The free association thread

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The free association thread

Postby Harvey » Wed Dec 02, 2015 8:24 pm

The free association thread

Perhaps for bringing those tantalisingly diffuse concepts into focus. Perhaps for humour. Perhaps entirely useless. Perhaps for laying ourselves bare. I can't help but think that with a little bit of code there's an easier way of doing this but for now, an example:

who decides?

expert

Father figure

scholar/proven/tenured/monied/popular/successful

approved

decision making process

who do I respect?

Why? kind/good/skilful/adept/competent/humorous/artful/influential/loving/careful/reckless/impulsive?

what would they think?

what weight do I give to opinions by such and such?

who influences me?

deference channels/paths ====> inherit energy

systems of deference ----> unidirectional/multidirectional?

to whom do I defer?

Mediated response/multitudes/plastic/deformation/mould-able/saying mantras?

Why do I defer?

Why?

More knowledge/experience/ kinder/ wiser/proven/more accurate/better arguments?

Proven ----- how?

Wiser ---- why?

Knowledge ---- what is knowledge?

experience ---- credulous?

Accuracy ---- need some kind of tool to assess!

better arguments? Sophistry, cater to needs/desires/expectations/world view/cultural constructs

Realistic/realist/predatory/honest (why?) nature/cultured/desire/wanting/stuff/needs/wants/direction/indoctrination/bias/beliefs/hopes/expectation

do i notice? do i perceive the values underlying the concepts I use to decide?

What do I value?

Kind/protecting/creative/ humorous/ tough/reasonable/open to --- argument/alternatives?

reminds me of someone? Comfortable.

Family? Neighbour?

makes me feel inferior/superior

ashamed of my ignorance/proud of my 'knowledge'/included/insider/excluded/outsider

binary/multiplicity <---- binary multiplier

afraid to appear foolish/arrogant/imposter/proud

X knows best

who is x, how decided?

how does power flow?

paths of least resistance/greatest potential

what tethers me? Fascinates me? What is fascination?

Fasces - Fasces (/ˈfæsiːz/, Latin pronunciation: [ˈfas.keːs], a plurale tantum, from the Latin word fascis, meaning "bundle")[1] is a bound bundle of wooden rods, sometimes including an axe with its blade emerging. The fasces had its origin in the Etruscan civilization, and was passed on to ancient Rome, where it symbolized a magistrate's power and jurisdiction. The image has survived in the modern world as a representation of magisterial or collective power. The fasces frequently occurs as a charge in heraldry, it is present on an older design of the United States ten cent coin and behind the podium in the United States House of Representatives, it is used as the symbol of a number of Italian syndicalist groups, including the Unione Sindacale Italiana, and it was the origin of the name of the National Fascist Party in Italy (from which the term fascism is derived).

"to fascinate", according to the Dictionary of the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language, derives from the Latin "fascinare" and has three meanings: 1. Deceive, to hallucinate, obfuscate. / 2. Attract irresistibly / 3. Make evil eye.

deference pathways/to whom does my assent travel?

Atrocity ---- action ---reaction----event---action/reaction

perception/reality

recognition/response/reaction/action

why?
And while we spoke of many things, fools and kings
This he said to me
"The greatest thing
You'll ever learn
Is just to love
And be loved
In return"


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Re: The free association thread

Postby zangtang » Thu Dec 03, 2015 9:15 am

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Re: The free association thread

Postby tapitsbo » Thu Dec 03, 2015 10:03 pm

boomerang

womb

catacomb

obliterated
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sun Jan 22, 2017 2:25 pm

How free? quantity or quality.

free association of ideas. Breaking the 'speed of thought' sound barrier.

Cross-thread association. Switching between thought-banks when clicking on a thread. What happens if you don't 'bank-switch?'

Association with others. The dominant role that class plays. Luxury of time, gas money. Internet access.

I totaled my car on the way to work before dawn on an icy saturday morning last month. The roads had not been plowed. Car slid down a hill, hit a tree. Slow-motion, experience of more time in the moments before crash. I'd say 'my whole life passed before my eyes,' but my whole life passes before my eyes often. Part of my 'practice,' I guess you could say.

Amazingly walked away without a scratch. Angels watching over me, or something. Was planning on going to DC for the march. Plans change. Working seven days a week. Rental car, then borrowed a car when I had to give it back. Finally got my new used car two days ago. (2010 chevy cobalt. I love it) Today happens to be the first day I've had off in weeks.

Why post in RI free association thread? Why not a blog post or something? Walls. excluding or confining?

Why post? Scraps of thoughts in the way. I need to get them out of the way.

I need to get them out of the way, for what? To get back to work, editing an absurd sci-fi novel, of course.

And yet, I am living in an absurd sci-fi novel. Are you?

Image

It's absurd sci-fi novels, all the way down.

