The Philosopher Of Paradox

[@stevenzheng5459]

Heraclitus's philosophy sounds a lot like Daoism. His definition of "logos" is like "Dao", and the union of opposites is like yin-yang (complementary opposites). Daoist are also interested in the dialectic/paradoxical nature of change and transformation, its connection to the Dao. Unlike Heraclitus, the Daoists venerates water over fire. Water flows in the path of least resistance and is ultimately not obstructed. Water may be soft, but can smoothen stones and carry everything on it.

[@seeker2seeker]

This comparison between Heraclitus and Daoism is actually a fantastic idea for a video :) Thank you for the thoughtful comment!

[@tbab147]

Ding, ding, ding, good sir. From Wikipedia's Tao page: "In some Chinese translations of the New Testament, the word λόγος (logos) is translated as 道, in passages such as John 1:1, indicating that the translators considered the concept of Tao to be somewhat equivalent to the Hellenic concept of logos in Platonism and Christianity.[36] "

[@ALavin-en1kr]

Heraclitus and philosophers of his time used metaphor to describe consciousness and states of mind. To understand what they meant we have to interpret it from that perspective. The logos; (intelligence), fire; (consciousness) water; (mind). It was common for actual physical things to be used to describe the non visible inner states. Christ also used metaphor or parables e.g. To build one’s house upon the sand, could be interpreted as placing one’s consciousness or mind on the temporal which shifts and changes and gives no permanent stability. Gilgamesh is also metaphorical and is widely misinterpreted as it uses a story to tell about an inner state and a transformation that took place in the consciousness of the protagonist. Most people miss that, approaching the story from a literal perspective.

[@xuesenliu]

If you combine Heraclitus, Thales, Anaxmandros and Anaxmenes, you will get a compelete Daoism.

[@ALavin-en1kr]

@@stevenzheng5459 I seem to recall the Plato opined that those who lived in low places would perish by water and those who lived in high places would perish by fire. As elements were used as metaphor it would be interesting to speculate as to what he meant. It is likely he was using metaphor to describe consciousness so interpreting it that way the emotional would drown in their own feeling and the overly cognitive or intellectual would burn themselves out in their own cognitive heat. The middle way was advised in all the disciplines; negotiating a path between opposites, which as we are in a dual system is what we have to do. Don’t choose one point of view or another just negotiate a path between them; maybe that is where the truth lies.

[@henripepels815]

I'm in my sixties. As a young man, I studied philosophy. The first semester held the course 'ancient philosophy', given by a professor who had just published his translation and commentary on the 'fragments' (no, not Charles Kahn, wished it were). I instantly knew this held something, something hidden, something I had to understand. I did not. It took me years, decades, to really see the depth, to experience the oneness, to see how deeply Heraclitus connects with other wisdom traditions like the Indian and daoist, and how little and poor the understanding of my professor was. From an Indian perspective, it takes almost uncountable lives to come to this understanding. You must be a very old soul, my young brother. God bless you.

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you, Henri, this is one of the most touching comments I’ve ever had…

[@meghan42]

I would hope the "onenes" you experienced was not just intellectiual, but also Actual. You seem to think that it takes countless lives to .... whatever. I think we all know it's happening now. Everythig else is conceptual. Nothing wrong with knowledge as long as we know it''s only that.

[@C.E.Thomas1952]

I am 71 and a former teacher and astrologist and I just want to say that what took our generation time to understand and integrate, that time is accelerating now and many younger ones understand and can transmit more quickly (and possibly more clearly?) because we are moving into the Age of Aquarius where we will be living a more conscious life. However, speed of understanding is not the issue. There has to be realisation of the heart intelligence for integration and that is an individual Path. I really enjoyed reading your experience BTW.

[@user-ft5qp7zi2m]

​@jacquelinelion9879 Hey, if you think of it. Logic exists, which is on a single vector. Once you look at that vector, it goes out into an asymptomal expansion. No matter which tangent line you take out; each tangent line directly contradicts each other.... just like each other's own realities. Once they clash, there's a lot of energy. Once both tangent lines from a single convexity collide; they can shorten and become meaningless. Once you come to a conclusion; that which existed a convexity is whole. Existing just like walking; a convexity of order. Convexity which opposes others when you learn how to walk... Once you see the vectors in which those tangent lines form an endless theory of excuses... it holds no value to you; once you go into it - it is as if you're dragged into one line or another, deeper and deeper... growing bigger with even more complexity within more vectors that build even more tangent lines and logic that opposes each other original vector the bigger it gets.... somehow no tangent line forms a square of that within it exists... no matter how small and narrow it gets. Yet once you take the base of the narrow log; with pi it somehow equals 1 under the imaginary unit..

