2014.06.23 13:00 - Phenomenology and "Geeez, Compassionate Spoons?"

The Guardian for this meeting was Eliza Madrigal. The comments are by Eliza Madrigal.

--BELL--

Agatha Macbeth: Hello Liz
Bleu Oleander: hiya Eliza, Aggers :)
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Bleu and Aggers <3
Agatha Macbeth: Hi Bleuji
Agatha Macbeth: How's the bus pass cat doing?
Eliza Madrigal smiles
Bleu Oleander: :)
Agatha Macbeth: Hiya brucie
Bleu Oleander: hiya Bruce
Bruce Mowbray: Heya, aggers, Eliza, and Bleu!
Eliza Madrigal: buspass cat's mom and I are skyping and texting a lot... have made our first plan to get together, so, we're adapting ^.^ Home feels weird though :) thanks for asking
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Bruce :)
Agatha Macbeth: Not surprised
Bruce Mowbray: Hi, Liz!
Bleu Oleander: sounds good :)
Eliza Madrigal: I'm fine then something small grips me by the throat
Eliza Madrigal: sigh :) love
Bruce Mowbray listens carefully.
Bruce Mowbray: Are you sure it is small?
Agatha Macbeth: Indeed
Eliza Madrigal: my younger daughter moved last weekend Bruce, so going through change pangs...such is life
Bruce Mowbray: OH MY....
Agatha Macbeth: As Ned Kelly said
Bruce Mowbray: Alas.... SUCH IS life....

Eliza Madrigal: But what I'm wondering right now is... shall we discuss phenomenology?
Bruce Mowbray: ;-)
Bleu Oleander: :)
Bruce Mowbray: Phenomenology is also "life," my dear.
Bruce Mowbray: WOLLIE!
Wol Euler: evening all
Agatha Macbeth: If you like, but don't expect me to understand what you're on about!
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Wol :)
Bleu Oleander: hiya Wol
Agatha Macbeth: Hi Wolster
Eliza Madrigal smiles @ Aggers
Bleu Oleander: hi Zen
Agatha Macbeth: And Zenny
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Zen, too!
Zen Arado: Hi Y'all
Bleu Oleander: the "P" word does get kinda complicated :)
Agatha Macbeth: Gone for a P
Bruce Mowbray: My typist's mother used to say ( about the empty nest syndrome....) "We teach them how to walk so they can walk away -- and become their own persons."
Bleu Oleander: if we discuss, can we use "P" so don't have to type that P word?
Bleu Oleander: lol
Bruce Mowbray: P is good.
Eliza Madrigal: for me, it is like a 'practice'... getting beneath the presentation to sensation... so I think our APAPB is P
Bruce Mowbray: definitely so, Liz.
Agatha Macbeth: If you say so
Eliza Madrigal: and beneath sensation ...
Eliza Madrigal: etc
Bruce Mowbray: I say "so" also.
Agatha Macbeth: So...

Eliza Madrigal: whether the muppet video is P, may be another discussion :)
Bruce Mowbray: Zen!
Bleu Oleander: so what do you mean by "sensation"?
Zen Arado: I prefer the Muppets' explanation
Bleu Oleander: info coming into our senses?
Eliza Madrigal: including the interface
Zen Arado: manamanah
Bleu Oleander: mahna mahna
Bleu Oleander: :)
Eliza Madrigal: I'm less aware if I am just interacting without considering the filters or functions of interaction
Bruce Mowbray: ;-)
Zen Arado: doo doo doo doo doo
Bruce Mowbray enjoyed both versions of the vid, actually.
Eliza Madrigal: Give me a second... I'm going to see if I can still pull up the phenom. list we once had at Kira (brb and please continue!)
Bruce Mowbray: kk,.
Bleu Oleander: is that a conscious choice to consider the filters and functions of interaction? can we even have access to all that?
Bruce Mowbray: I make it a conscious choice to go for subtlety in experience.
Zen Arado: don't we erect them in the first place?
Bruce Mowbray: them?
Zen Arado: filters
Bruce Mowbray: the filters.
Eliza Madrigal: maybe not but if we don't automatically say we can't, and try, we are doing P
Bruce Mowbray: kk, thanks.
Eliza Madrigal: (really brb, lol)

