Cell Intelligence in Physiological & Morphological Spaces

[Federica]

I don't think that's the reason, though, but I suspect it's more the length of the post combined with the fact it points directly at the core issue and forces ML to confront a severe inner contradiction (the Guardian).

Well, Ashvin, in your comment you told him that his constrained intellectual thoughts are unreliable because steered by many unknown factors. Then you mentioned moral capacities, and that we are not in the best position to get the purity and completeness of phenomena. Then you added that we may have secret desires when doing research. And that we should be careful to avoid judgments and premature conclusions, as much as possible. To conclude, you “guessed” the appropriate new direction for his future research, once he’s ready (“eventually”) to be open to a more intimate way.


In all fairness - and though I don’t sympathize with Levin’s perspective - what for anything could he have answered to that? As you say, you forced him to face the inner contradictions, yes well you put it in a corner, but in a voice that not only is non deferential (lecturing?) but also inevitably remains cryptic, without the extensive explanations. What I am saying is, at that point, it was too late to invite Cleric. I think it’s obvious.

Federica,

This reminds me of the commentators who have never played the sport they are commentating on who are nevertheless always second-guessing the coaches and players, criticizing their strategies and decisions Maybe it would be more productive to redirect your inexhaustible energy toward critical opinions of our approaches and wordings toward learning the game and playing it yourself?

What I'm saying is that it doesn't matter at all whether my comment killed the track or not, whether your opinions happen to align with the objective situation or not, because that's all an unproductive focus on first-order content which will leave you in the same position. Whenever Cleric and I discuss these things, it's not to dissect and analyze the wordings and approaches involved, to find some rational foundation that justifies our opinionating and argumentative curvatures, but to become more inwardly sensitive to the archetypal thinking and feeling tendencies that live within all of us and come to expression in various ways. Even if the opinion occurs to us (as it surely does) that someone else's post could have been worded better, toned better, shortened or lengthened, etc., it doesn't occur to us to bring this up, because we know that serves no productive purpose and is only a temptation of lower impulses.

Do you think there is anything you could possibly learn from this?

Cleric first offered his comment just to help us orient to some of the issues involved, and you took that as an invitation to critically opinionate on its "lack of context". Fine, it's not like I think it is completely out of bounds to offer your opinion or that we can't possibly learn from it, but you should also try to take notice of this habit. Then, when I gave more context, the opinion switched from "lack of context" to "Ashvin killed the track". Great, another sideline commentary on the plays which fails to learn from the first instance of offering an opinion without context. Instead of this repetitive opinionating pattern, you could focus more on sensitizing to the underlying thinking habits at work like you did with the recursive mathematical analogy. Then you would soon find yourself in a position to experiment with "new comments of the same length" on ML's blog and see what happens.

You are truly incredible Ashvin It's crazy how you cannot stop yourself from making assumptions and taking such paternalistic stance. This is another opinion I express - sure it is. And I entirely own it. Not only does it take 0,01% of my spiritual development time (that you know nothing about, but still think you somehow know, can measure, and feel entitled to criticize) but also, and more importantly, I think it has a precise function, although you don't seem to even remotely think it could have one. But just consider:


1. Cleric not only shared his comment to Levin, but also spoke of the difficulty reaching out to people in writing. He said: "Of course, he did not reply. Who knows if he even read it. It's understandable because it turned out quite long, but I couldn't find a way to convey in a more compressed way these things. So we have something like the dilemma with FB: people want short messages but these can be endlessly deflected since they need to be substantiated from many sides. Without this, one attacks one of the sides and the conversation keeps skimming along the surface. On the other hand, if it is substantiated from the needed sides it becomes at least several paragraphs long and the other party simply says TLDR."
And I shared my opinion in response to exactly these concerns. The reason is, of course, because I hope it can help more people, and the right people, be exposed to the content of his posts. Since he thinks the comment didn't get an answer because it was too long, I want to present him with the alternative reason, which for me is obvious, that it's not at all because of length. The true reason for no answer is that, at that point, there was nobody alive on the receiver side. I think this is very important, lest he starts writing shorter comments and posts, which in my opinion would be a great pity. You seem completely insensitive to all that. But hopefully not everyone else is. Is all this a sideline? Sure, with respect to the topic of higher cognition it surely is. But then even the quoted note by Cleric is the exact same type of sideline. Yet, he shared that spontaneously, in response to a post where I was only speaking of center lines.


