.

So what if the camera is part of a bot whose job it is to wander around and take pictures of ducks? — khaled

Who said the user was a bot or an automated security camera? Those are programs programmed by human beings.

And what is my argument that breaks down exactly? — khaled

I have no idea, it just breaks down if you consider the camera to be the final viewpoint in the stupid metaphor.

According to my research, when you respond to me, you're responding to this:

No, the mind of the camera-user is what puts the photo together. They do this first and then take the photo. It's a poor metaphor until you acknowledge this. -Noble Dust

No metaphor. — Isaac

No, the camera is a metaphor in this discussion. Read back if you need to.

Correct.

This is also true of a camera taking film. — Isaac

The problem is that you're still using the metaphor. The metaphor gets you from A to B, but you have to cast it off once you reach B. This is the classical mistake of analytic thought.

:rofl:

:rofl:

So there is the user of the camera, the camera, and the image. Correct?

@Hanover

(non-Pro tip: when you say this (love the convoluted text formatting here

I just fed my dog. Give me the 2 complementary explanations of that so I can know what you're talking about.

Stop there. Now @180 Proof is forced to ADDRESS things "the argument" on his own terms.

If you want to use this metaphor — Noble Dust

The point is, although the camera isn't, and can't be in the photo, the camera is not thus ontologically different from the photo or the things getting photographed. — khaled

If you want to use this metaphor, you have to include the user of the camera. Otherwise the metaphor breaks down, and your entire argument breaks down, because your argument is based on a metaphor that does not include the user of the camera.

Pfhorrest's example shows that even though a camera is what puts the photo together — khaled

No, the mind of the camera-user is what puts the photo together. They do this first and then take the photo. It's a poor metaphor until you acknowledge this.

Within the analogy.

I love the byline, and I respect David Bentley Hart (oh wait, these two things are related). :up:

Ok ok, calm down. Again, in my little universe, there's what we called "early country" or whatever the fuck we called it. Many if not all of those artists would be included. I'm also younger than you, so gimme a freebie.

Back to the serious stuff:

It doesn't happen to everyone. Paul Simon. Bob Dylan. CJ & VSB. Bob Seeger did what more musicians should do - said what he had to say, made the money he needed, then sat down. — T Clark

Sure, but it does happen to some. Maybe it's a phantom of the popular music world; when I think of artists who grew better with age, my mind immediately goes to "art" music; French symbolist classical (Ravel/Debussy) or late jazz (Jonn Coltrane/Alice Coltrane/Pharoah Sanders). What if the popular music phenomenon brought on the age of the idolization of art? of the artist's age? What ever happened to artists getting better with age? What about Pharoah Sanders heart-renching, soul-destroying collab with young electronic artist Floating Points (which was released THIS fucking year? )

I've had a hard time believing that materialists of any stripe are so stupid that they can't realize the perspectivism inherent in their own experience. But the more I read, the older I get, and the more I interact with people, the more I'm starting to believe it.

As @180 Proof would say, :up:

I wonder to what extent your interlocutors skim-read your very precent, extensive quotes, and dismiss them. Not your fault if they do.

No, the early books I'm talking about were not necessarily the first ones I read. In fact, generally they weren't. A writer's first book, a songwriter's first song tend to have something raw and immediate about them. The artist is trying to figure things out for themself. — T Clark

Sure, I've noticed the appeal of early rawness, but I've also noticed the appeal of later refinement. Is one more valuable than the other?

Roots music, bluegrass, and much of folk are country music. — T Clark

In my mind those genres preceded country. I worked for a folk/bluegrass/roots radio station for a few years, and there was a clear distinction between what was acceptable and what not.

Keep mainlining me Crazy Joe and VSB and I may just come around. Maybe I'll trade songs with ya.

Sure, but the camera is also not part of the picture, so "not being part of the picture" doesn't have to mean being of an ontologically different kind than the things in the picture, which is the point. — Pfhorrest

But within the analogy, the person taking the photo/video is ontologically different from both the image and the camera.

