Post by stardustpilgrim on May 24, 2015 19:19:41 GMT -5
2004 Ford BA XR6 5 speed manual Ute.
DOHC 4 litre straight six, pumping out a reasonably pleasurable 244 horsies.
Installed extractors with 2 1/2in hi-flow system, sounds so sweet when you get up it.
Bought some 18in mags down in Hobart, painted them green.
Bonnet will be painted gloss black, and possibly black door surrounds and side mirror cowlings will be same white as body.
80% of suspension upgrades came in the mail last week, so tight solid suspension will soon be a reality.
No more bouncing around corners like i'm riding a drunk jellyfish at a waterpark for me thankyou very much.
But, that's not the ute in the hooning story i wish to share...this one is...
My previous 1999 Ford XH XR6 5 speed manual Ute.
So anyways, this OP is about the experience of hooning, and an alternative view to the idea that there is no separate self within an experience, purportedly evidenced by the absence of thought. That some conclude there is just 'hooning' happening, with no separate individual self having any thoughts that causes the hooning to occur.
So back then, having only been in Tassie for 6 months, and having just acquired me XH ute, thus still getting used to how far i can push it till it starts losing grip and thus causing possible ouchies to both ute and my weathered old body...i had reached a level of acclimation to me ute and the intricate details of the bumpy and windy road to Scottsdale, so that i could now take all but one corner at 100kph in the dry, and 80kph in the slipperiness of fresh drizzle.
And due to the low level of grip the cheap tyres afforded...smooth turning and gradual increases and decreases in speed is required to keep the ute on the road during all forms of rain and colder months producing possible 'black ice' on teh roads.
But one arvie, during a mild rain, i was slowly powering up in 3rd gear to 90kph, coming out of a corner over one of the bridges, and being a ute with rear booster springs, and an empty tub, the rear end was light, stiff and bouncy...couple that with crappy tires and a wet road...
...so just before fully straightening up, the rear end hits this slight indentation that ran right angles across the whole left lane and the rear end instantly bounced up and flicked out to the right so much that in the blink of an eye i was now heading, at high speed, for the farm fence with huge posts, no more than 3 metres from the edge of the road.
Milliseconds after the initial shock of the rear end flicking out unexpectedly, of envisioning plowing my ute into said fence and causing considerable damage, due to calculating current trajectory of ute...without any conscious thought, i simply and calmly counter-steered, mildly sliding halfway over the flat, wet and slippery grassy embankment, and returning back fully onto the road and continued on my merry way back home. The only damage, clumps of grass stuck in the lower grill on the left side of the front end.
My observation is, that even though there were no conscious thoughts of figuring out a solution to this unexpected and instantaneous problem, that i did not consciously think about 'counter-steering' as a solution, nor consciously engaged in that activity...there was the mental activity of searching for a solution, thinking what one would be, and choosing and implementing 'counter-steering',and it was very much present...it just happens in the subconscious part of self.
It's commonly referred to as 'instinct'. And considering all the exploring i have been doing of my self, i can easily theorize that 'instinct' is closely related to 'intuition' or even the 'higher self'.
It can be said that i instinctively counter-steered as a response to the situation.
There was no thought involved, i just instantly responded.
The term 'instinct' is usually in reference to animal behavior. 'Salmon swimming upstream to spawn' type stuff.
Instinct - An inborn pattern of behavior that is characteristic of a species and is often a response to specific environmental stimuli.
Using that definition, i was not born with the ability to 'counter-steer'.
But there is another definition - An innate capability or aptitude.
This denotes that the ability to 'counter-steer' has been learned\acquired, to such a degree that it is now an innate ability, that it can be classified as an 'autonomous response'.
Have you noticed how consciously focused you are when first learning how to drive.
Your mind is extremely active as you consciously are focused on the numerous elements involved in driving.
You are processing stacks of data from your senses as you develop the skill to drive.
But notice how there is very little conscious thought during driving once you have mastered the skill, when you are confident the procedures you perform results in a high level of efficiency and safety.
So what happens to all that knowledge and thinking of driving you acquired during your experience of learning how to drive.
It gets sent to the subconscious, where some researchers state that 99% of all our human behavior is controlled from.
Once the 'tick of approval' has been given to a belief or thinking procedure, it is classified as correct or the most efficient\effective, thus can be activated and run without conscious supervision.
Thus i did not have to consciously think about 'counter-steering'. I subconsciously activated the program and ran it without conscious supervision due to already knowing\trusting it's the best way to respond.
Thinking has not ceased, only conscious awareness of it has.
My mind still has to receive and process incoming data from the real time situation of me ute running off the road, and i have to calculate how much to turn my steering to bring the car back onto the road, and adjust myself at each millionth of a second as i continue to receive incoming data of what each 'counter-steer' movement produces so i don't end up over-steering and end up on the other side of the road or spin out 180°.
It can be said this way...
'My skill at 'counter-steering' is well practiced\known so that i do not have to consciously think about it while performing it.'
But i think there is inaccuracy in that statement.
I consider the mind is not separated into two distinct elements of 'conscious' and 'subconscious'. I perceive it is one mind and the line between 'conscious' and 'subconscious' is arbitrary, in proportion to the range of self awareness.
It's called 'conscious mind' because self can see\be aware of what is occurring there, and it's 'subconscious' because self cannot see\be aware of what is occurring there. And what i have discovered on my Self Knowing journey is the areas that were once unseen by my awareness, are now seen. It's the subconscious zone of self, it's below the sight range of the conscious self simply because self has not gone that far into self to see it.
And it seems to me this might have something to do with whatshisface when he said "Know Thyself"
This is one of several reasons why i simply cannot accept some precepts of the Advaita philosophy.
The theoretical equations do not match the real experiences i've had and continue to have.
Hey jay, I don't want to wreck your thread, but I wanted to post something and this seems a good opportunity. I learned yesterday, Saturday, that a cousin of mine died about 5:30 PM Friday afternoon. He ran off the road and hit a tree. Joel was one year younger than me, 61. We grew up together, he lived next door, only a field separating our houses (about 60 yards). If we hadn't been cousins and lived next door to each other, we probably would not have been friends. I had four aunts and uncles living within sight of my front yard, but most of those cousins were girls, the three boys besides Joel were really either too old or two young to play with. I moved away at sixteen, and then after graduation I didn't see Joel very often, maybe once or twice a year, sometimes not. It happened on Thompson Rd not 1/4 mile from his house, from where we grew up (where he still lived, moving back there after his father died and his mother no longer lived there, Mint Hill, NC). Saturday I didn't yet know who was driving, as there was a passenger. I would have bet almost anything that Joel was not driving. It happened at the top of a steep hill on a sharp curve. Joel lived there all his life and drove that road thousands of times. (A quick calculation, he would have driven it at least 10,000 times). I went and looked at the spot this afternoon. There were four sets of black marks, so he must have been swerving. He completely pulled up a metal street sign before hitting the tree, the tree was about 3' in diameter, about 12' off the road. I couldn't figure out what might have happened. Later (today) my parents said yes, Joel had been driving. They said the police said it looked like he ran off the road to the right, and overcompensated getting back on the road, and went across both lanes and off the road to the left and hit the sign and the tree. They also said police said there was no indication alcohol was involved. Part of the car was still stuck in the tree, I couldn't tell what it was (it was round plastic about six inches across, maybe part of a wheel cover?) The passenger lived, was airlifted to a hospital. I don't even yet know his name, don't know how he is doing. That tree is in what used to be my mother's grandfather's front yard.
When I taught my four kids to drive, I told them that driving would probably be the most dangerous thing they would ever do. (At the time I didn't know 3 of the 4 would serve in the military, Army, Air Force and Coast Guard, I don't know how that happened).
