2 Minutes of Reality

Brothers of Briar

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That about helps me decide on what not to eat for supper------Salad is OUT!!!:x 
 
Cartaphilus":srwpzjkn said:
Well, At least ya don't see me suing or complaining to Nabisco because they call some of there products "Crackers" do ya?
Good one!!
 
'Bout time too. The world moves on, for better or worse, and this one's well past it's sell by date. :twisted: :twisted: 
 
Frank Zappa":07mu4dsx said:
"Who are the brain police?"
The pompous, sanctimonious, self-righteous assclowns who insist that everyone "think" as they do, that's who.

Cartaphilus":07mu4dsx said:
...they just want to stand on there (sic) soap box and see if they can control something or someone...Pure and simple and no doubt about it.
Get your fair share of power today?
Yup. Nailed it...well, except for the fact that they'll never have their "fair share" until they completely dominate and control every aspect of everyone else's life.

It's coercion. It's wrong masquerading as "right". Some of them run for office, and the ones that don't get the ones that do to put the coercive muscle behind their brain police agendas.

It's time we laughed these assclowns off the stage. If everyone stopped taking them as seriously as they take themselves, they'd scurry back to their holes like the vermin they are.

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Another Two Minutes :

Marc Oromaner":6ou6gcm9 said:
Back in September, 2010, Wired magazine published a discussion between two of its tech writers, Kevin Kelly and Steven Johnson about where ideas come from. Despite the stereotype of the solitary genius toiling away in his basement, the duo argued that great discoveries typically come not from individual minds but from the hive mind, aka, the collective consciousness. History shows that the most game-changing innovations including calculus, the electric battery, the telephone, the steam engine, the radio, and thousands more, were all uncovered simultaneously by different inventors who had no knowledge of one another. As Malcolm Gladwell brought up in a 2008 New Yorker article titled “In The Air,” this phenomenon of simultaneous discovery, innovation, and invention is extremely common. So much so, historians even have a term for it—“multiples.” It’s almost as if all these breakthroughs come from the same, unseen information source.

The concept reminds me of a lesson from one of my college anthropology classes that had been wedged somewhere deep within the recesses of my brain. It was about an isolated group of monkeys on some island that had learned to use sticks as tools to get at termites or wash sweet potatoes or something to that effect. Despite no other group of monkeys on record having this knowledge, allegedly, after a critical mass of these monkeys had learned the technique, monkeys on other islands began to use the same technique, as if their minds were somehow all connected.

“Hive mind” experiments have also been done with humans to see if we are similarly connected. In the late 1980’s British biologist Rupert Sheldrake’s The Presence of the Past reported on experiments that he felt proved a collective human memory. In one, a difficult hidden figure puzzle was solved much faster by various groups around the world after its solution had been made known to millions during a British television broadcast. Even though these groups had not seen the broadcast, they were able to solve the puzzle much faster than earlier groups who’d tried before the solution had been aired. It’s as though they all somehow had access to the same info or were sharing one mind.
http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/20/hive-mind-invisible-thread/

:face:
 
Yak:

I respectfully beg to differ. Cultivating the hive mentality isn't going to solve anything.

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Mr. Oromaner's piece is "another two minutes" of fantasy. He isn't just plain wrong; he's so deeply and utterly wrong that I hardly know where to begin.

But I'll start here. The calculus absolutely was NOT invented by the "hive mind". It was invented independently by two original individual minds — Newton and Leibniz. The two approaches were so fundamentally different that there is no question as to their complete independency and true originality. It is a prime example of the old cliché "great minds think alike", not evidence that Bolshevized "thinking" has anything whatsoever to do with actual progress in human knowledge.

In fact, that kind of psychological collectivism is precisely what gives rise to the political Bolshevism you (quite rightly) vilify. The latter is a symptom of the former. If you genuinely want to eliminate the effect, your purpose is ill-served by promoting the cause.

The truth is that the greatest, most important fundamental discoveries are made by individuals. Lower-level, technological advances are often the product of collaborations, cross-pollination, and cooperation. But even in that context, the ideas that make incremental advances toward breakthroughs are the products of individual minds. Always. THAT is reality, notwithstanding any amount of historical revisionism or wishful thinking.

