"We have nothing with the outcast"
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93s
Not to reawaken any arguments but I think it should be noted that "radical scientism" is as much a dogma as say any religious belief. Of course we embrace the scientific method, but the metaphysical assumptions behind any branch of philosophy can and always will be questioned, and rightly so, becasue metaphysics operates and always will operate in the sphere of uncertainly.
It should be apparent that all of our models, mystical, religious, scientific or otherwise are as much descriptors of our environment as they are descriptors of the tool used to measure that environment, namely, our nervous system - as Kant said, even space-time is an anthropocentric albeit intuitive "idea". So as wonderful as science is, there is unfortunately no such thing as "objective" (or more correctly, noumenal) knowledge, at least in the sphere in which the intellect operates. To buy into any dogma / perspective, scientific, religious or otherwise as a truth in itself is, in my opinion, an intellectual error. (Besides, the intellect, by it's own analysis, must inherently contain limitations)
Of course sometimes dogmas are useful maps and we should adopt them as needed. Personally I tend to think that all these perspectives contain part truths and part fallacies...when it comes to Atheism vs Theism, I think they both make valid points just from different perspectives. I find that not taking my own intellectual views too seriously goes along way in allowing me to experience new and valuable points of view.
"Also reason is a lie; for there is a factor infinite & unknown; & all their words are skew-wise." - Liber AL vel Legis
Anyway, just regarding the original topic, I've tended to interpret this both internally and externally. Stamping down the "wretched and the weak" to me is as much an internal "alchemical" process as it might be
an external process of removing psychic vampires (or better yet assisting them in identifying their own "wretchedness" and "weakness"). Just my personal interpretation of these passages at this point in time.93s
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@Fnord said
"You could just as easily make an analogy with music. A song is played on an instrument, but a song is not identical with the instrument. Many different people can play the same exact song on many different instruments. And yet there would be no songs without instruments, and the way the songs sound is related to instruments in a lawful way. Now that's some spooky metaphysics."
Hey, this analogy brings me immediately to associate with the ToL. Chokmah comes before Binah; action before form. But people like Froclown seem to think more in terms of "you have to have a car before you can run it anywhere" and prioritize things opposite the Qabalistic manifestation path.
Btw, sorry for quoting an old post.
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You would be correct if we go down the tree of life from kether to malkuth. However to use Fnord's example, the song is not manifest directly out of heaven, and takes form in physical instruments. Which is an idealist dialectic similar to the Hegelian. The Hegelian dialectic is great if we are working from the Jewish notion of theism and creator God ideals on which Kabbalah was based, than God being other worldly creates all material things out of an ideal/spiritual substance or even ultimately out of manifestation of himself (which if we go the Buddhist way of Bereshith can be a transcendent void).
However, we have far more science backing up the materialist dialectic, something more like the Marxist inversion of Hegel. That is music is not a divine gift from the Gods, but rather we fist by trial and error mixing material things together end up with a primitive instrument, it makes some sounds. Then by fiddling with the instrument we find it makes specific type of sounds, and how to make each one, then we find the sounds are placed in space-time orders to make a simple musical piece. Other people realize they can say tap their feet to the sound, and if they can remember the foot tapping, they can replay the same music. Later some one realizes with pen and ink she can record the music pace and foot taps as marks, which by trial and error become more sophisticated and refined. Eventually, people can write music, that has not yet been played, on paper, such that an instrument can play a note at each ink point on the paper. Since the music on paper was not recorded from an original type of instrument, the same or similar music can be played from based on paper template.
However, this whole process is material, and it becomes more abstract with one material symbol standing in for another material object of event in space time. in short, we work our way up from Malkuth to higher abstraction with Kether the limit of ultimate abstraction where a single symbol is pregnant with symbolic information that the entire world or matter and symbol is condensed into a single abstract point.
Idealism assumes than the physical world came into being from God's one WORD in Kether and in this word is the template for all creation. Materialism states than the physical world is base matter on which we build upward by abstraction to reach Kether, The materialist view however we must realize than the progress of those who came before us shapes the abstractions that are already in play. Thus the word of previous Magi to reach Kether and declare a single world law, does basically instigate a zeitgeist, paradigm or what Heidegger would call a Horizon of being. It established the nature of the time and place in which we work.