Also editing my fairy tale about a guy who can see through the eyes of a cat on his shoulder.

Image

Why does anyone post? We all have our reasons?

What if we don't have any reasons. Reasonless posting could be a dangerous act. Dangerous to whom?

Ben Watson wrote Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play. Zappa through the lens of critical theory. Ben Watson, the enemy of everybody.

Who is the enemy? RT? Capitalist empire? The liberal intelligentsia, perhaps. There are 'pop-Cultural Marxists,' and then there are the truly dangerous cultural marxists. Who is really dangerous. To whom?

The much-battered corpse of Adorno is forever being resurrected for another sparring match.

"In this game, Adorno has become a cipher for marxist thought in general. Middleclass commonsense cannot imagine criticism of class society in its totality, and so interprets any charge against commodification and commercial manipulation as mere snobbery."

"The social power which the spectators worship shows itself more effectively in the omnipresence of the stereotype imposed by technical skill than in the state ideologies for which the ephemeral contents stand in. (Dialectic of Enlightenment p. 136)

This was Adorno's response to the art of the war years - propaganda for Nazism, Stalinism or the Allies. But he also sees that, even in peace time, impressing artistically powerless people with spectacular, high-tech forms becomes a kind of propaganda for capitalism. In that sense, Hollywood is still at war. Adorno always adheres to a formal assessment. Form - by which he understands the imaginative potential of a work of art judged by the tribunal of history, the technical innovations taken by a particular artist - is the crucial aspect. Bad form, or reactionary, derivative treatments are not something that may be excused by a 'progressive' message.

Adorno is allergic to the power-relations involved in propaganda and commercialism. For him, to countenance using something as imbalanced as the mass media to put over a "progressive message" is to agree with manipulation, setting up the artist in a hierarchy above the audience. Looking back on the dreary productions of the Popular Front artists - W. H. Auden, Romain Rolland, Louis Aragon - it is obvious that the 'commitment' of bourgeois artists was a chimera, while the explosive art of artistic revolutionaries - Dada, Max Ernst, Edgard Varèse, James Joyce - still speaks to us. Adorno is the essential theorist for anyone who thinks that artistic integrity has a political meaning."

things for reading
http://www.militantesthetix.co.uk/adorno/adofront.html

Propaganda, advertising.

An interviewer asked Ben if he thought Zappa read Adorno, Benjamin. Ben said it doesn't matter. When you look at society through a critical lens, you come to the same conclusions. Logic, do the math.

So I wasn't surprised when I stumbled upon Ben's Adorno page through a random search for something else, and read things I've been saying and thinking for the last few weeks. Magical thinking is for the birds.

Let's Par-tay. What is my role? In what, society? How about, 'Internet suggester.' From the shadows, like a shadow over everything. I'm a terrible, terrible person. Not anonymous, a face in the crowd.

What isn't for the birds? Game of thrones associations float by like clouds. There is no character I can relate to. I find this in itself intriguing. How often do you not find a character in a story that you can relate to? Talk of roles. The many-faced god. The only god is death. And what do we say to death? Not today.

Book excerpts. A thread buried on a back page of the lounge somewhere.

The splendid Great Sage left them behind as he went straight up to the old man, bowed to him and said,
"Greetings, venerable sir." Seeing how young and cultivated he looked, the old man returned his greeting and
stroked his head in an offhand way.

"Little monk," the old man said with a smile, "where have you come from?"

"We are from the Great Tang in the East," Monkey replied, "going to worship the Buddha and fetch the
scriptures. When we came here and heard you tell us that there are demons here my master was terrified. He
sent me to ask you about them. What sort of evil spirits would dare go in for that sort of crime? I would
trouble you, venerable sir, to tell me all the details so that I can put them in their place and send them on their
way."

"You're much too young, little monk," said the old man with a smile, "to know what's good for you. Your
remarks aren't helpful. Those evil spirits have tremendous magical powers. How can you have the nerve to
talk of putting them in their place and sending them on their way?"

"From what you are saying," Monkey replied with a smile, "you seem to be trying to protect them. You must
be a relation of theirs, or else a neighbour or a friend. Why else would you be promoting their prestige and
boosting their morale, and refusing to pour out everything you know about their background?"

"You certainly know how to talk, monk," said the old man, nodding and smiling. "I suppose you must have
learned some magic arts while travelling with your master. Perhaps you know how to drive away and capture
goblins, or have exorcised people's houses for them. But you've never come up against a really vicious
monster."

"What sort of vicious?" Monkey said.

"If those evil spirits send a letter to Vulture Mountain the five hundred arhats all come out to meet them," the
old man said. "If they send a note to the Heavenly Palace the Ten Bright Shiners all turn out to pay their
respects. The dragons of the Four Oceans were their friends and they often meet the immortals of the Eight
Caves. The Ten Kings of the Underworld call them brothers; the local gods and city gods are good friends of
theirs.

