It's quite easy in most cases to determine the substance of an emergent layer of reality. For example, the substance of a cell is the molecule. — punos

Yes, I understand; but you are DaVinci having convinced me regarding the face of Mona Lisa. Still, I cannot access the real her by your art; you can paint the substance of her face, and give me even the best I can possibly get in our world of painting pictures of reality. But only seeing Mona Lisa's naked face with my naked eyes will have given me any access go her face which is real. Pardon the presentation by analogy; on the other hand, the argument is that, in some sense, all of our knowledge is by 'analogy.'

As far as scientific or philosophical explanations of a cell or the universe go, I have no disagreement with what you say. Philosophically, maybe an intelligence can 'understand' the universe; as long as if by 'understand' we mean paint a perfect picture. In understanding, a picture is inevitably as far as we can get.

place your bet. — punos

I bet that everything you said, I can easily agree with, but constructed, or constructed then deconstructed then reconstructed, you and I are not getting at the substance of the universe, just playing with ideas about it; if one is skillful, the ideas function and we believe them to be reality; but they were structured by ideas, and remain ideas.

in principle, the whole of the universe can be understood to an almost god-like degree. Mankind, now in its present stage of evolution, is not yet capable of this feat. — punos

Have you considered that all of understanding is actually constructing, and that there is no end to make-beleve? I'm not denying the functional success, what we'd point to as accuracy, even empirical certainty in some of our more daring constructions. But at the end of the day there is no understanding the universe. We are only constructing a [model of the] universe.

Though not inspired by him, I think I'm Blake was on to something, in spite of whatever might have been his intentions. The only way to access infinity is all at once, as if by holding it in the palm of your hands. You cannot do that by the slow and arduous process of building a comprehensive understanding. You can only do that by being that organic particular of the whole universe, like each cell carries the genome.

or would it go after its own interest — Carlo Roosen

I respectfully submit that without organic feelings or some other unimaginable authentic reward system, it will not evolve its own interests, but will always carry out its presumably programmed function. The risk I think is less in AI pursuing self interest (the self even over rated in humans, a whole other topic) than flawed programming or unchecked evolution (both of which bring us book to square one, which is that AI might be ineludibly always and only an extension of Mind, a cultural artifacts, and never a real Other.

my idea is to let computers develop their own "language" or "representation code". — Carlo Roosen

I agree that doing so is the only way for the 'end product' to stand any chance of being anything but an extension of human Mind.

will not having this animal brain make an AI naturally friendly or not? — Carlo Roosen

Unless 'we' / 'it' evolves a 'way' to feel; tge way we do organically; it will not be authentically friendly. It will only act in ways which function best for purpose. Friendliness may be conditioned for, say, an AI functioning as a house mate, but it would lack the organic bond humans presumably feel

What is innocence, and why is it very important to society and law? — Shawn

I would say the word is being doubly applied, albeit the differences are arguably subtle.

Legal innocence, even irrespective of poetic arguments to tge contrary, just means one is not guilty, in the same sense as tge verdict. That is, innocence means entitled to due process before a verdict can be concluded.

A Child's Innocence (the legal implications are incidental. There are implications across the spectrum of 'knowledge'), in my opinion, is intuitive by many adults because it 'uncovers' a truth (maybe the truth). A child is innocent because they remain closer to the organic truth of a human animal. There haven't been enough Signifiers, and their associated structures, laws and dynamics, to fully displace organic sensation, mood and imagination, with perception, emotions, and make-believe. Thus the child is the real deal in our pursuit of truth and being.

To tie that in with the legal innocence of a child as victim, not accused; the fact that a child is a real human animal who is in the ineluctable process of being 'tainted' with make-belief is 'bad' enough (vis a vis our longing for truth and reality; for our survival, we have derived many benefits from our constructions and projections, hence human Mind is perpetuated); but to add insult to injury by inputting the worst of our worst in make-believe; a violent, selfish, oppressive set of Signifiers, we see that as a gross violation of their natural 'innocence ' I.e., of their, our true natures.

While we're at it, I am not a soul, and I am not my brain. I am a whole, conscious, physical unit. — Kurt Keefner

It's complex, but I'll be as simple as I can.
I agree, except that, if the soul part--call it, also, the 'mental'--is not real, but only perceived (for several reasons) to be real; if the mental is 'actually' a system of codes to which the body responds with feelings and action (and only the latter is real, albeit not in a form we are familiar with, i.e., not narrative, and so, necessarilyoverlookedby the narrative); if the narrative form of that code, the part to which we desperately attach, is not real, then it can be acknowledged as 'other' than the body, to exist, and still, it can be eliminated from that category we think of as 'real.'

