> > Religious people believe in a god, whether
> > it is a literal one with beard or an abstract
> > one that supposed to be symbolising some
> > sort of human feeling/thinking/valuing.
>
> There is nothing abstract about Ultimate Concern withthat which is Ultimate in the
> person's life. It could be an
> automobile, a book or even another person or pet.
> We put it a different way, we said: "When we die, so
> do our Gods."
>
Do you mean that people can believe in anything?
Ofcourse they can. However it doesn't mean
that anything people believe in is valid.
If some one tells me that he believes that I
have a nestful of pink unicorns behind my
left earlobe, I won't take his word for it.
I differentiate between my fantasies and
my beliefs. I don't believe in fantasies,
but I believe in stuff that is linked with reality.
> You said:
>
> > Well, I am thankfully free of all this, so I don't know
> > what sort of opinions you have alotted as mine.
>
> I say:Put yourself in my place. That is what, as an actor, I do with you.Then I
>have
> a conversation knowing that the dialogue is with
> myself on an inadaquate machine. I can only stir the things
> you already know within yourself and you within me. Neither
> one of us is Mime or Wotan and so we don't have to worry about
> only asking that which we already know. That is all there is
> anyway. That is also what I was trying to say to you about
> translation but you have a different thought attached to me on that
> one.
>
I don't understand what you're saying.
I think I am able to learn new things,
though yes, obviously, I measure up the validity
of new ideas with my experience.
> You said:
>
> > Yes, there is an underlying human concern with
> > finding our place, finding our role in life,
> > but as there is no evidence for anything
> > "ultimate".
>
> I say:Glad to know that you don't believe in a hierarchy of needs.
>
hm? I am lost again.
>
> > I have no reason to think
> > any of it has anything to do with
> > a fair description of our reality.
>
> I say:See the Gardner article or see the earlier post I wrote on Arts and Crafts.
>
what was the gist of it?
> You said:
>
> > There is enough wonder around
> > in the form of all that ended up
> > existing temporarily as a result of
> > chains of random coincidences to fill
> > our lives, especially if we also
> > have an ambition to make the best
> > of the short period of consciousness
> > we have for ourselves therefore for
> > everybody else.
>
> I say:1. I'm all for "wonder".2. There is no more proof that it is random than that
> it is not. One might compare it to the randomness of the Internet except there are
> all of those links. I tend to believe more in the interconnectedness of all
> reality and that it is a conscious as I am but different.
Reality is "conscious"? I could imagine a theory
that connects all the material in the universe,
including the yet undescribed structure of empty
space, but how could it be conscious?
That seems the usual thing - trying to make
everything reflect us, measly humans...
> 3. I to wish to make the best for my short period of life in this place but I have no
> idea about
> before or after and I must find a balance between enlightened self-interest and the
> rest of the world. Are you saying, along with Ayn Rand, that if you are truly
>selfish
> with your brief period that it will be good for everyone else as well?
>
I think I've answered this one in my other post: you
have to realise, that it is in your selfish interest
to make the social/economical structure work for everyone.
There is no sense in quantifying selfishness.
> You say:
> >If you think that all of it is here to please
> >you or your god, you are wrong,
>
> I say:Actually that is a paper tiger but how do you know that it is wrong. I
> thinkthat is as much an area of "belief" as the "faith" of the people you deride.
> I'm not speaking of faith as "ultimate concern" but as "belief in that which
> cannot be proven."
>
Not everything is falcifiable, but that
doesn't mean that we cannot make rational decisions
about what we belive, especially if we manage to keep
an open, but critical mind.
All the religions except the most abstract ones are
in contradiction with the reality we have, so
I think my best option is to say that I have no
reason to believe in any of them and I put them
in the same category as those pink unicorns.
> You say:
>
> > but you should
> > let me criticise peacefully yours ...
> > it is just an other aspect of life one has
> > to puzzle about...
>
> I say;I agree and you can.
>
> You said:
>
> > As for languages and people - they exist to
> > pass on meanings. If there is no content,
> > there is no point in language or communication.
>
> I said;Every word in every language can contain at least seven
> meanings.Meaninglessness is the concept of the Barbarian gibberish that the
> Greeks claimed everyone else spoke but them. They meant that
> foreign languages were gibberish. I find it quaint that you seem to be
> asserting that in the 20th century. But it feels like something else.
> It feels like you are using it for a purpose other than the Greeks
> ethnocentricity. But I don't know. This is still a one dimensional
> machine. But:
>
you lost me. Do you mean to say, that
every uttered noise has a meaning?
I think if someone takes part in a debate, they
should convey their opinion as concisely
as possible, if they have no opinion yet,
they should ask questions or just listen
rather than pretending that they have something to say.
