KURZSCHLUSS:
now, that might raise the
question of what kind of FREEDOM there is for the person. as along
as we are in this system, there is very little freedom. you can say:
"i do what i want", but what you want is the result of the system.
we are wanting thinkgs which are incoherent and which are creating
misery. and we are not free to give that up. [david bohm, thought
as a system ~ tas, p.217]
the issue here, says bohm,
is that "thought doesnt know it is doing somethinkg and then
struggles against what it is doing". [tas foreword] f.e.: flattery
is a pleasing experience which usually sets up a reflex of
receptivity toward the one who flatters. if X fails to flatter Y
when he expects her to, or takes advantage of him in some unpleasant
way, Y will attribute his subsequent bad feeling to somethinkg X
did. he fails to see that he participated in constructing the reflex
that produced not only the good feelings, but the bad ones as well
Bohm sees the pervasive tendency of thought to struggle against
its own creations as the central dilemma of our time.
i'm saying that the source [note: of all this trouble -]
is basically in thought. many people would thinkg that such a
statement is crazy, because thought is the one thinkg we have with
which to solve our problems. thats part of our tradition. yet is
looks as if the thinkg we use to solve our problems with is the
source of our problems. its like going to the doctor and having him
make you ill. in fact, in 20% of medical cases [david bohm,
thought as a system ~ tas, p.2>3] we do apparently have that
going on. but in the case of thought, its far over 20%
Q: kids are pushed to have the solution.
David Bohm:
they are rewarded if they have the right solution, and they face a
certain amount of unpleasantness if they dont have it. the
educational system does that, as does the political system.
everythinkg has grown up to do that [david bohm, thought as a
system ~ tas, p. 33]
Q: we have been educated to have an
answer. all my life, as soon as the teacher asks a Q, if i have the
A i am a good kid. and then i hear for the first time that if i do
not have an A i am a good kid. so the system is broadening to
include somethinkg new which i never even conceived would be a
possible: its OK to be confused, it might even be
interesting.
but it is also possible for thoughts -
reassuring thought, or pleasant thought - to produce endorphins. and
then you become in some sense addicted to those thoughts, saying 'i
wont give them up; even if they are wrong i'll believe them to be
true'. you cant bear the idea that what you want to thinkg might not
be true, because that would remove the endorphins and then the pain
would start coming back.
so you can say that there is a kind of
addiction in the thought process which is possible.
the
>positive and the >negative are two sides of the same system.
anythinkg positive is implicitly negative, and vice versa. . lets
try to look at that.
somewhere in the middle of the brain there
are pleasure-pain centers. researchers have access to those centers
in animals. i once saw an article which showed a picture of a cat
looking very pleased when they touched a pleasure centre either
electrically or chemically. then when they touched it a little
stronger the cat looked very frightened. when they touched it a
little stronger still, it looked enraged but somewhat pleased at the
same time. rage was pleasure.
what they said was that every time
you stir up >pleasure, all the >pain centers around also come
in to compensate. every time you stir up pain the pleasure centers
come in. there is always a mixture of the two . its a very complex
feeling. suppose you stub your toe: you feel pain, but meanwhile the
pleasure centers are set to work to overcome that. and when the pain
goes away you then feel pleasure - its left over. in other words,
the pain has died away and the pain centers are quiet for the
moment. but the pleasure centers take a bit longer to quiet because
they were stirred up a little later , so one turns into the other.
likewise, the sense of >fear and the sense of >security will
turn into each other . [david bohm, thought as a system ~
tas, p. 49]
take any company, such as general motors, as
an example of somethinkg organized by thought. we have the thought
that it exists and has a certain structure. but it is that very
thought which ties the factories and everythinkg else together as a
company. what we consider 'general motors' is entirely organized by
thinkging. except for that thought - i mean, unless people believed
that it existed - it wouldnt exist. there might be factories and
buildings and all, but people wouldnt know what they are supposed to
be doing or how there are supposed to be related, and so forth. the
thought is at the core of it, and there is a whole system which
develops out of that [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas,
p. 88]
yes, somethinkg is happening in thought which
rejects sensitivity or prevents it or resists it. its clear that if
you could see the activity of thought, you might discover that most
of the thinkgs we are counting on actually are just nothinkg; they
are produced by thought - the self and the society, and on and on
[david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
138]
originally T(hought) was set up to try to protect
you and to help you. and after a while it runs on its own . and it
is just running. so i dont thinkg you should thinkg it is trying to
do anythinkg, any more than your knee-jerk is trying to do anythinkg
[david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p. 118]
Q:
when there is the disappearance of the endorphins and then the
agitation of the brain to get that state back, what are the other
possibilites besides what thought does?
