How to handle the unknown

[Marblehead]

 

Now as Mr Marbles has accurately said, there does seem to be some basic universal laws of nature that apply to every one. And so my view is that the path of Dao is about dissolving the "fixated conceptual descriptions," which really are just the artificial decorations on our "island of the known" (mind you I do like that fountain over by the waterfall ), and bring ourselves back to the unadorned state of ziran, self-so-ness.

 

Not to abolish the island completely mind you, but just minimize it's harsh features and harmonize how all the features interact with each other so that our personality (which really is just the expression or "face" of our "known") is peaceful and calm.

 

But there is another, less altruistic, and perhaps more practical reason for this process of "feng shui of the island of the known."

 

I personally view the message of Laozi as saying that, because wu ming and you ming are polarity aspects of the subtle reality of Dao, the wayfarer must encapsulate both in their perception and awareness. But this is simply not possible in any way shape or form if you are excessively constrained within "you ming/to have name/the known".

 

To me the balance is to have a minimal, fluid and well integrated "known," whilst allowing a liberated and pervasive "wu ming/no name/the unknown".

 

 

Hehehe.

 

Now remember, I am not recommending living only in "yo". I do understand the importance of "wu" for achieving a very fulfilled life. But I do not believe that we should minimalize "yo". Afterall, this is the realm of the 'known'. It is good to always have a home base to return to when we go out on maneuvers.

 

Ah, the island. Okay, I look out into the void of the ocean but instead of seeing nothing but ocean I see an island. My tropical paradise! So I swim out to my future paradise. I arrive and find it is really much smaller than I thought it was and worst of all, there is nothing to eat on my island of paradise. My imagination took me into the unknown and it ended up being other than I imagined.

 

What am I to do? There is only one option. To swim back to the 'known'. But, a fog has rolled in and I have no idea in which direction the 'known' is. I am lost.

 

I think it is a bad choice to venture into the unknown, to become lost, and never be able to return to the known.

 

This is why I think it is a good idea to keep one foot firmly fixed to 'yo' and use the other foot to go tiptoeing around in the unknown. This way we will never become lost.

[Marblehead]

The "ideal", if there is such a thing, is for the known and the unknown to have the same interplay as the Yin/Yang symbol.

 

I would not however attach your conceptual associations of "lost, unclear, floundering, suffering, drowning" to the unknown. I could quite easily use other conceptual terms of "liberating, exhilarating, pervasive, flying free, wondrous."

 

Well, of course you prefer those terms. Hehehe. Afterall, you are a religious person.

 

As to the word "interplay", I do agree although I use the word "harmony". That is, our 'wu' experiences are in harmony with our 'yo' realities.

 

The lion ain't never, ever going to lay down with the lamb. Lambchops are for supper. That's reality.

[Marblehead]

Creativity is in its essence a destructive act

 

h

 

That's a fact but very difficult for most to understand.

[Marblehead]

LOL to you and me its just a chair ... but to an aboriginal in central Australia it's firewood

 

Although this is a valid understanding I wonder if the aboriginal would find more usefulness in the chair if he understood that if he did not burn the chair but sat in it he would not have to wipe off his butt every time he got up from sitting on the ground.

 

This is called understanding the usefulness of things.

[doc benway]

Great thread Stig - one of the single most important concerns for those of us interested in exploring ourselves.

Can truly venture into the unknown, that is - beyond it's contents?

Whatever the mind perceives and works with is, de facto, contained within it's contents and therefore, known.

 

How does the mind conceptualize that which it does not know/contain/perceive?

As it connects with new things, these things are integrated into it's existing framework, conditioning, and biases.

Sure, we can think creatively, adopt new ideas and concepts, create beautiful art and science, but I think it is an inaccurate statement to call this a part of the unknown.

 

Certainly, there are moments where we experience the AHA! phenomenon and seem to gain new insight or knowledge where before there was hope and belief. Nevertheless this is all a part of the contents of mind and, therefore, You Ming.

I would suggest that it is a much more subtle thing to connect with Wu Ming than your original post suggests, Stig.

