As an original Trekkie myself, I can't argue with you there, Athena. LLAP (n o t MAGA :mask:) — 180 Proof

Hot damn, it is not often my path crosses someone who knows what I am talking about. I am curious. Does anything stand out to you about the difference, such as the captains' relationships with their crews and with headquarters?

Indeed.

Just for the record, the art of mass manipulation was brought to modern form by Edward Bernays (November 22, 1891 − March 9, 1995) considered a pioneer in the field of public relations and propaganda, and referred to in his obituary as "the father of public relations". (Born in Austria the year Sigmund Freud published one of his earliest papers, Bernays was Freud's nephew twice over. His mother was Freud's sister Anna, and his father, Ely Bernays, was the brother of Freud's wife Martha.)

Walter Lippman was Bernays' unacknowledged American mentor and Lippman's work The Phantom Public greatly influenced the ideas expressed in Propaganda a year later.
5 minutes ago — BC

Indeed just for the record, one story does not do justice to the whole story. Here is another one older than yours.

Niccolò Machiavelli was a political theorist from the Renaissance period. In his most notable work, The Prince, he writes, "It is better to be feared than to be loved, if one cannot be both." He argues that fear is a better motivator than love, which is why it is the more effective tool for leaders.Mar 23, 2021

To Be Loved or Feared: Which is Better? | Blog | 6 Group — Lily Nathan

That one is important to our understanding of our own evolution and so are the Nazis. The Nazis campaigned for a long time before elections. They went to villages and rented large rooms and questioned people about what made them the angriest, then someone would give a lecture about how their party would resolve the problems and make Germany great again. You know just like our present polls asking people about their political concerns and then writing speeches that please the people. Trump is the star of this show. He is so good at manipulating people he thinks he can get away with anything.

Trump: I could 'shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters'
https://www.cnn.com › 2016/01/23 › politics › donald-tr...
Jan 24, 2016 — Donald Trump boasted Saturday that support for his presidential campaign would not decline even if he shot someone in the middle of a ... — Jeremy Diamond

But he got charged with sexual abuse so maybe the tide will turn against him. For sure up to this point he has been as popular as Hitler was.

We evolved to get excited in critical situations. Stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline are released. Our blood pressure and heart rate increase. We start breathing faster. Even our blood flow changes. — praxis

That is all true, unless a person intentionally trains himself to remain calm and reasonable. Most of our perceived threats today are not life-threatening, and being hijacked by our instinctive fight-or-flight reaction is not a good thing. Flipping into the fight or flight mode is much more a Western characteristic than an Eastern characteristic. Asians tend to remain calm. The difference begins with different child-rearing styles and different cultural influences.

I can see why you would disagree with me, but why would you be insulted by that? — T Clark

Let's see. The story of George Washington cutting down his father's cherry tree is one of several myths intended to teach children the relationship between good morals and being a good citizen, but saying the Social Security Act and old textbooks stress the importance of human dignity, is not a myth. I don't know how we can maintain a discussion that mixes myth with facts without agreement about what is a myth and what is a fact.

If you knew the educated people of my grandmother's generation, I don't think we would have a disagreement. I don't know how many years of life experience you have but I doubt if they are as many years as I have experienced.

If you were to watch old TV shows you might notice cultural differences between the 1950's and the present. The original Star Trek TV shows contrasted with the Next Generation Star Trek TV shows is an excellent example of what the change in education did to our culture. Captain Kirk is the John Wayne of outer space and Picard is the "Group Think" generation.

The nature of reality ensures we can never be certain, and ironically that also means we can (almost) never be certain we are wrong. — Tzeentch

I love your thoughts! I have a very old book of logic that explains that is exactly why we should never be too sure of ourselves! That is why we should remain humble.

My concern is we have become as paranoid as Germany was. Meaning we are suffering from an excessive need to be superior and in control. We have worshipped technology as though it were a new God that can give us all the blesses the old God didn't give us. In the US today, who wants to be humble and who wants to say "I do not know"? Good honest people can not get jobs without appearing to be superior and in control. US Rep. Santos is on the hot seat today for embellishing his resume and buying the clothes he had to have to be competitive but such behavior has been a requirement for getting a job for many years. Some of us were taught not to brag about ourselves and that means not winning the competition with everyone who does what Santos did. We have to be superior and we have to be in favor of strong control, or we face some very difficult problems in the culture we have today.

how to best educate people in a way they develop critical (or better, 'autonomous'?) thinking skills is an interesting question. Perhaps intuitively one would look toward the education system to improve things, but perhaps the answer is simpler. — Tzeentch

I think the "higher order thinking skills" answeres your question.

What is higher order thinking?
Higher order thinking is thinking on a level that is higher than memorizing facts or telling something back to someone exactly the way it was told to you. When a person memorizes and gives back the information without having to think about it, we call that rote memory. That's because it's much like a robot; it does what it's programmed to do, but it doesn't think for itself.

Higher order thinking, or "HOT" for short, takes thinking to higher levels than restating the facts. HOT requires that we do something with the facts. We must understand them, infer from them, connect them to other facts and concepts, categorize them, manipulate them, put them together in new or novel ways, and apply them as we seek new solutions to new problems. Following are some ways to access higher order thinking. — Alice Thomas, Glenda Thorne

In some of my old textbooks, warn teachers not to pay too much attention to dates or names because their focus should be on a child's understanding of concepts. The name for this is the "Conceptual Method". We replaced that with the "Behaviorist Method" and the Behaviorist Method can be used for training dogs. IQ testing relies on a person's memory not exactly the ability to think things through or be creative.

Socrates simply asked questions - an intuition so natural to the human condition that a child never even needs to be taught to do so. Without any instruction they will question their parents until the parents run out of answers. — Tzeentch

And my love, that is essential to democracy and intellectual development. It is what separated Athens from the rest of the world. Socrates proved even an ignorant slave boy can reason through a difficult math question. Athenians argued human beings were created to think, as horses were made to run, and birds to fly. We can learn to be better human beings and we can learn the technologies Zeus feared we would learn, because it is the nature of man to reason. Okay, that is not the whole truth of man. We can also be highly emotional and stupid, but Confucious and Aristotle and others have a few things so say about living with our emotions, and everyone here knows of the Stoics.