Rather than denying credit where credit is due, I would rather know the true authorship of ideas, and pay gratitude to those who are my benefactors. It's more than just acknowledging reality (...you know—truth); it's the moral thing to do.

It's also the practical thing to do. Our culture is in deep doo-doo right now — stuck in a rut wherein the "solutions" are just different versions of the problem, and you can't solve any problem by applying more of it. REAL solutions are going to be innovations, not more of the same kind of group-think that has only gotten us in deeper in the first place. The very last thing we need to do is glorify the hive, promote even more dronehood, and further subjugate ourselves to The Great Collective™.

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This is mysticism; there is no such thing as a collective mind. Why oddities and coincidences of existence, of which there are many, have to be "explained" by bizarre constructs eludes me.

(I lie. I know why, especially in this case. I don't have the time. Who is the writer who said "Never write, except for money." Boswell? Besides, Vito has done yeoman's work above. Kudos to Vito.)
 
No one wants to be in the hive, they would prefer to control the hive.

It's always about control. I seem to remember reports and essays by old-school scientists and anthropologists that used to argue that certain "breeds of people" worked better in strict servitude when applied to modern society. Of course, this idea didn't stand the test of time, but slavery is still alive and well. Isn't it better to have your subjects choose their shackles and a few different jobs, even be proud of them--rather than whip, beat and curse them into restraints and work? It's much easier for those at the helm, cost-effective, even...dare I say... productive. A free man is one of a trade, a skill, and a goal. These are dangerous men, because they edge toward independence.

There's a glitch in the matrix if anyone suspects anything is wrong, eh Veet? :) I just saw the same black cat, like, a billion times. :lol:

Pulling the wool over my own eyes,

8)
 
Kyle Weiss":q4a6ecyh said:
...slavery is still alive and well. Isn't it better to have your subjects choose their shackles and a few different jobs, even be proud of them--rather than whip, beat and curse them into restraints and work? It's much easier for those at the helm, cost-effective, even...dare I say... productive. A free man is one of a trade, a skill, and a goal. These are dangerous men, because they edge toward independence.

There's a glitch in the matrix if anyone suspects anything is wrong, eh Veet?

8)
Well, said, Kyle. That is the insidious truth of the version of the Matrix that we've created — namely, that it is a far more pernicious form of slavery than the kind that comes with chains. At least those who are in chains KNOW they're enslaved. But those who've been defrauded into believing they're "free" simply because they get to choose their masters...they're victims of total enslavement.

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Richard Burley":izhkrpdy said:
This is mysticism; there is no such thing as a collective mind. Why oddities and coincidences of existence, of which there are many, have to be "explained" by bizarre constructs eludes me.

(I lie. I know why, especially in this case. I don't have the time. Who is the writer who said "Never write, except for money." Boswell? Besides, Vito has done yeoman's work above. Kudos to Vito.)
Thanks, Richard. The very fact that you know that "the collective mind" is a fiction [...I mean, in the sense that Mr. Oromaner uses the term, which undermines and obfuscates creative individuals as the true source of primary value, whether he does so intentionally or merely because he's confused and doesn't know better] tells me that you probably know why folks have a need to fabricate such bizarre constructs, and then believe them with such tenacity that they ultimately descend into the limbic brain, whereupon they acquire a permanent emotional impetus that is immune to reason.

Not that I'm imputing such an irrevocably entrenched world-view to Yakster, or to any of the other brethren here, for that matter.

And to be fair, I do acknowledge the existence of a certain kind of "collective mind" phenomenon. In fact, I've experienced it. It happens all the time among musicians, who are "on the same wavelength". And there are numerous other examples: guys who function as a unit in combat; or the synergy among members of a well-tuned sports team (the 1972 Miami Dolphins, for example—a team that arguably contained no individual superstars, yet achieved something no other team in football history has achieved).

