Lecture I.1.2 - The Individual in Oriental Mythology

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Evinnra
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Post by Evinnra »

Neoplato wrote:

I’ve also calculated it to be 62 or maybe 400+900=1300. (But can you figure out the question?) :D
Have some ideas what the question could be, ( if 4 represents 'being', 9 represents redemption/discernment/choice, and 100 brings the notion of light to mind :? :roll: ) but what is the question? (Tentatively thinking it can't be wrong to ask ... :oops: )
'A fish popped out of the water only to be recaptured again. It is as I, a slave to all yet free of everything.'
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jonsjourney
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Post by jonsjourney »

DON'T PANIC!

And, just as important, don't lose your towel.
Not panicking...towel in hand...which way to Milliways? I need a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster!
I’ve also calculated it to be 62 or maybe 400+900=1300. (But can you figure out the question?) Very Happy

However, I noticed that the Buddha, in the attainment of enlightenment spent 6 periods of 7 days accomplishing various tasks. Coincidence?
Oh no! Not more options! My simian brain is on overload!
Wait...6x7=42. Ah much better now.
I think I'll just run out and start a nice 501c charity based on the Book of Adams...chapter and verse, of coarse!
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams

Neoplato
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Post by Neoplato »

Evinnra Wrote:
Have some ideas what the question could be, ( if 4 represents 'being', 9 represents redemption/discernment/choice, and 100 brings the notion of light to mind ) but what is the question? (Tentatively thinking it can't be wrong to ask ... )
Thanks for the attempt. I was really just trying to be funny. But since you asked, here's a hint:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_solids

(What did you expect from a guy whose username is "Neoplato" :mrgreen: )
Infinite moment, grants freedom of winter death, allows life to dawn.

Evinnra
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Post by Evinnra »

Neoplato wrote:Evinnra Wrote:
Have some ideas what the question could be, ( if 4 represents 'being', 9 represents redemption/discernment/choice, and 100 brings the notion of light to mind ) but what is the question? (Tentatively thinking it can't be wrong to ask ... )
Thanks for the attempt. I was really just trying to be funny. But since you asked, here's a hint:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_solids

(What did you expect from a guy whose username is "Neoplato" :mrgreen: )
Oy, that’s a hell of a lot of work to do on an empty stomach. :shock:

But thanks for the hint anyway, I’ll look into it … later … after reading a bit more of Plato’s works. (Still struggling with the Parmenides, and it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if I ended up loosing my marbles completely while attempting to make sense of the second part . :roll: )
'A fish popped out of the water only to be recaptured again. It is as I, a slave to all yet free of everything.'
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Ercan Arisoy
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Post by Ercan Arisoy »

I was wondering, the thought popped into my head, as I read the above quote what the average age of a contributor to these forums is. I tend to agree with Jung and most Native American thinkers that we do not really begin to 'get it' until we reach middle age. Many put it from age 35 to 40 when the process really begins. I wonder if there are many who come to Campbell and stay with the process of mythological explorations that are below the age of say...30. I first read The Power of Myth when I was only 20, and while it was powerful in many respects, it wasn't until I was older that I began to truly apply what I read.
I believe in reincarnation. I mean, sometimes we encounter an old soul in a young body.
Again, reincarnation is a helpful idea when I start thinking that I'm growing old.
You see life differently when you're almost sure that your Swissbank account will follow you wherever you go :)

Neoplato
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Post by Neoplato »

Ercan Wrote:
I believe in reincarnation. I mean, sometimes we encounter an old soul in a young body.
Again, reincarnation is a helpful idea when I start thinking that I'm growing old.
There is a poll on another thread that asks this question and I think most people feel much "older" than what they are. From my experience, it feels that I "knew too much" as I was growing up. I've had scattered concepts and notions that were "Campbell like" since my early 20's but I didn't start piecing them together until my thirties. Now that I'm 40, they all make sense (and I feel much better too).

Of course then comes the question "Now what?" :? For now, I'm taking a moment to enjoy all the conversations I'm finding with people with like minds. It's nice to know I'm not alone, and I have at least 20 years of conversation locked up inside me. :)
Infinite moment, grants freedom of winter death, allows life to dawn.

