The Mask (1994 film) related to The Magic Consciousness Structure

[LukeJTM]

Luke, I think the nature of time that emerges from an anthroposophical, or more generally an esoteric, approach to reality is different from the one appearing to lie in the background of the quoted text.

In the quoted text it is suggested that time can be experienced as space-time, as non-linear, subjective, variable in its passing, depending on various factors. However, the frame of reference, the grid against which the concept of time itself is apprehended seems to be the same as that of linear time. It’s as if they are saying: time is not representable as a straight line on a Cartesian plane, it’s more like a curve, interacting with various parameters that can influence the shape of the curve, so things can happen earlier or later than expected according to a linear model, and two events can even intersect, and the linear flow of time can be ‘messed up’. But this is all still happening on the same Cartesian plane, and still in reference and contrast to linear time. There is no lifting the eyes from the standard ground idea of what the nature of time is. There is no orthogonal intuition to break the pattern of intellectual looking at it "from the side".

Basically what they are really saying is: true, experienced time is not a linear phenomenon, it’s more like a certain function of linear time. It says: we might know (as in “Einstein's time”) or not know (as in “clairvoyant time”) the exact parameters of the function (“it cannot be dated”) but it’s still sequential. In other words, the flow of time is imagined as curved, not linear, but time is still seen as an observable outer phenomenon that can be represented and understood as sequential. This means that time is still seen as space. It’s seen as a repetition of comparable instances, that our intellect only can imagine “out there” as deployed in (mental) space, so that the character of repetition/sequence can be appreciated.

In short, we are still within a materialistic, intellectual appreciation of time that little has to do with clairvoyance (at least this is my impression based on the quoted text, I have not read further at the link). As a brief attempt to recall what’s been brilliantly illustrated in other threads here, like the one containing the Time-Consciousness Spectrum - From an esoteric perspective, time is experienced as inscribed within the quality and maturity of our spiritual activity itself. It is the name and measure of our level of awakening to, and conscious partaking in, spiritual reality at large, in interplay with the becoming of everything/everyone else. Therefore, the experience of expansion in meaning and understanding could be called time integration (we bring within consciousness deeper and deeper experience-based, participative knowledge of spiritual reality).

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Regarding the quoted text, the broader context of the chapter was to try to show the changes in scientific understanding (at least from the West in recent centuries) and how those changes correspond to changes in our self-definitions, which perhaps is a valuable thing to consider because it seems to connect with the evolution of culture and thinking.
I think the point was that linear time is limited to the earthly sphere, and the author brought up a few times the point that these concepts are still steeped in dualism. And I recall the author made a point somewhere else in the book that all models are just metaphors for reality, not reality itself. I think overall she was just trying to make the subject of the book more accessible to the average person, because the main focus of the book was on holistic healing rather than about scientific models, and it is just unavoidable that most people wouldn't understand these subjects without some sensory-intellectual concepts to provide some sort of anchor... those types of concepts are useful as a starting point. Even Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophy is tough to understand initially without starting with sense concepts, I recall in Theosophy he tried to relate spiritual concepts to what we can know from just the earthly sphere, I'm sure he gave examples of how reincarnation is hinted through knowledge we can gather from the earthly sphere. I haven't read all of Theosophy yet though, so correct me if I'm wrong. I'm not particularly advanced on my spiritual path either so I am just trying to explain what I understand so far.

Do you think the theory of relativity is significant? As in, what it tells us about our spiritual activity? That is what I was trying to bring up when I made the post, sorry it wasn't clear. I hope this question isn't too vague. I wonder if relativity has been discussed before on this forum, any idea?

What do you think of the direction modern material science is moving? Because it seems like a lot of modern science is slowly heading towards holistic knowledge (aka spiritual science), or will be forced to go in that direction at some point. I've seen modern science ideas with some similarity to what people talk about on this forum. I recall a post about that actually, here is a link viewtopic.php?t=892 I think someone shared the link with me in another post on here but I'm not sure.

[Federica]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Regarding the quoted text, the broader context of the chapter was to try to show the changes in scientific understanding (at least from the West in recent centuries) and how those changes correspond to changes in our self-definitions, which perhaps is a valuable thing to consider because it seems to connect with the evolution of culture and thinking.
I think the point was that linear time is limited to the earthly sphere, and the author brought up a few times the point that these concepts are still steeped in dualism. And I recall the author made a point somewhere else in the book that all models are just metaphors for reality, not reality itself. I think overall she was just trying to make the subject of the book more accessible to the average person, because the main focus of the book was on holistic healing rather than about scientific models, and it is just unavoidable that most people wouldn't understand these subjects without some sensory-intellectual concepts to provide some sort of anchor... those types of concepts are useful as a starting point. Even Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophy is tough to understand initially without starting with sense concepts, I recall in Theosophy he tried to relate spiritual concepts to what we can know from just the earthly sphere, I'm sure he gave examples of how reincarnation is hinted through knowledge we can gather from the earthly sphere. I haven't read all of Theosophy yet though, so correct me if I'm wrong. I'm not particularly advanced on my spiritual path either so I am just trying to explain what I understand so far.

Do you think the theory of relativity is significant? As in, what it tells us about our spiritual activity? That is what I was trying to bring up when I made the post, sorry it wasn't clear. I hope this question isn't too vague. I wonder if relativity has been discussed before on this forum, any idea?

What do you think of the direction modern material science is moving? Because it seems like a lot of modern science is slowly heading towards holistic knowledge (aka spiritual science), or will be forced to go in that direction at some point. I've seen modern science ideas with some similarity to what people talk about on this forum. I recall a post about that actually, here is a link viewtopic.php?t=892 I think someone shared the link with me in another post on here but I'm not sure.

Ok, I understand. My purpose wasn’t to question this author in particular, but because you started you post saying: “About the criticism given here for linear time”, I just wanted to point out that the criticism given here and the one elaborated by Brennan, seem to be two different sorts of criticism.

This being said, I understand the broader context you provide, and it surely makes sense that the evolution of consciousness and thinking is reflected in the evolution of culture, including science and the understanding of time. So yes, I certainly agree it’s a valuable thing to consider.


