(3D+) Reframing Spirituality: A New Series

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It sure is good to be back and talking Resilience with old and new friends. I’d like to think at you also about a related topic, namely, spirituality, and specifically how to reframe it in our time of the great unraveling. The purpose of this post is to seek out a few similar-minded people, similar to the regulars in Resilience discussions, who would converse with me as I try to sort out my own spirituality. More below:

First off, I realize that this is a lightning rod topic. I will explain some of my rules for participation at the end of this post and as we go along. All right, let’s get to it (before I change my mind :=) Here’s my take on the importance of spirituality and where I’m at with it.

Resilience is about working on things within our control: our person and our local community. The first item in personal resilience is a strong, sound mind and will. Of all the practical tools and best practices, a strong mind and will is foremost. In the spring, I posted several reflections on Stoicism. You can find them in the Resilience essay queue. I have found Stoicism to the best practical philosophy for building a strong mind and will and rely on it daily.

Here's the thing. I found and read Stoicism in depth because I needed stronger medicine than the weak tea of my Anglican faith to help me survive PTSD. And my experience was common: Christianity (and all theism) is dead religion walking: conscious folks everywhere are struggling to reformulate their spirituality in intelligible words for themselves. That is certainly my problem. Perhaps it is yours too.

None of us is Einstein. He had no difficulty at all. I once copied one of his sayings:

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the sower of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms-this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong to the ranks of devoutly religious men.
(Phillip Frank, Einstein: His Life and Times, p.285)

I’m like: “What he said.” But I can’t use his words for my spirituality; I have to find my own, now that speaking Anglican doesn’t make any sense anymore. So here is where I think we are at.

The advent of Christianity as the dominant mode of thought in the Roman Empire and subsequently in Europe displaced the practical philosophies of antiquity, such as Stoicism or Epicurianism. Classical philosophies were practical life guides in a cosmopolitan, pluralistic world. Citizens hired the eminent philosophers of their liking to teach them how best to live. If a philosopher couldn’t help clients live better lives, he didn’t eat. Christianity abrogated that role, to the extent that all knowledge and wisdom was subjugated to Christian doctrine. Philosophy was retired to academia, where "the fights are so deadly because the stakes are so low."

From there, philosophy battled Christianity under all sorts of guises until the enlightenment gave it an assist, together with the other forces of modernity. Christianity was at last vanquished to its present state of ruin; a religion fit only for the developing world, until enough development will eventually consign it to the history books in those places where history is still taught.
Postmodern people will not mourn its loss, and that gap in the social fabric was quickly filled by the new religion birthed by the enlightenment.

So here we find ourselves at the early days of the 21st c., bereft of any life guidance save that of the present global state religion – capitalism. If you don’t know that capitalism is a religion, you should brush up on religion a bit. Capitalism has its god - the omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent market; it has its devil - socialism, ‘nuff said; its body of life wisdom - the manifold creeds of greed in individualistic consumerism; and its sacred calendar with great festivals of bacchanalian consumption like Superbowl Sunday and Black Friday.

This is all perfectly obvious, but if you’d like to learn more on the market as god, Harvey Cox is a good guide. He taught on religion at Harvard for 50 years. (He’s got a new book out on this topic.) If you’d like to read him on this, here’s a link to a 1999 article of his in The Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1999/03/the-market-as-god/30...
(Don’t get me wrong, eh. All religions have been one long losing battle against greed within themselves.)
Those of us, who cannot and will not be assimilated by the market, huddle in little corners like c99, trying to figure out WTF happened to our society and us.

How should we live now? Here in "the desolation they call peace?" as Tacitus described it in his Agricola. The market, our modern state religion, has atomized us and enslaved us just as, or perhaps even more effectively than, Christianity had done in its imperial Hellenic form. Capitalism has reduced to hollow slogans all of the “ties that bind" individuals, local communities, and society together.
Humans are "produced" by our education system, brainwashed families, and consumer culture - much as meat is "produced" in industrial agriculture - to be atomized, defenseless, powerless food for the privileged elites. What do you think they eat at Davos? With a bit of Chianti :=)

Capitalist society atomizes us deliberately, unrelentingly, and continuously. Think of the two-income economic trap. Read Elizabeth Warren's book (with her daughter) on that: The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Parents Are Going Broke, 2003. As families, we have zero power over anything because both parents are running on their separate hamster wheels in the same cage made from plastic cards. The market insists that its producer-consumers (not “it’s citizens,” eh) live like that. It’s the prime directive of the god “Market.”

Arbeit macht frei” and all that.

Lovie and I made a conscious, deliberate choice 25 years ago to live on one salary no matter what. For all the hardships, we'd both do it all over again. Our grown children tell us repeatedly that we made the right choice for them. What we lost in world we made up in life, family, love, and relationships. We had made a spiritual choice, informed by our counter-cultural values, which came from our religious convictions. Naturally, your mileage may differ.

Think of how capitalism atomizes us by exploding our families. We had to invent the Orwellian phrase "nuclear family" to describe the first phase of family dispersal.
The market’s centrifugal forces have made families so disintegrated nowadays that most kids think the "nuclear family" is the town’s Atom hockey team.
We are produced by society as atomized individuals - with no "ties that bind" to anyone or anything or anywhere - who are easy, peasy prey for global marketers.