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Post by jonsjourney »

Of course then comes the question "Now what?" For now, I'm taking a moment to enjoy all the conversations I'm finding with people with like minds. It's nice to know I'm not alone, and I have at least 20 years of conversation locked up inside me. -Neo
I have come to see this website and its forums as a modern day School of Athens (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_School_of_Athens).

It is a place where we can bring our thoughts and opinions on grand/inane topics and share them with a large community of thinkers. I think that Joe would have just loved this website. :D

Neo~ I would also add to your above quote by saying that I appreciate the perspectives of those who do not think the same as me, as well. I am sure you do too, I just thought I would throw that in there.
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams

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Post by Clemsy »

I think that Joe would have just loved this website.
Jon, one thing I've learned since starting to post here, is that we all project our personal sentiments onto Campbell...

...but in this I think you're quite correct. I believe Campbell would have been ecstatic over this website, and the potential of the Internet as a form of global communication in general.

We are creatures of habit. We become accustomed to our environment and take everyday miracles for granted. The tech of personal computers was just getting started when Campbell passed on.

I think it very likely he would have been enormously encouraged by this medium.

More later, perhaps. Gotta take the kid to talent show practice.
Give me stories before I go mad! ~Andreas

jonsjourney
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Post by jonsjourney »

Jon, one thing I've learned since starting to post here, is that we all project our personal sentiments onto Campbell... -Clemsy
What/Who do we not project our personal sentiments onto?
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams

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Post by Clemsy »

The answer, I think, is relative to one's feeling toward the object. I think one must care first. The more one cares, the more one projects.
Give me stories before I go mad! ~Andreas

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Post by Neoplato »

JJ Wrote:
Neo~ I would also add to your above quote by saying that I appreciate the perspectives of those who do not think the same as me, as well. I am sure you do too, I just thought I would throw that in there.
I think people can tell from my posts that I like different viewpoints (as long as they can be discussed instead of running me in circles). :roll: Now I did say "like minds" and not "like opinions". It's the "willingness to explore" I really enjoy.
What/Who do we not project our personal sentiments onto?
My Dog. :D
Infinite moment, grants freedom of winter death, allows life to dawn.

jonsjourney
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Post by jonsjourney »

The answer, I think, is relative to one's feeling toward the object. I think one must care first. The more one cares, the more one projects. -Clemsy
That is a good take on it. Emotion does seem to color our perceptions. When we become emotionally attached or repulsed, the feelings we project on an object can become concrete, or at least hardened. So we do not project anything onto objects we do not care about? Hmmmm. Not sure about that, but it is a good way of approaching the idea.

What about the social influence exerted upon us? A great deal of research has shown that we are far less aware of how our attitudes are shaped than we would like to believe. The notion of in-group/out-group influences on our perceptions has been an area of much research since the inception of the social sciences. It is possible, when viewed from the research conducted on attitudes, that there are tremendous influences exerted upon our thinking and perceiving of objects/persons that we are even scarcely aware of.

For example, the idea of 'modern racism'. Most of us would like to think we are not racist people, yet we may still have subtle biased reactions to a member of an out-group without even being aware of it. We may over react in an attempt to not be, or act, racist, but by doing so, are we not acting differently than we would in our in-group situation? The same is easily visible among many dogmatic religion practitioners. Are we always conscious of our views, or are there influences upon our perspectives that we are scarcely aware? It is possible that we are socially encoded to be suspicious of a member of any out-group.

From the papers I have been reading (taking Social Psych this semester), it seems that we are influenced in profound ways while not being actively involved in perception. Interesting, no?

One other related area, more along the cognitive line of research...

I was reading a paper, as I was working on a literature review for some future research on mindfulness, and found an interesting area about perception and emotion. I am not going to get into all the intricate details, but research has found that there seem to be two different types of ways people encode visual stimuli (primarily). Internal and external encoders. Internal encoders tend to bring their own emotional experiences to much of what is being encoded in their brain. Their view is colored, to a larger degree, by experiences, actively perceived or not, rather than environmental 'facts'. External encoders tend to use information in their environment when perceiving an object/person and are less susceptible to emotional coloring of visual perceptions.

