The New Age of Thought and Self-Reflection

... right here, right now. That's a topic for ATS, innit?

Feel free to add all of your weird thoughts on this utopia of sorts. I'll leave you with a rather short interview of Horkheimer explaining this idea in detail, and that shall be all for now.

Have a great day and thanks for chiming in!

In 1963, Martin Heidegger sat down for an interview with Bhikku Maha Mani, a Vietnamese-born Buddhist monk, radio presenter and great admirer of the reclusive and influential German philosopher. In their wide-ranging conversation, Maha Mani poses broad questions to Heidegger, yielding an illuminating exchange of ideas between two distinct schools of thought – and some characteristically enigmatic answers. Heidegger shows a sincere appreciation of aspects of Buddhism, such as its rejection of materialism and the compatibility of non-theism and religion. Some of the considerable differences between Buddhist thought and his own emerge as well, including his notion that, among living things, only humans possess the burden of ‘Being’. Their discussions of these timeless questions also open the way for fascinating glimpses into Heidegger’s views in the wake of the Second World War, including his call for a new age of thought and self-reflection amidst the ceaselessly rising tide of technology, and the enduring need for philosophy despite its historical shortcomings.

A Buddhist monk probes Heidegger on the limits, and necessity, of philosophy

a reply to: PublicOpinion
Has there ever been anything other than right now?
Nothing other has ever been found.

The mind/thought imagines other.... it does it now.

a reply to: PublicOpinion

Being and nothingnesss.

There is no other question greater that one can ask than why does anything exist at all as opposed to nothing.

This is I remember from philosophy class 30 years ago.

a reply to: dfnj2015
No things.....just what is occuring.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

The mind/thought imagines other.... it does it now.

Actually, the mind does its thing a moment after now.

a reply to: butcherguy
Actually it doesn't.
Thinking happens presently.

originally posted by: butcherguy
a reply to: Itisnowagain

The mind/thought imagines other.... it does it now.

Actually, the mind does its thing a moment after now.

How did you arrive at this conclusion?

a reply to: butcherguy
Do you assume that there are things happening outside of what is happening?

a reply to: Itisnowagain

Could be alternative universes or just things we can't perceive due to a lack of organs to perceive with, or a lack of experience to differentiate very subtle impressions. Yes.



However, let me explain my intentions with this, developing a new kind of epistemology beyond a mere materialist/ positivist understanding of reality with all of it's dimensions. The New Age of Thought and Self-reflection as an utopia of sorts, and for all that we need more than one little brainstorming to explore new ways for new beginnings.
One example would be the profound effect of synchronicities and the various epiphanies they entail. That phenomenon would be one of thoses reflection thoughts can find themselves in, very surreal manifestations which we would've perceived differently if it wasn't for that thought.

In my head this is part 2 in a series of reflections on Odysseus, Myths and Cunning. Only with a focus on the light this time, and not on the dark.
This Age of Thought would be the utopia to build anew once we teared down the shackles of mere cunning.



You still with me? Of course you are. Shoot!

originally posted by: Itisnowagain
a reply to: butcherguy
Do you assume that there are things happening outside of what is happening?

This is the material world explanation.
If a material world does exist, the mind responds to things that have already happened. When you 'see' an event happen, there is a lag between the event and you processing it in your mind. The time it takes for the light or sound to reach you, the time it takes for the stimuli to reach the brain via the nerves and time that it takes for the brain to process the information.

a reply to: PublicOpinion
On the topic of trickster mythology, have you read "Trickster Makes This World" by Lewis Hyde?

Currently reading and a fascinating study of the various trickster cycles around the globe.

a reply to: PublicOpinion

However, let me explain my intentions with this, developing a new kind of epistemology beyond a mere materialist/ positivist understanding of reality with all of it's dimensions. The New Age of Thought and Self-reflection as an utopia of sorts, and for all that we need more than one little brainstorming to explore new ways for new beginnings.

I'm not criticizing here PO, just posing a question. The sense I get from this is it is asking about a paradigm shift of thought. We have been through numerous paradigms in history and such, this would seem to be, by the capitalization of the term New Age of Thought and Self-reflection, a new ''degree or phase'' within an historical progression of thought. That is a manner by which we can carry our mental development into a future that is conducive with the progress of human development. If so, then is it even relevant?

Any ''new age of thought'' will have to take into account things that have, if ever, only been considered on an abstract level but are now compelling evidence on the very nature of ''THIS'' reality, HERE, this physical world and it's limitations.

Who in the past history of thought has had to deal with the impending knowledge of global destruction as an immediate threat. Who in the past has had to deal with the evidence that our species has or soon will out grow our habitat. Who in the past has ever had to deal with the thoughts of a climate that threatens to curtail, if not all at least huge portions of established domiciles. Can you see my question here, though posed as several it is one big general question.

I would posit that focusing on a new age or thought or reflection might be nice for a few to consider here and there, but considering something like that as a paradigm shift ignores a glaring, and I mean ''glaring'' potential that thought as we know it is set to implode on itself and revert to nothing more than verbatim recitation of entrenched and sanctioned creeds.

Did I get that out well enough for comprehension?

originally posted by: Itisnowagain
a reply to: dfnj2015
No things.....just what is occuring.

I have spent years studying non-duality and yet when I try to put my finger on what it is the idea escapes me:

originally posted by: DictionaryOfExcuses
a reply to: PublicOpinion
On the topic of trickster mythology, have you read "Trickster Makes This World" by Lewis Hyde?
Currently reading and a fascinating study of the various trickster cycles around the globe.

If you appreciate psychology of types or Jungian archetypes you might enjoy this book:

King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine

originally posted by: butcherguy
a reply to: Itisnowagain

The mind/thought imagines other.... it does it now.