Capitalism destroyed our democratic institutions and our common values. Kids graduate high school as highly trained consumers, not citizens. We've been sheared away from our societal roles in our local communities and our civic duties as citizens. Atomized individuals are easy propaganda consumers; there's no family, community, or societal filters left.

Well, you know all this already. And you probably also know that the word "religion" comes from the Latin "religare," which means, "to bind or tie together," as in mooring a ship. Today, the word “religion” has fallen into disrepute. Religion today means “something odious,” like organized crime, or prostitution, or taxidermy. Deservedly so, many would rightly say. Indeed. Say, how does one moor a ship when the piers got blown up? That’s what we’re trying to figure out here.

If there are four or five or so c99 members who would like to converse with me as I think at them about reframing spirituality, send me a pm or say "holla" in the comment section. Here’s what I propose. I’d like to call the series “3D+” and I’ll explain that as we go. The posts will be meant only for folks who experience the universe “multi-dimensionally,” for want of a better word.

Here’s a preliminary indication of what I mean. Much of our western culture requires of societal participants an adherence to the dogmas of materialist reductionism. Materialist = only matter exists. Reductionism = you can have any number of dimensions, as long as it adds up to three.
Everything must be explainable in the three dimensions that humans minimally experience.
(Similar to how Christianity insisted that everything must be explainable through the biblical worldview.) This works well for simple human endeavours such as science and technology.
Your mileage though, may vary as you try to apply it to more challenging things, like living a good life.
Aristotle said in his Nichomachean Ethics, along with most Greeks, that the goal of life is to flourish. Try that in no more than three dimensions :=)

For some people, materialist reductionism becomes more than a worldview. A worldview is one’s general orientation to life: it’s changeable, has many moving parts, and is open to new information. Circumstances may cause a person’s worldview to harden, lose compassion, and reject the new.
Cultural disinformation and internal fears usually form large components of such circumstances.
I have PTSD and am unlearning loads of ideological formations from the dumpster of my mind.
My shorthand for such a person is a “flatlander.” Read the little Victorian novella - the mathematical satire of E.A. Abbott called Flatland: A Romance In Many Dimensions, written under the delightful pseudonym of “A Square.” Here's a little summary:

Flatland described a two-dimensional universe inhabited by figures such as lines, squares, pentagons, circles, and so on. On the eve of the millennium, a sphere passed into the home of a square, an inhabitant of this two-dimensional universe. You can imagine the cognitive dissonance that the square flatlander experienced as the sphere tried to explain the addition of height to the dimensions of length and width.

The sphere then tried to preach to the council of flatland this experience of three dimensions.
The councilors flatly rejected it. Apparently, this particular "lunacy" appeared once per millennium.
So they quickly hid all the evidence and life continued in flatland as before, until the next millenium, which would be someone else's problem.

Thereafter, the sphere took the square on a visit to spaceland, where he saw a cube and speculated enthusiastically (to the horror of the sphere) on the possible existence of four dimensions. Upon his return to flatland, he tried to explain this vision of many dimensions to his grandson and others. Naturally, he ended up on trial for heresy before the council. The story ended with him in prison, dreaming dreams of “upwards, not northwards” and of the “once-seen, oft-regretted cube.”

So that introduces the series title “3D+” Three dimensions plus. Remember, it is a metaphor: don‘t get all literal, eh :=)

William James, the Harvard scholar of the 19th century, was a founder of American psychology and a renowned philosopher. He gave the Edinburgh Gifford Lectures in 1901, which were subsequently published as The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature (1902).
James said this about individuals who have worked purposefully at enlarging their field of consciousness and experience beyond that of their evolutionary endowment and cultural constraints:

He becomes conscious that this higher part is conterminous and continuous with a MORE of the same quality, which is operative in the universe outside of him, and which he can keep in working touch with, and in a fashion get on board of and save himself when all his lower being has gone to pieces in the wreck (his italics, pp. 498-9).

A flatlander rejects this statement outright, often with contempt. Well dear reader - you who have persevered this far - if James’ statement elicits a smile not a frown, I’d like to converse with you about “the More.” I would like to find words to describe my experience of “the More” over my lifetime, now that the Anglican ones I know have become senseless. For I have always had such experiences: before I became a Christian, when I was a Christian, and now still when I am a post-Christian.

The dumbest question in the world is “Do you believe in God?”
What has belief to do with reality?
I believe that E=mc2 (where's the superscript button?) because Einstein did the math: I’m not smart enough to understand any of it. I believe it because Einstein’s peers agree with him after they reviewed his math. Believing Einstein though, changes nothing in my world. Sure thing, so what?

I don’t believe in “the More,” I experience it. It changes my world and being through experience.
Could you believe in “the More” because I say it exists? Of course not: you experience it or you don’t.
In this 3D+ series I want to talk with other folks who experience “the More.”
There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with being a flatlander. Same with being a 3D+ person, long as it’s a worldview not an ideology, it’s fine. We just don’t have anything, anything at all, to say to each other, because we have no experiences in common. Cheers and best wishes: stay in your lane.