2. Speaking of resisting tendencies, what do you say about your tendency to write and write and write, and again write? Do you contain it sometimes? Since you doubt that I do anything to resist my own tendencies, please know that I have actually resisted writing plenty of times here. And a truly careful observer - rather than one who can't resist patronizing tendencies - would have noticed that.


3. What do you mean I "never played the sport"? It's remarkable how you think you have in check what content I interact with. Truly incredible By the way, if you even just refreshed your short memory, you could at least recall BK's blog, Masi's and more. Yes it's far from easy to have these exchanges in a fruitful way, I admit that of course. Precisely because I have tried it myself.


By the way, please don't worry about me and how I spend my time, and whether I spend too much time "opinionating". Besides the 10 minutes spent writing about these "sidelines" I can assure you I have spent hours and hours without any opinionating, away from the forum, facebook degraded groups, substacks, and other media. So would you please correct your unwarranted assumptions, statements, accusations, and similar? Thank you

[AshvinP]

By the way, please don't worry about me and how I spend my time, and whether I spend too much time "opinionating". Besides the 10 minutes spent writing about these "sidelines" I can assure you I have spent hours and hours without any opinionating, away from the forum, facebook degraded groups, substacks, and other media. So would you please correct your unwarranted assumptions, statements, accusations, and similar? Thank you

I have to worry because it dominates your activity on this forum, especially in relation to my posts. I am not offended at your posts but disappointed at such a continual waste of potential. It pains me to see how often people put major obstacles in their own way of spiritual development, including myself as I flow with various habits. Yet both you and I have been given, through Divine karmic threads that led us to this forum, the unparalleled opportunity to become conscious of this tendency, resist it, and modulate it. If you are really putting in the resistance work outside this forum, then it shouldn't be so difficult to be a better sport on the forum and contribute to the creative inner exploration without arguing about every little point.

Instead, you keep seeking out ways to start arguments with me based on your personal opinions and 'sensitivities' (not just me, but mostly me since I have interacted the most with your posts). It's obvious that 90% of your forum activity has become to seek ways of blaming me for something, questioning my posts/quotes and the terminology used, or contradicting me on some point or another. In your response to Cleric, you questioned Levin's intuitive insight and openness to experiencing inner gestures for no other reason than to contradict what I said, even though this entire thread has been a testimony to that intuitive thinking and the 'fertile ideas' he has reached, above and beyond most other thinkers. We can see plenty of evidence of that again in this Q&A with BK (the different modes of thinking through the questions are on clear display, although to his credit, BK actually raises this exact issue about 'organizing principles' around 38 min), which I may add some more comments on later.

The point is, instead of standing on the sidelines and poo-pooing the paragraphs-long efforts of other people to communicate extremely unorthodox ideas and telling them to find new ways of communicating, try to do it yourself and lead by example.

[AshvinP]

The point is, instead of standing on the sidelines and poo-pooing the paragraphs-long efforts of other people to communicate extremely unorthodox ideas and telling them to find new ways of communicating, try to do it yourself and lead by example.

In fact, if you could just elaborate on how specifically you would modify my 2nd post to address the same or similar ideas and lead in the same direction, but in a more 'deferential' way that could invite more engagement, that could be helpful and I would be grateful for the effort and potentially new insights.

[Federica]

Ashvin,
I'll be very brief because, indeed, these things should take minimal amount of time. Here's an exercise for you: read again your posts of the day and find out:
1. Where you blatantly self contradicted yourself
2. Where you made false (I precisely mean false) statements (without bothering rectifying or acknowledging anything)
3. Where you let yourself make convenient assumptions though, if you are honest (one may wonder by now) you must admit you don't know.
As sad as it may look, there are apparent cases (the careful reader could find most of them) of all three. If you find at least 2 it would already be a great exercise.