Then I would agree less with the statement: “linear time is limited to the earthly sphere”, which for me is highly suggestive of dualism. Dualism is not an insult, it’s just our normal, XXIst century understanding of reality. I constantly fall into dualism, and regularly have to put in effort to regain some more truthful intuition of the constant interconnection, of the oneness of spiritual and physical. So the esoteric intuition is, there is only one true Time, not an earthly time that’s linear, and a spiritual time that is more like all over the place. Then it all depends on how we understand it, how we let ourselves grow in the inner experience of time, and how we use that experience to expand our grasp on reality.

Again, the trap we constantly have to watch for (on the esoteric path) is that we are drawn to look at phenomena as purely external objects, that can be watched from the side, and encompassed and pondered through the tool of our thinking, from the side, and from the outside. The trap is to consider our thinking as a tool. It reassures our intellectual nature. We fantasize that we can just watch and consider, without direct involvement of all our human ‘layers’ in that same act of understanding. We feel it’s too much, too overwhelming to know and be at the same time. So we try to do the knowing in isolation from involved being. We are unconsciously afraid that we can’t think, if we ‘let the engine roll’ at the same time. So we imagine that we can press Stop and take a sneak peak at reality, while nobody is neither looking nor doing anything. But that’s just not possible. Still, we think and act as if it was possible, and we don’t even realize we are doing it.

We just can't extract ourselves from the flow of becoming, freeze it, and throw the light of our thinking on it, in static in-between. Either we recognize that, we regain consciousness of that, and accept to move in unison with the whole, from within it, simultaneously in thinking, feeling and doing, or we keep on luring ourselves, decide to remain blind to the life of our shared spiritual activity, and to only remain with its hardened secretion, the material perceptual world. When we squeeze all the depth of our shared existence on the flat layer of perceptions, then we can surely align, and compare, and collect objects of perception, and we can label and measure their distance-separation, and theorize the rule of time in various ways.

Coming back to what you said the author is pointing to:

I think the point was that linear time is limited to the earthly sphere, and the author brought up a few times the point that these concepts are still steeped in dualism.

Not only are these concepts of time steeped in dualism, but the idea of linear time applicable to the earthly sphere also is dualistic.

And I recall the author made a point somewhere else in the book that all models are just metaphors for reality, not reality itself.

This statement also seems problematic to me, from an esoteric perspective. But let me try not to be too pedantic and go into what this could reflect just yet. Maybe Ashvin will comment on your whole post and highlight the most relevant angle.

Even Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophy is tough to understand initially without starting with sense concepts, I recall in Theosophy he tried to relate spiritual concepts to what we can know from just the earthly sphere, I'm sure he gave examples of how reincarnation is hinted through knowledge we can gather from the earthly sphere. I haven't read all of Theosophy yet though, so correct me if I'm wrong. I'm not particularly advanced on my spiritual path either so I am just trying to explain what I understand so far.

I don’t know about Theosophy, I also haven’t read it yet. However the bold text is the whole purpose of PoF part one! I would say that the anthroposophical understanding fully includes the sense worlds. It’s not a purely spiritual understanding that Steiner then tried to make accessible by linking it to the sense world. There is only one world, so yes, starting from perception is fundamental, in order to grow from what we can experience with our most familiar senses, so that we don’t need to believe in the accounts of the spiritual world, as a spiritual tale. Rather, we can grow in its understanding progressively, through direct experience. Steiner made that possible with PoF, and I believe he said PoF is his most important book (I have read it here from Ashvin or Cleric) exactly for that reason, that it starts from a proper phenomenological understanding of the sense world, that's paramount for us to feel that we can proceed to the spiritual with sound, orderly, experiential method, aka with a spiritual scientific method.


Luke, please know, I am also not advanced on the path. If my statements sound determined and affirmative, it’s not a reflection of any level of spiritual advance, but only of a personal tendency that I need to correct. So, as I see it, you are evidently more advanced, in a way that lets you write with more equanimity. All I can say is: although I do try my best to be thoughtful and consistent in what I write, please always take my statements as the reflections of a not very advanced work in progress.

Do you think the theory of relativity is significant? As in, what it tells us about our spiritual activity? That is what I was trying to bring up when I made the post, sorry it wasn't clear. I hope this question isn't too vague. I wonder if relativity has been discussed before on this forum, any idea?

What do you think of the direction modern material science is moving?

I’ll keep it brief here, as I don't have much to add to what’s been developed and highlighted by Cleric in various places here, for example the Cell intelligence thread you have linked. Yes, I surely agree (or should I say, I understand) that modern material science is significant and it is evolving in a way that reflects the evolution of consciousness. Consciousness is evolving towards spiritualization, as the peak of materialistic polarity has now passed behind us. This process has been very insightfully described by Barfield. In particular, he speaks of “final participation” that awaits our consciousness as a coming evolutionary phase, in which we will participate in the spiritual world without dualistic reserve, this time in full awareness, not instinctively as humanity did in past epochs. Barfield’s ideas provide a great way onto the path of Anthroposophy, and Leyf and Loftin, in their recent book “What Barfield thought”, make it efficient and fully approachable to discover that access point.

Steiner said that material science is still to ascend, and will ascend, to the spiritual. It’s on its way, so to say, currently still working through its instinctive phase, where the counterparts of the spiritual world on the material plane are still seen as abstract, mathematical, laws of nature. Maybe it can be said that Einstein’s thought showed preliminary signs of the descent of the Christ impulse in the sphere of material science. Maybe his theories, and even more so the more recent developments in a variety of scientific disciplines, show some signs of spiritualization.

[LukeJTM]

Ok, I understand. My purpose wasn’t to question this author in particular, but because you started you post saying: “About the criticism given here for linear time”, I just wanted to point out that the criticism given here and the one elaborated by Brennan, seem to be two different sorts of criticism.

This being said, I understand the broader context you provide, and it surely makes sense that the evolution of consciousness and thinking is reflected in the evolution of culture, including science and the understanding of time. So yes, I certainly agree it’s a valuable thing to consider.

