Category: Reading

The Fall into the phenomenal: How idealism can help the Creation story converge with deep scientific truth

Reading | Theology

Androu Arsanious, BS, MBA | 2024-02-18

The Church bells tolled, and I felt it in my bones.

I grew up in a religious household. We’d attend church twice or thrice weekly: sports, youth group, and Sunday school. Every Easter liturgy, they’d ring the Church bells at 10:30 pm to mark the Resurrection of Christ. Incense filled the Nave as deacons sang at the top of their voices, and then we’d process around the packed church three times, holding crosses and icons. It was a surreal experience for 10-year-old me. We didn’t just accept the stories propositionally, we performed them. That’s because religious stories describe what is beyond the world in terms of the world. Good stories aren’t just heard or read. They’re felt.

Scientists tell stories too. They call them theories. Like any good story, a valid theory doesn’t just describe the past but helps us understand the present and prepare for the future. The most foundational theories in science use mathematics, a language that wasn’t invented as much as it was discovered. After all, math will remain true well beyond the heat death of the universe. As such, scientific theories are religious stories turned inside out because they describe the world in terms that are beyond the world.

No one tried harmonizing theory and story more than St. Augustine. Born in the 4th century, the Berber Bishop was a prodigal son of the Church. Raised by a Christian mother, he rejected religion as fictional absurdities in his youth and chose to walk “the streets of Babylon, in whose filth I was rolled, as if in cinnamon and precious ointments.” After moving to Italy for a teaching post, he discovered the teachings of St. Ambrose of Milan, whose biblical exegesis gave him a new purchase on his mother’s faith. St. Augustine recounts the moment he converted “under a certain fig tree, giving free course to my tears, and the streams of my eyes gushed out.” He felt a story and was reborn a saint.

A towering figure in Western thinking, St. Augustine emphasized the oneness of Truth as revealed in the Book of Scripture and the Book of Nature. He urges the faithful to “let the Bible be a book for you so that you may hear it. Let the sphere of the world be also a book for you. So that you may see it”. For St. Augustine, perception and interpretation had to be guided by rationality and revelation. In the Venn Diagram of religious stories and scientific theories, the most profound truths lay in the area that encircled both.

In the 1600 years since his death, the Book of Nature has seen a few updates. Today, it is full of theories spanning biology and physics that would be foreign to the North African Saint. Is the Augustinian project redeemable, or has the plot in the Book of Nature hopelessly strayed from that of the Book of Scripture?

 

The Paradox of Perception

If there were an opening chapter in the Book of Nature, it would be on Evolution. The Darwinian theory has much to say about human perceptions. Different life forms evolved diverse ways of sensing and responding to their respective environments. Bats use sound to see. Bees see UV light to sniff out their flowers. Nematodes don’t “see” but “sniff” out sugar using chemical receptors on the surface of their body. Life is the process of figuring out how to live, perceive, and respond to the environment through the senses.

Life forms use short stories—cheat codes—to survive. Male jewel beetles track their female mates using the cheat code ‘smooth, glossy surfaces = female’ to find mates. Yet, when humans started throwing out their shiny, glossy beer bottles, the male beetles started getting funky with the empty beer bottles. It nearly drove the species to extinction.

Natural selection hadn’t ‘cared’ whether the smooth, glossy surfaces were females. The cheat code had been sufficiently reliable to help the males pass their genes onto the next generation. None of the beetles needed to understand the game; they just needed to learn how to cheat.

What about our perceptual senses?

We can answer this question with mathematical precision. In evolution, game theory predicts how a population changes over time if competing for limited resources and—importantly for our purposes—how its sensory systems would have to evolve to compete effectively. A population is more likely to outcompete another population if its sensory systems are superior. But there’s a trade-off. A population can’t have the perfect cheat codes while also being attuned to the objective world. In the words of Donald Hoffman, “In evolution, where the race is often to the swift, a quick and dirty category can easily trump one more complex and veridical.”

Perceptions do not provide a window into the objective world if natural selection is valid. Instead, they’ve evolved to interfaces that maximize our fitness. Critically, the Interface Theory of Perception posits that this interface diverges from Reality.

Think of the relationship between a computer screen and its motherboard. Screens are helpful insofar as they help us manipulate electrons to ‘increase our fitness.’ Fitness in this context could mean completing a bank transaction or writing an essay. The pixels on our screen tell us nearly nothing about the nature of the motherboard. They’re not designed to help us ‘understand’ semiconductors.

Theoretically, you could open the back of your computer to tinker around with the switches in the semiconductors to write an essay or send a bank transfer, ignoring the ‘illusion’ of icons on a screen. But this red pill is a hard one to swallow. Even though screens tell you nearly nothing about how the computer works, they’re virtually essential to any task.

