[MD] Is this the inadequacy of the MOQ?

[rapsncows at fastmail.fm]

Mark,



>[Mark] Hey Tim,
> I didn't realize that I missed a post to me that I didn't answer.  By no
> means do not take it personally.  I am not always there (or here), and I
> forget.  Nothing more than that.  For what it is worth, I submit
> questions
> all the time, but do not always get an answer.  Perhaps I am scary, or
> just
> nonsense, I don't know or care really.  I get what I can.  More below.

[Tim]
hmmmm, I didn't think that you had missed that one: it was pretty long,
I was frustrated, etc.  Either way, your non-response was okay.  But I
did think that I had turned you off from conversing with me for the time
being...  Either way...  No problems.



> 
> [Mark]
> Sometimes I am not that clear.  However, the sense of self or "I" is
> about
> the only thing that I am sure about.  Even my thinking happens to me as
> something foreign.  But the "I" is what it is all about.

[Tim]
I can sympathize with a foreign feeling to my thinking, at least
frequently: I don't know how 'new' thoughts can arise just because I
'try'.

I'm glad to hear that you are sure about your sense of your 'I': I was
under the understanding that you thought otherwise (however that would
work).  Importantly, when you say 'the "I" is what it is all about.', I
hope you mean all I's.



> [Mark]
> Yes, I would agree.  SOM is a perspective.  I think we only refer to it
> in retrospect or when we are communicating.  Most of our time is SOM free. 
> We do a lot of things besides think intellectually throughout the day.

[Tim]
here I think we differ, SOM is a metaphysics, it is more than a
perspective (though perspective is the way the 'I' would view it).  I do
not subscribe to the idea that thinking (intellectually) is inherently
SOM.  I think that we should be able to be SOM free all the time,
including when thinking intellectually, if we have transcended SOM and
come to MoQ.  Let me give one more quote from chapter 25 of Zamm, early
on:

"The way to solve the conflict between human values and technological
needs is not to run away from technology.  That's impossible.  The way
to resolve the conflict is to break down the barriers of dualistic
thought that prevent a real understanding of what technology is -- not
an exploitation of nature, but a fusion of nature and the human spirit
into a new kind of creation that transcends both.  When this
transcendence occurs in such events as the first airplane flight across
the ocean or the first footstep on the moon, a kind of public
recognition of the transcendent nature of technology occurs.  But this
transcendence should also occur at the individual level, on a personal
basis, in one's own life, in a less dramatic way."


> 
> [Mark]
> This was meant more for Marsha.  Sometimes words are used that confuse
> me.
>  Perhaps I over analyze them.  Been known to happen.

[Tim]
mine was meant more for Marsha too.  In vain I guess.



> [Mark]
> More than one "I", interesting.

[Tim]
I'm pretty sure that we have come across to each other right, but, just
to be sure, I have referred to different aspects of my 'I', but that the
more than one refers to other people, you for instance.  I don't think
there was a confusion, but just in case - or if someone else
disconnected is ever reading through and wonders - I wanted to clarify
it here.

But, what are you thinking?  That there is one 'I' (capital) to which
'i' (individual) have access?  All little 'i's are in a big 'I'?  Why
was this interesting?  ---  For my part, I see why one might be led to
such thoughts, but I do not accord such a capital 'I' with I'ness,
because ...  well, I'll leave off here, now.


> [Mark]  I grew up speaking Spanish, but came to the
> US many years ago, and switched to English full time.  I have found that
> when I speak in Spanish now, I think differently, kind of much younger. 
> But it is still the same "I".  Another story, I am an avid sleepwalker.  I
> will wake up to find myself somewhere else.  When I can remember what I was
> sleep thinking, it could be that I was on a bus or something.  So the reality
> is completely different, however, the "I" is still the same.  I would
> imagine that for those who are seriously dual in personality, the "I" is still
> the same, the brain cannot remember the other one when it is not present. 
> Don't know if this makes sense, but it is my notion of the "I".  This also
> allows for reincarnation without memory of what was before.  That is the "I" is
> the same, but the brain is different.  Now, some Buddhists claim that memory
> can escape the physical and reappear.  This may be possible, but it is too
> complicated for me.  Someday it will make sense, once I create it; got to
> think about Karma and forces and something else to get there.

[Tim]
Thanks for the spanish and sleepwalking examples.  About dual
personalities, I guess that is why only the personality would be dual,
not the 'I'.  Death is weird, I'm glad for it, but I don't like to think
about an after.


> 
> [Mark]
> Two I's again...

[Tim]
at least!  I think I'ness would be intolerable by one's self.

> [Mark]  
> Certainly there are things that we call absolute, or unchanging.  One
> could be the other side of life for example.  It is hard with our current
> available senses to really conceive of these things, and change is
> easier.  Perhaps change is absolute, or energy is absolute, or the use of sex in
> Hollywood.  Who knows?

[Tim]
what do you mean by 'the other side of life'?

'sex in Hollywood' - hahaha, nice.


> [Mark]
> Every event, as in every movement of a molecule, to choosing to go right
> instead of left.  Either there are choices at every moment, or there are
> no choices at all.  That is my ultimatum (for now), just to open it up for
> discussion.

[Tim]
Yes, this distinction between every event and every moment is what I
needed.  This is what I imposed on Marsha in my reply to her too.
I think she meant event as more of an SOM type trap.  But, who knows?

> 
> [Mark]
> What? indeed.  If you can answer this you have solved the mind/matter
> problem.

[Tim]
the problem may even be another level deeper than mind and matter.  How
did the 'twilight zone' intro go, "into a realm of ideas..."?

Tim
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