All good. I apologize again for the misunderstanding, Sometimes I am not always clear with what I communicate, I will try improve that. I can see now why you said the two criticisms are different types. I brought in Brennan's one because it might have an angle that is valuable to explore.

Again, the trap we constantly have to watch for (on the esoteric path) is that we are drawn to look at phenomena as purely external objects, that can be watched from the side, and encompassed and pondered through the tool of our thinking, from the side, and from the outside. The trap is to consider our thinking as a tool. It reassures our intellectual nature. We fantasize that we can just watch and consider, without direct involvement of all our human ‘layers’ in that same act of understanding. We feel it’s too much, too overwhelming to know and be at the same time. So we try to do the knowing in isolation from involved being. We are unconsciously afraid that we can’t think, if we ‘let the engine roll’ at the same time. So we imagine that we can press Stop and take a sneak peak at reality, while nobody is neither looking nor doing anything. But that’s just not possible. Still, we think and act as if it was possible, and we don’t even realize we are doing it.

We just can't extract ourselves from the flow of becoming, freeze it, and throw the light of our thinking on it, in static in-between. Either we recognize that, we regain consciousness of that, and accept to move in unison with the whole, from within it, simultaneously in thinking, feeling and doing, or we keep on luring ourselves, decide to remain blind to the life of our shared spiritual activity, and to only remain with its hardened secretion, the material perceptual world. When we squeeze all the depth of our shared existence on the flat layer of perceptions, then we can surely align, and compare, and collect objects of perception, and we can label and measure their distance-separation, and theorize the rule of time in various ways.

I will admit as well that I can fall into that trap too. I find it takes courage to put effort into practical knowledge rather than intellectual knowledge. I tend to fall into the "intellectualising" when I feel overwhelmed. But as you pointed out, this is a main reason people do it.

So, to come back to what you said the author is pointing to:

I think the point was that linear time is limited to the earthly sphere, and the author brought up a few times the point that these concepts are still steeped in dualism.

Not only are these concepts of time steeped in dualism, but the idea of linear time applicable to the earthly sphere also is dualistic.

And I recall the author made a point somewhere else in the book that all models are just metaphors for reality, not reality itself.

This statement also seems problematic to me, from an esoteric perspective. But let me try not to be too pedantic and go into what this could reflect just yet. Maybe Ashvin will comment on your whole post and highlight the most relevant angle.

I agree about the dualism "earthly time" vs "spiritual time". That was just the way I was interpreting Brennan's claims, so it might not be totally accurate, it's been a while since I read anything by Brennan.
But anyway it's probably not too important to dwell too much on the specifics. I do feel the most relevant angle is about the changes in modern science and its relation to thinking, and also how the understanding of time is evolving too, because that is the angle I was mostly bringing up earlier in this thread. I believe there is definitely something to that.

I don’t know about Theosophy, I also haven’t read it yet. However the bold text is the whole purpose of PoF part one! I would say that the anthroposophical understanding fully includes the sense worlds. It’s not a purely spiritual understanding that Steiner then tried to make accessible by linking it to the sense world. There is only one world, so yes, starting from perception is fundamental, in order to grow from what we can experience with our most familiar senses, so that we don’t need to believe in the accounts of the spiritual world, as a spiritual tale. Rather, we can grow in its understanding progressively, through direct experience. Steiner made that possible with PoF, and I believe he said PoF is his most important book (I have read it here from Ashvin or Cleric) exactly for that reason, that it starts from a proper phenomenological understanding of the sense world, that's paramount for us to feel that we can proceed to the spiritual with sound, orderly, experiential method, aka with a spiritual scientific method.

That's a realisation I keep having over time: that we grow into the knowledge. As I said before, I'm guilty of falling into the trap of "intellectualising" things, and it comes from overwhelm, but it can also be from fears.
As Steiner points out so lucidly in PoF, percepts are given to us, but knowledge we must work out for ourselves, that is how it works; so therefore the bad habits (that I still have) of trying to fit new ideas with old concepts, or trying to figure out things from where I am currently, doesn't hold up to reason.

Luke, please know, I am also not advanced on the path. If my statements sound determined and affirmative, it’s not a reflection of any level of spiritual advance, but only of a personal tendency that I need to correct. So, as I see it, you are evidently more advanced, in a way that lets you write with more equanimity. All I can say is: although I do try my best to be thoughtful and consistent in what I write, please always take my statements as the reflections of a not very advanced work in progress.

Not a problem, I understand. I am still getting used to this forum, and I don't know the regular posters here very well so clarity is always good. To be honest, outside of the regular posters on this forum I don't have many people to talk regularly to about these types of topics, so I do appreciate hearing any second or third opinion because it allows me to see a bigger picture or possibilities.

Do you think the theory of relativity is significant? As in, what it tells us about our spiritual activity? That is what I was trying to bring up when I made the post, sorry it wasn't clear. I hope this question isn't too vague. I wonder if relativity has been discussed before on this forum, any idea?

What do you think of the direction modern material science is moving?

I’ll keep it brief here, as I don't have much to add to what’s been developed and highlighted by Cleric in various places here, for example the Cell intelligence thread you have linked. Yes, I surely agree (or should I say, I understand) that modern material science is significant and it is evolving in a way that reflects the evolution of consciousness. Consciousness is evolving towards spiritualization, as the peak of materialistic polarity has now passed behind us. This process has been very insightfully described by Barfield. In particular, he speaks of “final participation” that awaits our consciousness as a coming evolutionary phase, in which we will participate in the spiritual world without dualistic reserve, this time in full awareness, not instinctively as humanity did in past epochs. Barfield’s ideas provide a great way onto the path of Anthroposophy, and Leyf and Loftin, in their recent book “What Barfield thought”, make it efficient and fully approachable to discover that access point.

Steiner said that material science is still to ascend, and will ascend, to the spiritual. It’s on its way, so to say, currently still working through its instinctive phase, where the counterparts of the spiritual world on the material plane are still seen as abstract, mathematical, laws of nature. Maybe it can be said that Einstein’s thought showed preliminary signs of the descent of the Christ impulse in the sphere of material science. Maybe his theories, and even more so the more recent developments in a variety of scientific disciplines, show some signs of spiritualization.

