Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
|
|
Clearly they come through the unconscious symbolic mind. The question as always is whether or not that mind is connected to any other form of consciousness. Meanwhile, I could probably come up with 50 such stories - 10 or so from Nepal and another 40 from Okinawa where it is thought normal to see and feel other conscious beings, who sometimes appear tp people though not in the physical form that we would regard as normal. They even appear as people are walking down the street texting on their phones.
|
|
MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
|
|
Jan,
This used to be a funny story to me, until I got into my mid 60s a few years ago. Now it’s not quite so funny.
As my father succumbed to his deathly illness in his last few months, he would report to my mother that he would see his mother now and then (who was of course long passed on). Upon hearing this, my mother (who was watching my father wither away) would exclaim, “Oh No You Are Not!”
I’m not ill, and I’m not seeing my father or grandparents or anything, but I must admit that ever so occasionally, I think I see what might appear to be a person just out of my sight to the far left or right of me.
My mother is remarkably able and cognizant 21 years my senior.
|
|
Ward Trotter
Trad climber
|
|
Interesting stories Jan. I encourage you to write a larger collection of same.
|
|
jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
|
|
Clearly they come through the unconscious symbolic mind
Jan, Jung's "Original Patterns" - like The Hero - seem to me to still require the writer to identify actions so implied with either actual humans or the portrayal of such human characters in prior ways. I'm doubtful that The Hero exists as a symbol from the unconscious transmitted through some evolutionary process, and that the creation of a heroic fictional character depends only upon this mysterious process. At least that's how I see it. We need Ms Sycorax to chime in here since she is the resident expert on literature.
And here, of course, is a reference to JL's insistence on the mind's effect on matter:
"It was this psychoid aspect of the [Jungian] archetype that so impressed Nobel laureate physicist Wolfgang Pauli. Embracing Jung's concept, Pauli believed that the archetype provided a link between physical events and the mind of the scientist who studied them" (Wiki)
Interesting turns this thread has taken recently.
My mother would tell of the time she visited a fortune teller while she was attending the University of Alabama. The woman told my mother she would "meet a handsome, dark haired young man with blue eyes whose name was John soon, and that they would marry and have a single child - a boy"
If you can believe it, at that time a music education major required introductory calculus, and the class in which she enrolled was taught by a handsome, dark haired young man with blue eyes whose name was John. The rest is family history.
|
|
Ward Trotter
Trad climber
|
|
The theories of Jung and Freud are interesting in that both theories represented bold and opportunistic attempts at fashioning overarching descriptions of what both men regarded as the essential functioning nature of human consciousness: Freud with his tripartite self and Jung with his collective unconscious.
Fraud's theories went nowhere and Jung's seems to be going nowhere, but in a much more interesting way.
I've mentioned this earlier on one of these threads but my reasoning on Jung's archetypes is very simple: the archetypes are, or were, pure cultural entities. In other words, the hero myth in no way represents a fundamental structured template of the human psyche-- but rather an adaptive mode of social organization determined by fleeting environmental and evolutionary demands, carried over into survival narratives, persisting by cultural iterations into the current day.
The archetypal forms have had a long and persistent life in human cultures only to the extent that the conditions spawning them persisted in some way-- into the industrial and post-industrial consumer age-- even if a bit quaint and antique. This is precisely why Joseph Campbell, in his florid attempts to describe the various generalized mythologies, such as the hero that embarks upon a quest, seems to be at a loss to find credible,analogous examples in contemporary life. He tries a few times but doesn't quite pull it off; a reference to Star Wars notwithstanding. That's because these mythologies are no longer required by rank and file psyches fighting paying bills and navigating freeway back-ups. They are now convenient modes used to good effect by modern storytellers. Especially since most contain sex and violence.
Jung detailed scores of dreams that included these recurring themes and their attendant forms-- such as the serpent tempter. From patient to patient the serpent would slither into their dreams. This fascinated Jung but he could never quite convince himself that what he was observing were cultural legacies from mans long hunter/gatherer history-- kept vigorously alive in religious texts and popular culture. Hence the collective unconscious, which for him explained processes at the very core of human consciousness. Jung was a very creative scholar and did a brilliant job of exploring these various subjects.
One would be hard pressed to detail such dreams today. The serpent tempter might slither into someone's dream but closer inspection usually discovers such a person might be spending a little too much uncritical time at the local Pentecostal meeting. But in Jung's time such dreams were quite common, kept active through cultural proxies, when the signal to noise ratio in culture was much much greater. The serpent of the Bible, or its numerous forerunners, inhabited the dreams of ordinary people, as they once did many a human ancestral group.
|
|
Ward Trotter
Trad climber
|
|
The entire trajectory of the modern "anti-hero" bears no similarity whatsoever to the archetypal hero discussed by Jung or described in anthropological studies.
The anti-hero is a relatively recent literary invention. James Dean ?
