The Eagle and the Chicken

[mystery]

Hi Nick, are you asking about the viewpoint and mindset of the 1% and how they see the same story of eagle and chicken or something different, pls detail and give some example.

Hi Mystery

To discuss the deeper meanings of this story requires a long discussion on the inner meanings of Plato's Cave. So this is just the basic idea.

First of all, Imagine yourself on the ground floor inside of a tall building. This is the domain where chickens live and interact with other chickens. It includes chickens of all societal status and definitions of intelligence.

For some reason you take the elevator to the first floor and look down upon yourself in the domain of chickens. You begin to feel that living like this is not I. Why should I be controlled by so many unnecessary fears and habits. Taking the elevator still higher you see that the building is part of a city which is part of the world and also part of an integrated whole we call universe.

The ride on the elevator represents our consciousness normally at the level of chickens but with the potential to experience higher consciousness which enables us to acquire a human rather than a chicken perspective limited to the ground floor.

Wisdom and knowledge are not the same. Wisdom is defined as the ability to use knowledge to serve universal rather than personal aims. Nietzsche defined the will to power as the ability to become master of oneself to dominate the earth. A person of wisdom has become master of themselves, not slaves to imaginary fears and inhibitions, so as to serve universal purposes including furthering Man's conscious evolution.

The person of wisdom is the eagle representing evolved consciousness not limited to the earth or the barnyard. It is the conscious potential for a human being. This potential represented by the sky is rejected in favor of maintaining the barnyard. Only a small minority are attracted to the light and leave the barnyard in their need to feel human rather than indoctrinated meaning. The world needs these individuals for its survival.

I can understand how you tell it. My viewpoint is slightly awkward for this. I see the tall building, and instinctively know that the most powerful position is in the basement next to the foundation footing. Destruction at this point will bring the entire thing down and all of the self-important ones at the top. One eagle can rule over chickens and even defeat many, but all of them together can always replace any eagle. The power is in the foundations deep in the coop.

I see wisdom as using knowledge for gain, the gain can be either personal, shared, or donated.

When the point of light erupts in the footings, change occurs. When it is only in the sky, it is only decoration.

Hi Mystery

I agree a solid foundation is essential for any societal conscious evolution. The trouble is that if Plato is right the lower parts of the human essence which would provide such a foundation has become corrupted. Plato explains in the Ship of Fools analogy and also in the Chariot analogy.

Consider the chariot analogy for the moment. The chariot is pulled by two winged horses. The white one is immortal and pulls in the direction of the forms. The dark one on the left represents our lower parts Plato describes as deformed and obstinate. He describes the horse as a “crooked lumbering animal, put together anyhow…of a dark color, with grey eyes and blood-red complexion; the mate of insolence and pride, shag-eared and deaf, hardly yielding to whip and spur.” It seeks to pull the white horse and the chariot's driver (reason) down into the earth with it.

If Plato is right, the dark horse responsible for the foundation is incapable of providing one. Attempts to open to higher consciousness will end up on the ship of fools with everyone defending hypocrisy and arguing opinions with no knowledge of the way home. It must collapse

Can the sick horse be made normal in ourselves and in the world? In ourselves it is possible but in the world; I don't think so. The Ship of Fools has been redecorated and corruption is just too inviting so as usual society will have to hit bottom and start again promising, of course, the empty promise of never again.

Nice, it's entertaining how your well-refined description so closely fits with my course one. I wonder if this pattern and reality is destiny or we can evolve to something that no longer has a faulty foundation or greedy horse. Our evolution is already controlled by greed, so I don't know. What do you think? All could feel the wind and freedom of an eagle, but perhaps it requires to see chickens too be an eagle.

[Nick_A]

Hi Mystery

Nice, it's entertaining how your well-refined description so closely fits with my course one. I wonder if this pattern and reality is destiny or we can evolve to something that no longer has a faulty foundation or greedy horse. Our evolution is already controlled by greed, so I don't know. What do you think? All could feel the wind and freedom of an eagle, but perhaps it requires to see chickens too be an eagle.

This is really the concept of conscious evolution. Science accepts mechanical evolution. It believes mechanical evolution is an accident based on trial and error. It is so silly I can only explain it as a secular PC justification to deny the source of consciousness.

Conscious evolution begins where mechanical evolution ends. Man, as a tripartite essence, (3 in 1),is the highest form of mechanical evolution on earth. We know that the perversions of the dark horse prevents it and why it makes us vulnerable to the dominance of imagination. Simone Weil explains the effects of imagination taking the place of sustained conscious awareness.

Imagination is always the fabric of social life and the dynamic of history. The influence of real needs and compulsions, of real interests and materials, is indirect because the crowd is never conscious of it.

Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.