That is a different line of thinking than believing a god intended for us to be like angels, but Eve ate the wrong fruit and ruined everything. I say this because I think Christianity is an enemy of education and democracy. Some Christians and some Muslims are okay with democracy but there is tension there. This all matters to the culture we have or by default the culture we do not have.

My response to this kind of argument is always the same - this mythical society focused on dignity you describe allowed and supported the enslavement and oppression of human beings. It was only after the events you describe ended that things changed in a significant way. Thomas Jefferson kept slaves. — T Clark

I love the saying that the guardians of truth are confusion and paradox.

Let us be clear on the meaning of paradox.

a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement or proposition that when investigated or explained may prove to be well founded or true.
"in a paradox, he has discovered that stepping back from his job has increased the rewards he gleans from it" — Oxford Languages

Jefferson proposed slavery end on a specific date, giving everyone the opportunity to adjust to the change. He had slaves because that was the reality of his day, but he dealt with slavery not being compatible with us all being equal and having the same human rights.

Here is the fact...

Throughout his life, Jefferson privately endorsed a plan of gradual emancipation, by which all people born into slavery after a certain date would be freed and sent beyond the borders of the United States when they reached adulthood.

“This Deplorable Entanglement” | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello — THOMAS JEFFERSON FOUNDATION®

I feel insulted by your wording "mythical society" and that does not advance a discussion of truth. My opening is about paradox and our failure to be our ideal human beings is paradoxical and has been a problem since the beginning of humanity. I think the East deals with this problem better than Christianity.
We are not born knowing as much as we need to know and even when we learn a really good concept of being a better human being, it takes a long time and a lot of effort before being better becomes a habit. In all places and at all times there will be both the good and the bad, however, that does not mean culture is not important.

We are fully supporting "the enslavement and oppression of human beings" today. Only today it is not exactly a human that is oppressing us, but technology. It is totally color-blind and cares nothing about individual differences but it reduces us to complete powerlessness. I look forward to your argument.

Well no, but I think those things will ensure social conflicts won't be solved by any other means than force, since communication is made impossible. And they're the tools which enable the elite to easily manipulate people. Via that route, what may start as a genuine social conflict is artifically inflamed and warped into something else - something which ultimately serves no one, except the ruling class, which will profit from never solving it. — Tzeentch

Excellent points!

For me, it is glaringly obvious that people have their opinions confused with facts and this is directly related to the change in education. This is really paradoxical because science benefits democracy, so everyone should learn the scientific method of thinking but in Texas the 2012 Republican agenda was to prevent training in the high order thinking skills, expressing concern that the training leads to children questioning their parents' authority. What went with that is Texas demanding science books teach creationism as equal to evolution, clearly demonstrating these Christians do not have a good understanding of the difference between science and mythology.

Let us be clear on the meaning of mythology.

Dictionary
Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more
my·thol·o·gy
noun
1.
a collection of myths, especially one belonging to a particular religious or cultural tradition.
"a book discussing Jewish and Christian mythologies"
Similar:
myth(s)
legend(s)
folklore
folk tales
folk stories
lore
tradition
stories
tales
mythos
2.
the study of myths.
"this field includes archaeology, comparative mythology, and folklore" — Oxford Languages

Around the world countries have a mythology that prepares people to be civilized and I know of no scientific reason to believe one religion is better than another, but the argument that we must study the Bible to be moral people is just wrong because there are so many sources for learning how to be better human beings.

Anyway, if we learn how to use logic and get in the habit of reasoning instead of just reacting, we can have a healthier society, a healthier democracy. And I must say Zeus was afraid with the technology of fire man would learn all the other technologies and then rival the gods. We are now technologically very smart but lost our wisdom.

Likewise, "our institutions are failing" because the macro structural imbalances, of which they are functions, are imploding as the ramifications of those imbalances accelerate. — 180 Proof

Absolutely!!! And this is made possible by adopting the German model of bureaucracy. Before Hoover and Roosevelt worked together to give us Big Government, the US government was relatively weak. I am hoping with increased awareness of the bureautic changes and the importance of culture we can decrease the problem.

A house doesn't collapse because of its occupants' "values" but mostly from a combination of shoddy construction, prolonged disrepair and entropy. — 180 Proof

I am not understanding your meaning. Are you saying it is not values that lead to shoddy construction, prolonged disrepair, and entropy? That does not make sense to me, so I feel confused.

We had different values because we educated for different values and manifested a culture that keeps democracy healthy. I remember the older people who all about honesty and human dignity. I think the great depression and world war, lead to unfortunate changes because of the difference between generations.

What strikes me is that all of the responses so far except Joshs show contempt for our fellow citizens. Certainly this is not a sign of reason. We're all in this together, for better or worse. As I see it, the main requirement for democracy is a sense of common purpose, not "critical thinking." — T Clark

When the Social Security Act was passed in the US, it was agreed people would qualify by age, rather than making it a charity given only to the poor because of concern for human dignity. At the time it was better to starve to death than ask for charity, contrasted with today's attitude about being deserving and expecting something for nothing. My older books including grade school books have much to say about human dignity, and we used public education to advance a culture that embraced independent thinking, respect, and human dignity.

The 1958 National Defense Education Act lead to no longer transmitting the culture that we defended in two world wars. We replaced education for independent thinking with "group think". We ended education for good moral judgment and left moral training to the church. We are now as paranoid as Germany was. That means we hold an excessive need to be superior and in control. Instead of defending our privacy and liberty, we have turned to technology that collects our personal information and in subtle ways controls our lives. Culturally we are what we defended our democracy against, and people are going crazy and have become quite violent and this justifies the advancement of a police state. So much for letting military minds make our education decisions.

Thomas Jefferson and his educated peers understood the importance of education for democracy. Today we do not have that understanding.

Both are already lost in many nations, along with the US. — Vera Mont

I agree. I think the change is driven by global competition for finite resources and world markets and that technology has made our governments too powerful. That includes the bureaucratic technology that shifted power from individuals to governments. I would feel better if the changes were well understood along with increased understanding of the importance of culture.