Oh yes, apart from quotes from pre-modern traditions, we’ll not have much use for the word “God” in the 3D+ series. Within three dimensions, "God" is a verb, as the rabbi once explained. More to follow.

A last word about words. They’re our biggest problem, especially when we mistake words and reality for each other. The Taoist master (we know as) Chuang Tzu (3rd century B.C.E) explained it like this:

A fish-trap is for catching fish: once you’ve caught the fish, you can forget about the trap.
A rabbit-snare is for catching rabbits: once you’ve caught the rabbit, you can forget about the snare.
Words are for catching ideas: once you’ve caught the idea, you can forget about the words.
Where can I find a person who knows how to forget about words so I can have few words with him?
(Wandering on the Way: Early Taoist Tales and Parables of Chuang Tzu, 1994, p.276.)

I’m looking for the same people :=) We’ll begin in the next post with the notion of the holon and holarchies.

PS: Those who don’t need any words are in the same masterclass as the Dali Lama. When asked what his religion was, he said, “Compassion.”

Peace be with us (honestly, it's not worth arguing about any of this :=)
gerrit

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michelewln's picture

I'm one of the administrators for Street Prophets at TOP where we have been able to discuss things like this for many years. I would love to participate over here if you would like. I was born Catholic, fell away many years ago, sleep under a quilt blessed by a Native American shaman, and read the Tao te Ching when stressed to calm down and refocus.

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A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world. Oscar Wilde

Gerrit's picture

I look forward to us talking! I remember SP at top and would like to see something similar here at c99. I'd appreciate any and all advice and help :=) We'll have fun.

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

Raggedy Ann's picture

as I can. Busy working that job that capitalism has dictated in order to try and live. Once my house is paid off, though - I'm outta here!

I was raised Catholic but left it long ago. I believe in one energy force that we are all part of - no separation. Reincarnation is another of my beliefs. Look forward to the discussions. Good

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Gerrit's picture

off that house soon, eh. Outta there!!! Best to R.Andy.

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magiamma's picture

Glad to participate. I call myself a Buddhist because of kindness. I love to be quiet and listen when I am outside in nature. I learn so much.

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Gerrit's picture

so glad you're in. Best wishes, g

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PriceRip's picture

          . . . conscious folks everywhere are struggling to reformulate their spirituality in intelligible words for themselves.

I prefer Einstein's words to those of Phillip Frank:

          The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. This insight into the mystery of life, coupled though it be with fear, has also given rise to religion. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms— this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong in the ranks of devoutly religious men.

          I come from a similar place as Einstein but with a little more modern point of view.

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Gerrit's picture

has treated you well. You're always welcome to anything I try, my friend. You think with such precision. This is a field that requires as much precision as we can muster given the complex terrain. It's real good to "see" you again, eh. Cheers, mate, g

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

I think science is the foundation of spirituality. How can anyone look at the beauty of planet and universe and not be in awe.

I'd love to drop by to see if I fit.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Gerrit's picture

are warmly welcomed. I will try to make it clear in the next essay on holons that theist language is senseless in postmodernity. (In 3Dmax, "God" is a verb anyway, not a noun.) The "more" that we experience, which theist language tried to describe, prompts us to try to find new language. That's what we're trying to do here in 3D+
Have a great day, dkm,

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

Your timing is perfect Gerrit, thank you (because I'm getting tired of my own deep/post Primary/pre shitty General cynicism). And altho I read here more than I comment, a big yes please from me for your time and efforts to guide us through 3D+ ...and beyond! Wink

Oh, and I love this place/will be sending JtC more $$ asap!
Smile

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Gerrit's picture

and I hope you'll dive in when you feel like it, eh. I have the same problem. I experience so much, yet I can't say a damned thing, because I don't want to be misunderstood. And without a new language, it's real hard to find companions with a similar worldview. Well, with folks like you around, we'll be all right talking 3D+

And TY for the donation reminder.
Cheers, my friend,

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

Sounds good to me.

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Gerrit's picture

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

Unabashed Liberal's picture

to read this series (than to dive into the discussion), since it's often difficult to explain, or discuss spirituality.

Wink

Considering examining the precepts of Buddhism, since our local Unitarian Universalist Congregation hosts a Buddhist meditation service once a week. UU is a cool denomination. Actually, some folks mock it, denying that it qualifies as a religious denomination--but that doesn't bother us.

(Many of the good folks at the dog rescue, SOSD, are Buddhists. Looking at the selfless way many of them live their lives, has peaked my interest in this faith/philosophy.)

Catch up with you Guys, later!

Mollie


“I believe in the redemptive powers of a dog’s love. It is in recognition of each dog’s potential to lift the human spirit, and, therefore, to change society for the better, that I fight to make sure every street dog has its day.”
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Gerrit's picture

Buddhist meditation references. I love the Unitarian Church. When I couldn't be an Anglican anymore - too much cognitive dissonance and real differences - we switched to the UU church and attended for years. My family loved it. Sadly, the Ottawa UU congregation is simply too far away for us to participate. I carry the UU statement of principles in my wallet.

