GENIUS FORUMS

Lyrics excerpt from a song used on the iphone commercial here, very apt.

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Music is my boyfriend
Music is my girlfriend
Music is my dead end
Music's my imaginary friend
Music is my brother
Music is my great-grand-daughter
Music is my sister
Music is my favorite mistress
...
Music is my beach house
Music is my hometown
Music is my king size bed
Music's where I meet my friends
Music is my hot hot bath
Music is my hot hot sex
Music is my back rub
My music is where i'd like you to touch
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Summed up as: music is my narcotic. I particularly like the bolded line "music is my dead end", because it really is. So why does this generation spend so much time listening to music? Free time -- music! While working -- music! While with friends -- music! Etc. Surely it is harmful for accomplishing anything. In the past music was used as a celebration for accomplishing and striving, now it is used as a cheap drug to alleviate strife. Seems related to the meaninglessness of life, nihilism.

This thread could probably come down to the value of narcotics. I think the philosophy taught here is somewhat of a narcotic itself. "Why struggle? Why have goals or emotions? Life is so painful lets just drop out and have a permanent high!" However I am particularly interested in opinions on the value of music.

Much like psychadelic drugs, if the music is rich enough, it can stimulate and inspire the mind toward lofty henids, or even valuable insights.

Ultimately, music, like altered states of consciousness, needs to be abandoned shortly after it proves useful, otherwise it serves as a common stumbling block.

In the lives of todays young people, music is largely a means for catharsis and motivation in run of the mill romantic pursuits. It's also often a means to feel 'hip' and 'with it'. This is especially true with aspiring hipster musicians who like to believe that music can do more than it really does. The Beatles are a classic example this sort of over-self-aggrandization. Change the world with music! I can remember Timothy Leary was really big on how 'the beatles' were working some esoteric means and lifting the collective consciousness of humanity into new heights.

Timonthy Leary can be seen at the end of this really bizarre video made by Johnny Depp. The music is by John Frusciante, who I believe epitomizes the tendency to promote music as being able to do more than it really can.

Cory Duchesne wrote:if the music is rich enough, it can stimulate and inspire the mind toward lofty henids

By the way, I've created a web page about the henid since you won't find it in any dictionary that I've seen. It's not indexed by Google yet, but it should be eventually.

Neil Melnyk wrote:Free time -- music! While working -- music! While with friends -- music!

Browsing the Genius Forum -- music!

I've actually been thinking about music for the brain for a few weeks, and of course applying it to my theory of nature. What I came up with is that music stems way back in our evolution. I mean way back before even the Earth created humans. We were once just a flow of energy. A transmission of information along pathways. Much like a newton's cradle, passing information to our neighbour, because we didn't have the ability to move yet. Music is very closely related to the passing of information in a flow of energy levels. Because our brain still works in a very similar way to the passing of information in a Newton's cradle allignment of stem cells we confuse it with a sort of placebo to learning.

So my theory is that.. Music is a reminder of where we came from, combined with a placebo feeling that we are doing our most fundemental job of passing information as a series of energy levels.

There is a very insightful thought in Plato's Symposium about this. There were Socrates, Alcibiades etc. and one of them says something like: 'No musicians, for we are men able to entertain ourselves, with our discussions.'

Music often stifles thinking. Why is there very loud music in clubs? So people could spend their money and act stupid without being interrupted by thoughts in the process.

Neil wrote

In the past music was used as a celebration for accomplishing and striving, now it is used as a cheap drug to alleviate strife. Seems related to the meaninglessness of life, nihilism.

Yes people are to afraid to face the nihilism and its consequences, so they block their minds by listening to music as much as they can. And are generally afraid of boredom and thinking, so they use music to kill every little bit of free time that could cause them some reflection.

Another form of human evasion in a sense.

Nietzsche - 'How will one ever become a thinker if he does not spend at least a third of his time away from passions, people and books?'

I used to be a musician, and the #1 reason I played/listened was to get high. It has absolutely nothing at all to do with "thinking" per se - only thinking about the intelligence of the structure of the notes being played. In my experience there aren't too many people out there who really understand intelligent structure or how it works (including most musicians), but for those who do it can get you very, very high.

I had to stop. . . because where was that leading me?

Interesting!

I don't see how any type of music inspires the mind to higher henids. Unless you ignore the music, it doesn't give you time to think.

Music is designed to put one in a state of euphoria, where they certainly are as far away from thinking as possible. Classical and other music might have a more intelligent design to it, but I still don't see how this leads to thinking or henids, it only servers to captivate more in listening to the intelligent sounds rather than falling into some repetitive trance.

Thinking requires that you are not focused on any particular senses. Music serves the purpose of catching your attention and holding it for long periods of time. At dinner parties music is played quietly in the background to catch someone's attention when they break from the conversation, lest they might fall into thinking!

I saw the commercial recently, and thought it was a typical expression of mindless values.

However, music can also be a "Zen thing." Those of you who play an instrument may know what I'm talking about. Ideally, music functions as a conduit for the fundamental creativity of Nature to be expressed through the human mind, effortlessly and without the interference of ideas and concepts. Good writing or any other form of art can be like this as well, if one is "in the zone." Listeners/readers/viewers can tell when such art is created, and they naturally respond to it.

Granted, most music, most writing, and most art is not like that. It either stinks of commercialism or is of poor quality, contrived through effort and fashion-consciousness.

