Krimel --
[Ham]:
The problem indeed lies in regarding the Self as a "thing" or an
"existent", But the solution is not to regard it as "a process"
but as subjective sensibility which is prior to objective events
in process.
[Krimel]:
I don't see how calling it "Subjective Sensibility" solves anything.
It sounds like a proper noun to me. Categorically speaking that's
a thing. You can't use the name game to make it go away.
So categorically speaking I'll stick with process which is a set of
relationships.
Yes, Sensibility is a noun, just as Quality is a noun. If you must speak
"categorically", Subjective Sensibility is a category. But it is not a "set
of relationships." It is the unit of awareness that identifies the
individual Knower.
[Ham]:
Each of us is a different point of view. The difference is in time,
space, and the values perceived...
[Krimel]:
It is hardly a mystery that each individual has a different self.
The body part of the self is a complex chemical soup. Each of us
produces a slightly different body order. We should expect to see
individual differences in the chemistry of the nervous system
as well. And then you have the problem of each self occupying
different physical space.
What do you call the part of self that is not a body? If each of us
produces a body, then this "non-body part" is accountable. This is what I
call the Self. It is the "awareness" contingent of being-aware.
[Ham]:
Is it a "top down" fallacy to consider the self as the PoV agent?
[Krimel]:
Not if you see that the self constructs itself from the bottom up.
[Ham]:
You are the KNOWER of reality as an accumulation of patterns
and processes. This knowledge is an intellectual construct of
your value sensibility.
[Krimel]:
I don't know that my accumulated patterns could be considered
reality, even by me. I have found that my memory is riddled with
encoding errors and often is at odds with the recollection of
others. But it is a conceptual construct. I think value sensibility
is much more physiological like our revulsion to excrement and
fear of blood. But if you want to get all reductionist, sensation
comes prior to value sensibility.
Sensation IS value sensibility, which is the core self. That's what I've
been saying. Do you think emotions such as revulsion and fear are
physiological? Consider the epistemology: You are unconscious, and the
endorphines in your nerve synapses are behaving physiologically as if
reacting to revulsion or fear. But where is the revulsion or fear? It it
is not sensible (i.e., made aware) it cannot be revulsion or fear.
Insensible emotion is an oxymoron.
Unrealized value is a myth.
A world that is not experienced does not exist.
[Krimel]:
You seem to be talking about what some would call executive
function. I think Buddhists call it the watcher. As I have said
I think this is a complex pattern that results from an enormous
amount of instantaneous parallel processing.
Watcher, Knower, Subject, Observer all refer to the Self. By whatever label
you choose, this is the individual's cognitive awareness. It is neither a
"thing" nor a "function". Intellection is a function because it
differentiates sensible value into the discrete components of experiential
existence. That's where "process" enters into our worldview.
[Krimel]:
Our conceptual patterns are our construction but they are
rooted in our senses. The senses are our interface with the
physical world. We transduce physical energy into patterns
of electro-chemical interactions. We encode the physical.
Our concepts and understanding are always dependent on
sensory confirmation. As I have said illusions are not false,
they are just particular ways of organizing sense data.
We are capable of having multiple views and understandings
of our selves. It is our capacity to shift point of view that
makes us unique. And we can see it developing in our young.
As incredulous as it seems, you have just restated my position in your own
words. I find nothing in your statement that I disagree with. But I would
emphasize that "having multiple views and understandings of our selves" in
no way means having someone else's conscious awareness. Every self is a
unique and individual point of view.
If you insist on using your terms, then Self does not invent
values, but values invent the Self.
As I define the Self as value-sensibility, I can understand how values might
be conceived to "actualize" selfness. However, it's inconsistent with the
epistemology of Essentialism. Not that you particularly care, but I
consider Sensibility primary to value realization. Value doesn't "realize";
it simply represents what is beyond sensibility. I like to think of it as
desire's "referent". Socrates described desire as what man wants and does
not possess: "...what he neither has nor himself is--that which he
lacks--this is what he wants and desires." If Socrates was right, then the
object of desire, the thing wanted, is the desire's value. In the
differentiated world of existence, we yearn for value and experience it in
passing things and events. But pure (metaphysical) Sensibility needs no
object; Value is already and immutably its undivided Essence. That's why in
my ontogeny Sensibility is negated from Essence to create the entity
Being-Aware. Since the individuated self is incapable of sensing Essence
directly, it experiences the Source as the value of otherness.
I think this discussion has been both productive and amiable. Are you as
pleased that we are fundamentally in accord as I am? Or is it more fun to
quibble over terminology and accuse me of conjuring up "fantasies"?
Thanks Krimel,
Ham
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