[Federica]

In fact, if you could just elaborate on how specifically you would modify my 2nd post to address the same or similar ideas and lead in the same direction, but in a more 'deferential' way that could invite more engagement, that could be helpful and I would be grateful for the effort and potentially new insights.

What you suggest is not possible, Ashvin. A month ago, it was too late to invite someone else into your fully condensed thoughts addressed to Levin, and it is still too late today. And yes, you are right, it was on BKs blog that this same pattern unfolded a few months prior, when you first did your thing, formed your thoughts, brought them to conclusion, and then, invited Cleric to weigh in, under the closed framework of your precipitated landscape. Can you see these are invitations to the past? Invitations into your past? It's not apporpriate to materialize a fully scripted scenario of your liking, and then ask people to come in, comply with your curvatures, and operate under your command. Will you ever understand that?

In the same way, you can’t ask me now to "elaborate" on your post to Levin “to address the same or similar ideas and lead in the same direction” but with a different style. I see you are making an effort while writing this, but in this form it doesn’t help. Is it so difficult to understand that you can't sport this command & control type of approach? By the way, as I said above, my critique was not that your post was inappropriate. As I wrote - it might have excaped you, but I did - your post was not inappropriate. To be fair, I have also been too direct in comments, be them to BK, Masi, Kutzler, Linnell, and others. What I criticize are not your critical comments per se. It's your invitations to the past.

And I think that pointing this out can be helpful. This is the only reason why I am doing it. If the reason was to disagree with you, don’t worry, there have been many other chances I could have jumped on. But I didn’t. And please note: I reopened this thread to say that ML’s approach was unfortunately getting flat and that he was in the blindspot - to which Cleric concurred. At that point, it is you, not me, who jumped in to disagree. You came in to say that ML is not in the blind spot, that he is open to this and that, thinking gestures, and so on and so forth. So please be objective. And if you look dispassionately at recent posts, there is repeated evidence of this same pattern to be found. I really hope this will usefully close this cumbersome and painful topic, and that we can move on, as you also wish, to something more central to spiritual development. I will look at the link you provided above and see if it sheds new light on Levins perspective.

[AshvinP]

In fact, if you could just elaborate on how specifically you would modify my 2nd post to address the same or similar ideas and lead in the same direction, but in a more 'deferential' way that could invite more engagement, that could be helpful and I would be grateful for the effort and potentially new insights.

What you suggest is not possible, Ashvin. A month ago, it was too late to invite someone else into your fully condensed thoughts addressed to Levin, and it is still too late today. And yes, you are right, it was on BKs blog that this same pattern unfolded a few months prior, when you first did your thing, formed your thoughts, brought them to conclusion, and then, invited Cleric to weigh in, under the closed framework of your precipitated landscape. Can you see these are invitations to the past? Invitations into your past? It's not apporpriate to materialize a fully scripted scenario of your liking, and then ask people to come in, comply with your curvatures, and operate under your command. Will you ever understand that?

In the same way, you can’t ask me now to "elaborate" on your post to Levin “to address the same or similar ideas and lead in the same direction” but with a different style. I see you are making an effort while writing this, but in this form it doesn’t help.
Is it so difficult to understand that you can't sport this type of command & control type of approach? By the way, as I said above, my critique was not that your post was inappropriate. I As I wrote - it might have excaped you, but I did - your post was not inappropriate. To be fair, I have also been too direct in comments, be them to BK, Masi, Kutzler, Linnell, and others. What I criticize are not your critical comments per se. It is your invitations to the past.

And I think that pointing this out can be helpful. This is the only reason why I am doing it. If the reason was to disagree with you, don’t worry, there have been many other chances I could have jumped on. But I didn’t. And please note: I reopened this thread to say that ML’s approach was unfortunately getting flat and that he was in the blindspot - to which Cleric concurred. At that point, it is you, not me, who jumped in to disagree. You came in to say that ML is not in the blind spot, that he is open to this and that, thinking gestures, and so on and so forth. So please be objective. And if you look dispassionately at recent posts, there is repeated evidence of this same pattern to be found. I really hope this will usefully close this cumbersome and painful topic, and that we can move on, as you also wish, to something more central to spiritual development. I will look at the link you provided above and see if it sheds new light on Levins perspective.