I led meditation classes at church and at work for a good long while. Sadly, when the PTSD closed in, the fractures in my cognitive functions made meditation impossible. We'll talk some about meditation here in 3D+ later on when we get to practices: the how's and whats, the benefits, and the cases where one should not meditate (for long periods, brief meditation up to 2 minutes still works.)

Thanks Mollie, for bringing up these wunnerful topics :=)

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mimi's picture

Your essay is pretty complicated for my level of spiritual or religious education, which is none. Can't participate in that. I like the Einstein quote.I have met highly educated scientists, who come from that same corner, one that I can follow. Some people told me God is good, and they were pretty despaired. I have no clue why the question what that persons believes, is dumb. I would not ask such a question, but I don't consider it a dumb question. I don't know if I could believe that God is good, considering what happens in the world among its peoples. Nor do I know if I am an atheist or an agnostic. Sometimes I believe in God. Other times not. I let people believe what they want. Because it's hard to change a believer. That much I learned. If you pray, does it mean you believe in God? Sometimes I pray, you know, like a little child.

Too bad I can't talk smartly about those things. Good luck with the series, I will read it.

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elenacarlena's picture

he's saying that what you believe is irrelevant to reality. What is, does not depend upon belief.

How'm I doing, Gerrit? There are, of course, philosophers who disagree with this view. Then again, there are philosophers who disagree with everything.

I am interesting in the series and will at least read and strive to understand. I only know the Church in which I was raised, and that they have a lot of it wrong.

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mimi's picture

I don't know what a buttinsky is, but don't many people believe in something that has nothing to do with reality, because they want to escape reality and not face it, as they wouldn't be able to handle reality? They are may be reality-deniers for the sake of keeping their sanity. Would you blame them for it?I think it's often a self-protective measure.

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Pluto's Republic's picture

This one is a doozy:

...don't many people believe in something that has nothing to do with reality, because they want to escape reality and not face it

Yes, they do. In some cultures like the US, they invest more energy in denial than they invest in adapting to evolutionary change, which is a constant in this universe. They spend a lot of public money on denial, too! Most of their legislation is actually a prohibition of reality. Or a prophylactic to prevent unwanted reality.

They may be reality-deniers for the sake of keeping their sanity. Would you blame them for it?

I certainly don't blame them. But they can't have their country back either. I'm sorry. They and their votes are what happened to democracy in the US.

It would be paradise to live in a nation of enlightened stoics.

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The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
janis b's picture

that makes you wonder how Americans will ever manifest the change they need, when they keep voting for the opposite, and are desperate to believe in all the voices that are untrustworthy.

"They may be reality-deniers for the sake of keeping their sanity. Would you blame them for it?" ... mimi

"I certainly don't blame them. But they can't have their country back either. I'm sorry. They and their votes are what happened to democracy in the US." ... Pluto

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mimi's picture

enlightened stoics.

They may be reality-deniers for the sake of keeping their sanity. Would you blame them for it? - mimi

I certainly don't blame them. - pluto

I thought if I really, really don't blame some believers. Even if I understand the denial of reality and an attempt to believe in something to escape from the reality, if the believers are stoic and believe in shit that abuses other people with it, my patient generosity to see them as part of our human range of coping is running thin.

There are a lot of un-enlightened and inhumane stoic believers. I try to walk away from thoese. And if they get exploitative I think one should fight them.

And there we have the next misery in the making. You are damned if do and damned if you don't. So to speak. And then all there is to say (to myself) is: "God help us, because we don't know what we are doing"

Thanks, Pluto, this place here is at times enlightening and you play a big part making it that way. And that makes me quite happy and all worth it.
I-m so happy

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Who is pulling their load while they're off in la la land? Assuming avoidance is a weakness and I do, it doesn't get catered to. It goes to boot camp and toughens up.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Gerrit's picture

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Gerrit's picture

are always so humble and you raise the deepest heart of matters so fast. It was a wunnerful pleasure to read the comment thread. It's precisely the kind of discussions I would like us to engage in.

I used the wrong word. (Saying something is dumb is always dumb!) I meant useless or unprofitable. For all the reasons that elena and pluto and all have raised. Even that may be too strong: perhaps it would be better to say something like it is a question too fraught with difficulty for having a fruitful discussion.

I'm so happy you're interested. Enjoy your day, mimi,

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mimi's picture

to really read a long essay like this and stay focussed. Often I have to google several times to understand what has been written. That is tiring. I was very tired reading yesterday. I have the similar problems sometimes with hecate's essays. They are full of hints and expressions and truthiness behind the words, it takes me several trips to 'the google' to get the essence right. But those are very funny. And then I like to have some strength left to really read the articles in the EB. They are essentially what I am coming here for. I am telling you 12 hours are not enough for that either.

So I get unfair and impatient and make remarks that are hurtful. Like I did to you. Speaking of doing something dumb ... i am part of that crowd ...

I am determined to have a good day. It's ninetydegrees already in the morning, I think I will throw myself in the bathtub with ice cubes in the cold water. Even the cold water is not cold anymore coming out of the faucet.

You have a cool day, all.

