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13 Dec 2004 @ 12:21, by swanny. Philosophy
Livelihood .... the way we make our way in the world.
What are the considerations. Would we do whatever it
takes to provide us and our loved ones the necessities
of life?
What if it were illegal?
What if it were unethical?
What if it damaged the environment?
What if it damaged our health?
Are there any decent jobs that even take such things
into consideration or are they even considerations
or do we do whatever the boss says and whatever pays
the bills?
Never thought ones livelihood was such a messy issue did you?
Yet this is the nature of civilization. Sure there is free yet legal enterprise
and some would argue it should just be the enterprise of the free and brave
but our actions and work has consequences and these consequences effect others and the environment and our world and eventually ourselves. It is truly a small world of sorts. So how do we sort through this mess or does the market or should the market be the sole arbitarator of what is good and right. Yet oft in its glee for profit and gain the market assigns the spoils of its enterprise to no one. Whos going to pick up the trash that the market produces or does the market decide? Well it depends. There are those that see an opportunity and go for it and that has its place but there are perhaps other considerations, holistic considerations. Some say Government is to big and that the market should rule but the market does it have a conscience?
They say that when a society reaches a certain stage of viability then such concerns have a tendancy to surface and this is how we progressed from the farms and homesteads to the cities. Yet it seems a complex system of a lot of mumbo jumbo and red tape at times and is it really better than the market place?
I don't know I don't have the answers and its just another one of those things to consider when deciding upon the sustainability and viability of ones career choice and such. Do we need to think about the future when it seems hard enough worrying about the day or do we just live for the day. Choices and decisions we need to make in the course of our lives. Whether its possible to meet all the crieteria and find that dream job is probably unlikely and you're probably going to be steppin on someones toes or at least at some point.
The market and the system and sadly the church and government all seem to have there fingers in our pockets from time to time, so life and livelihood becomes a matter of becoming a "juggler" of many hats and fancy footwork and sometimes flyin on the seat of ones pants but oh were it that it weren't so. More >
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 19 Oct 2004 @ 22:48, by ming. Philosophy
Since a long time, one of the subjects I'd like to delve more into and write about is the subject of making realities. That could be addressed from many angles. Personal Reality. Shared Reality. Virtual Reality.
Now, that's starting off with an assumption that each of us have a hand in what reality we're experiencing. Some people don't believe that. Even some of those people who're best at constructing realities that they get others to live in. Many people will insist that reality just is some kind of objective finite thing which one can establish and prove and that's it. Ironically, some of those people probably live more in a reality inside their skull than outside it. But that wasn't my point.
The way I use reality here is as that which we can perceive ourselves to be living in, and which we actually can live in. There can be several or many of those. One might live in one without being conscious of it, or one might willingly step in or out of different realities at different times.
You can think about a movie, for example. If it is well-made and you enjoy it and you're watching it in a movie theatre, you can live yourself into it and believe it while it is playing. Oh, you're still aware that you're watching a movie, but if it is made well enough, you'll forget it to a considerable degree and it will be real, and you have some kind of relation or response to the characters and situations in it. Even if what you're watching is really photos of a plastic model and actors pretending to be other people than they are, you might go along with the whole thing.
Good film makers and good actors know a bunch of things about making convincing realities. For example, a method actor would work hard at developing a lot of invisible things that are part of the character they're asked to portray. Like, what is their past history? What are their feelings and actions rooted in? What is really motivating them? What do they feel? What happened to them before? Where are they going afterwards? Even though you see none of those things directly, if the actor has chosen for himself what they are, his character will appear more real to him and to you.
A very simple example: If a character is supposed to say a sentence that gets interrupted in the middle, like "But why do ...", and then something happens. If the actor only practices saying "But why do .." and then stopping, it will look and sound kind of fake. It will work much better if he worked out for himself what the whole sentence should be and why he's saing it, even if he never gets to do so. The fabric of the reality he's presenting is more coherent and complete. And you notice that, even if you only get to see a corner of it.
Realistic realities have a number of perceptions to them, and they have depth. It is not just that the right words are said. They sound right, they look right, they smell right, they feel right. The periphery seems right.
