Alpha Ti+Ne Ephemerality (Music)

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August 12, 2020 at 2:30 pm #21437
Juan E. Sandoval
Keymaster
- Type: TiNe
- Development: l--l
- Attitude: Adaptive
In this thread I'll be painting a picture of what Alpha Ephemerality is (as an emergent Ti+Ne behavior) using musicians as a case study. I think this needs greater explication after the recent clarifications of the difference between Ti/Fi and any sort of emotional component. The people I'll be presenting are clearly very emotional beings. And given the very emotionally charged nature of music, and the undeniably affective quality of it as embedded by the musician, we can properly see how high Ti users are not unemotional, but that emotionality can, and often does, coexist with Alpha Ti+Ne ephemerality. By extension it also decouples emotionality necessarily from Fi.

Composition of Ti+Ne Ephemerality

But first a few notes on what 'ephemerality' means here. First of all this is a technical term not identical with the dictionary term. It refers to the emergent effects of Ti+Ne, specifically Ti's aspiration for an archimedian point (third-person-ness) that is absolute, in combination with Ne's modularity and contingency on emergentism.
What this does is it creates a situation where Ti struggles to find non-contingent absolutes (about subjects), because Ne presents a tapestry of reality as always "easy to vary" and the notion that "it could be this too, or that" presents a sea of potential interpretations for things that makes it decisively difficult to settle in one place. Deltas have a similar effect in Fi+Ne, leading to ethereality, but in Deltas the ambivalence is more about reality's construction, not about subjects. For Ti+Ne, there is an ambivalence about the ontology of 'subjects' themselves that must be overcome. And each Ti+Ne treats this differently, but it is a "problem" they need to contend with -- even if they solve it, and many do.
Some common ways Alpha Revisers "solve" this:
- 1. Choosing, by some Ti-Fe justified reasoning, to land on a notion of "what they are" based on what they see of themselves "as a human" (i.e. outside-in self-observation)
- 2. Choosing to see oneself as a fluidity, an emergence composed of influences that have been accumulated over time but which have no necessary obligation to stay the same.
- 3. Not choosing to define oneself, and thus remaining agnostic about what they are but deciding to live through it anyway -- but just without any fixed self-concept.
It's in these definitions that the term ephemerality starts to come into focus. The dictionary definition comes as: "Noun. 1. ephemerality - the property of lasting for a very short time. ephemeralness, fleetingness. transience, transiency, transitoriness - an impermanence that suggests the inevitability of ending or dying."
The key aspect of this term that's of value to us is not time (we all die and have limited time), but the absoluteness or non-absoluteness of whatever we are. Ephemerality here is ontological rather than temporal. There's an inescapable contingency, for the Ti user, on some outwardly justified metric (Fe) for their biotic truth.
Identity?
However this doesn't mean Alpha Ti's will lack a sense of identity. Quite the contrary, I think all Ti users have one, and by virtue of being high-Ji they're more prone to obsess over the question. But the definition always has to be constructed with some usage of Fe, and thus source from some interpersonal reality. This interpersonal dependency can be something like 'what they can give back to the world', 'what they achieve', or 'what kind of person was I [seen-as/in-the-world]'.
Anyhow, here are some very emotional Alpha Revisers demonstrating this conundrum:
August 12, 2020 at 2:30 pm #21438
Juan E. Sandoval
Keymaster
- Type: TiNe
- Development: l--l
- Attitude: Adaptive
Miranda Diamandis

Lyrics

Spoiler

[Verse 1]
The pagodas and the palaces
Dressed in gold leaf, hide the damages
Spot the geisha as she balances
Life’s a cakewalk full of challenges
[Verse 2]
Go to Russia, see the red square
Lenin’s body lying dead there
From Kyoto, Hiroshima
Watch the black clouds crawling nearer
[Pre-chorus]
There were riots in America
Just when things were getting better
All these things I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t what life means
[Chorus]
All the people living in
Living in the world today
We’re united by our love
We’re united by our pain
Ooh
All the things that I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t know, don’t know what it means
[Verse 3]
Fly to Athens past the Parthenon
See the village where my father’s born
To Chicago from Angola
São Paulo to Verona
[Pre-chorus]
And anywhere you go you see
People are just like you and me
All the things I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t what life means
[Chorus]
All the people living in
Living in the world today
We’re united by our love
We’re united by our pain
Ooh
All the things I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t know, don’t know what it means
To Be Human
Ooh, ooh, ooh
Still I don’t know, don’t know what it means
To be human
A real human being
[Bridge]
I like to think about how we all look from afar
People driving fancy cars look like beetles to the stars
The missiles and the bombs sound like symphonies gone wrong
And if there is a God, he’ll know why it’s so hard
[Chorus]
To Be Human
Ooh, ooh, ooh
Still I don’t know, don’t know what it means
To be human
A real human being
[Outro]
I want connection
I want to feel human again
Lost my direction
I want to feel human again
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human