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Gerrit's picture

spirituality, sadly, is and will be very dense. It's partly because of too much education, and partly because it's all really close to my core. I have a master's degree in religion and a lifetime of reading and contemplation. The result is that I'm so full of compacted shit there's a brown spot between my eyes :=)

The solution to the dense writing is lots of comment discussion. That's where we'll unpack stuff and become clearer on things. Mimi, please feel free to just copy paste any dense sentence and say, "G, what do you mean?"

I do understand about the energy demands of c99. I feel the same: there's too much and not enough time in the day. I thank you for any time you add me to your reading list.

The heat is frightful. When we lived in Africa, we had no AC. In the summer, Lovie would draw a cold bath early in the morning when the pipes were cool. During the day, she'd pop in and out to cool down. And that was a dry, semi-desert air. Yours is very humid, I think. That's a big problem. Best wishes, g

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elenacarlena's picture

more. Dense and compact if possible, one concept at a time? Maybe not always possible because you want to cover the topic thoroughly, but where possible we would absorb more I think.

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Gerrit's picture

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janis b's picture

There’s so much here to read and to consider. The link to the Atlantic article was a great read. I highlighted a few excerpts, but the whole piece, with its threads of thought and understanding about the The Market being synonymous with religion was fascinating.

Divine omnipotence means the capacity to define what is real. It is the power to make something out of nothing and nothing out of something. The willed-but-not-yet-achieved omnipotence of The Market means that there is no conceivable limit to its inexorable ability to convert creation into commodities. But again, this is hardly a new idea, though it has a new twist. In Catholic theology, through what is called "transubstantiation," ordinary bread and wine become vehicles of the holy. In the mass of The Market a reverse process occurs. Things that have been held sacred transmute into interchangeable items for sale. Land is a good example. For millennia it has held various meanings, many of them numinous. It has been Mother Earth, ancestral resting place, holy mountain, enchanted forest, tribal homeland, aesthetic inspiration, sacred turf, and much more. But when The Market's Sanctus bell rings and the elements are elevated, all these complex meanings of land melt into one: real estate. At the right price no land is not for sale, and this includes everything from burial grounds to the cove of the local fertility sprite. This radical desacralization dramatically alters the human relationship to land; the same happens with water, air, space, and soon (it is predicted) the heavenly bodies.

And the Liebenberg manifestation of this is a potential tragedy.

The Market is not only around us but inside us, informing our senses and our feelings ... I am beginning to think that for all the religions of the world, however they may differ from one another, the religion of The Market has become the most formidable rival, the more so because it is rarely recognized as a religion.

Certainly, as you imply, our spiritual wellbeing would improve if - "Citizens hired the eminent philosophers of their liking to teach them how best to live.”

I will at some point read more about what you are referring to. Thank you for posting this.

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lotlizard's picture

The Market: What am I bid for . . . death in Yemen and sectarian genocide across the Middle East, which progressives would normally condemn but for the fact that now it’s Democrats who are leading it?

Obama: 115 billion from the Saudis for arms.

The Market: 115 billion going once . . . going twice . . . sold! to the Democrat in the pantsuit and the Democrat in the White House for 115 billion dollars from the Saudis for arms.

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Gerrit's picture

a good read. You highlighted some great pieces on the market as religion. This one goes to the heart, the dark heart in the Joseph Conrad sense:

The Market is not only around us but inside us, informing our senses and our feelings ...

I hope to introduce folks to Walter Wink, an important author and practitioner on nonviolence. He wrote from a progressive Christian pov, but his teachings are easily read by pluralists. He snuck in and out of South Africa in the 70s teaching nonviolent resistance to anti-apartheid activists. He wrote a trilogy on what he called "the principalities and the powers" in which he dealt with exactly what you highlighted. A very helpful book is his summation called The Powers That Be. I hope to raise some concepts from that along the road.

Thanks so much, janis. Enjoy your day, g

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Pluto's Republic's picture

It's too unutterably depressing to realize that most people on this planet believe in other people's gods because they don't have one of their own. Insufficient evolution in the sentient species bodes poorly for their future.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
janis b's picture

and this statement consolidates so well and succinctly so much of what I enjoy in your 'sayings'.

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Pluto's Republic's picture

But thanks for the kind words, Janis. We've always shared a warm regard.

The real truth is, I thought the topic was "Paradigm Shift" and I was trying to pitch in.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
janis b's picture

And I think you only sound like a broken record to yourself, while dedicatedly trying to help anything broken ; )

[video:https://youtu.be/ijftZIE9b7g?list=PLIYziAULhFZxdJWLf5_JFiLxu_jEuun7f]

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

People believe in the religion of capitalism without knowing it's a religion. (It's posing as bedrock reality. Arrogant little sod.)

As for other gods, I'd argue a bit against what Gerrit is saying here re: outdated Christianity; there's never been a better time to believe in a sky god who is going to give you great rewards in an afterlife in which you leave this earth and go...somewhere...up above it.