We can only begin to feel the power of imagination keeping humanity as like chickens rather then experiencing the potential for conscious evolution to become like eagles is through efforts to "Know Thyself." to have the experience of ourselves and our hypocrisy. Without it, Man just glorifes idolatry including technology.

Idolatry comes from the fact that, while thirsting for absolute good, we do not possess the power of supernatural attention and we have not the patience to allow it to develop (Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace 53)

Idolatry created by imagination keeps Man attached to the earth and the shadows on the wall like chickens and oblivious of his potential for conscious freedom and experiencing objective human meaning and purpose.

[mystery]

Hi Mystery

Nice, it's entertaining how your well-refined description so closely fits with my course one. I wonder if this pattern and reality is destiny or we can evolve to something that no longer has a faulty foundation or greedy horse. Our evolution is already controlled by greed, so I don't know. What do you think? All could feel the wind and freedom of an eagle, but perhaps it requires to see chickens too be an eagle.

This is really the concept of conscious evolution. Science accepts mechanical evolution. It believes mechanical evolution is an accident based on trial and error. It is so silly I can only explain it as a secular PC justification to deny the source of consciousness.

Conscious evolution begins where mechanical evolution ends. Man, as a tripartite essence, (3 in 1),is the highest form of mechanical evolution on earth. We know that the perversions of the dark horse prevents it and why it makes us vulnerable to the dominance of imagination. Simone Weil explains the effects of imagination taking the place of sustained conscious awareness.

Imagination is always the fabric of social life and the dynamic of history. The influence of real needs and compulsions, of real interests and materials, is indirect because the crowd is never conscious of it.

Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.

We can only begin to feel the power of imagination keeping humanity as like chickens rather then experiencing the potential for conscious evolution to become like eagles is through efforts to "Know Thyself." to have the experience of ourselves and our hypocrisy. Without it, Man just glorifes idolatry including technology.

Idolatry comes from the fact that, while thirsting for absolute good, we do not possess the power of supernatural attention and we have not the patience to allow it to develop (Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace 53)

Idolatry created by imagination keeps Man attached to the earth and the shadows on the wall like chickens and oblivious of his potential for conscious freedom and experiencing objective human meaning and purpose.

Hi Nick, would you be willing to summarise in very simple terms; like if teaching a child. I'll be the child in this case. I think I get the point but I am not sure.

[Nick_A]

Hi Mystery

Maybe this may help clarify. What we are is defined by our being or the inner Man. What we do is defined by our personality or the outer Man. In other animals what it does is a natural expression of its being. With humans, the personality created by life exists in opposition to ones being. What we do is not a natural expression of what we are. To compensate for this situation a person lives in imagination to make life tolerable

https://excellencereporter.com/2016/01/ ... uman-life/

Excellence Reporter: Prof. Needleman, what is the meaning of life?

Jacob Needleman: The dramatic effects of the accelerating advance of technology, for all the material promise they offer the world (along with the dangers, of course) are but the most recent wave in a civilization that, without recognizing what it was doing, has placed the satisfaction of desire above the cultivation of being.

The deep meaning of many rules of conduct and moral principles of the past — so many of which have been abandoned without our understanding their real roots in human nature — involved the cultivation and development of the uniquely human power of attention, its action in the body, heart and mind of man.

To be present, truly present, is to have conscious attention. This capacity is the key to what it means to be human. It is the key to the meaning of human life itself. Without conscious presence there can be no real, enduring love, compassion, will or wisdom, or justice in the world.

It is a metaphysical fact that the being of man is diminishing. In the world as in oneself, the meaning of life is vanishing because we have lost the practice of consciously inhabiting our life, the practice of conscious attention to ourselves as we go about our lives.

The philosophical concept of Absurdism exists because the majority have lost the ability to experience the meaning of life. Lacking in conscious attention and living out of balance, life must be considered absurd inviting imagination to make life tolerable.

The eagle represents the being of Man. He becomes like a chicken because of the effects of society. Is it any wonder why life lived in this way must appear absurd?

[mystery]

Hi Mystery

Maybe this may help clarify. What we are is defined by our being or the inner Man. What we do is defined by our personality or the outer Man. In other animals what it does is a natural expression of its being. With humans, the personality created by life exists in opposition to ones being. What we do is not a natural expression of what we are. To compensate for this situation a person lives in imagination to make life tolerable

https://excellencereporter.com/2016/01/ ... uman-life/

Excellence Reporter: Prof. Needleman, what is the meaning of life?

Jacob Needleman: The dramatic effects of the accelerating advance of technology, for all the material promise they offer the world (along with the dangers, of course) are but the most recent wave in a civilization that, without recognizing what it was doing, has placed the satisfaction of desire above the cultivation of being.

The deep meaning of many rules of conduct and moral principles of the past — so many of which have been abandoned without our understanding their real roots in human nature — involved the cultivation and development of the uniquely human power of attention, its action in the body, heart and mind of man.