Their is an important distinction there. The internal encoder is, to simplify a metaphor, like a religious zealot. They are unable (unwilling?), in many respects, to take external environmental evidence into account when perceiving. Their emotional belief system imposes its view upon their perceptions to a much larger degree than an external encoder. The external encoder (I may call this person "Joe C" :wink: ) is able to encode visual (this is what has been researched the most, as opposed to auditory, sensory, etc) stimuli in more 'objective' terms. The important point here is that our encoding style has a great deal to do with how we perceive our world and how we approach living in it. Much like Joe was able to take in great deals of information about concepts and ideas that many of us have a great depth of emotional feeling about and, in my view, most often step back from these percepts emotionally and deliver a sensible and 'objective' meaning to the ideas.

The work I came across specifically claimed that mindfulness is more effective for external encoders, which actually makes sense, even though it may seem somewhat counter intuitive. Why? Because being mindful means, while being in touch with our inner thoughts/feelings/motivations, not allowing those inner aspects to distort our view of the external world. It encourages us to be aware of our external situations, while attempting to not 'color' them from our own subjective viewpoint.

Interesting stuff. Whether or not it relates to what Clemsy wrote, we will see, but my reading of the research does seem timely to this notion.
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Neoplato
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Post by Neoplato »

JJ Wrote:
The work I came across specifically claimed that mindfulness is more effective for external encoders, which actually makes sense, even though it may seem somewhat counter intuitive. Why? Because being mindful means, while being in touch with our inner thoughts/feelings/motivations, not allowing those inner aspects to distort our view of the external world. It encourages us to be aware of our external situations, while attempting to not 'color' them from our own subjective viewpoint.
I think this is a good example of the notion that only a “pure mind” can be “purely objective”. A catch phrase in the “business world” is “paradigm shift” (although that doesn’t mean “pure mind”). I think one of the biggest problems to overcome is just “realizing” that you are using a “set of filters” that you’ve developed over time through, experience, socialization, and religion. Not an easy thing to overcome, and a person’s mind may utterly reject this because it may be a threat to the ego.

I’m reading the “Tale of Desperaux” and it’s interesting how he is sentenced to death for not “being a mouse”. Desperaux was rejected because he refused to use his “mouse” filters.

To me, even empirical evidence can be subjectively interpreted (not to mention statistics). However, some would argue that it is our ability to be subjective that makes us “human”. Otherwise, we may all end up like “Mr. Spock” (which might be a good thing).
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Post by Evinnra »

Neoplato wrote:JJ Wrote:
The work I came across specifically claimed that mindfulness is more effective for external encoders, which actually makes sense, even though it may seem somewhat counter intuitive. Why? Because being mindful means, while being in touch with our inner thoughts/feelings/motivations, not allowing those inner aspects to distort our view of the external world. It encourages us to be aware of our external situations, while attempting to not 'color' them from our own subjective viewpoint.
I think this is a good example of the notion that only a “pure mind” can be “purely objective”. A catch phrase in the “business world” is “paradigm shift” (although that doesn’t mean “pure mind”). I think one of the biggest problems to overcome is just “realizing” that you are using a “set of filters” that you’ve developed over time through, experience, socialization, and religion. Not an easy thing to overcome, and a person’s mind may utterly reject this because it may be a threat to the ego.

I’m reading the “Tale of Desperaux” and it’s interesting how he is sentenced to death for not “being a mouse”. Desperaux was rejected because he refused to use his “mouse” filters.

To me, even empirical evidence can be subjectively interpreted (not to mention statistics). However, some would argue that it is our ability to be subjective that makes us “human”. Otherwise, we may all end up like “Mr. Spock” (which might be a good thing).
Coincidentally – or ‘if we speak of the devil’ – just after posting on the thread discussing metaphors, it occurred to me that I would have made much harsher decisions in my life had I relied solely on my ‘objective’ view of my circumstances.

