What do we really know?

[DoktorGreen]

How many things can you say you really know are true?

We are born.
We perceive.
We perceive differently at night.

We die.

What else? Is everything else an assumption?

[funnyguy]

I know that after I eat I don't feel as hungry as opposed to if I don't eat.

[DoktorGreen]

Update-
How many things can you say you really know are true?
We are born.
We consume.
We perceive.
We perceive differently at night.
We die.
What else? Is everything else an assumption? What do we experience that is not a result of our programed perception?

[glance left]

What do I really know for sure?  Nothing!  

Nothing is as it seems, the closer I look

[funnyguy]

In my opinion like it or not we've learned a lot throughout our lifetimes. It is most definitely possible to alter, ignore or discard knowledge, however, knowledge is gained just as power and experience is gained. Hence DJs expression "Brujo", "One who knows", "A man of knowledge".

In fact believing or knowing that you don't know is still a form of knowledge. It merely states that you're aware of not being aware. One can greatly benefit from knowledge but it's most certainly possible to have the opposite effect from the knowledge one possesses too.

Don't get me wrong saying "I don't know" opens wonderful doors to new experiences which will lead us to new knowledge and points of view which beforehand we were not aware of and if we were saying "I know, I know..." they'd likely remain closed.

Intellectual knowledge, however, holds close to none pragmatic value unless applied or learned from experience. So in order to be efficient in applying what one knows the knowledge must be put to or gained from practice.

If you don't do the right things, the right things won't happen.
You can plant a tree seed in lava as an experiment and see if it will grow.

[DoktorGreen]

You make good points funnyguy! We have learned in this lifetime! We've learned all about this world and how to function. Some better than others. Do you think that's knowledge? It seems to me that it is just memorizing the programming of this culture and band, but maybe I'm wrong.
What IS a man of knowledge?

[funnyguy]

Doktor Green
We've learned all about this world and how to function.
It seems to me that it is just memorizing the programming of this culture and band, but maybe I'm wrong.
Isn't memory knowledge? Why is it that what we've learned or memorized should not be considered as knowledge?

What is your definition of knowledge?

Carlos Castaneda

"DJ defines himself as a man of knowledge or one who knows. He uses that interchangeably."
Source:


Don Juan

"A man of knowledge is one who has followed truthfully the hardships of learning, a man who has, without rushing or without faltering, gone as far as he can in unraveling the secrets of power and knowledge. To become a man of knowledge one must challenge and defeat his four natural enemies.

Don Juan

"Power rests on the kind of knowledge one holds. What is the sense of knowing things that are useless?"
Don Juan

"A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war, wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it will live to regret his steps."

[glance left]

Maybe a Man of Knowledge knows that what he knows is born of silent knowledge.  To reach it, he has to suspend what he thinks he knows....his certainty....and then it comes in floating in, like flecks of gold (or something like that, per DJ).  From where?  Where does silent knowledge come from?  Where does it go?  From somewhere hitherto undreamt of!  (sorry....had to toss in an Infinity War quote )

[funnyguy]

In my experience silent knowledge happens to you in the momentary experience whatever the situation is when you suddenly know without the shadow of a doubt something about something which is currently occurring or you did not previously have the answer to. It's basically seeing not looking as described by the books.

Knowledge on the other hand is something else...
I for example know that most people can walk, birds make the sounds birds make, most people can talk, there's parrots that can mimic people sounds. If I jump of an 8 storey building It's highly likely that I'll break my feet.

There's a lot of things I know so do you.

[funnyguy]

Here's a person who really does not know something and what the effects of that are.

[funnyguy]

As I described above she most likely knows perfectly (which she learned overtime) what pain is intellectually, however, as she has no basis in her experience to compare that to.

So in essence she actually knows what pain is but that makes no difference at all in her experience of it it only has effects on the way she has to lead her life and if someone didn't possess the knowledge of pain to share with her do you think she would've survived as long as she has?

[DoktorGreen]

Well, I'm not going to say that I KNOW what knowledge is. It is one of those things we don't know for sure!

From my experience, memory is a collection of information. Inventory, if you will. And that "ah-ha" moment that sometimes happens out of nowhere ... that's intuition. Also based on a subconscious assessment of our inventory or some bleed-through from a broader perspective. Again, my personal opinion and experience.

 a "Man of Knowledge" is a "Man of Action". To "know" is to create. It is an act in full alignment with the true nature of Intent. A "Man of Knowledge" willfully Intends his life. Of course we all do that, don't we !

