StephenK

@Serotoninluv @bejapuskas So ownership is nothing more than an exercise of power in the context of society/government/politics? If two people acknowledge each other's ownership fully with no malintent (that is, no need for an external force to exercise it's own will, like police, law, etc), is it still a power dynamic? I can imagine a dynamic where a husband is fully willing to let his wife 'own' his car, even though it is legally in his name. When it comes to ownership, what do you consider a 'healthy' form of a power dynamic? That is, when should power be exercised against the will of another? As for power, what forms does it manifest in? Physical violence (police,military)? Psychological violence (shame,fear)? I know there are a lot of questions here, so don't feel obligated to answer ?

If everything is perfect the way it is, why change anything? Isn't the desire to change what has manifested (through thought/future/past) just a movement away from love/acceptance of the present moment?

@Nahm I think it's the resistance to inspection work that is causing the dis-ease, not the inspection itself. Unless that is not what you mean, and I'm missing the point completely. As a side note, I read some of my writings from when I was a teenager and I seemed wiser then than I am now, almost a decade later. I used to be very opinionated back then. Now, I feel like I know nothing. Everything feels like it needs to be re-examined. I find it hard to form opinions now, as they all break apart upon closer inspection. I've had many bouts of crying/laughter recently, not out of fear or sadness, but out of awe and laughter at how I've been tripped up by ego over and over again. Anyway, I'm veering off the original topic.

Ok that makes sense. Yes, the body does not have many demands. All it wants is water, good food and a little tender love and care. It seems that the ego treats the body as a slave. This inspection work hurts like a b**** at the moment. But I feel as if a momentum has overcome me and I will continue on with it regardless, even to my last day. Simply a feeling? I think I understand, but that seems like I would have to tear my mind apart, in a metaphorical sense. I hope I can get there one day.

@Bas Yes, I think I veered off the topic with my first post and I spoke about UBI as a general concept and as a result we started speaking past each other because we were discussing fundamentally different issues. I'll try stick to the topic in future as to not cause confusion ?

Oh, ok. No problem. I'm not committed to any particular view on this matter, so I am participating as a way to be open to new ideas. I assume you live in a first world country, and have the privilege of having a positive relationship with your government (that is largely not corrupt). I on the other hand live in a third world African country infested with corruption. In fact, I can apply that logic (I don't have to imagine) to the police department, as where I live, the police are so incompetent/corrupt that private security is needed. But perhaps I am letting my own context effect my view on what is an American issue (where corruption is not as rife) -- for now. As for your exaggerated example, than CAN be true, but I come from an African Country where the government is so corrupt that implementing universal healthcare would crash the economy and leave people without doctors, as everything would have been stolen by government officials. I believe that government and the free market need to hold each other accountable. How this is done, I'm not 100% sure. As for proof, I need look no further than my own country. If you live in the United States or Europe, perhaps your relationship is a bit different. All that I'm looking for is accountability when things go wrong. I don't see where I defended US healthcare. If you can point me to where I did, I'd be most appreciative. I was speaking of a theoretical idea regarding UBI in my first post, which your link does not address in the slightest. But call me lazy if you want, that's your right. I am perhaps taking a more meta view on this issue, as I don't have the luxury of having an innate trust of government.

@Bas Hmm, I thought we were just having a discussion. You seem triggered and have set up a strawman and negated a question without an explanation. Since you don't want to have a discussion, I guess I'll be on my way. Nice talking to you.

Free healthcare is kind of like ubi though isn't it? -- government mandated ubi in a sense. Instead of the individual having control over those healthcare funds, the government has control. Yes, I agree that a completely unregulated free market will cause problems, but if private institutions are able to offer higher quality healthcare than government healthcare (maybe as a result of government corruption, lack of innovation), then private citizens should have some level of autonomy in deciding how/where those healthcare funds get spent. Somehow the gross inefficiencies of government spending needs to be kept in line, in the same way that the unregulated free market needs to be kept in line.

@Bas I wonder if UBI could be partitioned so that 20% can only be redeemable for food, 25% only redeemable for education etc, and we use the current education budget to fund that 25% of UBI required for education. This would allow parents to be forced to invest in education, but at a private institution of their choice. Hopefully the free market will fight to lower education prices. I'm no economist, so I'm sure there are holes in my plan that I cant see.

