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by seemslikeadream » Tue Jul 03, 2012 10:42 am
by ida pingala » Tue Jul 03, 2012 11:45 am
by Hammer of Los » Wed Jul 04, 2012 6:03 am
ida pingala wrote: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.
Celestial travellers have always been here with us
Set in the homes of the universe we have yet to go
Countless expansions will arrive and flow inside of us
My friend, he of fantasy, dancing with the spirit of the age
by Allegro » Thu Jul 05, 2012 1:59 am
Composer, Richard Strauss, and philosopher, Henri Bergson, lived during the same time period.from Time and Free Will, Henri Bergson wrote:…The aesthetic feelings offer us a still more striking example of this progressive stepping in of new elements, which can be detected in the fundamental emotion and which seem to increase its magnitude, although in reality they do nothing more than alter its nature. Let us consider the simplest of them, the feeling of grace. At first it is only the perception of a certain ease, a certain facility in the outward movements. And as those movements are easy which prepare the way for others, we are led to find a superior ease in the movements which can be foreseen, in the present attitudes in which future attitudes are pointed out and, as it were, prefigured. If jerky movements are wanting in grace, the reason is that each of them is self-sufficient and does not announce those which are to follow. If curves are more graceful than broken lines, the reason is that, while a curved line changes its direction at every moment, every new direction is indicated in the preceding one. Thus the perception of ease in motion passes over into the pleasure of mastering the flow of time and of holding the future in the present.
A third element comes in when the graceful movements submit to a rhythm and are accompanied by music. For the rhythm and measure, by allowing us to foresee to a still greater extent the movements of the dancer, make us believe that we now control them. As we guess almost the exact attitude which the dancer is going to take, he seems to obey us when he really takes it: the regularity of the rhythm establishes a kind of communication between him and us, and the periodic returns of the measure are like so many invisible threads by means of which we set in motion this imaginary puppet. Indeed, if it stops for an instant, our hand in its impatience cannot refrain from making a movement, as though to push it, as though to replace it in the midst of this movement, the rhythm of which has taken complete possession of our thought and will. Thus a kind of physical sympathy enters into the feeling of grace.
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To understand how the feeling of the beautiful itself admits of degrees, we should have to submit it to a minute analysis. Perhaps the difficulty which we experience in defining it is largely owing to the fact that we look upon the beauties of nature as anterior to those of art: the processes of art are thus supposed to be nothing more than means by which the artist expresses the beautiful, and the essence of the beautiful remains unexplained. But we might ask ourselves whether nature is beautiful otherwise than through meeting by chance certain processes of our art, and whether, in a certain sense, art is not prior to nature. Without even going so far, it seems more in conformity with the rules of a sound method to study the beautiful first in the works in which it has been produced by a conscious effort, and then to pass on by imperceptible steps from art to nature, which may be looked upon as an artist in its own way.
By placing ourselves at this point of view, we shall perceive that the object of art is to put to sleep the active or rather resistant powers of our personality, and thus to bring us into a state of perfect responsiveness, in which we realize the idea that is suggested to us and sympathize with the feeling that is expressed. In the processes of art we shall find, in a weakened form, a refined and in some measure spiritualized version of the processes commonly used to induce the state of hypnosis.
Thus, in music, the rhythm and measure suspend the normal flow of our sensations and ideas by causing our attention to swing to and fro between fixed points, and they take hold of us with such force that even the faintest imitation of a groan will suffice to fill us with the utmost sadness. If musical sounds affect us more powerfully than the sounds of nature, the reason is that nature confines itself to expressing feelings, whereas music suggests them to us.
Whence indeed comes the charm of poetry? The poet is he with whom feelings develop into images, and the images themselves into words which translate them while obeying the laws of rhythm. In seeing these images pass before our eyes we in our turn experience the feeling which was, so to speak, their emotional equivalent: but we should never realize these images so strongly without the regular movements of the rhythm by which our soul is lulled into self-forgetfulness, and, as in a dream, thinks and sees with the poet.
