Kenneth Folk on Disembedding (and Flying Monkeys)

May 7, 2010

- Kenneth Folk on Disembedding (and Flying Monkeys) -

Some years ago I was sitting around a television watching The Wizard of Oz with my family and some family friends including their little 5-year-old, Tommy. When we got to the part where the flying monkeys attack Dorothy, somebody elbowed me and pointed to little Tommy, who was sitting, mouth wide open in abject terror, eyes riveted to the TV screen. The elbowing continued around the room until all of the adults in the room where watching little Tommy, who was completely oblivious to the fact that he was now the center of attention. Little Tommy was embedded. As far as he was concerned, it was he who was being attacked by flying monkeys. Finally, one of the adults, moved to compassion by Tommy’s suffering, put a hand on his shoulder and said, “It’s all right, Tommy. You’re here with us. It’s just a movie.”

It’s possible that different people use the term “radical identification” in different ways (I hadn’t heard the term before I saw it in your post), but I would say that little Tommy was “radically identified.” And he was suffering. It was an act of compassion to reach out and help him dis-embed from his nightmare. We can learn to do that for ourselves; we can be our own wake-up call. It’s a beautiful thing to wake up and look around, only to find that you are safe and sound in your own living room, surrounded by loved ones. You can still watch the movie, but without the suffering. This is enlightenment, and this is why dis-embeddedness is preferable to radical identification.

(from comments on this article)

quotes —

And just to clarify, I don’t see the world as being the movie we have to disembed from, just our concepts about the world. The world is the world, and we are in it regardless. It’s our concepts that we’re watching and identifying with, they are the movie we’re watching, and they’re limiting our vision.

Comment by Ian — May 7, 2010 @ 12:01 pm

This is exactly what McLuhan said about television, that it draws the observer in. He actually implied that this was a good thing: a televised war could never be fought, as the civilians would complain too much.

I wonder how people reacted to Oz at the cinema?

Actually Oz is a particularly fine case-in-point, because of that thing with only going into technicolor halfway through. I remember that blew me away the first time I saw it. I’d love to know what cinema audiences of the time thought.

Comment by speedbird — May 8, 2010 @ 8:59 am

Yeah, I don’t think there’s anything really wrong with getting drawn in, just so long as we can always draw ourselves out, when we want to.

Comment by Ian — May 10, 2010 @ 11:52 am

> just so long as we can always draw ourselves out

Cool. Actually I think I’d rather like the freedom to move in and out at will… hmm.

Comment by speedbird — May 10, 2010 @ 12:45 pm

I mean, seriously, I love that feeling of embeddedness. Sometimes it seems hard to find, like the mind can’t settle and just keeps running off the surface of whatever-it-is. Technology is sometimes like this, like the makers have blocked all the ways in. I don’t like that.

Comment by speedbird — May 10, 2010 @ 12:49 pm

Yeah, later on in that comments thread, someone mentions a “zoom in, zoom out” technique, where we need to be able to both see what’s going on in our minds as “not us” (zoom out) and also be able to get into it intimately to see how it works (zoom in). Kenneth agreed that was a worthwhile goal.

I believe he means embeddedness as “stuckness”. If we’re stuck in some form of identity, that must necessarily stop us, in certain ways and on certain levels, from adopting other forms of identity. Its really all about actually just knowing what we’re doing, as best as we can. The only identity we can rely on is “no identity”, if you see what I mean.

Comment by Ian — May 10, 2010 @ 4:29 pm

Yes, actually I see what you’re getting at, hadn’t thought about it like that. Unconsciously embedding with a technology (in the broadest sense) is asking for trouble.

Comment by speedbird — May 11, 2010 @ 6:17 am

Its been explained much better here:

http://kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/3916571/Embed%2FDisembed+++Engage%2FDisengage

Comment by Ian — May 11, 2010 @ 1:17 pm

I wrote about this subject on my blog:

Avatar and the Archimidean point

Ted

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 7:27 am

Actually, what you’re talking about, that separate sense of self in the archimedean point, is what would be described as being embedded in Kenneth’s system. You’re embedded in an idea of a self that is somehow separate from its reality.

