Philosophical Speculations

AshvinP wrote: ↑Mon Jun 28, 2021 3:29 am

findingblanks wrote: ↑Mon Jun 28, 2021 1:26 am "You are also saying #2 example shows how it is our personal faculties which make the difference in richness of meaning rather than anything in the percepts themselves or our lack of finding the proper concepts for them."

I genuinely think it would be interesting to know why you think I claimed our personal faculties make 'the difference' in richness. Maybe it seemed implied by the way I contrasted the examples. While I absolutely believe that our individuality plays an important role, I'd say the greater role is played by a whole host of factors related to the interactional nature of experience itself. But, yeah, I can go with the main gist of your summation.

Because you mentioned in #2 the person wakes up muddled and goes out to see the same things as #1 - that made me think you are conditioning the difference in meaning quality on the person's state more than what he is perceiving-thinking when he goes outside. Of course, I do not deny a person's state can affect their thinking process.

The bigger point, though, is that I think you are still regarding this whole thing in a very mechanistic way, which is the precise way that people like Steiner and Barfield want us to leave behind when considering these experiences so that we may gain true understanding of them. What is one of the biggest hallmarks of this "mechanistic" thinking in the modern age? It is the focus on particular manifestations and isolated experiences as the means through which we can gain true understanding of what is happening. That derives from nominalism which became the dominant philosophical perspective over realism. The latter focuses much more on archetypal principles as the means to true understanding.

So how is that relevant here? You are asking us for a clear mechanism by which the conceptual meaning gets "attached" to the perceptions in #1 example. When I cannot come up with one, then you say, "see this experience shows that we immediately have meaning when we walk out the door and take a quick look around". If I were to respond with, "all of the conceptual attachments happen very rapidly in that experience", you would respond with, "ok then describe the precise mechanism of how that happens so quickly?", and of course I do not have any such detailed mechanism. (if that does not accurately reflect your position, then again I urge you to just state it plainly in response). I am not responding with "concepts are attached very quickly" because I fundamentally do not believe that is the proper way to understand our experience, in philosophy, science, or any other field of inquiry.

Rather, I think we must look to those overarching principles which make sense of our experience. We both seem to believe Barfield was correct to say modern man no longer perceives the inherent meaning in the natural world he looks at. That evolution of consciousness from "original participation" to modern age of logical positivism and atomism (which results naturally from modern mode of consciousness) is a major principle we should keep in mind, perhaps the major principle. That explains why our perception, no matter how immediately meaningful it seems when we look out at the world in the morning, is still lacking most of its true meaning. The meaning we get from seeing the kid running and the mother looking with pride is still a dull shadow of the true spiritual meaning which underlies that experience. I think even philosophers of Will agree with that observation, even if they would not call the underlying reality "spiritual".

Here is where the mystic (not saying this is your approach) may agree with me and say "therefore we should stop looking for meaning in these worldly perceptions and just accept it is all Maya and the only true connection to spiritual reality is via deep mystical experience from meditation, psychedelics, etc.". Cleric and I (and Steiner and Barfield) disagree with the mystic completely. We say the dull shadows still carry some shape of that which is producing the shadows and it is through our disciplined and rigorous Thinking activity, including imagination, inspiration, and intuition, that we can build back up the meaningful networks of percept-concept relations which give us that immanent meaning from Nature our ancestors had without any effort. And since we are, in fact, gaining this meaning through our own individual effort and seeing how it manifests within us every step of the way, in full consciousness, we are actually gaining much more than even our constantly dreaming ancestors possessed - that is Barfield's "final participation".

FB - I didn't see any response to the above. I am wondering what you think about it? Clearly there is disagreement about the ES in Chapter 3 of PoF, but I don't see how, if your position is correct, it changes Steiner's philosophy of Thinking as Cleric has outlined it many times, which I tried to crudely summarize above and show how the philosopher of Will ("mystic" in this example) diverges with that philosophy of Thinking. What do you think?

OK. I'm not sure why exactly but it seems that all my explanations have left the impression that I equate the exceptional state with intuitive thinking. I'm not claiming that I express myself anywhere close to the clearest possible but it will be valuable feedback for me if you tell me what exactly left you with that impression.

