Phenomenology

[Ok08Y567gA]

We're going to talk about phenomenology roughly as the study of being in the world as most popularly characterized by Martin Heidegger in his most famous work Being and Time. Phenomenology is a method of investigation or style of thought that has applications and implications within many fields of human intellectual and creative interest: religious studies, neuroscience, film, and painting are some that most immediately come to mind. What I want to say is that for me phenomenology is about a person or being experiencing the world from the vantage of its beingness or in our case our creatureliness. Human phenomenology is anthropomorphic meaning distinctly of human character, because the idea is that phenomenology is from the vantage point of the experience of existence.

Check out this You tube video:

Now, let's talk about the phenomenology of whatever comes to mind. For instance, the phenomenology of basketball would be the content of the conscious experience one has when playing basketball the emotions, judgments, and perceptions normal to you playing basketball.

For more on Phenomenology check out this wiki page:

Phenomenology (philosophy) - Wikipedia

If you're curious about Heidegger check out this playlist:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4gvlOxpKKIgfufAQZ55tItfcQxAXub--

 

[Matty]

Uh, phenomenology seems like a strange system of self-interest. It's a little like the reflexive interest in how one's perspective is unique, as expressed in sentences starting: "as an INTJ, I can't help but see this as....etc"

It's something to consider, but is eminently impractical.

 

[Cinnamonmints]

I wrote about an evening walk in early spring. Don't know if I did it correctly.

Most of shortcut paths that served as main roads have turned into slippery mudlanes thus all the enthuasiasts of an evening walk condense on the sidewalks. The rush of the day is over, there's little traffic and the only noises are muffled conversations. The silence surrounding those chatters is the remnant of winter sleep spell casted on most other life. No birds yet wasting their energy for songs, no bugs awake and buzzing, no rustling leaves yet. But something indicates the winter spell is wearing off. It's a smell. You start inhaling deeper and you feel energized, awake. It's almost tasty to breathe. Eventually the realization kicks that the smell you associate with spring is not a smell, but a simple change in air temperature. The warm breeze allows you to take deep breaths without a threat of frozen air cutting into your throat. Warmish air replaces the scarf and the gloves engulfing the body in a comfortable blanket. You feel as thought nature finally relented on her intentions to kill you. A sense of gratification after a long longing for the warmth spring brings.

 

[John K]

I'm probably weird, but I take great comfort in the reality that the world outside humanity gets on with itself without any words. If you take away the words from phenomenology you are left with pure being - talking about it cannot express the experience, but can only metaphor it.

 

[aeon]

I'm probably weird, but I take great comfort in the reality that the world outside humanity gets on with itself without any words.

Words defile and spoil. Everything that makes life worth living is ruined by words. Every beauty, tarnished and suited for the scrapheap.

Shut up, I say. I want only birdsong.

Too many words, and my heart is aching. So many stories of humanity’s pimping and whoring.

Give me the whispering wind, and the bubbling brook. They never lie.

The first time my lover commanded “no talking!” I knew she was The One.

Words are but sophistry. Poisoned by words. Every syllable a tiny deceit.

Melancholy,
Ian

 

[John K]

The first time my lover commanded “no talking!” I knew she was The One.

I love this!

Words defile and spoil. Everything that makes life worth living is ruined by words. Every beauty, tarnished and suited for the scrapheap.

I see the world filled with spirits. I’m less interested in what it’s like to be a bat, but what’s it like to be the spirit of a cloud? Maybe a wisp of cloud sailing over my childhood on top of a hill near where I lived. It was the first time I really 'saw' a cloud when I was 8 years old.

What’s it like to be a cloud on Titan or on Jupiter?

The words are only metaphors and, in expressing, they cannot help but distort. They can act as signposts though for anyone who can see where they are pointing. Maybe language, not the apple, was what went wrong in the Garden?

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

Uh, phenomenology seems like a strange system of self-interest. It's a little like the reflexive interest in how one's perspective is unique, as expressed in sentences starting: "as an INTJ, I can't help but see this as....etc"

It's something to consider, but is eminently impractical.

It's more the humility to acknowledge that the world "out there" cannot be honestly separated from our experience of it in any reliable way that gives us absolute and objective truths as understood in Grecian and Medieval classical philosophy. You're trying to see what makes an experience of something, you're less interested in what's unique about you, but unique about the thing you are and its experience of something within a given context. Like a human and a bat can both experience a cricket at night, but the cricket will appear as differing content to the two.

