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' She's prettier than you are. How do you know ? · · ![[Linked Image from t0.gstatic.com]](http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:YTSAkr6F3LOCkM:http://www.x64bit.net/site/board/style_emoticons/default/whistle.gif)
Last edited by numan; 01/29/13 08:56 PM.
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Pooh-Bah
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Now how can I express, to an American, even a bit of the wisdom of Daoism, and the deep meaning of the phrase, Wei-wu-wei ? Because of the attention-span problem, it will need to be short . . . . Ah, I have it !! "HANG LOOSE, DUDE !" , I suspect your grasp of Taoism is not what you would have us believe. A far better modern English expression of wu wei would be "go with the flow", which is rooms away from "HANG LOOSE, DUDE" in meaning (compounded by the shouted, with exclamation, mode of declamation). And really, would Laozi ever approve such verbosity? (Say, there are ways that you can tell!) (Sorry for any whiplash resulting from coming back to the topic...)
You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the old model obsolete.
R. Buckminster Fuller
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' I agree with you, Logi, that "go with the flow" is a better translation, but in harmony with the Daoist priciple of adapting my means to the material to be worked on, I thought my phrase would be more readily absorbed by the philosophically-challenged average American. It was not meant for someone of your sophistication. And really, would Laozi ever approve such verbosity? Well, he wrote a book, didn't he ? · · 
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old hand
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Chuang Tzu Story - The Useless
Hui Tzu said to Chuang Tzu:
“All your teaching is centered on what has no use.”
Chuang Tzu replied:
“If you have no appreciation for what has no use,
you cannot begin to talk about what can be used.
“The earth for example, is broad and vast,
But of all this expanse a man uses only a few inches
Upon which he happens to be standing at the time.
“Now suppose you suddenly take away
all that he actually is not using,
so that all around his feet a gulf yawns,
and he stands in the void
with nowhere solid except under each foot,
how long will he be able to use what he is using?
Hui Tzu said:
“It would cease to serve any purpose.”
Chuang Tzu concluded:
“This shows the absolute necessity
of what is supposed to have no use.
"The liberals can understand everything but people who don't understand them."
Lenny Bruce
"The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month."
Dostoevsky
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' One could extend the metaphor to any object and the environment which surrounds it and supports it -- a particle in a field, a species and the ecosystem which is essential to its survival. It would be foolhardy to jump quickly to the conclusion that anything is useless -- though, of course, even fools may have their uses. · ·
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old hand
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' One could extend the metaphor to any object and the environment which surrounds it and supports it -- a particle in a field, a species and the ecosystem which is essential to its survival. It would be foolhardy to jump quickly to the conclusion that anything is useless -- though, of course, even fools may have their uses. · · Indeed they do!
"The liberals can understand everything but people who don't understand them."
Lenny Bruce
"The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month."
Dostoevsky
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Pooh-Bah
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Is there a reason that you two have shifted to the topic of uselessness?
You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the old model obsolete.
R. Buckminster Fuller
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'
Perhaps we have finally seen the value of your postings, Logi.
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' Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy -- School of Names[/b][b]A client said to the King of Liang, “In talking about things, Hui Shi is fond of using analogies. If you don't let him use analogies, he won't be able to speak.” The King said, “Agreed.” The next day he saw Hui Shi and said, “I wish that when you speak about things, you speak directly, without using analogies.” Hui Shi said, “Suppose there's a man here who doesn't know what a dan is. If he says, ‘What are the features of a dan like?’ and we answer, saying, ‘The features of a dan are like a dan,’ then would that communicate it?” The King said, “It would not.” “Then if we instead answered, ‘The features of a dan are like a bow, but with a bamboo string,’ then would he know?” The King said, “It can be known.” [A "dan" was the bow section of a Chinese crossbow -- the most powerful projectile weapon of the ancient world which could be used by an individual person]Hui Shi said, “Explanations are inherently a matter of using what a person knows to communicate what he doesn't know, thereby causing him to know it. Now if you say, ‘No analogies,’ that's inadmissible.” The King said, “Good!” As we would expect from mainstream Chinese theories of language and disputation, Hui Shi is accustomed to explaining things by appeal to analogies. Indeed, his answer to the king is itself an analogy, or at least an illustrative example (the Chinese word for “analogy,” bi, refers to both). We can also notice from the story that in seeking to learn about something unknown, one does not ask for a definition of the object, but for a description of what its features “are like.” The standard response is to cite a familiar analogue and then point out the differences between the unknown object and the familiar one. Communication proceeds not by knowing “meanings,” but by knowing how to distinguish similar from different kinds of things.
Last edited by numan; 01/29/13 10:42 PM.
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Pooh-Bah
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Perhaps we have finally seen the value of your postings, Logi. Zekemon has taught thee everything he knows, and ye are a faithful disciple, noomie.
You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the old model obsolete.
R. Buckminster Fuller
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