01-11-2020, 08:39 AM
The idea that the ultimate good is complexity, vitality and capacity for experience. We should as individuals and as society always strive to protect and expand Mind in all its forms.
Pros and cons?
Pros and cons?
(01-11-2020, 08:39 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote: [ -> ]The idea that the ultimate good is complexity, vitality and capacity for experience. We should as individuals and as society always strive to protect and expand Mind in all its forms.
Pros and cons?
(01-14-2020, 07:40 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote: [ -> ]So you think Extropianism is a good philosophy, Eric?
A more complete description is available here:
https://www.mrob.com/pub/religion/extro_prin.html
I don't like it that the authors borrow concepts from libertarianism and Maslow's psychology of self - two bad ideologies that should die with the Millennial Saeculum. But I'm all for the basic idea I stated in the OP.
Is Extropianism more civic or prophetic?
Eric the Green Wrote:I favor transhumanism more or less as Nietzsche first defined it, and it goes back to the romantics. To become the overman requires a spiritual journey, not so much a scientific technology. It requires developing our human potential. I don't oppose technology, but do not agree that it is the key to becoming more than human. That is an ethical, psychological, spiritual pursuit. To be transhuman in the new age perspective I uphold is to be able to manifest God as ourselves. The human potential movement begun in the 2T Awakening is the path to follow for a genuine transhumanism.
Quote:I don't think any world view for the future is viable that keeps too much of the worldviews dominant before the sixties awakening, and only if they express the sixties awakening to some degree, especially the preference for spirit over matter, are they viable for the future.
(01-15-2020, 06:38 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote: [ -> ]The Toccata unfolds in seven distinct upward-moving phases, it is an audio picture of the seven major chakras
I don't believe in chakras (which are a Hindu superstition) and I don't think Bach ever did. He lived in 17th century Europe, and it's very unlikely he was familiar with Hinduism at all. Furthermore, he was a devout Protestant:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/arts/...music.html
The number 7 is prominent in many cultures because it reflects 5 planets visible to the naked eye plus sun and moon. 7 days in a week, 7 sacraments and 7 cardinal sins in Catholicism, 7 wonders of the world according to ancient Greeks, seven paradises in Islam. All of these could have inspired Bach.
The correspondence between some parts of the Toccata and the Hebrew alphabet is more likely since Hebrew was widely known in Europe back then.
I agree that mindful listening to classical music is very good for your brain. So is mindfulness. As for your meditation on the Toccata, I see it as a poem reflecting how you see reality. Music can bring the wildest associations.
Quote:Eric the Green Wrote:I favor transhumanism more or less as Nietzsche first defined it, and it goes back to the romantics. To become the overman requires a spiritual journey, not so much a scientific technology. It requires developing our human potential. I don't oppose technology, but do not agree that it is the key to becoming more than human. That is an ethical, psychological, spiritual pursuit. To be transhuman in the new age perspective I uphold is to be able to manifest God as ourselves. The human potential movement begun in the 2T Awakening is the path to follow for a genuine transhumanism.
What are these "ethical, psychological, spiritual pursuits" that can make us more than human? If they don't require technology, they have likely been known for ages. So why aren't we transhuman already?
Quote:I don't devalue things like art, music or psychotherapy. I always try to interpret my dreams to understand myself better. But all that has only limited potential. If we want to really transcend human limitations, we need to use biotech.
Quote:Quote:I don't think any world view for the future is viable that keeps too much of the worldviews dominant before the sixties awakening, and only if they express the sixties awakening to some degree, especially the preference for spirit over matter, are they viable for the future.
Extropianism values the mind above matter, but it doesn't try to deny that mind needs a material substrate (a brain, or a computer, or a swarm of nanobots) to exist. New Age idea of consciousness is like the ghost Casper
Also, we duly notice that the Sixties awakening was an overreaction to the evils of fascism:
-fascism praise military discipline above all, the Sixties awakening condemned all things martial
-fascism believed in racial superiority, the Sixties awakening pretended all cultures are equal
-fascism subordinated everything to the state, the Sixties awakening wanted to do away with the state
-fascism was insane collectivism, the Sixties awakening was extreme individualism
I guess extropianism looks out for common sense positions with respect to these issues. Sometimes the answer is more self-expression to allow creativity, sometimes the state and the military must come first.
(01-16-2020, 02:31 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: [ -> ]But how can biotech make us better human beings? I suspect it still requires cultivation of virtue. Can you technologically instill good character, and bring out our spontaneous and genuine love? No, it takes spiritual practice, of which meditation is primary.
Quote:I don't think extropianism values mind over matter if it holds that the mind needs a material substrate.
Quote:Those who wanted to preserve the power of corporations and the wealthy as well as the racists and religious traditionalists fought back against these reforms, and they put their man Reagan into office. His efforts and those of his cohorts created the 3T, in which reaction held sway against government as "the problem" with trickle-down economics as the false cure.
