• Duality in the universe
    I am thinking that the duality of non-existence lies in space and vacuum. while existence comprises of matter and energy.
  • Concepts of the Tao?
    There isn't anything dark and mysterious about Daoism. It is simply about observing life.MondoR

    And hopefully just living life.
  • Concepts of the Tao?
    What creates flow. It is the Universal Mind. What is Mind? No one can define it, yet we all feel it as existence.MondoR

    Isn't our own minds but a reflection of the capabilities of the Universal mind? if so then does that mean it can be understood by looking inside?
  • Maintaining Love in the family
    Love is the deception of nature to force us to reproduce.Miguel Hernández

    if it's is deception then I am surely fooled!
  • Maintaining Love in the family
    And made by hand and muscle and patience, not by machine. If you think love is a feeling you have rather than a labour you work at, there is not much hope for marriage or for child rearing.unenlightened
    Can we get a show of hands?
  • Maintaining Love in the family
    I love the list you made up. These are all good qualities for an individual to have in any relationship. Then, could you answer what properties or characteristics of love that could allow us to understand the way it works?
  • People Should Be Like Children? Posh!
    I do try not to look down upon others who are less gifted than myself, for we are all in this together as this generation breeds the next. All I hope is for everyone to try their best on their own path whatever that may be.
  • People Should Be Like Children? Posh!
    A child knows the obvious answers... but doesn’t yet know why those are the right answers.Pfhorrest
    Perhaps he doesn't need to know why but just live life and be elated that that's the way things are. I like your adage as I would think reality wouldn't change after you are enlightened, and I would imagine there's an immense satisfaction for having things be the way they are after questioning everything.
    There’s an old adage that a philosophy professor related to me once (if anyone knows the source of this please let me know it). It went something like “Before one walks the path of enlightenment, tables are tables and tea is tea. As one walks the path of enlightenment, tables are no longer tables and tea is no longer tea. After one has walked the path of enlightenment, tables are again tables, and tea is again tea.”Pfhorrest

    Love the comment. Then it really goes without saying that life is meant to just be lived due to the joy in living it, rather than analyze everything and breaking them apart as all you get is excavation, which is devoid of radiant feelings.
  • People Should Be Like Children? Posh!
    Think of any adults you find objectionable. Don't you think he behaves like a child?Miguel Hernández
    I more so mean childlike in "nature" as in inheriting all the healthy aspects of youth rather than the unhealthy irrational/emotional aspects. As I find in my friends group that the most happiest of them tend to be more childlike in nature despite having aged.
  • People Should Be Like Children? Posh!
    The image portrayed by many commentators on this forum give a very grim view of reality and treat it as the way it should be or is. Lets say if that were true, then in no way this philosophy or knowledge benefits mankind and therefore should be forgotten and replaced by a different image. So childhood is beautiful and should be retained in essence. Childhood love is divine and should never be forgotten, ever! And being a parent to amazingly bright children and reflecting those qualities back at them could never be fully described in words because it only can be felt.
  • People Should Be Like Children? Posh!
    Good comment. So then a whole societal shift would be required in order to sustain such a philosophy. It would be tough to do it alone, especially since society encourages "men" to be like men. So, then, what you are saying almost assumes I am accurate to say the world would be a better place with more people who look at it with wonder and purity of heart.
  • Philosophers toolbox: How to improve thought?
    I think the problem would be simpler than it presumes. When you read a word you obtain an image in your mind Associated with that word, for example the word "war" most likely gives you the most common image of war such as men killing each other with guns on a battlefield rather than less associated images such as strategy in war. Those images are the thoughts you think when reading various words you have learned to associate with them.
  • Philosophers toolbox: How to improve thought?
    But doesn't writing serve as a artificial replacement for the capacities that already exist within the mind? If so you are in the end weakening your mind.
  • Concepts of the Tao?
    Great post and very detailed, two thumbs up. I was just reading C.S. Lewis' abolition of man in which he speaks of the Tao which I find interesting as he is a famous Christian writer.
  • Philosophers toolbox: How to improve thought?
    I highly appreciate your input especially on trying to turn your thought off for a while. I know it is possible to also overdo the thinking process in your brain and actually start burning holes in it. But how to turn it off? I would imagine it would require a supreme conscious awareness of your thoughts, as I'm sure you're aware that controlling when you think is very difficult. Like a masters dog in a whistlers convention.
  • Philosophers toolbox: How to improve thought?
    I see the speed and quality of peoples thoughts vary from individual to individual. An extreme example would be retardation. I think that if we were to come up with a way to think and live to improve the thoughts themselves that it would become a great asset to the philosopher in his works. So hypothetically finding an answer to this question is more important than any other, for once found it would be capable of answering many other questions to a higher degree and perception.
  • I think therefore I am – reduced
    Could it be simplified even further to I am? As it seems irrelevant to state you are conscious of this existence.
  • Are there situations where its allowed to erase a memory from someonelse's mind?
    I don't think it would be necessary. For in many cases which victims are subject to extreme trauma the memory erases itself in order to sustain the well being of the individual... my own past for example.
    I was supposedly raised in a meth house and beaten regularly, but I hardly remember most of my childhood memories in which that was the case. I only remember a few bad ones but mostly the good in order to best maintain my sanity the only way my body knows how.
  • Memory Vs Imagination
    There seems to be a bit of convergence between imagination and memory. Due to their qualities being similar and precisely are derived from thought, I have experienced first hand old memories that were not recalled often enough and therefore subject to the imagination to compromise for inadequacies in the memory being recalled. Similarly, in trying to imagine something I have come across inspirational memories in my life to help dictate that which I am imagining.
    In the end I think It is incorrect to completely separate these two aspects which partly form the amazing energy known as thought, for lack of looking at the bigger picture which constitutes the whole.