Purity

Agatha Macbeth: Filters need a lot of cleaning in my experience
Bruce Mowbray: ;-)
Bleu Oleander: I don't think we have access to all the processes and filters that perception goes through before we recognize it as a perception
Zen Arado: it's more a 'not doing' to me
Bruce Mowbray: nods.
Bruce Mowbray: appreciating the presence of appearance . . .
Bruce Mowbray: for me, means letting the appearances be themselves as much as we are able to do that.
Bruce Mowbray: of course there will be filters....
Bruce Mowbray: innate filters, conditioned filters, chosen filters....
Zen Arado: 'The human mind has a tendency to make everything it takes up more complicated and elaborate than it needs to be. You may have noticed this. The Buddhists even have a word for it, papanca, which means something like mental proliferation. Meditation moves us in the other direction. It is an attempt to remove, piece by piece, layer by layer, all of the baroque ornamentation with which we embellish our world of constructed experience. '

Bruce Mowbray: but still, if we can let the appearance speak for itself as much as possible . . .
Bleu Oleander: I don't understand that concept though, appearances in our consciousness are not pure by any stretch of the imagination
Bruce Mowbray: agrees with the Zen --
Agatha Macbeth: Certainly not in mine
Wol Euler: I thought the purpose was to try to clear away the impurities?
Zen Arado: from: Keep It Simple The gift of awareness Andrew Olendzki
Bleu Oleander: impurities?
Wol Euler: [13:12] Bleu (bleu.oleander): I don't understand that concept though, appearances in our consciousness are not pure by any stretch of the imagination
Bruce Mowbray: Do we trust appearances?
Wol Euler: impure = opposite of pure
Eliza Madrigal: Can anyone access this link, or is it private to those of us who attended: https://sites.google.com/site/phenom...ngs/2009-10-02 ?
Bleu Oleander: we can't have "pure" perception
Agatha Macbeth: I can
Wol Euler points to the words "try to"
Zen Arado: http://www.tricycle.com/thus-have-i-...keep-it-simple
Bleu Oleander: useless to try
Bruce Mowbray: I got it, Eliza.
Wol Euler: works for me, eliza, ty
Wol Euler: why?
Bleu Oleander: don't have access
Zen Arado: no?

--BELL--

Bleu Oleander: process is hidden from our consciousness
Eliza Madrigal: That link at least gives some interesting reading on the subject, but doesn't really help us here directly, so nevermind..
Bruce Mowbray: I must confess that the quest for "purity" in anything seems highly suspicious to me....
Eliza Madrigal: It is also impossible to talk about Being, or the Nature of Reality, but we try
Bleu Oleander: no problem to try to talk about anything
Bruce Mowbray: for sure; we try . . . but this ultimate goal of "purity" leaves me feeling somehow abstract and inhuman.
Wol Euler: except that you just ruled out the possibility of achieving anything by it!
Bruce Mowbray: , welcomeQt!
Qt Core: Hi all!
Bleu Oleander: well, I said it was not possible to have access to the unconscious processes
Zen Arado: Hi Qt
Agatha Macbeth: Hm, that's interesting
Agatha Macbeth: Buona sera QT
Eliza Madrigal: shame to get sidetracked so early in conversation... 'pure' can be a flag word, true, but one could hear it like the phrase "original face" if they wanted to
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Qt :)
Bleu Oleander: you may be able to achieve a lot by trying in terms of a practice
Bruce Mowbray: I would prefer "original face."
Bleu Oleander: hi QT
Wol Euler: buonasera, qt
Bleu Oleander: sorry if I side tracked ... didn't mean to ... will sit and listen :)
Eliza Madrigal: I read a lot by a teacher "longchenpa" and in his time he used words like purity, so I'm comfortable with it.. I don't think of it like antiseptic
Eliza Madrigal: not at all Bleu... didn't mean that at all
Eliza Madrigal: just don't want any of us to feel corrected in the terms we're comfortable with for ourselves
Eliza Madrigal: if possible
Bruce Mowbray: "Purity" is a perfectly acceptable word --- my question is whether it is a perfectly acceptable goal, or target, or even an acceptable mode for filtering our perceptions.
Bleu Oleander: ok I recognize I can get too "neurosciency" at times :)
Bleu Oleander: hazard of my job
Eliza Madrigal: :)) gets like that in universities too.. that everyone has a speciality that has particular language
Bruce Mowbray: to appreciate the appearance of presence . . . seems, to me . . . to involve a lot of impurities.
Eliza Madrigal: which is important of course... but makes the interdisciplinary thing an interface of its own
Bleu Oleander: indeed
Wol Euler: can we agree to each individually substitute for "pure" a nicer word meaning "clear away" or "detach" or "cease to be influenced by"?

