There is no ‘we’ separate from the ‘it’. There is no self separate from thought. Can thought itself see what is going on here? So this is not about you or I, alone or together, seeing what is going on. There is no you or I, alone or together as ‘we’ or ‘us’. There is only thought.
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That is what I am saying. I don’t know why you call it dissembling when we are saying the same thing. Our awareness and perception of the world is largely a mechanical awareness because it is filtered through thought, through the millions of fragments of influences from the past. However, one has to be aware of one’s own mistakes in logic and expression. When you say that the brain is aware of thought yet chooses not to be aware of what thought is doing, you are giving some kind of agency to the brain, which is merely a lump of material matter. The whole concept of choice is built into the brain because of thought. Without thought, choice is impossible. So we have to go a little bit deeper into this, if we have some degree of patience and care for one another. That is all I am asking for. There is no demand for agreement on anything, but we must use what skills we have very carefully and accurately.
Thought is mechanical. Our brains are also mechanical. Our awareness of the world is a mechanical awareness. What brings this mechanical movement to a complete stop? The physical act of death will eventually bring it to a stop through disease or accident or old age. Is there not a death that is also a part of life, not something that comes along at the very end?
If we talk of the brain or of the self being aware of what thought is doing then we are making a huge error in our thinking. Our thinking is thought. The thinker itself is thought. So for thought to be aware of itself and to be aware of its own mechanical nature, it must begin to question everything about itself and about its favoured activity of separating itself into fictional components. You and I are two of those fictional components. But, of course, the central fictional component is oneself. This fictional central component is incapable of awareness. It is only thought that can be aware of itself.
Therefore, a global brain operates from a fictional basis only with tremendous care and sensitivity, for there is a great deal of pleasure and fun in it too. Most of our sexual activity is from this fictional centre, which can bring with it just as much heartache as bliss. The wellspring of laughter is also there, as well as those of despair and depression. It is only with such a global brain that we can really converse and discover the joy of living with one another. And thought is at the centre and the heart of all this, which is alright, but it demands a tremendous sense of enquiry on our part wherein nothing whatsoever can be taken for granted.
Can thought see anything? Can thought do anything more than manipulate words, concepts, and images to communicate?
Thought is something the brain does in the service of its most deeply held beliefs. When there is little or no awareness of what these beliefs are, thought can do only what the brain’s beliefs can allow.
There is no you or I, alone or together as ‘we’ or ‘us’. There is only thought.
There is no thought without the brain, and each one of us is a brain pretending to be someone who knows something, when in fact, the only thing we know is that we don’t want to know what we’re doing because we’re afraid of being no one, nothing but awareness and response.
This pretense is obvious with a dissembler like you who speaks as if he knows more than those to whom he speaks.
Is there a perceiver separate from thought? If you say, ‘Yes,’ and call it the brain or awareness or some other such word, it is still only thought saying, ‘Yes,’ isn’t it? When it quickly hides itself behind another word or phrase, - like the phrase ‘awareness and response’, which sounds superficially acceptable - thought is able to keep itself alive in perpetuity. But in being aware of its own machinations, this very simple yet immediate awareness changes the whole nature of thought from the inside. That’s all we are saying. There is no great mystery about it. One doesn’t need to conjure up any other agency.
Isn’t it that the brain has been conditioned? And part of that conditioning is that there is a ‘thinker’ (you/me) separate from the process who is ‘doing’ the thinking. So the only ‘pretender’ is thought itself? This is the situation ‘we’ (all brains) share. Insight can reveal some of the conditioning but thought quickly adopts it as its own and it is added to memory and becomes part of the 'System" as David Bohm called it.
Thought is not aware and it is not alive. If can’t do anything for itself because it has no agency. It is what the intellect is doing according to its beliefs. You’re personifying thought because you think you’re a person.
in being aware of its (thought’s) own machinations, this very simple yet immediate awareness changes the whole nature of thought from the inside.
Don’t you see what you’re doing when you attribute agency and reason and purpose to thought, as if it is more than just the mechanism activated by hidden unexplored feelings of fear, desire, ambition, etc., that determine its activity?
