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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Sep 13, 2018 - 11:58am PT
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Well said, Werner. I agree but I like to study things outside my self, too.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Sep 13, 2018 - 11:04pm PT
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[Click to View YouTube Video]
all sorts of machines seem "inconceivable," yet...
A tailless aerial robotic flapper reveals that flies use torque coupling in rapid banked turns
Matěj Karásek, Florian T. Muijres, Christophe De Wagter, Bart D. W. Remes, Guido C. H. E. de Croon
Science 14 Sep 2018:
Vol. 361, Issue 6407, pp. 1089-1094
DOI: 10.1126/science.aat0350
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Sep 14, 2018 - 08:00am PT
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Ward,
Generalizations are indeed what people employ, but that doesn’t mean that generalizations aren’t weak. Instrumentality is not proof of truth. Mythical religions were also generalizations, and they too worked to knit together different elements of societies. Today people argue that religions were incomplete, inaccurate, and not final understandings of how things really are. That's a myopic view, imo.
About a month ago, I finally assimilated a survey (book) of historical and current empirical and theoretical views of ritual. Even though we live in modern times of grand and pervasive rationality, the studies compel to accept that ritual somehow seems to be unavoidable and even necessary social instruments to the construction of societies and reality—from table manners to sporting events to food feasts to graduations to Swazi or British enthronements. Why do we shake hands, and why with the right hand only? Why do we pay attention to calendrical rites? Why do we follow social scripts and roles when we go to restaurants? Why aren’t ritualistic practices the same in different cultures? Why are there so many theories attempting to explain the use and development of rituals, and why can’t academics finally explain the development and use of rituals and myths? Are you aware that their are studies showing how rituals were “invented” in relatively modern times (*not* actually long-past traditions)—e.g, British enthronement rites. Is everyone completely stupid for continuing to follow and partake in rituals in everyday life? (The most general academic definition of ritual is a practice that serves no immediate, utilitarian, rational purpose.)
What’s often presented here in this thread as irrational, silly, and useless about various social practices here (e.g,, myths, religions) would seem to serve purposes beyond conscious human hegemonies of domination—if one takes reads academic studies. It would suggest that it is no “error in thought and behavior; an impediment to a fuller experience, or even experience itself,” to use your language.
There is no need to play the “quasi- spiritual mystagogue”’ or the “religious doctrinaire” card when faced with the research on the subject. If anything, imo, it shows a bias toward only rationalistic and material conceptualizations about what’s real and what’s not.
When someone refuses to take your hand in greeting, do you get an immediate real sense of meaning or not, or has your mind simply “made stupid sh*t up?”
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Don Paul
Social climber
Washington DC
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Sep 14, 2018 - 08:36am PT
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Is everyone completely stupid for continuing to follow and partake in rituals in everyday life?
Yes. I refuse to bless people who sneeze or hold open a door for someone who's overdressed.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Sep 14, 2018 - 12:04pm PT
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we live in modern times of grand and pervasive rationality,
What do you mean "we," North American?
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Sep 14, 2018 - 12:38pm PT
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The most general academic definition of ritual is a practice that serves no immediate, utilitarian, rational purpose.
this would include, I presume, faculty meetings....
"The word universitas originally applied only to the scholastic guilds—that is, the corporation of students and masters—within the studium, and it was always modified, as universitas magistrorum, universitas scholarium, or universitas magistrorum et scholarium. Eventually, however, probably in the late 14th century, the term began to appear by itself to exclusively mean a self-regulating community of teachers and scholars recognized and sanctioned by civil or ecclesiastical authority."
from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_university
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Sep 14, 2018 - 03:07pm PT
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"The most general academic definition of ritual is a practice that serves no immediate, utilitarian, rational purpose."
When I get out of bed in the morning I indulge in a ritual of making a pot of Peets Italian Roast coffee. Then I drink several cups with cream. Then I read the newspaper. My ritual is immediate, utilitarian and rational.
(That's amazing HFCS!)
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Ward Trotter
Trad climber
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Sep 14, 2018 - 06:41pm PT
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Hey MikeL, how you doing?
Almost every generalization seems foolish.
Clearly a somewhat different attitude displayed here:
Generalizations are indeed what people employ, but that doesn’t mean that generalizations aren’t weak.
MikeL, it was almost predictable that you would move the goal posts closer when it was your turn to kick again. But when it comes to people in general I am never surprised when unmistakeable hints of the passive-aggressive often emerge. I frequently find myself guilty as charged.
