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[Auxiliary] Chloe Valdary interviews Curt Jaimungal on the Psychological Turmoil of Seriously Studying Consciousness / The Phenomenon
May 6, 2022
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The Economist covers math, physics, philosophy, and AI in a manner that shows how different countries perceive developments and how they impact markets. They recently published a piece on China's new neutrino detector. They cover extending life via mitochondrial transplants, creating an entirely new field of medicine. But it's also not just science they analyze.
Culture, they analyze finance, economics, business, international affairs across every region. I'm particularly liking their new insider feature. It was just launched this month. It gives you, it gives me, a front row access to The Economist's internal editorial debates.
Where senior editors argue through the news with world leaders and policy makers in twice weekly long format shows. Basically an extremely high quality podcast. Whether it's scientific innovation or shifting global politics, The Economist provides comprehensive coverage beyond headlines. As a toe listener, you get a special discount. Head over to economist.com slash TOE to subscribe. That's economist.com slash TOE for your discount.
Brief announcement! Some people wanted to talk to me, either asking me questions or presenting their ideas to me slash others, on a monthly one hour group call, so a Patreon tier has been opened up for that purpose. The first call will be limited to around 10 people and is June 1st, 2022, for the Meta Field Theorist tier. That's patreon.com slash Kurt Jaimungal.
This is an auxiliary episode where Chloe Valdery of the Theory of Enchantment interviewed me a few weeks prior for her channel, which is linked in the description. This is a dive into the experiential versus the analytical approach to understanding reality, as well as delving into the question of what reality and consciousness indeed are.
This episode is not sponsored by Brilliant, but I wanted to mention them regardless because many have started to understand the concepts in the Toe Channel more lucidly by engaging with their interactive material on math and physics. You can visit brilliant.org slash toe to get 20% off and it helps the Toe Channel as well. If you'd like to hear more podcasts like this, then do consider going to patreon.com slash C U R T J A I M U N G A L
and supporting with a contribution of whatever you can, as the only reason I'm able to do this is because of the patrons and the sponsor's support. A written review on whichever platform you're listening to this from also helps. Thank you, and enjoy this supplementary episode where Chloe Valdery interviews Kurt Jaimungal.
The term dark night of the soul comes from a 16th century poem written by a Spanish mystic. It is a term that describes the spiritual crisis that emerges in a person on his way to a mystical union with the divine. It is a difficult time marked by temporary feelings of desolation, melancholy and hopelessness. All guide posts on a trip back to one's authentic self.
I have experienced this in my own life, many times, and my sense is that my next guest is experiencing it as well. Kurt Jaimungo is the host of the podcast Theories of Everything, and if that title seems overwhelming, that's because it is. It seemed overwhelming to me because I believe it is impossible to discover the truth about everything. Though the term comes from the field of physics,
The sense that I got while interviewing Kurt is that he is painstakingly in search of everything, and that he is on his way to finding out that he will be unable to find it. Our conversation meandered into so many different twists and turns, I sometimes didn't know where we were, but I thought it was important to stay in that lost liminal space, wanted to have it teach me, wanted to learn something from it.
One of the themes Kurt and I touched upon is a central question we face in modernity. Are we over-intellectualized? Have we become hyper cerebral Cartesian robots? Have we become afraid to drop into the body, into feelings, emotions, those parts of ourselves that make us human that we have devalued for so long? I personally think we have become afraid to do that, but
The goal in this episode was not to convince Kurt, but to stay with the questions themselves, in the hopes that being with them would allow something new and worthwhile to emerge. I wasn't always comfortable in this episode, but I think that's okay. And if nothing else, I hope this episode pushes you to stay in discomfort when it arises in your own life, rather than immediately trying to flee from it.
I believe discomfort can teach you something about human suffering, but also about beauty and joy. It has already taught me so much. Awesome. Well, welcome Kurt to the Heart Speaks podcast. So good to have you with us today.
Thank you so much, Chloe. So I was taking a look at some of your work online and I thought to myself, wow, I'm going to be so blown away by this guy. He knows so much, so much more than I do. Physics, consciousness, science, mathematics, all things that I am very much a novice, if even that, at. So I wanted to start by asking you,
I know you have a podcast called Theories of Everything, and I wanted to start by asking you what is your current relationship with consciousness, with God? I know that you interview a lot of people who opine on these subjects, but I wanted to know if you personally had any relationship with these subjects right now. I'm sure it changes over time, but what is that like for you right now?
You and perhaps your audience will be woefully disappointed if they think that if you think that I have a wealth of knowledge in these subjects. When it comes to theories of everything. So firstly we should define what a theory of everything is.
Many people, well, it's a physics term, first and foremost, and it means to unify what's called general relativity with what's called the standard model. And that usually is the theory of the large with the theory of the smallest, how some people describe it. And then the way that I take it is, so my background is in physics, and that is what I'm interested in. It's more of the mathematically rigorous theories of everything. But as well as I started from when I started exploring this, I found that some people have their own
they would call it a theory of everything because they take that in a much more broad they take that in a much more well they take it literally and i also tend to take it literally everything which means well what the heck is consciousness too some people think that consciousness has a constitutive role in reality that is it's fundamental and somehow we have a relationship between what exists and our consciousness rather than it being a
landscape of dead material that our consciousness emerges from so i'm interested in what the heck is consciousness and then does that have a relationship to free will and also also what is god so some people say god is that's tricky as you know that's tricky some people the more those that are on the more new atheist end will say god is the person that's in the sky that's a man that's a fictitious story that was useful perhaps or perhaps
Subreption
which means it's a deliberate misrepresentation. And I don't know if it's a, if it's a deliberate misrepresentation, but it's somewhat of a straw man because it wasn't until recently that that idea has come about and only with a certain subset of people. I was looking at the Pew data research and it turns out that most people who consider themselves to be believers in God don't find it to be anathema to define God, that it's any definition of God would automatically be
What is your current relationship with consciousness?
and with God. How do you personally perceive consciousness, given all of the beautiful minds that you've interacted with on both topics? Where are you right now? Well, where I am right now, it's a strange place. It's not a comfortable place. When I interview people on the subject of
theories of everything and consciousness. So let's talk about theories of everything. So the mathematically rigorous theories of everything, the physics theories of everything, for example, geometric unity may be familiar to some of your viewers or listeners. I go into the papers and I make sure that I research it as if I'm being tested in a course. And when it comes to the more the theories on the consciousness end,
Some of the people who feel like they have their own theory as to what consciousness is, say that you need to experience it. And I also tend to believe that that consciousness is a is a first person activity. And it's a subjective first person activity rather than a dispassionate objective third person activity. And that latter approach is more of the neural correlates. So you hear people say that, well, consciousness comes about when there's a certain neural circuit that
a cortical loop, and the more active that loop is, the more conscious we feel. Well, well, that's a correlate. So I try to, in the podcast, in the theories of everything podcast, I tried to make sure that I bring the same level of research, perhaps it's experiential research, instead of analytic research, to the more consciousness end. And then that tumbles me, because there's so many varying theories,
There's a quote by Rene Descartes that says something akin to. It's what happens when you repeatedly subvert the ground that you stand on by doubting interminably. And I'm in that place. So it's like, he would say that it's as if I fall in unexpectedly into a whirlpool where I cannot stand on the bottom nor swim to the top.
And then he has a great phrase, which is, nevertheless, I'll still endeavor the same effort that I did yesterday today. Now, I'm not sure about that last part, but I like that. And I used to believe that last part. Well, it's interesting. Either way, it's a strange place to be in. Yeah, it's interesting that you bring up Descartes and this sort of liminal space that he described himself as being in. It strikes me that historically speaking, in the West, this has always been a kind of
existential crisis to be in a sort of liminal, almost limbo-esque state, whereas in the East it's not. And so I'm wondering how that lands for you when you think about it, because I've been studying Taoism. I've been on a Taoist trip lately, and it's actually enhanced my understanding of the Abrahamic faiths, or at least Christianity and Judaism, and it's enriched it in a deeper way. So I'm curious how that impacts you, if at all.
Yeah, Daoism provides me with some comfort and I used to, I'm not an expert in this, but Confucius has some great sayings. However, Confucius was more, if one wants to think of it, you can think of Confucius as more the radical left in terms of, like this is an extreme generalization, but you can interpret it because he would say
that in order to work on oneself, one needs to have an optimal society. And so it's a political theory in some sense, or it's a political philosophy in some sense. Whereas Lao Tzu and Confucius and Lao Tzu lived around the same time. Confucius came to Lao Tzu and said, this may be apocryphal because we're not sure if this actually happened. But Confucius said that meeting Lao Tzu is like meeting a dragon and the dragon is as high as one can get in the pantheon of Chinese animals. Lao Tzu was more about
You cannot get rid of the bad without creating the bad and that it's all about balance and that if there's a force on you, it's almost like Newtonian, you push back and then there's an equal and opposite force. So perhaps it's best to flow with it. So it provides me with a modicum of comfort. However, you mentioned, okay, look in the East, this existential crisis not seen as a crisis.
Well, I have a crisis. I'm tortured by what I study, and I don't hide that. I try to minimize it, but perhaps Lao Tzu would say perhaps you shouldn't minimize it. Recently, I've come to this conclusion that there isn't much of an emphasis in these religious New Age circles about
what practices work and which ones don't. So they'll almost uncritically adopt an Eastern practice in a Western world. And it may not be that that's productive. It may be like forcing your PC to install Mac software and all of a sudden you get errors everywhere. It may be that we're in our bones, a Western, we're in our bones so Western that an Eastern solution produces the crisis and the Eastern
People would say, why is it producing a crisis? Well, you don't know what the software is like that we run on. And I don't like to think of the brain is running on software. I know that Yoshabok, some people may be familiar with Yoshabok. Yoshabok likes to think like that. This is just an analogy. So here's another analogy. Maybe that we're on the globe and that what we need to get to is
Yeah, maybe what we need to get to is this the North Pole. And depending on where you are on the globe, it's better to go north or it's better to go south. It may so there's a path dependence. And I don't hear much about this in the New Age circles, they would just uncritically adopt different strategies like you should mindfully meditate. See, I've forced myself to mindfully meditate for for years and years. What was the works? What was that? So I have sorry, I have several questions.
First of all, it seems to me that you're in search of something, but I'm not quite sure what it is. So if you could define, if possible, what you're in search of, I think that would help me understand some of the analogies. I mean, the North Pole analogy makes sense to me, but I still don't precisely understand what it is you're searching for.
So what would be at the North Pole once we got there, regardless of where we started? Some people may say inner peace, and I wouldn't, I wouldn't say that, although I would certainly welcome that because I can certainly use it. I am searching first and foremost for an understanding of the landscape of theories of everything in the physical sense, in the physics sense, the mathematical sense. And then as, and then secondarily,
the consciousness sense, the more Eastern sense, the more experiential sense. So first and foremost, analytical, then secondly, experiential, almost to aid the analytical. The more that I studied this, the more that I see that these may be integrally tied and perhaps one is the one that I, perhaps the experiential one is the one that I should be pursuing as, as the top one. I was going to say it sounded like the order that you presented that in was the incorrect order.
At least from my perspective. Yeah, that's what most people who are more easterly inclined would say. And that's why I'm tumbled, because I don't know what I'm searching for other than I'm trying to understand. There's this term that I like to use called Weltanschauung. So Weltanschauung is my mispronunciation of a German word, which the German word literally means Welt's a world.
And Xiaowu means point of view, so your worldview. But the way that I use it is an all-encompassing worldview, such that any new piece of knowledge can be interpolated in your model. And then your model contains its own updating mechanism. I know this all sounds abstract, but I'll give some examples. So if you were to speak to Ian McGillchrist and you were to ask him about this pen,
would say well the reason you have this pen and the reason why I'm holding it with my left hand is because of the brain and its left right asymmetry and and he would have some well articulated point of view now Peterson would say it's because the Oedipal mother and you want to make sure that Nietzsche is with the Dostoyev etc etc and they all have this they all have a way of explaining almost any fact and they also have a they also in their model have a conception of ontology and if your viewers aren't
don't know what ontology is it just means what exists you can think of it like metaphysics what exists and then they also thirdly have a consistency between their model and how they act now some people i know we don't want to talk about this and i personally i'm not a fan of of being anti-woke but some people in the are and the same with the alt right they have they're hypocritical
in what they say and how they act. And so a Veltan Shaung to me is to be consistent with what one professes their model to be and how one acts. Maybe what I'm doing is I'm on a journey to find or create my own Veltan Shaung or perhaps, see I call the theories of everything
Okay. Now, do you know why you're searching for a worldview? Because I'm a confused person, and it's not a comfortable position for me to be in.
for me to talk about this right now makes me somewhat nervous. And, and right, it makes me somewhat nervous. It's, it's a destabilizing position to be in, and it's absolutely not comfortable. But that wasn't why I started this. When I started the theories of everything project, it was because I've always been interested in certain fundamental mysteries. Why are we here? What is the, and I would have eschewed that question as being in the
fictitious religious domain that tries to impose meaning upon the world. I don't see it the same way anymore, but I would have. And what are the origins of the universe? What is the origin of life? How does consciousness come about? So I'm interested in those questions ever since I was a kid.
