The Peripatetic Philosopher offers his readers:

The Absence of Mind in the Modern Self

The Invasion of Media

Description

We have lost our moral center. As a consequence, we have lost our way. We are not happy campers. Media and advertising have exploited our mass confusion creating the bizarre world that we all now call "home."

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The Peripatetic Philosopher shares:

A Reader Reacts to “The Absence of Mind in the Modern Self – The Invasion of Media!

JAMES R. FISHER, Jr., Ph.D.

© October 22, 2017

Reference:

I have had a two month absence from writing anything due to illness.  As often happens with me in creating my missives, something stirs me, or you might say provokes me, which finds me sitting down at my computer and composing a new missive such as this one.  

Sometimes there is little reaction to such efforts; other times people write and tell me that they have enjoyed the missive, but disagree with it leaving me in the lurch as to how they disagree causing me to wonder why they write.  Still other times, like what follows  (see attached) someone quotes me generously and then builds their own conceptual foundation on that stimulation to take possession of my ideas and to make them their own. 

It is in the case of the latter the reason that I write. 

More specifically, I am not a crusader for a specific cause.  Nor am I out to build a monument to my point of view.  I have never been interested in writing for profit much to the chagrin of my wife who puts up with me and my obsession.  Nor am I interested in the celebrity that many readers imagine the primary motivation of all writers.  

Simply stated, I believe in civilization and the linchpin of that civilization is communication.  If we are speaking to each other, it is unlikely that we are raising arms or plotting indignities against each other.

Some forty seven years ago, I wrote an essay, "Let Me Introduce You to Yourself."  As it so happens, four years ago, I conducted a seminar at the local library in which the theme was "Everyone Is an Author."  Both exercises were the same theme in different guises.  

The turnout for the seminar was encouraging.  I hope some of those in attendance have since written and either published an article or a book.

Our culture alienates us and makes us strangers to ourselves.  My message in that essay was that it is often necessary to go against the grain of the established tradition to discover our authentic self.  

The premise of the seminar was that everyone has a story to tell, and in the telling of that story the writer experiences a feeling of being reborn into a new dimension of the self. 

It is why I experience pleasure in sharing this reader's reaction to this particular missive.

Author Ken Shelton is a most accomplished author, publisher and consultant as well as a devoted servant to his Church.  He displays a sincerity that I feel is in short supply today, and does so with unambiguous clarity, gusto and panache.  His essay is attached.  

JRF

*     *     *     *     *

A Tale of Two Selves

Absence vs. Presence of Authenticity

By Ken Shelton

Note: This piece was inspired today by the thoughtful essay, The Absence of Mind in the Modern Self, by James R. Fisher, Jr.

We each have a dual nature—both the carnal natural man and the spiritual soul, causing a war within that is fueled daily by persuasive advertising and advocacy media. Such is the theme of a thoughtful essay, The Absence of Mind in the Modern Self by James R. Fisher, Jr.

He notes that advertising awakens artificial desires that initially arise outside ourselves, but then bombard our consciousness and stimulate deep desires within us. “Something unexpected then occurs in our mind,” he argues, “something physical, spiritual, moral, emotional or intellectual—something that touches the cockles of our heart, mind, and soul.”

“What causes these desires to surface may be obscure, difficult to trace,” he continues, “because they are often carried subliminally and planted in our conscience as if by an imaginary drone that is looming overhead and spraying its message into our consciousness. We act or react, not knowing why but thinking we do, because we want to believe we are in control and in charge and responding to legitimate desires. But what we desire remains a mystery to us. We think we desire what we seek but fail to understand what has influenced our choices. We sense an irrepressible desire to acquire what has so carefully been packaged in the commercial.”

He insightfully notes that what started out in the domain of advertising has shifted into mainstream journalism and all media. “Journalism has become a 24/7 commercial with the repeated histrionics of breaking news, fighting for the limited attention span of a bored public by promoting a confection of selective facts that support its manifest destiny while tailoring its copy to that audience’s collective biases. Facts are carefully culled from data that support the biases favored by the journalists and their networks, newspapers and journals.”