(The instrument came first historically, latter came music writing based on the instrument, then later the music comes first when instrument players use the music that was written by musical masters who left behind pieces of written music still based originally off of physical instruments. The historic writer of the music creates a sort of abstraction downward effect, but creation of the original abstraction was from material upward)
Which lends credit to the notion than perhaps YHVH was the Word of a Magus whose name became lost in time, who was a physical mas who established the Temple and the whole Jewish racial-cultural system. This explains why they hold an Idealist view than the "world" emanates from the Ideal (WORD of GOD), because the established Jewish way of life does follow from the formula of YHVH. But the establishment of that word is lost in history possibly hidden on purpose, to create a supernatural origin myth. Likewise the established Thelemic way of life, culture, customs, society etc. should follow from ABRAHADABRA.
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How can a thought be physical?
A neuron firing across a synapse is no more a thought, than an instrument and a daub of ink on a piece of sheet music, is a song.
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A single neuron is no more a thought than a grain of sand is a beach or a letter is a novel or a pixle is a photograph.
a brain fireing on it's own is not a thught either, but rather when the brain is connected with the body and the senses and this creates an exchange with the state of matter in the world, that is a thought.
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Thought exists independent of matter. As organic beings we don't even originate thoughts - they pass through us and are grabbed and held and owned and deployed and all the rest. Our neurological flesh is more aerial than anything else.
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err incorect
everything is matter there is nothing else
All non-physical substance or forces or energy etc are non-science they are made up false explinations by a culture of people from a less technoloically developed time who did not know the true cause of things.ot.colorado.edu/~oddie/physic.html
see also
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All we know is that these physical conditions coincide with something non-material. But sciences tells you that correlation is not causation.
Your statements are all circular by the way - of course everyTHING is matter, and the idea of a non-physical SUBSTANCE is inherently ludicrous.
A strictly empirical stance presupposes that only the material and measurable is real, and so bases all knowledge of measurement of the material world. Therefore whether or not there exists any reality outside of physical reality, it would be incapable of acknowledging anything non-material.
Do you see the circle in logic?
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NO, we do not know that there exists anything non-material.
You may believe that, but knowledge only comes from experience and verifying that experience via science.
You can say you believe anything and hold fast to it on faith, but you have no knowledge and no reason to even suspect non-physical accounts are correct.
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I agree wholeheartedly.
I have no empirical knowledge of the existence of anything non-emperical.
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It's necessary to read Immanuel Kant's work to realize the problems of any metaphysical assertion....that being, if translated in terms of mystical philosophy, it's inherent dualism. The mistake of scientists is that having no training in philosophy they tend to make contextual mistakes about what their results and data mean in the greater scheme of things. The whole of materialism is founded on metaphysical assertion, whereas empiricism does not support materialism if properly understood. Kant still supported empiricism, but he pointed out the flaws that empiricists such as David Hume had made.
Schopenhauer had this to say of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason:
""With Kant the critical philosophy appeared as the opponent of this entire method [of dogmatic philosophy]. It makes its problem just those eternal truths (principle of contradiction, principle of sufficient reason) that serve as the foundation of every such dogmatic structure, investigates their origin, and then finds this to be in man's head. Here they spring from the forms properly belonging to it, which it carries in itself for the purpose of perceiving and apprehending the objective world. Thus here in the brain is the quarry furnishing the material for that proud, dogmatic structure. Now because the critical philosophy, in order to reach this result, had to go beyond the eternal truths, on which all the previous dogmatism was based, so as to make these truths themselves the subject of investigation, it became transcendental philosophy. From this it follows also that the objective world as we know it does not belong to the true being of things-in-themselves, but is its mere phenomenon, conditioned by those very forms that lie a priori in the human intellect (i.e., the brain); hence the world cannot contain anything but phenomena.""
