A Bradburyan Nighmare: The Shunning of Intellect

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by gendanken, May 1, 2004.

  1. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    It's no worse than you deserve for getting your gripe on.

    Leo tried to use the Plato's Cave analogy to explain why nerds are reviled.

    I said that the Plato's Cave story was meant to support Plato's metaphysics and imply that Socrates had access to absolute truth, and that the analogy was therefore 1) highly questionable, and 2) had nothing to do with nerds. The fact that Socrates is fictitious DOES figure into this.

    You have, ever since, been trying to defend Leo's statement! Why?

    Do you think that I'm diminishing the sum of human knowledge by claiming that Plato's words may not be absolutely true?

    Do you think that the real Socrates, or even Plato's fake Socrates, is really turning over in his grave because I called him a dick?

    Do you think that the statement "The only thing I know, is that I know nothing," really helps to clarify things in this context? Or the Goethe quote for that matter? Goethe (assuming his words were translated properly with respect to his original intent) was trying to say that we shouldn't diminish a person's ideas by calling them DERIVATIVE.

    That's not what I was doing.

    If you saw a sock puppet dancing back and forth on TV saying, "Be good little workers now! Swink and slave for Chairman Mao!" You would probably call this propaganda.

    But let the little Socrates hand-puppet come out singing "I only want to tell you about How Things Really Are," and what? You sit down and take in everything he says as gospel, because there really used to be a guy called Socrates? Because the passing of two thousand years has placed his words beyond reproach, no matter how misappropriated or crooked they sound?

    SOCRATES IS PLATO'S SOCK PUPPET. PLATO'S WORDS ARE LIKE THOSE OF ANY OTHER HUMAN BEING. IT DOESN'T MATTER WHOSE MOUTH THEY COME OUT OF, THEY CAN STILL BE WRONG.

    Plato believed that ALL human knowledge, without exception, was an incomplete remembrance of their life in Heaven with the Gods.

    Plato believed that most people in the world (including other Athenians) were of much baser stock than himself and his enlightened buddies, and that only by their benificent rule could the mud-footed farmers and other dastardly laborers be kept in check.

    Plato believed that a government should lie to its public regularly, to conceal the fact that it was exercising control over every aspect of their lives, including their choice of husband/wife and ability to have children.

    By today's philosophical standards, Plato was kind of an ass.

    So, why defend him? Why defend Socrates, his sock puppet? Why defend Socrates' sock puppet - Leo - for using his words out of context? Why continue to defend Leo when he has obviously passed on from this point and has forgotten what we're talking about?
     
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  3. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    The practical refutation of Plato's Cave analogy, by R.:

    Plato's Cave analogy is not in place for a simple reason: it is not realistic.

    I am aware that many many will be very glad to smash me to pices because of thinking in such practical terms, but: If we are trying to explain real life phenomena, we cannot use real life phenomena taken to unreal-life-extremes.

    What bothers me with the cave story/analogy/metaphor is this: If the people were in the cave all their lives -- who brought them food, who brought the wood to keep the fire burning and thereby ensure that they could see themselves as shadows all the time? Plus, if they had been in the cave all their life, their eyes would get so sensitive to light, that when they would step out into the sun, they would most likely be blinded immediately.

    Ok, so you enter another metaphor into the cave metaphor, explaining that it is nature or whatever that gives people food and everything, in real life.

    When choosing a metaphor to explain something, we have to make sure that we stick to that metaphor, and not mix it with other metaphors.

    Saying that "experience is the wind we fly on, and it is a rock we build our house on" may be nice and poetic, but the two metaphors (being a wind, being a rock) render eachother meaningless. They are both meaningful, but only in their own contexts.


    P.S.
    BBH, if something is said enough times, it becomes true.
     
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  5. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    An oldie but a goodie - so sayeth Lewis Carroll:

    "Just the place for a Snark!" the Bellman cried,
    As he landed his crew with care;
    Supporting each man on the top of the tide
    By a finger entwined in his hair.
    "Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice:
    That alone should encourage the crew.
    Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice:
    What i tell you three times is true."

    BUT

    Orwell once said that metaphors, when used long enough, become dead and you cease to recognize them as such. His example was an "iron will".

    "Since it with me, one two three!
    Lots of dead guys disagree."
     
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  7. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    BBH,


    Another oldie but a goodie, by the very Lewis Carroll, behold:

    "When *I* use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
    "The question is," said Alice, "whether you *can* make words mean so many different things."
    "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master -- that's all."



    That's true. The newer (well, now it isn't that new anymore) theory of metaphor by Lakoff & Johnson works with exactly such metaphors -- here's the link:
    http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~market/semiotic/met1.html
    And the starting page:
    http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~market/semiotic/metaphor_toc.html
     
  8. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    If it be,
    Why seems it so particular with thee?
     