As for the Greeks - they were ignorant about
the fact that other people were
as intelligent as they were in this example,
though I thought they did a lot of translations
and learned other languages themselves.
> It feels like you are using my words to allow you an opportunity to
> pass judgment on my being and intent. Is that true? If so, Why?
> I have attempted to convey respect about your first language, including
> going to the trouble to check my translations and your couplet even
> after I said that I didn't speak your language. But I have studied it
> enough to make those beautiful songs available to our audiences here.
> But next to a native speaker I am no more than a tourist. But that being
> said:
>
I'm sorry, I think all I am is impatient, at times,
as I find it difficult usually to find the point
in your postings. Sorry again.
> I have made my living on the International Arts scene in New York City
> for the last thirty years both with myself, my professional students and
> my company. During that time we have placed our expertise and
> artistry on the line before world critics and in venues including the
> Metropolitan Opera, Covent Garden, La Scala and others as well as
> on premiere recordings. So I find your judgments interesting in that
> no one is perfect or above learning.
>
I am just a technician if no importance, so
just use the delete button freely...
> At the same time I find that
> carefully worded sections and passages rethought to mean exactly
> what I am thinking in the moment are just "put down" ignored or skipped.
> The key to what a professional singer does is words and words are almost
> God in that we are very nearly ultimately concerned with them.
>
see above. I think sometimes you say things because
they sound good, rather than because they mean something.
this must be part of your artistic being.
and I am looking for debating points... sorry again.
> I like a great deal of what you say and I am delighted to read a genuine
> Marxist rather than the Capitalist professors and others that have tried
> to represent you without listening to you. You pull no punches but
> neither do I. I would bet that you have done more to me through your
> culture than I to you even though I may seem harsh and blunt. The
> harshness and bluntness of the Native Peoples is pretty impotent next
> to people who number like the leaves on the trees. And yet the judgment
> you have made on what I have said is incorrect.
>
I have only the above "judgement".
there goes my train - perhaps more later
Eva
> You said:
>
> > I don't know what sort of person Marx was,
> > I am interested in his theories.
>
> I said:As a performing artist I am required to recreate the reality of people inthe
> past as completely as possible. Their theories are usually much more
> complicated when viewed in terms of their life. That is why one can do math
> on the computer but cannot create, with today's technology, a translator for
> languages that is anymore sophisticated than a child.
>
> The political and philosophical "language" that you
> venerate is much more complicated than simple theory. Making a
> society from it is like trying to predict the weather from current chaos theories.
> It's still an issue of relative predictability. Marx was tied to the Industrial
> era and
> its machine models. They were just one period in the history of humanity and will
> be consigned to the same honored place of all of the other "great writings."
> Venerated and read only by experts and artists.
>
> You said:
>
> > You'll find, that most geniuses, including artists,
> > tend to be self-centered and preoccupied with their
> > art or science, so they are usually unhappy and
> > difficult/antisocial individuals.
>
> I said:That is too complicated to answer in this long post. I think you
> shouldrethink that.
>
> You said:
>
> > So what?
> > Ask Jay not to make leaders out of them...
>
> I said:I never advocated that. I believe leaders spring from need and talent in
> themoment. You can only plan your children's resources you can
> never design a leader. It too is like the weather.
>
> You said:
> Their biographies are
>
> > fascinating like anybody else's but
> > the major thing is what they
> > made for us to use and enjoy.
>
> I said:OK
>
> You said:
>
> > Even if we know
> > absolutely nothing about Wagner, Mozart and x number
> > of scientists and poets, if their work somehow touches
> > the human condition (they are lucky
> > enough to develop their potential instead
> > of dying of malnutrition aged 3 or sitting in prison
> > after a deliquent youth), it will be in the public
> > domain forever.
>
> I say;How many poems do you know by Nezhualcoytl? Malnutrition is anissue of human
> alienation. They are "objectified" and therefore separate
> and we can therefore be untouched by it. That is a problem with both
> their family and our heart.
>
> There was no malnutrition in the Cherokee
> nation until the Europeans began to muck around in it. We had universal
> education and health care and no poverty. And we didn't have prisons
> until you guys insisted upon it. But they were places very different from
> any of the prisons across the Western world. Too big of a story for here.
>
>
> > You quoted:
> >
> > "Marx's zest for punctillious intrigue"??
> > "Counter warlike postures of the Soviets"??
>
> you said:
>
> > You are what you preach, all words and no meaning.
>
> I say;
> Why do you denigrate that which does not make sense to you.
> Read Lord Russell, he said the same but it took a book.
> "Why I am not a Communist." I think he should have
> written another book entitled "Why I am not a Capitalist Either."
>
> REH
>
>
>