To be clear: I don't see the exceptional state as nothing more than a starting point. Let's take a broader view. Why is it necessary for Steiner to bring the question for this exceptional state, where we observe thinking? In order to help us attain a proper inner stance in regards to thinking. Why is that needed? Because thinking is viewed in the most varied ways by the different philosophical streams. We already mentioned materialism, where thinking is seen as flashing of pixels on a screen, the cause for which is sought through chains of events that can be investigated through the senses. It must be said that various spiritual/idealistic philosophies are in no better position, as long as they try to explain thoughts with more thoughts - for example, energy vibrations, ripples in MAL, information, etc. Other streams try to do away with thinking altogether. What is common in all these attempts? That they are product of thinking. Thinking that speculates about its nature, yet it does that through adding more and more thoughts.

Steiner's starting position has to do with precisely this fact - that we can't get away from thinking. No matter how brilliant our theory of mind is, it still exists as a creation of thinking. This in itself should be enough to hint any serious thinker that maybe it can be of value to step back and see what we can know about thinking itself, before we use it as ready-made tool, to spin out our wild theories that are supposed to explain it.

So what can we know of thinking? As long as we don't want to simply use thinking in order to theorize about thinking, the only logical thing left is to try and observe thinking. This leads us to the exceptional state.

You said:

findingblanks wrote: ↑Mon Jun 28, 2021 6:12 pm But the foothold stands far below intuitive thinking itself. As Steiner says, the foothold tells us nothing about reality, whereas intuitive thinking reveals the essence of self and cosmos.

I don't think we're speaking here of the same 'foothold'. The exceptional state is not the foothold. It only leads us to the foothold.

Steiner wrote:For everyone, however, who has the ability to observe thinking — and with good will every normally developed human being has it — this observation is the most important one he can possibly make. For he observes something that he himself brings forth; he does not see himself confronting an object at first foreign to him, but rather sees himself confronting his own activity. He knows how what he is observing comes about. He sees into its relationship and interconnections. A firm point has been won from which one can seek, with well-founded hope, the explanation of the rest of world phenomena.

So we see that there's important observation here. We start by turning our inner gaze towards thinking (the exceptional state) but this in itself is not yet the goal - it is what we can realize in this state, that is important. And what we realize is that in this state we contemplate the only thing within the World Content for which we know the exact reason for its existence - it is because it proceeds from us. Now this is the actual foothold, the firm point.

The interesting question is how do we know that the thoughts proceed from us? As Steiner said, the perception of our thinking in itself is nothing special. Then what is it that makes us know that what observe as thoughts is not just some random voice in the head but something that we produce?

Steiner wrote:The reason it is impossible for us to observe thinking in its present course at given moment is the same that allows us to know it more directly and more intimately than any other process of the world. Just because we bring it forth ourselves, we know the characteristics of its course, the way the happening to be considered takes place. What, in the other spheres of observation, can be found only in an indirect way — the factually corresponding connection, namely, and the interrelationship of the single objects — this we know in the case of thinking in a completely direct way.

Steiner introduces the term intuition later but it's clear that he speaks of the same thing here with completely direct way. And how could it be otherwise? We don't need to build chains of philosophical arguments which lead us to the conclusion that what we observe as thoughts are in fact our creation. This knowledge is direct and completely supersensible intuition. I remind:

Steiner wrote: In contrast to the content of perception, which is given us from outside, the content of thought appears within us. Let us call the form in which it first arises, “intuition.” Intuition is for thinking what observation is for the perception.

So we know that the thoughts proceed from us because before we observe them, we already live within the thoughts in intuition. Our observation of the thoughts is only confirmation of what we already know because it sprang from us and it was known through intuition.

Now we can see that the foothold is not really that far below intuitive thinking. If by foothold you mean observation of thinking, I would agree that this in itself doesn't tell us much about the essential being of thinking. But if we understand the foothold in the way Steiner intended, as the firm point, then here we have precisely the point of contact with the essential being.

Steiner wrote:Whoever observes thinking lives during his observation directly within a spiritual, self-sustaining weaving of being. Yes, one can say that whoever wants to grasp the being of the spiritual in the form in which it first presents itself to man, can do this within thinking which is founded upon itself.

Note the wording. When we observe thinking we are living in the essential being but this doesn't mean that we recognize it as such. Yet we achieve exactly this recognition when we experience the foothold - that is, when we recognize that in the observation of our thinking we're beholding weaving of the essential being. And as you also quoted:

Steiner wrote:And about this essential being he can say that it is present for him in his consciousness through intuition. Intuition is the conscious experience, occurring within the purely spiritual, of a purely spiritual content. Only through an intuition can the being of thinking be grasped.

So that's why this is the 'the most important observation one can possibly make'. Not simply because we can observe our thoughts but because we recognize in these thoughts a point where the World is fully explained, through the intuition we experience at that point.