Hence, as Kant said, "we know the world as it appears to us", and as Nietzsche later pointed out in his philosophy of perspectivism, we cannot even entertain the concept of "objectivism" without making problematic assertions....all we can conclude from empirical methods really is an "inter-subjective consensus", a type of methodological solipsisim, about a supposed noumenal (external reality). This is essentially what the Buddha taught about "consciousness" being the result of the interaction between the perceived and the perceiver. Saying any more about this would evoke metaphysical assertion into the equation, and the problem with that of course is that materialism becomes a circular argument....ie:
- We make the assertion that matter is real and independent of the human mind in and of itself.
- We perform experiments and find supportive data, that is by the method of inter-subjective consensus (peer review) found to be "true".
- We re-assert the assumption in point 1 based on point 2.
See, the absurdity? The key is in the term "inter-subjective consensus", that is being twisted to mean "independent of human minds". Of course if you disagree you can always provide scientific knowledge (or any kind of knowledge whatsoever) that is independent of human minds.
Of course it's important to note that it is not empiricism (inter-subjective consensus) that is being criticized, after all that is our dictum in, "the method of science", it is the assumptions and conclusions made by the philosophically-illiterate masses about the results of empiricism that we must subject to criticism.
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I am confused. What happened to the topic of this thread? As long as people do not share the same understanding of the words used, this discussion is a porridge going nowhere. The notions used today may not have the same meaning in the future or held as false. It is a natural ongoing development ,we all know.
Is this all a discussion on science versus religion/supernatural or what? Wherever I come across these discussions it seems to me the majority of people discussing hold science as their new religion, unconditionally. By that, saying "Come on medieval idiots, you cant be for real......science holds the ultimate truth and everything we know today is set" Its really one of the easiest ways to be ignorant. Refusing to learn from history.
So what is meant by "there is nothing that excist beyond what is material" ? Something that comes out of (apparently) nowhere and starts manipulating our material things, would you say that is something material itself or would you consider it supernatural and non excistent? Maybe it is the material manifestation of one of the involved people? Many options. When Crowley said that there is nothing supernatural, wasnt it just to illustrate that all we call supernatural is in fact perfectly natural? Questions are rethorical, as this is quite far away from the original topic.
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in order to have relation you have to have 2 things
The human mind which is the perceiver and the thing which is perceived.
The Human mind then is a Thing in it self and the thing perceived is a thing in itself. The result of the interaction between there two things in them selves is perception.
Perception is not the mind nor is the perception of a thing the thing itself. However there is a solid actual reality of material objective things, the brain and the object that stimulates the brain, which both exist. Where as the event of perception and awareness are only happen within the brain as information content held in the brain. Information content in the brain just like information on a computer software is also the physical arrangement of material substance that makes up the brain.
The brains interaction with itself internally, is what we call awareness and we center than awareness on a construct we call the SELF as merely part of the total brain activity. This self is mutable depending on which type of brain activity is feeding into the conscious part of the brain and which is being filtered out. The higher self refers to the physical brain actions than work to discern what type of lower selves to cerate and in what situation, which is to say the meta-programming aspect of the brain that creates program schemas that process input stimulation in different ways.
But at base of all in the physical brain that is determinately and causally inter-meshed in the physical world.
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I have to reply to the posts in the beginning of this thread as well, because I think one thing remains to be answered, unless I've missed it, which validates a request for clarification, at least. Well then:
If a person is, like I see myself e.g., outside the herd, not finding a lot of "soul-mates" or anything like that anywhere, and therefore feels more drawn to individualistic tendencies, but am capable of handling most social situations pretty well, give a good enough appearance of "normality" that SHe gets away with not internally being one of the herd without raising eyebrows, in that situation, when one strives for greater individualistic freedom whilst on the surface moves with the herd so as to give oneself the largest possible amount of personal freedom to work with the Self or whatever, how does one differ between detrimental feelings/notions/thoughts/etc. and beneficial if the aim is that, as I understand it from the discussions in this thread, Thelemic aim to individuate oneself and discover one's True Will in the midst of the "ignorant" herd?