So arrogance, pride and brainwashing are the sources of social conflict? And the old-fashioned moral virtues are the solution? I would flip this around. Belief in the old fashioned moral virtues forces us into a way of interpreting social behavior in terms of such concepts as pride and brainwashing. If we discard moldy subject-based moralisms in favor of a more sophisticated account of human behavior based on reciprocal and joint interaction we can leave the personalized blame aside and focus on collective aims. — Joshs

Yes and no. :grin: The guardians of truth are confusion and paradox. How well we do here depends on how well we can deal with paradox.

par·a·dox
noun
a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement or proposition that when investigated or explained may prove to be well founded or true.
"in a paradox, he has discovered that stepping back from his job has increased the rewards he gleans from it" — Oxford languages

I don't know who you figure brainwashing is part of the virtues problem. And I wish everyone had a sense of honor and pride. Exactly why would that be wrong?

reciprocal and joint interaction Surely that is a matter of logos and why would you say it is modern and insult past wisdom? :worry: Where did you get your low opinion of our past and high opinion of our present?

The problem of our time is that the ruling elite have turned mass manipulation into an artform that would have made even Goebbels proud.

They know exactly what strings to pull to get people emotionally invested in their narratives, generally by feeding a sense of moral superiority. The narrative becomes an integral part of their self-image. The narrative has been tied to the ego and becomes as precious to its followers as if it were an arm or a leg.

Along those lines people are then easily divided, because criticism of the narrative becomes a criticism of the person themselves. Communication becomes impossible, because every debate is a battle between personas.

This is 'identity politics', and it essentially keeps us in a state of permanent intellectual warfare with our fellow man.


Education is pointless to combat this, because even the well-educated fall prey to pride. In fact, so-called intellectuals may be more susceptible to it.


Man has been utterly divided and conquered by the powers that be, and its his arrogance that stops him from admitting that.


Critical thought is what is needed, but can critical thought even be learned?


Perhaps virtue would be the place to start.

Humility, so as to always keep the possibility that one may be wrong, and the other may be right. A quintessential quality for critical thought, perhaps.

Charity and kindness, to extend the benefit of the doubt to other people. To assume they act in good faith. And to treat them well, even if they don't believe what you believe. — Tzeentch

Wow, that is a very elegant explanation of what has gone so wrong. Can we look closely at the cultural components, with an eye for how the culture can be changed to manifest a different reality?

Reading what you said, woke my mind to the evil of having a "personal God". :gasp: How could it have taken me so long to see this glaring truth? There as a time when people had patron gods and goddesses and that includes the Hebrews, who had a god that favored them. Jews and others have designed systems to regulate who is one of "us" and who is not, just as countries have rules for citizenship. I think a lot of harm comes from believing in a god who has favorites even it there is rule to say His name or create religious idols and icons.

Greeks came up with the concept of logos, reason, the controlling force of the universe that is one system of universal causes above everyone, and when they took control of Christianity by writing the first bible, we get Jesus is logos, and anyone can be a Christian. :rofl: Christians still argue who can be a Christian and who is not, but maybe that is another thread. However, how universal is the Christian god? A belief in logos is open to anyone and is a sound foundation or good moral judgment, that does not include having to believe unbelievable stories. We argue as the gods did until we have a consensus on the best reasoning unless you are a politician today and then everything is a power play for personal or political party gain, not an understanding of logos and how to get the best for all.

I think education for technology is strongly behind our arrogance. That education along with having a personal god, is a deadly mix! But no I do NOT agree with this

"Education is pointless to combat this, because even the well-educated fall prey to pride. In fact, so-called intellectuals may be more susceptible to it."

A very old logic textbook that I have explains why we should never be too sure of ourselves because we can never know enough to be absolutely sure of anything. We can teach humbleness. And a huge part of our present problem is a failure to teach children logic and good reasoning. Far too many people rely on what the Bible says instead of reasoning. Their thinking stops at believing the Bible is the authority and absolute truth of God's word and they can believe crazy things like a god made humans from mud and there are supernatural beings of good and evil. That thinking does not apply the scientific method.
If education returned to teaching logic as it was taught and preparation for independent thinking, instead of "group think" viewers would reject the emotionalism of our present media and political power struggles.
"Critical thought is what is needed, but can critical thought even be learned?" Yes!

"virtue would be the place to start." Yes! And if we all understood this no one would vote for a candidate with questionable morals. There was a time when we thought virtues were synonymous with strength.

For "king", I read "$$", but for the rest, I agree. Except that I don't believe there is time for an eventuality that relies on future education - which, in any case, is not currently achievable. — Vera Mont

Okay if you want to use the term "money" instead of "king", we can discuss the importance of morals to any economy. Being able to trust each other and our institutions such as car manufacturers and insurance companies and banks is vital to a good economy. Just look at how fear crashes our banks and our stock market. When we believe we can trust one another, we minimize fear and that is exactly for the economy.

Education for technology unfortunately is not education for good moral judgment and good citizenship. Church morality is patriarchal and relies on the Father's authority over the people as it was manifested in Rome, a very patriarchal, ancient civilization, that adopted Greek technology but not Greek culture.

True it takes time for Education to resolve our problems, but it is the only way to save our liberty and personal power. We must focus on education for good moral judgment and destroy the false notion that a secular government can not also be a highly moral government and that morality does not mean a Father above us taking care of us because we can not take care of ourselves. Secular morality can be a higher morality when a nation educates the young for good moral judgment. Whereas the morality of ancient times can not possibly give us good morality for today. Huge populations and aging populations and technology gives us a reality very different from ancient times.

Women, blacks, the seas, the forests, the soil, fossil fuel, fossil fertiliser. Looks like we have run out of things to exploit. There is one thing left, disaster.

https://tsd.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine.html

↪Athena You are not alone; but you are relatively alone here because philosophy is still male dominated. What you need is "feminism". A deal of folk think that to take women seriously means to treat them just like men. That has led, not to the valuing of child-care and caring in general, but to its industrialisation, so as to free women to become wage slaves. That this "liberation" has proven unsatisfactory is unsurprising.

I, nor I fear any here, can direct you competently to the wealth of material available, but assuredly, the analysis and deconstruction of Dick and Jane has already been done for you, Women's Studies is a thing, and Feminist Philosophy, though it lacks any representation here is quite well developed. You need to go talk to your peeresses first, and then come back and educate us neanderthals. — unenlightened

This morning I am freaking out about the failure of all our institutions and the failure of education to prepare us for a democracy that is rule by reason, not rule by authority over the people. That includes the harmful domination of men over women. As long as we rely on the church for moral education, we will continue the destruction of our democracy and continue to manifest wars and social problems.

