Men desire power

Abstract wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

Abstract wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

But isn't in the case that because you need to change to suit the environment, the environment has power over you?
Isn't submittal a yeld of power?

How is it that the environment would have power over you if you are changing in a matter such as to further control it...(by my logic one is already power because they have the amazing capacity to evolve...) that is just strategy, the step in between gaining power... even in the case of say becoming a dictator you must cow toe to the political influence of your order in order to rise to power even be those the politico's of the rebel forces.

Obviously, in the example you gave, cow toeing to the political influence of your order is a sign of the order's power over you. You must play by their rules before you can rise the power ladder and become the rule maker.

such is almost always the case. and some times it is best not to rise to the top because that is how you get assassinated. And thus remain with less acclaimed power equally submitting to behavior expectations yet doing most of the "manipulation".

Are you now more keen on the definition of power in the original post?

Satyr wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

Satyr wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

I understand what you say as it is related to power, and compassion as a tool for power.

However, I am making a distinction between success and power.
Power is a lot more obvious than success, it is something that an observer is able to perceive.
Success is to reach a goal, it is personal.

I consider this an aspect of indifference.

I need more.

You'll have to do some work on this on your own.
I'm not going to spoon-feed you this and then, down the line, be accused of brain-washing you or infecting you or impregnating your mind with my essence.

Ask yourself:
What is it about someone which is perceptible about him but you cannot put your finger on, which makes him exude power or confidence?
Is it beauty, physical symmetry?
No, because many attractive people are invisible as personalities. Their energies do not match their appearance.
Is it money?
No, because many rich people seem bland and unimpressive when you meet them in person.

So, what is it?
It's an attitude.
Sometimes an attitude which does not make good first impressions as attitude is more about personality and not only movement, grace, a certain style.

Ask yourself why young women, before maturity forces them to put their sexual preferences on the back of more practical considerations, go for the "bad boys"?
These boys need not even be attractive, to look at, not wealthy, but they exude an energy.

What is it?

I am not concerned with these considerations.
It is easy for me to understand my own perception of people's power over me.

What is difficult, and it's what I need help with, is understanding the desire for power.
I'm one of them underachievers. I know you are, as well.

So, instead of thinking about the questions you asked, I like this one better: Why didn't you take over the world? Did you reach a sphere of power that satisfies you?

Why do you assume that "taking over the world" is a sign of power?

Why do you assume that power means power over others?

I said it once and I'll say it again, the master/slave dynamic is one based on reciprocal dependence.
True power, to whatever extent that it is possible, begins with power over one's self, and is characterized by an indifference over all else which does not have an effect over this self.

The desire for power, like any projection, is a desire over what is missing in self.
Inevitably this search for what is missing begins with otherness.
People seek in others what they lack in themselves.

Since lack is a characteristic of existence they search in vain, as to exist is to lack, feeling it as need.
The other can never fulfill this need because he or she is also lacking.

The only answer is to limit your search by becoming self-aware. This stops you from looking for what you are missing in what can never fulfill it more than a short while.
It is to increase your tolerance of need/suffering so as to make the sensation of need more bearable or to habituate yourself with need/suffering to a degree where the average is a comfort zone - athletics/ascetics.
This is called strength.

In other words what you lack and how to deal with it is entirely a personal and solitary affair.
Others can distract you from this, providing a momentary relief, but they cannot do it for you.

phoneutria wrote:

Abstract wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

Abstract wrote:

phoneutria wrote:

But isn't in the case that because you need to change to suit the environment, the environment has power over you?
Isn't submittal a yeld of power?

How is it that the environment would have power over you if you are changing in a matter such as to further control it...(by my logic one is already power because they have the amazing capacity to evolve...) that is just strategy, the step in between gaining power... even in the case of say becoming a dictator you must cow toe to the political influence of your order in order to rise to power even be those the politico's of the rebel forces.

Obviously, in the example you gave, cow toeing to the political influence of your order is a sign of the order's power over you. You must play by their rules before you can rise the power ladder and become the rule maker.

such is almost always the case. and some times it is best not to rise to the top because that is how you get assassinated. And thus remain with less acclaimed power equally submitting to behavior expectations yet doing most of the "manipulation".

Are you now more keen on the definition of power in the original post?

Maybe... are you then agreeing that a woman has the potential to be more powerful then a man?

though I would still say that such is not a matter of controlling the environment alone as one still must submit to aspects of it... at the most it is a combination of the two... capacity to handle submission and capacity to control.

sometimes i think feminine nature is more about or has been more about submission
male's of dominance...

it would seem to me oddly that the strongest man has both powers.. the power to submit when it benefits the most or dominate when it is best...

Satyr, are you saying, in sum, that power is a lack of will?

Abstract wrote:

Maybe... are you then agreeing that a woman has the potential to be more powerful then a man?

