/lit/ - Literature

>>15731527
>>15731551

>Being / Becoming
>Calculus

"These two types of change correspond to Yin (instantaneous change in the present) and Yang (cumulative change over time) in the most abstract; the fundamental theorem of calculus is the tao in mathematically pure form."

Our perception of change involves two mutually necessary contrasts: presentational immediacy (instantaneous change in the present) and causal efficacy (cumulative change over time.) These are also intimately related to the philosophical concepts of being and becoming.

In the mode of presentational immediacy the past and future are not experienced, what is experienced is continuous, immediate change in an omnipresent experiential moment. Mindfulness meditation involves focusing on this mode, in contrast to the temporal mode of causal efficacy that involves remembering, anticipating, and planning.

While mindfulness practices correspond to the mode of presentational immediacy, practices that I call "perception bending" uses a feedback loop between anticipation and perception to alter one's perception of the world, potentially to radical degrees. Here's a guide to what I've learned of these sets of practices: https://pastebin.com/vHKeTau2

The mathematical principle that exactly corresponds to this dynamic is found in the fundamental theorem of calculus as differentiation and integration as inverse operations of the same process. A derivative measures sensitivity to immediate change, such as velocity as first derivative of displacement with respect to time, while integration allows one to calculate wholes such as area and volume.

Both of these perceptual modes serve a role in human conscious experience as an evolutionary process. These roles and their relation to calculus was described by philosopher Henri Bergson as discovery (i.e., differentiation) and explanation (i.e., integration), and that every discovery is the inverse of an explanation and every explanation the derivative of a discovery. A discovery is a mutation of conscious experience, and is apprehended in the present moment as the continuous re-discovery of the world of experience. An explanation is causally effective, able to anticipate effective change and interact with it, and corresponds to selection.

>>14418857
I'm someone else replying. My reply includes my own understanding of process philosophy which I find irremovable from my interpretation of his work, so this isn't Whitehead verbatim. Substance metaphysics is closely related to the law of identity, x=x, something is equivalent to itself, in itself, and change is secondary to whatever essential unchanging facets something has. Process philosophy finds its corresponding mathematical principle in calculus (the mathematical study of change) as integration and differentiation as inverse operations of the same process, with the intuitive sense of integration being "cumulative change" and differentiation "instantaneous change."

These correspond to modes of perception and interaction with change, what whitehead calls "causal efficacy" and "presentational immediacy." I independently derived this relationship from my experience and analysis of meditative techniques, with a set of practices I call "perception bending" corresponding to the anticipatory mode of perception, utilizing a feedback loop between imagined anticipation and perception to create hallucinatory experiences and altered states of consciousness. Here's descriptions of some of the techniques I learned, all by using this basic technique: https://pastebin.com/vHKeTau2 I took a course in mindfulness-based cognitive therapy a few years back that introduced me to mindfulness meditation, which is the counterpart practice: the "goal" isn't to alter experience, but to merely observe and be aware of present change. The theory of the workbook I used, "The Mindful Way Workbook" by Teasdale et al described two modes of consciousness it referred to as "being" and "doing" which I quickly recognized as corresponding to calculus.

These modes are reference frames of change-perception, with the differential mode making a fixed omnipresent experiential moment as the point of reference, with continuous flux experienced in this ever-present. Favoring this mode is doubtlessly a big reason for the presentist bias in Buddhist thought. The more familiar mode of integration has a duration as the fixed point of reference, with experienced change being "a story of change over time," the mode of language and narrative that Western philosophy emphasizes.

>>14192153
>integralists btfo (again) by the Pope
>Accelerationists blamed for far-right terrorism by Vox.

>for Bergson, calculus is more than just a handy metaphor or analogy, but rather, he indeed aimed at framing an approach to the organicist world hypothesis that employs the calculus as its actual method of discovery (i.e., differentiation) and explanation (i.e., integration), and that every discovery is the inverse of an explanation and every explanation the derivative of a discovery.

Space Taoism is no meme.

>>14043288
Eckhart Tolle is an extremely advanced avatar of toxic presentational immediacy: the power of an unending Now that shields itself from any intrusion of future-directedness. It is the omnipresent cock and ball torture of mindlessness-based cognitive therapy that insists that one just like, chill out bro while the world burns. It is hyper-pacification of the temporal, to see an illusory "harmony" by detaching The Present Event with all other events, using cock-snipping scissors to abort all relationships except immediate reactivity.

Then you have the hyper-temporalists, the future-fuckers who seek to cancel the present and make the future their only audience, engaging in frantic grasping-towards of the will to power with every cell in the giant evolutionary cock of their bodies. They seek to violently suffocate the present by dragging an immanent future into the present, raping it with the shock and awe of what cannot be presently accounted for, as the account is only found after-the-fact, in the Aftermath once the deed has been done.

