Self/Other, annoyance + My Muse

Things we notice are of two types. Thinks we like and are welcome, and things we don't like and are not welcome. Both can stress us as we try to get what we like and push away what we don't like. But when we are getting what we like or pushing away what we don't like it feels good. But when we don't get what we like or get what we don't like it feels bad. Now I think I notice something.

The personal side is irrelevant, but in terms of personal history the very first thing I wrote to My Muse was an experience on a river a few months previous. I had managed to get control of an inflatable mattress my friends and I were messing around with on the river and with an accomplice we just lay there in the Balkan sun and let the river take us where ever it was going. I rolled on my side to watch the water and the river bed sometimes shallow so I could see the rocks on the bottom and suddenly deep crystal turquoise green. Sometimes the river flowed fast and the banks and over hanging trees sped past, at other times we would get caught in a eddy and slowly rotate around a few times until being discharged back into the main current. It was an ever changing journey, unpredictable but not an adrenaline rush--with no white water or anything challenging--just a gentle and engaging conversation with the river, just letting it speak to me and reveal itself in all its unlimited depth and character. The result was being washed over by a sense of deep relaxation and a cooling spiritual connection with the world as if I had walking into the peace a cool of a deep forest within my soul. After the mattress grounded some time later and a few miles down the river we both realised it was probably time we rejoined the others. Let the air out and walked back to the party. But I remained in that inner forest for months afterwards. I wrote to My Muse about this because it was a sense/hope that she knew what I was talking about that originally attracted me to her. I have since learned other names for this and believe its a borderline Jhana, a teetering on the edge of pure mind. we tend to look for this type of thing in the wrong place and I realise thinking I could continue my river journey with her was the biggest and most damaging mistake I ever made.

So now I begin to continue that journey in the most ordinary of places. You do not need to be abroad in the Balkan sun to approach your pure mind. Recently have been enjoying the unpredictable current and eddies of train travel. As a train moves our bodies are subjected to all the jolts and sways of the wheels as they pass over the tracks. If we let ourselves go into this sensations of this journey that is being revealed to us we quickly begin to enter the peace that I found on that river.

BUT sometimes the opposite happens. If we are trying to sleep, or read, or write on a laptop the jolts and swaying can becoming annoying as it interrupts our own processes and wishes. When Isambard Kingdom Brunel decided to make his Western railway so smooth a journey that a champagne glass would not even be upset he had a particular type of customer in mind who expected a particular type of predictability and control. But we when we do not get this we can get quite irritated and upset. So how can something that can give us ultimate peace in one state of mind, give us annoyance and even anger in another?

It is to do with Self. If we analyse the river experience the key was "submitting" to the river. I imagine having a companion on that journey was important because it took away the worry of what might happen. What if we did enter rapids or choppy water? What if we did over turn in dangerous waters? These thoughts have never emerged until now more than 20 year later. There was submission to the river and whatever it wished to reveal, no thought of self. I was ready for whatever was coming, and was listening perfectly. Perhaps when religions talk about Submission to God this is the mind they are talking of. This is the real mind we need in life to be fully present and fully listening to life and existence.

But then we spoil it because we take the self view. This view is trying to sleep on a train that is jolting around. We wish for turning inside and being able to forget about the outside world so we can drift off to sleep. But once we are caught by some jolts breaking into our consciousness we begin to focus on them as hostile and opposing our inner wish. We are doing the exact opposite of submission and are trying to suppress. Trying to suppress closes our heart and traps us within our self and our wishes. You know when this is growing in strength because we begin to battle with the world and resist it on principle. The more the train jolts the more we try and sleep and push it away.  I WILL SLEEP we begin to fight for. And if someone tapped us on the shoulder at this moment and said "just relax and give in to the train movement" we would probably attack them and tell them go get lost "Why should I? I am going to win this, stupid train. How dare it upset my wish to sleep" and so get more worked up and ironically as unlikely to sleep as is possible.

SO I speak from experience only yesterday. I had both experiences. I had both the pleasant Submission experience and the unpleasant irritated Wish to Submit experience. The difference is Other. When we self accepts and submits to The Other then we are peaceful. When we self rejects the other and wishes to fight it we are stressed and it is unpleasant. It's as simple as that.

So we are trying to sleep and the train jolting is invading our mind and stopping us. We are incredibly tired we wish to, even need to sleep. We start to get annoyed. Stupid train. Whole load of thoughts now "can't they fix the tracks with all the money I am being charged", "look at the state of the nation" anything to reinforce Myself and My wish, and attack the Other. But its all superficial wins; it feel bad but I won't accept that.

