Rosy Fingered Gong

At times it seems reasonable to point out what may be a deep structural feature of the universe:an astonishing thrift:

that saves each green worm waving

that marches each single spermatazoa to an appreciative haven

that cradles each tulip leaf dropped onto the ground

and it may be so, but one hesitates to label, lose. 

The shapes of words

Rather than the shapes of words, perhaps we have to say, 'the shape of words.' All words, one shape. It is quite possible that all words are -- rectangular. That is, they must be arrayed, spoken, so that reality itself, is NOT glimpsed. Does this seem harsh?  Would not progress on a mystical path be signified in,-- to continue the metaphor-- the amount of grass you could see between the verbal paving stones? 

And if words are not, totally opaque, if words convey something, then perhaps they are circular, so that in a speech, they fit together so that there are breaks in the pattern of the patter. Holes, where a glimpse may be had....an objective picture. 

The reason I like the metaphor of words as opaque rectangles, though, is that it enforces the reality that whatever words do, they do NOT convey reality. Perhaps the words of some few ARE more circular, but --- that does mean the words themselves are less opaque, that does not mean that what you see between the words is mediated BY the words.

My story for today may sound unbelievable, all these worlds, all these words, and the point of words is not to convey knowledge? Okay, regarding the external world--the exclamation, oh look, there's a hawk!, if you understand the phrase 'external world.' That phrase has an obviousness you can trust. Most people however, have no idea what the phrase 'external world' even means. 

You cannot believe this, perhaps. All the words, written by the smartest people, and they do not convey --- knowledge of reality???

Well, what did you think the eastern phrase, 'there is no truth in words' ---- what did you think that meant??

And the phrase of great teachers -- of course here I mean Jan Cox, as the only example one can confidently put forward -- "I can teach you nothing,"  he said. What after all, do you think that meant??

Can thought be -- superluminal

First tests showed neutrinos were measured, by some teensy fraction of a second, as faster than the speed of light. These results ran counter to over 100 years of  research in the natural sciences. There was a predictable amount of clucking in the professional community and sure enough, new test results throw doubt on the first measurements.

Regardless of whether neutrinos are really "superluminal" there is the possibility that thoughts can be. Superluminal thought is even rarer than scientific law anomalies. Much rarer. My picture is of words as -- light. And then the "super" luminal would be a glimpse of the border between the speed of thought and that into which thought speeds...Superliminal thought would be beyond words.

Thought then can be superluminal, in our picture, and understanding the rareness, not rareness of superluminal thought itself, but the rarity of focusing on this aspect of reality, distinguishes a few figures in the history of reality. How, after all, do you illuminate that which is faster than -- thought. 

Keeping the past to grow the future

So quoting the Bible is a big fad now. It used to be just the atheists quoting ridiculous stuff to discredit they think one of the world's major religions. Now I see a new twirl: on a friend's facebook page -- the text from Leviticus 19:27

Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. 

 and also the same day another friend posts a quote of Deuteronomy 22: 20-21.

...if this thing be true, that the tokens of virginity were not found in the damsel;... then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones.

 My friends have a subtler purpose than most recent quoters. And I read these quoted words with interest. 

I myself am thrilled to recall this evidence of where I came from -- to be able to read some approximation of the words of my fathers and get a sense of where their center of gravity was millenia ago and be astonished at how diligently and brilliantly they analyzed the major questions -- of origin, of purpose, of how we go about living. 

It is interesting how with change all about, a whirling chaos then, when the people were writing, and now, their children, often unable to imaginatively grasp that with different cultural boundaries for the arguments, there might be results that seem strange, even perverse. This whirling of all into everything, is minimally, disquieting often, and so disturbing that words are very popular among humans: words seem to profess a stability that makes the words always misleading if they are taken too seriously. Yet we must, take the words-- as the whole story, at some point. It was called by Gurdjieff, being asleep, that is assuming words can point to something stable when really words must always be tools, be partial. Both Gurdjieff and Jan Cox pointed out you must go to sleep, as part of the process of growth. 