>>13906856
https://principiadiscordia.com/
The Principia Discordia is process philosophy as experimental art. The medium of parody religion is an essential part of the message.

>And how does process philosophy reconicle being and becoming?

I can only speak about my own experiences, but it involves reconciling our perception as being comprised of two reference frames of relational change: https://www.reddit.com/r/Tao_of_Calculus/comments/9rpnrl/space_taoism_101/

This isn't just thinkery I'm talking about, it's an experienced created rhythm that I can only describe as engaging with one's life as a co-creative multiplicity, an immense tapestry of creative occasions. For this reason Whitehead should be considered above everything as a POET, with the goal of seeking to inspire philosophically creative inspiration. He didn't want people to get stuck on him, to stop at Whitehead, he wanted to be surpassed in every way, and knew he could: there is no position which is unpassable.

The reconciliation between being and becoming is a process of self-reconciliation and self-realization.

The Tao of Calculus

If this being/becoming interdependency is the fundamental nature of relational change itself, it must be expressed in all domains of change. This is found in calculus, the mathematical study of change, in the fundamental theorem of calculus which describes integration and differentiation as inverse operations of the same process, with the physical intuitions of each being "cumulative change" and "instantaneous change" respectively. These correspond to being and becoming respectively, a theme explored in Deleuze's "difference and repetition."

This relationship is also expressed in our perception of change as two different reference frames. In mode of becoming/differentiation a singular omnipresent experiential moment is the fixed point of reference, and experienced change is instantaneous change in this ever-present. This mode is that of sense-perception, present awareness, and mindfulness. In mode of being/integration the continuum of time is the fixed point of reference, and experienced change is cumulative change through time. Substance is repetition through time, what persists despite temporary change.

An analogy to describe this which is also another instance of this interdependency is viewing a strip of film vs. viewing a "motion picture." If one places the film strip as the foundational reality, the fact remains that it was recorded from the "motion picture" of reality and organized into frames. If one places the motion picture as the foundational reality, the fact remains that one makes coherence of it by translating it into a story of change over time.

The synthesis of space and time into an interdependent continuum by Einstein is another instance of this relationship, and indeed was hugely influential to Whitehead's work. Difference and repetition is fundamental to the process of biological evolution, a process that can build on itself by evolving evolvability. Wherever one looks, The Tao of Calculus is written into the fabric of existence itself. Only one domain is left for it to be extended into: that of conscious creativity itself, of language, reason, and technology.

>>11541796
>>11541847
See my post here: >>11540091

Our perception of change is not singular but twofold: instantaneous change in the present and cumulative change over time, becoming and being.
From the perspective of becoming what is experienced is a singular, omni-present moment which is the fixed point of reference, and instantaneous change in all things within this moment. Past and present are not experienced. This is the reference frame of mindfulness and direct sensory experience, and as an ontological principle leads to the conclusions of Heraclitus, that "No man ever steps in the same river twice." It is a-narrative and a-linguistic, and is behind the Buddhistic principle that the self is an illusion (as it is a story of the self through time, requiring temporality.)
From the perspective of being the fixed point of reference is temporality and temporal extension, the entire structure of past, present, and future, with the moment being variable. The present moment is gone as soon as it arrives, it is an infinitescimal. What exists has persistance through time, with change being accidental towards the unchanged essence that persists. As an ontological principle this leads to the self being the foundation of reality, "I think, therefore I am" and the idea of object/substance as a thing in itself that only needs itself to exist.

My position is that being and becoming are two different reference frames, not mutually exclusive but complimentary. The proof of this is found in the mathematical study of change: calculus. The fundamental theorems of calculus show that integration and derivation are inverse operations of the same process, and the physical interpretations of integration and derivation are cumulative and instantaneous change respectively. Thus the fundamental theorems of calculus are a mathematical reflection of the more general metaphysical nature of change itself, showing that our perception of change isn't a mere psychological construct but a reflection of the nature of change.

The Eastern tradition that corresponds to this being-becoming synthesis is philosophical Taoism, with becoming corresponding to yin, and becoming yang. The Tao being literally described as a "path" or "way" implies that it is a principle of change, and the Tao has been described as the "the process of reality itself, the way things come together, while still transforming... The contrast is not between what things are or that something is or is not, but between chaos (hundun) and the way reality is ordering (de). Yet, reality is not ordering into one unified whole. It is the 10,000 things (wanwu). There is the dao but not “the World” or “the cosmos” in a Western sense." http://www.iep.utm.edu/daoism/#H5