If you say the word toothbrush, it doesn't count for much. But if you can hold it in your hand, and put toothpaste on it, and put it in your mouth, and clean your teeth with it, and your mouth feels nice and fresh, then it is a convincing reality. It doesn't matter if somebody else thinks it is a hairy-nosed wombat. If you can brush your teeth with it every day, and have a minimum of cavities, you're fine.
No, it doesn't quite mean that it is just as good to live in a delusion as to live in a reality. A delusion would be when you exist in a certain reality and you deny it, and maintain the abstract idea that it is different than it is. A functional reality is made of perceptions, not just of a concept. Perceptions are abstractions too, in relation to what the universe REALLY is, but they're much more solid than recooked abstract concepts that are based on denying perceptions. Important difference. If you sit by a table and you tell yourself you're flying a spaceship, you probably won't be doing anything very sensible. If you can actually operate the controls and land on another planet and pick fruits off the trees, then you might actually have something. If you're only thinking: "This is not a table, it is a spaceship", and you convince yourself, then you're probably just a human who'll have difficulties functioning.
Affirmations are a common newagey way of getting something you want to happen. Nothing wrong with that. Prayers are in the same category. It can be quite useful to affirm or ask for that which you want. You might get it. Better than not to ask for it, or to ask for that which you don't want. But it is also very flimsy as far as realities are concerned. Just a concept and some words. To really get something different, you need to feel it, see it, hear it, taste it. You gotta be able to get into it and drive away. If you only have a movie prop facade, like from Universal Studios, you can't live in it. Workable realities have a whole range of dimensions to it. You can't eat a picture of a cheese. It needs to have a certain consistency, it needs to taste right, and it needs to be nutritious. There's a whole bunch of perceptions and details that need to be there. Realities have a lot of detail, and detail that is not just on the surface, but which sticks quite deep.
However, if we don't need to eat it or live in it, we can be persuaded to accept realities that really are rather flimsy, and which aren't much more than props. But they're detailed enough that we'll accept tham as real without actually inspecting them. You'll probably accept the news and the state of politics in that manner. You don't really go and double-check the news for yourself, to see if it is real. You might check some other sources, but you'll probably stop when you feel you have a picture that is sufficiently self-consistent. It is still just a concept, and has the real substance missing. It is pictures and words and opinions. But it is impractical to get the real thing, so you've become used to accepting a prop. And you're just looking for a certain coherence of the picture, rather than whether it really is edible. And most likely you vote for political candidates the same way. You haven't met any of them. You've just seen them on TV.
So, the people who design mass realities for us have a much easier time than what would be required to design livable realities. You don't have time to receive much more than a cardboard cutout, so their job is simply to provide a cardboard cutout that seems to suit you, and which will survive its journey through the news media, and which will fool you sufficiently. It doesn't have to be the truth and it doesn't have to add up.
But the same rules still apply. You just need less of them. For example, if a certain political character is presented as taking a certain stand, you'll want to hear the history that let up to that. I.e. you want to hear about a background that is consistent with what they're presenting. And you want them to sincerely look like they're playing that part. And you want other people to confirm it. Whether it is the truth doesn't matter. It is obvious that you can't add up everything, so you'll settle for accepting things as more real if you've heard them enough time from people who look like they know what they're talking about. And their story makes sense to you.
You'd want to know about how realities are made in order to protect yourself from mass manipulation.
And for your own sanity you'd want to know how to make your reality that which you prefer. Personal realities are on one hand harder to make than mass realities, because they require more detail and self-consistency. On the other hand they're easier, because there's mainly one person involved, and because the things that make the most difference in your life are rather subjective, and don't really need to be validated by anybody else.
Some people accomplish great things and breeze by even the most impossible obstacles. That's not just because they're gifted in that way from the beginning. More importantly it is because they implicitly believe that things work that way. They don't just believe that as a loose and shakey idea. They feel it, see it, hear it, taste it. They have experiences to back it up. They're both coming from somewhere and going to somewhere that is well-defined, self-consistent and in accordance with that which they're accomplishing. And, no, not just because that's what REALLY happened. Mainly because THEIR reality is structured that way.