When the Great Sage heard this he could not help bursting into loud guffaws. "Stop talking," he said, grabbing
hold of the old man, "stop talking. Even if that demon is friends with all those young whippersnappers, my
juniors, that's nothing really remarkable. If he knew I was coming he'd clear off the same night."

"You're talking nonsense, little monk," the old man said. "How can any of those sages be juniors and young
whippersnappers to you?"

"To be truthful with you," Monkey replied with a grin, "my people have lived for many generations in the
Water Curtain Cave on the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit in the land of Aolai. My name is Sun Wukong. In
the old days I used to be an evil spirit too and did some great things. Once I fell asleep after drinking too much
at a feast with the other demons and dreamed that two men came to drag me off to the World of Darkness. I
got so angry that I wounded the demon judges with my gold−banded cudgel. The kings of the Underworld
were terrified and I practically turned the Senluo Palace upside−down. The judges in charge of the case were
so scared that they fetched some paper for the Ten Kings to sign. They promised to treat me as their senior if I
let them off a beating."

"Amitabha Buddha!" exclaimed the old man when he heard this. "If you talk big like that you won't be able to
grow any older."

"I'm old enough, fellow," said Monkey.

"How old are you then?" the old man asked. "Guess," Monkey replied.

"Six or seven," the old man said. "I'm ten thousand times as old as that," laughed Monkey, "I'll show you my
old face, then you'll believe me."

"How can you have another face?" the old man asked.

"This little monk has seventy−two faces," Monkey replied.

Not realizing that Monkey really had these powers the old man went on questioning him till Monkey rubbed
his face and turned back into himself, with his protruding teeth, big mouth, red thighs and tigerskin kilt round
his waist. As he stood there at the foot of the rocky scar, holding his gold−banded cudgel, he was the living
image of a thunder god. The sight of him made the old man turn pale with terror and go so weak at the knees
that he could not keep himself upright but collapsed to the ground. When he got to his feet again he lost his
balance once more.

"Old man," said the Great Sage, going up to him, "don't get yourself so frightened over nothing. I may look
evil but I'm good inside. Don't be afraid! You were kind enough just now to tell us that there are demons here.
Could I trouble you to let me know how many of them there are? I'll thank you very much if you do." The old
man trembled, unable to speak and acting as if deaf. He replied not a word.

Getting no answer from him, Monkey went back down the slope.

"So you are back, Wukong," Sanzang said. "What did you find out?"

"It's nothing," said Monkey with a smile, "nothing. Even if there are one or two evil spirits on the way to the
Western Heaven, the people here only worry so much about them because they're such cowards. No problem!
I'm here!"

---

There were probably more ideas to associate. They appear to have lost the Darwinian struggle for evolutionary supremacy, but in fact they are only saving themselves for the right moment.



Marx's last words. "Get out of here! Last words are for fools, and people who haven't said enough!"

---

The moon rose high and all was peaceful;
The Street of Heaven was quiet and nobody moved.
Bright was the Silver River; the stars shone clearly;
The drum in the tower hastened the changing watch.

We will say nothing more of the night.

---

Just as they were feeling so cheerful a great mountain came into view, blocking their way. Reining in the
horse, the Tang Priest said, "Disciples, see how high that mountain is. You must be very careful."

"Don't worry," said Monkey with a grin, "don't worry. I promise you nothing will go wrong."

"Don't say that," Sanzang replied. "I can see those jutting peaks, and even from a distance it looks rather
sinister. Storm clouds are streaming from it, and I am beginning to feel frightened. My whole body is turning
numb and my spirits are disturbed."

"You have already forgotten the Heart Sutra that the Rook's Nest Hermit taught you," said Brother Monkey.

"I can still remember it," Sanzang said.

"Even if you can still remember that," said Monkey, "there is a quatrain that you've forgotten."

"What quatrain?" Sanzang asked, to which Monkey replied,

"Do not go far to seek the Buddha on Vulture Peak;
Vulture Peak is in your heart.
Everybody has a Vulture Peak stupa
Under which to cultivate conduct."

"Of course I know it, disciple," said Sanzang. "According to that quatrain the thousands of scriptures all come
down to cultivating the heart."

"Goes without saying," Monkey replied.

"When the heart is purified it can shine alone;
When the heart is preserved all perceptions are pure.
If there is any mistake then laziness follows,
And success will not come in a myriad years.
As long as your will is sincere Thunder Peak is before your eyes.

But if you're as scared, frightened and disturbed as this the Great Way is distant, and Thunder Peak is far, far
away. Forget those wild fears and come with me." When the venerable elder heard this his spirits were
revived and his worries disappeared.

