Two Hundred and Twenty Six

I read an article today about the Kepler telescope.  Since its launch in 2009, this telescope has been searching our galaxy for planets similar to ours, on which life similar to ours may have evolved.

It's found that, on average, every other star in our galaxy has at least one planet.  These exoplanets are usually larger than our Earth, but smaller than Neptune—a size of planet that doesn't exist in our star system.

   

When another star has several planets, they all tend to be about the same size—unlike our star, whose planets range in size from Mercury, which is smaller than our Earth, to Jupiter, which is larger than Neptune.  Not only our planet, but our star system, seems to be the exception that proves the rule.

We’ve always had the feeling that we’re exceptional, even unique.  Gradually we accepted that we're not unique—our planet isn't the center of the universe, or even the center of our star system—but now it's beginning to seem that we may be unique after all.

We already knew that our planet seems to be the only one in our star system on which life like ours has evolved.  One or two other planets in this system may have, or had, single-celled life, which is also the dominant form of life on our planet—multi-celled organisms like us live only on its surface—and now we’re discovering that even our star system may be unique.

Our first impressions are never entirely discredited—only revised, as we learn more.  This could mean they were always true in some way, and it only remained for us to discover in what way.  Or it could mean that our senses are limited, so we’re capable of perceiving reality in only one way.  But what's the difference?  

We can’t perceive the whole of which we’re a part—assuming there is such a whole—any more than a cell can perceive the body of which it’s a part.  Most of us know this unconsciously, but not consciously, because most of us aren’t conscious.  We sleepwalk through life.  That's why most of us are slaves.

The majority of us live in service to a minority, just as our bodies live in service to our brains.  But if this is true, it’s not this simple.  The truth always seems simple when we first discover it, but looks increasingly complex the more we study it.  For example, the relationship between the brain and the rest of the body is so complex that we still don’t understand the relationship between mind, supposedly the activity of the brain, and the activities of the other organs of the body.  The more we know, the less we understand. 

We understand mind so little that some conclude it’s an illusion.  The modern myth that only our material bodies are real, and mind is an illusion, is a version of the myth that only the material world is real, and the mind we used to call god is an illusion—a reversal of the ancient myth that only the mind is real, and the material world is an illusion.  We keeping thinking about the same things, revising what we think about them.  This not only calls into question whether what we think about things is true, but whether the things we think about are real.  Perhaps both are products of the way we think.
 
Why do we assume the existence of a whole of which we’re a part, a body of which we're cells?  Mystics have always said all bodies are illusions, and the only reality is what we call the void.  All things come and go.  Only the void endures.
  
In the body politic, most people are unconscious—slaves, living in servitude to a supposedly conscious minority of masters, just as cells of a biological body live and die for the cells of itheir brain.  Or so it seems.  Are the differences between individuals, and the communities to which they belong, objectively real, or are they real only to us because we agree to suspend our disbelief in them?

And why do we agree?  The force that brings individuals together, and holds them together as a community­—whether it's physical, biological or social­—is what some call desire.  And desire doesn't last.  Therefore all communities exist only as long as their individual members agree, whether consciously or unconsciously, to believe­—or rather to suspend their disbelief—in them.   

What we believe, consciously or consciously, is true may not be true for everyone.  But if it should turn out there is no other life but ours, then our reality will be the only one.

Two Hundred and Twenty Five

We all want to believe we exist for a reason.  Even those of us who haven’t been taught to believe in gods want to believe there’s someone to whom we’re important, even if that someone is our self.  We even want to believe we chose to be who we are.  But who, given the choice, would choose to be who they are?

Two Hundred and Twenty Four

"I'm glad I'm dying now", she said, "because I don't want to see what's coming".  I thought I didn't, either; but that's not true.  I'm still alive because I want to see how it ends.

Two Hundred and Twenty Three

I learned last week that the city is distributing free food at nine o’clock every Monday morning in the parking lot of the public library, so last Monday I drove over there at eight o’clock.  Not only was the parking lot already full, but a police car blocked the road to prevent any more cars from entering; so this morning I drove over at six o’clock, and got there just before the police arrived.

