the role of language

[fela fan]

Anyway, whatever. I take your point about how langauge can limit us, but the rest of it...while you might not see it yourself fela, what you're describing is a form of belief and is the basis of religious belief (which is different from a codified religious text which you should have picked up on from what I said) for millions of people.

Well, whatever happens, you've set me on a bit of research, and i don't do that often. Ta.

But, it is not belief that i'm involved in, i am emphatically against belief. It has shown itself as such a let-down, and so ungrounded in my own personal reality of my own life. Now, i'm more than amenable that i can't see things of myself, a good reason why i like a good discussion, but it's not possible for me to entertain the idea that you can know more about me than me. I say that purely coz of the medium we are using here. It is far too slow. Finding the common ground and shared assumptions takes a fraction of the time in the spoken medium.

What i'm talking about on this thread is about what i've experienced personally, and therefore it simply cannot be belief. Perhaps the way i've written stuff can lead to this assumption, and fair enough. I'm now going to concentrate on more unambiguity.

The whole point about belief is tapping into others' interpretations of life. I want my own, so i simply accumulate as many experiences as possible.

Today i am the sum total of those, and today it means i have no more time for belief.

 

[fela fan]

It's meditation fela - that's what meditation is about!!

PLEASE can you think about WHAT these guys are saying and in what other cultures and contexts their words have appeared in.

Yes, but why meditate?

And please do me a modicum of credit. Of course i fucking think about what i read.

You mention context. Well that should say it all. Yours is different to mine, and like i say, it's not easy on such a forum as this to narrow them down, from which fruitful discussions can take place.

But we try.

 

[kyser_soze]

Now, i'm more than amenable that i can't see things of myself, a good reason why i like a good discussion, but it's not possible for me to entertain the idea that you can know more about me than me.

No.3 in excuses to stop over in Thailand on way back from NZ in February 06

 

[fela fan]

No.3 in excuses to stop over in Thailand on way back from NZ in February 06

You'd better be careful, bad shit goes on in this town... people lose their materialist instincts!

 

[maomao]

You'd better be careful, bad shit goes on in this town... people lose their materialist instincts!

Alcohol and sex aren't materialist?

Is that an open invo btw? I was planning to go to KL next Spring and could be persuaded.

 

[fela fan]

Alcohol and sex aren't materialist?

Is that an open invo btw? I was planning to go to KL next Spring and could be persuaded.

Who says i'm drinking and fucking my way through life?! If i were i'd be living in pattaya. And the money up here's so shit that a materialist couldn't support their cravings for things.

Nah, there's lots of mountains and things round these parts.

An urban convention could most certainly be held up here, lots of lovely teak houses that pass as pubs and restaurants... even the sex could be arranged i guess.

Nah, better cancel that last bit, i don't think sex and philosophy go down well as bedfellows...

You're all welcome, one urbanite has passed through this way, the only one i've met. This town is a winner for good convos, loads of folk from all over, living here and passing through (my mate's pub).

So yeah mate, come over and have a beer with ya commas...!

 

[Dai Sheep]

Originally posted by fela fan
It shapes our perceptions, create boundaries, and allows us to be manipulated by those who have ulterior (negative) motives.


Very much like the language what George Orwell created in 1984: 'newspeak'

 

[Ryazan]

Orwell is overrated.

 

[fela fan]

Orwell is overrated.

By whom?

 

[kyser_soze]

By whom?

Everyone.

 

[jbob]

Amazing. A discussion about the role of language and truth that doesn't mention Saussure, Nietzsche, Levi-Strauss, Barthes and Althusser (amogst others) as any points of reference. (With due respect to Kyser banging his head against the brick wall of rationalist Enlightenment/New Age gobbledegook).

 

[Good Intentions]

That would be because fela fan refuses to read any philosophy. Because it might corrupt his innate understanding of reality.

 

[jbob]

Shit, nobody told me that all I had to do was 'look inside yourself, man.' All those wasted years...

 

[neilh]

Amazing. A discussion about the role of language and truth that doesn't mention Saussure, Nietzsche, Levi-Strauss, Barthes and Althusser (amogst others) as any points of reference. (With due respect to Kyser banging his head against the brick wall of rationalist Enlightenment/New Age gobbledegook).

much as i think a lot of folk like that have said stuff of value, sometimes it's more effective in a discussion about what might vaguely be termed philosophy not to get into quoting work from them excessively cos 1) even if some of the folk in the discussion have read whatever it is, it alienates folk who haven't; 2) it can turn a thread into a kind of competition almost to appear well read and 3) there's really no need if you feel you can kind of say what you mean without it. often philosophers like them will write for pages and pages just writing about their views on reality or whatever, without refering to other philosophers theories.