I.e. if I am in that situation where I can choose to participate and be "one of the guys", where I have the ability for that, but mostly don't feel the need for it because I'd rather read/study/do research than talk about sports/parties/social interactions and all kinds of update information which I find to be a waste of my time and therefore very tedious, But say there are a few types of situations in which it's hard to define what's best for me to do; worry about myself directly or think more long-term and allow others to do as they please so that in the long run cooperation benefits me personally. I guess what I'm asking is how to balance myself, and to do that I need to know what specific fundamental tenants I should choose to balance. In short, how much to follow the world and how much to fuck the world and do my-way-or-the-high-way-routine.
According to Crowley's book on astrology, this is one of my major tasks in this life, because I'm one of the Pisces who have the least focus and am drawn to every direction; interested in everything and unable to prioritize unless absolutely forced to (but I refuse to take orders, so that's paradoxical as well).I'm coming at this from the point of view where Froclown and, I believe it was beneathabloodredsky (?) argued about if it was considered to be teenage angst-conformity or pure individualism to go against the herd, and that discussion didn't quite clear these tenants, as I call them here, up for me. Do I need to clarify my question, anyone?
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@Froclown said
"err incorect
everything is matter there is nothing else
All non-physical substance or forces or energy etc are non-science they are made up false explinations by a culture of people from a less technoloically developed time who did not know the true cause of things.ot.colorado.edu/~oddie/physic.html
see also
www.cesnur.org/2008/london_asprem.doc"
I don't speak up in these dog-fights often, but I might follow on from AvshalomBinyamin and add this:
There is no 'physical', no 'mental', no 'natural', no 'supernatural'.
These are all words. There are only impressions made upon the mind. Nothing more. To say that the physical is true or the non-physical is not true is as presumptious and even blasphemous as asserting the reverse. Words are words. They define, categorise, and fence off these impressions so that they are intelligible to our own prejudiced world-view.The ideas of the 'physical' or the 'non-physical' are human constructions. Neither are any more true than saying the moon is made of green cheese.
But from a materialist's perspective, nothing exists outside his definition of reality: his particular filing and shuffling of the impressions. Argument is useless because in this closed loop (and we continue to argue in circles) to imply a non-material substance in a material universe invalidates its own premise and- pow! Implodes.It is our semantics that hold us back and grind us down. Christ, Krishna, God, Brahman, Tao, Allah: all are but names of the nameless.
This barking of the dogs of reason distracts us from the true goal. We must go beyond this fruitless card-shuffling and focus on what we're really after. Otherwise we're just chasing our own tails.Froclown says there is no evidence of anything non-material. I challenge you to provide some unshakable 'evidence' of anything material - or any-thing at all!
Then I wouldn't have to bother with this whole Great Work thing.
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@Froclown said
"in order to have relation you have to have 2 things
The human mind which is the perceiver and the thing which is perceived.
The Human mind then is a Thing in it self and the thing perceived is a thing in itself. The result of the interaction between there two things in them selves is perception. "
Yes, trinities are a rational construct which is based on dualistic perception in/below the abyss. Unfortunately, describing something any other way is impossible because mental constructs and language itself are limited to that which lies within or below the abyss.
@Froclown said
"Perception is not the mind nor is the perception of a thing the thing itself. However there is a solid actual reality of material objective things, the brain and the object that stimulates the brain, which both exist."
You see, that unfortunately is a unprovable (and hence unfalsifiable) assertion. (and by the methods of empiricism something must be falsifiable to be considered proveable). Materialists, in their conclusions about reality make the VERY mistakes that empiricism is against because they don't understand Kant's contribution to empiricism! They still think like the outdated David Hume, that Kant refuted.
You see, by the unfortunate fact of solipsism (eg: Descarte's demon), it cannot be proven. Just like in the movie "The Matrix" we cannot know if what we perceive is real in and of itself, or simply"thoughts" of some "Overmind" (or any other hypothesis). To posit ANY of those hypotheses in a purely intellectual discussion would be flawed because it would rely on metaphysical assertion. You can no more prove rationally (or by empiricism) that matter is some thing-in-itself nor that matter is the thoughts of an overmind, nor that matter is an illusion cast by demons.
There's a simple zen-like exercise where you can try to define matter by ever-deepening definitions. Crowley actually speaks of this in his comment on Liber AL with respect to "Becasue" and an ever-deepening sense of confusion when we evoke "Becasue".
