Didn’t know he was a General. :wink:

oops

I think that we have the capacity for rational and deliberate behaviour but it is just that many people don't get stretched enough. It is often only rare circumstances or experiences which push people to go beyond what Guirdjieff and Colin Wilson described as 'robot' consciousness. But, I do believe that gradually more people are becoming 'individuated' more fully, as Jung describes it. Maybe it is time for the philosophers and humanity to wake up to greater self knowledge and consciousness.

Maybe it is time for the philosophers and humanity to wake up to greater self knowledge and consciousness. — Jack Cummins

Perhaps such an awakening would lead to more
deliberate behavior not because it was more ‘rational’ but because it went beyond the limits of rationality.

“…when we sit down to try to figure out what will happen in the future, it usually seems as if the thing to do is to start with what we already know. This progression from the known to the unknown is characteristic of logical thought, and it probably accounts for the fact that logical
thinking has so often proved itself to be an obstacle to intellectual progress. It is a device for perpetuating the assumptions of the past.”
George Kelly

I definitely don't hold a view an emphasis upon rationality or greater consciousness which ignores other aspects. I think that balance is of key importance as suggested by Iain Gilchrist in 'The Master and the Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World'. He points to the need for science, reason, intuition and imagination' being central, and believes that emotions are important. So, any idea which I have about rationality and self understanding would involve greater understanding of all the various aspects of the brain and human consciousness, rather than a lopsided development of the self.

... we’re all mostly automated, unconscious beings. There’s no way around it. From our breathing and heart beating to our internal workings of our organs, there’s far more unconscious activity going on than conscious— leaving aside more complex behavior, which is itself largely unconscious (though it does vary). — Xtrix

There’s nothing to be convinced of— it’s a simple fact. — Xtrix

:100: :up:

... we’re all mostly automated, unconscious beings. There’s no way around it. From our breathing and heart beating to our internal workings of our organs, there’s far more unconscious activity going on than conscious — Xtrix

Unconscious doesn’t have to mean automatic and split off from consciousness. Enactive, embodied approaches to cognition reveal the body as integrated with mind in a complex and inseparable fashion. Each subsystem of the body is reciprocally interconnected with all the others , so that the person operates as a functional unity. What this means for the idea of the unconscious ia that what is outside of awareness is not necessarily cut off from it. Rather, the unconscious is a kind of implicit consciousness. One can think of this in terms of levels of awareness rather than functionally independent chambers as Freud’s psychodynamic theory had it.

The reason that subliminal
advertising was such a dismal failure is that what is not important enough for me to be consciously aware of it cannot influence me at an unconscious level

I often wonder about the idea of 'self' and how it stands in relation to philosophy. Today, I was reading David Hume's suggestion that, There are some philosophers who imagine we are every moment intimately conscious of what we call our self. The idea of self is central to ideas of authenticity of identity, but what is self exactly?The idea may be seen as underlying questions arising in body and mind, as well as in connection with the question of self and others. But, what is 'self' exactly? Does it exist in it's own right, or as a construct? Even if we only see it as a construct, most of us do feel a sense of self, and how do we make sense of this at all in a way which is useful and meaningful for us in life? — Jack Cummins

This recalled to me a passage from Allan Bloom’s “Closing of the American Mind”, p. 177:

“Rousseau’s intransigence set the stage for a separation of man from nature. He was perfectly willing to go along with the modern scientific understanding that a brutish being is true man. But nature cannot satisfactorily account for his difference from the other brutes, for his movement from nature to society, for his HISTORY.

“Descartes, playing his part in the dismantling of the soul, had reduced nature to extension, leaving out of it only the ego that observes extension. Man is, in everything but his consciousness, part of extension. Yet how he is a man, a unity, what came to be called a SELF, is utterly mysterious. This experienced whole, a combination of extension and ego, seems inexplicable or groundless. Body, or atoms in motion, passions, and reason are some kind of unity, but one that stands outside the grasp of natural science.

“Locke appears to have invented the self to provide unity in continuity for the ceaseless temporal succession of sense impressions that would disappear into nothingness if there were no place to hold them. We can know everything in nature except that which knows nature. To the extent that man is a piece of nature, he disappears. The self gradually separates itself from nature, and its phenomena must be treated separately.

