"If I am feeling something and I cannot tell you it clearly in words, why then, I am harbouring a lie, yes? Root it out!"
I think, for me at least, that is the clear warning that the course is wrong. If people praise intuition, I habitually respond with all the very real reasons to be suspicious of it. An immune system is a thing of terri…
"If I am feeling something and I cannot tell you it clearly in words, why then, I am harbouring a lie, yes? Root it out!"
I think, for me at least, that is the clear warning that the course is wrong. If people praise intuition, I habitually respond with all the very real reasons to be suspicious of it. An immune system is a thing of terrifying savagery, after all; like a jungle trying to kill you. And they can overreact horribly. I immediately think of people whose intuition tells them things about black people, gay people, women, etc.
But I think those valid concerns are a distraction when it gets to this point - and it so easily does. When you are straight up saying something *cannot exist* because you can't describe or explain it, then I think you've betrayed science even more than you've betrayed yourself. It doesn't match anybody's principles, only habits.
I am sorry Nicholas, I don't follow what you are saying. An immune system is a normal part of living beings, like eating, drinking, movement or sleeping. Interfere with any of these and the creature suffers. Eating requires plants, fungi and animals to die for us to be nourished. I see this as an entirely normal part of the natural process, and, like the immune system, not at all a 'terrible savagery'. By intuition I do not mean 'fantasies and projections based on prejudices'. I mean subtle, non verbal senses of the reality of a situation. Intuition makes you feel uncomfortable. Fantasies make you feel secure / righteous / justified. People don't seem to praise real intuition. People mistake assumptions and emotions for intuition. I have done so, even recently, and have learned much from it. I am not sure who these people you mention who are praising intuition are, but then I don't watch TV or follow popular culture, so I am probably out of touch.
Personally, the times I have strongly overridden my intuition, I have been physically or verbally attacked, almost died in landslides, a raging river or fires, or by infection, amongst other ill outcomes. My organism seeks to persist. This is not cruel, it is a good and proper function of part of the living universe. I am grateful for my intuition and now treat it with more respect, and train it by paying close attention to outcomes after the heat of the moment has passed, critiquing and refining it, I hope. I also use it to protect those I love, not just myself. This is what any parent does (or should do), and it is adaptive (and dare I say it?), good. It is the basis of how we learn to care for others, when times are such that we can put down our immediate fear of the moment and include others in a widening circle of loving attention.
Sorry for not being clear. The spirit in which I was commenting was, overall: "Here is why I can reject appeals to listen to intuition. Here is an obvious reason why I shouldn't." For better or for worse, I'm able to doubt the argument that goes 'my intuition has saved my life.' I am able to doubt many other arguments which talk about what intuition can do in the world and get lost in debating the pros and cons.
What I am *sure* is wrong, with both halves of my brain, is to say 'this thing that I feel: I must ignore it, it can't be in any way real, it must be a lie because I cannot explain it.' That just doesn't make any sense. It defies logic. It's highly unscientific because, while doubt is essential to science, denial is certainly not. So I was singling out that sentence: "...why then I am harbouring a lie, yes? Root it out!" because I can be confident this argument is wrong. Even at times I would be inclined to dismiss any talk of intuition as fantasies, I can still be sure (if I remember to think about it) that this argument is wrong. I, personally, need to remember that.
Immune systems: well of course they are necessary. I think they are also savage. You can't be vegan or pacifist enough to not have an immune system. I can't see 'a good and proper function of part of the living universe' and 'cruel' as mutually exclusive things. Otherwise I will have to go round judging lions and orcas and ichneumons and forming a declawed Eden in my mind. And immune systems do sometimes attack the 'wrong' things (in our judgement), causing suffering and death to human beings. We die very quickly without them but that doesn't mean they are perfect. Right?
"If I am feeling something and I cannot tell you it clearly in words, why then, I am harbouring a lie, yes? Root it out!"
I think, for me at least, that is the clear warning that the course is wrong. If people praise intuition, I habitually respond with all the very real reasons to be suspicious of it. An immune system is a thing of terrifying savagery, after all; like a jungle trying to kill you. And they can overreact horribly. I immediately think of people whose intuition tells them things about black people, gay people, women, etc.
But I think those valid concerns are a distraction when it gets to this point - and it so easily does. When you are straight up saying something *cannot exist* because you can't describe or explain it, then I think you've betrayed science even more than you've betrayed yourself. It doesn't match anybody's principles, only habits.
I am sorry Nicholas, I don't follow what you are saying. An immune system is a normal part of living beings, like eating, drinking, movement or sleeping. Interfere with any of these and the creature suffers. Eating requires plants, fungi and animals to die for us to be nourished. I see this as an entirely normal part of the natural process, and, like the immune system, not at all a 'terrible savagery'. By intuition I do not mean 'fantasies and projections based on prejudices'. I mean subtle, non verbal senses of the reality of a situation. Intuition makes you feel uncomfortable. Fantasies make you feel secure / righteous / justified. People don't seem to praise real intuition. People mistake assumptions and emotions for intuition. I have done so, even recently, and have learned much from it. I am not sure who these people you mention who are praising intuition are, but then I don't watch TV or follow popular culture, so I am probably out of touch.
Personally, the times I have strongly overridden my intuition, I have been physically or verbally attacked, almost died in landslides, a raging river or fires, or by infection, amongst other ill outcomes. My organism seeks to persist. This is not cruel, it is a good and proper function of part of the living universe. I am grateful for my intuition and now treat it with more respect, and train it by paying close attention to outcomes after the heat of the moment has passed, critiquing and refining it, I hope. I also use it to protect those I love, not just myself. This is what any parent does (or should do), and it is adaptive (and dare I say it?), good. It is the basis of how we learn to care for others, when times are such that we can put down our immediate fear of the moment and include others in a widening circle of loving attention.
Sorry for not being clear. The spirit in which I was commenting was, overall: "Here is why I can reject appeals to listen to intuition. Here is an obvious reason why I shouldn't." For better or for worse, I'm able to doubt the argument that goes 'my intuition has saved my life.' I am able to doubt many other arguments which talk about what intuition can do in the world and get lost in debating the pros and cons.
What I am *sure* is wrong, with both halves of my brain, is to say 'this thing that I feel: I must ignore it, it can't be in any way real, it must be a lie because I cannot explain it.' That just doesn't make any sense. It defies logic. It's highly unscientific because, while doubt is essential to science, denial is certainly not. So I was singling out that sentence: "...why then I am harbouring a lie, yes? Root it out!" because I can be confident this argument is wrong. Even at times I would be inclined to dismiss any talk of intuition as fantasies, I can still be sure (if I remember to think about it) that this argument is wrong. I, personally, need to remember that.
Immune systems: well of course they are necessary. I think they are also savage. You can't be vegan or pacifist enough to not have an immune system. I can't see 'a good and proper function of part of the living universe' and 'cruel' as mutually exclusive things. Otherwise I will have to go round judging lions and orcas and ichneumons and forming a declawed Eden in my mind. And immune systems do sometimes attack the 'wrong' things (in our judgement), causing suffering and death to human beings. We die very quickly without them but that doesn't mean they are perfect. Right?
Yes to all this. No declawed Eden. Also, no such thing as 'perfect', as no place to stand and say 'that is perfect' from.