Speakin' of books I can recommend Sapiens by Harari, and Denial of Death by Ernest Becker. The latter being somewhat boring except for the subject of the book.
General / Off-Topic Some numbers and a shortage
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recoveries surpassed deaths a few days ago and are starting to kick off, currently 450 recoveries vs 300 deaths. good!
number of cases still grows exponentially.
sapiens is indeed a view changing work, highly recommend. gonna check out mr becker, thanks!
also indeed don juan's teachings. to be taken with a grain of salt, though.
read the whole castaneda thing as a teen, might be time for a revisit ...
number of cases still grows exponentially.
sapiens is indeed a view changing work, highly recommend. gonna check out mr becker, thanks!
also indeed don juan's teachings. to be taken with a grain of salt, though.
read the whole castaneda thing as a teen, might be time for a revisit ...
Instead of reading Becker (he is dry as dust), instead I can recommend Sheldon Solomon. It's rare to laugh when listening to a scientist speaking about death. It's also an excellent introduction to Becker:recoveries surpassed deaths a few days ago and are starting to kick off, currently 450 recoveries vs 300 deaths. good!
number of cases still grows exponentially.
sapiens is indeed a view changing work, highly recommend. gonna check out mr becker, thanks!
also indeed don juan's teachings. to be taken with a grain of salt, though.
read the whole castaneda thing as a teen, might be time for a revisit ...
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others"
www.theguardian.com
Fury in China as footage appears to show officials taking doctors' face masks
Local and central government officials face growing wave of anger over handling of coronavirus outbreak
www.theguardian.com
have to agree:
"those are basically becker's ideas: human beings are so smart that we realize that we exist. that makes us aware of death, tragedy and our animal nature. that creates potentially overwhelming existential terror that we manage by embedding ourselves in a culturally constructed belief system that gives us a sense that we're persons of value in a world of meaning."
I found it interesting, but not terribly enlightening.
There is a very significant passage in Casteneda's book that are more on point regarding fear and man's natural psychological hurdles to dealing with it. In the original paperback that I read IIRC it was on page 83. Of course, I could be mistaken in that I was reading his books back in the late 70's.
EDIT: I've found it here,
Four enemies of a man of knowledge
A quote from Carlos Castaneda’s “The teachings of Don Juan”: A man of knowledge is one who has followed truthfully the hardships of learning, a man who has, without rushing or wit…
thoughtsforbreakfast.wordpress.com
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well, it all resonated quite a bit. the part that really struck me was the bit about atheism, or atheists more precisely. considering myself one and a tolerant mind, i wonder how i would fare on one of those tests?
i guess it's too late for me since i already know the trick! now, my preliminary impression is that maybe my atheist stance (rather than simply agnostic) is not fueled as much by existential fear but as a reaction to the consequences of theism and the fact that theists (not just religious ones) have shaped and ruled the world. anyway, i'll have to chew on that one for a while ...thanks for the tip, wecomeinpeace!
The idea Solomon and friends had about proving Becker's hypothesis was rather brilliant, and the results have been reproduced hundreds of times now. Still like with much other science it doesn't matter much, because people don't really want to know about reality, only the fun stuff. I think Solomon's theory is very relevant regarding the epidemic, but mostly with regards to everybody's reaction.well, it all resonated quite a bit. the part that really struck me was the bit about atheism, or atheists more precisely. considering myself one and a tolerant mind, i wonder how i would fare on one of those tests?
thanks for the tip, wecomeinpeace!
I have my own hypothesis. To survive and reproduce, thereby passing along your genome, evolution has "taught" itself, and built into our DNA, the understanding of the joy of staying alive compared to dying. To maximise your chances for that, you need to first survive yourself, then your offspring and your mate, then your family, mates, etc. in that order. Every time life on Earth divided into two mutations, where one was more aware of the necessity of survival than the other, the one that didn't "see the light" died off. We also "learned" to know almost by pure instinct, that surviving the current moment and the near future is more important than planning distant future. I would therefore suggest, that if you were able to measure empathy (you can't), then you would see that it fades like light, with the square of the distance, including distance into time.
An old saying according to people who are in no position to know, I suspect. Personally, I think that the decline in belief in benevolent bearded sky-men in in the last 100 years or so is to a significant degree attributable to the willingness of those in control to use 'God is on our side' arguments to persuade otherwise sensible people to need foxholes in the first place.
I've never met a person who was either in a life or death situation or had a loved one who was, say pinned under a car in a raging snowstorm in the middle of the night, who wouldn't appeal to a higher power for a positive outcome, regardless of their every day take on spiritualism under more comfortable circumstances.
Pretty funny, when we know that France is the mother of the Catholic Church.
I did five operational tours and came very close more than once. Never believed for a second.
The one time I really thought I was absolutely and utterly done for (not an army thing it was medical) I thought "I wonder what happens now" as I passed out from the excruciating pain.
Waking up was a nice surprise, no choirs of angels as I went under though.
I cant stop laughing.
Sounds good, Stigbob.
Similar experience here.
I had only fading consciousness and curiousity. As the pain receeded, it was rather pleasant.
361 dead, more than SARS in the early 2000s (349 dead).
More than 17000 infected - 57 dead for Sunday.
More than 17000 infected - 57 dead for Sunday.
Yep, very similar for me. You get to the point where the pain can't get any worse and you want to die, there's no fear just curiosity.
I very nearly died of hyperthermia once, that's actually very pleasant and peaceful once the shivering stops.
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