Reply to the Response to Entry 156 (original entry 147)

"To understand how soul travels with thoughts, we have to understand the basic thinking process. How does it start? Who initiates it? What is needed to start the process of thinking?

Since the time we are born, through perception and cognition we feed data in our minds about numerous objects we perceive and the incidents or events we witness. While doing this we are creating mental world parallel to the physical world in which we live. The people and the surroundings also add up to our data to widen our mental world.

With the help of this data one can think, one can imagine, one can feel, in short the thinking process starts. Data is the material which is processed, but to process we need energy which is supplied by our mind, which is subtle part of our brain. Just the way our physical body parts do not work if soul is not present in our body, similarly, mind cannot work if soul is not present there. Thoughts are the subtle product of the thinking process. Just the way fragrance mixes freely with the air, and travels with the air if there is a breeze, the thoughts also mixes with the soul, and when thoughts are projected in particular direction, soul too travels with it. That is how when we are engrossed in our thoughts or reading a novel in which we are deeply engrossed, we are not aware of our surroundings.

Now coming to the question, "How does withdrawing ourselves from all external perception allow us to know the inner self or "soul"?

With every external object we perceive, our thoughts try to compare it with the data within our mind, which give rise to new thoughts and so on. Thus our soul is constantly getting mixed or diffused with the thoughts.

To know our inner self, we have to first make our thoughts steady and direct them to our inner self. This is possible only if we stop our train of thoughts from going in other directions. Unfortunately, our sense organs are habituated to keep projecting them outwardly. Thus the first step in spiritual practice is to control our sense organs. Then next is to train them inwardly. When thoughts are projected inwardly, automatically, with concentration, our life force too gets concentrated at one point. This is not easy to practice and just as without tasting one can not know the taste of sugar, without practice one cannot reach the inner self. If one cannot reach inner self, one cannot know or rather experience the self."

Mrs. Bharathi Shanker February 3 2001

Response:

Just because the soul appears to be necessarily present in the human physical body for the parts of the physical body to work, does not mean that the soul needs to be present in the human mind for it to work. (i.e. for there to be thoughts.)
From another perspective, it is not necessary for the parts of the physical body to be present in the human mind for there to be thoughts. Though it appears necessary for the essential parts of the physical body (i.e. primary organs) to be working for the mind to work. The same reasoning can be applied to the soul in relation to the human mind.
In short, we agree that the aspects of the physical body and soul are necessary for the human mind to work, though it does not follow that it is necessary for the physical body or soul to be present in the human mind for it to work.

Also, just because human beings have the capacity to focus their attention or be "deeply engrossed" in something like a book, does not necessarily mean that soul is behind that focusing as in the "soul traveling with thoughts". For instance, it is equally reasonable that when an individual is deeply engrossed in something, his physical body and soul are simply behind his engrossment or mind, without actually being part of it. However, if we examine further, the position that soul is part of thoughts, runs into problems like:

1. there is no scientific evidence showing soul either travelling with thoughts or part of them.

2. how can individual know without intrinsic separation from what he knows and who he is? (i.e. his thought and who he is would be in oneness.) If an individual can know without intrinsic separation from what he knows then what he knows appears illusory, which would contradict the assertion that an individual can know without intrinsic separation, by making the assertion illusory as well.

3. if who we are is part of thoughts as form, there is no separation in terms of who we are between thoughts and who we are. Yet there is separation when we are not thinking and we are thinking, which leads to the problem of how who we are could be part of thoughts.

4. the idea of soul as part of thoughts contradicts the apparent reality that human beings create thoughts, or knowledge, through their sensory and thought process. (i.e. an individual cannot create who he is through who he is.)

If when "thoughts are projected inwardly with concentration, our life-force too gets concentrated at one point", how can individual know he is concentrated on his life-force, while at the same time being his life-force? (It appears that in order to know one’s life-force, an individual needs to get outside of his life-force, and yet by doing so, he ceases to be.)

158. Entry:

"Well, as I looked at the proposition at the first time, it seamed that it is some kind of a joke... really. I even think that the 2 sub-propositions are in no relation with each other.