Back to my main point though, she said -- we have this book called a Bible, and apparently all these smart people, think it is one solid thing, when of course, it was written over many centuries by many people. A variety of insights, things observed, preserved in one place, in some editorial process, for which I am so grateful. And who knows, maybe some of the things that seem crazy to us, were kept with the mostly astounding record, to give people a poke, a clue that they -- the readers -- have to think for themselves. That after all is where the words of the Bible came from. People understanding that the truth is a result of Real Work. 

So many ways to go from here -- maybe next time. In fact I have been planning a little essay on --- how there is no god, so to speak. So stay tuned. 

The Biological Basis of Binary Constructions

It just hit me -- there is a very real time when binary thinking is and should be triumphant. The analysis of the binary nature of the rational intellect, (everything is either this or that, -- two choices is all you have, pick one,)  and the dreams that operation allows, when the rational intellect is directed elsewhere than the external world, that elucidation is crucial for the vertical growth Jan Cox spent his life encouraging. To understand how the black/white, on/off, war or peace, friend or enemy, clean or dirty, ---- always there are two choices confronting the intellect as it constructs the world of human psychology, is critical to observe. Binary, means only two choices-- when in reality there is a such a multiplicity that the intellect is staggered and must turn away from any complexity accidentally glimpsed. 

In one instance though, you have to simplify, and that is if you are threatened with unexpected physical harm. The world then is divided into two. Of course that scenario is a bit of a fudge because the body acts on that division handily, not really needing the intellect to chip in. Still I like to say, -- biological basic of binary thought. 

Life is a setup

A joke, life is a setup and words just a bunch of syllables, entering the bar, any words, they are all entering a bar. Anything you say, it's a setup. What can this mean? Are these words now, a setup? Well yes. They all have a punch line. They all have a period. They all have a sense of a completed picture. The period is just another word for edge, ending, for -- punchline.

Knock knock.

Who's there?

YOU know who's there. A period, an edge, a sense of closure, a line, a division. 

Life is not just a joke, life is a - good -- joke; these sentences, all, of them,  are funny as heck. For these punchlines---they believe they have an accuracy.  The joke, is that life is nothing like that -- life has no abrupt edges, no sharp parts. Life has no periods. Oh it is -- hilarious. 

Taming wolves

Jan Cox used to laugh at how the media (and policy makers) would tout education as the solution to human ills. This came together for me with something else he said, when I read this etymology of the word 'lyceum.' :

1. A lecture hall or an institution that provides public lectures, discussions, concerts, etc....

From Latin lyceum, from Greek Lykeion, an epithet of Apollo meaning wolf-slayer, from lykos (wolf) which also gave us words such as lupine (like a wolf) and lycanthropy (the delusion of being a wolf). In ancient Greece lyceum was a gymnasium so named because it was near a temple of Apollo. Aristotle established his school here. Earliest documented use: 1579.

'Wolf-slayer' which gave us a glance at human progress, also. 

I just put in the whole thing (from Anu Garg's word newsletter) for fun. What caught my attention was that lyceum comes from a word meaning wolf-slayer. Wolf slayer---that which, let us gloss, subdues the beast, the body. Some have called it 'the red circuit.' The point though is that we have here etymological evidence for the growth of Humanity. That continuous growth which is not perceptible normally within one generation, and for ends we cannot intellectually encompass in totality. We have in the etymology of lyceum a perspective for the growth of the intellect from the more simplistically hormonal body.

So the Greeks saw education as a means of civilizing man, as we do. The interesting thing, though, is how this shows multiple meanings. For while over a short span, the proposal of education is misleading as a solution, in the long run, education IS, part of the growth, the growth of Humanity -- though, and I stress this, my words do not mean the lyceum is an answer, rather part of a mystery to investigate. In this case, and recalling Jan's words, I realized he had two sides of this complexity, because he also mentioned, that morality began when men realized they had to protect their women from other men.  Morality is just another word for education, for slaying the wolf, for human progress. What is a joke viewed from the perspective of the ordinary intellect, is a real gear in a larger and dynamic pattern. There is of course, at least another side, and that is part of the mystery that beckons.