For sure!
You will recognise this in my earlier posts but I consider any philosophising that starts with humanity rather than nature to be a specialist enterprise, and thus a distorted anthropocentric lens if applied to greater reality.
For sure!
Exactly. Rhapsodising could be characterised as "dancing as if no one is watching". Lack of self consciousness does not always lead to spiritual rhapsody but it's an essential ingredient. There is a "letting go". Some people cannot let go. Some cannot reign inmarjoram_blues wrote: ↑Sun Jan 14, 2018 3:06 pmAnyway, the word 'rhapsody' caught my attention. And yes, I admit to a feeling of discomfort.
It sounded over the top. And I can understand why some more logic- oriented, less emotional sorts might be uncomfortable with thinking of themselves as 'spiritual' beings. Indeed, you don't need to self-describe as such - just as nobody goes around describing themselves as 'material' or 'mental'.
I think it's worthwhile to see all things as holistic and all of the details too - the more angles and perspectives with which we can observe reality, the better we get to know it. For some reason this appears to be to crux of everything - working out what seems to be going on. This has been the task of life before it could even think - their bodies would automatically detect things in the environment and adapt. Reality is wonderfully weirdmarjoram_blues wrote:However, it is worthwhile trying to see humans as holistic: body, mind and spirit. One of our objectives being to try to keep a sense of, if not actual, well-being.
Do you not endorse secular spirituality for yourself or for everyone? Have you thoughts on this?Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Sun Jan 14, 2018 11:52 pmWhether it was tone, style or whatever that did not allow me to embrace the content of the article, I don't put in doubt that the content does reflect what "secular spirituality"is all about. I guess that means that as a secularist, humanist and atheist, I cannot endorse this "secular spirituality" thing.
Some people are so attached to logic, sensibleness and practicality that they find it distasteful to "let go", aside from accepted conventional areas of release like sex and thrillseeking. So they contain their own capacity to rhapsodise, to become carried away - and then they scoff at believers for rhapsodising (because what feels right on the inside can appear silly from the outside) ...
In a eusocial society, you need both types - and any other types too. We need hard-headed gatekeepers and cynics who try to keep everyone grounded and honest. We also need maniacs to inspire and amuse.
I don't endorse it for myself and I would hope that most people decided to endorse a different type of secularism, free of the romantic anticapitalism that is behind the New Age movement, which looks for shelter in some elements of Eastern religions and begs for a "return to nature". This "secular spirituality" reminds me of the ideological proposal of Avatar. A more promising future for humanity is not found in Pandora and its "tree of life" (quite a reactionary and regressive proposal), but in the splendid possibilities of its mechanical inventions.Greta wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 12:57 amDo you not endorse secular spirituality for yourself or for everyone? Have you thoughts on this?Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Sun Jan 14, 2018 11:52 pmWhether it was tone, style or whatever that did not allow me to embrace the content of the article, I don't put in doubt that the content does reflect what "secular spirituality"is all about. I guess that means that as a secularist, humanist and atheist, I cannot endorse this "secular spirituality" thing.Some people are so attached to logic, sensibleness and practicality that they find it distasteful to "let go", aside from accepted conventional areas of release like sex and thrillseeking. So they contain their own capacity to rhapsodise, to become carried away - and then they scoff at believers for rhapsodising (because what feels right on the inside can appear silly from the outside) ...
In a eusocial society, you need both types - and any other types too. We need hard-headed gatekeepers and cynics who try to keep everyone grounded and honest. We also need maniacs to inspire and amuse.
Are Richard Dawkins, Carl Sagan, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Max Tegmark and Roger Penrose new agers? If so, then I agree with you that New Age romanticism and secular spirituality are synonymous. Seriously, why paint with such a broad brush? I thought you'd be more rigorous.Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 5:21 amI don't endorse it for myself and I would hope that most people decided to endorse a different type of secularism, free of the romantic anticapitalism that is behind the New Age movement, which looks for shelter in some elements of Eastern religions and begs for a "return to nature". This "secular spirituality" reminds me of the ideological proposal of Avatar. A more promising future for humanity is not found in Pandora and its "tree of life" (quite a reactionary and regressive proposal), but in the splendid possibilities of its mechanical inventions.Greta wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 12:57 amDo you not endorse secular spirituality for yourself or for everyone? Have you thoughts on this?Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Sun Jan 14, 2018 11:52 pmWhether it was tone, style or whatever that did not allow me to embrace the content of the article, I don't put in doubt that the content does reflect what "secular spirituality"is all about. I guess that means that as a secularist, humanist and atheist, I cannot endorse this "secular spirituality" thing.Some people are so attached to logic, sensibleness and practicality that they find it distasteful to "let go", aside from accepted conventional areas of release like sex and thrillseeking. So they contain their own capacity to rhapsodise, to become carried away - and then they scoff at believers for rhapsodising (because what feels right on the inside can appear silly from the outside) ...
In a eusocial society, you need both types - and any other types too. We need hard-headed gatekeepers and cynics who try to keep everyone grounded and honest. We also need maniacs to inspire and amuse.
Human society is not a eusocial society, but in any case, "to every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven." We need clowns and artists as much as we need scientists and computer programmers, but I just wouldn't frame a striving secular society with the phony, shallow ethos of New Age spirituality.
fooloso4 wrote: ↑Wed Jan 10, 2018 9:24 pm We should keep in mind that the term ‘secular spirituality’ covers a wide variety of meanings and practices. A major problem that will prevent mutual understanding in our discussion is a type of guilt by association.
