I've not posted for a few weeks because so many things have happened that make me believe nothing can be said to describe or change certain aspects of our lives that really need to be described to be changed. It's easy to relate to H. G. Well's fatalistic essay in his last book, Mind at the End of its Tether . He was my age (79) when he wrote : "The end of everything we call life is close at hand and cannot be evaded." and "Something queer has come into life...." and "There is no way out or round or through." " ... life as we know it is at an end.".
I've not played around with his contexts, the quoted words mean exactly what they say. He died soon after writing that the 'end is near'.
The recent Casey Anthony trial has just blasted my belief that its possible to get at the truth somewhere: in courts. Last night I watched Maher's show and heard Neil de Grasse (wonderful man) say something that needed to be said: "more than 50% of our senators were/are lawyers. He asked: "Where are the scientists, the engineers, the accountants...?" . My hope that the legal process is really about justice and that people will abide by the law has been shattered too, from experiences of my own. I was involved in a lengthy trial presided over by Judge Gary Little, (check that name on the Internet) but that was not the most instructive court situation I've been involved in.
The Anthony situation which so many people could watch in its entirety is much more complex than the reality that's the theme of the play Rashomon. It's a play in which several people describe a rape, then a murder but not one person saw the same event. Every person experienced something so different than what others told had happened, that the priest is ready to give up his faith. If the truth could not be found it court, where else?
At the end of the play the only 'good' was that a torrential rain storm had kept four people in a sheltered location long enough to talk about what had happened in a court, each telling their version. So they 'saw' the strangeness of human perception and memory. They saw a side of reality that really is real, nobody experiences an event the same way. After the rain stopped a baby's cry was heard, someone had left an infant in the rubbish near the Gate so it was rescued although its future was uncertain even then. The priest learned a lot about reality and they saved an infant that had been 'dumped'. The play is supposed to be based in ancient Japanese folk tales so the strange aspect of human perception is not new or unknown.
At the end of the play the only 'good' was that a torrential rain storm had kept four people in a sheltered location long enough to talk about what had happened in a court, each telling their version. So they 'saw' the strangeness of human perception and memory. They saw a side of reality that really is real, nobody experiences an event the same way. After the rain stopped a baby's cry was heard, someone had left an infant in the rubbish near the Gate so it was rescued although its future was uncertain even then. The priest learned a lot about reality and they saved an infant that had been 'dumped'. The play is supposed to be based in ancient Japanese folk tales so the strange aspect of human perception is not new or unknown.
I saw the play 50+ years ago and a thought occurred into my mind that the play probably explained why people quarrel so about reality. That thought stuck firmly in my understanding, partly because someone had told me I had imagined some things that seemed to me to really have happened. That incident probably created an unconscious interest in trying to prove to myself whether I imagined things. Or it was evidence of foresight other than my own.
But only recently I've read enough of Freud's ideas in the origin of psychiatry and psycho-analysis to realize that what he really discovered was how invisible a person's understanding is to the individual. I suggest A. A. Brill's Freud's Contribution to Psychiatry, its available on google books. The discovery process itself has been difficult to identify, but it's obvious the ancients experienced the kind of relationship that individualizes 'life's events' and the results, the 'voice of the Time' that has been named the voice of Gaia. That process is not going to be scientifically validated for a while, probably.
It's a good idea to know for your self what psychiatry is and its origins, which Theodore Reik wrote, originated in Freud's need to cure himself.
It's a good idea to know for your self what psychiatry is and its origins, which Theodore Reik wrote, originated in Freud's need to cure himself.
I've felt and heard the temper of the 'voice' of our Time, the main theme of which right now is: "this is the end of life as we know it". That doesn't need to imply negativity because the word 'end' also means 'goal'. But the idea is embedded in many places, in advertisements, television shows and actual 'art' of every form. It felt very 'strange' to hear a television advertisement 'speak' directly to me the way a person does. "The second world is here, and in the second world, all the rules are changed." I paused briefly, thinking ad men didn't have to make sense. Later the memory of a few unusual events that had happened recently began to resurface often enough to arouse my curiosity. The words told me a fact that was happening, literally describing that a 'new world' was speaking. One event is not enough to believe, a steady stream of similar events had to happen. A person that's not experienced that 'strangeness' will be unable to relate to that! It's a voice that may be heard without knowing it is 'the' voice, because it is created, abstracted from embeddedness some where and a new context is created, automatically and at an almost un-see-able speed!
