Positive Things to Embrace, for Perspective for Choice

I noticed that in my post yesterday:

Before attempt Rational Living - First Cast Aside Anxiety, Irritation, Negative Judgement

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was completely stated negatively!  I only mentioned what I wanted to avoid, which is exactly the worst way to go about changing your focus.

So, stated *positively* I have:

Before attempt Rational Living - First Embrace --

• Philosophical Security
• Epicurean Delight
• Graciousness - Tolerance - Accommodation
• Being Informed by Honest Work.

Embrace these before, as a prerequisite for attempting Rational Effective Living -- attempting --

• analysis
• decision
• commitment
• action
• rinse & repeat.

In detail:

Embrace Philosophical Security - this is the peace and security of the Stoic philosophers, such as found in Epictetus

Show me someone who is sick, and yet happy; in danger, and yet happy; dying, and yet happy; exiled, and yet happy; disgraced, and yet happy.  Show him to me, for, by the gods, I long to see a Stoic.

http://www.knowledgereform.com/2010/02/17/stoic-advice-from-epictetus-on-the-art-of-living-part-2/

Embrace Epicurean Delight - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aponia

As with the other Hellenistic schools of philosophy, the Epicureans believed that the goal of human life is happiness. This was to be found in the tranquillity of spirit which resulted from aponia, suppression of physical pain, and ataraxia, elimination of mental disturbances.

In my mind it is taking enthralling happiness from the commonest of physical experiences, like a breath of morning air, or a sip of cold pure water.

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Embrace Graciousness - Tolerance - Accommodation - for other people and outside things, offer them all graciousness, tolerance, accommodation.

Embrace Being Informed by Honest Work - how wonderful to enter a situation being informed by honest work.  You can speak with understanding, assurance, and earned confidence.

I have a lot of practicing to do, to learn this skill!

Wang Yangming (Wang Shou-Jen)

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Listening to Audible.com _Confucius, Lao Tzu, and Chinese Philosophy_. Very interested in Wang Yangming. He felt very strongly that action and knowledge are inseparable.

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy » Wang Yangming (Wang Shou-Jen): "
...[T]wo possibilities: first, that one can have knowledge without/prior to corresponding action; and second, that one can know what is the proper action, but still fail to act. Because of these two possibilities, the traditional position left open the possibility of separating knowledge and action, but called for the overcoming of this separation.
However, Wang denied both possibilities. These two denials constitute the essence of Wang’s theory of the unity of knowledge and action. First, according to Wang, it is only through simultaneous action that one can obtain knowledge: “If you want to know bitterness, you have to eat a bitter melon yourself.” Wang denied any other possible routes to obtain knowledge.
According to Wang, it is not possible for one to put something into practice after acquiring knowledge. This is because knowledge and action are unified already, from beginning to end. We cannot unify knowledge and action because they are already unified. Of course, Wang was aware of the claims that “there are people who know that parents should be served with filial piety and elder brothers with respect but cannot put these things into practice. This shows that knowledge and action are clearly two different things.” Wang’s answer was: “The knowledge and action you refer to are already separated by selfish desires and are no longer knowledge and action in their original state.” In other words, knowledge necessarily/automatically leads to action in its original state. We cannot have knowledge while preventing it from leading to action.
"

from Wikipedia article:

Wang believed that only through simultaneous action could one gain knowledge and denied all other ways of gaining it. To him, there was no way to use knowledge after gaining it because he believed that knowledge and action were unified as one. Any knowledge that had been gained then put into action was considered delusion or false.

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This is an important one for me, because my days are filled with knowledge acquired and never put into action. What a change if I never let it outside of the focus of my mind: turn knowledge into action, NOW, because otherwise that knowledge was false, it was simply delusion that lulled me into indulgent contemplation.

Free Will and Sloppy Dualism

Very thought provoking post by Mark C. Chu-Carroll, talking about sloppy thinking with regards to "free will". Sloppy Dualism on Bad Astronomy : Good Math, Bad Math

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This is what I call "sloppy dualism". Classic dualism is the belief that there are two separate parts to our beings: bodies, which are physical, and spirits, which are something else. Phil has been very clear in the past: he utterly rejects religious beliefs in "spirits" or "souls"; dualism is just religious nonsense. But the implication of what he's saying tries to sneak dualism in by a back door. It's almost like a "god of the gaps" argument; a "free will of the gaps" kind of dualism. He's claiming to argue in favor of a purely scientific universe, with no room for the supernatural. But he tries to sneak a little bit of space in to the fuzziness of how things work to make room for his own free will.

Mark calls me out, because I have been guilty of allowing my concept of "free will" to have more latitude than I allow my concept of "God". Some very good comments:

I agree with you on dualism and the criticism of Phil. There's no reason that certain things like consciousness and free will should be 'special'. Certainly the same laws of physics fundamentally apply to everything and I don't think any special exceptions are necessary to explain choice; emergence is sufficient physical explanation for me. So I'm not seeing the need for invoking anything extra, either by claiming materialism but making exceptions, or claiming dualism. As far as I can see my position requires me to admit that free will is (probably) an illusion, but I don't have a problem with that. The world is complex enough that I wouldn't notice the difference.