@Emerald Let me present a scenario to you: Suppose the majority of white people think that black face is a 'minor issue'. Yes, they think it is slightly racist, but not a huge societal issue, as far as societal issues go. These people might have a level of internalized racism they have not yet been able to see, but they're otherwise not too concerned with race. Now suppose Emerald has the ability rile up the mob to shame someone that committed a black face offence. Suppose this mob gets very large and so agitated that fringe elements of the mob make comments such as 'See, all white people are really racist deep down inside', or some random individuals in the mob posts a death threats. These comments spread on social media. These extreme individuals in the mob come to represent the mob, and your otherwise slightly racist white people start to think "These people are insane. Look, they're posting death threats!". To them, the representation of the herd looks extreme. This then galvanizes the middle-of-the-road-racist individuals into feeling victimized by the mob. This then galvanizes them into being more hyper aware of race, and hence more agitated. I must say, the ease with which you said: makes my hair stand on end. I enjoy your other content, but there is an air of lovelessness and lack of subtlety to your approach that really disturbs me. I will say one last thing: I hope you don't have the ability to rile up an internet mob, as I think it will backfire on you spectacularly.

@Serotoninluv And then the same people will say, "but it's been pretty chilly here this winter, so I don't know about this climate change thing". Or they'll point to the fact that the climate changed in the past. Again, climate change has no particular location, no particular temperature, no particular color, shape, sound. It is a very real, but abstract thing. Most people can't process these abstractions in my opinion.

@Serotoninluv The problem in my opinion is that climate change is not an object that people can point to, touch and smell. When you can't show people something tangible, they're not inclined to believe it. I think humans have a hard time understanding long term existential threats. This is probably also why we're inclined to be hyper aware of things that can immediately kill us, but things like obesity, heart-disease, unmanaged anxiety and poor diet are ignored, even though they're objectively long term risks to our lives.

@CreamCat Yeah, every last atom will eventually decay and the universe will go dark, but that will be trillions upon trillions of years from now, so it might as well be infinite from a human perspective.

@Leo Gura Yes, this seems like the most reasonable approach. And once we figure out how to produce a functioning fusion reactor, we basically have free, clean energy forever

@Leo Gura https://ourworldindata.org/what-is-the-safest-form-of-energy Are you saying nuclear energy is not good because there are risks involved? You can pretty much apply that reasoning to all things in life. All forms of energy production have a cost to human life, so relative risk should be the determining factor here shouldn't it?

People should refrain from telling ol' Greta about the potential for Nuclear War, militarized AI, bio-engineered viruses and bacteria, antibiotic resistance, global pandemics, asteroid impacts etc. Poor girl might end up with grey hair.

@Leo Gura ? Yes, this is my instinct as well.

@Leo Gura Oh, I must have mixed you up with someone else then. Even so, do you think that those that experience so called hell realms only experience suffering as a result of a sense of self being present?

@Leo Gura Is that true for your experience of DMT hell realms too? Is there still a sense of self in those experiences?

@ShivaShakti This pointer resonates with me. Thanks Can they really be kept separate though? When we do, it's all rather confusing to be honest. @Nahm I wish I could see what you're pointing to, but I cant.

I can see that the loosening of the body-mind-person can be largely equated with the loosening of the Ego, but I do not see how the two are identical. For instance, one could drop the body-mind-person view and still be identified with something (something that is not the body-mind, like an idealized state of consciousness, or "purpose of life"). There seems to be an implication that if one drops the body-mind-person view, then anything left over is by definition not egoic, and is therefore 'God's will', or some similar notion. Could it be that the body-mind-person is but a subset of the larger Ego structure, and we falsely assume that when body-mind-person view has been dropped, ego has been dropped? Why would one choose to view something as imperfect when they know that imperfection is just a lens we use to view the world? Life becomes decidedly unpleasant if I don't. I need to reflect on this statement.

@crab12 I'm not committed to particular position on the issue, just thinking out loud. Your response is interesting and has given me a new perspective on the matter.

I think minimum-wage would follow the principals behind the Laffer Curve, even though it pertains to taxation. Raise it (minimum wage) too much, employment is going to tank and you'll destroy businesses -- lower it too much and people will be unwilling to work. I think Libertarians think that the free market will adequately decide where that rate is, regionally. I think that a flat out minimum wage across a country is far too crude, as it does not address regional issues. A minimum wage has to be highly sensitive to local market dynamics within the region, because if it falls within the extremes of the laffer curve, the effect could be disastrous in particular regions.

@Leo Gura You know, you could write a bot to post that exact reply to 80% of questions on here. And the bot would be right ?

@Key Elements yes, culture and race often overlap and it's hard to to see which aspect people are really focusing on in conversion (it is probably a bit of both as you mentioned).