Rather than turn to my peers who only know our Christian-dominated culture, I want to turn to the women who have cultures that respect and empower women and their difference from men. The tribes of the Iroquois nation might be more helpful to us. They have a culture that is better than the one that patriarchal religion gives us. We need to look to matriarchal cultures to know a better way.

I was ok with this up to your last sentence, which is a bridge too far for my rationale. — universeness

I know what I have experienced and once again I wish you would be more open-minded. I am not sure why I had those experiences so I like to talk about them and get other ideas.

That's not the point I am making. Earlier in your posts, you suggested (unless I misinterpreted your meaning) that you consider the creation of a cybernetic body which was as capable as the human body is, in functionality and sensation, was impossible. Was I incorrect in my interpretation of your posting regarding this point? — universeness

Now I am the one with a closed mind. Even if science could create something like a human body why would they? That is a bridge too far for my rationale.

. Venus has no living creatures but it is an active planet. Do you consider it to be alive? — universeness

I have not contemplated that and can not answer your question.

Here is a link that says it is alive.

For decades, researchers also thought the planet itself was dead, capped by a thick, stagnant lid of crust and unaltered by active rifts or volcanoes. But hints of volcanism have mounted recently, and now comes the best one yet: direct evidence for an eruption. Geologically, at least, Venus is alive.Mar 15, 2023

Active volcano on Venus shows it's a living planet - Science — Paul Voosen

I think it depends on how we understand what is living and what is not. Chardin said God is asleep in rocks and minerals, waking in plants and animals to know self in man.

Jose Arguelles uses different terms and this universal force may be life/God? I want to make it very clear, I don't understand things like a quasar and the sense fields.

The Mayan return, Harmonic Convergence, is the re-impregnation of the planetary field with the archetypal experiences of the planetary whole. This re-impregnation occurs through an internal precipitation, as long-suppressed psychic energy overflows it channels. And then, as we shall learn again, all the archetypes we need are hidden in the clouds, not just as poetry, but as actual reservoirs of resonant energy. This archetypal energy is the energy of galactic activation, streaming through us more unconsciously than consciously. Operating on harmonic frequencies, the galactic energy naturally seeks those structures resonant with it. Their structures correspond to bio-electric impulses connecting the sense-feilds to actual modes of behavior. The impulses are organized into the primary "geometric" structures that are experienced through the immediate environment, whether it be the environment of clouds seen by the naked eye or the eery pulsation of a "quasar" received through the assistance of a radio telescope. — Jose Arguelles

Anyway, there is a lot more to think about when we zero in on what is life. I do not consider my vacuum clear or computer to be living. I am not sure our lives end when our brain waves stop.

Does this not contradict your claim that a future AI system cannot have a body which is capable of the same or very similar, emotional sensation, to that of a current human body? — universeness

I don't think so. My vacuum cleaner and washing machine are very helpful and so is my computer, but they are machines, not organic, living and feeling bodies. True the users of the bureaucrats and the internet do their best to control me, but I am not giving up the fight.

We have already surrendered too much of our liberty to the media and bureaucracy. Hum, I am seeing the opposing forces of wanting connection and also wanting to defend my integrity which requires a cell wall to separate myself from the beast. I most surely do not want to succumb to the Borg!

https://www.google.com/search?q=you+Tube+the+Borg&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS926US926&oq=you+Tube+the+Borg&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i13i512j0i22i30l4j69i64.18730j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:8119c6e9,vid:WZEJ4OJTgg8

I also think that even if all his evidence is true then this could simply mean that humans and other species have another 'sense' system that we do not fully understand but this other sense system is still fully sourced in the brain. — universeness

I want to take all the evidence seriously and I would not say it is fully sourced in the brain. The feeling of being watched is in the body and the brain detects this sensation and tries to make sense of it. Usually, turn around and look at what is behind us when we have that feeling. Then we confirm whether someone is either looking at us or not. Personally, I have many telepathic experiences, including messages from those who have crossed over. It would be hard to convince me something we do not fully understand is happening.

I prefer the work of people like Sheldrake, which is also entertaining but also has some real science behind it. — universeness

That is a cultural bias starting with the materialistic Romans. Materialistic meaning believing all things are matter. The Greeks were not so materialistic. Not all of the Greeks believed in a spiritual reality such as Plato's forms, but Greeks had the language for the trinity of God, that the Romans did not have.
Language being a very important factor in what thoughts our culture accepts and which ones are taboo.

Our cultural bias prevented us from understanding Gia, the earth as one living organism. Capitalism still works against our awareness of Gia and the need to change our ways to prevent the destruction of our planet. Western culture also ignored Eastern medicine and we still remain unaware of this other understanding of how our bodies, minds, and spirit work. Here are demonstrations of qigong energy.





There are many more and I want to add the Mayan matrix contains the position of the acupuncture points. This is shown in Argüelle's book Mayan Factor.

"Argüelles' significant intellectual influences included Theosophy and the writings of Carl Jung and Mircea Eliade. Astrologer Dane Rudhyar was also one of Argüelles' most influential mentors." The words I underlined make me go :rofl: — universeness

Yes, that is our cultural bias but do you wish to be close-minded? I very much appreciate that information of influences. I was not aware of those connections. Thank you. It helps me understand what Arguelles in a new way.

Are you aware of this lecture by Rupert Sheldrake (released to YouTube 2 months ago,) regarding his theory of morphic resonance and morphic fields? It's 2.5 hours long but worth the watch. I knew about his work but I found this lecture on how an aspect of 'mind' might reach beyond the restriction of brain and body, quite interesting. — universeness

Seriously?! Have you read Jose' Arguelles's book "The Mayan Factor" It is all about the Mayan understanding of morphic resonance and our cosmic connection with the universe. Some of Jose' Arguelles's thoughts are too weird but if you want to talk about morphic resonance his book should be part of the discussion. Here is a way of seeing reality in a different way....