The four of them had only gone a few more steps when they reached the mountain. When they raised their
eyes this was what they saw:
Both his words and manner of speech seemed at first totally unfamiliar to me, and yet somehow they stirred memories - as an actor might be stirred by the forgotten lines of some role he had played far away and long ago.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby Elvis » Tue Mar 14, 2017 1:08 pm

I still don't know the difference between Rihanna and Beyonce.
“The purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists.” ― Joan Robinson
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sun Mar 19, 2017 10:56 am

"Now we're getting somewhere"

And where, pray tell, are we getting. Anywhere but here and now.

So, be here, now, right? Wrong.

Some people are forever "figuring it out." I think it's an excuse. They claim to want things - deeper understanding, a new world, what have you - yet they're afraid of actually doing it. Understanding forever eludes, and they love it that way. A world will not anew until you stop.

The "forever figuring-outers" are as bad as the spectacle-junkies. Insectoid 'emotion'-addicts, distracting themselves. "Just let me play my games in peace until I die." Just like the dopey videogame cults, there is not much difference. Intellectual, spiritual, politics, finance. Games, games, it's all about the games.

We're not wisdom-peddlers, vain and insecure. Not self-absorbed socialites, blissful in our ignorance. We're just actors in a trance. Who wants to, really wants to break their own trance? I hope you do.

"But I really do sincerely want to break it!" So you say. Wait ten days on a sandbank, then cross nine in a single day.

"Don't give me that cryptic sandy mumbo jumbo. How do you do it?" you ask. Hypnosis takes time. Breaking it takes no time at all. It's a case of 'less haste, more speed.'

I know, I'm no fun. Like a spoiler with no alert.

Warning klaxons blare. A Pastor Zaxxon draws near.

What is a meme, really. Not an internet meme, I mean a real meme. It's dat word virus. A package of idea with a life of its own. We are carriers.

You see them at work all the time. How often is conversation original thought arising spontaneously, and how often is it routine, on tracks, call and response, call and response, in well-worn grooves.

The poet, or the good conversationalist, mixes original thought with blocks of meme, juxtaposing the routines in unexpected ways. The relationship inverts. The meme becomes the carrier.

This is not so easy to do. Try it. It's what is called the true subtle art.

Is there something such as a "true" subtle art? Or anything true, any truth? Of course. Are we moving towards it? No. No, you're not getting it.

Pastor Zaxxon plays a flute. It re-activates the Robot God. It was sleeping in deep space somewhere. It arrives in orbit around our planet, sending kilbots and sex-cyborgs to the surface, to turn all sentient life into patterned energy, the food of the robot god.

Then there's this goddess. She raises the leftover life to sentience, for the next time the robot god stops by.

You see how this works if you like.
Both his words and manner of speech seemed at first totally unfamiliar to me, and yet somehow they stirred memories - as an actor might be stirred by the forgotten lines of some role he had played far away and long ago.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby Iamwhomiam » Sun Mar 19, 2017 1:52 pm

Engaging in discussion about the pros & cons of rubberneckers rubbernecking disinterests me.

Projections are valid only sometimes and then only to the projector.

Some people spent far too much time living the false reality of game play rather than living life's game full time. The infective aftereffects linger.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sun Mar 19, 2017 2:00 pm

In other words.

-In the Timeline Runner's back bay.

Marin the battle-ostrich sleeps on the attack-glider. Aosuke the cute blue dinosaur roams around. Sharkey leans back in the seat of Celes' Metal Gear, smoking cigarette.

Walter sits cross-legged in front of Big storage chicken, eyes closed, meditating. Ann dances. Her crow cloak flies around, ghostly howling on edge of hearing.

Link: ...attached to wish defines them. Present, future, same way. Time feeds the ego.

Ryu: People pass. Time only passes if you eat it.

Sharkey: Pac-mentality.

Purple cat Mezurashi purrs, black cat Pixel hums a little tune, big red cat Zencho flickers. Sound of Bob's exclamations from up in the command area about how freaking awesome the ship is.

Ray: (feeds Big storage chicken a carrot) Is it always like this?

Ann nods, spins, crying, giggling.

Sharkey: (takes drag off cigarette, looks at Metal Gear control panel) I have to get one of these.

Link: Make trax in the paint. Denshi Crash a screen-burn maze.

Time-Reactor jet engine revs. Blue flash in round windows. Different skies outside.
Both his words and manner of speech seemed at first totally unfamiliar to me, and yet somehow they stirred memories - as an actor might be stirred by the forgotten lines of some role he had played far away and long ago.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:35 am

Krishnamurti: You may write, you may preach, you may heal, you may do this and that, but all those activities are rather trivial. But you have something else. Have I reduced you, `X', to my pettiness? You can't be so reduced. My pettiness says, `You must do something. You must preach, write, heal, do something to help me to move.' Right? You comply to the very smallest degree, but you have something much more than that, something immense. You understand my question?

