Partly I'm a victim of our historical age. Today, for the most part, generalists are obsolete; and the advancement of "knowledge" is left to a multitude of specialists who don't talk to specialists in other fields; and no one is in a position to pull the pieces together and see if they make sense as a whole.
Partly, I'm a victim of my personal age. With experience, I've become less and less sure about everything. And, as a result, most of what I think about and talk about and write about is practical, limited -- basically petty; and the "big questions", topics that matter, get no time or attention at all. Either I defer to the "experts" (in matters of science) or I presume that since the questions are unanswerable, it's foolish to waste time even trying to answer them.
Well I prefer to be wrong and sound foolish, rather than remain silent. I want to stir up the old fire of imagination, and try to make the best sense I can out of issues dealing with the nature and purpose of life. I hope that by posting these notions on the Web and maybe distributing them by email, I can stir up discussion with old friends and make new friends, leading to new ideas and refinement/correction of old ones.
Please join me in daring to express your own "fuzzy" ideas.
I'll post these notions in a "fuzzy thinking" section my blog http://www.samizdat.com/blog and on a Web pages (as a single growing document, at least at first) http://www.samizdat.com/fuzzy.html If you would like to receive such thoughts by email, please let me know and I'll add you to a new distribution list. And if you have reactions and similar kinds of thoughts, please send them to me by email for possible inclusion all those ways.
Richard Seltzer, seltzer@samizdat.com
Fuzzy #1 -- Is Reality Discontinuous (7/14/2007)
Fuzzy #2 -- Getting Personal (8/8/2007)
Fuzzy #3 -- Scared to Life: the Plus Side of Night
Terrors (9/1/2007)
Fuzzy #4 -- The Master-Plot Generation Seeks Meaning
(1/20/2008)
According to Wikipedia, Occam's Law boils down to "the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory." Or "All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one."
But that statement itself is an assumption -- a huge one. And the fact that much of science since Occam came up with that in the 14th century is based on that puts much of science in doubt.
When Newton came out with his laws of gravity, following in Occam's footsteps, he presumed that those laws would apply not just for the Earth or the solar system or the observable stars -- but everywhere. Yes, that is simple, beautifully simple. But is simplicity truth? Is beauty truth? Does "truth" mean anything?
A hundred years ago, on "A Pluralistic Universe" William James speculated that reality isn't necessarily neat or logical or predictable. Rather, the world we live in is messy and mixed up and full of surprises.
More recent books like "The Elegant Universe" and "The Fabric of the Cosmos" by Brian Greene, "Warped Passages" by Lisa Randall, and "Parallel Worlds" by Michio Kaku explain the many flavors of string theory (successor to quantum theory, which was the successor to relativity, which was the successor to Newtonian physics). Those books deal with a multitude of bizarre possibilities, such as multiple universes, multiple dimensions, dark matter, dark energy, and negative gravity. They build on the notion that not just our senses but our reasoning abilities reach limits as the scale goes down or up, far beyond our normal experience. Our ability to make sense of the world around us evolved. The result is very practical for everyday life. But we are not very well equipped to understand what happens on scales smaller than an atom, much less smaller than an electron, or scales larger than a galaxy, much less multiple universes.
Given those insights, isn't it time to seriously question the basic assumptions of science?
Far too often, great scientists have, like Occam and Newton, presumed that the universe is simple and logical -- as if designed by an omnipotent creator. But why -- aside from the aesthetic taste of Plato and his contemporaries -- should simplicity and logic be presumed to be "beautiful" and the beautiful presumed to be true? Personally, I find complexity fascinating. And I suspect that, at some level, reality is "broken" and discontinuous.
In other words, the laws of physics that apply in our solar system and in our galaxy may not apply elsewhere in the visible universe, much less beyond; or may not be stable, and if they change, may not change in ways that are predictable.
So what? Well consider Hubble's Law. Wikipedia explains "the redshift in light coming from distant galaxies is proportional to their distance." In other words, our calculations of the distances from Earth of stars and galaxies are based on analysis of the light from those bodies and on the assumption that the same laws of physics that apply here also apply hundreds, thousands, and even millions of light years from here. That's an enormous assumption, with mind-boggling consequences. If there are, in fact, discontinuities in reality and variations in basic physical laws beyond our galaxy, then what scientists have concluded about the size and nature and past and future of this universe (much less other universes) is seriously in doubt.
Perhaps it's time to question such assumptions and to explore the possibility that reality is very messy, and that complex answers may sometimes prove more useful and suggestive than simple ones.
Response from Judy Vero, 7/14/2007
Just read your first post and it's a fascinating question. I too enjoy complexity, but my own sense is that complexity is generated by a very simple process undergoing repeated iterations. Even physicists have reduced everything to four fundamental forces, and continue to look for a single principle that underlies them all...of course, they're making that same assumption...that there IS a single principle.