The foothold is grasped entirely through intuition. Intuitive thinking proceeds from there. So I hope I made it clear that I don't hold that the observation of thoughts is intuitive thinking. My diagrams from the post which I suppose made you think that I was holding such position, were actually to illustrate precisely the foothold, where perception and intuition fuse. This is the seed point from which we can continue further and exercise intuitive thinking in the wider sense, in order to unveil the essential being in more and more of the World of Perceptions. To clarify - this doesn't mean that for all further intuitive thinking we'll be making thinking the object of observation (although this observation is the gateway to higher forms of cognition but that's another topic).

Cleric K wrote: ↑Tue Jun 29, 2021 12:07 am The interesting question is how do we know that the thoughts proceed from us? As Steiner said, the perception of our thinking in itself is nothing special. Then what is it that makes us know that what observe as thoughts is not just some random voice in the head but something that we produce?

Steiner wrote:The reason it is impossible for us to observe thinking in its present course at given moment is the same that allows us to know it more directly and more intimately than any other process of the world. Just because we bring it forth ourselves, we know the characteristics of its course, the way the happening to be considered takes place. What, in the other spheres of observation, can be found only in an indirect way — the factually corresponding connection, namely, and the interrelationship of the single objects — this we know in the case of thinking in a completely direct way.

Regardless of whether the ES is the "firm point" or leads us to the "firm point", either one of which fits in just fine with how the phenomenology of Thinking proceeds from there, the above quote blows my mind every time I consider it. It is so amazingly simple and profound at the same time in the span of two sentences, as soon as it clicks what he is talking about. At first it seems almost a negative comment on thinking that we can never observe it "in its present course" - like it always remains withdrawing from us and we cannot catch it (a point also made by Heidegger in his lectures on What is Called Thinking?) - but then he flips it to show that observation is exactly how we intuit it is our own spiritual activity which brings forth the thinking, and the implications which unfold from that one simple fact are stunning to say the least. Heidegger said what withdraws from us also draws us towards it, exactly as Steiner illustrates here.

Cleric, to be clear. When I am working hard on an email and realize that I'm getting distracted from my task and then I pull into my consciousness that I'm thinking of the table I've been building at home. I think, "Ah, I'm thinking of the table," this is an example of the exceptional state to you, yes? Rather than add other spiritual and philosophical additions to what it is like to realize the thought we are having, I'd like to stay with Steiner's suggestion that we can become enter into a state that is less common than our constant perceiving and thinking. His example, "I am thinking of a table," seems helpful. He distinguishes this from my walking into a room and having the thought "That is a table." As we can see, having the thought "That is a table" is nothing like having the thought, "I am thinking about table." The latter is an exception to the more common state. In other words, the latter is the exception to the common state or more pithy still, it is the exceptional state.

So to be clear.

1) When I notice, "I am thinking of a table," that is an example of the exceptional state for you, right?
2) Do you believe the quotes from PoF I've shared in which Steiner describes the living warmth of intuitively grasped thinking are examples of the exceptional state?

"The bigger point, though, is that I think you are still regarding this whole thing in a very mechanistic way..."

Again, to me this is because of an intellectual projection. Not a psychological one. I'm not commenting on your psychological health. You seem very healthy to me that way and it has nothing to do with trying to understand where each other are coming from.

But the fact that I consciously refrain from using mechanical terms as much as possible and the fact that I also show why I don't believe the mechanical ways most students talk about these fundamental experiences unfold...demonstrate that I am pointing towards a less mechanical conceptualization. I know you don't see that yet. But even Steiner worked to abandon his early articulations because he found them deeply dissatisfying. This is related to why he never published his early drafts of Fragment, saying he simply couldn't express it as it needed to be expressed. Later he even explained why within decades it would be much easier for people to find words for some of the basic things he wanted to point to. This is just one of the reasons why I'm worried that 130 years after his death, most of his students still clutch to notions he was better understanding as he developed.

But regardless. I can't force you to see that I don't have a mechanical model of this process.

I can just keep pointing out that the utter spontaneity that I find in my phenomenology of these core experiences is nothing like the taking apart an putting together of fundamental elements that you often speak about.