The reality you're seeing and touching might appear very real, but it is in no way THE reality. It is probably more real than many of the delusions one can have ABOUT the reality. But as far as the universe goes, there's no scarcity of options. The table you're sitting by is probably just one of zillions of possible tables. The sub-atomic particles it is made of could be in any of an unfathomable amount of states, and they probably are, at the same time, depending on who's looking. You could call that parallel dimensions, or the quantum soup, or Reality with a capital R, or whatever. Regardless, any insistence on that table, or your political views, being some kind of only and ultimate reality is laughable on the scale of infinity. Time and space are but somewhat illusory properties of the way you happen to perceive things. The same pieces appear in so many other guises, at the same time, the appearance of which has a whole hell of a lot to do with how you perceive them and interact with them.
Maybe it is a little pretentious to call it "making" or "creating" realities. It is maybe more like choosing. Every possible different perception you might have about anything at any time forms a possible branching point. Nobody forces you to take any one of them. There might be some inertia going on, but you're always free to start branching off in a different direction at any time.
But it helps to know what realities are made of. Detailed perceptions. A coherent and consistent history. Depth. Multiple levels that all work. Systemic synergy. Things fit together. And for us humans: a meta-story, a set of beliefs about how and why it works. And realities have a certain continuity. They don't flicker on and off all the time. They're there even if you look away and look back again.
You could call it a worldview, but, no, I mean it more tangibly and mechanically than that. As well as bigger. Like the structure of the interface between consciousness and an infinite universe. If you don't believe consciousness really exists, half of what I'm saying is probably making no sense. In that case, think of being able to download yourself into a virtual reality. The power will remain plugged in, and you can populate the reality with what you choose, and you can adjust the parameters of the program. I'd bet you'd want as many perceptions as possible, a certain multi-layered systemic coherence, and you want a certain history and consistency, and some good people to hang out with, and a suitable level of surprise and adventure, and the chance to do really well. Just like in real life. More >
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 16 Oct 2004 @ 11:36, by ming. Philosophy
I like to make complicated things simple.
And simple things complex.
The world we live in is mostly upside down and inside out. Simple things are made terribly complicated. And things that are very complex are made very simple. Falsely.
You'll often find the amazing infinite complexity of the universal organism reduced to a few simple platitudes. Religions are very good and degrading into that. Here you go, all you need to know about life is to follow these 10 rules.
And it becomes terribly complicated to just exist. You have to keep track of loads of abstract and self-contradictory disjointed information. Most people don't get around to the simplicity of just being present.
It is really quite simple. Or complex, if you will. We screw it up by abstracting. Abstracting in the sense of forming abstract notions about reality, and then getting lost in the abstractions.
Lying in the grass, looking at the clouds drift by, feeling a light breeze, listening to the rustling of leaves - that might be complete and whole in itself. The simple enjoyment of life. As might be the satisfaction of figuring out the periodic table of elements. But when you try to pack it up and take it with you, trouble easily starts. You might accidentally assume that your experience is THE experience, and you might persuade others to adopt a symbolic version of your experience, rather than having their own real experience. And since that initially seems to work, we easily get further and further away from the real world, which is both complex and simple. And we end up in shadow worlds of the mind that are simple and complex in the wrong places.
But sometimes we wake up and feel the breeze. And sometimes the condensed learnings of others help us do so, or help improve our lives. So we easily forget that most of the time we're wallowing in misplaced abstractions.
We all share the fault, of course. We seem to think we're something that we really aren't, thinking we're capable of something we really aren't. And we're not noticing that we really are something much grander.
We can walk through the mirror any time, of course. Turning ourselves rightside in and out. More >
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9 Oct 2004 @ 10:31, by jwwells. Philosophy
Knowledge or what is and what may be.
In this article I seek to answer the question: “Why do I believe what I believe?” This is a key question; one which must be answered by anyone seeking to teach and more importantly, by anyone seeking to add to the overall pool of knowledge.
Knowledge is in some ways like c, the speed of light:
In physics we see that as we approach the speed of light it takes ever greater energy to create ever smaller accelerations, until, at the speed of light, it takes infinite energy to create any acceleration. We cannot go faster than light.