"We can be who we are" has nothing to do with our own awareness of self.
A person that can't even speak or eat without help, due to brain-defect, is who s/he _is_, and does not know who s/he is, at the same time.
Every person _is_ who that person is!

And the self-awareness of the given person does not imply that that person can or cannot be him or herself."

Goran Arsov February 4 2001

Response:

Yes, we agree that a human being as long as he/she is alive, cannot help from being who he/she is.

Also, we agree that the "self-awareness of the given person", or self-awareness of a given individual’s fundamental level of being", assuming that he/she is already knows his/her fundamental being, does not imply that the individual cannot be who he/she is. However, we contend that this situation could not occur because, for instance, in order to know one’s fundamental level of being, an individual needs to get outside who he/she is, and by doing so he/she ceases to be.

159. Entry:

"The problem presupposes that there is something to know. There is not unchanging 'self' to be known. We are in flux, both mind and body. There is no 'beyond' that can be reached by perception or thought, only individual moments and feelings. It is our fairly stable bodies and memories that give us the perception of self; and this can only be known as it presently is, or as we remember, and in both cases only from a phenomenal standpoint."

Trey February 4 2001

Response:

The problem presupposes that there is something to know from our limited perspective, or within the bounds of reason. So your contention that who we are or "self" is in flux and that we can only know who we are from a phenomenal standpoint, supports the challenge proposition that we cannot really know who we are.

160. Entry:

The Nature of Existence

Some readers of earlier versions of my essay have objected strongly to my use of the word metaphor. To those readers of like mind I must apologize, and offer them the olive-branch metaphor of sorts, by telling them that they are free to use whatever word of their choosing to replace the word metaphor. Provided that the chosen word does not change the contextual meaning of my message, a substitute will work, like Ensemble, or Canonical Ensemble, or Grand Canonical Ensemble, or Super-Grand Canonical Ensemble. The fact that I have used the word metaphor only reflects the internal struggle that I have faced with the issue of existence. At a deep level we observe the universe, and hope that our observations have a real meaning. This does not change the fact that observations are only metaphors in our mind where we are free to alter our perceptions by making new analogies, and that the certainty of our observations are in fact restricted at the smallest level by the uncertainty! s of quantum mechanics. And if we give special meaning to our mind grown metaphors, or not, these things I am calling metaphors have the most special properties; which brings us to the subject of the nature of existence. Metaphors exists because they are observed.

Definition: A metaphor is a holistic expression of component parts, an expression that is not to be confused with the separate realities that govern each of the individual parts.

Definition: An observation is any reality forming interaction among two, or more, metaphors.

That the whole is greater than the parts is a truism that relates to much more than what is known. This truism relates to creation, including the existence of the universe and reality. To the known world, the parts unit in a communion to create a mere metaphor; e.g., the body of Christ. But the metaphor seeks its own existence by its holistic expression, it seeks observance by its interactions with other metaphors. Nevertheless, reductionism has continued to explore at the boundary of existence, and while exploring deeper into the particles of physics, electrons were found to have both wave-like and particle-like properties. Quantum mechanics suggest that electrons can only exist as a point in space and time by forming a synergy with an observer or by binding with an atom; that the part needed the whole for its certain existence in space, otherwise it was a mere wave-like metaphor with only a quantum existence as a probability function.

Entropy moves everything to higher states of disorder by bringing higher levels of complexity; the opposite of what scholars might think, as I did at one time. That chaotic systems require more bits of memory, to form a metaphor to represent the states of chaos, is a reflection of complexity. And that the storage of information is a direct measure of this complexity. The complexity we recognize in nature, is therefore, not the complexities, but the simplicities; the ray of order or simpleness that has regulated the chaos, we recognize the metaphor. Otherwise, we would not be able to recognize the beauties of life. That chaos represents itself by the unpredictability of adaptive systems is a natural progression, therefore. That simplicity remains to please the observers, is perhaps not a mystery but a survival instinct. That metaphors seek their own existence by a process of observance, as an electron must find an observer to avoid the uncertain quantum existence it knows as ! a wave-like probability function. And that to accommodate entropy, they tend to permit unpredictability in the fractal-like unions that result, in a way that creates a simplistic beauty to an observer, like a flower pleases a bee.

