{"id":2173,"date":"2013-09-20T23:46:13","date_gmt":"2013-09-21T07:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/goodshare.org\/wp\/?p=2173"},"modified":"2013-09-28T01:15:22","modified_gmt":"2013-09-28T09:15:22","slug":"there-is-neither-past-nor-future-the-tao-is-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/goodshare.org\/wp\/there-is-neither-past-nor-future-the-tao-is-now\/","title":{"rendered":"There is Neither Past Nor Future: The Tao is Now"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

the banished djinn<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Having come to the conclusion that there is neither past nor future, it seems right to me to share this finding, and an explanation of it, with others, who I am guessing, are not likely to be offended by it.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

For me, our option to understand change in the world in terms of an all-pervading relational-spatial transformation [holodynamic] rather than in the standard terms of our standard European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language-and-grammar where everything in the universe is forced to undergo passage from ‘the past’ into ‘the future’ changes one’s entire outlook on social dynamics and social institutions (governance, commerce, justice) and gives one a very different perspective on issues like \u2018reconciliation\u2019 associated with the residential schools that indigenous aboriginal children were forced [by the government of the people] to attend.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is often brought up that we can only experience things in the present so this suggests that \u2018the past\u2019 and the \u2018future\u2019 and \u2018time\u2019, are some kind of abstractions or idealizations, and that there is only the \u2018continuing now\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, indigenous aboriginals of North America [traditionalists] understand the world this way and so do \u2018relational\u2019 interpreters of quantum physics [see Julian Barbour\u2019s \u2018The End of Time\u2019].\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Joining them is Nietzsche, who similarly claimed that the world is a continuously transforming relational space, not to mention Heraclitus \u03a0\u03ac\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1 \u1fe5\u03b5\u1fd6 (panta rhei) \u2018everything is in flux\u2019 and others.<\/span><\/p>\n

There is no \u2018trick\u2019 here.\u00a0 <\/span>I really do not believe in \u2018time\u2019 in the sense of a past or future era [that can be occupied].\u00a0 <\/span>It also follows, as I will explain, that I don\u2019t believe in \u2018growing up\u2019 and \u2018aging\u2019 [as a thing-in-myself] nor do i believe in the ‘reality’ of any binary opposites such as \u2018good\u2019 and \u2018evil\u2019, \u2018creation\u2019 and \u2018destruction\u2019, \u2018space\u2019 and \u2018matter\u2019, \u2018inside\u2019 and \u2018outside\u2019 nor, as mentioned \u2018past\u2019 and \u2018future\u2019.\u00a0 If one thinks of oneself and forms in general as relational features in a transforming relational spatial plenum, then the notion of a ‘past’ that ‘exists’ as a particular, occupy-able era-in-itself is not something that can have any meaning to us since we are the relational space we are included in<\/em>, and “we cannot step into the same river twice for it is not the same river and we are not the same person”.\u00a0 <\/em>in other words, ‘time travel’ does not make any sense, nor do remarks made by elders to children such as ‘if you had lived back then, you would know what I am talking about.’
\n<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

When one suspends believing in \u2018space\u2019 and \u2018time\u2019 as two separate measuring references, all of the \u2018dualisms\u2019, including the \u2018mind\u2019 and \u2018matter\u2019 split are subsumed by non-dualist yin\/yang relations where the two opposites are understood as conjugate aspects of the one dynamic of \u2018transformation\u2019. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

[N.B. The Taoist, Zen, Vedanta concept of yin\/yang is key to an understanding of the source of incoherence in the European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European\/Scientific language and grammar.]<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>For example, if you construct a house, you are at the same time destroying forest and meadow; i.e. \u2018construction\u2019 and \u2018destruction\u2019 are conjugate aspects of the one dynamic of the transformation of relational space.\u00a0 <\/span>The understanding that space is a \u2018fullness\u2019 rather than an emptiness is the finding of modern physics;<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cSpace is not empty. It is full, a plenum as opposed to a vacuum, and is the ground for the existence of everything, including ourselves.\u201d \u2014 David Bohm<\/span><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This is probably still sounding weird, although you might agree that our experience tells us that \u2018there is always something in space, like the forest and meadow, and that if we are constructing a house, we are, at the same time, destroying some of what is already there.<\/span><\/p>\n