In knowledge we see that as we approach truth, it takes ever greater thought to make ever smaller improvements in our model, until, at truth, it takes infinite thought to create any improvement. When our model accurately reflects truth, no improvement is possible.
Knowledge is in other ways more like an electron:
Every now and then in knowledge, a person has an Einstein moment. Einstein saw that Newton’s Laws of Motion apply only under normal circumstances, which lead others to Quantum Physics. At that moment, as the electron makes its quantum leap to a higher or lower state, knowledge as a whole, made a quantum leap into a new and advanced state.
We know from studies of evolution that these two rules apply to the evolution of species. There is slow change from natural selection and every now and then, rapid change from special selection. As we can say these two rules apply to several areas of science, we may apply them as a part of the theory of knowledge. From this we say “Knowledge normally grows slowly as thought is applied and errors are corrected. At unpredictable times, knowledge grows rapidly as an individual applies a previously unknown concept to the knowledge base.”
ONE: We can now say that the velocity of knowledge growth is lumpy except when arbitrarily near to the current model of truth.
From history and statistics we can now import the concept that the overall growth of knowledge is accelerating. As our current model approaches objective truth the lumpiness will average out, the acceleration will slow and knowledge growth will eventually stop: That is, unless an Einstein moment occurs. Should one occur, as seems likely, then the entire knowledge base will change and the lumpy acceleration will once more start; new growth towards a new and better model of truth occurs once more in normal mode.
TWO: This constant jumping to ever better models of reality is the most accurate theory we have for answering the overriding question “What is truth?”
Therefore, we have a test for the question “Are we close to the current model of truth?” The lumpiness of growth in the knowledge base is an objective standard measuring how close we are to the current model of truth. The closer to the current model of truth, the fewer new concepts are being added and therefore the flatter the curve of knowledge growth.
Now we must apply the known statistical corrections in order to remove anti-knowledge as we use our theory. The corrections are:
a) Is there any political pressure being applied to supporting the current model? From our knowledge of fear in groups we can say: The more political pressure being applied in favor of the model, the greater the odds are that the model is wrong.
b) Are there any data points in the current model which are wrong or probably wrong? From history of science we can say: The greater the chances of one or more error points, the greater the odds that the model is wrong.
c) What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the model? Again from history of science we can say: The greater the pressure from experts deriding an alternate view as impossible, the greater the odds are that an alternate view is the correct one. This comes from the observed concept that when an elderly and distinguished scientist says something is possible, he is almost always right: When the same scientist says something is impossible, he is almost always wrong.
Now we can use our theory of knowledge to look at individual models of reality.
From my point of view, wishing to understand spiritual growth as a tool of healing for damaged men, two of the models I most desperately wish to know about are the current model of gender and the current model of spirituality.
So I ask “How lumpy is the current growth of knowledge in gender?” That will tell me how close we are to the current model. After spending almost a year searching for scholarly articles on gender I can give as my opinion the statement that “knowledge growth in the field of gender is virtually flat.” All articles are rehashing of previous knowledge and do not include testing for concept errors.
Next I ask “Is there political pressure being brought to bear to support the current model?” The answer, based on the rather extreme damage done to people questioning the current model, is a resoundingly loud “YES.” The problems which Murray Strauss and Doris Lessing faced are only tiny examples in the sea of bigotry thrown at anyone disagreeing with the current model of gender.
Next I ask “Are there any wrong or probably wrong data points in the current model of gender?” As the theory of Patriarchy is a center point in the current model of gender and the theory of Patriarchy has a great many error points I can say “Yes, there are error points in the current model.”
Next I ask “What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the current model?” Almost without exception the experts deride and disdain all alternate views of the current gender model.
Therefore, I can say with reasonable assurance that we are, knowledge wise, arbitrarily close to an incorrect model of gender. We need a breakthrough to a new and better model of gender.
So I now ask “How lumpy is the current growth of knowledge in spirituality?” After looking at a great many articles and books I can offer my opinion that the growth of knowledge in spirituality is quite lumpy. In fact, knowledge of spirituality is so severely fractured that I can go further and say that there is no currently accepted model of spirituality.
