Darkbake: Digging into my philosophy, an open discussion

The Core of Ethics

There would be universal ethics that transcend cultures, and I think those would be like laws of physics, except for interactions between two or more people. Although these laws would only dictate cause-and-effect and not moral value,

The laws could then be used to determine the most positive outcome for the individual and groups of individuals, and that would be a good candidate for universal morals.

Wow dark, there are a LOT of similarities here and I thank you for sharing.

I think a common trap that people fall into is that when they take a look at things "through the looking glass", quite often they feel betrayed and out of hurt decide to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

These occurrences do not discourage me, as it is a perfectly reasonable reaction, and I know that the one thing we can be certain of in this uncertain world is change. Nearly everyone I know is not the same person they were just a year ago, and that gives me a bit of optimism... some of the holes we've been dug into did not take place overnight and they're not going to get patched overnight either.

Perhaps once everyone takes a time out from all the distractions and seeks to find the real truth and meaning in their lives, the world will become at least a little bit happier, if not better.

reply to post by KyrieEleison


Yeah, totally. It takes a high amount of perception to be able to make healthy choices and decisions based on individual traits and not accidentally judge someone's competence in one area based on something completely irrelevant.

I think that perception comes from dropping the whole "good / bad" thing (which basically just means culturally acceptable or not) and replacing it with thinking about cause-and-effect and understanding what is going to happen in a certain situation if you make certain choices, and then making the best one possible.

This skill is ridiculously harder than following a preset belief system, in fact, even realizing that every action I take affects the world around me and myself (once I gained the freedom to make actions as I wished) blew my mind for a few years.

This is hard to do, because once you get to an understanding point where you can act against culture and explain why in such a way that people are like "oh, yeah!" everything is fine, but it is extremely hard getting there because you will likely make mistakes and be blamed for them for irrelevant reasons. Not only that, you are still going to make mistakes and even possibly fully regress at times, no matter how wise you get.

I'm glad I wrote what I did though - I seriously come back to this sometimes in order to enlighten myself sometimes, as it sort of feels like I was channeling someone and I don't always have access.

When I start feeling powerless or like I'm making bad decisions, or I'm not sure what to do, these writings help.

Originally posted by graphuto

Originally posted by darkbake
to learn what we need to in order to progress, and / or where we should go in order to help others progress if we are at that point.

Progress from what to what? Why is it necessary for us to "progress" ?

Progress from living in a series of fantasy worlds that are unbalanced and causing stress for individuals as well as conflict (because the beliefs are not based on reality and thus cause stress when they don't work).

Progress into what? That is hard to explain, I don't quite know. Into human beings that understand both human interaction and the science behind how things work, and are able to work on improving themselves without stepping on others, while maintaining a positive spirituality, sense of community, altruism and the ability to create. It is also important to try and figure out the masculine and feminine and how they can interact in a healthy manner. An individual that is able to lead by example, who's simple presence enlightens those around him or her. This part is not entirely thought out, so you know, but that is the best I can explain for now.

The point is to be able to achieve a higher level of existence that has a lot less stress, and a lot more freedom, and allows for much more in-depth personal interactions (all of which is better than sex) with little need for conflict.

Originally posted by darkbake
... as it sort of feels like I was channeling someone and I don't always have access...

I'm glad you decided to share this part with me. Quite often when I read over things I've written I'm left wondering where the words came from.

Probably not in the same league as, for example, that math genius guy from India - but something like it at least. Whatever it is, I hope it's benevolent.

reply to post by KyrieEleison


Yes, I hope it is benevolent as well. But I do spend a lot of time checking out my philosophy both intellectually and experimentally in social situations in order to ensure benevolence. I even try to build in things like leading by example and making it a personal philosophy in order to do this.

reply to post by darkbake


Karma

You are welcome to do as you please, but understand the consequences...

There are so many wonderful things to discuss here that I don't know where to begin. Good stuff, DB!

Let's start with the line above. I really like it as long as it means what I think it means. I smoke, drink lots of coffee, eat all the wrong foods, and gamble.

I understand that this lifestyle will shorten my lifespan. I also understand (after trial and error) that NOT doing these things makes me utterly miserable. I would rather enjoy what I enjoy for forty years of life, than to live 90 years not enjoying life.

