Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Greta
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Greta »

Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 4:47 amYou have no idea of what either conscious attention or emotional detachment is. If you did you would admit how far you are from sustaining either.

A person can have more than one scapegoat.
Nick, what can I say? You have been right all along. I confess: I have been faking consciousness all this time. There, I said it!

Scans revealed that my cranium is filled with olive oil with a small peanut with a thin fungal layer floating freely in the goo. Apparently my masquerade of consciousness is just the processing of this slowly evolving fungus.

I thought I did a pretty good impression of consciousness that seemed to fool almost everyone. However, your special powers allowed you to - as always - see what others cannot. Alas, it's lonely at the top, being superior to all, hence your malcontent. I personally cannot relate, not personally being conscious.

Still, thanks for the good news that scapegoats don't only exist alone! They are intelligent animals and it's saddening to imagine the poor things being lonely.
Nick_A
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Greta wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 12:48 am
Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 4:47 amYou have no idea of what either conscious attention or emotional detachment is. If you did you would admit how far you are from sustaining either.

A person can have more than one scapegoat.
Nick, what can I say? You have been right all along. I confess: I have been faking consciousness all this time. There, I said it!

Scans revealed that my cranium is filled with olive oil with a small peanut with a thin fungal layer floating freely in the goo. Apparently my masquerade of consciousness is just the processing of this slowly evolving fungus.

I thought I did a pretty good impression of consciousness that seemed to fool almost everyone. However, your special powers allowed you to - as always - see what others cannot. Alas, it's lonely at the top, being superior to all, hence your malcontent. I personally cannot relate, not personally being conscious.

Still, thanks for the good news that scapegoats don't only exist alone! They are intelligent animals and it's saddening to imagine the poor things being lonely.
Simone Weil wrote:
"Attention consists of suspending our thought, leaving it detached, empty and ready to be penetrated by the object. It means holding in our minds, within reach of this thought, but on a lower level and not in contact with it, the diverse knowledge we have acquired which we are forced to make use of. Above all our thought should be empty, waiting, not seeking anything, but ready to receive in its naked truth the object which is to penetrate it."

"Absolute unmixed attention is prayer. "
I don't think you have any idea of what she refers to. Just some crazy lady spouting off.
Last edited by Nick_A on Sun Feb 04, 2018 2:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
Nick_A
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Belinda wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 6:10 pm Nick wrote:
He uses reason to justify genocide.
No. Sophistry is not reason.
Why can't sophistry be an expression of reason? You will agree that a logical syllogism is an act of reason. Yet it can either be true, false, or valid depending upon the propositions which create it. Just because a valid conclusion is reached does not mean it must be true. A lot of secular conclusions are valid but based upon faulty propositions leading us away from the essential truth of the human condition
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Arising_uk
Give me an example of this 'objective justice'?
Karma

To the contrary I would allow them to experience the purpose of philosophy which is to remember what has been forgotten as it relates to wisdom. ...
And how would you do this?
By means of the Socratic dialogue and its ability to create contradictions which open the mind to the intuitive experience necessary to resolve them.

The ONE is also a trinity beyond the limits of time and space. ...
How do you know this?
I don’t. I have always had an interest in meaning and nothing around me offered anything sensible. Then I discovered there were people who totally dwarfed my understanding. Where previously the world made no sense, now it made perfect sense, I learned of a skeleton of our universe and the mini universe called Man within the great universe. I was invited through efforts to know thyself if the skeleton is true or not. The idea isn’t to prove anything to you but to find reasonable means to answer the essential questions about life for me. Verify through inner experience
'Father'? So not Plotinus then but a cobbled together 'secular version' of Christianity that you say you abhor.
The words father and mother refer to the direction of forces. There is nothing about the conception of the Christ within the scale of universal being in the image of the ONE and between God and Man that is contrary to esoteric Christianity
In all of the above you seem to be unwise in the Socratic sense as you are speaking about what you cannot know but maybe I'm wrong, so tell me how you know such stuff?
Need, reading, and experimenting either alone or with others with attempts to impartially “know thyself” to have the conscious experience of oneself.
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Arising_uk
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Nick_A wrote:Karma ...
And the values independent of Man that this idea relates?