If you drop a pebble in a pond, it sends out a circular wave. As that wave interacts with other objects, such as a boat or the shore, it is reflected back and the returning wave interacts with the outgoing wave in ways that can create tremendous complexity. I guess it's a matter of what "floats your boat." If you look for complexity, you'll find it. If you look for simplicity, you'll find that. Our beliefs shape our perceptions, so we can pretty much create any reality we want ;-)
For another take on where all the complexity might come from, I'd suggest reading "The Field," by Lynne McTaggart.
Judy Yero
Response from Grant Wiggins, 7/14/2007
Good stuff. Occam's Razor is a hell of an assumption. But so is the idea that our experience is sufficient enough to trust all our models. I have no doubt that when we finally figure out what dark matter is and how the forces of nature all work the physics and chemistry we know will be out the window.
Put differently - why is every age prone to the view that we understand just about all of it, we just need to put the pieces together? I highly recommend - if you haven't done so - Kuhn's Paradigms of Scientific Revolution. He was really the first to be onto the lack of continuity in the history of science...
Cheers,
Grant Wiggins
Response from Joseph Harris, 7/14/2007
You'd better be careful Richard, the scientists are gearing up for an inquisition ;-).
If I ever need a reminder that scientists are the least logical of people I usually turn to Richard Dawkins, the Cambridge (England) prof for scientific understanding... No, I won't ask you to read (or distribute) any of his books.
You rightly point out the circularity of so much 'science', and the tendency to assume some common theme. Of course that must presuppose some intelligence to impose such a theme. But then you get scientists who can't stand that idea since they consider themselves archbishops in the religion of science - which brings us back to that prof who is trying to show proof that there is no God - in a series of lucrative books and spin offs.
And, of course, it is not just what an idea is, but also how it is applied [and maybe how it is understood]. But ideas do change and get revised, and too often we find something that remains defended well beyond its sell by date!
These problems stretch even to archaeology. Suddenly, it seems, having settled to the idea that farming may have started 10,000 years ago, evidence is being examined that moves the date back 400,000 years. Which rather disturbs a whole knowledge base of assumptions.
I do love (genuinely) how science teases out so many of the mechanics of the world and the body, but it does need some humility from our science friends; like the rest of us they do not know.
Joseph Harris
Response from Gene Trumbo, 7/15/2007
Here are a few of my thoughts on the subject of big pictures and generalists. Much of my TV watching are the Science, Discovery and History channels. I've tried to understand string theory and parallel universes, but I come back the the question of how energy was created originally. For every effect, there is a cause. Although I was an atheist once, and I know quite a bit about science, I now conclude that there is an intelligent design to everything--which infers an intelligent designer. It is easier for me to accept an intelligent designer than to think that energy had no beginning. I recommend a book called "The Privileged Planet".
I'm a generalist. I haven't been a big success in life, but if I didn't have a generalist's mindset, I may not have survived to this point. A generalist has a wide perspective that allows him to see trends in the future. Life in the 21st century is likely to be more traumatic than even the events of the 20th--including 2 world wars, the influenza pandemic of 1918, the Great Depression, nuclear weapons and the like. But science and technology will likely continue to explode at an ever increasing rate. So I'm balanced.
I think another depression is likely. Depressions are caused by too much debt and have occurred every human lifespan since the Industrial Revolution began. I think there will be a die-off of the human race that will put us back in balance with the ecosystem we depend on. I've lived in the third world(Peace Corps, Africa). Most of humanity is already living on the edge of survival. It won't take much to kill them off. We're so dependent on paychecks, cities and grocery stores, that we may die before the people who live in mud huts and eat bugs.
Although many of my thoughts about the future are pessimistic, I think they are realistic based on my observations.
I hope that books will never become obsolete. Most of the world's supply
of books are in English. If you want to learn something very specific,
books are the main repository of knowledge and information. Book cds are
great, but I can see cds becoming obsolete, and the information contained
on them being lost when nobody is making cd players anymore. I've already
thrown away my VHS tapes. Before that, I threw away my Beta tapes. Anyone
seen a floppy disk lately? Ultimately, the information repository of the
future will be the future version of the internet. But if our civilization
dies, some future archeologist will likely only know us through books that
were discovered in some landfill protected from deterioration by lack of
oxygen underground. The internet will go poof and everything on it forgotten.
Decorated on a museum wall that can be seen from the street in Washington,
DC is a bit of wisdom: "The Past is Prologue". The current generation of
humanity is running around mindlessly working to acquire possessions and
to indulge in the current culture of iPods, iPhones and the like. We are
developing a severe case of amnesia about the past, which makes us pretty
unprepared to deal with the future. It may hit us like a brick wall at
60 miles an hour if there are surprises ahead.
I wish you success in your blog and in your business. It's pretty neat to have a library in a shoebox. But understand, it is transitional technology.