That's fine, Federica, I have noted your concerns about my attempts to dialogue with BK, Levin, etc. I understand how, from your perspective, it feels like I am "inviting to the past" by the way in which I am wording, toning, etc. my posts and that this "kills the track" of further dialogue.

But do you see how neither I nor anyone else can learn anything from this general critique? I am not asking you to rectify the Levin situation with another post, but to put some effort into exemplifying for us a more productive way of engaging with someone like Levin. This is for our benefit right here and now, not Levin or anyone else for the moment. If you insist on making the critique, I would ask that you also make an attempt to show us a better way of "inviting to the future" instead of the past.

By the way, I never disagreed with Cleric or you that Levin is flattening the higher-order organizing principles onto the intellectual plane. That is something people do by default and Levin has not overcome that yet. In fact, I had missed that in the earlier dialogue with BK and Cleric brought it to my attention. I never said "ML is not in the blind spot" and, overall, I have no interest in trying to establish some conclusive judgments about what ML is or isn't doing, or about the "correct" way to dialogue with him - everything I write is only a means of loosely exploring the inner habits that we repeatedly encounter across forums to get a better intuitive orientation (especially me, since I am active across a few).

And I'm sorry but the bold is simply incorrect. Take a look at the thread with FB and see who jumped in (with like a one-sentence comment) to disagree (which I initially tried to ignore). Take a look at the discussions with Guney on multiple threads and see who jumped in to disagree. On this thread, I never jumped in to disagree with you, but simply responded to Cleric on things I have noticed in my interactions with people lately, to which you disagreed. Then I provided more context for Cleric's post because you were lacking it. What was your response?

[Federica]

That's fine, Federica, I have noted your concerns about my attempts to dialogue with BK, Levin, etc. I understand how, from your perspective, it feels like I am "inviting to the past" by the way in which I am wording, toning, etc. my posts and that this "kills the track" of further dialogue.

But do you see how neither I nor anyone else can learn anything from this general critique? I am not asking you to rectify the Levin situation with another post, but to put some effort into exemplifying for us a more productive way of engaging with someone like Levin. This is for our benefit right here and now, not Levin or anyone else for the moment. If you insist on making the critique, I would ask that you also make an attempt to show us a better way of "inviting to the future" instead of the past.

By the way, I never disagreed with Cleric or you that Levin is flattening the higher-order organizing principles onto the intellectual plane. That is something people do by default and Levin has not overcome that yet. In fact, I had missed that in the earlier dialogue with BK and Cleric brought it to my attention. I never said "ML is not in the blind spot" and, overall, I have no interest in trying to establish some conclusive judgments about what ML is or isn't doing, or about the "correct" way to dialogue with him - everything I write is only a means of loosely exploring the inner habits that we repeatedly encounter across forums to get a better intuitive orientation (especially me, since I am active across a few).

And I'm sorry but the bold is simply incorrect. Take a look at the thread with FB and see who jumped in (with like a one-sentence comment) to disagree (which I initially tried to ignore). Take a look at the discussions with Guney on multiple threads and see who jumped in to disagree. On this thread, I never jumped in to disagree with you, but simply responded to Cleric on things I have noticed in my interactions with people lately, to which you disagreed. Then I provided more context for Cleric's post because you were lacking it. What was your response?

Ashvin,

I see from the above that what I tried to signify has not been understood. Given what you seem to have understood, I don't even see how you can find that what I said is fine. But anyway, for the sake of not dwelling in sidelines - and only for that - let's drop that part.