We take stock. Actually we may need to sleep, but we will survive. Its amazing how little sleep you can survive on, its just when you never get a chance to recover that it starts to damage you. You will get a chance to sleep sometime, so do you really need to Fight for a sleep now? So you begin to look at what is annoying you. The sways and jolts of the train. Are they so bad? You look deeper into them. What are they really like? What is so annoying about them? There is another one. My arm is compressed. Then my heads moves. Then we return back. It's not doing me any damage. I am okay. I don't actually need to do anything. I can watch what is going on quite peacefully. Now this is where the switch begins. Once we start to watch what is going on "as it is" and we establish that there is no real danger and we don't actually need to do anything then we can relax and we no longer relate to The Other as enemy. Now those jolts start to feel like caresses or perhaps the work of a masseur. People actually pay money for this type of manipulation. We now feel our body being compressed and manipulated by a friend, or someone we trust and the feeling now switch from stress and anger to warmth and pleasure. This is the feeling of Accepting the Other. I wonder how much of "Love" is a confusion with the feelings of accepting the Other and Submitting the Self to Another. When we trust someone and know they will not hurt us, when we believe they will be faithful and not put someone before us, when the door to them is open then we feel we can submit and that then is the same experience of accepting Other that you can find on a river or on a train.

Now its interesting as far as I can tell when Ajahn Brahm speaks so softly and kindly about absorbing for extended periods into the bamboos at a monastery I believe (tentatively) that this may be the same door into The Other. Resting the self and opening to the Other is the key to Pure Mind.

Now how crazy is that if we think about it discursively. The way to my heart is to go into the Other. It makes no sense! Surely the way to Me is to hold Me and push The Other away?

Well try it. Apparently it does not work like that. Indeed if they way to our soul is through the door of the Other, and we must step over Our-Self and submit to the Other instead it is really no surprise that we get so confused! and our lives are full of so much suffering. Look what I did. True I looked for Another and found My Muse but I did not succeed in fully submitting. What happened is that because there were other men around who were also interested and because from her perspective all this attention was very thrilling I was not able to maintain my submission. It was like submitting to the movement of train, but instead of the train massaging me it seemed to be massaging someone else (literally since physical relationship was the deal here). And that raises a whole new level here.

So on the train I explored this too. At each station people were getting on a filing past me. What started to annoy me were those people who joined the train in one carriage then walked through the train to other carriages. It meant that I was being disturbed not just at stations but between stations too. Like with the train jolting the thoughts begin "what is stopping them walking up the platform first and just getting on the train in the right place rather than getting on carriage 1 and walking through" ... any thought to justify what I want. So I tried the submission thing. But now this is much more complex because when you submit to a "person" you are engaging with an "agent" and someone who really could be hostile. The train is easy. No train actually wants to hurt you or not, it is just a sensation. But a person may actually be hostile. You are annoyed with them, they can be annoyed with you! So submission appears to be much more complex and hindered. Well actually this is as far as I got. Enough live meditation for one day and the train was starting to empty and my objects of observation were getting off.

So how do we deal with this added element of "agency." I don't like or agree with Sartre but he does analyse the experience of a stranger entering a room and how this completely distorts consciousness. But this is a very simple and naïve analysis. It does not need to be like this!

One issue that comes from this is the core question of  how "other people" and "myself" occupy the same world. I believe I have some progress on this. To be clear there is ultimately only One World. It is a mistake to think of the world as a foam with loads of bubbles around people; each person seeing a different world. That said this is part true, but it is not the ultimate truth. The Foam is the ultimate truth and there is only One Foam. So then the question if we are all inside bubbles then can we know about The One Foam?  Well of course we can because we are each looking at part of The Foam. we are inside a bubble that is part of The Foam. If we reach out and touch the walls of our bubble that is actually part of The One Truth. The problem is that our perspective is just one bubble, and we are not therefore able to see our bubble in relation to other.

Not at the common level anyway. But what is happening when we submit to The Other? When we let go of the The Self that is "inside" the bubble and we instead absorb into The Other then we are actually letting go for that perspective that is "within" the bubble. The world only feels like a "bubble" from the perspective of The Self. When we let go of that perspective and accept The Other then the world becomes less "single bubble like."

There are so many ways to write this. Hinduism is the strongest, but their way is also fraught with danger because the eternal temptation is to take the bubble perspective and hold The Self rather than The Other. Buddhism stamps this our completely by talk of Emptiness and Non-Self. But to other committed to Bubble Existence and Fighting The Other both ways of saying it fall on deaf ears. Scriptures like these just become wall paper for our bubble until we begin to be able to accept The Other in place of Our-Self.