I'm re-reading your post now, and have some thoughts.

You say your favorite works from your favorite authors were their earliest. Were they also the first works of theirs you read, or no?

I ask, because I've noticed something in my own appreciation of music: my favorite album from an artist tends to be the first one that I heard; not always, but usually. So rather than the arc of the actual artist determining the aesthetic worth of their work for me, it's my own arc as a listener that determines my opinion of their arc as an artist. Is this some sort of art appreciation juvenilia, or just par for the course of appreciating art?

I like folk and roots music (hell I even like bluegrass), but I'll leave your comments about country music where they should be left. :razz:

I used to be religious, and thought my experience of "creative flow" was something akin to the Holy Spirit moving in me. I've since lost that religious perspective, but would not equate that experience with glossolalia. I've seen Glossolalia happen too, and think of it more in terms of a mania; there is certainly something happening, as @Ciceronianus the White illustrated, of a riotous nature. It's certainly not epileptic or vapidly gullible as all stars such as @Banno and @180 Proof like to assume (presumably out of fear of the unknown). It seems to be more akin to being swept up in a herd environment and momentarily losing one's sense of individuality; almost a momentary psychotic break.

"Creative flow", on the other hand is distinctly different from glossolalia, in my view. As an artist myself, I tend to become less and less interested in whatever the mechanics may or may not be behind creative flow. I don't care about whatever nomenclature is used to attempt to set the experience in resin. The "unconscious" feels the closest to my own experience, in that I find myself following some sort of bread crumb trail that feels (experientially) outside of myself (like that text formatting @180 Proof? :razz: ). I'm not dogmatic enough at this point in my life to label it "brain chemistry", the "collective unconscious", or "the Holy Spirit". Whatever it is, it's something not normally present in every day "non-creative" life that does seem to interject when I'm in the process of trying to create something. I've even gone so far as to set up rules for myself that I think I have to follow in order to fall into "flow", only to realize later that there are no rules; if a set of circumstances brought great creative results at one point in time, the only thing maintaining those circumstances as necessary is my own thinking that they are so. So I can wrench the "flow" of my creative thinking out of that particular vein and willfully place it in a new vein, and see if any new creative "flow" begins. Sorry for the ramble.

Haha nice. I can't even remember how I was introduced to Sleepytime Gorilla Museum.

floating in space like grapes in a Jello salad — T Clark

I think I'm going to fast for the rest of the day after reading that.

Woah, serious throwback

I'd like to see @180 Proof use his former copy writer skills and make a philosophical argument without the use of text formatting, unnecessary ellipses, and emojis. Somehow I get the sense the magic would be lost.

It's such a meaningless statement. Yawn

Possibly the most unique record I've heard in a long time:

sometimes there's an idea inside them that needs to be exorcized and they keep returning to it again and again in a kind of ritualistic catharsis. Perhaps it's intensely satisfying. — Tom Storm

I wouldn't say it's satisfying, except in a momentary sense. The itch is scratched until it starts itching again, which can be very quickly. Maybe "mania" is a good descriptor.

You can actually see this repetitive theme exploration going on here from some members. There's an idea that they seem driven to pursue in endless variations. — Tom Storm

A more apt sentence I have not read on the forum recently. :up:

Some artists don't mean to rehash but return to themes, sounds and subjects because there's fence around even the most fecund of creative imaginations. — Tom Storm

Absolutely; I return to lyrical and musical themes on accident all of the time. I've grown to embrace it rather than avoid it. I guess I'm almost disagreeing with my premise in the OP by saying this, but there is also something creatively fulfilling about trying to do the same thing over and over again. Maybe it's psychosis, or maybe there's something noble in the pursuit. But the more I try to push myself and create in new ways, the more I often find myself falling back on the same creative obsessions that I've had for my entire adult life.