Gene Trumbo
Response from Richard Borda, 7/15/2007
We are living in an age where perception and data are king; needs are best satisfied in looking out not in. Of course, there are needs of the inner self such as integration, meaning, general rules to deal with life. Regrettably, science and data sciences have made huge advances and success breeds repitition ad nauseaum. We have two feet and right now left foot-perception- dominates right foot-conception. Your books suggest a liberal education as a cure for the dysfunctioning that has arisen out of the lop sided view of the use of the faculties and does suggest that eventually there will be a return. Those thinkers that will advance reflective thinking in our generation have not surfaced but the if the field is built then people will come. You are one of the frontliners in this task. Good luck and leg me know how i can assist you in your very great task......richard borda.
Response from John Lepant, 7/15/2007
Interesting String: with all due respect ( and a great deal of respect is due ) to Sir Arthur Eddington, I've never completely accepted the notion of the Cosmological Constant.
John Lepant
Response from Sister Maria Philomena, Immaculate Heart of Mary School, in New Hampshire, 7/18/2007
You have asked for feedback, but I can’t even begin to give feedback until I know “where you’re coming from”. . . so I have a few questions for you.
I gather that you don’t believe in God, the Creator of Heaven and earth. Is this accurate?
What do you think man’s purpose is? Have you every heard of Philosophia Perennis?
May Our Lady bless you with Her Holy Child!
Sister Maria Philomena, M.I.C.M.
Response from Richard to Sister Maria Philomena, 7/19/2007
You credit me with far too much certainty ...
I believe that many explanations/answers can be true at the same time, that one answer does not exclude others, that we all have an obligation to make sense of our lives, and that that is a personal/individual quest.
As for the purpose of the "fuzzy" discussion, I believe that while specialization has been essential for the overall progress of mankind, it puts us at an ever greater distance from making sense of our lives. I believe that many of us are far too inclined to accept "authority" -- the "official" word of media and scientists and other "experts". We become spectators, passive observers. As we get immersed in the day-to-day tasks of life, we forget the "big questions", as if they were unanswerable, or as if only genius specialists could possibly try to answer them.
I feel that I have "dropped the ball" and gone many years without daring to pursue the kinds of thinking that I feel all of us should pursue.
It is wonderful that science progresses, but there is no end point to scientific inquiry. And such "progress" means nothing to me as an individual unless I somehow assimilate it, translate it to personal and human terms, make it part of the overall mental map that helps me try to get glimpses of the "big picture", that provides a context that provides meaning for day-to-day events.
That's pretty much where I'm coming from.
The question of God (and what "God" might mean) is open. Even whether we might be able to (personally) arrive at a sense of certainty and knowledge with regard to God is also an open question.
You might find interesting a blog item I posted a year ago at http://www.samizdat.com/blog/?p=122 about a "miracle".
You also might enjoy an historical novel of mine entitled The Name of Hero, the first of a projected trilogy about a Russian officer of the guard who became an explorer in Ethiopia, led troops during the Russian conquest of Manchuria, then became a monk at Mount Athos -- a man who was driven in a variety of directions, in his quest to find what could be, for him, the meaning of life. You can see the full text of that book and other writings of mine online at http://www.samizdat.com/everything.html
Basically, I don't believe that their is a singular and absolute purpose for all of mankind. But rather that each of us must find our own individual purpose or purposes.
And, no I haven't heard of "Philosophia Perennis".
Thanks very much for your stimulating feedback.
I'll put your question and my answer at the blog http://www.samizdat.com/blog and the Web page http://www.samizdat.com/fuzzy.html
Best wishes.
Richard
Response from Will Wright
I think the decline of the generalist comes from the secularization
of society. From the early middle ages until the late 18th - early
19th century, all academic disciplines answered to theology. As a
result, anyone who studied theology felt qualified to speak to any discipline.
Most arts and sciences see secularization as a liberation, and though the
church frequently exhibited poor parenting skills, much is lost as well.
Art and science need guidance. As a theological
generalist, I certainly lack the technical data an immunologist has concerning
T-cell bonding, but I have perspective that is useful in larger picture
projections.
The church loses more than it's former power.
By limiting their focus to worship, evanglism and mercy, the church pigeon-holes
the God/Creator they seek to serve. God is best percieved through
the widest possible lens.
Is that sufficiently fuzzy?
Response from Roberta Kalechofsky
I have taken a while to get back to you, because I have been thinking
about the problem and don't quite know how to handle it. I have several
levels I work on, and questions and answers are related to my immediate
concerns as someone involved with the vegetarian and animal rights movements,---which
have given me a lot to think about evil, about the horrors of our relationship
not only with other humans, but with other creatures. I am just off
an animal rights conference, where the latest "buzz" topic is whether animals
have souls--not something that obsesses most other human beings,---and
a subject that I personally don't care much about. But many animal
rights people--especially religious people--- believe--or hope--that if
you can persuade people that animals have souls,
it will increase respect for animal life and help protect them.
I am at pains to point out that the belief that humans have souls does
nothing to protect human beings---we still slaughter each other.