  9. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    1,996
    Because I don't like to argue with phantoms, particularly when they represent prior art rather than current effort.
     
  10. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

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    4,779
    Greetings, my dears. The infection is back......

    Rosamagika:
    You're walking up a philosophical cul-de-sac, you'll get nowhere.

    It takes a second to grasp Plato's symbolism if treated as all other gedankens (cheap plug). Einstein speaks of a closed room flinging through space, a vaccum you'd implode in but I see it and that was what explained his equivalance principle to me. Beautifully- that's the point.

    But as for who brings the wood...... surely you know its my boyfriend.

    Bigblue:
    Speaking of effort, lets us examine a recent dissection of a recent schoolboy named Leo. Courtesy of a little blue bird:


    "Leo's synthesis of world media culture is a little like someone lying on the bottom of a sewer, devising a clever system to collect all the fecal treasures raining from above so that he can determine which one smells the best. It's a sort of dialectical materialist account of striving to wallow in shit with the greatest possible degree of excellence."

    Bingo- let us rejoice that the average child watches 16-18 odd hours of television.
    Let us rejoice that language is thinning.
    Let us rejoice that gossip spreads like gonhorrhea nowadays.
    Let us rojoice at 3 people sitting on the same bench, in the same park, on the same beautiful spring day all on the fucking cell phone.
    Let us celebrate the quotedropping sumabitch who knows that 99% of people won't ever find out he's a fraud.

    People like Leo we find squatting in the background stroking the brown off a beautiful turd.


    On topic:
    Jung is of course a deluded schmuck, but were he alive today I belive he'd be posting in my thread- from his "Memoirs, Dreams and Reflections":

    "More than ever, I wanted someone to talk with, but nowhere did I find a point of contact; on the contrary, I sensed in others an estrangement, a distrust, an apprehension which robbed me of speech. That too depressed me. I did not know what to make of it. Why has no one had similiar experiences to mine? I wondered. Why is there nothing about it in scholarly books? Am I the only one who has had such experiences? Why should I be the only one? It never occrued to me that I might be crazy...."

    And after going through the trials of insecurity that by their exaggeration moves us to finally stand up in front of them and kick them in the groin, Jung became a little more secure as we all have:

    "I felt firmer ground under my feet and even sumomned up the courage to speak openly my ideas. But that, as I discovered much too soon, was a misunderstanding which I had cause to regret. For I met not only with embarassment or mockery, but with hostile rejection."


    See?

    In closing, to all those people who curl their lips in disgust when a nerd quotes his Shakespeare or goes on about string theory, I will visit you one day in your nursing homes if only to strip the diaper right off of you and jam it in your face- then you'll really have something to curl those ugly lips up in disgust at.
     
  11. P. M. Thorne Registered Senior Member

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    574
    Good quotes. Do you have the book? Just wondered, because these are not often quoted, (unless I missed something).
    pmt
     
  12. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    6,442
    Here she comes,with el diablo en el ojo: Gendanken.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!




    I don't like mind experiments with inconsistent metaphors, that is all.
    Of course, metaphors can be wildly revealing, but one should be careful with their use.
    Make a metaphor, step in it to understand something, then step out of it.
     
  13. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    1,996
    But Jung believed in racial memory, didn't he? He would have taken that kind of rejection as a slap in the face where most people would shrug it off, I would have thought; I think the idea of "humanity as emotional collective" isn't so strong with most people.
     
  14. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    1,996
    You're missing the wonder of this. Isn't it fabulous that nowadays, you can learn all kinds of incredible things about someone without having to go to the bother of getting to know them? Just listen to them yelling into their headset like an idiot.

    In this age of identity theft, I am sometimes surprised that people will wander around a bus station talking loudly about their personal life...
     
  15. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

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    P.M.T:
    Of course I have the book- "Memories, Dreams, and Reflections" translated from the German by Richard and Clara Winston, couple highbrows only good for translations.

    Rosamagika:
    Ha!
    Y en el corazon un veneno de oro, quien sera el humano con la suerte de probarlo?

    Sure are, but overmuch is overmuch. I've learned through the years to go easy on the metaphors for not doing so is beating a dead horse whose flogging is only a hammering of the the words through the pages that will crumble like the stale cookies that make for delicious literature.
    That's just the way the ball bounces, you know?
    Make your bed, monsieur, now lie in it with dead dogs and so much bullshatta.

    Blueboy:
    Racial memory? Enlighten me- far as I know, he believed in the unconscious being a seperate objective entity which he felt able to talk to us, in the form of an animus. His was a woman and his personality Number 2 was named Philemon. I belive Friedrich called it 'arrhenton' or somesuch.

    My animus has no name but he sounds very British, he's got specs and brown, checkered lapels, an overcoat with frayed tails and a Wonka hat topping his sexy head. He speaks eloquently- and he won't shut the fuck up at night.

