JennaW

It didn't twist at all-- I have a dynamic diagram in my head for just this description. I imagine a single sphere-- say, an orange (the fruit). Then I imagine about 400 people looking at the fruit (stick figures surrounding the fruit). Then I draw in lines from each stick figure to the fruit, each line in 400 different colors. That's the subjective-objective line. Each stick figure is perceiving and conceiving of the orange, and each one has their own line. But this diagram isn't dynamic yet. Let's set this in time: as time goes on, the fruit will rot. The stick figures (the people) will grow older. If the fruit changes, and the people looking at the fruit changes, then the lines between each figure and the fruit will change. AND, if the people communicate with each other about what they see, what they will do is provide aspects of a whole, and cause their direct interaction with the orange to change more. To make this more complicated, imagine each figure in a special orbit around the fruit, at their own special distance. Then, imagine these distances constantly changing. Next, imagine the fruit changing positions-- say, rotating. This is the image I have, and it contains subjectivity, intersubjectivity, objectivity, transparency, interaction, dynamism. Each figure looking at the orange is a persepctive, with a relative position in regards to other figures and the orange, at a point in time. It isn't within human identity to have an absolute perspective of absolute reality. Perhaps this orientation would be fitting for Zeus or Jehovah... ;) Couldn't have said it better myself! And this is why I love science.

Well, instead of starting off with just "a thing", "identity" and "behavior", let's ask: What is "identity"? What is separate from the identity? How is identity formed? Who forms it? What forms it? What happens when you say that it is our identity as human beings to form our own identities-- then what happens out of this? If this is true, then when does this start-- at 5 years old, 10, or 18? Or is it really a continuum? And if we form our own identity, then we must have behavior before the full identity-- then one could say behavior forms identity. But it's our identity to form the behavior that forms our identity. On and on... But what if identity and behavior are not linearly related, but feedbacked? What if other factors, such as other's behaviors and identities, feed into this interaction? What if one's identity changes over time? I am not exactly the same person I was when I was 18. I also acted differently. What if behavior is a dynamic process? The point is that "a thing's identity determines its behavior" being conceived of this way seems to set "the thing" in a vacuum, in a linear fashion. What seems to be missing is that a thing may have such complex attributes that its identity and behavior are complex and dynamic as well, and if this complex thing exists with other complex things, the interactions that emerge can have several different forms: probable behaviors, contingent behaviors, necessary behaviors, a balance of externally induced and internally induced behaviors, etc. AND this will reflect back and change the identities of the things involved. So starting off with "entity-to-action" is only part of the picture; it is one-dimensional, flat. Instead of a linear approach, I go by a networked, cyclical, feedbacked approach. I don't have to integrate networks/dynamics/fluidity/complexity into a linear approach as this is going backwards-- to me, the linear approach must integrate with the dynamic, complex, fluid reality that I see, use, and study, every day. In essence, I look for tools of thought to help me understand reality. Since reality is complex and exhibits nonlinearity, I must use a guideline that matches. A linear approach usually only helps me if I want to act like I'm programming in assembly code; such a way of doing things frustrate me as it is very brute force and slow.

hehe....

Congrats guys! I'm sorry that I didn't know anyone who knows how to program-- I barely know how, all I know is basic stuff-- but this is wonderful. Since I like blue, and I like simplicity in design, plus I dislike flashy, 3-D, blinking icons, and large banner/flash ads all over the place, I think this layout is good for me. Of course, I don't know what other color themes there are so I can't compare... all I know is that black background and white text tends to give people headaches (from my old digital design days). Could you grab some screen shots of different layouts and post them?

Are these the only alternatives? What about intersubjectivity of an objective reality? There is one reality, yet we are all individual, but social, creatures that all share that reality. Subjectivity and objectivity seem too bifurcated into a dichotomy; I see them as two sides of the same coin: the interaction of an individual, or of individuals, to the reality that they are a part and parcel of. Our consciousnesses are subjective and objective, depending on the perspective.

I hardly ever do this, but Roger beat me to it: So, what Roger said.

It depends on what context -- what level-- you're looking at. For me, a sleeping person hovers between-- s/he can hear and respond to external events (earthquake, alarm clock) and do math, carpenting, cashiering, etc. (ever dreamt of work?) but cannot actually talk with you (sleeptalkers can talk to you and respond, but it's not in an awake, aware context). And it depends on how you're using unconscious or conscious. There are a lot of subtleties of context that we need to take into account before discussing.

LOL, that sounds incredibly naughty! My mom, though, hasn't any idea that I posted her cake online...