Interesting. That certainly makes sense. Barfield's "final participation" I recall but I can't remember the specifics, so perhaps I should revisit him again. Barfield feels more accessible than Steiner (at first). I think it's because Steiner's work had a lot more information and detail.

[LukeJTM]

So yes I think the quoted text from Brennan seems to sum up the majority views / concepts held in "mainstream" science right now-- the Cartesian "time and space container" view. But as you say Federica, perhaps we are seeing higher spiritual impulses starting to appear more in modern physics, but still dimly. There are some scientists that started taking seriously the idea of "the holographic universe" (see Michael Talbot's book called The Holographic Universe for examples, or just look up David Bohm), so there does seem to be a slow progression into more holistic concepts/ideas even in just theory.

But what about the concept of space? Modern science is suggesting time and space are intertwined as a single entity. But what is the esoteric understanding of space? And how is it related to time? Could space be something like condensed time rhythms? I'm not sure though.
If anyone has thoughts about that, let me know.

[Federica]

I will admit as well that I can fall into that trap too. I find it takes courage to put effort into practical knowledge rather than intellectual knowledge. I tend to fall into the "intellectualising" when I feel overwhelmed. But as you pointed out, this is a main reason people do it.

For my part, I do it all the time, in the flow of life and things. Even if the intuition of immersion in knowing/being is there, it’s also easily eclipsed by all the habits and situations that keep going as they always did, and drag us along. I don’t need to be overwhelmed or fearful to fall into the trap. In fact, the image of a trap that I suggested is probably not very fitting. When the approach to the world, as we always knew it, is the generalized trap, we actually constantly live in the trap. So it’s not as much about avoiding falling into a trap, as it is about finding the way out of a trap-at-large through a sort of 'reverse trap'. In other words, we have to find the pinhole leading to the path of growth in understanding.

As Steiner points out so lucidly in PoF, percepts are given to us, but knowledge we must work out for ourselves, that is how it works; so therefore the bad habits (that I still have) of trying to fit new ideas with old concepts, or trying to figure out things from where I am currently, doesn't hold up to reason.

I believe that intellectual understanding - using concepts, old and new, to reason things out - shouldn't be stigmatized and banned. It is a necessary part of our I-organization that is very well adapted to interaction with the sensory world. Moreover, it can be elevated. It can come to trust higher knowledge, so to say, and humbly unite forces with it, in an aspiration to bridge our present-day thinking habits towards high ideals, by elaborating insightful concepts and supporting arguments, with the help of appropriate feeling.

The intellectual mode is for example one necessary enabler of a fruitful experience on this forum. So I don’t think it's a bad habit per se, when we try to fit new ideas with old concepts (or with new concepts, for that matter, which I think are on equal footing with old concepts when it comes to intellectualizing). I think we can, and have to, figure out things from where we are. We don’t want to create a full stop in the flow of our life, and cancel and forget everything that brought us where we are now. We should incorporate the past in our new aspirations, and even find its deeper meaning in the longer perspective of our entire trajectory, that we are now about to grasp. But yes, what you mean is probably that we have to raise ourselves orthogonally with respect to the way we have always thought things through. In this sense, a seasonal change in our life certainly has to happen.

I am still getting used to this forum, and I don't know the regular posters here very well so clarity is always good. To be honest, outside of the regular posters on this forum I don't have many people to talk regularly to about these types of topics, so I do appreciate hearing any second or third opinion because it allows me to see a bigger picture or possibilities.

It’s the same for me, in terms of not having may other opportunities to talk about the topics we discuss here. Although I feel something similar to an exchange happening when reading some books, to the extent that one can ‘ask a question’ by reading a passage again, with renewed intents. Then an answer is often provided, in the form of a rounder understanding being attained and experienced. In those cases, reading becomes similar to an exchange of the type we can have here, in certain sense. But other than that, I haven’t been met with much enthusiasm, let’s say, when I have attempted to explain my interest in this path.

Interesting. That certainly makes sense. Barfield's "final participation" I recall but I can't remember the specifics, so perhaps I should revisit him again. Barfield feels more accessible than Steiner (at first). I think it's because Steiner's work had a lot more information and detail.

I will try to comment on this separately, in the Barfield thread.

[Federica]

So yes I think the quoted text from Brennan seems to sum up the majority views / concepts held in "mainstream" science right now-- the Cartesian "time and space container" view. But as you say Federica, perhaps we are seeing higher spiritual impulses starting to appear more in modern physics, but still dimly. There are some scientists that started taking seriously the idea of "the holographic universe" (see Michael Talbot's book called The Holographic Universe for examples, or just look up David Bohm), so there does seem to be a slow progression into more holistic concepts/ideas even in just theory.

But what about the concept of space? Modern science is suggesting time and space are intertwined as a single entity. But what is the esoteric understanding of space? And how is it related to time? Could space be something like condensed time rhythms? I'm not sure though.
If anyone has thoughts about that, let me know.

Luke, I haven't yet checked what the idea of holographic universe is. However, in general, I do believe there are a variety of signs in society, not only in science, that indicate that the peak of extreme materialism is behind.
Regarding the understanding of space, your question is very relevant. It's certainly not from me that you will get the most appropriate explanations, but I can still try. Speaking a little bluntly, we could maybe say that space is the facies, the facial expression, of the sensory world. Space is the makeup of 'the trap' we were discussing above. When we consider space, we can't but be overwhelmed by it as the omnipresent, essential feature of the material world. It sucks in all of our attention and stands in the way of that pinhole we need to discover in order to start envisioning reality in its thinking nature, spaceless nature.

The expression "space is intellectualized time" (unless I'm wrong, it's from Bergson) has been used on various occasions here. You may want to see how Ashvin has characterized it in this short essay.

