Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Lacewing wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 3:41 am
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 2:31 am The big picture refers to the human ability to see the purpose and value of the forest without falling victim to arguing about trees.
Whose forest, though? The forest that you define? That's not a big picture... that's your picture. Can you see the difference? A big picture that embraces vast perspectives and awareness is a bigger picture than that which is defined/limited by only one viewpoint... don't you agree?
You still don't understand the big picture. Consider contemplating the big picture the similar to striving for knowledge as Plato described.
The way Plato presents it, the battle between these opponents was the contest between seekers of knowledge (lovers of wisdom), episteme, versus purveyors of opinions, doxa. Thus he begins with the contrast between knowledge and opinion and the question why is one, knowledge, so much preferable to the other, opinion.
You seem to believe that knowledge comes through arguing acquired opinions rather than consciously transcending opinions. For example, does the answer to the question "What is Man" come through arguing or transcending opinions in order to experience the reality of Man from a higher perspective or the higher perspective on the path to knowledge.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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-1- wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 6:15 am
Nick_A wrote: Tue Dec 26, 2017 5:37 pmA perfect example of the weakness of the progressive mind. It is so identified with its agenda that it is incapable of opening to the big picture but must reduce it to aimless attacks.
If you substitute "progressive mind" with "Jews", this stands out as a page from Mein Kampf.

I am NOT saying you are anti-semitic, Nick_A; I am not saying you are a Hitlerite. Not at all. It's just that your literary styles and methods of convincing others are so very similar. This, again, is no reflection on your views or on your politics. It is a reflection on form and style, not on content.
Isn't this the same as you do with those you call Christians? People psychologically locked into an agenda regardless if polital, religious, or whatever else need a scapegoat like hitler did.
"When a man joins a political party, he submissively adopts a mental attitude which he will express later on with words such as, ‘As a monarchist, as a Socialist, I think that …’ It is so comfortable! It amounts to having no thoughts at all. Nothing is more comfortable than not having to think." Simone Weil
Are you not the same with your bias against something you call Christians?
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Lacewing
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:11 pm
Lacewing wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 3:41 am
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 2:31 am The big picture refers to the human ability to see the purpose and value of the forest without falling victim to arguing about trees.
Whose forest, though? The forest that you define? That's not a big picture... that's your picture. Can you see the difference? A big picture that embraces vast perspectives and awareness is a bigger picture than that which is defined/limited by only one viewpoint... don't you agree?
You still don't understand the big picture.
Are you not simply demonstrating what I just said, by inferring that YOU KNOW what the big picture (aka "the forest") is?
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:11 pm Consider contemplating the big picture the similar to striving for knowledge as Plato described.
I have some very effective (and proven to me) ways of contemplating the potentials of the bigger picture, Nick. Why is Plato's methodology the ONLY one that YOU can see any validity in? That reflects your limitation, not mine. If it works for you, great... but why do you insist that other people must use it too and see the same as you?
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:11 pm The way Plato presents it, the battle between these opponents was the contest between seekers of knowledge (lovers of wisdom), episteme, versus purveyors of opinions, doxa. Thus he begins with the contrast between knowledge and opinion and the question why is one, knowledge, so much preferable to the other, opinion.
Okay.
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:11 pm You seem to believe that knowledge comes through arguing acquired opinions rather than consciously transcending opinions.
Explain where the hell you came up with this assessment of me? When have I ever appeared to be a follower of opinions? If you cannot tell that I am a lover of wisdom and a very individual thinker who consciously transcends opinions, then you are as blind as a blind man. And I suggest that your blindness is a mechanism for protecting your ego -- because if you see or admit that anyone else is focused on the same ultimate goals that you are, WITHOUT using your path, then your beloved path -- which you seem identified with to an unhealthy degree -- becomes invalid, therefore making you invalid. That's sad, Nick. You are much more than any path. Paths are of the material world. They, too, can be transcended.
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:11 pm For example, does the answer to the question "What is Man" come through arguing or transcending opinions in order to experience the reality of Man from a higher perspective or the higher perspective on the path to knowledge.
Naturally, transcending opinions in order to view from a higher perspective is going to reveal more clarity. [Please read that sentence over and over to truly absorb where I stand so that you can stop accusing me of thinking otherwise. And then ask yourself what the true payoff is for you in continually falsely accusing me otherwise.] Now, to continue my statement above: There are SURELY many levels/degrees of what humans THINK they are transcending, and viewing from a higher perspective. I tend to think that however big we think it is, it's bigger and broader than that. So there is NO position/answer that is an end or an ultimate. And if a human thinks they are seeing such a thing, their ego is likely involved. Do you agree/disagree?
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