Zen Arado: interesting bio of Yo Haiku
Zen Arado: but not much else there
Zen Arado: Eliza
Eliza Madrigal: there are several sessions.. as I said, just a reference if interested
Zen Arado: ok
Wol Euler nods.
Eliza Madrigal: we had another P wiki, but I don't find that one just now
Wol Euler: thank you, noted, I'll read those
Eliza Madrigal: and want to be here anyway :P

Eliza Madrigal: the other wiki had exercises like, having a spoon look at you
Eliza Madrigal: :) or something like that
Agatha Macbeth: There is no spoon :p
Eliza Madrigal grins
Bleu Oleander: doesn't sound like my kinda exercise hehe
Bruce Mowbray: :)

Eliza Madrigal: Bleu, was the issue you take most with the muppet video, about it suggesting we are coming from a state of confusion?
Bleu Oleander: now change that to my dog looking at me ... no problem
Agatha Macbeth: Woof
Zen Arado: as I said before I got disillusioned with philosophy...it just seemd to be so much wordspinning never getting anywhere..getting buried in big words and concepts and increasingly specialized and removed from reality...just my take
Wol Euler listens.
Bruce Mowbray also listens.
Agatha Macbeth: Agree with that Zenny!
Bleu Oleander: my main issue (s) were 1) the muppets had nothing to do with the text
Zen Arado: big long chains of hypotheses but all slightly flawed
Bruce Mowbray: (and appreciates what Wol said earlier: "a word meaning "clear away" or "detach" or "cease to be influenced by"...")
Bleu Oleander: 2) the text said many times not to try to understand
Agatha Macbeth: Ma nah ma nah
Zen Arado: but it is still fun for people I guess
Eliza Madrigal: okay I can see that
Eliza Madrigal: maybe the thing is, when we 'understand' something it just means we can put into words the knowledge available at the time?
Zen Arado: it's always just descriptions of reality, not reality itself, as Rorty said
Bleu Oleander: had a problem with: ...don’t try to understand life, ...just accept life as it is. phenomena .... phenomena .... ... always changing too phenomena .... ..unknowable, chaotic ...don’t try to understand life ...just accept life as it is.
Eliza Madrigal: not that we have all knowledge about anything... I'd prefer ignorance to confusion probably
Zen Arado: best is if the words point to something but you have to ignore the pointing finger at the end
Bruce Mowbray agrees with Eliza . . . and also ' understand' means to find some relevance, some framework of identification, some way of accepting it into our own life experience.
Bleu Oleander: yes prefer ignorance
Eliza Madrigal: that's the main point for me Bruce
Zen Arado: but that is impossible Bleu
Bleu Oleander: what?
Zen Arado: humans are curious by nature
Eliza Madrigal: is this something workable ... like a koan that opens up my understanding in surprising ways
Eliza Madrigal: I've found P to be that
Zen Arado: to just stop enquiring
Bleu Oleander: yes I like to think so
Zen Arado: but maybe we have to realize its limitations?
Eliza Madrigal: I find it more "hands on" than other types of philosophy
Bleu Oleander: we don't know our limitations on everything do we?
Eliza Madrigal: limitations are a given
Bruce Mowbray: [drop approaches]

--BELL--

Zen Arado: I don't mean it in that sesse of personal limitations
Bleu Oleander: we've pushed many of our limitations beyond what we thought they were
Zen Arado: can a description of reality ever actually ever become reality?
Zen Arado: seems always a gap to me
Zen Arado: and reality is everchanging
Bleu Oleander: we describe reality every day and the stories we tell ourselves are in a sense our realities
Zen Arado: yes but still fiction
Bleu Oleander: we are reality trying to understand reality
Bruce Mowbray: can a word or a sign or a symbol that represents anything ever become the thing it represents? of course not.
Zen Arado: took me years to see what I tell myself as just stories
Bruce Mowbray: "just"?
Zen Arado: yes just ;)
Eliza Madrigal: I think that's factoring the interface and suspending it too
Bleu Oleander: its really amazing the "just" part
Zen Arado: not deserving the importance I attached to them
Zen Arado: I mean
 