I consider both men and women equally capable.
Historically, men have been more of a subduing force, while women more notably employed manipulation. Nature of the beast, I suppose, though examples abound for all sides and in all forms.

Quote :

though I would still say that such is not a matter of controlling the environment alone as one still must submit to aspects of it... at the most it is a combination of the two... capacity to handle submission and capacity to control.

Don't be stubborn, submission is not power. Submission is the admittal of a power over you.

Quote :

sometimes i think feminine nature is more about or has been more about submission
male's of dominance...

There is something in my psyche that speaks loudly about submissal. Once again I don't feel comfortable speaking for all women as I'm not exactly typical. I'm certain that a large portion of it is due to the conditioning I received in my education. I can attempt to expand on my own perception of it, if you would like me to.

[Quote
it would seem to me oddly that the strongest man has both powers.. the power to submit when it benefits the most or dominate when it is best...[/quote]

I still conflict with your notion of submissal as a form of power.
A man that yields to something hoping for some sort of benefit, is playing strategically.
However, if he had the power to, he would rather have the benefit without having to yield.

phoneutria wrote:

Satyr, are you saying, in sum, that power is a lack of will?

I'm saying that Will is the focus of power, the aggregate energies at an organism's disposal, upon the completion of power: omnipotence.

But power can be replaced by any notion of an absolute, such as omniscience, perfection, God, oneness, and the meaning and motive is the same: finding or attaining the absolute which is absent.
It is the completion of Becoming into Being.

Since the attainment of the absolute would entail an end to acting, striving, needing....it essentially means the end of existing.
Life and consciousness are now obsolete, in an end, THE END.

So, power or any concept relating to value, must always be considered a comparison....a degree...rather than a completion or an absolute.
I can never be powerful in a universal sense....I am always powerful in relation to an other.
I am always wise, or strong, or intelligent, or fast, or tall, or whatever in relation to an other or to an average otherness.

Therefore I am never absolutely without need, but always less in need in relation to another.

The other can also be a reference to one's own earlier state or to a projected, imagined, hoped for state.

phoneutria wrote:

Quote :

though I would still say that such is not a matter of controlling the environment alone as one still must submit to aspects of it... at the most it is a combination of the two... capacity to handle submission and capacity to control.

Don't be stubborn, submission is not power. Submission is the admittal of a power over you.

Submission can also be lieing to the person and saying they have power over you until you are in position to kill them. ( Perhaps you could look at is as "controlling" by means of faking of submission...I think of it as temporary submission)

Men wouldn't get killed as much if they new when to shut up. And take it up the ass.

phoneutria wrote:

Quote :

sometimes i think feminine nature is more about or has been more about submission
male's of dominance...

There is something in my psyche that speaks loudly about submissal. Once again I don't feel comfortable speaking for all women as I'm not exactly typical. I'm certain that a large portion of it is due to the conditioning I received in my education. I can attempt to expand on my own perception of it, if you would like me to.

Do expand. most modes of thought seem to be memes they come and go... enjoyment in this then in that...

phoneutria wrote:

Quote :

it would seem to me oddly that the strongest man has both powers.. the power to submit when it benefits the most or dominate when it is best...

I still conflict with your notion of submissal as a form of power.
A man that yields to something hoping for some sort of benefit, is playing strategically.
However, if he had the power to, he would rather have the benefit without having to yield.

Perhaps you just don't like the use of that particular metaphor as it holds negative connotations for you? Call it submissal or call it control... it can be called either, I guess.

Satyr wrote:

I'm saying that Will is the focus of power, the aggregate energies at an organism's disposal, upon the completion of power: omnipotence.

Obviously. Will is the focus of... everything.
What I have a difficulty accepting, and I suppose is the whole reason for this thread to exist, is will to power as a metaphysical doctrine. And...

Quote :

But power can be replaced by any notion of an absolute, such as omniscience, perfection, God, oneness, and the meaning and motive is the same: finding or attaining the absolute which is absent.
It is the completion of Becoming into Being.

... it seems you have a problem with that as well.

Quote :

Since the attainment of the absolute would entail an end to acting, striving, needing....it essentially means the end of existing.
Life and consciousness are now obsolete, in an end, THE END.

The gods did enjoy food, drink, and play.

Quote :

So, power or any concept relating to value, must always be considered a comparison....a degree...rather than a completion or an absolute.
I can never be powerful in a universal sense....I am always powerful in relation to an other.
I am always wise, or strong, or intelligent, or fast, or tall, or whatever in relation to an other or to an average otherness.

Therefore I am never absolutely without need, but always less in need in relation to another.

The other can also be a reference to one's own earlier state or to a projected, imagined, hoped for state.

