The abstractness of unity
This chapter focuses on the challenges involved in directly experiencing unity.
Indivisibility
All that exists is the whole of all things. This is the universe of existence. All things have the potential to exist. Everything is possible; some things are just more likely than other. What varies is the probability of that existence to manifest. Possibility is lateral. Probability is linear. We (all things) exist here and now only probably. If causality were broken and the past were altered, the current present would never have existed at all. Everything that has ever happened (and not happened) in the entire universe has led to the present moment being exactly as it is. All things are a part of the whole.
Divisions of the whole may appear to be opposites, or complements, but the whole is not the divisions. The whole is without distinction and can only be described as indescribable, a description nonetheless. Thus the highest description of the universe is silence.
Cause
The universe, originally all one thing in one place at one time, maintains forever a connectedness in all its parts as that one thing. This is an acausal connection - one without cause. There is no first thing causing any second thing. No part comes first or second. There is no linear sequential connection. Instead, the connection is lateral. Time, as a continuous now, laterally passes through all entities at the same time, like a circular water ripple passes through the corner points of a surrounding polygon, or like a spherical expanding wave passing through all the points of the surrounding polyhedron- all at one time.
The points on the polygon that the circular line passes through all at the same time are acausally connected. The passage of the line through acausally connected points happens all at the same time.
Causal connection across a polygon is seen in two expanding polygons expanding through each other from beginning to the end of the process of expansive interaction.
A two-dimensional plane passing perpendicularly through a three dimensional crystal shows a three-dimensional static as a dynamic two-dimensional process. Action in three lateral dimensions (the directional flow of time expresses in actions of the past, present, and future) is similarly viewable as passing a three-dimensional plane across a four-dimensional static crystal.
From the point of unity, all things happen at once and all of time and space is an unmoving higher-dimensional crystal. Through the geodesics of this four-dimensional crystal passes a three-dimensional plane of dynamic action.
In a two-dimensional universe, the axis of time and the axis of space may be seen as separate dimensions for the diagonal process of both at once as two-dimensional space-time. On the diagonal, passage through space also means passage through time.
A photon passes through space but does not pass through time.
On the higher crystal of unity, all points are but one point, and what is happening to any one thing is happening to all other things at the same time. We all exist in one higher dimensional place, experiencing the same acausal connection of a single present moment. All things exist simply in the here and now. All things started out together, and are still together. There is no division. In this universe of action, all entities are doing the same thing. In this universe, all things exist through a common set of actions necessary for persistence, the objective and subjective propagation through space and time.
Disunity
Our everyday experience is of disunity and does not directly reflect the abstract unity of existence. Our discrete experiences process a linear flow through time. One basic division of the whole of all things into parts is the dynamic division of before and after. This is another perspective of cause and effect, the subject acting on the object (and the object on the subject), the interaction of the observer and the observed. Each event observed (physically recorded) is similar to, and different from, other events observed.
The observer is not separate from the observed. Each one changes the other during the mutual act of observation. In unity, the concept of distinction, as in similar or different, does not exist. There is no exchange; there are no things. The distinction of differentiation does not exist. In this ‘place’ things that are different are also not different. This is a contradictory notion and is beyond linear objective reasoning. In unity there are no objects or subjects. There is no cause or effect, and no flow of time or position in space. There just is.
Koans
Non-linear abstract thinking is perhaps best seen in koans. The classic koan is ‘What is the sound of one hand clapping?’ Such koans have no linear logical answer. The purpose of a koan is to circumvent the linear avenue of thought. This leaves lateral non-linear thinking, an all at once arrival at a conclusion. The connection is induced, not deduced. A Zen Master would say that this understanding comes not from words or things, and cannot be described. The imagery of the unity is described as indescribable.
Godel
Kurt Godel, a 20th century mathematician proved something so earthshaking to the world of mathematics that it rivals any scientific revolution for loss of foundation and a need for a new perspective. His work was in non-linear equations.
Godel proved that any finite mathematical system capable of meaningful process would be unable to prove all of the mathematical statements of that system to be true or false. Such unprovable statements can also be expressed in spoken language. (Another system of meaningful process) As example, such a statement in English would be “This statement is false.” This self-contradictory statement possesses neither truth nor falseness. If the statement is true, then it is false. If the statement is false, then it is true. The statement just is.
The variety of these unprovable statements is unending, and their formulation can be quite intricate and insightful. What makes these statements so important is their implications in the description of formal systems. These unprovable statements are self-contradictory. The paradox of self-contradiction has been known for millennia. Some mathematicians have explored it, most have ignored it, but Godel’s work is definitive.
Mathematics and linear objectivity are nothing if not self-consistent. Paradox and self-contradiction have no place in linear reasoning. One counts on getting the same answer to the same equation every time the numbers are calculated. An electron always has the same charge.
Besides self-consistency, the other expectation of mathematics was self-completeness; the potential resolution of the truth or falseness of any statement presented. This completeness is what Godel destroyed.
What Godel actually proved was: Any finite self-consistent system of representation must be incomplete.
What Godel did not state, but what follows logically (and linearly) from this proven fact is that: Any finite system of representation that is complete must be self-inconsistent.
A complete description of the universe, in any language, must be self-contradictory.
Flatland
contradiction
Edwin Abbott envisioned a universe of two dimensions with ensuing dimensional limitations. These Flatland creatures are aware of only two dimensions and not three as we are. These two dimensional creatures have no awareness of a third dimension running perpendicular to Flatland’s two-dimensional world, as we are unaware of a fourth dimension running perpendicular to the three dimensions that we experience.