I now this: When I realize that I'm thinking a very specific thought, it is nothing like the moments I live within the intuitive reality of thinking itself. I just realized that I was thinking "find an example". When I first thought "find an example" I wasn't reflecting on the thought itself. My attention was on continuing the sentence I was typing. It was the 'thinking" that Steiner says we are doing all day along with perceiving (I was looking at the screen and my hands). But when I observed the thought, "find an example", I was no longer in that constant flow of thinking and perceiving and was in an exceptional state. That thought "find an example" is, on the one hand, like any other object of my observation; but, on the other hand, there is the sense that "find an example" was born entirely via my activity. The thought "find an example" gave birth to the example I'm giving now of having that particular thought. But while using it as an example, I was back in the thinking and perceiving flow that dominates most of the day. That flow is obviously not the transformation that comes when the activity of thinking itself is grasped from the inside as the sole 'object' of our attention. Standing outside of that flow (as Steiner calls it in Chapter 3) and having recognizing that I was having the thought "Find an example" is also not the transformation that comes when thinking becomes the sole 'object' of its own activity.

I can only suggest that you will most likely become more and more aware of why it is utterly amazing and important to notice the nature of standing outside of the flow and recognizing your thoughts. This experience is usually clouded by either the context in which we are thinking; that is, we recognize our thought, "I'm thinking of a table" and then simply rush on and utilize that thought back in the flow of experience. Or, we go too far in the other direction and attribute some kind of cause to the thought, like when the materialist embeds it within an "all neuron" explanation or a spiritual scientist embeds it in an "etheric activity" set of ideas. As we progress on the path, we can remain in the middle and not fall too far in either direction. In that case, we notice the simple clarity of how a thought like "Find an example" or "I'm thinking of tables" stands on its own within the field of our awareness. The special nature of this thought is grasped but not with other thoughts ('neurons' or 'etheric'). At this stage, as Steiner makes clear, you don't really have any understanding of the thoughts nature and you certainly aren't experiencing the fundamental nature of being an "I" participating in the fundamental nature of spirit. That experience (the essential nature of "I" and 'world's inherent union) comes with grasping intuitive thinking itself.

But the process of clearly the ground is the process of noticing a thought without adding anything at all to it. This absolutely necessary clarity is not the direct recognition of of spiritual reality that intuitive thinking is.

At some point I hope the difference between these two core and wonderful experiences becomes so clear to you that when I speak of why "I am thinking of a table" is a fundamental experience (even if I do so in a sloppy way) you'll see how and why it is cleanly differentiated from the experience of "Not I, but Christ thinks in me." If you haven't yet read Steiner's lectures in which he explains that the core experience of The Philosophy of Freedom was couched in philosophic terms but that the transformation he describes in chapter 9 and 10 (most specifically) is the recognition that "Not I, but Christ lives in me." (In some lectures he equated 'lives' and 'thinks' for obvious reasons). And I can't make you see that "I am thinking of a table" is not yet that experience. But if it is had in the manner that Steiner sets up in Chapter 3, it provides the foothold for where it is all heading.

When young Steiner was writing to his friend Rosa (and others) about his deep disappointment that certain thinkers were not appreciating and grasping what he wrote in The Philosophy of Freedom, he wasn't upset that they didn't have a Christ Experience. But I can't make you see that. His disappointment is most likely just not elevated enough to really matter to many of us these days.

If we believe that his purpose in Chapter Three is to point the reader to the Christ experience, we miss it.

Remember, Steiner said that he slowly builds the text towards intuitive thinking so that any reader could stake the necessary steps that eventually lead to thinking grasping its essence.

The notion that "I am thinking about a table" was when he was expecting the reader to recognize the 'fundamental experience of the Spirit' is based on a major conflation.

But there is a kind of spiritual lust that wants to have everything at once. Or wants to have the 'big stuff' right at the beginning.

All I can say is that it really is an amazing experience to notice one of your thoughts without adding any jot of representation or explanation to it. Steiner really wanted you to experience this and Chapter three sharply marks why this experience is a necessary step towards the fundamental experience of the Spirt. If they aren't distinguished, neither can be had in its essence.

I'm curious; for those of you who think Chapter 3 is expecting the reader to have grasped intuitive thinking, in which earlier portion of PoF do you believe Steiner marks the importance of reflecting upon our thinking ("standing outside" of it) without adding additional representations to it? Since we all agree that Steiner ultimately wants us to recognize the transformation that is real intuitive thinking, at what point in the text does he carefully reveal the importance of turning towards our own thoughts and not muddying them up with reductive explanations?

findingblanks wrote: ↑Tue Jun 29, 2021 3:52 pm "The bigger point, though, is that I think you are still regarding this whole thing in a very mechanistic way..."

