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brobin
2003-05-30 05:49:17
Stephen, whilst registering for the forum I noticed a question that I thought was a little different to those that one would normally find on a site devoted mainly to the physics of sub atomic particles in an accelerator.  The question was:

Do you like parrots?*:

It intrigues me and I have to know.....Why do you ask this??
[DPC]Stephan202
2003-05-30 06:05:33
I think this question serves the same purpose as this forum, called 'Marmite-flavoured mallards': There IS no purpose.

(Like there is no spoon)

---
Dutch Power Cow.
MOOH!
Bill[Romulus2]
2003-05-30 13:53:15
There was a spoon?  Smile
[DPC]Stephan202
2003-05-31 01:42:43
Yeah, it has been there, once, a long, long time ago.

---
Dutch Power Cow.
MOOH!
Lord Groundhog
2003-06-09 15:37:39
quote:
Originally posted by [DPC]Stephan202:
Yeah, it has been there, once, a long, long time ago.

---
Dutch Power Cow.
MOOH!


Very debatable.  The memory of the spoon is confused and uncertain.  The evidence that this memory is an accurate representation of a historical event simply isn't there.  We may as well say the spoon is a legend, or a plan by some anonymous committee to invent such a thing, or even a mental construct.  Indeed, there is no reason to believe that the alleged spoon is anything more than the result of a Greek philosopher of ancient times suffering a hallucination while contemplating the Platonic ideals. 

Naturally, knowing which of these possibilities (if any of them) is correct would help to clarify many things about the spoon -- or about whatever it is we call a spoon in the absence of spoons.  There is even a slim chance someone might make sense out of the Platonic ideals one day, if they can avoid hallucinating.

-- peace.  LG
Stephen Brooks
2003-06-15 11:17:46
Does a spoon left alone in the woods truly exist if there is nobody to eat yoghurt with it?

Today's weather in %region is Sunny/(null), max.  temperature #NAN°C
Lord Groundhog
2003-06-15 18:40:21
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
Does a spoon left alone in the woods truly exist if there is nobody to eat yoghurt with it?

Today's weather in %region is Sunny/(null), max.  temperature #NAN°C


This brings us to the nub of the matter, doesn't it?  Although we have discussed the spoon as if there were really someone there to see it, supposing it really existed, we need to allow for the more radical possibility that there is [only?] nobody.  Also, that there is no woods, and no yoghurt. 

This eventually brings us to the realization that perhaps this board isn't here, these threads and posts aren't here, and ultimately, even here isn't here -- or anywhere else. 

"You do not bend the spoon, only your mind". And some of us are naturally more bent than others.

-- peace.  LG
Stephen Brooks
2003-06-16 12:44:37
quote:
Originally posted by Lord Groundhog:
This eventually brings us to the realization that perhaps this board isn't here, these threads and posts aren't here, and ultimately,

And ultimately, you're wasting your time?  The mere fact that you "posted" to this message board is helping to propagate the illusion that this whole website is actually here, an illusion I started when I told the DNS registrars that there existed a site at this address.

Today's weather in %region is Sunny/(null), max.  temperature #NAN°C
[DPC]Stephan202
2003-06-16 12:51:50
Foolishness.  There are no such things as 'DNS registrars'.

---
Dutch Power Cow.
MOOH!
Klaartje
2003-06-25 00:51:36
I can live with the idea of no spoons, but no yoghurt... that's simply uncomprehensable.
The Mechanic
2003-08-29 12:59:02
Yoghurt is an illusion, and (except in certain, highly specialised cases) that in the flavour of blueberry, doubly so.  Many is the time when a blueberry yoghurt has vanished from under my very fingers, and while I was directly looking at it.  No worries.

I challenged the mighty Titan and his troubadours
excaliber[Free-DC.org]
2003-12-13 12:47:37
Hmmm...Interesting. 

Must be why everything taste's like chicken...or chicken tastes like everything.

Did we bend our minds to the fact that chicken tastes like everything else, therefore everything tastes like chicken?

http://intheory.ath.cx InTheory - Game Design and Idea discussion forum
Stephen Brooks
2003-12-16 07:18:54
...or parrots.

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.
Lord Groundhog
2004-01-28 11:31:23
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
...or parrots.

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.


Parrots?  Ah, the illusion of something called a "word", intended by the illusion(s) of something(s) called "people" who carry out the illusion called "speaking English", to refer to an illusion of a certain kind of thing that belongs to a more general class of illusion, referred to with another "word"; to wit, "bird". The illusion called "chicken" also belongs to the more general illusion called "bird". As for "yoghurt", well, who really believes that anything so unlikely could exist? 

This set of illusions is all part of that illusion sometimes referred to as "communication".

Of course, there is still the need to ask whether any of these illusions are real, or whether they are, themselves, an illusion.  Trouble is, can it be entirely certain that anyone really exists to ask, or to answer, such a question?