Of course your mileage may vary. Which is why we can't find msny things that we know for sure.

[funnyguy]

In my point of view to know is not to create. To create is to create. To know is to know. Yet I'm a simple dude I don't like very complicated things explanations or definitions.

Switching "I know that I'll die if a nuclear bomb is detonated 2 feet away from me." to "To create that I'll die if a nuclear bomb is detonated 2 feet away from me." doesn't make sense to me.

The way I see it knowledge is the information and experience we've gained through perceiving. What I know includes my memories as well and I'm quite open to learning new stuff.

[DoktorGreen]

Yes and you are definitely in the majority with that definition!

[glance left]

  I remember a story about jumping........what was it?  Jumping from......something.  A cliff?  Something about Carlos jumping over and over and over off a cliff?  I can't quite remember what happened, do you?   But I think it was something unexpected!  Certainly not broken feet.

I was listening to the "sound that birds make" the other day.  The more I listened......the less the sounds sounded like sounds that birds make.  I think that if I were to answer someone truthfully the question "what does the sound that birds make sound like?" I would have to answer, "It depends"

You're right....silent knowledge knows within the context of what it sees.  But the knowledge is open ended.....not fixed because the context, he knows, is not fixed.  What was it DJ said about the assumption that we live in a "world of solid objects"?

[funnyguy]

Doktor Green

Yes and you are definitely in the majority with that definition!
I share it with others, yes.
Help me understand your view on it better.


Glance Left

  I remember a story about jumping........what was it?  Jumping from......something.  A cliff?  Something about Carlos jumping over and over and over off a cliff?  I can't quite remember what happened, do you?   But I think it was something unexpected!  Certainly not broken feet.
I like good stories.


Glance Left

I was listening to the "sound that birds make" the other day.  The more I listened......the less the sounds sounded like sounds that birds make.  I think that if I were to answer someone truthfully the question "what does the sound that birds make sound like?" I would have to answer, "It depends"
As I already said knowledge is free to be aligned, altered, ignored, and discarded. You can just as easily alter the knowledge you posses about bird sounds and re-align your perception of them that doesn't mean they're not making bird sounds to me or anyone else while you perceive them as something else unless we do what you are doing. So I most definitely know that birds make bird sounds and as you can see I also know that I can perceive them as something else and align different knowledge/perception/awareness.


Glance Left

You're right....silent knowledge knows within the context of what it sees.  But the knowledge is open ended.....not fixed because the context, he knows, is not fixed.  What was it DJ said about the assumption that we live in a "world of solid objects"?

Here's what he said
DJ
"Of course it's a world of objects. We are not arguing that."

Carlos
"What are you saying then?"

DJ
"I am saying that this is first a world of energy; then it's a world of objects.
I would be a fool if I said that the knowledge I posses is not subject to a change and I don't recall ever saying such a thing.
I merely said that knowledge in my opinion includes information and experience gathered in this lifetime among other things.
So indeed you're right knowledge is not fixed. I never really assumed the world of solid objects is the only reality out there either I've actually been probing that awareness since I can remember myself.
Did you assume that CC's jumping off a cliff story is valid or do you have any experience that proves its validity?


Doktor Green

a "Man of Knowledge" is a "Man of Action".
Don Juan

A man of knowledge endeavors, and sweats, and puffs, and if one looks at him he is just like any ordinary man, except that the folly of has life is under control.

[Kaomea]

What do we really know?

Only what we've been taught. There are some things we haven't had the opportunity to learn yet. Without mastery over the foundations of living, we don't gain access to the good stuff.

What is the good stuff?

Magic!



Abracadabra!

[DoktorGreen]

Juan Matus was dealing with that stubborn Carlos and used whatever he could to break his fixations and relliance on the tonal perspective. He offers some good pointers, but even his own stories describe many processes for breaking through to an acolyte.

To know is to express pure intent, not as a tool we might use to achieve something..., but by expressing as the Nahual. We are a collection of filaments. These filaments compose the Nahual. When isolated and compressed, the ball of fibers that we are is forced into a mode of perception. That's birth! We are the intent of the Nahual. We are intent. We are the Nahual perceiving. When we grasp what we are, we can 'know' a thing and it becomes.

Until then, we have to use words and feelings which offer a varying degree of manifestation. This is because we are forcing our will into a mass of other wills, ie. the programmed cultures. The more personal power we have in our savings account, the better we are at this. When we have enough to "stop the world", the slim chance to become the double arises!