[@user-ft5qp7zi2m]

​@@C.E.Thomas1952if you can visualise it; it's like you can see it everywhere. Try it! Trust me.. it's amazing... every single mistake and feeling... it's as if those vectors are seen as feelings but as if they are logic itself... bad is it you feel bad... good as if you feel good... neutral.. as if it were just a table at the chair; meaningless - yet abundant... if you look into with - creating an endless theory of excuses no matter how big...

[@wighatsuperreggie]

Wow. What a great video. I made the mistake of starting my studies in philosophy. And very soon discovered that they don’t teach philosophy or even how to think, they just teach the history of philosophy. And it was Heracitis who jumped out at me as being the only perspective of any use. I’ve crossed many roads since then and followed many other teachings, but this video of yours really brings me back to that initial inspiration thank you so much.

[@morganmarusteri8879]

6:04 the road up is the road down: beacause it’s about breaking yourself is the same as building yourself up. What breaks in you is your ego, your idea about an identity you may have. So by breaking yourself you become who you truly are, SOURCE, FIRE 🔥.

[@C.E.Thomas1952]

Well explained. It is because we live in a world of duality which is necessary in order to transcend duality. First we understand that the road goes down because it has gone up, etc... and then......

[@frankchilds9848]

Most honest video I've ever experienced on U tube, especially toward the end. This is a gem 💎 worth mining indeed.

[@enigma-yu4jo]

this video should seriously have more views than this. this wisdom in this video is pure gold. it does make sense though how the path for those seeking the deeper truths of life's mysteries is rarely walked.

[@chamikarunarathne8566]

I am a classic student and this is the perfect explanation that I have seen so far. Thank you so much and keep doing eye opening videos like this (beleive me I have never ever commented on a youtube video before)😅

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you for the kind words Amasha!

[@meghan42]

The non-dualistic understanding is insightful.

[@frostacademy7071]

Man, I love you! I hope you become the next veritasium

[@seeker2seeker]

Hahah... thank you!

[@PinoSantilli-hp5qq]

when someone truly sees the world as it is --all come to this conclusion.

[@mitchmitchell9588]

Keep going.

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you Mitch, I appreciate your support very much!

[@petermiranda6939]

Thank you for providing music credits!

[@restlesscow2137]

What a fantastic piece. Watched a lot of your stuff over and over and this is one of my favourites. Just clicks with me for some reason. Love the work you are putting out

[@bg-se7rq]

Emotion + Reason (repeated) = Wisdom … Ty for posting this vid 🔁

[@michaellyttle4347]

Wisdom is silence. Blessings brother

[@bonnielincicome8055]

Thanks!

[@seeker2seeker]

You have my gratitude!

[@themiddlewaymeditation]

Really great video. It really points out the importance of looking deep inside ourselves and emphasizes my practice of meditation.

[@morganmarusteri8879]

3:14 the fire 🔥 was the highest for Heraclitus, and it has a consciousness of it’s own: ”Logos doesn’t speak but gives signs” That is: Logos is to be found inside fire 🔥 which is VISION! A mute consciousness. The prince of air is Saturn/Satan. Though the word ”Logos” is interpreted as ”the word” in Genesis. The conceptual belongs to the prince of air, that is ego, the ”sleeping”. This is my interpretation

[@ruudschulten]

A real gem. These are by far the most impressive comments on Heraclitus that I've heard or read. Far beyond platitudes as 'the weeping philosopher' or 'the obscure'.. Also thanks for your claire Images. Did I recognize the work of Escher explaining the road of man going up and down? His work suddenly in your Video struck me like a 'hammerblow.' .

[@seeker2seeker]

Escher it is :) Thank you for the kind words!

[@seeker2seeker]

Many thanks to the S2S patrons on Patreon: Tsvetina Ivanova , Arian Rasuli, @RMSounds , and Joshua Day. Your encouragement really makes a difference! ⭐ Support this channel: www.patreon.com/seeker2seeker 💰PayPal Donation: www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=28CCPBHAFUUX8 📨 Join the S2S newsletter: www.seekertoseeker.com/esoteric-circle/ Thank you for watching!

[@piotrl.7549]

Logos really resonates for me with the first words of 'Dao te ching'. "Dao that can be told is not ethernal Dao. Name that can be named is not the ethernal name. " It's a reminder that words are only tools to focus perspective on subject. But subjects have endless depth, and to truly understand them we need to look beyond language logic and words.

[@ivanjokovic]

Glad I found this channel 😊

[@seeker2seeker]

I’m glad too! Welcome aboard :)

[@lewisthorntondre5265]

Where is the footage at 2:51 from?

[@RMSounds]

Great video. Not long, not short. Just right. Timeless occult-like fragments of film. -RM Sounds

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you! Only thing missing is your music!