As unhealthy values will make your life experience worse. On Karma: Hurting other people is not in your best interest, as it burns bridges, and will only result in harm to you later Helping other people is in your best interest as it will improve the quality of life of those around you, and thus your life, it will also result in people liking you more and helping you, on occasion.

At what age group are you speaking to with this paragraph? And, what do you mean by 'hurting other people'?
Are we talking about people being rude, insulting, argumentative, and just too stressful for others to be around? I ask this because I look at these negative behaviors as a way for people (usually older - about 35 and up) to push others away. And, they push others away because they are more comfortable being alone or with just a select few. If these rude-type people cannot handle having too many people in their lives, then wouldn't their rudeness actually be healthy? After all, through our chemical make-up and past experiences, we all can't have easy, outgoing personalities.

I guess what I'm suggesting is that 'healthy' for one, might not have the same definition for all.

reply to post by darkbake

On Knowledge: It is important to be willing to accept and create new ideas until they are proven false

Not only do I disagree, I find this idea to be dangerous. We know that the men that crashed the planes into the twin towers fully believed in the idea (with no evidence whatsoever) that their actions would take them to heaven where great rewards would be bestowed upon them. At some point in Islamic history this was a new idea that should have been questioned and vigorously doubted.

Interesting stuff Darkbake, but I have a few (hopefully constructive) thoughts.

You argue that God is merely a manifestation of culture, a symbolic figurehead, but you can’t really ignore that this is not solely the case. Perhaps from an analytical perspective this could be true if you are doing some kind of anthropological study but within the context of all these different cultures God is just that – all-mighty, creator, rule-giver etc. A defence of God from a cultural perspective has validity don’t get me wrong but that still doesn’t make it scientifically correct. If you are basing a philosophy on empirical evidence then you would have to be pretty open-minded to say the least on the existence of God as there is no empirical evidence whatsoever for his/hers existence (not to say there is no God, just wondering how it would fit into your philosophy as you seem to believe in a God)

“One thing that Richard Dawkins also fails to understand is that this same delusional thinking is present in Atheist culture, gay culture, feminist culture “

I’m interested as to why you think this?

“Cultural delusions are beliefs placed upon you by society that are not, in fact, real. Another example of a type of cultural delusion would be a way of interacting that is not, in fact, the healthiest way of interacting. “

While cultural beliefs may well not be the healthiest way to exist does that make them any less “real”?

reply to post by jiggerj


Welcome, JiggerJ, and it is an honor to have you here! Yes, you basically have the idea. You are right on both accounts - it would be considered healthy for the older people to be rude to keep others away from them, if they can't handle the extra socialization. And you figured through your life experience that you like gambling and such, and found a way for it to work for you.

The basic idea is that someone could be doing something "unhealthy" because it is not bringing them to their maximum potential - sometimes this potential is something that they might not be aware of themselves -

And for philosophical purposes, this "healthier" state is not one that another person believes they should have, but one that the multiverse knows about (basically and alternate universe where different choices or slight changes are made to a lifestyle), and one in which the individual in question is happier.

reply to post by StudentType


Thanks for visiting. Well, I think that God as a figurehead representing a value system seems fairly accurate. I like to keep this kind of God in a separate category than the all-knowing creator.

They are basically Demi Gods. If you think about it, regardless of whether or not one of us believes in monotheism, we live in a heavily polytheistic society. Monotheism doesn't mean that there is only one God, it really means that the individual belongs to a group that only accepts one figurehead, or way of life.

In my opinion, an openly polytheistic society allows for more variety and understanding between people with different viewpoints, life perspectives and inherent personalities.

Also, the reality of cultural values. That is a good point to bring up. I actually wrote a whole post a while back about why Richard Dawkins was wrong, and the various Gods were actually real because they were influencing cultural behavior.

I'm just saying that in the sense that a suicide bomber is going to go to heaven for his deeds, this is not real, he is under some kind of delusion. It might be real in the Yang realm, but hardly real in the physical realm, or reality.

Also, drinking is bad - this is not a real statement, although it is a value, it would be more accurate to assess the situation at hand and decide whether or not one should drink on the occasion and how much based on factors such as age, who is driving, legality in the area, etc.

To say that something is "bad" without reasoning behind it is dangerous because, in a lot of cases, that binary value is actually going to end up making things worse.