I deeply envy the people who believe in those things. They are better adapted to survive right now than I am.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Gerrit's picture

the Joe Hill song "The Preacher And The Slave" in the post says it beautifully :=)

There's even a 2,000 year-long current in Christianity that tells folks they can have their cake and eat it too: they can get rich and go to heaven. It's called the "prosperity gospel" and it's what blasts out from these televangelist types. No sense of shame at all :=)

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Gerrit's picture

read this a few years ago:

Evolution can be fast, but not fast enough to keep up with the rate of human-caused climate change, say two researchers who have studied the evolution rates of hundreds of species in the past.

In fact, many vertebrate species would have to speed up their evolution rate 10,000 times to match today's pedal-to-the-metal rate of global warming, according to John Wiens, an ecology and evolutionary biology professor at the University of Arizona, and Ignacio Quintero, a postgraduate research assistant at Yale University.

"A big question is 'Can some species adapt quickly enough to survive?'" said Wiens. “So we looked at 17 groups of animals” comprising 540 species that included amphibians, birds, reptile and mammals, to see how they adapted to temperature changes in the past. “We estimated the rate of climate change for these species.”

Specifically, they looked at when these species split into new species based on genetic data, which is a measure of their rate of evolution, and compared that to climate changes in the niches where those animals lived at those same times in geological history. What they found was that the species could handle a global temperature change of about one degree centigrade per million years. Their results appear in a paper in the latest issue of the journal Ecology Letters. (my bold)

http://www.seeker.com/climate-change-10000-times-faster-than-evolution-1...

So, what's left is resilience and compassion. Ever has it been thus, now at a planetary scale. Douglas Adams was a prophet: a (dead) earth will be demolished for an intergalactic highway overpass :=)
Cheers mate, g

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Bollox Ref's picture

I meant to say a while ago that I enjoyed your posts on Marcus Aurelius and his Meditations.

Much pondering.

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

Gerrit's picture

Marcus Aurelius helpful. Those quotes of his helped me for a long, long time when my world was very dark. Cheers, mate, I'm glad you're with us; we'll have fun, I think.

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Centaurea's picture

Glad to know there are other "multidimensionally similar-minded" folks here. Crazy

(That emoticon was just too good to pass up.)

With respect to the "do you believe in God?" thing, I don't know that I'd call it a dumb question exactly, but it makes my mind go *tilt*, and not necessarily in a good way. The question comes from a mindset that is established in cultural norms; a position of religious privilege, in other words, in which the question and the questioner are considered as obviously "normal", and anyone who answers "no" (or worse, answers "huh?") is obviously not normal and is therefore wrong.

When I see a question like that, my own questions arise: What the heck does "believe in" mean? Why does it matter? And what does the term "God" refer to, anyway?

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"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi

"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone

Gerrit's picture

in these discussion.

Thanks for a great exposition on that question. I mentioned above to mimi that my wording was poor. I mean "useless" or "fraught with too much misunderstanding" or something like that.

I sure hope to see that funky emoticon often here on 3D+ :=)

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studentofearth's picture

I have read Charlemagne selected Christianity as the official religion since it was the best religion to use for governing people to do your bidding. Top down obedience, with little emphasis of individual development.

My Puritan ancestors migrated to to America for religions freedom. They were having a hard time in Europe forcing their religious practices on the communities they settled.

Spent the last few years exploring the thought pattern of Eastern religions and cultural habits.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

Gerrit's picture

how you framed the Puritan motivation. That was exactly it, eh!

Your point on Christianity as a most effective religion for mass control is well taken. Second by a hair probably only to Islam among the world's ancient religions. Probably not nearly in the same league as the modern religions of communism and capitalism, but Christianity had a 2 millennia-long era to dominate people and populations.

I look forward to our discussions. So glad to have you aboard. Enjoy your day :=)

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You have posed many ideas I have been trying to work out for myself. Looking forward to this.
I also liked your phrase "post-Christian". I can identify with that.

~42

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Gerrit's picture

work out ideas and experiences and it's hard without other similarly-minded companions. A hard road is easier to walk with good companions. You're so right about that.

I'm glad you find the phrase "post-Christian" helpful. Who knows where I picked it up :=) and that's another thing that I hope we could accomplish with 3D+, to help develop a vocabulary for our experiences of the "more" that could help us express ourselves here in postmodernity. I think we'll have some fun with that. One of the habits my kids picked from me is making up new words as occasion demands :=)
Enjoy your day, my friend,

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Slightkc's picture

Born and raised in the Charismatic Christian religion. The same type of religion experienced by the traveling preacher doing revivals throughout the Midwest and South. This sect differed from other fundamentalist religions in that women were not as inwardly reviled as they were in other sects. My grandmother was one of these preachers, in a way. She led a Sunday church many times when I was a young'un.

I tried to enter the Baptist seminary at 18 and was basically, laughingly, showed the exit door post haste. I WAS a female after all. A woman is not to stand higher than a man! Ticked me off so much, I joined the Air Force so I could maybe stand in other cultures' realities and learn first hand from them.

Thru them (and on my own) I experienced Christianity in many of its sects, including Baptists (Southern and American), Methodist, Catholic, and AME. Eventually, I branched out and studied Tantra in a Tantric house, then went on to study the Firewalkers and their religion of old Hawaii (tho I never got the chance to go to Hawaii... sigh).

