Abaddon,
Excuse me while I take a few tokes of some really good shit (here in Cali. there are a lot of growers and alway something different.Oakland is MJ friendly).
Yeah, what did our brains ever do for us. Other than grammatical language. And writing. And agriculture. And smelting. But besides grammatical language, writing, agriculture and smelting, what have our brains done for us? (Etc.) Methinks you're starting on a supposition.
Good catch,, yes I think stated it that way as a suposition and relative ie.."limited". Limited would mean the mind being superior in just a few ways. And thus limited,, and all this based on human judgement of course.Which has its limits for human judgements are not absolutes. I hope I'm a little clearer here,,these things are alway hard to put in words especially when I shoot for the smallest amount of words(lazy i guess).
Why are we 'limited'? What criteria do you use in defining this? How do you explain your definition of 'limited' with the rather obvious contradiction of this supposedly limitedly superior species being more of a success in terms of evolutionary biology than any other multi-celled organism (other than a few that parasitise us)?
See the above for my use of limited. And I totally agree with you here,,human terms are so abritrary because they conveigh the idea that human judgement is the absolute: ie our word "superior" clearly a human judgement is needed to label something as "superior" I don't think a Killer Whale would have the same thoughts about what is "superior" as a man would. So it all from where your veiw point is looking from.
Would it? Think of not being able to lie. Think of a situation where this would be dangerous. Having the ability to act as though reality were actually different to what it is is a useful survival tool. You are not obliged to use it, but having it is useful.
I agree lying sometimes has its good side. But the point I'm talking about is not lying to others but the mind lying to oneself and forming very incorrect opinions,,that harm us and that threaten the extinction of the whole human race. You do beleive in the possibilty of that happening?
Again, you assume an honset organism would be better. Quite frankly most higher social animals 'lie'. They have to. For example; most displays by males during breeding seasons consist of two males 'boasting' about their physical prowess. Who makes the most convincing display tends to win, regardless of who is actually stronger.
Yes I agree that lies are a natural way that is used in life it is neither good nor bad it just is,, and for that reason I can not make a judgement either way Oh I could I guess but deep down I would know my judgement was meaningless. But if we have a mind that is honest to us personally,,maybe it would make much better decissions,,I know this is speculation but it appears to me logical.
Frankie: Seems to me since the brain (i.e..mind) is evolving the next thing should be a uncondition purely objective thought process. Maybe harmful emotions will in time be disguarded and a more "vulcan" type of mind may be the future evolution of our species.
Abaddon: Ah, but what if our ability to be creative relies upon our ability to work with known sets of data and create projections (which are lies, in a way, if they are wrong) based on grey areas where there is no 'right' solution?
I'm sure they play a part,, but isn't it alway the rule breaker or the rebel that has more of a creative nature? That's my opinion and admit I could be wrong,,but it seems to me the person that breaks out of the mold or paterns that life around trys to mold him is the one who is creative and some what fearless.Not fearing to be different has alot to do with honesty and creativity IMO.
We are attracted to things that MIGHT be right. Science for example is the process of trying things that might be right until you happen upon the one that IS right. Intuition is linked to our ability to 'test reality' AND to our ability to spin a convincing psuedo-reality (as otherwise we couldn't do it).
I agree with you here. We all want truth and some want it more and some want it less. Science trys to be as objective as humanly possible,,but here to are limits and that is human.
These pseudo-reafullities can be harmful, but they are as neccesary to human progress as thumbs, as they allow us to advance beyonbd what we know. Having brains incapable of anything other than pure objective thought would limit creativity, and not just of art, but of science too. Being able to believe in an idea that might work is an essential part of the process.
Well now you are supposing here,, because we don't know how a purely objective mind would be? We can only speculate and imagine (I'm taking another puff) but you may be right for all I know.
I think the whole universe has a certain honesty to it, up to certain points,,,ieNewton's: "every action has and egual and opposite reaction",,up to a point and then as you probe deeper it proves not to be so but something else all together (Quantum Mechanics and theories of a non-local universe).
And 'harmful emotions'? If we didnl;t HAVE emotions we would end up killing each other. Emotions are part of the communication software that humans use to co-operate socially. Star Trek is fiction. Vulcans could not be utterly logical without loosing the ability to follow a hunch. Most of human achievement is built on hunches.
I think emotions are a good tool just as a hammer is a good tool there usefulness varying as uses vary.
What if though our emotions changed and we no longer had unfounded fear,,we felt more a part of the whole human race instead of a seperate self isolating individual. I'm not saying get rid of emotion,, I'm saying would not it be good if we evolved with more helpful ones that might come from the mind being honest with itself. Maybe the mind can break free from suffering by changing how it thinks,,makeing the mind peaceful and resting with emotions not pushing it to be false to itself that to me sound like a clearer more useful mind. A mind that allows what he has learned to be useful.