 

[jbob]

much as i think a lot of folk like that have said stuff of value, sometimes it's more effective in a discussion about what might vaguely be termed philosophy not to get into quoting work from them excessively cos 1) even if some of the folk in the discussion have read whatever it is, it alienates folk who haven't; 2) it can turn a thread into a kind of competition almost to appear well read and 3) there's really no need if you feel you can kind of say what you mean without it. often philosophers like them will write for pages and pages just writing about their views on reality or whatever, without refering to other philosophers theories.

I can't really dispute what you're saying here; I just felt it was a bit nebulous to have a philosophical discussion, in a philosophy forum, without reference to discourse. I agree with your notion that the willy waving aspect of such debates can be tedious, but on the other hand, the total absence of reference to such ideas does tend to make things rather insipid. As for your third point, again fair enough (with regard to writing what 'you' think), but I tend to take the view that there's always an implicit assumption contained within philosopher's works that they are by their very nature referential.

 

[fela fan]

That would be because fela fan refuses to read any philosophy. Because it might corrupt his innate understanding of reality.

All good philosophers find their own way in life GI. Why would they wanna stick their heads into philosophy books at the expense of experiencing life?? Man.

I never refused to anyway, at the beginning at any rate. I just didn't read that kind of book when i was reading prolifically. Then i left my country and discovered the practice of doing hammock time on tropical isles. Only then did i consciously decide not to read any, coz i was on my own journey, and you're right, i didn't want it corrupted.

Which also told me that philosphy, like everything else, is just not enough. It's only a part of it all. We need to study the whole...

... which means all those famous names were just that. Any substance they had is immaterial and basically bullshit. What did they ever agree on? Far better to spout your own bullshit than quote the bullshit of others, no?

 

[fela fan]

Shit, nobody told me that all I had to do was 'look inside yourself, man.' All those wasted years...

Well mate, you are now freed to make up lost time...

 

[Good Intentions]

I could point you to excellent arguments and discussions on the point I'm trying to make. But you would refuse to read them.

Has it never struck you why philosophy is called The Great Conversation?

 

[fela fan]

I could point you to excellent arguments and discussions on the point I'm trying to make. But you would refuse to read them.

Has it never struck you why philosophy is called The Great Conversation?

GI, i wouldn't necessarily refuse them, not any more. I went through a period of life (in the 90s basically) where my journey had no room for all the famous names in philosophy. I had a good mate who did it for his first degree, and often over the beers in our 'Great Conversations' he'd tell me that what i was saying would be what so and so had written. This used to please me inasmuch that i'd found my own way, and it just happened to agree with someone a few hundred years older than me. It encouraged me, after all i've spent a long long time now just philosophising with anyone who will lend an ear and a mouth.

Furthermore, my finding my own way, i was in less danger of accepting or agreeing with someone just coz of who they were, rather than what they were saying.

There is philosophising, and there are philosophers. I like the former, and don't really like talking about what person x or person y advocated. I prefer to present my own theories for consideration.

The problem i have nowadays is that the tool of philosophy is language, and i've found an area of life that cannot be discussed in language, at least not yet. And to me that area has total answers, whereas philosophy doesn't, and indeed if it did, then the subject would be dead, it would become extinct!

What point are you trying to make? And do point me that way, i'll have a look.

 

[jbob]

Well mate, you are now freed to make up lost time...

Sorry, that was an unneccessarily snide comment. My position would be that I'm nothing more than the sum of a series of influences that have come from 'outside' of me. There's nothing inside to look at: I have no innate knowledge of anything. But then neither do you.

 

[jbob]

There is philosophising, and there are philosophers. I like the former, and don't really like talking about what person x or person y advocated. I prefer to present my own theories for consideration.

The problem i have nowadays is that the tool of philosophy is language, and i've found an area of life that cannot be discussed in language, at least not yet. And to me that area has total answers, whereas philosophy doesn't, and indeed if it did, then the subject would be dead, it would become extinct!

Everything you've written in this thread can be traced back to some philosophy that has merged into meinstream consciousness. That's what it does. Much of what you have written is locked in 19th century reason, combined with, as kyser tried to point out, a quasi-religious bent (all new age babble is of this nature, much as it vainly attempts to distance itself from by - yup, using different language and terminology).