AI researchers and Neuroscientist find it practical because they are trying to figure out how to get robots to make accurate identification, intelligent movements, and take reliable learning routes. Also, Phenomenology is useful in thinking about consciousness which is why Neuroscientist care about it. Anytime something other people care about seems eminently impractical just assume you don't know much about it and thus don't have very much interest.

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

I'm probably weird, but I take great comfort in the reality that the world outside humanity gets on with itself without any words. If you take away the words from phenomenology you are left with pure being - talking about it cannot express the experience, but can only metaphor it.

Yes, but metaphor and analogies are useful for thinking about the world outside, because as human beings we're imbedded within the world with a need to decide on what is true, right, or wrong in the world, so we're not in the position to take pure being and know what to judge as up, down, right or wrong, pure being is immanent but goes beyond the horizons of our experience such that we can only know it through logical consideration when we consider the role language and memory plays in forming and shaping our perceptions.

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

I love this!


I see the world filled with spirits. I’m less interested in what it’s like to be a bat, but what’s it like to be the spirit of a cloud? Maybe a wisp of cloud sailing over my childhood on top of a hill near where I lived. It was the first time I really 'saw' a cloud when I was 8 years old.

What’s it like to be a cloud on Titan or on Jupiter?

The words are only metaphors and, in expressing, they cannot help but distort. They can act as signposts though for anyone who can see where they are pointing. Maybe language, not the apple, was what went wrong in the Garden?

Would a lion, if it could, see the same spirits as you or experience spirits the same way as you?

I think reason is what went wrong in the Garden.

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

I wrote about an evening walk in early spring. Don't know if I did it correctly.

Most of shortcut paths that served as main roads have turned into slippery mudlanes thus all the enthuasiasts of an evening walk condense on the sidewalks. The rush of the day is over, there's little traffic and the only noises are muffled conversations. The silence surrounding those chatters is the remnant of winter sleep spell casted on most other life. No birds yet wasting their energy for songs, no bugs awake and buzzing, no rustling leaves yet. But something indicates the winter spell is wearing off. It's a smell. You start inhaling deeper and you feel energized, awake. It's almost tasty to breathe. Eventually the realization kicks that the smell you associate with spring is not a smell, but a simple change in air temperature. The warm breeze allows you to take deep breaths without a threat of frozen air cutting into your throat. Warmish air replaces the scarf and the gloves engulfing the body in a comfortable blanket. You feel as thought nature finally relented on her intentions to kill you. A sense of gratification after a long longing for the warmth spring brings.

This was lovely to read, thank you for sharing.

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

Uh, phenomenology seems like a strange system of self-interest. It's a little like the reflexive interest in how one's perspective is unique, as expressed in sentences starting: "as an INTJ, I can't help but see this as....etc"

It's something to consider, but is eminently impractical.

Maybe, you and everyone else will find this video helpful in better understanding Phenomenology:

 

[John K]

Maybe, you and everyone else will find this video helpful in understanding Phenomenology:

Many thanks for this video Yoh - it's very informative and clear, and gives a great summarised synopsis as far as I can see.

Yes, but metaphor and analogies are useful for thinking about the world outside, because as human beings we're imbedded within the world with a need to decide on what is true, right, or wrong in the world, so we're not in the position to take pure being and know what to judge as up, down, right or wrong, pure being is immanent but goes beyond the horizons of our experience such that we can only know it through logical consideration when we consider the role language and memory plays in forming and shaping our perceptions.

I'm not sure I have the language to express this clearly, but I think you are right when it comes to expressing thought in a way that it can be analysed and communicated. But when it comes to actually experiencing pure being, that's different. A crude analogy is that the words are to the experience what a photograph I take is to a place I visit - it communicates some idea of what I experienced there, but it's not that actual experience. The trouble is that, in trying to overcome this inadequacy of representation, analysis and communication, we hit all kinds of technical linguistic problems that are to do with the means, not the raw experience. It seems to me that much of philosophy has got caught up with building better camera systems, metaphorically speaking, rather than getting to the heart of what it is trying to capture. But that doesn't mean we are wasting our time - just that it's very hard to communicate an experience of being to other people.