This was what attracted me too, at first. It was clear, and made general sense. I could do without the polemics and the sometimes unctious tone, but the beautiful parts are beautiful. And I also began to see it as a system. However, rigidity and stasis in real life stagnates and dies. So I began to try to see it as a dynamic system, as a tool or a ruler, as something alive-- like the living world I'm studying-- but I couldn't get much positive feedback for this (and saw lots of negative-- and, boy, does negativity make me want to just drop it like a bag of snakes). The complementary differences (linear and non, static and dynamic, particulars and wholes) have been facile in my mental life, but socially awkward. Like someone else said here, (I suppose) I'm expecting way too much out of it. I realized that where I rapidly departed from the "mainstream" is the dynamism and the nonlinear part, that emerges from complexity, that emerges from networks, that emerges from linearity, that emerges from particulars. I think people can "get" systems... but what about constantly evolving, changing systems? And the last thing I would do is to conform myself to just a single line of linear thought, or a static system, when I know I can go beyond it into the "complex adaptive systems". First, I am no crowd follower. Second, I like what I can do with my mind. Third, I'm way over the prospect of being guilty for being me. I also decided that I didn't just want to stop at intelligence as the ultimate-- I longed for wisdom, insight, and balance-- beyond intelligence. I know I'm intelligent-- but what next? Whether or not other places encourages or discourages how a person thinks is not even a meaningful thought to me because I find the entire notion of conforming one's thought processes to some group highly demeaning. I am not a Dell computer with a binary programming language installed. I enjoy thinking this complex way and I have absolutely no guilt for it at all... if "free mind" means anything...! However, I do think a lot (but not all) of people do respect this. No matter, I go my merry way. I *do* understand deeply by what you mean when you write "integration of different perspectives". I do it all the time-- I once asked someone if it was possible to be a "partialist" because for every thinker I've come across, I've agreed/disagreed anywhere from 0% to 12% to 55% to 90% (for example). I haven't agreed with a thinker 100%; & I probably won't, unless that thinker is me. Which is why, as a person who is creative anyway, I'm making my own philosophy. Why not? There has been no realistic, naturalistic, neuroscientifically sound, complex, dynamic, nonlinear systems philosophy of life. So why don't I just go ahead with it? ;) A writer who thinks this way is Stephen Jay Gould-- he writes about biology, history, evolution, scientists, theories, and sometimes baseball. I don't like baseball (but I do like statistics), and I don't agree with him on everything, but he's primarily a joy to read for people who can understand systematic thinking. Eventually, and I write this with foresight, I'm going the way of other complex thinkers and pushing myself even more to conceptualize multitudinous variables in layers of systems. More and more of my time will be taken up by understanding the complexity of the human brain, and eventually I won't even have an interest to slow down to just a linear approach. For the complexity stuff, I need my style of thinking at its utmost best-- where my goal is anyway!

The link is here: Visual Complexity. I've realized that there *are* people who think this way, and some of them apply such causal intuitions/reasoning in their heads to different areas such as economics, philosophy, science, marketing, aesthetics, etc. Most, however, are not anywhere near me, and I have 2 or 3 personal friends who can "get it". Most other people, I have to talk them through. However, unless people realize this about themselves and pipe up, Oists, or Oist-friendlies, generally do not think this way as far as I've known or read. I'd love to be proven wrong on this, though; Sciabarra has demonstrated that he can describe systems thinking. I figure that if one can describe it well such that someone else "gets it" because they do it, one can understand it. What's cool about being able to do this is that it's not a problem of being logical at all-- to me to think in linear fashion is hard only because it's boring and lacks depth, but I can do it-- it's the layering of logical lines into a network such that others have a hard time following. Not even all neuroscientists can think this way-- but I think eventually most have to; all fields of science within the past 50 years have gotten more "complex"; the brain is one of the most complex things in the known world. I've also noted that I am more linearly logical over at RoR and more freely imaginative or complex or artistic over here. It is so hard, sometimes, to be one or the other, when I'm both. This is what I'm talking about though, when I think I can use my "whole" brain instead of being "left-brained" or "right-brained" (all 3 terms used pop-science-y). Paul, it sounds like you think in complex systems.

Actually Paul, I do think of what you call "vortex". I'm reluctant to describe them because just describing what I already have seems a big chore for most people I communicate with-- in person or online. I'm not sure what people can grasp, so I take it step by step. I call your "vortices" "emergents"--- the different properties that arise out of a specific collection of particulars with specific interactions, seen as a whole. The texture of a cake. The shape of a wave. The processes of the brain. I can think of different emergents that arise when even one particular or interaction is changed-- but, on the other hand, it is possible that nothing would change. One example might be an avalanche, for the former. The latter example would be the human brain at the neuron level. I think I started to think this way from when I was a teenager (I remember seeing an interconnected network in my head at that 16-- I was so confused as to why I was connecting things and didn't know how to use it, control it, or map reality to it). However, I was too young to know what applications it had, especially since most of the world likes to see things as singular, linear paths. I've had to grow into it; I had snatches of it doing video production, design, and artwork, but this didn't gel so consciously until I took physiology and cell biology. I'm glad someone knows what I'm seeing/thinking/feeling/grasping/visualizing/conceptualizing as much as I do.

