Here and Now

[brainpanhandler]

Know thyself

[2012 Countdown]

The Terrence Moonseed-like contingent response:

My physical experience is my truth, and everything else is just a story, without me, nothing can exist... so nothing does exist without me, and with me everything is. Having a plan is being afraid to succeed. The best way of being is to accept that the world is perfect the way it is now, and any changes that happen is a change in the right direction, for me.

Looking at my physical reality I can see that I am always physically in the center of my self (self = me and everything physically around me), so being a self centered mind is in aliment with my physical reality. I am all about nothing, because something always ends, and nothing lasts forever. The word "illusion" comes from the energy of fear, so I prefer to use the word "reflection". (divine/divided = I/ALL)

Of course I post in jest, but at least it gives you a bump, and aknowledgment it was watched. I just randomly came across this. Pay attention at 2:30 minutes in.

[brainpanhandler]

Pay attention at 2:30 minutes in.

Fritz Perls calls "is" the "zero point".

I assume there are many here that would take issue with Harris and indeed I disagree with a number of things he has said. He's a pretty controversial figure.

But nothing we do in this world matters as much as "know thyself". Nothing. All else that is good, right and true flows from it.

Some of us are more broken than others. All forms of superstition lead to further fracturing.

From Perls I moved onto Wilhelm Reich who to this day I still believe had the answers to our woes. The way out though is an impossible passage from where we are.

As beautiful as the human race is we are just as monstrous. But that is not our nature.

[Simulist]

Fundamentalists, religious or non, are almost always difficult for me to listen to, and Sam Harris is no exception.

Still, the "here and now" (note my "location") is what we presently have, and I do think we should try and live in the giftedness of this present.

What I am not at all convinced about is that any kind of reductionism that limits which human experiences are to be considered as valid — either by the lenses of scientific materialism or by religious dogma — is the best way to do that. It probably isn't. I think the better way for us to be fully present to ourselves and each other in the present moment is for human experience to be permitted to be whatever it is, regardless of any prevailing philosophy of the times.

Superstition comes clothed in fashionable garments for each age.

[brainpanhandler]

I think it is easy and understandable to confuse deeply held conviction with fundamentalism. Please remember that scientific materialism by definition is open ended. It really isn't fair to lump it together with religious fundamentalism no matter how seemingly ossified.

I swear that I sometimes feel like I am the only one here willing to defend science.

I think the better way for us to be fully present to ourselves and each other in the present moment is for human experience to be permitted to be whatever it is

I honestly doubt Harris would disagree with that, aside from a quibble or two. A religious fundie? Different story.


I mean scientists are humans too and they come in all different stripes. The best scientists, I believe, would simply observe and be self aware enough to account for their own biases in the analysis and would have principles which would trump any personal idiosyncracies. They know themselves.

[2012 Countdown]

On a slightly more serious note (by me), I would be remiss if I didn't post this latest tune in this spot. Rush just came out w/a new album a week or so ago...


Track 12 from Clockwork Angels




-

Rush The Garden Lyrics

VERSE
In this one of many possible worlds
All for the best, somethings are test
It is what it is and whatever
Time is still the infinite jest

The arrow flies when you dream
The hours tick away
The cells tick away

The Watchmaker keeps to his schemes
The hours tick away
They tick away

CHORUS
The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect
So hard to earn, so easily burned
The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect
So hard to earn, so easily burned
In the fullness of time
A garden to nurture and protect

VERSE
In the rise and the set of the sun
To the stars goes spinning
Spinning 'round the night
Oh it is what it is and forever
Each moment of memory aflight
The arrow flies while you dream
The hours tick away
The cells tick away
The Watchmaker has time up his sleeve
The hours tick away
They tick away

CHORUS
The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect
So hard to earn, so easily burned
In the fullness of time
A garden to nurture and protect
(Its a measure of a life)
The treasure of a life is a measure of love and respect
The way you live,
The gifts that you give
And the fullness of time is the only return that you expect

BRIDGE
The future disappears into memory
With only a moment between
Forever dwells in that moment
Hope is what remains to be seen
Forever dwells in that moment
Hope is what remains to be seen

SOLO

OUTRO
In the fullness of time a garden to nurture and protect
(Its a measure of a life)

It's a measure of a life

[Seamus OBlimey]

[Joe Hillshoist]

hey Seamus, good to see you're around.

