I think this is what happens during sleep (a part of it).
There have been times where I've been unable to "fall" asleep, but stayed in my bed, completely unaware of my surroundings or anything else except what's going on inside my mind.
It feels like my thoughts were starting from a single point, then randomly branching off into multiple directions (one after the brisk "completion" of the other), and each path had a certain "feel" to it -- as if my brain was testing things it had "learned" or "inferred" (and the mental models it had collected), or even things it wasn't too certain about or even guessing -- simply to see how it would "feel" when thought.
It's like your mind has a complex array of filters/gates that decide how an input will be processed -- and these filters are constantly changing, rearranging, and growing more complex as you grow; so during sleep it feels like the mind is in a loop, constantly throwing very simple things that have collected in memory, into the "mix"/filters to see what happens (will those filters adjust, a la conditioning and adjusting weights like in a neural net? Will some new and palpable way of looking at things be found? Are some thoughts/paths no longer needed? Should other thoughts/paths be prioritized?).
I think our minds hold onto all the inputs we've gotten during the day, and then process them at night, is what I'm trying to say. I imagine this is one of the big reasons why we sleep so much as we do (compared to hunger-gatherers, and primitive tribes): we have so much sensory input that gets collected during the day (including our thoughts, albeit the thinking we do during the day serves the same end: forcing our heads to deal with new information to figure out what to do with it).
And then you have meditation, that basically forces you to clean out the "volatile memory," so it doesn't interefere throughout the day. Basically telling your mind, "I don't need to incorporate this shit into my thinking. It's not vital. Dump the memory onto the disk, and we'll deal with it later, but not now!"
I've noticed that sleep completely changes my train of thought.
On any given day, I'll have a certain "mindset" or overarching "feeling" for the day. If I stay up for a day or two, that feeling will remain. And no matter what I do, that feeling rarely changes throughout the day. BUT, when I go to sleep, it's completely different. I always wake up with a new "train" of thought. Like when I was awake, the train was going on a certain rail line, but during sleep it was moved to a different one.
Related to this: Since when I was young, maybe around six or so, on nights before special days I looked forward to a lot (like my birthday), I was desperate and agonized over the realization that my current self (what you call "train of thought") would end once I fell asleep, so this current longing that I had would never actually be fulfilled. This made me really sad, and it felt like my current "self" would die and get replaced the next morning by a somehow related "self", that was in it's essential emotional state very new and in that regard definitely separate. I continued to have this feeling from time to time (maybe 2-3 times per year, less later on) until well into my twenties, when it somehow receded. I have not talked about this often, but when I did, I never found anybody that could relate.
There are a lot of things wrong with doing manual work:
Pay sucks dick.
Unless you bust ass and work overtime/meet management's obscene expectations (you won't unless you're on meth), your pay is going to suck.
If you want a more relaxed environment (residential stuff, "small," few employees, lifestyle biz) your pay is going to be even lower.
Commercial pays better, but it's more soul-sucking and kills your body quicker.
If you're not in a skilled trade (big 3: plumber/pipefitter, electrician, or HVAC; physical IT/wire-pulling) it's even worse.
If you don't have a family/friend connection, good luck breaking in to anything worth anything (that includes a union. If you're non-union, you're basically screwed, unless you're high-skilled/massive amount of certs and can negotiate for yourself).
LUNA (or whatever the labor union goes by nowadays) is pretty decent if you've got a lot of problems in your life, but can come to work sober (and on time), do the work without bitching, and be productive. All the other unions worth anything are, once again, almost impossible to get into (unless you wait years, have a connection, or have a track record). Everyone wants to be an electrician (so much so, that even non-union shops aren't accepting any "apprentices,"---cheap labor---that don't already have experience; this is no different from the unions).
If you get in, it's a golden meal ticket for the uneducated; but pay caps out quickly (and any white collar professional with a shred of ambition will surpass you in pay in their 30s).
Hours are uncertain.
You can sometimes be working 2 hours a day, and sometimes 12. Overtime is cool, but it doesn't beat getting home and having a few hours to do anything at all, instead of passing out on the couch and waking up at 5am to go back to work.
Past that, any other jobs that pay better (tow truck operator, lineman, etc.) have even worse/more dangerous conditions. Your body will start hurting in your twenties, and you'll feel like you're 60. This won't go away unless you stop doing any physical labor for a while, but if you do that, you won't make money, nor gain "hours" (for those sweet union pay bumps after you pass a certain amount of hours -- regardless if you're the most efficient and most experienced apprentice, you'll still be getting paid the same as the bumfuck nephew of the owner who's only there because family takes care of family).