Post by Nick_A »

Lacewing
I have some very effective (and proven to me) ways of contemplating the potentials of the bigger picture, Nick. Why is Plato's methodology the ONLY one that YOU can see any validity in? That reflects your limitation, not mine. If it works for you, great... but why do you insist that other people must use it too and see the same as you?
What is a superior way to contemplating the big picture than beginning with the Socratic axiom: “know thyself”, to have the experience of oneself without analysis?
Explain where the hell you came up with this assessment of me? When have I ever appeared to be a follower of opinions? If you cannot tell that I am a lover of wisdom and a very individual thinker who consciously transcends opinions,
I have never read you express anything other than politically correct opinions and polically correct defiance. Have you ever considered the difference between a person living by acquired opinions and a person willing to sacrifice opinions for the sake of knowledge?
I tend to think that however big we think it is, it's bigger and broader than that. So there is NO position/answer that is an end or an ultimate. And if a human thinks they are seeing such a thing, their ego is likely involved. Do you agree/disagree?
As a creature living in Plato’s cave I would agree. Speculations are the product of fantasy.

However there are those who have experienced awakening and are called to pursue it. We can verify that we are not them
The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face? - Thoreau, Walden
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Lacewing
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:41 pm What is a superior way to contemplating the big picture than beginning with the Socratic axiom: “know thyself”, to have the experience of oneself without analysis?
Knowing that one doesn't know. Analysis is entertainment.
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:41 pm I have never read you express anything other than politically correct opinions and polically correct defiance. Have you ever considered the difference between a person living by acquired opinions and a person willing to sacrifice opinions for the sake of knowledge?
I am far from politically correct, Nick. :lol: So are you being dishonest or stupid? (And my answer to your second question is: "of course".) You're seeing/hearing only what you want to see/hear -- and (again) I suspect it's to protect your self-absorbed, self-righteous empire, that you selfishly don't want to share with anyone else. :D
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:41 pm
Lacewing wrote: I tend to think that however big we think it is, it's bigger and broader than that. So there is NO position/answer that is an end or an ultimate. And if a human thinks they are seeing such a thing, their ego is likely involved. Do you agree/disagree?
As a creature living in Plato’s cave I would agree. Speculations are the product of fantasy.
Hoorah! We can acknowledge agreement on something.
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:41 pm However there are those who have experienced awakening and are called to pursue it.
Yes, whatever that means to them.
Nick_A wrote: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:41 pm We can verify that we are not them
The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face? - Thoreau, Walden
Well, wakefulness is a capability within all of us -- and it may come and go through any of us, like a current. It's an interesting thing to contemplate, but I think it's a game/trap of the ego to build one's philosophy on who is and who isn't awake AND what it requires.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Lacewing
Well, wakefulness is a capability within all of us -- and it may come and go through any of us, like a current. It's an interesting thing to contemplate, but I think it's a game/trap of the ego to build one's philosophy on who is and who isn't awake AND what it requires.
The bottom line is that for you Plato's discrimination between knowledge and opinion is meaningless and Simone Weil's need for truth was a futile search. Denial is your truth. I respect the open impartial mind capable of opening to reality and not in slavery to preconceptions keeping a person in psychological slavery.

