Maybe its time to play a dialogue game again - in order to see if we can meet ideas differently - to change the way we habitually interact with each other.
Anyone interested?
If so, I’m proposing that we play the “repeating game” wherein we repeat a statement or question in our own words until we feel we’ve really seen it clearly.
At which point we use the same statement to play the “deconstructing game” where we explore the pre-suppositions inherent in the statement.
If applicable, in the case of violent disagreement about the truth of the statement, we can also play “devil’s advocate” (where we pretend to be our opponent) or “socratic questions” (where we test the soundness of the claims in the statement - google “street epistemology” on youtube for examples).
I know, it sounds daunting - but there’s no obligation to succeed - its a game.
For me it is a fact that there is a very different ‘relationship’ between the proprioception of the body’s movements, hands, feet, etc and that of (the missing proprioception) of the movement of the thinking process. And since my thinking has a large part to do with how I feel and act in the world, awareness of its movement seems important?
It’s game on folks! DanMcD has come straight in with a fact claim.
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to repeat in your own words what you think Dan - and I, as I restate the claim - are saying.
My attempt at restating the claim is :
We are not aware of our thoughts in the same way that we are aware of our body’s position and movement in space. Our intimacy with the mental process is somehow lacking. Which regrettably translates into a kind of ignorant kneejerk relationship with the world?
I know what you are suggesting, and the following question is probably not relevant here, but I would like to seriously ask it anyway…
Can we have a conversation about ‘the truth of the statement’ without exposing ourselves in the conversation? Because if not, the whole thing becomes a mere discussion of who has the “true interpretation” of the “statement”, which obviously can lead to aggressive reactions towards each other due to misinterpretations (which unfortunately are not often asked for clarification).
Hello @fraggle - this thread is an experiment in dialogue where we are playing a game to see what happens if we change the normal rules of interaction by all looking at an idea together - please come and join us.
Maybe your speculation about what will happen when we allow ourselves to disagree about a statement will be addressed if and when we ever get to that part of the game. Or maybe we can address your question together as part of the game if the opportunity arises later on. Or we can address it right away if you post it on another thread.
But right now the challenge is to restate the following statements in our own words, to see if we are all seeing the same meaning :
No, I’m just joking. I actually think that, whether we accept it or not, I think that expressing what we think @DanMcD (in this case) is trying to express, before answering what he says, would create a space that would prevent the rush of a quick response (an interesting question would be how many of us here reflect on what the other is saying, and weigh a response before responding?).
So here is my reformulation (and my questioning) of what I think he is saying:
It could be widely accepted here that we might be more related to the reception of stimuli produced within the organism, than to the reception of stimuli produced within thought. But I question whether that means that we are aware of what happens in our body, and unaware of what happens in our thought. Because are we really aware of the movement of our body, or is it our thought that thinks it is aware of that movement?
Thank you @fraggle - I realise its tricky to play new games with new rules. You have made a slight mistake by rushing to make slight challenges/questions (maybe even slight opposing opinions) which is our normal behaviour.
We are seeing if we can keep our divisive mind at bay - its weird - but when it looks like the players are agreed on whats being said, we will move from “repetition” to “deconstruction”
nb. all players are welcome to restate the claim as many times as they want in this initial stage
Ah, I think I get it now. You’re not talking about us agreeing or disagreeing on what the other says, but about us trying to have a common understanding of what the other is trying to express, right?
Sorry, but you see we’re playing without a manual, not even a guide!
And what is the one who made the initial statement supposed to do next, clarify whether our understanding of what he is saying is correct or not?
No one has any authority (in the repeating stage) about what is correct or incorrect - even @DanMcD has become a player like everyone else - the statement no longer belongs to him - He is cordially invited to restate the claim in his own words to help us all understand what he thinks we are saying…
Maybe I expressed myself badly (language problems), but that is exactly what I tried to express in my post. By the way, I really like the expression “cordially invited”!
Well, it’s time for bed. I hope to find more of us participating in that interesting experiment/game tomorrow! Good night or good morning, depending on which part of the world you are in, @macdougdoug
Thought may think that someone is a fool or this or that but if there is no awareness of that taking place then that ‘conclusion’ may become part of the system: that so and so is this or that. That is why it seems important that there is an awareness of what thought is doing, in order to see if it is ‘coherent’, in Bohm’s words, or not because if it’s not then we can question it and even change it. But if there is no awareness, then these conclusions become the way we meet the present and the ‘other’.
If I am not coherent with my own reality seeing that I am dying, I may come to think that I am living, then that conclusion becomes my way of meeting the present and the ‘others’. But if I am able to see the incoherence, I can question it, and even change its course (through what I may be able to see in that questioning myself).
Our deluded, insensitive experience of the world is constantly being refined and reinforced by itself - without awakening to this process we are caught in this unrelenting spiral where the world and I become more and more as we appear to be.
Will thought’s awareness of itself keep it from doing monstrous things? Like the creation of tiny ‘butterfly’ land mines that can be dropped from planes into fields that will blow off a child’s legs years later when he or she plays in those fields? Will proprioception of thought subject it to a scrutiny that would make it impossible to bring forth such a horror? Would thought with awareness of its movement be able to still reason that ‘yes people will suffer horribly but that’s not my problem, there’s money to be made and I have a family to support…etc.’ What I’m getting at is that thought creates and invents and doesn’t consider the long term effects of its ‘inventions’. It even forgets it has made them.
So is it the lack of awareness of what thought is doing each moment as it moves, that is responsible for the chaos in and around us?
Okay, sounds like @DanMcD has started to question what we are saying - so maybe we can move on to the deconstruction phase - in which we look at the claim and inquire into its structure : the beliefs or presuppositions necessary for such a claim to arise, the implications about what we are saying etc…
The claim seems to be that : we are not aware of our thought process and that this insensitivity affects our experience of, and interaction with the world.
So - what do we need to understand about this claim - maybe we can sit silently for a while with the claim? Then each share one insight about the claim.
We are aware of our thought processes. At times. Especially when we are trying to figure out what makes us and others tick. Nowhere near 24/7. And only partially. This fragmentariness is what gets us into trouble, we rarely see the big picture. And the ‘truth’ of the small picture may be totally different than the truth of the big!
I agree - do we need to flesh out what we mean by “awareness of the thought process”? because @rickScott is correct : I am aware of my thoughts at times, just as I am sometimes aware of what my right hand is doing.
The original claim seems to state that there is a major difference between bodily awareness and awareness of mental states - this has not been demonstrated, maybe we need to drop that idea?
Sounds like whining. Oh thought did it, that’s why I’m so miserable, etc,etc. Truth is life is tough and you either make it work or you sit in the corner and cry. Plans are afoot to ‘cull’ the herd of whiners and misfits…get with the program and leave the philosophizing to the losers!
It seems to be based on an erroneous assumption about self awareness, coupled with the hope that I can somehow tweak that self awareness for my own benefit.