One can think about it this way.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>There is this thing called \u2018the world clock\u2019 that gives a running (statistical) account of births and deaths [ http:\/\/www.poodwaddle.com\/Stats\/<\/a> ].\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>As I have already mentioned, \u2018creation\u2019 and \u2018destruction\u2019 are conjugate aspects of the one dynamic of transformation of relational space.\u00a0 <\/span>So, if you think about it, the space of the earth\u2019s biosphere in which things are continually gathering and regathering stays the same size while things come and go with in it.\u00a0 <\/span>There are more humans coming than going and more trees going than coming and more wolves going than coming but since everything in the biosphere is interdependent, it is more reasonable to think in terms of \u2018transformation of the relational space of the biosphere\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>As Nietzsche puts it, the biosphere does not get bigger or smaller, it \u2018transforms\u2019;<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

And do you know what \u201cthe world\u201d is to me? Shall I show it to you in my mirror? This world: a monster of energy, without beginning, without end; a firm, iron magnitude of force that does not grow bigger or smaller, that does not expend itself but only transforms itself; as a whole, of unalterable size, a household without expenses or losses, but likewise without increase or income \u2026\u201d \u2013Nietzsche, \u2018The Will to Power\u2019, 1067<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This is the same view as those physicists who support the \u2018relational space\u2019 interpretation of quantum physics and relativity. \u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Don\u2019t worry, if this is sounding complicated and obscure, it is only because of the mistakes we have been culturally conditioned to make since being born and raised in the culture of European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language and grammar.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>If you were born and raised in an indigenous aboriginal (traditionalist) culture, you would NOT, in the first place be believing in \u2018past\u2019 and \u2018future\u2019 nor in the various binary opposites such as \u2018construction\u2019 and \u2018destruction\u2019 or \u2018good\u2019 and \u2018evil\u2019, so there would be no need to talk you through this (as I have had to talk myself through it).<\/span><\/p>\n

The support for the view that \u2018relations\u2019 are in a natural precedence over \u2018the things that are woven into the relations\u2019 is growing in physics, and I have footnoted [1] a short article from August\u2019s Scientific American (\u2018What is Real\u2019, by Meinard Kuhlmann)<\/span><\/p>\n

So, the outlook is that the biosphere, and space in general, is an energy-charged fullness that is continuously transforming [NOT an emptiness populated by things-in-themselves as we tend to think of organisms, humans included].\u00a0 <\/span>One has to, instead, think of humans and organisms as relational features in the continuously transforming relational space.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>This is the same relations as with storm-cells in the flow of the atmosphere.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s where the \u2018disconnect comes\u2019 for us folks with the European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language and grammar, because our language encourages us to RE-present things as if they are \u2018independently-existing things-in-themselves\u2019 that inhabit \u2018absolute space\u2019 and \u2018absolute time\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The picture here is of an \u2018emptiness\u2019 that is of infinite extent that is populated by independently-existing \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019, including \u2018organisms\u2019 which we understand as having their own internal process driven and directed development and behaviours.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