I now ask “Is there political pressure being brought to bear to support the current model of spirituality?” As the growth of knowledge in spirituality is so very lumpy and political pressure is being brought to bear on a great many models of spirituality I can say that this question is not answerable.
“Are there any wrong or probably wrong data points in the current model of spirituality?” It seems to be clear that there are error points in a great many of the models of spirituality.
“What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the current model?” Our experts are of a great many opinions.
Therefore, I can say with some assurance that there is no currently acceptable model of spirituality.
I now have a starting point. I know that the current model of who and what the two genders are is fundamentally wrong and that there is no generally acceptable model of exactly what spirituality is. More >
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3 Oct 2004 @ 05:49, by skookum. Philosophy
The Great Stone
How great is a stone that sits by flowing water? It in its massiveness seems impervious, omnipotent. If there is one crack upon its great face, there comes opportunity for new things to happen. More >
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22 Sep 2004 @ 23:22, by nednednerb. Philosophy
Hey all. I've moved in and am attending classes, 2nd year university! Yay! English and Philosophy are fun! Here are some thoughts I wrote after thinking about a philosophy lecture. More >
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12 Sep 2004 @ 12:04, by newdawn. Philosophy
DOES EVIL EXIST?
This may or may not be a true story but it is a nice bit of logic
A university professor challenged his students with this question. "Did
God create everything that exists? A student bravely replied, "Yes, He
did!"
"God created everything?" the professor asked. "Yes, sir," the student
replied.
The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created
evil, since evil exists. And according to the principal that our works
define who we are, then God is evil." The student became quiet before
such an answer.
The professor was quite pleased with himself, and boasted to the
students that he had proven once more that the faith in God is a myth.
Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question,
professor?" "Of course," replied the professor. The student stood up and
asked,"Professor, does cold exist?"
"What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never
been cold?" The students snickered at the young man's question.
The young man replied, "In fact, sir, cold does not exist. According to
the laws of physics, what we consider cold is, in reality, the absence
of heat. Everybody or object is susceptible to study when it has or
transmits energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of
heat. All matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that
temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe
how we feel if we have no heat."
The student continued. "Professor, does darkness exist?" The professor
responded,"Of course it does."
The student replied, "Once again you are wrong, sir. Darkness does not
exist either. Darkness is, in reality, the absence of light. We can
study light, but not darkness. In fact, we can use Newton's prism to
break white light into many colors and study the various wave lengths of
each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break
into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a
certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this
correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when
there is no light present."
Finally, the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?" Now
uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course, as I have already said.
We see it everyday. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to
man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the
world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil."
To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist, sir, or at least it
does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is
just like darkness and cold -- a word that man has created to describe
the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or
love, that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what
happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like
the cold that comes when there is no heat, or the darkness that comes
when there is no light."
The professor sat down. The young student's name -- Albert Einstein. More >
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11 Aug 2004 @ 06:45, by scotty. Philosophy
“Presence is needed to become aware of the beauty, the majesty, the sacredness of nature. Have you ever gazed up into the infinity of space on a clear night, awestruck by the awesome stillness and inconceivable vastness of it? Have you listened, truly listened, to the sound of a mountain stream in the forest? Or to the song of a blackbird at dusk on a quiet evening? To become aware of such things, the mind needs to be still. You have to put down for a moment your personal baggage of problems, of past and future, as well as all your knowledge; otherwise, you will see but not see, hear but not hear. Your total presence is required.”
“The Man Watching the Storm Approaching,”
I can tell by the way the trees beat, after
so many dull days, on my worried windowpanes
that a storm is coming,
and I hear the far-off fields say things
I can’t bear without a friend
I can’t love without a sister.
The storm, the shifter of shapes, drives on
across the woods and across time,
and the world looks as if it had no age;
the landscape, like a line in the psalm book,
is seriousness and weight and eternity.
What we choose to fight with is so tiny!
what fights with us is so great!
if only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm,
we would become strong too, and not need names.
When we win it’s with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.
What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers in the Old Testament:
when the wrestlers’ sinews
grew long like metal strings,
he felt them under his fingers
like chords of deep music.
Whoever was beaten by this Angel
(who so often simply declined the fight)
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand
that kneaded him as if to change his shape.
Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.
( taken from this [link] More >
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3 Aug 2004 @ 06:46, by namakando. Philosophy
3 Aug 2004 @ 06:11, by NAMAKANDO NALIKANDO SINYAMA
THE ALL IN MY PSYCHE SERIES NO.1
"They can take away your everything but NO one will ever take away your education."-namakando nalikando sinyama
“PRISONS WITHOUT BARS”
BY NAMAKANDO NALIKANDO SINYAMA
21STCENTURY WACKY THINKING, MILLENNIUM MANIA
WAY TO THE FUTURE, DONÂ’T YOU THINK?
I find the concepts of FREEDOM and INCARCERATION as being RELATIVE. Well, I may not be a direct descendant of The father of Relativity (Albert Einstein), but I confidently do feel I have a fair command of the idea of relativity only in the philosophical sense. If peopleÂ’s traditional understanding of freedom is as a state of mind where or under which one can freely express their innermost feelings and thus view prisons as places where this amount of leverage is blatantly denied then get ready to rethink your stance as society.
Here is a paradoxical statement, everything considered, a prisoner can actually feel and be free inside the prison. The general explanation is that it depends on what one wants to do and where they want to do it, in or outside the prison. All right! Enough of the philosophical jargon you say, fine. Hang on then.
When I first came to varsity as a freshman, I had this misconception of the place being where students easily get morally corrupted because of the –so –called excess ‘freedom’. Freedom my arse! This would be your reaction too if you spent a year here. While here, I have noticed that it is the strictest place, you can ever be at, which in comparison makes places like ALCATRAZ or other penitentiary prisons seem like kindergartens. Wet even them have rules! The whole system at the university I discovered was structured in such a way that one was never really free to do anything. The design of ‘The University Prison’ is such that, there are no visible razor-sharp barbed wire fences or a high voltage electric fence to keep the students in per se. Yet the students are heavily guarded, by TIME. The trick is what the students want is inside the ‘prison’, which is EDUCATION, so he finds himself not making any attempts to escape. Although I stand to be corrected on this point as not every student is out to get a decent education. This point is made evident by the phrases in Campus Lingo. When a student goes to study it is called an activity of defending the BC, which is the monthly meal allowance. I guess due to the state of the country’s labour industry we’ve had our priorities shifted. Is it therefore Freedom when you go out of campus on a drinking spree and still come back rushing, uncalled, to attend the morning lectures? Is it freedom if you only sleep for four hours a day? Is it freedom if you live in the district where the university is situated but only visit home or never at all? Is it freedom if even during vacation many a student opts not to go home? Is it freedom if you even fail to write a letter to your dear friend because you have piles of books to read? Well, as the Yankees (Americans) would say, that’s a cock and bull story, bollocks, and a bunch of baloney sheer humbug! Kindly excuse my bad language. It’s just that I react this way sometimes when I’m pissed, oops here I go again!
A student’s stay at varsity is determined by how good they are at managing their TIME. You see, it’s funny how you can have all the fun and indulge yourself in all thinkable orgies but still be attracted to your cell ‘The level’ or the room to bury your face in the books. Therefore, it’s never freedom if in the night you doze but cannot yield to the natural process of sleep. I always break down and cry when I remember how on a countless number of times I could doze off clutching a book in my hands, yank myself out of it for sleep was a luxury which a student could ill afford to avail himself. The spirit was willing to study but the Body was weak. I will never forget not as far as long as I live. But then I realized it is in critical moments like these that the true BAROTSE CHARACTER reveals itself. So I held on and here I am with a B. Sc under me belt! I can only hope I use the knowledge and experience I’ve gained for the service and betterment of mankind. The task is indeed a bit Herculean if done alone but together we can be strong and our collective contributions will go a long way.
Yet it is all very easy and simple to escape and thus free oneself from this mental and physical torture that tests you to the limit until your sinews snap. Stories of students who decide they’ve had enough and quit mid way are all too common. I will also never forget, how despite my sweet tooth that makes me crave the Mango fruit, it was Mango season in the rest of the country, but I did not know or realize it whilst at C.B.U. But then C.B.U is just that, another country! A little corner in the world. You see there’s always this seemingly ugly, scar-face, goblin monster creature they call SENATE and it’s agent the SESSIONAL EXAMS which determine the fate of individual students and checks those that had too much freedom during their stay in the ‘prison’. This if you asked me is the surest way of getting out of THE MAXIMUM PENITETIARY PRISON.
