What does /pol/ think of Alan Watts?
https://youtu.be/VCxRSiaFciI
>I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.
Which sounds like Taoism. He doesn't have a religion afaik, but he lectured and spoke about philosophy of thought. It seems very redpilled.
DUDE ZEN LMAO
Sounds like he read to much Kurt Vonnegut and self help meditation books
>>72464661
I sure did.
also, he had many valid points.
My favorite is the one about the Joker/Jester
>>72464492
>He doesnt have a religion afaik
Taoism and Buddhist have plenty of great points that aren't specifically tied to spirituality.
>>72464661
Do you have any idea how old the two respective people are? Honestly a 7 minute clip that OP linked doesn't say much of anything, although dismissing it off the bat as "self help" crap doesn't convince me that you actually listened to it.
>>72465028
Helping yourself is discouraged bro.
>>72464086
Smartest man there ever was.
a complete fucking idiot with a constant stream of contrived bullshit flowing out of his mouth
>>72467178
He was wise and smart but don't get too far. Not detracting from what he's done, just saying.
>>72468441
>a complete fucking idiot with a constant stream of contrived bullshit flowing out of his mouth
Sounds like you're projecting a bit there, mate.
>implying you have any direct critique
>>72464086
he's still the best introduction to eastern religion today imo
Alan Watts was a truly brilliant man and explained Eastern philosophy better than anyone in history.
Unfortunately he had the mentality of a weak, lazy beta... Had a defeatist attitude ie. "theres nothing you can really do to change!"
In other words, he was ultimately a weak, nihilistic alcoholic who drunk himself to death.
But if you can overlook his defeatism and passivity he really was a genius.
>>72464086
he is the best at saying nothing.
>>72469382
He doesn't seem to pick his religion, he seems to just take what he wants out of each and apply it to his own life. I think what people do benefit from is the ideas he takes and shares to others.
I appreciate that, because you don't need to be tied to any religion to understand what he's talking about. Different perspectives.
>>72469621
Are you exaggerating just a tad? He did drink a lot in his later years, but would you consider him to be an alcoholic? Would you even consider him a deafeatist? Many times he's spoken against the mentality that there's nothing you can do.
>>72464086
Wow, yet another iteration of neoplatonism. Wonderufl.
DUDE WEED
>>72469931
>neoplatonism
>DUDE WEED
Are you even sure you haven't gotten this guy confused with someone else? Absolutely mentally retarded you sure are.
>>72470233
>the physical world is in illusion, we are spirits trapped in this illusion
>not an iteration of neoplatonism
>not DUDE WEED
>>72469823
Alan Watts was certainly an alcoholic. He drank whiskey by the bottle and got increasingly worse over time. His family became more and more concerned with his drinking, and it was eventually alcohol which killed him at the relatively young age of 58.
He clearly was a defeatist. You can find this in dozens of his works and lectures. He was always explaining how you "can't lift yourself up by your own boot straps" or how "the person who needs the changing can't be the person who does the changing."
He was personally opposed to meditation and practically completely wrote it off. Some say he never once engaged in zazen, with the justification that we are all already Buddha and so don't need to achieve it.
>>72470449
>neoplatonism = DUDE WEED
>That line of thinking is specific to neoplatonism
I don't understand how you led to this conclusion. Spare me a dime brutha?
>>72470615
>He clearly was a defeatist. You can find this in dozens of his works and lectures. He was always explaining how you "can't lift yourself up by your own boot straps" or how "the person who needs the changing can't be the person who does the changing."
I was under the impression that he's always making a distinction between a past "you" and a present "you", and a "you" and your body as a whole. So in other words he could be saying that the old you isn't the one changing, the new you is. This is supported by his metaphorical way of speaking throughout almost all of his lectures.
>>72470615
>He was personally opposed to meditation and practically completely wrote it off.
Source on this. I recall him mentioning it many times and even the very act of meditating, and he would speak often of being the observer of one's own mind (which is a part of meditation but you see the point here).