Actually, the mind does its thing a moment after now.

Have you ever thought about what your brain is doing between thoughts?

Before you laugh off my question as meaningless and irrelevant take note the question itself is the very answer to the question.

a reply to: dfnj2015

Thank you for the tip, it's on my list.

In order to truly advance ALL* must be allowed to come to the table, wealthy and non-wealthy, strong and weak, aware and unaware.

Otherwise nothing actually changes, except holders of illusionary power, within a powerless realm. And holdbacks continue.

Therefore none are actually powerful as they think they are for they have not managed to outsmart the power of time without potentially depending on technology...

And so are judged EQUALLY as are the rest by the truly powerful over ALL* the Created as time reaches for them pulling them into class for evaluation of how time was used by them, individually.

a reply to: PublicOpinion
I feel the teachings that some feel are irrelevant are not truly understood until time exist no more, yet conscious perception shall.-

Test...How do you know that you are alive and not a sleeping soul under advanced conscious apprehension within a controlled mechanism?


-And at those points of Existence it is better understood and seen w/o the physical eyes but w/ the third eyes how effective such teachings deemed irrelevant really were/ARE.

It comes back to free will ironically and what you perceive and believe to be your religion, science or political foundations.
Choose wisely 😉

HAPPY HALLOWEEN 😈

originally posted by: PublicOpinion
...
You still with me? Of course you are.

Ya man !

Before we let the wolves sit at the table: perhaps we should just get the table set-up ?

originally posted by: butcherguy

originally posted by: Itisnowagain
a reply to: butcherguy
Do you assume that there are things happening outside of what is happening?

This is the material world explanation.
If a material world does exist, the mind responds to things that have already happened. When you 'see' an event happen, there is a lag between the event and you processing it in your mind. The time it takes for the light or sound to reach you, the time it takes for the stimuli to reach the brain via the nerves and time that it takes for the brain to process the information.

Doesn't matter..... thought still appears presently.....everything is appearing and disappearing now.

Send a reply when it is not now, lol.
At the beginning of the reply it will be now.... and on completion it will be now and even when I read it, it will be now.

Time is simply a mental idea..... tomorrow is a word that happens now.

If there is no time then how can there be a separate you? A separate you needs time to have a life.

But what if there is just what is happening..... the one (without a second) life?

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
a reply to: PublicOpinion

However, let me explain my intentions with this, developing a new kind of epistemology beyond a mere materialist/ positivist understanding of reality with all of it's dimensions. The New Age of Thought and Self-reflection as an utopia of sorts, and for all that we need more than one little brainstorming to explore new ways for new beginnings.

I'm not criticizing here PO, just posing a question. The sense I get from this is it is asking about a paradigm shift of thought. We have been through numerous paradigms in history and such, this would seem to be, by the capitalization of the term New Age of Thought and Self-reflection, a new ''degree or phase'' within an historical progression of thought. That is a manner by which we can carry our mental development into a future that is conducive with the progress of human development. If so, then is it even relevant?

Any ''new age of thought'' will have to take into account things that have, if ever, only been considered on an abstract level but are now compelling evidence on the very nature of ''THIS'' reality, HERE, this physical world and it's limitations.

Who in the past history of thought has had to deal with the impending knowledge of global destruction as an immediate threat. Who in the past has had to deal with the evidence that our species has or soon will out grow our habitat. Who in the past has ever had to deal with the thoughts of a climate that threatens to curtail, if not all at least huge portions of established domiciles. Can you see my question here, though posed as several it is one big general question.

I would posit that focusing on a new age or thought or reflection might be nice for a few to consider here and there, but considering something like that as a paradigm shift ignores a glaring, and I mean ''glaring'' potential that thought as we know it is set to implode on itself and revert to nothing more than verbatim recitation of entrenched and sanctioned creeds.

And that's the comedy gold of human progress right there. In a way your thoughts have been the basis for this thread, I'm totally with you on that. Nearly nothing we have up and running is free from our positivist mindset, which is why the things we do must be (more ore less) directly connected to mere survival. Our hands are bound, effectively.
Within our highly specialized centers of production (designed to maximize effectivity and profits - think Amazon) humans are merely a cost-factor with ears and their work looks more and more robotic due to the merits of automatisation, digitalisation and compartmentalization for the corporate business model.

Think about it as a thought imploding on itself:

“Enlightenment, understood in the widest sense as the advance of thought, has always aimed at liberating human beings from fear and installing them as masters. Yet the wholly enlightened earth is radiant with triumphant calamity.”

D.o.E. - Adorno & Horkheimer

Here's another analogy to ponder:

originally posted by: Nothin:

Before we let the wolves sit at the table: perhaps we should just get the table set-up ?

Dang on the money, innit? We don't just need a new table after a pack of beasts ate the old one, all of our collective efforts actually led us to the point we're at: a complete disaster. Let's set things up differently this time?
What I'm getting at would be nothing less than the space we meet in, the way we set up roundtables and hence the processes we would need to keep the beasts (within us) at bay this time. I'm not asking for little things, I'm not even asking for a change of the paradigm only. A new renaissance? Maybe. But a peoples republic along the lines of Marx isn't really going to change the whole ordeal, or is it?

Here's one of my usual thoughts on this: what if we would free our mental capacities from this hunt for profits, and have science look into those, not fully understood processes like synchronicities and "esoteric" in general, for example? The effect of the mind on the body (or on the perception of reality as such) is already better understood in traditional chinese medicine, for example.

What if we'd use science to ask questions again, in a truly self-reflective Age of Thought which is aware of it's limitations? We didn't explore the depth of our own oceans but here we find ourselves, a bunch of arrogant naked apes on a path of extinction, reaching for the stars.