The above presented scenario should not be discouraging as it is only reflective of conditions where I was but it should spur every student where ever they may be that we need to have them prepared for all hardships and that new civilization will require all especially students to look at things in a totally new light so as not make the same mistakes that have been made in science and politics. In retrospect therefore, universities need not be ‘prisons’ but places where we should nurture ourselves into more responsible social beings, exercising greater levels of tolerance and acceptance as we prepare to become members of the New Civilization.it was under this environment that I made my first steps towards what I can only term enlightenment. One just has to experience it as i cannot put it in words. The moment one starts looking at same situations differently you get illumined by an inner glow of excitement then just know you are getting there!
CAUTION: DO NOT BITE OFF MORE THAN YOU CAN CHEW
“ Absolute Freedom Corrupts Absolutely”.
- NAMAKANDO NALIKANDO SINYAMA III, 4th Year
- B.Sc. FORESTRY (L 235)The Copperbelt university(CBU)
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 28 Jul 2004 @ 21:40, by ming. Philosophy
Yahoo Dictionary:Paradigm: A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline. An important word to know. The Paradigm Web:The word "paradigm" was originally one of those obscure academic terms that has undergone many changes of meaning over the centuries. The classical Greeks used it to refer to an original archetype or ideal. Later it came to refer to a grammatical term. In the early 1960s Thomas Kuhn (1922-1996) wrote a ground breaking book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, in which he showed that science does not progress in an orderly fashion from lesser to greater truth, but rather remains fixated on a particular dogma or explanation - a paradigm - which is only overthrown with great difficulty and a new paradigm established. Thus the Copernican system (the sun at the center of the universe) overthrew the Ptolemaic (the earth at the center) one, and Newtonian physics was replaced by Relativity and Quantum Physics. Science thus consists of periods of conservatism ("Normal" Science) punctuated by periods of "Revolutionary" Science. Even more important is finding out how to get these things changed, preferably faster than waiting around for the people with the old views to die. From the same source:Paradigm Shift: When anomalies or inconsistencies arise within a given paradigm and present problems that we are unable to solve within a given paradigm, our view of reality must change, as must the way we perceive, think, and value the world. We must take on new assumptions and expectations that will transform our theories, traditions, rules, and standards of practice. We must create a new paradigm in which we are able to solve the insolvable problems of the old paradigm. More good info at Wikipedia. Anyway, so, get that. A paradigm is on its way out when it no longer solves the problems it is meant to solve. Or, rather, it should be on its way out, and a better paradigm should replace it, which better solves the present problems. For various reasons, that might not happen readily. There are people with a vested interest in the old paradigm, who have based their careers on it. And we all have habits that might be difficult to change, including habits of thinking. And we might not really know what the new, better paradigm should be. Even if we bump into it.
 Paradigms usually don't start working well right away. And they don't suddenly just stop working either. One way of looking at the life cycle of a paradigm is with a diagram like this. There's a starting period, A, when the paradigm is still being developed, and one hasn't quite figured out the best way of using it yet, so it isn't all that impressive how well it solves problems. Then there's a phase B, where it all has been streamlined, and the paradigm accepted, and it solves lots of problems. Finally, phase C, it slows down, or might eventually drop. Maybe the problems get harder, or they change fundamentally. That's probably when somebody might start looking for better paradigms. Would be better if they did it in phase B, so that there would be time to develop the new approach. But most people wouldn't be looking at that time.
Joel Barker explained all of that really well, in a (very expensive) video and a (cheap) book. Several books, actually.
It is worthwhile to learn to see paradigms. So one can realize which ones one is stuck in, and so one can recognize the alternatives when one sees them. Both are hard. The well-worn paths of the human mind makes it difficult to see where else one could go.
Imagine that changed. That we evolved a bit and we always had a consciousness of what paradigms we were living in, and the myriad of other possibilities. Meta-humans. More >
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