[collapse]

There's so much Ti/Fe in this song that it's hard to know where to begin, but I'll just take a few highlights.
"To Be Human" is the title. This song is very much about "the human condition", which is a phrase that itself puts the person at a distance. Calling oneself a human is already treating oneself as an external object. You'll notice this is a common theme.
There were riots in America
Just when things were getting better
All these things I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t know what life means
^ The song starts by listing anecdotes (Si) and watching these different situations, as if from afar, and after three scenarios it says "...still I don't know what it means [to be human]."
And anywhere you go you see
People are just like you and me
All the things I’ve done and seen
Still I don’t know what life means
^ This line emphasizes the common denominator between people (Fe), and then goes into biotic agnosticism (Ti)
To Be Human
Ooh, ooh, ooh
Still I don’t know, don’t know what it means
To be human
A real human being
^ "A real human being" is a very interesting line. Not all alpha revisers experience a sense of not being real, but Marina is one of those renditions of alpha that fits definition #3, of not knowing.
I want connection
I want to feel human again
Lost my direction
I want to feel human again
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human
To be Human
^ This is again specific to Marina, but I've personally known this feeling. In some cases alpha reviser psychology can lead to a sort of "impostor syndrome" when it comes to being oneself. It's not really about "feeling" or not "feeling" things -- clearly Marina has lots of feels, but there's a questioning about their realness status. It doesn't matter how much they 'feel', they can still sense an artificiality to them if they're being cognitively depreciated.

Lyrics

Spoiler

I wanna be immortal
Like a god in the sky
I wanna be a silk flower
Like I'm never gonna die
I wanna live forever
Forever in your heart
And we'll always be together
From the end to the start
[Pre-Chorus 1]
That's what we do it for, to reserve a place
It's just another part of the human race
That's what we do if for, to reserve a space
In history it's just part of the human race, race
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
[Chorus]
I'm forever chasing after time
But everybody dies, dies
If I could buy forever at a price
I would buy it twice, twice
But if the Earth ends in fire
And the seas are frozen in time
There'll be just one survivor
The memory that I was yours and you were mine
Everybody dies, dies
Chasing after time, time
[Verse 2]
When you love somebody
They'll always leave too soon
But a memory, a memory
Can make a flower bloom
We wanna be remembered
Don't wanna live in vain
But nothing lasts forever
This world is in a losing game
[Pre-Chorus 2]
I wanna mean something to somebody else
Feel a significance in the real world
It’s not enough to live out a lucky life
(Life, life, life, life, life)
[Chorus]
I'm forever chasing after time
But everybody dies, dies
If I could buy forever at a price
I would buy it twice, twice
But if the Earth ends in fire
And the seas are frozen in time
There'll be just one survivor
The memory that I was yours and you were mine
Everybody dies, dies
Chasing after time, time
[Bridge]
No, I don't want to be afraid, afraid to die, (die, die)
I just wanna be able to say that I have lived my (life, life)
Oh, all these things that humans do
To leave behind a little proof
But the only thing that doesn’t die is love, love, love, love, love
[Chorus]
I'm forever chasing after time
But everybody dies, dies
If I could buy forever at a price
I would buy it twice, twice
But if the Earth ends in fire
And the seas are frozen in time
There'll be just one survivor
The memories of our lifetime (life)
Everybody dies, dies (life)
Chasing after time, time
[Outro]
So keep me alive, so keep me alive
So keep me alive, alive
Race, race, race, race

[collapse]

This song is difficult for me to listen to without tearing up...
Because it happens to align with my personal existential experience. However, once again this is specific to Marina, and other types can certainly echo the overall sentiment. But, we're specifically looking for alpha ephemerality:
That's what we do it for, to reserve a place
It's just another part of the human race
That's what we do if for, to reserve a space
In history it's just part of the human race, race
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
(Race, race, race, race)
^ Once again we see the third-person term "human race", with an excessive repetitive emphasis on the word. The matter (the existential dilemma) is being confronted at the collective level. It's not about any one person, but all of us being in this predicament.
"That's what we do it for, to reserve a place" <-- this line in particular assumes intent. The intent assumed here is 'legacy', some sort of social and external reality that lives on after our ephemerality fades.
August 12, 2020 at 2:31 pm #21439
Juan E. Sandoval
Keymaster
- Type: TiNe
- Development: l--l
- Attitude: Adaptive
Chris Corner