Posted by: Archena October 2, 2009 3:34 PM

There are different contexts in which will is discussed. It makes a lot of sense in the context of human intent, a context in which Phil's will was free, because he was working absent coercion or threat. It makes much less sense in the context of physics, where for the most part, its proponents cannot even define what free will means. They simultaneously want it to be non-random but also not a function of the state of the person who makes a decision. The problem is that there isn't much conceptual space between those alternatives. In the context of physics, the opposite of deterministic is probabilistic. And while it is quite likely that we are not fully deterministic systems, given that physics isn't fully deterministic, the involvement of the random flip of coins doesn't help the philosophical case for a mystical free will.

Posted by: Russell October 2, 2009 12:17 PM I ended up with a much more skeptical, cynical, and limited concept of "free will". I still think it is best studies across the species, across time periods on the order of a decade, and in spoken in terms of morality and abstraction and action.

Gideon Bible - helping some, but I would change the book...

I am just going to free form this one. Just in the last 24 months I gots a better grasp on things, from things I have read. It could easily fit inside one book. I think it would help a different sort of person than the ones who may find comfort in a Gideon Bible. If you collected the prescriptions and techniques of morality and virtue and ethics from these fine Greeks and Romans...

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicureanism ... if you collected their ethics and life philosophy, you would really have something. Forget their crazy science and cosmology - all stupid. Get a recent book - scholarship on these fine fellows only really began in earnest in the 1970s. ... and Plato and Aristotle can go stick it. Forget those two gas bags and everything they blubbered about. Socrates, alone, is of limited value as well - read what the Cynics, Stoics, Epicureans developed based on his example, because that is more comprehensive and usable. Besides, we don't have access to Socrates, we only have Plato's Socrates.

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You could do worse than start with: A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy By William Braxton Irvine Read Larry Winget: you can do worse than start with "It's Called Work For A Reason" Here is a book free on Google Books Self-help: with illustrations of character and conduct By Samuel Smiles, [ http://books.google.com/books?id=hSwCAAAAQAAJ ], there is a nice write up by Charles Petzold [ http://www.charlespetzold.com/blog/2009/09/1859-Books-Samuel-Smiles-Self-Help.html ]. Dale Carnegie's _How to Win Friends and Influence People_ . Why not? Why make yourself miserable in human relations by not using these effective techniques? The Buddha had some solid info on eliminating human suffering. In huge block letters I would put on the first page:

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(1) NOBODY IS COMING TO RESCUE YOU! (2) NO INSPIRATIONAL MOMENT IS COMING TO BRING CLARITY. (3) YOUR BEST TOMORROW LOOKS EXACTLY LIKE TODAY, EXCEPT WITH A LITTLE MORE WORK AND A LITTLE LESS SELF-PUNISHMENT. (4) YOU WILL PROBABLY BE ALIVE 15 YEARS FROM NOW. YOUR BEST TODAY IS PAYING FORWARD FOR YOUR FUTURE 15 YEAR SELF. That is enough of this foolishness. Anyway, I have to scrounge up a few bucks to match the 1.5 billion Gideon's Bibles that are out there, for my book. Coming to a hotel nightstand drawer near you.

Erf, looking back in anger...

I have been pretty down on all adults and social influences during my childhood. It took me 38 years to find out where human society was keeping the "good shit" when it comes to how to live your life. I have no idea what occupied the time of all the adults in my life, when I was a child. Modern western culture is all about maintaining a slightly enlightened form of hedonism and narcissism, and being a very good consumer and a good enough producer.

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I am even down on the Charlie Brown cartoons I used to read. You had my undivided attention, Charles M. Schultz, why didn't you teach me how I could live meaningfully and effectively? OK, I am driving my point over a cliff. Backing off of this extreme position... it would have taken a miracle to reach me at a fundamental level - I was so self-absorbed and so full of energy to defend my fragile ego. Quoting from Patton Oswalt's fantastic high school graduation speech:

“Advice is everywhere in this world. Your friends, family, teachers and strangers are all happy to give it. “A lesson is yours and yours alone. Some of them take years to recognize and utilize.

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“My lesson was this – experience, and reward and glory are meaningless unless you’re open and present with the people you share them with in the moment.” http://www.pattonoswalt.com/index.cfm?page=spew&id=78

It is a great speech. Read the whole thing. My closed nature made it difficult for any teacher to reach me. So I am not 100% sure what the take-away is. Bah, just live your life the best you can, and when a creepy kid asks you a question, answer honestly. That is the best you can do.

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Also, assume that the teachings that are easily available are only there to make you easier to be controlled - the readily available teachings and thought only put a bit in your mouth and a bridle harness on your head. Look for the stuff that is wildly unpopular, but has stuck around for millennium. If it is wildly unpopular, but has stayed in print since the Hellenistic Age, there must be something to it. Something like Philip K. Dick's quote "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." Surviving thousands of years of unpopularity is quite an achievement for a life philosophy, and might suggest some truth to it.

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But those kind of thoughts are only available under the surface, because they won't have any social approval. So you have to be open to people to let them show you those type of things. I am back to where I started. My favorite teacher was Mister Bugbee, who was the principal and the eighth grade teacher at my Evangelical Lutheran private grade school. He was a kind man. Everything he did showed he had a kind heart. That was enough.