“Descartes’ ego, in appearance invulnerable and godlike in its calm and isolation, turns out to be the tip of an iceberg floating in a fathomless and turbulent sea called the id, consciousness an epiphenomenon of the unconscious. Man is self, that now seems clear. But what is self?”

This paragraph is excerpted from the chapter entitled “The Self”, which begins, “The domain now supervised by psychiatrists, as well as other specialists in the deeper understanding of man, is the SELF. It is another of the discoveries made in the state of nature, perhaps the most important because it reveals what we really are. We are selves, and everything we do is to satisfy or fulfill our selves. Locke was one of the early thinkers, if not the earliest, to use the word in its modern sense. From the very beginning it has been difficult to define...

“...We are suffering from a three-hundred-year-long identity crisis. We go back and back, ever farther, hunting the self as it retreats into the forest, just a step ahead of us. Although disquieting, this may, from the point of view of its latest interpretation, be the essence of the self: mysterious, ineffable, indefinable, unlimited, creative, known only by its deeds; in short, like God, of whom it is the impious mirror image...”

I hope this contributes to your understanding of the self. It is to be understood in contrast to what it replaced, the ancient soul. To truly understand the self therefore we must first understand what it replaced, and also why that replacement had to take place, which these mere excerpts cannot effect. They can only suggest that a larger understanding lies behind them.

Unconscious doesn’t have to mean automatic and split off from consciousness. — Joshs

By definition it does. Not everything unconscious is "automatic," true. It helps to give concrete examples: things happening at the cellular level are unconscious. Your liver's function is unconscious. Your breathing is usually unconscious, but can be made to function under conscious control. I liken much of our average behavior to breathing -- yes, you can control and direct it at times, but mostly it's unconscious and automatic. Most of our behavior is habitual. Habits are mostly unconscious, again almost by definition.

It's not that it's "split off" from anything, it's just how we live. If we want to define consciousness to include habit, fine. But then we're just off to playing word games again.

Enactive, embodied approaches to cognition reveal the body as integrated with mind in a complex and inseparable fashion. — Joshs

We have no technical notion of "body," so to say they're "integrated" is meaningless to me. Yes, the human being is a complex entity. But that we knew already.

Rather, the unconscious is a kind of implicit consciousness. — Joshs

See above about word games. Now we're just defining our way into believing that everything is conscious. But that's just not the reality. There are all kinds of things I do that I have no memory of, am not aware of, etc. -- from complex behavior like driving to the inner workings of my body. If we want to claim this is "implicit consciousness," then we're off to a computer model of the mind, where rules are "stored" somewhere in consciousness. That's not convincing to me.

Now we're just defining our way into believing that everything is conscious. But that's just not the reality. There are all kinds of things I do that I have no memory of, am not aware of, etc. -- from complex behavior like driving to the inner workings of my body. If we want to claim this is "implicit consciousness," then we're off to a computer model of the mind, where rules are "stored" somewhere in consciousness. That's not convincing to me. — Xtrix

Gene Gendlin uses as an example
of implicit consciousness driving a car:

Currently we are said to be “unconscious” of the background. We can drive the car “unconsciously”
while attending to other thoughts. But we don't mean that we could drive if we were unconscious
from a blow on the head. The background is not unconscious, but we need new terms to define
“consciousness” as vastly wider than the narrow scope of attention. And, our “background” is not just vague. We could not drive without attention if what functions were only a vague, peripheral knowledge of driving. Actually each detail of knowing how to drive functions
precisely

We could not act or speak as we do all day without the implicit function of the past, from all our previous behavior and cognition. The body can drive home without our attention, but much more is involved also when we pay full attention, not just the few details to which we are attending. We can attend only to very little at any one time. Vastly more functions implicitly. That includes where we're going, why we're going there, when we need to get there, that we will need to get gas, that that rattle noise is just the stuff in the back seat, that all those cars coming at us are really in the other lane, that a piece of rusty metal in the road might blow out the tires, etc., etc. Countless items function, usually quite appropriately. We don't explicitly attend to most of this. We could do nothing if action were guided only by attention.
Furthermore, it isn't enough for these strands to be known individually. In being implicit they cross, which they must do if we are to drive properly. It wouldn't be enough to know that sharp metal can blow out tires, and separately the height of the car above the road. They have to be crossing to know whether it's safer to straddle the piece of metal between the wheels or to go
onto the shoulder at this speed.
A computer program would say something like “up to such and such a size straddle the piece of metal; over that number go to the right shoulder.” But this kind of “program” is implicit between all the myriad strands and in all kinds of respects and numbers. “Crossing” is somewhat like simultaneous “programs” in all directions and is also an entirely new process with an entirely
new result.
Obviously we are not unconscious of all this. We could not drive if we were. The implicit is an implicit consciousness. Its vast content functions implicitly.