This is the fourth coldest May on record.  As I sat shivering in my car, watching snowflakes land and melt on my windshield, it seemed apparent to me that even though we’re doing our best to destroy the world, it’s fighting back against global warming.  A wave of rage then washed over me at the stupidity of the people who sat in the other cars.  Instead of fighting back against those who are destroying the world, they waited, like sheep, to be fed.  Instead of fighting back, they're fighting to return to work and die for them.  But the rage soon washed away, as it always does, and was replaced by pity.

Eventually workers brought out pallets stacked high with cardboard boxes of food.  The stacks swayed in the wind, and the boxes at the bottom were crushed almost flat by the weight of those above them.  The workers had been doing this for months, but still they hadn’t learned how to do it right.

This absurdity was followed by another, as two men carrying bundles of paper, which I assumed (correctly, it turned out) were leaflets telling us the food was ours thanks to the generosity of our mayor.  One of the men was tall and thin, and the other was a short stout dwarf.  They looked like r2d2 and c3p0 made flesh.

The twine holding the dwarf’s bundle broke, and the wind scattered the leaflets over the parking lot.  He stood there for a moment, shoulders sagging, then waddled after them on his stubby legs.  It was like a scene from a comedy, not least because the police got out of their car, but instead of helping the dwarf retrieve his leaflets, they strode back and forth, swaggering self-importantly, the only two people in the parking lot not wearing masks.

Seeing this comedy almost made the long wait worthwhile.  The food certainly didn’t.  When I got home and opened my box, I found it contained mostly candy and soft drinks, which I threw away.

Two Hundred and Twenty Two

Trump is not a dictator, as some claim.  He pretends to be one, but he’s only a figurehead—a clown who reigns but does not rule, an old-fashioned lord of misrule.

Most of our presidents have been figureheads who reigned but did not rule, though not all were lords of misrule.  Most pretended to govern.  But what does governing mean in a society composed of masters and slaves?

Masters pretend they govern their slaves instead of merely exploiting them, and slaves pretend they’re governed, not merely exploited.  Thus both are able to keep their self-respect.  But eventually this charade ends, and then the slaves must rebel.  Not because they finally wake to the truth, as some claim—they’ve always known the truth—but because when masters become confident their slaves will never rebel, they stop pretending to govern.  Slaves must then rebel in order to keep their self-respect.

No one is fit to govern others.  Most of us find it difficult enough to govern ourselves.  We endure being governed by others by pretending our masters are our superiors, more competent to govern us than we are.  When they demonstrate their incompetence, we have no choice but to rebel.  But what does rebellion mean when society is still composed of masters and slaves?

Our earliest societies celebrated a holiday, usually during the winter solstice, when the world died and was reborn.  During the interregnum, masters and slaves traded places and the slaves elected a lord of misrule.  But when the sun returned, order was restored.  All returned to their proper places, and the slaves' lord was killed.

Freedom, for slaves, has always been only a dream.  It’s too late now for us to wake up and stop being slaves.

Why am I thinking about this?  I should be thinking about important things while I still can think.       

Two Hundred and Twenty One

I’ve read three articles recently that explained why we’re all dreaming more often now—or rather, since the experts say we dream every night, why our dreams are more vivid now, so that we remember them when we wake.  It’s due to the lack of activity in our waking lives, now that everyone is staying home, so that our unconscious minds are compensating.

My dreams used to be vivid, years ago.  I no longer remember them now.  But as I thought about it, I realized that I have been having a recurring dream.  Not vivid, but short and simple.

I’m in a large building of cool white marble.  It’s not the building I used to dream of—Vanity Fair cum Tower of Babel—nor am I lost in it, as I was in those dreams, and looking for her.  I no longer look for her.  But there is a woman.

She’s sitting at a desk.  I ask her for directions.

It’s the building where I went to pay my taxes, and she’s the woman who directed me.  It’s both a mausoleum and a government building because the only things in this life that we can be sure of are death and taxes.

When Abraham Lincoln was shoveled into the tombs, he forgot the copperheads and the assassin ... in the dust, in the cool tombs.

And Ulysses Grant lost all thought of con men and Wall Street, cash and collateral turned ashes ... in the dust, in the cool tombs.

Pocahontas’ body, lovely as a poplar, sweet as a red haw in November or a pawpaw in May, did she wonder? does she remember? ... in the dust, in the cool tombs?

Take any streetful of people buying clothes and groceries, cheering a hero or throwing confetti and blowing tin horns ... tell me if the lovers are losers ... tell me if any get more than the lovers ... in the dust ... in the cool tombs.