How can Karma apply if there are no people?
By means of the Socratic dialogue and its ability to create contradictions which open the mind to the intuitive experience necessary to resolve them. ...
Give us an example of such a dialogue?
I don’t. ...
Then why do you state it as a fact?
I have always had an interest in meaning and nothing around me offered anything sensible. Then I discovered there were people who totally dwarfed my understanding. Where previously the world made no sense, now it made perfect sense, I learned of a skeleton of our universe and the mini universe called Man within the great universe. I was invited through efforts to know thyself if the skeleton is true or not. The idea isn’t to prove anything to you but to find reasonable means to answer the essential questions about life for me. Verify through inner experience ...
Such as?
The words father and mother refer to the direction of forces. There is nothing about the conception of the Christ within the scale of universal being in the image of the ONE and between God and Man that is contrary to esoteric Christianity
I'll take your word for it as as far as I can tell all your issues are because you are a Christian so I guess your solutions will be found there.
Need, reading, and experimenting either alone or with others with attempts to impartially “know thyself” to have the conscious experience of oneself. ...
So what experiments will you be doing with our kids? Give us an example.
Last edited by Arising_uk on Sun Feb 04, 2018 1:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Greta
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Gosh Nick, you genius, you've done it again!

Who would have ever though of quieting the mind before Simone and you did? No one, that's who! Your profundity and depth are an inspiration. Have you considered becoming a saint or a guru? It could be your calling. Go forth, O teacher, find yourself a flock, and help them find God by quieting their minds, submitting, being receptive to the penetration of spirit before sacrificing a progressive scapegoat, scourged pure in the fires of Trumpian morality.
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Greta wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 5:55 am Gosh Nick, you genius, you've done it again!

Who would have ever though of quieting the mind before Simone and you did? No one, that's who! Your profundity and depth are an inspiration. Have you considered becoming a saint or a guru? It could be your calling. Go forth, O teacher, find yourself a flock, and help them find God by quieting their minds, submitting, being receptive to the penetration of spirit before sacrificing a progressive scapegoat, scourged pure in the fires of Trumpian morality.
Nice rant but little to do with conscious attention.
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Arising_uk
How can Karma apply if there are no people?
The dharma refers to the interactions of universal laws and their moral implications. Karma is an expression of the dharma. An elephant has karma but it is always the same. Man’s karma changes since intentions and associated reactions change. But the bottom line is that even if Man were no more, the dharma would be as true as ever.
Give us an example of such a dialogue?
Here is a well known example. Socrates by questioning his three associates sees that there can be no agreement. They all express partial truths created by Man. They can only be reconciled through the awareness that objective justice is soul knowledge

https://www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/Anci/AnciBhan.htm
Plato realises that all theories propounded by Cephalus, Thrasymachus and Glaucon, contained one common element. That one common element was that all the them treated justice as something external "an accomplishment, an importation, or a convention, they have, none of them carried it into the soul or considered it in the place of its habitation." Plato prove that justice does not depend upon a chance, convention or upon external force. It is the right condition of the human soul by the very nature of man when seen in the fullness of his environment. It is in this way that Plato condemned the position taken by Glaucon that justice is something which is external. According to Plato, it is internal as it resides in the human soul. "It is now regarded as an inward grace and its understanding is shown to involve a study of the inner man." It is, therefore, natural and no artificial. It is therefore, not born of fear of the weak but of the longing of the human soul to do a duty according to its nature.
.So what experiments will you be doing with our kids? Give us an example.
Here is an example which would be opposed by all modern educators who seek to create indoctrinated violent snowflakes compelled to deny free speech. Conservative or Christian speakers must be banished from the university by all means possible including destruction of property. What could be worse for this intent than an exercise intended to allow students to understand mindsets they are violently opposed to? It may invite a quality of understanding questioning the value of violent snowflake reactions. Jacob Needleman describes such an effort that I would also allow.

He invites two students to discuss abortion but not just as a debate. He has them first describe their opponent’s position to them so their opponent agrees that it is their position. The pro abortion student describes the anti abortion position to their opponents satisfaction and the anti abortion student describes the pro abortion student’s position to their satisfaction. Not good for creating indoctrinated violent snowflakes so not an acceptable effort for the modern secular progressive classroom. Listen to what happened.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSOs4ti0sm0
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Greta
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Nick_A wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 3:32 pm
Greta wrote:Gosh Nick, you genius, you've done it again!

Who would have ever thought of quieting the mind before Simone and you did? No one, that's who! Your profundity and depth are an inspiration. Have you considered becoming a saint or a guru? It could be your calling. Go forth, O teacher, find yourself a flock, and help them find God by quieting their minds, submitting, being receptive to the penetration of spirit before sacrificing a progressive scapegoat, scourged pure in the fires of Trumpian morality.
Nice rant but little to do with conscious attention.
The great teacher does it again! I was unaware that the word "rant" has been redefined. You are a veritable minor of information.

