[time 574] Re: [time 566] Re: [time 565] Rational vs. Synthetic (?) modes


Matti Pitkanen (matpitka@pcu.helsinki.fi)
Thu, 19 Aug 1999 07:43:54 +0300 (EET DST)


On Thu, 19 Aug 1999, Hitoshi Kitada wrote:

> Dear Matti and Stephen,
>
> Matti Pitkanen wrote:
>
> >> Have you ever considered the reason why "only the rational mode
> is"
> >> thought as "the desired one" yet?
> >
> >
> > Difficult question. It seems that these two modes are competing.
> > Perhaps this is good for survival of self containing both kinds
> > of subselves. Perhaps Eastern-Western division is to certain
> degree
> > good for mankind also.
> >
> > One reason for the 'desired oneness' of rational mode is that
> the
> > rational mode dominates in recent society. It is very difficult to
> > take seriously even the possibility of different mode of self
> unless one
> > experiences it personally. Usually this occurs completely
> spontaneously:
> > for individualistic 'Westener' the idea about 'guru' is very
> > difficult to accept. The tragedy is that people doing science are
> by
> > definition in rational mode in professional life= often entire
> life (my
> > personal dream is to stop thinking when I am fifty and fall into a
> state
> > of whole-body consciousness for the rest of my life(;-)).
>
> I am already more than fifty, and maybe in "a state of whole-body
> consciousness";-)
>
> Apart from personal things, it is easy to say that these two modes
> are complementary, but the point is balance. Remind what the biased
> dominance of rationalism brought. Recall what Columbus and
> successors brought into American continent, and what misery happened
> in Australia. Maybe the westerners think them as triumphs of ratio
> and they brought civilization into poor American Indians and
> Aborigines. But both races had been almost terminated. Do you think
> these justice? If the western would continue to keep biased emphasis
> on ratio, it would bring further violence and destructions. Bias to
> either modes would not work good for our future in both physical and
> mental aspects.

I think nowadays very few westeners are proud about what they
have done for American Indians and Aborigines. From a discussion with
my good friend I learned that the postmodernistic
relativization of moral (everything is reletive and
everything goes) was the reaction to the earlier attitudes which regarded
other cultures as primitive and morally inferior. It was of course
reaction and as such not good.

I believe that this busily occurring consciousness theorizing gives
hopes. When we understand scientifically that these
two modes exists and are equally valuable for survival and spiritual
life and even that evolution of consciousness at the level of entire
species is possible and that we are not at the top of hierarchy of
consciousness, we can survive.

Best,
MP

>
>
> Stephen P. King wrote:
>
> > Dear Hitoshi and Matti,
> >
> > Perhaps the two modes are "complementary", in that a "complete"
> > understanding is impossible to realize within only one mode, and
> it is
> > impossible to "be" in both modes simultaneously. Rudy Rucker
> discusses
> > these modes and this complementarity, it is not new...
> >
> > Kindest regards,
> >
> > Stephen
>
> Best wishes,
> Hitoshi
>
>
>



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