The term "anti-hero" was concocted as an apologetic to explain the actions of protagonists not conforming to the cultural/psychological requirements that had hitherto formed the raison d'tre of the classic hero. The anti-hero (although that term was never used) in classic mythology was something that was arrayed against the hero-- to thwart his progress.
The anti-hero is not a hero , just an "anti" who is made so by a brutally conformist society opposed to his sacred individuality. The anti-hero, confronted with his own implausible alienation, seeks to desperately escape such an ignoble fate by employing method acting techniques.
I could be dissuaded from this view Sycorax.
Where'd ya go? Wha? Wha?
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
If a character appears in literature how likely is it that they are based on a real person with whom the writer is familiar? Or a composite of several such persons? Can there be any other way a fictional (real life - not fantasy) character emerges upon the page?
Another personality asserting itself on the stage of life?
Could be. How could we know? One way would be to look for patterns related to personality, such as how often certain words or phrases are used.
“The orthodox view was that Shakespeare didn’t collaborate at all. When the Oxford Shakespeare in 1986 proposed that eight plays of Shakespeare contained writing by other writers, some people were outraged. What has happened since 1986 is that the accumulation of new scholarship, techniques and resources has made it clear that, in 1986, we underestimated the amount of Shakespeare’s work that’s collaborative.”
Gary Taylor, Florida State University
quoted in The Guardian 23 Oct 2016
http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2016/oct/23/christopher-marlowe-credited-as-one-of-shakespeares-co-writers
|
|
paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
|
|
The entire trajectory of the modern "anti-hero" bears no similarity whatsoever to the archetypal hero discussed by Jung or described in anthropological studies.
The notion of the anti hero goes back at least to antiquity: Achilles with his anger and rebellion against authority, Prometheus as a rebel against the authority of the gods. Later Dante's Paolo or Parsival as the reluctant Arthurian hero or how about David in the old testament. How many anti heros can you find in Shakespeare? Seems like there are any number of examples that define the notion of archetype... perhaps born out of the notion of the reluctant hero. Even Satan himself is seen as an archetype anti hero to some.
|
|
i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
|
|
"Be thankful unto him, and bless his name."
Psalm 100:4
Our Lord would have all his people rich in high and happy thoughts concerning his blessed person. Jesus is not content that his brethren should think meanly of him; it is his pleasure that his espoused ones should be delighted with his beauty. We are not to regard him as a bare necessary, like to bread and water, but as a luxurious delicacy, as a rare and ravishing delight. To this end he has revealed himself as the "pearl of great price" in its peerless beauty, as the "bundle of myrrh" in its refreshing fragrance, as the "rose of Sharon" in its lasting perfume, as the "lily" in its spotless purity.
As a help to high thoughts of Christ, remember the estimation that Christ is had in beyond the skies, where things are measured by the right standard. Think how God esteems the Only Begotten, his unspeakable gift to us. Consider what the angels think of him, as they count it their highest honor to veil their faces at his feet. Consider what the blood-washed think of him, as day without night they sing his well deserved praises. High thoughts of Christ will enable us to act consistently with our relations towards him. The more loftily we see Christ enthroned, and the more lowly we are when bowing before the foot of the throne, the more truly shall we be prepared to act our part towards him. Our Lord Jesus desires us to think well of him, that we may submit cheerfully to his authority. High thoughts of him increase our love. Love and esteem go together. Therefore, believer, think much of your Master's excellencies. Study him in his primeval glory, before he took upon himself your nature! Think of the mighty love which drew him from his throne to die upon the cross! Admire him as he conquers all the powers of hell! See him risen, crowned, glorified! Bow before him as the Wonderful, the Counsellor, the mighty God, for only thus will your love to him be what it should.
CHARLES SPURGEON
Isaiah 9:6-7
For unto us a Child is born,
Unto us a Son is given;
And the government will be upon His shoulder.
And His name will be called
Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the increase of His government and peace
There will be no end,
Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom,
To order it and establish it with judgment and justice
From that time forward, even forever.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.
|
|
MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
|
|
Jgill: Jung's "Original Patterns" - like The Hero - seem to me to still require the writer to identify actions so implied with either actual humans or the portrayal of such human characters in prior ways.
I hope a few posts here might dissuade you from this view. But, you are a mathematician, a scientist of sorts, and so you probably feel compelled to see what is literal. (It will not open up the field of literature to you very much.)
The narrative of a hero is a presentation of a character who must destroy himself in some way or another to discover who and what he (she) really is. Heroes abound in everyday life. Anyone who, or anything that, transcends / evolves to its next level, destroys itself to create anew.
As for templates or models that are deeply recessed in the human psyche, . . . inherent fears, instincts, emotional sensations and responses, etc. might suggest otherwise to one.
Not everything is (nor could be) learned through experience. It would appear that some things (desires, fears, apperceptions) human beings seem to be born with. There appears to be some generalized characteristics of being a human beyond a physical body. People do not seem to be wildly different from one another even in the earliest stages of life. We do not seem to come into of be in this world tabula rasa.