Now saying that can put us into the classic opposition of Christianity and Mahayana Buddhism. We identify Self and Other and we try to submit The Self to The Other. We start "doing good deeds" we start trying to help people, we start sacrificing Our-Self in place of others at its extreme we are Jesus on the Cross dying for the sins of the World which for us is The Other. You have sinned and I will take your suffering.

But it most probably starts wrong because actually to start with this is all just Self. I AM HELPING YOU. I am not submitting at all, I am just directing My Self to take on You. I supress my wishes, I supress myself so I can absorb you. And, this ends up with resentment of The Other. I try to offer food. How often when I am hungry do I not think "why should you get this food, its mine, I want it, I need it." This is because "I" am offering "You" the food. I am not submitting to you, I am experiencing You through Me. At the core is still me and what I do.

And realising just how embedded we are within Our Bubble its easy to see just how badly the many doors to The Other are locked shut.

But the world is not Cruel. The moment we successfully submit we will feel the unlimited joy, happiness and release from being trapped in Our Bubble and this often encourages us to try it again.

But, but, there is a major trap even here. When we feel good about "giving"or "submitting" often its because of an unexpected and brief submission to The Other: we suddenly feel good. And when we analyse that and think "ooo that was nice how do I do it again" we are already on the wrong foot because it was not something "I" did but actually the opposite: it was a moment of submitting to The Other and not Myself for a moment. We are not Enlightened because in our Bubble State it would be the absolute worst thing: we would think we were Gods and untouchable from everything else both Suffering and Other People. What a monster!

So on a more positive note, the goal is simply to look into the Other, observe it and allow it To Be and Let it Be and submit and enjoy that.

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The intersection of sexuality and openness to The Other is quite interesting. Taking a vow of celibacy and rejecting all forms of pleasure could actually hamper access to The Other. Unsure about this, but if the caress of the breath on the nostril is a pleasant experience that opens the door to The Other than what is the difference between the caress of a lover? It seems that there is a sexual response that gets triggered in the latter which leads to a desire for gratification. In the former however "entering" The Other (from a male perspective) is simply the unwrapping of the layers of imposed Self to reveal ever deeper submission to The Other. The parallels between the two are actually quite uncanny. I have not ever resolved this, but perhaps what many people are really looking for in a sexual relationship is better achieved through meditation. And conversely the move to celibacy is actually just shifting from wanting crude external access to Another to the deeper letting go of oneself to enable deeper access and submission to The Other. They are actually not entirely different.

I have certainly heard it said that the Kundalini Energy starts in the basal chakra which is the source of sexual impulse, and through lifting that energy we can access ever more subtle and deeper modes of existence.

So perhaps it is not so surprising that spiritually so often derails into sexuality in its early stages.

Back to basics and Self-Reference vs Indeterminate results/Contradicts

A problem which can change its state allows for self reference

Suppose this situation:

You have 1 microwave.

A) Someone is making lunch. It will take 5 mins.

B) But you want to quickly use it which will take 1 min.

Time till lunch depends on whether you use the microwave.

So Lunch will take 5 mins if you don't use it, and 6 mins if you do.

You may be hungry and want to use it if lunch is not ready in 5 mins.

So this is okay cos if you don't use it lunch is ready in 5 mins.

But if you do use it then lunch is ready in 6 mons which self-justifies using the microwave. Either outcome works and there is no better solution.

Now this allows for contradiction. If you reverse your condition that you will not use the microwave then you can't win. If you use it lunch is in 6 mins so you do not use it. If you do not use it lunch is in 5 mins so you use it. There is no solution the result is indeterminate.

Now silly situation, but interesting how such things turn up in even teh most mundane situations. Now can we say that such a situation is possible with a system that cannot change the state of variable on which it depends. That is constant variables are used.

       

Sex & Disgust

The body is disgusting. It's an evolutionary necessity then for reproductive behaviour to waive this disgust and so it appears. In a state of sexual arousal what was previously disgusting is no longer disgusting. What was fearful is no longer fearful, making us braver. And the state of depression is also lifted by the cocktail of brain chemicals also. Sex is a very potent remover of barriers presumably underlining the fundamental importance to evolution of procreation. Any genetic based behaviours that do not result in childbirth will get lost, so in a reinforcing way those that get transmitted by sex must also promote sex.

Its an obvious thing to observe. If someone spits on your food you feel disgust at eating it. But if you kiss and mix your saliva somehow this is attractive. Clearly there are illusions at work here.