Coming to the BK - ML Q&A video you quoted. What BK says from around minute 38, about micro- and macro-organizing principles seem to me like a mere summary of ML's research approach. He says that the scientist of today only looks at the micro rules of transformation. That's the science we are good at doing today, that sets up experiments in isolation and under controlled conditions. But we actually can't exclude that the macro-spaces which contextualize the micro-ones vertically, have an influence. However, those larger spaces are way more difficult to study. That's all he says. He's basically paying a homage to Levin, paraphrasing his research philosophy. Now, his conclusion - that in the foreseeable future we won't be able to discover anything about these possible "macro-level organizing principles that only kick in at high level of complexity" - is wrong, as we know, because he takes it for granted that the intellect, and todays scientific method, is the way to explore these macro spaces. But do you see more than that in that passage? What was it that you wanted to add in that respect?

[AshvinP]

Coming to the BK - ML Q&A video you quoted. What BK says from around minute 38, about micro- and micro-organizing principles seem to me like a mere summary of ML's research approach. He says that the scientist of today only looks at the micro rules of transformation. That's the science we are good at doing today, that sets up experiments in isolation and under controlled conditions. But we actually can't exclude that the macro-spaces which contextualize the micro-ones vertically, have an influence. However, those larger spaces are way more difficult to study. That's all he says. He's basically paying a homage to Levin, paraphrasing his research philosophy. Now, his conclusion - that in the foreseeable future we won't be able to discover anything about these possible "macro-level organizing principles that only kick in at high level of complexity" - is wrong, as we know, because he takes it for granted that the intellect, and todays scientific method, is the way to explore these macro spaces. But do you see more than that in that passage? What was it that you wanted to add in that respect?

I understood it as BK referring to the contextual depth of 'organizing principles', which cannot be assumed to emerge from the 'micro'-scale 'laws of nature'. He mentions the level of organisms, the level of collectives, solar systems, etc. That aligns with the contextual depth of higher spiritual perspectives which modulate the World flow, of course. I don't know - this is the first time I remember hearing him refer to this depth, but he doesn't elaborate on it very much.

When he says it is impossible to discover the dynamics of these higher organizing principles, I think he is referring to with natural scientific research methods, which of course is valid. We can never understand those dynamics by combining our bodily experiences of 'chopping wood' in ever-more elaborate ways. But yes, on a philosophical level, BK wouldn't even consider that there is any way to extend natural science and its method into the domain of intuitive intents. He would never connect how what he seems to be intuiting has already been explored via esoteric science, as long as he erects the Kantian barrier to knowledge and allows its meaning to squish his imaginative activity from reaching into 'denied spacetime'.

The part I was thinking about commenting more on was the most disturbing part, which comes from Levin, as usual. A great question is asked around 1:03 about the 'will-to-power' that is implicit in these types of transhumanist pursuits. He of course humbly denies he is the most important or powerful person in the world, or that he is interested in those things, which is good. But then he goes on to describe his goal as 'freedom of embodiment' (the polar opposite of starting with spiritual freedom) and why we "don't need to have any allegiance to where evolution dumped us". In other words, the possibility that our own higher intents are involved in the physical conditions we have inherited isn't at all suspected and, moreover, it seems he is heavily invested in not suspecting it. Steiner once mentioned that many people are interested in thinking about what happens after death but almost no one thinks about what happens before we are born, and this is an example of that.

In general, I have noticed the most resistance to taking spiritual science concretely is entangled with some form of 'egalitarian' ideology. The latter simply makes it impossible to explore the possibility that natural-cultural differences have emerged from an intentional, trans-incarnational evolutionary process and our intimate knowledge of that process will determine whether and how those differences are harmonized and unified over future epochs. The ideological commitment numbs all sensitivity to the experience of deeper inner gestures, the intuitive temporal glue, even when they are brought explicitly to attention, since we desperately want to avoid the implication that our current condition, personal and collective, was seeded by our receded activity. It is considered outside the realm of possibilities that our suffering has a higher purpose and can serve as feedback for triangulating the path of inner perfection by compensating for receded activity. This anti-Christian impulse works very subtly and under many masks, in such a way that it seems very difficult for people to even sense that it exists.