David Bohm:: if thought
didnt do anythinkg, it might be that another solution would come.
the agitation might just disappear. it may be that if you stay with
the fact that there are no endorphins for a little while, the system
will soon come to an equilibrium . there may be no real problem at
all except that thought says: "quick, i must do somethinkg' [david
bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p. 121]
i want to
say that T takes itself as very big. but maybe its just a ripple on
the stream. and the stream is the stream of consciousness. so the
stream of C has to be aware of itself. but thats no great thinkg bc
C is simply allowed to be aware. the Q is: can the stream of C be
proprioceptively aware of this ripple that it is producing, just as
it is aware of how it moves the body. [david bohm, thought as a
system ~ tas, p. 129]
Q: i wonder if a simple analogy
would be the difference between memorizing a bunch of multiplication
tables and understanding a formula. once there is understanding of
the relationship, then the overhead of remembering all the other
data is gone and you can now relate to it [david bohm, thought as
a system ~ tas, p. 150]
but psychological addiction
is always the most difficult one. f.e., experiments have been done
where animals were injected w some drug, maybe morphine, which made
them chemically addicted. there were two groups - one was enabled to
inject itself and the other was injected. then the drug was withheld
from both groups. the group that was injected went through a
withdrawal process and was no longer addicted. the ani that were
able to press the button to inject themselves got through the
withdrawal process, but whenever they say the button they [david
bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.153>154]. pressed it
again, even though is no longer gave them the drug. the point is
that the memory of that pleasure produced a reflex to press the
button. the button stirred up the whole system of
memory
and thats how you perceive everythinkg. clearly,
there is a kind of imagination involved in looking at the tv image.
if you were to look carefully you would see nothinkg but flashing
lights. but you see people, trees, characters; you see emotional
conflicts and danger; you see anger, fear , pleasure . but its all
yourself . its all the imagination being infused into the picture on
the screen - just as it gets infused into perception. so when you
are looking at the tv set, what you experience must come from
somethinkg like the imagination. where else could it come from?
[david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
160]
now, its around the self-image that the problem is
mostly difficult. we have got a kind of self-image that is almost
like a tv programme going on inside; its going on in the nerves, and
so forth. and this image has several parts. one part seems to be
'somebody' inside at whom you are looking. another part seems to be
'somebody' who is looking. we have different words for these. the
word 'i' stands for the subject, the one who sees, who acts, who
does, who determines ethinkg, who has WILL. 'will' is the same as
'determine' and 'intention'. "i am determined" means strong will.
"i" is the active agent : i will, i determine, i see, i choose, i
thinkg. and also there is "me", to whom it is all done. 'me' is the
object, ethinkg happens to me. then, the basic concept, the 'self',
is what unites those two. I and >ME are two concepts of
>MYSELF. so there are me, myself and I. thats a concept of the
self. [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
161]
thus the self-image becomes central. and everythinkg
becomes arranged to feed and sustain it in as good a way as
possible. we try to arrange thoughts that way. we try to get people
to support it. we try to produce situations, such as acquiring
wealth - people will make a lot of money to show that they are
really very great people. they make far more money than they need
for whatever they want to do. they keep on making money. and if the
mere making of money isnt enough, then they buy all sorts of thinkgs
- far more than they need - to show that they are great
people.
why do people do this? [david bohm, thought as a
system ~ tas, p. 166]
their identitiy is what they
can do or what they have or what their relations are; thats usually
taken as more important. people will allow their bodies to
degenerate in favour of that. other people may regard their bodies
as all-important. it can vary. you can put your identity into almost
anythinkg - into your country, or into your bank account or into
your achievements - into anythinkg . [david bohm, thought as a
system ~ tas, p. 166] although we may try to identify ourselves
with godog, or somethinkg like that, there again its the culture
which gave you the thought allowing you to do that. thats what we
have to keep in mind. [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas,
p. 167]
now, maybe mind is another 'side' of that same
thinkg - that which we call energy on one side is mind on the other
side. that is, energy is pervaded with a kind of intelligence, out
of which perhaps insight comes, or deeper perceptions of truth.
thats the suggestion. [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas,
p. 172]
i'm suggesting that if you try to touch the
>self, it will be the same difficulty as trying to touch the
rainbow. we have a representation of the self, which is really
arising in a process. we dont know this process very well; but the
attempt to treat the self as an object is just not going to mean
anythinkg. so instead, suppose we say that this self is UNKNOWN. its
origin, its ground is UNKNOWN. and it is constantly revealing
itself, through each person or through nature or through various
other ways [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
173]
there was an ancient view: >>>"I DONT KNOW
WHAT I AM. WHAT I AM IS UNKNOWN, BUT CONSTANTLY REVEALING ITSELF".