And then I went into filmmaking, so I abandoned that. And then I thought, since this pandemic started, well, why don't I go and elucidate it for myself as well as others simultaneously via talking to people who claim to have the answers? That's how it started. And then as for where I am now, I'm just continuing on this journey, but I'm not sure where I am now. That's fair. That's a fair place to be. But you say that it's also uncomfortable. Yes, to say the least.
That's very interesting to me. I've had a bit of a spiritual journey. I grew up in a, what would I call it? I grew up in a non-denominational Christian family, which was very much similar to Seventh-day Adventists, which meant that I was exposed to Jewish thought at a very early age without realizing I was Jewish. And so I had an insider-outsider relationship with both Christianity and Judaism.
because I grew up observing all the holy days in the Old Testament as a Christian, and I grew up not observing any of the mainstream Christian holidays like Christmas and Easter, also as a Christian, which gave me a paradoxical identity and a capacity to see sort of inside and outside things simultaneously. And that's probably why I ended up
being attracted to Taoism on some level, because Taoism, I think, it welcomes the paradox as a fact of reality. And also, it's not as if this paradoxical understanding, this limbo-like understanding, is only exclusive to Eastern traditions. There are many Western mystical traditions that correlate or just have their own versions of what
what would seem to be a more Eastern viewpoint. And, you know, John Vervecky has said that the Eastern-Western dichotomy is really an illusion anyway, to some extent. And so I'm very curious to... I mean, I've struggled in the past with identity crises from a spiritual perspective. And I know how discomforting that can be and that can feel.
It feels like you're grasping for something, but you don't actually know what you're grasping for. And so I can, I resonate with that. But I'm still trying to, maybe it's not possible and that's okay. Part of me has this impulse to try to fix everything and heal everything and ameliorate everything. And so I'm feeling this impulse within me now to
to tell you to be like, well, what about this idea? Or what about that idea? Or have you tried this? Or have you tried that? Tell me like what? Give me an example. But part of me wants to avoid that because I don't know if that's if that's the quote unquote right thing to do. I can just say that I've been very much impacted by I started meditating during when COVID hit. I started a meditation practice when the pandemic started. And at first I was just sort of
Moving along, doing my own thing, and it wasn't really impacting me deeply. And then I discovered John Vervecky's work with his whole awakening from the meeting crisis. And then I discovered he has a meditation practice on YouTube that anyone can follow. And so then I started doing that. And it's really beautiful because it combines both Western, both quote unquote Western and Eastern traditions. And then some of the books that I started reading,
which were about different mystical traditions. One book is about mystical Judaism or Hasidism or Kabbalah. And another book that I've just finished reading by Ken Wilbur is called Spectrum of Consciousness, which is highly, highly Eastern. And so long story short, I began to see that there's this synthesis. It seems to me there's a synthesis between many Eastern and Western mystical traditions. And that is something I found comforting.
Can you give me an example of what would ordinarily be thought of as a pure Western phenomenon or practice or viewpoint that you found that is actually Eastern or has Eastern influences or is compatible? So there's a particularly
Some would say Jungian interpretation of Christianity, which I'm going to be really reductive about, so please bear with me as I try to paraphrase it. But the Jungian interpretation of Christianity essentially boils down to this idea that the prominent figure in Christianity, Jesus Christ, represents someone who is able to individuate
who is able to achieve psychological wholeness, who is able to achieve inner peace, if you will. And there's a book called The Tao of Christ, which actually explains that using Eastern Taoist mystical metaphors, if you will. And so there is a
You mentioned Ken Wilber.
Is he the integral theory or integral integer theory? That's my understanding. Spiral dynamics? I've only read one. Yeah, I've only read the one book by him. But yes, he is. That's what he's known for. And what is that? Because I would like to speak to him. I probably am not the right person to answer that question. The book I read wasn't I mean, it was I guess it was the beginning of integral theory. I can talk to you a little bit about spectrum of consciousness because I just finished it.
Spectrum of Consciousness is very interesting. It actually starts out by a discussion of physics. It starts out with this discussion of the perceiver not being able to be perceived. It starts out with talking about Halleke. And you can correct me if I'm wrong, because again, I'm a novice at all of this. But his understanding is that when you're measuring something in physics, the measurer themselves actually impacts the measurement.
And so he goes on to talk about how there are many implications that come from this. One of them being that time is an illusion. Another of them being that the subject-object duality is also an illusion. And so he starts from a point of view of rooted in physics, and then he actually ends up speaking a lot about different Hindu, Daoist,
and Buddhist traditions and how many writings and sayings and quotes from any of the mystics in these traditions actually confirm what many physicists have discovered about the nature of reality and the non-dual nature of reality. And he also talks about how wholeness can be achieved by unlearning
The thoughts that occurred to me right now, the reason why I'm unsure whether the analytical approach or the experiential approach is one that should be primary, is that
People like Ken Wilbur and Rupert Spira, Deepak Chopra, I'm not trying to, I know when Deepak's name is mentioned, some people scorn. I'm not saying that with any level of derision. They say what is fairly nebulous and unfalsifiable from an objective standpoint so that you can't tell if what they're saying is true or not. And when it comes to their interpretations of quantum mechanics, there's this
There's the sense in the new age, for lack of a better term, community, that quantum mechanics says that the observer is necessary and has a role in creating reality. That's one interpretation of quantum mechanics and there are 10 or even 15 interpretations of quantum mechanics that are all consistent with what we've seen. So for example, one is that we just require
non-local something called non-local hidden variables and then you don't need necessarily an observer to create reality and another one is what's called super determinism which says that it's all determined and when we it's all been determined before we all have we've been correlated at some point in the distant past that we're
And we have missing information and this missing information is what brings about the uncertainty in quantum mechanics. And there's nothing mystical about it. There's also decoherence that well to explain decoherence is not trivial. Anyway, there's people can look up decoherence. So there are many interpretations of quantum mechanics that don't require some outstanding role of the quote unquote observer.
So when I hear that, I feel like it's as if the new age type people have this view that they've already settled on. And then they see that physics has come to similar conclusions, like, oh, see this all along. This is what we've been saying all along. Okay, what if in 20 years, because remember, quantum mechanics was just found out, quote unquote, about 100 years ago or so,
What if in 100 years from now we realize, oh, our interpretation of quantum mechanics is entirely deterministic and it requires no observer, then are those new age people going to give up their point of view? Perhaps not, because they already have that instantiated. So it's as if they're looking for evidence that confirms. However, the absence of that evidence doesn't disconfirm. So it's non disconfirmatory evidence. And I'm not a fan of that type of evidence or that type of reasoning.
I'm not sure that that's a fair assessment of spectrum of consciousness. I can't speak to the other people that you've mentioned. I haven't actually engaged with their work. But spectrum of consciousness struck me as one of the more mathematically involved texts that I've read in a long time, and it actually got me interested in physics and interested in mathematics. I've been interested in science ever since I discovered John Vervecky, really.
But this particular text got me interested in physics as such. So I would recommend reading the text, taking it apart, do all of that, but I would also give it its fair shot because at least my impression was that it seemed mathematically grounded to me.
I definitely am interested in I think I've already confirmed an interview with Ken, we just have to set up the date. This was a few months ago. So I'm interested in going through his theory. I don't know his theory. I don't. Yeah, I can't speak to it. Hear that sound.
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You just mentioned another theory, actually if you could maybe repeat it, another theory of quantum mechanics. It was the second theory that you mentioned. Before you mentioned the decoherence, there was one that you just spoke about. Superdeterminism? Yes, can you explain that again? Superdeterminism says, okay, so one way of thinking about it is that if you look at
the cosmic cosmic microwave background radiation, you see that that is if you look far off into the distance and when you look far enough, that's as if you're looking back in time. So hear that sound.
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To look far enough back in time, you see that the universe is fairly uniform in every direction. However, these antipodal points, so if I go there and I go there, they shouldn't, they're so far separated that they shouldn't be so correlated with one another. They shouldn't be so uniform because
In terms of causation, so you can only be within, I'm trying to figure out how to explain this. There's something called a light cone. And so I'm sure you've seen this, this Einsteinian light cone. Okay. And then if you're within the light cone, then you can influence one. Okay. Let me think about how to explain this. It doesn't matter. The point is that they shouldn't have been able, they're not within the causal
light cone of one another. So they shouldn't have been able to influence one another. Okay, so super determinism says, well, perhaps far back enough in time, they were within some inflation also says this. So it's not as if super determinism says this alone. But either way, the point is that there are correlations, there are all there is is correlations, not all there is correlations, but everything is correlated. Okay,
There's something you said earlier about, I think when you were describing this theory, about quantum physics doesn't require an observer, maybe, because what is unknown will one day be known, or something like that.
It doesn't that doesn't require an observer necessarily for the quote unquote collapse of the wave function. So the mystery in quantum mechanics is why is it that when we don't observe it, we have this a wave function that looks like a superposition of different states and a superposition, don't worry about what that means. But then when we observe it, it collapses to one of the states. So the standard example is a spin up or spin down particle.
Okay. So if you look at it, if you can't look at the electron, but if you, if you model the electron, then it's, you can prepare it in a state that is a superposition of being 50%. You've heard that. I'm sorry. I'm trying to. Let me say something that might spark an insight. You said something specifically about there. There's a theory in which there's no need for an observer. The known, the unknown will become known and ultimately there's no mystery.
I don't know about the unknown will become known. I don't know if I said that. But if I did, then I misspoke. I don't I don't know. I could have misheard. Okay, that's fine. That's fine. I wouldn't even place the interpret any of those interpretations as as known versus unknown. There just is. Well, you said something specifically about mystery, though. Do you remember that?
No, I don't remember using the word mystery. I'm sorry. So maybe I used a synonym of mystery and I'm trying to remember exactly what I said, but I don't remember exactly. Let me tell you what I'm getting at. Let me tell you what I'm getting at or let me try to articulate what I'm getting at. Sure, sure, sure, sure. I have a theory of many theories, but one of my theory is that
And what I want to do is I want to try to bridge the gap between some of the things that we're talking about, search for meaning, search for consciousness, what is consciousness, what is God, et cetera, but especially search for meaning. I want to try to bridge the gap between that and better left than said, which I think you sort of try to do at the end. But my theory is that the quote unquote woke
which I'm increasingly not fond of that term, but the quote unquote woke, they are actually revolting against a world created by Descartes. And they are ultimately, they may not be explicitly aware of this, but I think that the fervor and the sort of, um,
Explicit statements, especially that we saw in 2020, around Black Lives Matter, where you had people promoting or producing posters where they would say like, don't perpetuate whiteness, or what is whiteness? Whiteness is us versus them thinking, whiteness is linear, objective, rational ways of thinking, whiteness is showing up on time, blah blah blah blah blah. Whiteness is us versus them?
They would say whiteness is okay. It's ironic. It doesn't make sense. But but what I think what I think is actually underneath all of that is a because one african-american woman who is a professor I believe was talking about how like she was saying black people don't do analytical work which doesn't which isn't accurate and a lot of people a lot of conservatives got angry at her for this but she also said
Black culture is such that we're tied to our families, we're tied to sort of a context. And what I was hearing in between the lines was something that Ian McGilchrist has actually spoken about, which is this
failure of the emissary, failure of the left brain, when not being, when not honoring the right brain, this analytical sort of impulse to measure and to
control and to predict for the purposes of controlling and predicting and how that has created an incredible, um, wasteland in the West. And what I, what I was hearing in between the lines of many things that were being said in 2020 in the sort of woke black versus white debate was a revolt against Cartesian frameworks.
And it was a revolt that was manifesting in ways that are very unhealthy and very problematic and very much in a way that would perpetuate problems of us versus them thinking. But I have a creeping suspicion that that's actually what's underpinning a lot of this, and I'm curious what you think of that.
Yeah, this connection between the philosophy and what's happening with the extreme left and the extreme right is something I used to be so interested in. I'm not, the reason why I'm not anymore is because I feel like it may be a distraction of mine, and it may be
It's also extremely complicated, way too complicated for me to analyze. Anything that's political is extremely, extremely more complicated than mathematics, at least for me, because math is extremely simple in terms of you just start with axioms and you look, it's extremely clear this
It's disambiguated as for the extreme left and then the brain, this asymmetry in the brain. I'm curious, Chloe, because this is something I've thought about, and I believe it's something that I don't think Ian answered precisely. Would you map? I'm curious about what your thoughts are. Would you map the extreme left and perhaps the extreme right? Because I see them as
somewhat similar. Would you map them onto the left side of the brain or the right side of the brain? Or you feel like that's unproductive? Um, that's probably true. That's probably too reductive to map to map them on one side of the brain or another side of the brain. I think that when one is, as Ian McGilchrist points out, when an entire civilization
is motivated exclusively by the left brain which is sort of this analytical need to control and predict and have certainty and not be in right relationship with the unknown.
then you will lack the relational peace. You will lack the capacity to be in relationship, both with yourself, which contains a mystery, and with the rest of the world, at the heart of which is also a mystery. And this will lead to alienation and despair. And because you don't have the proper tools to deal with alienation and despair, which I would argue the proper tool is the relational, then you will continue to split the world into us versus them, me versus you,
Black versus white, whiteness versus blackness, etc. And so that's what I think has been going on in these culture wars. Have you mentioned Ian McGillchrist before on your podcast?