As you have suggested many times, I do not actually experience any form of consciousness. Everything you tell me about consciousness, such as that clever idea of not using it for a while, is entirely new to me. Who would have thought that one could quiet the mind and gain benefits from it!
Last edited by Greta on Mon Feb 05, 2018 12:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Belinda
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

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Nick_A wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 2:15 am
Belinda wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 6:10 pm Nick wrote:
He uses reason to justify genocide.
No. Sophistry is not reason.
Why can't sophistry be an expression of reason? You will agree that a logical syllogism is an act of reason. Yet it can either be true, false, or valid depending upon the propositions which create it. Just because a valid conclusion is reached does not mean it must be true. A lot of secular conclusions are valid but based upon faulty propositions leading us away from the essential truth of the human condition
Sophistry cannot be an expression of reason because sophists are self-interested. Reason is completely democratic by its nature. It is reason , not sophistry, which enables us to understand validity of syllogisms and their empirical premises.
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Nick_A »

Greta wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 10:01 pm
Nick_A wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 3:32 pm
Greta wrote:Gosh Nick, you genius, you've done it again!

Who would have ever thought of quieting the mind before Simone and you did? No one, that's who! Your profundity and depth are an inspiration. Have you considered becoming a saint or a guru? It could be your calling. Go forth, O teacher, find yourself a flock, and help them find God by quieting their minds, submitting, being receptive to the penetration of spirit before sacrificing a progressive scapegoat, scourged pure in the fires of Trumpian morality.
Nice rant but little to do with conscious attention.
The great teacher does it again! I was unaware that the word "rant" has been redefined. You are a veritable minor of information.

As you have suggested many times, I do not actually experience any form of consciousness. Everything you tell me about consciousness, such as that clever idea of not using it for a while, is entirely new to me. Who would have thought that one could quiet the mind and gain benefits from it!
Quieting the mind as in meditation is one thing; conscious attention is another. You fight too hard to recognize the difference.
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Nick_A »

Belinda wrote: Mon Feb 05, 2018 9:33 am
Nick_A wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 2:15 am
Belinda wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 6:10 pm Nick wrote:



No. Sophistry is not reason.
Why can't sophistry be an expression of reason? You will agree that a logical syllogism is an act of reason. Yet it can either be true, false, or valid depending upon the propositions which create it. Just because a valid conclusion is reached does not mean it must be true. A lot of secular conclusions are valid but based upon faulty propositions leading us away from the essential truth of the human condition
Sophistry cannot be an expression of reason because sophists are self-interested. Reason is completely democratic by its nature. It is reason , not sophistry, which enables us to understand validity of syllogisms and their empirical premises.
Reason is amoral. It defines a relationship between premises and conclusions based on these premises.
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Greta
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Greta »

Nick_A wrote: Mon Feb 05, 2018 6:56 pm
Greta wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 10:01 pm
Nick_A wrote: Sun Feb 04, 2018 3:32 pmNice rant but little to do with conscious attention.
The great teacher does it again! I was unaware that the word "rant" has been redefined. You are a veritable minor of information.

As you have suggested many times, I do not actually experience any form of consciousness. Everything you tell me about consciousness, such as that clever idea of not using it for a while, is entirely new to me. Who would have thought that one could quiet the mind and gain benefits from it!
Quieting the mind as in meditation is one thing; conscious attention is another. You fight too hard to recognize the difference.
Most usually they are the same - with meditation's quiet mind usually focused on one thing such as breath, ie. conscious attention on the breath.
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Belinda »

Nick_A wrote:
Reason is amoral. It defines a relationship between premises and conclusions based on these premises.
Reason is amoral but there are ethical moral systems and ethical personal acts based upon reason.
True, a robot bases his acts upon reason but we are not talking about robots but natural men who are by nature sympathetic.
Nick_A
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Re: Scapegoats for Secular Progressives

Post by Nick_A »

Belinda wrote: Tue Feb 06, 2018 11:34 am Nick_A wrote:
Reason is amoral. It defines a relationship between premises and conclusions based on these premises.
Reason is amoral but there are ethical moral systems and ethical personal acts based upon reason.
True, a robot bases his acts upon reason but we are not talking about robots but natural men who are by nature sympathetic.
Do you really believe in ethical moral systems. If so, how do you explain the power of the demagogue?
The secret of the demagogue is to make himself as stupid as his audience so they believe they are clever as he. Karl Kraus
The mobs participating in the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, and the genocide in Sudan didn't seem so sympathetic. Collective humanity is governed by the need for prestige; not ethical moral systems. That is why we need scapegoats to blame for what we are.
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