Animal rights people have concerns that often strike other people as hokey,
yet so much of our concerns are entrenched in the whole question of cruelty
and evil and--for me---how did we lose reverence for other creatures and
for the earth, for creation? These concerns have put me in something
of a position, concerning science---as "the loyal opposition." You
would have to read my essays on the animal rights movement and at least
some of the sophisticated material that is out there by others to know
where I am coming from. It has given me a lot to think about the
value of modernity. Sure, I like my "technological toys"---I am writing
this on a computer----but we have turned the planet into a hell hole.
Someone at the conference I was at was wearing a tee shirt that had on
the front, "Knowledge is power," and the back "Beware." Precisely my sentiments.
There is an essay by Bertrand Russell concerning this that somewhere in
the mid twentieth century science turned from being a lover of nature (from
which the old 17th century scientists sprang)to being a lover of power.
I don't think the public is aware of this change in sentiment in science.
My research and much of my non-fiction writing concerns this.
As a fiction writer, some of my fiction is about this too (my latest collection of short stories---Job Enters a Pain Clinic), but it is also about the historic Judeo/Christian clash.
What are the big questions for me? One of them concerns the myth of the deicide charge, the other concerns how, after Descartes, animals became demoted creatures and were then thought of as "machines," and the horrors this has created in our modern forms of industrialized husbandry and animal research. How does evil begin, how do we trace its branches, how does it become so much a part of our cultural way of regarding the world that we no longer realize it is evil. And yes--and always--the questioins never get far for me, as a Jew; I trace--as much as I can--the origins of the Jewish/Christian theological conflicts---or as the eminent Anglican theologian, James Parkes, called it, "The Conflict Between Church and Synagogue," and I am, at the same time, very concerned abut a desacralized West which has allowed the planet to become a scientific toy.
Beyond that---oh boy! I have specific political worries.
Is the west---which I have brooded and worried over---becoming an obsolete
construct as the Muslim civilization swallows it up---and as punk rock
swallows up Mozart; should we go or stay in Iraq? Is McCain a
voice crying in the Wilderness, and why is it that these questions seem
to be dead ends--does this mean we have come to the end of our political
potential and, if so, does this mean that the United States now survives
on military might alone?
I'll stop here and wait for replies.
Such was the case recently with a passage from Boethius. Who reads sixth century Latin philosophers? Well, sending out a “free ebook of the week” motivates me to be on the look out for little known/little appreciated works from long ago. In prison, awaiting execution at the random whim of King Theodoric of Italy, Boethius tries to make sense of life. Infinity, eternity, and chance reduce everything we might do to total insignificance.
Those thoughts didn’t strike me as new — rather his starting point toward religious faith, seemed very similar to the world view of Ecclesiastes or of Camus in “The Myth of Sisyphus”, and from which Camus went in a totally different direction, valuing the heroism of continuing to live and do what you feel is “right” even if you believe life is meaningless.
But at this stage of my life (having passed 60), that starting point triggered another kind of response.
The endeavor to try to understand the nature of everything is unending. That’s just another aspect of infinity/eternity — no single breakthrough, no individual contribution matters in the long run, because the process of discovery never ends. There’s never a moment when “THE ANSWER” is found. Every answer gives rise to new questions, which lead to new insights.
Yes, part of why we exist (presuming there is a “why”) must be to participate in some way in such overall human endeavors — trying to make the world a better place than we found it, trying to advance knowledge, or trying to help those who might some day do so.
But another very important role (one which becomes all the more important the older we get) is personal — striving to make personal sense of the world that we live in and our role in it. I will never understand the absolute nature of anything, but I can arrive at a personal understanding — building context through reading and experience, making personal mind maps to help me recognize interrelationships and potential directions, arriving at personal answers to the “big questions”, answers that help me deal with day-to-day reality and arrive at a sense of fulfillment, so the ordinary tasks and challenges of life make sense to me in a self-built context.
From this personal perspective, infinity and eternity are positive, not negative. Every moment in time is the middle of all of time. And every point in space is in the middle of all of space. I, just like everyone else who has ever lived, stand at the center of the universe. Truth and meaning aren’t outside somewhere to be discovered. Rather one of your goals should be to build and find truth and meaning, in the fabric and context of your life.
In practical terms, this means that I need not read and strive to understand the works of every major philosopher and scientist and novelist. Rather (after having sampled widely) I read particular authors because their perspective and style feel right to me. Their thoughts make sense to me and stimulate similar follow-on thoughts of my own.
Yes, learning is important, but not in the sense of struggling through everything written by the great names, in hopes of catching a glimmer of what they discovered; but rather in the sense of a very personal quest, following your natural path toward an understanding of what really matters to you.
Please send me email if you have a comment/reaction or if you’d like me to add you to an email distribution list for such thoughts.
Response from Chuck Rackers
Those are great thoughts. I admire what you are doing with the book collections, the books of the week, and your thoughts on these esoteric subjects.
Although I once believed that there was a single great Truth out there somewhere waiting to be discovered (by me, of course, in the ignorance and arrogance of youth). I now agree with you, if I understand you correctly, that we each find our own truth and meaning in life.