Again, to me this is because of an intellectual projection. Not a psychological one. I'm not commenting on your psychological health. You seem very healthy to me that way and it has nothing to do with trying to understand where each other are coming from.

But the fact that I consciously refrain from using mechanical terms as much as possible and the fact that I also show why I don't believe the mechanical ways most students talk about these fundamental experiences unfold...demonstrate that I am pointing towards a less mechanical conceptualization. I know you don't see that yet. But even Steiner worked to abandon his early articulations because he found them deeply dissatisfying. This is related to why he never published his early drafts of Fragment, saying he simply couldn't express it as it needed to be expressed. Later he even explained why within decades it would be much easier for people to find words for some of the basic things he wanted to point to. This is just one of the reasons why I'm worried that 130 years after his death, most of his students still clutch to notions he was better understanding as he developed.

But regardless. I can't force you to see that I don't have a mechanical model of this process.

I can just keep pointing out that the utter spontaneity that I find in my phenomenology of these core experiences is nothing like the taking apart an putting together of fundamental elements that you often speak about.

I should have been more clear. It is not that you have a model of thinking which claims thinking is mechanistic, it is that you think Steiner has that sort of model in PoF, or is so unclear in PoF that most people come away thinking that is his model, and that we are two of those "most people" (or maybe just me), and that this mistake leads us to misunderstand the core of his philosophy as it unfolds in his mature thought. That should be much more specified in conveying the meaning I originally intended. Ironically, this sort of criticism of PoF ends up being mechanistic itself, because it refuses to just step back and view the living essence of the text, which is also filled out by much of his other strictly philosophical works, and instead chooses to dissect every sentence and paragraph, looking for reasons to cast doubt on the overall project which is otherwise crystal clear and plainly spoken in so many of his writings. What other reason would you have to only respond to that first sentence of my post and ignore the rest leading up to conclusion about Barfield's "final participation"?

FB wrote:I now this: When I realize that I'm thinking a very specific thought, it is nothing like the moments I live within the intuitive reality of thinking itself. I just realized that I was thinking "find an example". When I first thought "find an example" I wasn't reflecting on the thought itself. My attention was on continuing the sentence I was typing. It was the 'thinking" that Steiner says we are doing all day along with perceiving (I was looking at the screen and my hands). But when I observed the thought, "find an example", I was no longer in that constant flow of thinking and perceiving and was in an exceptional state. That thought "find an example" is, on the one hand, like any other object of my observation; but, on the other hand, there is the sense that "find an example" was born entirely via my activity. The thought "find an example" gave birth to the example I'm giving now of having that particular thought. But while using it as an example, I was back in the thinking and perceiving flow that dominates most of the day. That flow is obviously not the transformation that comes when the activity of thinking itself is grasped from the inside as the sole 'object' of our attention. Standing outside of that flow (as Steiner calls it in Chapter 3) and having recognizing that I was having the thought "Find an example" is also not the transformation that comes when thinking becomes the sole 'object' of its own activity.

I can only suggest that you will most likely become more and more aware of why it is utterly amazing and important to notice the nature of standing outside of the flow and recognizing your thoughts. This experience is usually clouded by either the context in which we are thinking; that is, we recognize our thought, "I'm thinking of a table" and then simply rush on and utilize that thought back in the flow of experience. Or, we go too far in the other direction and attribute some kind of cause to the thought, like when the materialist embeds it within an "all neuron" explanation or a spiritual scientist embeds it in an "etheric activity" set of ideas. As we progress on the path, we can remain in the middle and not fall too far in either direction. In that case, we notice the simple clarity of how a thought like "Find an example" or "I'm thinking of tables" stands on its own within the field of our awareness. The special nature of this thought is grasped but not with other thoughts ('neurons' or 'etheric'). At this stage, as Steiner makes clear, you don't really have any understanding of the thoughts nature and you certainly aren't experiencing the fundamental nature of being an "I" participating in the fundamental nature of spirit. That experience (the essential nature of "I" and 'world's inherent union) comes with grasping intuitive thinking itself.

But the process of clearly the ground is the process of noticing a thought without adding anything at all to it. This absolutely necessary clarity is not the direct recognition of of spiritual reality that intuitive thinking is.

At some point I hope the difference between these two core and wonderful experiences becomes so clear to you that when I speak of why "I am thinking of a table" is a fundamental experience (even if I do so in a sloppy way) you'll see how and why it is cleanly differentiated from the experience of "Not I, but Christ thinks in me." If you haven't yet read Steiner's lectures in which he explains that the core experience of The Philosophy of Freedom was couched in philosophic terms but that the transformation he describes in chapter 9 and 10 (most specifically) is the recognition that "Not I, but Christ lives in me." (In some lectures he equated 'lives' and 'thinks' for obvious reasons). And I can't make you see that "I am thinking of a table" is not yet that experience. But if it is had in the manner that Steiner sets up in Chapter 3, it provides the foothold for where it is all heading.

