All language subtitles for [1920x1080] Vision & Destiny - EP1 - Understanding Vision - DW

Let's speak about vision a bit.

Okay, so we can start by
thinking about vision technically.

Vision is what occurs
when you look out at the

world, and so you see
the world array itself in front

of you, and you
think that's vision.

But vision has another sense
too, and that's the sense of

visionary, and so a
visionary is someone who

can envision not
actuality, but possibility.

Now, we should start by
assessing the relationship

between vision in the
narrow technical sense what

happens when you
orient your eyes towards

the world, and vision
in the visionary sense.

So, you need to use your vision
to weave your way through life.

You look at the world so that you can move
forward two desirable goals through the

world, and your vision
specifies something like

pathways and tools and
obstacles. And you might

say, well, the world consists
of what is, and so you

can derive sufficient
vision by observing what

is. Now, it's obvious that you can derive
a fair bit of vision by observing what is.

If you walk up the stairs,
you should match your steps

to the stairs that you
see. But the problem with

the idea that you can
derive sufficient direction.

from seeing what is,
is that what is changes,

and that's really the
problem of the future.

So, you might say the
past is fixed, and you might

say that the present is
stable, but the future is.

indeterminate, and it's
technically indeterminate.

And what I mean by that
is that you cannot compute

your way through the
present into the future by

using an algorithm. What
you already know is not

sufficient to guide you
into the future, because

the future is actually
different from the past.

Not only are we not
clockwork machines, we

can't be, because a
clockwork machine, which

operates according to
principles that have already

been established, cannot
compute its way forward

into an indeterminate
reality. And the future isn't

entirely indeterminate
because it's constrained

by the past, but it's
indeterminate in many ways.

It's a branching, the
future is something like the

possibility of multiple
pathways forward.

That's one way of looking
at it. So, if you're walking

across a field, there
are an infinite number

of directions you can
take across the field.

And the future is the
space in which those

possibilities is latent
before it becomes manifest.

And what you confront
in the world, you could

say is when you look at
the world, you might say,

well, I'm confronting the
actuality of the present

world, but your apprehension
doesn't really work that way.

What you apprehend
are the possibilities

that make themselves
manifest in that determinate

space in the present. You grapple with the
possibility, you grapple with the future.

And I think you could
say in some sense that

the past and the present
are finite and bounded.

And the future is the
infinity that surrounds

us. And the horizon of
the future that we make

contact with our consciousness is the point
where the infinite meets the finite for us.

And so, and the infinite
has to be somewhere,

and well, it makes its
presence known in the

form of the future. And the
future is what we envision.

And then you can
think about that.

neurophysiologically.
We use vision to orient

ourselves in relationship
to the territory that

currently exists. But
there's a new territory

constantly manifesting
itself, and that's the future.

And so then the question
is, well, how do you orient

yourself to the world
of possibility? And that

might really be what your consciousness is
doing. Because your consciousness doesn't

have to attend to things
that are already fixed.

You ignore everything that's
already fixed and predictable.

You actually attend consciously.

So this is your reality to that which is
transforming or is most likely to transform.

Because why otherwise pay
attention to it? You've already

got it mastered. You
don't have to pay attention

to the floor unless there's an earthquake,
which is a transformation of the future.

You can ignore the floor as
you walk towards the door.

In fact, the concept floor is predicated
on the ignoreability of solid surfaces.

It's an axiomatic assumption,
the solidity of the floor.

And most of the time, it's true,

although not always. And so everything
that's predictable, you can make unconscious.

And so it disappears out of
reality itself in some real sense.

It's this horizon of
transformation that

you're contending with. That's
what your consciousness does.

That's the essence
of the human being,

the spirit that confronts
the possibility or

possibility itself, and then
endeavors to transform

that into habitable
actuality, the habitable

actuality that is
good. That's the logos.

That's the image of God in
which human beings are created.

And that's real. And so far
as anything is real, that's real.

It might be the most real thing.

And so then the question
is, well, how do you conduct

yourself as an entity
existing on the horizon

between the present and
the future or between order

and chaos? That's another
way of thinking about

it. That's where you
exist. And the answer is,

by envisioning the future.
And so the way human

beings have evolved is
that we can see what's

there, but we can also
see what isn't there.