>>72470980
>His specific rejection of the necessity of zazen (Zen meditation) in The Way of Zen and elsewhere is part of this general critique, whose basic argument is that any kind of effort is always, both in principle and in fact, in the service of ego; therefore, striving to attain any kind of realization becomes pragmatically self-contradictory, because the attempt to overcome ego only makes ego-attachment stronger. What is wrong with this position is simply that it a priori excludes the possibility of right effort. For example, he argues that doing zazen as a means to the attainment of enlightenment is wrong effort, but from this he wrongly infers that there is no way to do zazen rightly. He even goes so far as to suggest that Tang dynasty Zen masters never encouraged their students to do zazen, this despite the fact that "Zen" means "meditation."[12]
Alan W. Watts
ccbs ntu edu tw/FULLTEXT/JR-PHIL/ew26759 htm
>>72470643
It can be done in non-DUDE WEED (yet still heretical) ways, but you don't really see that in modern neoplatonists. It's the WOW THE UNIVERSE MAN type of thinking
Alan Watts is most based philosopher
>>72470615
This was the main reason I never went full Watts.
When I learned this I couldn't stop thinking this smart sounding guy was fatally addicted to alcohol.
>>72471479
Wrong, its Kant
He was the greatest autist the world ever knew
I love that /pol/ is attempting to have a philosophy thread.
Watts was a spook, just like Leary, RA Wilson, and many other big names in the “counterculture”
Source
http://pressblog.uchicago.edu/#article/2185
Cybernetics should be of great interest to any meme magician on this board.
>>72470615
I believe it wasn't defeatism. Rather he was simply stating that one can't change anything without it remaining the same. The universe is full of constants that can bend, but never break. I can never become a snake, for instance. There are simply some things we cannot change, and therefore should have little focus on. Worry about the now. Here you find peace. Contemplation. And the resolve to continue. You cannot change, because that would imply you are a part of time. You are and you are not. You can change, but also cannot. Dualism.
>>72471479
>>72471718
>not Aquinas
>>72471730
go away pleb
>>72471851
lmao.
I've sat zazen daily and done weekly sesshins with a Soto zen sangha for years now. Also fully redpilled a voting Trumo. What now faggot?
At first I thought he was a really pretentious pseudo-intellectual, but I kept listening and listening, and he has really grown on me.
There have been a couple of things he has said that I think are a little silly, but all things told he is an incredible philosopher, and he predicted the fall of communism, citing marxism and equality as being too boring to sustain themselves.
>>72472199
Why are you here?
>>72472335
To give my input on Alan Watts. He knew nothing of Zen and was generally a complete faggot.
Did you read the link I posted?
>>72472485
No. I didn't ask why you are typing on your keyboard connected to 4chan, I'm asking: Why are you here?
>>72472564
10/10 anon
Shitposter stumped
he is part of mk ultra cia program along with aldous huxley
>>72471474
It really makes me shudder when thinking about the universe becomes a meme to be mocked. I don't care much for "spirit science", personally. I think a lot of the prevailing ideas (meditation, living in the moment, nonjudgement) is beneficial to people psychologically. I think Alan Watts has a lot of good ideas. Not saying I agree with him 100%. But he really makes one think about the way they think, and a person can go on from there and do their own exploring. Alan Watts doesn't need to be taken at his word, he's just a person. What I've found is a lot of people try to see him as a spiritual teacher or philosopher.
>>72471792
Aquinas was pretty lame and crusty
>>72471600
You blinded yourself with judgement of him? That's why I was kinda weary looknig into his personal life but I've found he was just a regular faulty guy. That's why I try not to put him up on a pedestal. He carries himself pretty well and is a great thinker with great ideas, but he did have his faults. I can't see the man in black and white.
>>72472485
>To give my input on Alan Watts. He knew nothing of Zen and was generally a complete faggot.
>
>Did you read the link I posted?
I have yet to see you say anything in your own words. Say something that exemplifies your years of experience.
>>72471774
That's what I think. It's not something to take literally, like a lot of the things he says.
>>72472262
If anything he redpilled me against dismissing people as pseudo-intellectuals. If anything it's part of the constant attempt at subverting anyone from being redpilled. Convince people to mock curiosity as "people who think they are intellectual and who are forcing their will on others". This is why they feel like these people were lying to them when they realize they were ordinary people all along. Shame.
>>72464086
A great speaker, a highly entertaining lecturer, a fine spiritual communicator, and brilliant interpreter of Zen for the west. His brand is what got people here hooked, he stripped it down to it's bare essentials and help spread a deeper spirituality to people here. It isn't what people in Japan actually have, over there its as dense and distant as Catholicism is here- that is, most people don't find they can connect with it. He was way ahead of his time, and although a huckster in his own right, probably would have laughed at people thinking of him as a guru. He helped me quit drugs and get on with being a man.