It is in that sense that I agree with and understand MP's Hypothesis. In fact, I think his side notes on the mental unwittingly cling to what his Hypothesis rightly resists. I mean he doesn't go far enough in dismissing the mental as, though effective, ultimately nothing.

We are not dealing with a doubtful situation in which one path is smooth and another one is rugged. — MoK

Fair enough. Will re-think. I appreciated your thoughts.

We don't know how doubt emerges from biochemical processes in the brain. We also don't know about the emergence of thought, qualia, and intentionality. — MoK

Maybe because of our approach.

All of these items you listed are mechanisms in an autonomously moving deterministic process which is transmitted by socialization generationally.

As you suggest, at the level of reality whatever the heck doubt is, is not what we're assessing here. A prehistoric human, like other animals lacked this 'artificial' autonomous process. When it faced a divergence in a path, it either used its senses and responded in accordance with its conditioning to follow the 'right' path, or it just moved forward indifferently. It did not have the pronoun to attach either congratulations for a right choice nor doubt with respect thereto.

We are assessing a thing we have over eons constructed and reconstructed, and transmitted from generation to generation, such that whatever real doubt is, has been displaced by it. The 'doubt' we are assessing is not that biochemistry, but the deterministic movement of images constructed and projected into this world of moving images--not world of natural conditioning where the chemistry is at play. And I realize they function together on a feedback loop, but we're really talking about the surface, the world of images, where d-o-u-b-t abides, with all of its triggering powers. I'm confident we're not going to find
d-o-u-b-t in any chemicals.

I'm saying (oversimplified for space and time) those images move deterministically. For humans born into history, confronted by a divergence in a path, if one path appears rugged and dangerous, the other smooth, and these are the only factors, reason, moving images of a specific variety, autonomously gets to work, and the easy path is selected. If a given person happens to defy reason, they did not. Their 'reason,' just as autonomously applied as conventional reason, the rugged so-called choice was triggered by moving images of xyz autonomously moving them to take the rugged path. Finally if one cannot choose, and 'reads' into experience, moving images called doubt, that too, is pushed upon the body at that moment, e.g., a balance of xyz's or conflicting structures, just as autonomously playing on the next step/no step as reason or defiance did.

In none of those cases is an agent 'choosing.' Its just stimulus and conditioned response. But built into the deterministic movements, is, because of the attachment of the image(s) to the pronoun, the Subject, giving the illusion of an agent/choice in what's really a deterministic process. So that in neither prehistory nor history is it valid for an animal to congratulate themselves for a choice or to curse bad choices or indecisions. It is all stimulus and (conditioned) response. It's just for human animals there is an illusion of a chooser and choice.

How could your decision be based on history when you have doubt? — MoK

How then does doubt emerge, if not by the push of history? Is doubt arising, out of the blue?

The decision is called free when you don't have a reason to choose one option over another. Therefore, there cannot be any preceding cause for a free decision. — MoK

Apologies, I may be looking at a different page altogether. My final input. But if there is no reason, free decision, ok, lets say I agree on the face of it. But where there is reason, you agree we are compelled by reason? But what if you "choose" to go against reason, why is it we accept reason triggered your choice, but going against reason was free? Something triggered that foolish choice. And if there is uncertainty, no reason, then though the triggers are less patent, there are triggers there too. You go through a balancing, and choose, having been triggered by something already input into your history, and used to trigger a choice. It's not PRE-determined; but the choice was the temporary settlement in an incessantly moving deterministic system where history reconstructs itself in the most functional way to meet new "circumstances". Should I stay or should I go? The choice is determined by history. There is no self soul or will in the process.

decision is either based on a reason or not, — MoK

Another way to express what I'm angling toward, is that "reason" is defined to restrictively above (or, I assume). A decision is always based on a preceding trigger, whether such a trigger can be defined as a "reason" or not. Nothing happens absolutely independently. Even the most randomly seeming "choice" can be traced back to its triggers, right up to the immediately pre ending domino that pushed the domino with choice printed on it.

My questions are posed as exploratory, not argumentative. In case they seem otherwise.