Instrumentality is not proof of truth
I don't know what that means?
Today people argue that religions were incomplete, inaccurate, and not final understandings of how things really are. That's a myopic view, imo.
I agree that it is short-sighted. I would also add in answer to your first sentence that in past millennia many people argued the identical thing about religion. Greek mythology being the penultimate example ; the interesting difference is the fact that the Greeks often found aesthetic means of first projecting then folding such arguments and queries back upon the mythological narrative itself, thus fully incorporating the inevitable tension of newer elements. This should provide fresh insight as to how an organic symbiosis between believer and non-believer can reliably proceed.
By the time of The Holy Roman Empire and succeeding centuries the technique had luridly shifted to simply burning or imprisoning those who questioned "...the final understanding of how things really are. Nevertheless the plea for rationality has always been disproportionate and asymmetrical. Has it not?
What’s often presented here in this thread as irrational, silly, and useless about various social practices here (e.g,, myths, religions) would seem to serve purposes beyond conscious human hegemonies of domination—if one takes reads academic studies. It would suggest that it is no “error in thought and behavior; an impediment to a fuller experience, or even experience itself,” to use your language.
I did not say that as regards my own thoughts about ritual , or religion, or non-rational behavior --I was stating that about your own attitude in opposition to rationality or science or the thinking they foster. I later compared your attitude to be hauntingly similar to the conception of original sin.
There is no need to play the “quasi- spiritual mystagogue”’ or the “religious doctrinaire” card when faced with the research on the subject. If anything, imo, it shows a bias toward only rationalistic and material conceptualizations about what’s real and what’s not.
The mystagogue comment was a sort of tongue-and-cheek thing I identified with a "LOL".
At any rate, I am not biased in favor of rationalism, empiricism, or merely "material considerations" when it comes to ultimate questions about the nature of the universe.I do however have a tremendous respect for nature and the seemingly endless mystery that enfolds us hereabouts on our tiny planet, and appears to stretch out in all directions. How can I not?
This respect for nature has led me to a mixture of boundless admiration and complete subservience to the natural world. In other words when she says "jump" I immediately reply "HOW HIGH?"
BTW in the earlier discussion about ritual I was struck by how little distinction was afforded between highly formalized, nearly reptilian ritual of a full-dress Catholic Mass for instance , and the so-called ritual practice of simply having morning Joe and reading the newspaper.?
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Sep 14, 2018 - 07:06pm PT
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Sometimes I think that I am the only one on this thread truly trying to solve the answer to the question posed by the OP. I think that most everybody else has given up. I have my eye on the prize. It is clearly a model that includes science and algorithm. I think that somebody (probably smarter than me) with a good understanding of both will eventually solve the problem.
Algorithm is the term I would use to describe the "computer science" angle to how biology works. It is a discipline that derives from the more general discipline of logic. The hierarchy would be: Philosophy => Logic => Algorithm => Biological algorithm (Philosophy not needed)
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WBraun
climber
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Sep 14, 2018 - 07:41pm PT
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So sorry, but .... You really are insane with that post you just made .....
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Sep 14, 2018 - 08:18pm PT
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"Sometimes I think that I am the only one on this thread truly trying to solve the answer to the question posed by the OP."
And for that you deserve an award! Here is your Medal of Merit. Wear it proudly:
(Produced by one of those mysterious algorithms to which you refer. Beyond human design. Sorry it has a somewhat biological demeaner, but that's evolution for you!)
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Sep 14, 2018 - 08:28pm PT
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I have my eye on the prize. It is clearly a model that includes science and algorithm
Is making tea (or coffee) an algorithm or a ritual? What's the difference?
The biological trouble with an algorithm is that it might make your behavior predictable and then you become breakfast, ritual or not, for a predator.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Sep 14, 2018 - 10:11pm PT
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jgill, does your most recent algorithm have a name?
I can't help but be reminded of the goddess Artemus or Diana of Ephesus.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis
Again, I ponder the relationship between the archetypes of the human unconscious and the mathematical nature of the universe. I assume the mathematical archetypes came first and then humans evolved to see them, imitate them, dream them? Microcosmic vs macrocosmic once again.
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WBraun
climber
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Sep 15, 2018 - 07:54am PT
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Studies of people on the verge of death who, while supposedly unconscious, accurately report events relating to their physical body from a perspective outside it.
