Plato's Retreat

Hola mi gente,

I’ve had it up to ::here:: with the Clintons and their playing victim. It’s sickening. Hillary could shoot democracy dead in the middle of Fifth Avenue and her supporters would still vote for her.

Regarding the widely echoed charge that Russians hacked the DNC? Stop it! As the folks at ZeroHedge stated:

No, there is absolutely no proof that the Russians hacked Podesta’s email account, so please stop saying it. If the idiots in the intelligence community expect us to believe them after all the crap they have told us (like WMD’s in Iraq and “no we don’t collect data on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans”) then they need to give clear proof of what they say. So far, they have failed to prove anything.

Which suggests they don’t have proof and just want to war monger the US public into a second cold war with the Russians.

After all, there’s lots and lots of money in that for the military-industrial-intelligence-governmental complex of incestuous relationships.

Plato once said that, “If a man neglects education, he walks lame to the end of his life. I think he nailed that time. Life is the most precious gift we have and we all take it for granted to varying degrees. I was fortunate in that my father instilled within me a love for knowledge. I have an insatiable curiosity that has been the source of constant enjoyment in my life. This love for knowledge is a value I have attempted to instill in my son.

One day, when he was about eight years of age, we were watching some martial arts movie and I mentioned to him that Steven Seagall couldn’t hold a candle to Bruce Lee. He had never heard of Bruce Lee. So, we rented some Bruce Lee movies and he got the “Kung Fu bug.” At various times during my life (beginning at age 12), I have studied the martial arts under several teachers, mostly in the Wing Chun style (which was Bruce Lee’s first art). So I made a pact with my son: we would study together under a sifu (teacher) I knew, but he had to commit to become a “scholar-warrior.”

The “Scholar-Warrior” is an archetype that appears in most cultures throughout history: the samurais, the knights, the Buddhist monks, and nuns of China, etc. The Scholar-Warrior learned not only the martial arts, but also the fine arts of poetry and painting, and music; and they learned the healing arts. Scholar-Warriors were well-rounded individuals who represented the best of their culture.

My son and I studied the martial art of Wing Chun for several years. As part of that training, we learned many things: reiki, chi exercises, knowledge of herbs, healing arts, etc.

The following, which I find very much relevant, considering the current political environment, is one of the first lessons I taught my son after he took the “Vow of the Scholar-Warrior”...

Knowledge

Hola Everybody,
If you can, please consider supporting my writing. Any amount would be welcomed. You can donate by clicking the link here.

I want to thank the anonymous individual who donated $5,000… I’m kidding! (Made you look, huh? LOL)

Knowing

The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty: not knowing what comes next.
 -- Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness

I agree with our friend Socrates that the unexamined life is not worth living, but I’ll take it one step further by adding that it is how we examine life that determines its worth. This is no small matter. Until very recently, humans mostly lived within one culture, never having to confront the belief systems and meaning-making of other cultures. Today, that is no longer true and depending on the culture we were born in to gain knowledge is not an effective means for obtaining meaning and value.

I believe this is a good thing.

One of the first beliefs that has been shattered (but that people still cling to nonetheless), is the myth of the individual standing outside of cultural context as an objective observer. This notion has been shattered in almost all areas of knowledge. In the hardest of sciences, physics, The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle (measurement), and the observer effect demonstrated that the tools we use effect what we measure and observe. In that way a quanta, the most essential building block of matter can be seen as both a wave and a particle, according to which instruments are used to measure it. Additionally, the observer effect impacts all other sciences from psychology to information systems.

Cognitive neuroscientists have shown that we do not much as observe reality, but create it. I’ll give you a good example. Right now, you’re reading the pixels on the screen that turn out to be letters (in actuality they are codes). Are you aware of other objects within your awareness? The area beyond your screen, for example? The wall behind you? Even now, you’re “deciding” which data to observe and which data to omit. 

Much of what we pay attention is decided by our cultural views. Culture is a very human concept -- it’s a major way we create meaning. Your language, for example, is a product of your culture and every language omits and includes certain data. There are concepts for example, in Sanskrit, that are almost impossible to translate into English. A reason for that is that English tends toward categorizing things while Sanskrit was better suited to describe pre-verbal, spiritual concepts.

Even better, let’s take Spanish and English. I remember a particularly interesting study whose aim was to study language and childhood development. Specifically, the researcher wanted to study the impact of Spanish-speaking parents on children in Boston. What she discovered was extremely interesting to me, as I am bilingual. 

The study showed that when Spanish-speaking parents spoke to their children, they often used open-ended questions. English-dominant parents used closed questions. For example, a Spanish dominant parent would ask her child questions about a trip that led to qualitative thinking/ responses. They would ask, for example, “So you went to the zoo? How did you like it?” Open-ended questions are question that can’t be answered with a simple yes or no, and Spanish-dominant parents relied more heavily on getting the child to describe the quality of their experience. English-dominant parents relied more heavily on close-ended questions, such as, “So, you went to the zoo. Did you enjoy it?” They would go on to ask questions that helped their children to quantify -- or categorize -- their experience.

