2010.12.31 01:00 - Mini Vacations

The Guardian for this meeting was Pema Pera. The comments are by Pema Pera.

Pema Pera: Hi Rhia!
Rhiannon Dragoone: hi Pema!
Pema Pera: how are you?
Rhiannon Dragoone: I am awesome; cold but awesome. How 'bout you?
Rhiannon Dragoone: And what's a rubyist?

Rhiannon was refering to the group's tag above my avatar.

Pema Pera: somebody programming in Ruby, a computer language :)
Rhiannon Dragoone: oh, ok
Pema Pera: I'm glad to see that you enjoy visiting us here. May I ask, what attracts you most to our group, and where do you think we could improve things?
Rhiannon Dragoone: What attracts me is the range of conversation; esp. like the philosophical threads, of course; but the way it's facilitated, with respect and empathy being the hallmarks
Pema Pera: glad to hear that :)
Pema Pera: have you tried to play with the 9-sec breaks?
Rhiannon Dragoone: And i don't know about improvements; there were a couple of times in my first visits where I was made to feel uncomfortable; but the facilitators handled it the best they could
Rhiannon Dragoone: hi 0
Pema Pera: hi five-rings!
Pema Pera: do you know about our 9-sec breaks, Rhia?
Pema Pera: Hi Calvino!
Rhiannon Dragoone: 9 seconds? I know that every 15 min, you have a 90 sec break; is that whaty you're talking about? I have to confess I use them to catch up with IM's.
Rhiannon Dragoone: Hi Cal!
Calvino Rabeni: Hi Rhi, Pema and O
oO0Oo Resident: Hj Cal
Pema Pera: the idea behind "Play as Being" is that in RL we spend a few hours or more a day in which we create little breaks in what we do, roughly once every 15 minutes for 9 sec (here in SL it's longer, for good measure)
Pema Pera: the idea is that when you do something every day, it has the possibility to actually change your life, or the way you look at the world
Pema Pera: these 9-sec breaks can be see as micro-meditations
Pema Pera: and we don't give much instruction, beyond the general advice "drop what you have to see what you are"
Rhiannon Dragoone: oic
Pema Pera: even though the total time required, a few minutes a day, is very small, it does seem to have a large effect on those who try, within the first few days already
Pema Pera: compared to more traditional meditation methods, we trade duration for frequency
Pema Pera: here is some more background: http://wiki.playasbeing.org/About_PlayAsBeing/Basic_Ideas
Rhiannon Dragoone: Almost like mini-vacations

which provided the titel for this log.

oO0Oo Resident: I was just going to ask for a link. Tjanks pema
Pema Pera: and here is another: http://wiki.playasbeing.org/About_PlayAsBeing/Chat_Log_Excerpts/Excerpts_%28short%29
--BELL--
Pema Pera: (and thanks a lot, Calvino, for helping with the last minute wiki transfer crisis :-)
Calvino Rabeni: YW
Calvino Rabeni: Can you say anything, Pema about recent activities you're aware of in phenomenology?
Rhiannon Dragoone: hooray for Cal, the hero
Pema Pera: hmmmm, it's a very diverse field, and I'm not keeping track of it all -- there is frankly not that much that really grabs my attention -- most papers that are written seem to be rather academic and detailed, either more language oriented, or applied in a way that doesn't really seem to touch the core of phenomenology
Pema Pera: but when I occasionally run into phenomenologists who are really driven by curiosity about the very nature of reality, then I perk up and I'm happy to engage in conversations (^_^)
Calvino Rabeni: Was there some activity that Wol attended during the visit?
Calvino Rabeni: Not a formal event then.
Rhiannon Dragoone: Yeah, most phenomenologists have taken a lief from analytic philosophy
Rhiannon Dragoone: And are very detailed oriented and scholarlyk
Pema Pera: yes, he and I met a Japanese phenomenologist with whom I'm collaborating, Shigeru Taguchi, one with whom I really see eye-to-eye
Calvino Rabeni: That's the problem Rhi, in brief, that the details are a priori speculative and hardly based on phenomenological observation
Pema Pera: he has written a wonderful book, about core-self or original self, "Ur-ich" (but written in German and translated into Japanese; no English version yet)
Calvino Rabeni: Any position papers in English?
Pema Pera: I'm not sure -- we're writing a book now, together, in English, with a third author whom Wol also met, a mathematician from Kyoto
Calvino Rabeni: Something in German, I see, but I don't read
Rhiannon Dragoone: Well, Cal, but the whole problem with phemenonology is that it purports to give a description of experience pure and without preconception, but there is always an a priori structure; always.
Rhiannon Dragoone: Who will publish the book, Pema; i'd be interested in reading it
Pema Pera: A good English introduction to Phenomenology is the book by Dan Zahavi, a good friend of mine (who brought me in contact with Shigeru). It is called Husserl's Phenomenology