We have an imagination
and an imagination is a

visionary capacity. We have the ability to
generate possible worlds in a psychological

meta space that's
dissociated from the real world.

And so, look, most animals
manage adaptation to

the transforming horizon
of the future by producing

variants of their physical self.
So mosquitoes are like that.

Mosquito will lay thousands
and thousands of eggs.

And each of those
eggs, if fertilized,

will turn into a mosquito
that's a tiny bit different

than the original mosquito,
partly because of the

mixing of genes from
two different organisms

that sex enables, but
also because of mutations.

So a mosquito pair will
produce a whole bunch of

variant mosquitoes. And
each of those mosquitoes

is slightly differently adapted
to the changing environment.

And most of them
die, almost all of them.

In fact, more or
less all die, but two.

Otherwise, we'd be knee deep
in mosquitoes in no time flat.

And so the mosquitoes
allow all their

children to die, except
two. And that's how they

deal with the encroaching
chaos of the future.

Now human beings also
do that, to some degree,

because we produce
children and they vary from us

because of sexual reasons
and because of mutations.

But we don't produce tens
of thousands of variants.

We've taken a different
tack, which is all our eggs

are in one basket, so
to speak. But inside each

person is that capacity
to generate variation.

And so as our prefrontal
cortex emerged out

of our motor cortex, we
were able to generate

variant sub personalities
of our future selves.

So their imaginary avatars,
we're able to evaluate

how that imaginary
avatar might perform in the

world to envision that
before implementing it.

corporally before
actually acting it out.

And so when you're
sitting there thinking about,

well, what might I do
today? You generate variant

selves, you think, well, I
could go to the drug store.

That's how this would work.
I could go mow the lawn.

I could go have a
fight with my wife.

I could go have an affair.
I could go down to the

bar and then you lay out
your character traversing

this imaginary space and
you evaluate the various

options that present
themselves for their suitability

given your goals. And
then you collapse that space

of apprehension into a single
actuality and you implement that.

And so what you're doing is
you're performing the equivalent of.

variant generation and
death. It's the Darwinian

selection process
conducted abstractly.

So you generate these variant
selves and you evaluate them.

Now you can do
that in imagination.

And that's with vision,
right? Because you play

it out like you imagine
the characters in a book.

You play it out on the
internal visionary landscape.

And you think, oh,
that's a stupid idea.

It's like, well,
I'd like to do that.

But I don't think it'll
turn out very well.

And then you might think
too, well, my wife and my kids

wouldn't be very
happy if I did that.

And then you might think,
well, that would be fun.

But man, I'm going to pay
for it tomorrow. And so you just

dispense with those
avatars and worlds until

you narrow it down to the one
thing that you can implement.

You embody that. And then you walk forward
with that. Or you do it in conversation

with someone else,
because maybe you're sitting

with your wife at the
breakfast table and you say,

well, what should we do
today? Which is what should

our vision of the day be?
What game are we going

to jointly play? And what
outcome do we both expect

and desire from that?
It's more important to think

about it as desire, right?
Because you play a game

in relationship to a
desired end. And that also

means that you select the
game you play according

to your hierarchy of desire.
And that's bloody well

worth thinking about.
What do you really want?

Well, that's part of
developing a vision in the

more fundamental sense.
What do you want? So there's

a gospel saying, knock,
and the door will open,

seek and you will find,
ask and you will receive.

And you think, well,
no, it can't be that way.

It's like, well, it's that
way a lot more than you

think, because you
transform the chaotic potential

of the future into
actuality with vision.

And you might say, well,
I don't really make plans.

It's like, no, what you're saying
is you just make bad plans,

because someone who
doesn't make a plan, it isn't

that they don't make
plans. It's that they make

unconscious plans. So
they're ruled by their own

whims or their plans
are so short term that they

don't really count as
plans. If you're going to the.

pantry to get some bread
to make a peanut butter

sandwich, that's a plan.
Now, it's not the sort

of plan you might write
down. It's not a medium to

long term strategy
encompassing all the different

aspects of your being.
But it's still a plan.

And the truth of the matter
is, is that you can't do

anything without at
least a micro plan.

And then you might say, well,
I'm nothing but an aggregate

of micro plans, although
no one ever says that,

but you get the point. And
that's a pretty confused person.