-- peace.  LG
Stephen Brooks
2004-01-28 18:40:01
quote:
Originally posted by Lord Groundhog:
Trouble is, can it be entirely certain that anyone really exists to ask, or to answer, such a question?
...or parrots.

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.
Lord Groundhog
2004-01-30 11:27:49
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
quote:
Originally posted by Lord Groundhog:
Trouble is, can it be entirely certain that anyone really exists to ask, or to answer, such a question?
...or parrots.

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.


If you insist, let's do this using the well-known substitution method:
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
...or parrots.

...

now becomes:
...or {the illusion of a particular "word", apparently intended by the illusion(s) of something(s) called "people" who carry out the illusion called "speaking English", to refer to an illusion of a certain kind of thing that belongs to a more general class of illusion, referred to with another "word"; to wit, "bird".}

In fact, what we have here are illusions which are subsets of other illusions -- or to put it another way, a series of nested illusions.  Rather fitting for talking about "parrots", eh?

-- peace.  LG
Stephen Brooks
2004-02-01 03:01:00
:

...or parrots.

...or {parrots}.

...or { {parrots} }.

...or { { {parrots} } }.

...or { { { {parrots} } } }.

... ...

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.
Lord Groundhog
2004-02-01 08:09:40
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
:

...or parrots.

...or {parrots}.

...or { {parrots} }.

...or { { {parrots} } }.

...or { { { {parrots} } } }.

... ...

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.


Errr, yes.  Since we seem to be fixated on parrots just now...

*backs away slowly*

-- peace.  LG
Lord Groundhog
2004-02-09 10:53:07
Why look!  It's everything! 



...or nothing.

-- peace.  LG
Stephen Brooks
2004-02-10 00:59:00
It's eating its foot?

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.
Lord Groundhog
2004-02-10 18:25:10
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
It's eating its foot?

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.


In the symbolism of the monistic world view we may have been discussing -- if we're here, of course -- it isn't unusual to represent this idea of existence by a circle consisting of a cobra eating its own tail. 

Just think of this parrot as the avian version of the symbol...

[This message was edited by Lord Groundhog on 2004-Feb-11 at 2:35.]
Stephen Brooks
2004-02-13 05:49:04
Wisest is he who knows his nose knows nothing.

More seriously, if anyone is wondering what a monistic world view is,
The fundamental thesis upon which the entire superstructure of non-dualism is built is this: The self (atman) of each individual corresponds to the Universal Being (brahman).  This a priori axiom finds its best in one of the Upanishadic aphorisms, which runs like this: That Thou Art (tat tvam asi).  This formula or axiom, when translated into simple language, means that the self of each individual is non-different from the Cosmic Self.  It is upon this understanding that Tantrism later on would affirm the correspondence between the microcosm and the macrocosm.  It is this monistic view of reality which will be responsible in determining the specific type of Hindu and Buddhist, particularly the Mahayanic one, anthropology.  The focus of this anthropology will not be man as an embodied existent, a being who is located within history, but a being who is transcendent to all that that is phenomenal.  This approach would ultimately result in the divinization of man in terms of which one finds himself to be identical with brahman or with buddhahood.  The effort is not to restore the lost humanity to man, but it is to abrogate it.

Trying to understand that may erode this afternoon's attempts at productive work.  Razz

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.
Lord Groundhog
2004-02-26 07:14:26
quote:
Originally posted by Stephen Brooks:
Wisest is he who knows his nose knows nothing.

More seriously, if anyone is wondering what a monistic world view is,
The fundamental thesis upon which the entire superstructure of non-dualism is built is this: The self (atman) of each individual corresponds to the Universal Being (brahman).  This a priori axiom finds its best in one of the Upanishadic aphorisms, which runs like this: That Thou Art (tat tvam asi).  This formula or axiom, when translated into simple language, means that the self of each individual is non-different from the Cosmic Self.  It is upon this understanding that Tantrism later on would affirm the correspondence between the microcosm and the macrocosm.  It is this monistic view of reality which will be responsible in determining the specific type of Hindu and Buddhist, particularly the Mahayanic one, anthropology.  The focus of this anthropology will not be man as an embodied existent, a being who is located within history, but a being who is transcendent to all that that is phenomenal.  This approach would ultimately result in the divinization of man in terms of which one finds himself to be identical with brahman or with buddhahood.  The effort is not to restore the lost humanity to man, but it is to abrogate it.

Trying to understand that may erode this afternoon's attempts at productive work.  Razz

HB Pencils, also sold as "Moron's Choice" Graphite Cigars.


Surprisingly, no one ever asks the question, "what does a 'world view' view, when it claims to view the world as ultimately non-existent?"

Look!  I think I see mirrors, infinitely reflecting one another into the infinite distance...

-- peace.  LG
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