The epoch of ritual and language is coming to a close.

[MagsJ]

The other day I watched a TV program where a Chinese scholar and an American scholar discussed the moniker "Age of Anxiety" ... a moniker used to describe the prevailing global circumstances. The moniker "Age of Anxiety" seems to dovetail nicely with the moniker "Age of Transition".

1) Are emerging technologies the underlying cause of the disruptions/changes in human behavioral patterns?

or

2) Are emerging technologies a gift to humanity to grease the wheels so to speak ... ergo ... to facilitate the transmutation of the human mind ... a process self evidently long underway.

The amount of cases of anxiety have risen drastically.. is that because we are in your aforementioned age of transition but without knowing the consequences that will follow?

[pilgrim-seeker_tom]

Yesterday, in this thread I wrote ... "neurons slip off the rails so to speak".

Today, my thinking has matured some ... neurons don't slip off the rails ... rather an individual's mind NP&C ruptures ... the image of a train wreck comes to mind ... an extension of my "slip off the rails" metaphor.

The attachment Rupture.jpg is no longer available

Mags ... if you are reading this ... I'm reminded of the picture you posted of an old rusted, delapidated, non functional train ... attempting to explain your personal experience with a NP&C rupture.

It was an old abandoned Orient Express, left to rust.. of which there are many. I wonder if those involved with their life cycle ever thought that they would end up like that.. left to decay from rust and neglect?

There's something beautiful in decay and destruction..they're irreversible for one, but they can be fixed - is the imagery envisioned a metaphor for a need to be fixed? and how would we know of what? In my case I had reached the end of the line, and saw a need for my chassis to be revamped and my spark plugs rested. The process is well under way.

Mags ... thanks for your thoughtful response and in particular sharing how your personal experience seems to fit the image of the train. Familiar imagery is often our best resource when attempting to describe/explain the ineffable. Let me propose another image intended to represent neural pathways.

Neural Pathways.jpg (12.23 KiB) Viewed 1126 times

If the above image is a fair rendering of neural pathways one could argue the "old abandoned Orient Express" image you shared earlier is a consequence of crumbling communication infrastructure ... ergo ... crumbling existing neural pathways.

For me ,,, this "crumbling" is a prerequisite of what is often labelled a conversion experience ... the call narrative. In secular terms ... a radical change in one's personal world view.

...until today I explained the above science as temptation. I now realize there is no such thing as temptation ... only NP&C's competing within a single mind.

Why temptation? Of what? Of daily responses to things/thoughts?

Until recently my definition of "temptation" was confined to ... a personal desire to do something I know I shouldn't do ... a simple example being continue to indulge in my poor eating habits.

Somewhere in the time line delineating this thread I realized temptation as a moral imperative doesn't exist ... OTH a neural pathway that embodies the notion of moral imperatives does exist ... either as the result of social constructs or hardwired in the human species DNA ... or most likely some combination of the two.

Similarly I now see the term "inner voice" as neuron activity in my brain ... caused by some external energy source.

[Meno_]

Removed for reasons of lack of clarity.

[pilgrim-seeker_tom]

The other day I watched a TV program where a Chinese scholar and an American scholar discussed the moniker "Age of Anxiety" ... a moniker used to describe the prevailing global circumstances. The moniker "Age of Anxiety" seems to dovetail nicely with the moniker "Age of Transition".

1) Are emerging technologies the underlying cause of the disruptions/changes in human behavioral patterns?

or

2) Are emerging technologies a gift to humanity to grease the wheels so to speak ... ergo ... to facilitate the transmutation of the human mind ... a process self evidently long underway.

The amount of cases of anxiety have risen drastically.. is that because we are in your aforementioned age of transition but without knowing the consequences that will follow?

I wish the stats were available ... I believe what you described as "risen drastically" would better be described as "off the charts" literally ... and seems it's a global phenomenon.

Your second comment is equally profound ... psychologists have long confirmed the roots of anxiety/fear are so often found to be the "unknown".