So that's how it seems for me. Because everything is subjective to the Nahual, there are very few anchors of reliable truth. But to fixated humans, everything is objective! My plan with this thread was to try a conversation beyond the logicial and rational, hoping to  stretch my mental grip toward its breaking point! It's a serious issue for today's warrior. Science has discovered multiple worlds and thus we can accept those concepts into our inventory without striving and reaching personal experience. We think the gives us "knowledge" of other worlds! NO. Just an addition to our bulging inventory!

[glance left]

"I am saying that this is first a world of energy; then it's a world of objects"

It's both....I agree   

The key is in the emphasis.  I've spent a life time from a fixed position, in which birds make bird sounds.  First attention.   And then, the option to shift perception.....in which birds maybe, really, aren't birds at all....maybe they are something different.  Something unknown.  Second attention.  And then, ofc, if one persists on this trajectory (if he dares!), when the world stops, as Dok alludes to, and a third option becomes apparent. Energy flowing in the universe, for lack of a better term.....the unknowable.  Down deep, I know that this is the ultimate reality....what's really going on.  I've seen glimpses and it really is indescribable.....even though I've tried to describe it.  And so, I make space for that in this world of solid objects, which are growing softer as I get older.

Energy first.

Abstract first.

Everything is an unfathomable mystery, as DJ said.  

Allowing for this to infect my certainty gives me access, as Kao puts it, to magic.  It is, indeed, the good stuff.  There's nothing like it!  I'll sacrifice my certainty all day long.....heads rolling down steep stone steps, one right after another....for a taste. Where's Jihadi John when I really need him!  A little off the top, my friend

[funnyguy]

Dok from what I gather you and I are using different words with the same definitions that's all.

As I said knowledge, awareness, perception are subject to change. We can definitely change the descriptions of the what we perceive in any way we want. That doesn't make one thing less true than another it just makes it another potential description and assemblage position.

One can stay fixated in that one position or be fluid.
We're free to traverse the unknown, find, and learn new assemblage positions and realities.

Here's a certainty our (assemblage) points are holding a lot of knowledge (I call it knowledge Dok calls it inventory) right now for example about DJ and CCs descriptions of the world. We're free to play with it that's the cool part. Do we put it to the test and find out for ourselves? Do we discard it? Do we assume it's all valid? Do we blindly believe in it? Do we become monks or get on the FBIs most wanted list?

"Unless we do the right things. The right things won't happen."

[Julio Juliopolis]

DoktorGreen wrote:
How many things can you say you really know are true?

We are born.
We perceive.
We perceive differently at night.

We die.

What else? Is everything else an assumption?

My most favoritest word at the moment is hypothetical. I remember watching Deepak Chopra get stymied on a youtube video in which him and several other spiritual gurus du jour were being interviewed on some sort of talk show when the host opened things up for audience questions. The man picked from the audience tells the host that his question is for Deepak and the following exchange occurs.
Man "You said that no belief is true?"
Deepak "Yes"
Man "Do you believe that?"
Deepak "Yes"
Man "Thank you" and immediately heads back to his seat, while the audience laughs.

Poor Deepak. At least he had the good sense to laugh appreciatively about it, in spite of it being "at his expense". Perhaps if Deepak had a better mastery of the word hypothetical he would have better been able to address the man's questions, or at least not fallen into such a linguistic trap.

Hypothetical, (according to me) - Anything that may or may not be true. When a hypothetical is considered true it is still different from a belief in that no energetic investment is made into it's being true.

Armed with a word like this, perhaps Deepak could've clarified that he doesn't have beliefs, he only has hypotheticals, some of which he's subscribed to, and he always considers them to be in question. Of course, that might not really be true, but it seems to be the gist of what he's recommending people do, (a recommendation I agree with).


So, using my favorite word to answer the question "What do we really know?", I'll suggest that the question can be fairly and more precisely re-phrased as "What hypotheticals, if any, can we say are true without having to make any assumption?"

An assumption in this case would mean to accept a hypothetical as true without proof. Proof meaning that a hypothetical has been shown to be drawn in a logically valid manner 1-exclusively from other hypotheticals which are known to be true or 2-as an immediate inference in which no other hypotheticals need be considered.

