Thinking collectively is to think about others, to think about yourself is to be selfish. To be selfish is inherently destructive. Individuality is best expressed through our work for others.
They're opposite magnetic forces vying with one another chaotically and yet implying higher order. A.k.a. collective consciousness.
Not really. If to be selfish is to preserve yourself and your beliefs, then to protect that would often require acts beneficial to the collective. For example, if your selfishly motivated goal is to be respected in the community you must do good for the community. As far as futurity and egoism, the preservation of your legacy or bloodline will suffice for long term considerations. Under this thought, an act of fatal heroism is a potential for even the most selfish. But for the collective's potential, I don't see much. A person is smart; people are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it.
for real man, like i was thinking. if the universe is whatever we perceive it to be. then that means we are the ones who make the universe real. we create our own reality with what we percieve reality to be. if we can have control over our perception than we can make reality whatever we wanted it to be by just perceiving it in the way you want it to be perceived. yaa heardd
word i had the same thought after learning about the venus project...like damn...weve had pretty advanced technology for a while now, and havent applied it to much of society. imagine if humanity actually used their full potential, what a different world this would be. its kind of sad... quite irrelevant to the potential of humanity, but nevertheless, agreed.
I think if more people had respect for diversity, we would reach toward our potentiality in a big way.
When you say beneficial to the collective, you mean the status quo. Selfishness always desires to maintain the status quo, which you further support in discussing legacy and bloodline. When you are selfish you never want to advance the collective beyond that of which it can return to you; because if you do, you can render yourself out of power, thus defeating your selfish endeavor, as well as your legacy. To establish yourself as an icon and solidify your legacy you must glorify yourself above others; this will occur at the cost of your own true self. Because the true self has gifts that it can bring to the table. Ego self protects those gifts, and only uses them with the intent of not using them. This is like a CEO of a company. A CEO often has the greatest gifts so in order to protect himself from actually using his gifts for the betterment of others, he hedges himself by dividing the company up into compartments. Each compartment therefor cannot presume to challenge his gifts, nor his power, because they do not have the knowledge of the other compartments. This CAUSES the individuals of the company to be 'dumb and panicy' while making the CEO seem smart and in control. When in actuality, if the compartments were removed, and the collective allowed to act within it's full potential, the individual with the best capacity for leading would be promoted to the leading position; not the the 'smartest' individual.
Nice response, but I disagree. An egoist can be beneficial to the collective by pursuing alternatives to the status quo, they do not need to preserve what is not in their best interest. You can be selfish and be utilitarian at the same time, if you recognize that the most good for the most people will invariably make your own life more enjoyable. Lets say there is an egoist that loves pot, it would be in his best interest to campaign for the reform of laws. Being selfish is not synonymous with being power hungry. Yet a problem arises when the selfish and powerless are made incapable of battling the selfishness of the powerful.
Well, what's interesting is that we're tapping into a mental/spiritual collective nearly always. The problem is, that yes, we're unaware of our capability to do so. Were you referring to more of an intuition-related "collective potentiality", or a more functionally involved one? Either way, I agree with you.
**This is long and I'm sorry, but when I get baked I love to write. Accept my apologies. I'm not sure which way the cookie crumbles here, but I do know that if you are supporting the ego argument you should be aware that not everyone is allowed to follow their self-interest. In, which case it is a power issue and no longer about self-interest, but fear of loss for those who are in control. Egoism is the lack of an internal perception of oneself. When most of us think, we only worry about the details that support our argument. Most people simply cannot appreciate any other perspectives than their own. It is beyond them to think rationally. All the ideas, thoughts and concepts they use to back up their points are usually alien to them. These ideas are injected in us at young ages and over the years build up to create this convoluted mosaic of morals and values that completely clash with one another. Yet, most people never question thier validity. They prosetylize out of inherent fear and guilt, but don't truly understand the gravity of that which they advocate. As long as they are percieved as right, everything is ok. Being wrong validates your weakness and brings oneself closer to anniahlation. This cannot happen. We've been taught that being wrong is weak. That is unfortunate. The Ego is your artificial self really, the part of you thats run by emotions, especially fear, and not logic. The majority is attracted to the good intentions of our policies. But you can only ever judge a policy on its result, not its intention. However, most don't even consider that. They feel so long as the action is done is good faith than its ok. Those on top hide policy flaws that they use to exploit the system and instead spread the intention of the article. That is a fallacy. So self-interest and the collective do not get along and never works. When they do mix you get America, or at least post Federal Reserve America. An example if you will. A hundred years ago, the people were the back bone of America. Now its a chemical country, everything you do is chemical related. Food, Fuel, Medicine, Fiber. Everthing, which means that everything is run by those very few who manufacture and produce. Eighty years ago, the American public invested in chemical technology based upon lies. Presently the American people are getting poorer and poorer, there infrastructure is broken because is was based on flaws, people are dying everyday from the wierdest shit and they are the ones making you sick! Then they make you pay to get cured! Yet, preventitive medicine has been shunned like its voodoo or something. Preventive medicine essentially advocates boycotting the big industries. Don't eat preserved food, workout... etc. This takes money from the man. Oh and those big guys who looked out for their self-interest have fled to Dubia. Oh and I'm not American, which sometimes I feel bad about because I do love your country, but if I do recall Thomas Jefferson was definitely not persuing his self-interests and hes known in history for writing the most influencial document on the planet. And I'm not making a point in this post, I just kinda talking about nothing.