I do not feel at all comfortable addressing how that occurs in words or ideas but I do feel that it is an absolutely critical exercise for each of us to try and wrestle with, if we are at all serious about our approach to reality.

 

One way I like to phrase the question (inspired by J Krishnamurti) is something like -

What is the quality of mind that can go beyond all of its contents and conditioning?

To try and answer this question is futile because the answer must lie within the realm of the known.

To ask the question and sit with it is worthwhile.

This is one of the questions to life's answers....

[Marblehead]

 

And I am not trying to allude to any "we create the world but when our back is turned the world is no longer there" presumption.

 

Again "the known" as I am referring to it, is about you ming, to have name. It is about the descriptives and internal dialogue we use to uphold our view of the world.

 

You and I might look at the same chair and interpret it differently based on our internal construct of conceptualizations. You may look at it and get a nostalgic feeling because it reminds you of the chair your Aunty Esmaralda once had when you were a boy. I might look at it and think, "Wow if I sanded that back and put of bit of stain on it then it would probably sell quite well at an antique auction."

 

Same chair but because of different conceptual filtering two versions of the same base reality is formed. But the chair is still just a chair.

 

If we are to truly become ziran/tzu jan/self-so and see reality for its plain truth these constructs of what we uphold as "known" must dissolve and dissipate.

 

 

Good.

 

I just had to make sure others didn't think you had drifted off into never-never land.

 

Yes, I use the tree for this example. We two may see the tree differently because of its attributes but it is still the same tree.

 

Your last sentence is valid and I agree in principle. However, the rest of the world does not operate according to our truths. It operates according to its truths. Therefore if we try to tell someone that the chair does not exist they will think we are some kind of a nut case.

 

One gave birth to two, two gave birth to three and three gave birth to the ten thousand things. The ten thousand things are nameable; one, two and three are not. The ten thousand things are 'knowable', one, two and three, well, that's a different story. Hehehe.

 

But I agree that when we name a thing we should not limmit it to only one functionality. If we are freezing we can use that wooden chair as firewood if we have not limited its usage to only sitting in. But under most conditions we would use the chair only for sitting in (on). We can normally find less expensive firewood.

[Marblehead]

Can truly venture into the unknown, that is - beyond it's contents?

 

Great addition to the discussion Steve. Thanks for joining in.

[Stigweard]

You do know, of course, that I disagree with you here. Who appointed man God?

 

The Earth existed before man came along. It did not need man to conceptualize it in order for it to be.

 

We are not the center of the universe nor does the universe need us for there to be a function of this universe. (No, I have no idea what its ultimate function is.)

LOL no, no, no Mr Marbles ... I am not talking about man creating anything here.

 

I believe this comes back to our different interpretations of you 有 and wu 無. You are seeing it as the manifest reality and the unmanifest reality ... either being a "thing" in the physical, natural sense, or being a "no thing". And I truly respect and understand your view on this ... I am even inclined to agree with you

 

I am quite clearly looking at Laozi's ch1 as You ming 有名 and Wu ming 無名 ... that which is conceptually described versus that which lays outside of conceptual description. To me this is a much more practical way of looking at it, practical in terms of something that I can use for my cultivation.

 

The earth, matter, stars, rocks etc etc are there independent on man's existence ... no arguments there.

 

What I am alluding to here is that the over-development of our rational, conceptual faculties, coupled with the intense social conditioning we are exposed to, sunders our natural holistic view of the world (a view that sees things in their full spectrumed wholeness), effectively blinkering and filtering our perception so that we only see a very narrow and distorted bandwith of reality. This sliver of "what is" we mistakenly call reality and it is this that I am referring to as "the known".

 

Not "all that can be known" mind you. Just "the known" as we chose to view it.

 

So in essence we are all walking around with our head in a bubble of perceptual filters and conceptualizations. We may see a chair, but the raw sensory data passes through our fixated conceptual filters so that, in the end, the chair we end up "seeing" is not really the chair that's there (I am a professional magician after all and I exploit this human trait quite well ).