Excerpted from a letter Simone Weil wrote on May 15, 1942 in Marseilles, France to her close friend Father Perrin:

At fourteen I fell into one of those fits of bottomless despair that come with adolescence, and I seriously thought of dying because of the mediocrity of my natural faculties. The exceptional gifts of my brother, who had a childhood and youth comparable to those of Pascal, brought my own inferiority home to me. I did not mind having no visible successes, but what did grieve me was the idea of being excluded from that transcendent kingdom to which only the truly great have access and wherein truth abides. I preferred to die rather than live without that truth.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A wrote:Arising_uk, why this obsession with attack? ...
Who's attacking? I'm just asking you questions.
What is so odd about furthering the inner development of a healthy young kernel of life as opposed to leading them into a slow spiritual death?
Who said anything was odd? I'm all for furthering one's inner development but dependent upon what development and whose version of the spiritual is being proposed?
You re avoiding the initial means for introducing philosophy. You prefer to teach it.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hi ... udy-wonder
Not sure Psychology is the answer to Philosophy thanks.
I
n Plato’s Theaetetus, Socrates presents the young Theaetetus with a number of difficult contradictions. This is the exchange that ensues.
S: I believe that you follow me, Theaetetus; for I suspect that you have thought of these questions before now.
T: Yes, Socrates, and I am amazed when I think of them; by the Gods I am! And I want to know what on earth they mean; and there are times when my head quite swims with the contemplation of them.
S: I see, my dear Theaetetus, that Theodorus had a true insight into your nature when he said that you were a philosopher, for wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder. He was not a bad genealogist who said that Iris (the messenger of heaven) is the child of Thaumas (Wonder)…
Pay attention at the back there! Questions come first.
Killing eros in the young begins with killing the natural impulse to wonder. ...
Actually no, closing down questions comes first.
That is why Prof. Needleman’s students were embarrassed about their basic heartfelt questions arousing wonder. They were educated into metaphysical repression. ...
I told you, my opinion is that it was their religious indoctrination that would have first repressed such metaphysical thoughts.
You demand to know how to teach philosophy ...
I demanded nothing of the sort as I already have a good idea of how to teach Philosophy.
and I am concerned with providing the environent encouraging the mind opening attribute called wonder. ...
And still not quite saying what this would involve other than teaching Philosophy and a Liberal Arts, Humanities and Science education?
I am a pre-Christian. A law student isn’t a lawyer and a medical student is not a doctor. Why should a person with an interest in Chrstianity but yet unable to follow in the precepts of Christ be considered a Christian? So I am a pre-Christian. ...
So an Egyptian theist, a Jew, a Muslim, a Persian theist? Can't be a Greek as they were pantheists. Is it that you are a theist who doesn't think Christ the Messiah and is still waiting?
God the father is too distant fo Man to receive from. That is why the Christian needs the Son at a level of reality between Man and the Father. ...
Which doesn't apply to you?
Yes, the Man animal on earth following the cycles of dust to dust is as insignificant as any other animal. ...
That's a bit harsh on the other animals I think. You clearly didn't read the link you posted.
Conscious man in contrast performs a higher conscious purpose greater than a creature of reaction. ...
This purpose being?
Without a conscious source, Man cannot acquire human consciousness connecting levels of reality. ...
What 'levels of reality', can you give an example?
Without God, they cannot exist.
What 'God' is this you talk about?
The big picture refers to the human ability to see the purpose and value of the forest without falling victim to arguing about trees. The life of a forest requires the death of trees? Is this unfair? Is it unfair that a minority see the big picture as to the value and purpose of Man on earth as opposed to arguing over collectives?
Hold tight! A forest is a collective?

Still, I think I get your point. You don't give a toss about the bulk of kids just as long as you can find your messiah so you can reach this 'God' of yours.
Human education as opposed to indoctrination enables a student To acquire a conscious human perspective within which facts can reside and vivify human meaning.
Give me an example of a fact and how it resides within your 'conscious human perspective'?
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Anybody who makes that many comments in a single post is either psychotic, moronic or both.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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bobevenson wrote: Mon Jan 01, 2018 2:12 am Anybody who makes that many comments in a single post is either psychotic, moronic or both.
Either means one or the other, but not both. A faux pas on your part.

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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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bobevenson wrote: Mon Jan 01, 2018 2:12 am Anybody who makes that many comments in a single post is either psychotic, moronic or both.
:lol:
Or just addressing the points as they come up. You should try it sometime loon.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Arising
Killing eros in the young begins with killing the natural impulse to wonder. ...