I'm not sure it's possible. I've definitely talked about him on Twitter, but I don't know if I've mentioned him on my podcast. The reason is that his book, The Master and His Emissary, there's only two books that I recommend for virtually everyone who watches the Theories of Everything podcast. And it's The Master and His Emissary was one of them, the other one's Order of Time. And by the way, that's about a relational view of quantum mechanics, which says that
I just ordered that book, actually. Because I heard you mention it on your podcast. That's great. I'm glad to contribute to Carlo Rovelli's author to people knowing more about his ideas. So Carlo would say, if you look at this pen, well, he likes to use speed. See, speed is a relative term.
If this pen doesn't actually have a speed, the speed depends on if you're moving toward it or if it's, this is Galilean relativity. It's just standard. If you, you don't know if a car is moving or if you're moving toward the car more, more fundamentally, there are other actions. Hear that sound.
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Shopify.com slash theories attributes that we think are inveterate qualities of this pen, like let's say mass, let's say orientation is also orientation. Almost clearly there is no objective orientation because it depends on where I am. So I can say that it's oriented straight up or straight down, depending on if I'm upside down, if I'm doing a handstand, but then mass, we would say, well, mass is an object. Well, then there's also relative mass and so on.
And Carlo Rovelli would say that all the properties of the pen are in the relation, just like it's unclear what its velocity is, that's a relational property, that all the properties of the pen are relational. In fact, all of everything is relational. And then that leads in that leaves an interesting conundrum, because if what you're saying is mathematically, there's something called the graph, and then you have edges, and then you have what connects those two nodes. Sorry, you have
vertices and you have what connects those two so he's saying well the edges are primary the relations are primary however you can invert that there's a dual notion and you can say that the edges are primary and that's what i was asking carlo why is it that you say that if because if you're saying the relations are primary you can actually flip that mathematically they're equivalent of saying that the vertices are primary he said yes you can do that and then what's interesting is then then what's interesting is
If Carlo Rovelli is to be believed, then it would have to be, quote unquote, relations all the way down, that there is no bottom. It's just relations, relations, relations, relations, relations. And then it's strange. If he's a physicist, how do you bootstrap your way up? Because you start with axioms, you start with something. How do you? He doesn't have a well-defined theory with that, at least as far as I can tell. But he does. He is of the opinion that it is relationships all the way down, relations all the way down.
A friend of mine actually mentioned in passing the other day that the most, the smallest unit is relationship, which was interesting because that was before I heard of this guy on your podcast. See, there's another view. So Carla would say that time is illusory because of this. There's a way that you can connect this and make an argument that time is illusory. However,
Carlo's greatest collaborator, Lee Smolin, who's a physicist, one of the greatest living physicists of quantum gravity. Lee Smolin says, no, no, no, time is actually what is most fundamental and the rest is illusory. And someone else that I've spoken to recently named Nicholas Gisson comes to a similar argument from another perspective that has to do with free will, which is so fascinating, Chloe, because all of these topics, you're wondering,
How are these tied? I'm wondering how are these tied? There seems to be a connection between consciousness and God. There seems to be a connection between that. There seems to be a connection between that and meaning, between that and free will, between that and physics. What is that connection? So it's as if what's happening with your podcast, perhaps with mine as well, is we're touching, you've heard the story of touching the elephant at different parts and not realizing that it's the same object. That's what I feel like, except that I'm not at the stage where I see it's the same object
at a verbal articulated level, maybe it's a pre verbal level, sorry, maybe it's at a pre verbal level. And I have intimations that that this that these are all reflecting on some underlying quote unquote reality. But as for exactly how that comes about, I don't know. And I've had feelings like
experiences where I'm about to touch true reality. And it was extremely terrifying, extremely, extremely, extremely terrifying. Some of the most terrifying experiences of my entire life. I can't, I can't even talk about it without perhaps sending myself into another bit of mental instability and crisis. It's because it's such a recent experience of mine that I'm only now recovering from Chloe.
Part of why I had to push this back was because I had some, let's say an episode, I don't know what to call it. It wasn't a panic, like to call it a panic attack would be a lovely word for it. Like I wish it was a panic attack about this subject, partly because I treat this subject so solemnly and so zealously, so diligently and so devotedly that
When I'm interviewing someone, I try to take on their theories. I try to take it on experientially. Like if I'm interviewing Ken Wilber and he says, you need to do this meditation practice in order to understand my theory. You can't just understand it by reading it. Well, then I'm going to, I'm going to try my best to emulate the meditation practices in order to understand his theories. But then there's so many different kinds. And I mentioned an analogy of PC software with, sorry, PC with Mac software. Well, imagine then there's Linux as well. And imagine there's 10 different ones being installed in my PC or being installed in whatever.
There's so many errors and I'm so, I'm so confused and well, I can't describe that experience. Yeah, it sounds to me like what you're experiencing is what Verveki would call combinatorially explosive, right? It's like there's too much to process.
There's too much that you're trying to process all at once. And it sounds like to me that you believe that it's only by processing it all that you will achieve true reality. But maybe I have got that wrong. Is that where you are conceptually or is it somewhere else? Think Verizon, the best 5G network is expensive? Think again. Bring in your AT&T or T-Mobile bill to a
Ever seen an origami version of the Miami Bull? Jokes aside, Verizon has the most ways to save on phones and plans where you can get a single line with everything you need. So bring in your bill to your local Miami Verizon store today and we'll give you a better deal. It's that right now because I'm
at least somewhat in a sane, stable state. I feel as if I'm behind my eyeballs speaking to you as an individual and perhaps you similarly, perhaps people who are listening similarly, perhaps they feel like there's these objects around them. That's such a wonderful place to be in. I never realized how comforting that is and how precious that is. That is so effing precious, Chloe. The place where I was was I was in a place where
Oh, man, I can barely say it. You also don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. Okay, sure, sure, sure. But the point is that it's not about there are too many options. It's that there was ambiguity as to what is ontology, so ambiguous ontology. And that sounds like, well, see, up until about three weeks ago. What is is so much.
What is is so much. Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah. And what could be is also so much. And then the relationship of what could be to what is, is it true that all possibilities exist? And I can intellectually understand that. And that's a comfortable place. That's where I love to be because it's so effing. It's so, it's so.
Comforting is the only word that I can use right now compared to what I was, which was extreme discomfort. It's such a comfortable place to be in. But to actually comprehend that, to think of what that means, to treat it seriously, will at least leave me in a void of inoperativeness and feeling like I'm on the brink of
a place where I may not be able to recover from. So I don't know if what I should be doing right now. Oh yeah. And then I had this information, Colleen, this information that Kurt, what you've been doing with your life, not just with the theories of everything podcast is thinking way too much. You think thinking you're such an analytical person, such a trust your feelings, trust your feelings, Kurt, trust it. Ground yourself in your feelings.
And it's not to say that thinking is wrong, but Kurt, you've been doing it way too much, way too much. And look at where it's leading you. You're spiraling out of control. And so I had to keep telling myself so hard, Chloe, it was so hard. It was metaphorically and almost literally like I was being pushed in this
I think that's right. I
It sounds like you might be going through this, what has been termed the dark night of the soul experience. Well, the fact that even has a name, I'm glad because it brings me some amount of
I also wonder if you've ever played a musical instrument?
I play or I used to play the guitar, I haven't played in years. And that's something I spoke to Ima Gilchrist about, because I'm so analytical, Chloe. I was gonna say, yeah, you should, if I were you, I would start listening to music and I would start playing music again. Yeah, yeah, I should do that. I'm much more a fan of playing than I am of listening. So I, same with films. So I'm a filmmaker and I'm not a
I watch films to pass the time with my wife. It's an enjoyable activity, but it's not as if I actually like creating more than I do consuming. Perhaps you're the same. If you're, I think maybe that's, but I'm not entirely sure. Maybe that's
The Roots of Jewish Consciousness
um promoted introversion right in order to achieve psychological wholeness but then so that you could go back out into the world and and reveal to the world what has been revealed to you and help the world essentially so i am an introvert by nature but and i and i have a love hate relationship with social media because of that um but i but i do uh love that idea of
needing to go inward and outward and be in balance. And there's also a musical analogy there when it comes to jazz, for example. A jazz musician, if a jazz musician is playing with other jazz musicians,
then there's some ambiguity there. There's some, there has to be a kind of unknown-ness with which one can riff, and that's part of the context that actually beautiful jazz can emerge from. If everything was known, if everything was pre-known, then jazz wouldn't be as exciting or surprising, right? And so for me, balancing the introversion with the extraversion is an attempt to
to go out into the unknown and to be challenged by the unknown, but also to be delighted by the unknown. And what I'm hearing in some of the things that you're challenged by right now, and this probably is off because of the insufficiency of words, but your relationship with the unknown seems to be one of terror.
You mentioned something interesting you said. Words are insufficient.
There's someone called Wittgenstein who's of the analytic tradition to an analytical philosopher, analytic philosopher, who said that of what one cannot speak of precisely one must be silent. And then also which I resonate with and that's one of the reasons for me, explicating as
Specifically as I can when I choose my words as well as what the podcast exploring it with this with as much rigor as I can because I feel like much of philosophical problems are a result of Dubious meaning so let's say even the word consciousness perhaps that word should be fractionated to John Verbeckis adverbial versus adjectival consciousness that's not John Verbeckis, but he popularizes that and I believe Yoshivak uses phenomenological consciousness versus
some other type of consciousness versus some other type of consciousness. Perhaps these words we use in the paradoxes that we feel are because we're using a term that is polymorphous. And so we're taking one aspect of it and finding contradictions when actually they're separate aspects. So I like that from Wittgenstein, but then Wittgenstein also had his ladder, which said that the whole point of my, I believe his tractatus
or tractate. The whole point of it was to get you to this point where you realize now that there's no point even to speaking at all, that this is all foolish. And I tend to like that. At least right now, though, my views change on a monthly basis. The reason is that the reason I like that is that I, I do wonder how much of reality is like a fractal in the sense that at any scale it's
similar to any other scale and so the investigation of any phenomenon to its extreme leads you to the same answer of if you were to investigate it through some other means that's one of the reasons why i'm not so sold on this solely experiential approach over the analytical approach because people like cantor who is a mathematician believed by studying
infinite sets he was studying the mind of God and perhaps he was perhaps if you study logic to its extreme you come to the same conclusions as if you were to fully experience to the extreme let me think about that for a second I don't it strikes me that strikes me as impossible that is my intuitive gut level reaction um yeah it strikes me as impossible because consciousness is embodied
And so, this idea of a kind of hypercerebral, this idea of defining a hypercerebral approach to the study of logic as though it is itself divorced from experience. I mean, it is a kind of experience, right, to study logic to the infinite extreme.
The question, so it's not a dichotomy between experience versus the study of logic. The study of logic is an experience. It's similar to how, at least colloquially, the difference between the West and the East is the East would say, sorry, the West would say, there is good and bad, you choose the good, and you use your will and choose the good. And then the East would say, that's all illusory. And the whole point is to realize that's illusory.
I have a feeling that both of those approaches are the same in some manner, similar to look, if you're at a part of the globe, you can go north to get to the North Pole, or you can actually go south and you end up to the North Pole if you go sufficiently far enough. So I have a feeling that it's somewhat akin to that. Yes, but I would I would push harder though and say that if if one conceives of oneself as a bodyless mind,
then and one acts that way in the world then I mean this is a very McGill Christian argument but one will become cut off from oneself and and I don't know that if one is cut off from oneself that they can discover the mind of God now I'm not saying that this is what this person was doing you're referring to Cantor with the infinite sense
Yeah, but I'm very cautious because in the West we do have this long history of elevating the analytical framework over the experiential. There is, you understand the point I'm making? It's not really a dichotomy, but we do have this history of conceiving ourselves as bodiless. I mean, Descartes said
in one of his writings that I could, and I'm paraphrasing, but he said, I can exist without my body, right? And so there is this thread within Western civilization which creates a kind of disembodiment, which celebrates disembodiment and then becomes alienating.