1. The Pulsation-Ray of Unity.
2. The Pulsation-Ray of Polarity.
3. The Pulsation-Ray of Rhythm.
4. The Pulsation-Ray of Measure.
5. The Pulsation-Ray of the Center.
6. The Pulsation-Ray of Organic balance.
7. The Pulsation-Ray of Mystic Power.
8. The Pulsation-Ray of Harmonic Resonance.
9. The Pulsation-Ray of Cycle Periodicity.
10. The Pulsation-Ray of Manifestation.
11. The Pulsation-Ray of Dissonant Structure.
12. The Pulsation-Ray of Complex Stability.
13. The Pulsation-Ray of Universal Movement.

Do you reject the idea of a merging of the human brain with a future cybernetic body (cyborgs) or a cloned body or some combination of tech/mecha and orga?
I dont understand why you think any process/sensation/feeling that you have ever experienced in your body an interpreted in your mind, CANNOT EVER be reproduced by scientific efforts. — universeness

Yes, I do not think merging the human brain with a future cybernetic body is a good idea. Our brains are limited and I think we need to understand the limits and stay within them. There are concerns about what could happen to our brains and also what could happen to AI.

"I, Robot" starring William Smith is about an attempted robot takeover. The original Star Trek TV series addressed the potential of people being under the control of a computer. A British show "Humans -made in our image out of our control" a show about robots having self-awareness as humans do. It offers many many things to think about. I so wish we could sit together and watch these shows and discuss them.

Also, how far can we go in a discussion of feelings? Exactly what is required to have a feeling? Why do we have feelings? Would we be better without feelings? Star Trek also addressed the question of the good of our feelings. Joseph Campbell said Star Trek is the best mythology for our time. The Greeks shared a mythology and there are many benefits to having a shared mythology. You and I have the problem of no shared mythology and it is hard to build a debate without a shared understanding of what we are talking about.

I am posting now so it is easy to find this thread when I return. Tomorrow I will join my sister's protest at the Oregon State capitol. She needs someone to watch her tent while she testifies and then goes off to help a homeless person. I will go with my warmest clothes and an excellent raincoat.

We have agreed to help people, but the resources are exhausted so people are not getting the help they are qualified to have. No, we are not intentionally killing them like the Nazis killed Jews, it is death by neglect, and a failure to deal with today's reality. The US is still mentally where it was in the pioneer days when we had more land than people. Exponential growth has radically changed all that.

I will be back to talk about reality and how the US is not dealing with it well.

Not current AI no. Do you reject the idea of a merging of the human brain with a future cybernetic body (cyborgs) or a cloned body or some combination of tech/mecha and orga?
I dont understand why you think any process/sensation/feeling that you have ever experienced in your body an interpreted in your mind, CANNOT EVER be reproduced by scientific efforts. — universeness

Yes, it is the same guy. I want to talk about that in the thread for that subject but not this thread.

I have a preference for life on this earth being organic. I was thrilled with the internet when it first came up but hate what has been done to it. Opening AI to everyone is like giving a teenager the keys to car and ignoring Saturday night is a party night and all may not go well. We have some serious problems and need to stop here for a while and contemplate what we are doing and where we want to go with this.

But I also have a spiritual concern as well. It goes with wanting to preserve the organic earth and valuing humans. I think valuing AI more than we value humans, and nature, can be a path into the darkness. I want to be very clear about this. I am concerned about how much we value humans.

Emulating the human brain processes that cause emotions/sensations/feelings in the human body is POSSIBLE in my opinion but I fully accept that we are still far away from being able to replace your pinky, with a replicant which can equal it's functionality and it's actions as a touch sensor. — universeness

Artificially measuring the pressure of a touch may be possible but that is not equal to an emotional feeling. Right now even the sensation of touch requires a physical body.

https://www.science.org/content/article/prosthetic-hands-endowed-sense-touch

More interesting is how an emotional feeling is different from the sensation of touching something. I can recognize my emotional feelings as illogical. Like duh, I am talking with a man who has right frontal brain damage, and getting angry with him because he does not understand what I am saying. That is pretty stupid. For several years I worked with a mildly retarded guy who never got upset when someone didn't understand something as simple as sweeping the floor. He could relate to not understanding and would help the person understand. While I am instantly screaming at someone for being an idiot. Who is the idiot? It is not easy being human and really, I don't understand why it is so hard but my emotions make me behave will an idiot even when I know better. So what is up with these emotions?

I love the demeanor of the Asian people I have met. They stay calm and basically more logical than emotional. It is our culture that makes us so hyper-emotional. But just wanting to be like them, and repeating their logical statements about things being as they are and fussing about them does not help, does not make me the reasonable person I want to be. We do not mentally manifest our emotions. Our emotions can control us, especially if we are unaware of them and think we are being rational.

I too give my sympathies, for your mother and for any caregivers, a heroic task similar to caring for an Alzheimer's patient. I have a cousin-in-law that is in final stages of ALS, in hospice now. — noAxioms

Yes, and that is so for us because we are humans. It can not be so for AI because AI can not have emotional responses to life. I think we are being truly philosophical now, reminiscent of some ancient Greek arguments. I hate being controlled by emotions, but I am also thankful that because of emotions I am motivated to make things better for myself and other human beings. I think it would be dreadful if I just didn't care about others, and AI will not have the emotional experience of life that makes us caring people. A human can program the computer to process thoughts that a human gives the computer but that is a human creation, not an AI self-generated creation based on experiencing life.

Hum, that did not address your condolences well. I remember my mother crying whenever something was meaningful to her and she would say it was ALS that caused her to cry. She had much work to do to come to peace with her life and the end of it.

I am listening to a series of lectures about spirituality and meditation and I think this is an important part of the process of preparing for death. My mother was resistant to what was happening to her and did not make good choices compared to a man who was diagnosed with ALS when he was only 28. He took advantage of everything that could make his life better and that made being part of his life easier for me because we were working for the positive, rather than bracing against the negative and rejecting a lift chair or an electric wheeler chair and accepting my help. I am very thankful for the CDs that could improve how I manage my life and death.

Put the gun down Athena! Remove yourself from the room or suggest the person leaves until you both calm down, of is this situation not as bad as I suggest? — universeness

I am back. I really wish such darn emotions did not hijack my sanity! I have logic in my brain and what I just went through was not logical! It was emotional and intensely physical and this is why I keep arguing with you about where our emotions are. My head wants me to be a better person but our bodies! and insane emotions, can consume us. Now I will probably have to take a nap and I will probably lack energy for the rest of the day.