Epoche', Stories

Eliza Madrigal: maybe a helpful way to approach is to talk about the epoche'? I think that "is" P in practice? 
Zen Arado: when I believed them
Bleu Oleander: but they are you Zen ... part of the reality
Bruce Mowbray: Is your coming to this realization about your stories - not also a story? And a fine story, to be shared with us here and now.
Bleu Oleander: :)
Wol Euler: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epoch%C3%A9
Zen Arado: I don't think so...they are a false view of me
Zen Arado: and ceate a 'me'
Agatha Macbeth: La belle epoche
Eliza Madrigal: thanks Wol
Bleu Oleander: not false they are you
Bruce Mowbray: like it or not, we seem to be a storytelling species . . .
Zen Arado: I see it as a dropping away of a story
Bleu Oleander: thats a story too
Zen Arado: a believing them less and less
Eliza Madrigal: the only way you would discover for yourself, that the story isn't all there is, not complete or true in that sense, would be to get beyond it for a moment somehow
Bruce Mowbray: I see Second Life has a campfire in a cave . . . around which the entire world has an opportunity to gather and share stories.
Eliza Madrigal: even though as Pema said we can't really get out of the water we're in, somehow we can question the water
Zen Arado: allowing the elaborations to fade away
Bleu Oleander: and that's the problem ... we can't get outside the system
Agatha Macbeth: Neo did
Zen Arado: no but we see thrugh the stories
Eliza Madrigal: need to see Matrix Bleu ^.^
Bruce Mowbray: To inquire how the spoon sees us is a way of breaking outside the system.
Eliza Madrigal: yes!
Zen Arado: they become more transparent
Eliza Madrigal: hacking reality
Bleu Oleander: can't see beyond that though
Eliza Madrigal: or, what we think is our reality
Zen Arado: mayb the worst is believing other's stories about us
Eliza Madrigal: unless others tell us nice stories about ourselves Zen :))
Zen Arado: creating a personae for us that is just their opinion
Bleu Oleander: we have a tendency to talk about reality as if its something other than us ... something outside us but it is us too
Eliza Madrigal: indeed
Bruce Mowbray: Well, if we don't even believe the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves, what chance is there that will believe other people's stories about us?
Zen Arado: nice stories might be even more dangerous Eliza :)
Eliza Madrigal: hehehe
Eliza Madrigal: yes
Eliza Madrigal: I don't have that issue... none of the 3 kids for instance, ever agree about whether I'm a "good mom" at the same time
Zen Arado: oh I think we are mote influenced by others than we realize
Zen Arado: more
Zen Arado: you are all influencing me greatly
Bleu Oleander: but that's only one of many stories your "good mom" story :)
Bruce Mowbray: so, is this about words, or stories, or beliefs . . . or merely the appreciation of the appearances?
Eliza Madrigal: indeed, stories rushing at us all the time
Eliza Madrigal: most changing too fast to buy into
Zen Arado: all our descriptions are stories are they not?
Zen Arado: can we ever verify them?
Bruce Mowbray: naked appearances. . . . (stories? maybe not.)
Bleu Oleander: we do check most of our stories with our experiences
Zen Arado: but stories are so i9nterrsting
Zen Arado: interesting
Zen Arado: I love them
Zen Arado: maybe if we could treat them like a novel or film?
Zen Arado: and we are the space in which they are enacted?
Eliza Madrigal: did anyone watch Oscars or clip of them this year? they are just long commercials... BUT there was this moment when Lupita said something like "your dreams are valid" - loved that story
Zen Arado: just a screen
Zen Arado: :)
Qt Core: rl calls, bye all
Bleu Oleander: bye Qt
Zen Arado: byee Qt
Wol Euler: bye qt, take care
Eliza Madrigal: okay Qt, bfn
Eliza Madrigal: she is living out a dream ... a story ... but it is real in its context
Wol Euler nods to Eliza
Bruce Mowbray: I share with Zen a suspicion of the stories --- and fear that they will seem to have an authoritarian influence -- as if designed by a platonic force. but phenomenology (aka "P") seems to me to be a route away from that authoritarianism. . .
 

