Abstracts vs Actualities: What Do You "Know" is "Happening?"

"The Tilled Field", Joan Miro, Oil on Canvas 1924

If you haven't already, read PART 1 of this particular series HERE. Everything will make much more sense. If not, carry on, and let the confusion hopefully inspire you to new heights of philosophical self-inquiry.

What's "Happening"?

YOU ARE. "Reality", as only YOU can define is, IS happening right now. Understand that "reality" requires consciousness to qualify it as "reality" in the first place. Minus conscious awareness there is no "reality". Anyone that attempts to argue otherwise is using irrational (contradictory) logic. Contradiction is not knowledge, nor "truth", whatever that may be. It's contradiction, and that sums 0.

(ASIDE - If you want to argue consciousness is an illusion, I'll rationally ask you to please explain "an illusion of what?" You might reply "of reality". This implies you have empirical knowledge and evidence of a reality existing somewhere that is the base layer projection for this illusion, which begs even more rational questions. Meet me in the comments for that stuff.)

Consciousness is a prerequisite for claiming "reality" is "reality", and consciousness is NOW. Always NOW. Absolutely NOW. When is consciousness? Consciousness is NOW. Kind of a funny way to think about it, but that's exactly what it is. NOW.

What Do You "Know", for Certain?

Your consciousness is the only thing you've ever actually known for certain; you are conscious/self-aware. This is key to understanding how to appropriately apply the concept of balance into a useful tool, that actually yields measurable (and pleasurable) results to your life and experiences.

Ontologically (not just psychologically), there is nothing outside of the "present". Your "projections" about what took place in the past, or what may or may not happen in the future, are just that; projections. 

People love to call each other delusional for a variety of things, but this right here takes the cake; projecting your awareness outside of the present moment directly dilutes your actual ontological relationship with what's happening. 

You ARE, and You ARE (Happening) NOW

The word "happening" implies NOW. NOW-ness. 

Everything you've ever experienced since you can recall becoming self-aware, is happening right now. Even the language used to describe that is a concept; an abstraction, not an actual. It exists only in the mind of the observer. 

The conscious, self-aware agent using that very self-aware consciousness to conceive concepts that are useful for the mastery of its environment...The only thing that exists to give anything meaning in the first place is YOU. YOU (SELF) exist, and you exist absolutely. The only constant is you as an existential singularity; consciousness is the ability to conceive concepts in the first place. This cannot be overstated. 

Rationally, it then follows that the only constant is your self-awareness, your consciousness. 

Everything you "know" is relative to this existential singularity anchoring of awareness. 

Epistemologically you don't know shit other than YOU ARE YOU, and OTHER THINGS ARE NOT YOU. This is where it all starts.

The World is an Ideological Shopping Mall of Contradiction as "Fact (I.E. "Truth")"

To continue to sleepwalk via treating concepts as real (Plato's Big Fuck Up) vs appropriating them as descriptions, not determinative of ontological reality is to thus elevate those concepts over reality itself. 

Welcome to insanity. 

This just so happens to be how the modern world functions without so much as a second thought.

Yes, they call those of us who refuse to settle for contradiction, paradox, and mystery as legitimate rational explanations for reality are the insane, conspiratorial, schizo ones. 

I don't settle for that bullshit, and neither should you if you've read this far. 

Come get a hot cup of coffee (or tea, juice, water, etc.) and a breather, you've fucking earned it.

Part 3 of this series is already written and being edited now. Stay tuned. Most importantly...

Stay rational, stay sane.

-Loaded Shaman

Why Truth is Like Panning for Gold

The following is an article I wrote for another blog, and rightfully re-posted here:

Axiom #1: That which is True DOES NOT CONTRADICT.

CONTRADICTIONS can be physical (evidence) or psychological (broken logic), but they are CONTRADICTIONS none the less. What remains after working through CONTRADICTIONS is thus NON-CONTRADICTORY, and thus MUST IN FACT BE TRUE/TRUTH relative to the context of any situation, circumstance, or given set(s) of information. Why? Again, remember: whatever IS TRUE, by definition, NEVER CONTRADICTS. This process is analogous to panning for GOLD: you sift away the excess "NOT GOLD" (I.E the sand, dirt, glass, and other assorted bullshit), and what remains can only be GOLD (True/Truth).

What Tools Are You Using?

Most people's minds are like sifts that have way too big of holes. Thus all the gold - that which is actually TRUE for any given set of information, situations, circumstances, and/or contexts - slips through with the rest of the sand ("Throwing the baby out with the bathwater"). The difference between True and not-True is impossible to perceive, because the gaps in your sift (or net, etc.) are too big to capture anything new or useful. It makes discerning anything True indistinguishable from not-True.

Some people fall for the opposite trap and have too tight/small of holes in their sift. They trap the gold, sure...but they also still retain most, if not all, of the sand. Any gold retained is obscured by CONTRADICTION (bullshit), and is thus effectively useless for personal progress. This is the same thing as letting the gold escape. You still can't tell the actual difference between what's sand and what's gold without "digging deeper" to uncover your "nuggets of wisdom". The reason for the "These hole are too big/too small" phenomena is entirely due to the presence of CONTRADICTION - I.E. not-Truth - SOMEWHERE IN THE PERSON'S CURRENT CHAIN OF REASONING.

