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] wwwSite > SamHarris.org Reader Forum Index
-> / 17 April 07 /
] Forum > Politics, Religion, Philosophy, and
Science > Philosophy
] Thread > Sophiology & History / Topic
> how written-language emerged
.
] on 16Apr homunculus say: Fascinating essay,
textman.
.
textman say: thx, homunculus.
I never get tired of hearing those three most-beautiful
words!
.
] h: It's sort of surprising how little attention
ends up being paid to the vast
] cultural revisions Akhenaten managed to attain,
even if many of them were
] only temporary.
.
tx: I agree. the scholars have yet to fully
appreciate the black-pharaoh's
rightful place in history. he started something
that is still being played-out.
.
] h: You touch on the transition between oral-tradition
and early writing.
] Would you say that very early writings were
almost by necessity
.
tx: 'necessity is the mother of invention',
yes.
.
] h: (since they lacked human personality and
other subtlety as well as formal
] complexity) clumsy and unwieldy,
.
tx: yes. again, necessarily so, since simple-signs
and symbols are very basic
compared to a flexible, yet useful, written-language.
.
] h: introducing much error into myths of various
cultures?
.
tx: no, not really. the early-writings merely
expressed the thinking that was
done by those who used the larger spoken-language.
writing itself is simply a
tool. it can help us to clarify our thinking,
if we approach things rationally, or
it can be used to express imaginative flights
of fancy. Today we call this kind
of literature 'science-fiction', but in the
age-of-myth mindset such literature
is taken very seriously, and called sacred-scriptures
and holy-texts. Of course,
some languages are better suited to rational
thinking than others.
.
] h: In other words, does it seem to you that
spoken subtlety, when it was
] translated into words, suddenly (comparatively
speaking) needed precision
.
tx: well, precision is always helpful, but
that was a relatively late development.
I'd say that real precision did not emerge
until the rise of classical greece
and the greek-alphabet. this is why philosophy
and science first appeared among
the ancient greeks. language has an awful lot
to do with *how* people think,
as well as with the *way* people think. thus
the bronze-age languages were
far more supportive of priestly and mythic
ways of thinking, than of more
rational ways of thought. and this only makes
all of Akhenaten's achievements
that much more remarkable.
.
] h: akin to mathematics
.
tx: If I recall correctly, i think that the
first systematic use of signs (ie.
a row of "dots" or tiny holes carved into bones
and antlers) was as an aid to
counting and remembering. thus written language
may well have gotten its initial
impetus from mathematics. hence the lists-of-kings
and tallies-of-booty are a
natural extension of the stone-age row-of-dots.
all this would suggest that
written-language was born a child of rational-pragmatism,
and only later was side-
tracked for the exclusive priestly-usage. in
ancient-egypt, to be a scribe meant
that you were part of the religious-elite.
The ancient-egyptian god Thoth was
the special deity for this small, yet wise,
class of citizen. yes, you just know
you're special when you have your own exclusive
god looking out for you, eh?
.
] h: -- and that the precision itself tended
to remove the subtlety?
.
tx: in a sense, that's true. symbols and myths
seem to carry more "weight"
than a 'how-to build a table' pamphlet. being
ambiguous allows you to import
and hold more meaning than purely technical
how-to instructions. everything
depends on what you want to do with the language.
this is why english is the
number-one language in the world: there is
none other that is so flexible.
.
btw: I sure would like to know what waltercat
thinks of S&H ... as much of
what is to follow depends rather heavily upon
one particular quality whose
presence or absence can make or break sophiology
even before it is fully
birthed. And that quality or characteristic
is its ... ummm ... [insert much head-
scratching here] ... its solidity? okay, let's
try that. so, dude, would you say
that S&H is a solid foundation from which
to launch an inquiry? or not?
speak now or forever hold your piece ...
.
Sorry, i mean: 'your peace', of course.
x
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] wwwSite > SamHarris.org
Reader Forum Index -> / 28 April 07 /
] Forum > Politics, Religion,
Philosophy, and Science > Philosophy
] Thread > Sophiology
& History / Topic > on being misty and worthy
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] tx previously say:
[snip] despite some major setbacks (eg. Sartre and Camus)
] Existentialism remains
basically an ongoing prophetic-enterprise. It is also the
] first organized and
systematic attempt to generate wisdom that is actually
] useful and relevant
to all people!
.
] on 28 apr Salt Creek
replied: Sorry, textman, tricks are for kids. I don't hang
] out at this forum to
be evangelized about the next great "miracle cure" or
] "universal wisdom".
.
tx say: hey, Salk Creek.
i respect your skepticism. if i were not in the driver's
seat, i too would be
somewhat skeptical about all this. and i don't mean to
come across as one who
is trying to evangelize people into a position that they
really don't want to
assume. This is no miracle-cure that i'm offering here.
philosophy and wisdom
both require determination and hard work; but i
would like you to reconsider
your inflexible opposition to the notion of
"universal wisdom".
.
] sc: Such a system or
cure, should it actually appear, is in no need of
] "prophets" to go around
selling it.
.
tx: who then should go
around selling it? who has sufficient authority to get
people's attention long
enough to realize that there's something of value here?
a scientist maybe? but
scientists can't measure wisdom. a philosopher maybe?
but philosophers don't
believe in wisdom. perhaps Einstein could indeed pull
it off, but he is no
longer available for such duties, alas.
.
] sc: Sure, it's an ongoing
"prophetic enterprise". But an enterprise it is, a
] cottage industry, a
pyramid scheme, a shell game, a scam, a grift, a trick.
.
tx: i fail to see how
you can call wisdom (or philosophy) a scam. is the idea of
the supremacy of individual
conscience in all matters of religion a trick? is the
ideal of the separation
of church and state a grift? is the observation that man
is basically an irrational-creature
a pyramid scheme? is the idea of rule-by-law
a shell game? is philosophy
itself a con-job? if so, that's a rather bleak and
cynical view of philosophy;
and one that i am not much disposed to accept.
so while it's true that
philosophers have made a mess of things lately, i think
that the potential is
still there to work through it, and maybe even to give
philosophy a sense of
purpose and direction.
.
] sc: I actually appreciate
existentialism, textman;
.
tx: i'm very glad you
said that, because my "sophiology" ought to be of
considerable interest
to anyone concerned with existentialism. it is easily my
favorite philosophical
"system", but it is certainly not the only kind of philosophy
that interests me. i
also notice that you did not actually deny my notion that
Kierkegaard and Nietzsche
are both prophets. if i have sold you on that idea,
then perhaps there is
more to this confusing business about prophets than what
most people suppose.
all i ask is that you keep an open mind. one of the main
ideas i am trying to
establish here is that while wisdom is wherever you find it,
it is nevertheless the
prophets who - historically - have been the main carriers
and disseminators of
new and radical ideas (ie. wisdom).
.
] sc: it's poetic, bittersweet,
a kind of naked, shivering nymph stepping out
] of her lily pond to
dry off. But if you try to catch her, she vanishes, poof,
] in a puff of mist.
.
tx: i know what you mean.
existentialism is rather vague and ill-defined when
compared to mathematics
and the hard-sciences. on the other hand, so is
wisdom. and so are the
prophets. flexibility appears to be essential to all three
of these things, and
just because they are hard to grasp onto doesn't mean that
their reality is in doubt.
it only means that science is ill-equipped to properly
handle them. moreover,
wisdom is not a minor or esoteric subject; it is a matter
that ought to concern
everyone ... especially philosophers. this is why a rational
understanding of wisdom
within the context of a sustained and disciplined
philosophical investigation
is so important at this stage in history.
x
textman
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