When you were talking about disinterestedness before, and I asked you about lack of will, I was hoping that you would have gone further on that line.
Here is what I came up with.
You are only able to exercise any power over me if you can create any sort of interest in me.
If you have nothing that I want, you have no power over me.
If nobody has anything that I want, nobody has power over me.
By controlling my will, I create a situation in which I alone have power over myself.
In absolute terms, if I can eliminate will altogether, I become powerful.

I don't know if this is what you meant, but it sort of makes sense in a faqir sort of way.

phoneutria wrote:

Obviously. Will is the focus of... everything.

No Will is not the focus of everything.
Learning to use the proper words in the proper order is a first step in understanding.
Words relate to each other, like colors do on a canvas.

phoneutria wrote:

What I have a difficulty accepting, and I suppose is the whole reason for this thread to exist, is will to power as a metaphysical doctrine. And...

Then don't.
I'm not pushing Nietzsche on you, my sweet.

Try "Will to beauty"..."Will to Understanding"...."Will to unity"..."Will to Harmony"..."Will to God"...any term denoting an absolute ideal will do.

phoneutria wrote:

... it seems you have a problem with that as well.

No...I am quite happy with Becoming...I don't want to BE anything.
To Be is to end Becoming...and so you end your self.

phoneutria wrote:

The gods did enjoy food, drink, and play.

With measure.

phoneutria wrote:

When you were talking about disinterestedness before, and I asked you about lack of will, I was hoping that you would have gone further on that line.
Here is what I came up with.
You are only able to exercise any power over me if you can create any sort of interest in me.
If you have nothing that I want, you have no power over me.
If nobody has anything that I want, nobody has power over me.
By controlling my will, I create a situation in which I alone have power over myself.

Yes.
But given that there are o absolutes all of this is a matter of degree and a comparison.

The more powerful one is the one who needs from the other far less than he or she needs from him.
This is why power is attractive without meaning to.

The "bad boy" is attractive to the girls because he does not care about them, on a personal level as much as they care about him.
He is more indifferent to them individually.

phoneutria wrote:

In absolute terms, if I can eliminate will altogether, I become powerful.

Yes, if you mean "power" in the absolute sense: omnipotence.

Now notice how this also means the end of you.
To will the absolute in any form, projected in any way: God, Power, Knowledge, etc. is essentially a will towards self-annihilation or self-negation or self-obsolescence.

phoneutria wrote:

I don't know if this is what you meant, but it sort of makes sense in a faqir sort of way.

Close enough.

So contentment is a matter of limiting what you need or controlling what you need or more efficiently dedicating energies in acquiring specific things you need by not wasting energies pursuing things that you do not really need, even if you do not know it.

Contentment is a matter of efficiency.

The body is content when its immediate needs are taken care of easily.

Satyr wrote:

]No Will is not the focus of everything.
Learning to use the proper words in the proper order is a first step in understanding.
Words relate to each other, like colors do on a canvas.

Will is the focus of everything pertaining human nature. That is what we are talking about.
A particular will drives you to become.

Quote :

Then don't.
I'm not pushing Nietzsche on you, my sweet.

Try "Will to beauty"..."Will to Understanding"...."Will to unity"..."Will to Harmony"..."Will to God"...any term denoting an absolute ideal will do.

Well, look at the premise of this thread. It states that men desire power.
With that in mind, can I understand that you disagree with that premise?
Couldn't you as easily say that behind a will to beauty, understanding, etc, there is a desire for power?

Quote :

No...I am quite happy with Becoming...I don't want to BE anything.
To Be is to end Becoming...and so you end your self.

This to me sounds like a labor oriented mentality.
I find that the opposite is true, that when the pressure of becoming acts upon you, you are not quite yourself, but being led by the need to act toward becoming.
It is when that pressure is lifted, in the time for play, that the being is revealed.

Quote :

Yes.
But given that there are o absolutes all of this is a matter of degree and a comparison.

The more powerful one is the one who needs from the other far less than he or she needs from him.
This is why power is attractive without meaning to.

It is only attractive as a secondary attribute. There isn't a direct correlation.

Quote :

The "bad boy" is attractive to the girls because he does not care about them, on a personal level as much as they care about him.
He is more indifferent to them individually.

It is a bit presumptuous of you to speak with such confidence about what a girl finds attractive, don't you think?

Quote :

Yes, if you mean "power" in the absolute sense: omnipotence.

Now notice how this also means the end of you.
To will the absolute in any form, projected in any way: God, Power, Knowledge, etc. is essentially a will towards self-annihilation or self-negation or self-obsolescence.

No need to repeat, vide above.

Quote :

Close enough.

So contentment is a matter of limiting what you need or controlling what you need or more efficiently dedicating energies in acquiring specific things you need by not wasting energies pursuing things that you do not really need, even if you do not know it.

Contentment is a matter of efficiency.

The body is content when its immediate needs are taken care of easily.

A mind which dreams of what it can't have is a restless one.

phoneutria wrote:

Will is the focus of everything pertaining human nature. That is what we are talking about.
A particular will drives you to become.

