From: "Luke Pellen" <luke-AT-seol.net.au>
Subject: Re: Soul and Body Two
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 97 00:51:01 PDT


Hello again Edward,


> >You're not a Cartesian dualist are you? or a vitalist? I am not sure
> >exactly what you are implying - that "soul" and "body" are two 
> >distinctly independent phenomena? 
> 
> Not independent.  But like water and the fish tank.  Only we leak, and 
> take stuff in.  We only know about the stuff that passes through us 
> because we have a body.  But we certainly don't deny the existence of 
> stuff that doesn't pass through us... do we?  If we deny anything, why 
> do we continue to educate ourselves?  

Although we can only know of the world around us via sensation and
perception, so in a sense, we DO deny the existence of stuff which doesn't
pass through us - i.e. stuff which we cannot perceive. But yes, that is not
to say that such things do not exist, but that for the sake of simplicity
we must assume (until proven otherwise) that such things don't exist
(Occam's razor). For example, we cannot disprove the existence of tiny
invisible flying pink elephants, but no-one would seriously suggest that
this phenomena is a reality.
 
> >Matter (at the atomic and molecular level) is not unique, it is in fact
> >completely interchangable [you've met one carbon atom and you've met 
> >them all]. What is unique is the system itself - the assembly and 
> >interaction of these components. 
> 
> On what level are we speaking here?  Of what degree...?  I'm no 
> scientist, but does the carbon atom receive... oh, what shall I say... 
> extra-material influences that affect its responses to external forces 
> at a future date?  Does an atom EVOLVE... not physically, but 
> SPIRITUALLY?  The power to think above the immediate (or near-immediate) 
> produces an idea, or a mythology, of a system that may or may not 
> override the formative (original?) system -- thank science for that...

I think it is nonsense to talk of the spiritual development of an atom,
although an atom does have certain physical (e.g. electrical) properties
which allow it to interact with other atoms. But if, for example, I were to
replace every atom in your body with an atom of the same type [carbon for
carbon, nitrogen for nitrogen etc.] (don't worry about how!) you would be
no different.
 
> "Existence is elsewhere."  (I couldn't resist)  But did you understand 
> what I was getting at when I spoke of metalepsis?

Yes, I understand. My comments regarding immortality were a bit tangential
in that respect.

>...If you are able to 
> achieve a total identification with someone who existed a thousand years 
> ago (and still exists as an influential force via their writing or art), 
> then you can experience the activity of your own thought from the 
> distance of the time-span.  Longinus knew of this, in a way, when he 
> wrote about the "sublime" in art -- one of the effects of the "sublime" 
> being the sensation that the work in question is or could have been a 
> product of your own creative self.  If your "soul" is nothing more nor 
> less than received influences that pass through your body, which 
> "processes" them, only to pass back out into the world when you die, 
> then you can achieve an immortality as a spirit always waiting to be 
> born... that is, if you leave behind a WORK to be interpreted.  
> Interpretation is altering, it defers birth by an "unautonomous creative 
> act."  When you leave behind a WORK, you also leave behind a greater 
> body... an _incorruptible_ body.  

Leaving behind some great work still does not guarantee any kind of
"cultural immortality". Also, who is to say that any work you leave behind
is "incorruptable"? - either physically [i.e. the medium] or
interpretively? 

Leaving some intellectual/artistic legacy is also a second rate kind of
immortality; my work becomes immortal, not myself. But I am not trying to
discourage such a practice.
 
> My use of the "godhead" metaphor (notice that I did not, neither here 
> nor in my previous text, capitalize the term.  That is significant.) was 
> not intended to signify a "super-individual," but rather an overriding 
> system that our highly (some might say _over_) evolved thought has made 
> necessary.

I would say that this is in the realms of anthropology and sociology.

> ...The individual 
> (the "brain cell") is not alone in the world, of course, and is 
> incapable of any action that will not produce some sort of result which 
> will be felt, however minutely, by a far greater number of other 
> individuals than s/he could possibly have knowledge of.

Accepted - but you understand that calling a person a "brain cell" is quite
like calling a brain cell an "atom" - it just doesn't really wash, except
as a very crude (and so perhaps useless?) analogy.

This idea of giving rise to some godhead seems a question to do with
complexity theory. We can assemble billions of simple units (like neurons)
to create something of staggering power and complexity (the brain) - but if
things are too complex [or too simple] then they tend towards the "random".
So it is the case that a collection of  neurons give rise to a brain (JUST
the right level of complexity) whereas a collection of humans DOES NOT give
rise to a greater level of organization (the system is simply  TOO
complex). We can of course study the interactions of humans and the higher
level manifestations that result from such interations [i.e the
transmission of ideas, ethics, religion etc.].

> It would, at this point in our history, seem so.  But we are not 
> prophets.  The "birth" of the Christian god, I would say, was the result 
> of a despair the likes of which you allude to: the despair of being 
> forever excluded from understanding the nature of our being.  Just one 
> result.  It all comes down to _hope_.  Art is religion too.  Science is 
> driven by this hope, among other things.

Science is a religion too [it says that our perceptions of the world can be
trusted] - although it is the simplest, most elegent and most practical.
 
> >Does this deny the artist true understanding of himself, if he 
> >"pretends" to emerge, if he "creates the illusion" of self-generating? 
> 
> The artist does not know s/he is pretending.  The illusion is a 
> spontaneous creation.  The artist's other can only speak of pretending.

But you've let the cat out of the bag! I am an artist, so it puts me in a
bit of a fix. I cannot agree with you and leave the artist in me to
"pretend" that he is a spontaneous creation.

> >> AUTOMATISM, of any sort, is a surrendering of the self to the chaos of
> >> the godhead... to be thrown about...
> >
> >We must beware total automatism - total madness...
> 
> Why?  

Because automatism means relinquishing control of your conscious "self" and
becoming more animal than man. Jung spoke of the difference between diving
and drowning - those who can successfully dive for pearls in the
unconscious and those who drown in the process.

> >The artist becomes both God and interpretor to himself - more often 
> than not a cruel and painful combination...
> 
> Yes.  But it is a combination that can, and has, produced genius.  
> IMMORTAL genius.

Undoubtably. "Genius is pain" - John Lennon. But I imagine many men* [I use
the term "man" here, and forever after, to refer to any human being without
regard to gender] of great potential have not been able to cope with their
own minds and abilities (especially in the social context) and so have led
sad, forgotten and tragic lives. The genius is no more virtuous than the
idiot.

> I thank you, Luke, for your valuable response.  I'd like to hear more.

Thank you for continuing the dialogue...
 

Luke.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Luke Pellen
e-mail: luke-AT-seol.net.au