…reality can appear both discrete and continuous depending on how it is observed; …nonetheless continuity has ultimate priority. —Iain McGilchrist, The Matter with Things #mcgilchrist

Consciousness, for example, let us say with Descartes, is a ‘thinking thing’, res cogitans. Well, I’m glad we got that clear. But what is thinking? And what is a thing? —Iain McGilchrist, The Matter With Things #mcgilchrist

Interesting interview, "Left-brain thinking will destroy
#civilisation," with Iain #McGilchrist:

> a civilisation cannot thrive if differing points of view cannot be
> heard. Hannah Arendt, one of the greatest philosophers of the last 100
> years, who was herself a German Jew and experienced Nazism, said that:
> "Once something can't be said, you're already in a tyranny."

Perhaps one thinks there's something wrong with #civilization though,
like #HuckleberryFinn:

> I reckon I got to light out for the territory ahead of the rest,
> because Aunt Sally she's going to adopt me and sivilize me, and I
> can't stand it. I been there before.

https://unherd.com/2023/04/left-brain-thinking-will-destroy-civilisation/

Today recorded a #podcast out in the Woods for the first time. Took a bit of doing to get the volume right but I'm reasonably happy with the output.

In this episode, I speak in the Wood about what I'm interested in why. This includes #Pyrrhonism, #Buddhism, #Spinoza, #Schopenhauer, #Nietzsche, #Hume, #Peirce, #Kuhn, #Jaynes, #McGilchrist, and more.

https://pod.fo/e/165031

I discussed metaphor with a fun group recently. https://anchor.fm/bkam/episodes/A-Discussion-of-Metaphor-e1t6c0q

#McLuhan, #Jaynes, #McGilchrist, Douglas #Hofstadter, #Heidegger, Barbara #Ehrenreich, #Freud, #Nietzsche, Ivan #Bilibin, #Tarkovsky, #Durkheim, #Kuhn, Lera Boroditsky, Johnson and #Lakoff 😊

Iain #McGilchrist on the pandemic: "I'm a great believer that mainly in life it's cock-ups, not conspiracies. I mean there's some people who think it's all conspiracies, but I think it's largely cock-ups. Mainly, we had a lot of cock-ups during the evolution of our ideas both scientific and political about how to handle the pandemic." https://youtu.be/nsl7eWLYhLk

“Legalism is an unattractive element in all three of the monotheistic religions. I see it as the inevitable reaction of the left hemisphere to an essentially right hemisphere phenomenon, an attempt to make what are necessarily uncertain, but nonetheless profound, insights into the nature of Being, certain and declarative: ‘let’s codify, make the rules explicit, clarify our terms, rationalise the subtleties out of existence, and make it all cognitive.’" - Iain #McGilchrist, TMWT

“Czesław Miłosz quotes ‘an old Jew of Galicia’:
When someone is honestly 55% right, that’s very good and there’s no use wrangling. And if someone is 60% right, it’s wonderful, it’s great luck, and let them thank God. But what’s to be said about 75% right? Wise people say it is suspicious. Well, and what about 100% right? Whoever says he is 100% right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal.”

Source: The Matter With Things by Iain #McGilchrist

One prompt stood out: “beyond non-dual dualisms”. #McGilchrist writes about what happens when we take non-dual dualisms seriously. What happens next? Donald #Hoffman said “Whatever agent that is me seems to be a combination of my left hemisphere and my right hemisphere agents.” A greater understanding of the relationship between our parts, and how they influence who we are, both as individuals and cultures, is extremely important for “staying with the material trouble”, as they say.

Having some understanding of paradox may be a litmus test. Iain #McGilchrist quoted Martin #Heidegger (at the start of his Logical Paradox chapter in TMWT): “The #evil and thus keenest danger is thinking itself. It must think against itself, which it can only seldom do.” Indeed this is seldom for humans, but is it even possible for #ChatGPT?

"If we survive, humans in the future will look back on this as a consummate age of folly, where what the Greeks called hubris led to our downfall and destruction." - Iain #McGilchrist https://youtu.be/dlV_AtdVO8c

“The thoughts of William #Blake cry out to be understood in the light of cerebral asymmetry. This is a highly original and stimulating book, the best I have read on one of the greatest of English poets.” - Iain #McGilchrist

@Davinport Very striking! However the credit belongs to Iain #McGilchrist for making that connection. You would probably enjoy seeing his lecture here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CkVwGpOXhf8&t=3462

"Bryan #Charnley made a series of paintings as he progressed further into #psychosis. He could really have been a botanic artist. This is very reminiscent of a one of the greatest plant books ever published. The plates look like this - enormously detailed pictures of #flowers with a landscape background." #McGilchrist https://youtu.be/CkVwGpOXhf8?t=3462

“Elaborate overworking comes to its apotheosis in a self-taught artist who goes by 143 different names. His favorite is Vonn #Stropp. This work [entitled Oestrum] shows a number of things. Enormous detail, no sense of overall form, however a magnificent sort of working which is almost claustrophobic. One feels one needs air and space in this depiction. We see odd body parts in here, and you may have noticed a sort of saber-toothed tiger detail.” #McGilchrist https://youtu.be/CkVwGpOXhf8?t=2630

Here's a list of what I've been working on/thinking about for the last week. https://clerestory.netlify.app/work/?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=20221129

Featuring #duBoisReymond #Kant #Graeber #Lucretius #Hesiod #Spinoza #Bacon #McGilchrist #Arendt #Geertz #Piaget #Einstein #Wertheimer #Solon #Confucius #Buddhism #complexity #Logos #Althusser #Nietzsche #Spinoza #Marx #Schopenhauer #Montaigne #Kuhn #Nagel #Pythagoras #Popper #Gödel and more!

The Progress of the Left Hemisphere: from glorious Emissary to devouring Dragon... from the cunning, rationalising Enki in Sumerian legends to Apollo, #Lucifer and the Aten, from the rationalising luminous Logos to the solar Gods of Newton, Bacon and Locke in the age of the left-brain’s final “En-lightenment” – what #McGilchrist refers to as “the triumph of the left hemisphere”. https://thehumandivine.org/2022/01/23/fearful-symmetry-blake-and-the-symbolism-of-the-left-brain-by-iain-mcgilchrist/

#McGilchrist Mcgilchristing on #art and #names. Master & His Emissary

“Straight lines, in as much as they can be said to exist at all, do so as the limit case of curves, which constitute all the lines in #nature (even space and the paths travelled in it are curved). Linearity is the limit case of nonlinearity, and can be approximated only by taking ever narrower views of an infinitely complex picture.”

- The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World
by Iain #McGilchrist

Friedensreich #Hundertwasser did not like straight lines. As #McGilchrist might note, they are merely the “limit case” of the curve, and in any event they are surrounded by broad arcs that expand outward into wide open space, all of which becomes visible when we finally lift our eyes from its “absolute tyranny”.