You might relate better to merleau-Ponty’s notion of the unconscious, as related by Thomas Fuchs:

“From the point of view of a phenomenology of the lived body, the un-conscious is not an intrapsychic reality residing in the depths "below consciousness". Rather, it surrounds and permeates conscious life, just as in picture puzzles the figure hidden in the background surrounds the foreground, and just as the lived body conceals itself while functioning. It is an unconscious which is not located in the vertical dimension of the psyche but rather in the horizontal dimension of lived space, most of all lodging in the intercorporeality of dealings with others, as the hidden reverse side of day-to-day living. It is an unconscious which is not to be found inside the individual but in his relationships to others.

Unconscious fixations are like certain restrictions in a person's space of potentialities produced by an implicit but ever-present past which declines to take part in the continuing progress of life. Their traces, however, are not hidden in an inner psychic world but manifest themselves rather as "blind spots", "empty spaces" or curvatures in the lived space: in the "slips" in speech and action; in the relationship patterns into which a person repeatedly blunders, in the actions which are avoided without being aware of it; in the spaces which are not entered, the opportunities offered by life which one does not take, and
does. or even dare to see.

The unconscious is thus absence in presence, the unperceived in the perceived (Merleau-Ponty 1986, 308f.). Like a figure blanks out the background from which it stands out, consciousness, perception and language conceal the reverse side of the unconscious, of the unper-ceived and of silence which are always bound up with them. This reverse side, however, does not remain fully concealed but expresses itself in reversals, chiasmatic entanglements, in an ambiguity of con-sciousness: One does not know something and does not want to know it; one does not see something and does not want to see it - in other words, one looks past it intentionally-unintentionally. Consciousness is not fully transparent to itself because it hides itself from itself.”

A lot of that I like.

:up:

Amity also speaks of the multidimensional aspects of the self. — Jack Cummins

Yes - but only included as a rather obvious throw-away line. It is no great surprise !

How does self-concept affect how we interact on forums such as this?
We bring ourselves, thoughts and ideas. We are multi-dimensional beings. Not all of which is on display here. — Amity

I was thinking of our selves as we try to express ourselves/thoughts externally here (as TPF participant) compared to elsewhere (pick any socio-cultural role) and other dimensions of self-concept such as the physical, temperament, moral attitudes and intellect. How they interact...as we interact.

Some share more of of their selves and life history than others. Judgements are made accordingly and sometimes wrong assumptions made. This can affect our patience, tolerance and ability to give another person time to explore further, in their own way. Or to engage fruitfully with others who seem to be the direct opposite of ourselves - we have blind spots and a tendency to dismiss without really listening to points being made. This can lead to misunderstandings or misrepresentations which hang around like a nasty smell, if the other person feels there is no will to understand and so doesn't clarify further. And so on...

I thought this was pertinent:

To be aware of the games we play with ourselves and to become cognisant of the constructed persona we have become. I don't have the answers to this and I am not recommending an obsessive and paralysing intellectual examination of everything we do and think - that would bring its own problems. However, being aware of one's self-talk and asking some simple questions about our assumptions can work wonders. — Tom Storm

Asking questions of ourselves and others. Being aware of our assumptions or judgements...
How limited and blinkered we sometimes are...especially if we feel under threat.

I think what is interesting in these is the cultural aspects of thinking about the self because I am sure that the whole way we think about the self is in a social context. — Jack Cummins

Of course it is...how could it be otherwise ?
There's a small bit in the article comparing the cultures of East Asia and America.
Also, the dimensions of time and development - included are exercises and questionnaires for all age groups to explore self-concept.