Even in what Ashvin wrote yesterday, in this post in the Tomberg's thread, there is a reference to the trap of space, and the fact that the normal, intellectual mode of our intelligence, is spatial. The post, I believe, may sound obscure to the newcomer forum member, but if we leave aside the Moon intelligence, and the Sun intelligence, and only focus on the "outwardly visible", we can recognize that it's another description of the intellectual trap, and its spatial essence:

Over time, we need to gradually experience how this projective thinking [our third person perspective that wants to look at phenomena as outer phenomena, from the side] conditions our entire understanding of the World around us and within us. Everything outwardly visible and inwardly conceivable is formatted in this way.
It is perhaps most difficult to experience that in relation to our inner conceptual life, because we naturally feel that to be immune from the formatting of our spatial intelligence.

If you think about it - as an example - when we conceive, in conventional way, of regular intervals of time, along the arrow of time, what our intellect immediately does is to spatialize the thought. Can you see what I mean? In our mind it's almost as if we feel the need to lay out the intervals, one after the other (here, see if you recognize the word "after" has a spatial quality to it, not only a temporal one). So, this sequence we create in our mind, has a certain spatial character to it. In a way, we press out into space what we're unable to hold as living experience of true Time. We somehow imagine an alignment, a repetition, that extends 'visually', that takes some space, and that's how we conceive of the idea itself of "repetition". Either we do that literally, by really visualizing a sequence of some sort, or we do it mathematically, more abstractly. But in any case, we are drawn to deploying our concepts in mental space, as a proxy of an idea of true Time that we can't really get (unless we are on an anthroposophical path). We kind of smear out Time onto space, just because space (=the realm of matter, and sensory perception) is what we have at hand, what we can reach out to easily, so to say. Space is what occupies, or overwhelmes, our cognitive capacity, so we are drawn there anyway, even when trying to grasp the nature of time. It's as if Perception asked us "So, do you want to hire me as your cognitive personal secret assistant, yes or yes?" And our unconscious self replies: "Yes! Perfect fit!"

[LukeJTM]

When I say bad habits like fitting new ideas with old ones I mean that sometimes it doesn't work. As in, those situations when what is doesn't fit in with the concepts and models built up in the mind; the way we have thought about things becomes too limited and it is easier to just declare something impossible instead and go back to the old ways, or to blame the self or someone else or something like that. But, I suppose it depends on the situation what you should do.

You make a really good point about intellectualizing not being "bad", I see that attitude too much in some spiritual circles for some reason, people treating thinking and the ego as something bad. That attitude seems to happen mostly in the "non dual" mystical circles though. It doesn't make any sense to me to be honest.


Anyway, I believe you have hit the nail on the head- trust or faith is very important. Especially trust or faith in one's self.

[AshvinP]

So yes I think the quoted text from Brennan seems to sum up the majority views / concepts held in "mainstream" science right now-- the Cartesian "time and space container" view. But as you say Federica, perhaps we are seeing higher spiritual impulses starting to appear more in modern physics, but still dimly. There are some scientists that started taking seriously the idea of "the holographic universe" (see Michael Talbot's book called The Holographic Universe for examples, or just look up David Bohm), so there does seem to be a slow progression into more holistic concepts/ideas even in just theory.

But what about the concept of space? Modern science is suggesting time and space are intertwined as a single entity. But what is the esoteric understanding of space? And how is it related to time? Could space be something like condensed time rhythms? I'm not sure though.
If anyone has thoughts about that, let me know.

Luke,

I will provide a few additional thoughts on this topic, which Federica already covered quite well. As you are probably aware, Gebser also describes at length in The EPO the ways in which modern philosophy, science, art, etc. reflect to us a transition towards a more 'aperspectival' and 'time-free' consciousness.

For this reason it is remarkable that all of the sciences today are manifesting a tendency toward an integral mode of inquiry, although positive results are obtained only when “time” is taken into account in the one or the other of its manifestations. This development has given rise to the recognition that the old antithesis between inorganic and organic does not exist, having been replaced by a closer relationship between physics and biology that is not restricted only to quantum biology. This also holds true of biology and psychology where the old dualism of body and soul has given way to a psychosomatic medicine that has evolved an integral conception of man, a perception of man as a whole (as in the work of G. R. Heyer and Arthur Jores; see below, p. 448). And the aspirations toward integrality in Karl Jaspers’ existential philosophy form a bridge between psychology and philosophy. Philosophy itself has even established contact with its long-standing cultural antipode, literature, by its attempts to form a “metaphysics of literature.“6

These integral achievements that together demonstrate a dissolution of erst-while antagonisms and dualisms were possible only because their originators had consciously or unconsciously divorced themselves from an exclusively three-dimensional spatial framework. Wherever we encounter these integral endeavors which take into consideration the full efficacy and varied manifestations of the thematics of time we are conceptually approaching the whole. It is perceptible only through a mode of realization sufficiently bold to allow us to transcend mere conceptualization while preventing us from a regression to the imagistic world of the psyche or the magic vital sphere. Since the realization of freedom from time is a precondition for the realization of the whole, we must observe that both require the additional capacity of consciousness crucial to the current mutation of consciousness whose elucidation forms the subject of our inquiry.

Mere mental wakefulness is not sufficient to realize the new reality. Diurnal wakefulness achieves only partition and division; it sheds light on the path, the “Tao,“7 as long as mental consciousness dwells in the phenomena of diurnal brightness—itself, like conceptual time, a divider, dividing the night, dreams, sleep, and the world. As long as its dividing is not an end in itself it indirectly yields valid knowledge of the undivided. But if the world is regarded only through wakefulness, it loses its undivided dream-like and somnolent aspects and precipitates their separation. The dividing deed leads to death: the death of man and his entire culture. Wakefulness, then, is not adequate, least of all the attitude of all-or-nothing wakefulness. Clarity, however, is adequate, for it alone is free of brightness, twilight, and darkness, and is able to penetrate the whole where somnolent timelessness, somnial temporicity, and mental conceptuality all become diaphanous. Anyone who perceives in this manner is free from time and can see through the whole in which he partakes, not as a part, but integrally.