Jonsjourney, the above research you mention sounds rather intriguing; that externally encoding perception benefits more from mindfulness than internally encoding perception. I would have guessed the opposite to be the case, but I suppose it all comes down to what we nominate to be the greater benefit. As you wrote, the internally encoding perception is incapable of registering those particular facts that are cancelled out by the subject’s own predispositions to receive data whereas the externally encoding perception registers far larger quantity of relevant information regarding its context. However, if mindfulness of the moment is the process of being aware of the innate energy spent on perception, then it seems mindfulness of the energy spent on dealing with emotions would be easily recognisable to even an internally encoding perception. From this I would think it follows that it is particularly the internally encoding perception that benefits more by reducing spending the excess energy on emotions, since mindfulness opens up a brand new perspective for the subject. On the other hand, an externally encoding perception can’t ignore the sheer energy spent on feelings by others in his/her context and I would guess it would seem objectively reasonable to an externally encoding perception that there might be great value attached to performing an activity, which requires so much effort. So, I wonder, how does the externally encoding perception benefit more by opting for spending more energy, and the internally encoding perception benefit less by opting for spending less energy? Perhaps it is the type of benefit that is different; one benefits by getting a life, the other benefits by achieving peace? :? If getting a life is the greater benefit, then perhaps what your research suggests is right; indeed it is the external encoder that benefits more from mindfulness.

Neoplato, indeed this paradigm shift you mention could be the crux of our question at hand. How does the mind perform this trick from a set position without external stimulus? While learning about this topic in grad school, it occurred to me that a cumulative effect of suppressed innate motivations might propel the mind (in the way Hume suggested) to a brand new perspective periodically. But if it is the case, that would be just one more logical reason to be mindful of what innate dispositions we ignore on a daily base. No? David Hume argued that we don’t have the capacity to work out what’s going to happen next, simply because nature is not uniform. It is our innate dispositions that make us opt for perceiving a particular outcome and if it is true that ‘no ought follows from an is’, then I think we are living our lives far more ‘subjectively’ than we hoped to be possible. Yet, it must be a good thing – having subjectivity, that is – since aided by subjectivity the mind can perform a paradigm shift that allows for a far more variable universe to exist around the perceiver, which in turn allows for avoiding stagnation that leads to inevitable death.

Although Desperaux could save his life by adopting the mouse filters, I suspect it could cause the collective demise of all the mice around the world. For why else would he have a naturally occurring paradigm shift if not for saving his entire species? Orthodoxy, heresy, they are both natural to sentient thinkers … :roll: :arrow: the individual’s duty is to chose carefully between them. No? :idea: :P
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jonsjourney
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Post by jonsjourney »

So, I wonder, how does the externally encoding perception benefit more by opting for spending more energy, and the internally encoding perception benefit less by opting for spending less energy? Perhaps it is the type of benefit that is different; one benefits by getting a life, the other benefits by achieving peace? Confused If getting a life is the greater benefit, then perhaps what your research suggests is right; indeed it is the external encoder that benefits more from mindfulness. -Evinnra
Well, let me clarify one thing off the top, this was not my research, that is, I did not conduct this specific research, I found it during my process of literature review leading up to my own research (still 6-8 months out). It was found in a peer-reviewed journal called Personality and Individual Differences 44 (2008) 32-41. The title for anyone interested in fact checking, etc...is Testing mindfulness with perceptual and cognitive factors: External vs. internal encoding, and the cognitive failures questionnaire. Whew! Sounds scary! :shock:

To address your above question, as best I can, I have to say that the idea does not appear to have anything to do with energy consumption or efficiency. What the author has found through several studies involving the currently used questionnaires to measure mindfulness is that people who predominantly use external coding information about their environment appear to be more mindful. They tend to benefit from not coloring their perceptions with so much affect (emotion).

When I first read the article, I was a bit taken back, as well. It seems counter intuitive to what we may think of mindfulness, but when I thought about it more, it makes sense.

Think about so many of the great teachings of the Buddha...
Develop the mind of equilibrium.
You will always be getting praise and blame,
but do not let either affect the poise of the mind:
follow the calmness, the absence of pride.
-Sutta Nipata

In what is seen, there should be just the seen;
In what is heard, there should be just the heard;
In what is sensed, there should be just the sensed;
In what is thought, there should be just the thought.

These teachings are like a raft, to be abandoned once you have crossed the flood.
Since you should abandon even good states of mind generated by these teachings,
How much more so should you abandon bad states of mind!
When I started re-reading some of these that I have read over the years, it became more obvious that being mindful is very much about removing emotional attachment to what we perceive. This is tricky stuff to grasp here in the West, we tend to attach emotion to everything, no?
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