Fisher sees that “everyone is fair game, and nothing is sacred as leaks pour into their coffers from confidential sources. Everyone seems to have an ax to grind at the expense of someone else. It is brutal, childish, ubiquitous and cruel. Any story, no matter how sacred or mundane, can be made a national nightmare in the devious hands of reporters, politicians or broadcasters. Politicians, elected to do the people’s business, somehow find time to make mountains out of molehills when such activities support their nefarious agenda. Those so inclined think nothing of pouring accelerant on a raging internecine fire, then mockingly seem surprised when the insanity of mass hysteria follows.” 

The modern mind is not only absent in the modern self, he notes, but is caught up in “the paradoxical dilemma of displaying misplaced hubris in the moment. Civil society is collapsing around us, and yet we seem incapable to generate even a hiccup of despair. Our electronic pacifiers take us out of ourselves, occupying most of our waking hours. Consequently, we remain a mystery to ourselves, struggling to distinguish between our real desires and our true nature, our real self and our ideal self.”

“Our self-demands (ideal self) and role demands (real self) compete self-consciously for our attention and allegiance. Advertisers know this; media personnel know this; politicians know this. This is a recipe to exploit the vulnerability of their audience whether it involves the selling of soap, the slanting of news stories, or spewing political rhetoric that generates outrage.”

Fisher notes, “Super-salesman Elmer Wheeler originally realized that selling involves the sizzle and not the steak. Wheeler admits you can’t eat an image, but the image once it takes residence in the mind, apathy and resistance disappear, which leads to the desired action. Wheeler may not have understood that we are on automatic pilot or that robotics have become the new distinction, but 50 years later his formula is still being exploited.” 

In despair, Fisher cries: “Alas! God has lost His dominion over us as has Nature. We have lost interest in the teleological process or concern for final causes. It is all about now: have it now, be it now, experience it now. We are drifters, metaphorical tumbleweeds, directed and guided by outside sources with false premises, false prospectus, false descriptions, and false objectives as if we have no mind at all. We have lost our moral compass and our way. We have arrived at the gates of Nowhere Land as Nowhere Man with an inability to decipher true desires from false desires; as our desires no longer are self-generated from our imagination, experience and character. We are renters of someone else’s ideas, captives of the bandwagons of true believers who tell us what is real, important, and necessary, and what we should do about it.”

He concludes: “Our ‘two selves,’ one dominant the other recessive, are in conflict in our subconscious, dissipating rather than synergizing our limited energy. This is a war within—a war that seldom rises to overt action other than purchasing what we don’t need but want or joining a group to feel a sense of identity, then becoming a proselytizer, only to wonder how we got into this mess. We avoid making choices, and so choices are made for us. Not far from our consciousness lurk horrors and perversions that we are apt to experience vicariously and unapologetically on the never-ending commercial that media have become.” 

My Rebuttal

I feel for you, brother Fisher, as I too have felt deeply the despair that Henry Wadsworth Longfellow writes about: “And in despair I bowed my head. There is no peace on earth, I said; for hate is strong, and mocks the song of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Only the bells of Christianity have the power to restore my faith: “Then pealed the bells more loudly and deeply: God is not dead, nor doth he sleep! The Wrong shall fail, the Right prevail, with peace on earth, good-will to men!”

I too have wrestled with the war within my own soul and felt the weight of my sins. And only the atonement of Christ has the power to free me from despair and remind me of glory.

As C.S. Lewis writes in The Weight of Glory: “It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. 

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.

I too have felt the fear that stems from my unworthiness and inadequacy.

As Marianne Williamson writes in A Return to Love: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. 

We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

“Love is what we are born with. Fear is what we learn. The spiritual journey is the unlearning of fear and prejudices and the acceptance of love back in our hearts. Love is the essential reality and our purpose on earth. To be consciously aware of it, to experience love in ourselves and others, is the meaning of life. Meaning does not lie in things. Meaning lies in us.”

Finally, I have hope in winning the war within because of what the prophet Nephi writes in the Book of Mormon: “My soul delighteth in the scriptures, and my heart pondereth them, and writeth them for the learning and the profit of my children. Behold, my soul delighteth in the things of the Lord; my heart pondereth continually upon the things which I have seen and heard. 

