Wonderful! I'm not a big student of the ancient philosophers or anything like that, but I find the distinction helpful in regular day-to-day life :) I think that we westerners are often really stuck in the idea that what we perceive is 100% sensory input + reasoning about it.
But if we think about it even a *little* bit, we know this isn't true. Sometimes, you *know* in your heart something about this person you just met and have no information about: that this person is nice, or that this person is dangerous, or that this person is someone to stay away from. Then you work your way backward from the "answer" to come up with a chain of logic that "leads" to that answer. But we do it backward from the way we say we do it, you know?
IMO, that's the nous showing through in a little flash, before we jump on it and suffocate it with a thick blanket of reasoning.
Encountering the nous/dianoia concept finally gave me a framework for understanding that experience (and not feeling guilty about it!). You have senses and reason, which are indirect means of perception, and you have nous, which perceives directly. They can't operate at the same time: it's one or the other. A lot of Orthodox discipline seems to be oriented around clearing the gunk out of the eyes of your neglected nous, and re-acquainting yourself with it: It's how you perceive God.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2021-03-11 01:58 am (UTC)But if we think about it even a *little* bit, we know this isn't true. Sometimes, you *know* in your heart something about this person you just met and have no information about: that this person is nice, or that this person is dangerous, or that this person is someone to stay away from. Then you work your way backward from the "answer" to come up with a chain of logic that "leads" to that answer. But we do it backward from the way we say we do it, you know?
IMO, that's the nous showing through in a little flash, before we jump on it and suffocate it with a thick blanket of reasoning.
Encountering the nous/dianoia concept finally gave me a framework for understanding that experience (and not feeling guilty about it!). You have senses and reason, which are indirect means of perception, and you have nous, which perceives directly. They can't operate at the same time: it's one or the other. A lot of Orthodox discipline seems to be oriented around clearing the gunk out of the eyes of your neglected nous, and re-acquainting yourself with it: It's how you perceive God.