The plastic arts obtain an effect of the same kind by the fixity which they suddenly impose upon life, and which a physical contagion carries over to the attention of the spectator. While the works of ancient sculpture express faint emotions which play upon them like a passing breath, the pale immobility of the stone causes the feeling expressed or the movement just begun to appear as if they were fixed for ever, absorbing our thought and our will in their own eternity.
We find in architecture, in the very midst of this startling immobility, certain effects analogous to those of rhythm. The symmetry of form, the indefinite repetition of the same architectural motive, causes our faculty of perception to oscillate between the same and the same again, and gets rid of those customary incessant changes which in ordinary life bring us back without ceasing to the consciousness of our personality even the faint suggestion of an idea will then be enough to make the idea fill the whole of our mind.
Thus art aims at impressing feelings on us rather than expressing them; it suggests them to us, and willingly dispenses with the imitation of nature when it finds some more efficacious means. Nature, like art, proceeds by suggestion, but does not command the resources of rhythm. It supplies the deficiency by the long comradeship, based on influences received in common by nature and by ourselves, of which the effect is that the slightest indication by nature of a feeling arouses sympathy in our minds, just as a mere gesture on the part of the hypnotist is enough to force the intended suggestion upon a subject accustomed to his control. And this sympathy is shown in particular when nature displays to us beings of normal proportions, so that our attention is distributed equally over all the parts of the figure without being fixed on any one of them our perceptive faculty then finds itself lulled and soothed by this harmony, and nothing hinders any longer the free play of sympathy, which is ever ready to come forward as soon as the obstacle in its path is removed.…
ida pingala wrote:Henri Bergson wrote: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
by brainpanhandler » Tue Jul 10, 2012 10:32 am
by Allegro » Sat Jul 21, 2012 12:14 pm
.by brainpanhandler » Sat Jul 21, 2012 2:03 pm
by Allegro » Fri Aug 17, 2012 1:55 am
brainpanhandler,In response to Allegro, brainpanhandler wrote:Allegro,
It does seem as though there is some sort of correspondence there.
by Allegro » Fri Aug 17, 2012 1:56 am
?by Marie Laveau » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:02 am
Simulist wrote: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.
by justdrew » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:12 am
Living with 'The Gloria Films': A daughter's memory
In 1964 Dr Everett Shostrom, a psychologist from California, produced a series of educational films titled "Three Approaches to Psychotherapy", therein filming complete psychotherapy sessions for the very first time. Three celebrated therapists demonstrated their models on a willing client called Gloria. Dr Shostrom had asked Gloria to be prepared to discuss, on film, a subject that was currently troubling her as a recently divorced mother - dating men and dealing with direct questions about her sex life from her fourth-grade daughter, 'Pammy'. At the time, the topic had pith, intrigue and moral uncertainty. Although the interviews quickly diverged from sex, an aura remained that underscored the state of psychotherapy, the era of the mid-60s, and the evolving consciousness and 'liberation' of women during that decade. Immediately upon the release of the films, reverberations began. They were translated into multiple languages and became a regular part of the college curriculum in psychology departments in the USA and abroad. The three therapists - Carl Rogers, Albert Ellis and Fritz Perls - were solicited for their responses and evaluations; the films were, controversially, shown in theatres and on TV. There was a lawsuit and a life-long relationship. The success of the films was said to be down to 'Gloria's genius'. Countless papers, theories, rumours and idiosyncratic research titbits circulated about Gloria and the films, yet what she experienced, how she was treated after the filming and how her personal life evolved, was never fully revealed. She had brilliantly happy moments, devoted relationships and profound loss. Her generosity with her time and spirit was her spark of grace.This beautifully written memoir blends the intimacies of family life, intuitive characterisation and an insight into the development of psychotherapy in California in the 60s. Gloria's daughter P----- J B----- ('Pammy'), whose innocent question sparked Gloria's disquiet, has woven together a legacy of letters, notes, transcripts, tapes, articles and her own memories to write about a life which became the subject of much academic analysis, moral outrage, rumours of suicide and speculation in the years following the release of "Three Approaches to Psychotherapy", more popularly known as 'The Gloria Films'.
by Marie Laveau » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:13 am
brainpanhandler wrote: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.
by brainpanhandler » Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:13 am
by brainpanhandler » Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:21 am
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