In the most extreme case, there could even be a war and a lot of bloodshed breaking out between those that believe that drinking is "bad" and drinking is "necessary" (say a clan of drunken Irishmen and some kind of puritan group)

when in reality, both groups are wrong, and the choice to drink or not should not only be taken on an empirical basis,

but if there is a society of people that like to drink and a society of people that do not, there should be free movement between the two societies in order to reduce internal strife, and the two societies should respect each other's cultural differences -

The free movement and respect are both necessary. Without free movement between societies, children run the risk of being brainwashed into something they do not wish for themselves, and in extreme cases, women could end up being placed in abusive and compromising situations without a way out.

Even this extremely simple example of ONE binary value gets complicated. So you can imagine how complicated it could be with a string of say, simply eight binary values - 1010 0011 (0 is yes, 1 is no?)

Which results in a possibility of TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY SIX different belief systems!!! Holy crap!! And that is only based on EIGHT beliefs!

With the Ten Commandments alone, we have the possibility of 1024 different belief systems, depending on which commandments one follows or not.

Since we already know that thinking in binary is not as versatile as thinking situationally, why even bother with this kind of value system at all if it is just going to result in warring factions, none of which know what is going on?

The answer to that question does, actually, seem to present itself - thinking in binary appears to be much faster for doing logical calculations and also appears to allow the user of the particular mental interface to manipulate the space-time continuum and choose a future to head towards.

If you think about it, this makes sense. Considering the fact that accessing different futures in the multi-verse is dependent on choices one makes, that means that thinking in binary would be essential for goal-setting / arriving at the intended future.

Therefore, if a culture wants to be able to head in a certain direction instead of being stagnant, the binary thinking is necessary in order to have time flow.

reply to post by StudentType


And upon further thinking and life experience, I have found that there are two forces - the Yin and the Yang. The Yang is where this figurehead would exist and manage the mental cultural network that is traditionally handed down through males.

Since I have experienced both Yin and Yang (for some reason that I don't know, I have a personality disorder where I shift between them) I know the difference between having access to the cultural network and being free from it, in the physical world.

In other words, depending on my personality at the time, I will either identify with male or females in movies / television shows / real life.

So... I think that feminism, at least, actually does not have its own belief system in the traditional sense. I think that feminism is about trying to keep the Yang forces in a manageable state where they are not trying to harass, manipulate, or harm other people who don't agree with their particular perspective.

The Yang forces, if not kept in check, can result in things such as domestic abuse, crooked capitalism and selfish politics -

it can also result in denying information or resources to people of the Yin persuasion and keeping them as indentured servants.

I am still debating what to do about the Yang forces. I know that in a relationship, having the Yin (female) force in charge and allowing for communication between the two (in other words, she lets him do as he wishes, and he listens to her input in order to improve his functionality, and she is able to access the Yang Network through him) is the healthiest way for things to work.

reply to post by jiggerj


Wow, okay, I should specify that I am talking about feminine ideas, not closed-minded masculine ideas - in other words, those suicide bombers should listen to the women in their life when they say "Don't do this! You have a family at home!"

So good catch, I should have specified the direction of energy flow I was talking about. I am talking about keeping the particularly dark forces of Yang from preventing someone with a positive idea that would help humanity from going forward with it because it threatens the particular Yang Collective in question.

reply to post by jiggerj


Here is an easy example: I have a lot of male friends because girls tend to stay away from me. I'm probably somewhat homosexual, although I am still into girls, so I think that is part of it.

At any rate, being almost 30, I might suggest to one of my friends, who is male and also almost 30, to try out a new game or restaurant. They will usually refuse because they are stuck in their ways - and I mean that with respect -

On a side note, I would STRONGLY recommend taking Vitamin K2 along with Vitamin D (the two work together, and vitamin D can be found in any regular supplement) in order to decalcify your pineal gland. It has worked wonders for me in helping me be able to adapt to new situations and remain youthful.

For example, although my brain was supposed to harden at age 26, I bought a new laptop with a copy of Windows 8 on it today and was able to learn the operating system and I'm already modifying it. That puts me clearly outside of my generation's general cultural boundaries.

Originally posted by graphuto

Originally posted by darkbake
to learn what we need to in order to progress, and / or where we should go in order to help others progress if we are at that point.

Progress from what to what? Why is it necessary for us to "progress" ?