In other words, it works to subvert our sensitivity to feeling this thought:

The whole feeling and attitude of soul that must emerge from a true understanding of karma, is one which makes us realise when, perhaps some misfortune befalls us as consequence of an earlier weakness in the life of soul — that if this misfortune had not come about, the weakness would have persisted. Looking into the depths of our soul, we must realise: It is good and right that this misfortune has come upon me, because it has enabled a weakness to be eliminated. […]

That man alone faces misfortune aright who says to himself: ‘If it has occurred because of an earlier weakness, it is to be welcomed, for it will make me conscious of the weakness (which expressed itself perhaps in some definite failing); I will now eradicate the weakness, I will be strong again.’ […]

In a case, on the other hand, where a misfortune befalls one as the first step in karma, the right attitude is to say to oneself: If we were always only to encounter what we wish for ourselves, such a life would make us out and out weaklings! One or two earthly lives might continue to be comfortable and easy through the fact that only that would befall us that we desired for ourselves — but in the third or fourth life a kind of paralysis of soul and spirit would supervene, and no effort to overcome obstacles would arise in us. For, after all, obstacles would not be there for us to overcome unless the unhoped-for, the undesired came upon us.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 224 – The Forming of Destiny in Sleeping and Waking – Bern, April 6, 1923

[Federica]

I understood it as BK referring to the contextual depth of 'organizing principles', which cannot be assumed to emerge from the 'micro'-scale 'laws of nature'. He mentions the level of organisms, the level of collectives, solar systems, etc. That aligns with the contextual depth of higher spiritual perspectives which modulate the World flow, of course. I don't know - this is the first time I remember hearing him refer to this depth, but he doesn't elaborate on it very much.

When he says it is impossible to discover the dynamics of these higher organizing principles, I think he is referring to with natural scientific research methods, which of course is valid. We can never understand those dynamics by combining our bodily experiences of 'chopping wood' in ever-more elaborate ways. But yes, on a philosophical level, BK wouldn't even consider that there is any way to extend natural science and its method into the domain of intuitive intents. He would never connect how what he seems to be intuiting has already been explored via esoteric science, as long as he erects the Kantian barrier to knowledge and allows its meaning to squish his imaginative activity from reaching into 'denied spacetime'.

Yes. I think the reason why he didn’t mention the organizing principles before it’s because this is not his theory. But he’s loving this “organicistic” approach to biology of Levin's. I guess BK's words would make a fitting illustration of this picture. This is what came to mind for me when I was listening:

The part I was thinking about commenting more on was the most disturbing part, which comes from Levin, as usual. A great question is asked around 1:03 about the 'will-to-power' that is implicit in these types of transhumanist pursuits. He of course humbly denies he is the most important or powerful person in the world, or that he is interested in those things, which is good. But then he goes on to describe his goal as 'freedom of embodiment' (the polar opposite of starting with spiritual freedom) and why we "don't need to have any allegiance to where evolution dumped us". In other words, the possibility that our own higher intents are involved in the physical conditions we have inherited isn't at all suspected and, moreover, it seems he is heavily invested in not suspecting it. Steiner once mentioned that many people are interested in thinking about what happens after death but almost no one thinks about what happens before we are born, and this is an example of that.

In general, I have noticed the most resistance to taking spiritual science concretely is entangled with some form of 'egalitarian' ideology. The latter simply makes it impossible to explore the possibility that natural-cultural differences have emerged from an intentional, trans-incarnational evolutionary process and our intimate knowledge of that process will determine whether and how those differences are harmonized and unified over future epochs. The ideological commitment numbs all sensitivity to the experience of deeper inner gestures, the intuitive temporal glue, even when they are brought explicitly to attention, since we desperately want to avoid the implication that our current condition, personal and collective, was seeded by our receded activity. It is considered outside the realm of possibilities that our suffering has a higher purpose and can serve as feedback for triangulating the path of inner perfection by compensating for receded activity. This anti-Christian impulse works very subtly and under many masks, in such a way that it seems very difficult for people to even sense that it exists.

