Thinking, thinking, thinking....Experience!

[Pineal]

Mulling over an idea. Arguing about that idea. Rewording the idea and the pros and cons of it. Reading the writing of others' thoughts on that idea. Mulling over an idea. Thinking in words, thinking in words, thinking in words.....

Is this overdone? When is it time to 'go out' and experience something new that might reflect back on these words, enrich and challenge our semantics, highlight false dilemmas and other assumptions that seem mere common sense, apriori givens?

Some possible experiences that might enhance philosophical positions and undestanding:

Beginning meditation practice
Learning a foreign Language
Hanging out with the other sex regularly - if you had not done this before - or your own sex if that was the exception
Spending time in a very different culture
Talking to someone with a mental illness, savant skill, difference in sensory skills
Spending time with animals one has not spent time with - either in relaxed ways or more focused ways - dog or horse training, naturalist type observation for long periods, etc.
Improvisational theater workshops
Biofeedback training

[cosmictraveler]

Many live their lives vicariously through others experiences and are just as happy as those who are out doing stuff. If you are doing either that's your choice so when you want to change your environment only you can do so.

[wynn]

As I read the thread title, my mind went:

Thinking, thinking, thinking ... gone!

[Pincho Paxton]

Mulling over an idea. Arguing about that idea. Rewording the idea and the pros and cons of it. Reading the writing of others' thoughts on that idea. Mulling over an idea. Thinking in words, thinking in words, thinking in words.....

Is this overdone? When is it time to 'go out' and experience something new that might reflect back on these words, enrich and challenge our semantics, highlight false dilemmas and other assumptions that seem mere common sense, apriori givens?

Yeah, it's called Wikipedia, the Internet, and science news. You may have an idea, but you can always read all of the other current ideas, and the current discoveries. Besides, you aren't going to see much outside apart from nature at full scale. If you want to test something.. sure test it, but personally, I have to test my ideas on a computer.

[Pineal]

Many live their lives vicariously through others experiences and are just as happy as those who are out doing stuff. If you are doing either that's your choice so when you want to change your environment only you can do so.

I was thinkingin terms of philosophical ideas or other ideas that get discussed here on the forums - perhaps year in year out. To me it seems that it can be very easy to think you have the necessary perspective on the experiences/phenomena one is discussing, when you really don't. Or to put it less negatively, one can enrich one's experience through new experiences - ones one has not had before or much - and come back to such discussions with some assumptions challenged and perhaps more to offer others.

[Pineal]

Yeah, it's called Wikipedia, the Internet, and science news. You may have an idea, but you can always read all of the other current ideas, and the current discoveries. Besides, you aren't going to see much outside apart from nature at full scale. If you want to test something.. sure test it, but personally, I have to test my ideas on a computer.

Let me give an example: in philosophy one might be discussing perception. One might feel quite confident about how language and perception are linked. One defends and puts forwards one's opinions and these remain rather much the same and seem well supported by one's own experiences.

Then one takes a medication workship or spends a year in another culture and picks up a good deal of the language....

and suddenly what seemed obvious and well supported before no longer seems so.

Even the way a person comes at these sources of other ideas on the internet may prevent taking seriously ideas that differ from current conceptions.

[Dywyddyr]

When is it time to 'go out' and experience something new

Probably about the time you start thinking things like your post.
But definitely well before you start "thinking" like Pincho:

Besides, you aren't going to see much outside apart from nature at full scale. If you want to test something.. sure test it, but personally, I have to test my ideas on a computer.

[Pineal]

I have added to the OP a far from exhaustive list of some types of experience I think could easily change one's perspective on philosophical issues.

[Pineal]

Probably about the time you start thinking things like your post.
But definitely well before you start "thinking" like Pincho:

I added a list of specific experiences to the OP. I was not finding a rather roundabout way of saying get a life, but rather thinking of experiences that can change or enrich one's philosophical positions in ways that rehashing things in words cannot do.

