Comment by Dilettante_
2 months ago
Did you mean it doesn't set its own goals? Or what did you mean by "determine the why" if not a stack trace of its motivations(which is to say, its programming)? Could you give an example of determinimg meaning or value?
Yes, set its own goals. Here's an example - say you wanted to track your spending, you might create a spreadsheet to do so. The spreadsheet won't write itself. If you want, you could perhaps task an ai to monitor and track spending - but it doesn't care. It is the human that cares/feels/values whatever-it-is. Computers are not that type.
Is your position that humans are pretty mechanistic, and simply playing out their programming, like computers? And that they can provide a stacktrace for what they do?
If so, this is what I was getting at with my initial comment. Most people do not apply their intelligence personally - they are simply playing out the goals that we inserted into them (by parents, society). There are alternative possibilities, but it seems that most people's operational procedures and actions are not something they have considered or actively sought.
>Is your position that humans are [...] simply playing out their programming?
Yes, at least it's what I wanted to drill further into.
Boiled down, I'm interested in hearing where "intelligent" people derive their motivations(I'm in agreement that most people are on ["non-intelligent" if you will] auto-pilot most of the time) if not from outside themselves, in your framework.
When does a goal start being my intelligent own goal? Any impetus for something can be traced back to not-yourself: I might decide to start tracking my spending, but that decision doesn't form out of the void. Maybe I value frugality, but I did not create that value in myself. It was instilled in me by experience, or my peers, etc. I see no way for one to "spontaneously" form a motivation, or if I wanted to take it one step further(into the Buddha's territory), I would have to question who, and where, and what this "self" even is.
Here's a question for you. Imagine a child who was well looked after (fed and loved) but didn't go to school for 12+ years. Now imagine the same person who from the age of 5-6 followed the usual path of 12+ years of schooling. Which person do you imagine would be more fully themselves, the more complete expression of whatever was already inside? If the schooled person did a PhD too (so another 6 years) would that help or hinder them from becoming themselves?
To me, the answer is obvious. Inserting thousands of ideas and patterns of thoughts into a person will be unlikely to help them become a true expression of their nature. If you know gardening, the schooled person is more like a trained tree - grown in a way that suits the farmer - the more tied back the tree is, the less free it is.
As I see it, each individual is unique, with a soul. Each is capable of reaching a full expression of itself, by itself. What I also see is that there are many systems that are intentional manipulations, put in place in order to farm individuals at the individual's expense. The more education one receives, the more amenable one is to being 'farmed' according to the terms that were inserted. To me, this is the installation of an unnatural and servile mentality, which once adopted makes the person easy to harness - the person will even think being harnessed and 'in service' is right and good.
The problem is that these principles were not their own. These are like religious beliefs, and unlike principles founded according to personal experience. Received principles will always be unnatural. Acting according to them, is to act in an inauthentic way. However, there is no material reason to address the inauthenticity, as when one looks around, everyone else is doing the same. This results in a self-supporting, collective delusion.
In my view there are answers to what the self is - but 'society' cannot teach you them - it can only fill you with delusions. Imo, you would be on a better footing to forget everything you think you know (this costs you nothing) and do something like apply the scientific method personally - let your personal experiences guide you. Know the difference between 'knowing' because of experience and 'belief' because you were taught it. Even more simply, know thyself.
7 replies →