I have reason to believe (with careful observation) what it 'says' to me because so many books have been written about 'it', but more as a result of hearing 'it' myself. That has happened to me and could be happening to others in the same form, without consciousness and psychological awareness or prior knowledge about what 'neurosis-psychosis' really is. But the history and evolution since Freud wrote his version down, of modern psychological interpretations is important to know about. That kind of understanding can't be gained from reading anything anywhere, its learned in a body.
That's a different kind of 'sense' functioning and it produced in my opinion the works of Freud, Jung and other authors who write about our modern process of psycho analysis,but that's another post I'll make.
That's a different kind of 'sense' functioning and it produced in my opinion the works of Freud, Jung and other authors who write about our modern process of psycho analysis,but that's another post I'll make.
The war between humans and electronic creatures is the main theme of so many movies now. But to anyone that's not decently well read in philosophy, history and especially the pulp science fiction magazines I read (when I was able to find them, because my father hid them from me) there's no way to see how the themes intertwine, and are 'at one' the theme hasn't changed. We seem to be electronic ourselves, flesh coated energy, perhaps are information that has to be discovered 'bit by bit' through so called 'coincidence'. Synchronization is what happened to me when books, events, thought, memories and two groups of individuals seemed to know what I was thinking but had not said aloud to any one. Those groups were at war with the mainstream, it was painful to be part of that war. We were literally 'leaving the mainstream to learn advanced and challenge levels of square dancing' but new ideas occurred to me, such as 'subracting my self from what was outside my body' so that I could 'see' my body and track the 'phantoms' when they were suddenly added to the set. That was a change so drastic its almost impossible for me to mention without feeling ashames that I'd not noticed even the basic forms of the square dance set.
I was strangely fascinated by certain mirror image aspects of the dance that didn't make sense to me.
All aspects of our lives were woven into a fragmented story, that assembled in my mind much like a puzzle is assembled bit by bit, every one was in my private drama and that almost 'floored' me at times. The current books have in them ideas that are the same themes; in the stories of our time, read by teen agers, young adults. Some of whom read and devour Harry Potter as pure fantasy. I read them too but a lot that's not new is conveyed in them. The themes in the Transformers, the Twilight 'phenomenon', and in True Blood are making me think about the 'dark ages', about paintings that depict a war between angels and demons that I saw in the Louvre, that are 700 years old.
I've read a lot and recognized in reading philosophers from the past that it was obvious there's been an ongoing 'theme' in Time itself that 'echoes' in the popular fictions of this point in Time:
I was strangely fascinated by certain mirror image aspects of the dance that didn't make sense to me.
All aspects of our lives were woven into a fragmented story, that assembled in my mind much like a puzzle is assembled bit by bit, every one was in my private drama and that almost 'floored' me at times. The current books have in them ideas that are the same themes; in the stories of our time, read by teen agers, young adults. Some of whom read and devour Harry Potter as pure fantasy. I read them too but a lot that's not new is conveyed in them. The themes in the Transformers, the Twilight 'phenomenon', and in True Blood are making me think about the 'dark ages', about paintings that depict a war between angels and demons that I saw in the Louvre, that are 700 years old.
I've read a lot and recognized in reading philosophers from the past that it was obvious there's been an ongoing 'theme' in Time itself that 'echoes' in the popular fictions of this point in Time:
Whether we are alone in the universe is the primary theme. That's what religion is basically concerned with isn't it? But derived from it is another: whether there is really a war in Time between two agencies, one that wants 'man' to find his own destiny and fights with the 'other one' which wants to rule and decide for man.
From that theme is derived: whether electronic beings are real and will take over or whether 'we' are them but cannot know it and be happy to 'serve' another level of intelligence.
Ira Levin's book, This Perfect Day is about a world where chance has been eliminated, its a perfect society where rain falls only at night, food is 'total cakes', and the word 'hate' is the filthiest word. There's a real shock at the end of the book, I won't reveal it but I felt it in my body when I turned a page and the entire past of the character 'Chip' was suddenly changed. Read the book! That shock was used several times, retrieved, relived literally.