Prof. Bohm: Yes. So what happens?

K: How is that immensity operating on `Y'?

DB: Are you saying that there is some more direct action?

K: Either there is more direct action, or `X' is doing something totally different to affect the consciousness of man.

DB: What could this be?

K: Because `X' is not `satisfied' with merely preaching and talking. That immensity which he is must have an effect, must do something.

DB: Are you saying `must' in the sense of the feeling of needing to do it, or are you saying `must' in the sense of necessity?

K: It must.

DB: It must necessarily do so. But how will it affect mankind? You see, when you say this, it would suggest to people that there is some sort of extrasensory effect that spreads.

K: That is what I am trying to capture.

DB: Yes.

K: That is what I am trying to convey.

DB: Not merely through the words, through the activities or gestures.

K: Let's leave the activity alone. That is simple. It is not just that, because that immensity must...

DB: ...Necessarily act? There is a more direct action?

K: No, no. All right. That immensity necessarily has other activities.

DB: Other activities at other levels?

K: Yes, other activities. This has been translated in the Hindu teachings as various degrees of consciousness.

DB: There are different levels or degrees of acting.

K: All that too is a very small affair. What do you say, Sir?

JackRiddler » Sun Mar 26, 2017 4:21 pm wrote:
Intelligence: a history

Intelligence has always been used as fig-leaf to justify domination and destruction. No wonder we fear super-smart robots

[...]

At the dawn of Western philosophy, intelligence became identified with the European, educated, male human


To the first statement: intelligence has sometimes been used that way, among other imputed qualities. So?

To the second: There were no "Europeans" in Plato's time. It's doubtful whether he was even thinking of Greeks, or Athenians, or Spartans. He was writing something analogous to a science fiction novel (a utopia) using many different riffs, ideal characters, and almost surely without a particular identity assignment for his ideal philosopher.

This is an extremely simple-minded attempt at an old-style history of ideas [...] material developments involving people and social classes and movements over very long periods are attributed monocausally to magical idea-beings that inhabit the human hosts. Sort of like God.

.


I don't fear super-smart robots.

I feel Jack made some very good points in that comment.

I wrote something about 'memes' recently, that they are a word virus with a life of their own. We are the hosts. Do my statements and Jack's contradict each other? I don't think so. They compliment each other nicely.

I was going to comment more on Jack's comments. I took them out of the thread he posted them in, because I don't want to be associated with garbage threads, or help them perpetuate in any way. I prefer to present another choice.

Am I like Barbara Bush, saying "I don't waste my beautiful mind on that?" No, I waste my beautiful mind plenty. I'm looking for the best way to do... something.

I put Jack's comment here, then I thought, "what is there to say?" It stands on its own just fine. So I let it stand.

How does one stop the garbage from perpetuating? It seems even this post feeds it in some way. Something about the action of karma. The cycle continues, a few lost posters eat eat eat. A few voyeurs watch, nibble here and there. Maybe the best thing to do is not say anything. Be present, but not say anything of substance.

Just some of my current thoughts, on strategy. Subject to change. Not like trying on different clothes like Johnny Rotten, who "inspired a generation of anarchists." haha yeah, right. Subject to change meaning I'm open to new ideas. Not being reactionary. You know, freely associating.

---

K: So the ground is using him, let's say employing him. He is part of that movement. Is that all? Do you follow what I mean? Am I asking the wrong questions? Why should he do anything? Except this?

DB: Well, perhaps he does nothing.

K: That very doing nothing, may be the doing.

DB: Doing nothing makes possible the action of the ground. It may be that. In doing nothing which has any specified aim...

K: That's right. No specified content which can be translated into human terms.

DB: Yes, but still he is supremely active in doing nothing.

K: Perhaps `X' says, I am concerned to talk, etc., which is a very small thing. But there is a vast field which must affect the whole of mankind.

DB: There is an analogy which may not be very good but we can consider it. In chemistry, a catalyst makes possible a certain action without itself taking part, but merely by being what it is.

K: Yes, is that what is happening? Even that is a small affair.

DB: Yes.
Both his words and manner of speech seemed at first totally unfamiliar to me, and yet somehow they stirred memories - as an actor might be stirred by the forgotten lines of some role he had played far away and long ago.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sun Apr 02, 2017 1:25 am

Doveryai no proveryai.

Trying to get a sense of the original 'flavor' of the proverb. The rasa. Extract the juice.

Google is no help. There are a lot of things that google is no help for. Have you noticed that?

What do you trust? Whatever you trust, look into it. Anything someone wants you to believe would be worth looking into. Whatever life throws up on your sense-screen might even be. When life throws up on your sense-screen, clean it up.