To be present, truly present, is to have conscious attention. This capacity is the key to what it means to be human. It is the key to the meaning of human life itself. Without conscious presence there can be no real, enduring love, compassion, will or wisdom, or justice in the world.

It is a metaphysical fact that the being of man is diminishing. In the world as in oneself, the meaning of life is vanishing because we have lost the practice of consciously inhabiting our life, the practice of conscious attention to ourselves as we go about our lives.

The philosophical concept of Absurdism exists because the majority have lost the ability to experience the meaning of life. Lacking in conscious attention and living out of balance, life must be considered absurd inviting imagination to make life tolerable.

The eagle represents the being of Man. He becomes like a chicken because of the effects of society. Is it any wonder why life lived in this way must appear absurd?

Nice!! I can not disagree with any of it.

How can we improve?

Is it pride -> greed that is the negative force? If yes, then pride... what is the cause of pride as a reaction?

Don't mean to derail your thread if this is outside of the scope.

[Ecurb]

Conscious evolution begins where mechanical evolution ends. Man, as a tripartite essence, (3 in 1),is the highest form of mechanical evolution on earth. We know that the perversions of the dark horse prevents it and why it makes us vulnerable to the dominance of imagination. Simone Weil explains the effects of imagination taking the place of sustained conscious awareness.

Imagination is always the fabric of social life and the dynamic of history. The influence of real needs and compulsions, of real interests and materials, is indirect because the crowd is never conscious of it.

Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.

We can only begin to feel the power of imagination keeping humanity as like chickens rather then experiencing the potential for conscious evolution to become like eagles is through efforts to "Know Thyself." to have the experience of ourselves and our hypocrisy. Without it, Man just glorifes idolatry including technology.

Idolatry comes from the fact that, while thirsting for absolute good, we do not possess the power of supernatural attention and we have not the patience to allow it to develop (Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace 53)

Idolatry created by imagination keeps Man attached to the earth and the shadows on the wall like chickens and oblivious of his potential for conscious freedom and experiencing objective human meaning and purpose.

The problem with "Know Thyself" is that it is one small step away from navel-gazing, egomania, and narcissism. "He who has found his life will lose it," said Jesus. I tried but failed to find a short, humorous poem about a critic who failed to watch a play because he was too busy observing his reaction to it.

We can't get away from self-consciousness -- but let's not over-emphasize it. The eagle is an eagle because he has expanded his range of vision, not because he has become more self-aware. He soars to look down at the world, not at himself. We gain wisdom by looking outward, not inward.

The self-consciounsess that Nick is promoting is exposed when he writes, "Man... is the highest form of mechanical evolution on earth." Evolutionary theory does not rank species as "higher" or "lower". Such a ranking might, perhaps, justify the kind of self-conscious inquiries that Nick espouses. If humans are some sort of evolutionary ideal, why shouldn't we look inward to understand our own perfection? But the eagle doesn't look inward. He's not even self-conscious (perhaps). He looks down on Tennyson's "wrinkled sea", just as Tennyson gazed at a flower and thought that if he could understand it, he would know what "God and man is" (does "man is" really rhyme with "crannies"?).

The chicken and the eagle see the world from different perspectives; the eagle sees more broadly, from on high, the chicken more narrowly, from ground level. It doesn't follow that the eagle's perspective is "better". As Tennyson suggests, we can gain wisdom from looking at thing from nearby, as well as from far away.

Here's my suggestion: we learn more about ourselves from studying art, literature, chemistry, biology, and astronomy than from looking at ourselves. He who would find himself must lose himself, and he who loses himself in studying things outside himself will reap the added benefit of learning about himself.

Added bonus: Here's Tennyson's poem:

Flower in the crannied wall,
I pluck you out of the crannies,
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand,
Little flower—but if I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,
I should know what God and man is.

And here's another about an eagle:

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ringed with the azure world, he stands.
The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

[Nick_A]

Hi Mystery

Maybe this may help clarify. What we are is defined by our being or the inner Man. What we do is defined by our personality or the outer Man. In other animals what it does is a natural expression of its being. With humans, the personality created by life exists in opposition to ones being. What we do is not a natural expression of what we are. To compensate for this situation a person lives in imagination to make life tolerable

https://excellencereporter.com/2016/01/ ... uman-life/

Excellence Reporter: Prof. Needleman, what is the meaning of life?

Jacob Needleman: The dramatic effects of the accelerating advance of technology, for all the material promise they offer the world (along with the dangers, of course) are but the most recent wave in a civilization that, without recognizing what it was doing, has placed the satisfaction of desire above the cultivation of being.

The deep meaning of many rules of conduct and moral principles of the past — so many of which have been abandoned without our understanding their real roots in human nature — involved the cultivation and development of the uniquely human power of attention, its action in the body, heart and mind of man.