You can see the \u2018trade-off\u2019 or \u2018alternative picture\u2019 here.\u00a0 <\/span>Our noun-and-verb European language and grammar RE-presents our physical experiencing of the world in terms of \u2018what things do\u2019, NOT as \u2018transformation of relational space\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>But the point is that modern physics, plus cultures such as the indigenous aboriginal culture, understand the same dynamics NOT in terms of \u2018what things do\u2019 but in terms of \u2018transformation of relational space where organisms are like storm-cells in the transforming flow-space.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our \u2018mental picturing\u2019 of dynamics is in the idealized terms of \u2018what independently-existing things-in-themselves do\u2019 because of our noun-and-verb European language and grammar.\u00a0 <\/span>This is not born out by physical investigations [one can’t investigate absolute space], but the relational transformation view jibes with our experience, but we should need a different sort of language to easily think in terms of relational transformation; i.e. a language like the indigenous aboriginal languages that captures things in terms of \u2018flow\u2019;<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThe fact of the matter is that the \u2018real world\u2019 is to a large extent unconsciously\u00a0 built up on the language habits of the group . . . We see and hear and otherwise experience very largely as we do because the language habits of our community predispose certain choices of interpretation.\u201d\u00a0 \u2013 Edward Sapir<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBohm did note, however, that our (Indo-European) languages tend to be highly noun-oriented and well suited to discussions of concepts and categories. By contrast, quantum theory demands a more process-oriented approach, a verb-based language perhaps that emphasizes flow, movement and constant transformation. (Bohm’s Holomovement – the movement of the whole.)<\/span><\/em>
\n<\/span><\/em>.<\/span><\/em>
\n<\/span><\/em>To this end Bohm developed the notion of a particular language form, the Rheomode, adapted to the discussion of quantum theory and, indeed, to consciousness. It is not clear if Bohm ever considered the Rheomode to have any practical consequences – ie that people would end up speaking it. However, he does appear to have encouraged staff and students at Brockwood Park School, England to experiment with the language. Towards the end of his life Bohm met with Blackfoot and Ojibwaj speakers and discovered that their own family of languages, as well as their process-world view, have much in common with the Rheomode.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So, the reason we understand things in terms of \u2018past\u2019 and \u2018future\u2019 is because of our noun-and-verb Indo-European language and grammar, and ditto for our \u2018dualist\u2019 view of \u2018construction\u2019 and \u2018destruction\u2019 and the other binary polar opposites.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

For example, because space is full, it is entirely subjective as to whether we speak of \u2018construction\u2019 or \u2018destruction\u2019 since in order to construct something in a \u2018full space\u2019, one has to, in the process, destroy something.\u00a0 <\/span>Another way of saying this is that what is really, physically going on is \u2018relational spatial transformation\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

This, in turn, bears on \u2018history\u2019.\u00a0 <\/span>The colonizers claim that \u2018they have constructed a wonderful new world (amazing cities etc.) in North America while the indigenous peoples claim that the colonizers \u2018are destroying a wonderful established world on Turtle Island\u2019.\u00a0 <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>In a logical sense, both claims are true at the same time, even though they are inherently contradictory.\u00a0 <\/span>This paradox is resolved by understanding what is going on as \u2018transformation\u2019 of relational space.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

While \u2018history\u2019 is a developmental progression over \u2018time\u2019 that proceeds from the past to the present towards the future, \u2018transformation of the relational spatial plenum\u2019 continues on in the continuing present.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>That is, there is just one world, the transforming relational spatial Unum\/Plenum and this transformation transpires in the continuing now.<\/span><\/p>\n

The idea of \u2018the past\u2019 depends on the \u2018existence of a thing-in-itself\u2019 that persists \u2018over time\u2019.\u00a0 <\/span>For example, we might say that \u2018my home town was very different five summers ago\u2019 (i.e. \u2018in the past\u2019) and our language has the \u2018tenses\u2019 to support the concept of \u2018the past\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>But as Heraclitus says;<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u00a0 <\/span>“No man ever <\/span><\/span>steps in<\/span><\/em> the <\/span><\/span>same river twice<\/span><\/em>, for it’s not the <\/span><\/span>same river<\/span><\/em> and he’s not the same man.”<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