They just move from one
short term, unconscious

attention orientation to
another. And the problem

with that is there's no
coherence to their actions.

And the problem
with that is the actions

then contradict, or
they're so multiplicitous

that the person is anxious.
And because there's no

long term goal or vision,
they don't have any

hope because hope is
experienced in relationship

to a superordinate goal.
You know, you might

hope that you make the
peanut butter sandwich.

properly. And fair
enough, that's important in

that tiny frame of time
and space. But it's not the

sort of thing, because
it's so short term, it's not

the sort of thing that
can give deep and abiding

meaning to your life. And
you need that deep and

abiding meaning to orient
you so you're not terrified

by the multiplicity
of possibilities.

And you need it to have you
aim towards something that's

high enough so that you
feel hope and enthusiasm

as you observe yourself
moving towards the goal.

So you might well
ask yourself, this is the

whole point of humanity's
education in real.

in the real sense, or any
education worth its salt,

because education isn't
about how you describe

the world of facts.
That's a narrow scientific

education that might
be useful for a particular

subspecialty, for the
reason of advancement

of a certain brand of
knowledge. But education

overall is something like
the development of vision.

It's like, well, if you
could have what

you wanted, what would
it be? The question then

is, well, what should you
want? And what should

what should you want in
a manner that also grants

you what you necessarily
need? And then what should

you have that you want
and need that you could

have with other people?
And now you're starting

to come up with something
like a philosophical vision.

It's like, well, how are you going to
conduct yourself optimally so your marriage

is as positive as it can
be? Well, obviously,

you're going to have to
take your wife into account.

So then you have that shared vision, that
necessity of shared vision, which is part

of shared identity. And
so you might think, well,

little play would be nice.
Some love would be all right.

Some mutual respect. Hey,
we could throw that in there.

Some genuine
caring for each other

through times of trouble,
because those times will come.

Something stable
enough so we can rely on it

and trust each other,
because that's a lot easier

than not trusting each other, even though
it might not be that easy to establish.

You can think vision, what do you want?
And the more deeply you take that.

necessity, the more
your vision integrates and

the longer term it becomes.
And so that's like the

development of a
monotheism in some real sense,

because you're hammering
all your micro visions.

into some unified
macro vision that has the

highest possible mode
of being at the pinnacle.

And you need to shape
that. Now, the alternative

to not shaping that is
that you don't shape it.

So then you're incoherent.
And if you're incoherent,

you're anxious because anxiety
marks incoherency technically.

And you're hopeless
because if you're

not climbing up to a
pinnacle that's worth climbing

to, then you're not doing
anything worthwhile.

And if you're not doing
anything worthwhile,

you don't have any
positive emotion because

positive emotion marks
doing something worthwhile.

And so there's no
alternative. The only alternative

to developing a vision is
having a very bad vision.

That's all there is. And
so you want to have a

noble vision of intent and
purpose. And you have to

have one that's of
sufficient staying power and

profundity so that it
doesn't fragment in response

to the inevitable
catastrophic challenges of life.

And that's the fundamental
religious question in

some sense is that is
there a manner of is there

a mode of vision that
enables resilience in the

face of catastrophe?
That's a perfectly reasonable

way of looking at it in the face of the
ultimate catastrophe of mortality and death.

And maybe even more than
that, the ultimate catastrophe of

atrocity, mortality,
and death, is there a

vision that can sustain
you in the face of that?

And that is the fundamental
religious question.

And we even know the
answer to that to some degree,

interestingly enough,
one of the ways that you

fortify yourself against
catastrophe is by facing

the possibility of that catastrophe
voluntarily. All of the psychological,

neurophysiological, cognitive, behavioral
data, all stack up, pharmacological data,

all stack up on that
point. If you, if your goal is

to develop a vision that
will sustain you through

catastrophe and the
reality of atrocity, then

you can develop that
vision. And you develop that

vision in part by being
willing to undertake

exposing yourself to the worst
possible catastrophes of life.

I just walked down
the Via de la Rosa the

other day, Jonathan
Pazio, a good friend of mine,

and the cross, the
crucifixion, is in some sense

the instantiation of the
suffering of mortality.

That's a reasonable
way of thinking about it.

Now that's not all it is, but
that'll do for the time being.