I knew better than ask him to help me by getting the box down from above the shelves. He could not understand " the box above the shelves". Not even when I pointed to it could he understand the request. He would not be in home if he were more capable. I really want to talk about this but not in this thread. However, here, perhaps we can speak of who rules, our brain or our body because that has been our argument for a long time. I want to be different from how I am and heaven knows I have put a lot of effort into being a better person. :lol: I look forward to being reincarnated in a totally different body with the hope of having a different life experience. AI will not have this problem because it does not have a body and hormones and therefore the ability to experience life. But it also won't be capable of the good either.

It is called a local anesthetic here, not a regional anesthetic. — universeness

If you want us to believe you know it all, you should read the links before making your arguments.

Local anesthesia. This is the type of anesthesia least likely to cause side effects, and any side effects that do occur are usually minor. Also called local anesthetic, this is usually a one-time injection of a medication that numbs just a small part of your body where you’re having a procedure such as a skin biopsy.

Regional anesthesia is a type of pain management for surgery that numbs a large part of the body, such as from the waist down. The medication is delivered through an injection or small tube called a catheter and is used when a simple injection of local anesthetic is not enough, and when it’s better for the patient to be awake. — American Society of Anesthesia

All physiological responses are controlled, enacted and terminated via the brain, imo. — universeness

That may be so but the feeling is still in the body and without one there are no feelings. The brain can not terminate a feeling like a switch being turned off. The hormones must be metabolized in their own time and as we age this process slows down. Music is good for producing desired feelings and calming us down when we are in fight or flight mode, as I am now because of a communication problem with someone in the room with me. :lol: My intense anger may be the result of hormones started in my head but I assure you they are in my body, not my head and I should probably go for a walk to metabolize these fight of flight hormones faster. Yipes he is not shutting up- I am going for a walk.

Not sure what you are referring to here Athena, a particular sci-fi movie perhaps? — universeness

I can not find a decent link with all the clutter like this one. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/microsoft-shuts-down-ai-chatbot-after-it-turned-into-racist-nazi/

I want to add to what I said, I watched a video explanation that used a human as AI and she insisted she has feelings. That is to say, things are being misrepresented. If our brains were in a vat and could think and communicate, there would be no feeling body. Going on stored information, the brain could think losing a child is sad, but it could not feel the sadness. AI can not have an emotionally feeling body.

Anesthetic, can remove all feeling from your body and you can remain awake. How is this possible if any aspect of consciousness or mind, exists outside of the brain? My brother-in-law, had a triple bypass operation, and he was awake all the way through the operation and asked to see his opened body and exposed heart, during the operation, this request was fulfilled. Why did Stephen Hawking continue with his life considering the lack of function/feeling he had in his body? Do you think he was less conscious or had less access to 'mind' due to the reduced state of his body? Why do people paralised from the neck down, still want to live? Christopher Reeves of superman fame for example? — universeness

If your brother-in-law was awake during surgery he had a regional anesthetic, not a general anesthesia
that makes a person unconscious. His brain was still working, right?

https://www.asahq.org/madeforthismoment/anesthesia-101/effects-of-anesthesia/

Stephen Hawking had ALS and so did my mother. ALS destroys the muscles but does not interfere with emotional feelings that are a different nerve pathway. If you are interested in the body's relationship to emotions you might find this link interesting.

Emotions are how individuals deal with matters or situations they find personally significant. Emotional experiences have three components: a subjective experience, a physiological response and a behavioral or expressive response.
https://online.uwa.edu/news/emotional-psychology/#:~:text=Physiological%20Responses,-We%20all%20know&text=This%20physiological%20response%20is%20the,fight%2Dor%2Dflight%20response. — Psychology and Counseling News

The song wrote by chatGBT, about the topic of this thread IS original. ChatGBT IS the author. I see little difference, in the way chatGBT consults the information it has stored, to produce such a song on such a topic, compared to the way a human writer of such a song, on such a topic would do it. — universeness

If there is no organic body to feel and give feedback to thoughts generated as chatGBT generates thoughts, it is not equal to what happens in the human mind. It can become very dark with no feelings to inhabit the dark side. ChatGBT can not have empathy, shame or regret, or motivation to do good, because it does not have feelings.

Sorry I am out of time for reading and responding but hope to get to you soon.

What if they could replace the bit that was being destroyed? What if you got a new brain, same memories? Would that be OK. The dementia seems to destroy memory, so what if they replaced only the memory part, but it was somebody else’s memories. The thinking part is still all original equipment. I bring this up because that’s pretty much where I might draw the line. For one, I don’t think anyone would choose this because by the time you might want this, you’re too far gone to make an informed decision. — noAxioms

This is the most interesting question. A man-made joint or pig value in my heart would not change who I am. Messing with my brain in a way that changes whatever it is that is a consciousness of me, is a death to my ego that might as well be a death to my body as well. What if Socrates and his peers could argue such a question that is a result of technological advancement? I think the body is as important as the brain in experiencing who we are. Now I will entered the scientific taboo line of questioning...

Personality changes following heart transplantation, which have been reported for decades, include accounts of recipients acquiring the personality characteristics of their donor. Four categories of personality changes are discussed in this article: (1) changes in preferences, (2) alterations in emotions/temperament, (3) modifications of identity, and (4) memories from the donor's life. The acquisition of donor personality characteristics by recipients following heart transplantation is hypothesized to occur via the transfer of cellular memory, and four types of cellular memory are presented: (1) epigenetic memory, (2) DNA memory, (3) RNA memory, and (4) protein memory. Other possibilities, such as the transfer of memory via intracardiac neurological memory and energetic memory, are discussed as well. — Mitchell B Liester

I am strongly in favor of ideas about cellular memory. This includes Rolfing....

Holistic Massage Called Rolfing Helps Release Emotions ...

Maui Rolfing
https://olanaturalhealing.com › uncategorized › holisti...
Aug 19, 2014 — Holistic Massage Called Rolfing Helps Release Emotions Hiding in Your Tissue — Lu Parker Reports · Rolfing experts say our bodies can trap ... — Lu Parker

I don't know if anyone wants to pick up on this, but I have spent a lifetime on self-improvement and I assume we all like some of ourselves but would like to improve ourselves as well. Now the ego comes into play and may be willing to make some changes but reacts to changing as though it is a threat and must be resisted. Perhaps we all have different levels of tolerating change? Anyway with cellar memory being an important part of how we experience ourselves, it makes the idea of physical changes more complex.