What do you mean by self? Soul? — MoK

I'm not convinced there is a real self nor soul, if by those, we mean a separate entity with a will.
So...:

Mind is an indeterministic entity. It receives input from the brain. — MoK

If the brain is deterministic (I believe you are suggesting so) and it feeds the indeterministic mind, where, if anywhere, does will fit in? Which one of these is confronted with the duality of belief v doubt? And how does that entity settle upon either? If the mind is indeterministic, and, accordingly, the entity of "choice" (presumably willful choice), there are still presumably a series of causes (including the so called input from the brain) prior to that final "moment" where, what? suddenly there is a gap in causes, and mind leaps, on its own, independently of any last cause, thus choosing willfully (even, perhaps, freely) to either believe or doubt? What mechanism does/causes that (free) choice?

I personally have difficulty jumping into this idea of a self soul will to explain that gap. It makes more sense for me to believe (I recognize the seeming internal challenge of "I believe") that the final step too, belief/doubt is also "deterministic." Not pre-determined; not inevitable, but still, the final "choice," believe/doubt was triggered by that immediately preceding it; not by an agent willing it.

We don't choose to doubt. We face doubt. — MoK

Agreed. We don't choose doubt, nor do we choose belief. We are cornered by the factors at play into settlement with respect to each. Deterministic, in both instances.

ENOAH
Matter including the brain as I discussed is deterministic entity so it cannot freely decide when we have doubt. — MoK

Agreed again.

The mind is conscious. It is not unconscious. — MoK

Right again.

an entity with ability to freely decide — MoK

And, by that do you mean, the so called self? Or is Mind a [deterministic] entity which decides autonomously, without input from a central authority or agent?

Isn't the subconscious process deterministic? Doubts are not allowed in a deterministic system — MoK

Can't doubt be a mechanism developed into, and operating within, a deterministic system; the "sense" that there is an agent doubting being, not a challenge posed by doubt so much as by the illusion of the agent "choosing" to doubt (the so called self/subject/ego)? Further, isn't it bad enough we superimpose a false duality by speaking of mind as a separate being from matter? Do we really need to make mind itself consist of dualities--conscious/unconscious? Isn't the entire process we conventionally think of as mind, deterministic: choice, belief, and doubt? If the chain of signifiers constructed by mind align one way, functionally, belief is triggered and the body responds accordingly; if another way, from dysfunctionally to just not functionally enough, doubt is triggered and the body responds accordingly.

conceptually, why would people think that our mind happens to have the right tools to understand the universe? — Skalidris

I agree. All we do with our so called scientific knowledge is fit bits and pieces of the universe into a format of "our" (actually, its) own construction. We prize empericism, but it pretends to conclude truths for Mind when they are confirmed by nature; when really, they are constructing so called truths about nature and accepting the ones that fit within the structures of mind. It's one thing to say water is made up of hydrogen and oxygen atoms, but what does nature think about atoms, let alone hydrogen? We have no way of knowing because both thinking and knowing are things within the limitations of mind, and nature is way out of its league. So I agree. Not only what you said, but it's almost "embarrassing" that we think we're actually discovering as opposed to making and believing. Hopefully no one else is watching.

But I do think all of that shouldn't diminish science. That we can make nature fit within our structures and serve functions is not embarrassing. We should just admire science for what it is.

the tools we can create with it — Skalidris

Are they not just an extension of mind, and therefore, within its limitations? If the AI communicates in anything other than a human language, then I think, we can start talking beyond the limitations of human mind.

And I don't mean invents a new mathematics or a new language with its own alphabet and grammar. We too can do that. It's within the limits of human mind.

They were like the discomfort of very cold weather: one shivered. — BC

Not to be a stickler, but shivering in the cold: if there is a God, It might stand responsible for that, and for the cold. But if I imagined the cold to be anything beyond the temperature and a potentially painful experience; if I imagined it to be, for example, a curse, or a sign, then I'm to "blame" for that.

I think it's like a preschooler asking if her parents also hate the monster in her closet tormententing her. For some it goes further; asking why her supposedly loving parents allow monsters to occupy her closet

If that's the result in logic, I accept. Now how to answer the residual unresolved question? How then is [only so called for a point of mutual focus] God to be conceived of, absolutely? I.e., where we are not left with any risk of elimination by a simple sweep of logic.