Hidden from whom? And what is the entity that explores or chooses not to explore its own feelings? So it is not that there is any arribution of agency, reason or purpose to thought. There is only thought and no other agency, which then changes the whole meaning of the word ‘agency’. Therefore, it demands an entirely different approach. This we can go into together, but it requires a global brain, not one already fixed in its conclusions.
Is there a perceiver separate from thought? You seem to suggest that there is, but each time we come back to thought.
‘Thought is not aware and it is not alive.’ These are your words. And you are quite right. But who or what is the entity that sees the truth of this statement? Unless thought itself is aware of its own essential mechanical nature there will be no end to the mess we make of things upon this earth. It is simple enough.
Is intelligence a who or an entity or a force that can only reach us when we do nothing else?
We must be careful not to invent yet another agency in the form of intelligence. Our question is about the possibility of thought undergoing a change from the inside without reference to anything other than itself. This may be about thought acting intelligently - perhaps we could put it this way - but first are we clear about what it is we asking of thought?
This does seem to be the case. When K was trying to explain the critical difference between ‘me’ being aware of the contents of consciousness and just awareness of them, he used the phrase: “they light up!” Implying that he saw that there was no agent apart from them.
The problem with agency of any kind is very simple: it means separation from the rest of the universe. Thought has separated itself from the rest of consciousness and has then tried all sorts of tricks to resolve the division which thought itself has caused.
Yes it has done this for ages. And will continue to do so unless it becomes ‘aware’ that it is the very source of the problem it is trying to resolve. The source of the division it is trying to unite.
As long as “you” we or I, set yourself up an authority, you are delusional self, the delusion “I know” “I have the answer” is attachment to ignorance, delusion, conflict Inwardly outwardly. You may identify as thought it thought only but you don’t actually see it!? You cling to the delusion as security, as a comfort, as self preservation, and you further delude yourself, about it.
Why?
Please sir, what is thought?
There is no whom and there is no entity. There is only the psychological content than dictates reaction.
There is only thought and no other agency, which then changes the whole meaning of the word ‘agency
So you say, and thought knows nothing but belief, so you are the belief that there is nothing but thought.
Therefore, it demands an entirely different approach. This we can go into together, but it requires a global brain, not one already fixed in its conclusions.
Now you’re doing what you always do, trying to lure some poor sap into carrying on a conversation that begins with one of your falsehoods.
Is there a perceiver separate from thought? You seem to suggest that there is, but each time we come back to thought.
There is choiceless awareness and the knee-jerk reaction of psychological content.
‘Thought is not aware and it is not alive.’ These are your words. And you are quite right. But who or what is the entity that sees the truth of this statement?
Thank you for admitting to be being a liar.
But who or what is the entity that sees the truth of this statement?
Who is awareness?
Unless thought itself is aware of its own essential mechanical nature there will be no end to the mess we make of things upon this earth. It is simple enough.
You just conceded that thought is not aware and is not alive, and now you say thought must be aware. Are you confused or just incorrigibly dishonest?
Unless there is awareness of what thought is doing and what psychological content dictates its activity, there can be “no end to the mess we [people like you, Paul] make of things upon this earth.”
Therefore we come back to the original question of whether or not we are facing all these questions with a truly global brain. Then from the beginning we are solving these twin issues of agency and authority. Because either we are operating globally, thinking together globally without any sense of divisive, personal self, or there is only the question, which is really the same state of being. When one puts a question like, ‘What is thought?’ and when there is no other question at all being asked or considered then the intensity of the question must inevitably bring about an equally intense response, not just another line of words or a weak description of the problem. We very rarely remain with just one question, but when one does then an answer must come.
One can see the knee-jerk reaction very clearly in other people. Can one see it in oneself though? If one cannot see it in oneself then any talk of choiceless awareness remains - to use a word you are very familiar with - a matter of dissembly.
One can see it when one is more interested in what is actually happening than in what one wants to happen.
Yes, that’s right. So what is actually happening now? In this exchange with one another, what is actually happening? Are we aware of one another or are there only knee-jerk reactions?