Heart attack patients, accident victims, and soldiers wounded in battle have all reported such experiences.
Dr. Michael Sabom, a cardiologist at the Emory University Medical School, undertook a scientific study of such reports.
He interviewed thirty-two cardiac-arrest patients who reported out-of-body experiences.
During a cardiac arrest the heart stops pumping blood to the brain, and so a patient should be totally unconscious.
Yet twenty-six of the thirty-two patients reporting out-of-body experiences during cardiac arrest were able to give fairly accurate visual accounts of their resuscitation.
And the remaining six gave extremely accurate accounts of the specific resuscitation techniques, matching confidential hospital records of their operations.
The results of Sabom’s study, detailed in his book Recollections of Death: A Medical Investigation (1982), convinced him of the reality of out-of-body experiences.
He concluded that the mind was an entity distinct from the brain and that the near-death crisis caused the mind and brain to split apart for a brief time.
Sabom wrote, “Could the mind which splits apart from the physical brain be, in essence, the soul, which continues to exist after the final bodily death, according to some religious doctrines?
As I see it, this is the ultimate question that has been raised by reports of the NDE [near-death experience].”
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 15, 2018 - 08:05am PT
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However, John, your reply seems to lack evidence of "great progress" by any interpretation (other, perhaps, than accepting as real the wily coyote's romp down the path of Zen). If philosophy has produced such results please spell them out briefly without simply referring to one or another philosopher. That might set in place a productive path of investigation
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Fair enough. But that's not something that I can dash off as I usually do here. Gimme a minute.
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Sep 15, 2018 - 08:32am PT
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Ward,
I over-wrote, and too quickly. My apologies and regrets. I took-off on a topic that I find here on the thread a bit regularly: “What’s not rational, instrumental (where, ’it works!’ is the proof of a theory’), or scientifically definable . . . is poppycock.” I admit that is not what you were saying (but I thought you were leaning in that direction).
The academic survey (book) on ritual I finished reading and annotating impressed me. Indeed, as suggested, the most fertile places to look for ritual is in religious contexts, but ritual and ritual-like practices are remarkably ubiquitous in modern life. Societies and communities seem to require rituals, although academically it’s unclear exactly why (which is to say there are many theories). For example, one can note Don Paul’s comment about how he does not hold doors open for some people (a silly ritual?), but I’d say he likely lives in a legal world that is full of ritualistic practices that if suspended would cause considerable consternation, maybe even shock, among jurists.
There is so much to everyday, moment-to-moment “reality” that is socially and seemingly arbitrarily constructed, which we do not question. That’s all I’m trying to note.
As for generalizations appearing foolish, and weak, and employed . . . my assertion in these conversations is that we cannot help ourselves. We are socially, educationally, ideologically, psychologically, and even scientifically compelled to use generalizations. We could be aware of those compulsions and hold them lightly.
A iconoclastic sociologist by the name of Erving Goffman studied what’s been referred to as micro sociology. After studying typical social scripts people used to interact with others in mundane situations, he would send his graduate students out to break convention in those situations and recorded how others reacted. Not only did those other people not know how to respond (they often froze), but Goffman’s research indicated they would became outraged and at times would respond aggressively to his students’ behaviors. I often find similar response when I challenge the almost pervasive belief that science surely knows what it’s talking about.
We are not nearly as rational, logical, scientific, and reasonable as we would like to think we are. If a person were interested in such questions, he or she could observe it by looking at their own minds.
Cheers, and be well.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 15, 2018 - 09:03am PT
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After studying typical social scripts people used to interact with others in mundane situations, he would send his graduate students out to break convention in those situations and recorded how others reacted. Not only did those other people not know how to respond (they often froze), but Goffman’s research indicated they would became outraged and at times would respond aggressively to his students’ behaviors.
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I'd love to hear some examples of people behaviorally breaking from the script, and how others responded. That's interesting stuff because it breaks us out of machine mode. I've seen this in climbing many time, when the topo is wrong and how some people fly into a rage when facing new situations not accurately detailed by the physical data in the guide.
New experiences. The unknown. Off the beaten track and all that. Not for everyone.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Sep 15, 2018 - 09:47am PT
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New experiences. The unknown. Off the beaten track and all that. Not for everyone.
Yes.
Apply to (1) mind-brain science (What is Mind?), (2) life management systems (e.g., religions).
Voila.
Largo says, NOT FOR EVERYONE.
He's got THAT right.
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