Here is a URL: http://www.amazon.com/Husserls-Phenomenology-Cultural-Memory-Present/dp/0804745463

Pema Pera: oh, we just started, Rhia, no publisher yet
Rhiannon Dragoone: I kind of plunged in like diving into ice water; my introduction was Sartre's Being and Nothingness; which I read at age e16
--BELL--
Pema Pera: that must have been quite a plunge :-)
Calvino Rabeni: But you survived the plunge ... I know other who nearly did not
Pema Pera: I read Spinoza and Seneca when I was 17
Pema Pera: somewhat different tags
Pema Pera: how so, Calvino?
Rhiannon Dragoone giggles at Cal
Rhiannon Dragoone: Yeah, Spinoza takes some mathematical preparedness, AI think, although his work isn't mathematical, it is in geometric form
Calvino Rabeni: He was somewhat disturbed... went through a succession of philosophers and then ended up in the bathroom with a revolver I'm afraid
Rhiannon Dragoone: Seneca is almost a poet by modern philosophical standards
Pema Pera: hmm, he may have taken nothingness too directly . . .
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
Rhiannon Dragoone: Pema, Sartre only took two shots a day; or was that Touluse-Latrec and absenthe? I get the two confused sometimes.
Rhiannon Dragoone: One had broken legs and the other a wal-eye
Pema Pera: what I liked about both Spinoza and Seneca was how the atmosphere changed completely as soon as I opened their books and started reading them -- and still that is a kind of direct test for me, how a writer changes my immediate being-here while reading, more than the precise arguments given
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, I understand that
Rhiannon Dragoone: Yes, all the great philosophers transport you into their minds
Calvino Rabeni: You're reading between the lines
Pema Pera: :-)
oO0Oo Resident: | :) |

I was really impressed by oO0Oo's quick power of improvisation!

Pema Pera: hahaha
Pema Pera: or peeping between a picket fence?
Rhiannon Dragoone: Well, you have to be careful when reading between the lines, lest they read between you.
oO0Oo Resident: u|u
Pema Pera: (^_^)
Pema Pera: Rhia, do you have a favorite philosophical direction?
Rhiannon Dragoone: Pema, Im an analytic philosopher by training
Calvino Rabeni: And where did you go after being trained?
Rhiannon Dragoone: Oh, Afganistan, El Salvador, Columbia; oh, youj meant after my philosophical training. heh
Calvino Rabeni: heh
Rhiannon Dragoone: Seriously, I have always had a love hate relationship with analytic philosophy; as you can tell by my likiing Sartre
Rhiannon Dragoone: (Oh, this is so cool; Heinlein was right; the best way to lie is to tell the truth uncinvincingly.)
Calvino Rabeni: I'd say I'm more interested in the leading edge rather than the trailing edge of your investigations
Rhiannon Dragoone: oh, speaking of lies--the latest rusmor about me at PI/PHJ is that I'm Saul Kripki
Rhiannon Dragoone: Well, i'm applying my thought to practical situations; applied ethics; that takes both an analytic and phenomenological bent.
Calvino Rabeni nods
--BELL--
Rhiannon Dragoone: Sort of like Austin was a linguistic phenomenologist, i have to be an ethological phenomenologist
Calvino Rabeni: I misread that as ethnological
Rhiannon Dragoone: yeah, that's close, but ethology is the study of common ethics and values

The word ethology can be confusing,  because of its two quite different meanings.  According to the thefreedictionary.com it can mean:

1. The scientific study of animal behavior, especially as it occurs in a natural environment.

2. The study of human ethos and its formation.

Calvino Rabeni: Pheno is like type O blood, you can tranfuse some of it into nearly any discipline
Rhiannon Dragoone: Cal, now that's a nice analogy; i like that
Rhiannon Dragoone: yeah, as long as you don't get too hung up on being a purist in the use of the methodology
Calvino Rabeni: Especially for phenomenology
Rhiannon Dragoone: But that's one thing both analytic philosophers and phenomenologists have in common though, the emphasis on methodology, rather than conclusions
Calvino Rabeni: purists of any stripe paint themselves into a corner
Rhiannon Dragoone: yeah, they do
Rhiannon Dragoone: reality is too complicated for any one approach to work
Rhiannon Dragoone: hi Zen!
oO0Oo Resident: welcome Zen
Pema Pera: hi Zen!
Zen Arado: Hi all :)
Calvino Rabeni: I think the main thing of interest to me about any methodologist - it's more important than their philosophy - whether they are purists or muli perspectival
Calvino Rabeni: Hi Zen
Rhiannon Dragoone: yeah, that is an important feature of them.
Zen Arado: what's a methodologist?