I think that my own sense of self is affected by interaction on this forum in particular. When I feel that I am doing badly here I feel that my own self esteem is affected detrimentally, just as if it was happening at work. Similarly, when I feel that I have meaningful interactions on the site, I do feel validated as a human being, and I think that this definitely gave me a sense of self worth during the isolation of lockdowns. — Jack Cummins

I think that has become clear to anyone reading your posts. Most recently when the 'reputation system' was reintroduced.
What does it mean to 'do badly here' and why would that affect self-esteem so much ?
What power do you give TPF and its members to adversely affect you ?
I agree that it can and does have an impact. Both positive and negative.
Sometimes...often I need to take a break.
However, I am not sure that, in my case, it is about being 'validated as a human being'.
It is only a small part of my life - but an important one and I would miss it if it disappeared.
Just like that...

Take care. Stay well.
:sparkle:

I think that your post is interesting because while we are talking about embodied selves in life, as we interact on this site we project ourselves in a disembodied way. It is true that some people disclose more than others and, personally, I feel that to disclose a certain amount gives the interaction gives some kind of human touch.

With regard to how I wrote about the idea of fearing doing 'badly' on the site, I will admit that this connects to my own fears of failure and rejection. When any of us come to the forum, we come with our own life history and underlying sense of self. I can trace my own feelings of potential rejection to when I was about 8 years old and after not seeing a group of friends for a few days, how they told me that they were forming a rock band, but that I could not be any part of it, and they kept taunting me over this. I felt so rejected, not that I thought that any of them, or myself, had any musical talents. But, the issue was about exclusion. That is an issue which I can share but I think that we all have weakspots.

A couple of months ago, I asked if ' reality is solid' and we can even ask if our own selves are solid? Hopefully, most of us are fairly solid, or stable, but I think that most of us have areas of weaknesses and strengths.

I think that your question, 'What power do you give TPF and its members to adversely affect you? ' is an interesting one. Personally, I think that it does affect me possibly more than it should, and that is probably because I spend a lot of time in my room by myself using it. It almost feels like reality television because it goes on night and day, with new threads popping up and heated, dramatic exchanges of ideas.

I also believe that you make an important point when you speak of how we listen to one another and have our own 'blindspots'. Even going beyond this forum, the idea of blindspots is not addressed within philosophy as it is in psychoanalysis, but, perhaps, it should be, because it may be an underlying aspect behind arguments and premises. It is interrelated to your point that on the forum, 'Judgements are made ... and sometimes wrong assumptions are made'. I definitely feel that often people write heated posts, quoting another, without exploring the issue fully with the other person. I think that there is a danger of conflating the other's position and the other person almost into a caricature. I think that there is more danger of doing this on a site like this in which we cannot see the other person, especially as the non verbal aspects of interaction are left out.

So, this is the reality of meeting as disembodied selves, and, of course, philosophy has traditionally often been in the form of books, but that does usually mean more direct human contact with others in the process of the creation of books. That may be less now when people can self publish online.

With regard to how I wrote about the idea of fearing doing 'badly' on the site, I will admit that this connects to my own fears of failure and rejection. — Jack Cummins

What does it mean to 'do badly here' — Amity

Thanks for time and interesting reply.
To clarify a little. My question about 'doing badly' was an attempt to understand the criteria you use as to what constitutes you 'failing' on TPF. I seem to remember you once talking of length of thread and how you hoped it would continue, even as you started another one. Also, moving a thread to the Lounge because it seemed to be less 'successful' or 'worthy' - ? due to lack of immediate response. Then back again. A noticeable and uncomfortable degree of anxiety creeping in ?

Personally, I think that it does affect me possibly more than it should, and that is probably because I spend a lot of time in my room by myself using it. It almost feels like reality television because it goes on night and day, with new threads popping up and heated, dramatic exchanges of ideas. — Jack Cummins

Yes. Pretty addictive, huh.
What was that you were saying about 'balance'? :wink:
Sometimes, more than others, it is difficult to keep. That's fine as long as it doesn't adversely affect one's life, as you know.
And we keep our eye on the ball...so as to achieve...whatever...wellbeing...becoming a heathier and more knowledgeable whole rather than a complete asshole ? ( to use the American version).
I've heard it said that:
'Anyone from the UK who says asshole is an arsehole.' What's in a word, huh ?
I just think asshole trips off the tongue better - aesthetically pleasing, whot !

