On the last blog, way back in 2015, I briefly noted that the influenza, or whatever it was that hit me on Christmas Eve, seemed to have peeked. In fact, it had not, and I can only now say, tentatively, that this may have occurred yesterday, as we hiked along a packed path of snow by the river. It was not that I was suddenly anxious to jog along in my snow boots, or that the endless drool from the nose had stopped, but because, for the first time in over a week, I felt hope. Not about getting well - I presume that will take place in its own time, as usual - but about life in general. It may have been only a feeling of normalcy, but in contrast to the last week, it seemed like a gift of grace. There was no light of the sun shining through the gray clouds, but the dark river edged by shelf ice looked beautiful. There were no bright red cardinals greeting me like a sign along the way, but suddenly, from out of the blue - or gray - all things seemed possible and good. In short bursts that took me by surprise, I liked being alive. There was a future, and better yet, an appealing present. I took this as a change in body chemistry that could only mean one of two things: either I was being prepared for the Holy Gates, or health was on the way. As I feel no closer to death today than yesterday, I assume it was the latter.
Early morning has stilled this optimism, as coughing fits woke me at 5 AM, but it got me to thinking about the book I am currently reading, Scream, by Margee Kerr. It is a modestly interesting book about fear - why we have it, how the body reacts to it (or creates it) and, most essential for her thesis (for it reads in many places much like a thesis), why we crave it. I will leave the latter for another time; what has occurred to me now is Kerr's continual use of bio-chemistry to explain just how we are, and, almost, who we are. It brings up a debate that started, as far as I know, with Descartes, and continues unabated to this day. Are we only our chemistry, DNA and culture? Or is there something more? Is Man, as I believe Descartes said, a spirit (god) in a machine (body), or are we the machine alone?
On this fine Monday after a long holiday, I will not drag out all the canons of philosophy and theology on this one - even if I could, for those accounts would be nearly endless. Rather, I will offer only my own humble experiences that have assembled themselves haphazardly into an informal personal philosophy. It is this: the results of mood caused by body chemistry, whether by inner states of health or outer stimuli, do not in themselves constitute who or what we are. Rather, they offer us a possible way to act or think, as directed by the reader, that which experiences the biological sensations. This reader, oddly, is itself outside the sensations; and if this reader remains truly objective, it becomes what I call the overmind, a part of ourselves that is both interested in our experiences but also detached, more of an observer than anything else. This overmind, I have found, is supremely intelligent, although not perfect or unlimited. It might be called the soul by some, or a guardian angel by others, but it exists independent of both body chemistry and current events, even as it finds them interesting. I have been this overmind (as its consciousness alone is what "I" experienced) in a few out of body experiences, as well as at other unexpected times. It is both me and not me, but it is, from a Pavlovian view, free.
I suppose this would be called the God in the Machine, but it gets weirder than that; there is another vantage point that is either the soul of the overmind, or something different. It is, for me, a consciousness most often found in intellectual revelation, but not of the discursive kind. It is that sudden flash of knowledge that brings one to understand that the self, history, nature, all that is observed and lived is itself an artifact, or shadow, of something else. That is, that the body and the thought processes that come from it, including the brain, are themselves a reflection of a condition, or a specific view, of creation. And while I might think of it and write of it now from my brain to my fingers, the actual realization is intuitively understood to bring us beyond the limits of physical reality. This view is not fantasy, but a "given," every bit as real as our currently shared reality. Some have called this view "more real than real," and I would agree, but one doesn't have to. Rather, it informs us of at least another context beyond our current "read" - that is, the bio-chemical. In this, we, our deeper selves, would not be a god or spirit in the machine; rather, both the god and the machine would be a partial manifestation of a fuller reality that can, at times, be discerned from some kind of outside by - by what?
The strict materialist would claim that this "realization" is only, in and of itself, a bio-chemical change manifesting as a thought. He could perhaps point to an area of the brain that is lit with increased energy and say, "see? There is your realization." Of course, it is not, and he knows it - for what, after all, is his perception of my "lit" brain but another part of his brain being lit? More importantly, I would simply say, "yes, that is what you perceive - but his perception itself is only an angle, or an attitude, or a way of seeing "seeing" itself. I can see, from this case of realization, that what you see is simply a reflection from the Great of a certain aspect of it. In effect, I can understand your experience of understanding from outside, just as you think you can understand my experience with your brain monitor." I don't think, however, that he would be convinced.
