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Not sure I follow the explanation. And apologies cause I’m not that familiar with these texts, but afaik it talks about “soul” here, not information? Words like

by wruza 2y ago

Not sure I follow the explanation. And apologies cause I’m not that familiar with these texts, but afaik it talks about “soul” here, not information? Words like Brahman, Atman come to mind. In case I mistook it, ignore the above. All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind Doesn’t it come from the mind’s interaction with the world? I don’t think that any important knowledge comes from doing nothing (apart from psychology due to its nature). It all sounds like a typical religious salad, tbh. “You” discover from your “mind”, but then some seers understand that “you” and “all” and “mind” are the same, etc. Well, you don’t have to be a seer to see it. “You discover from your mind” is a useless semantic loop that creates all this unnecessary complexity, imo.

freilanzer 2y ago
>> All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind > Doesn’t it come from the mind’s interaction with the world? There is no difference between these concepts, is there? In both cases knowledge comes from the mind. Also, you can come up with ideas without interacting with the outside world, can you not? This feels like nitpicking.
- wruza 2y ago
  The mind quickly falls apart when interaction-deprived (at least human one). This whole “comes from the mind” is just a metaphor, because the mind is also the arriving point, so it’s like “knowledge is defined by and comes from where it arrives to, on itself”. This semantic no-op nonsense originates in taking this metaphor literally, which one should not do. What physically happens is that a mind accumulates and (sometimes) systematizes information from outside, and knowledge is the result of this concentration process. Akin to a puddle collecting water from higher grounds. But it doesn’t synthesize water by simply being concave. Blowing ideas out of poor metaphors is a regular thing in religious texts, so be careful with that if you want to build some practical world view.
  - freilanzer 2y ago
    I think you're too hung up on the mind part. I don't understand this as saying the mind synthesizes knowledge from nothing. That's why I said, there is no fundamental difference for me - whether the mind conceives of something new, or synthesizes knowledge from outside information is not very interesting a difference, since a mind is required to grasp this knowledge. Maybe a better term would be information vs. knowledge.

by wruza 2y ago

freilanzer 2y ago

>> All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind > Doesn’t it come from the mind’s interaction with the world? There is no difference between these concepts, is there? In both cases knowledge comes from the mind. Also, you can come up with ideas without interacting with the outside world, can you not? This feels like nitpicking.

wruza 2y ago
The mind quickly falls apart when interaction-deprived (at least human one). This whole “comes from the mind” is just a metaphor, because the mind is also the arriving point, so it’s like “knowledge is defined by and comes from where it arrives to, on itself”. This semantic no-op nonsense originates in taking this metaphor literally, which one should not do. What physically happens is that a mind accumulates and (sometimes) systematizes information from outside, and knowledge is the result of this concentration process. Akin to a puddle collecting water from higher grounds. But it doesn’t synthesize water by simply being concave. Blowing ideas out of poor metaphors is a regular thing in religious texts, so be careful with that if you want to build some practical world view.
- freilanzer 2y ago
  I think you're too hung up on the mind part. I don't understand this as saying the mind synthesizes knowledge from nothing. That's why I said, there is no fundamental difference for me - whether the mind conceives of something new, or synthesizes knowledge from outside information is not very interesting a difference, since a mind is required to grasp this knowledge. Maybe a better term would be information vs. knowledge.