I think that there is a danger of conflating the other's position and the other person almost into a caricature. — Jack Cummins

Yes. We can hold an impression of a poster after a single interaction. Just as when we meet someone in real life. How unfortunate when there can be so much more to a person and their thoughts.

In philosophy we are encouraged not to attack the person but the argument.
Ideally, this would be the case but I am not sure that this can always be avoided. Even if the intention is not to be hostile it is often perceived as such.
Especially when the positions people hold are a major part of who they are, sometimes after a lifetime
of experience and reflection. Other times, we are still growing and are happy to learn or be corrected.

...philosophy has traditionally often been in the form of books, but that does usually mean more direct human contact with others in the process of the creation of books, although that may be less now when people can self publish online. People can promote their own ideas without them being validated through being accepted for publication — Jack Cummins

Well - before print there was the oral tradition.
Perhaps that meant improved interaction but at the cost of messages being interpreted differently.
We see and hear what we want...

I don't know enough about 'the process of the creation of books' to comment.
Is that something you want to do ?
Sharing your ideas with others online - getting feedback - is a form of validation and part of a publication process, I suppose.
Is that one of the reasons you write so many threads ?
Not just for exploration. Are you writing a book ?

Time for a break.

Unfortunately, I am not writing a book but I do love writing which is probably why I write so many threads. Perhaps, I will write one oneday. But, I think that I have probably created a lot of threads in a short time, and it is actually a lot of work trying to write so many replies. So, I probably do need a bit of a break, and, of course, I wish to get involved in others' threads as well.

Your reply is very interesting, in tracing the way in which the idea of self has in itself gone through many identity changes in itself. Yes, the ancient people often thought of it as the soul. In particular, Plato spoke of the daimon, in speaking of the idea of the soul in relation to the divine. How different the concept of the daimon is to most contemporary thinking about the self.

But, I think that I have probably created a lot of threads in a short time, and it is actually a lot of work trying to write so many replies. So, I probably do need a bit of a break, — Jack Cummins

'Probably' ?
Hell, yeah :smile:
Just for a larf - I did a wee comparison.

Amity - 3yrs. 1692 posts. 12 threads.
Jack - 10 months. 3242 posts. I lost count but I think c. 63 threads.

Wow.
I know how much time and energy it takes to read, write and respond. One of the reasons I gave up starting a thread.
You will know best what is right for you; your brain, mind and body.
It's just doing it.
Not always easy to listen carefully and be kind to all aspects...but you know that already :sparkle:

Oneself is what each of us is, but yourself is what no one else can be.

I didn't realise just how many threads I had created, when the truth of the matter is I often struggle with writer's block. I probably need to slow down a bit and I certainly don't believe that sheer quantity of writing is important. Sometimes, thought before speaking or writing is important. I do still wish to write threads, but I see them as prompts for others to think about, rather than just as platforms for my own ideas.

On the subject of writing, Jack Heffron, in' The Writer's Idea Book', suggested that writing,
'is a means of carving order from chaos, of challenging beliefs and assumptions, of facing the world with eyes and heart wide open. Through writing, we declare a personal identity amid faceless anonymity'. So, it may be that the process of writing, including our expression of ideas on this site, is a central aspect of the realisation of the self.

I think that your point, 'Oneself is what each of us is, but yourself is not no one else can be,' is extremely important in our times. We have seen individualism but I think that we are now in a time in which the individual is viwed as being so insignificant. But, each of us is unique and needs to be valued, even in the digital, information age. There is the whole focus upon the needi to assert oneself, as many psychology experts emphasize, but, there is a contrasting ethos to current life, which seeks to dehumanise or crush the individual self, and I think that we have to be wary of this.

Just for a larf - I did a wee comparison.

Amity - 3yrs. 1692 posts. 12 threads.
Jack - 10 months. 3242 posts. I lost count but I think c. 63 threads.

Wow. — Amity

Yeah, wow. Interesting. This got me curious about my own "production" —

6 years
12 posts, 0 threads

in the last c2 years (logged off for +4 years)
4,592 posts, 0 threads

current totals
4,604 posts, 0 threads — 180 Proof on TPF

I think the pandemic quarantine + :fire: 2020 politics, etc account for 2/3rds of my posts, but I've no idea why I've not started any new threads.