Someone continually reinventing themselves successfully is either riding the wave of ephemeral and unpredictable popular fads or trends, — Pfhorrest

I think you can also make the converse argument and say that someone continually reinventing themselves is creating the fad or trend. Or, more likely, it's a complex matrix of creating trends and following them at the same time.

@Tom Storm @javra

In terms of artists that are still evolving, I would throw Steve Reich into the ring. Maybe a bit questionable, as the demarcation of eras in his work are less clear, but what I love about his arc is that it's so logical. He's in his 80's, and wrote this piece a few years ago:



It's certainly not my favorite piece, but the evolution is so apparent if you're familiar with his work. There are few artists that I feel a sense of "reverence" towards when I listen to new work; Steve is one.

When it comes to Shakespeare it's complex. — Tom Storm

I have no expertise in theatre, but I do agree. I didn't care at all for Shakespeare until I saw my old roommate perform (I think Lear) in an outdoor setting, at close range. Spellbinding, and all of the outdated language and dress seemingly fell away. I was glued to the stage.

Works are reinterpreted out of their author's intentions, so is the text really evergreen? But since all authors died some decades ago, would anyone complain except for the remnants of old school Levisite criticism? — Tom Storm

I don't think the text is evergreen; the older a work gets, the more we rely on experts to explain to us why it's important. I don't say that to suggest that it isn't important, but to suggest that the concept of "timeless" is really only based on our ability to continue to uphold a work as such.

I'd say "no". I've got folk that only made on album in my library that I don't get tired of enjoying. Good quality, little breadth. — javra

I agree with you. I always wonder, though, about those artists. Why did they stop? Did they say all they needed to say, or did something external prevent them from having a so-called "arc"? Could we have enjoyed their arc if it had had a chance to blossom?

Assuming one shares minimal tastes with mine, Leonard Cohen comes to mind (now deceased), as well as Tom Waits and Tori Amos (not deceased but fairly well blossomed by now). There might well be others but this is what I think of first. All these have gone through a creative evolution with sustained quality that hasn't slowed down with age. — javra

I like Cohen and Waits, just haven't dug into Amos properly. I would say I tepidly agree, if that makes sense. I don't disagree.

Thanks for the great response.

What you say brings up the daunting question of whether there is an "eternal" aspect to great art. Because let's be honest, what's hinted at in the veneration of Shakespeare and The Beatles is that this art is truly eternal; we say it's "timeless" and we seem to assume that that's a figure of speech, but do we really mean it in that way?

I often think of Scriabin when it comes to artists that were lauded in their day and subsequently forgotten (to a degree).



And attempting to steer back to the thread topic, Scriabin is actually a pretty impressive example of an artist who's creative arc is quite long and complex. He's almost like a mirror image of the shift in the early 20th century from post-romanticism to the introduction of atonality and the onset of the modernist movement. His unique arc almost represents the actual world's transition into modernism.

As time went on I found there were different degrees of the experience, from a very close approximation of normal reality to bizarre escapades far removed. — jgill

This is the kind of response that gets me excited; what you say here closely mirrors the experiences of OOBE folks like Robert Monroe and William Buhlman (who I like less as he's a bit new age-y). It's so fascinating that different people in different times, unbeknownst to each other, seem to accidentally discover ways to induce these experiences, and they appear to be the same experiences.

Monroe, for instance, distinguishes between the "second body", which is close to the physical, and generally experiences things in a physical-esque manner, and a "third body" which is capable of having what you describe as "bizarre escapades far removed".

I keep saying this to everyone who responds in the affirmative, but I would love to hear more...but I also recognize how personal these experiences can be, so I don't want to pressure you. Castaneda I'm familiar with, although I've read that he was accused of being some sort of fraud; about what exactly I don't remember.

No, it was your use of text formatting and jumbled sentence structure.

I'm not sure why you're so curious, but my ontology isn't a closed system; I leave room for the possibility of consciousness not being confined to the physical.

:scream: