(September 24, 2016 at 7:21 pm)InquiringMind Wrote: This part I understood, both literally and figuratively.

Far from me to tell you what to do, but you're talking to a 911-truther, anti-vaccination guy that thinks the root cause of depression is a bad diet.

Tread lightly.

(September 24, 2016 at 5:58 pm)Arkilogue Wrote: Perhaps a better approach would not be subjective personal meaning but high levels of harmonious function with environment.

I've walked around properties and trimmed dead/suckers off trees that were not part of the job...because I enjoy taking care of trees. The meaning for me was just based line maintenance, what should be done regardless. But it was much more meaningful to the client.

A bicycle is not very meaningful as a functional bicycle if it has a broken chain and 2 flat tires....unless it a decorative lawn ornament in your yard of your child's first bike they'e long outgrown.

I think the two, personal meaning and harmonious living, can be and ideally are compatible.

(September 24, 2016 at 8:44 pm)Faith No More Wrote:

(September 24, 2016 at 7:21 pm)InquiringMind Wrote: This part I understood, both literally and figuratively.

Far from me to tell you what to do, but you're talking to a 911-truther, anti-vaccination guy that thinks the root cause of depression is a bad diet.

Tread lightly.

Anti-vax before the age of 2 due to the genetically induced anti-inflammatory learning phase of all infant mammals.

And I clarified my statement that the biome of the gut, which populates the "second brain" emotional seat of the body affects the harmony or disharmony of the "background noise" of the mind which is experienced as a whole body phenomenon. Diet affects the type of bacteria you gut provides sustenance for. There are good bacteria and bad bacteria and the both produce neurotransmitters.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/articl...ond-brain/

(September 24, 2016 at 8:46 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:

(September 24, 2016 at 5:58 pm)Arkilogue Wrote: Perhaps a better approach would not be subjective personal meaning but high levels of harmonious function with environment.

I've walked around properties and trimmed dead/suckers off trees that were not part of the job...because I enjoy taking care of trees. The meaning for me was just based line maintenance, what should be done regardless. But it was much more meaningful to the client.

A bicycle is not very meaningful as a functional bicycle if it has a broken chain and 2 flat tires....unless it a decorative lawn ornament in your yard of your child's first bike they'e long outgrown.

I think the two, personal meaning and harmonious living, can be and ideally are compatible.

Certainly. If you are true to yourself (inner), it follows that you are true to others and environment (outer)

(September 24, 2016 at 9:21 pm)Arkilogue Wrote:

(September 24, 2016 at 8:46 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: I think the two, personal meaning and harmonious living, can be and ideally are compatible.

Certainly. If you are true to yourself (inner), it follows that you are true to others and environment (outer)

Assuming, of course, mental and emotional balance.

(September 24, 2016 at 8:44 pm)Faith No More Wrote:

(September 24, 2016 at 7:21 pm)InquiringMind Wrote: This part I understood, both literally and figuratively.

Far from me to tell you what to do, but you're talking to a 911-truther, anti-vaccination guy that thinks the root cause of depression is a bad diet.

Tread lightly.

I believe that ideas stand on their own merits.  Newton had plenty of whacky ideas, and he might have written more about religion than about physics.  I am a surfer and a physicist, so I feel like I understood the literal meaning of the phrase.  I do understand a certain inertia of meaning, where my assumptions about meaning go unchallenged.  And new experiences do feel very much like riding a wave 

(September 24, 2016 at 10:52 pm)Jörmungandr Wrote:

I saw people surfing some 8-9 foot waves today.  The surf was huge.  I don't quite have the skills for waves that big.  I ride 2-5 foot waves.

(September 24, 2016 at 9:49 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:

(September 24, 2016 at 9:21 pm)Arkilogue Wrote: Certainly. If you are true to yourself (inner), it follows that you are true to others and environment (outer)

Assuming, of course, mental and emotional balance.

I'd expand that to "counter-balance"

They are both fields in motion. Mentation is projective outwards while emotions are receptive inwards. Where the interaction is harmonious they pass through each other and there is no cognitive dissonance.

(September 24, 2016 at 1:46 pm)InquiringMind Wrote: This is a spin-off of my other threads about meaning, but I think it deserves its own thread.  Here's a thought experiment: why is "meaning" valuable in the first place?  Why should I care about meaning?

Let's say (to create a hypothetical scenario) that I have a superlatively meaningful life.  Let's say I have a life that is just oozing with meaning.  Let's say that this is my day: I get up in the morning and eat a meaningful breakfast.  I walk out to my car, and my car has deep meaning for me.  I drive my meaningful car on a route to work that is profoundly meaningful.  I get to work, and it's difficult to describe how profoundly meaningful, satisfying, and and fulfilling my job is.  I spend eight meaningful hours at my meaningful job, where I get to do meaningful tasks that bring meaning to myself and the people who are meaningful to me.  My job is so meaningful that I become overwhelmed and cry several times at the profoundness of the meaning that my job gives me.  I then get back in my meaningful car and take my meaningful drive home.  I arrive home and kiss my wife.  Unlike the kisses of people who are just looking for pleasure, this kiss actually means something.  I eat a meaningful dinner, and me and the wife and the kids have a meaningful conversation about meaningful things that really mean something in the world.  Then I help the kids with their homework, and helping them is meaningful for me, because my relationship with them is so meaningful and because the stuff they're studying in school is so profound and meaningful.  Then the kids go to bed, and me and my wife make love in way that is not just pleasurable, but meaningful.  Then I slip off into a peaceful and meaningful sleep that is filled with meaningful dreams.  

So let's say that's my day.  Let's say I'm living a life that is infused with meaning.  A life that is oozing with meaning.  A life that is overwhelmingly meaningful.  But now I have a new problem - what do I do next?  Now that I have achieved a meaningful life, what do I do with this super ultra uber meaningful life?  If I've got so much meaning in my life that I have to rent extra storage space to store all of the extra meaning, what do I do next with my life?

Sounds like you'd just regard meaning as one more possession.  Kinda weird.