I know that you have queried engaging with me on my many threads, but I think that our differing angles are so interesting. You are an highly valued member of the forum but write in response to others' threads. On the other hand, I write threads with complex questions, and I struggle my way through reading and thinking about replying. I often think how interesting it would be to see threads you might think of. But, I am not thinking that you should necessarily do so, because you are doing well anyway. I may need to slow down, but I love creating threads.

I just think that it shows how different we are as individuals. Fortunately, the forum allows for our individual expression of self and I can't help but laugh at how it would be if everyone created as many threads as I have done. The front page would be changing constantly, and it would really be a Tower of Babel of so many threads.

We have seen individualism but I think that we are now in a time in which the individual is viwed as being so insignificant. — Jack Cummins

As I see it, there are opposing extremes. On the one hand, those who are intolerant of deviation from what they regard as the norm, and on the other, an obsessive need to assert one's individuality and uniqueness. The former has been with us forever, the latter is a relatively new and growing phenomenon, supported and fueled first by the self-esteem movement and now by social media where everyone can have a platform to talk about themselves in endless and nauseating detail.

One aspect which I wonder about this, is to what extent are people creating identities on social media because the scope for expressing in daily life is so restrictive. I think that have become locked into a mixture of institutions and individuals floundering socially. I probably would not have joined a forum at all if it had not been due to the pandemic and lockdowns.

As it is, I think that we are in an extremely upside down world, with a mixture of pros and cons and, the question is where is humanity going to end up, including our plights as individual selves struggling to find meaning and a place within it all? I think that the last 18 months, with the pandemic and lockdowns, have seen a speeding up of so many processes which had been beginning already. At this stage, it is hard to know what will happen and how life for any of us will be in, say, five years time.

One aspect which I wonder about this, is to what extent are people creating identities on social media because the scope for expressing in daily life is so restrictive. — Jack Cummins

I think it is not so much that daily life is so restrictive as that on social media there is little or no restrictions. Who you are can be whoever you want to appear to be. It is not constraints of society but the constraints of reality that can be overcome in part or in whole by the creation of a fictitious self.

It makes it sound as if the existentiali prospects of a disembodied fictitious self may make life in the real world seem so incredibly dull. I am actually wishing to get back to real life and having a life as an embodied self, but perhaps, the alternative reality of the internet and cyberspace will be too alluring. We will all sit alone, fixated on our devices with the ability to shapeshift a sense of self at the flick and tapping of digits.

Unconscious doesn’t have to mean automatic and split off from consciousness. Enactive, embodied approaches to cognition reveal the body as integrated with mind in a complex and inseparable fashion. Each subsystem of the body is reciprocally interconnected with all the others , so that the person operates as a functional unity. What this means for the idea of the unconscious ia that what is outside of awareness is not necessarily cut off from it. Rather, the unconscious is a kind of implicit consciousness. One can think of this in terms of levels of awareness rather than functionally independent chambers as Freud’s psychodynamic theory had it.

The reason that subliminal
advertising was such a dismal failure is that what is not important enough for me to be consciously aware of it cannot influence me at an unconscious level

I like the idea that the unconscious is a kind of implicit consciousness. We are probably more conscious than we care to admit. In the driving example, something pays attention to driving even when one believes he is not, and that something is the very same person who believes he is not paying attention to driving. How could we create antibodies if we weren’t in a sense conscious of the disease? And so on.

How could we create antibodies if we weren’t in a sense conscious of the disease? — NOS4A2

For a normal person, this would be the stupidest thing they've said on the forum. For you, maybe it makes the top 20.

I need to engage and be engaged. Locking horns, not polite small-talk. Apparently, we differ in this way. Online discussions bore me really quick when they fail to amuse, perplex, inform and/or challenge me; I've always got more than a few discussions going at the same time, and find, or suss out, plenty of threads already in progress which interest or annoy me enough so I don't have (time) to start my own. Also, I find that perplexities which really focus my thinking are more profitable when thought through via solitary inquiries (i.e. contemplation) than unguided public discussions – from which I then produce countless essays and fragments that never make it to TPF except as background assumptions or conceptual asides. Occasionally I unfold my substantive philosophical commitments when more-than-superficially engaged. Anyway, we're quite different people, Jack, and so we're here with different agendas. A glance at our respective post histories somewhat illustrates that.

Why is it stupid?