"There is a possibility of ceasing to be a machine. It is of this we must think, and not about the different kinds of machines that exist."
-George Gurdjieff
How interesting is
that.
Couldn't even tell which book of his it comes from, or if it even comes from a book. Might've just been from some overheard and recorded dialogue or something. Watching a series of lectures on him, which is where I found the quote.
The whole thing, according to this set of lecturers (who, I have the impression, might not be far along enough to do the kind of things that need to be done. But I think its still noteworthy in them, that they could all likely be referred to by their close acquaintances as "wise", perhaps even "inspiring".)
But I think the lectures so far are interesting, and seriously thought-over. I just doubt its intensity.
Don't know how much he pops up in conversation here though. Might be an elusive specimen. He seemed to closely incarnate a sort of psychic attracter for the high-minded. Tough for me to think of this as someone just harboring "subjective"/or non-absolute opinions, but rather just seems like someone who, from my perspective, is attempting to express an effectively higher-order ontology - in terms we can understand.
Regardless of what we think of Gurdjieff, the kind of "graduation" from our order to the "higher" order is operationally identical of a sort of fractal tournament of iterations. The winner in this pond is elevated to a pond ten times wider. Rather, the winner in tis pond then becomes the pond, and moves around as a pond within another pond, still administering the smaller pond from which it graduated.
Weird description, but it'll have to do. The point is that: the whole field of possible opinions is itself, just a single meta-opinion in a field of possible meta-opinions. We can preserve our ideological rivalries, and still progress rapidly. What matters is not which ideology wins out, but which balance of ideologies wins out.
Sometimes a higher-order operation requires, what appear to us as, a shortcoming here and an overshooting there. So long as we conserve our ideology, rather than orchestrate all ideologies to generate the higher harmony.
But in auditing this guy Gurdjieff, he seems legitimate. It really
seems like he exhibits a certain possibility of overcoming "natural" and foundational aspects of Human subject. I suggest we nominate him for the pantheon - their lineup could always use some fresh blood, no? - and I will pass a vase around to collect your votes.
But, unless he continues to sustain the audit, which I am subjected to just as much as I subject him to it, let us not forget he would be but one aspect of the mission. How, say, could something like that be marketed,
today? Totally have no idea.
Is there a crash course for religion building? (Kidding as I wrote that, but I guess not really)
(Edited this one a lot. Also, high.)
(edit:
@shiels was spot on earlier about this seeming like I'm a theory bot trying out material on you. I hopped around all over the place in this post.)