. . . And then there is karma.
|
|
jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
|
|
I am in considerable agreement with what you have to say, Mike. That was not my point. I asked how a writer conjures up a fictional persona having, let's say, the quality of heroism. Yes, the characteristic of heroism may be an evolutionary result, but when a writer begins a story about a hero the writer must draw upon a memory or observation of a human or composite of humans to create this central character. And it may be that the subconscious is in play in this process, but my point was that without fleshing out the fictional figure the abstract quality of heroism has no meaning in the story. How does the writer begin to visualize their creation? one way would be to imagine themselves in the role. Another would be to imagine someone they know or have some familiarity with. By itself heroism is an abstract quality.
Suppose you wish to write a story about a character who displays heroism. How do you decide what this character looks like or how he thinks? Does that description come out of thin air? Probably it would be a composite of persons, both real and fictional, with whom you have some familiarity.
This was not a trick question and has nothing to do with abstract logic.
Tell me how you describe your hero, his physical appearance. How did you arrive at that description? Was it purely through abstract archetypes?
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
I don't answer for Mike, but from what he said, the answer seems clear. A writer creates a character out of what they know of themself and of other people. The same way that Mike created a character from the post of jgill which suits Mike's ideas about jgill. I wonder whether Mike will see where his idea of jgill could be written anew.
|
|
MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
|
|
Gentlemen:
I see. Ok. I understand, I think, your points of view.
Where does improvisation come from? Where and how do ideas arise? How can anyone do anything truly creative that breaks the bounds of what is known? Is incrementalism the answer? If it is, then isn’t this somewhat like the problem of how macro events don’t adhere to the same physical dynamics as do super-micro events (ala, quantum mechanics)? In a close examination of incrementalism, aren’t the same problems showing up that Zeno’s paradoxes illustrated? How does anything get from one place to another? I know how it *seems to get* from one place to another, but how does it really? What is time? What is space? What are objects? How can things change? If things change, then are they really things after all?
My sense of these things is that a person plays.
Artistically, I refer you to written works on various subjects concerning artistic creativity. But they won’t be very satisfying, I suspect. Much of artistic creativity simply “shows up” for artists who become obsessed by certain images or views. They can’t put their fingers on what they see, much less where it comes from. But express they must. I can tell you from my side the process constitutes a real struggle. But a struggle with what? Me? How can I struggle with myself? I must be a combination or an agglomeration of different complexes (the ego only being one). The object of your artistic expression “talks to you.” A conversation emerges—a real one. But with who or what??
Have you ever had a dream that was novel for you? Doesn’t seeing one thing (and the associated evaluations and feelings that come from see that thing) give rise to what you DO want or DON’T want? Personal experiences are few when compared to all that we know either explicitly, implicitly, or unconsciously. The breadth and depth of the imagination cannot be defined or said.
Take a look at two of Mary Watkins’ works on Amazon: “Invisible Guests,” or “Waking Dreams.” (There are other books.)
All these notions about the creative urge and expression appears facilitated or communicated through symbolism, metaphors, and images, which religion, myth, and psyche operate and use.
There is a different sense of reality that comes from the heart than that which comes from the intellect. The imagination covers both of these domains, I’d say. There appears to be no limit to the imagination.
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
Where does improvisation come from?
Neurons fire in certain sequence and tell the brain.
Youtube and Sam Harris will show you how.
:-)
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
Youtube and Sam Harris will show you how.
Sure, but then I asked them how WBraun works and they combusted.
|
|
Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
21. The high mission of any art is, by its illusions, to foreshadow a higher universe reality, to crystallize the emotions of time into the thought of eternity.
What think you?
|
|
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 7, 2016 - 11:22am PT
|
I consider it a valid question per where does any thing come from. If you work off a machine-causation model then what seems creatively new - a line in a story, a new equation, etc. - will be seen as a recombination or reconfiguration of some thing(s) or latent content already IN the machine. If something actually new were to show up, how would that ever square with the causal notion that only some other thing(s) can "create" some other thing, new or otherwise. If something actually new were to suddenly appear, where would it come from, since mechanical output has to come from somewhere, some physical source.
This is of course reductionist thinking - that any thing, thought, line, equation - derives from smaller, more fundamental things.
Some of my progressive science friends are quick to point out what they consider to be the error in considering any of this in absolute terms, and for good reason. No object or thing or force can be described or understood as stand-alone, or independent of the whole shooting match. We can artificially tease out seemingly singular things, like a baseball, a boulder, or a boson, but if you keep digging down deep enough you end up with either energy or mass, and neither apparently exist either separate from the other (try and locate "pure energy"), and neither can be defined in and of themselves, but only in terms of action, flux, movement, forces, etc. Nobody has an final definition of either matter or energy themselves because neither seems to exist as an independent thing. In fact there apparently are no non-contingent things.
So when we ask, "Where did that line of poetry come from," we perhaps are entirely mistaken to believe we can reverse engineer any phenomenon back to this or that, neither of which actually exists in the way we are implying - as real X's and Y's or discrete things that "cause" this or that.
JL
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!