Should I / should we speak for others here? For ‘all of humanity?’
I have direct experience of what I think-feel. (Assuming I’m not just making things up or deluding myself.) If I speak from a first-person “I” point of view, there is a fair degree of certainty that I know of what I speak.
I have, at best, indirect experience of what others think-feel. (This might be different if I were an empath or psychotherapist.) So if I speak from a “we” pov, I’m speculating, taking my best guess. It often feels presumptuous to me.
Otoh, speaking as “I” narrows the focus to/towards just me, whereas “we” is more inclusive, widens the spotlight and encourages a sense of connection.
Hello Nobody. Encouraging a sense of connection seems important to me. However, I think the crucial thing is not to create separation and division when we post here if that’s at all possible. I always liked the fact that K was so inclusive - encouraging a spirit of talking, listening and exploring together. He never came across as"I know but you don’t know", which, for me at least, is so destructive to communication. How do you see this?
Yes, and that’s where it gets tricky. To speak as “I” tends to separate: “I think this” implies (perhaps quite subtly) “But you don’t.” Whether the implication is intentional or not, it still comes through. But to say “We think this” seems to assume we all think alike, which is imo a misassumption.
When I use “we” it’s because I think it is something common or not limited to my person. If I’d assume my experience or view is exclusive it would make no sense to me to talk about it.
Why not? You might talk about something that feels exclusive to you, but that resonates with me, helps me understand you or myself better. It is often the most ‘personal’ messages that invite me to open up.
We wouldn’t have a chance to understand each other if our experience were really exclusive I guess.
What hinders me to bring something up in public is to think that only I see it that way, only I feel that way.
Part of the joy of hearing personal experiences is that they may resonate, that they show us aspects we have overlooked till now (and to satisfy curiousity :-). To me that seems only possible cause our experiences are common to some degree, and not totally strange.
I might add that something we tell each other is a kind of summary and the way we express something that happened to us is already specificly formulated to our dialog partner. We might stress one part and neglect another one due to our relationship and the topic. So conveyed experience is already aiming for some common ground I’d assume. What do you think?
I, is the I we all have, maybe. There are other words, self, ego, id, me, you, he and she, soul, spirit, whatever. So it is used without prejudice to mean all I’s. Although then we might go on to be discussing the nature of I as it is known in thought is the division.
Yes, so there are different types/levels of “I.” On the one extreme is the individual I that points to my specific nobody-only experiences. On the other is the collective I that points to experiences I (assume I) share with other humans.
It might be enlightening to consider, when “I” comes up in your mind, which level it is pointing to.
Yes: “I” to mean all “I’s” or
“I” to point to an uniqueness
The use of “we” often causes objection and is reproached as allegation, and one is asked to speak for oneself.
But “we” on the other hand may point to the result of a shared inquiry, too.
Maybe it depends on how one understands “You are the world” .
“I” as it is known in thought is the division, and “I” to mean all other “I’s” to me means “you are the world”. “I” in it’s seperation is not different from “you” in form of “I”. So “we” in our thoughts are seperated from the world and the content of thought and put ourselves in an outside position as observers, while we are within.
Sorry, this seems rather clumsily formulated.
I guess there is a difference in using “I” and “we” in conversation conventionally or using it to express a view.
Conventionally speaking a generalization is unapt, maybe unpolite and the use of "we " is probably only okay if we really agree on something.
Each thing created has a life cycle. It attempts, fights to stay alive. It procreates and the cycle repeats. A recycling and a renewal of energy with new forms being created and other forms becoming extinct. There are no ‘individuals’ in that sense. Only arbitrary beginnings and endings in the ‘chain of life’.