Progress from unhealthy situations to healthier situations, or to the situation that we want, or the situation that would make us happier, whatever it is you want to do. If things seem like they are doing good for you, no need to worry.

Also help others progress to where they would like to be. This is a philosophy meant for the individual, not society, as society is not under your control - but you and your surroundings are. If you lead by example, maybe others will change around you as well.

reply to post by darkbake

It is important to be willing to accept and create new ideas until they are proven false - It is also important to accept when you are wrong, for brandishing false beliefs is unhealthy

If a person believes in something, and that is the extent of their reality of it, they're no different than a blind person.

Consider four people standing in a field on a bright sunny day. They look up at the Sun.
One person says "I believe the Sun is there!",
Another says "...And I have a philosophy that proves it's there!",
And the Third says ' I've found empirical evidence that it's there!".

We don't know who the fourth guy is, but we know three of them must be blind.

Originally posted by darkbake

The Matrix Trilogy

I will give you one example. When Morpheus told of the prophecy and "The One" I used to believe him and think that everyone else was getting in his way. Now, when I watch the movie, I tend to connect more with the people who think he is crazy.

Art is something that is hardly understood. A lot of what an artist depicts, he or she has no idea of the true meaning, but is accessing a realm beyond our understanding. The duty of an artist is to express what they encounter in the other realm. Therefore, their art may have meaning in it that they are not aware of.

Another very important lesson that The Matrix: Reloaded mentions is the idea that the matrix repeats itself, over and over again.

I have not watched The Matrix: Revolutions yet, but I am guessing it will have to do with the next time period, where we awaken and fight the machines (which represent, well, human machines basically) and the final overthrow of the system, even after many cycles

When you mention human machines, are you referring to popular science hybrid robot organisms? I find the deeper message suggesting that we must fight to keep from becoming the harmful mechanized ritual that we have allowed to rise up and control us, but which no longer serves any real purpose. This is the endless repeating of cycles that you described as another important lesson from the movie,which is the barrier keeping us all from becoming illuminated by the One light of truth (ie reality). And that Truth would show us that these cycles are harming ourselves, and we must make new ones that are natural and will endure forever.

I thought the morpheus character was usually portrayed well as someone who was wise enough to know the path to follow, i'm not sure why you think he could be insane if he knows at least that much. Would you elaborate on the "everyone getting in his way" idea if you think he was wrong or mad or whatever.

Art isn't as unknown as you suggest. Information on the effects of color, shape, vibration, etc have been known and kept hidden by occult secret schools that often require indoctrination and the giving up of power in order to receive this hidden knowledge. Because of this, it is no wonder that many of the biggest names have connections to lodges and other orders. Art created from a place of understanding is truly something extraordinary, but most delve far into the "realm of the goddess" and by chance are able to bring back from it something that speaks to the common truth in everyone's soul, but only once, or just for a brief time. This is because they didn't keep the internal balance that brought them to the higher place that they created the art from.

Originally posted by jiggerj
reply to post by darkbake

 

On Knowledge: It is important to be willing to accept and create new ideas until they are proven false

Not only do I disagree, I find this idea to be dangerous. We know that the men that crashed the ****** into the **** ****** fully believed in the idea (with no evidence whatsoever) that their actions would take them to heaven where great rewards would be bestowed upon them. At some point in Islamic history this was a new idea that should have been questioned and vigorously doubted.

You are mistaken because accumulation of knowledge is only a positive thing, it is impossible to have negative knowledge unless it invested into embracing conspiracy theories like the one you were told and are now repeating.

And then you confuse knowledge with morality? Yes we need all need to know in our hearts when we truly have been stolen from, and uphold rightness of principle over the contrivance of man's law (ie government). Only men who have given up on themselves and of ever truly knowing what truth and morality is could have been convinced of doing the insidious acts of which you speak.

reply to post by Visitor2012


How come none of them asked "why" the sun was there? That might spark some intelligent debate instead of diluting the beauty already inherent in the sun by trying to measure or judge it as something less than it is.

Originally posted by vv3vv3vv

When you mention human machines, are you referring to popular science hybrid robot organisms? I find the deeper message suggesting that we must fight to keep from becoming the harmful mechanized ritual that we have allowed to rise up and control us, but which no longer serves any real purpose.

Yes, I love it. These are the machines I am talking about. You might notice them.