Again, it isn’t clear to me what you are saying Douglas. You quoted two sentences of mine, but didn’t really say much about them, or even if you agreed with them or not.
I am seeking some clarity in where we may be misunderstanding each other, that’s all.
Language, we might say, is a symbol system in which a single word stands in for something it’s supposed to communicate. We could call any word or series of words a ‘model’ of reality if you like.
So what is being asked here is whether
we can each be clear about the words we are using, and
what is the relationship between a word/sentence/model and the actual fact, the reality or world-issue to which the word points?
Obviously the word is not the thing. We can agree to this. But can we explore this question a little bit: what is the relationship between a word/sentence/model and the actual fact, the reality or world-issue to which the word points?
I’m gonna psychoanalyse us a bit here (sorry - and most probably wrongly) but I reckon we might also be responding to the memory of past conflict and emotion - we want closure for our recent debates.
Can I suggest we just try and do our best going forward? I’ll try my best to be as honest and clear as possible - but of course we cannot be sure that we will obtain satisfaction (crazy humans that we are).
Sorry… mind gone blank… maybe if I can sit with this question a bit?
I don’t think that’s what James had in mind when he used this metaphor. If I’m not mistaken, grasping (not interpreting) what Krishnamurti was saying, is “getting” it intellectually, but not actually, which is when the rubber (the teaching) meets the road (brain transformation).
We are “confronting models/images” mostly when others use them, but when we use our models and images, are we aware of it at all? If we are, we can’t take ourselves seriously enough to be defensive or assertive, and we are sensible enough to know we know little, if anything.
Please don’t. This takes us off track. We are trying to understand what we mean by ‘models’, and we seem to have reached a point where we are saying that ‘models’ really mean words or symbols that stand in for the thing they are supposed to be words or symbols about.
So we are now asking,
On the one hand the word or symbol is not the thing. I presume we can agree on that? It is a very basic thing, but it is important not to go off track right from the get-go. So I am assuming we agree that the word ‘door’ is not the actual door in front of me.
We have agreed - as members of society I mean, as speakers of the English language - that the word ‘door’ means that thing through which I can go into another room, etc. So when we use the word ‘door’ in a communication we can be in agreement about its meaning. Alright so far?
In practical matters language doesn’t present too many problems, so long as we are using words in the same is way, and use our common sense. But when we are communicating about something that is not so straightforward, such as perception, or even perception without mental images, we need to slow down and be clear about what we mean by these words.
Do you see what I’m saying?
Doors and chairs are very easy to point to through words. Either the communication is right or wrong: the door leads to the bathroom or it doesn’t. The chair is by the table or it isn’t.
But when we use a word like perception or awareness or mental image, it may not be so clear what we are talking about. And it seems that it is here we get confused.
Yes when we are actually acting in the world, are we free of the roles we are playing, or not - or are we completely taken up by our roles?
Can we have a discussion about our ideas, whilst at the same time being clear as to what is playing out?
James may be saying in this thread (as an aside to me) that considering the melodrama whilst considering the arguments is a barrier to clarity.
You want us to use the word “see” or “look” instead of the word “perceive”?
I’m willing to go along with this - though I’m wondering what your plan is, if any - and do we just ignore for now that these words can have different meanings (eg. “see” can mean perceive the image with eyes or understand)?
Now, can we us the word ‘image’ - by which I mean ‘mental image’, something we have ‘imagined’ with our thinking (by which I mean our psychological thinking, as opposed to the brain’s perceptual cognition - a distinction we have explained above)?
Isn’t “useful concept” the problem? Perception is either direct or distorted by useful concepts employed by the psychologically conditioned brain to maintain its illusions.
We have agreed on the word seeing to mean see or look with the eye , as when we look at a tree or a flower .
We can put a pin in that to come back to it later.
Now we are exploring a perhaps “trickier” word: ‘image’.
Image can mean many things. Sometimes it helps (though not always) to look at etymologies.
The word ‘image’ comes from a root meaning ‘to copy’, ‘to imitate’.
So an image of a rose is a copy of a rose - either through a painting, a photograph, or some other visual representation of the flower we call a rose .
in front of me.
are very easy to point to through words. Either the communication is right or wrong: the door 
, ‘Look at the tree’ 
, ‘See the cloud’ 
- ?
let me read that again.
, as when we look at a tree 
is a copy of a rose - either through a painting, a photograph, or some other visual representation of the flower we call a rose