Well, you should find and read the book then, Callan, because that is precisely Itoh's argument, not mine own.

It is in a word file on mine heer laptop .

I think I'm just over halfway (I've been busy with school). Also, I promised Sci a collection of health links from my psychopharmacology course, which ended Monday and for which I've kind of allocated my life towards first, and I'm hoping to mirror his emergency resource cheat-sheet for a Canadian parallel. I work on the Glossary a bit every day though.

I've been thinking about posting a couple teasers to generate some discussion in the Through the Brain Darkly subforum, especially as there is probably a significant amount of traffic here at SA interested in BBH.

I'm not promising an entirely valid or articulate collection but there have been numerous requests at TPB for a list of terms so I've attempted to break it into reference (within the glossary) heavy definitions, followed by an "Idiot's Guide" style breakdown to mirror.

At the least, the less sense I make, the more discussion to be had .

In the show The West Wing Toby Ziegler and Josh Lyman obsess over every word and turn of phrase, not just because of political implications but because wordcraft is a little like mind-control: if you say the right things with the right timing, you can actually yoke the listener's brain into a particular emotional state.

+1. Traditional linguistics and neurolinguistics are two subjects very close to my brain .

Some of the best orators in contemporary times are comedians. A lot of George Carlin's later stuff was just political rhetoric dressed up with some humorous asides. He was a master of repetition, timing and cadence.

+1 for Comedy Oratory.

They say Obama is one of the last of the great orators but I'd say he's just one of the few orators remaining at all.

Though, Occupy would have been interesting for opportune oratory.

Is anyone interested in the practice? Since reading Rhetoric for Radicals last month, I've decided it's something I'm going to work at.

I'm working my way through the first two pages of The Art of Manliness' 35 Greatest Speeches in History (unfortunately, history is skewed as just what remains for our perusal). Just rote memorization and practice (perhaps, peoples also have some speech memorization tips too).

If interested, anyone know of any other good speeches?

Cheers.

I picked up my signed copies of PON and Neuropath from storage the other day. Reunited at last .

Just gloating .

I'm getting myself some TSA apparel made (a band tour-style sweater and a circumfix hat) and I'm considering getting a few t-shirts made up in a similar style to the sweater: Who are the Dunyain? written on the front and R. Scott Bakker on the back above The Second Apocalypse Tour and The Brain Brain Tour.

What kind of contest might we run and offer the t-shirts as prizes?

Not a problem. Just thought I'd offer some personal connotations. I'm still very interested in the discussion of BBH relevant themes.

Your question draws upon the misread science I had mentioned - like the suggestion that there is a single on/off gene for consciousness. I feel Itoh's grasp of some psychological experimentation lacking, especially in comparison to Bakker.

Philosophically, I think there is some merit to Itoh's claims. So much of the manifest human problems in our various spheres (geo, bio, noos) are the result of our internal indecision/self-recrimination. Doubt can't exist without consciousness, ergo, no consciousness, no doubt. But I feel that's misconstruing the point.

It's interesting - I felt very much like Itoh's conceptions resonated more with the various posts by Benjamin Cain on TPB than Bakker's conclusions about the post-human (in the sense of using human to denote us, the contemporaneous creatures, from the creatures differing from us in the future).

We are humans fretting about how we manifest (something I hold dear as we seem to be able to choose to manifest beautifully as well as terribly) when, in reality as we are redrawn by BBH or Itoh's conclusions, we're really just protrusions of a fleshly Nature, our intentions and doubts no different than the leaves rustling the wind, plants growing towards the Star, or the motion of the planetary orbs through the galaxy. That bothers us - even though, there is so much accumulating evidence towards the conclusion. And in reality, it is only a problem so much as other humans use this leverage to dominate other humans because argumentatively, if there is no gestalt shift in perception, then these realizations wouldn't and couldn't change our behaviors.

I've experienced that over the years and various threads, Murphy. Have no enlightenment to offer.

Cheers for making it over again . I wish we could entice with a more active membership but it seems the Bakker fandom is mostly holding its breath until TUC.

Though, I'm sure you'll be interested in my fan-based, precursor glossary of Through the Brain Darkly. Thirty some odd specific BBH terms, three (I think) of which are appropriated from Philosophy and Biopsychology. I'm down to one summer credit after today and can pursue that writing more vigorously - as I want to beat the book .