"Ended" up in Wicca for a long while... I'm still there, tho I called myself "Craft" rather than "Wiccan" after I studied the Irish side of my family. The types of discussion you seem to be hinting at here are what I've been missing in my life for a long time. As much as "Elders" in the Craft are given high marks in words, it's funny how (like everything else) the younger ones tend to run off with their own kind once you get to that age! (LOL)

"Capitalism" as religion resonates with me and has for a long while. "Market" as God is a good analogy, and one I'd not considered. But it's not just the loss of community it has engendered, but also the hardening of hearts and the cruelty we see all around us. While I savor the idea of learning from you and others from discussions here, I hope we also see a way to bury this concept of God once and for all, before it makes further inroads thru out the world.

Merry Meet!

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Gerrit's picture

to offer. Many of us have had similar journeys to yours, seeking a good "fit" with communities and practices over life's changing circumstances. I look forward to hearing from you as we go along.

No worries about the "god" thing. I hope to make clear in the next post that the word has no meaningful sense in our times and like Laplasse before Napoleon, we have no need for that hypothesis :=)

Have a great day, eh,
g

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earthling1's picture

Ran screaming from the Church of Nazarene @ age 5 and never looked back.
Currently believe the human race to be an infestation consuming the entire planet.
Yeah, got some things to sort out. Will be here if you'll have me.
Great essay.

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Gerrit's picture

church as a kid. My brother and I dodged and ducked and dove. My father died young and my poor mother was under the delusion that we should keep going for my father's sake. We lived near the beach and I remember the times she stood at the water's edge and tried to call us back for church. We just pointed our boards towards the swell and pretended we couldn't see her distant figure!

I'm with you on the infestation thing :=)

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yellopig's picture

I'll be walking along with you too, for a bit. Smile

I also know how to superscript (E=mc2), but don't know how to show the pointed brackets. Anyway, the magic word there is "sup", and "/sup", in pointed brackets. Heh, so half the answer. Unknw

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“We may not be able to change the system, but we can make the system irrelevant in our lives and in the lives of those around us.”—John Beckett

lotlizard's picture

In < the “lt” stands for “less than” and in > the “gt” stands for “greater than”.

Also, the magic word for & is &

In all cases, the semicolon is part of the magic word. If an instance of this particular kind of magic word (called “HTML entities”) doesn’t end with a semicolon, that instance won’t be recognized as a magic word.

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Gerrit's picture

one could meditate on your sentences: they sound like kabbalah :=)
I'm real glad you're on board. Enjoy your day,
g

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mimi's picture

those and am mad if I have to seach for them over and over again, because of "brain leakage' ...

I remember also that there was a way when writing a page of code that you could insert a paragraph of text in it to help you navigate the pages of code noodles. I think it was something like starting the text line with
<! -- , but I am not quite sure. In order to make the ! visible in this expample, I had to put a / in front of the !, because it's behind the <

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yellopig's picture

The answer actually woke me in the middle of the night! Good that you added it, thanks Drinks

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“We may not be able to change the system, but we can make the system irrelevant in our lives and in the lives of those around us.”—John Beckett

Gerrit's picture

Thanks very much for being here. We'll have fun, I think.

Ahah, you know the secret code for superscript! :=)

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michelewln's picture

I'm a scientist daughter. I was talking to my Dad and we were talking about the big bang and the primordial atom. He was saying that all of life can be explained in the big bang but the question still remains where did the primordial atom come from?

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A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world. Oscar Wilde

Commonly thought to have been originated by Democritus at around 400 BC, there is also speculation that it might be much older. From NPR's Science Friday:

FLATOW: Who first coined the word atom in the English language?

MARKEL: Well, in the English - before the English language, it's actually a Greek term. Now, there are some people who think that Indian Jainism clerics may have come up with the idea of indivisible units comprising matter. And you know, Sir Isaac Newton thought it was a Phoenician named Moses the Phoenician from the 13th century B.C., who we(ph) also link to the real Moses or the Moses of Charlton Heston fame.

But when it comes to the word atom, we have to go to ancient Greece of 400 B.C. And there was a brilliant philosopher named Democritus, and he proposed the Greek word atomos, which means uncuttable. And so as he explained, all matter was eventually reducible to discrete, small particles or atomos.

And it has a little irony, because as it turns out, atoms can be split. And if you only split an atom mentally, there are protons and neutrons to ponder.

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mhagle's picture

I very much look forward to this series.

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

Gerrit's picture

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I'm in. I find I can't live without some spiritual practice, even if it's just spasmodic prayers and candle lighting / visualization. I'd like to be more consistent.

And I find I'm just getting sick, almost literally, of the presidential horse-race bickering. It matters......but there are other things that matter as well.

I think I'm eclectic enough for this thread - ethnically Jewish, raised Episcopal Alien, reborn witchy pagan Goddess worshipper, now tolerant Unitarian.

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Gerrit's picture

sure like the "spasmodic" - it probably describes us all!

Oh and I soooooooooooooo agree on all this election inside baseball. I don't read any of it.
I'm glad you're aboard; we'll have fun. Have a great day,

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

Not sure theism is exactly the problem, but totally with you on capitalism as religion. I could talk about that all day.