[Dywyddyr]

I added a list of specific experiences to the OP. I was not finding a rather roundabout way of saying get a life, but rather thinking of experiences that can change or enrich one's philosophical positions in ways that rehashing things in words cannot do.

Didn't take it as "get a life".
But once one becomes absorbed in thinking about thinking it's either time to go and get an "injection" of reality and put some thinking into "practice", or get a job as a philosopher.
As per Pincho's almost-dismissal of "nature at full-scale" (ridiculous since nature is what he's supposedly modelling) and his inane (effective) claim that testing ideas on computer is somehow better than comparing it with nature. Nature is wrong! It disagrees with my perfect computer model!

[Pineal]

Didn't take it as "get a life".
But once one becomes absorbed in thinking about thinking it's either time to go and get an "injection" of reality and put some thinking into "practice", or get a job as a philosopher.

So what kinds of experiences might alter your perspective on some philosophical issues. And note: I don't mean - well, if God came down in a lightning bolt and..... - or other specific experiences that likely one could guess how you might be influenced - but more what categories of experience might do such things, without you really knowing in advance how?

Similar perhaps (?) to ones I suggested on my list.

As per Pincho's almost-dismissal of "nature at full-scale" (ridiculous since nature is what he's supposedly modelling) and his inane (effective) claim that testing ideas on computer is somehow better than comparing it with nature. Nature is wrong! It disagrees with my perfect computer model!

I had a little trouble understanding what he meant there. I thought perhaps it meant what you took it to mean and I would say I agree with what you say here.

I am being critical of the notion that staying on a word level with ideas can lead to real change or full perspective and also that changes in what one habitually experiences - given that habitual experiences may reinforce biases and assumptions - are necessary for fuller and deeper perpectives.

[Dywyddyr]

So what kinds of experiences might alter your perspective on some philosophical issues.

Most seem a bit "new age" to me.
But spending time in a different culture would be on my list.
Or, as I have done in the past, switch disciplines altogether.
After a couple of decades as an engineer I went back to university for a degree course in the social "sciences". That opened my eyes more than slightly...

[Me-Ki-Gal]

Mulling over an idea. Arguing about that idea. Rewording the idea and the pros and cons of it. Reading the writing of others' thoughts on that idea. Mulling over an idea. Thinking in words, thinking in words, thinking in words.....

Is this overdone? When is it time to 'go out' and experience something new that might reflect back on these words, enrich and challenge our semantics, highlight false dilemmas and other assumptions that seem mere common sense, apriori givens?

Some possible experiences that might enhance philosophical positions and undestanding:

Beginning meditation practice
Learning a foreign Language
Hanging out with the other sex regularly - if you had not done this before - or your own sex if that was the exception
Spending time in a very different culture
Talking to someone with a mental illness, savant skill, difference in sensory skills
Spending time with animals one has not spent time with - either in relaxed ways or more focused ways - dog or horse training, naturalist type observation for long periods, etc.
Improvisational theater workshops
Biofeedback training

Ah yeah put your words to the test . What you learn from others that seem viable . You should try my way . You might be pleasantly surprised at your results .

A lot of you think I live in dream land . Well it is a great place to live .

My son was moved up to precalculus today . Yeah they moved him up from Honors Algebra 2 . He is 14 . Only the second kid to do so in the last 2 decades at his school and the other was a P.H.D. before she was 20 . Went on to do great things . That is pretty good experiencing would you not think. He sucks all the living he can get out of something is why . He learn that from Me . This need to eat knowledge . That is only half of it cause he figured out he needed it to get what he really wants . He needs the math so he can do the other things he wants to create . He is a creator like Me . He is going save your butts and not because I force him to drink the water. I don't force him to do anything . I don't even make him make his bed . Why ? Cause I know his work is more important than making his bed .

You are all so lucky to have him in the world .