Robert Solomon was an accomplished teacher of mainstream Western philosophy. As a quick reading of the preface to his Spirituality for the Skeptic makes clear, on the one hand he wishes to rescue the meaning of the term spirituality which has been taken over by religion, and on the other hand he wishes to rescue philosophy from the narrowness of contemporary trends . In addition, it should be noted that he is disdainful of what might be called “new age spiritualism”.
What Solomon calls his Hallmark-card phrase “spirituality as the thoughtful love of life” seems to me to be wholly consonant with the meaning of philosophy as the love of wisdom. Although we would probably never find it on a Hallmark card, we might put Socrates’: “the unexamined life is not worth living” together with Solomon’s. As Plato reminds us, the lover of wisdom desires but does not the possess wisdom. That is the source of both the comedy and tragedy of life.
We fundamentally misunderstand spirituality as long as we posit a disjunction between the physical and the spiritual or the rational the spiritual. The desire to be wise shows them to be aspects of a whole. But it is a whole that is incomplete because the philosopher never possesses what is desired. The circle is never closed. We desire the good life, but we remain tentative in our understanding of what that is and powerless to secure it for ourselves.
Analogous to the aporia of Plato’s Meno, we do not know what it is we desire when we desire wisdom because unless we possess it we cannot know what it is. Here we may fall victim to promises of answers from religion, spiritualism, mysticism, etc., or to the despair of longing. The thoughtful love of life may lead most to wisely conclude that the love of wisdom is not the proper pursuit for them. The love of thought and thoughts of love may lead one to see that there are other things their spirit desires more than an empty and abstract notion of wisdom. As Nietzsche’s Zarathustra discovers, what he loves most is life itself. Is this then the abandonment or fulfillment of philosophy?
There is no sense in which I started this discussion with a view to 'endorse a [particular] type of secularism'. There seems to be an instinct to attack any interest in this aspect of the human condition with false accusations.Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 5:21 amI don't endorse it for myself and I would hope that most people decided to endorse a different type of secularism, free of the romantic anticapitalism that is behind the New Age movement, which looks for shelter in some elements of Eastern religions and begs for a "return to nature". This "secular spirituality" reminds me of the ideological proposal of Avatar. A more promising future for humanity is not found in Pandora and its "tree of life" (quite a reactionary and regressive proposal), but in the splendid possibilities of its mechanical inventions.Greta wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 12:57 amDo you not endorse secular spirituality for yourself or for everyone? Have you thoughts on this?Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Sun Jan 14, 2018 11:52 pmWhether it was tone, style or whatever that did not allow me to embrace the content of the article, I don't put in doubt that the content does reflect what "secular spirituality"is all about. I guess that means that as a secularist, humanist and atheist, I cannot endorse this "secular spirituality" thing.Some people are so attached to logic, sensibleness and practicality that they find it distasteful to "let go", aside from accepted conventional areas of release like sex and thrillseeking. So they contain their own capacity to rhapsodise, to become carried away - and then they scoff at believers for rhapsodising (because what feels right on the inside can appear silly from the outside) ...
In a eusocial society, you need both types - and any other types too. We need hard-headed gatekeepers and cynics who try to keep everyone grounded and honest. We also need maniacs to inspire and amuse.
Human society is not a eusocial society, but in any case, "to every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven." We need clowns and artists as much as we need scientists and computer programmers, but I just wouldn't frame a striving secular society with the phony, shallow ethos of New Age spirituality.
I am sure that Condor is intelligent enough to realize this.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 10:57 am I agree with Conde Lucanor that New Age gives the word 'spirituality' a banal connotation. I mean, we all love hippies, but we don't much like po-faced but silly arguments.
However there is more substance to ideas of spirituality than many New Agers express.
Ant and termite societies are usually considered the default models of eusocial organization. In fact the word "eusocial" was first used in describing the behavior of bees and other insects. E.O. Wilson extended it from there giving it a human aspect but a debatable one. The term is far less distinct, amorphous when applied to humans.Greta wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 6:04 am Whatever humanity is, it's far closer to eusocial organisation than any other organisational model. Neither you nor Dubious will be able to point to any organisational model in nature that is even nearly as close to the way humans organise themselves as eusociality. Basically, humanity is developing an extension of eusociality.
I have generally found EO Wilson's arguments persuasive. Consider the definition in human context:Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 11:58 amAnt and termite societies are usually considered the default models of eusocial organization. In fact the word "eusocial" was first used in describing the behavior of bees and other insects. E.O. Wilson extended it from there giving it a human aspect but a debatable one. The term is far less distinct, amorphous when applied to humans.Greta wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 6:04 am Whatever humanity is, it's far closer to eusocial organisation than any other organisational model. Neither you nor Dubious will be able to point to any organisational model in nature that is even nearly as close to the way humans organise themselves as eusociality. Basically, humanity is developing an extension of eusociality.
So unless I misunderstood something, (always a possibility), your statement doesn't sound right or needs more clarification. Also, what would an extension of eusociality look like since the word already incorporates the highest ranking in the hierarchy of sociality? It would seem another word containing "social" must define the extension. To properly do that one must at least have an idea what it means to go beyond the eusocial.
I agree that devil's advocate is a useful tool.I think there is a suggestion of playing the devil's advocate.
A useful tool to enable further clarification of thought for the sake of debate.
Yeah, I noticed already.