Facinating confluence of ideas, very well laid out. Thanks!
I challenge your assertion that everything you read is 'extremely personal', hence those who read are narcissists. For some, maybe. For others (perhaps the majority of others), reading or writing is a way of safely navigating toward empathy. Putting the self in another's shoes is not narcissistic, it is the opposite. Abstract concepts still existed before writing, and the skill of communicating/exploring them (eg. via narratives) is simply not available to the physical realm. Try drawing 'honour' as a picture. If you fail and resort to literacy, that is probably more honestly presented as a focus on concepts separate from the self, rather than a focus on the self.
I wonder if we are ever going to get to Barfield's "final participation" where we went from ancient mythic consciousness (original) to where we are now in modernity stuck in our heads (but at least learned some interesting things about ourselves); but now need to get back out in the world in the final stage, outwardly connected to the world again as individuals. Surely not the NPCs without souls, but the rest of us I mean.
There was a thread on X a while back about Goodreads people who read thousands of books and never really gain anything but being stuck up and prideful, they read all those books thinking other people's thoughts but never really had any of their own through life experience; never created or explored much themselves.
Facinating confluence of ideas, very well laid out. Thanks!
I challenge your assertion that everything you read is 'extremely personal', hence those who read are narcissists. For some, maybe. For others (perhaps the majority of others), reading or writing is a way of safely navigating toward empathy. Putting the self in another's shoes is not narcissistic, it is the opposite. Abstract concepts still existed before writing, and the skill of communicating/exploring them (eg. via narratives) is simply not available to the physical realm. Try drawing 'honour' as a picture. If you fail and resort to literacy, that is probably more honestly presented as a focus on concepts separate from the self, rather than a focus on the self.
This makes me think of general semantics but that deals with language instead of literacy, tho the effects are analogous https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_semantics
I wonder if we are ever going to get to Barfield's "final participation" where we went from ancient mythic consciousness (original) to where we are now in modernity stuck in our heads (but at least learned some interesting things about ourselves); but now need to get back out in the world in the final stage, outwardly connected to the world again as individuals. Surely not the NPCs without souls, but the rest of us I mean.
There was a thread on X a while back about Goodreads people who read thousands of books and never really gain anything but being stuck up and prideful, they read all those books thinking other people's thoughts but never really had any of their own through life experience; never created or explored much themselves.
Dance like everyone is busy watching tiktok.