Unmaking Sense

Episode 5.21: The vicious circle of working to live and living to work is broken by energising life.

It is dangerous to do things as a means to an end rather than because they are rewarding in themselves. A key indicator of this is that doing something or being with someone is energising, and the converse also applies.

Episode 5.20: An objection that proves the rule.

If what we do does not produce a net gain in energy, we live to work and work to live with nothing in reserve. So it is better to earn less but be energised than earn more and be drained by what we do. The former affirms our living and the latter denies it. But only those who experience being energised seem able to understand its importance.

Episode 5.19: The Kennedy Principle and mutually beneficial patterns of living.

Human beings commonly get hung up on questions such as how much they will be paid for what quality of comp qualifications they will earn. In both employment and in education these are the wrong considerations to put at the top of our concerns. What matters is whether we are net beneficiaries - ourselves and our employer, or our schools and the pupils - whether together we generate more energy than we consume. If we do, it is mutually beneficial; if we don’t, it isn’t, and we should respond accordingly.

Episode 5.18: Sources of the self.

If we only have access to our selves through a narrow band of consciousness in the now and it consists mostly of immediate experiences but no access to the deeper totality of our self, then where does our sense of self come from? There are at least three perhaps four answers: from memory and anticipation; from the interactions that we have with others and the stories that they tell about us; and lastly from the narrative that we weave about ourselves consisting of pieces of all those other features. There are also of course mistaken things and lies told about us that may constitute a fourth source, but I don’t deal much with that here.

Episode 5.17: Why I cannot recapture what it was, or anticipate what it will be like to be me.

We remember and anticipate in representations but not in existential experiences, so although we can recall how we represented past experiences and anticipate how we may describe future ones, we cannot know what it was or will be like to be “me” on such occasions.

Episode 5.16: What it is not like to be me. And what it is.

I recently had a moment of real realisation about a problem with the notion of what it is like to be me that I have not taken into account in my discussion of the relationship between the conscious and non-conscious existence of each living thing. So I’m trying to clear that up now in this episode and to move on a little bit into new territory that I think proves very fertile. What is it like to be a bat? Well, it is not like a bat to be a bat. That’s the short answer. And it’s not really like being me in some total sense to be me.

Episode 5.15: Two ways we forget our selves: one positive; one negative.

Distinguishing between two different motives for forgetting our selves: one to contribute more effectively whatever we can to some objective worthwhile end; the other to escape from an unbearable self-denigration which would make life impossible if it persisted by allying ourselves with causes and leaders no matter how monstrous their purposes.

Episode 5.14: Tying together cognition, self and interdependence in our formative processes.

It is more effective to develop oneself by attending to some purpose than to concentrate on the self directly. How this relates to conscious and nonconscious cognition, and how by forgetting ourselves and living in purposes defined by objective aims and other people we find ourselves again, returned and restored. Connections to Dewey, Polanyi and Kropotkin.

Episode 5.13: Positive and negative aspects of the self in relation to others.

There’s nothing wrong with, say, supporting a team, and we derive great benefit from observing and enjoying the achievements of others in many walks of life, but if we invest so much of ourselves in them that their fortunes comes to matter to us “more than life itself”, something has gone badly wrong.

Episode 5.12: Chaos Theory and the Significance of the Insignificant.

The Butterfly Effect: what it implies and what it doesn’t.