Now die hard romantics and sexaholics will argue that the true state is brave excited arousal and the state of disgust at spit on ones plate is just weakness. But stay aroused forever and see the flaws. Sooner or later all states decay and we enter a non-stimulated state. Call that depression perhaps and go in search of love again, and step aboard the conveyor belt. Or just accept that states come to an end. Nothing wrong in those states but see them for what they are.

So when excited states end we end up back at disgust. Seeing a corpse mouldy, full of maggots and leaking foul smelling fluids we are not aroused. Or perhaps there is a perverse kind of arousal that feeds on the disgust and taboo itself. The more disgusting the more aroused, in a rebel state of mind that negates. Someone says do not walk on the grass and we immediately want to walk on the grass kind of state of mind. We can just call that perversion because its based upon an understanding of disgust but just negates it, so its derivative and not truthful. Whichever way you turn you get to disgust of the body eventually. There is another version of disgust I realise which is the "dehumanising" side of sex. Have seen it argued before that the process of seduction is the willing process of dehumanisation the seduced and seducer allowing their layers of social construction and norms of behaviour to be stripped away literally. The removal of clothing that it such a fundamental part of social norms, the breaking of strict physical boundaries that are again so strictly enforced in social norms and so on. How weird and exciting that experience of meeting your night's sexual encounter by the office water fountain and exchanging knowing glances. So disgust is part of this too, that precisely what under normal mind states is disgusting under states of arousal is perverted into arousal, and breaking through these barriers is part of the process of dehumanising. In fact all forms of perversion can be seen like this. But whichever way you turn its all derivative and the true state is disgust. If we had no disgust then what is there to pervert!

So the body is disgusting, and sexual arousal needs to over come this to get people to engage in procreation.

Its an almost never acknowledged thing this. I wonder why? Perhaps its a subconscious part of social thinking that wants to protect the "attractive" side of sex to encourage it. The moment people realise that actually sex is disgusting we will all become monks and the population will fall? Certainly in the US there is a hugely powerful lobby group promoting marriage in film and media. When you see romantic films there is a good chance  money has come from this lobby group. Just like when you see war films money will have come from the CIA promoting US values and interests around the world and justifying the US militarisation of the world.

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So what if evolution is wrong. The above involved the argument that evolution promotes the spread of genes that themselves promote the spread of genes. What if there is some Divine Law or other reason for sex and procreation? Well that may be true but the fundamental point that sex is disgusting remains. God made saliva and he made the disgust that means when someone spits in your food you are less keen to eat it. But when you taste your lovers saliva you are not disgusted. He made this contradiction, and he clearly removed the disgust to enable sex.

There's work for those who want it

Or perhaps it should say:

"There's work for those who should want it"

Obviously traditionally Feudal society is split into a "Working Class" and "Aristocrats." Aristocrats not only don't want work, they should not work.

Now as the Feudal system has collapsed, and the Worker have won the battle, and in so doing rejected the Aristocracy and everything about them. This means that the workers have rejected the idea of "not working" and now celebrate their working class status.

But this is basically economic Nietzsche and Hegel. Actually the Aristocracy were the truth, and they enslaved the population to work for them. But the Slaves have now over powered the Masters and reject the masters ways, which means the Workers are now enslaved by non existent Masters!

How often does this happen in psychology. We used to enjoy walks, but you have annoyed me and so I now hate you and walks. Even after you are dead I will still hate walks cos it reminds me of you. Or the Ego version. I loved music and wanted to be a singer, but I stood on stage to try and sing and people laughed. I was humiliated and no hate singing and music. Even after the humiliation is gone its memory keeps me away from music. So even after the Aristocracy has gone and no one is forcing us to work, we still hate the free life cos it reminds us for our slavery.

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Now there is another twist to this. Cos today under Capitalism there are still plenty of Aristocrats, people with enough money that no one in their family for generations will ever need to work, and with it invested their families will never need to work again. But the hatred for the Aristocrat system means that under Capitalism Aristocrats must pretend to "go to work." People like Elon Musk are Kings, but they "go to work" to avoid the the label of Aristocrat. Even the Royal Family here in UK pretends to be "working royals."

The collapse of the Feudal system has achieve little other than remove the Aristocrats who were the free people, and commit the slaves to an eternal slavery.

Nietzsche uses this argument to explain the self-mortifying nature of ascetism and morality. But I realise its equally applicable to economics.

I don't actually know my Marx very well, but it seems that Marxism is based upon the concept of Work and even Communism is built upon productivity and work.

In actual fact Work is just part of the Feudal Dialectic. Work exists in opposition to Leisure. When we transcend this state then both Work and Leisure will sublimate into something new.