The ancient Liriope bore a son, Narcissus. She asked Tiresias "Will my son live to old age?" If he never knows himself." was the answer. At a certain place in his life, the beautiful Narcissus could not recognize his own reflection. (Thought is a reflection. This is important to take literally, he could not see his own reflection.) A lonely female, Echo repeated the last words she heard him say because she'd been 'cursed' herself, she could only use (re-use) words someone had said!!! These are facts told long ago about a certain relationship that many females live today. They are writing books, but males are beginning to describe themselves accurately, too!!! I listened to Dr. Phil while writing this post, 8-16-2011, (maybe its available to view on the Internet?) and heard with the new (to me its still new) sense that created a new understanding, how those 'fictions' are acted out in our 'now'.
Ira Levin's book, This Perfect Day is about a world where chance has been eliminated, its a perfect society where rain falls only at night, food is 'total cakes', and the word 'hate' is the filthiest word. There's a real shock at the end of the book, I won't reveal it but I felt it in my body when I turned a page and the entire past of the character 'Chip' was suddenly changed. Read the book! That shock was used several times, retrieved, relived literally.
The ancient Liriope bore a son, Narcissus. She asked Tiresias "Will my son live to old age?" If he never knows himself." was the answer. At a certain place in his life, the beautiful Narcissus could not recognize his own reflection. (Thought is a reflection. This is important to take literally, he could not see his own reflection.) A lonely female, Echo repeated the last words she heard him say because she'd been 'cursed' herself, she could only use (re-use) words someone had said!!! These are facts told long ago about a certain relationship that many females live today. They are writing books, but males are beginning to describe themselves accurately, too!!! I listened to Dr. Phil while writing this post, 8-16-2011, (maybe its available to view on the Internet?) and heard with the new (to me its still new) sense that created a new understanding, how those 'fictions' are acted out in our 'now'.
"Behold I make all things new." means something to me and its likely that is what the interactive force is supposed to accomplish.
The fictions of our time and of the ancients are 'about' something real in reality in our Time itself or outside of what has been named time. It can't be defined by naming the present as 'now' because it's a point that's moving constantly. Do you remember when the space between one second and another was fixed, stable? I know that more people 'get that message' today than in my generation.
What is our future? That space has expanded in the years since 1984, and apparently can continue expanding.
There seems to me to be a lot of prophecy embedded in science fictions. I'm reading Arthur C. Clarke's Rama II, published in 1989 in which he and co-author Gentry Lee described prophetically much of our current situation, the collapse of banking, especially and the corruption and inaction of politicians. In 1989 they described aspects of our 'now'. But David Bowman, a fictional character in 2001 is in 2010 alive, being educated by an invisible presence, he's learning a lot but he's not in a body! He feels that presence but can't see it and he knows he is being manipulated but not why.
Discovering that invisible presence is a task that requires isolation and experiences in the real world, in my opinion. It is not depersonalizing without being ultra-personalizing at the same time.
There seems to me to be a lot of prophecy embedded in science fictions. I'm reading Arthur C. Clarke's Rama II, published in 1989 in which he and co-author Gentry Lee described prophetically much of our current situation, the collapse of banking, especially and the corruption and inaction of politicians. In 1989 they described aspects of our 'now'. But David Bowman, a fictional character in 2001 is in 2010 alive, being educated by an invisible presence, he's learning a lot but he's not in a body! He feels that presence but can't see it and he knows he is being manipulated but not why.
Discovering that invisible presence is a task that requires isolation and experiences in the real world, in my opinion. It is not depersonalizing without being ultra-personalizing at the same time.
I wonder who should make the rules and what can make the rulemakers address real problems and solve them so that everyone feels somewhat secure that good judgment prevails unless its by 'twice born' individuals? That's my question today. But my own answer is that it may be that way already.
The ancients had the same problems but one real fact has changed: now the 'slaves' can write books and publish their experiences themselves. Cameras are everywhere. Its getting hard to lie. Any one can get on the Internet and publish real events because cameras are in the hands of those (of us) who often couldn't prove anything by merely telling their version of what happened, as happened in Rashomon. A picture is worth millions of words.
The ancients had the same problems but one real fact has changed: now the 'slaves' can write books and publish their experiences themselves. Cameras are everywhere. Its getting hard to lie. Any one can get on the Internet and publish real events because cameras are in the hands of those (of us) who often couldn't prove anything by merely telling their version of what happened, as happened in Rashomon. A picture is worth millions of words.