[@NainaMadhukar]

U r literally amazing ❤️✨🤌. I have watched multiple numbers of videos to understand heraclitus philosophy but then I got this and literally appreciate your work that how u connect each n every topic without leaving a single piece of his philosophy. Amaaaazzzinggggg...... 🥴✨

[@justjosh188]

Great video!

[@FlamingSwordOfWisdom108]

Rebirth is the habituated mind born again in a new life. It is not us. It’s our habitations taking root. We die as we live. Born as we die. ❤❤❤

[@guangboqi9731]

nice video and nice explanation

[@VenusLover17]

Beautiful stuff❤❤ thanks so much

[@krzysztofwos1856]

Incredible work. Heraclitus' fragments, unsurprisingly, remind me strongly of Hermetic philosophy. I would love to your take on The Kybalion.

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you for the suggestion and for supporting the channel, my friend. I am writing The Kybalion down as a topic for future research.

[@tanjimhasan2813]

Could you tell me a bit hermetic philosophy and what should I read(to initiate myself)?

[@randecolley7054]

This is THE BEST!!

[@angelitoramire]

Very nice edits! Congrants

[@danruehlman]

I think his ideas also helped develop the concept of punctuated equilibrium.

[@mindovermeTV]

I didn't really begin to look into Heraclitus, until I read Marcus Aurelius 'meditations', where he mentioned him. Some of his quotes were familiar, but now I really love his philosophy

[@mariannirenkristiansen4475]

Thank you 🙏🏼🕊️

[@kricketflyd111]

Very good, Thank You

[@russellbarndt6579]

Wow, combine with some Alen Watt's lectures this is having a profound effect on my comprehension of right action and if you allow me "real reality" since being stuck by lightning while studying an old testament Bible passage then comparing it to a new testament passage 24 years ago in my effort to understand consciousness or to say ultimate reality. I wish we had any of Christ teachings before corrupted by old men in Rome, as I see, likely similar to this understanding as in Taoism and early Hindu teachings...

[@TerryPark70]

That waa really great ! Always look forward ro your work?

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you very much!

[@eastafrika728]

And now every student of existence must interpret this video in their own sense of truth. Always translate everything you watch and hear into your own sense of truth.

[@morganmarusteri8879]

13:57 yes, truth is alive and this was the reason why Sokrates didn’t write. Learn how to see! ”The eyes are useless when the mind is blind!”

[@Damnchaosemerald_e.e]

11:42 the first shall become last and the last shall become first

[@thisisobviouslynotmyrealname]

there is no opposite. What we call opposite is just the absence of sth. Darkness is the absence of light. Cold is the absence of heat. Chaos is the absence of order. So, yes, light and darkness are effects of the same thing, so they are one in this sense, cause darkeness does not exist as an autonomous entity, its just the absence of light.

[@Dyslexic-Artist-Theory-on-Time]

The absorption and emission of light is spontaneous, continuous change! The continuous movement of positive and negative charge, Union of Opposites!

[@RebelleRed]

I don’t think I’ve ever heard of him until my dream last night.

[@gooddaysahead1]

To understand wisdom teachers and wisdom literature, you will and must encounter paradoxes. Without delving into paradoxes, you will remain on the surface of things.

[@Benevitism]

This is a well-made and presented video, but I would have to harshly disagree with the translation used, and the interpretation derived, although there are some good and novel insights provided as well. Unfortunately, though it is a penguin edition, the Haxton translation is widely regarded as disreputable, and I would add that the psychologizing post-modernist introduction to it is perhaps more damaging. Clearly you have drawn from additional sources, but relying on the Haxton translation in any respect will not yield a just conclusion. Perhaps the most egregious problem is indicating that Heraclitus ever suggested we should “look within”. What he actually says is “I inquired for myself”, and in the context that it is given in that form, which is Diogenes Laertius’ Life and Times of Eminent Philosophers, it’s an expression of his independence of thought, emphatically NOT a mystical pursuit of his inner being. Heraclitus’ extant fragments actually abound in the exact opposite sentiment, with an amazing number of criticisms for those who live in “private worlds” or have “private understanding”, as against wisdom which is common. This is just one example, but I do hope it illustrates the need not to impress upon Heraclitus our own prejudices, of which he was wholly innocent.

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you for this comment, I was not aware of this issue!

[@Benevitism]

@@seeker2seeker you’re welcome, I appreciate your grace. I do not mean to denigrate your video, which was very well made and insightful, only to point out the unfortunate situation of Heraclitus who is tragically viewed as though a funhouse mirror, reflecting in a distorted manner the existing opinions of those who interpret him.

[@outsidersperspective13]

Awesome video! Thanks for teaching me about this profound thinker. He's been on my radar a while; glad I clicked on your video!

[@seeker2seeker]

Thank you, I’m glad you enjoyed it!

[@outsidersperspective13]

@@seeker2seeker what struck me was the close parallel to Lao Tzu. Shouldn't be surprised - mysticism is the same regardless of where and when it emerges!