 

So in actual fact we could go as far as to say that there is:

 

~ The Known - in terms of the conceptual descriptions that form our view of the world which is only a sliver of the holistic view possible to the human experience

~ The Unknown - the rest of the bandwith of perception possible to the human experience but which currently remains outside of the narrow bandwidth currently perceived.

~ The Unknowable - the possibilities of perception that lay outside the human experience which, if they were perceived, would necessitate the perceiver to not be human anymore.

 

So from a practical point of view, if we are truly to see our chair truly as the chair is, in other words to see the full spectrum or plain wholeness of the chair, then we must soften our calcified descriptions of the chair and simply and quietly view the chair as it is. In essence we are broadening our view to encapsulate more of the "unknown" into our perception.

 

[Stigweard]

Great thread Stig - one of the single most important concerns for those of us interested in exploring ourselves.

Can truly venture into the unknown, that is - beyond it's contents?

Whatever the mind perceives and works with is, de facto, contained within it's contents and therefore, known.

 

How does the mind conceptualize that which it does not know/contain/perceive?

As it connects with new things, these things are integrated into it's existing framework, conditioning, and biases.

Sure, we can think creatively, adopt new ideas and concepts, create beautiful art and science, but I think it is an inaccurate statement to call this a part of the unknown.

 

Certainly, there are moments where we experience the AHA! phenomenon and seem to gain new insight or knowledge where before there was hope and belief. Nevertheless this is all a part of the contents of mind and, therefore, You Ming.

I would suggest that it is a much more subtle thing to connect with Wu Ming than your original post suggests, Stig.

I do not feel at all comfortable addressing how that occurs in words or ideas but I do feel that it is an absolutely critical exercise for each of us to try and wrestle with, if we are at all serious about our approach to reality.

 

One way I like to phrase the question (inspired by J Krishnamurti) is something like -

What is the quality of mind that can go beyond all of its contents and conditioning?

To try and answer this question is futile because the answer must lie within the realm of the known.

To ask the question and sit with it is worthwhile.

This is one of the questions to life's answers....

Agreed, agreed, agreed !!!

 

As always I value your input Steve.

 

[Marblehead]

What I am alluding to here is that the over-development of our rational, conceptual faculties, coupled with the intense social conditioning we are exposed to, sunders our natural holistic view of the world (a view that sees things in their full spectrumed wholeness), effectively blinkering and filtering our perception so that we only see a very narrow and distorted bandwith of reality. This sliver of "what is" we mistakenly call reality and it is this that I am referring to as "the known".

 

Alright!!! Now you are point toward the idea you had in starting this thread in the first place.

 

So in actual fact we could go as far as to say that there is:

 

~ The Known - in terms of the conceptual descriptions that form our view of the world which is only a sliver of the holistic view possible to the human experience

~ The Unknown - the rest of the bandwith of perception possible to the human experience but which currently remains outside of the narrow bandwidth currently perceived.

~ The Unknowable - the possibilities of perception that lay outside the human experience which, if they were perceived, would necessitate the perceiver to not be human anymore.

 

 

Very nice and I totally agree. There is the known (or at least the knowable), Manifest; there is the unknown (but not unexperienceable), Mystery; and there is the unknowable, Tao (the Great). (But perhaps this too is experienceable? Some suggest that it is.)

 

Yes, so far I have been talking about 'yo' and 'wu' from a universal physicality point of view. We really have not begun to discuss the application of these two concepts (yo and wu) to the condition of man's mind yet. I am still trying to make sure we all have at least one foot firmly planted in 'yo', the physical universe before we go flying off into the unknown.

[Apech]

Stig,

 

Just going back to the OP again. Your ocean is more like an unknowable because it will never be 'known', while unknown implies a possible known which we haven't discovered yet. As sentient beings we spend quite a lot of time on the shore of our island, living in between the known and the unknown, in the twilight if you like between our yesterday (all that we have known) and our tomorrow (that which we have yet to encounter).