If you're a citizen of the U.S., there's no real reason to do manual labor, unless you really don't care that much about money or starting a family (most people in manual labor). For illegal immigrants, the pay is fucking amazing compared to what they get paid back home. They can work for a few seasons, save up their cash, then go back home where American dollars let you live like royalty.
I work in tech now. I get paid more than 2,000x what I did being a tradesmen, my body feels amazing now, I can fuck around all day doing whatever I want because I'm remote, and---in comparison---I barely do any work. These are my anecdotes.
Went. Dropped out for a variety of reasons. Never went back. Don't have a degree.
Definitely made finding a job as a SWE difficult. Pretty hard to break in. I got lucky.
I never had any connections/family worth anything, so I learned how to sell/market myself, and I talked my way into all of my early jobs.
Pretty straightforward once you figure out the process. Took a long time of eating shit to get there though.
I'm also lucky that I was adopted into an upper middle class family, and went to good schools, and interacted with children from successful families.
Even if those relationships have done zero for my career prospects, being surrounded by those sorts of people rubs off on you. If I grew up in a working class area, around working class people, my sense of values and my perspective on the world and so on would be a lot narrower, and less likely to lead to great financial success.
Some people never had a chance. The communities they're born into, and the people that imprint onto them, can snuff out any hope of moving up and out.
Seems like the only way to enact "real" change is to convince the propertied class that such changes are within their interests (and have them pull the strings in a mutually-beneficial way).
I cannot think of anything the lower classes can offer that would be of any substance -- only things they can take away by force to impel the other to meet "eye to eye."
That's because you've been sheltered from most of it; and most of the time it's "kept within the family," never made public, and simply swept under the rug -- so as to not "break apart the family" (at the cost of one victim).
People will allow all sorts of horrendous things to happen, if it serves their interests.
Father rapes his daughter? The mother refuses to believe it: thinks her daughter is only doing it for attention; doesn't want her "perfect" family image to get shattered (plus, daddy dearest pays the bills and funds her lifestyle). Same goes for extended family.
"It couldn't happen in our family." "You know how teenage girls are." "He would never do something like that. I've known him for decades."
Cognitively checking-out, because it's not their "problem." And other forms of dissonance.
Those are only the stats for pregnancy, though. I'm sure the incidence of sexual abuse without pregnancy is higher.
I’m 64 years old, so I’ve been around a while. Essentially every woman I have ever been close enough with to discuss these issues has reported either being sexually abused as a child or raped as an adult. As a young man I never realized how widespread this is.
It's no longer art if it's for commercial purposes.
Those who have the courage necessary to become artists, and renounce the vulgarity of the world, will continue to do so.
Those who delude themselves into thinking they're creating anything while being employed in commerce, will be managed out.
The deep crevice where the two meet and manage to find compromise, will continue to be filled by wealthy, independent patrons.
Asking others to think and do as we wish is silly.
Ironically, if it's that important to you, why don't you start giving monetary support directly to artists? Changing one's own actions is more impactful than trying to change those of the many (and the prior is more likely to lead to the latter, than if one were to focus solely on the latter).
I think your definition of art is just a partial one. As an example, the characters drawn for an RPG are works of art. They are receiving monetary value in return for that art. So its commercial/entertainment art, and a place where many artists aspire to be.
Your definition is what I would call "culture defining art", which is art that some part of the culture identifies with (or more specifically, a person's way of communicating that they can identify with). The currency here is tribalism, i.e. it creates a way for two or more people to bond together through what they feel and think.
>Those who have the courage necessary to become artists, and renounce the vulgarity of the world, will continue to do so.
Courage is trumped by needs. If they need pay rent, buy food, support a family, pay for a car, etc, then no matter what they are sacrificing some part of their time in order to obtain those things. Thus any artist who can make money off their work would have more time for their work, and possibly grow faster.
>Those who delude themselves into thinking they're creating anything while being employed in commerce, will be managed out.
Seems like you're too attached to the idea of what an artist is and isnt?
>Ironically, if it's that important to you, why don't you start giving monetary support directly to artists?
Because Im not building something that is taking away from their dreams (e.g. living off their work/passion).