So, I'm not completely denying that there are manifestations of what I think one can reasonably call "a collective mind", but it is absurd to claim that the historical FACT of genuinely independent contemporaneous discoveries somehow "proves" that "great discoveries typically come not from individual minds but from the hive mind, aka, the collective consciousness." That just isn't true. And it certainly doesn't obviate or disprove the vastly more abundant cases wherein lone individuals are the source of great value.

By the way, if you do have the time and feel inclined to hold forth as to why such mystical notions as "the collective mind" have such broad appeal, I'd be interested in reading it.

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:fpalm: 

Translation : The model of the world I have adopted does not allow for anything like that to exist. As established once and for all time in the immortal words of Herr Professor Doktor Heissluft,

HPDH":itw581ym said:
This cannot be, because it cannot be !
[Translation continues] That being the case, no matter how often such "coincidences" continue to happen, this will not affect my capacity to warp the mechanism they suggest into approximate conformity with what I believe.

This, in accordance with my unalienable right as a rugged individualist to believe that which reinforces my self-image as a latter-day Benvenuto Cellini -- an inimitable, unique, individual genius.

Besides -- that's what all my friends think, too.

Enjoy your snooze, gents.

:face: 

PS : There was nothing in that post about ideological conformity.
 
For the record, I didn't expect that anything I wrote would alter your opinion, Yak. I just couldn't leave Mr. Oromaner's bold-faced lie sitting there unchallenged.

You prolly don't see it, but your response kind of pegs the irony meter. If I didn't know that you meant it as a scathing rebuke of views that don't align with The View From YakSpace, I'd send my congratulations for posting such a refreshingly frank self-examination. :mrgreen: 

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Charles Fort":6tuiscw5 said:
Reality is not only stranger than we imagine ;
it is stranger than we CAN imagine.
I leave room for that.

Especially when there's a clear pattern & it makes sense.

:face:
 
Yak":r4arasr3 said:
Charles Fort":r4arasr3 said:
Reality is not only stranger than we imagine ;
it is stranger than we CAN imagine.
I leave room for that.

Especially when there's a clear pattern & it makes sense.

:face:
That is laudable.

You know what the issue is here, I presume. It's really a matter of what you or I or anyone else considers to be "evidence", and what "makes sense".

In both cases, the ultimate determination is subjective. Anyone who pretends otherwise is...well, a pretender.

What you and I consider to be "evidence" and "sense" is different. That's been obvious for a long time. I see no need to cast aspersions one way or the other. We've both tried everything we know to bridge the gap...so far without success. I'm willing to let it rest there. The only alternative is perpetual, unresolvable conflict. I don't have the stomach for it any more.

I will continue to state my opinion when reality as I perceive it is at variance with the view from Yakspace. I trust you will continue to do the same. So be it.

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Yak":ln5b3g2s said:
Enjoy your snooze, gents.  There was nothing in that post about ideological conformity.
It's cool.  There was nothing in my post suggesting I took up a snooze against/aloof to your thoughts.

I was just babbling about hives.   I see Borg, I get all excited, because they were some of the best Sci-Fi villainy that was ever written into entertainment.   :cheers: 

Don't shoebox all of us so quickly.   :heart:  I got your point; I'm  just more knowledgeable about the Borg.  I may be simple, but I try and only talk about that which I know.   With knowledge, though, resistance is futile.  
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8)
 
I really miss cheese.

No, really, I do. Haven't been able to eat the stuff in over two years.

Pisses me off.





 
Cheese ? ..... Ever heat blu cheese in the microwave...... Don't... Awful.

Is there any theory on how the memories / thoughts are transferred ? Some kind of electro magnetic energy or is it just observations? I really am curious not being sarcastic. Seems too big a coincidence but I'm having a problem making any guesses on how they can be connected over such large distances.
 
The fascist regimes of the 20th century, the most notorious of which were WWII Germany and communist China and Russia, all put boundaries around thought and expression. Not content to control certain acts, they formulated their version of reality and forbade anyone to speak or think otherwise.

The urge to control is probably as old as man. If I fear but can control you, I can maintain the comforting illusion that I retain control of my life. For humans with rampant craziness and useless complexity, that is very appealing. Not to mention that if I am in control I can ensure that I get more of life's prize goodies than you, housing, food, etc.
 
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