I have been led to reading some of the existentialists' writings, as well as the stoics and the transcendentalists, and others. I was amazed to find that many of the thoughts that I believed were original had been discussed at great length for tens, hundreds, or even thousands of years. And like finding a well-worn path in a dark forest, I find great comfort in that.
At the same time, when faced with infinity and eternity, I can only feel an overwhelming sense of awe. With modern instruments, we can not just guess what is out in the universe, we can actually SEE it! We can see billions of stars in thousands of galaxies from billions and billions of light-years away -- and that is not conjecture, they are real! They exist!
So I have come to realize that, though the infinite and [possibly] eternal Universe may be sustained and governed by an impersonal Tao, it is through a manifestation of that in a profound and personal Higher Power that I exist and have the consciousness to experience the Universe and everything in my life. And so, my life has meaning through the very fact (and the very act) of my own existence.
but... that's just my rambling thoughts. You can post or distribute this or whatever; I would love to hear others' thoughts on these ideas.
Thanks!
Chuck
Response from Eden Thomas
I agree there is immense value in putting intuitions, "personal truths" and beleifs each of us has into precise words. The classical authors and texts have helped me do this in my own life. Most of us are clumsy with words. Good authors fill my verbal void, and clarify my nebulous conceptions of perennial intuitive truths. The clear picture helps reduce uncertainty, and comes as a releif from my own limited mind that can't always express what it knows.
As a reader, thinker and cerebral person, my sense of self is very much bound up with my concious mind and the ideas I hold there. In contrast to a beauty queen who's sense of self is bound up in her looks, or a young lover who's sense of who he is derives from his feelings, a cerebral person's sense of who they are is in their ideas, views and philosophies. Polished and sculpted expressions of thought, that I already hold as self evident though fuzzily sketched truths, can be moved to my concious mind and fitted into my cognitive schemata; the result is an opportunity to view what I believe, thus better viewing and understanding who I am as a rational human. In some ways a thought doesn't exist if falls in a forest of neurons without being seen and expressed directly by the concious part of the mind.
When an author adds inspiration or humour to the clarity of thought that's gravy...and the sign of the great writer.
Those are my own self-centered thoughts on your fuzzy.
Response from Ken Wilson
At 63 I was beginning to lose my practical vision and that is the time also that my eyes were opened to new horizons.
I never did much reading while raising my family and at 63 I had to find new ways to read. That is whenI found Gutenberg, and later, of course your cd’s. It has been necessary to convert these to speech but through this medium I have met some great people, both between the covers, books that is, and via the email.
Thank you for having me on your list, as you have really enriched my life.
Ken Wilson
Last week, when I had my annual checkup, I told my doctor. He laughed. He had never come across an instance of dreams as warnings of serious physical problems or as an unconscious first aid mechanism.
But I can't help but wonder...
My wife, Barb, has two or three such visions a week -- terrifying apparitions in a half-awake state, where she sees people (people she has never seen before) in the room with her, often approaching her. The visions never speak. Only rarely do they act in a threatening way. But each time she screams. I feel like the husband in the TV series "Medium". But there is no communication of any kind, and nothing comes of it, and each time the images/apparitions are different (sometimes alone and sometimes in groups).
We joke about ghosts, about the house being haunted. (We periodically have bizarre occurrences around the house -- for instance, ice cubes form in the freeze with tall thin spikes, like stalagmites in a cave. I posted a short silly item in my blog here, with photos, in hopes that somebody could explain what was happening, but that got zero response.) Then we took a short tourist trip to London, and the first night in the hotel room, Barb woke up screaming that there were three men sitting huddled and frightened on the floor in the corner. The next morning we found out that two hundred years before the pub next door had been the last stop for prisoners on their way to be hung at Tyburn. So if it's ghosts she sees, it's not a matter of the house being haunted, but rather of her sensitivity.
But that's a digression... My night terror got me to thinking, as I had many times before, about self-regulating mechanisms; how from the perspective of you own individual life events take on special meaning that they would have to no one else -- leading you to see the world in different ways and to live life differently.
Seven years ago, at the age of 54, I had a stroke. I was eating salad at the dining room table and suddenly the room began to spin. Soon I was so dizzy I couldn't sit straight in my chair, even holding on, desperately to the arms of the chair; and I almost fell to the floor (my wife caught me). The next morning, sitting at my computer in my home office, I had another dizzy spell and fell again. Then I knew I had to call the doctor. An MRI showed a serious stroke. There was a large black area in the cerebellum. A neurologist concluded that vertebal artery on the left side was occluded. Very fortunately, I had no negative affects from the stroke. It was a wake-up call, a reminder of my mortality, a warning that if there was anything I really wanted to do, I'd better do it. After a month or so of heightened awareness, I simply went about my business as if it had never happened.