Actually-- I spent the 4th in upstate NY! With my parents, who were well asleep before midnight (I wasn't). And they live in the country too, so it was relatively quiet. I tried to take a picture of my scars, but this is the best I could do. It hurts to twist around like that still. I'm still taking Ibuprofen for the pain, and I had the surgery June 20th. Those crazy SFians-- always boring! ;)

In case anyone's curious, here's how I think I've been annoyed in that it was really hard for me to find thinkers who can conceive of particulars, interactions, and networks all at once; those people who can form a conceptual 3-D image in their minds to map knowledge and evidence and reality, who can come up with different mental models on the same topic, who can analogize between models while grounding themselves in reality, who can see that nature exists as discretes from one context and as continua in another. It's when both logic and creativity are combined; where it's possible to start from wholes to parts and parts to wholes, where there are not just one or two paths but 10, 15, or 20+. Because of this, I can understand why people would consider her contradictory because they are not considering her entire system as a whole. Because two things are opposites does not mean contradiction, or black-and-white would be in grave danger. On the other hand, those that take her every word literally, and only in one way, do not forge different structures from the same fundamentals-- all their buildings are the same, inside and out. It becomes cookie-cutter like, a landscape of one voice, one mind. One change for them would take it all apart. Maybe they can only see one structure... and then that's it. How sad, for reality-- nature-- is not rigid. Reality is immense, complex, dynamic, changing, growing, mysterious, layered, beautiful, and despite all this-- knowable in parts and pieces (it is up to us to integrate our knowledge, not destroy each other)-- and not simply black and white, forever and ever. There is gray and colors as well. With the same foundations, it is possible to build different buildings. I've realized that I don't have to take the same path as Rand from A-->B because B is not the *only* option. Thus it becomes deterministic, and simplifies what she at her best tried not to do. I make options on my own, much like she did, much like the immense individuality that comes when one considers #s of amino acids (starting points) to make how many million options? One thing I've realized that it's not that I should just follow what she said, but do what she did. And that is to make my own philosophy for myself, based on all the things I've lived through, observed, learned, etc. It is exactly what she did.

I'd say not to worry about it. That question has ceased to be of any real meaning to me. It's like wondering if I'm a real Christian or a real Scotsman: I'd rather save myself the headache and consider it all well and done with by knowing that I am me.

I take forgiveness as this: people who don't forgive have no conception that people have potential to grow, change, learn, and become wise. People who don't forgive, or find it very hard to do so, have no real respect for human potential for good. And as always, if a person wants people to forgive them because they've learned, then it goes the other way too.

Wow, I just found this thread today! Thanks, WSScherk! It's really neat to see what kinds of categories this test has, & to see who thinks they fit or don't fit their profiles. My four letter temperament changes too much for it to be definitive. I'm an Independent Leader. Independent-- yes, very. Leader? I've never actually thought about wanting to lead anyone, actually-- my style is free spirited, I lead myself, and I just think and DO my own things regardless of the crowd.

I like this. There's a story in it, and a sense of a bond.

Hm, Firecracker seems appropriate for today's celebrations! I wrote a short posting on my celebration of Independence Day. How is everyone else celebrating? Happy 4th everyone!

I'm reading The Big Book of Concepts by Gregory Murphy and it goes into some detail into concept formation research. From what I'm getting, there are concepts and categories that are more hardlined with a defined boundary-- like in math, which has connetions to logic-- while in other areas there are fuzzy boundaries, as when it comes to qualitative descriptions such as "warm", or "lengthy". So, no, just going by the classical view of concept/category formation is not realistic. And this subject in re: to cognitive science is actually old news, as 20+ years of research has taken place; not to mention neuroscience has been blossoming.

Paul-- I agree with you. Before/as one is being taught autonomy, critical thinking, etc., one must be psychologically balanced as a person as well. If anything is to come out of a human being's mind, that human being would be better served if the mind was healthy if what's to come out is a philosophy of rationality, life, and joy for that person.

I think most, if not all, of us know a lot of factors that are behind the "religious" take on Objectivism. I'd like to see it grow into a philosophy that I wouldn't mind calling myself a more complete admirer of, so now I'm wondering what are some suggestions to "heal" whatever errors have been made in the past and currently? Obviously, it's more than just a list of "don'ts"-- I think don't are easy to say but extremely hard to do. Perhaps a more understanding and balanced approach to application would work where individuals can remain so without the usual memorize-regurgitate factor; and be helped to come up with their own ideas fearlessly. But ultimately, I'm sticking to my main suggestion: that before Objectivism is taught, independence of thought, self-esteem, and critical thinking need to be developed first.

"If you take her ideas, then take them farther in your own mind, you can find answers to pretty well everything on an individual basis." If you take anyone's good ideas-- and further them on your own, then answers are pretty easy to find! This quote is so true from personal experience-- and I'm loving being able to think through to answers to everything, even if I disagree with every major thinker out there (which I do, and gives me the pleasure of being an individual).

Is it strange to oscillate between several types depending on circumstance? I don't have a type especially, since I am 50/50 or pretty near to it on a couple of the domains...

I second that! I'd love to research into group dynamics in the future with neuroscience. Well said, and I feel like I'm trying to say this all the time to everyone around me. It's nice to find it understood already. Would be blasphemous to say "Amen to that" on an Oist forum? ;)

I got a 17-- average-- where most people score, except I score where the men score usually. Oliver Sacks wrote some stories on autism-- especially musical or numerically inclined autism. But in general, his books are very human, very interesting, and very insightful. He's also a good writer and you can tell he's very observant and caring through his words and descriptions.