At the Big Bang, time began and the universe was formed. Presumably, the laws of physics were formed first, and then the laws of chemistry. It was not a static universe but one that changed in complex ways, as can be observed by our many celestial bodies that are light-years away. Einstein would tell us that space and time are curved because of interactions involving mass. Einstein also postulates that energy is proportional to mass, and light speed is a universal constant and nothing travels faster than light.

Perhaps there is this additional clue, that the observance of celestial bodies is limited by light, and this observance may have contributed to the profound effect of gravity on the universe's shape as non-local observances predicted by Bell's Theorem meet with light-speed observances. That when the first physical metaphors came forward in the Big Bang, they found mutual observance as a holistic expression. The universe itself may be viewed as a metaphor seeking a higher communion to achieve stable existence as Saint Thomas Aquinas would probably argue, or it would be a shared observance as Darwin would possibly counter argue with equal veracity. And black holes may only be a signature of a large mass or distant universe that went its own way, and without the observance of light there can be no shared reality with us.

But smaller elementary particles did not have a certain existence, so they united to form bigger conglomerates leading to the elements, and including physical chemistry. Only those forms that remained stable were permitted existence in the universe. The metaphor-like combinations that found the most stability showed the greatest observance, and this holistic fitness was shared with the component parts, the elements and their elementary particles. The building blocks of matter went through a process called complexification.

The elements of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen were particularly adventurous in the pursuit of stability, but not for their own stability needs. It was their interactions with photons that needed preservation in the form of chemical metaphors, and moreover, that new organic molecules were needed to provide safe harbors for the various metaphors that were produced along the way.

Organic chemistry represent a significantly more complex world above physical chemistry, and entropy no doubt played a significant role as molecules formed unions to preserve their existence by presenting some observable simplicity in the newly formed synergies. The geometry of the three dimensional world must have also contributed to the progression, as very unusual shapes interacted among the wholly formed molecules in a contest to attract the most mutual observance.

Molecular chain reactions came into existence, and some of these cycled with the observance of the sun's energy, as unlucky substrates were digested for the first time being the victims of divisiveness. However, the more successful cycles perpetuated themselves as groups, and they found salvation in their newly found wholeness. And some groups eventually happened into a process, or synergy, which permitted the self-copying of the entire group, or the copying of important subsets of the group. This new kind of observance among a select group of compounds permitted reproductive advantage; and as such reproduction came into existence.

The reproductive observance supplemented the early forms of observance seen in quantum physics, and in the chemical bonding of elements, including interaction with the sun's photons, and chemical digestion. Among some mere metaphors, however, the observance of reproduction became the main driving force as these metaphors reproduced in direct proportion to their observances. But the world was not to remain static. The world grew increasingly complex as entropy eventually disrupted the early communions, and new forms of reproductive observance came into being.

Somewhere in the earth's primordial soup there must have been a molecular evolution as such, leading to the first example of reproduction in organic chemistry. But something also created the metaphor, DNA or RNA, and life sprung forward. DNA organized, and created cells, and these new metaphors found observance in their reproductive success. And the principals of adaptation and natural selection turned these cells into new cells, creating newer metaphors along the way. The cells learned to differentiate themselves, and gave purpose to the observance of the organism metaphor. Just as the cells had specialized, the environment was changed too, and in ways that could not be predicted or reversed. And with plant life came an abundance of oxygen and the animal metaphor was born. And lost was the primordial soup that gave rise to adaptive molecules like DNA or RNA. But these molecules would continue their existence within cells and viruses.

The universe of the living came to be known as the biosphere, and it came into existence once the first living metaphors started to interact to give new meaning to a mere set of metaphors, through observance.