Last year, at my annual physical, my doctor informed me that I have "pre-diabetes", that it was inevitable that I would get diabetes, but that with diet and exercise I could postpone the onset of the disease. That was another wake-up call. I made abrupt changes in what I ate and started walking/jogging 1-3 miles per day. Since then I've lost 30 pounds and my blood glucose levels now delight my doctor. But aside from the greater concern about my physical condition, I simply went about my business as usual.
So I now see that terrifying "vision" as a mental/moral wakeup call. If the obvious physical signs aren't enough to get me going, then my unconscious will take over and scare me into life.
That's what led me to start this series of "fuzzy" thoughts, trying to make sense of questions I've left unexamined for far too long.
And, now I realize that the experience itself is an affirmation of a basic fuzzy belief of mine -- that as individuals and as a species self-regulating mechanisms come into play, pushing us toward balance and reason and compassion. And in that context, our worst experiences and our worst fears can help nudge us in the "right" direction, as if some force were trying to navigate a huge ship down a river, with the crudest of controls, a push this way, then push that way. Toward what goal?
Response from Duncan Holmes
Man, that’s scary. That’s why I, as a committed Christian, sometimes
have to pull out a recording of the Bible, and especially the Psalms on
occasion. Hearing those words of all various emotions at least lets me
know that Someone’s with me in my own darkest hours.
While I’ve never had visions (never seen, so wouldn’t know what it’s like), there are sounds I don’t like and sensations I don’t like, and I sometimes have dreams involving such. I don’t like being out in a thunderstorm, for example, not because of the rain, but because you don’t know whether or not you’ll get zapped by the next lightning bolt.
I hate the sounds of old-fashioned air raid and fire sirens-not the flutyor slide whistle type that began to surface in the early 1960’s, but those I grew up hearing in New York City as a toddler and later, in the Washington, Dc area where I was brought up. I would not want to be alone in a big city hotel room or in a shower if one of those sirens went off, and I could hear it.
I could go on and on, but I’m going to quit and have my wake-up cup of coffee and get ready for worship this Sunday morn.
Have a restful day, and thanks for sharing your Fuzzy Thought.
Duncan Holmes
Response from Joseph Harris
To suggest anyone knows certainly what these experiences are would
be incorrect. On the other hand there is a wealth of experience of ’sensitivity’
or mediumship. I get the impression that often sensitivity is awakened
by an experience which shocks the body, or by a health weakness.
Why see what appears to be souls that cannot get rest, or move on to the next realm [the most obvious and satisfying answer]? Well, who knows?
Perhaps a testing of the soul’s ability to operate in two realms at once. Perhaps preparation of more revelations to come. That both you and your wife appear sensitive is unusual I believe, though I have no statistics on that.
The problem with regard to science and medicine is that, presumably because they can find a physical trail of health and brain activity, they disregard the non-physical possibilities despite their total lack of evidence outside the material [a weakness of science].
The excellent tv series ‘Medium’ is a dramatic exageration and over-simplification of course. But in its essentials it conveys actual experience. The medium approves the content of each show but says clearly she does not dream such precise information!
One aspect of Mrs Dubois’s story is that she is driven by her ‘gift’ and cannot choose not to garner information though the channel that is open. Not all these contacts are benign or well-meaning of course, and they should be examined for understanding in case there are unwelcome elements.
And all this can exist separately and side by side with the idea of the body’s self-regulating systems; an idea of yours that I think has much merit.
But I think you and your wife have to calm yourselves over these appearances,
and examine them with some care if more occur. It may be that you have
things to do that you had never dreamed of
being involved in.
I wish you luck in sorting this out; the experiences are unlikely to stop, and research into the matter and organisations that may be able to advise or help will be time well spent.
Response from Gudrun Brunot
Richard, I read your last fuzzy about having dreams that scare you to life. I didn’t have anything suitable to reply with or add at the time, but, just the following night, I had an experience that brought me up sharp:
My partner, Rob, and I had both been under a bit of stress lately and shown our individual brands of irritability–him with cranky vituperations about one thing and another, me with more quiet outbursts. Both of us, I think, felt a certain depression over how we just didn’t seem able to talk to each other without bickering . Were we losing our grip on getting along? So, to my dream: I dreamed that Rob had just been posted to Viet Nam. Not as a soldier, but he was definitely not there on vacation–there was a war going on. At the same time, right before he was about to leave, I blurt out that we probably aren’t getting along anymore. He didn’t contradict me, and it was the most miserable feeling I can remember experiencing. But, in my dream, I had said it, so I couldn’t take it back. I seem to remember that the dream went on, miserably, for quite a while until I woke up. What a blessed relief–no Viet Nam, and I hadn’t blurted out anything. I told him the dream, of course. We’ve started laughing at things again, including each other.
Response from Anonymous
I have enjoyed reading your “fuzzy” thoughts. This latest one seems
to be a valiant attempt to put a positive spin on one of life’s most unpleasant
experiences — nightmares. You may be right, of course. But
your explanation — that it all has a purpose, including nightmares
– is too Aristotelian for our age, I’m afraid. There is a difference between
saying that something reveals information about yourself (the
Freudian view of dreams, roughly) and believing that it’s actually
happening to help you solve a problem.
