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When you know the name of a spirit you can command it. The spirit world, the occult world, is in truth the world of words and ideas. What is a spirit? A virtual thing, in the body, yes, of the body, but also somehow ephemeral, made of invisible things, words and perceptions
Dualistic and gnostic worldviews are perennially popular for this reason; they describe something true, even if it is not the whole truth, or the most useful truth; you are a body, as Allan Watts said, but this is only shocking or revelatory because you feel you are more
But you are a body. Whatever being conscious is, whatever it means to be a mind, or to have a mind, it is something your body does. You are not apart from your body. Somehow we labor under a naive metaphysical conceit that a soul comes from outside, and is assigned to a body
No matter how much you preach monism, you invariably catch yourself using dualistic mental models, if you have any self awareness. The language of computer science and the concept of the virtual lets us name this thing. The existence of the name let's us notice the category
This did not start with Descartes or any such thing. It is not a western conceit, it is not an eastern one either, it is something deep, something down in the firmware, ironically, something about the body and the brain, which secretes the mind, makes it feel this way
The pull of naive dualism is very powerful, it's why so many people fall for Rawls. Was there ever a more fitting phrase than "veil of ignorance" ? Your soul is a product of your body, an output of your life, not an input, you didn't come into the world, you came out of it
Those who neglect the body will find that their mind also deteriorates. It is impossible to maintain good mental healthâhonesty, discipline, stable moods, motivation, a positive dispositionâif you neglect the body that houses the brain that makes the mind
But to get back to the point; the mind is small and the world it sees is interpreted through the conceptual models it contains. You are no doubt familiar with Sapir-Whorf: the idea that we can only think about things for which we have words
The âstrongâ version of the hypothesis is obviously false. If it were true, it would not be possible to invent new ideas, and yet the advances of science and mathematics clearly put the lie to this claim.
On the other hand, we do relate to all new ideas we invent through metaphors from our past experiences, analogizing the invisible abstract world by describing it with paradigms from the physical world. https://twitter.com/0x49fa98/status/1026836226681139200
The weak version of Sapir-Whorf is the claim that our language shapes our thoughts, even if it does not wholly determine them. This is obviously true, as you observe when you try to think about ideas for which you have no words. You get nowhere unless you manage to coin new ones
What you should consider is that even when you do have words for concepts, your mind is small and just like you have Dunbar groups of people, 5 critical people, and Dunbar places, you also have Dunbar ideas, familiar places for your brain https://twitter.com/0x49fa98/status/1025740101970608128
The law of 5s states that all things happen in 5s, or are divisible by 5, or are somehow directly or indirectly appropriate to 5. This is rank nonsense, but once you have the name, you will start to notice the 5s.
When you know the name of a spirit, it can command you...
When you know the name of a spirit, it can command you...
If you want to be intellectually humbled, write ~30k words. Just start explaining everything, donât use google, start anywhere and write out of your own head. Why is the world the way it is? If youâre anything like me you will quickly notice how repetitive your thoughts are
The same few mental models, the same themes, start popping up over and over,
Itâs true that you canât exactly enumerate your thoughts, but you can get a representative sample. What I notice from writing long form is the boundaries of my mental space
Itâs true that you canât exactly enumerate your thoughts, but you can get a representative sample. What I notice from writing long form is the boundaries of my mental space
At least half of Sapir-Whorf comes down to the smallness of your mind. The same few topics, the same few names. If you fill your head with popular movies and tv, mass media, you will have common thoughts, your insights will be the instincts of the crowd https://twitter.com/0x49fa98/status/1031893387819905025
Itâs hard to notice the walls in your mind; they may be fortified with emotions: shame, fear, disgust. They may be fortified with ignorance; we see a pattern but obliquely, we lack a name for it. It takes a certain boorishness to scale that wall, perhaps a lack of common decency
A name can be a wall or a bridge.
structural oppression, toxic masculinity, equality, privilege. Prison walls
homo hypocritus, revealed preference, signaling, the cathedral. Bridges
Which ideas close off avenues of thought, and which ones give you access to unexplored places?
structural oppression, toxic masculinity, equality, privilege. Prison walls
homo hypocritus, revealed preference, signaling, the cathedral. Bridges
Which ideas close off avenues of thought, and which ones give you access to unexplored places?