The last sentence is the key one here and is in tension with everything you wrote before. The key is exactly to recognize it is all continuous. The intuitive element in "I am thinking of a table" observation of thinking and also the realization we are never observing our "present thinking", and therefore the thinking flows forth from our own activity, is not fundamentally disconnected from the much higher grasping of intuitive thinking. I have read enough of Steiner's books and lectures to know that continuity of experience-cognition is never in doubt with him. Even what seems to be completely discontinuous only appears that way from our limited perspective. Like Cleric said, I may not be as familiar with the specific terminology he employs as you guys are, and therefore as careful when I write about it, but I understand the overall conceptual framework well enough.

And all of that leads me back to the same questions I have been asking of you - what is the import of "we can remain in the middle and not fall too far in either direction"? What does that mean for Steiner's overall philosophy of higher cognition and spiritual science? What is your position on those things? Clearly you find some sort of deep commonality between Steiner and Schopenhauer (or their two general philosophies), but other than that we have no idea where you stand on the question of what is possible to know through human cognition and/or what you have come to know with confidence through it, which is so "utterly amazing and important" and relates to the living essence of "not I, but Christ living in me". Please elucidate those things for us. Thanks!

"Should have been more clear. It is not that you have a model of thinking which claims thinking is mechanistic, it is that you think Steiner has that sort of model in PoF..."

I think this is reductive. I think there are aspects of PoF's articulation that represent the living process mechanistically. Steiner did as well, which is why we see in the updated versions that he consistently rephrased his characterizations to avoid this in brilliant ways. Now, you will want to immediately remind me that this is just about words and obviously his ideas did not change. That is another discussion and a very interesting one. But I agree with the gist of it.

My ultimate concern is that I find that not only do many Anthroposophists say things like, "Thinking connects concepts to percepts" but they mean it. That is, they don't just say words that imply various kinds of separations, they have allowed those representations to shape their early training in higher knowledge. This becomes a filter that unknowingly shapes how their first spiritual experiences are 'seen'. But since they haven't cleaned up their starting point, they have no idea of this. That is just one concern. But it is a serious one.

Another concern is that I find that a large majority of Anthroposophists believe in 'pure experience'. They don't just say the words "pure experience" (as Steiner uses the term in various phrases and ways in his core texts), they have developed ideas and representations of 'pure experience.' One reason I keep asking folks to tell me what they think "pure experience" is is because that is the only way they really start to begin realizing the muddy form in which they hold this as both an idea and as a tacit representation.

.......................

another topic:

Steiner warned over and over about certain ways of working with his text. He came at it from various angles, but the core warning he gave was to bring one's other insights and spiritual experiences (or not) to the text. He wanted close readings. He did not want close readings that begin to sound like the following:

"Well, when we read that sentence, we need to see that he is actually starting to show the spiritual nature of..." Or things like, "Once you've begun to understand PoF, you see that when he says this here he really is indicating the stuff about..."

He said that despite the blind-spots and limitations of his youth, he tried to write each sentence in a way that could be connected to the next and discussed rationally by readers who have no prior commitment to other notions or experiences.

In this group, I am striving to point out how often we pop away from what he actually says and then coat it with other ideas. I'm not talking about the understandable difficulty that comes with the necessity of translations and the inherent ambiguity with language tenses and grammar. Those are tricky enough on their own. But the larger problem is brining too many other ideas and representations to a careful reading.

If you are new to this, you may not yet have experienced how far this can go. You will literally try to talk about PoF to some serious students of Anthroposophy and they will make it clear to you that Steiner is carefully teaching about the etheric body systematically in the first ten sentences of the book. It is nearly impossible to get them off the track of this kind of reading.

I'm not equating you two to that at all. But I am finding it very hard to let Steiner's words be taken as they are. I know you experience the same with me. But the difference is that I will happily show you how his words must be allowed to be ambiguous at various points, whereas you both are immediately slamming them with spiritual meaning out of the gate. And I know that you both feel certain that your experiences of thinking make it obvious to you that when he says, "I am thinking of a table" he is pointing to the fundamental nature of the spirit. I won't be able to shake you of that.