Just give up

Zen Arado: reality is too harsh for us
Zen Arado: got to soften it somehow
Bruce Mowbray: take it piece by subtle piece, Zen.
Bruce Mowbray: honor your own capacity for "having" it.
Zen Arado: 'humankind cannot bear very much reality'
Bleu Oleander: you can't get out of reality so just learn to accept it and not question it hehe
Bruce Mowbray: this requires great compassion for the self ("self")
Eliza Madrigal: eep
Zen Arado: yes Bruce
Zen Arado: it's the way it is
Bruce Mowbray: (Zen)
Eliza Madrigal: you sound like muppets :P
Bleu Oleander: hehe
Wol Euler: hehehe
Bleu Oleander: exactly
Bruce Mowbray: I WISH!
Zen Arado: manamanah
Bleu Oleander: NOT
Eliza Madrigal laughs wildly
Bruce Mowbray: the Muppets are enlightened.
Eliza Madrigal: well, they're cute anyway

--BELL--

Bleu Oleander: they're puppets! talk about not accepting reality!!
Bruce Mowbray: the Sufi storytellers would have been amazed by the Muppets.
Wol Euler: and tv is light projected onto the inside of a box
Eliza Madrigal: Bleu shared a wonderful cartoon several weeks ago : http://www.boreme.com/posting.php?id...1#.U6iR-o1dUag
Bruce Mowbray: Is the reality that they are puppets fashioned of cloth? or is the reality what they represent, the stories they tell, the songs they sing, and something even deeper?

The medium, the matter

Wol Euler: the medium does not matter IMHO
Wol Euler: yes, bruce
Bruce Mowbray: the medium does not matter . . .
Agatha Macbeth: Strike a happy medium
Zen Arado: because we add meaning
Eliza Madrigal: the medium doesn't matter to one who can see through it
Wol Euler: if the story is true, then it remains true no matter who tells it to you.
Bruce Mowbray: nods.
Eliza Madrigal: but to the one who cannot it is a very solid obstacle at times
Wol Euler: if it is false, then it remains false no matter who tells it to you
Bleu Oleander: its all reality
Zen Arado: reduce Football to 22 men kicking a ball around a field
Zen Arado: that's all it is really
Zen Arado: but we add so much to that
Bruce Mowbray: and if it is true, then the merest spider on its web, or homeless person on the sidewalk, could share that truth . . . Are we ready to hear it?
Bruce Mowbray: can we accept the appearance?
Bruce Mowbray: without filters.
Bleu Oleander: its always through filters
Eliza Madrigal: no filters = no we to accept
Zen Arado: could we bear life without filters?
Zen Arado: perhaps meditation helps with that
Bleu Oleander: not a real choice
Zen Arado: life isn't as horrifying as we fear when we face it
Bleu Oleander: perception is a series of filters


Such seeing


Bruce Mowbray: does the spoon want us to see itself through our filters --- or does the spoon want us to see itself as it is . . . see its spoon-ness, raw, naked -- isn't phenomenology about such seeing?
Zen Arado: we can allow them to drop or fade away little by little
Zen Arado: it isn't even a spoon until we decide it is
Bleu Oleander: last time I checked spoons can't "see"
Eliza Madrigal: view from object at subject doesn't mean anthopomorphizing
Zen Arado: it is just a piece of metal with a certain shape which we learned to call a spoon
Eliza Madrigal: it is a question aimed at questioning both
Bruce Mowbray: OH BLEU! YOU're an ARTIST!! COME on, gal!!
Wol Euler applauds!
Bleu Oleander: if the object is a spoon it is anthropomorphizing to say it can see
Bruce Mowbray: you have given us so many spoons -- so many new visions --- so many new ways of seeing!
Bruce Mowbray: what you mean a spoon is just a piece of metal?
Eliza Madrigal: not if one is underneath or questioning/suspending the subject/object dichotomy as a given
Bleu Oleander: ok so artists can paint spoons to see :)