[david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p. 167] 'we dont want
seats. we want that >contact." the reason they are going to those
football games is not just to see the games; the game is a socially
acceptable reason for having this contact which the society doesnt
allow anywhere else . [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas,
p. 205]
but all the people in a certain culture have more
or less the same image of their individulaity. its clear that
thought determines the Q of what is connected or separate, how you
see it, and so on. [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
209]
now, we are sugg that T is a sys belonging to the
whole culture and society , evolving over history, and it creates
the image of an individual who is supposed to be [david bohm,
thought as a system ~ tas, p. 210>211]. the source of
thought. it give the sense of an individual who is perceived and
experienced, and so on. this would be conducive to the next step,
which is for thought to claim that it only tells you the way thinkgs
are and then the individual inside decides what to do with the
information - he chooses. this is the picture which emerged
gradually: thought tells you the way thinkgs are and then 'you'
choose how to act from that info.
David Bohm: usually
what first happens is that the 'me' has been hurt and 'i' must
remove or get rid of pain. 'what can i do?' thats the first
reaction. so you start a train of thought: 'who did it? who is to
blame?', and you say: "ok, that ones to blame. i must take revenge".
or else another reaction would be to say, "i should not be
hurt".
but then there's a conflict, bc the same thought process
which makes you be hurt is also fighting and saying you should not
be hurt. [david bohm, thought as a system ~ tas, p.
212]
but there are all sorts of assumptions, such as: " i
am too important to give up on this Thought. i cant allow myself to
give up the pain". is that assumption clear? its a common one.
people who are hurt have an assumption: "i cant allow myself to give
up that pain bc then i would be sort of negating myself, saying i
have no importance. that cannot be allowed. its absolutely nec to
maintain my importance".
yes, it is all influenced
heavily by the culture, very strongly. its all there, and we form
this image. we have the image that "i do the thinkging", "i am the
thinkger". but in fact the culture has produced most of the thought.
it sort of passes through me, i add a bit to it, i do this or that
to it. the kind of thought we use, which is communicated, originates
basically in the whole society and the culture. we have the sense of
separation because our culture tells us that each individual is
separate, and therefore we perceive it that way. [david bohm,
thought as a system ~ tas, p. 216]
nevertheless, we
seem somehow to experience >time in our own psychological
existence. but if you thought that time was a basic reality then you
would have a paradox: the >past is gone - it doesnt exist. the
>future doesnt exist either - its not yet. and the >present,
if it were thought of as the point dividing past and the future,
also could not exist. thats the paradox of this view. however, it is
no paradox if you just say that 'time is a representation'. a
representation can be all kinds of thinkgs. [david bohm, thought
as a system ~ tas, p. 228]
you see, to begin
with, it requires some attention to reveal this blockage, and to
feel it, and to see the Thought that is behind it - the fixed
Thought. now you see that Thought acts like a >program which is
very fast, and it hides itself. thats is the whole problem - that
Thought tends to conceal itself - as you may have noticed. its a
program which is programmed to conceal itself. any attack on the
program will seem to be an attack on what i am, right? and
therefore, automatically, i will prevent any move to make that
attack. and concealment is one way of preventing attack. [david
bohm, unfolding meaning ]
if we can see these
>programs, then they will change - if we see the meaning of these
programs as programs. at present they dont mean programs to us; they
mean somethinkg much more fundamental. they mean ME, right? [david
bohm, unfolding meaning p 108]
David Bohm: well, i
thinkg that we can first of all try to observe our own habits and
programs, and suspend them sufficiently to get some insights; and
secondly, in relationship, we can observe this happening. also, i
thinkg, in dialouge it could perhaps begin to be revealed because
different people can see different aspects of this whole thinkg. now
that would require however, as peter was saying, that people be
really >friends with each other, so that they can take criticisms
from each other - thinkgs that will appear to be ciritcisms. you
see, the minute that somebody is pointing out that you are doing
somethinkg wrong, silly, or st, then there is a reaction, and you
say no its not. you defend yourself. thats is part of the
concealment. its very hard to be able to take this. but in this
dialogue it must be possible for it to go both ways, you see? now
say, in the family, the parents will do this with their children,
but the children are not allowed to do it with the parents. usually
they say that the children really do not understand enough. but that
often conceals the fact that the parents dont understand - dont want
themselves citicized or anythinkg. so the Q is whether we can
establish a relationship truly between 2 friends, so that this
dialogue is really possible? [david bohm, unfolding meaning p
111]
more&less to
come&go
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