Nevertheless, notwithstanding the great goodness of the Lord, in showing me his great and marvelous works, my heart exclaimeth: O wretched man that I am! Yea, my heart sorroweth because of my flesh; my soul grieveth because of mine iniquities. I am encompassed about, because of the temptations and the sins which do so easily beset me. And when I desire to rejoice, my heart groaneth because of my sins;

Nevertheless, I know in whom I have trusted. My God hath been my support; he hath led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness; and he hath preserved me upon the waters of the great deep. He hath filled me with his love, even unto the consuming of my flesh. He hath confounded mine enemies, unto the causing of them to quake before me. Behold, he hath heard my cry by day, and he hath given me knowledge by visions in the night-time. And by day have I waxed bold in mighty prayer before him; yea, my voice have I sent up on high; and angels came down and ministered unto me. And upon the wings of his Spirit hath my body been carried away upon exceedingly high mountains. And mine eyes have beheld great things, yea, even too great for man; therefore I was bidden that I should not write them.

O then, if I have seen so great things, if the Lord in his condescension unto the children of men hath visited men in so much mercy, why should my heart weep and my soul linger in the valley of sorrow, and my flesh waste away, and my strength slacken, because of mine afflictions? And why should I yield to sin, because of my flesh? Yea, why should I give way to temptations, that the evil one have place in my heart to destroy my peace and afflict my soul? Why am I angry because of mine enemy?

Awake, my soul! No longer droop in sin. Rejoice, O my heart, and give place no more for the enemy of my soul. Do not anger again because of mine enemies. Do not slacken my strength because of mine afflictions. Rejoice, O my heart, and cry unto the Lord, and say: O Lord, I will praise thee forever; yea, my soul will rejoice in thee, my God, and the rock of my salvation.”

The Peripatetic Philosopher apologizes for his absence:

The Absence of Mind in the Modern Self –

The Invasion of Media

JAMES R. FISHER, JR., Ph.D.

© October 21, 2017

Note:

This is my first missive in nearly two months as I have been ill.  It has not however stopped my reading, which includes the final volume of the LETTERS OF ISAIAH BERLIN: Affirming Letters (1975-1997), or letters until his death November 5, 1997. 

Henry Hardy and Mark Pottle have edited these letters very lovingly and comprehensively.  I have read nearly all of Isaiah Berlin’s published works, including his biography by Michael Ignatieff (1998), which was published posthumously.

Berlin was perhaps the greatest letter writer of the twentieth century, as he wrote expansively and unselfconsciously.  Consequently, more is revealed of the man (in my view) in these letters than any of his published works.

He has influenced me in my writing in the past thirty years.  This opening anecdote is taken from these letters, moving me to write the following missive.

THE POWER OF A WASHING POWDER COMMERCIAL

Paulina Julia Sygulska’s the first child (born 1984) of Polish author Dr. Beata Polanowska-Sygulska, had seen a TV advertisement for washing powder and conceived from that exposure an irrepressible desire to acquire it.  Advertising had been virtually unknown under Communism, and this was Paulina’s first exposure to it as a six year old in 1990 after the collapse of the USSR in 1989.   

Advertising awakens artificial desires that are not real desires as they arise outside the self and bombard one’s consciousness.  Desires are stimulated by something within whether from the depths of one’s character or through one’s experiences.

Something occurs in one’s mind, something unexpected, something physical, spiritual, moral, emotional or intellectual, something as common as being reminded of someone or something that has previously occurred in one’s life, something that touches the cockles of one’s heart, mind, and soul. 

Of course, chances are one is not aware of these causes, which may be many and totally obscure, difficult if not impossible to trace if we are of a mind to do so.  That is because they are often carried subliminally and planted in one’s conscience like an imaginary drone looming overhead and spraying its message into one’s consciousness.  
We act or react; we don’t know why but think we do, because we want to believe we are in control; that we are in charge!  This arises from what we believe to be our legitimate desire.  But is it?

What we desire remains essentially a mystery to us as we think we desire what we seek failing to understand the influence of our choices on commercials.  Like little Paulina, we sense an irrepressible desire to acquire what the commercial has so carefully packaged.  This has become the only game in town in all dimensions of what can be designated as “media.”

To wit, journalism has become a 24/7 commercial with the repeated histrionics of “breaking news,” fighting for the very limited attention span of a bored public.  It does so by promoting a confection of selective “facts” that support its manifest destiny while tailoring its copy to that audience's collective biases.  

The evidence is overwhelming.  People who watch FOX cable or FOX network news are unlikely to watch CNN or PBS, or the CBS, ABC and NBC networks, or visa visa.    

The “facts” presented are carefully culled from millions of data that support the biases favored by the journalists and their networks, newspapers and/or the journals for which they work, which are now mainly on-line. 

