Patience, my love; one step at a time.
Friday, January 15, 2010 by the BCth
I am often frustrated by the inadequacy of language as a mode of expression. Stringing words together in a linear sequence to form sentences and paragraphs seems so clumsy and crude. The confluence of brevity and precision is so hard to achieve. In writing, thank goodness, the process of composition is at least somewhat non-linear and unbound by time, which is a big help. But the fact remains that one is limited to a single perspective and a single voice at any one time, and as a result, the literal description of a complex thought or idea takes a great many words.
Poetry seeks to circumvent this limitation by calling upon the imagination of the reader as a decoding device. It is well understood that poetry is not like prose; it cannot be absorbed in an instant of literal understanding. It requires the engagement of the intuitive faculty. Because it depends upon the ability of the reader to decode it subjectively, poetry remains more or less opaque to the mind that is not already calibrated to receive it.
Even now, looking back on the few sentences above, I despair of my inability to express what I mean. I feel like a painter without the ability to mix his colours. If I say this, then it is automatically not-that until I say that as well.
I would like there to be a mode of communication that were more like a holographic projection than a flat image built up of one-dimensional lines. Instead of one word illuminating one little piece of an idea at a time, I could convey the whole idea at once, with all its shades and subtleties, in such a way that it could be viewed from all the multiple perspectives that I perceive.
Of course, such a mode exists, although few of us are yet able to make much use of it. It's called telepathy. My concept of telepathy is that it is something like poetry, something like music, something like sculpture and painting and photography and dance and theatre. It is all these things and more. Speaking and writing would be included, but in their higher-dimensional aspects.
The Internet gives us the ability to start bridging toward that model. Using hyperlinks, mouse-over texts, context menus, images, sounds, videos, and other interactive media, it is possible to convey information in an almost fractal or holographic way. For this reason, I sometimes think of the Internet as “training wheels for telepathy.” True telepathy will be much smoother and faster, since we will no longer need these crude technological interfaces and our brains will be operating at a much higher bandwidth than they do now, in higher dimensions, allowing for exponentially greater data density.
The transhumanists believe this will be achieved through man-made technology. Maybe it will, for some, but I would much rather let it happen naturally, through the activation of DNA. That, I think, would ensure that physical evolution doesn't happen without the corresponding spiritual evolution that is needed to be able to handle the new abilities responsibly.
I know there are going to be people reading this who think this idea of our consciousness evolving is just New Age bullshit being pushed on the masses to distract and placate us while the controllers steal the last of our wealth, genocide the useless eaters, and implement the final stages of their world police state. Others will call bullshit on both of these views. It doesn't matter. You can believe whatever you want, and you will. This is just me talking.
Anyway, I'm of the opinion that we're all one mind to begin with, so telepathy is ultimately nothing more than us realizing and manifesting a slightly truer image of ourselves. Whatever you might think of that, isn't it interesting to note how there's less and less privacy, more and more transparency in all human affairs? That's why so much dirty laundry is coming out into the open. You can't keep secrets anymore. The times don't allow it. For those who only want the truth, that's great news. And if you've got something you're hiding from the world, well... I'd say you'd better come clean while you still have the chance, because it's going to come out one way or another, telepathy or no.
This is the sixth and final Night of the Galactic Underworld. Shit stinks and there's no hiding the smell. We've all got our own shit to deal with. Hoo-ee! These are the times that try men's souls. (And women's, obviously. Stupid language with its stupid conventions.) Yeah. So let's all work on ourselves and not waste time about it. Evolution ain't optional, I'm afraid. It's happening whether you want it to or not, and the more you resist, the tougher the schoolmaster'll have to get on you. Might as well do it the fun way, huh?
That sounds like a good idea to me.
Poetry seeks to circumvent this limitation by calling upon the imagination of the reader as a decoding device. It is well understood that poetry is not like prose; it cannot be absorbed in an instant of literal understanding. It requires the engagement of the intuitive faculty. Because it depends upon the ability of the reader to decode it subjectively, poetry remains more or less opaque to the mind that is not already calibrated to receive it.
Even now, looking back on the few sentences above, I despair of my inability to express what I mean. I feel like a painter without the ability to mix his colours. If I say this, then it is automatically not-that until I say that as well.
