Bill Clinton apparently knew about and read the books of Ken Wilber

[aurum]

11 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Well, birds of a feather flock together, roughly speaking: would Sam and Emma be able to understand Wilber?

No, of course not.

They are secular materialists deeply bought into their progressive, liberal political ideology. 

Any introduction of Wilber will either be dismissed or twisted to be assimilated into their Green worldview. Neither of those involve actually understanding Wilber. Just like Bill.

It's not impossible they could get there eventually, but it would take a lot.

11 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

That's exactly my point. You don't need to be very developed to spout some of Ken Wilber's ideas. That's the power of downward assimilation, of adopting cultural symbols above your level of development. Those that are really developed and that are truly able to grasp the ideas down to their bones, are able to produce similar ideas (original ideas) at a similar level. Now, if you take a look around, most people can barely construct a coherent sentence. Forget a meta-systematic or meta-paradigmatic theory.

Okay, but then I'm not sure why you're confused about my position on Bill Clinton.

Bill is talking about something he doesn't really understand. That's been exactly my whole point.

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, aurum said:

Okay, but then I'm not sure why you're confused about my position on Bill Clinton.

Bill is talking about something he doesn't really understand. That's been exactly my whole point.

I'm saying most people here don't, even us who proclaim to understand. Because we don't produce these level of ideas ourselves. We mostly just download a stripped-down version and then go about our lives making simplistic observations, thinking we're being profound when in reality we're as simple as the so-called materialists we put beneath our feet.

That's the pessimistic version, as there is also "upward assimilation", in that immersing yourself in symbols above your development will eventually start to lift you up. But there is no good way to prove this other than your mind actually creating something new at these levels. If everything sounds like recycled quotations, the safest bet is that you are indeed only recycling quotations.

(And as a proof of concept: "downward/upward assimilation" is something I've read. I did not invent those terms).

[aurum]

13 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

I'm saying most people here don't, even us who proclaim to understand. Because we don't produce these level of ideas ourselves. We mostly just download a stripped-down version and then go about our lives making simplistic observations, thinking we're being profound when in reality we're as simple as the so-called materialists we put beneath our feet.

That's the pessimistic version, as there is also "upward assimilation", in that immersing yourself in symbols above your development will eventually start to lift you up. But there is no good way to prove this other than your mind actually creating something new at these levels. If everything sounds like recycled quotations, the safest bet is that you are indeed only recycling quotations.

(And as a proof of concept: "downward/upward assimilation" is something I've read. I did not invent those terms).

Undoubtedly some of that is true.

I think you may be selling this community a bit short though. My position is that Leo’s work is exceptional, and as such he does attract some exceptional people. I won’t drop usernames but I’ve conversed with many of them of the years.

If you legitimately put the work in, you may even be able to surpass Wilber himself in terms of understanding.

[Elliott]

20 hours ago, aurum said:

But I think the more likely case is he's just an average politician. What you see is what you get.

Why would a politician bring it up?

[aurum]

18 minutes ago, Elliott said:

Why would a politician bring it up?

He is making a point in favor of his globalist, liberal agenda.

[Elliott]

14 minutes ago, aurum said:

He is making a point in favor of his globalist, liberal agenda.

It seemed more like a critique of an agenda to me.

[aurum]

59 minutes ago, Elliott said:

It seemed more like a critique of an agenda to me.

It’s a relatively high perspective, but he’s not free from agenda.

The entire point of being a politician is to represent people’s agendas.