This is an untruth, because we’re never actually separated from whats going on around us. And it takes work and energy to maintain the metal boundaries that keep that illusion alive. Hence the feeling of release when that split is dissolved, all the energy is freed up to be used.

Nevertheless, as you argue, such a position does has its appeal, since it gives us a different perspective on things.

The solution, as I see it, is to somehow managed to be both. To be fully embedded and fully individual. Its a fine-tuning of opposites, but that, I think, is a good working definition of what I think of as enlightenment.

I’d further speculate (not argue-as-fact, just speculate) that this sense of the individual as apart from its surroundings is something of a stepping stone between two ways of being-in-the-world. One does not understand the self, the other understands the self but transcends it, so that we have the understanding of distinctness without the alienation of separateness.

The feeling of angst and suffering, then, would be what happens when we get sidetracked and stuck along this path of development. But to give up that feeling of separateness (in order to move beyond it, not in to fall backwards to a pre-self) is not an easy thing to do.

I guess that’s the kind of surrender I was talking about in the other post.

Comment by Ian — May 12, 2010 @ 11:07 am

I don’t think thats what you were talking about.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 11:13 am

And that makes absolutely no sense that losing yourself while watching the wizard of Oz is an analogy of being stuck in a seperate sense of self.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 11:15 am

I think your definition of enlightenment makes sense though and reminds me of something I read by Alan Watts.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 11:18 am

I don’t think thats what you were talking about.

Well, you would know more than I would, I suppose. ;)

losing yourself while watching the wizard of Oz is an analogy of being stuck in a seperate sense of self.

Both involve being stuck in something that you don’t need to be stuck in, but that is causing you fear and suffering (which you wouldn’t feel if you weren’t stuck in it). The key part of Kenneth’s story is that the kid was frightened by the monkey’s on the TV, but couldn’t seem to bring himself to look away from it.

I think your definition of enlightenment makes sense though and reminds me of something I read by Alan Watts.

Thank you, very much. That it makes sense to someone else (you) and that it reminds you of Alan Watts are both high compliments to me.

Comment by Ian — May 12, 2010 @ 11:32 am

I think Alan Watts had it right.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 11:37 am

That was his understanding of Zen Buddhism being the “middle way.”

There are bright people from time to time that are able to distill the essences out of things, like cultures and religions. I think Alan Watts was such a person.

Then there are dolts, that copy all the superfolous minutae to the letter and get the big stuff wrong. A lot of the People over there are dolts, being doltish about their native religion. Then there are people over here following the dolts, dressing and talking like them.

People such as Lamas can grow up around all this religious talk and be steeped in it and sound really smart but really be a dolt/scumbag and ironically a bright sincere person can hear what some scoundrel cult leader spews and discern the core truth from it.

But in the final analysis, this core of truth is just part of the truth. There are still lots of problems in the World.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 11:50 am

Yeah, I hear you, that’s well said. Though even Alan Watts was a student of a Zen Roshi for some time, under formal zen training rules. His bio’s pretty interesting.

The middle way is the key. There’s core truths, and there’s the live expression of those truths, and its not easy to have both…

Comment by Ian — May 12, 2010 @ 12:04 pm

I think the core expression of truth is always revolutionary. It should be a dynamic thing that adjusts with the times. I don’t think any entrenched religious institution has that as its aim.

I think Eastern Religions make enlightenment as an end and it should be the beginning of a revolution. I don’t think any clergy from Asian Countries have many answers for solutions to Western Problems because Asian countries have the same problems.

These poeple that want to buy into this stuff whole hog, and adopt the dress and the rituals and the mannerisms and take Asian names are just exchanging one set of problems for another.

The best you can hope for is a synergy. I think Allan Watts was on the right track with that.

I think a lot of these hippies looking at the relationship between quantum physics and eastern religion were on the right track.

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 1:01 pm

Well, the East offered the West a lot of what it was missing, when the west “discovered” these ancient traditions. And the West went over to that strongly, recognizing it was important. But we overdid it, and so know it seems to be a case of digesting what we’ve eaten, making use of whats useful and getting rid of whats not.