Note that I’m not saying one is better than the other, just pointing out the difference. Moreover, as a bilingual individual, I can understand the difference because the two languages emphasize different aspects of reality.

Scientists are no different, though they do try to control for these effects. Still, it’s only recently that the western medical community is beginning to understand traditional Chinese medicine. Modern medical practitioners scoffed at acupuncture until research began to show that there was something to the practice. 

Even today, with more and more western practitioners accepting eastern medicine, they still do not completely understand why acupuncture works. As one basic scientist Candace Pert, put it, “We just don’t have the geography to understand why it works.” That’s just another way of saying that we don’t have the language. We still do not understand the meridian system and today, westerners are taught acupuncture in a way I find unethical. In the East, you have to study for at least 10-15 years before you’re even allowed to pick up a needle and much of the training (calligraphy, qi-gong practice, etc.) is considered extraneous to acupuncture by Western practitioners.

Another great example is the now more commonplace practice of attending the mind as well as the body. Medical doctors are trained to view the body as a mechanism, divorced from its mental state. They are trained to treat the “symptom” or the “disease.” In this way, people were reduced to symptoms and diseases, their humanity sacrificed on the altar of scientism. What modern western medical science never acknowledged or fully appreciated was that the mind -- the mental state -- of the patient was attached to the body. 

Today, there is strong evidence that one’s mental state holds an enormous influence on the outcomes of any treatment, so western medicine has taken a turn toward a more holistic approach, though my experience tells me there is more lip service than actual practice.

I say all this to show that we are not simply individuals living outside of the culture in which we are embedded. If you were to attempt to change the meaning of one word, for example, it would be succeed until a significant portion of the population began accepting that meaning. The meaning may change for you (to a small extent), but it has not really changed. It still has a larger cultural meaning and that meaning still has an influence on you.

That you don’t notice this influence doesn’t mean it does not exist. Rather, it means that you are not aware of it. The purpose of life, as Socrates would have it, is to make the unconscious conscious.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

Anthropology

Hola mi Gente,
It’s been a lonnnnnng two weeks, but thanks to the leadership at my organization, I’m seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

Sculpture: The Raven and the First Men by Bill Reid

When the missionaries first came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land.
 -- Desmond Tutu, South African Bishop

When I attended university, I was in my late 30s, married, and was actually exceedingly well read. I would say, without conceit, that you will probably not meet many people that have read more than I have.

I went to school not so much to learn in the traditional sense, but to become a part of a community of scholars. I didn’t attend school to get a career, or make more money, but because I wanted to engage with like-minded individuals and test what I had learned previously and in that way, learn anew. I learned many things, chief among them that learning in the context of a community is quite different from learning in isolation.

I also discovered that my notions of science, or rather, how knowledge is gathered and accepted (or not accepted) is not as logical as I had thought previously. I quickly wanted to explore the origins of knowledge (epistemology), and how culture impacted our collective concept of knowledge. It has become part of my life’s work, to research the researchers, to focus the light of my curiosity on those who study others.

It led me to a completely new field of work called cultural studies and into the realm of the philosophy of science. It started innocently enough: I was taking a class on counseling and there was a section on cross-cultural issues and I learned that how people describe their ailments have a deep connection to cultural values. I learned Western medical science wasn't so much a science as it was an art, deeply influenced by cultural mores and a body of research conducted mostly by privileged white men.

In addition, much of the research I was coming across regarding Latino/as, for example, seemed to me to be deeply flawed -- not congruent with my own experiences growing up Latino in the US. Then while working as a research assistant, I came across Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and I discovered that the history of science wasn’t one that marched in a straight line, with newer innovations replacing older ones as they became known or discovered. Kuhn wrote about paradigm shifts in a way that demonstrated that the history of science is one of fits and starts, rather than a linear evolution.

Then I came across anthropology and in reading earlier anthropological works, I came to see clearly that culture is an inescapable equation when it comes to science. Some of this science history is sad, brutal, and tragic even. As part of a class assignment, I came across the following piece written by a Naïve American poet. See if you get its message:

Anthropology
(excerpt)
Chrystos. (1991). Dream on (1 ed.). Vancouver, BC: Press Gang Publishers.

We have been conducting an extensive footnoted annotated indexed and complicated study of the Caucasian culture hereafter to be referred to as the cauks for ease in translation.

The most important religious ritual, one central to all groups, is the mixing of feces and urine with water. This rite occurs regularly on a daily basis and seems to be a cornerstone of the culture's belief system. The urns for this purpose are commonly porcelain, of various hues, although white is the most frequently used. The very wealthy rulers have receptacles of carved onyx or malachite with gold plated fixtures. We have been unable to determine what prayers are said during this ritual because its solitary nature & the fact that the door to the prayer room is always shut.

The main function of the majority of non-city dwellers is the production of an object called a lawn. Numerous tools for the cultivation of this lawn are sold in the market places. It appears also to have a sacred character, as no activity occurs on it & keeping it short green & square is a constant activity.

