Gendo: informal study group in southern california

Question

If you think in english, you're confused.
- Edna Hosner
gendo: a way of thinking...
language as a path to liberation...
.unconscious, erroneous assumptions imposed upon our thinking by the structure of the language (english) running in our skulls are responsible for most of what is wrong with the world in both the personal and planetary domains
when: wednesday and saturday afternoons, between 3 and 5 where: the cafe at Borders Books (91 at Bloomfield in Cerritos)

.look for the black and red gendo logo on my dark blue notebook on the table
heron
unDO email address

Nature, heron stone to be commanded, http://www.gendo.net must be obeyed. mailto:(Email Removed)

Usenet · Accepted Answer

I'm guessing that the surgeon is the boy's mother or ... perhaps some odd case of mistaken identity?

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]I'm guessing that the surgeon is the boy's mother or ... perhaps some odd case of mistaken identity?[/nq]
?guessing
unDO email address

Nature, heron stone to be commanded, http://www.gendo.net must be obeyed. mailto:(Email Removed)

Usenet · Answer

Well, OK, to me it was rather obvious but then my competence is Classic Greek and so I find the nominal orientation of most every Western European language a little wanting including Modern Greek. Also, I read it as a riddle and not perhaps as the simple question (requiring a simple answer) that it was intended to be. I do get your point, though, and can appreciate the clarity of your alternative writing-style. By the by, I'm writing from Virginia and have lived here all my life.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Well, OK, to me it was rather obvious but then my competence is Classic Greek and so I find the ... the clarity of your alternative writing-style. By the by, I'm writing from Virginia and have lived here all my life.[/nq]
.ok, you're disqualified
.being knowledgeable in classic greek puts you
squarely in the over-educated/effete subclass
of **** sapiens, those who have time to sit
around thinking about thinking... shame on
you
.however, i'm suspicious
.i was serious when i said that i have told this
story to thousands of people and NO ONE has
ever got it... unless they had run into it
before
.in fact, i've had people admit that they've heard it before and were still stumped by it again...
a real tribute to the power of unconscious
assumptions
.perhaps you heard it long ago and have forgotten
.if you really did see right thru it, then you
have my admiration
.please look me up the next time you are in south
california
heron
unDO email address

Nature, heron stone to be commanded, http://www.gendo.net must be obeyed. mailto:(Email Removed)

Usenet · Answer

I don't believe that I saw "right through it" so much as viewed it as a riddle. And when I discovered the answer, I understood your point. Upon reading your bibliography I discovered that we have more than a few books in common. I remember, for instance, reading Julian Jaynes' book as a kid ... actively anticipating his general psychology through my 20s ... learning of his death ... and I suppose THAT's a book that will never appear. It's good to see that your sense of humor is intact. So far as SoCal is concerned I've never been though my parents met and married while in GradSchool at UCLA. For what it's worth, Good Luck!

Usenet · Answer

Have you ever read E.H. Gombrich? Particularly Art and Illusion ... or any books of this particular ilk modern or "classic"? Or any of Gaston Bachelard's (more) Scientific Works like The Philosophy of No ? Or Walter Benjamin? I can think of many if older writers whose interests collapse or collapsed upon your subject, and beginning with the Pre-Socratics! I mention the three former because they seem VERY close, and yet. But I shall and do confess a fondness for 1970s Harold Bloom. If you think AT ALL, you're confused ... as borne out by Histories from Thucydides to Simon Schama! But I do tend to support the Poets. So again, Good Luck.