By the way, I have sometimes also believed that I saw dreams while awake
– but then I *really* woke up. In fact, some of the most interesting dreams
I have (not all nightmares) are the ones in which I am
consciously trying to figure out if I am asleep or not. (Of course,
much of philosophy has devoted itself to that very subject — but that’s
another story). Cold medicine does that to me every time — but it also
happens without any chemical assistance.
As for ice cube spikes — don’t let yourself be immersed so much in Gutenberg that you forget about Google. A few seconds with the latter brought up this: http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/icespikes/icespikes.htm (I’m sorry if this takes the magic out of it — but you asked).
Also — I think that what you are doing with samizdat is very worthwhile. I am amazed that many people don’t even know about it.
Another Response from the Same Anonymous
Curously, though, this fellow who wrote about the ice spikes seems to be using the very same ice trays as you do. So it would be scientifically inexcusable not to allow for the possibility that these specific blue ice trays are haunted. Too much of a coincidence. The mystery is back.
Response from Roberta Kalechofsky
I have read your email several times, not sure of how to answer. The
issue is very complicated and I would have to know more about what is going
on in your life. However, I totally disagree with your physician that dreams
may not be warnings of different physical and/or mental states. Nor do
I believe that our body/minds have complex self-regulating systems is irrational.
I believe they are there, though
sometimes the systems malfunction. Ours may be the only culture that
has so severely severed the ties between our waking and dreaming lives.
And we tend to cut away anything we don’t understand and put in a hopper
called “irrational.” Rationality requires a neatness that can be expostulated,
explained in Ph.D thesis. So we don’t like the “fuzzy’ stuff, we don’t
where to put it and what to do with it.
However, when you write that you saw the three hooded men “while awake,” there are many states which are neither awake nor alseep. That’s a state of mind I would have to analyze more carefully. People walk in their sleep and swear they were awake. They leave their beds, go out into their gardens, for example, and come back to their beds, thinking they were awake, but people who monitor their movements say they were not.
As for Barb’s visitations, I would have to know more there, too. Exactly what do these figures look like. Do they resemble anyone she knows, or knew. Do they remind her of anyone she knows or knew, or saw in a movie or read about, or are they totally amorphous? What age does she think they are? Are they all the same age, the same shape, size, gender? How do the apparitions differ from one time to the next? A notebook next to her bed might help her to “report on them.” Also, noting down anything that went on the day or two days before, and what she ate at the day before, silly as it sounds miht be helpful— It’s been known that certain foods induce nightmares.
In such matters, one has to be his/her own analyst, and faithfully record one’s life to see where the pattern is.
While I myself am often skeptical about many “reports,” such as UFO
sightings and stigmatas, I generally live under the banner of Hamlet’s
statement to Horatio: “There are more things on heaven and earth,
Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” However, the elusive
and the strange require exceedingly careful paying attention to detail.
Let me know what happens and whether any of this helps.
Reponse from Deral McKeel
Today I had a chance to spend a few minutes exploring your Blogging
about Books site. In Blog “Fuzzy #3? you mentioned that in an earlier blog
you had posed the question: “Why do stalagmite like
spikes occasionally appear in ice cubes?” You may have now/finally
received a response/answer, but on the off chance that you have not….
A reasonable (to me anyway) explanation is one given by Gabor Vali, an ice nucleation and atmospheric ice physics professor at the University of Wyoming. The explanation goes something like this:
Water expands as it freezes. The ice cube tray restrains the water from
expanding in all directions except the top. Rising bubbles cause spikes.
Water forms bubbles as it freezes. “As ice forms, it
excludes the gases that were dissolved in the water. Growing ice crystals
incorporate the water molecules but not the other gases (such as carbon
dioxide, nitrogen, etc.). A single crystal is
completely transparent and has no bubbles. Exceptions to this only
occur when ice forms extremely fast.
Ice forms first at the walls, bottom, and top of the ice cube tray since
the freezer cools the tray from the outside. The walls and tray bottom
(in contact with the freezer) conduct the cold quickest;
ice forms first along these surfaces and becomes thicker than at the
ice-cube top.
The bubbles rise and press their way through water crevices in the slowly
growing ice front. The bubbles and their clinging, freezing water push
the top-layer ice and fracture the thinner ice. Pressure
from the water below squeezes the bubbles and their clinging water
up into a spike. Eventually the spike freezes solid and stops the rising
bubbles. ”
The above information was taken from the http://www.wonderquest.com website.
Response from Marc Sonenthal
Hi Richard, I think I might be able to give you something with regards
to the night terrors you and your wife are having.