In other words, it works to subvert our sensitivity to feeling this thought:

The whole feeling and attitude of soul that must emerge from a true understanding of karma, is one which makes us realise when, perhaps some misfortune befalls us as consequence of an earlier weakness in the life of soul — that if this misfortune had not come about, the weakness would have persisted. Looking into the depths of our soul, we must realise: It is good and right that this misfortune has come upon me, because it has enabled a weakness to be eliminated. […]

That man alone faces misfortune aright who says to himself: ‘If it has occurred because of an earlier weakness, it is to be welcomed, for it will make me conscious of the weakness (which expressed itself perhaps in some definite failing); I will now eradicate the weakness, I will be strong again.’ […]

In a case, on the other hand, where a misfortune befalls one as the first step in karma, the right attitude is to say to oneself: If we were always only to encounter what we wish for ourselves, such a life would make us out and out weaklings! One or two earthly lives might continue to be comfortable and easy through the fact that only that would befall us that we desired for ourselves — but in the third or fourth life a kind of paralysis of soul and spirit would supervene, and no effort to overcome obstacles would arise in us. For, after all, obstacles would not be there for us to overcome unless the unhoped-for, the undesired came upon us.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 224 – The Forming of Destiny in Sleeping and Waking – Bern, April 6, 1923

Yes. I would perhaps leave political egalitarianism out of the matter, but in essence I entirely agree. It’s actually borderline sinister. Levin repeats this word several times: the body in which we were "dumped" at birth, by meandering evolution. He is deeply angry at something. I still have to figure out what that is exactly. And he seems to live in an idea of algorithmic randomness, the scariest version of M@L. Evolution dumped us in an entirely random state, therefore we don’t need to have any allegiance to that state. We are born the way we are born for no reason, into random embodiment.
In this vision, as you say, the reality of karma and unbornness are hopelessly lost. In a strange way, he’s both excited about randomness, as creativity, and eager to revenge against it. In anycase, the “metaphysics” of all this is lime. Basically embodiment should be "freely" optimized for individual happiness on the one hand, and on the other hand he has decided that his lab will help humanity scale up on "the radius of compassion, concern and care" - on his preferred terms, as it seems. What a system! The radius of compassion... I wonder if he himself fully believes in this borderline totalitarian ‘mission statement’.

I would add that the dynamics of these farther questions and answers also confirm for me the allegiance, and I would even say submission, of BK to ML. He goes on reformulating Levin's answers, and even gracefully accepts to be outsmarted, without a flinch, for example in the question preceding the “freedom of embodiment” one. Interesting!

But there's not much to rejoyce about in all this...

Best quote: "My goal is to open up knowledge so that whatever we do or don't do isn't because we don't know how, but because we've decided to do it, or not do it. The reason that you live in the body that you have should not be because you have no other options."

[Güney27]

I understood it as BK referring to the contextual depth of 'organizing principles', which cannot be assumed to emerge from the 'micro'-scale 'laws of nature'. He mentions the level of organisms, the level of collectives, solar systems, etc. That aligns with the contextual depth of higher spiritual perspectives which modulate the World flow, of course. I don't know - this is the first time I remember hearing him refer to this depth, but he doesn't elaborate on it very much.

When he says it is impossible to discover the dynamics of these higher organizing principles, I think he is referring to with natural scientific research methods, which of course is valid. We can never understand those dynamics by combining our bodily experiences of 'chopping wood' in ever-more elaborate ways. But yes, on a philosophical level, BK wouldn't even consider that there is any way to extend natural science and its method into the domain of intuitive intents. He would never connect how what he seems to be intuiting has already been explored via esoteric science, as long as he erects the Kantian barrier to knowledge and allows its meaning to squish his imaginative activity from reaching into 'denied spacetime'.

Yes. I think the reason why he didn’t mention the organizing principles before it’s because this is not his theory. But he’s loving this “organicistic” approach to biology of Levin's. I guess BK's words would make a fitting illustration of this picture. This is what came to mind for me when I was listening:

The part I was thinking about commenting more on was the most disturbing part, which comes from Levin, as usual. A great question is asked around 1:03 about the 'will-to-power' that is implicit in these types of transhumanist pursuits. He of course humbly denies he is the most important or powerful person in the world, or that he is interested in those things, which is good. But then he goes on to describe his goal as 'freedom of embodiment' (the polar opposite of starting with spiritual freedom) and why we "don't need to have any allegiance to where evolution dumped us". In other words, the possibility that our own higher intents are involved in the physical conditions we have inherited isn't at all suspected and, moreover, it seems he is heavily invested in not suspecting it. Steiner once mentioned that many people are interested in thinking about what happens after death but almost no one thinks about what happens before we are born, and this is an example of that.