Time for me to leave; the session would continue for a second hour and longer, but since I was not present I will leave that part uncommented.

Pema Pera: I'll have to take off, to catch dinner -- a few more hours to go in the old year :-)
Rhiannon Dragoone: Zen, someone who emphasizes a method in philosophy, reather than a belief or outlook
Rhiannon Dragoone: nite, Pema
Zen Arado: bye Pema :)
Calvino Rabeni: I meant, Zen, someone who takes their methodology (in any discipline) in a fundamentalist manner
Pema Pera: nice talking with you all
oO0Oo Resident: all the best Pema
Rhiannon Dragoone: Zen, like an analytic philosopher or a phenomenologist
Calvino Rabeni: Take care, Pema :)
Rhiannon Dragoone: nice talking to you pema
Zen Arado: like a pragmatist?
Rhiannon Dragoone: As opposed to a pragmatist, or a Marxist, or someone who comes from a point of view of set of dogmas
Rhiannon Dragoone: Well, a pragmatist can be a methodologist
Calvino Rabeni: Well they can be fundamentalists too
Rhiannon Dragoone: Or he can believe in pragmatism, the dharma
Rhiannon Dragoone: And Cal and i were opposing what Cal calls fundamentalism in methodology
Zen Arado: funny how we use words and assume the other person agrees on what they mean
Rhiannon Dragoone: Whether you use the methodology that works at the time, rather than a strong commitment to it
Rhiannon Dragoone nods at Zen
Rhiannon Dragoone: Well, i'm going to log; have some heavy duty sleetping to do
Zen Arado: nite Rhi
Calvino Rabeni: Dream well
oO0Oo Resident: bye Rhi
Rhiannon Dragoone: nite Zen
Zen Arado: sweet dreams
Rhiannon Dragoone: thank you Cal; you too
Rhiannon Dragoone: bye Samud
Rhiannon Dragoone: sweet dreams to you all
oO0Oo Resident: ty
Zen Arado: think Buddhism is methodological
Zen Arado: Hi Bleu
Bleu Levasseur: hello zen
Zen Arado: we work in direct experience
oO0Oo Resident: hi bleu
Bleu Levasseur: morning everyone
Bleu Levasseur: sorry, i rezzed in last place i was at
Calvino Rabeni: good morning
oO0Oo Resident: np Bleu
Bleu Levasseur: and am logging off again now..
Bleu Levasseur: tc all
Zen Arado: sure
Zen Arado: see you again
Calvino Rabeni: Zen,
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: can you tell me, what's the distinction suggested to you by the word "psychological" when you use it to critique a perspective?
Zen Arado: yesterday I was referring to Caplan bringing so much psychology into her book
Zen Arado: but she has a Ph D in psychology - so hardly surprising
Calvino Rabeni: I was curious what that means to you
Zen Arado: I feel some antipathy to the fusion of psychology and spiritual matters
Calvino Rabeni: Can you say why?
Zen Arado: hmmmm...I'm not sure that Zen, for instance, needs it
Calvino Rabeni: In other words they seem like separate and somewhat well defined categories?
Zen Arado: and it kind of changes it somehow
Zen Arado: it's as if America in particular has such a psychology oriented culture
Zen Arado: was surprises when my Zen teacher started using psychology during his teaching
Zen Arado: maybe I have purist leanings in this direction
Zen Arado: not sure that psychology adds anythng to Zen teachong and might be distracting
Calvino Rabeni: For example, would you tend to say the concept of spiritual materialism is not meaningful or doesn't refer to anything, or on the other hand that psychological formulations aren't important to it and if it exists it can be approached in other ways?
Zen Arado: I read TRungpa's book about SM
Calvino Rabeni: For example, different people may undertake a practice under the influence of very different motivations - does that matter?
Zen Arado: a phrase he coined?
Zen Arado: maybe we shouldn't have any motvation
Zen Arado: just adopt a kind of natural path
Zen Arado: the psychology kind of makes Zen a method ot cure psychological problems
Calvino Rabeni: but that ideal doesn't have pragmatic traction, really ... the fact remains of motivation
Zen Arado: curing *
Zen Arado: there is a difference in a spiritual search
Calvino Rabeni: Yes i agree, that would be spiritual materialism to use it as a cure in that way
Calvino Rabeni: however the psychological analysis could as easily be used to control for such influences as to "cause" them
Zen Arado: I remember John Loori in one of his books saying that if a would be spiritual seeker had psychological problems he should find a therapist to heal them