Likewise, our screen of perception maximizes our ability to get things done, yet conveys precisely nothing about the nature of the world. That isn’t to say we shouldn’t take what we see seriously. Walk in front of a bus, and you might not walk again. Drag that Word Document icon into your screen’s trash bin, and you will lose all your hard work. Bernardo Kastrup goes at length to stress how our perceptions don’t tell us what the world is, only how it behaves. Scientific theory quantifies these behaviors.

The ‘Fitness Beats Truth’ theory illustrates a wider conflict between real truth and desired outcomes that isn’t exclusive to evolutionary biology. Social media is a distortion field that warps online personas to maximize the shareability or likeability of their content, regardless of its underlying truth or authenticity. How often have people lied to move ahead in their careers or fibbed about their physical height to up their profile on a dating app? Consider the psychological aspects of playing sports, where pure skill and athleticism may not be enough to win a match. Or the art of the bluff in poker. Behaviors that maximize fitness are more valuable yet less veridical. Systems often disincentivize ‘truthful’ behavior.

If natural selection is true, then objects in space-time don’t have stand-alone existence in the way we think they do. Instead, our senses build an interface, a story that allows us to organize our lives. This odd conclusion is one physicists have likewise converged on.

On the quantum level, energy and matter are pixelated or ‘quantized’ as discrete bits. These quantized chunks behave in ways that defy all commonsense notions of spacetime. They influence each other’s behavior instantaneously, seemingly defying both Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and our commonsense intuitions of the world. Quantum objects exist in a superposition of states, and only take on defined characteristics once measured. Such irreconcilable differences have forced many physicists to explore alternative models for understanding the cosmos.

In other words, at a fundamental level in physics and biology, our best scientific theories conclude that Reality is not what we experience it to be. Yet, because we logically cannot experience the un-experienceable, we cannot experience Reality as it truly is.

Philosophers were onto this idea centuries ago. Writing 2,500 years ago, Plato analogized the human relationship with Reality to prisoners chained in a cave, mistaking the silhouettes and shadows on its walls for Reality. To the Greek philosopher, the physical world is an illusion we can only break out of through contemplation. Immanuel Kant distinguished between the noumenal, things in themselves, and the phenomenal, things as they appear. The German philosopher proposed that, while the phenomenal world operates via cause and effect, the Noumenal world is the arena for human agency, will, and spirit. This dualistic framework for understanding our relationship with the cosmos is central to religious stories, as we will soon see.

Screens glitch and this Interface is no different. It is in these glitchy moments that we can appreciate this metaphor.

 

The Apocryphal Sciences

For the better part of 150 years, scientists have documented psi phenomena. Everything we think we know is confounded by psi, which include precognition, paranormal experiences, near-death experiences, and miracles. Psi phenomena are important “because they provide examples of human behavioral capacities that seem extremely difficult or impossible to account for in terms of presently recognized computational, biological, or physical principles.” There is an overwhelming amount of empirical evidence documented across thousands of cases.

Take the curious case of “The Twins,” described by famous neuroscientist Oliver Sacks in the 1970s. The two brothers couldn’t perform basic arithmetic calculations and had been institutionalized for the better part of 20 years, being “variously diagnosed as autistic, psychotic, or severely retarded.” However, during one consult, Sacks found them riffing prime numbers to each other, sometimes over 20 digits long. This would’ve been an impossible feat for the most powerful computer at the time, let alone for anyone without arithmetic skills.

There are documented reports of people who can be hypnotized into thinking their skin is burning, only to have their skin spontaneously blister shortly afterward. Then there are apparitions and documented cases suggesting premonitions of death. Near-death experiences have turned skeptics into advocates for alternatives to conventional materialism. Faith healing cases defy conventional explanations. Inert substances with no clinical effects can ‘elicit’ a state of mind that instills positive clinical effects.

The glitches happen constantly, yet the scientific theories we tell ourselves simply cannot explain this data away. But religion might…

 

The Fall into Evolution

With each page turn in the Book of Nature, the world has gotten stranger. Evolution and physics conclude that the world as we experience it is not the world as it truly is, and psi breakout experiences appear to vindicate this claim.

It is here where religious stories pick up the mantle. Recall that religious stories describe what is beyond the world in terms of the world. We’ll enlist the help of the third-century Church Father Origen of Alexandria to guide our brief tour. A pioneer of Biblical exegesis, it is on Origen’s shoulders that Augustine stood when he proclaimed the oneness of Truth. Origen comes as close to recognizing the duality of the created order—in terms of the noumenal and the phenomenal—as the most viable interpretation of the Judeo-Christian Creation account in Genesis.