No offense but how can "theism be true? As in ultimately/absolutely, independently of humans. We made it up. I like your definition, I agree with the point you're making, Im just also taking a step back and saying, we can't grasp its truth by thinking about it. I'm not in a position to doubt whatever it is that is [more] real than us. So I don't. If that's just agnostic, so be it. But I'm also saying I'm not in a position to grasp its reality with my little language box. In my readings etc. that there is such a Truth not accessible to us through our minds seems inevitably to come up. I see the inescapable paradox. I think we all do but we yammer on; its what we are. Anyway, that's what draws me (and presumably many) to whatever it is that is [more] real than us. But I recognize that I can't access that with my mind. My mind inevitably makes stuff up (like theism); albeit functional and valuable in our own world. They necessarily can't surpass the gap from their constructedness to whatever that reality is.

That's why I initially said, and still think, you cannot access "God" by any method of proof.

No. I don't think it's possible to affirm anything outside of the minds affirming. Does that mean there is no other access to "X"? In other words is "X" only real if a human mind can affirm it? Or, if "X" is real, must it only be accessible as real to the human mind? I hypothesize that the "flaw" in proving God is not necessarily to be focused on God, but rather on the proving, and the idea that our flaws in proving "X" somehow seal the fate of "X".

Some of us affirm the "god exists" in the heads of it's believers and nowhere else. — 180 Proof

There is nowhere else to "affirm". Where outside of the heads of its believers is anything affirmed?

If included in the definition of God is a thing transcending the mundane; and if proof is a thing of the mundane, then you're not going to reach any certainty regarding God by proving it.

they believe that visual perception has nothing to do with them." Extend this lack of ownership via lack of qualia to all qualia and the self itself disappears. — Luke

Visual sensation always and already has nothing to do with the self. It's when sensation gets immediately translated/assimilated to perception (to simplify: sensation mediated by language) that the Subject steps in and the visual sensation becomes a linear, more or less narrative experience. No longer seeing [the nameless thing presently]. Now I am seeing an apple. This translation of sensation into a linear event, an always becoming, necessarily unified by a Subject in order to conform to the logic of its dynamic, gives rise to the illusion that "I see apple" and "You see apple" are irreconcilable alienated. But really both of us are human organisms sensing the same thing with the visual sense organ etc. There is no qualitative difference until the particular embodied mind constructs a Fictional one.

. I think when you get to that rarified "space" of a phenomenologically reduced world and thought is free of the clutter or habituated assumptions, THERE you discover the transcendental self. — Constance

The strange thing I have found myself saying, here again, I totally agree. I'm just saying, as it appears from this last post is at least vaguely in line with what others have said that that so called transcendental self is not the I conventional brought to mind as ourself; it is utterly not that I. It is necessarily "transcendent" as in utterly other. And unless we want to adopt a tri-ism, that utterly other can't be the spirit, must be the conscious body

For example, Does the Bible have any prima facie authority at all on matters of philosophy? — Constance

No. It has no authority. It was brought up as an historical document to illustrate the human intuition regarding the conflict between Mind(knowing) and Body(being).

I say a "disembodied" pain is impossible, — Constance

I agree. Pain requires nerves. That organism with nerves is the agent of the pain. But the suffering we construct to displace pain, is all in the constructing and projecting of the Mind without agency.

A thing which suffers? Nobody argues this — Constance

That may be.

At any rate, if you think about the self, human dasein, as a thing, you are deep in scientific reductive territory. — Constance

I do not. I think about the self and human so called dasein (I'm not sure why that concept is treated as a given) as NO THING

Love your enemy. — BitconnectCarlos

Yes, but if only [that one stuck around]

For me, and I am likely in the minority, the historical facts are not necessary to appreciate/even if one wishes, to adhere to the message.

If Jefferson et. al. were mythological, and if I were an American, I might still appreciate and live by the Constitution.

If Socrates and Kant were mythological, I might still appreciate and live by the philosophies contained therein.

Why can't I appreciate and adhere to Christian principles and deny its history. Who says that you have two choices, believe and belong, or reject and stay clear?

First, I understand your position, and there are approaches to religion where I would agree with you. Outside of what each of us thinks of as "essence" of religion, I likely have no dispute with any claim that religions per se and in practice are rarely liberating from suffering, if ever.

Second, and this is most important, I reiterate that my expressions are entirely hypothetical, and would likely fail even the test of logic. (especially falsifiability).

Then why?

Fair question. My responses below may address that.