Actually no, closing down questions comes first.
Questions like “where’s the ketchup” don’t require wonder to initiate them. I’m referring to the attraction to eros and you’re only concerned with fitting in which only requires simple answers.
And still not quite saying what this would involve other than teaching Philosophy and a Liberal Arts, Humanities and Science education?
Again, you have no idea what it means to open to wonder. You are too caught up in answers. If you don’t know by now, I cannot explain it.
So an Egyptian theist, a Jew, a Muslim, a Persian theist? Can't be a Greek as they were pantheists. Is it that you are a theist who doesn't think Christ the Messiah and is still waiting?
You are caught up in beliefs and what people do. Christianity as opposed to secularized religious expression is primarily concerned with what we are.
Yes, the Man animal on earth following the cycles of dust to dust is as insignificant as any other animal. ...

That's a bit harsh on the other animals I think. You clearly didn't read the link you posted.
I didn’t post the link so you would blindly believe it but to raise the question of significance worthy of the name philosophy. Just because philosophy has degenerated into indoctrination and self justification for many doesn’t mean everyone must go philosophically into the gutter.
Conscious man in contrast performs a higher conscious purpose greater than a creature of reaction. ...

This purpose being?
A creature of reaction lives in one level of reality. Conscious Man consciously connects levels of reality.
What 'God' is this you talk about?
Plato’s GOOD or Plotinus’ ONE; take your pick.
Hold tight! A forest is a collective?
Yes, a forest is a collective of trees just like a secuprog is a collective of secular progressives. It is the same idea
Still, I think I get your point. You don't give a toss about the bulk of kids just as long as you can find your messiah so you can reach this 'God' of yours.
No. We re all “in the world.” However some are not “of the world.” They are attracted to something repulsive to the world so a struggle begins between the world and the need to awaken. The world seeks to eliminate them. I am on the side of those who support inner freedom from the self while the world seeks to make the indoctrinated self dominant.

"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by how he has attained liberation from the self." ~ Albert Einstein
Give me an example of a fact and how it resides within your 'conscious human perspective'?
Addition is an objective fact. Two apples plus two apples will always equal four apples. But what is the objective value of two plus two or even of numbers themselves? Science deals with facts while the human perspective places them into the human rather than subjective perspective which appreciates objective value. As we are now, people serve machines. They govern our consciousness. If society reflected a conscious perspective machines would serve people. Society lacks a conscious perspective and does what it can to assure it will never have one. Accepting the ideal of objective values greater than that of society's would cause the loss of imagination as the dominant impulse which is intolerable. Society cannot allow the young to be open to what Einstein wrote. It may cause them to question what a human perspective is and that is intolerable.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A wrote: Mon Jan 01, 2018 10:04 pm
"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by how he has attained liberation from the self." ~ Albert Einstein
Wow! how original; how droll can one get aside from being the one theory that never worked for Albert!
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Nick_A wrote:Questions like “where’s the ketchup” don’t require wonder to initiate them. ...
I wonder where the ketchup is?
I’m referring to the attraction to eros and you’re only concerned with fitting in which only requires simple answers. ...
You seem amazingly informed about what people are concerned with before they've told you, how are you doing this?

You keep mentioning this "eros", what do you mean by it as it can't be Platos' Socrates as he appears to use it to mean a love of questions. Although we can't really say we understand what they understood by such words but the context of the translation does appear to say this.
Again, you have no idea what it means to open to wonder. You are too caught up in answers. If you don’t know by now, I cannot explain it. ...
But you've not tried explaining it at all?

Do you mean something like wonder in awe?
You are caught up in beliefs and what people do. ...
Best way to judge them I've found.
Christianity as opposed to secularized religious expression is primarily concerned with what we are. ...
You do know "secularized religious expression" is just nonsense upon stilts don't you?