At first glance we might say that matter is atomic particles, then we question "what are those", until we invoke sub-atomic particles or strings or quarks or waves or whatever the hell you like. Finally when you question what those are, you come up with "the smallest unit". Well, the smallest unit of what exactly? Moreover, to get us lost even further in "Because", we can now ask "what is an unit?" Well an unit is a mental construct. Hence we are now back within the realm of thoughts, a purely "mental construct" and nowhere in our journey did we even find "matter" as an independent thing-in-itself. Of course I spoiled the exercise for you by giving you the answer, but you can try it yourself. Try to define matter!
This is why the greatest intellectual thinkers like Kant and Nietzsche have warned us to refrain from positing ANYTHING metaphysical. Just be content with empiricism as a tool and don't limit your understanding of reality by making ANY metaphysical assertion about the world whatsoever.
Of course this does not stop us from making "psychological/ spiritual" assertions that are wholesome for us as Stars, ie: based on the human condition....which is exactly where Nietzsche went with his "Der Wille Zur Macht" (Will-to-power), and of course that leads us to Thelema....
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@Froclown said
"However, this whole process is material, and it becomes more abstract with one material symbol standing in for another material object of event in space time. in short, we work our way up from Malkuth to higher abstraction with Kether the limit of ultimate abstraction where a single symbol is pregnant with symbolic information that the entire world or matter and symbol is condensed into a single abstract point."
I am curious to see how you define these notions of "standing in for" or "abstraction" (nevermind "the ultimate limit of...") or "pregnant with symbolic information" in terms of the metaphysical materialism that you espouse.
At the very least you have to grant that these concepts belong to a vocabulary that cannot ever be reduced to the vocabulary of particle physics. There is no uber-long sentence about subatomic wavicles and their interactions that is conceptually equivalent to a sentence about the meaning or reference of a word or idea. These are just fundamentally incommensurable ways of talking and thinking.
You could of course say that the vocabulary of reference, meaning, intentionality, etc. and the vocabulary of particle physics are just different ways of talking about the same thing (i.e. the world), but to the extent that in practice we need both and cannot reduce the one to the other, it simply makes no sense to me to say the vocabulary of particle physics is somehow privileged and describes the way things are "in themselves". A vocabulary can only ever be the map and not the territory. The world does not appear to us with labels indicating its materiality or immateriality. It appears only in its suchness. All ways of carving that suchness into discrete objects and patterns are only as good and as true as what we can do with them.
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And lest anyone forget this simple scientific fact:
No atom ever touches another atom. Their electromagnetic fields interact with one another, but nothing we ever consider "physical" when looking at the structure of an atom ever touches.
Rip open a speaker, pull out the magnet, and stand a nail straight up on its point. It will be suspended straight up and down by the interaction of the fields. It looks rather miraculous until you realize that this is all that happens with "matter" - ever. The fields created by it interact.
The desk you're pounding away at is made up of much more empty space and electromagnetic field than any so-called "matter." In fact, we're still banging away at the core of those tiny things to see what's in there. What is it that we actually consider the "matter" of an atom? We are still only learning. We have never yet "seen" it, nor "touched" it. We have only ever seen and touched the energetic fields created by it.
But back to the realm of the phenomenological... Now, if you can "touch" an electromagnetic frequency pattern (field) and call the experience "matter" and "real," and you also consider thoughts as electromagnetic patterns in the brain and call them "matter" and "real," then you yourself have already equated mind and matter.
Insisting that what exists is "all ultimately matter" instead of "all ultimately mind" seems like merely continuining in the falsely contradictory semantics that are transcended in that very same realization.
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This is one example of the reason for my question. The Will and how it applies in the environment is certainly a difficult topic:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxSoUlEfcFQ&NR=1
About 3 minutes or so should be good. Now, I assume he's pretty much the person who tells himself the same rant in his head over and over for years until nothing is true, everything is permissible as it applies to irresponsible action where the judgment is clouded by temporary outbursts and the like, but judging from the way he argues, I have a hard time judging if a J Random Thelemite would say that he is living close to his True Will or not.