For myself, this isn't simply a drawback of language. To experience the world, we each build our own, real-time simulation of reality and that's the world each of us actually lives in. What we experience consciously is entirely within our heads, mediated by all sorts of unconscious processes. Is there an objective world out there that this VR is a genuine reflection of? It's a moot point because things we take for granted as real, like time, light and matter, seem to be very different in nature from how we experience them - and even that realisation is dependent on human conceptualisations that may also use hard-wired metaphors and simplifications of the world in our mental architecture. It may well be that the quest for what is real outside the boundaries of human consciousness is a hunting of the snark.

The phenomenological approach may well be a better way of approaching these things than many other ways of philosophy, and gives me a lot of food for thought.

Would a lion, if it could, see the same spirits as you or experience spirits the same way as you?

I think reason is what went wrong in the Garden.

A lion wouldn't, but maybe a Tyger would, burning bright, in the forests of the night

But not even other humans see as I see, or you see, let alone another sort of creature. I'm sure that the world looks very different to an alpha male lion, too, at the peak of it's life compared with the defeated males who are outside the pack, or the females within it.

I agree about the Fall legend. I think this tale is about the 'theft' of consciousness - and maybe the story of Prometheus stealing fire is similar. These tales are far more meaningful than at first sight.

 

[aeon]

I think reason is what went wrong in the Garden.

I agree about the Fall legend. I think this tale is about the 'theft' of consciousness - and maybe the story of Prometheus stealing fire is similar. These tales are far more meaningful than at first sight.

For me, the “fall” is duality consciousness. Self versus other, so emancipation/exclusion from the divine, and seeing the uni-verse as cause and effect events.

What an absolute fucking cock-up. That said, I do enjoy a good, crisp Braeburn.

Sigh,
Ian

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

I'm not sure I have the language to express this clearly, but I think you are right when it comes to expressing thought in a way that it can be analysed and communicated.

Understood.

. But when it comes to actually experiencing pure being, that's different. A crude analogy is that the words are to the experience what a photograph I take is to a place I visit - it communicates some idea of what I experienced there, but it's not that actual experience. The trouble is that, in trying to overcome this inadequacy of representation, analysis and communication, we hit all kinds of technical linguistic problems that are to do with the means, not the raw experience. It seems to me that much of philosophy has got caught up with building better camera systems, metaphorically speaking, rather than getting to the heart of what it is trying to capture. But that doesn't mean we are wasting our time - just that it's very hard to communicate an experience of being to other people.

I agree, I cannot adequately or fully represent the raw experience of pure being or the unfolding and revelation of the roaring thunder or blaze and flash of the leaded lightening, yet philosophy is a human activity, a game for man to put to use intellect and creativity in a harmony that can be seldom achieved in more stringent scientific programs to arrive at an understanding and consideration of what escapes the purview of pure observation and immediate thought. We hit technical problems in capturing the character, meaning, and existence of raw experience, because philosophy is a technical discipline of representation where one uses rigorous thought guided by intuition to do justice to the phenomena of raw experience in an attempt to understand them; the living is complex and we're figuring things out as we go. Philosophy is both an art and science, yes, it has at many instances fallen short, but what better for future philosophers to do than to attempt to do more justice in getting to the heart of what it is trying to capture? Nay, we waste no time in endeavoring to understand and render the world we inhabit in an intelligible sense, for knowledge is the servant of man, man is not the servant of knowledge, that is error is not a sin, but a part of the process of the evolution of thought as necessary as the space between notes and minor discordances in harmony are to creating pleasing music. Philosophy is extremely difficult and that's what makes it satisfying to the philosopher, one should see forming a sound argument more like performing a monstrous dunk or landing a solid jump shot, yet we ultimately are aiming for understanding, wisdom, truth, and insight regarding something.

For myself, this isn't simply a drawback of language. To experience the world, we each build our own, real-time simulation of reality and that's the world each of us actually lives in. What we experience consciously is entirely within our heads, mediated by all sorts of unconscious processes. Is there an objective world out there that this VR is a genuine reflection of? It's a moot point because things we take for granted as real, like time, light and matter, seem to be very different in nature from how we experience them - and even that realisation is dependent on human conceptualisations that may also use hard-wired metaphors and simplifications of the world in our mental architecture. It may well be that the quest for what is real outside the boundaries of human consciousness is a hunting of the snark.

