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Re: Perception is---anything





Robert Eberwein wrote:

> Lemme just throw this out there-- if only in the spirit of: have you 
>thought
> this through, for yourself.

i don't mean to begrudge your point, but thinking it through implies 
there's an
endpoint to the process. with this kind of topic i'm not sure one can ever
fully "think" it through...

>
> Is it not possible that *Perception is NOT everything*.

perception may not be everything, but it IS the quality by which we 
mediate the
world "out there". funny thing is, so far, by western science (or any other
historical method), humans have been unable to show how it comes to be that
there is a subject and an object. i mean, where do you draw the line?
physically? well, do you then disregard the interpenetration of subtle 
matter,
i.e. air molecules in your lungs? what lies behind your eyes, but more (and
different forms) of what is out there in front of them? (loop content 
noted :-)

> --That there are NOT
> an infinite way to see anything- but, rather, one way that allows the
> greatest appreciation of the thing. Maybe not everything is relative, but
> absolute.
>

well, if we all shared the same set of eyes, optic nerves, brain, etc. but 
i
think perhaps a deeper reality lies buried somewhere in these opposites. to
rephrase your statement, "maybe everything is relative, but absolute."

>
> *Heresy! Run him off the list! Blasphemer of the sacred lessons of the
> Enlightenment!*
>
> I notice this in putting a song together. Most of the time I settle with 
>one
> of the infinite possibilities. But SOMETIMES I find that absolutely 
>perfect
> thing [chord/word/sound/change] that had been there all along.

how do you define "absolutely perfect"? is this not relative to your 
impression
at that time? does everyone that hears it think so too? can your impression
ever change?

> What if
> everything is like that? That means that there would be MOST RIGHT thing 
>to
> say to your girlfriend at a certain moment- as opposed to an infinite 
>range
> of possible things. There would be the MOST RIGHT time to get pregnant, 
>the
> right person to accompany you on your trip to Maui, the right song to 
>play
> at the wedding gig, the RIGHT way to raise your kids...The RIGHT delay 
>unit
> to buy... The RIGHT way to handle the rude clerk at the computer store...
>
> Maybe it's not all cool/good.

just because things are relative does not make them "cool/good".

> Maybe we need to search out the sublime.

absolutely :-). i don't rule out the possibility that there is some greater
self, reality, etc. that we might witness fleetingly from time to time 
which
somehow communicates to us what is *sublime*, i.e. what accords with the
established order (tao), etc. it may not be one thing to all, 
however...there
is the great sufi parable about the elephant in the village of the blind. 
this
is where the relative and the absolute somehow come together...we all 
perceive
the world (the elephant) through our own particular means. there is no way 
to
grasp its entirety, since this would imply an enlightenment beyond our 
current
state (blindness)...yet we sometimes have the sense that the elephant does
indeed exist, if only as a fleeting memory...

> Maybe
> there are folks out there who've subconsciously joined in an effort to 
>make
> us all think that there should be no standards-for anything.

aha! a conspiracy!

> And maybe they
> are motivated by not wanting their limitations to be highlighted, next to
> excellence

perhaps it is more the desire not to be judged by foreign standards.

> [excellence is the first thing to go when one believe that
> perception is everything]...

explain how a notion of excellence is necessarily at odds with a view of
relativity? just because there may not be any absolute judge or standard, 
this
does not mean that things can't be judged on their relative merits within a
given context. it's just not so cut and dry, i think...


thanks for your post. it made me think (and that doesn't happen that much
around here on fridays!)

best,
lance g.