OTF - Our Thinking Forum

[noleisthebest]

T. Edison:

“Five percent of the people think; 
ten percent of the people think they think; 
and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.”



Discuss.


ps

I thought we could have a thinking thread here...be a bit creative.

Humour, poetry, own theories...what's happening, what's going to happen kind of thing...

Leave your pride and PC shoes outside the door.

Nobody knows everything! 

(except Daniel  )

[legendkillar]

I am going to go out on a limb and suggest this is partly born out if the recent debate that erupted on the Nastase/Williams/Konta saga.

I am all for creative thinking. However more from a perception aspect. How people see life and it's environment and surroundings. Philosophies essentially. I like how a way of life or philosophy can help one achieve a more spiritual connection with themselves.

To quote one of my favourite poets:

"The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity...and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself."

[noleisthebest]

No, I was just listening to someone who quoted Edison.

I was intrigued by the numbers.

For most of my life I lived with the notion of "the other 80%".

Then recently a friend mentioned that there is only 10% of thinking people.

But I agree with Edison...it's probably only 5%.

That has at least been my experience.

And it fascinates me why it is such a small number.



I get your point about all of us seeing things differently...but that is not the same as having the thirst for truth.

[legendkillar]

But truth and creative are 2 different things....

Almost like a platform to spout accusations without any real substance.

Re: Edison. I think the quote essentially was in context of people not maximising their cognitive ability. Dare I say this isn't anything to do with trying to establish truth.

[noleisthebest]

The idea is to question things, not for the sake of questioning or self-gloating, but to find truth.

The opposite is not to question anything, anesthetise the mind, morals, etc...and slowly die.

I dunno, I've had that urge ever since I can remember.

[legendkillar]

Depends on what truth it is you are trying seek. Relating to the quote I posted, it's the equivalent of taking two people to look at tree and ask what they see.

My urge or should I say my natural curiosity has always been to see beyond what is in front of me. Take the blandness out of things. Go by instinct rather than instruction.

I don't watch the news. I find that my happiness levels increased as a result. All I saw was doom and gloom and mass hysteria and getting caught up in emotions with things I had no control over. Didn't see I needed to keep wasting my life like that.

My family find me weird because I will go out on long walks into green fields and try to find the furthest horizon to stare behind. I have to say part of me when I stand in an empty field and look across the horizon thinks "hundreds of years ago this was the norm" as in beauty like that was global. I watch wildlife in all it's glory and fascinates me to watch other animals completely embrace their own environment.

I enjoy writing down thoughts, stories, poems. Anything that takes me out of the reality I exist in. I hope that my children will embrace that similarly. Though I wouldn't think any less of them if they didn't.

[Jahu]

You also go and mow the law of you in-laws every weekend like a little puppy, but still we accept you as you are 

You be good dady one day

[noleisthebest]

Depends on what truth it is you are trying seek. Relating to the quote I posted, it's the equivalent of taking two people to look at tree and ask what they see.

My urge or should I say my natural curiosity has always been to see beyond what is in front of me. Take the blandness out of things. Go by instinct rather than instruction.

I don't watch the news. I find that my happiness levels increased as a result. All I saw was doom and gloom and mass hysteria and getting caught up in emotions with things I had no control over. Didn't see I needed to keep wasting my life like that.

My family find me weird because I will go out on long walks into green fields and try to find the furthest horizon to stare behind. I have to say part of me when I stand in an empty field and look across the horizon thinks "hundreds of years ago this was the norm" as in beauty like that was global. I watch wildlife in all it's glory and fascinates me to watch other animals completely embrace their own environment.

I enjoy writing down thoughts, stories, poems. Anything that takes me out of the reality I exist in. I hope that my children will embrace that similarly. Though I wouldn't think any less of them if they didn't.

That is the whole point!

Will your chkdren have a meadow & fields to walk through and time to sit and stare.

[legendkillar]

Well they might do should people stop multiplying at an alarming rate!

[legendkillar]

http://www.cambridgeblog.org/2017/04/celebrating-national-poetry-month-200-years-since-poems-by-john-keats/

Fascinating read I have to say. I wish there was this artistic undercurrent today in such times.

[noleisthebest]

Hehe, I actually studied English language and literature (as well as world literature), poetry being my mode of expression and a soothing way of relating to world...

I concluded though that there is no poetry in English language.

Yes, I know there are many well known poems.

But for me, no poetry. It is too rational & earthly, verbose and just like its people - beats about the bush...
Does not go beyond 3d. No element of quantum which is the essence of poetry.

I know poetry won't fill one's stomach but for me it's kind of the last bastion of keeping alive.

I almost think there is such a thing as a gene of poetry.

It is interesting how various nations/languages express themselves through poetry.

The more complex the grammar - the better it is. 

And generally not very long.

The unsaid says more than words...as the main task and burden of a poet is to express/unload the unatterable.

[legendkillar]

Depends if you define poetry as planned constructed body of work or just a random chaotic burst of inspiration.

Good poetry grabs for you that split second and captivates you and makes you question what you ever knew of this life and takes you away from being you.

It's a dying art for sure.

[noleisthebest]

There is absolutely nothing "constructed" and "planned" in poetry...that's prose.

[legendkillar]

Maybe not in it's conception, but certainly around it's shaping for sure. Read many works which to have read like they've been imposed upon the body of work. Anyone who's anyone has conceived an ideal and at times not ended up with the outcome they expected.

[noleisthebest]

No, not at all. Poetry is like the wind. Nobody knows where it's come and where it will go.

The person whose pen it pours out of is just a vessel.

Everything else is just decorating and frills of various thoughts and emotions.

[legendkillar]

Centuries ago I would share that notion. Purely because of the under-developed nature of the English language. Now, even when I write I find it difficult to truly accept that what I have written was born out of pure inspiration.

Past poetry I love. The language certainly had a purity about it. Nowadays I find it difficult find the same joy with today's poets.

Like any form of artistry. You know that feeling when you reach a point when you just start looking backwards over what has felt a progressive journey.

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