Comment by Ian — May 12, 2010 @ 1:25 pm

I really like this from Watt’s Wikipedia entry:

Watts often wrote about, or sometimes alluded to, a group of neighbors in Druid Heights (near Mill Valley, California), who had endeavored to combine architecture, gardening, and carpentry skills to make a beautiful and comfortable life for themselves. These neighbors accomplished this by relying on their own talents and using their own hands, as they lived in what has been called “shared bohemian poverty.”[11] Druid Heights was founded by the writer Elsa Gidlow.[12]

Regarding his intentions, Watts attempted to lessen the alienation that accompanies the experience of being human that he felt plagued the modern Westerner, and (like his fellow British expatriate and friend, Aldous Huxley) to lessen the ill will that was an unintentional by-product of alienation from the natural world. He felt such teaching could improve the world, at least to a degree. He also articulated the possibilities for greater incorporation of aesthetics (for example: better architecture, more art, more fine cuisine) in American life. In his autobiography he wrote, “… cultural renewal comes about when highly differentiated cultures mix”.[13]

Comment by Ted — May 12, 2010 @ 1:34 pm

Yeah, that’s good stuff right there.

Check this out: http://boingboing.net/2005/06/11/erik-davis-visits-dr.html

Too anarchic and happenstance to count as a commune, Druid Heights became what Gidlow jokingly called “an unintentional community:” a vortex of social and artistic energy that bloomed out of nowhere, did its wild and sometimes destructive thing, and, for the most part, moved on.

Sounds like your kind of place, Ted! :)

Comment by Ian — May 12, 2010 @ 2:16 pm

>> Its been explained much better here:

Good link, thanks. Again, I think McLuhan talked about a lot of this stuff, just not quite as succinctly.

>> a televised war could never be fought, as the civilians would complain too much

Been thinking about this. It occurs to me that the exception to this was the Cold war, but only because EVERYONE was a combatant. Except the hippies and the Greenham Common women.

Now we’re back to the state where the true war is not being broadcast on TV or intermesh. In fact it seems there’s a concerted disinformation effort. Entirely appropriate for the circumstances, I suppose.

Ever wondered how to hide something from Google? It’s worth giving some thought.

*

Also this:

‘Video killed the radio star
In my mind and in my car
We can’t rewind, we’ve gone too far…’

Comment by speedbird — May 16, 2010 @ 4:52 am

yeah, McLuhan was frustratingly vague/complex, though I feel as if this was due to how much he was taking into account…

And I like your point about the Cold War, “everyone was a combatant”. That’s right on the spot.

I believe, when it comes to hiding things from google, you can add a small text file on your server, telling webcrawlers that their not to crawl the page. And supposedly they don’t. But I don’t think you really meant that literally, yeah? ;)

If we’ve gone too far, then we just have to keep going. Only, in a different direction…

Comment by Ian — May 17, 2010 @ 3:04 pm

>> I don’t think you really meant that literally, yeah?

I mean, suppose you want to prevent Google users from finding stuff on your project? Sort of the opposite of ‘search-engine optimisation’. How do you make Google really inefficient in your chosen field of operation? It’s worth thinking about, that’s all I’ll say in this forum.

Comment by speedbird — May 18, 2010 @ 2:26 am

Google doesn’t seem as efficient to me anymore. Tim Boucher would know more about that. There is a software called “buzz tracker” that was developed by the World Bank that tracks anyone mentioning “The World Bank” in blogs. You can use it for any word you want to see what people are saying about you/your organization.

Comment by Ted — May 18, 2010 @ 7:13 am

http://blog.dreamhosters.com/kbase/index.cgi?area=1172

Comment by Ian — May 18, 2010 @ 10:33 am

Also:

http://www.antezeta.com/blog/avoid-search-engine-indexing

Comment by Ian — May 18, 2010 @ 10:34 am

>> You can use it for any word you want

Well, exactly. :)

Comment by speedbird — May 18, 2010 @ 11:22 am

Reclusland

May 7, 2010

- Kenneth Folk on Disembedding (and Flying Monkeys) -

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