I can give you an example. So there's someone who I'm sure you're familiar with named Gibson is a psychologist who you've heard the term embodied cognition. So embodied cognition body cognition. Descartes was on the more cognitive end saying that I don't even need my body. I'm purely
a screen for sensory input. And then there's on the right now, the trend in cognitive science is embodied cognition, which is somewhere in the middle. And then on the extreme end of the body to part is Gibson, who would say that we're just bodies. And what we're doing is simply floating, we're attuned to our environment. And that's where these notions of optimal grip, which I'm sure you've heard for Vicky talk about, come from. And one way to think about that is
is much like there are some victorian devices that have no cognition they're just robots in a sense but they're executed they're put together in such a manner that if you roll them down a hill they look like they're walking they're like dolls but they look so beautiful as if they're walking it's because they're engineered so perfectly with their environment so they're pure bodies now gibson was more on the pure body end
And he came to that conclusion from some scientific observations so that you can think of that as analytical through some through so that is through analytical means he came to the conclusions that the body through analytical means he came to the conclusion that the body matters most and that all we are our bodies. Now that's a bit of an oversimplification, but that's an example of how, even though we're saying that, even though you're saying we should start with the body, I'm saying, no, you can also start with the mind and perhaps come to the same conclusion. And also perhaps,
Yes, but I would disagree with Gibson's conclusion, right? I wouldn't say that you should start with the body over the mind, but rather to realize that there's a relationship between the body and the mind. And so to go into a purely analytical exercise,
without taking into account one's own feelings, psychology, emotions, you know, all the things that make us who we are as human beings is kind of a, well, it's folly in a sense. Yeah. See, if you've ever followed Peterson, I'm sure you know he's a fan of saying the logos is
Akin to Christ, if not the same as Christ, and that the root of the word logic is logos. And so studying logic, one way to think about what the logos is, is where it developed from, there's this, and so I'm articulating this here for the first time, so forgive me if I stumble upon my words, there is this in ancient Greek, in ancient Greece, there's this
diviner called Gois. I believe the Gois are Gois. And what they would do, this is maybe minus 1000, so 1000 BC, they would speak in tongues and somehow make prophecies from that. And so what they would do would be, would be, they would go into some other world, speak in tongues and somehow extract information from that. And that is almost the root of what Logos is.
because it was the first time that you attach. Firstly, it means that you can communicate with this other truer world. Secondly, that you can extract information from it. Thirdly, that there's an order to it. And fourth, that it has something to do with speech and something to do with, well, something to do with speech. And then from that, you get the ideas of, of. Hmm.
When you would ask an ancient Greek person, let's say minus 600, so 600 BC, I say minus because it's just easier for me. So 600 BC, what languages do you speak? It wasn't as if they would say, I speak German and I speak French and so on, presuming those languages exist back then. They would say, oh, I speak the rocks if they were a stratographer, for example, or study stratigraphy, or I speak the language of life if they were a biologist, biologist,
the logic of life. And what they mean is that because they can understand the principles by which this operates and I can use that to communicate, not communicate, I can use that to interact with it properly. That's as if I'm speaking the language. Then you can abstract that further and wonder what is the logic of the universe. For example, I'm sure you've heard of the law of the excluded middle, which says that it's either some proposition is either true or false.
Okay, it turns out that that may not be the case. There are other forms of logic. But either way, the point is that there's logic. And what is logic? What is the true logic? It's almost like what is the what is happening with the universe? How do I communicate? How do I act properly with the universe? And Verveki may say this, how do I know how do I conform to the universe?
Well, all of this is my roundabout way of saying that it's not clear to me and I'm not saying that I've decided upon an analytical approach over an experiential one at all. I'm saying that I'm saying that it's not clear to me that predominantly we should have the experiential over the analytical or vice versa. It's not clear to me that one is
Right, one's more of an imperative than the other. It's not clear to me, though, it may be that for where we are in society as a whole, in the West, we've been overvaluing the scientific and the propositional, and that we need to start to value other forms of knowledge, like the perspectival and participatory and procedural. Right, right, right. So maybe that. And
But it may not be that that's just the case for everyone at every instant across humanity or across the world. So that's what I mean is that it could be the case as a whole for our culture, but it may not be the case as a whole for other cultures or other beings, or it may not be a cosmic truth that we need to value the experiential over the propositional that is. Sure. Well, this reminds me of a book by Robert Bly called A Little Book on the Human Shadow.
Some cultures may have overvalued the analytical, and so they need to focus on the experiential, whereas other cultures may have overvalued the experiential, and they need to focus on the analytical. But all of this is in service of an attempt to bring balance.
to the world. And so that balance is not a, Verveki has said this, balance is not like a propositional thing that falls from the sky. Balance requires practice. It requires attunement, much like you would need in playing an instrument. And depending upon where you're situated and the culture that you belong to, what you will need in order to bring balance to your life will differ from person to person and from culture to culture.
But that still speaks in my mind to an elegance of the cosmos. And I think that that's ultimately a beautiful thing. Well, Chloe, I've got to get going. Okay. It went by so quick. Yeah, I did. Thank you so much for joining me today. It was a very fascinating conversation. Yeah, thank you. And I would like to know a bit more about your theory of enchantment. See,
Hmm, yeah, I'd like to know more about that at some point. Sure, we can definitely talk about it. I'm happy to also invite you back on another time if you'd like that. Thank you, Chloe. You're welcome. I would like that, yes. Awesome. All right, well, Kurt, I'll let you go, but thank you for joining me today. Thank you so much, Chloe. Take care.
The podcast is now finished. If you'd like to support conversations like this, then do consider going to patreon.com slash c-u-r-t-j-a-i-m-u-n-g-a-l. That is Kurt Jaimungal. Its support from the patrons and from the sponsors that allow me to do this full time. Every dollar helps tremendously. Thank you.
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"text": " This is an auxiliary episode where Chloe Valdery of the Theory of Enchantment interviewed me a few weeks prior for her channel, which is linked in the description. This is a dive into the experiential versus the analytical approach to understanding reality, as well as delving into the question of what reality and consciousness indeed are."
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"text": " and supporting with a contribution of whatever you can, as the only reason I'm able to do this is because of the patrons and the sponsor's support. A written review on whichever platform you're listening to this from also helps. Thank you, and enjoy this supplementary episode where Chloe Valdery interviews Kurt Jaimungal."
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"end_time": 329.514,
"index": 12,
"start_time": 308.951,
"text": " I believe discomfort can teach you something about human suffering, but also about beauty and joy. It has already taught me so much. Awesome. Well, welcome Kurt to the Heart Speaks podcast. So good to have you with us today."
},
{
"end_time": 355.009,
"index": 13,
"start_time": 329.94,
"text": " Thank you so much, Chloe. So I was taking a look at some of your work online and I thought to myself, wow, I'm going to be so blown away by this guy. He knows so much, so much more than I do. Physics, consciousness, science, mathematics, all things that I am very much a novice, if even that, at. So I wanted to start by asking you,"
},
{
"end_time": 381.681,
"index": 14,
"start_time": 355.009,
"text": " I know you have a podcast called Theories of Everything, and I wanted to start by asking you what is your current relationship with consciousness, with God? I know that you interview a lot of people who opine on these subjects, but I wanted to know if you personally had any relationship with these subjects right now. I'm sure it changes over time, but what is that like for you right now?"
},
{
"end_time": 394.718,
"index": 15,
"start_time": 383.131,
"text": " You and perhaps your audience will be woefully disappointed if they think that if you think that I have a wealth of knowledge in these subjects. When it comes to theories of everything. So firstly we should define what a theory of everything is."
},
{
"end_time": 421.92,
"index": 16,
"start_time": 395.452,
"text": " Many people, well, it's a physics term, first and foremost, and it means to unify what's called general relativity with what's called the standard model. And that usually is the theory of the large with the theory of the smallest, how some people describe it. And then the way that I take it is, so my background is in physics, and that is what I'm interested in. It's more of the mathematically rigorous theories of everything. But as well as I started from when I started exploring this, I found that some people have their own"
},
{
"end_time": 451.783,
"index": 17,
"start_time": 422.534,
"text": " they would call it a theory of everything because they take that in a much more broad they take that in a much more well they take it literally and i also tend to take it literally everything which means well what the heck is consciousness too some people think that consciousness has a constitutive role in reality that is it's fundamental and somehow we have a relationship between what exists and our consciousness rather than it being a"
},
{
"end_time": 480.469,
"index": 18,
"start_time": 452.517,
"text": " landscape of dead material that our consciousness emerges from so i'm interested in what the heck is consciousness and then does that have a relationship to free will and also also what is god so some people say god is that's tricky as you know that's tricky some people the more those that are on the more new atheist end will say god is the person that's in the sky that's a man that's a fictitious story that was useful perhaps or perhaps"
},
{
"end_time": 495.06,
"index": 19,
"start_time": 481.613,
"text": " Subreption"
},
{
"end_time": 523.08,
"index": 20,
"start_time": 495.35,
"text": " which means it's a deliberate misrepresentation. And I don't know if it's a, if it's a deliberate misrepresentation, but it's somewhat of a straw man because it wasn't until recently that that idea has come about and only with a certain subset of people. I was looking at the Pew data research and it turns out that most people who consider themselves to be believers in God don't find it to be anathema to define God, that it's any definition of God would automatically be"
},
{
"end_time": 547.961,
"index": 21,
"start_time": 524.497,
"text": " What is your current relationship with consciousness?"
},
{
"end_time": 576.954,
"index": 22,
"start_time": 548.319,
"text": " and with God. How do you personally perceive consciousness, given all of the beautiful minds that you've interacted with on both topics? Where are you right now? Well, where I am right now, it's a strange place. It's not a comfortable place. When I interview people on the subject of"
},
{
"end_time": 609.206,
"index": 23,
"start_time": 579.445,
"text": " theories of everything and consciousness. So let's talk about theories of everything. So the mathematically rigorous theories of everything, the physics theories of everything, for example, geometric unity may be familiar to some of your viewers or listeners. I go into the papers and I make sure that I research it as if I'm being tested in a course. And when it comes to the more the theories on the consciousness end,"
},
{
"end_time": 636.254,
"index": 24,
"start_time": 610.981,
"text": " Some of the people who feel like they have their own theory as to what consciousness is, say that you need to experience it. And I also tend to believe that that consciousness is a is a first person activity. And it's a subjective first person activity rather than a dispassionate objective third person activity. And that latter approach is more of the neural correlates. So you hear people say that, well, consciousness comes about when there's a certain neural circuit that"
},
{
"end_time": 663.097,
"index": 25,
"start_time": 636.988,
"text": " a cortical loop, and the more active that loop is, the more conscious we feel. Well, well, that's a correlate. So I try to, in the podcast, in the theories of everything podcast, I tried to make sure that I bring the same level of research, perhaps it's experiential research, instead of analytic research, to the more consciousness end. And then that tumbles me, because there's so many varying theories,"
},
{
"end_time": 693.319,
"index": 26,
"start_time": 664.087,
"text": " There's a quote by Rene Descartes that says something akin to. It's what happens when you repeatedly subvert the ground that you stand on by doubting interminably. And I'm in that place. So it's like, he would say that it's as if I fall in unexpectedly into a whirlpool where I cannot stand on the bottom nor swim to the top."
},
{
"end_time": 722.927,
"index": 27,
"start_time": 693.507,
"text": " And then he has a great phrase, which is, nevertheless, I'll still endeavor the same effort that I did yesterday today. Now, I'm not sure about that last part, but I like that. And I used to believe that last part. Well, it's interesting. Either way, it's a strange place to be in. Yeah, it's interesting that you bring up Descartes and this sort of liminal space that he described himself as being in. It strikes me that historically speaking, in the West, this has always been a kind of"
},
{
"end_time": 752.978,
"index": 28,
"start_time": 723.609,
"text": " existential crisis to be in a sort of liminal, almost limbo-esque state, whereas in the East it's not. And so I'm wondering how that lands for you when you think about it, because I've been studying Taoism. I've been on a Taoist trip lately, and it's actually enhanced my understanding of the Abrahamic faiths, or at least Christianity and Judaism, and it's enriched it in a deeper way. So I'm curious how that impacts you, if at all."
},
{
"end_time": 780.213,
"index": 29,
"start_time": 753.985,
"text": " Yeah, Daoism provides me with some comfort and I used to, I'm not an expert in this, but Confucius has some great sayings. However, Confucius was more, if one wants to think of it, you can think of Confucius as more the radical left in terms of, like this is an extreme generalization, but you can interpret it because he would say"
},
{
"end_time": 809.599,
"index": 30,
"start_time": 780.299,
"text": " that in order to work on oneself, one needs to have an optimal society. And so it's a political theory in some sense, or it's a political philosophy in some sense. Whereas Lao Tzu and Confucius and Lao Tzu lived around the same time. Confucius came to Lao Tzu and said, this may be apocryphal because we're not sure if this actually happened. But Confucius said that meeting Lao Tzu is like meeting a dragon and the dragon is as high as one can get in the pantheon of Chinese animals. Lao Tzu was more about"
},
{
"end_time": 836.237,
"index": 31,
"start_time": 811.578,
"text": " You cannot get rid of the bad without creating the bad and that it's all about balance and that if there's a force on you, it's almost like Newtonian, you push back and then there's an equal and opposite force. So perhaps it's best to flow with it. So it provides me with a modicum of comfort. However, you mentioned, okay, look in the East, this existential crisis not seen as a crisis."
