Childlike Innocence

The state of pure, unselfconscious making where one pleases oneself absolutely, free from rules and concepts—the closest we can come to the egoless state.

Neighborhood — ranked by edge-count

Claims (3)

claim

When we reach the innocence of the child where we only please ourselves, that is the closest we can ever come to the egoless state in which we see the structure perfectly.
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The equation of childlike making with the perfect perception required for structure-preserving transformation.
The I itself—this thing which seems so rarified, so philosophical and which somehow has a religious origin—is also entirely personal in nature.
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The claim that the transcendent ground of existence is accessed through the most direct, childish, personal making.
The good stuff is always childlike, a pure thing which comes from the heart.
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Generalization from all the examples: the finest work has an almost embarrassingly direct, childlike quality.

Artifacts (4)

artifact

Vache Accroupie by Paul Gauguin (1900)
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Painting of a crouching cow, black and white with golden green around its head; described by Christie's as a 'minor Gauguin' but held by Alexander to be more innocent and greater than Gauguin's knowing works.
Mexicali Project
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Group of houses and communal buildings in Mexicali (1976), with domes, white walls, courtyards, each window different; cost $3,500 per house and was ridiculed by Berkeley faculty.
Gioja House (Austin, Texas)
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Courtyard house built for Geoffrey and Linda Gioja, ambiguously both outdoors and the main living room; came from real liking.
Sunset (Sonnenuntergang) by Emil Nolde (1909)
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Bold, wild Expressionist sunset painting with blazing yellows, crimsons, blues, and grays; exemplifies the freedom to please oneself with direct, primitive response.

Related by similarity (8)

cosine ≥ 0.65 · no typed edge

Entities in the same semantic neighborhood but without a typed relation to this one — candidates for new edges or unrecognized duplicates.

Innocenceconcept0.804
The unforced, joyful, uncontaminated state of making that allows genuine beings to arise.
"the innocence, once lost, cannot be regained. The loss demands attention, not denial."concept0.702
Alexander's quote from Notes (with footnote #19); Steenson invokes it twice: once to honor, once to critique.
Wholesomenessconcept0.693
Pleasing Yourselfconcept0.686
The core prescription of the chapter: making what truly pleases you at the deepest level, which Alexander argues is the key to creating all living structure and the path to the I.
Jailbreakconcept0.685
Methods to bypass model safety training; features may activate during jailbreaks.
If we reach the innocence of the child where we only please ourselves, then we will achieve the egoless state in which we see structure perfectly and make the perfect structure-preserving response.hypothesis0.682
Conditional claim linking childlike self-pleasing to flawless perception and action.
True Beautyconcept0.678
The quality of being in touch with the I; beauty so deep that it makes God visible and which 20th-century design systematically avoided.
What has self cannot be captured by any simple formula like formal/informal or ornamented/unornamented.claim0.677
A warning against oversimplifying the nature of life-quality.