To be present, truly present, is to have conscious attention. This capacity is the key to what it means to be human. It is the key to the meaning of human life itself. Without conscious presence there can be no real, enduring love, compassion, will or wisdom, or justice in the world.

It is a metaphysical fact that the being of man is diminishing. In the world as in oneself, the meaning of life is vanishing because we have lost the practice of consciously inhabiting our life, the practice of conscious attention to ourselves as we go about our lives.

The philosophical concept of Absurdism exists because the majority have lost the ability to experience the meaning of life. Lacking in conscious attention and living out of balance, life must be considered absurd inviting imagination to make life tolerable.

The eagle represents the being of Man. He becomes like a chicken because of the effects of society. Is it any wonder why life lived in this way must appear absurd?

Nice!! I can not disagree with any of it.

How can we improve?

Is it pride -> greed that is the negative force? If yes, then pride... what is the cause of pride as a reaction?

Don't mean to derail your thread if this is outside of the scope.

No, it fits right in. Society as a whole can only improve if it recognizes the value of "the harmony of the soul". The human organism does not express inner unity but rather three basic parts out of balance so is said to lack "harmony" in which the human being acts in chemical terms as a solution rather than a mixture. It is described superficially which is misleading in wiki but it does get the basic idea across

"The Platonic tripartite soul consists of three parts which are located in different regions of the body:[1][2][3]

the logos (λογιστικόν), or logistikon, located in the head, is related to reason and regulates the other parts.
the thymos (θυμοειδές), or thumoeides, located near the chest region and is related to anger.
the eros (ἐπιθυμητικόν), or epithumetikon, located in the stomach and is related to one's desires.
In his treatise the Republic, and also with the chariot allegory in Phaedrus, Plato asserted that the three parts of the psyche also correspond to the three classes of a society.[4] Whether in a city or an individual, δικαιοσύνη (dikaiosyne, justice) is declared to be the state of the whole in which each part fulfills its function, while temperance is the state of the whole where each part does not attempt to interfere in the functions of the others.[5] The function of the epithymetikon is to produce and seek pleasure. The function of the logistikon is to gently rule through the love of learning. The function of the thymoeides is to obey the directions of the logistikon while ferociously defending the whole from external invasion and internal disorder. Whether in a city or an individual, ἀδικία (adikia, injustice) is the contrary state of the whole, often taking the specific form in which the spirited listens instead to the appetitive, while they together either ignore the logical entirely or employ it in their pursuits of pleasure."

Modern society doesn't seek inner balance but rather outer advantage so it remains in chicken life. However what may be possible for an individul is not possible for society as a whole so the question is if it is possible for an individual to consciously attain inner balance and become eagles capable of conscious Action as opposed to chickens limited to mechanical reactions

Ecurb believes efforts to know thyself consists of naval gazing but actually efforts to know thyself consist of impartially learning the workings of the human body or the machine the tripartite soul is a part of. If the machine governs our life as opposed to reason, we should know why and how it works. It is the result of the human condition and why humanity lives in contradiction and sustains it through imagination. Can the mind consciously observe the mechanics of the machine or the body?

If you would like to discuss the "Harmony of the Soul", what it means, and what is consciously required to attain it at least in theory, we could do so after I get back from the holiday.

[Ecurb]

Ecurb believes efforts to know thyself consists of naval gazing but actually efforts to know thyself consist of impartially learning the workings of the human body or the machine the tripartite soul is a part of. If the machine governs our life as opposed to reason, we should know why and how it works. It is the result of the human condition and why humanity lives in contradiction and sustains it through imagination. Can the mind consciously observe the mechanics of the machine or the body?

If you would like to discuss the "Harmony of the Soul", what it means, and what is consciously required to attain it at least in theory, we could do so after I get back from the holiday.

Actually, what I said was that efforts to know thyself are (often) one small step from navel-gazing. I'm no expert on Plato, but if self-knowledge involves knowing how the "machine" (our bodies) works, then it would also involve knowing how our brains (souls? reason?) work. Perhaps we learn that not by self-examination, but by examining other people, or other animals, or neurons. The notion that the charioteer (reason) should control the two horses (appetite and "hot-bloodedness) is, of course, reasonable. But it is also reasonable to allow reason to be guided by the appetites. Love (for example) may be, per Oscar Wilde, the "delusion that one woman differs from all others". But perhaps delusion and imagination should sometimes take precedence over reason. This is the religious perspective, at least. The charioteer may guide the horses, but if he doesn't allow himself to occasionally follow their lead, and guide them in their preferred direction, he will be warring with himself.

[mystery]

If you would like to discuss the "Harmony of the Soul", what it means, and what is consciously required to attain it at least in theory, we could do so after I get back from the holiday.

If I don't notice the new thread when you create it, just flag or msg me so that I do notice.