This story (myth) is not "salvation" because, in fact, one's "suffering" (i.e. frustrations, fears, pains, losses, traumas, dysfunctions) ceases only with one's death. — 180 Proof

Yes. We can't escape the enumerated examples of suffering until death. Salvation is a term borrowed from "religion" and is of course misleading. My admittedly overzealous assertion for what it's worth is that religion--loosely, focus on/concern with the transcendent (I can easily adjust that "definition")--as opposed to religions and their various failed manifestations; can provide "the right attitude" (though "right" implies orthodoxy and that's not what I mean) to bear the suffering, by "enlightening" us to the transient nature of that thing which is most desperate to escape it. That is, by pointing to an ultimate reality beyond the suffering.

Yes. I already see the ways in which you can properly dispute this. However, 1. Space and time; 2. The very nature of what I'm suggesting has its proper place in doing something and necessarily not in discourse.

Besides, most historical religions preach that every person has an 'eternal soul' – imo, there isn't any notion that's more of an ego-fetish than this. — 180 Proof

I completely agree with you. That is where both religion, and, with respect, much philosophy, east and west, has gone astray. That is the exact point. Fetishization of the Subject, causes our awareness to focus on that illusion as a thing which suffers and ought not to. I'm wondering whether (like so many things which history corrupts) the essence of religion (to remind/warn against etc. this fetishizing of the ego) has been "lost."

In any event, I'm clearly having difficulty expressing that clearly. I'm not fixated on an idea which I alter to meet with criticism. Believe me that I get your criticism, but am only responding because it appears the point I am trying to make is misunderstood.

Yes, religions are not successful at dealing with suffering; but not because there is utterly no valid function. Rather, because the valid function--to de-fetishize and de-mythologize the ego--has been lost.

I am not prepared to do an exegesis of scriptures, or to review theologians here. But if it helps (and at the obvious risk of further confusing) here are a couple of the sources for my intuition/perhaps bold hypothesis that religion is essentially "designed" to put the ego in its place: Christianity's essence "love your neighbor as yourself, love God with all your might." Islam is by name, submission (to god). In the eastern religions, Hinduism /Buddhism, this emphasis on "liberation" from ego is even patently obvious. Atman is Brahman/ there is no self. Yes, all of the aforementioned have bastardized this proposed essence.

Any way, for what that was worth. Maybe I'm completely out to lunch. But I haven't been persuaded otherwise. Like I said, not from any aversion to being so persuaded.

Still a bit mystified by "organic," though. — Constance

I imagine not just the Abrahamic, but Western philosophy too, had always entertained an intuition about this--that what happens in Human Consciousness, is not Real. Although, Mind itself having evolved "an interest" in its own survival and
growth, developed mechanisms which block the obvious, that Reality is the living organism, and out of this, emerges the attachment western philosophy cannot shake, the reification of itself, presented to us as Spirit, and its necessary dualism. The intuition is expressed earlier than Plato, but with him the attachment to mind, and corresponding demeaning of the flesh, begins to structure the future. Kant I think knew it, that reality was a thing not knowable by mind, but actually inaccessible to it. But he understandably did the ethical thing and steered clear. Focusing instead on the best way he could present Mind as Constructed, experience as just projections of that, for his time, and given his locus in time. Then the thing unfolds. It is not Scientistism, nor Empiricism, nor physicalism, which prompts me to view reality as organic. It is, I genuinely, ironically, believe. The comical is I shouldn't even attempt to prove it. Proving it is not it. But so called we, actually are. But alas, lije everyone else, I am no less attached to the reified Mind. That makes me necessarily speak.

Mind being make-believe (construct-project), by the way, is not good or bad, mind is both. That's just how it evolved after trial and error, most efficiently. In order to perpetuate construction and projection, it evolved difference, causing a reason for construction and projection, time, narrative or linear form of experience, cause and effect, logic, grammar, subject, me. This is a significant thing for metaphysics to go on dreaming about forever. Why does it have to be real?

Still a bit mystified by "organic," though. — Constance

To try simply, borrowing (not necessarily endorsing) an Abrahamic metaphor, so called "God" cares only about the living(ness) of "his" "creation" i.e., organic; and not the becoming, knowledge, that "he" actually warned humans against. Out of the latter, we invented a universe of our own, unreal, and not "precious" to "God." Now, yes, I am being "poetic" and do not necessarily hold to "God," and "precious." My point is, we have been clinging to knowledge at the direct expense of living. Living is not in our constructions, but in our being. The whole false spirit/body duality, is a direct result of that clinging.