Everyone is fair game and nothing is sacred as “leaks” pour into their coffers from secret and confidential sources.  Everyone seems to have an ax to grind at the expense of someone else.  It is brutal, childish and ubiquitous and therefore cruel.  

Consequently, any story no matter how sacred or mundane can be made a national nightmare in the devious hands of reporters, politicians or broadcasters.  We see evidence of this in the current case of the four brave United States soldiers who died recently in Nassier.  

Politicians who are elected to do the people’s business, but somehow find time to make mountains out of molehills when such activities support their nefarious agenda.  This is as true of those on the right as those on the left of the political spectrum.  

Seventy years ago, President Harry S. Truman gave Congress the designation of the “Do Nothing Congress.”  Little has changed since.   

With 24/7 cable news as well as nightly network news, this is grist for the mill.  Those so inclined think nothing of pouring accelerant on a raging internecine fire, then mockingly seem surprised when the insanity of mass hysteria follows. 

THE ABSENCE OF MIND IN THE MODERN SELF

What one desires, one desires.  It may not be a good thing.  It may even be a bad thing, or even a horrible thing.  That was the case of Stephen Paddock (1953-2017) who killed at least 58 people who were attending an outdoor Country Western Concert on October 1, 2017.  

Paddock barricaded himself in a room on the 32^nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas shooting down on these innocent concert goers from more than a thousand feet away with multiple automatic weapons.  Why?   

His motivation still remains a mystery.  How could this happen to a boy who was born in the very same hospital as I was, although much later, which was Mercy Hospital in Clinton, Iowa? 

Clinton is a sleepy town of some 27,000 residence and the place where I grew up from birth to a young man.  It is a quiet town, an unassuming town of good law abiding citizens, and yet this monster was born amongst Clintonians.  Go figure!

It points out, once again, that the modern mind is not only absent in the modern self, but has been caught up in the paradoxical dilemma of displaying misplaced hubris in the moment.  

Everyone is too busy being busy to realize civil society is collapsing around them, while being unable to generate as much as a hiccup of despair. 

We have these wonderful electronic pacifiers that take us out of ourselves occupying most of our waking hours.  Consequently, we remain a mystery to ourselves and totally unhinged when someone like Stephen Paddock explodes in our midst.  Why?  I confess I don’t have the answer.

It is obvious we should not make a rigid distinction between our “real desires” and our “true nature,” any more than we should make a distinction between our “real self” and our “true self.”  The enemy of our enemy is on display in these two selves.

Our self-demands (“ideal self”) and role demands (“real self”) compete self-consciously for our attention and allegiance.  Advertisers know this; media personnel know this; politicians know this.  

This is a recipe to exploit the collective vulnerability of the audience whether it involves the selling of a soap powder, the slant of a news story or the political rhetoric that generates outrage.

Selling involves "the sizzle and not the steak," claims super salesman, Elmer Wheeler (1903-1968).  He admits you can't eat an image, but the image once it takes residence in the mind, apathy and resistance disappear, which leads to the desired action.  This is Wheeler's genius.   

He may not have understood that we are on automatic pilot or that robotics have become the new distinction, but fifty years later his formula is still being busily exploited. 

Alas!  God has lost His dominion over us as has Nature.  We have lost interest in the teleological process or concern for final causes.  It is all about now: have it now, be it now, experience it now.  

We are drifters, metaphorical tumble weeds, directed and guided by outside sources with false premises, false prospectus, false descriptions, and false objectives as if we have no mind at all.  We have lost our moral compass and our way.

We have arrived at the gates of Nowhere Land as Nowhere Man with an inability to decipher true desires from false desires; as our desires no longer are self-generated from our imagination, experience and character.  

We are renters of someone else's ideas, captives of the bandwagons of true believers who tell us what is real, important, and necessary, and what we should do about it.

Our “two selves,” one dominant the other recessive are in conflict in our subconscious dissipating rather than synergizing our limited energy.

This is a war within; a war that seldom rises to overt action other than purchasing what we don’t need but want or joining a group to feel a sense of identity, then becoming a proselytizer, only to wonder how we got into this mess.  We avoid making choices so choices are made for us.  

Not far from our consciousness lurks horrors and perversions that we are apt to experience vicariously and unapologetically on the never ending commercial that television has become, or through our apps on our iPhone which are television’s stepchildren.  Get used to it as this is unlikely to change anytime soon.