A
bit after noon local time. Tomorrow, it turns out, work begins on
the hall bath. You are waiting for Carol to complete the bills so you can take
them in the post office and do a couple other errands at the same time. You
have been thinking about the meaning of ‘the difference between IS and EXISTING
in terms of Greater Reality than the terms Physical as a contrast to Spiritual.
Later. – Amorella
You had a
Penn Station shared lunch and Carol is walking in the community center because
of the sunlight (too much chance of skin cancer). You have the car in the far
section of the lot parked cater-cornered so that neither side windows are
getting direct sunlight. The back window has the strongest UV protection. –
Amorella
1351
hours. I cannot remember a time in my life that my perceptions of reality were
congruent with most everyone else’s that I have known personally. I have
mentioned examples of this within these several years of ‘Notes’ on the blog.
Doug (knowledge and concepts) and quantum mechanics in general takes care of
the smallest particles. We do not know things at the depths of particle
fragmentation or integration – the building blocks of the known building blocks
of matter. Within ourselves we know our composition as physical creatures but
not as spiritual creatures. What makes us spiritually oriented? Imagination comes
to mind first. We calculate from personal perspective and then from the
perspective of those who surround us – this embodies knowledge, wisdom and more
imagination as well as conjecture and happenstance. Ignorance plays a major
part too because there are times in our lives that we don’t know any better. I
am going to feign arrogance here and say the difference (in context) between IS
and EXISTING is that we don’t know any better. One reason for this ignorance is
because we don’t have the vocabulary to express between Timelessness and Time except
to say that supposedly Timelessness has no gravity, that it is only with
gravity that Time as a human perception exists (the gravity in thought v.
gravity in physics?). This is where ignorance is helpful. I simply don’t have
much to ponder against such a concept because I don’t know any better. These
are my (mostly internal) personal observations and certainly they not necessarily
the observations of others. (1410)
Following, your mind moves about to Heinlein’s
Stranger and a Strange Land and character Michael Smith’s Martian word, ‘Grok’.- Amorella
** **
Influence
Like many influential works of literature, Stranger made
a contribution to the English language: specifically, the word "grok". In Heinlein's invented Martian
language, "grok" literally means "to drink" and
figuratively means "to comprehend", "to love", and
"to be one with". One dictionary description was "To understand
thoroughly through having empathy with". This word rapidly became common
parlance among science fiction fans, hippies, and computer hackers, and has
since entered the Oxford English Dictionary among others.
Selected and edited from Wikipedia Offline – Stranger in a
Strange Land
** **
1427
hours. I’m taking a break before I forget where I am going with this.
You would like me to help you here, as an
imaginary-or-not writing persona, in distinguishing between Timelessness and
Time from the Amorella’s perspective. This is where you were going whether you
realized it or not. Later, dude.
You are
home. Carol called from home because her phone was out of electric so she
walked home. She didn’t know where you were in the lot or if you were in the
lot because you said you were going to look for shade as she left the car. –
Amorella
1504
hours. I feel bad about it; she is up taking a cool shower presently and will
put on lotion to sooth her skin. I took her a cookie and a large glass of ice
water and left it on the sink.
Evening.
You have been writing to Doug this evening on ‘is’ and ‘existence’ and other
things. Suddenly, in your last note to him you brought Anaximenes and hot,
cold, wet and dry. The discussion reminded you of your major focus in a graduate class in
philosophy at Bowling Green State University. You had to teach a class on the
three Milesian philosophers and here they are from Wikipedia Offline.
** **
Thales of Miletus (c. 624 – c. 546 BC) was a pre-Socratic Greek
philosopher, mathematician and astronomer from Miletus in Asia Minor, current
day Milet in Turkey and one of the Seven Sages of Greece. Many, most notably Aristotle, regard him
as the first philosopher in the Greek tradition. Aristotle reported Thales' hypothesis
that the originating principle of nature and the nature of matte was a single
material substance: water.
Thales attempted to explain natural phenomena without reference
to mythology. Almost all of the other Pre-Socratic philosophers follow him in
attempting to provide an explanation of ultimate substance, change, and the
existence of the world without reference to mythology.
In
mathematics, Thales used geometry to calculate the heights of pyramids and the
distance of ships from the shore. He is the first known individual to use
deductive reasoning applied to geometry, by deriving four corollaries to Thales’
Theorem. He is the first known individual to whom a mathematical discovery has
been attributed.
Anaximander
(c. 610 – c. 546 B lived in Miletus, a city of Ionia (in modern-day Turkey). He
belonged to the Milesian school and learned the teachings of his master Thales.
He succeeded Thales and became the second master of that school where he
counted Anaximenes and, arguably, Pythagoras amongst his pupils.
Little of his life and work is known today. According to
available historical documents, he is the first philosopher known to have
written down his studies, although only one fragment of his work remains.
Fragmentary testimonies found in documents after his death provide a portrait
of the man.
He was
an early proponent of science and tried to observe and explain different
aspects of the universe, with a particular interest in its origins, claiming
that nature is ruled by laws, just like human societies, and anything that
disturbs the balance of nature does not last long. Like many thinkers of his
time, Anaximander's contributions to philosophy relate to many disciplines. In
astronomy, he tried to describe the mechanics of celestial bodies in relation
to the Earth. In physics, his postulation that the indefinite (or apeiron) was
the source of all things led Greek philosophy to a new level of conceptual
abstraction. His knowledge of geometry allowed him to introduce the gnomon in
Greece. He created a map of the world that contributed greatly to the
advancement of geography. He was also involved in the politics of Miletus and
was sent as a leader to one of its colonies.
Anaximenes
of Miletus (c. 585 –
c. 528 BCE) was active in the latter half of the 6th century BC. One of the
three Milesian philosophers, he is identified as a younger friend or student of
Anaximander. Anaximenes, like others in his school of thought, practiced
material monism. This tendency to identify one specific underlying reality made
up of a material thing is what Anaximenes is principally known for today.
Selected
and edited from Wikipedia Offline
** **
2159
hours. I volunteered to teach this lesson and I tried to teach as I thought
they might have, by demonstration. No one laughed, as I was the first in the
class to give a lesson. I’m sure they were far from impressed because I was
ignorant of how one conducted one’s self in a 500 + Philosophy course. I
attempted to teach the lessons as if they were twelve or fifteen year olds
because that is who I had been teaching for three years. I got a B in the class
anyway. I’m sure the teacher was dumbfounded. All the other presentations were
for twenty to thirty year old students. Anyway, I have and had a great
admiration for their individual thinking with one student building on another
student. Very cool. [I probably mentioned all this several years ago on another blog page. Sorry. Old age is creeping in like a flood no doubt.]
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