Spoon stories

Agatha Macbeth: Some of my best friends are spoons
Zen Arado: an alien from outer space would see some metal
Eliza Madrigal: heheh Agatha
Zen Arado: only
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, artists paint spoons that can see!
Eliza Madrigal: what a friendly universe... just like SL
Bleu Oleander: alien spoons ... oh my
Bruce Mowbray: and there it is.
Zen Arado: when we were young we were taught this is a table, this is a chair etc
Eliza Madrigal nods
Bleu Oleander: for good reason :)
Agatha Macbeth: If you can have watches melting on trees...
Zen Arado: yes but it's all alearned overlay
Bruce Mowbray: May all your spoons have 20-20 vision. May all your spoons see you as you are, through compassionate eyes.
Bleu Oleander: geez compassionate spoons?
Bruce Mowbray: yes, for sure, Bleu.

Parkour

Eliza Madrigal: I find parcour a good example. We see an alley way and a few ways to walk or run through it perhaps. Someone who does parcour may see a thousand options
Bleu Oleander: yikes
Bruce Mowbray: or what's an artist for?
Bruce Mowbray: Yikes!
Zen Arado: drifting off into spoon stories ...:)
Agatha Macbeth: What's that Liz?
Eliza Madrigal: free running
Bruce Mowbray: parcour is a wonderful example!
Agatha Macbeth: As opposed to...?
Wol Euler: running up the sides of buildings etc
Bruce Mowbray: as opposed to marching...
Agatha Macbeth: Expensive running?
Bruce Mowbray: in straight lines.
Zen Arado: what is parcour?
Eliza Madrigal: look at the beginning of Casino Royale (I think that's the one) - Stim first pointed this out to me
Eliza Madrigal: and my daughter's boyfriend does it
Agatha Macbeth: Bond film?
Eliza Madrigal: so its is a bit of a fascination
Eliza Madrigal: yes
Wol Euler: reality
Agatha Macbeth nods
Bleu Oleander: never heard of parcour
Wol Euler: people do it in downtown Stuttgart on the weekend
Bleu Oleander: what is it?
Eliza Madrigal: same basic 'room' or 'space' but seen in very different ways
Bruce Mowbray: it is an extreme form of movement...
Agatha Macbeth: Thought it was a board game
Bruce Mowbray: jumping from ledge to post to ledge to sidewalk... with grace.
Zen Arado: ah
Bleu Oleander: parkay?
Zen Arado: dangerous
Bruce Mowbray: very dangerous.
Bruce Mowbray: but worth the risk.
Eliza Madrigal: lots of things are like this to an artist in their medium...but this is a good example immediately at hand
Bruce Mowbray: a man needs a little madness or else he never dares to break the ropes and be free.
Wol Euler: https://www.google.de/search?q=parkour+images
Eliza Madrigal: oh, with a k


Zen Arado: part of our nature
Zen Arado: when young especially
Zen Arado: to take risks
Bruce Mowbray: are you chalking it up to testosterone, then?
Bruce Mowbray: is this not another story?
Eliza Madrigal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZxNbAwY_rk
Zen Arado: could be
Zen Arado: just a likely explanation to me
Zen Arado: perhaps why humans are still around
Eliza Madrigal: it is waking up from the dream of the room given being only what one has seen it as before
Zen Arado: one of the factors
Bleu Oleander: dream of the room?
Eliza Madrigal: not knowing what we don't know
Bruce Mowbray ponders the room -- such a powerful metaphor.
Zen Arado: remembers reading about a retreat where the man had to just sit in a room alone all day for weeks
Zen Arado: really hard
Agatha Macbeth: Bet Wollie could do it
Zen Arado: no books or internet
Zen Arado: just 3 meals
Agatha Macbeth: Ah, maybe not then
Eliza Madrigal: hah
Zen Arado: heheh
Agatha Macbeth pokes Wol i nthe ear
Zen Arado: so why is that so difficult?
Wol Euler: sorry, I was watching
Eliza Madrigal: I think of myself as someone who could do that, but haven't tested it, and am probably wrong
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Bruce Mowbray: the same notion is mentioned by Eric Fromm in his Art of Loving. Unless capable of solitude in a room, without distraction, Fromm says we are not capable of true loving.

