Day’s pictures

Day 886, communication.

Day's pictures, Haiku, Philosophy, Poetry

Day 886-1

 

Delicate armor

layered to embrace a flower

to spring in autumn.

 

Definition of communication: The imparting or exchanging of information by speaking, writing, or using some other medium. (Oxford dictionary)

If I ask for a sandwich with cheese to a person who speaks English and knows what bread and cheese is, they can probably make me that sandwich. In this case we had good communication and in these kinds of cases it’s no problem of talking about communication.  If one of them doesn’t speak English we might still have communication in a formal way but it’s far from successful if the sandwich with cheese never appears.

Wikipedia defines communication better than the Oxford dictionary I think: Communication is the act of conveying meanings from one entity or group to another through the use of mutually understood signs and semiotic rules.

The part “mutually understood signs and semiotic rules.” Is important in my opinion. Can you communicate about the taste of red wine with someone who only tasted water before? How do you convey the different taste sensation in wine to someone that cannot recollect does tastes and experiences? If you never tasted bitter, how can someone explain that to you. If I start talking about lice there is a chance you start scratching your head even if you never had them, it’s just that you know that they are itchy from hearsay. If you never heard of lice you would not have that same itchy sensation.

A lack of experience can hamper in clear communication. A daughter explains how a computer works to her Grandfather is like seeing two people talking different languages, can you talk of communication in such a case? A Syrian refugee talking about war to a westerner in a safe place, is that communication?  Black people feeling unsafe, woman on the work floor a veteran after the war. Maybe we al fit in our own unique little box of circumstances that prevents us from real communication with each other.

Communication doesn’t stop when the words leave your mouth, or the letter is sent.

The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place. George Bernard Shaw

 

 

Day 884, free will.

Day's pictures, Haiku, Philosophy, Poetry

Day 884-1

Wondering alone

starlight brightens the shadows

stirred in my mind.

 

Free will.

Why do we feel free, unbounded when we make choices? What is it that moves our arm if we want to pick something up? Is it a soul or matter that gives us our identity? This is what we call the mind–body problem and it is still not satisfactory resolved.

Most people in this world believe that we have a soul and that the soul is you and makes the decisions separated from the physical body. The problem with a nonphysical soul is the way it interacts with our physical body, so it(you) can control what you do like making you walk and let you pick up things.  Many philosophers have sought for solutions and others tried to find for a physical place in our body where the soul makes contact with our body, without success.

I am not in a position to disqualify the idea that we have a soul but the chance that we have one is minute if you look at all the knowledge we have now. The consensus between a wide variety of scientist is that our identity originates in the brain and disappears when we die.  What chemicals, hormones and fluids are involved is now topic for debate between scientist but the rest of the world ignores this problem or dismisses it.

But imagine what it means for the world if we all believe that its over when we die, and religion is something you study in the history books.

Men are mistaken in thinking themselves free; their opinion is made up of consciousness of their own actions, and ignorance of the causes by which they are conditioned. Their idea of freedom, therefore, is simply their ignorance of any cause for their actions. As for their saying that human actions depend on the will, this is a mere phrase without any idea to correspond thereto.

Men believe themselves to be free, simply because they are conscious of their actions, and unconscious of the causes whereby those actions are determined.

Baruch Spinoza

Day 883, words.

Day's pictures, Haiku, Philosophy, Poetry

Day 883-1

I spread my fingers

trying to touch entirety

its hidden rhythm.

What do you think if you never heard words? If you have a languish can you than imagine what it is to think without the words that form your thoughts? If I think of a boat does my mind than take a picture of a boat from the folder labeled boats? How do you ask someone without language to think about a boat?

These questions bother me sometimes because it’s difficult to imagine it let alone answer them. But you can ask yourself also the (almost) opposite, do we use languish in our day to day thinking? Maybe the words we use, and think are only the top of the iceberg, a sugary coating to make it pretty. I can never recall why I got up to make some coffee. Did something in me say the words “make coffee” to…me…to who? Maybe our thoughts are formed by habits (the coffee), chemicals in our brain, hormones and functions like our hard and intestines do, independent from us.

Words are the afterthought.

Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings – always darker, emptier and simpler. Friedrich Nietzsche

Day 882, pointless.

., Day's pictures, Haiku, Philosophy, Poetry

Day 882-1

Attract and reject

Echoing eternal needs

detested and blessed.

 

I am not a philosopher in the sense that I can quote famous philosophers or understand all the different chapters from the history of philosophy. I might have some insights, but I have no story to tell or a system to unfold. I have my preferences and I can get aroused by a good book but that’s about it.

I have many thick books on my bookshelf, I bought these books because I’m interested in them but also as an investment. I knew that I was not ready for these books with condensed thoughts in them. The people that wrote these books where good at their job and I can admire them for that. These books helped change the world but…how much? Did they?

Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them. Aristotle

This quote is more than 2000 years old and for me it says something about how you should treat other people and go through life opposed to living for material wealth and appearances.

I think that a lot of people could agree with this, but the reality is that the clear majority can’t or won’t live according to this suggestion of Aristotle. We westerners see goods, likes and freedom as ”honor” badges we wear, in religious minded people wearing a book, following the rules and prey is there badge as a sign of there piety. With these badges some people think they deserve praise, but they are often pined on an empty shell.

Aristotle told these words thousands of years ago, and around that time you could find, in countless different cultures, similar sentiments. He told these words and since then countless learned people have read these old works and refined them, and refined them but with what result?

We might not kill our neighbor, or raid the village next door as in the olden day’s but at the same time we praise our global economy and borderless internet, is our willingness to let thousands of children starve in poor countries not the same as letting your neighbor starve 2000 years ago? Did Aristotle let his neighbor die?

We wear our badges of material goods and pious behavior and think where good, but should we not throw these symbols away and act like the world is one small neighborhood? This is what (some/in general) philosophers are trying to tell but the massage is not understood. You might say that this has made all of philosophy pointless, but I hope that it is a fundament for future generations to finally find a way to tell the story that the ancient thinkers started in a languish that is understood by all.

What do you think?