He is saying that the whole space is transforming in a relational sense and this transpires in the continuing now, so that \u2018five summers ago\u2019 is the subjective measure of the observer, marking when he last looked at things.\u00a0 <\/span>However, a transforming relational space CANNOT AGE as there is nothing in that space that we can say is now \u2018five years older\u2019 because there are no \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019 in a transforming relational space. \u00a0\u00a0<\/span>You can\u2019t step into the same river twice,…. the valley or community you observed five summers ago is not the same valley or community and you are not the same observer.\u00a0 <\/span>Everything is in flux, and it is in flux in the continuing present.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Split-apart \u2018space\u2019 and \u2018time\u2019 are artefacts of noun-and-verb European language and grammar; i.e. if one starts off presuming the existence of \u2018things-in-themselves with their own internal process driven and directed behaviour\u2019\u00a0 <\/span>[the ego archetype] then one is forced to invent an absolute space reference frame for these \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019 to act and interact in, and one is likewise forced to invent a reference time to measure change in the form of, and in the location of the \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019. <\/span><\/p>\n

The sense of \u2018past\u2019 and \u2018future\u2019 come directly from the notion that space is absolute and populated by things-in-themselves that we can monitor by repeatedly observing them in successive intervals of time.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>We can do this, for example, with hurricanes that we name (Katrina, Francis, Ivan) even though we know that the real physical dynamic is the continuing-in-the-now transformation of the relational space of the atmosphere\/ocean.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It is our noun-and-verb European language and grammar that has us say that \u2018Katrina is growing larger and stronger\u2019, … \u2018Katrina is heading towards the Gulf Coast\u2019, … \u2018Katrina is ravaging New Orleans\u2019, … \u2018Katrina is dissipating\u2019 when the real physical dynamic is the transforming-in-the-now of the relational spatial atmosphere-plenum.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>* * *<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Social Implications of \u2018Belief in a Past and a Future\u2019<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

To be clear, what I am saying is that \u2018physical reality\u2019 as validated by our real-life experience [putting our experience in precedence over our powers of abstract reasoning, or,\u00a0 <\/span>\u2018putting empiricism into precedence over rationality\u2019] supports the understanding of the world we live in as a continuously transforming-in-the-now relational spatial plenum wherein there is no \u2018past\u2019 and no \u2018future\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

What I am further saying, and going to explain as best I can in this short note, is that the European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language and grammar, to believe in \u2018the past\u2019 and \u2018the future\u2019 and to institutionalize such belief in governance, commerce and justice, is the source of incoherence and social dysfunction on a global scale. <\/span><\/p>\n

For example, the colonizers believed that they were \u2018improving the land\u2019 [as it says on today\u2019s property tax assessments], \u2018civilizing it\u2019, and \u2018making it more productive\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Looking back \u2018into the past\u2019, the land was \u2018deserted\u2019 [terra nullius] and by working together we [the European colonizers and their descendents] have planned for and achieved the construction of a \u2018desired future\u2019.\u00a0 <\/span>We have \u2018tamed the wilderness\u2019 and created \u2018civilized\u2019 \u2018sovereign states\u2019 that are \u2018independent\u2019; each exercising their God-given right to pursuit of happiness, as is also the case with their independent citizenry, committing their labours to bringing about a \u2018desired future\u2019 of their choosing. <\/span><\/p>\n

This idea of \u2018independent states\u2019, each with its own past and future, does not \u2018reconcile\u2019 with the understanding of the world as a continuously transforming-in-the-now relational spatial plenum.\u00a0 <\/span>It is like dividing the sphere of the earth up into segments as make up a soccer ball, superimposing these segments on the unbounded [bio-]sphere of the earth, and claiming that each superimposed segment is an independently-existing thing-in-itself [sovereign state] with its own internal process driven and directed behaviour, … its own \u2018domestic product\u2019, … and its own individual \u2018history\u2019 that describes its maturing from past to present and its potentials for continuing development \u2018into the future\u2019.\u00a0 <\/span>Nothing in physical nature, not the winds, the waters, the airborne and waterborne soil, not the thermal energy flow of climatic variation pay any heed to these \u2018declarations of independence\u2019 of the sovereign states, whose soccer-ball segment boundaries are defined by the coordinates of imaginary lines which subjectively differentiate between the \u2018inside\u2019 and \u2018outside\u2019 of a state [\u2018subjective\u2019 since the outside of state A is seen by the neighbouring state B as the inside; i.e. there are no such things in physical reality as binary polar opposites such as \u2018inside\u2019 and \u2018outside\u2019].<\/span><\/p>\n