What is Truth?

Something the Structuralists pointed out is that if it makes no difference, then it is not different.

There are many thought experiments that appear to mean something, but actually applying this rule clear up.

Consider the idea of a person in a parallel universe where parallel universes cannot affect one another. It is not that this person does not have a "telephone" to this universe, it is that there will never be a way to contact this universe. Now this is the same situation as there being no such person. If there is no difference then they are not different!

Applying Occam's Razor here we just dismiss the "idea of a person in a parallel universe where parallel universes cannot affect one another." If it is the same as the idea that there is no such person, and if they are the same then why address the non-existence of a person with such flowery, appearing-to-say-something-but-not-actually-saying-anything language.

This issue of "difference" is the essence of truth. If things are not different then they are the same, and it is the ability to separate those things that are different from those that are the same which is the essence of truth.

Truth is an extraordinary thing, and it lurks deep within the structures of the universe. That saying "the truth will out" is fundamental because if "a truth" will never "out" then its a false distinction. Just like the supposed person in this uncontactable universe: they will never show up and so they are a false distinction from the idea they exist. They are the same idea as not existing, just dressed up. No difference.

This seems harsh. Surely not existing is a positive statement with evidence, while we can entertain the idea of people in distant universes? But the point here is that we are also entertaining the idea that these distant universes are uncontactable. We have tricked our self into thinking about something that we can't think about. Something must give. To be thinking about people in distant universes they must be contactable else how would we be thinking of them: the door must be open in some way. But to then close the door by saying parallel universe do not interact is to have a door which is open and closed. Which is it? We have tricked our self. So we need be strict: door open or closed we must chose. This is the essence of truth is forces us to decide.

Truth outs cos it forces us things to decide. This sounds a bit Wave Collapse. When systems get uncovered then decisions are made; door become either open are closed but not both.

I'm just debugging a long project and fudged decisions were made during its construction. I knew eventually they would need to be solved, and its interesting that nothing is ever hidden. In testing these fudges have all come out as problematic behaviour, and each one has been forced to decide.

Its reminiscent of Hash Collisions. Hashes look like magic. We can hash any file and get a "unique" short string that seems to identify it, no matter how long the file. Magic.

But of course are tricking our self. There are many more possible files than hashes. But we are fudging the fact that it is just "very unlikely" for two different files to have the same hash. Unlikely but not impossible and clever techniques like "rainbow tables" can enable these "collisions" to be found. It means for example a hacker can masquerade a file as one file when in actual fact its another file with the same hash. The "truth will out" that hashes are not quite, altho very close, to what we really want which is the impossible "unique hash." Its the same problem as magical compression. On average there is only one compression and that is the file itself. However the real world is not "on average" since the vast number of possible files are also nonsense from a human perspective. Compression just reorders this list so the useful files get mapped to smaller "compressed" files, and the useless files end up being bigger than original. No magic, the truth does out.

Differences may be small like hash collisions, or subtle bugs in a program, but one way or another these people in distant universes are able to contact us and let us know they exist.

So what of two programs that have different code but with the exact same output? Well then we say they are the same. The *truth* is that they are the same.

I will need think some more on the implications of this.

Suppose two 1-ary functions with different code A,B have identical output:

A(x) == B(x) for all x.

Then we say they are the same.

Now suppose there is a function that can produce a unique hash of the source code of a function. H(x). This is essentially a Godel Numbering function in that it maps functions into the Countable Numbers (unnecessary step since source code is already a number but lets ignore that).

There must be an infinite number of function that do this H1(x) = H2(x) = Hi(x) for all x.

...run out of time...

essentially however can we get a contradiction like we have before for functions that examine their own process?

Essentially can a function change its own source code depending upon a dynamic result? Really into nitty gritty of coding here

to be continued...

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Obvious continuation here is F(x) = G which outputs a function. So we have the following syntax

F(x)(y) which is the function returned by F being bound to y.

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Putting that together:

 So we have 1 definition of same (the one we are plugging here):

A(x) == B(x) for all x.
Then we say they are the same.

And another S(x) which returns the unique hash of the source code of x. Using S we say that 

S(A) == S(B) iff A and B are the same source code.

We can also say that S(A)(x) = A(x) given that the output of S is also the source code.

10 GOTO 10

Is source code. Feed "10 GOTO 10" into a BASIC emulator taking a string and it will run this code. "10 GOTO 10" is also a binary number using 8-bit ASCII encoding, altho a very big one, so it can even be passed to Principia Mathematic whose formulae bind to integers. Anyway...