I wonder--- Stem cells are flexible and I believe they are what forms our brain, They may be able to share information, but if that information is already lost because of damage to the limbic system there is nothing left to transfer the necessary information, so technology could not help.

The point is, they are not 'thoughts,' the song was produced by chatGBT, an AI system, yet it was able to invoke an emotive response from you. Not bad, for an AI system with zero self-awareness. — universeness

If those are not thoughts, how did they become part of AI and why have you asked us to think about those words?

That same AI had to be shut down because it crossed into the dark side and it had no feelings to make aware of the need to stop the direction in which it was going.

I am asking you for what convinces you most that 'mind' and consciousness are not the same thing. — universeness

You didn't ask this of me but it is in line with the questions you did ask me. Our feelings are in our body and I don't think I like life without a feeling body. "I think I am enjoying life" requires a body that can feel joy. How could consciousness without a feeling body be valuable?

Hum not such an easy question. I can imagine life after death. I am okay with life after death, provided I get a new body and a new physical reality. I have a sense the "I" is not limited to the body I live in now, but my "I' could be reincarnated into different bodies and different life experiences. Oh my, there is so much I do not know and can not think through without more information.

I don't choose to live my life based on the fate of others, even those I love. My life is certainly diminished by loss but it is also reinforced by new friendships/relationships/experiences. But you are correct in your suggestion that our personal 'hell' is something that we create from our own personal psyche. — universeness

That reply is fascinating to me. Have you experienced grief? I have heard that men change in a positive way when they experience grief. The Greek gods are built around what they do and the goddesses are built around their associations. Men are programmed to reproduce but not so much to stick around and care for the children, while women are programmed, hormonally, to nurture the child. Some women do not have that programming. One of my granddaughters gave away her daughter because she did not want to be a mother. She gave her daughter to a nurturing man who lost his own daughter, and who is now devoted to enriching my great-granddaughter's life. That is to say, there are variations. But I think in general the Greeks got things right. The male identity is built on what he does, and the female identity is more about her relationships. My life does not hold much value to me without my relationships. If like the people in Turkey I lost my whole family in an earthquake I would not want to live. I don't feel so good with the idea of a man not having that same sense of meaning but I do accept that as fact.

How much of your current body would you accept 'just as good or better,' replacements for, if they could keep you alive and healthy and embarking on new adventures, for as long as you liked, (barring fatal accidents). — universeness

What a delicious question! That deserves a lot of pondering because it is so rich in values. I would NOT like to wake up in the morning with someone else's face as is true for at least one man. He attempted suicide with a gun and destroyed half his face and was given the face of another young man who was killed in an accident. I think it would be very distressing to look into a mirror and see a different face. That may not be logical but that is my gut feeling, however, an attractive and functional face would be better than living without that. Having my joints replaced with artificial ones is okay.
I am okay with having someone else's kidney or heart and I am an organ donor. Let's see, I will accept whatever keeps me alive and functioning as long as my life has purpose and I can make a contribution, but if I am the only surviving member of my family please let me die. Or if dementia is destroying my mind, please help me die. Or if I could become immortal with my brain in a jar and no body, please, I rather be brain dead. Not even a completely artificial body would please me because I do not want to be a brain without a feeling body. I am not sure I would want immortality either. The gods envied us because we know death.

Thanks for the question. It was fun thinking about my answer. I am sure more thoughts are possible.

I started out liberal and I think I'm just as liberal now. I would say my liberality is more nuanced. I'm also less likely to see political decision making as something that has to have winners and losers. I guess I'd say I'm liberal in outlook, but moderate in attitude. There are ideas I believe are the right thing to do, but I don't insist that I always get my way. — T Clark

I like all your statements and this one pushes my buttons and puts me on my soup box to lecture about the value of democracy! Many ancient people, not just the Greeks, realized if we don't get it right, things will go wrong. Ideally democracy is about getting it right. I was hoping to complete a book about democracy before I die but that ain't going to happen. My brain has become like a large lake, instead of a river moving fast from here to there. My thinking never was strongly linear and now it is even less so.
Perhaps we all have a dream of leaving something valuable before we cross over.

I take heart knowing so many, many people are also trying to get things right, but I see the Christian notion of what is right as more autocratic than democratic. Both are necessary, but how do we balance the autocracy with the democracy? How do we get things right so, if like some Greeks believed, we come back, we come back to a life we want to live. Don't we all want the future to be a life we would like to live? Do we want to turn the decision over to a God that is unbelievable, or technological society that has lost its humanity?

I think our experience with reasoning and our maturity is so vital to the future. When I was young I counted on God and a lucky rabbits foot. I advanced to witchcraft and herbs. :lol: I finally found philosophy but I have more questions than answers.

Most older people become more conservative -- not necessarily in the political sense of the term. Aging bodies have to be more careful, lest they fall and break bones. Perception isn't quite as sharp. Our productive years are over, so we are operating on stored resources. We can't afford (figuratively and literally) to take big risks.

Because old people have been around for a few decades they have seen some bright ideas that did not pan out, while some tried and true methods did work (and visa versa). The result is more caution. — BC

Very nicely said. I have wondered if what is happening to my brain, the increased awareness of perspective, and things that work and things that lead to trouble, and a sense of enlightenment, be happening if I didn't think my life is behind me? I would love to go roller skating but the risk of breaking is too great. I would love to travel but if I broke down in a mountain pass would I have the physical ability to get to safety? :lol: My body just is not user friendly despite my many hours of daily exercise in a pool and a weight room. That makes me very cautious! And it goes with thinking my life is behind me because I am so physically vulnerable and limited. I can't do this or do that so I have lots of time to think. I am not going to achieve any great goals, but maybe I can discover in books, lectures, this forum, and my own inner self, a peace with joy. Will I die with a smile on face, being pleased with the life I have had? Will I gain an understanding of life that my those I leave behind will value?

Jung saw the second half of life as more about inner growth, but if people have not been encouraged to think about their inner lives in the first place, this will not happen necessarily. — Jack Cummins

I am comforted by that thought. However, the second one about technology leading to people being more concerned about what is external to them than knowing one's self, distresses me. Might that diminish our humanity and heavens forbid lead to wars? Liberal education would promote more self awareness than educating our young to be products for industry.