[@seeker2seeker]

@@outsidersperspective13 Yes! As Meister Eckhart put it, 'theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world all speak the same language'.

[@tomato1040]

It's very simple in that the beginning of the circle⭕is also the end of the circle once the circle💫 is fully made as has been spoken in the Nag scripture of St.😇 Thomas, "The 1st🥇is the last, & the last, 1st, in the Circle of LIFE=mc2🧬😂!

[@Ronin3Zero9]

Living organisms are geared towards preserving Energy and maximizing pleasure a Biological Phenomena in our body called homeostasis which is trying to maintain inner balance..

[@justinbyrge8997]

Preserving energy and maximizing pleasure isn't homeostasis. Preserving energy is synonymous with efficiency. Maximizing pleasure is hedonism. Homeostasis is a state of balance and harmony needed in order for a system to function properly, ie to its maximum potential.

[@Rotalus]

pain is signaling you're out of homeostasis. just because its hedonistic doesnt mean its not moving towards homeostasis. and justs because homeostasis is the physical end goal doesnt mean it is the spiritual end goal.

[@ujjwalbhatt1460]

Amazing content bro. Subbed the channel ❤️

[@seeker2seeker]

I appreciate it Ujjwal!

[@rahulshah5349]

Weird fishes playing in the background ♥️. You know something good is coming.

[@Damnchaosemerald_e.e]

0:36 THERES A SECERET DOOR!!!

[@jaimlawson]

“Don’t quote me boy, cuz I ain’t said shit.” - Eazy E

[@michaelchase5304]

How many including myself have to quote others and thus block seeing for ourselves 😮

[@shyamaltalukder323]

Sound is not clear.

[@buddhalovechild]

Health depends on the balance forces pulling in opposite directions- homeostasis, applies to everything.

[@michaelchase5304]

Fire could be passion🎉

[@IvanGlavas]

Inhale, exhale inhale exale. First we need our breath to be able to live. And then to think.

[@agatadelaparra1789]

Games men choose to play indicate not only their type, but also their level of inner development. Following Thomas Szasz, we can divide life games into object games and meta-games. Object games can be thought of as games played for the attainment of material things, primarily money and the objects which money can buy. Meta-games are played for intangibles such as knowledge or the "salvation of the soul." In our culture object games predominate. In earlier cultures meta-games predominated. To the players of metagames, object games have always seemed shallow and futile, an attitude summarized in the Gospel saying: "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" To the players of object games, meta-games seem fuzzy and ill-defined, involving nebulous concepts like beauty, truth or salvation. The whole human population of the earth can be divided roughly into two groups, meta-game players and object-game players, the Prosperos and the Calibans.The two have never understood one another and it is safe to predict that they never will. They are, psychologically speaking, different species of man and their conflicts throughout the ages have added greatly to the sum of human misery. S. De Ropp

[@danruehlman]

He helped Karl Marx develop dialectical materialism

[@clumsydad7158]

more i learn more appears that axial age philosophy seems similar from athens to beijing (or whatever it was called then) ... underlying similarities in all human thought

[@stinkydraya]

Hey it the Mario madness guy

[@CMVMic]

No Heraclitus never believed all is mind, he believed all was fire. Idealists love their sophistry

[@runningonfullnostanks4523]

The logos is the Son (divine mind) the Son is existence/life.

[@ranaarjun10]

He sounds like buddha or it you projecting buddha or me ?? Very very tensed

[@roselotusmystic]

🙏☯

[@jainamsatunda340]

Man this looks exactly same as jainism. do look into it too

[@charleymarkson]

weird fishes - radiohead

[@Ari-kh1cf]

On one hand there is hunger, and on the other hand there is bread.

[@seeker2seeker]

But really, they are different forms of one and the same Logos 😉

[@DS-vq9dm]

All comparisons are for man, by man. For God, everything is one and same.

[@BarryShakespeare]

no, Thomas Paine is the greatest forgotten philosopher

[@James-ll3jb]

Until Nietzsche, Empedocles was more significant.

[@NavzXx]

mario madness smash bandicoo

[@BH-BH]

No - Parmenides is!

[@VedantTiwari3]

minecraft

[@willzill538]

There is no point in giving the meanings of the words(mind). What you think/want it to mean is probably wrong.

[@frostacademy7071]

Trying to give meaning is what leads to the actual meaning, the actual meaning is then called knowledge.All knowledge in college books is a product of someone trying to give meaning and eventually figuring it out

[@2msvalkyrie529]

Heraclitus : one of the earliest purveyors of meaningless drivel . ( or " philosophers " as they are better known .)

[@majorlycunningham5439]

Go back to your cave, dweller! Lol

[@garymelnyk7910]

You really shouldn’t be here!