(01-17-2020, 01:13 PM)Bill the Piper Wrote: [ -> ](01-16-2020, 02:31 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: [ -> ]But how can biotech make us better human beings? I suspect it still requires cultivation of virtue. Can you technologically instill good character, and bring out our spontaneous and genuine love? No, it takes spiritual practice, of which meditation is primary.
What about eliminating Dark Triad traits (psychopathy, narcissism and sadism) from the human genetic makeup? The love we feel now is also a result of our brain structure and neurotransmitter production, so future humans with better brain structure and more balanced neurotransmitters will certainly be better at loving their fellows. To the extent meditation works, it does because it affects the brain.
I agree that transhumanism must be based on cultivation of virtue, and a correct moral philosophy. 60s Leftism that glorified "sex, drugs and rock'n'roll" won't do
Quote:Quote:I don't think extropianism values mind over matter if it holds that the mind needs a material substrate.
Think how the amount of limitations we experience because of our material substrate is decreasing because of technology. We can talk in real time to people from another continent. We can access all mankind's knowledge online. We can also slow down ageing, at least superficially, so that thirtyish women already can run in beauty pageants and compete with 20-somethings. All of that would seem magical or otherworldly to a person from the Victorian age, let alone Ancient Greece. This development has to continue using a similar methodology, based on rationality rather than magic or faith. In the future, full immersion virtual reality will enable people to experience being their favourite fictional characters or play out their sexual fantasies. We will also be able to clone a new body and transplant our brains into it, gaining a completely different appearance. Remotely controlling the cloned body would probably be more handy, and allow one's brain to remain absolutely safe. In fact we will gain many abilities Greek Gods used to have. Furthermore, automation will free us of the necessity of wage labour and capitalism will become obsolete or at least marginalised.
Quote:Quote:Those who wanted to preserve the power of corporations and the wealthy as well as the racists and religious traditionalists fought back against these reforms, and they put their man Reagan into office. His efforts and those of his cohorts created the 3T, in which reaction held sway against government as "the problem" with trickle-down economics as the false cure.
Wait... Didn't America already have a Keynesian economics and strong welfare sector (aka compassionate conservatism) under the New Deal? European nations also chose a similar system during the previous cycle.
(01-18-2020, 10:14 AM)Anthony Wrote: [ -> ]The tarology I was taught lined up the colors to the suits of the Minor Arcana, which are in turn linked to the elements, and are the same as the Christian (specifically Roman Catholic) liturgical colors:
Cups: Water/White (sometimes Gold)
Wands: Fire/Red
Pentacles: Earth/Green
Swords: Air/Violet
Extending this to the Major Arcana, that would make violet the color of the Justice card (indeed, the figure holds a sword and sits in front of a violet curtain).
(06-09-2021, 04:00 AM)Captain Genet Wrote: [ -> ]Extropianism is an oversimplified moral philosophy. Not all complexity is good, and not all good things can be reduced to complexity. Simple, yet wholesome lifestyle of the Amish is more moral than complex nuances of online millennial culture.
Max Scheler's axiology has multiple values, arranged as a hierarchy: prosperity, pleasure, vitality, cultural sophistication and sanctity. It fits human moral intuitions better.
(06-15-2021, 05:55 AM)Captain Genet Wrote: [ -> ]Yes, I left Orion's Arm space magic to embrace postwar California weed magic.
(06-17-2021, 02:38 PM)Captain Genet Wrote: [ -> ]http://www.skepdic.com/chakras.html
"Some have tried to connect the chakras with physical organs such as the pineal gland and the thymus." So rather than waste time with pre-scientific descriptions of the human body, I'll just go straight to an anatomy text book. Anyway, I don't see connection between human anatomy and Scheler's value hierarchy.
(06-20-2021, 05:04 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: [ -> ]It's like this. If people are not grounded in the knowledge of chakras, then they only function from their brains. They are likely dominated by their lower brains too. The Awakening revealed that modernism has no heart; only a brain. Our modern culture literally has no heart, and we are living and walking around in our modern structures and computerized lifestyles with no heart. Thus we are often unkind and lack compassion, and don't know how to relate to others. Educated as a modern, I count myself among these.
Quote:Our other chakras are cut off too. The chakra that rules the brain is the third eye. But modern western culture has no notion of such a thing, whereas it is common knowledge in the Orient. The third eye is where we can meditate and control the wild and compulsive thoughts in our brains. It also balances the left and right brain. This way it opens intuition as well as reason. Modernism is completely cut off from the right brain and its thinking is completely unbalanced.
Also we lack another very important connection. Modernism wants us all to be industrial slaves. Cogs in the machine. It wants us to buy progress as our most important product. Consequently, modernism robs us of our own will. We have no connection to our own ability to direct our lives and express power. That is convenient for modern western society that wants subservient robots it can control. Our will and power is our solar plexus, the navel or third chakra. Martial artists center and power themselves by using it. But modernists and modern society has no notion of such a thing, and thus modern people have completely lost their own will and their own power.
Quote:The Wizard of Oz is actually a story of how we can recover these three vital chakras. And if we don't, we are lost, and not at home. And there's no place like home.