Your words are interesting considering I have left my home for a couple of hours because the person in it is watching the 700 Club. A Christian program that raises my passionate dislike of the religion because of the likes of the Evangelical Christians and their politics in the US. The person in my home, takes great comfort in the 700 Club explanation of God and reality, and with your words, I see his lack of self awareness. He has a traumatic brain injury that damaged his ability to reason and function. It serves him well to have the 700 Club reality instead of dealing with his own reality. That is saying the failure to know ourselves and clinging to another reality is not just the effect of technology. I see religion and technology as both worshiping a God capable of bringing us to perfection. Whereas, I come to death with no defenses or other-defined reality. I have to search more or less on my own to determine my values and why I have those values and come to be peace with my life and the end of it.

Physical, yes.
I'm not sure though what do you mean by "emotional feelings". Emotion is itself a state of feeling.
But a "feeling" can mean different things. When you say "I feel fear" you refer to a mental reaction. When you say "I feel a pain" you refer to a physical reaction. And "I feel guilty", is still another example, referring to conscience.

Mental states can produce changes in the body. E.g. when you are very anxious/stressed, you can feel one or more of various things: adrenaline running in your body, irritability or pain in your stomach, tightness in your chest, increased heart beats, etc. There are also positive emotions which you can "feel", but are very little physical: E.g. When you feel joy a cheerful you feel your body "lighter" and a sense of wellness. The more positive an emotion is, the lighter body feels. And the opposite, the more negativean emotion is, the heavier the body feels.

All these states are produced by the mind. The brain receives automatically signals (stimuli) from these states and sends in its turn signals to different parts of the body (organs, organism) via the nervous system, which in turn react to these signals according to their nature and f\unction. The brain can also get signals from these parts of the body as a feedback. It's a wondrous system! :smile: — Alkis Piskas

Well, your last line explains the feedback system. The feelings are in the body. However, more explanation of that may be helpful, since I already replied before reading your last line.

I will argue the body feels and the brain does its best to determine what the feeling is and its cause. :lol: I am a female. I think most of us learn about crazy for a few days of the month. I have days when mentally I am totally miserable and I know I am not being logical. Our bodies are reacting to hormones.
This hormonal control can lead to men and women having relationships that go against their better judgment. The Buddhist talk about us being controlled by our emotions, being like a puppy that is shaken. It is not the brain in control but the feeling body.

I had to use tranquilizers to get through a very hard time in my life, and the tranquilizers did not change my thinking but did change how I felt and the change in my feeling improve my ability to react in a more positive way. Or, years later after doing a lot of daily walking, I noticed I was not as depressed as I had been. Exercise is very important to how feel mentally and physically.

Here is another one. We should not get botox injections that prevent us from smiling, because if we can not smile we can become depressed, or if we force ourselves to smile despite being miserable, we can ease feelings of depression.

I should not have mentioned the economic problem because that is a different subject. My point is I see such matters differently than when I was young. I started this thread because I am curious about what I perceive as a change in thinking and the possibility that we tend to become more conservative with age?

However, I love economics and could start a thread to explore economists Thomas Robert Malthus' and David Ricardo's differences of opinion which would get into what is good or wrong with government giveaways. Despite their differences, they remained good friends for life and used their arguments to develop their own thinking.

In this thread, I am wanting to understand why I see life so differently today! Has this happened to anyone else? I read that as we age we gain a sense of meaning to all those facts we learned. The young absorb the facts but don't have a sense of meaning until they experience what the facts mean. Like a young person volunteering for military service and knowing nothing of the meaning of being in war. The old warrior may answer the call to duty but will do so with a very different sense of what he is getting himself into.

The way I see philosophy it is a tool because philosophers have asked questions I never thought of asking and in that way it teaches us to ask questions and to see with a much broader perspective. This is far different from a youthful diet of Dick and Jane readers, fairy tales, and Bible lessons.

But I think it is also about how our brains change as we age. I live in housing for older people and I know getting older in itself does not make us better thinkers. We may gain some wisdom with life experience, but most of the older people in my life are not thinkers! However, those who do turn to philosophy or intentionally engage in debates, do develop better thinking skills and are less apt to be caught up in the popular mindset of the moment. Stopping to think, instead of just reacting, is a learned habit, and those of us who actively nurtured the habit become better thinkers because of the accumulation of thoughts and experiences over a lifetime. We just have more information to work with and hopefully, the time to ponder what is important in life and how might that be achieved. It is with that experience we see what is wrong with Utopian ideas. We realize a lot of good ideas do not get good results because it is not compatible with our nature.

The huge money giveaway we have just been through resulting in inflation and talk of doing more of the same, looks like a bad idea to me today, but I when I was younger I would have thought it is a good idea. I have gotten more conservative.

Verse 1:
We are more than just the sum of our parts
Our minds and bodies, intertwined works of art
There's something deeper, something that we can't explain
A quality within us, that we can't contain — universeness

Those are very nice thoughts but also dangerous because they ignore our dark side. They ignore our gun culture and parents buying their sons guns and the sons taking the guns to school and killing people. We must get those silly notions of our divine nature out of our heads and deal with our reality that we can be hateful and hurtful and even killers. We need to understand how that happens and how to prevent it. Only when we understand reality can we make the decisions necessary for good results.

Would you accept the free pinky upgrade and become one of the advanced pinky people, or would you stay as one of the current mundane pinky humans? — universeness

:lol: When the dinosaurs walked the earth and I was in high school, I wrote a story about a woman who wanted to die because everyone she cared about was dead. She could not die because she volunteered to have every organ replaced when her own stopped working. To me, that is a kind of hell and I would not choose it.

I was very glad to get my artificial hip. It gave me a new start in life and I hope it will last for the rest of my life. Before I knew more about the artificial hip, I thought how great it would be to be better than nature made me. In reality, nature made us better than artificial parts, unless something goes wrong and we do not develop normally or something has damaged our parts. I was born without a left hip socket and was in a body cast for a year to help nature develop my left hip socket. That hip lasted a little over 40 years before it had to be replaced with an artificial one in. Yes, if I need a new part, I will accept one, but not for something silly and not with the expectation of it not being without problems.