Usenet · Answer

.yes, i've read "The Philosophy of No"
.i'm not familiar with either of the others
.i'll check them out
.i disagree with your assessment that "if you
think at all, you're confused
.thinking in natural, unreprogrammed english
is the problem
.it is possible, with much effort unfortun-
ately, to reprogram one's language machine
.further, being confused and knowing it is a
far superior position to being confused
and not knowing
.the real job before us is to raise a
children who are not programmed with all
the erroneous, unconscious assumptions with
which we have been burdened
.this needs to be accomplished before puberty
.after puberty, the brain goes into a different
mode, having settled basic epistemological
issues
.children need to be programmed with an up-to-
date epistemology
.thanks for the encouragement
heron
[nq:1]Have you ever read E.H. Gombrich? Particularly Art and Illusion ... or any books of this particular ilk ... out by Histories from Thucydides to Simon Schama! But I do tend to support the Poets. So again, Good Luck.[/nq]
unDO email address

Nature, heron stone to be commanded, http://www.gendo.net must be obeyed. mailto:(Email Removed)

Usenet · Answer

Your metaphors of computation are frightening indeed! And I'm not kidding! But where I stand with respect to the whole "AI" (that's an "Eye," not the SteakSauce) Thing, Debate, Whatever, is likewise where I stand with respect to (say) "the Economy," and it's not on any ground that I'd call solid! And though I'm more than a little familiar with what certain persons SAY, I have trouble convincing myself that they ever really know what they're talking ABOUT.

That they're clever, or that I even find myself sometimes in agreement is beside the point: which, so far as I'm concerned, is where real "thinking" begins. One need not (I know) wear confusion "like a crown," but that Standard English is the Chimera or the Dragon at which you tilt your spear or bend your bow is to me, seriously doubtful. Attack ManKind; your concerns are penultimately Ethical; and do it in whatever Form you please. Your Style is Charming.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Your metaphors of computation are frightening indeed! And I'm not kidding! But where I stand with respect to the whole ... doubtful. Attack ManKind; your concerns are penultimately Ethical; and do it in whatever Form you please. Your Style is Charming.[/nq]
.thanks... i think
.altho, i'm not exactly sure what you said
.i agree, this is a dangerous business
.but i'm not out to eliminate wild english
.i am for supplementing it with tame english
(EarthLing)
.they don't compete... they complement each other
.EarthLing would be lousy for poetry or picking up girls in bars... as bad as wild english is at
analysis
.poetry and analysis are two different linguistic
endeavors... both valid
.a problem is that most human are actually incapable of rigorous analysis
.that won't work any longer
.and you are right again.. i am against mankind
.we need a new species
.fortunately, that doesn't appear to be too great
a difficulty
.it seems to be happening right before my eyes
heron
unDO email address

Nature, heron stone to be commanded, http://www.gendo.net must be obeyed. mailto:(Email Removed)

Usenet · Answer

The "AI" or "Artificial Intelligence" Debate (the true concern of which is ultimately the"official" determination of what might be styled "the nature" of Biological Human Consciousness) is the concern of scientist-philosophers like Edelman, Penrose, John Searle, Daniel Dennett, David Chalmers, Etc. and I left off following it about three years ago. Is the Brain a Computer? This seems to be at issue. But in order to answer it "the problem of consciousness" must first be resolved, ...

um, etc. I tend to trust the writings of John Searle most, but then he's the clearest writer of the group for what it's worth. At any rate, the computer-speak (when speaking of the human brain) in your previous missive but one put me in mind of it and prompted the thought that you were yourself probably an advocate of the "strong - AI" position or that the Brain's a Computer, Human Consciousness (as an issue) a Bust, and therefore that the generation of at least Human-Type Consciousness Artificially is More than just likely, if not an actuality ALREADY ..

When it became apparent that what was at issue was the official Scientific Recognition of a Few Definitions, I lost interest. Strong-AI thinkers tend to undervalue Human Consciousness, Non-AI thinkers tend to overvalue It, Weak-AI thinkers are subtler but generally tend to gravitate one way or the other, and so I like them best. The best THINKER of the bunch is probably Edelman, but he's also the one least sensitive to language (though he obviously tries), and so I find him very difficult to read.

His style is just awful. So far as this AI-Debate Thingy is concerned I take no stand. My impression, however, was that You did. Do you?

Gendo: informal study group in southern california

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