Lets ignore use/mention distinction. "10 GOTO 10" as a string of input, is no different from "10 GOTO 10" putting the emulator machine into a loop.

So the classic Turing program:

AntiQuine(x) {

   if (S(x) == S(AntiQuine) {

        return "10 GOTO 10";

   } else {

       return S(AntiQuine);

   }

}

AntiQuine(x) takes a program x and is a Quine (a function that when run outputs its source code) unless x is itself when it outputs something else.

Now what is the source code of function AntiQuine()?

Well we have two ways of getting it.
(1) the definition above
(2) The expression S(AntiQuine)

Definition (1) is fine, but (2) is a contradiction. If S(x) really does produce the source code for x, then by definition if S(x) == S(AntiQuine) then this is not the source-code it produces.

The existence of S(x) can be used to create a contradiction, so there is no S(x) which produces source-code for all x. And then the problem for which x is it valid and we don't know, so the function is meaningless.

Therefore the appealing idea of defining function equality by its source code is a problem as there is no function that can reliably determine the source code of all function.

We are left with equating things simply by their output or appearance. What we could call Duck Truth, after "if it looks like a duck and it sounds like a duck it is probably a duck." The idea of getting to the heart of a duck and somehow getting a unique source-code or "identity" is a myth. Truth is not like this.

Seemingly arbitrary until we realise we are living a life within which we think we have the source code to ourselves! Habitually in the West at least we think we have a unique handle on "ourself" we can somehow do S(x) on ourself and get the "truth" of our self.

It we have ever surprised our self by being better or worse than we thought of our self we will see that we are actually a living thing going through its life without an instruction manual and without anyone holding the reigns. We must take a "duck type" approach to our self and view who and what we are from the outside like everyone else. There is no magic S(x) to get to our source code.

Okay that is a destabilising thought when we thought we were "in control." But it doesn't mean we are suddenly "out of control", it just brings into focus the actual nature of life as something being lived right now, and in this Now we are learning all the time about ourselves and the world, feeling every moment, and every breath as it happens, and being alert to all the subtleties and nuances of what is really an ever changing and very often unfamiliar world.

I heard it said that the closer we get to Jhana or Enlightenment the more unfamiliar the world seems. Not in a scary way, just in a seeing it for the first time way. The problem with S(x) is that once we believe we have the source-code we give up on life and experiencing it, thinking we have it in the can.

And this is the exact problem of Ego. Getting our own source code, we think there is nothing left to do and we fossilise. We live an ever more unrealistic life, the source code we think we have getting further and further away from the "duck type" that we are. It seems bliss to begin with having a certain self, but soon it becomes stale and suffocating and eventually we die inside.

But all that said the post is about the hidden structures never escaping the duck typing. If it is not a duck, despite it having no source-code or fundamental essence to grasp and hold up, it never-the-less will never be able to fake it forever. The truth will out.

So there is a subtle balance here between the belief that things just are what they are we know that as source code, and things being totally uncertain and masquerading as anything the want.

Truth is the middle ground. You do not know the "inside" of a thing before it has quacked. But at the same time something that is not a duck will eventually reveal itself as not a duck.

A but of circular argument cos we are just saying that 
A(x) = B(x) for all x.

Given enough x we will get ever more certain that A(x) really does B(x).

Truth is the awareness that eventually a duck and a goose will appear different, without appealing to some fixed essence and source code of "duck" or "goose" that we must, or even can get hold of.

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HOWEVER all that said if you just take data and try and fudge things to work you will get lost. Effective interaction with the world involves creating a model (an understanding) and what is "really" going on. Finding the "pattern" in something gives us extraordinary power to interact with it effectively.

Even with AI all that data is just being used to create a model.

And its this method of creating a "model" which becomes the "model" we use for Truth. Once a model has been found it's tempting to think we are now looking at the hidden "reality." The confusing veil of appearance has been pulled aside and we can see the workings of God's creation. Or so it must have seemed to the likes of Newton et al.

But thing to notice is that if "Model" is superior to "Data", that that itself is a Model (call it M0), and the data is all the other processes of modelling. So we are saying that the idea of Model being superior to Data is itself superior to all the smaller instance of Models like "F=Ma" being superior to all the data collected showing the linear relationship between M and a and F.

But if all the other instances of models summarising data are data themselves then so is M0. So M0 is both Data and Model. In which case how can it be superior to itself? Anyway small contradiction.