We almost never are. If a miracle comes one day, it won't be long before we ask, "what have you done for me lately?" and then, sooner than we could have thought, we would be saying, "nothing has been done for me ever." It is the way of our shared form of perspective. But still - how can a dark snowy day go from blah to beautiful in one instant? Whatever the biochemistry in it, what is the meaning behind it? And how, most importantly, can we bring this meaning ever closer to ourselves? I personally have tried to coerce this with an array of exogenous chemicals, but they, in the end, only bring another sort of flatness or even misery. In the end, I have come to believe, it is the belief in something greater, bigger, in something more wonderful and beautiful, that allows this "something" to light up an area of our brain with greater regularity. And at that, we don't care what the brain monitor says, for it says nothing of what we really are, at least at that moment. FK
Early morning has stilled this optimism, as coughing fits woke me at 5 AM, but it got me to thinking about the book I am currently reading, Scream, by Margee Kerr. It is a modestly interesting book about fear - why we have it, how the body reacts to it (or creates it) and, most essential for her thesis (for it reads in many places much like a thesis), why we crave it. I will leave the latter for another time; what has occurred to me now is Kerr's continual use of bio-chemistry to explain just how we are, and, almost, who we are. It brings up a debate that started, as far as I know, with Descartes, and continues unabated to this day. Are we only our chemistry, DNA and culture? Or is there something more? Is Man, as I believe Descartes said, a spirit (god) in a machine (body), or are we the machine alone?
On this fine Monday after a long holiday, I will not drag out all the canons of philosophy and theology on this one - even if I could, for those accounts would be nearly endless. Rather, I will offer only my own humble experiences that have assembled themselves haphazardly into an informal personal philosophy. It is this: the results of mood caused by body chemistry, whether by inner states of health or outer stimuli, do not in themselves constitute who or what we are. Rather, they offer us a possible way to act or think, as directed by the reader, that which experiences the biological sensations. This reader, oddly, is itself outside the sensations; and if this reader remains truly objective, it becomes what I call the overmind, a part of ourselves that is both interested in our experiences but also detached, more of an observer than anything else. This overmind, I have found, is supremely intelligent, although not perfect or unlimited. It might be called the soul by some, or a guardian angel by others, but it exists independent of both body chemistry and current events, even as it finds them interesting. I have been this overmind (as its consciousness alone is what "I" experienced) in a few out of body experiences, as well as at other unexpected times. It is both me and not me, but it is, from a Pavlovian view, free.
I suppose this would be called the God in the Machine, but it gets weirder than that; there is another vantage point that is either the soul of the overmind, or something different. It is, for me, a consciousness most often found in intellectual revelation, but not of the discursive kind. It is that sudden flash of knowledge that brings one to understand that the self, history, nature, all that is observed and lived is itself an artifact, or shadow, of something else. That is, that the body and the thought processes that come from it, including the brain, are themselves a reflection of a condition, or a specific view, of creation. And while I might think of it and write of it now from my brain to my fingers, the actual realization is intuitively understood to bring us beyond the limits of physical reality. This view is not fantasy, but a "given," every bit as real as our currently shared reality. Some have called this view "more real than real," and I would agree, but one doesn't have to. Rather, it informs us of at least another context beyond our current "read" - that is, the bio-chemical. In this, we, our deeper selves, would not be a god or spirit in the machine; rather, both the god and the machine would be a partial manifestation of a fuller reality that can, at times, be discerned from some kind of outside by - by what?
The strict materialist would claim that this "realization" is only, in and of itself, a bio-chemical change manifesting as a thought. He could perhaps point to an area of the brain that is lit with increased energy and say, "see? There is your realization." Of course, it is not, and he knows it - for what, after all, is his perception of my "lit" brain but another part of his brain being lit? More importantly, I would simply say, "yes, that is what you perceive - but his perception itself is only an angle, or an attitude, or a way of seeing "seeing" itself. I can see, from this case of realization, that what you see is simply a reflection from the Great of a certain aspect of it. In effect, I can understand your experience of understanding from outside, just as you think you can understand my experience with your brain monitor." I don't think, however, that he would be convinced.
We almost never are. If a miracle comes one day, it won't be long before we ask, "what have you done for me lately?" and then, sooner than we could have thought, we would be saying, "nothing has been done for me ever." It is the way of our shared form of perspective. But still - how can a dark snowy day go from blah to beautiful in one instant? Whatever the biochemistry in it, what is the meaning behind it? And how, most importantly, can we bring this meaning ever closer to ourselves? I personally have tried to coerce this with an array of exogenous chemicals, but they, in the end, only bring another sort of flatness or even misery. In the end, I have come to believe, it is the belief in something greater, bigger, in something more wonderful and beautiful, that allows this "something" to light up an area of our brain with greater regularity. And at that, we don't care what the brain monitor says, for it says nothing of what we really are, at least at that moment. FK
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