People have been wrestling with this question for thousands of years. A few answers tend to come up a lot for this question, and they are all somewhat lacking.
1 - If A is true than A is true.
This answer, which seems true, simply hides the assumption in itself. We're looking for something we know to be true, not something we know to be true IF it's true.
2 - You cannot have A and ~A.
Which means that A can't be both true and untrue at the same time. This is arguably the fundamental belief of reason, and it is necessary for the rules of logic to be at all credible, since they are ultimately based on this. However, it still isn't telling us any specific thing that is true. This is a bit better than the first answer in that from it we get 1 hypothetical out of it, that being "Truth and falsehood are universal opposites". Two problems with this though. First is that it is still an assumption, and second is that it only describes our labelling/mental modelling system. It is pretty useful however. 
3 - The cogito, aka "I think therefore I am" - This ego-based amateur attempt at a proof is hardly worth the effort to discuss. Let's just say that if I were to say "The pink elephant sitting on top of your head thinks, therefore the pink elephant sitting on top of your head is" you would be able to find the problem in this yourself. Thus if you can't find the issue in the original it's because of your attachment to "I". The fact that logicians and philosophers have treated this seriously so long is an embarrassment to their entire fields of study.


So... from a logical, mind-centric viewpoint, to the best of my knowledge I don't know anything. However their is another viewpoint to consider, and that's the "direct knowledge" that funnyguy and many others have talked about.

===========

Direct knowledge is quite a bit different than logical proofs. To me it doesn't seem to occur in the mind at all. If I'm going to throw a basketball towards a hoop, direct knowledge can tell me if it's going in or not. But it seems like it operates on a scale. Usually I have an idea of whether that will happen but I don't "know" for sure. Often I've thought it would go in and it did not, (and vice versa). Only when a lot of energy was placed on the awareness would I absolutely know for sure. It takes a lot of energy to be aware of exactly how to throw every shot so it goes in.

This seems to invite the question "Does putting energy into awareness inform us of truth or create it?" If I put enough energy into the awareness that my grandma is actually still alive, can I make that true? Note that I'm talking about putting energy into the awareness of this, not putting energy into believing it.

At the moment, I don't have a great system of understanding for this, but it seems worth my while to take time contemplating it. But if I know anything it's that I'm gonna need more words like hypothetical before I'm done.

[DoktorGreen]

Good contributions JJ! If Depak used English as a firts language.. yada yada. Let me rephrase the title question. Is that allowed?!?

Excluding beliefs, how many things can you say you really know are true?

[Kaomea]

This is a good start from JJ, "This seems to invite the question "Does putting energy into awareness inform us of truth or create it?" If I put enough energy into the awareness that my grandma is actually still alive, can I make that true? Note that I'm talking about putting energy into the awareness of this, not putting energy into believing it."

You wouldn't need to put energy into this statement to make it true. It already is true. I see what you mean, but you're assuming she has died. That is a true assumption, but that is a limiting assumption because that is not the only assumption to be had. It's ignorant to assume she is only dead.

It's difficult to describe something like this. It relates to time. If time does not exist (but it can, if we see it as linear) why would death be the end? There are no endings. So just as the past, present and future are linear; birth, decay and death can be a linear states. However for both time and life they can be nonlinear. That is the point where people struggle. Grandma is dead, but she is also alive, and also in a state of decay.

Nonlinear states are illogical and the human mind requires attunement to hold this AP. It is unnatural for most because society has taught us reality is a linear experience.

Why would society avoid teaching nonlinear thinking? Is it a useless skill or might there be some risk involved? CC thought there was power in seeing in a nonlinear fashion.

[Kaomea]

A quickie:

Society teaches us that someone who hurts us is bad. If we are hurt we must hold on to that hurt forever. We must punish the bad and reward the good. Only then does the hurt go away. Or does it?

That's why people are imprisoned right? To punish and divide. That's so easy to do when we label people as good or bad.

A wise man once told me that people are complex. They each believe they are doing what is right. Suicide bombers believe what they are doing is right. Christian religious leaders believe they are also right. And so on.

What does one do in a world where everyone is so different and sometimes contradictory but each right in their own perspective?

Society is ran by people who are very logical. However, there is more to life than logic and the reality in play, the one the sheeple see, is only a fragment of the whole.

[Julio Juliopolis]

DoktorGreen wrote:
Good contributions JJ! If Depak used English as a firts language.. yada yada. Let me rephrase the title question. Is that allowed?!?

Excluding beliefs, how many things can you say you really know are true?

Thanks DoktorGreen,

Answering your question is getting more and more confusing.
Everything is true. 
Nothing is true.
I don't know, why don't you ask someone who exists?!