Leo's Blog Discussion Mega-Thread

[RisingLane]

Leo's old-man-yells-at-cloud phase has begun:

Edited yesterday at 03:55 PM by RisingLane

[Yimpa]

3 hours ago, Davino said:

Thanks for sharing the children soldier video, def thought provoking 

“They are messy questions with no comfortable answers.”

[LoneWonderer]

In regards to the blog post on the gulag archipelago does anyone have an alternative link to the yt video? The video is blocked in my country. Cheers

Edited 18 hours ago by LoneWonderer

[Leo Gura]

33 minutes ago, LoneWonderer said:

In regards to the blog post on the gulag archipelago does anyone have an alternative link to the yt video? The video is blocked in my country. Cheers

I updated the blog post to add a few alternative docs, but they are not the same.

Use a VPN.

[LoneWonderer]

25 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

I updated the blog post to add a few alternative docs, but they are not the same.

Use a VPN.

Thank you! 🙏 

[Ulax]

Nah i disagree with the meditation blog post. If that were true then that would mean if Timothy Snyder doesn't meditate then you shouldn't take him seriously on politics. 

[Miguel1]

@Ulax There’s levels to being an intellect. A politician and a serious philosopher trying to understand reality is a vast gap.

That being said, Conscious Politics is possibly only when you do serious meditative work.

[Ulax]

48 minutes ago, Miguel1 said:

@Ulax There’s levels to being an intellect. A politician and a serious philosopher trying to understand reality is a vast gap.

That being said, Conscious Politics is possibly only when you do serious meditative work.

I get you mate. But the quoted claim leo made is:

"Any intellectual who doesn't meditate or do meditative yoga isn't serious"

That is a distinct claim from "there are levels to being an intellect"

[Terell Kirby]

1 hour ago, Ulax said:

Nah i disagree with the meditation blog post. If that were true then that would mean if Timothy Snyder doesn't meditate then you shouldn't take him seriously on politics. 

Bit of a strawman of the post.

The ontology of an intellectual matters. Not only that, but a philosopher who hasn't had insight into the nature and structure of reality through meditative practice has a flawed metaphysics. It's critical one has a proper metaphysics to do serious intellectual work.

I also wouldn't categorize Tim Snyder as a philosopher- he is a political historian, similar to Stephen Kotkin, they are doing good work, but not focused on philosophical questions of metaphysics at all.

John Vervaeke would be a good model of a serious intellectual that Leo is talking about.

Edited 15 hours ago by Terell Kirby

[Ulax]

2 minutes ago, Terell Kirby said:

Bit of a strawman of the post.

How is that a strawman when the first line of the post is: 

"Any intellectual who doesn't meditate or do meditative yoga isn't serious"

[Terell Kirby]

Just now, Ulax said:

How is that a strawman when the first line of the post is: 

I clearly explained it in my post. Read past the first sentence 

[Ulax]

6 minutes ago, Terell Kirby said:

I clearly explained it in my post. Read past the first sentence 

grrrr okay

[Ulax]

27 minutes ago, Terell Kirby said:

Bit of a strawman of the post.

The ontology of an intellectual matters.

 

Not only that, but a philosopher who hasn't had insight into the nature and structure of reality through meditative practice has a flawed metaphysics. It's critical one has a proper metaphysics to do serious intellectual work.

 

I also wouldn't categorize Tim Snyder as a philosopher- he is a political historian, similar to Stephen Kotkin, they are doing good work, but not focused on philosophical questions of metaphysics at all.

 

John Vervaeke would be a good model of a serious intellectual that Leo is talking about.

I see most of the issue here as you and I having different conceptions of what is meant by intellectual.

I see it more as someone who is a humanities academic or self-publishes humanities academic work. Seems you see an intellectual as someone who is a philosopher.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

It is always the presuppositions that lead to misunderstanding in arguments - the definition of 'intellect' is case in point here!

And do we not think this also may tie into the blog post regarding meditation? Because there are many forms of meditation - and we again presuppose one form is being spoken of by Leo.

If he is referring to a wider scope of all forms of meditation; then one cannot really have serious intellect without it. The deep enquiry into the nature of existence would mean we address assumptions and presuppositions... we approach our own thinking with such awareness as to go meta with our thinking. To reveal our own bias. Bring clarity and depth to anything we apply ourselves to.

We would probably disagree less. Realize where the misunderstandings lie. Be more accurate in our thoughts, logic and derivations. Co-operate on a global scale more. Achieve things never before seen. And maybe, just maybe, we might have higher intellect  

[Jannes]

Feels like Leo is going back and forth with meditation and always with such a sense of supremacy if thats the right word. At one point he says its overrated because some genetically gifted people extract value from it but the vast majority it doenst do much and then at other points he says its foundational and everyone who doesnt do it cant be taken seriously as an intellectual. 

I guess at no point was the importance of meditation as a form of calming the mind negated.

[Leo Gura]

Obviously you can still do good narrow intellectual work, like writing a biography of Hitler, but as far as sense-making of reality as a whole, that will fail.

[Jannes]

3 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Obviously you can still do good narrow intellectual work, like writing a biography of Hitler, but as far as sense-making of reality as a whole, that will fail.

So you think a topic like politics needs to be grounded in consciousness work from meditation to reach a respectable level of depth?

[Leo Gura]

39 minutes ago, Jannes said:

So you think a topic like politics needs to be grounded in consciousness work from meditation to reach a respectable level of depth?

It depends how deep you want the understanding to be.

You can't understand that the point of all politics is Love unless you realize that Love is what drives all conscious beings. How you gonna realize that without some meditation?

Most people are happy with shallow explanations, for which meditation is not needed.

Edited 14 hours ago by Leo Gura

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Leo Gura hey boss... Christmas special video? Plez?

 

 

[Leo Gura]

Christmas is gone.