Federica is exactly right to characterize our normal intelligence as that which makes true Time into space, by teasing apart simultaneous 'streams' of potential into separate frames for analysis. For ex., if we want to think about how we walked from point A to point B yesterday, we normally don't grasp the intention as a holistic movement in relation to other intentions, but as a series of dim spatial frames that we watch in our memory like a movie clip. We don't normally consider how that intention was interacting within a tapestry of other intentions, some we can call 'our own' and others we would ascribe horizontally to other human beings, and yet others vertically to subsensible and supersensible beings. The subsensible beings permeate our lower nature of selfish tendencies, and the supersensible are the 'better angels of our nature', striving towards selfless ideals. The latter generally prompt us to take more and more creative responsibility for our ideal environment, beginning with our own soul life. That is of course what Cleric discussed in the TC spectrum essay. The more we can get a living sense for that, the more we approach true Time.

Listen to this short clip of Beethoven's 9th Symphony.


[bbvideo]https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxpUNAFK19cN ... rlRWcRT5qw[/bbvideo]


Since this movement is so familiar to us, we probably feel quite uncomfortable listening to only these few notes that cut off abruptly. It's as if the particular notes are not even real when they are cut off from our intuition of the holistic movement. The isolated notes no longer serve their intended function. In other words, with our musical experience, we sense that the Whole is always present in the parts. The reason we don't become so uncomfortable when thinking about the particular frames of our daily existence is that we aren't too conscious of the holistic intentions that musically structure our movements and are always present in them. Our localized intentions come mostly automatically and mechanically out of habit and routine, and we aren't even aware of the higher-order intentions. At best, we are only aware of them as vague concepts like 'God intends for me to love my neighbor', and we can hardly hold even such simple concepts in our awareness as we go about the day.

On the path of higher development, though, it does start to become uncomfortable to think through the frames in this fragmented way. That is a healthy feeling. It should feel painful when there are frames of our existence that apparently are not united by overarching intentions. This pain or discomfort prompts us to begin thinking more vertically. That is part of the reason Steiner suggests that we think through the frames in reverse order. We can do this for our day, or even with scenes from a movie, acts from a play, chapters of a story, etc. If you have tried such exercises, you have probably experienced how uncomfortable they can feel. This helps us resonate with higher order intents that are experienced during sleep, where we do actually review our day experiences in reverse order as something holistic. All that which leads to higher thinking and true Time really should strain the intellect and make it feel uncomfortable, like it is twisting and turning to find a new orientation.

Then we may also experience that our sleeping frame and our waking frame are not separated in linear time, but are always overlapping, as Gebser also pointed to in the quote above. It's clear to us that we can be more sleepy during the day, or become more lucid during sleep. Or we can awaken to new insights about previous experiences. But we hardly stop to wonder what all this means. Or what it means that certain domains of our waking experience are "subconscious", namely our deeper currents of feeling and will. The horizontal intellect simply takes such occurrences for granted, as easily explainable or irrelevant, and thereby misses opportunities to unveil their deeper significance. Gradually, through vertical effort, we can expand out to experience more overarching 'movements' of our individual and collective destiny. This overlapping way of thinking about experience should also be applied to our conceptual systems.

It is fine to distinguish between normal Earthly time or Newtonian time and 'clairvoyant time' etc., but it's always up to us to situate these things in their proper context so we don't end up conceiving of multiple ontological planes where different 'rules' apply. The different rules simply reflect our intuition that experiential phenomena transform in differing ways depending on our mode of cognition and frame of reference. When sensory phenomena transforms with the frame-like manner, we distinguish that as sequential Earthly time. Whereas after death when we experience the holsitic memory tableau of our Earthly experience, that is something we could label more 'clairvoyant time'. But really, the Earthly time is simply the clairvoyant time viewed from a different perspective, through more 'friction' of sensory-related intents, just like the nightly reverse review is a different perspective of the day's experiences.

It is our mode of cognition which determines how invisible Time-ryhthms will be perceived as visible forms that metamorphose in some manner. Normal spatial cognition can be considered a decohered analysis, frame by frame, of simultaneous potential. In an interesting way, it is the exterior manifestation of the highest possible consciousness in which All exists simultaneously (in terms of relativity, everything exists everywhere at once from the perspective of Light). Every mode of cognition between our normal mode and the highest mode can be viewed as a progressive interiorization of the spiritual rhythms underlying all that we perceive outwardly. These rhythms reflect the ways in which patterned spiritual activity unfolds in relation to other streams of spiritual activity. One way to get an intuition for this dynamic is to consider the microcrosm of the human individual. What is the human organism except a spatial conglomeration of many rhythms, like the circulatory, respiratory, glandular, metabolic, etc. rhythms? Even the physical body exteriorizes and returns all of its matter to the shared material environment in a 7-year rhythm.

We could say the metabolic rhythm reflects how certain Macrocosmic spiritual activity provides an overarching context for our localized will. The respiratory and pulse rhythms reflect how that activity contexualizes our localized feeling. The rhythm of the senses and nervous system reflect how it contextualizes our localized perceiving-thinking. These things can't be so neatly divided and categorized, though, since all the rhythms overlap and feedback into one another in complex ways. We should be careful not to make yet another intellectual system when considering these dynamics. Any framework we use to encompass these dynamics should be held only as a loose and fluid symbol that we are using as a convenient point of balance for many interwoven ideal relations which inform our intimate inner experience, like in the metaphor Cleric gave for the meaning of 'concept'. These entire conceptual frameworks should be considered concepts with the same symbolic function as any particular concepts we use. We should never feel satisfied with the mere conceptual framework. The intellect should continually challenge itself to work through the mere propositional content of its systems to experience the latter’s symbolic value, so as to reach higher and higher vantage points with broader and broader moral significance.

[LukeJTM]

Thank you Federica and Ashvin for your thoughtful and lucid responses. The discussion in here keeps getting more interesting.

Ashvin and Federica, are you trying to suggest that the past, present, and future can be understood as 3 perspectives which occur in the Now, Instead of merely being a flow from A to B?