In short, the European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language and grammar has the habit of constructing a fictional world based on notional \u2018independently-existing things-in-themselves\u2019, notionally with \u2018their own internal process driven and directed development and behaviour\u2019 [organisms, humans, sovereign states] that act\/interact within a notional absolute space and absolute time reference-frame-come-notional-operating-theatre.\u00a0 <\/span>The European mind is in the habit of giving these \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019 [that it synthetically splits out of the relational-spatial activity continuum] \u2018identity\u2019, with the help of language labels and definitions, creating pure abstract \u2018objects\u2019;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cEvery definition implies an axiom, that in which we affirm the independent existence of the object defined\u201d — John Stuart Mill<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0Instead of the activity continuum of our experience; e.g. the continuously transforming-in-the-now relational-spatial atmosphere-plenum, we have storm-cells that we use language to name-label and define and personify [we personify their \u2018independent self\u2019-based development and behaviour] and so RE-cast the dynamics of the relational space in terms of the \u2018storm-cell things-in-themselves\u2019 and \u2018what these things do\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

It should be clear that these soccer-ball-segment sovereign states that we present, using noun-and-verb European language and grammar, and use to construct a pseudo-reality in which we impute \u2018independent existence\u2019 and \u2018independent development and behaviour\u2019 to these \u2018things-in-themselves\u2019\u00a0 <\/span>ARE NOT REAL but are abstractions or idealizations and the notional world we construct in\u00a0 <\/span>terms of \u2018their actions\u2019 and their \u2018interactions\u2019 within a notional absolute space and absolute time reference-frame\/operating-theatre IS NOT REAL in any physical sense that can be \u2018picked up\u2019 by our natural sensory experience.\u00a0 <\/span>The bird that flies from northern North America to the tip of South America and back is not going to acknowledge the \u2018existence\u2019 of the sovereign states it is supposedly passing through since these states are language based concepts and are not the stuff of sensory experience.\u00a0 <\/span>They do not exist in a physical sense, but they do \u2018exist\u2019 as noun-and-verb European language and grammar based abstractions in the minds of \u2018believers\u2019, and these beliefs help to shape the physical behaviours of the believers.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The indigenous aboriginal, like the bird, will not acknowledge their physical existence [they have none] and is unlikely to be co-opted into believing in them as abstract notions.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cAll significant concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts, not only because of their historical development … but also because of their systematic structure.\u201d —Jens <\/a>Bartelson, A Genealogy of Sovereignty<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cState sovereignty “is a ‘religion’ and a faith.”<\/a> — Mark Owen Lombardi, Third-World Problem-Solving and the ‘Religion’ of Sovereignty: Trends and Prospects<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe skillfully drawn borders that cartographers have provided for us are … spiritual and philosophical abstractions representative of a form of quasi-belief. They are … not detached maps of reality as proponents would have us believe. These geographies reflect an ardent desire to make (or impose) sovereignty a physical reality as natural as the mountains, rivers and lakes….\u201d [Ibid<\/span><\/em>.]<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The continually transforming-in-the-now relational spatial plenum is what is available to our sensory experience, and it has no \u2018past\u2019 and no \u2018future\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It is only the abstractions of our noun-and-verb European language and grammar that have \u2018a past\u2019 and \u2018a future\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The European mind conditioned by noun-and-verb European language and grammar created the secularized theological abstraction of \u2018the United States\u2019 as an \u2018independent thing-in-itself sovereign state\u2019 on July 4, 1776.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The birds detected no changes [via their sensory experience] associated with the U.S. declaration of independent existence and neither did indigenous aboriginals like those in akwesasne.\u00a0 But the latter have been disturbed by all the fuss that the ‘believers’ make in their insistence that everyone must observe their rituals of paying their respects to the invisible line. <\/span><\/p>\n

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