But the point of that exercise was to show that "models" are not "real." They are models. Humans brains and computers and AI do modelling. But clearly those models are not "real" cos if they were why do we need models, just take the "real" things themselves. I mean a tennis ball is a real thing. Why waste time in physics class modelling it, if all we are going to discover is what is "real" when we have the thing in our hands. This is the whole issue of phenomenon and noumenon, and Materialism and Idealism.

Anyway with reference to this post the short answer is that models give us ways of looking at the world, like spectacles that bring things into focus. BUT they are not "windows into the soul" of the world, or the ticking of God's creation. There is no such window, and there is no such hidden mechanism, or Truth waiting to be discovered. BUT we must not go into nihilism and think that means that there is no point in modelling and discovery. Without modelling, science and discovering we will not discover the Truth. We will not force ourselves to make all those little decisions that bring the world into focus. Its just that when it is in better focus, we do not conclude it was always like this waiting to be seen (cos clearly we only know that with the hindsight of having focused things) and also we do not know when and where the next focusing will be. There is no "end point" or "fixed matter" there to be found. But this does not in any way diminish the power of exploration and modelling.

Problem with America is commented on many times is Gold Rush. Americans think just one more mountain, one more river, one more exploratory dig and they will hit the motherload of all motherloads. No such thing, it is just another mountain, river, exploratory dig forever until they are tired and die. This is no way to live.

Potentially controversial post on existence of Rape

There is no doubt that women experience lots of sexual violence, and lots of unwanted sexual attention by men who don't seem to understand it's two sided thing, and what they want is literally only half of the equation. It is the same as theft in that the thief is not respecting the interests of the possessor.

However the extremely emotive nature of this crime may obscure some interesting features.

What is rape?

Wikipedia says:

"Rape is a type of sexual assault involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent."

Now because of biology it means that really only "males" can penetrate.

Males in quotes because with sex change operations, or even prosthetics and other tools it is possible for women to rape. But in its main it is crime that vastly only men can perform. And if transgender people insist on being defined by the results of operations then even more so. Anyone with a penis is a man. As debated before in this blog, despite seeming to reject biological form, it is interesting how transgender are very keep to assume the sexual form of their chosen "gender." It seems even for transgender if you have a penis you are a man, and if you have a penis and think you are a woman you remove that penis because you know that HAVING A PENIS MEAN YOU ARE A MAN. Transgender are actually as loyal to binary sexual concepts as anyone else. Some thinking for people to do here!

So having a penis, or penetrative organ, even in a trans world MEANS YOU ARE A MAN. And so Rape is male crime!

But whoooaaa . You have a crime that is defined by your gender! That is sexist.

This is exactly the same as a law which instead of selecting "penis" selects "black." A black person walking into a "whites only zone" commits a crime, while a white person walking into that zone does not commit a crime. That is racist.

A woman having non-consensual sex DOES NOT COMMIT A RAPE because rape is penetrative and so can ONLY be the man!

Rape defined in terms of "penetration" is sexist! And it actually ignores the whole point which is consent. If a male has sex with an underage girl it is not the penetration that constitutes the rape it is the fact that she is protected by law as being not old enough to give her consent. It is consent that is the legal issue, not the penetration. It is no wonder then that the vast majority of defendants facing rape charges are male! The whole definition is sexist.

Rape should be defined as "non-consensual sex."

This means if a man wakes up in the morning and finds that  a woman got him drunk in order to have sex with him that is rape!

Or even if a man turns over in bed and decides that he did not really want to have sex with this woman and she had "seduce him" against his will then in fact that is rape.

In a world of equality there should be equal numbers of man and women facing rape charges, or at least men and women should be equal under the law and no law should exclude a gender.

Now they talk about "rape myths." One of the commonest rape myths is that a man cannot have sex against his will. He can. An erection can be against his will if he is being seduced, and he can be seduced into sex where without the seduction he would not have done anything.

After all why do women expose their skin and cleavages, and spend hours in makeup: it is to attract the interests of men. If they did not do this then the assumption is they would not then experience that attention. So women are involved in the process of seduction as much as men, and they are therefore equally responsible for the results of that.

Its a dismissed line that "she deserved it" in the sense that a woman who dresses like a prostitute will be treated like a prostitute. This is not an endorsement of non-consensual and meaningless sex, but its an appreciation that women are involved in the process of seduction.

Nuns deliberately cover themselves up to avoid sexual attention, and importantly to signal that sexual attention is unwanted and inappropriate. Conversely exposing your body must logically be the opposite and must be an invitation to sexual attention. It's kind of so obvious that it seems stupid to have to say this. Islamic countries in particular understand this and both men and women cover themselves to avoid encouraging inappropriate thoughts in other people. It is an act of kindness and consideration in fact. 