[Allegro]

…I assume there are many here that would take issue with Harris and indeed I disagree with a number of things he has said. He's a pretty controversial figure.

But nothing we do in this world matters as much as "know thyself". Nothing. All else that is good, right and true flows from it.

Some of us are more broken than others. All forms of superstition lead to further fracturing.

From Perls I moved onto Wilhelm Reich who to this day I still believe had the answers to our woes. The way out though is an impossible passage from where we are.

As beautiful as the human race is we are just as monstrous. But that is not our nature.

I put Wilhelm Reich’s The Mass Psychology of Fascism here because you had put it here.
Thank You for that.

I have no problem listening to Mr. Harris talk about his ideas, although I will tell you that I thought my left brain was sliding out almost to land on my shoulder. Harris was just a bit heavy left-brained, leaving us to imagine a tad more humor accompanied by full-on smiles. But that’s neither here nor there, for most.

Anyway, when some believe that Gods of the primary monotheisms do not exist, that death is forever sitting alone in a dark theater with no movie or no soda or popcorn; that all we humans will experience is THIS life—those thoughts can become pretty bleak over time. I suppose I’ve been fortunate in that I seek art and music as well as contemplations such as the one Harris spoke toward the close of his lecture in the video. But not everyone is able to appreciate art and music, or even visualize one’s feet or ankles or knees or legs, brain, heart, breathing, etc., during that sort of contemplation.


^ Margaret Atwood
on Religion Part 3/3So, what for me was missing in Harris’s talk? A story. A really good story to hang on to. But I wouldn’t have remembered that until I looked up Bill Moyers’s interview of Margaret Atwood on PBS. Readers may watch the last few minutes of that interview in the posted video to the left to hear her story about stories with a tiger and stories without a tiger. At the end of her story and in her typical manner, she quipped ironically, “How’s that?” I laughed out loud.

Actually, it was a relief to hear her talk after listening to Harris: Atwood is a woman, and (all, some, most) women can have and usually do have different ways of describing life than (all, some, most) men. And, that’s what I enjoy about life. ’Gotta have a somewhat equal number of fe/males speaking to find that balance; that’s probable yet not always possible. Maybe that’s just me.

Thoughts?
~ A.

[2012 Countdown]

-
I suppose I’ve been fortunate in that I seek art and music as well as contemplations such as the one Harris spoke toward the close of his lecture in the video. But not everyone is able to appreciate art and music, or even visualize one’s feet or ankles or knees or legs, brain, heart, breathing, etc., during that sort of contemplation.
-
So, what for me was missing in Harris’s talk? A story. A really good story to hang on to.
-
Atwood is a woman, and (all, some, most) women can have and usually do have different ways of describing life than (all, some, most) men. And, that’s what I enjoy about life. ’Gotta have a somewhat equal number of fe/males speaking to find that balance; that’s probable yet not always possible. Maybe that’s just me.

Thoughts?
~ A.

I am being a bit fanboi and slightly OT, so please excuse my indulgence. I'll try to not let it happen again.-



"Animate"
Polarize me
Sensitize me
Criticize me
Civilize me
Compensate me
Animate me
Complicate me
Elevate me

Goddess in my garden
Sister in my soul
Angel in my armor
Actress in my role

Daughter of a demon lover
Empress of the hidden face
Priestess of the pagan mother
Ancient queen of inner space

Spirit in my psyche
Double in my role
Alter in my image
Struggle for control

Mistress of the dark unconscious
Mermaid of the lunar sea
Daughter of the great enchantress
Sister to the boy inside of me

My counterpart, my foolish heart
A man must learn to rule his tender part
A warming trend, a gentle friend
A man must build a fortress to defend
A secret face, a touch of grace
A man must learn to give a little space
A peaceful state, a submissive trait
A man must learn to gently dominate

Polarize me
Sensitize me
Criticize me
Civilize me
Compensate me
Animate me
Complicate me
Elevate me

[DrEvil]

I swear that I sometimes feel like I am the only one here willing to defend science.

You're not alone! Science rules!
We wouldn't be having this discussion without science. When's the last time religion did something like that?

[Hammer of Los]

...

edited.

...

[Allegro]

.
Countdown, I’ve listened to Animate twice now, and during the second listen, I watched it, and saw those first few images . I’ll reread your Rush thread as I see you’ve added more. Thank You!

By way of contrast to Rush’s music would be music performed by a traditional vocal ensemble. I’m loving the surprise felt when I discovered choral music and its composer while recently reading Bad Astronomy.