    I never said Jung was brilliant- he was deluded and obsessed with God, not to mention the alchemy.

    As far as the emotional collective, he was far too impressed with Schopenheaur in his youth so of course he's going to sound even more like a midieveal quack (which he was- even so I dig him).

    Useless fyi- I once had to sit through a black chick's gossip on her cellphone.
    To this day I know her name, her mother's name, her boyfriends name, what her major was and what school she attended (suprisingly, a major univerisity).
    [deleted].
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 26, 2004
  16. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    6,442
    Gendanken,

    A note from William Blake, for your approval, perusal and your possible refusal:

    [On Sir Joshua Reynolds]

    O Reader, behold the Philosopher's grave!
    He was born quite a Fool, but he died quite a Knave.




    P.S.

    Aunque sepa los caminos
    yo nunca llegaré a Córdoba.



    Don't tempt me to start learning Spanish, damn! I have exams to study for.
     
  17. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    1,996
    You have an animus? I just have... people... I don't really know which one's the opposite of me.

    Nah, I'm just saying that Jung was a shiny-eyed baby squirrel looking for a hug, and the world is a cruel place. He warn't a nerd, but rather a Care Bear in a world of Securitat-Offizieren. (Exaggeration for effect.)

    Or is this a form of the reviled nerd-dom you're talking about? Those who need a kind of love that no one wants to give?
     
  18. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    6,442
    Does this lead back to the issue started before -- namely, that (some) nerds are socially/emotionally dysfunctional in some way or another?

    Gendanken spoke of how some people don't know the right "strokes" in communication.
     
  19. BigBlueHead Great Tealnoggin! Registered Senior Member

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    1,996
    But this is really at the heart of the issue?

    Some people seek love above all else, accepting all manner of abuse and sacrificing their own individuality and self-determination for the sake of this pursuit.

    Are they nerds?
     
  20. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    6,442
    Is this a question, a statement, ...?

    Some of them, probably.

    We can then get into a (quasi-) psychological analysis of why some people, with certain intellectual abilities, turn out seeking emotional satisfaction in non-typical (" ") ways.
    So far, I think we've discussed the more external phenomena regarding nerddom.
     
  21. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

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    Rosamagika:
    Niiiiiice..... Puts me in the mood for some poetry...soon.
    All I ask is a tall ship and a star to sail her by.

    Nunca tomas de los muertos, Rosa. Nunca llegaras a Cordoba porque las palabras usted robo de Cortes. O Colombo?


    Bigblue:
    Aye, I have an animus. People bore.

    True enough- I imagine he would show up and gendanken would jump on him for being an irritating softy.
    But he was a nerd, very much so- spent his life obssessing over bugs and dreams and meaning, devouring his father's library, toning down his eccentricities for the sake of convention. This messed him up for it depressed him- typical.

    His critique of Freidrich is interesting though-
    "Most of them (collegues) did not read a word of Neitzche and therefore dwelt at length on his outward foibles, for example, his putting on airs as a gentleman, his manner of playing the piano, his stylistic exaggerations- idyosincracies which got on the nerves of the good people of Basel in those days. Such things would certainly not have caused me to postpone the reading of Neitzche-on the contrary they acted as the strongest incentive. But I was held back by a secret fear that I might perhaps be like him, at least in regard to the 'secret' which had isolated him from his environment."

    He was afraid he might be like him- this belies his (Jung) being one of those complacent nerds who would accept all manner of abuse and sacrifice their own individuality and self-determination for the sake of comfort.
    Then again, not so for he spurned Freud who was practically blood.

    He would be reviled both for his pushing to fit in *and* his passion- the former looks clumsy on him and the latter smells odd to the layman, so he avoids it.

    Nietzche, from this description coupled with Kauffman's many accounts of the kind of person he was, was a nerdy asshole. One reviled for his submissivenss (J), the other reviled for his exaggerations.(N)


    OFF TOPIC:

    "We can then get into a (quasi-) psychological analysis of why some people, with certain intellectual abilities, turn out seeking emotional satisfaction in non-typical (" ") ways.
    So far, I think we've discussed the more external phenomena regarding nerddom."
    Ha.

    Do you really wish to know why? Oh do you?
     
  22. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

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    Blue:

    I owe you a crack dollar.
     
  23. water the sea Registered Senior Member

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    Okay, I will be so bold as to propose this hypothesis on the origin and explanation of nerddom:


    Nerds are people with a self-esteem issue* who have solved this issue or are dealing with it in a manner that is regarded by society as non-typically creative or overly creative.


    *This "self-esteem issue" is to be understood in the widest sense of the term.



    P.S.
    Gendanken,

    !Ay qué camino tan largo!

    Man geht an seiner Interessantheit zugrunde oder man wird ein Meister.
     

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