<side thoughts>
I wonder if people are aware of the consequences of automating creativity? IMO humans need human input in order to stay human. The less and less we come into contact with humanity, the less human we'll become.. and at the very end of that long path is a bag of chemical reactions that's forgotten the meaning of "how are you?" [1]
Which made me think, perhaps its the inefficiencies of life that is what makes us human
[1] This is because some company/companies will realize/have realized that tuning the machine to become most efficient at creating what the masses want will be the most profitable path.
That's not my definition of art. That's your take; and you're projecting your (mid-brow) sensibilities onto me.
I don't define art. It's a sense, not a logical box you can put things in.
Receiving money for your art is one thing; going out of your way to use it as a means of living is another. The work immediately becomes tainted, and is no longer art.
It could be an amazing piece, but if your line of work is receiving money for what you create, you're an artisan, not an artist.
A character drawn for an RPG is not art. It is not a work of art. It is a graphic designed for utility. That is all it will ever be.
The sublime nature of art is there because it transcends everyday vulgarity. One transcends mere personage and becomes an artist by being in the world, but not of it.
The more money an artisan makes, the more his craft suffers. He almost always improves his technical ability through this process (otherwise, he would not make money), but loses his soul, and will never be an artist. He does not have the fiber in his heart that allows one to suffer through all manner of anguish, and material poverty, to dedicate oneself towards something above oneself; so he settles for being an artisan.
I can understand not being educated on these matters. But the amount of misplaced confidence you carry, writing on things you know nothing about is detestable.
If your inquiries into the nature of humanity and what it means to be are genuine (and not mis-attributed self-importance), my recommendation is to read and listen more, and talk less.
Matthew B. Crawford's works are a decent bridge into all that, for the modern middle crust who feels something stirring in his soul, and needs a direction.
If you feel like your assessment of your own abilities is honest, then I would completely skip anything modern, and begin with Burke's A philosophical enquiry into the origin of our ideas of the sublime and beautiful. I will even buy you an unabridged copy and have it shipped to you, if you're a starving artist that cannot afford it (and my respect for you would increase, all the same).
I'm sure the irony isn't lost on you, Mr. Anti-Spreader.
One could argue any sort of idea is itself inherently a virus; once your mind understands it, it "clicks" into your head, and now you think about, and use it all the time -- spreading it to others.
It's a function of modern language/living, I believe.
We should all go back to clicking and clacking at one another in various tones and pitches.
There have been times where I've been unable to "fall" asleep, but stayed in my bed, completely unaware of my surroundings or anything else except what's going on inside my mind.
It feels like my thoughts were starting from a single point, then randomly branching off into multiple directions (one after the brisk "completion" of the other), and each path had a certain "feel" to it -- as if my brain was testing things it had "learned" or "inferred" (and the mental models it had collected), or even things it wasn't too certain about or even guessing -- simply to see how it would "feel" when thought.
It's like your mind has a complex array of filters/gates that decide how an input will be processed -- and these filters are constantly changing, rearranging, and growing more complex as you grow; so during sleep it feels like the mind is in a loop, constantly throwing very simple things that have collected in memory, into the "mix"/filters to see what happens (will those filters adjust, a la conditioning and adjusting weights like in a neural net? Will some new and palpable way of looking at things be found? Are some thoughts/paths no longer needed? Should other thoughts/paths be prioritized?).
I think our minds hold onto all the inputs we've gotten during the day, and then process them at night, is what I'm trying to say. I imagine this is one of the big reasons why we sleep so much as we do (compared to hunger-gatherers, and primitive tribes): we have so much sensory input that gets collected during the day (including our thoughts, albeit the thinking we do during the day serves the same end: forcing our heads to deal with new information to figure out what to do with it).
And then you have meditation, that basically forces you to clean out the "volatile memory," so it doesn't interefere throughout the day. Basically telling your mind, "I don't need to incorporate this shit into my thinking. It's not vital. Dump the memory onto the disk, and we'll deal with it later, but not now!"
I've noticed that sleep completely changes my train of thought.
On any given day, I'll have a certain "mindset" or overarching "feeling" for the day. If I stay up for a day or two, that feeling will remain. And no matter what I do, that feeling rarely changes throughout the day. BUT, when I go to sleep, it's completely different. I always wake up with a new "train" of thought. Like when I was awake, the train was going on a certain rail line, but during sleep it was moved to a different one.