Here’s hoping brainpanhandler will reappear and find more than just a few of us do, with a goodly amount of respect, love and would defend the sciences. And would love and defend music that has inspired scientists, and those scientists’ musical compositions. Frankly, I don’t remember this kind of music having been offered at RI.

A note, though. For those who possess a trained ear for music will be able to hear the piano that’s not been tuned properly. I think the sounds of the voices fit nicely the composition’s tonality and style during the performance achievement heard in this particular recording.

_________________
Cosmos | Kenley Kristofferson, composer
Composed for Choir (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass) and Piano
Featured in its entirety on Soundcloud

A choral suite using text of 20th-century astronomer and science popularizer, Carl Sagan. Recorded by Antiphony at the Manitoba Museum (Planetarium) in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada on May 29th, 2012.

There are three movements:

Mvt. 1 is about discovery (4.9 mb)…


Somewhere, somewhere…
The sky calls to us.
If we do not destroy ourselves,
we will someday venture to the stars.

Somewhere, somewhere…
Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were,
but without it, we go nowhere.
We make our world significant by the courage of our questions
and the depth of our answers.

Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known…
If we do not destroy ourselves,
we will someday venture to the stars.

Mvt. 2 is about beauty (5.8 mb)…


The beauty of a living thing is not the atoms that go into it,
but the way those atoms are put together.
The cosmos is also within us,
we are made of star stuff.
We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.

We are made of star stuff!

The beauty, the beauty…

Mvt. 3 is about space at large and our place in it (4.9 mb)…


If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch,
you must first create the universe.
[The universe is] neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent.
The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.
We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and it’s [a lifetime]…

Somewhere, somewhere…

If you wish to make…

On a personal level, Carl Sagan has taught me how beautiful science and the universe can be, and that understanding something enriches the experience, but doesn’t take away from the mystery that draws us to the big questions of life. He taught me that the sciences are beautiful; the natural world is elegant; and for such small creatures as we, the vastness is bearable only through love.

< snipped mp3 links already embedded in red, above >

Text by Carl Sagan, all rights to the text owned by the Sagan Estate (but permission given to share as a labour of love and the proliferation of scientific literacy). No money can be made from the sale or performance of this work.

Composed by Kenley Kristofferson (@kenley_k)
Recorded by Antiphony (@antiphony_)
at the Manitoba Museum (Planetarium) + (@MBMuseum)
Engineered by Jonathan Pearce
Text by Carl Sagan
Cover Image by Paul Duffield

[ida pingala]

When we assert that one number is greater than another number or one body greater than another body, we know very well what we mean. For in both cases we allude to unequal spaces, as shall be shown in detail a little further on, and we call that space the greater which contains the other. But how can a more intense sensation contain one of less intensity? Shall we say that the first implies the second, that we reach the sensation of higher intensity only on condition of having first passed through the less intense stages of the same sensation, and that in a certain sense we are concerned, here also, with the relation of container to contained ? This conception of intensive magnitude seems, indeed, to be that of common sense, but we cannot advance it as a philosophical explanation without becoming involved in a vicious circle. For it is beyond doubt that, in the natural series of numbers, the later number exceeds the earlier, but the very possibility of arranging the numbers in ascending order arises from their having to each other relations of container and contained, so that we feel ourselves able to explain precisely in what sense one is greater than the other. The question, then, is how we succeed in forming a series of this kind with intensities, which cannot be superposed on each other, and by what sign we recognize that the members of this series increase, for example, instead of diminishing : but this always comes back to the-inquiry, why an intensity can be assimilated to a magnitude.

-H. Bergson, Time and Free Will

[ida pingala]

Gazing past the planets
Looking for total view
I've been lying here for hours
You gotta make the journey
Out and in

Wonders of a lifetime
Right there before your eyes
Searching with this life of ours
You gotta make the journey
Out and in
Out and in
Out and in

If you think it's a joke
That's all right, do what
You want to do
I've said my peace
And I'll leave it all up to you

Wonders of a lifetime
Right there before your eyes
Searching with this life of ours
You gotta make the journey
Out and in
Out and in
Out and in

If you think it's a joke
Well that's all right, do what
You want to do
I've said my peace
And I'll leave it all up to you

Gazing past the planets
Looking for total view
I've been lying here for hours
You gotta make the journey
Out and in
Out and in
Out and in