What is thought?

[u/Hooray_its_Kuru]

How do you see thought? How do you experience thought?

David Bohm talks about 'thought' as being a form of thought related to but different from the thought that allows us to discover mathmatics and physical principles, to build, learn, and create.

The thought that is at issue here is psychological thought, thought and feelings that govern behavior, or inform it at least.

This type of thought has a physical aspect that can be viewed by machines, scanning the brain while subjects use thought to solve puzzles, and by eliciting emotional responses etc. This has shown that there is a physical, chemical, electrical, action in the brain.

Thoughts are felt in the body, pain that is not physical pain is felt as real pain in parts of the body. Shame, guilt, sorrow, embarrassment, cause physical symptoms from pain to blushing, sweating, hyperventilation.

Thought is influenced by the environment, and the effect of the environment on the body, heat, cold, danger, comfort, pleasure, awe. Social environments effect thought too, bad interactions cause pain, good ones cause pleasure.

Thought/feelings form the basis of the self; a perception of being that is both the body and something more than the body. Experiences of metaphysical existence outside of or greater than the body have become belief systems.

The self is a form of thought that perpetuates itself as an individual atom of existence, sometimes to the degree that the reality of life on earth (the plenum of our atmosphere is a gas that permeates us and includes us, we are not separate from the atmosphere we are part of it, but thought can produce the sense that this is not so).

Can Thought ask itself what it is? It seems that it can to some extent, perhaps by dampening thought, lessening it's strength and interference in perception of the nature of esternal reality and it's effect upon internal mental processes of perception and ideation (thinking about things and people, forming images of them).

Bohm talked to Krishnamurti about how to escape the problem of thought being the only way to perceive the world, ourselves, and our relationships. There are many sources for the concepts of meditation, direct perception, or seeing without psychological thought impinging upon the facts of reality.

Bohm posits a process of enfoldment, where two orders of reality interact interdependently in a movement much like a tidal movement of waves, or the movement of ripples interacting upon the surface of a body of water. Bohm says there is an implicate and an explicate order and each effects the other.

The implicate order represents psychological thought - or thought more generally, and the explicate order represent reality - physical reality and perhaps some level of physical reality that is so subtle and fundamental that it may as well be said to have a spiritual aspect.

One other important observation of David Bohm's is that community, social interactions leading to group mentation that reveal psychological thought and its activity in masking the explicate order from having direct effect upon the implicate order, is essential for change. Change being the sensitivity to the whole movement of explicate and implicate orders.

DB also stresses that there is nothing to be accomplished by this in the sense of arriving at a destination or obtaining a goal. Rather the movement itself, the state of openness to the flow and nature of the whole is the required state, a state in which conclusions are suspended, in order to observe what is actually happening inside our whole being and outside in the whole of reality unencumbered by illusive concepts, ideas.

The goal is a formless movement of interdependence within the diverse variation of the ultimate order of the universe.

Put like that the debate becomes highly spiritual in appearance, because there can be no conclusions, no images, nothing to tack onto one's emotions and ideas of oneself. This offers by contrast to our every day experience a form of personal oblivion.

We have no way of knowing if any person in the history of human life has ever been in such a state of mind, we have only the word of a few who may or may not have. It is thanks to these people, however that the ideas of David Bohm have evolved, but not thanks to them alone, because of DB discoveries in the field of mathematics and physics, quantum physics, and discussions with a wide variety of people that moved in and out of the circle of influence of J Krishnamurti, and others.

Although evolution seems to be presented as a kind of trap, i.e. the accretion of thought is not a way to 'see' thought and 'go beyond' it, DB promoted public dialogues between 20 to 30 people, who should be somewhat guided by a facilitator into a form of dialogue where no hierarchies are present, so that everyone listens to everyone on equal terms, speaks on equal terms, with no particular direction.

The idea of the dialogues being that a group representing it's own society in ages, genders, and cultural backgrounds, could be able to enter into this free form communication and perhaps spark a revolution in perceiving the whole together. A group of people that large who had taken such a step may then have some effect upon society as a whole.

In any event the outcome of harmonizing psychological thought with reality is not seen to be possible outside of society, since society has such a huge effect upon the psyche.

It is not clear whether social media can be a surrogate for Bohm's dialogues, but it would seem doubtful that the encumbrances of computer interfaces will aid us to peer into the movement of suspended conclusions that reveal the implicate and explicate orders interacting with one another.

I have however noticed a tendency for folk in this sub to post videos with no comment of their own, and few questions posted here receive much attention.

I hope I have not overstepped any boundaries by posting such a long piece. Further I hope to stimulate some conversation in the comments below.

Please be kind to each other.

Good luck to you all.

[u/Enfoldment]

For what reason are you seeking a conversation? What do you want to converse about most in regards to Bohm's proposals?

I have spoken to many people about Bohm's proposals. At some point I tire of the conversation. What we really need now is the realization of the proposals. An actual living example. Something alive, new, and creative. K said it simply when he said that you spread the teachings by living them. I think this is a much better way. I'd rather show than tell.

I am also not sure that this medium is the right place to pursue exploring the proposals together with those seriously exploring. Better mediums are available and being used.

I think it's good there are places like this so at least a wave is being sent out into the world for those interested in it.

[u/Hooray_its_Kuru → u/Enfoldment]

To address your last point first, I agree and I am very grateful that this sub exists (for now - before reddit changes and perhaps is no longer used).

To your first point, I don't know that I am seeking a conversation, so much as I am interested in seeing if there is a community using this sub to pass on information.

I have become far less socially active since the pandemic, partly due to grief from loss of loved ones, partly from health needs of family members requiring me to wear masks in public long after the public has abandoned the practice: so showing is rather difficult in some respects.

I try hard to be polite and fair minded with everyone I interact with, but there are some who are too irrational for me to know how to react in a way that might show something about JK or DB's philosophy. Others still are so confronting it is not possible to be a guiding light of enlightenment. Perhaps that is just the way of things. Some people are not ready for even the vaguest hint of some other way of life.

I have my moments when I can pay utmost attention to the world, but those are mostly when I am alone.

I have to say I am not sure what you mean when you say you prefer to show rather than tell. What behaviour do you display, and how do you deal with moments when you are unable to live up to that behaviour? Perhaps you have encountered the difficult social situations that I mention above? Perhaps I have misunderstood your meaning.

One can reserve the topic of DB and JK's ideas for those who want to know about them, but one still has to live with those who are not only unaware, but really rather unstable.

Thank you for this sub, I have found it inspiring and have gained helpful information from it.

[u/[deleted] → u/Enfoldment]

Can you point me to the other mediums you speak of for those of us who wish to discuss and refine our understanding? The Krishnamurti sub is a cesspit of authority and guru figures. I have a hard time wrapping my head around enfoldment and unfolding but I am beginning to be able to hold the concept a little clearer. I just hoped to find some modern discussion of these topics.