As for Harris: this free will stuff

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by laklak » Sat Jan 05, 2019 7:47 pm

Rum wrote:
Sat Jan 05, 2019 6:03 pm
At this juncture I am freely choosing to jump into my flying car and pop out to Joe’s Martian Moondogs for a takeaway.
I'm sending my girlfriend, Scarlett Johannson, to pick up my order.
Yeah well that's just, like, your opinion, man.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Rum » Sat Jan 05, 2019 8:01 pm

laklak wrote:
Sat Jan 05, 2019 7:47 pm
Rum wrote:
Sat Jan 05, 2019 6:03 pm
At this juncture I am freely choosing to jump into my flying car and pop out to Joe’s Martian Moondogs for a takeaway.
I'm sending my girlfriend, Scarlett Johannson, to pick up my order.
I feel sorry for you. I have a harem of 20 cloned Scarlett Johhannsons here at my beck and call. :smug:

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 7:25 am

As you know, I am a hypnotist and use hypnosis in coaching. In hindsight, I discovered early on how to induce trance states in myself (as a teenager) only I did not know I was doing self-hypnosis.
Free will, or will, as I understand it, resides in the conscious mind, because what kind of will is it if one is not conscious of it? But the unconscious mind is much bigger and should I say, determines the conscious one. However, I don't want to be called to provide definitions because there are none. It takes a mind to study a mind and how do you study an unconscious mind or how can an unconscious mind study itself? Hypnosis makes a point of accessing its workings though.

This article makes some very good points! I particularly like how it does away with some myths:
• “The ‘unconscious’ is very wise”
I heard a hypnotherapist saying these exact words, in a lovely, caring tone, on a YouTube video. The unconscious is not necessarily wise at all. It is very much influenced by how we are brought up, our life experiences and the culture we live in and so on: our conditioning. As far as the unconscious mind is concerned the GIGO rule applies: garbage in, garbage out. Much of the therapeutic work done in trance is concerned with overriding automatic unconscious responses, altering unhealthy patterns and opening up limited perceptions.
https://www.hgi.org.uk/resources/delve- ... s-hypnosis

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 7:45 am

Never thought the Hitler-gesture was an arm-levitation thing but it is definitely an anchor! From the same article:
Anyone who thinks hypnosis is harmless might do well to remember that Hitler studied it after being cured by a hypnotist of the hysterical blindness that he suffered at the end of the First World War. His personality changed at that point as the result of a strong suggestion given in trance by a psychologist who told him that he was special and that he had great personal powers and that, with these great powers, he could cure himself of the blindness. This acted as a post hypnotic suggestion and Hitler went on to induce receptive trance states in vast crowds at rallies, bombarding them with emotionally arousing nominalisations. He even adopted a stylised form of arm levitation as the Nazi salute.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Rum » Sun Jan 06, 2019 8:54 am

To say that Hitler somehow hypnotised large crowds of people diminishes his influence and the responsibility those people hold for their own actions in my view.

That he was a powerful public speaker is not in doubt. That he appealed to some of the lowest aspects of human nature and fears is also in no doubt. And that he was in the right place at the right time to grasp power in the way he did is also clear. But to suggest hypnotism was partly responsible is fanciful and speculative in my view.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 9:39 am

Rum wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 8:54 am
To say that Hitler somehow hypnotised large crowds of people diminishes his influence and the responsibility those people hold for their own actions in my view.

That he was a powerful public speaker is not in doubt. That he appealed to some of the lowest aspects of human nature and fears is also in no doubt. And that he was in the right place at the right time to grasp power in the way he did is also clear. But to suggest hypnotism was partly responsible is fanciful and speculative in my view.
Not partly responsible, but a useful tool he knew hot to use, not the only one, and a narrow definition of hypnotism is not useful either, powerful speakers induce mini-trances, therein lies their influence, the lowest aspects of human nature and the fears are in the unconscious mind as well.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Hermit » Sun Jan 06, 2019 9:55 am

DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 7:45 am
Never thought the Hitler-gesture was an arm-levitation thing but it is definitely an anchor! From the same article:
Anyone who thinks hypnosis is harmless might do well to remember that Hitler studied it after being cured by a hypnotist of the hysterical blindness that he suffered at the end of the First World War. His personality changed at that point as the result of a strong suggestion given in trance by a psychologist who told him that he was special and that he had great personal powers and that, with these great powers, he could cure himself of the blindness. This acted as a post hypnotic suggestion and Hitler went on to induce receptive trance states in vast crowds at rallies, bombarding them with emotionally arousing nominalisations. He even adopted a stylised form of arm levitation as the Nazi salute.
The Hitler salute was invented in 1914 by the John the Baptist of fascism, Gabriele d'Annunzio, who based it on the entirely mythical Roman salute. The myth was inspired by Jacques-Louis David's 1784 painting titled Oath of the Horatii. It was adopted by Mussolini shortly thereafter. In 1926 Hitler made the gesture among his followers compulsory. It has no connection with hypnosis whatsoever.
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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Brian Peacock » Sun Jan 06, 2019 10:59 am