Lyrics

Spoiler

I’ve got this funny feeling that I just can’t shake
The devil in the wires, the data eating up my brain
There’s a flood that’s coming up to my bed
Chaos wins and I can’t get over it
How do I even learn to play the human way?
Smiles without a heart, weird mechanical mistakes
There’s a flood that’s coming up to my bed
Love’s out there but I’m indifferent
Stand up can you keep your head?
Love me like tomorrow we’re dead
Beauty, violence
War is within us
We’ll be silenced
Tomorrow we’re gonna be stardust
No more ego
Nothing to control us
Painless freedom
Tomorrow we’re gonna be stardust
It’s pulling me apart a little piece by piece
Paradox and loss are knocking me off my feet
And there’s a flood that’s coming up to my bed
It’s a lose-lose world and I can’t stomach it
I wanna turn it all around in a volte-face
Eternally recurring, oh yeah put me in a trance
And there’s a flood that’s coming up to my bed
Love’s out there and I can’t stomach it

[collapse]

How do I even learn to play the human way?
Smiles without a heart, weird mechanical mistakes
^ again "the human way" puts him at a distance. But here there's even echoes of "playing" a human role, as if the body was a puppet (mechanical).
Beauty, violence
War is within us
^ here we see generalities once again, the choice to speak about humans in general.
We’ll be silenced
Tomorrow we’re gonna be stardust
^ and here we get to a very similar sentiment to Marina's "Immortal", the fact that we're all going to vanish back into stardust.

Lyrics:

Spoiler

I know I’ll never feel the same
I know I may never accept the change but I want
Happiness
I’m staring blank at my screen
Waiting for a sign, waiting for a smile to come to me
Happiness
Every day the news is death
You power drunk fuckers are filling my head with despair
Not happiness
Liars
Maybe I became too clean
Maybe the drugs are the only way to be free
Happiness
No breaking the anxiety
The man that I tried to but could never be faded out
With happiness
Everday hypocrisy
I see the zombies walking down the street and it kills me
Their happiness
Liars

[collapse]

Chris Corner also has a specific flavor of expression that focuses on the "non-real-ness" of people. His songs deal a lot with how people wear masks and are frauds. This might emerge in part with the help of Ti's influence if Ti/Fe is focusing on how everyone's expressions are contingent in externalities.
Everday hypocrisy
I see the zombies walking down the street and it kills me
Their happiness
^ ...this is of course influenced also by his own emotional turmoil and struggles to accept love and happiness. But his framing of his problem views people who have happiness as non-real, perhaps as a projection of his sensations - so that the struggle for it is seen as universal.
August 12, 2020 at 2:31 pm #21440
Juan E. Sandoval
Keymaster
- Type: TiNe
- Development: l--l
- Attitude: Adaptive
Christina Perri

Lyrics

Spoiler

I can hold my breath
I can bite my tongue
I can stay awake for days
If that's what you want
Be your number one
I can fake a smile
I can force a laugh
I can dance and play the part
If that's what you ask
Give you all I am
I can do it
I can do it
I can do it
But I'm only human
And I bleed when I fall down
I'm only human
And I crash and I break down
Your words in my head, knives in my heart
You build me up and then I fall apart
'Cause I'm only human, yeah
I can turn it on
Be a good machine
I can hold the weight of worlds
If that's what you need
Be your everything
I can do it
I can do it
I'll get through it
But I'm only human
And I bleed when I fall down
I'm only human
And I crash and I break down
Your words in my head, knives in my heart
You build me up and then I fall apart
'Cause I'm only human, yeah
I'm only human
I'm only human
Just a little human
I can take so much
Until I've had enough
'Cause I'm only human
And I bleed when I fall down
I'm only human
And I crash and I break down
Your words in my head, knives in my heart
You build me up and then I fall apart
'Cause I'm only human, yeah

[collapse]

I've used this song before to give an example of adaptive Fe. But it's also relevant here to our discussion.
I can hold my breath
I can bite my tongue
I can stay awake for days
If that's what you want
Be your number one
I can fake a smile
I can force a laugh
I can dance and play the part
If that's what you ask
^ This part echoes some of the self-puppeteering rhetoric that was used by Chris Corner above. All people can accomodate to others, and seelie Fi users also accomodate, but the focus here is on how the situation is framed. Christina's language reveals a view of herself as a doll that can be wound up, like a robot. This is depicted in the video itself. This metaphor is very telling of the abiotic way Ti treats matters and, again, how it has to embed biotic legitimacy from the third-person angle.
But I'm only human
And I bleed when I fall down
I'm only human
And I crash and I break down
^ And of course... the third-person "human" appears here too.
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