To ignore, marginalize, or outright double-down against this fact is to compound one's own ignorance with massive error.

Your Ability to REASON is Your Ultimate Tool for Knowledge & Personal Growth

Reason = conceptual consistency.

Your access to Truth - whatever the hell that may be for any given context, circumstance, or given set(s) of information - is an ABSOLUTE function of the QUALITY OF YOUR ABILITY TO REASON. The only thing actually preventing you from receiving the raw data of reality, as truthfully as you can possibly understand, relate to, and use it, is your ability to use REASON. TL;DR: the stronger your ability to reason, the less susceptible you are to bullshit, lies, and manipulation.

Until you have a proper "filter" - I.E. A SOLID EPISTEMOLOGY (How do we know what we know, and how do we know what we know is valid and useful?) in place, you'll never have the correct size holes in your sift to access Truth, and thus understand its genuine efficacy (actual usefulness and application) in your life.

People in positions of authority, whom are bullshitting you, won't set off your bullshit detector because you foolishly equate authority = integrity = truth. You've been fooled into letting anyone and everyone whom ISN'T YOU act as your "filter" or "sift", instead of genuinely understanding how to think for yourself, and thus PROGRESS YOURSELF. This is analogous to trying to have a phone conversation with a third party in between you and your guest, relaying what each of you is saying to the other. It's not a clear-cut path to what's actually going on; there's a "filter" in the way of the raw data attempting to come through.

That "third party" is your pre-programmed epistemology: your unconscious assumption that any knowledge uncovered by other people, especially in positions of perceived authority (I.E. "Scientists have measured this and proved it, it's a non-discussion", "The government wouldn't plan to sabotage its own citizens) is infallible and trustworthy. It is the extremely dangerous assumption that other people's knowledge is not only accurate, but also more accurate than your present capability of understanding what may or may not actually be going on with and in this crazy world. Compound this with the fallacy of group consensus (experts all agree claim X is true, despite being riddled with contradiction), and you have a veritable clusterfuck of psychological and spiritual smoke and mirrors.

You're Stuck Because You've Been Conditioned to Operate Unreasonably (Inconsistently)

Until you learn how to properly REASON with information and claims - how to sort what's bullshit from what's valid -  all personal development, mind hacks, business tricks, and relationship help in the world will not save you. You are stuck because you require a fundamental shift in your root assumptions, of which are presently analogous to writing philosophical checks that reality can't actually cash...because they contain CONTRADICTIONS. These CONTRADICTIONS cause seemingly-random anxiety that can manifest as stress, procrastination, etc. You have internal blocks which are CONTRADICTORY, and the part of you that matters the most knows this. Try driving your car while hitting the gas and the brakes at the same time. This is why you're actually stuck/experiencing resistance in life.

The purpose of this site is to help you figure out the optimal size holes for your gold-panning (Personal Growth) endeavors. To have the presence of a single false hood (I.E. CONTRADICTION) in your reasoning is to poison the proceeding logic, and thus poison the entire thing. Any extension of an absolute is also itself an absolute.

There are no "degrees of Truth". It either CONTRADICTS itself, or it doesn't. No combination of Truth with CONTRADICTION (Not-Truth) will ever yield raw Truth. Too much sugar spoils the entire batch.

Before you can even logic something, you have to have a reason for trying to combine those two things into a logical statement or claim. The process starts on the level of REASON, and if you have flawed REASONING, all of your logic will likewise be flawed. Why? Again, because any extension of an absolute is also itself an absolute. Thus, the ability to understand Truth, as it could ever exist or be applicably useful to make positive changes in your life, is a function of your ability to REASON. Fashion your sift, and prepare to uncover the treasures within and around you.

Stay rational, stay sane.

-Loaded Shaman

The Identical Twin Metaphysics of Theology and Scientific Determinism

The only difference is the terminology (wrapping paper) used.

Theology = Infinite Causal Absolute (God's creation).

Physics (Mathematics, Natural Law) = Infinite Causal Absolute (Big Bang).

That which is a logical extension of an absolute, is that absolute.

It can't be otherwise. If you can explain this without contradicting either the definitions of the words you're using, or the logic you're using, I'm all ears. I've yet to hear a rational argument that doesn't involve either of those two things. This is why I feel this stuff is so, so important.

The contradiction should be obvious, but it isn't because of hundreds of years of Platonic "reasoning" being accepted as "rational thinking". You cannot have an infinite absolute that creates or causes anything outside or beyond itself by definition. This is a perfect example of people using incorrect language to seal themselves off from already-challenging mental work. You are either free to choose or you are an extension of whatever caused you. There is no in between. It is absolute because you're an extension of what you're logically claiming to argue from. It works in funny ways because either you have to admit that you are god, by extension, or that you're nothing, by extension. The logic will always, always double back no matter how you try to dodge it, like water naturally seeking its level.

