The Real Threat to Consciousness

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
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BMcGilly07
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by BMcGilly07 »

Diebert van Rhijn wrote:Seeing the world through these eyes would show peace mostly being a mask for perpetual war, pacifism a luxury for those being able to afford it - a lucky circumstance - and world unity a menace for freedom and progress. When the lid comes of the human mind perhaps has not progressed that much at all. It only learned to contain, to drive itself increasingly insane?
Much akin to Nietzsche's outlook on war in "Thus Spake Zarathustra." However, the idea of war and warring is all too often driven astray by those who operate under the pretenses outlined by the Will to Power model.

As with Islam, the Sufi's speak of jihad-an-nafs as being highest, to war against one's self and ego above all other types, just as Nietzsche wanted for new creators of value to first cast down the old values and virtues. As with most of TSZ, I think Nietzsche was being metaphorical when speaking about warring.

This attempt to contain and compartmentalize the different factions in the world to preserve peace is an imminent sign of catastrophe's presence. Only through understanding the inter-connectedness and inter-dependency of things can we hope to diffuse these dangerous situations.

If we cordon these different factions off in our thinking and approach to peace, one from the other, that will only increase the ignorance, fear, and hatred of the "others."

We need to understand how these forces rely one on the other in order to understand how to better deal with them.
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Philosophaster
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by Philosophaster »

BMcGilly07 wrote:As with most of TSZ, I think Nietzsche was being metaphorical when speaking about warring.
I'm not sure you can be very confident in saying that. In Genealogy of Morals Nietzsche speaks with approval of specific nations that had "warrior cultures," such as ancient Greece and Japan. This is one of the reasons I see Nietzsche as a strange fit for the "demolish the ego" style of philosophy discussed on this forum. But I suppose you can dispute whether he saw the warrior-aristocrat as the highest stage in human development or as merely a stepping stone to something greater.
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Trevor Salyzyn
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by Trevor Salyzyn »

Are you sure about that Philo?

"In times of peace, the warlike man attacks himself." -F.N.
A mindful man needs few words.
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BMcGilly07
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by BMcGilly07 »

Philosophaster wrote:
BMcGilly07 wrote:As with most of TSZ, I think Nietzsche was being metaphorical when speaking about warring.
I'm not sure you can be very confident in saying that. In Genealogy of Morals Nietzsche speaks with approval of specific nations that had "warrior cultures," such as ancient Greece and Japan. This is one of the reasons I see Nietzsche as a strange fit for the "demolish the ego" style of philosophy discussed on this forum. But I suppose you can dispute whether he saw the warrior-aristocrat as the highest stage in human development or as merely a stepping stone to something greater.
I think Nietzsche appreciated warrior cultures because of at least two reasons, the first being that warriors approach life without fear of death and loss of self, and secondly their willingness to sacrifice themselves for a greater good.

If we look at Nietzsche's ideal man, that being Zarathustra of TSZ, he certainly wasn't a warrior in the conventional sense, but warred against the mediocrity of mankind.
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

BMcGilly07 wrote: As with most of TSZ, I think Nietzsche was being metaphorical when speaking about warring.
Yes and no. If I would channel Nietzsche I'd say that military warfare is just a metaphor for deeper, more hidden and "real" struggles and issues that a human life generates. War then becoming the superficial fact and having many forms. Aren't most wars fought without maiming and killing army-to-army? There are huge battlefields involving economics, blockades, infiltrations, coup attempts and ideological conversion. Some of them causing equally large death tolls or suffering. What most people call war is just a tip of the iceberg of what goes on with international politics all the time and in all ages. Peace ever only was happening individually, the occasional wise man's achievement.
If we cordon these different factions off in our thinking and approach to peace, one from the other, that will only increase the ignorance, fear, and hatred of the "others."
While this is essentially true, the cordoning off seems ingrained in the mind as we know it: the mental bubble human beings create, this whole second nature, this artificial jungle, forms in itself the cordoning off. The dialectic mind and also its development so far is grafted upon this. This is why Nietzsche spoke of going post-human eventually.
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BMcGilly07
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by BMcGilly07 »

Diebert van Rhijn wrote:
BMcGilly07 wrote: As with most of TSZ, I think Nietzsche was being metaphorical when speaking about warring.
Yes and no. If I would channel Nietzsche I'd say that military warfare is just a metaphor for deeper, more hidden and "real" struggles and issues that a human life generates. War then becoming the superficial fact and having many forms. Aren't most wars fought without maiming and killing army-to-army? There are huge battlefields involving economics, blockades, infiltrations, coup attempts and ideological conversion. Some of them causing equally large death tolls or suffering. What most people call war is just a tip of the iceberg of what goes on with international politics all the time and in all ages. Peace ever only was happening individually, the occasional wise man's achievement.
I would consider individuals who have achieved an enlightened, personal peace as a wise man's achievement. Anything less is the peace of cows, and without wisdom that peace may be used in a worthy or wasted manner, depending on the individual's wisdom or ignorance, and even the peace of the ignorant is violence against wisdom. The warring which Nietsche promoted beyond the inner life seems to me to be that of a revolution of values in a society, and that any change is preferable to stagnant stupidity.
Diebert van Rhijn wrote:
BMcGilly07 wrote:If we cordon these different factions off in our thinking and approach to peace, one from the other, that will only increase the ignorance, fear, and hatred of the "others."
While this is essentially true, the cordoning off seems ingrained in the mind as we know it: the mental bubble human beings create, this whole second nature, this artificial jungle, forms in itself the cordoning off. The dialectic mind and also its development so far is grafted upon this. This is why Nietzsche spoke of going post-human eventually.
Yes, that is what is meant by the world being an experience of nothing more than the mind, we project out onto our sense data the tumultuous swaying of our mind. This is all experienced as you state within the mode of duality. Only by investigating causation, cause and effect, as recommended by this site's founders and countless other wise men, can advances be made beyond the superficialities of "peace" and "war".
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Re: The Real Threat to Consciousness

Post by dysfunctionalgenius »

Are you from the Stars and Stripes side of the world BMcGilly07?

What a question?

When i registered on this site i felt a little insecure that i might be out of my depth with regards to the knowledge needed to interact, thanks 4 making me feel more secure!
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