--BELL--

Bleu Oleander: oops gotta run thanks for interesting chat :)
Bleu Oleander: bye and hugs
Eliza Madrigal: thanks Bleu, bfn
Bruce Mowbray: bye Bleu!
Agatha Macbeth waves
Bruce Mowbray: TYTYTYTY@!
Zen Arado: byee Bleu
Eliza Madrigal: interesting Bruce
Eliza Madrigal: can you elaborate on why you think that is?
Bruce Mowbray: (give the credit to Fromm)
Zen Arado: I need to finish my French homework mes devoirs
Zen Arado: sur la Mort
Eliza Madrigal: yes, but you chose it so have some feeling about it :)
Bruce Mowbray: yes I think it has something to do with phenomenology, actually.
Eliza Madrigal: Oh, okay Zen
Eliza Madrigal: ntsy, bfn
Zen Arado: cheerful topic
Bruce Mowbray: bye for now, Zen.
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: bye zen, take care
Eliza Madrigal: can be cheerful :)
Zen Arado: byee
Agatha Macbeth: Ta ta Zen


Phenomenology as love practice


Bruce Mowbray: I think loving has to do with acceptance of the other person as they are --- not through our filters of what we want them to be.
Agatha Macbeth: Zat's it zen
Eliza Madrigal smiles
Bruce Mowbray: I think this is what Erich Fromm was driving at.
Agatha Macbeth: Damn right Brucie
Bruce Mowbray: ty, aggers.
Bruce Mowbray: is this not what phenomenology is about? I really mean that question -- I mean it seriously.
Agatha Macbeth: :)
Eliza Madrigal: I like your definition, and I do think it is... intimacy
Wol Euler nods.
Bruce Mowbray: I feel that the Platonic modality - paradigm -- some truth that is abstractly out there waiting for us to discover and conform to -- is so much bullshit.
Eliza Madrigal: no self maybe could be seen as relaxing the subject that is always projecting onto objects (even seeing people that way) thus creating less friendly encounters
Agatha Macbeth: Hehe
Wol Euler: I've found it easier to get on with other people when one's sense of self is not over-inflated
Eliza Madrigal: perhaps a more fluid experience of time and space too?
Bruce Mowbray: for sure, Wol.
Agatha Macbeth nods


Andrew


Eliza Madrigal: billions of thoughts... but time for me to get ready to pick up son from summer school :)
Agatha Macbeth: Aww
Bruce Mowbray: GOSH, I sure wish that you would watch this TED vid if you've not already seen it: http://www.ted.com/talks/andrew_solo..._us_who_we_are
Wol Euler: summerschool already?
Eliza Madrigal: quite a schedule lately.... 9-1 training for job and 2-6 summer school for him
Wol Euler: seen it, bruce, loved it-
Bruce Mowbray: THIS is a man who has LIVED what we're talking about today.
Wol Euler: admire him greatly
Eliza Madrigal: OOOh adore Andrew
Bruce Mowbray: YES, Wol!
Wol Euler nods.
Bruce Mowbray: YES, Eliza!
Eliza Madrigal: read most of Far from the Tree, but got sidetracked
Eliza Madrigal: :) but he is or seems to be, one fantastic human in the world :)
Agatha Macbeth: We need to get to the woods before the trees
Agatha Macbeth: Bye Liz
Eliza Madrigal: hahahha
Wol Euler: bye eliza, take care
Bruce Mowbray: I hate to leave this session, but, alas, time to be scraping up dinner. Thank you so much Eliza!
Eliza Madrigal: (((Aggers))))) ylol
Bruce Mowbray: thank you everyone!
Agatha Macbeth: ♥
Agatha Macbeth: Scrape well Brucie
Wol Euler: and bye bruce and aggers too, be pure in being
Bruce Mowbray: you too, aggers!
Eliza Madrigal: bye lovely beings
Wol Euler is deliberately provocative in using that awful word
Bruce Mowbray: ;-)
Eliza Madrigal: even being a being is questionable ^.^
Eliza Madrigal: Night friends
Bruce Mowbray: bye for now, good people.
Agatha Macbeth waves