 

A shamanic journey might be a swim in that ocean where we allow the force of unknowable (the mystery) to impact on us giving us dreams of the unknown.

 

Also I think it is important to remember that although the island is a finite space - the intricacies of form mean that it has its own kind of infinity - the infinity of complexity.

 

If you think that your chair (for example) is a dependable given certainty... then you have forgotten that the chair is part of the mystery also ... there are no gaps in nature ... (who said that?).

 

Hope this makes sense.

 

A.

[Otis]

just to clarify, i would say preferences arise and that this is natural and human and need not be resisted. but i would not say it is "correct" to "make" preferences.

Excellent!

[Otis]

I think the question here is, "From where do preferences arise?"

Ah, that's part of the ocean of the unknown, isn't it?

 

My answer would be: from multiple sources. 1. Habit, which I have some control over, and is the part of "preferences" that is up to me to surrender. And 2. other parts of my brain than "me" (i.e. my ego), and those I can deny or judge, but I cannot control them. They do not belong to "me", and so therefore, to be against them is to do battle with other parts of my brain, the very parts of the brain whose job it is to do preference.

 

For example: my desire to eat is caused by hunger, but also by habits of comfort-seeking. I seek to evaporate the habits, but I only seek to have a sense of humor about the hunger.

 

Another example: a closeted gay man may try his damnedest to change his preference, but that's (mostly) not built from habit, and so his efforts will cause internal disorder, but no growth.

 

So, if I want to grow, then I surrender the preferences that I have control over, and I allow (but not necessarily capitulate to) the preferences that I do not.

Edited April 8, 2011 by Otis

[Otis]

I am a professional magician after all and I exploit this human trait quite well

Ah, what a great vantage point to observe how people believe!

[Otis]

Certainly, there are moments where we experience the AHA! phenomenon and seem to gain new insight or knowledge where before there was hope and belief. Nevertheless this is all a part of the contents of mind and, therefore, You Ming.

I would suggest that it is a much more subtle thing to connect with Wu Ming than your original post suggests, Stig.

I do not feel at all comfortable addressing how that occurs in words or ideas but I do feel that it is an absolutely critical exercise for each of us to try and wrestle with, if we are at all serious about our approach to reality.

Great! The deeper I look into my own epistemology, the less coherent facts I see, and the more mystery.

 

One way I like to phrase the question (inspired by J Krishnamurti) is something like -

What is the quality of mind that can go beyond all of its contents and conditioning?

To try and answer this question is futile because the answer must lie within the realm of the known.

To ask the question and sit with it is worthwhile.

This is one of the questions to life's answers....

Yes! Sometimes it is best to ask questions, without every trying to settle on a fixed answer...

[Otis]

If you think that your chair (for example) is a dependable given certainty... then you have forgotten that the chair is part of the mystery also ... there are no gaps in nature ...

Excellent!

[Stigweard]

How does the mind conceptualize that which it does not know/contain/perceive?

As it connects with new things, these things are integrated into it's existing framework, conditioning, and biases.

Sure, we can think creatively, adopt new ideas and concepts, create beautiful art and science, but I think it is an inaccurate statement to call this a part of the unknown.

 

Certainly, there are moments where we experience the AHA! phenomenon and seem to gain new insight or knowledge where before there was hope and belief. Nevertheless this is all a part of the contents of mind and, therefore, You Ming.

 

I would suggest that it is a much more subtle thing to connect with Wu Ming than your original post suggests, Stig.

I do not feel at all comfortable addressing how that occurs in words or ideas but I do feel that it is an absolutely critical exercise for each of us to try and wrestle with, if we are at all serious about our approach to reality.

Yup ... and here we see the fuzzy line of reality because already we have several slightly different perceptions of the original model ... all of which are valid and all yielding important insight to give us a more holistic vision.

 

"How does the mind conceptualize that which it does not know/contain/perceive?"

 

This is a vital question and links to my topic's title of "How to handle the unknown."

 

I would like to speak to this and other comments, but I must be off for my morning Tai Chi class.