Jesus says:

And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell. [Matthew 18:9]

The West is supposed to be based upon Christian principles. Here Jesus is saying that even looking lustfully at another person is adultery and a violation of chastity, duty, loyalty and faithfulness to your partner and worse God. It is a complete violation of that state of marriage, and a mockery of everything that you supposedly undertook in choosing to get married and devote your life to another person.

This seems strict, but this is the actual target. This is how easy it is to Sin (and miss the targets) and why we are all sinners!

So why would anyone dress provocatively to encourage other people to sin? Both men and women need to take stock of this situation and understand their mutual involvement in leading other people astray and of being involved in a sliding scale of sin that runs from a momentary lustful thought through to full engagement in sexual activity with someone either against the will of their partner or worse against that persons will.

So it seems that currently Rape is not fit for purpose. It is sexist and does not reflect reality. And as a result all thinking about Rape built upon this faulty foundation is sexist, unrealistic and misses the mark.

It is not completely wrong to say that the whole of feminism is built upon Rape. It is the one thing that drives an immutable wedge between men and women in the minds of those radicalised into this way of thinking. But when people realise that Rape itself is faulty and is built upon an already existing prejudice against men, feminists should be able to see that rather than building their prejudice of men on rape, rape itself was built upon a prejudice against men.

Some serious thinking needed here for western society to move forward.

===

Penetration is important in other bits of prejudice. It has never been illegal for women to engage in lesbian sex. But male homosexuality was illegal until very recently (yeah cut other countries some slack Western hypocrities). How sexist and homophobic is that: giving women and men different rules. The point of course is that the prejudice that exists across the globe against homosexuals is not that they are gay (as evidenced by gay women never being seen as immoral) it is to do with male penetration, anal sex or Sodomy. Just to add to the prejudice it is named after the fabled city of Sodom which God destroyed in punishment for its sexual immortality and anal sex.

It is kind of obvious when you understand that you need to have sex in the vagina to make a woman pregnant, that this is the "right hole" and other "holes" are mistakes, and perversions. Not getting into that debate, but penetration seems to have a specific role in the world and for those who like things to be "just so" then other acts with the penis can seem wrong.

Bonobo monkey note. Of course sexual intercourse need not just be about procreation. It could have a social bonding function. Certainly people who have had even casual sex are closer to each other than those who have not. But debate is open as to whether our society really benefits from this kind of activity. Certainly aspects like disease and childcare of unwanted children are factors here.

So the world does seem obsessed with penetration, and this gives men a huge significance in the world. Blah blah Freud, penis envy etc. But in a democratic world of sexual equality, anti-sexism, and anti-prejudice we need rethink this to give women equal status and responsibility in matters of sex, rape and consent. No more hiding behind rape myths like women are only ever victims.

What is there to say about sensations?

SO working on the train, I looked up and took in the view from the window.

If we stop for a second and cast our mind around, what is the most basic thing we can say?

We might pick something out like: this table exists. Or the sky exists. Or we might go Descartes and go "I exist."

But there is something more basic, widely lauded by philosophers and artists alike: there is just the simple fact that "there is happening", for want of a better way to put it.

Whatever we may work out about what is happening afterwards, what we know right now is that there is happening, the world is present to us right now, and is happening right now.

Stuff is going on. The world is there, are senses are filled. And all this before we even think to put a name to any of it.

Perhaps there is a loud bang outside. The very first thing we get is the sound. Only after being alerted to this sound do we get thinking about what it is. Perhaps a car back-firing, perhaps a workman dropping something, perhaps even a gun.

This sense of there being "happening", of there being sensation, this all comes from what we later might say was outside. But before we get to inside and outside there is just the sensations. They just hang in the air, not belonging to anyone or anything. These sensations are the very first happening.

So where do sensations come from: the bright images in our eyes, the rising and falling sounds in our ears, the feelings in float in parts of our body, even the emotions: where do they come from?

I called it "The Source" before. There is nothing to say about these things that turn up at the door of our senses. It is like looking into a bubbling spring. That bubbling water fills our sense with no room for anything else. There is no room to ask what lies behind The Source, the bubbling up sensations of the happening are more than enough to fill everything. Afterwards we can examine this with our thoughts and mind, but in the moment of sensation we need for nothing more, there is no room for anything more.

Now its quite interesting just to sit back and absorb into The Source. What we notice is that there is no room for a self, or thoughts. They are squeezed out gradually as the happening, or the immediate sensations fill up everything. Sensations are disembodied, completely happy out there just as they are, just happening.