Yeah a real Dougy Houser . Skinny like Dougy too . A savior is born. Lets hope you all don't fuck it up . I am doing my best not to

[scheherazade]

Many things can be modeled in the mind, a composite of what we may have observed and heard of the experience of others, and that which we may have learned about through other sources, including educational venues and the internet.

Yet, until a thing is experienced in actuality, we really cannot claim to know it.

Joy and sorrow are both capable of reducing us to tears, though they are arrived at by different paths......occasionally experienced simultaneously.

[Me-Ki-Gal]

Most seem a bit "new age" to me.
But spending time in a different culture would be on my list.
Or, as I have done in the past, switch disciplines altogether.
After a couple of decades as an engineer I went back to university for a degree course in the social "sciences". That opened my eyes more than slightly...

interesting ! I did picture you as a multi talented gifted person . Could it be my impression was right ? Possibly by your revelations right there? I like to think so anyway

[Pineal]

Most seem a bit "new age" to me.

Sure, however, outside of religions/spirituality it is harder to find organized practices aimed at experiencing without the dominance of the verbal mind. I am sure other more secular practices can do this - but often they are incredibly distracting. I would guess free climbers are very economic about mental verbiage, especially when leaping for a hold they are unsure of, but....it is not so easy to also note what perception is like doing that. Though I do think this could produce changes in positions - no pun intended - and would certainly think it fit on the list in the OP:

But spending time in a different culture would be on my list.
Or, as I have done in the past, switch disciplines altogether.
After a couple of decades as an engineer I went back to university for a degree course in the social "sciences". That opened my eyes more than slightly..

.So how did this shift, which is a perfect example, shift your philosophical perspectives, if it did.

And note: while this was an academic pursuit, and hence a bunch of reading and writing, you were also put in situations, I would guess, that you had not been before, at least in an organized way.

[Dywyddyr]

So how did this shift, which is a perfect example, shift your philosophical perspectives, if it did.

And note: while this was an academic pursuit, and hence a bunch of reading and writing, you were also put in situations, I would guess, that you had not been before, at least in an organized way.

Not the least was my fellow students. All adult, but compared to the majority I had been born with a "silver spoon in my mouth".
I'd always seen myself as "ordinary" (as, of course, were my contemporaries growing up and my colleagues at work), but things I took for granted were nearly a different planet for some of these people.

[Me-Ki-Gal]

Many things can be modeled in the mind, a composite of what we may have observed and heard of the experience of others, and that which we may have learned about through other sources, including educational venues and the internet.

Yet, until a thing is experienced in actuality, we really cannot claim to know it.

Joy and sorrow are both capable of reducing us to tears, though they are arrived at by different paths......occasionally experienced simultaneously.

See that is it right there . All the theory in the world don't mean a thing if it just sits on a shelf ( Fucking Daja voodoo right that second . I know were it came from too . A post that had the same verbiage utilizing shelving things concepts . I was set up by you alls pre language to say that ) It was put in my mouth by one of you .

So you can learn all you want about guitar playing but until you play guitar you will never be a guitar player . Did I say that right . You will not be a guitar player until you play guitar . It don't matter how much you know about playing guitar. I think that be clear enough to understand . Give it all you got . That is what is known as heart . Boxers learn what heart is . Never say die . Get back up after being knocked down . Get back on the horse so to speak . Why not is the question ? Better than lazing around the house watching reruns of Hazel or All in the family

[Pineal]

So you can learn all you want about guitar playing but until you play guitar you will never be a guitar player .

Not only will you not be a guitar player, but you will likely wax foolish if you hold forth on discussions of guitar playing. At the very least, you will be missing things the guitar players have.

[Pineal]

Not the least was my fellow students. All adult, but compared to the majority I had been born with a "silver spoon in my mouth".
I'd always seen myself as "ordinary" (as, of course, were my contemporaries growing up and my colleagues at work), but things I took for granted were nearly a different planet for some of these people.

Oh, yes. I was going to add spending time with people from other classes. That is a real eye opener. Not just about them, but about 'normal'.