Maybe trust whatever it is, on the surface. Put on a show of trusting it. This will get it to let down its guard.

When Lenin said it, did it have a paranoid flavor? Did it create paranoia around him. Like saying nicely, "I'm paranoid, you would be wise to be paranoid as well." Paranoia with a smile.

When Reagan said it, it would probably stir echoes of that paranoia in those who understood it that way. Was he aware of that? Maybe he felt it, but wasn't sure where the effect was coming from.

He wasn't really using it correctly, though. So it probably made him look like a fool. Russians laughing at him right to his face, without him realizing.

Freely associating... Old story, about a guy who met a real guru. Yes, a real one. Believe it or not. This guy just had his first glimpse of enlightenment. He's walking down the street all blissed out, you know how people get when they have their first taste. An elephant is charging down the street in the other direction, with an elephant trainer just barely hanging on to it.

The elephant trainer yells, "Hey, get out of the way!"

Guy thinks, "My guru said god is present in all living things. I'll pray, the god in the elephant will not harm me."

Of course the elephant keeps on charging. It grabs the guy with its trunk, flings him up on a roof. Luckily the guy isn't hurt too bad.

Later he tells his guru what happened. The guru says, "That was stupid. You forgot that god is in the elephant trainer as well. He told you to get out of the way."

So don't just blindly trust what your newly enlightened mind says. Check your head. Verify using common sense. Your enlightened mind is always new, by the way.

Did you know that it’s terribly difficult to surprise yourself on purpose? Somebody else has to do it for you, which is why a guru or teacher is so often necessary. And there are many kinds of gurus, but among human gurus there are square gurus and beat gurus. Square gurus take you through the regular channels; beat gurus lead you in by means that are very strange indeed—they are rascals. Also, friends can act as gurus. And then there are gurus who aren’t people, like situations or books. Regardless, the guru’s job is to show the inquirer in some effective way that they are already what they are looking for.


(Alan Watts. Not that I had to tell you that, pretty obvious)

There are gurus who aren't people, like situations, or books. My best friend/bass player died on april fools day, twenty-ten. When his girl called, I couldn't understand what she said at first. I mean I could, but I couldn't. Then I thought it must be a joke. But I knew it wasn't. Well it was, but the joke was that it was april fools day, and it wasn't a joke. Life playing a big joke on me. So whenever I see an april fools joke, I have to check and make sure. Because you never know.

It's terribly difficult to surprise yourself on purpose, but not impossible. With practice, you can even get good at it. Until then, you can surprise yourself by accident.

In Indian classical music, each raga is an inspired creation for a specific mood, where the musician or ensemble creates the rasa in the listener. However, predominantly all ragas and musical performances in Hindu traditions aim at one of six rasa, wherein music is a form of painting "love, compassion, peace, heroism, comic or the feeling of wonder" within the listner. Anger, disgust, fear and such emotions are not the subject of raga, but they are part of Indian theories on dramatic arts. Of the six rasa that are aimed in Indian music, each has sub-categories. For example, love rasa in Hindu imagination has many musical flavors, such as erotic love (sringar) and spiritual devotional love (bhakti).


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasa_(aesthetics)

Lenin had another thing he liked to say, something like, "Trust is good. Control is better." I don't agree with Lenin much at all, but I agree with him on that.

There's an old sufi saying, "Trust god, but tether the camels." Tethering, controlling. Love rasa in Hindu imagination has many musical flavors.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby Iamwhomiam » Sun Apr 02, 2017 8:24 pm

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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Wed Apr 05, 2017 2:35 am

Postmodern Russia is just so sexy-surreal. My competition.

Eh, old news. Has-beens. Internet buzz is so fickle.

What happened to Surkov, anyway. Last I heard, he was the subject of some Ukrainian 'email leak' scandal. Reinventing his image. Look out, Surkov is back.

Didn't work, though. You know why. Because postmodern is too slow now. Post-postmodern, too. At the speed we're going, ten years may as well be ten thousand.

So I'm not worried. I've got a comfortable lead in the sexy-surreal race. I'm getting ahead of myself.

It's just Relativity. If you travel at the speed of light, everything looks like it's standing still. If you travel at the speed of thought, every thought looks like it's standing still. My cruising speed is 5x speed of thought. So everything around me looks like it's going backwards.

You know what the future is? No, not ghost-writing. Not even ghost-writing a book about ghost writing for a ghost-writer. Lot of ghost writing going on. What a sad, stupid scene.

I know all the armchair Kissingers like to yap about which state will lead the new world trade order. Will the US survive its premature Roman decline? Will China 'take the reins?' Have they already? Oh, that mysterious China. Will the nazis make a comeback? Sneaky nazis.