},
{
"end_time": 864.241,
"index": 32,
"start_time": 836.886,
"text": " Well, I have a crisis. I'm tortured by what I study, and I don't hide that. I try to minimize it, but perhaps Lao Tzu would say perhaps you shouldn't minimize it. Recently, I've come to this conclusion that there isn't much of an emphasis in these religious New Age circles about"
},
{
"end_time": 890.418,
"index": 33,
"start_time": 865.486,
"text": " what practices work and which ones don't. So they'll almost uncritically adopt an Eastern practice in a Western world. And it may not be that that's productive. It may be like forcing your PC to install Mac software and all of a sudden you get errors everywhere. It may be that we're in our bones, a Western, we're in our bones so Western that an Eastern solution produces the crisis and the Eastern"
},
{
"end_time": 916.715,
"index": 34,
"start_time": 891.834,
"text": " People would say, why is it producing a crisis? Well, you don't know what the software is like that we run on. And I don't like to think of the brain is running on software. I know that Yoshabok, some people may be familiar with Yoshabok. Yoshabok likes to think like that. This is just an analogy. So here's another analogy. Maybe that we're on the globe and that what we need to get to is"
},
{
"end_time": 949.377,
"index": 35,
"start_time": 919.394,
"text": " Yeah, maybe what we need to get to is this the North Pole. And depending on where you are on the globe, it's better to go north or it's better to go south. It may so there's a path dependence. And I don't hear much about this in the New Age circles, they would just uncritically adopt different strategies like you should mindfully meditate. See, I've forced myself to mindfully meditate for for years and years. What was the works? What was that? So I have sorry, I have several questions."
},
{
"end_time": 976.22,
"index": 36,
"start_time": 949.616,
"text": " First of all, it seems to me that you're in search of something, but I'm not quite sure what it is. So if you could define, if possible, what you're in search of, I think that would help me understand some of the analogies. I mean, the North Pole analogy makes sense to me, but I still don't precisely understand what it is you're searching for."
},
{
"end_time": 1005.469,
"index": 37,
"start_time": 976.681,
"text": " So what would be at the North Pole once we got there, regardless of where we started? Some people may say inner peace, and I wouldn't, I wouldn't say that, although I would certainly welcome that because I can certainly use it. I am searching first and foremost for an understanding of the landscape of theories of everything in the physical sense, in the physics sense, the mathematical sense. And then as, and then secondarily,"
},
{
"end_time": 1035.896,
"index": 38,
"start_time": 1006.954,
"text": " the consciousness sense, the more Eastern sense, the more experiential sense. So first and foremost, analytical, then secondly, experiential, almost to aid the analytical. The more that I studied this, the more that I see that these may be integrally tied and perhaps one is the one that I, perhaps the experiential one is the one that I should be pursuing as, as the top one. I was going to say it sounded like the order that you presented that in was the incorrect order."
},
{
"end_time": 1062.688,
"index": 39,
"start_time": 1036.374,
"text": " At least from my perspective. Yeah, that's what most people who are more easterly inclined would say. And that's why I'm tumbled, because I don't know what I'm searching for other than I'm trying to understand. There's this term that I like to use called Weltanschauung. So Weltanschauung is my mispronunciation of a German word, which the German word literally means Welt's a world."
},
{
"end_time": 1086.015,
"index": 40,
"start_time": 1063.097,
"text": " And Xiaowu means point of view, so your worldview. But the way that I use it is an all-encompassing worldview, such that any new piece of knowledge can be interpolated in your model. And then your model contains its own updating mechanism. I know this all sounds abstract, but I'll give some examples. So if you were to speak to Ian McGillchrist and you were to ask him about this pen,"
},
{
"end_time": 1116.92,
"index": 41,
"start_time": 1087.261,
"text": " would say well the reason you have this pen and the reason why I'm holding it with my left hand is because of the brain and its left right asymmetry and and he would have some well articulated point of view now Peterson would say it's because the Oedipal mother and you want to make sure that Nietzsche is with the Dostoyev etc etc and they all have this they all have a way of explaining almost any fact and they also have a they also in their model have a conception of ontology and if your viewers aren't"
},
{
"end_time": 1142.261,
"index": 42,
"start_time": 1117.381,
"text": " don't know what ontology is it just means what exists you can think of it like metaphysics what exists and then they also thirdly have a consistency between their model and how they act now some people i know we don't want to talk about this and i personally i'm not a fan of of being anti-woke but some people in the are and the same with the alt right they have they're hypocritical"
},
{
"end_time": 1166.305,
"index": 43,
"start_time": 1142.551,
"text": " in what they say and how they act. And so a Veltan Shaung to me is to be consistent with what one professes their model to be and how one acts. Maybe what I'm doing is I'm on a journey to find or create my own Veltan Shaung or perhaps, see I call the theories of everything"
},
{
"end_time": 1196.203,
"index": 44,
"start_time": 1166.613,
"text": " Okay. Now, do you know why you're searching for a worldview? Because I'm a confused person, and it's not a comfortable position for me to be in."
},
{
"end_time": 1225.725,
"index": 45,
"start_time": 1196.493,
"text": " for me to talk about this right now makes me somewhat nervous. And, and right, it makes me somewhat nervous. It's, it's a destabilizing position to be in, and it's absolutely not comfortable. But that wasn't why I started this. When I started the theories of everything project, it was because I've always been interested in certain fundamental mysteries. Why are we here? What is the, and I would have eschewed that question as being in the"
},
{
"end_time": 1245.981,
"index": 46,
"start_time": 1226.305,
"text": " fictitious religious domain that tries to impose meaning upon the world. I don't see it the same way anymore, but I would have. And what are the origins of the universe? What is the origin of life? How does consciousness come about? So I'm interested in those questions ever since I was a kid."
},
{
"end_time": 1278.626,
"index": 47,
"start_time": 1248.899,
"text": " And then I went into filmmaking, so I abandoned that. And then I thought, since this pandemic started, well, why don't I go and elucidate it for myself as well as others simultaneously via talking to people who claim to have the answers? That's how it started. And then as for where I am now, I'm just continuing on this journey, but I'm not sure where I am now. That's fair. That's a fair place to be. But you say that it's also uncomfortable. Yes, to say the least."
},
{
"end_time": 1307.551,
"index": 48,
"start_time": 1278.831,
"text": " That's very interesting to me. I've had a bit of a spiritual journey. I grew up in a, what would I call it? I grew up in a non-denominational Christian family, which was very much similar to Seventh-day Adventists, which meant that I was exposed to Jewish thought at a very early age without realizing I was Jewish. And so I had an insider-outsider relationship with both Christianity and Judaism."
},
{
"end_time": 1333.933,
"index": 49,
"start_time": 1307.978,
"text": " because I grew up observing all the holy days in the Old Testament as a Christian, and I grew up not observing any of the mainstream Christian holidays like Christmas and Easter, also as a Christian, which gave me a paradoxical identity and a capacity to see sort of inside and outside things simultaneously. And that's probably why I ended up"
},
{
"end_time": 1361.852,
"index": 50,
"start_time": 1334.548,
"text": " being attracted to Taoism on some level, because Taoism, I think, it welcomes the paradox as a fact of reality. And also, it's not as if this paradoxical understanding, this limbo-like understanding, is only exclusive to Eastern traditions. There are many Western mystical traditions that correlate or just have their own versions of what"
},
{
"end_time": 1389.445,
"index": 51,
"start_time": 1362.142,
"text": " what would seem to be a more Eastern viewpoint. And, you know, John Vervecky has said that the Eastern-Western dichotomy is really an illusion anyway, to some extent. And so I'm very curious to... I mean, I've struggled in the past with identity crises from a spiritual perspective. And I know how discomforting that can be and that can feel."
},
{
"end_time": 1416.766,
"index": 52,
"start_time": 1390.589,
"text": " It feels like you're grasping for something, but you don't actually know what you're grasping for. And so I can, I resonate with that. But I'm still trying to, maybe it's not possible and that's okay. Part of me has this impulse to try to fix everything and heal everything and ameliorate everything. And so I'm feeling this impulse within me now to"
},
{
"end_time": 1443.37,
"index": 53,
"start_time": 1417.227,
"text": " to tell you to be like, well, what about this idea? Or what about that idea? Or have you tried this? Or have you tried that? Tell me like what? Give me an example. But part of me wants to avoid that because I don't know if that's if that's the quote unquote right thing to do. I can just say that I've been very much impacted by I started meditating during when COVID hit. I started a meditation practice when the pandemic started. And at first I was just sort of"
},
{
"end_time": 1469.974,
"index": 54,
"start_time": 1443.899,
"text": " Moving along, doing my own thing, and it wasn't really impacting me deeply. And then I discovered John Vervecky's work with his whole awakening from the meeting crisis. And then I discovered he has a meditation practice on YouTube that anyone can follow. And so then I started doing that. And it's really beautiful because it combines both Western, both quote unquote Western and Eastern traditions. And then some of the books that I started reading,"
},
{
"end_time": 1499.701,
"index": 55,
"start_time": 1470.742,
"text": " which were about different mystical traditions. One book is about mystical Judaism or Hasidism or Kabbalah. And another book that I've just finished reading by Ken Wilbur is called Spectrum of Consciousness, which is highly, highly Eastern. And so long story short, I began to see that there's this synthesis. It seems to me there's a synthesis between many Eastern and Western mystical traditions. And that is something I found comforting."
},
{
"end_time": 1526.698,
"index": 56,
"start_time": 1500.401,
"text": " Can you give me an example of what would ordinarily be thought of as a pure Western phenomenon or practice or viewpoint that you found that is actually Eastern or has Eastern influences or is compatible? So there's a particularly"
},
{
"end_time": 1556.92,
"index": 57,
"start_time": 1527.807,
"text": " Some would say Jungian interpretation of Christianity, which I'm going to be really reductive about, so please bear with me as I try to paraphrase it. But the Jungian interpretation of Christianity essentially boils down to this idea that the prominent figure in Christianity, Jesus Christ, represents someone who is able to individuate"
},
{
"end_time": 1579.155,
"index": 58,
"start_time": 1557.466,
"text": " who is able to achieve psychological wholeness, who is able to achieve inner peace, if you will. And there's a book called The Tao of Christ, which actually explains that using Eastern Taoist mystical metaphors, if you will. And so there is a"
},
{
"end_time": 1606.374,
"index": 59,
"start_time": 1579.514,
"text": " You mentioned Ken Wilber."
},
{
"end_time": 1636.408,
"index": 60,
"start_time": 1606.766,
"text": " Is he the integral theory or integral integer theory? That's my understanding. Spiral dynamics? I've only read one. Yeah, I've only read the one book by him. But yes, he is. That's what he's known for. And what is that? Because I would like to speak to him. I probably am not the right person to answer that question. The book I read wasn't I mean, it was I guess it was the beginning of integral theory. I can talk to you a little bit about spectrum of consciousness because I just finished it."
},
{
"end_time": 1665.845,
"index": 61,
"start_time": 1636.937,
"text": " Spectrum of Consciousness is very interesting. It actually starts out by a discussion of physics. It starts out with this discussion of the perceiver not being able to be perceived. It starts out with talking about Halleke. And you can correct me if I'm wrong, because again, I'm a novice at all of this. But his understanding is that when you're measuring something in physics, the measurer themselves actually impacts the measurement."
},
{
"end_time": 1695.981,
"index": 62,
"start_time": 1666.442,
"text": " And so he goes on to talk about how there are many implications that come from this. One of them being that time is an illusion. Another of them being that the subject-object duality is also an illusion. And so he starts from a point of view of rooted in physics, and then he actually ends up speaking a lot about different Hindu, Daoist,"
},
{
"end_time": 1724.565,
"index": 63,
"start_time": 1696.288,
"text": " and Buddhist traditions and how many writings and sayings and quotes from any of the mystics in these traditions actually confirm what many physicists have discovered about the nature of reality and the non-dual nature of reality. And he also talks about how wholeness can be achieved by unlearning"
},
{
"end_time": 1745.418,
"index": 64,
"start_time": 1725.367,
"text": " The thoughts that occurred to me right now, the reason why I'm unsure whether the analytical approach or the experiential approach is one that should be primary, is that"
},
{
"end_time": 1778.063,
"index": 65,
"start_time": 1748.08,
"text": " People like Ken Wilbur and Rupert Spira, Deepak Chopra, I'm not trying to, I know when Deepak's name is mentioned, some people scorn. I'm not saying that with any level of derision. They say what is fairly nebulous and unfalsifiable from an objective standpoint so that you can't tell if what they're saying is true or not. And when it comes to their interpretations of quantum mechanics, there's this"
},
{
"end_time": 1807.295,
"index": 66,
"start_time": 1779.172,
"text": " There's the sense in the new age, for lack of a better term, community, that quantum mechanics says that the observer is necessary and has a role in creating reality. That's one interpretation of quantum mechanics and there are 10 or even 15 interpretations of quantum mechanics that are all consistent with what we've seen. So for example, one is that we just require"
},
{
"end_time": 1829.36,
"index": 67,
"start_time": 1809.07,
"text": " non-local something called non-local hidden variables and then you don't need necessarily an observer to create reality and another one is what's called super determinism which says that it's all determined and when we it's all been determined before we all have we've been correlated at some point in the distant past that we're"
},
{
"end_time": 1854.735,
"index": 68,
"start_time": 1829.974,
"text": " And we have missing information and this missing information is what brings about the uncertainty in quantum mechanics. And there's nothing mystical about it. There's also decoherence that well to explain decoherence is not trivial. Anyway, there's people can look up decoherence. So there are many interpretations of quantum mechanics that don't require some outstanding role of the quote unquote observer."