Biological evolution created many living metaphors, and it created the nervous system and the brain. The human form is only one of many such metaphors. Our consciousness is a holistic expression of the neuron parts. It is a metaphor that cannot be explained by the parts because the mathematics of chaos has made prediction almost impossible with the abundance of dynamic interaction and feedback. Nevertheless, the metaphor of consciousness gave birth and meaning to a spiritual universe that no human would deny exists. And evolution gave the human form her own design on creation, the power of the metaphor itself, the power to make new metaphors from the observation parts that we store in our memory. It's called imagination. We write poetry, paint, design bridges, and explore the boundary of science. And it every case we form new metaphors.

That the whole is greater than the parts is also a truism that applies to our global economy, to our culture, it applies to the invention of the internet and our computers. It applies whenever parts can be combined to make a new whole with synergistic qualities that cannot be fully predicted, only observed. It seems that nature's evolution was much more than just an expression of a single phenomena such as adaptation that resulted from reproductive success. Perhaps in its smallest measure, nature's evolution is only about reproductive success, or the success of celestial bodies to avoid black holes, or the success of elementary particles to find stable communions. But it also has a direction, from the very simple to the most complex, where new types of observances are being made to give new fitness to the parts that make up the whole. And a direction that can't always be predicted, with complexities that cannot be fully understood by study of the parts.

In our spoken language, we recognize metaphors that are enduring as proverbs; e.g., the devil is in the details, that time and tide wait for no man, seeing is believing, that no man is an island, and that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. These successful metaphors, through whatever mechanism, have succeeded in a form of reproduction. They have evolved through a process involving some rather simplistic transition principles which have been observed throughout nature, and which inevitable lead to greater complexity:

(1) The universe is a collection of metaphors, and the universe exists as a holistic expression of these metaphors and their interactions, including local and non-local observance.

(2) While some metaphors are enduring, other metaphors cease to exist when they can no longer be observed.

(3) Some simple metaphors may be synthesized, from time to time, as the result of common interactions found in the universe, including digestion and creation.

(4) Creation occurs when two, or more, metaphors form a union to create a new metaphor, or metaphors. Therefore, metaphors can seek immortality by communion with other metaphors, by means of a synergy that wins better over-all observance.

Depending on the properties of the universe and the initial set of metaphors, the simple transition rules are enough to suggest the most unusual properties: (1) That metaphors have the capability of adaptation, is merely a corollary that relates to the statistical uncertainty of the fitness of a newly created metaphor and the competition that results once the new metaphor is added to the universe of metaphors. (2) That metaphors and their universe change in unpredictable and irreversible ways, from the most simple to the most complex, is also a corollary that follows from chaos theory and from the mathematics complex adaptive systems. (3) The occasional failure of reductionist theory to explain the whole from its parts is also a corollary. (4) That complexity, is an inevitable consequences of the initial set of metaphors and its universe. (5) That some advanced metaphors, that are called proverbs, may reproduce by copying themselves, or by producing metaphors of lesser compl! exity. (6) And that existence, as we know it, is headed to communion with highly evolved metaphors in a holistic state of observance.

It is 2001, but there is no space odyssey. And that leaves me disappointed! But there are some amazing lessons found in the creation process outlined above.

Firstly, it seems there is a new conservation law in the world, that relates to information. That energy is proportional to information, quite literally in the arrangement of elementary particles. And that despite entropy, information seeks self preservation. That as a state becomes more disturbed, the synergies of a few parts become more expressive to an observer when found in the right combinations, leaving the dominion of a few parts somewhat intact while others face sure extinction. It is this way information is preserved, as we give witness to the triumph of beauty over ugliness. And this explains why despite the expressive complexity of human kind, the human genome is only composed of a few 100,000 to 150,000 genes.

This brings up an inescapably intriguing conclusion, that the universe is wise enough to permit all these interesting synergies during the moments of creation when metaphors enter into communion, not once but numerous times since the Big Bang. We must be incredibly lucky to be part of such a wise universe, or a universe with such a strong will and an eye for beauty.