You may be suprised with how advanced philosophy is in terms of its approach to the study of language (semiotics), much can be explained. It seems contrary to ask what this 'area of life that cannot be discussed in language' is - do you mean drug experiences? Spiritual enlightenment? Dreams? Psychic ability?

Philosophy is very good at bending langauge to its will by, as Shakespeare did, inventing new terms/words. It is the most likely, and perhaps only, avenue you have for extrapolating whatever this phenomena that none of the worlds finest minds have yet to have encountered or dared to attempt explain.

Total answers do not exist. What's the point in looking for them?

 

[fela fan]

You may be suprised with how advanced philosophy is in terms of its approach to the study of language (semiotics), much can be explained. It seems contrary to ask what this 'area of life that cannot be discussed in language' is - do you mean drug experiences? Spiritual enlightenment? Dreams? Psychic ability?

Philosophy is very good at bending langauge to its will by, as Shakespeare did, inventing new terms/words. It is the most likely, and perhaps only, avenue you have for extrapolating whatever this phenomena that none of the worlds finest minds have yet to have encountered or dared to attempt explain.

Total answers do not exist. What's the point in looking for them?

Oh, plenty of thinkers/writers have talked about such a phenomena, but the common ground that i've taken from them, and from my own findings, is that one can know about the phenomena, or not yet know about it. But words are yet to be able to describe it. If you really really want a label to put it under, then 'spiritual enlightenment' is the least worst of your examples.

I'd say the knowledge of which i refer to, and really it's more of an understanding or an awareness, is about no longer needing to ask any questions about life. The answer to the ultimate question, 'what is life about', 'what does it mean' has been found. Once the answer has been arrived at, then all other questions cease to have any importance.

That is the nearest i can put it into language. Basically, stop asking.

And that, to me, means no more need for philosophising. The end has been reached, a rebirth has occurred.

 

[fela fan]

Total answers do not exist. What's the point in looking for them?

In language, yes you're correct.

Outside of language then there is totality, there is a whole, and therefore there is a total answer. And part of that answer is that all questions are ultimately futile. Except that you need to ask them in order to find this out. So, contrarily, there is a point in looking for answers. Only from the search can we find out that the questions we have asked are of no ultimate use.

 

[kyser_soze]

and therefore there is a total answer.

You are Vroomfondel or Majikthise and ICM my £5

 

[fela fan]

Sorry, that was an unneccessarily snide comment. My position would be that I'm nothing more than the sum of a series of influences that have come from 'outside' of me. There's nothing inside to look at: I have no innate knowledge of anything. But then neither do you.

What do you mean by no innate 'knowledge'?

There most certainly is an innateness of something. Society and upbringing conspire to hide it from us, but it's there to be uncovered by any of us. I'd say it is understanding or awareness. Or, making the unconscious conscious.

I have for many a year declared that i am, at any moment of time, the sum total of all my previous experiences. I now have to qualify that, it's still true, but only for the society person that i am. In order to get anywhere in life, in order to complete the journey, one has to become a nobody. And that is beyond society. Society has no hold on nobodies. It can only affect somebodies.

 

[fela fan]

You are Vroomfondel or Majikthise and ICM my £5

I guess you know full well i have no fucking clue who those people or things are!

 

[kyser_soze]

I guess you know full well i have no fucking clue who those people or things are!

Well you see, if you'd read The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy, not only would you recognise their names, you'd also recognise loads of the stuff you're talking about on this thread.

They are two philosophers who set out to turn Deep Thought off when it embarks on it's quest to find The Ultimate Answer To Life, The Universe and Everything.

Comic sci-fi but more convincingly argued than anything you've posted here so far.

 

[Diem K]

Real truth lies outside of language. No?

I think there is no answer to this question.

Truth and language and the relationship between the two are continuously evolving.

 

[fela fan]

Comic sci-fi but more convincingly argued than anything you've posted here so far.

That may be so, but i'm not in the business of convincing anybody.

Just in finding things out for myself, and sharing anything i can put into language. As with everything that is put up for sharing, folk can imbibe, adapt, or reject.

Did they find out that the ultimate answer to life is that they should drop the questions?

 

[fela fan]

I think there is no answer to this question.

Truth and language and the relationship between the two are continuously evolving.

There is no link. Truth lies outside of language. No sooner than language is brought into the equation than truth is lost. Humans belong to truth, not the other way round.