},
{
"end_time": 1884.428,
"index": 69,
"start_time": 1854.94,
"text": " So when I hear that, I feel like it's as if the new age type people have this view that they've already settled on. And then they see that physics has come to similar conclusions, like, oh, see this all along. This is what we've been saying all along. Okay, what if in 20 years, because remember, quantum mechanics was just found out, quote unquote, about 100 years ago or so,"
},
{
"end_time": 1913.268,
"index": 70,
"start_time": 1884.428,
"text": " What if in 100 years from now we realize, oh, our interpretation of quantum mechanics is entirely deterministic and it requires no observer, then are those new age people going to give up their point of view? Perhaps not, because they already have that instantiated. So it's as if they're looking for evidence that confirms. However, the absence of that evidence doesn't disconfirm. So it's non disconfirmatory evidence. And I'm not a fan of that type of evidence or that type of reasoning."
},
{
"end_time": 1941.715,
"index": 71,
"start_time": 1913.933,
"text": " I'm not sure that that's a fair assessment of spectrum of consciousness. I can't speak to the other people that you've mentioned. I haven't actually engaged with their work. But spectrum of consciousness struck me as one of the more mathematically involved texts that I've read in a long time, and it actually got me interested in physics and interested in mathematics. I've been interested in science ever since I discovered John Vervecky, really."
},
{
"end_time": 1962.227,
"index": 72,
"start_time": 1942.125,
"text": " But this particular text got me interested in physics as such. So I would recommend reading the text, taking it apart, do all of that, but I would also give it its fair shot because at least my impression was that it seemed mathematically grounded to me."
},
{
"end_time": 1978.234,
"index": 73,
"start_time": 1963.234,
"text": " I definitely am interested in I think I've already confirmed an interview with Ken, we just have to set up the date. This was a few months ago. So I'm interested in going through his theory. I don't know his theory. I don't. Yeah, I can't speak to it. Hear that sound."
},
{
"end_time": 2005.213,
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"start_time": 1979.121,
"text": " That's the sweet sound of success with Shopify. Shopify is the all-encompassing commerce platform that's with you from the first flicker of an idea to the moment you realize you're running a global enterprise. Whether it's handcrafted jewelry or high-tech gadgets, Shopify supports you at every point of sale, both online and in person. They streamline the process with the internet's best converting checkout, making it 36% more effective than other leading platforms."
},
{
"end_time": 2031.323,
"index": 75,
"start_time": 2005.213,
"text": " There's also something called Shopify Magic, your AI-powered assistant that's like an all-star team member working tirelessly behind the scenes. What I find fascinating about Shopify is how it scales with your ambition. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. Join the ranks of businesses in 175 countries that have made Shopify the backbone."
},
{
"end_time": 2054.701,
"index": 76,
"start_time": 2031.323,
"text": " of their commerce. Shopify, by the way, powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States, including huge names like Allbirds, Rothy's, and Brooklyn. If you ever need help, their award-winning support is like having a mentor that's just a click away. Now, are you ready to start your own success story? Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com"
},
{
"end_time": 2064.974,
"index": 77,
"start_time": 2054.701,
"text": " Go to shopify.com."
},
{
"end_time": 2085.981,
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"start_time": 2068.2,
"text": " Razor blades are like diving boards. The longer the board, the more the wobble, the more the wobble, the more nicks, cuts, scrapes. A bad shave isn't a blade problem. It's an extension problem. Henson is a family owned aerospace parts manufacturer that's made parts for the International Space Station and the Mars Rover."
},
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"text": " Now they're bringing that precision engineering to your shaving experience. By using aerospace-grade CNC machines, Henson makes razors that extend less than the thickness of a human hair. The razor also has built-in channels that evacuates hair and cream, which make clogging virtually impossible. Henson Shaving wants to produce the best razors, not the best razor business, so that means no plastics, no subscriptions, no proprietary blades, and no planned obsolescence."
},
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"text": " It's also extremely affordable. The Henson razor works with the standard dual edge blades that give you that old school shave with the benefits of this new school tech. It's time to say no to subscriptions and yes to a razor that'll last you a lifetime. Visit hensonshaving.com slash everything."
},
{
"end_time": 2159.138,
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"text": " If you use that code, you'll get two years worth of blades for free. Just make sure to add them to the cart. Plus 100 free blades when you head to H E N S O N S H A V I N G dot com slash everything and use the code everything. That's fair. I'm wondering, I know that you I saw your film Better Left Unsaid and I was wondering"
},
{
"end_time": 2185.623,
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"start_time": 2159.497,
"text": " You just mentioned another theory, actually if you could maybe repeat it, another theory of quantum mechanics. It was the second theory that you mentioned. Before you mentioned the decoherence, there was one that you just spoke about. Superdeterminism? Yes, can you explain that again? Superdeterminism says, okay, so one way of thinking about it is that if you look at"
},
{
"end_time": 2198.797,
"index": 83,
"start_time": 2186.715,
"text": " the cosmic cosmic microwave background radiation, you see that that is if you look far off into the distance and when you look far enough, that's as if you're looking back in time. So hear that sound."
},
{
"end_time": 2225.896,
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"start_time": 2199.753,
"text": " That's the sweet sound of success with Shopify. Shopify is the all-encompassing commerce platform that's with you from the first flicker of an idea to the moment you realize you're running a global enterprise. Whether it's handcrafted jewelry or high-tech gadgets, Shopify supports you at every point of sale, both online and in person. They streamline the process with the internet's best converting checkout, making it 36% more effective than other leading platforms."
},
{
"end_time": 2251.971,
"index": 85,
"start_time": 2225.896,
"text": " There's also something called Shopify Magic, your AI-powered assistant that's like an all-star team member working tirelessly behind the scenes. What I find fascinating about Shopify is how it scales with your ambition. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. Join the ranks of businesses in 175 countries that have made Shopify the backbone"
},
{
"end_time": 2275.333,
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"start_time": 2251.971,
"text": " of their commerce. Shopify, by the way, powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States, including huge names like Allbirds, Rothies, and Brooklynin. If you ever need help, their award-winning support is like having a mentor that's just a click away. Now, are you ready to start your own success story? Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com"
},
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"end_time": 2305.128,
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"text": " To look far enough back in time, you see that the universe is fairly uniform in every direction. However, these antipodal points, so if I go there and I go there, they shouldn't, they're so far separated that they shouldn't be so correlated with one another. They shouldn't be so uniform because"
},
{
"end_time": 2332.773,
"index": 88,
"start_time": 2305.845,
"text": " In terms of causation, so you can only be within, I'm trying to figure out how to explain this. There's something called a light cone. And so I'm sure you've seen this, this Einsteinian light cone. Okay. And then if you're within the light cone, then you can influence one. Okay. Let me think about how to explain this. It doesn't matter. The point is that they shouldn't have been able, they're not within the causal"
},
{
"end_time": 2362.346,
"index": 89,
"start_time": 2333.575,
"text": " light cone of one another. So they shouldn't have been able to influence one another. Okay, so super determinism says, well, perhaps far back enough in time, they were within some inflation also says this. So it's not as if super determinism says this alone. But either way, the point is that there are correlations, there are all there is is correlations, not all there is correlations, but everything is correlated. Okay,"
},
{
"end_time": 2385.623,
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"start_time": 2362.79,
"text": " There's something you said earlier about, I think when you were describing this theory, about quantum physics doesn't require an observer, maybe, because what is unknown will one day be known, or something like that."
},
{
"end_time": 2409.889,
"index": 91,
"start_time": 2385.708,
"text": " It doesn't that doesn't require an observer necessarily for the quote unquote collapse of the wave function. So the mystery in quantum mechanics is why is it that when we don't observe it, we have this a wave function that looks like a superposition of different states and a superposition, don't worry about what that means. But then when we observe it, it collapses to one of the states. So the standard example is a spin up or spin down particle."
},
{
"end_time": 2439.019,
"index": 92,
"start_time": 2410.247,
"text": " Okay. So if you look at it, if you can't look at the electron, but if you, if you model the electron, then it's, you can prepare it in a state that is a superposition of being 50%. You've heard that. I'm sorry. I'm trying to. Let me say something that might spark an insight. You said something specifically about there. There's a theory in which there's no need for an observer. The known, the unknown will become known and ultimately there's no mystery."
},
{
"end_time": 2460.981,
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"start_time": 2439.718,
"text": " I don't know about the unknown will become known. I don't know if I said that. But if I did, then I misspoke. I don't I don't know. I could have misheard. Okay, that's fine. That's fine. I wouldn't even place the interpret any of those interpretations as as known versus unknown. There just is. Well, you said something specifically about mystery, though. Do you remember that?"
},
{
"end_time": 2485.742,
"index": 94,
"start_time": 2461.425,
"text": " No, I don't remember using the word mystery. I'm sorry. So maybe I used a synonym of mystery and I'm trying to remember exactly what I said, but I don't remember exactly. Let me tell you what I'm getting at. Let me tell you what I'm getting at or let me try to articulate what I'm getting at. Sure, sure, sure, sure. I have a theory of many theories, but one of my theory is that"
},
{
"end_time": 2511.305,
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"start_time": 2486.425,
"text": " And what I want to do is I want to try to bridge the gap between some of the things that we're talking about, search for meaning, search for consciousness, what is consciousness, what is God, et cetera, but especially search for meaning. I want to try to bridge the gap between that and better left than said, which I think you sort of try to do at the end. But my theory is that the quote unquote woke"
},
{
"end_time": 2538.899,
"index": 96,
"start_time": 2512.381,
"text": " which I'm increasingly not fond of that term, but the quote unquote woke, they are actually revolting against a world created by Descartes. And they are ultimately, they may not be explicitly aware of this, but I think that the fervor and the sort of, um,"
},
{
"end_time": 2564.565,
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"start_time": 2539.241,
"text": " Explicit statements, especially that we saw in 2020, around Black Lives Matter, where you had people promoting or producing posters where they would say like, don't perpetuate whiteness, or what is whiteness? Whiteness is us versus them thinking, whiteness is linear, objective, rational ways of thinking, whiteness is showing up on time, blah blah blah blah blah. Whiteness is us versus them?"
},
{
"end_time": 2595.64,
"index": 98,
"start_time": 2565.742,
"text": " They would say whiteness is okay. It's ironic. It doesn't make sense. But but what I think what I think is actually underneath all of that is a because one african-american woman who is a professor I believe was talking about how like she was saying black people don't do analytical work which doesn't which isn't accurate and a lot of people a lot of conservatives got angry at her for this but she also said"
},
{
"end_time": 2617.637,
"index": 99,
"start_time": 2596.357,
"text": " Black culture is such that we're tied to our families, we're tied to sort of a context. And what I was hearing in between the lines was something that Ian McGilchrist has actually spoken about, which is this"
},
{
"end_time": 2637.346,
"index": 100,
"start_time": 2618.592,
"text": " failure of the emissary, failure of the left brain, when not being, when not honoring the right brain, this analytical sort of impulse to measure and to"
},
{
"end_time": 2660.094,
"index": 101,
"start_time": 2637.944,
"text": " control and to predict for the purposes of controlling and predicting and how that has created an incredible, um, wasteland in the West. And what I, what I was hearing in between the lines of many things that were being said in 2020 in the sort of woke black versus white debate was a revolt against Cartesian frameworks."
},
{
"end_time": 2681.561,
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"start_time": 2660.094,
"text": " And it was a revolt that was manifesting in ways that are very unhealthy and very problematic and very much in a way that would perpetuate problems of us versus them thinking. But I have a creeping suspicion that that's actually what's underpinning a lot of this, and I'm curious what you think of that."
},
{
"end_time": 2696.852,
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"start_time": 2681.698,
"text": " Yeah, this connection between the philosophy and what's happening with the extreme left and the extreme right is something I used to be so interested in. I'm not, the reason why I'm not anymore is because I feel like it may be a distraction of mine, and it may be"
},
{
"end_time": 2715.486,
"index": 104,
"start_time": 2696.852,
"text": " It's also extremely complicated, way too complicated for me to analyze. Anything that's political is extremely, extremely more complicated than mathematics, at least for me, because math is extremely simple in terms of you just start with axioms and you look, it's extremely clear this"
},
{
"end_time": 2743.131,
"index": 105,
"start_time": 2716.732,
"text": " It's disambiguated as for the extreme left and then the brain, this asymmetry in the brain. I'm curious, Chloe, because this is something I've thought about, and I believe it's something that I don't think Ian answered precisely. Would you map? I'm curious about what your thoughts are. Would you map the extreme left and perhaps the extreme right? Because I see them as"
},
{
"end_time": 2771.903,
"index": 106,
"start_time": 2743.524,
"text": " somewhat similar. Would you map them onto the left side of the brain or the right side of the brain? Or you feel like that's unproductive? Um, that's probably true. That's probably too reductive to map to map them on one side of the brain or another side of the brain. I think that when one is, as Ian McGilchrist points out, when an entire civilization"
},
{
"end_time": 2782.176,
"index": 107,
"start_time": 2772.739,
"text": " is motivated exclusively by the left brain which is sort of this analytical need to control and predict and have certainty and not be in right relationship with the unknown."