Zen Arado: and then take up the spiritual search again
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, .. were you resistant or supportive of that idea?
Zen Arado: it made sense to me at the time
Zen Arado: but perhaps that was old fashioned
Zen Arado: perhaps we can't get away from a melding of psychology and spirituality
Zen Arado: but I resist Caplan's idea that we all need a psychotherapist as well as doing a spiritual practice
Calvino Rabeni: We're acting as if those categories were defined, meaningful, and separate
--BELL--
Zen Arado: yes - have to use them to explain then get caught by them
Zen Arado: how do you know you need a psychotherapist?
Zen Arado: I'm slowly coming to the realization we don't need to do anything
Calvino Rabeni: or a guru...? Or a time management consultant, etc.
Zen Arado: yes
Zen Arado: we all want truth by authority
Zen Arado: how do we know we can believe anyone?
Calvino Rabeni: Well they're as credible as oneself in many cases more so
Zen Arado: I suppose we fool ourselves
Zen Arado: but we can practice to see through that
Zen Arado: others can fool us esier
Calvino Rabeni: One makes use of the knowledge of others, after an assessment that they've achieved more knowledge and mastery in a certain area of experience
oO0Oo Resident: http://is.gd/jPkpz
Zen Arado: but how do we assess if we aren't also experts ourselves?
Calvino Rabeni: I'd say for swatches of knowledge, self-blindness is greater than other-blindness
Zen Arado: interesting 0
Zen Arado: that's the main point of Caplan's book I guess
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, I was thinking along those lines 0 - thanks for the scheme
oO0Oo Resident: yw
Calvino Rabeni: It reminds me of the categorization of "Ten schools of Strategy" in management
Zen Arado: having discrimination about spiritual teachers especially
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
Calvino Rabeni: Which involves discrimination about oneself, fundamentally also
Zen Arado: if you chose a teacher by their lifestyle you wouldn't go near Chogram Trungpa :)
Zen Arado: but he was a great teacher
Zen Arado: finally we have to teach ourselves
Zen Arado: take on board what makes sense
Zen Arado: but I am wary of giving myself to a guru
Zen Arado: I wonder a lot about Ramani Maharshi - his presence alone taught you the way to enlightenment supposedly
Zen Arado: whare I look for rational arguments
Zen Arado: a great mystery to me
oO0Oo Resident: I apologise for making outside references, but if you have never seen the film, The Horse Boy, I recommend it, in line with this converstaion about psychology/therapy/spirituality, and what we essentially need, as it relates to cultural and social context
Zen Arado: maybe it is a kind of hypnosis
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: What's the mystery, Zen? ... Thanks 0.
Zen Arado: ty 0
oO0Oo Resident: yw, also The Cave of the Yellow Dog, as a fruitional fresh psychological health atmosphere
Zen Arado: that someone's mere presence could be so powerful
Zen Arado: always was suspicious of charisma
Zen Arado: like, say, Bill Clinton has reputedly great charisma
Calvino Rabeni: Thanks, The Horse Boy is available by video on demand
Zen Arado: suspect it is built up in people's minds?
Calvino Rabeni: what isn't?
Calvino Rabeni: (sorry...)
Zen Arado: true
Calvino Rabeni: well compared to "built up" as a social construction
Zen Arado: but not in such an exagerrated way
Calvino Rabeni: that's a collaborative or emergent structure?
Zen Arado: kind of group hppnosis?
Zen Arado: like powerful evangelistic preachers
Zen Arado: people's desire to believe what they say must be important factor too
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
oO0Oo Resident: conditioned to trust "experts"?
Calvino Rabeni: That's also something that influences what "spiritual" practices become popular
Zen Arado: the passions drive our reasoning, David Hume said
oO0Oo Resident: loose faith in our innate wisdom
Calvino Rabeni: It's not either or
Zen Arado: anyway I better go and get my groceries
Zen Arado: a pragmatic chore :)
Calvino Rabeni: But in a practical sense it seems worthwhile to have at least some groups undermining the "culture of experts"