The phenomenological approach may well be a better way of approaching these things than many other ways of philosophy, and gives me a lot of food for thought.

Well put and I couldn't agree more and I'm glad.

A lion wouldn't, but maybe a Tyger would, burning bright, in the forests of the night

Maybe, but it's worth thinking about is my point

But not even other humans see as I see, or you see, let alone another sort of creature. I'm sure that the world looks very different to an alpha male lion, too, at the peak of it's life compared with the defeated males who are outside the pack, or the females within it.

I agree about the Fall legend. I think this tale is about the 'theft' of consciousness - and maybe the story of Prometheus stealing fire is similar. These tales are far more meaningful than at first sight.

Well, yes, everyone's perspective is unique; however, there are shared content across experiences and shared events of experience such as emotions and religious experiences which is why phenomenology is employed to think about and understand these experential realities. Now, character and family resemblance might strike one as crude notions, but it's like walking through an art gallery and viewing the impressionist and then expressionist paintings of what one is considering and then explaining why these images make sense as representations, this is applying phenomenology.

Yes, but across alpha male lions there is shared content and the same with defeated males, there is a reason Gollum and Scar from lion king strike the psyche as similar figures and that's what phenomenology can endeavor to explore, what are the emotions, perceptions, and judgements of the alpha and defeated male lion?

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

I agree about the Fall legend. I think this tale is about the 'theft' of consciousness - and maybe the story of Prometheus stealing fire is similar. These tales are far more meaningful than at first sight.

Indeed, my perspective, I think Prometheus is different because nature is seen as fundamentally hostile to life when humans are created by the gods or when Prometheus creates man where in The Genesis account the world is made for humans to inhabit and Satan tricks them bringing on death and hostility. Prometheus tricks the gods and Satan tricks man. I see the Gensis account as the folly of reason and the myth of Prometheus as the heroic deeds of reason.

 

[Wyote]

Now that we've successfully created particles of matter from light, this is gonna get more interesting.

One day life really could be like Star Trek with the holodeck and (food) replicator.

 

[aeon]

One day life really could be like Star Trek with the holodeck and (food) replicator.

I started making a list of top food picks and realized I was on runaway Ne, so I deleted it.

But a custom diet that met nutritional, metabolic, and medical guidelines *as well as* individual tastes would really be something.

But if we’re doing Star Trek, I want to meet those original series fashionably-clad rainbow-colored alien women for...reasons.

I wonder if someone has made a “which Star Trek universe character are you?” test...jesus, Ne, calm down!

Rough times ahead, but it’s always that, somewhere, sometime. But yes, one day life really could be...so bright.

As a recalcitrant visionary idealist dreamer, I appreciate you saying this. More than I can say. I love hearing what other people imagine, in all the ways that presents.

You’re Really Something (Wonderful),
Ian

 

[Ok08Y567gA]

Why Phenomenology is the legitimate intellectual turning in understanding truth. The self is an oligarchy a thing that differentiates its relation and evaluation based upon emotions, drive, instincts, motivations, and conditioning that formulate into values that act as the basis of coloration for what we filter, recall, and cogitate upon from encounter, experience, and observation. There is no mind free from a set of values that underlies its valuation of what it encounters; thus, the condition of the truths we arrive at therefore cannot be value free and so in our reasoning there is no purely objective, there is only a relationship between perception, understanding, and an everchanging evolution and dynamic of cognitive and evolutionary forces conspiring to bring about awareness and judgement.

 

[just me]

I see the world filled with spirits. I’m less interested in what it’s like to be a bat, but what’s it like to be the spirit of a cloud? Maybe a wisp of cloud sailing over my childhood on top of a hill near where I lived. It was the first time I really 'saw' a cloud when I was 8 years old.

What’s it like to be a cloud on Titan or on Jupiter?

The words are only metaphors and, in expressing, they cannot help but distort. They can act as signposts though for anyone who can see where they are pointing. Maybe language, not the apple, was what went wrong in the Garden?

How in the world would we communicate without the cell phone?? (sarcasm)

 

[Wyote]

there is only a relationship between perception and and everchanging evolution and dynamic of cognitive and evolutionary forces conspiring to bring about awareness and judgement.

Can you elaborate on your personal feelings about this? How does your own awareness of this shape your own views.