This stuff about the compulsory salute puts me in mind of Divine Command theory. When the personal consequences of disobedience are catastrophic then there is every reason to obey. Where's the freedom in 'obey or die'? At the same time we generally maintain that the "I was only following orders" plea does not absolve one of personal responsibility for one's actions. Do we have more responsibility for the consequences of the actions which we think about beforehand, or afterwards? Are we more or less responsible for those acts we carry out without thinking, or those we think about?
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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:14 am

May be Hitler‘s reasons for adopting the salute were more complex based on various associations, the hypnotic convincer arm levitation being just one.
As for good people doing bad things when commanded by authority, there was this study study where people inflicted lethal doses of electricity on a person because the were told so by an authority, the subject was a actor by the way.
Or there was this study where college boys were divided randomly into two groups, one was assigned to be inmates, the other guards in prison, the study was interrupted after three days because the guards were becoming abusive, knowing full well that the boys in the other group had done nothing. Don a uniform, you adopt an identity, this is the purpose of uniforms too.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Rum » Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:40 am

DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 9:39 am
Rum wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 8:54 am
To say that Hitler somehow hypnotised large crowds of people diminishes his influence and the responsibility those people hold for their own actions in my view.

That he was a powerful public speaker is not in doubt. That he appealed to some of the lowest aspects of human nature and fears is also in no doubt. And that he was in the right place at the right time to grasp power in the way he did is also clear. But to suggest hypnotism was partly responsible is fanciful and speculative in my view.
Not partly responsible, but a useful tool he knew hot to use, not the only one, and a narrow definition of hypnotism is not useful either, powerful speakers induce mini-trances, therein lies their influence, the lowest aspects of human nature and the fears are in the unconscious mind as well.
Having studied psychology and psychodynamic theory in some detail I can think of no evidence that these ‘mini trances’ exist or that somehow a person with the right skills can manipulate or influence the sub conscious. Like so much ‘theory’ based on Freud’s thinking, it is supposition based on proposition, based on theory based on preconception.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:53 am

But what do you want? Even in mathematics you cannot do anything without making some initial assumption first. One guy set out to establish the principles of the pure mathematics and failed. As for the mind, nobody denies it exists but nobody can define it. It is the product of the brain yet it can induce material changes in the brain. Hence the boom in meditation, mindfulness, guided imagery, etc. especially over the last 10 year, there have been many studies in hypnosis too which shares a great deal.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Hermit » Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:56 am

DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:14 am
May be Hitler‘s reasons for adopting the salute were more complex based on various associations, the hypnotic convincer arm levitation being just one.
If you try to retrofit a hypnotic aspect to the Hitler salute, I suggest you supply some actual evidence in support.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by Rum » Sun Jan 06, 2019 12:19 pm

DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:53 am
But what do you want? Even in mathematics you cannot do anything without making some initial assumption first. One guy set out to establish the principles of the pure mathematics and failed. As for the mind, nobody denies it exists but nobody can define it. It is the product of the brain yet it can induce material changes in the brain. Hence the boom in meditation, mindfulness, guided imagery, etc. especially over the last 10 year, there have been many studies in hypnosis too which shares a great deal.
I think there are degrees of ‘assumption’. Newton’s maths work extremely well based on his assumptions about a static machine like universe for example. Freud and the early psychoanalysts, psychologists and psychiatrists based their theories on very much shakier ground.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 12:45 pm

Rum wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 12:19 pm
DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:53 am
But what do you want? Even in mathematics you cannot do anything without making some initial assumption first. One guy set out to establish the principles of the pure mathematics and failed. As for the mind, nobody denies it exists but nobody can define it. It is the product of the brain yet it can induce material changes in the brain. Hence the boom in meditation, mindfulness, guided imagery, etc. especially over the last 10 year, there have been many studies in hypnosis too which shares a great deal.
I think there are degrees of ‘assumption’. Newton’s maths work extremely well based on his assumptions about a static machine like universe for example. Freud and the early psychoanalysts, psychologists and psychiatrists based their theories on very much shakier ground.
We've come a long way since Freud, it's been some 100 years.
How something works is not the same as what it is. Are you saying Newtonian maths is free of any initial assumptions? Then he exceeded Bertrand Russel!
Last edited by DRSB on Sun Jan 06, 2019 12:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: As for Harris: this free will stuff

Post by DRSB » Sun Jan 06, 2019 12:55 pm

Hermit wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:56 am
DRSB wrote:
Sun Jan 06, 2019 11:14 am
May be Hitler‘s reasons for adopting the salute were more complex based on various associations, the hypnotic convincer arm levitation being just one.
If you try to retrofit a hypnotic aspect to the Hitler salute, I suggest you supply some actual evidence in support.
OK, you win, I have no evidence as to what associations went in Hitler's mind while choosing this particular gesture as the Nazi -salute. Once adopted and accepted though, it became an anchor for the whole identity by virtue of the association. You do it, you adopt the identity together with the values, behaviour, etc. This mechanism of association is how hypnosis works. There is evidence that Hitler was familiar with this, you can stumble upon it acciedentally as well.

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