[Marblehead]

"How does the mind conceptualize that which it does not know/contain/perceive?"

 

This is a vital question and links to my topic's title of "How to handle the unknown."

 

I would like to speak to this and other comments, but I must be off for my morning Tai Chi class.

 

Well, I wish you a very productive class.

 

Yes, that question is pointing to the purpose of this thread.

 

There is a learning theory, I forget who's, that suggests that when we are confronted with new information that contradicts what 'knowledge' we already hold to confusion is created in the mind. I suppose that this would also apply to conditions that we do not understand.

 

The arguement is that when this confusion is created in our mind we have two choices; try to understand the new information, or, fall back on what we already know.

 

I will use the snake for an example.

 

Many cultures teach the fear of snakes. This isn't all that bad in that there are many snakes that has enough poison to kill a full grown man within a few minutes. However, snakes serve a very important role in nature. The eat animals that humans consider pests and they plus some birds are the only animals that can eat toads. If it were not for snakes there would be many mose human pests on the planet and most of these pests spread disease amongst the human populations.

 

Now, yes, we should be weary of snakes. But if we understand snakes, the role they play in nature, and know which ones are a danger to humans we no longer need hold to our fear of them. We just totally avoid those that can do us harm.

 

Now an unknown has become a part of our 'knowns'. It is no longer a mystery.

 

So, in the beginning, (sorry about that) there were natural events that man could not explain. This caused confusion in man's mind. Man sought out the answers but no supportable answers were to be found. So man created his own answers. This reduced the confusion of the mind and all was peachy again.

 

Now, just because the answers man creaded had no basis in factual data didn't really matter. What mattered was that there was no more confusion. He now knew the answers and he taught these answers to the young.

[Otis]

Now an unknown has become a part of our 'knowns'. It is no longer a mystery.

Okay. That's fine, but how about (as a rhetorical example): what is a relationship between a man and a woman supposed to look like?

 

The answer to that, I think, is as varied as there are human beings (squared, because it takes two). Society makes concepts about it, but they are not "right" concepts. The relationship will always have to be "right" for those two, at the very moment, and always changing as they change. Even the word "relationship" is misleading, because it implies a noun (a "known"), when there is really just two verbs: I relate to her; she relates to me.

 

Any relationship is about existing in the unknown, and although we can get better at understanding each other and connecting together, I think it is a mistake to ever start thinking about it as "known", because that's when I forget the actuality of the woman, and replace her with a concept.

Edited April 9, 2011 by Otis

[Stigweard]

Ah, what a great vantage point to observe how people believe!

Yes it is quite sobering to see how easily it is to manipulate the way someone perceives reality.

 

The truth is that if people's fixations to the "known" weren't as rigid as they are then I would be out of a job

 

For example one of my signature pieces is a classic cut-n-restored rope routine. People have a very ingrained belief about what a piece of rope can and can't do, so when a piece of rope, which they can handle and examine at all times, is visibly severed in two and then restored into one piece right before their eyes then their brain goes, "WTF?!!"

 

And in my years of experience people will always react in the ways I mentioned previously:

 

Some will believe they know the truth of what happened immediately.

 

Some will deny it ever happened.

 

Some will get obsessed with questions.

 

Personally I love it when they react in the last way because it usually is, "No f**king way!!! How the f**k did you do that?!!!"

 

Edited April 9, 2011 by Stigweard

[Stigweard]

Very nice and I totally agree. There is the known (or at least the knowable), Manifest; there is the unknown (but not unexperienceable), Mystery; and there is the unknowable, Tao (the Great). (But perhaps this too is experienceable? Some suggest that it is.)

 

Yes, so far I have been talking about 'yo' and 'wu' from a universal physicality point of view. We really have not begun to discuss the application of these two concepts (yo and wu) to the condition of man's mind yet. I am still trying to make sure we all have at least one foot firmly planted in 'yo', the physical universe before we go flying off into the unknown.

Heheheh ... groovy.