It seems that the over-promotion of reductionism as a tool has reached far beyond science, and it has coincided with a moral degeneration that brought the highest levels of Darwinian self promotion. So I can forgive Saint Thomas Aquinas for his reductionist argument that a watch had an intelligent watchmaker. He would be on much firmer ground to suggest that the watch had an intelligent observer. You see, it is enough to say that spirituality exists because it has already been observed in nature. For example, altruism is unlikely to have evolved from the reproductive observance alone, and it is possibly a product of a higher communion in search of immortality. The migratory habits of birds and fish are also suggestive of an observance above reproduction. And there are countless other examples where biological evolution came forward with an unexplained inertia."

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Robert Wesson, 1991, Beyond Natural Selection, The MIT Press.

Nick Herbert, 1985, Quantum Reality: Beyond the New Physics, Anchor Books.

John L. Casti, 1994, COMPLEXification, Harper Perennial.

Roger Schrodinger, Erwin Schrodinger, and Roger Penrose, 1992, What is Life?, Cambridge University Press.

David Bohn, 1980, Wholeness and the Implicate Order, Routledge.

Steven Weinberg, 1992, Dreams of a Final Theory, Vintage Books.

Stephen P. Smith February 4 2001

Response:

Your overall contention that everything in the universe is intrinsically part of the same thing with the only difference being in their states, implies that what we know as form is intrinsically the same as who we are, whereby the basis for the who we are is intrinsically the same as everything else in the universe. There are several problems with your contention that need addressing:

1. Just because every part of the universe comes from the interactive dynamic within the universe, it does not necessarily follow that everything in the universe is intrinsically the same. (i.e. it is possible that some things could exist without the universe’s intrinsicity through a dependent relation to something else. In other words, some things like thoughts could exist as empty intrinsic forms through our imaginary belief that the relational meaning of thoughts actually exists, so that the universe may contain intrinsic things and non-intrinsic things.)

2. It is questionable whether thoughts as form actually "seek their own existence by a process of observance". The more likely scenario is that we ourselves are behind thoughts and use them to seek our own existence, thereby indirectly, or by associative use, thoughts seek their own existence.

3. It is questionable that the "metaphors of consciousness gave birth to a spiritual universe" when the basis for consciousness and life, is contingent on the existence of intrinsicity, so that it appears that the prevalence of intrinsicity or spirituality was already present in the universe prior to consciousness. (Note, we do not say prior to life, because intrinsicity may be equated with life.)

4. It is questionable that evolution gave the human form the power to make new metaphors, as in "Ensemble", because it does not follow how human forms can create who they are through who they are.

5. It does not follow how you can know that the universe is a holistic expression of the collection of metaphors, when the concept of "whole" is beyond our minds or causally restrictive. (Note, in our view, causal restriction is not an "occasional failure of reductionist theory", but an apparent failure of all theories.)

5.1 It is unclear how humanity is headed to a communion with highly evolved metaphors in a holistic state of observances, when the notion of holistic observance appears beyond our minds. (i.e. due to the self-referent nature of knowledge, there are no known examples of holistic observance.)

6. Your notion that "metaphors form a union to create new metaphors" is inconsistent with your view of a holistic universe, because so-called new metaphors are extensions of the metaphors that helped form them, while all of them are part of the whole, which means there is no actual "creation" within the whole.

Other issues:

Your view of the origin of the universe is limited, because it is unclear who or what caused the Big Bang, so that you are only making an assumption that "time began and the universe was formed at the Big Bang". Therefore, your notion of a holistic universe is in question as well. (i.e. the universe may not be whole.)

Are you not guilty of the same reductionism as Aquinas by asserting that the "watch has an intelligent observer"?! How can reductionism be avoided in any conscious perspective? Who are we to say which reductionist position is correct?
We contend that in absolute terms, we cannot distinguish a correct reductionist position from an incorrect reductionist position, but we can in terms of non-absolute and more reasonableness.

It is unclear to us your grounds for asserting that certainty of our observations are restricted at the "smallest level" by the uncertainty of quantum mechanic’s superposition. (It appears that you are implying that everything else you know than superposition is certain, and yet the same can be said for any system of thought. (i.e. there will always be a point where uncertainty will enter a conscious system.)

We agree with your view of the complex interactive nature of existence, whereby changes themselves from our standpoint are uncertain and irreversible.

Entries 152-156,  Entries 161-166