An over simplified example ... should we encounter a tiger in the woods ... with full knowledge that the tiger posed no danger ... would anxiety/fear of the tiger still exist in our mind? Seems to me there would be no market for visiting caged zoo animals if this was true.

[Ierrellus]

T. S. Eliot, in his later years, converted to Catholicism because he found ritual to be a necessity--for him that is.

[pilgrim-seeker_tom]

T. S. Eliot, in his later years, converted to Catholicism because he found ritual to be a necessity--for him that is.

Ritual constructs neural pathways in our brain ... a basic building block ... lego comes to mind.

[Ierrellus]

T. S. Eliot, in his later years, converted to Catholicism because he found ritual to be a necessity--for him that is.

Ritual constructs neural pathways in our brain ... a basic building block ... lego comes to mind.

So, how could "the epoch of ritual", if it is basic, be coming to a close?

[pilgrim-seeker_tom]

T. S. Eliot, in his later years, converted to Catholicism because he found ritual to be a necessity--for him that is.

Ritual constructs neural pathways in our brain ... a basic building block ... lego comes to mind.

So, how could "the epoch of ritual", if it is basic, be coming to a close?

Good question Ierrellus ... thanks!

More importantly ... questions imply interest ... even if the interest is simply to debunk a claim.

The word 'epoch' is a unit of time ... how much time is inferred with context.

1) Nesting the words "language" and "rituals" in the same sentence suggests a very long time.
2) A new epoch ... in the same context ... logically would require a very long transition period ... Age of Transition ... Liminal Space ...

The word liminal comes from the Latin word limen, meaning threshold – any point or place of entering or beginning. A liminal space is the time between the ‘what was’ and the ‘next.’ It is a place of transition, waiting, and not knowing.

Source: https://inaliminalspace.org/about-us/wh ... nal-space/

Note the words "waiting and not knowing" in the above quote ... ergo ... I have no definitive answer to your question.

Though ... familiar imagery ... I do have.

The image that came to mind when reflecting on your question is:

Puppet-Master.jpg (230.45 KiB) Viewed 1060 times

The human brain ... like the puppet in the above image ... is malleable. Examples of our puppet masters are peers, family, culture and so on. The transmission vehicle(strings in the above image) being principally audio and visual ... the consequence being the construction of well traveled neural pathways in our brain.

The above imagery and comments illustrate the need for an intermediary agency ... a puppet master. The coming epoch will have no need for an intermediary agency ... akin to Pierre Teirhard Chardin's "Omega Point"

Mathematical physicist Frank Tipler generalizes[6] Teilhard's term Omega Point to describe what he maintains is the ultimate fate of the universe required by the laws of physics: roughly, Tipler argues that quantum mechanics is inconsistent unless the future of every point in spacetime contains an intelligent observer to collapse the wavefunction, and that the only way for this to happen is if the Universe is closed (that is, it will collapse to a single point) and yet contains observers with a "God-like" ability to perform an unbounded series of observations in finite time.

[Meno_]

Would such a point conceivably be infinitely reduced to absolute nothingness or would be one of an absolute threshold of some limit?

[pilgrim-seeker_tom]

Would such a point conceivably be infinitely reduced to absolute nothingness or would be one of an absolute threshold of some limit?

Sheesh ... I don't know!

Well I do but it's a secret.

Two familiar images come to mind:

1) A glass of pure spring water ... looks crystal clear ... no visible alien particles.

Water under a micrscope.jpg (14.15 KiB) Viewed 1036 times

2) A black hole ... originally thought to be a version of "nothingness" ... now apparently the scientific community is not so sure.

black hole.jpg (12 KiB) Viewed 1036 times

I conceive such a point to be ... "all-ness" ... "one-ness" ... yet not a finality ... simply another stage of cosmic evolution.

The notion fails to get much traction because people fear the loss of personal identity ... individual consciousness ... what rubbish!