Which sect of Christianity are you talking about and didn't you say you were a pre-christian so how do you know what Christianity is concerned with?
I didn’t post the link so you would blindly believe it but to raise the question of significance worthy of the name philosophy. ...
I didn't blindly believe it. Unlike you I actually read it and agreed with the main thesis which ironically enough contradicts pretty much all you say.
Just because philosophy has degenerated into indoctrination and self justification for many doesn’t mean everyone must go philosophically into the gutter. ...
I seriously doubt you have read any Philosophy other than one author so I think you just talking from ignorance.
A creature of reaction lives in one level of reality. Conscious Man consciously connects levels of reality. ...
Give me an example?
Plato’s GOOD or Plotinus’ ONE; take your pick. ...
I'd prefer to hear what you mean by either or both of these terms as I doubt we can understand what Plato or Plotinus understood by them given that we're not of their culture and more specifically that they were written in ancient Greek. So what interpretation do you make of these terms?
Yes, a forest is a collective of trees just like a secuprog is a collective of secular progressives. It is the same idea
Not really as the last two terms are pretty much nonsense.
No. We re all “in the world.” However some are not “of the world.” They are attracted to something repulsive to the world so a struggle begins between the world and the need to awaken. The world seeks to eliminate them. I am on the side of those who support inner freedom from the self while the world seeks to make the indoctrinated self dominant. ...
What's this 'world' you talk about? I do hope you're not being a Yank and thinking America is the world.
"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by how he has attained liberation from the self." ~ Albert Einstein
He should have stuck to Physics.
Addition is an objective fact. Two apples plus two apples will always equal four apples. ...
What do two rain-drops plus two raindrops equal?
But what is the objective value of two plus two or even of numbers themselves? ...
They give Physics a language to model the world with, Engineering a language to build useful stuff with and a few brain-boxes some interesting symbolic puzzles.
Science deals with facts while the human perspective places them into the human rather than subjective perspective which appreciates objective value. ...
Science(not really sure what you mean by this?) deals with the how of the world and does it by using a method that allows intersubjective confirmation about the world, i.e. objectivity. A human perspective is subjective and that is why it appreciates what Science has brought, objectivity.
As we are now, people serve machines. ...
What machines are we serving?
They govern our consciousness. ...
How?
If society reflected a conscious perspective machines would serve people. ...
They do.
Society lacks a conscious perspective and does what it can to assure it will never have one. ...
Give me an example of what you mean by this?
Accepting the ideal of objective values greater than that of society's would cause the loss of imagination as the dominant impulse which is intolerable. ...
Pardon, you appear to be saying that you wish to remove the impulse to imagine from our kids?
Society cannot allow the young to be open to what Einstein wrote. ...
What do you understand by what he said?
It may cause them to question what a human perspective is and that is intolerable.
What do you think they are teaching the kids about a human perspective?
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

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Arising_uk wrote: Fri Jan 05, 2018 2:26 am
"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by how he has attained liberation from the self." ~ Albert Einstein
He should have stuck to Physics.
I really wish people wouldn't buy into Nick's willful mischaracterization of Einstein and read the Einstein quotes that Nick cherry picks in context.
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Re: Verbal abuse and cyber-bullying on Philosophy Now forums

Post by Nick_A »

davidm wrote: Fri Jan 05, 2018 6:09 pm
Arising_uk wrote: Fri Jan 05, 2018 2:26 am
"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by how he has attained liberation from the self." ~ Albert Einstein
He should have stuck to Physics.
I really wish people wouldn't buy into Nick's willful mischaracterization of Einstein and read the Einstein quotes that Nick cherry picks in context.
Why is it that the distinction between "I' and the self, so well known in the East at least theoretically is so condemned in the West as it is here. Those like Jacob Needleman have made great efforts for opening minds but still at least in the west it will always be denied. A recent book is such an effort. some of the young will understand and that is what is important for the survival of the human race. He raises needed questions regardless of how they are rejected by the majority who have become closed to the distinction between "I" and the Self and how to deal with it.

I Am Not I
by Jacob Needleman

Seeking to reconcile the split between our inner child and our adult self, eminent philosopher and religious scholar Jacob Needleman evokes the ancient spiritual tradition of a deep dialogue between a guiding wisdom figure and a seeker. The elder offers an initiation to a younger self, an initiation the author feels is missing from our culture. Rendered as a stage play, the conversation between the 80-year-old author and his younger selves unfolds, and an ambiguity emerges as to whether this is strictly the author’s internal dialogue or whether the younger self may be nurturing a rebirth of the author.

On one level, I Am Not I brings younger readers (teenagers and young adults) face to face with powerful spiritual and philosophical ideas. But as the book progresses, the dialogue delves into questions and insights that carry astonishing new hope and vision for every man and woman, challenging our culture’s accepted—and often toxic—ideas about humanity’s place in a living universe.
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