The main diet of the culture is available from push-button machines or orange plastic small markets and was found by our researchers to be completely inedible. It is truly amazing what the human animal can subsist on.

Another prominent feature of the cauks is the construction of huge monuments built in clusters in the villages. These are not living quarters but are used about five days a week for a ritual involving papers which appear to be sacred, given the life or death quality with which they are handled. The papers are passed about, often with consternation and eventually cast away when the spell is complete.

The mechanisms for healing disease appear to our eyes to be woefully complex & at the same time, inadequate. People who are seriously ill are quarantined in jails of pale green or white and often used to feed machines which appear to run on human blood.

Children who are born deformed in any way are usually confined to jails built for this purpose. The elderly are also jailed, there being no value system of respect for them. Those passing through transitions are called "crazy" and also jailed. Animals from distant lands again are jailed. In fact, there is some discussion of an alternative theory of central religious belief -- that the actual spiritual purpose of the culture, is to jail as much as possible. Extensive use of fences is the key argument to this theory.

Our data is yet incomplete. We hope by 1992 to have a more comprehensive overview, at which time a traveling exhibition of artifacts (including exhumed bodies to illustrate their burial practices) will tour for the education of all. Their attitude toward all non-cauk peoples is extremely hostile & violent. Many of our researchers have been massacred & yet, in the interests of science, we persevere.

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My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

Plato's Retreat

Hola mi gente...

The right wing, having lost on the marriage equality front, has now turned its warped attention to reproductive health and rights. To be sure, even mainstream news sources have thoroughly debunked the videos now wending their way through the innernetz. Here’s the problem, they don’t care if their efforts are rightfully debunked as bullshit. The USA’s version of the Taliban simply want to fling as much shit as possible to see what sticks. I’ve seen better behaved zoo monkeys. [LINK]

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 If a man neglects education, he walks lame to the end of his life.

-- Plato (c.427–347 BC)

To paraphrase a great man, I believe that the unexamined life – a life in which nothing is questioned – is a life not worth living. Life is the most precious gift we have and we all take it for granted to varying degrees. I was fortunate in that my father instilled within me a love for knowledge. I have an insatiable curiosity that has been the source of constant enjoyment in my life. This love for knowledge is a value I have attempted to instill in my son.

One day, when he was about eight years of age, we were watching some martial arts movie and I mentioned to him that Steven Seagall couldn’t hold a candle to Bruce Lee. He had never heard of Bruce Lee. We rented some Bruce Lee movies and he got the “Kung Fu bug.” At various times during my life (beginning at age 12), I have studied the martial arts under several teachers, mostly in the Wing Chun style (which was Bruce Lee’s first art). So I made a pact with my son: we would study together under a sifu (teacher) I knew, but he had to commit to become a “scholar-warrior.” 

The “Scholar-Warrior” is an archetype that appears in most cultures throughout history: the samurais, the knights, the Buddhist monks, and nuns of China, etc. The Scholar-Warrior learned not only the martial arts, but also the fine arts of poetry and painting, and music; and they learned the healing arts. Scholar-Warriors were well-rounded individuals who represented the best of their culture.

My son fell for it, hook, line, and sinker… LOL! He and I (along with my partner at the time) studied the martial art of Wing Chun for several years. As part of that training, we learned many things: reiki, chi exercises, knowledge of herbs, healing arts, etc.

The following is one of the first lessons I taught my son after he took the “Vow of the Scholar-Warrior”... 

Plato’s Allegory of the Cave

Plato is considered one of the most important intellectual figures in Western history. He was the founder of the first university, “The Academy,” where students read the Socratic dialogues. The essence of Plato’s philosophy is demonstrated in the allegory of the Myth of the Cave, which appears in his work, The Republic.

In this myth, Plato proposes the following vision: Imagine prisoners chained in such a way that they face the back wall of a cave. They have been there for life and can see nothing of themselves or of each other. They see only shadows on the wall of the cave.

The shadows are caused by a fire that burns on a ledge above and behind them. Between the fire and the prisoners is a path lined with a wall along which people carrying vases, statues, and other artifacts on their heads. The prisoners hear the echoes of voices and see the shadows of the artifacts, and they mistake those echoes and shadows for reality.

The point of the allegory is that our purpose in life is break free of those chains and venture out of the cave into the open in order to experience reality. That “steep and rugged ascent” is Plato’s allegory of education and leads us out into the real world of sunlight and knowledge where we can truly gaze upon the sun (the sun being the allegory of enlightenment).

Plato suggests that if such a man were to attempt to return to the cave and liberate the other prisoners, they would set upon him and kill him. The allegory of the cave, with its story of the liberation of the prisoner from darkness, deceit, and untruth and the ensuing hard journey into the light and warmth of the Truth has inspired many philosophers and social leaders. But Plato meant this allegory as more than mere poetic vision. He used this work, to give it a precise, technical application. Within this application, he was able to offer a map in which opinion and knowledge are clearly marked.

However, that would take too long right now and I need to get dressed and get out of here! LOL

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…