The question is, is it possible for an idea or an experience or a disclosure of any kind to be both what it is, yet occurring to "no one" ? Not about occurring in some locality, which is trivially true (Locality?), but experience of any kind requires it to be an experience to, or of someone. There is no such thing as an unmoored experience. — Constance

Is this the "tree falls in a forest" conundrum? I say it makes a sound. To humans only, the question matters, because of the illusion of separation between sound and perceiver/object and subject/cause and effect. EDIT: experience, by the way, I hold to be restricted to humans. So that is why "there is no such thing as an unmoored experience;" there is no real such thing as "experience" period.

Consider also: A babe in arms has no constructed agency, no historical self, neither personal nor cultural, yet her suffering and delight must have agency — Constance

Perfect illustration, the babe has no self based experience; no agency. Not mother feeds me; rather, just feeding.

No reason for me to disagree. Why not religions are tribal because kinship is tribal, and kinship is a driving force or fundamental element in religions.

I could stop there and feel the pleasure of our bond.. .

But the essence. .

Anyway, like I said, I appreciate and note the importance of your perspective (that sounds like lip service but I mean it. Ultimately, how could I know?)

is kinship not an ego less drive? I get that quickly egos rush in; buy at its "essence."

First, I assume you are labeling the hypothesis as a duality real land phony water for convenience. You are following well enough to know that such a label does not really define it, but let's carry on.
I want to "cooperate" and agree that I would feel such a kinship, but I truly do not know. Likely because kinship, though functional at the institutional level of religions is irrelevant to my understanding of the essence.
I agree with you that binding/community is a manifestation of religions as they developed, but not necessarily its essence.
Also, I think you'll agree that etymology, the latin root, though helpful, is not a conclusive way of understanding the essence.
I would feel something positive from agreement from others, but I am not sure if kinship is the root of that feeling. Maybe it is, bonding being a real organic drive for humans.
But then, so can the same be said of politics, philosophy, sports, etc etc etc. we seek agreement because of the pleasant feeling triggered by our drive to bond with others of our species.
Look, I reiterate, maybe you are right and bonding is the essence of religion, but in the sense that bonding is also the essence of law, society, the family etc etc.
You are definitely raising some very helpful points (for me to consider). I hope you are benefiting, as much as I am.

ou feel like kinship with those who see the world as you do, don’t you — praxis

No, but likely because I do not belong to any community of such believers. I suppose, if you told me you understood and agreed with my (let's be clear:) hypothesis, I might feel something akin to kinship. I'm not sure.

you admit that your adulation of egolessness is like a fetish — praxis

Well, words are never successful at precisely capturing truth. "adulation" not sure, observation (insofar as observation can even be relied upon) of the reality of egolessness, ...like a fetish? Hmm, that's tricky, and helpful to point out again (I have admited this "problem" several times in my efforts to gain a better understanding). Ego is like a fetish, in that we ascribe a truth to it that is not real (in nature). So, yes, so too my "adulation" of egolessness. And your "hidden" point is significant. Ultimately, everything I say or do regarding this topic is a "fetish" in the sense that I am ascribing a truth to a constructed fiction. But, just as in the case of sex (I cannot imagine mating in the way I described), I am bound to participate in the fetishized version.

That is why I have been suggesting that I cannot know egolessness; I cannot define it; doing so requires the ego. I need not do anything to be the real organic being that I am without "I". Because I already am that being. I am simply pointing to that truth; and, I think religion, at its essence, also points to that truth.

I am flowing on a synthetic river, seeing the real land on both sides of me. I am not saying I can get off the river. I just think it is functional knowing that. Religion(s) does not resolve the problem, it simply reminds us of the problem. Out of that "knowledge" we can flow more functionally. (Sorry for the metaphor. I hope it captures the gist.

in fairness, I do not speak for Constance. In fact, I do not think he agrees with me that the Subject/Ego is--to stick to your term--also a "fetish."

I wouldn't say corrupt with any connotation that word delivers; nor would I say inherently. I'd say (without enough attention paid to wording) we are a species divided between our natures and our constructions, Mind; and that the latter has displaced the former, a thing neither "good" nor "bad" but having aspects of both. To re-use the sex analogy, love making, good; rape, bad. Both are unnatural expressions of the mating/bonding drive.

As for religion is fetishism--the way we have discussed it most recently, sure. Even the essence is a "fetish" constructed, like love making, to address a real drive.

note that we cannot escape sex as a fetish while being human; just as we cannot escape the ego. I am suggesting, only that we recognize them and carry on F----ing, so to speak.