Thanks Sunil! I think you shared this during the live as I read it afterwards - very interesting, I have a friend doing a PhD related to Tibetan Tantra who spends a lot of time with teachers there, and she’s talked about the rigorous debate and inquiry in that tradition. Do you have any tips for a good book around the topic?
Alexander, I don’t have an idea of Tibetan tantra but the robustness of most Indic systems, including Buddhism, comes through a tradition of debate and deliberation that follow a strict method to the madness. I can look up a few resources for you depending on your specific interest. Meanwhile check this out https://www.anaadi.org/post/short-article-debating-insights-from-nyaya-sutra
What if we're all wrong? This discussion felt like a bundle of carefulness, neediness, and endlessly multiplying nuances. Why? It’s because you’re coming at it from the wrong angle. You are diving into the garbage dump of polarisation in the hope of sorting out the mess. Instead, we should focus on what’s causing the garbage dump. The cause is society’s negative view of humans, which allows each side to feel dependent on one viewpoint and to easily judge their opponents. If we drop the negative view of humans, we would relax into the innate happiness and goodwill of being. From there cooperative problem-solving is natural, easy, and fun.
This seems naive to me. I disagree that there's a neediness in the dialogue, carefulness and multiplying nuances yes, because that's how adults have conversations about difficult topics. Your solution feels very meta to me - change the fundamental value structure of everyone, and then we won't need to have difficult conversations. People develop negative views of other humans not just because of their social conditioning but their personal experiences with other humans. There will always be a need to dive into the garbage dump - I agree that positive regard and a deeper sense of connectedness is vital, but it isn't an either/or.
You're underestimating the power of contexts. Society conditions us with a negative view of humans - religion says we are evil and science says we are animals fighting for survival. They might compliment us too, but that just helps to smuggle in the negativity, e.g. "Humans can improve" implies we are unsatisfactory now. Society’s toxic framing of our species gets us running, competing, and polarising into righteousness and judgment.
The negative context is the disease and polarised opinions are merely symptoms. Focusing on symptoms means it never ends, hence the neediness and infinitely dividing nuances. I’m not saying that we need to "change everyone's value structure." I’m saying we need to eliminate the disease that created those artificial structures. All the values in Spiral Dynamics are mere reactions to the limitations of the lower reactions, and so on. Values are band-aids to cover the symptoms. They don’t heal the disease.
Our "personal experiences" do have great aspects, but they're contaminated by society's negativity. Even "positive" interactions leave us with futile idealism that keeps the disease alive through distraction and hope. People within a deluded context always channel society's negativity, even through positive interactions.
There won't "always be a need to dive into the garbage dump" because we're intelligent enough to learn from our mistakes. Step outside of Plato’s Cave and see the futility of trying to make the shadows work. Then enjoy the freedom.
Re Anti-debate, see this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debates_in_ancient_India
Thanks Sunil! I think you shared this during the live as I read it afterwards - very interesting, I have a friend doing a PhD related to Tibetan Tantra who spends a lot of time with teachers there, and she’s talked about the rigorous debate and inquiry in that tradition. Do you have any tips for a good book around the topic?
Alexander, I don’t have an idea of Tibetan tantra but the robustness of most Indic systems, including Buddhism, comes through a tradition of debate and deliberation that follow a strict method to the madness. I can look up a few resources for you depending on your specific interest. Meanwhile check this out https://www.anaadi.org/post/short-article-debating-insights-from-nyaya-sutra
"We're just a happy marriage waiting to happen." Now that's a positive spin.
What if we're all wrong? This discussion felt like a bundle of carefulness, neediness, and endlessly multiplying nuances. Why? It’s because you’re coming at it from the wrong angle. You are diving into the garbage dump of polarisation in the hope of sorting out the mess. Instead, we should focus on what’s causing the garbage dump. The cause is society’s negative view of humans, which allows each side to feel dependent on one viewpoint and to easily judge their opponents. If we drop the negative view of humans, we would relax into the innate happiness and goodwill of being. From there cooperative problem-solving is natural, easy, and fun.
This seems naive to me. I disagree that there's a neediness in the dialogue, carefulness and multiplying nuances yes, because that's how adults have conversations about difficult topics. Your solution feels very meta to me - change the fundamental value structure of everyone, and then we won't need to have difficult conversations. People develop negative views of other humans not just because of their social conditioning but their personal experiences with other humans. There will always be a need to dive into the garbage dump - I agree that positive regard and a deeper sense of connectedness is vital, but it isn't an either/or.
You're underestimating the power of contexts. Society conditions us with a negative view of humans - religion says we are evil and science says we are animals fighting for survival. They might compliment us too, but that just helps to smuggle in the negativity, e.g. "Humans can improve" implies we are unsatisfactory now. Society’s toxic framing of our species gets us running, competing, and polarising into righteousness and judgment.
The negative context is the disease and polarised opinions are merely symptoms. Focusing on symptoms means it never ends, hence the neediness and infinitely dividing nuances. I’m not saying that we need to "change everyone's value structure." I’m saying we need to eliminate the disease that created those artificial structures. All the values in Spiral Dynamics are mere reactions to the limitations of the lower reactions, and so on. Values are band-aids to cover the symptoms. They don’t heal the disease.
Our "personal experiences" do have great aspects, but they're contaminated by society's negativity. Even "positive" interactions leave us with futile idealism that keeps the disease alive through distraction and hope. People within a deluded context always channel society's negativity, even through positive interactions.
There won't "always be a need to dive into the garbage dump" because we're intelligent enough to learn from our mistakes. Step outside of Plato’s Cave and see the futility of trying to make the shadows work. Then enjoy the freedom.