Will is the focus of the emerging unity's aggregate energies upon an object/objective.
Need is how it is felt; desire is how it calls it.

All life has Will, including plants.
It is not only human.
Intelligence allows for the more efficient focus of energies and so it offers an advantage in this regard.

phoneutria wrote:

Well, look at the premise of this thread. It states that men desire power.

Which is simplistic as ALL desires power.
Power is another name for the absent absolute or the projected object/objective.

phoneutria wrote:

Couldn't you as easily say that behind a will to beauty, understanding, etc, there is a desire for power?

phoneutria wrote:

This to me sounds like a labor oriented mentality.

Life is a constant struggle.

phoneutria wrote:

I find that the opposite is true, that when the pressure of becoming acts upon you, you are not quite yourself, but being led by the need to act toward becoming.

It's because you do not know yourself and you abandon yourself to instinct.
Typically female.

phoneutria wrote:

It is when that pressure is lifted, in the time for play, that the being is revealed.

There is no being. That's another term for the absent absolute: the object/objective.
It is in time of "play", abandonment, that the organism surrenders to instinct, to blind need...and it truly reveals itself.
Reason not only tries to hide this self but it tries to control it.

phoneutria wrote:

It is only attractive as a secondary attribute. There isn't a direct correlation.

How naive.

phoneutria wrote:

It is a bit presumptuous of you to speak with such confidence about what a girl finds attractive, don't you think?

Is it less presumptuous to imply, without actually stating hit, that I am incorrect?

I see a dog wag its tail. I cannot know what the dog is thinking.
How do I presume to know that it is friendly towards me?

phoneutria wrote:

A mind which dreams of what it can't have is a restless one.

Restless, another term for active.
Ergo all life is active.

The ideal is never attained, the object/objective never reached....the journey, the activity, towards it, and how close you get to it, is what defines you.

I would sum up the previous few posts thusly:

The driving force of all living creatures is the will to obtain/achieve that which it lacks.

Power is not so much a tool for obtaining that goal, as it is an indicator of how far you have advanced toward the goal.

The hypotetical all powerful being is one that lacks nothing, and thus desires nothing, and thus cannot be manipulated.


Opinions, please.

phoneutria wrote:

I would sum up the previous few posts thusly:

The driving force of all living creatures is the will to obtain/achieve that which it lacks.

Power is not so much a tool for obtaining that goal, as it is an indicator of how far you have advanced toward the goal.

The hypotetical all powerful being is one that lacks nothing, and thus desires nothing, and thus cannot be manipulated.


Opinions, please.

I lack a lot of stuff I do not wish to obtain. Material or otherwise. So I disagree. I do not think living things want to obtain that which it lacks. I think this idea is too ambiguous. Why even add this "will" and not do away with it? I think living things are unconscious, without this "will" and they are no in control of their environment, only bits and pieces just like unliving things.

If you don't need or desire it, you don't lack it.

I do lack the smell of a dog, the horns of a goat, the something of something. Yet I do not need it. You can't say I do not lack it.

By your logic. A man doesn't lack goat horns because he doesn't need them. But a man does lack goat horns, since humans do not posses horns of goats.

If the word "lack" doesn't suit you, pick one that does.

Dear sweet mother of God!!!

Listen, lack is a feeling with no object.
I sense it as need.
Now, I might see something which I might think might fulfill this need, or I might evolve ways of sensing when the otherness I perceive has elements which I lack, as in nutrients, but my need is never extinguished, the lack is never fulfilled...it is only temporarily abated.

Use whatever fucking term you wish.

Need is the sensation of existing.
There is only one need...it is the sensation of an absence. This can be imagined or projected as anything.
For all intensive purposes let us call it the lack of an absolute...or the lack of perfection, or oneness, or God, or immortality.
All these terms designate human conception of what is lacking, as what is absent can be anything and everything precisely because it is absent.
That's why a child can then use horns or a dog's smell to designate it.

The trick is not to designate the different manifestations of lack as being what is missing, for they are a product of lack themselves, but to delve deeper and consider why horns come about or why there is a dog, and a cat, a a horses arse, instead of one big happy family of oneness?

Need is simply the sensation of a unity, an emergent unity, striving to maintain itself in entropy; it is the sensation of resistance: life resisting death; order resisting disorder.
Because need is the sensation of existing, whatever object/objective (ideal, thing, idea etc.) you can define this absence as is irrelevant, as it is the very definition of absence: non-existence.

Desire is the name given to the sensation of need when it finds an object/objective which it thinks, or rather feels in the early development of life, or has evolved to consider as promising fulfillment.

Will, is the focus of desire upon this object/objective.

Want is a desire minus the passion, the instinctual element.
Therefore a want can be manufactured by connecting it to one or more desires, corresponding to need.