In general, I have noticed the most resistance to taking spiritual science concretely is entangled with some form of 'egalitarian' ideology. The latter simply makes it impossible to explore the possibility that natural-cultural differences have emerged from an intentional, trans-incarnational evolutionary process and our intimate knowledge of that process will determine whether and how those differences are harmonized and unified over future epochs. The ideological commitment numbs all sensitivity to the experience of deeper inner gestures, the intuitive temporal glue, even when they are brought explicitly to attention, since we desperately want to avoid the implication that our current condition, personal and collective, was seeded by our receded activity. It is considered outside the realm of possibilities that our suffering has a higher purpose and can serve as feedback for triangulating the path of inner perfection by compensating for receded activity. This anti-Christian impulse works very subtly and under many masks, in such a way that it seems very difficult for people to even sense that it exists.

In other words, it works to subvert our sensitivity to feeling this thought:

The whole feeling and attitude of soul that must emerge from a true understanding of karma, is one which makes us realise when, perhaps some misfortune befalls us as consequence of an earlier weakness in the life of soul — that if this misfortune had not come about, the weakness would have persisted. Looking into the depths of our soul, we must realise: It is good and right that this misfortune has come upon me, because it has enabled a weakness to be eliminated. […]

That man alone faces misfortune aright who says to himself: ‘If it has occurred because of an earlier weakness, it is to be welcomed, for it will make me conscious of the weakness (which expressed itself perhaps in some definite failing); I will now eradicate the weakness, I will be strong again.’ […]

In a case, on the other hand, where a misfortune befalls one as the first step in karma, the right attitude is to say to oneself: If we were always only to encounter what we wish for ourselves, such a life would make us out and out weaklings! One or two earthly lives might continue to be comfortable and easy through the fact that only that would befall us that we desired for ourselves — but in the third or fourth life a kind of paralysis of soul and spirit would supervene, and no effort to overcome obstacles would arise in us. For, after all, obstacles would not be there for us to overcome unless the unhoped-for, the undesired came upon us.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 224 – The Forming of Destiny in Sleeping and Waking – Bern, April 6, 1923

Yes. I would perhaps leave political egalitarianism out of the matter, but in essence I entirely agree. It’s actually borderline sinister. Levin repeats this word several times: the body in which we were "dumped" at birth, by meandering evolution. He is deeply angry at something. I still have to figure out what that is exactly. And he seems to live in an idea of algorithmic randomness, the scariest version of M@L. Evolution dumped us in an entirely random state, therefore we don’t need to have any allegiance to that state. We are born the way we are born for no reason, into random embodiment.
In this vision, as you say, the reality of karma and unbornness are hopelessly lost. In a strange way, he’s both excited about randomness, as creativity, and eager to revenge against it. In anycase, the “metaphysics” of all this is lime. Basically embodiment should be "freely" optimized for individual happiness on the one hand, and on the other hand he has decided that his lab will help humanity scale up on "the radius of compassion, concern and care" - on his preferred terms, as it seems. What a system! The radius of compassion... I wonder if he himself fully believes in this borderline totalitarian ‘mission statement’.

I would add that the dynamics of these farther questions and answers also confirm for me the allegiance, and I would even say submission, of BK to ML. He goes on reformulating Levin's answers, and even gracefully accepts to be outsmarted, without a flinch, for example in the question preceding the “freedom of embodiment” one. Interesting!

But there's not much to rejoyce about in all this...

Best quote: "My goal is to open up knowledge so that whatever we do or don't do isn't because we don't know how, but because we've decided to do it, or not do it. The reason that you live in the body that you have should not be because you have no other options."

I don’t really know much about his theory or biology in general. Could you explain to me, why his idea is so interesting or novel ?