r/ProsePorn • u/Junior_Insurance7773 • 5d ago

Valis - Philip K. Dick

"We hypostatize information into objects. Rearrangement of objects is change in the content of the information; the message has changed. This is a language which we have lost the ability to read. We ourselves are a part of this language; changes in us are changes in the content of the information. We ourselves are information-rich; information enters us, is processed and is then projected outward once more, now in an altered form. We are not aware that we are doing this, that in fact this is all we are doing."

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u/ekubeni 3d ago

I couldn't understand this passage first time I've read it, but after encountering David Abram's work about the language I finally understood it. It's life-changing.

-1

u/coleman57 5d ago

Love ya, PKD, but I’m well aware that’s what I’m doing, and I don’t think I’m unique in that. But maybe it was much harder to see that back when he was writing.

8

u/Solomon-Drowne 5d ago

The single most specious humble-brag I have ever encountered.

0

u/coleman57 5d ago

I’m not bragging at all; I’m saying I think, contrary to his assertion, that most people (a majority at least) are well aware that we’re consuming, processing, and rebroadcasting information in altered form. And I’m saying maybe that’s considerably more obvious to more people now than it was 60 years ago, so maybe he was closer to right back then.

1

u/hither_nor_thither 4d ago

Most people don't realize that, and even if you think you do, how do you know that you're being truly honest and truly independent? People in cults believe they're independent and are doing the right thing; people who support dangerous political parties and ideologies believe they're independent and doing the right thing.... What makes you different?