I believe when we dream we become more sensitized to things around
us. I think there is a mental atmosphere that is unseen but filled with
all sorts of things and kinds of life that we are generally unaware of,
all around us all the time. When we sleep we become aware of these things
around us or coming towards us because our senses are still very much aware,
but the barrier which is the material world and our belief in its existence
is removed. Your experiences of seeing these things while half asleep or
awake is related to the same thing. I have also experienced these kinds
of things and done my own serious thinking about it. My question was this:
does it represent some kind of a problem that needs a solution that I need
to become aware of. And if this is so then is there something that I can
do to mitigate whatever problem it might represent.
I have come to believe that we are seeing things that actually are
there, but that if we ignore them, like they are nothing, whatever their
motivation is will simply blow by us like a bit of pollen floating on a
breeze as we walk down a road. They will then continue on in whatever direction
they are going, to end up at whatever their proper karmic destination is.
If you have done your best to live a decent and ethical life, which it
is my guess you have, (reading the stuff that you read so much, during
all of your life, says to me that you must be trying to live it at least
decently) then universal law will just speed them on their way and they
don't have to have anything to do with you. These things do have a tangible
expression in our physical environment, but if we live ethically and responsibly
then we won't deserve anything harmful that they might represent. They
are subject to universal laws just as we are. But if you engage them by
believing in them you might give them a way into your life. If something
is blowing by you in the breeze and you reach out to catch it, then it
becomes part of your life, if you don't touch it and let it keep floating
to wherever it's going then it becomes pretty meaningless. So I think the
best thing to do is to recognize that it might mean something, but that
if you ignore it, then it probably won't mean anything. Both you and your
wife. And you've got more important things to think about anyway, right?
I would guess also that this has something to do with you speculating
about a lot of things that would only lead to more misery for life in general.
Life could not want the human race to "figure it out". No matter what kind
of philosophical contortions man might try to use to explain his existence,
the human race as a whole is cruel and no asset to any life (if we are
going to be honest with ourselves about it). The more people know, the
more rotten they are likely to be. They probably want you to stop talking
about the universe, since all man would be likely to want to do is to rape
it, and treat everything else in it like it was there for him to use or
for his amusement. This is man like it or not. Nobody anywhere wants to
be the toy of a louse. I suspect that these things (in particular this
last paragraph) that are the real cause of your problem with night terrors.
I don't know if you remember me; we spoke on the phone about life for
about 3/4 of an hour when I bought my CD's. I know this kind of reasoning
might be hard for you to swallow, but anyway this is what I think. I hope
it helps.
This morning I woke up thinking that many of us have assigned plots. I wouldn't say "fate" or "destiny" because that implies a supernatural source and gives an aura of dignity. No, it's a plot, a storyline, perhaps randomly assigned following some statistical pattern known to insurance professionals and public health officials. Our plot is part of our lives for many years -- perhaps from the very beginning of our lives -- but only toward the end do we find out what it is.
Statistically speaking, there are a limited number of possibilities. Sure there are exceptions, but for the mass of us the possibilities are few: the quick (accident, suicide, stroke, or heart failure) and the long (diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer's, or failure of the immune system). It's the long that have the plots. There are more of them than I have listed. I'm not a statistician. The point isn't what they are, but that they are.
In most cases, we go 50, 60, 70, 80 years or even more before we find out which plot is ours. Advances in science are are making it possible to determine earlier which plot is likely to be ours and are enabling us to postpone the onset of such conditions and to slow heir progress. But the plots remain the same.
Yes, for millennia, death and taxes have been certain. Now we are progressing to the point where, for many of us, the type of death will be close to certain and known well in advance.
The certainty and fear of death prompted the formation of religions. Now will the knowledge of which kind of endgame is likely to lie ahead for each of us lead to new kinds of beliefs and behavior?
Would or should you live your life differently in the early stages if you knew that at the end you would face decades of Alzheimer's or cancer therapy or diabetic deterioration?
Or would you simply hope and believe in a cure -- a miracle of science that could radically change your plot and make human life in your generation far different than it was in previous generations?
From knowing what a person is likely to die of, techniques might be developed to change the "programming" so the end that was most likely becomes far less likely. That could mean that people live longer and remain healthy and active longer -- not that they would live for ever, but that they would die of a far greater variety of causes and with less fore-knowledge of the particular end.
Yes, we of the baby-boomer generation are now beginning to learn which plots we have and are beginning to have to cope not just with that medical condition, but also with the fore-knowledge, in a way that previous generations never did. And the next generation or the generation after that may be able to live out plotless lives, with far less constraint and far greater variability at the end.
Yes, we, and in many cases, our parents are the ones with the plots -- the pre-assigned long-drawn-out medical soap operas. But this may not be the "human condition", but rather our condition. And it is our challenge to find ways to make sense of it or derive meaning from it.
In a good novel, what matters isn't so much what happens from scene to scene, but what it means; not just what the characters do and say, but what that signifies; and the significance might vary through multiple perspectives. The plot itself is nothing. What matters is what you can derive from it, in the resonance from one life story to another, cascading insights and revelations into human relationships and into who we can become.
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