Nietzschean supermen. Educators should aim to teach independent thought and courage in action. I too suspect that Nick missed out on a good education and whose fault is that? Not Nick's! Moreover I am not going to slay the messenger, and if Nick had not introduced Simone Weil, I'd hardly have heard of her, and probably would have remained in ignorance.

I don't know, Arising_UK , if you are at all interested in metaphysical ontology. However Simone Weil is the only philosopher I know of who makes pragmatic sense of supernatural order of being.

[Arising_uk]

...
I don't know, Arising_UK , if you are at all interested in metaphysical ontology. ...

If you mean talking about things not in this world aand trying to make them in this world then I think it by an' large nonsense upon stilts. Ontology is a sub-set of Metaphysics so to my ears 'metaphysical ontology' is pretty much meaningless or disguised theology.

However Simone Weil is the only philosopher I know of who makes pragmatic sense of supernatural order of being.

The pragmatism being to starve oneself to death which helped no-one is it?

[Nick_A]

...
I don't know, Arising_UK , if you are at all interested in metaphysical ontology. ...

If you mean talking about things not in this world aand trying to make them in this world then I think it by an' large nonsense upon stilts. Ontology is a sub-set of Metaphysics so to my ears 'metaphysical ontology' is pretty much meaningless or disguised theology.

However Simone Weil is the only philosopher I know of who makes pragmatic sense of supernatural order of being.

The pragmatism being to starve oneself to death which helped no-one is it?

Why did Socrates die as he did? Crito gave many reasons why it was foolish to do so. Can you provide a reasonable explanation why Socrates voluntarily died? Why did Jesus voluntarily die even though Peter objected? Why did Simone refuse to eat more than the rations the soldiers were receiving speeding up her death from TB? Either they were all nuts or you are missing something. I'll put my money on Jesus, Socrates, and Simone.

[Belinda]

Arising_uk wrote:

The pragmatism being to starve oneself to death which helped no-one is it?

Maybe it's true that any publicity is good publicity. I don't have such courage of conviction as she had.

The pragmatism of Simone Weil's presuming that there be something supernatural lies in her additionally presuming that the supernatural is good and is available to all . Or as Iris Murdoch said, the sovereignty of good. I doubt if with the best will in the world anybody can live for long without the hope that good is after all, sovereign. Reason is a subsection of good.

I doubt if Nick's elitist understanding of Simone Weil's philosophy is what she meant.

You say "theology". I have almost no idea what academic theology consists of. I suspect that it is biased metaphysics.

Here's an extract from Solzhenitzin Nobel lecture:

There is, however, a certain peculiarity in the essence of beauty, a peculiarity in the status of art: namely, the convincingness of a true work of art is completely irrefutable and it forces even an opposing heart to surrender. It is possible to compose an outwardly smooth and elegant political speech, a headstrong article, a social program, or a philosophical system on the basis of both a mistake and a lie. What is hidden, what distorted, will not immediately become obvious.

Then a contradictory speech, article, program, a differently constructed philosophy rallies in opposition - and all just as elegant and smooth, and once again it works. Which is why such things are both trusted and mistrusted.

In vain to reiterate what does not reach the heart.

But a work of art bears within itself its own verification: conceptions which are devised or stretched do not stand being portrayed in images, they all come crashing down, appear sickly and pale, convince no one. But those works of art which have scooped up the truth and presented it to us as a living force - they take hold of us, compel us, and nobody ever, not even in ages to come, will appear to refute them.

So perhaps that ancient trinity of Truth, Goodness and Beauty is not simply an empty, faded formula as we thought in the days of our self-confident, materialistic youth? If the tops of these three trees converge, as the scholars maintained, but the too blatant, too direct stems of Truth and Goodness are crushed, cut down, not allowed through - then perhaps the fantastic, unpredictable, unexpected stems of Beauty will push through and soar TO THAT VERY SAME PLACE, and in so doing will fulfil the work of all three?

Simone Weil said that beauty is the medium by which we rise to meet God; to do so is not an act of will.