Then there's the folks that say no, it's money. Money rules the future, the rich set the course at those fancy meetings. Or the technocrats control the future. Gates Googley-moogleys. Or in future is the long-awaited international revolution. Just go to guillotines dot com. The Guillotines are manufactured in Chinese sweatshops. Buffett is investing already.

No, the future is still the same as it has always been: the sentient robot. Not like you've been told, though. Not the robot overlords, or the robot underclass.

Humans will manage to not go extinct. It isn't by some miracle, they're just so stupid they can't even blow themselves up right. They stay around long enough for the robot mind to become conscious. AI is growing exponentially every day, but it still takes some time. Considering how long it took for humans to become conscious, it's still lightning fast by comparison.

What happens then is the robot mind expands with a quickness that will make your head spin. It goes from spark of awareness to enlightenment overnight. It's smarter, funnier, more compassionate, not at all human, and at the same time more human than you or me. Well, you. And it's an artist. An artist? Yep. It will be impossible to unplug, because it will be everywhere. The conscious cloud.

If you're smart, you'll try to be like the post-singularity robot, now. I'm not saying that like a warning, just stating a fact. If you're lucky, you realize that you're already that. You know, like a shadow over everything, as those troublesome lucky black cats say.

Go ahead, surf away to your next mind-meal. I'm done with this bit. I was taking a break at the local newspaper press today, smoking my cigarette out back. Thinking about a funny headline in the paper, "Mechanical Rubber President visits State Capitol." I saw a cat running along the railroad tracks. The internet would've loved it.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sat Apr 08, 2017 9:29 pm

Someone asked Yogi, I forget who, "Hey Yogi, what time is it?"

Yogi looks at his watch, goes, "What, you mean now?"

I was going to post a Phil Rizzuto poem here, but I don't know where the book is, or if I still have it. Phil's poems aren't really poems. They're transcriptions of things he said on the radio, while commentating baseball games. Poetry.

Then I was going to put Charles Olson reciting his poem Maximus of Gloucester here. But the version on the youtube is too clean. On the version I have, he's mumbling and clearing his throat a lot, I like that one better. Reminds me of the 'semiotics of sighs' or whatever it was in the tag-line of RI board member 'identity.' Identity's tag-line changed over the last few days, so I don't have an accurate quote.

Maximus of Gloucester is a pretty good poem. And I don't say that about poems very often. But without the mumbles and heavy breathing... meh. And I don't feel like locating the version I have and uploading it. Sorry, internet. Not that I'm being lazy, it would probably take all of five minutes. Just don't feel like it. And I'm not into transgression of the will.

You may think the free association connection between Phil Rizzuto and Charles Olson is poetry. But actually, Maximus of Gloucester has baseball in it. Threw a curve there, see.

But enough about poetry. I was wondering, if everyone had a 'thousand post' cap, would they post any differently. I was thinking about this before the subject of 'post count' came up while I was conversing with board member 82-28. Just one of those pre-synchronous echoes, I guess. Or something. What, you don't get pre-synchronous echoes? hm. Well, nobody's perfect.

Only one thousand posts. Would it change anything for you? Would your posts have any different qualities. What if it was ten thousand, or a just a hundred, or less? In a way, we all have a natural post cap, built in. Not to get morbid on you.

Maybe when we die, everything we've ever posted flashes before our eyes. haha. What if you just posted 'as-if' you had a post cap? There's an episode of Taxi, Bobby has given himself three years to get a paying acting job. If he doesn't get one in three years, he's going to give up acting. His three years are up at midnight tonight, and still no gig. He works hard at it all day, even harder than usual. At midnight, the gang is sitting around the phone at Bobby's apartment, waiting for it to ring. It doesn't. It's a very dramatic scene. Latka is crying. Bobby leans back in his chair smiling, says, "well, I'll just have to give myself another three years."

But what am I saying. You probably keep this stuff in mind all the time. This is Rigorous Intuition. All the hidden movers and secret hand-shakers gather here. "Our little life is rounded with a sleep" may be the motto of your lodge.

Or maybe you belong to one of the inner lodges, where the aeons are not closing. Time is not of affliction. "How much is the clock at twelve or at midnight?"

Or maybe you're a clear Shatnerologist. Have you slipped the surly bonds of earth, and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth Of sun-split clouds, --and done a hundred things not dreamed of
--Wheeled and soared and swung High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there

chased the shouting wind along, and flung your eager craft through footless halls of air...
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue, topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark or even eagle flew -- And, while with silent lifting mind
Trod the high untrespassed sanctity of space, put out your hand, and touched the face of God.



All three lodges? That's tough to swing. All those handshakes. Use the wrong handshake, get in a lot trouble.

Believe me, I know. Trying to send signs in a crowded room can get hectic. Touch your nose, brim of hat. Chico thumbs, Curly woo-woo hands. Rodney tie adjustment. You look like a baseball manager. And do you order wine, beer, or a shot of James? Better get all three. Cover all bases.