Which is why I try other modalities of asking you to point to portions of the text. Like, I will be interested to see where in the text you believe Steiner sets up the prior necessity of cleanly noticing the nature of grasping one of our own finished thoughts. You clearly don't think that is what he is doing in Chapter 3. Or, I should say, one of you (I can't always remember every line from each other) is starting to conflate them and say that the fundamental experience of the spirit IS ALSO the clean noticing of a finished thought. Okay, but, like I said, a close reading of the text simply won't be able to show Steiner saying that. You have to add together various other ideas and interpretations and then say that it all happens in chapter 3.

It might sound mechanical to do a close reading in this way. One of you already said I merely list Steiner's words and don't think meaningfully about them. Okay, fine. But I believe that interpretation of my pointing to his words is the result of your conclusion that Chapter 3 is about the fundamental experience of the the spirit.

And I think a close reading clearly can show that Chapter 3 is about the necessity of a different kind of experience, one which does not yet give us spiritual knowledge. He says so at the end of the chapter but I get why that isn't registered yet.

findingblanks wrote: ↑Tue Jun 29, 2021 3:12 pm 1) When I notice, "I am thinking of a table," that is an example of the exceptional state for you, right?

In my opinion we should try to understand what the exceptional state is, entirely in the context of the purpose Steiner is building it for, and not just try to define it for itself. Probably we should distinguish between retrospectively becoming aware of what we've been thinking so far. Like you say, you got distracted and in an instant you snap back and realize "I've gone astray, instead of the email I've been thinking about the table for the last minute". Yet, as you said, now you're no longer thinking about the table - you're now thinking about the fact that you've been thinking about the table for the last minute or so. Let's imagine these two things as point A and B. Point A is what I've been thinking formerly, point B is my current thinking which is the realization about what I've been thinking of formerly.
Now this retrospective realization is certainly different kind of thinking than the one I've been doing while being fully engrossed in the thinking of the table. As you said, it's meta - I'm thinking about what I have been thinking. In that sense we can say that this is an exceptional state, although not so special. It's something that happens quite often, as you've given the examples with your daughter, etc. Most certainly, your daughter's or your realization about your former thinking about the table, was not accompanied with some philosophical insight about thinking.
So in my view this is only a very gentle point of departure. For this point to become the foothold we need to do something more. Pictorially speaking, we need to begin drawing A and B closer and closer together. Now you can have an additional realization when you observe the "I've gone astray ..." thought. The latter already becomes the new A which should be grasped by the new B, which is the invisible realization "I'm thinking about how I'm thinking that I've formerly gone astray". Thinking begins to chase its own tail. This is what I mean by trying to bring A and B closer and closer together. When we do that to sufficient degree this avalanche of As and Bs becomes almost like an uninterrupted flow, where we observe our real time thinking as closely as possible. This is somewhat more difficult to exercise with verbal thoughts because of their discrete nature. But we can, for example, imagine a moving light dot. We should experience very vividly not so much the dot itself (most people would hardly visually see anything at all) but the fact that we move with all our fully conscious intent the dot. In that case the dot is the observation of our thinking, it's only that we think with light and not with sound/words. When we move the dot smoothly we can very well feel we can focus strongly on the dot itself but we can also try to be, as much as possible, conscious of the fact that we are in fact moving the dot - "I am thinking the dot's movement". The continuous nature of the movement makes a little bit easier to delaminate the observation of the moving dot from the intuition that we're moving it. The further forwards toward the dot our focus is, the more we're occupied with the experience of the movement itself. The more we try to pull our focus backwards, as if to encompass what's lurking behind our face of consciousness, the more we feel the second layer of awareness, of that fact that we are moving the dot.

All this is simply a much more extended version of what Steiner speaks of in simple words. What Steiner invites us to experience (if we have the good will) is not only to retrospectively become aware that we've been thinking A, from our current standpoint B, but to bring them closer and closer together. Now in principle this is still the exceptional state but achieves a much more real time nature. We need precisely this if we are to comprehend the full significance of the firm point. In this mode of thinking imploding into itself, we become fully aware that we're in fact creating our thoughts, and we're perceiving what we thus create. We are not simply moving the dot but in addition to that we realize that what we observe (the moving dot) is a part of the World Content which reflects our innermost intuition. We don't analyze the dot and conclude that it is the result of our thinking, we have the intuition (the completely direct way) that the dot proceeds from or mirrors our activity. Only now we have the grasp on the firm point. We've snatched the World at a corner which is completely explained by its own nature. As long as I live in the thinking of the dot, there are no questions for me of why this dot exists. The intuitive content of my thinking activity gives in itself the full explanation of the dot.

findingblanks wrote: ↑Tue Jun 29, 2021 3:12 pm 2) Do you believe the quotes from PoF I've shared in which Steiner describes the living warmth of intuitively grasped thinking are examples of the exceptional state?