The stations of the cross, which are
part of a story, part of a vision of being,

are then opportunities to
expose yourself voluntarily

to the, to the range
of terrible things that

might happen to you in your
life, to prepare yourself for that.

So you might have
the vision of yourself

and you'd say, well, I
could never stand up to

the mob demanding my
blood, where I could never

stand up to the tyrant who's
willing to throw me to the mob.

It's like, well, that's
on you because.

you're going to face tyrants
and you're going to face mobs.

And if you're not constituted well enough,
if your vision doesn't encompass a self

that's you that cannot
prevail against the tyrant and

the mob, then you're going
to become the victim of

the mob and a slave. Period.
That's going to happen in your life.

Now, it might not happen in the same
dramatic manner that's played out, let's say,

in the story of the
Passion. It might not happen

the way it happens to
a superhero in a movie.

It might happen to you
by micro degrees across

decades, but doesn't matter.
That's even worse in some sense.

You know, maybe you, you have a tyrant at
work, petty tyrant, and you're enslaved by

your inability to stand
up to his petty tyranny

over the process of 15 years,
or that happens in your marriage.

That happens to
people all the time.

It's still very useful to
know that what you were

confronting was a pharaonic tyrant and that
you failed to free yourself from slavery,

just because it took
10,000 micro iterations

of that process before
it was fully manifest,

doesn't make it any less real. And so then
when you apprehend a challenge like, well,

I might have to face the
mob, it's like, yeah, well,

are you put together well
enough to face the mob?

Could you proclaim your
own innocence in a manner

that would be compelling?
Could you make a case

for yourself? And if the
answer is no, it's like,

well, it's time to generate
a better vision then,

and time to act it out.
And you might as well do

that before the flood
comes. It's no time to build

an arc after the floods
here. You want to be

prepared for that. One of
the things we know from the

psychotherapeutic
literature, every brand of

psychotherapy,
regardless of its scientific,

fundamental, or its
philosophical orientation

has converged on the
idea that voluntary exposure

to challenge is curative.
And so to what challenge,

well, I don't know what
the extent of that is,

it's like, to all the
challenges of life.

And so you have to develop
a vision of yourself that's

capable of withstanding
all the challenges of life.

One of the things that
many people have said

to me is I gave out a
proposition, delivered a

proposition a few years
ago that while you know

your parents are going
to die, and of course

that's a terrible thing.
And so then, well,

one question might be,
well, who do you want to be

at the funeral? And you
better think that through

because you're going to
be someone at the funeral.

And then you might think,
well, who could you be

optimally? You could
be the person that gathers

together your grieving
family so that they're

born strengthened as a
consequence of the loss.

That'd be pretty good. Be
better than the alternative,

and maybe it's
something to aim for.

And that's a terrifying thing
to apprehend. It's like, well,

how are you going to
pull yourself together when

the catastrophe comes?
And you might think about

that in relationship
to your own death.

And you certainly could think
about that in relationship to.

your treatment at the
hands of the vicious

mob, which has become
a more germane issue.

And in modern times, who
do you have to be in order

to withstand all the
vicissitudes of life? And

we know the answer to
that to some degree is like,

what should your
identity be predicated on in

the fundamental analysis?
It's like, well, it's the

open attention that you
devote, even to the worst

of all possible outcomes.
And you could easily

say that the more capable
you are, how could it.

be? Eyes fully open. The better you're
going to be in a situation of catastrophe.

Obviously, how could it be
any different? And so you think,

well, that's all
self-evidence, like, yeah, it is,

but it's taken a very
long time to figure out.

Because you can't ask
yourself, for example,

what's the core principle
of a healthy identity?

And it's something like
the willingness and ability

to adopt the stance of optimal challenge
in the face of the catastrophe of life.

And the reality of
atrocity. That's what it is.

It's a stance. It's like a
dancing stance in some sense.

It's a playful stance.
If it's optimized

particularly, but it's
eyes wide open, full front,

man, no matter what comes
at you, you're going to face it.

And that's the
ultimate challenge.

But why would you be
able to face the ultimate

barriers in life? If you
weren't willing to face

otherwise, if it comes
upon you unawares, you're

just going to collapse.
And then the catastrophe

is going to be far worse than
it might have otherwise been.

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