Flatlanders would know only the two-dimensional X, Y coordinate system. If a Flatlander were to become enlightened of the existence of this ‘third dimension’, the description would be in two-dimensional terms. A partial description of this theoretical Z-axis, a ‘third dimension’ would place it at 90 degrees to the X-axis. To Flatlanders, this would seem to be a description of the only other axis, the Y-axis. The enlightened Flatlander’s further attempt to describe this ‘third dimension’ would also fix the new axis at 90 degrees to the Y-axis. To the unenlightened Flatlander, these two depictions obviously contradict each other. Perpendicular to X is Y. Perpendicular to Y is X. To a two-dimensional being, the Z-axis can exist only as a contradictory reality and cannot be experienced directly. It is a meta-experience of contradictories in agreement. A similar logical limitation exists in our own three-dimensional quest for a higher dimensional perspective on reality.
Self-contradiction
Our universe is one of self-contradiction, and not. The convolutions of a non-linear self-contradictory system include agreeing and not agreeing with itself.
Quantification and measurement describe objective reality, but leave subjectivity unaddressed. The complete set of rules for existence, despite apparent self-contradiction, includes both the objective and the subjective in all their opposing manifestations. Since objectivity and subjectivity innately contradict each other, the expression of both in a single self-contradictory being provides a point of perspective where contradictory facts can both be locally correct. (A photon is correctly, if narrowly, described as a particle and also correctly described as a wave. A higher description of a photon sees it as both and neither a particle and a wave.) It is from a higher perspective that contradictories can be in agreement. Contradictory statements like ‘this is this’ and ‘this is not this’ (or ‘this equals this’ and ‘this does not equal this’) can both accurately describe contradictory aspects of the lower three-dimensional universe, which in four dimensions would not be contradictory.
What is parallel from one perspective can be perpendicular from another perspective. Valid opposing statements of a lower perspective’s contradictory viewpoints can be compared using a mathematical notation for ease of expression. To simplify the assertion ‘this is this’ and ‘not this is this’ (or ‘this is not this), the expressions ‘A’ and ‘~A’ will also be used. The following expressions of contradictory assertions about assertions show the expanded relationship between two contradictory statements. To see the relationship as one way or the other is to have a perspective. To see both opposing perspectives as the same as well as different is to take a higher more global perspective.
(A), (~A)
This is this, this is not this
(Linear deduction), (Lateral induction)
((A)=(~A)), ((A)~=(~A))
‘This is this’ equals ‘this is not this’, ‘This is this’ does not equal ‘This is not this’
(((A)=(~A))=((A)~=(~A))) , (((A)=(`A))~=((A)~=(~A)))
‘This is this’ equals ‘this is not this’ equals ‘This is this’ does not equal ‘This is not this’,
‘This is this’ equals ‘this is not this’ does not equal ‘This is this’ does not equal ‘This is not this’
The self-contradictory nature of reality is evident on all levels of being. Mutually exclusive statements are just differing perspectives on the same reality. How one looks at a thing is just as important as any intrinsic properties a thing may have. The observer effects the observed. The orientation of a tetrahedron to the observer provides the kind of symmetry an opposing pair of edges might display,
Perspective also decides the kind of symmetry exhibited by a plane’s passage across the tetrahedron, whether triangular, square, or hexagonal.
Distinction
The observation of the properties of an entity (or event) can be of the whole entity or of the parts of the entity.
The view of a part or set of parts of an entity is a view of a divided thing with distinct describable attributes observed. This is a self-consistent local perspective.
The view of an entity as a whole is of the entity as an undivided undescribed self-contradictory single thing. This is the perspective of the unity of a thing, and is self-contradictory global perspective.
In this image, each end is internally consistent, but as a whole, its parts are inconsistent with each other.
The change from a perspective of the unity (or the whole) to a perspective of the parts and differentiation is the change that allows for distinctions to be observed. This is a transition from a global perspective to a local perspective - not of the whole, but of the parts.
Locality is seen in the physical closeness that allows increasingly minute distinctions to be made from increasingly narrow observations, that is; less of sweep resonates around the circle. To observe locally is to perceive the flat facets of a polyhedron, to be too close to see the smooth curved surface of a sphere.
A global perspective takes in the whole, at the expense of being aware of the details of the parts. A local perspective focuses on the parts, making a global view impossible. The transition from a global view to a local view allows the parts of the whole to be seen. These parts themselves are seen as wholes that can be approached even more closely for an even more local, less global view.
There is a relationship between local-global interactions at different scales, and the energy level in the system. It turns out that a thimble of liquid helium, near absolute zero, when placed on a turntable, does not spin slowly first, then faster, but instead spins first not at all, then all at once. At extreme low temperatures, angular momentum is quantized in the entire thimble of liquid, and angular momentum is more global. It also turns out that the winds of Neptune travel much faster than on any of the warmer planets. Again low energy is the cause of such global motion. Where atmospheres are warmer, there is more turbulence, which causes local distortions. This local action prevents the swiftness of the global wind motions on the colder planet.
Description
The differentiations and distinctions of the local parts indirectly describe the global unity. Different sets of distinctions describe different kinds of parts, but the patterns found when comparing one set of parts to another set of parts shows the abstract parallels for the indirect understanding of the common unity. These abstract parallels are seen in structures of correspondence and relational arrays like tables of correspondence, geodesics, and mathematics.
OBJECTIVE SUBJECTIVE
LINEAR LATERAL
STRAIGHT CURVED
ALONG ACROSS
ENERGY MASS
SPACE2 TIME2