Tuesday 17 November 2009

The Law of Attraction and The Law of Thrownness

Some weeks ago I saw this statement on Twitter:

"You create your own world!"

I remember being struck by the power and certainty of this claim. And the sense that this is a statement that has to be investigated. It is emotionally appealing, but what are it's merits? As it stands it is not 'an argument' in the critical thinking sense of a conclusion supported by evidential premises. It is merely an assertion! Indeed, on Twitter, there is not enough space for an argument, in just 140 characters.

Anyway I have been very busy, and have not had much time to even think about that statement, about how we might 'create our own world'. I did write that assertion in my notebook, with a reminder to do some work on it. But other priorities kept intervening.

Today, I am tempted to try to write some reflective thoughts on this assertion. The reason this came up today is that I found a new comment on Twittter, by Brandon Gilbert, to the effect that 'The Law of Attraction is a Lie'. I checked out his video clip, and found he was not saying it is a lie, but that it is not enough to 'intend' to become wealthy and/or successful. Rather, we must take new kinds of actions to make those intentions and goals into realities.

Combining the original assertion and Brandon Gilbert's claim, we get the claim that: 'We creat our own world by our thoughts and actions'. This is a new assertion; again not an argument, in that it does not contain any evidential premises for the bald conclusion.

My main argument against this assertion is this (where P = premise, and C = conclusion):

This blog is continued here: The Law of Attraction and the Law of Thrownness.