},
{
"end_time": 2812.432,
"index": 108,
"start_time": 2782.995,
"text": " then you will lack the relational peace. You will lack the capacity to be in relationship, both with yourself, which contains a mystery, and with the rest of the world, at the heart of which is also a mystery. And this will lead to alienation and despair. And because you don't have the proper tools to deal with alienation and despair, which I would argue the proper tool is the relational, then you will continue to split the world into us versus them, me versus you,"
},
{
"end_time": 2827.159,
"index": 109,
"start_time": 2812.432,
"text": " Black versus white, whiteness versus blackness, etc. And so that's what I think has been going on in these culture wars. Have you mentioned Ian McGillchrist before on your podcast?"
},
{
"end_time": 2851.664,
"index": 110,
"start_time": 2827.244,
"text": " I'm not sure it's possible. I've definitely talked about him on Twitter, but I don't know if I've mentioned him on my podcast. The reason is that his book, The Master and His Emissary, there's only two books that I recommend for virtually everyone who watches the Theories of Everything podcast. And it's The Master and His Emissary was one of them, the other one's Order of Time. And by the way, that's about a relational view of quantum mechanics, which says that"
},
{
"end_time": 2876.988,
"index": 111,
"start_time": 2852.073,
"text": " I just ordered that book, actually. Because I heard you mention it on your podcast. That's great. I'm glad to contribute to Carlo Rovelli's author to people knowing more about his ideas. So Carlo would say, if you look at this pen, well, he likes to use speed. See, speed is a relative term."
},
{
"end_time": 2897.892,
"index": 112,
"start_time": 2877.295,
"text": " If this pen doesn't actually have a speed, the speed depends on if you're moving toward it or if it's, this is Galilean relativity. It's just standard. If you, you don't know if a car is moving or if you're moving toward the car more, more fundamentally, there are other actions. Hear that sound."
},
{
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"start_time": 2898.916,
"text": " That's the sweet sound of success with Shopify. Shopify is the all-encompassing commerce platform that's with you from the first flicker of an idea to the moment you realize you're running a global enterprise. Whether it's handcrafted jewelry or high-tech gadgets, Shopify supports you at every point of sale, both online and in person. They streamline the process with the internet's best converting checkout, making it 36% more effective than other leading platforms."
},
{
"end_time": 2953.524,
"index": 114,
"start_time": 2924.974,
"text": " There's also something called Shopify Magic, your AI powered assistant that's like an all-star team member working tirelessly behind the scenes. What I find fascinating about Shopify is how it scales with your ambition. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. Join the ranks of businesses in 175 countries that have made Shopify the backbone of their commerce. Shopify, by the way,"
},
{
"end_time": 2982.432,
"index": 115,
"start_time": 2953.524,
"text": " powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States, including huge names like Allbirds, Rothy's, and Brooklyn. If you ever need help, their award-winning support is like having a mentor that's just a click away. Now, are you ready to start your own success story? Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash theories, all lowercase. Go to shopify.com slash theories now to grow your business no matter what stage you're in."
},
{
"end_time": 3012.585,
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"start_time": 2982.637,
"text": " Shopify.com slash theories attributes that we think are inveterate qualities of this pen, like let's say mass, let's say orientation is also orientation. Almost clearly there is no objective orientation because it depends on where I am. So I can say that it's oriented straight up or straight down, depending on if I'm upside down, if I'm doing a handstand, but then mass, we would say, well, mass is an object. Well, then there's also relative mass and so on."
},
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"text": " And Carlo Rovelli would say that all the properties of the pen are in the relation, just like it's unclear what its velocity is, that's a relational property, that all the properties of the pen are relational. In fact, all of everything is relational. And then that leads in that leaves an interesting conundrum, because if what you're saying is mathematically, there's something called the graph, and then you have edges, and then you have what connects those two nodes. Sorry, you have"
},
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"end_time": 3068.046,
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"start_time": 3041.237,
"text": " vertices and you have what connects those two so he's saying well the edges are primary the relations are primary however you can invert that there's a dual notion and you can say that the edges are primary and that's what i was asking carlo why is it that you say that if because if you're saying the relations are primary you can actually flip that mathematically they're equivalent of saying that the vertices are primary he said yes you can do that and then what's interesting is then then what's interesting is"
},
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"end_time": 3099.36,
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"text": " If Carlo Rovelli is to be believed, then it would have to be, quote unquote, relations all the way down, that there is no bottom. It's just relations, relations, relations, relations, relations. And then it's strange. If he's a physicist, how do you bootstrap your way up? Because you start with axioms, you start with something. How do you? He doesn't have a well-defined theory with that, at least as far as I can tell. But he does. He is of the opinion that it is relationships all the way down, relations all the way down."
},
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"text": " A friend of mine actually mentioned in passing the other day that the most, the smallest unit is relationship, which was interesting because that was before I heard of this guy on your podcast. See, there's another view. So Carla would say that time is illusory because of this. There's a way that you can connect this and make an argument that time is illusory. However,"
},
{
"end_time": 3151.544,
"index": 121,
"start_time": 3126.391,
"text": " Carlo's greatest collaborator, Lee Smolin, who's a physicist, one of the greatest living physicists of quantum gravity. Lee Smolin says, no, no, no, time is actually what is most fundamental and the rest is illusory. And someone else that I've spoken to recently named Nicholas Gisson comes to a similar argument from another perspective that has to do with free will, which is so fascinating, Chloe, because all of these topics, you're wondering,"
},
{
"end_time": 3179.309,
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"start_time": 3151.903,
"text": " How are these tied? I'm wondering how are these tied? There seems to be a connection between consciousness and God. There seems to be a connection between that. There seems to be a connection between that and meaning, between that and free will, between that and physics. What is that connection? So it's as if what's happening with your podcast, perhaps with mine as well, is we're touching, you've heard the story of touching the elephant at different parts and not realizing that it's the same object. That's what I feel like, except that I'm not at the stage where I see it's the same object"
},
{
"end_time": 3199.787,
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"start_time": 3180.094,
"text": " at a verbal articulated level, maybe it's a pre verbal level, sorry, maybe it's at a pre verbal level. And I have intimations that that this that these are all reflecting on some underlying quote unquote reality. But as for exactly how that comes about, I don't know. And I've had feelings like"
},
{
"end_time": 3226.032,
"index": 124,
"start_time": 3200.026,
"text": " experiences where I'm about to touch true reality. And it was extremely terrifying, extremely, extremely, extremely terrifying. Some of the most terrifying experiences of my entire life. I can't, I can't even talk about it without perhaps sending myself into another bit of mental instability and crisis. It's because it's such a recent experience of mine that I'm only now recovering from Chloe."
},
{
"end_time": 3253.951,
"index": 125,
"start_time": 3227.329,
"text": " Part of why I had to push this back was because I had some, let's say an episode, I don't know what to call it. It wasn't a panic, like to call it a panic attack would be a lovely word for it. Like I wish it was a panic attack about this subject, partly because I treat this subject so solemnly and so zealously, so diligently and so devotedly that"
},
{
"end_time": 3284.718,
"index": 126,
"start_time": 3255.128,
"text": " When I'm interviewing someone, I try to take on their theories. I try to take it on experientially. Like if I'm interviewing Ken Wilber and he says, you need to do this meditation practice in order to understand my theory. You can't just understand it by reading it. Well, then I'm going to, I'm going to try my best to emulate the meditation practices in order to understand his theories. But then there's so many different kinds. And I mentioned an analogy of PC software with, sorry, PC with Mac software. Well, imagine then there's Linux as well. And imagine there's 10 different ones being installed in my PC or being installed in whatever."
},
{
"end_time": 3314.036,
"index": 127,
"start_time": 3285.009,
"text": " There's so many errors and I'm so, I'm so confused and well, I can't describe that experience. Yeah, it sounds to me like what you're experiencing is what Verveki would call combinatorially explosive, right? It's like there's too much to process."
},
{
"end_time": 3339.206,
"index": 128,
"start_time": 3314.36,
"text": " There's too much that you're trying to process all at once. And it sounds like to me that you believe that it's only by processing it all that you will achieve true reality. But maybe I have got that wrong. Is that where you are conceptually or is it somewhere else? Think Verizon, the best 5G network is expensive? Think again. Bring in your AT&T or T-Mobile bill to a"
},
{
"end_time": 3370.265,
"index": 129,
"start_time": 3343.336,
"text": " Ever seen an origami version of the Miami Bull? Jokes aside, Verizon has the most ways to save on phones and plans where you can get a single line with everything you need. So bring in your bill to your local Miami Verizon store today and we'll give you a better deal. It's that right now because I'm"
},
{
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"text": " at least somewhat in a sane, stable state. I feel as if I'm behind my eyeballs speaking to you as an individual and perhaps you similarly, perhaps people who are listening similarly, perhaps they feel like there's these objects around them. That's such a wonderful place to be in. I never realized how comforting that is and how precious that is. That is so effing precious, Chloe. The place where I was was I was in a place where"
},
{
"end_time": 3430.077,
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"start_time": 3403.148,
"text": " Oh, man, I can barely say it. You also don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. Okay, sure, sure, sure. But the point is that it's not about there are too many options. It's that there was ambiguity as to what is ontology, so ambiguous ontology. And that sounds like, well, see, up until about three weeks ago. What is is so much."
},
{
"end_time": 3453.985,
"index": 132,
"start_time": 3431.271,
"text": " What is is so much. Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah. And what could be is also so much. And then the relationship of what could be to what is, is it true that all possibilities exist? And I can intellectually understand that. And that's a comfortable place. That's where I love to be because it's so effing. It's so, it's so."
},
{
"end_time": 3485.811,
"index": 133,
"start_time": 3456.766,
"text": " Comforting is the only word that I can use right now compared to what I was, which was extreme discomfort. It's such a comfortable place to be in. But to actually comprehend that, to think of what that means, to treat it seriously, will at least leave me in a void of inoperativeness and feeling like I'm on the brink of"
},
{
"end_time": 3513.302,
"index": 134,
"start_time": 3487.722,
"text": " a place where I may not be able to recover from. So I don't know if what I should be doing right now. Oh yeah. And then I had this information, Colleen, this information that Kurt, what you've been doing with your life, not just with the theories of everything podcast is thinking way too much. You think thinking you're such an analytical person, such a trust your feelings, trust your feelings, Kurt, trust it. Ground yourself in your feelings."
},
{
"end_time": 3535.981,
"index": 135,
"start_time": 3513.473,
"text": " And it's not to say that thinking is wrong, but Kurt, you've been doing it way too much, way too much. And look at where it's leading you. You're spiraling out of control. And so I had to keep telling myself so hard, Chloe, it was so hard. It was metaphorically and almost literally like I was being pushed in this"
},
{
"end_time": 3564.292,
"index": 136,
"start_time": 3536.203,
"text": " I think that's right. I"
},
{
"end_time": 3589.36,
"index": 137,
"start_time": 3566.305,
"text": " It sounds like you might be going through this, what has been termed the dark night of the soul experience. Well, the fact that even has a name, I'm glad because it brings me some amount of"
},
{
"end_time": 3617.244,
"index": 138,
"start_time": 3591.732,
"text": " I also wonder if you've ever played a musical instrument?"
},
{
"end_time": 3642.363,
"index": 139,
"start_time": 3617.671,
"text": " I play or I used to play the guitar, I haven't played in years. And that's something I spoke to Ima Gilchrist about, because I'm so analytical, Chloe. I was gonna say, yeah, you should, if I were you, I would start listening to music and I would start playing music again. Yeah, yeah, I should do that. I'm much more a fan of playing than I am of listening. So I, same with films. So I'm a filmmaker and I'm not a"
},
{
"end_time": 3656.442,
"index": 140,
"start_time": 3643.985,
"text": " I watch films to pass the time with my wife. It's an enjoyable activity, but it's not as if I actually like creating more than I do consuming. Perhaps you're the same. If you're, I think maybe that's, but I'm not entirely sure. Maybe that's"
},
{
"end_time": 3688.387,
"index": 141,
"start_time": 3658.387,
"text": " The Roots of Jewish Consciousness"
},
{
"end_time": 3718.302,
"index": 142,
"start_time": 3688.968,
"text": " um promoted introversion right in order to achieve psychological wholeness but then so that you could go back out into the world and and reveal to the world what has been revealed to you and help the world essentially so i am an introvert by nature but and i and i have a love hate relationship with social media because of that um but i but i do uh love that idea of"
},
{
"end_time": 3733.78,
"index": 143,
"start_time": 3718.695,
"text": " needing to go inward and outward and be in balance. And there's also a musical analogy there when it comes to jazz, for example. A jazz musician, if a jazz musician is playing with other jazz musicians,"
},
{
"end_time": 3763.336,
"index": 144,
"start_time": 3734.701,
"text": " then there's some ambiguity there. There's some, there has to be a kind of unknown-ness with which one can riff, and that's part of the context that actually beautiful jazz can emerge from. If everything was known, if everything was pre-known, then jazz wouldn't be as exciting or surprising, right? And so for me, balancing the introversion with the extraversion is an attempt to"
},
{
"end_time": 3786.8,
"index": 145,
"start_time": 3764.309,
"text": " to go out into the unknown and to be challenged by the unknown, but also to be delighted by the unknown. And what I'm hearing in some of the things that you're challenged by right now, and this probably is off because of the insufficiency of words, but your relationship with the unknown seems to be one of terror."