Instead, I'll post something (maybe) useful; some psychologists are starting to be concerned about resilience, and are trying to exit the assumptions of upper and upper-middle-class 19th-century Vienna. Or middle-class 20th-century America:

Have a look at this guy's conference on how psychology should start addressing climate change:

http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/551504/27158827/1469029102913/ITRC...

I'd love to go, but it's in Washington DC on Nov 3-4. FFS, man, what a terrible time and place to hold something like this. The last place I want to be in early November is Washington DC.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Gerrit's picture

holy moly, I'm so impressed. Those are the very issues of human resilience in the face of catastrophic climate change. Could we obtain a copy of the conference's summations? Over in Resilience, we could very fruitfully discuss the agenda topics and if we could see some of the summations, it sure would help.
I've bookmarked the link and will return to it regularly.

You've placed your finger on the crux of the matter. Life is radically (at-the-root) different in times of peace and in times of disaster. Spirituality is radically different: the phenomena of disaster creates different experiences of the "more" than the circumstances of peace. Disaster produces a type of spirituality called "apocalyptic." There are many historical example of apocalyptic spirituality and religion. Here in 3D+, we need to address the issues you raise early on and then regularly. It will be close to the heart of our discussions, of that I'm sure. I'll introduce some historical examples as discussion material along the way.

Thanks so very much for raising this, CSS. We need strong minds and wills: it's the first tool in being resilient. Practical life philosophies like Stoicism are extremely helpful for developing strong minds. The ability to integrate harmoniously the multidimensional experiences of the "more" into our worldview and character is a powerful aide to a strong mind. The need for this ability to integrate "more" experience into worldview and character is always present in times of peace, but in times of disaster it is crucial to resilience.

Thanks again, mate. Please let me know if you find more on the conference, eh.
cheers, g

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I've spent some time searching around in the spiritual. I'm better at posing questions than in providing answers. There's a bit of the solitary monk in me, and I have spent long stretches in the wilderness asking questions. My current goal is to go there again,

As for the question "Do you believe in God?", I find it somewhat disingenuous and prefer to answer it by saying, "I believe in fairies, but I have faith in God." That is because I have learned that such faith is what can attract answers to sincere questions. At least, so it has been for me.

One of my assumptions about spirituality is that it is highly individualized. I think everyone is on a spiritual path whether they acknowledge it or not, and that everyone is at a different place on that path. The sin of religions is the attempt to make spirituality heterogeneous - it is a human flaw to want other humans' affirmations. But the reality is, if you believe in God, your internal knowledge of God is far different than your fellow parishioners no matter how heterogeneous your church tries to make you be. Let me clarify that this entire paragraph is one derived from belief and not faith. (All belief is subject to change.)

So, if you do not object to my faith in God, I would like to hope I can contribute a tiny bit - but I hope even more to be able to learn a great deal.

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Gerrit's picture

to 3D+ and your point on individualism is well taken. I hope to write the next post soon and I'm looking forward to your insights to it. The topic is holons and holarchies and it has great relevance for the individualization that you describe. We'll have fun, I think.

I think that spirituality is very much about, as you described well, how to "attract answers to sincere questions." And there is a lot to unpack in your word "attract." I hope we'll get to it soon.
Thanks and welcome :=)
g

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Hey Gerrit, great topic! To introduce myself, here's a poem I just gave my granddaughters for their birthdays (a week apart). Looking forward to all the excellent contributions.

Truth:

The immutable truths about reality are:
1. ultimately it is unknowable,
and
2. you are part of it.

Otherwise, broadly speaking,
those things we say are true
are maps or models
with which we agree.
Models are more or less accurate;
we cannot live without them, but,
as Von Clausewitz cautioned his
generals on the eve of battle:
"The map is not the territory."

Art, science, religion---
all culture---lie on map land,
a work in progress.
Choose your maps wisely,
annotate them, but keep
your eye on the territory,
the gate to which,
should you get lost,
is deep within you.

Beauty:

In the 17th century,
Francis Bacon said:
"There is no excellent beauty
that hath not some strangeness
in the proportion."

Those things that we find
beautiful
integrate
the unique and the universal,
our most disparate selves.
Beauty is both accomplishment
and direction. There is
nothing we do
that cannot be done
more beautifully.

Action:

who understands silence,
springs without doubt

for Hannah and Clara,
with love, Gumpa

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Gerrit's picture

There's a motto by which to live. That's a fantastic poem! Your grandchildren are fortunate to have such grandparents.

If I ever got a tattoo, I'd like to paste "The map is not the territory" on my forehead. (Old infantryman :=) It is one of the highest orders of life wisdom. We'll talk more, for sure, on this.

You are so right to point out the importance of beauty. One of Anglicanism's chief delights is the centrality of beauty as a portal into wonder and mystery. I miss that aspect dearly. I'm happy to report though, that my family hoisted that aboard early. They are all deeply anglican (even epicurean :=) in their appreciation of beauty. We'll talk!

Thanks very much. It's great to meet you, g

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earthling1's picture

If I believe in God, I tell them I'm certain there is a superior being out there.

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

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Gerrit's picture

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