 

It's good that we are on the same page here ... quite a feat really for a religious and a philosophical Taoist

 

The reason why I prefer to use you ming/wu ming is because it brings me back to home within my own perception. There is the known of the sum total of my current world view - the pinprick in the fabric or reality that I call my world. Then there is the unknown - the mysteriousness of the beyond that extends firstly out into things that I might possibly know someday, and then out to the things that I don't have a "beeswax on the surface of the sun's" chance of ever possibly knowing.

 

[aridus]

Unknown relates to what I like to call 'null'.

 

Example: what is my bank account number? Hopefully you have no clue what it is. That would be one thing you don't know, on the surface. Below the surface though, lies another question: do I even have a bank account at all? It is quite possible that I do not. So that's two potential things that you may not know, and one is connected to the other.

 

You might make a guess as to what my number is, but it is a meaningless guess if I do not in fact have an account to begin with.

[Stigweard]

Stig,

 

Just going back to the OP again. Your ocean is more like an unknowable because it will never be 'known', while unknown implies a possible known which we haven't discovered yet. As sentient beings we spend quite a lot of time on the shore of our island, living in between the known and the unknown, in the twilight if you like between our yesterday (all that we have known) and our tomorrow (that which we have yet to encounter).

 

A shamanic journey might be a swim in that ocean where we allow the force of unknowable (the mystery) to impact on us giving us dreams of the unknown.

 

Also I think it is important to remember that although the island is a finite space - the intricacies of form mean that it has its own kind of infinity - the infinity of complexity.

 

If you think that your chair (for example) is a dependable given certainty... then you have forgotten that the chair is part of the mystery also ... there are no gaps in nature ... (who said that?).

 

Hope this makes sense.

 

A.

Yup I hear and like your take on the model.

 

So we can see the possibility of making forays into the "unknown" in the "ordinary" sense of what Steve was talking about in terms of "thinking creatively, adopt new ideas and concepts, create beautiful art and science."

 

Then we can experience the "unknown" in the "non-ordinary" sense of engaging latent or unused perceptions available to the human experience. Perceptions that would deliver partial or complete shifts in the way one views the world.

 

Finally we have experiences of the "unknown" in the "super-natural" sense of having perceptions aligned that are completely outside the potential perception available to the human experience.

 

How we doing?

 

 

Oh, and I didn't want to get too much into shamanic journeys into the unknowable yet because I didn't want to mess with Mr Marble's blood pressure too much ... heheheh

Edited April 9, 2011 by Stigweard

[Stigweard]

One way I like to phrase the question (inspired by J Krishnamurti) is something like -

What is the quality of mind that can go beyond all of its contents and conditioning?

To try and answer this question is futile because the answer must lie within the realm of the known.

To ask the question and sit with it is worthwhile.

This is one of the questions to life's answers....

This is such an important line of exploration

[Marblehead]

Okay. That's fine, but how about (as a rhetorical example): what is a relationship between a man and a woman supposed to look like?

 

The answer to that, I think, is as varied as there are human beings (squared, because it takes two). Society makes concepts about it, but they are not "right" concepts. The relationship will always have to be "right" for those two, at the very moment, and always changing as they change. Even the word "relationship" is misleading, because it implies a noun (a "known"), when there is really just two verbs: I relate to her; she relates to me.

 

Any relationship is about existing in the unknown, and although we can get better at understanding each other and connecting together, I think it is a mistake to ever start thinking about it as "known", because that's when I forget the actuality of the woman, and replace her with a concept.

 

Oh My Goodness!!! You threw a monkey wrench into the machinery!!!

 

Your example is a perfect example of our need to be flexible because things around us are constantly changing. Some of these things in our life take a very long time to change and we can feel secure in establishing a fixed opinon of its reality but other things change quite reapidly so we have to stay aware of these changes and adapt as best we can.

 

This is why I speak to the concept of harmony rather than balance. Hard to keep our balance if things are constantly changing but it is a little easier to make a small change and reestablish the harmony.

 

I think it is possible to claim a known when a thing changes very slowly but for me, personally, I would never say I know a woman. Hehehe.