Ashvin, I have not read through all of Jean Gebser's book yet, unfortunately. I read the first two or three chapters so far, and I know some additional information about it from the internet. So far I am enjoying the book, but it is a tough read so it is taking me a while to process the contents (just like with Anthroposophy books like PoF which I still am figuring out). I haven't heard anything like what Gebser wrote anywhere else (aside from Steiner and Barfield, at least what I have been reading so far from them). For example, I was surprised but interested by Gebser's argument about historical battles being connected with people's mentality. I remember in the 1st chapter he was talking about the Aztecs vs the Spanish Conquistadors. The Aztecs lost because of their reliance on the magic-mythology mentalities, versus the Spaniard's individualistic rational consciousness. He does mention the common materialistic interpretation which is that the Spanish just had better technology and this allowed them to win. But to be honest both interpretations seem simultaenously convincing and true. Gebser's interpretation makes sense as well because of the quote he provides from the Aztec chronicle of Frey Bernardino de Sahagun.

i also thought it was interesting when he pointed out how in older languages such as Latin, the language points to people's understanding of the complementary opposities in Nature. Eg Latin altus meant "high" as well as "low"; sacer meant "sacred" as well as "cursed." Does he go further into this? I think Owen Barfield might have mentioned things on dead languages also, but I'm not sure.
I also liked the part in chapter two about the origins of the words eight and night (german: acht-nacht; french huit-nuit; italian otto-notte; spanish ocho-noche; latin octo-nox (octu); Greek ochto-nux (nuxto)). He was suggesting that the n-less "eight" is an unconscious expression of wakefulness and illumination, standing in opposition to the n-possessing or negating "night" (pointing to the noctural, unperspectival consciousness). Perspectivity is the eighth art, illuminating the unperspectival world, which conceives of seven-fold spiritual relationships, and cavern-like space. But I'm not sure if I understand this entirely. There is definitely something to this that I am sensing but I'm not sure what it is. I suppose it may make more sense later down the line.

In chapter two Gebser speaks about the three worlds: unperspectival, perspectival, and aperspectival. I wish he went into more detail about the unperspective worldviews, but I suppose that detail comes in later chapters?
He showed how in unperspectival world, people thought the world was like a cave or a vault. Do you have any idea if this is connected with ancient ideas about the Earth and heavens? E.g. the Ptolemaic Earth model, and the firmament over the Earth (the Bible).

I read through some of chapter three going into more detail about the different consciousness structures. I was very impressed with Gebser's research there too. The part about people doing paintings of animals in sand or in caves as a magical ritual to aid with hunting was something I have never heard before. But as I said, I have not read too far into the book yet to speak more on. I do feel that the book is beginning to provide answers that I seek.

[AshvinP]

Thank you Federica and Ashvin for your thoughtful and lucid responses. The discussion in here keeps getting more interesting.

Ashvin and Federica, are you trying to suggest that the past, present, and future can be understood as 3 perspectives which occur in the Now, Instead of merely being a flow from A to B?


Ashvin, I have not read through all of Jean Gebser's book yet, unfortunately. I read the first two or three chapters so far, and I know some additional information about it from the internet. So far I am enjoying the book, but it is a tough read so it is taking me a while to process the contents (just like with Anthroposophy books like PoF which I still am figuring out). I haven't heard anything like what Gebser wrote anywhere else (aside from Steiner and Barfield, at least what I have been reading so far from them). For example, I was surprised but interested by Gebser's argument about historical battles being connected with people's mentality. I remember in the 1st chapter he was talking about the Aztecs vs the Spanish Conquistadors. The Aztecs lost because of their reliance on the magic-mythology mentalities, versus the Spaniard's individualistic rational consciousness. He does mention the common materialistic interpretation which is that the Spanish just had better technology and this allowed them to win. But to be honest both interpretations seem simultaenously convincing and true. Gebser's interpretation makes sense as well because of the quote he provides from the Aztec chronicle of Frey Bernardino de Sahagun.

Hi Luke,

That is reconciled when we remember that ideational activity is also the source of better technology. It is the rational consciousness that can most efficiently tease apart the various components of the Whole and reconfigure those components into new relationships, while the magical-mythic consciousness simply has no interest in that so it never develops that capacity. In its infancy, however, the rational consciousness also loses sight of the Whole in the process of teasing it apart and therefore utilizes the new relationships for myopic, selfish purposes, such as weapons to dominate other groups of people. We should always understand that there is a reciprocal relationship between spiritual activity and its manifestations in the World, the latter feeding back into the former so that it can continually manifest new adaptive forms. That holds true even at the super-physical level of the etheric, astral, and so forth. I think it's generally more helpful to begin with a book like PoF (or maybe the condensed version that Scott is working on) before working through Gebser and other similar writers. The underlying principles of spiritual activity greatly illuminate the complicated details of its various manifestations throughout the ages. It is only through meditation and spiritual exercises, however, that these principles become more second nature, since the bombardment of fragmented details through our normal sensory-conceptual environment doesn't keep dragging us back to where we started when we have strengthened our I-consciousness.

i also thought it was interesting when he pointed out how in older languages such as Latin, the language points to people's understanding of the complementary opposities in Nature. Eg Latin altus meant "high" as well as "low"; sacer meant "sacred" as well as "cursed." Does he go further into this? I think Owen Barfield might have mentioned things on dead languages also, but I'm not sure.
I also liked the part in chapter two about the origins of the words eight and night (german: acht-nacht; french huit-nuit; italian otto-notte; spanish ocho-noche; latin octo-nox (octu); Greek ochto-nux (nuxto)). He was suggesting that the n-less "eight" is an unconscious expression of wakefulness and illumination, standing in opposition to the n-possessing or negating "night" (pointing to the noctural, unperspectival consciousness). Perspectivity is the eighth art, illuminating the unperspectival world, which conceives of seven-fold spiritual relationships, and cavern-like space. But I'm not sure if I understand this entirely. There is definitely something to this that I am sensing but I'm not sure what it is. I suppose it may make more sense later down the line.

In chapter two Gebser speaks about the three worlds: unperspectival, perspectival, and aperspectival. I wish he went into more detail about the unperspective worldviews, but I suppose that detail comes in later chapters?
He showed how in unperspectival world, people thought the world was like a cave or a vault. Do you have any idea if this is connected with ancient ideas about the Earth and heavens? E.g. the Ptolemaic Earth model, and the firmament over the Earth (the Bible).