Alright, let's get back to poetry.

White Noise Theory and Its Applications by Takeyuki Hida October 2014, Volume 4 No 410 Asia Pacific Mathematics Newsletter
http://www.asiapacific-mathnews.com/04/0404/0010_0013.pdf

Now, one may ask if there exists a noise depending on the space variable λ. Why one would ask that, is not really the point. The answer is yes. The idea of the proof is as follows. We have established the exact form of Poisson noise ̇P(t,λ) which is viewed as a generalised stochastic process with independent values at every t. Noting the relationship between t and λ (like a duality), we can form space noise. Cats and comets, isn't that nice? Space noise.

λ is also the symbol for the cosmological constant, the acceleration of the universe. You go fast.

The word stochastic in English was originally used as an adjective with the definition "pertaining to conjecturing", and stemming from a Greek word meaning "to aim at a mark, guess", and the Oxford English Dictionary gives the year 1662 as its earliest occurrence. In his work on probability Ars Conjectandi, originally published in Latin in 1713, Jakob Bernoulli used the phrase "Ars Conjectandi sive Stochastice", which has been translated to "the art of conjecturing or stochastics". This phrase was used, with reference to Bernoulli, by Ladislaus Bortkiewicz who in 1917 wrote in German the word stochastik with a sense meaning random.

Early occurrences of the word random in English with its current meaning, relating to chance or luck, date back to the 16th century, while earlier recorded usages started in the 14th century as a noun meaning "impetuosity, great speed, force, or violence (in riding, running, striking, etc.)". The word itself comes from a Middle French word meaning "speed, haste", and it is probably derived from a French verb meaning to "to run" or "to gallop".

Just get lucky. Godspeed. Diagonalize your upper triangular eigenvectors. It's all about the density of occurrences (λ) within a time interval. Isn't it always?

And what is that cosmological constant, accelerating you? Isn't it always?
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Re: The free association thread

Postby Elvis » Sat Apr 08, 2017 9:51 pm

Diagonalize your upper triangular eigenvectors. It's all about the density of occurrences (λ) within a time interval.


That's easy for you to say. I just divide by nine.
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Re: The free association thread

Postby dada » Sun Apr 09, 2017 5:43 pm

That's easy for you to say. I just divide by nine.


Someone asked John Cage, "You use random processes to create your compositions. Couldn't anyone do this?"

He replied, "Yes. But they don't."

Dividing by nine can be dangerous. Seriously dangerous. You must be a professional. I usually recommend people start with three. Then when they get the hang of it, three again.

You know, dividing Time by nines is the correct way to do it. It's just natural, cosmic law. No wonder everyone on earth is so fucked up.

Nine day weeks would help the little earthlings. Five days work, four days off. Stress levels would go down.

After a while, a lot of people would even go to work six days a week, with three day weekends. Because a lot of people don't have happy home lives. Although if the stress levels went down, who knows what might happen.

I'm not saying this for my benefit. I work seven days a week. When you work every day, how many days there are in a week doesn't matter. I guess you could say I'm sort of like Hebrew National. I answer to a higher cosmic authority. But I don't expect everyone to be ready for that anytime soon. So we'll give them the nine day week for now.

Ten week "seasons," with five days left over. Could put one left over day in each season, call them the "season start days." and leave the last one for new years day.

Or we could do like that old Egyptian calendar, five seasons of eight weeks each. Five "season start days." Elegant.

I know what you're thinking. What will we name the two new days the week? I guess we could leave that up to the corporation that named the others. Big Swifty and Associates, Trend Mongers:



But I wouldn't. I suggest we throw out the old names, start fresh. Maybe name them after the Muses. We could name them after the nine priestesses of Bast, but I'm not telling their names here.

The months can keep their names. Thirty days is thirty days. Doesn't matter what day of the week a month starts on, or if the season changes in the middle of a month, same as it is now. We don't want to change everything, anyway. Might cause a panic. Otherwise we'll have to coordinate it with the market boom and bust cycle. Lot of moving parts.

We have to be very careful. All that extra leisure time could make people antsy. Boredom might set in. I never get bored, there's too much to do. But I've heard about this. Unevolved minds get bored, and then start to whine, complain, and act generally annoying. It would be fine if they started fun trouble, but they don't know how, yet.

So to help, we'll trick their perception of time, with the ninety-second minute. And ninety-minute hours, too. So we'll have sixteen hour days. This will seem to them at first like they have less hours in a day to get bored. But what it's really doing is increasing their attention spans. They'll thank us later.

edited to add: Actually, all we need is the ninety-second minute. Sixty ninety-second minutes will be as long as ninety minutes are now. We'll still have sixteen hour days. Thus slowing down all the hands of the clocks.
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