My argument is uncomfortably rational. My Philosophical Chain of command has no contradictions, and thus must in fact actually be a compass toward what's true, whatever that means and whatever it is. This is because it doesn't contradict. Whatever is left after contradiction is dealt with, no matter how "unlikely", must be more accurate than what was previously assumed. This is called building a true progressively rational paradigm of observable reality. There will be an entire article series on this. For now, I leave you with the following thought exercise:


Two Questions For You, The Reader

1. Who created God? 

2. What was before the Big Bang?

BONUS question: WHERE AND WHEN was time BEFORE the Big Bang?

Can you answer those questions rationally in the comments below, or are you mentally blindsided into accepting contradiction, mystery, and "paradox" as explanations for what we as human beings observe?

Stay rational, stay sane.

-Loaded Shaman

Information is NOT Knowledge Part 1

"Information isn't knowledge. Knowledge is information with a commensurate amount of experience to go along with it." -Al Snow

In this day and age, we're drowning in information. The real question is, what's the quality of any said piece of information at any given moment? How can you tell what's "shit" from what's "legit"? 

Who decides? 

Who can you trust? 

What sources aren't trying to deceive people for some sort of gain, be it monetary, political, or both?

The answer is rooted in understanding and reaching a rational EPISTEMOLOGY - HOW you "know what you know" is actually valid. 

The majority of human beings on this planet substitute rational epistemology for arguments rooted in authority (scientists have this all figure out). 

The reason these people have to argue via fallacy is because their root assumptions contain contradictions. Ingredients that don't belong. There is nothing to make sense out of because you have nothing to begin with. Multiply anything by 0 and see what you get.

In general people are going to be clueless that they're either abiding by or violating rational consistency, let alone where in the philosophical chain that actually IS - and how to rectify it rationally:

Metaphysic > Epistemology > Ethic > Politic > Aesthetic.

Let's use baking bread as an example.


What The F#*% Are You "Baking"?!

Could you take the ingredients used to make bread - flour, water, sugar, yeast - eat each one separately, and get the same nutritional value of those ingredients separated, as you would if they were combined into a successful loaf of bread? 

Technically yes, but you're going to have an incredible stomach ache in the process. 

This process is contradictory to health and nutrition despite containing ingredients which should feed you. 

This is an example of the correct information being applied incorrectly due to lack of experience (Part 2 is all about this portion). 

Now this isn't so bad because you already have the correct information, but you just need the experience to put it all together correctly. It's an obvious two-step process that creates a third step that transcends both steps via the genuine Knowledge created by the combination of that initial information, and the proper experience to correct your actions/behaviors accordingly.

The reason I use this example first is this is best case. Most people aren't only NOT using the correct ingredients to bake their bread, they're using foreign objects, then claiming those foreign objects are indeed yeast, flour, and sugar. They are also so programmed by contradiction they eat their own bread and convince themselves that it's bread, instead of the reality of sugar, rusty nails, a little flour, some sawdust, and glue. 

My friends, that information is not only completely irrational, it's nowhere near Knowledge.

Replace "Bread" with "Rational Philosophy"

Instead of flour, sugar, water, yeast, think metaphysic, epistemology, ethic, politic, like the previous section:

Metaphysic > Epistemology > Ethic > Politic > Aesthetic. 

When those ingredients - those "steps"- don't contradict, at all, you have solid philosophical position. 

You're "baking the bread correctly", so to speak. 

You're arguing a RATIONAL PHILOSOPHY (the entire point of this blog)!

Philosophically, many claim to be making bread, but they're actually using completely foreign objects (I.E. contradiction) in place of every correct (rational, I.E. non-contradictory) philosophical ingredient. 

Most people are substituting yeast with rusty nails, and are unable to tell the difference because everything is infinitely relative to them...because they have BOTH a contradiction somewhere in their reasoning...AND they lack the commensurate amount of experience, study, etc. to correct it.

Then, when someone else - someone with experience, and thus genuine Knowledge of this same situation/topic/etc. - bites into their bread and kindly alerts them to the fact that there are rusty nails in their bread, instead of conceding and and thanking you for enlightening them, they double down and instead argue that you don't actually know what you're tasting, and science has used this method and it works, and is thus the most valid, accurate form of information, and thus knowledge. 

Scientists have been baking bread with nails in place of yeast because that's how it is because science says so. 

Circular reasoning city. 

Circular reasoning is the only reasoning because there is no rational reason.

Their metaphysic contradicts, their epistemology is incomplete, and thus their ethic and politic are flawed by extension. 

Start with the wrong ingredients, get the wrong result. 

This is plain as day obvious when baking, but not so much when dealing with the mind. 

So, how the hell do we know what's going on here? 

How do we course correct? 

The first step is understanding and accepting that not all ingredients - information - is/are equal, and then learning how to discern the correct ingredients so you bake an indestructible philosophy that will feed yourself and the masses, for life, in terms of "philosophical nutrition".

Stay tuned for the next several parts of this article series as we delve into just how to combat this bullshit...rationally.