One of the reasons I like some rap songs even though I have strenuous objections to the culture they promote is that certain rap songs do express the perspective of their creators very directly and authentically. In this sense, they have musical and artistic value, even if they promote poisonous values.

Unidian wrote:However, music can also be a "Zen thing." Those of you who play an instrument may know what I'm talking about. Ideally, music functions as a conduit for the fundamental creativity of Nature to be expressed through the human mind, effortlessly and without the interference of ideas and concepts. Good writing or any other form of art can be like this as well, if one is "in the zone." Listeners/readers/viewers can tell when such art is created, and they naturally respond to it.

Yeah, it's totally otherworldly - spontaneous wonder. Some of the experiences I've had.... no words can get close. I'd still be doing it if I didn't have a sense there is something else to reckon with.

Neil,

Music alone certainly cannot bring about higher henids and insight, but if you value thinking, music, like an amphetamine, can excite and stimulate your brain while it's thinking, bringing you closer to clarity. A lot of times people don't have the courage to think too intensely, and music can help reduce inhibitions and can excite the brain to stretch itself further than it would without the extra boost. Music, like altered states, can be useful at the beginning, but it's not for later stages.

What fun is reality without some good sound tracks?

http://www.dumpalink.com/videos/The_cha ... Punk-.html


Personal favorite here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOofy2cL9VM&search

.

I much prefer instrumentals, as... the lyrics tend to cause one (me) to stop thinking, becomes the same over n over n over. I write poetry but don't put to music cause it will then cease to exist as a springboard to another plane. Been playing piano since about 3 years-old. Used to play other instruments, only to mastery but then, always return to piano :-)

Somebody mentioned earlier about the background music at dinner parties... that's me in the corner playing away at some of the stuff i've written (in my head) that creates one to think (no lyrics, tho)
I'll put my hat (or dinner napkin) on the floor for the $$$, keep and write a check (plus 10%) to the local foodbank whatever.

Mom and sister played though mom played by ear, and sis read notes and i played (composed) by ear or wrote my own sheet music.

I thank them that they provided me with a strong work ethic. Growing up on a farm/ranch setting fit me well. We lost the farm from five straight years of drought, hail, and rust. I bought it back some 15 years ago though, just a beautiful setting and place to retire to some day. The girlfriend doesn't want to (permanently) come back to live out her graying days... as she is averse to cold weather. Maybe she will go (kick the bucket) first :-|

And it was wonderful to have known both grandmas and one grandpa well. The last one left this plane 30 years ago but the conscious/unconsciousness of the memories remains as vivid as were it just yesterday.

It is truly good to be alive - as the dead know nothing.

PS- Nice to see a thread without cursing, name-calling etc. :-)

And No Women.



Tomas (the tank)
Prince of Jerusalem
16 Degree
Scottish Rite Free Mason


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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgVjJWZ6P5A

The sound of one hand.

Or, two :-)

I'm one of those people who visualizes his music, the particular piece I'm listening to is Itsuki Fantasy for Six Mallets (Marimba) by Keiko Abe. It reminds of a warm spring day, the days that blend into summer, in some uncharted, grassy field where the sky is a bright but faded blue and the grass bristles in the gentle breeze; the sort of day you lay in the grass and day dream. If a musical piece can give me that, then its 'good'. I hope to someday be able to write a piece of music based on drawings, using mathematic principles such as Yannis Xenakis (Rebonds a multi-percussion piece was written based on a building he designed, this man never picked up a musical instrument even while composing).
You can find Rebonds A&B (I recommend B, the Steve Schick recording) on iTunes as well as Itsuki Fantasy.

Kevin Solway wrote:I've created a web page about the henid since you won't find it in any dictionary that I've seen.

The Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition:

henid ('h?nid) Philos. [ad. G. henide, coined by Weininger on the basis of Gr. ??- one; cf. HENISM.] In the philosophy of Otto Weininger (1880-1903): see quots. Hence he'nidical a.
1906 tr. O. Weininger's Sex & Character II. iii. 99, I propose for psychical data at this earliest stage of their existence the word Henid (from the Greek ??, because in them it is impossible to distinguish perception and sensation as two analytically seperable factors, and because, therefore, there is no trace of duality in them)... The very of a henid forbids its description; it is merely a something. 1909 J. London Martin Eden xxxvii. 322 By some henidical process - henidical, by the way, is a favourite word of mine which nobody understands - by some henidical process you persuade yourself that you believe in the competitive system and the survival of the strong. 1914 --- Let. 10 Sept. (1966) 428 The word henid was coined by a crazy German philosopher... all persons possess henids. 1915 --- Jacket xiv. 160 'I'll - ' he began explosively, proving , by his inability to conclude the remark , that he thought in henids. 1946 D. ABRAHAMSEN Mind & Death of a Genius 112 Weininger introduces a special name for the psychological data at the earliest stage before clarification has begun. He calls the vague perception the henid. Ibid. 113 According to Weininger, the henid is the form of perception known to the lower types of organism. In mankind development from the henid to the completely differentiated form of perception and idea is possible.

Greg Shantz wrote:The Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition:

Great, I'll have to get myself a good dictionary.

Did you get the above listing online? I notice that the subscription price for individuals is quite expensive.

Kevin Solway wrote:Did you get the above listing online?

Public library.