Zen Arado: nice talking to you both
Calvino Rabeni: Likewise Zen, as always
oO0Oo Resident: Did I interupt your train Zen?
Zen Arado: bye
oO0Oo Resident: take care Zen
Zen Arado: no 0 - I need groceries :)
Calvino Rabeni: Not to be confused with the Spanish word "grocerias"
oO0Oo Resident: which means?
Calvino Rabeni: something like "curses" or "maledictions"
oO0Oo Resident: while they can and do occur, we don't need them
Calvino Rabeni: Not something to be sought and gathered, no
Calvino Rabeni: The Cave of the Yellow Dog looks good too
--BELL--
oO0Oo Resident: Would ofcourse be interested in your oppinion of them, should it come to pass, that you are able to see one or both.
Calvino Rabeni: Of course, that would be a good conversation, I'll try to remember
oO0Oo Resident: Something about what Pema said, about feeling 'that feeling'
Calvino Rabeni: In what context did he say that?
Calvino Rabeni: Today, about the book reading
Calvino Rabeni: yes
oO0Oo Resident: When he described what was meanigful about reading the two philosophers when he was 17
Calvino Rabeni: Do you mean the movies affected you in a similar way?
oO0Oo Resident: the spark that was present
oO0Oo Resident: not his words
Calvino Rabeni: Spark, the "music"
Calvino Rabeni: the Quality
oO0Oo Resident: the interconnection maybe
oO0Oo Resident: therapy predominates, I believe because of disconnection in society
oO0Oo Resident: we have to pay people to be our friends
oO0Oo Resident: to care
oO0Oo Resident: for an hour at a time
Calvino Rabeni: I've heard that ... but therapists don't make good friends and vice versa
Calvino Rabeni: but
Calvino Rabeni: I know some therapists who basically decided
Calvino Rabeni: to tell their clients - look, get a good social life for yourself, so you don't need to keep coming to me
Calvino Rabeni: and then went beyond that
oO0Oo Resident: yes there's an awareness of how it can't be genuine, and that there is a commoditisatiob model happening, rather than a mutual
Calvino Rabeni: to create good settings for people to do just that
oO0Oo Resident: yes
Calvino Rabeni: I know at least 2 who had the same insight and did the same thing
oO0Oo Resident: they are saving themselves
Calvino Rabeni: One of them hosts a weekly amateur music and poetry event
Calvino Rabeni: which has its own community circle now
Calvino Rabeni: and the other hosts a conversation cafe and social event
oO0Oo Resident: getting to know neighbors, collaborating... everyone benefits
oO0Oo Resident: for the benefit of all
Calvino Rabeni: in other wortrue true
oO0Oo Resident: I feel this here
Calvino Rabeni: wondered if you quoted that from my profile :)
oO0Oo Resident: yes
Calvino Rabeni: heh
oO0Oo Resident: I did
oO0Oo Resident: and I really admire what you have written there
Calvino Rabeni: It spreads out from there
Calvino Rabeni: I helped set up a neighborhood group .. it's mostly for householders so I don't participate much, but it took off and has been growing
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: their current initiatives are around helping people re-learn various skills of relying on self and neighbor rather than commoditized technical systems
oO0Oo Resident: That's awesome. It is so true, about there being more than meets the eye, and authentic presence such a gift
Calvino Rabeni: Yes if it has that "music" in it
oO0Oo Resident: we are the music we have been waiting/longing for
Calvino Rabeni: meaning a kind of emergent and holistic quality (for lack of a better way to describe it)
Calvino Rabeni: The article on types of teachers was interesting - I wonder how systematic it was - it might be similar to thinking about the nature of "help" in a broader sense
Calvino Rabeni: So for instance, group facilitation on the one hand, or self-help on the other
oO0Oo Resident: einen augenblick bitte
Calvino Rabeni: That is, the article considers help that is provided by one individual to another individual presumably of lesser experience, but those parameters could be broadened some
Calvino Rabeni: Anyway ... I believe I best be going
Calvino Rabeni: Thanks for the chat O
Calvino Rabeni: Be well, talk to you later
oO0Oo Resident: thought I could find more on his blog or site unfetteredmind, but will not dig to much at present
oO0Oo Resident: ty Cal. Best to you
Calvino Rabeni: You too thanks