>>72476567
Personally I see alcoholics as subhuman, so its kind of hard to see past that
Also it wasn't exactly a situation where "just listen to his ideas and ignore the man behind them" since his ideas are pretty vague and personal
>>72464086
I love the old drunk and I'm friends with his son.
>>72476924
how is the Alan Watts center going? Is his son still working on it?
>>72476855
Part of the appreciation I have for his lectures is that I can relate to them. They are deeply personal and about thoughts, and I recognize thoughts that I've personally had. He seems to really aim at undoing conditioning with some of his lectures.
Why do you see alcoholics as subhumans? I understand the reasons many people have, but what are yours? Alcoholism that destroys a person is unfortunate, and I try to see that as an unfortunate part of a person rather than as THE person.
>>72476831
Surprisingly, I've found someone on /pol/ that speaks the truth!
>>72477065
His son is an avid AA member and swears off alcohol but is a total stoner living in the Bay area.
Rick is a great guy. :)
>>72477106
Everyone I know thats an alcoholic is a piece of shit, and not someone I want to be around
>>72464086
Eastern philosophy 101 for murricans, delivered with an exaggerated English accent.
>>72477259
Well I'm off the booze too, I gotta say it must be annoying having people talk about your dad all the time like he was some psychedelic jesus/aldous huxley mashup, but for what it's worth I would love to pick his brain about his old man. Take care ameribro, glad to have bumped into you
>>72477259
Is he into philosophy at all? I'd like to toke with that fellow.
>>72477543
There are alcoholics who are more quiet about it and aren't pieces of shit. I don't really have an opinion of what all alcoholics are like, I just judge them individually. More likely than not though they are pieces of shit. I'm figuring Alan Watts, by his personality, was not an asshole drunk.
>>72464086
I always liked him, nothing wrong with him.
>>72476831
ty leaf
>>72470615
Freedom comes from realising you can't change anything.
Only by surrendering to the moment can you find your true self and what you truly want.
So much of people's action in the world is useless chaff coming from dissatisfaction and ignorance of what they truly want.
/pol/ is full of it.
>>72467178
dont know about smartest, but most eloquent man for sure.
his fucking voice and talks are hypnotising, he could have easily be a cult leader.
>>72469621
maybe the eastern religions made them this way. honestly I dropped buddhism because of the nihilism. Currently a fedora tipper, which sucks too :(
>>72471425
>any kind of effort is always, both in principle and in fact, in the service of ego; therefore, striving to attain any kind of realization becomes pragmatically self-contradictory,
well, Alan is right on this though. that dude, tit nut chahn or whatever his name is, said the same. You should do meditation without any motivation.
>>72464086
>deadbeat spiritual healer giving out life advice
yeah retard follow his advice so you can grow up to be a big success like him
What lectures and books of his have you guys gotten familiar with?
>>72477713
>exaggerated
Are you saying he's faking it or something?
>>72464086
It's not Daoism, it just """sounds""" like Daoism to Western idiots.
My farts could sound like Daoism to most Westerners.
His explanations were subpar woo woo, that have nothing to do with actual Daoism.
>>72478721
>Only by surrendering to the moment can you find your true self and what you truly want.
Exactly. In harsher words, it's pretty much not becoming a bitch of your own mind. Not cowardly ignoring your impulses, hiding behind a mask, or policing your own thoughts on a constant basis. Being able to probe your mind and question yourself and figure out the "root of it all" is something a coward wouldn't be able to do.
>>72479701
>Strawman
Kill yourself.
>>72481603
This.
He was ordained in anything, and barely trained.
>>72482447
The West is full of these "teachers" claiming to be members of a tradition they've only read about.
You can't be a Daoist or Buddhist just by reading books, it takes practice to understand and embody the ideas or else they remain as abstractions.
>>72481323
Not exactly faking, but partly contrived. Like when Fraiser Crane is speaking in public.
>>72464086
ALAN WATTS VERSUS STEFAN MOLYNEUX
>>72482447
wasn't he more about incorporating daoism into his own philosophy rather than teaching? I never listen to Alan Watts to learn about daosim but rather to just hear his opinion on life and conscious experience.