The exceptional state, as far as we understand it in the above sense, where A and B asymptotically approach each other, gives us a clear experiential comprehension of what it means to have something within the World Content (the dot-thought) which is completely united with its intuitive essential being. As I said in the previous post, it is not necessary for intuitive thinking that we should always try to metacognize it and strive to experience continuously "Now I'm thinking intuitively". The exceptional state of collapse of A and B is an example of intuitive cognitive experience but in the grand landscape of thinking, it is only a special case (admittedly, a very important one, as we'll se below).
Thinking becomes intuitive not because we continuously try to metacognize it but because thanks to the firm point, we now know that what is revealed in thinking is the intuitions of the essential being. We've found a spark of light in the firm point, and this light begins to 'infect' the whole World Content with its essential nature. We now know that when we think we're experiencing the intuitions belonging to the spiritual interior of the Cosmos, and we try to bring this ideal interior into harmony with the shattered fragments of perception. This is the critical point. If we still experience our thinking as if we are making a conceptual model of reality, and we call that intuitive just because it has a 'flowy' character, thoughts lay themselves out easily and it feels 'right', we don't grasp what is meant with intuitive thinking in the real sense. Neither thinking about string theory and at the same time observing my thoughts, makes it intuitive thinking.

The implosion of A and B has an important place. Even though in the general intuitive thinking it's just a special case, it has a central place when we continue towards the higher forms of cognition. Without entering into details, as a kind of a metaphor, I can say that we approach the Imaginative (astral) realm when the fluctuation between A and B becomes so 'rapid' that it becomes as continuous and fills the entire consciousness with a kind of monolithic quality. Yet this monolithicity is not featureless but we begin to recognize there the higher order weaving of the astral body, the soul organs, the general astral environment, etc. Of course even in this state we have the movement of focus toward the Imaginations and more 'backwards' towards even higher forms of cognition, but direct analogy with visual focus is quite misleading. Anyway, this is a different topic altogether.

"And all of that leads me back to the same questions I have been asking of you - what is the import of "we can remain in the middle and not fall too far in either direction"? What does that mean for Steiner's overall philosophy of higher cognition and spiritual science? What is your position on those things?"

In my previous post I indicated at various larger reasons the details of PoF and how it is taken up mean to me.

There are symptoms that I believe are signs of the kind of error we are talking about.

For instance, nearly 100 years after his death we should be at a point where the movement has generated robust and highly creative responses to some of Steiner mistakes. This should be no big deal and Steiner himself indicated more than once that he would make mistakes and that it was up to his students to recognize them and update them as the decades went by. He even went out of his way to explain why this kind of correction process does not depend on clairvoyance. He said that the kind of mistakes an Initiate will inevitably make can be detected via careful thinking and observation; in other words, the Initiate might be speaking about a spiritual explanation of a given phenomena, but careful observation will show if that the Initiate was adding false assumptions or misinterpretations to their starting-point. And this sort of natural human blind-spot will then show up in arious ways, like, for instance, a prediction the Initiate made can be shown to be wrong. Such a finding means that the students must then examine carefully the various possible causes of the Initiates error. Steiner was clear about this. He's been dead for nearly 100 years and there is only utter silence when it comes to talking about his mistakes.

Just as I began this conversation by saying that I'm well aware of what happens when you try to speak about the 'attachment' issue in PoF (that is shorthand for the more intricate conversation we are trying to have), I can tell you exactly what happens when you try to strike up a conversation or research about Steiner's errors. It is still such a deep taboo that typically, ill will is assumed by most. Not at first though. At first people think you must simply be arrogant and not realizing that Steiner can seem wrong but is almost always right. If you can push past the 'arrogance' claim by showing that Steiner was humble enough to acknowledge that he would be making errors that we MUST correct, then a small few will be left willing to talk. They will mostly encourage you to mediate harder or 'be patient' and see that we simply can't know these things yet. And a the tiniest amount will say, "Okay, I do see that as an error, but it isn't all that important an error for this or that reason." That's a start. But those are mostly people already so on the outskirts of the movement that there is no force in the kind of regeneration necessary.

This is just one strand of the larger issues I see connected with even small missteps with regard to PoF.