I read through some of chapter three going into more detail about the different consciousness structures. I was very impressed with Gebser's research there too. The part about people doing paintings of animals in sand or in caves as a magical ritual to aid with hunting was something I have never heard before. But as I said, I have not read too far into the book yet to speak more on. I do feel that the book is beginning to provide answers that I seek.

The language connections you are mentioning are very interesting. The eightfoldness holds a significant occult meaning and generally symbolizes a threefold and sevenfold activity that is made Whole (the eightfoldness being the Whole). For example, the physical elements (solid, liquid, gas) and etheric elements (light, chemical, life) which are united through the element of warmth (such as the warmth of cognitive love) and are thereby made Whole. Or the threefold body and threefold spirit that are united through the link of “I”. Old Saturn, Old Sun, OId Moon and Jupiter, Venus, Vulcan that are united through Earth. Generally, the eighth element is the primal Unity that falls asleep and reawakens to itself through nested threefold and sevenfold structures (the latter being the reflection of threefoldness across a central axis, from unconscious to conscious). So the connection to wakefulness and illumination definitely makes sense. It’s really fascinating to see how these things are preserved in various languages since the latter has certainly been the most direct manifestation of our spiritual activity throughout the ages and will continue to be no matter what form it is expressed through - gestures, verbal concepts, images, etc.

Language has handed down words to us that we now understand only in a nominalistic sense. However, there are three reasons why we should not assume that, even originally, these words were only arbitrary names to label a phenomenon or object. First, as we have seen, the concepts of our language initially structure the perceptual world—and only through these concepts can we perceive its particulars. Second, we can name only things that have already been conceptually defined and outlined. Since we receive our first concepts through language, any “naming” is superfluous. Third, ethnological studies show that human activity has never produced a new word stem. When we encounter something new, we use old words or stems of words, though perhaps in a modified form, to name or describe the new experience. For instance, the Navajo Indians describe what we call film or movie in a phrase that means “those who are gliding past one after the other.” They call elephants, for which there is, of course, no original word in their language, “the one who throws a lasso with his nose” (free translation). Indeed, even in modern European languages we use old words for new inventions, or we use compound words, such as “television,” or we adopt words from other languages. In short, there is no known case of a new word stem being created—not even in modern times and not counting, of course, words derived from old roots, for example, through contraction.

Thus, all terms for natural objects, which are mere names for us today, were in their original or ancient form (all words have gone through changes) as meaningful as words like “spoon” or “or” are for us now. The old word-concepts of natural objects, then, were “understood.” The structure of the archaic consciousness meant that people experienced the living, sentient higher concepts—which cannot be brought down to the plane of the past of modern consciousness—in a dreamlike way. Moreover, archaic perception was hardly, if at all, separate from “thinking” and could therefore grasp much more of nature than ours. In the structure of the archaic consciousness—and also in very young children in our time—the plane of the past is not yet separated from that of the present by an abyss. For this reason it has a more dreamlike character and lacks sharp distinctions. It is linked, as if by resonance, with the continuity of the upper levels of consciousness, which for us are now in the superconscious. Words or word concepts in this archaic consciousness still carry within them a far-reaching perceptive feeling and willing by means of which the “concept”—very different from what we know as concepts—sends its roots deep into the perceptual world, touching the creational ideas of nature. These word-concepts are connections—relationships—in the perceptual world and structure it. They do not name “objects” but rather are relationships between what later separates into subject and object.

The I-being still lives in a unified world, in understanding. It experiences the world and itself as understanding, in a harmony—the later music of the spheres is a pale reflection of this—that is a sign of “understanding” what the natural world, the cosmos, is “saying.” It is an understanding from within, without juxtaposition and without any I-consciousness. The great ideas of nature are experienced in communion, and initially the human being is one of these ideas. In the archaic languages every word is an aspect of the world that structures the world while at the same time reintegrating into a unity the particulars that are distinguished.

Kühlewind, Georg. The Logos-Structure of the World . Lindisfarne Books. Kindle Edition.

Yes, certainly the ancient ideas about cosmology were a direct result of their modes of consciousness. And that is still the case today since our rational spatial consciousness leads us to form ideas of an infinitely expanding universe where there no longer is any Center. We can really try to sense the moral, amoral, or immoral valence in such ideas. A Center speaks of a plan, of intention, of lawful hierarchy, and so forth while an infinitely distributed series of rocks speaks of randomness, mindlessness, instinctiveness, lawlessness, and so forth. The latter reassures us that each individual can serve as his or her own center without accountability to anyone else. It is not a question of ethically judging these developments, of course, because they were necessary in the course of evolution toward individual freedom and the capacity for spiritual love, just as the stages of a plant are necessary for its blossom and seed, or childhood is necessary for adulthood. But now perspectival man also needs to recover the inner essence of the unperspectival world to integrate towards an aperpsectival world, or he risks lapsing back and undoing all his progress. Or we could say our waking consciousness needs to integrate our dreaming and sleeping consciousness that is always present beneath its surface but normally drowned out by its brighter intellectual light.

So I would answer yes to your first question - the past and future are always embedded in the present. They are both concretely influencing what unfolds in the present. But our current consciousness lives almost entirely in the past and feels like the future is some vague idea in our minds without any concrete influence on what is happening now. If we look at our current experience, there is hardly any event that occurs or decision we make that is not highly conditioned by past factors, such as our gender, our ethnicity, our nation, our culture, our family, our temperament, our character, our genes, our career choice, our social circle, etc. The only place where we can speak of this conditioning being absent is in the observation of our own thinking activity. That is something we can do with complete freedom because it is not based on any of those other past factors. It is the only place where we truly live in the present and can find a portal to the concrete future. What we call the ‘future’ are the layers of Thought-potential through which the manifest world is continually condensing, in which our own thinking activity is nested. These are the same layers through which the past condensed as well. That is why we can speak of moving into the future as a reawakening of the past.