},
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"index": 146,
"start_time": 3788.882,
"text": " You mentioned something interesting you said. Words are insufficient."
},
{
"end_time": 3838.541,
"index": 147,
"start_time": 3818.746,
"text": " There's someone called Wittgenstein who's of the analytic tradition to an analytical philosopher, analytic philosopher, who said that of what one cannot speak of precisely one must be silent. And then also which I resonate with and that's one of the reasons for me, explicating as"
},
{
"end_time": 3868.643,
"index": 148,
"start_time": 3839.36,
"text": " Specifically as I can when I choose my words as well as what the podcast exploring it with this with as much rigor as I can because I feel like much of philosophical problems are a result of Dubious meaning so let's say even the word consciousness perhaps that word should be fractionated to John Verbeckis adverbial versus adjectival consciousness that's not John Verbeckis, but he popularizes that and I believe Yoshivak uses phenomenological consciousness versus"
},
{
"end_time": 3892.056,
"index": 149,
"start_time": 3869.241,
"text": " some other type of consciousness versus some other type of consciousness. Perhaps these words we use in the paradoxes that we feel are because we're using a term that is polymorphous. And so we're taking one aspect of it and finding contradictions when actually they're separate aspects. So I like that from Wittgenstein, but then Wittgenstein also had his ladder, which said that the whole point of my, I believe his tractatus"
},
{
"end_time": 3920.589,
"index": 150,
"start_time": 3892.466,
"text": " or tractate. The whole point of it was to get you to this point where you realize now that there's no point even to speaking at all, that this is all foolish. And I tend to like that. At least right now, though, my views change on a monthly basis. The reason is that the reason I like that is that I, I do wonder how much of reality is like a fractal in the sense that at any scale it's"
},
{
"end_time": 3947.773,
"index": 151,
"start_time": 3921.186,
"text": " similar to any other scale and so the investigation of any phenomenon to its extreme leads you to the same answer of if you were to investigate it through some other means that's one of the reasons why i'm not so sold on this solely experiential approach over the analytical approach because people like cantor who is a mathematician believed by studying"
},
{
"end_time": 3977.21,
"index": 152,
"start_time": 3948.046,
"text": " infinite sets he was studying the mind of God and perhaps he was perhaps if you study logic to its extreme you come to the same conclusions as if you were to fully experience to the extreme let me think about that for a second I don't it strikes me that strikes me as impossible that is my intuitive gut level reaction um yeah it strikes me as impossible because consciousness is embodied"
},
{
"end_time": 4008.456,
"index": 153,
"start_time": 3979.053,
"text": " And so, this idea of a kind of hypercerebral, this idea of defining a hypercerebral approach to the study of logic as though it is itself divorced from experience. I mean, it is a kind of experience, right, to study logic to the infinite extreme."
},
{
"end_time": 4036.305,
"index": 154,
"start_time": 4009.292,
"text": " The question, so it's not a dichotomy between experience versus the study of logic. The study of logic is an experience. It's similar to how, at least colloquially, the difference between the West and the East is the East would say, sorry, the West would say, there is good and bad, you choose the good, and you use your will and choose the good. And then the East would say, that's all illusory. And the whole point is to realize that's illusory."
},
{
"end_time": 4064.343,
"index": 155,
"start_time": 4036.8,
"text": " I have a feeling that both of those approaches are the same in some manner, similar to look, if you're at a part of the globe, you can go north to get to the North Pole, or you can actually go south and you end up to the North Pole if you go sufficiently far enough. So I have a feeling that it's somewhat akin to that. Yes, but I would I would push harder though and say that if if one conceives of oneself as a bodyless mind,"
},
{
"end_time": 4093.319,
"index": 156,
"start_time": 4065.418,
"text": " then and one acts that way in the world then I mean this is a very McGill Christian argument but one will become cut off from oneself and and I don't know that if one is cut off from oneself that they can discover the mind of God now I'm not saying that this is what this person was doing you're referring to Cantor with the infinite sense"
},
{
"end_time": 4120.35,
"index": 157,
"start_time": 4093.353,
"text": " Yeah, but I'm very cautious because in the West we do have this long history of elevating the analytical framework over the experiential. There is, you understand the point I'm making? It's not really a dichotomy, but we do have this history of conceiving ourselves as bodiless. I mean, Descartes said"
},
{
"end_time": 4142.295,
"index": 158,
"start_time": 4120.862,
"text": " in one of his writings that I could, and I'm paraphrasing, but he said, I can exist without my body, right? And so there is this thread within Western civilization which creates a kind of disembodiment, which celebrates disembodiment and then becomes alienating."
},
{
"end_time": 4160.879,
"index": 159,
"start_time": 4143.677,
"text": " I can give you an example. So there's someone who I'm sure you're familiar with named Gibson is a psychologist who you've heard the term embodied cognition. So embodied cognition body cognition. Descartes was on the more cognitive end saying that I don't even need my body. I'm purely"
},
{
"end_time": 4189.701,
"index": 160,
"start_time": 4160.879,
"text": " a screen for sensory input. And then there's on the right now, the trend in cognitive science is embodied cognition, which is somewhere in the middle. And then on the extreme end of the body to part is Gibson, who would say that we're just bodies. And what we're doing is simply floating, we're attuned to our environment. And that's where these notions of optimal grip, which I'm sure you've heard for Vicky talk about, come from. And one way to think about that is"
},
{
"end_time": 4213.899,
"index": 161,
"start_time": 4191.237,
"text": " is much like there are some victorian devices that have no cognition they're just robots in a sense but they're executed they're put together in such a manner that if you roll them down a hill they look like they're walking they're like dolls but they look so beautiful as if they're walking it's because they're engineered so perfectly with their environment so they're pure bodies now gibson was more on the pure body end"
},
{
"end_time": 4243.575,
"index": 162,
"start_time": 4214.77,
"text": " And he came to that conclusion from some scientific observations so that you can think of that as analytical through some through so that is through analytical means he came to the conclusions that the body through analytical means he came to the conclusion that the body matters most and that all we are our bodies. Now that's a bit of an oversimplification, but that's an example of how, even though we're saying that, even though you're saying we should start with the body, I'm saying, no, you can also start with the mind and perhaps come to the same conclusion. And also perhaps,"
},
{
"end_time": 4272.619,
"index": 163,
"start_time": 4244.923,
"text": " Yes, but I would disagree with Gibson's conclusion, right? I wouldn't say that you should start with the body over the mind, but rather to realize that there's a relationship between the body and the mind. And so to go into a purely analytical exercise,"
},
{
"end_time": 4299.019,
"index": 164,
"start_time": 4273.234,
"text": " without taking into account one's own feelings, psychology, emotions, you know, all the things that make us who we are as human beings is kind of a, well, it's folly in a sense. Yeah. See, if you've ever followed Peterson, I'm sure you know he's a fan of saying the logos is"
},
{
"end_time": 4320.384,
"index": 165,
"start_time": 4299.821,
"text": " Akin to Christ, if not the same as Christ, and that the root of the word logic is logos. And so studying logic, one way to think about what the logos is, is where it developed from, there's this, and so I'm articulating this here for the first time, so forgive me if I stumble upon my words, there is this in ancient Greek, in ancient Greece, there's this"
},
{
"end_time": 4350.06,
"index": 166,
"start_time": 4321.852,
"text": " diviner called Gois. I believe the Gois are Gois. And what they would do, this is maybe minus 1000, so 1000 BC, they would speak in tongues and somehow make prophecies from that. And so what they would do would be, would be, they would go into some other world, speak in tongues and somehow extract information from that. And that is almost the root of what Logos is."
},
{
"end_time": 4375.35,
"index": 167,
"start_time": 4350.316,
"text": " because it was the first time that you attach. Firstly, it means that you can communicate with this other truer world. Secondly, that you can extract information from it. Thirdly, that there's an order to it. And fourth, that it has something to do with speech and something to do with, well, something to do with speech. And then from that, you get the ideas of, of. Hmm."
},
{
"end_time": 4404.855,
"index": 168,
"start_time": 4376.203,
"text": " When you would ask an ancient Greek person, let's say minus 600, so 600 BC, I say minus because it's just easier for me. So 600 BC, what languages do you speak? It wasn't as if they would say, I speak German and I speak French and so on, presuming those languages exist back then. They would say, oh, I speak the rocks if they were a stratographer, for example, or study stratigraphy, or I speak the language of life if they were a biologist, biologist,"
},
{
"end_time": 4431.425,
"index": 169,
"start_time": 4405.384,
"text": " the logic of life. And what they mean is that because they can understand the principles by which this operates and I can use that to communicate, not communicate, I can use that to interact with it properly. That's as if I'm speaking the language. Then you can abstract that further and wonder what is the logic of the universe. For example, I'm sure you've heard of the law of the excluded middle, which says that it's either some proposition is either true or false."
},
{
"end_time": 4451.084,
"index": 170,
"start_time": 4431.732,
"text": " Okay, it turns out that that may not be the case. There are other forms of logic. But either way, the point is that there's logic. And what is logic? What is the true logic? It's almost like what is the what is happening with the universe? How do I communicate? How do I act properly with the universe? And Verveki may say this, how do I know how do I conform to the universe?"
},
{
"end_time": 4475.316,
"index": 171,
"start_time": 4452.756,
"text": " Well, all of this is my roundabout way of saying that it's not clear to me and I'm not saying that I've decided upon an analytical approach over an experiential one at all. I'm saying that I'm saying that it's not clear to me that predominantly we should have the experiential over the analytical or vice versa. It's not clear to me that one is"
},
{
"end_time": 4507.022,
"index": 172,
"start_time": 4478.899,
"text": " Right, one's more of an imperative than the other. It's not clear to me, though, it may be that for where we are in society as a whole, in the West, we've been overvaluing the scientific and the propositional, and that we need to start to value other forms of knowledge, like the perspectival and participatory and procedural. Right, right, right. So maybe that. And"
},
{
"end_time": 4537.073,
"index": 173,
"start_time": 4507.398,
"text": " But it may not be that that's just the case for everyone at every instant across humanity or across the world. So that's what I mean is that it could be the case as a whole for our culture, but it may not be the case as a whole for other cultures or other beings, or it may not be a cosmic truth that we need to value the experiential over the propositional that is. Sure. Well, this reminds me of a book by Robert Bly called A Little Book on the Human Shadow."
},
{
"end_time": 4556.698,
"index": 174,
"start_time": 4540.384,
"text": " Some cultures may have overvalued the analytical, and so they need to focus on the experiential, whereas other cultures may have overvalued the experiential, and they need to focus on the analytical. But all of this is in service of an attempt to bring balance."
},
{
"end_time": 4587.159,
"index": 175,
"start_time": 4558.029,
"text": " to the world. And so that balance is not a, Verveki has said this, balance is not like a propositional thing that falls from the sky. Balance requires practice. It requires attunement, much like you would need in playing an instrument. And depending upon where you're situated and the culture that you belong to, what you will need in order to bring balance to your life will differ from person to person and from culture to culture."
},
{
"end_time": 4614.172,
"index": 176,
"start_time": 4588.097,
"text": " But that still speaks in my mind to an elegance of the cosmos. And I think that that's ultimately a beautiful thing. Well, Chloe, I've got to get going. Okay. It went by so quick. Yeah, I did. Thank you so much for joining me today. It was a very fascinating conversation. Yeah, thank you. And I would like to know a bit more about your theory of enchantment. See,"
},
{
"end_time": 4637.363,
"index": 177,
"start_time": 4616.459,
"text": " Hmm, yeah, I'd like to know more about that at some point. Sure, we can definitely talk about it. I'm happy to also invite you back on another time if you'd like that. Thank you, Chloe. You're welcome. I would like that, yes. Awesome. All right, well, Kurt, I'll let you go, but thank you for joining me today. Thank you so much, Chloe. Take care."
},
{
"end_time": 4660.026,
"index": 178,
"start_time": 4640.862,
"text": " The podcast is now finished. If you'd like to support conversations like this, then do consider going to patreon.com slash c-u-r-t-j-a-i-m-u-n-g-a-l. That is Kurt Jaimungal. Its support from the patrons and from the sponsors that allow me to do this full time. Every dollar helps tremendously. Thank you."
}
]
}No transcript available.