I would like there to be a mode of communication that were more like a holographic projection than a flat image built up of one-dimensional lines. Instead of one word illuminating one little piece of an idea at a time, I could convey the whole idea at once, with all its shades and subtleties, in such a way that it could be viewed from all the multiple perspectives that I perceive.
Of course, such a mode exists, although few of us are yet able to make much use of it. It's called telepathy. My concept of telepathy is that it is something like poetry, something like music, something like sculpture and painting and photography and dance and theatre. It is all these things and more. Speaking and writing would be included, but in their higher-dimensional aspects.
The Internet gives us the ability to start bridging toward that model. Using hyperlinks, mouse-over texts, context menus, images, sounds, videos, and other interactive media, it is possible to convey information in an almost fractal or holographic way. For this reason, I sometimes think of the Internet as “training wheels for telepathy.” True telepathy will be much smoother and faster, since we will no longer need these crude technological interfaces and our brains will be operating at a much higher bandwidth than they do now, in higher dimensions, allowing for exponentially greater data density.
The transhumanists believe this will be achieved through man-made technology. Maybe it will, for some, but I would much rather let it happen naturally, through the activation of DNA. That, I think, would ensure that physical evolution doesn't happen without the corresponding spiritual evolution that is needed to be able to handle the new abilities responsibly.
I know there are going to be people reading this who think this idea of our consciousness evolving is just New Age bullshit being pushed on the masses to distract and placate us while the controllers steal the last of our wealth, genocide the useless eaters, and implement the final stages of their world police state. Others will call bullshit on both of these views. It doesn't matter. You can believe whatever you want, and you will. This is just me talking.
Anyway, I'm of the opinion that we're all one mind to begin with, so telepathy is ultimately nothing more than us realizing and manifesting a slightly truer image of ourselves. Whatever you might think of that, isn't it interesting to note how there's less and less privacy, more and more transparency in all human affairs? That's why so much dirty laundry is coming out into the open. You can't keep secrets anymore. The times don't allow it. For those who only want the truth, that's great news. And if you've got something you're hiding from the world, well... I'd say you'd better come clean while you still have the chance, because it's going to come out one way or another, telepathy or no.
This is the sixth and final Night of the Galactic Underworld. Shit stinks and there's no hiding the smell. We've all got our own shit to deal with. Hoo-ee! These are the times that try men's souls. (And women's, obviously. Stupid language with its stupid conventions.) Yeah. So let's all work on ourselves and not waste time about it. Evolution ain't optional, I'm afraid. It's happening whether you want it to or not, and the more you resist, the tougher the schoolmaster'll have to get on you. Might as well do it the fun way, huh?
That sounds like a good idea to me.
Thanks for sharing this, BCth. I know just what you mean. I think you expressed it as well as anyone could. I too have felt frustrated by the way our language is not made for expressing multi-leveled meaning. It allows for talking about physical OR psychological OR symbolic events and realities but not all of them simultaneously. You can describe each level of meaning separately and then point out the eqivalency, but it is time consuming and somehow insufficient. The whole is more than the sum of it's parts, and the "more" gets lost when you split them up. It's a bit like representing a 3D object in 2D. No matter how skillfully you do it, you are still confined to a single point of view. I was trying to express something like this when I wrote "Lost in Translation" a while back. It ended up being so long, I had to do it in two parts and I still felt disappointed with the results. I think we are in the process of evolving towards a more integrated mode of awareness and a new kind of language will be required to manage it. One of the people on Evolver, John Topp, wrote a series on synchronicities around this theme. It's well worth checking out: " The Book In The Sky. I particularly like the title you chose for this post.
In Lak'ech
Thanks, 13 Muluc. I read your piece, "Lost in Translation," some while back, but I didn't think of it as I was writing this. Maybe some kernel from there found its way here, I don't know. What's becoming clear to me is that we are in fact all connected to one collective subconscious mind. The Internet isn't making that happen, but it's certainly helping to reveal the fact to us. The synchs in John Topp's piece and in the comment sections there are a wonderful example of thoughtforms propagating through the ether, and I see more almost every day.
Namasté