Origen notes this in his commentary on Genesis 1:6, when God creates the firmament or sky. That God first creates the light and darkness on Day 1, then the sky on Day 2, suggested to Origen the need for an alternative, allegorical interpretation. He writes, “The first heaven … which we said is spiritual, is our mind, which is also itself spirit … sees and perceives God. But that corporeal heaven called the firmament is our outer man, which looks at things in a corporeal way.” For Origen, God created a spiritual and ‘corporeal,’ or physical, world.

At the end of the first chapter, God crowns his creation, with humans famously formed in His image and likeness. But not the material image, writes Origen: “For the form of the body does not contain the image of God, nor is the corporeal man said to be ‘made,’ but ‘formed.’”

In Genesis 2, God creates man in his Image by molding a “wet clod” of soil and blasting his breath into it. Humans have a unique relationship with their Creator, according to Origen, who observes that “it is our inner man, invisible, incorporeal, incorruptible, and immortal, which is made according to the image of God … But if anyone supposes that this man … is made of flesh, he will appear to represent God himself as made of flesh and in human form. It is most clearly impious to think this about God.”

Why does Origen think God needed to create a corporeal and spiritual world?

God places him in Paradise, the Garden of Eden. The root word for garden is “ganan” in Hebrew, which means “to defend, cover, or surround.” In every other use, it describes the defense of a city, as if in battle. God then creates a helper, often better translated as a ‘rescuer’: a woman from the Man’s rib who lives in shameless nudity with the Man.

Among the shrubbery of the Garden are the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life. God explicitly tells the couple not to eat the former’s fruit lest they “surely die.” Here, we see a hint of the trade-off between having the ‘cheat codes’ to knowledge, courtesy of the first tree, and participating in everlasting life, courtesy of the second tree.

A Serpent resides in Eden. It asks the Woman what God had commanded for the Tree of Knowledge, and she responds by saying God told them not to eat or touch its fruit. By adding to God’s words, Eve opens the door for the Serpent to twist God’s words further. He replies that, to the contrary, her eyes would be opened and that she and her husband would become gods.

Serpents play an evolutionary role in our history, for only creatures with acute vision and quick reflexes could avoid the tree-dwelling reptiles. Sure enough, the serpent’s words opened her mind, and she “took of its fruit and ate.”

But in their attempt to raise their consciousness, the fated couple is brought lower than the dirt. The “original sin” is one that all humanity partakes in, and for Origen, the events precipitate a fall of humanity into the safety net of the corporeal order. Adam and Eve’s eyes opened to the material realities that would forever consume their descendants. God had anticipated this fall and engineered the corporeal world to accommodate their eventual self-destruction. This, for Origen, is why God created the corporeal world.

The fall sparks a sense of self-awareness that sheds light on the couple’s corporeal vulnerability. The Tree of Knowledge opens their eyes up to the possibility of death. Overcome with fear, Adam and his wife cover themselves in fig leaves and fearfully cower as though hunted like wild beasts, for instinct has taken over.

In Kantian terms, the ordeal of Eden is the human fall out of the noumenal and into the phenomenal place. Adam and Eve lose the blissful truths of paradise and must now face the nasty, brutish existence awaiting them in the corporeal world. Fitness is of primary concern now. True to the Serpents’ words, their eyes ‘see’ and fall into the corporeal world, yet are also blinded to the noumenal, ‘spiritual’ place they once inhabited. Eden was cloistered and gated because the noumenal world could not be accessed from the phenomenal world. And once you fall into the phenomenal world, you cannot return to the noumenal place.

The story of the fall is, therefore, a tale of exile into Plato’s Cave. Origen writes that “this sinking results in us taking on bodies” and warns that “all rational creatures who are incorporeal and invisible, if they become negligent, gradually sink to a lower level and take to themselves bodies suitable to the regions into which they descend.”

As a result, the embodied souls of Adam and Eve become ensouled bodies. Material corporeal concerns take center stage for man, woman, and beast. Fitness is the new name of the game, and God reluctantly pronounces its accursed rules.

The Serpent will slither on its belly and, as a symbol for all animal life, enmity erupts between it and humankind, telling it that humans “shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise its heel.” The interface between humans and beasts is created.

For Eve, her toil will be in labor and the accursed state of yearning after her husband. The helper has become helpless because the corporeal world is now too dangerous for her to fend for herself. Indeed, Adam’s first act after their exile from Eden is to name his wife Eve, a ‘power move’ symbolizing the rule of man over woman. The interface between man and woman—patriarchy—is born.

Adam fairs no better, for the soil he once tilled is now cursed and must be tilled in toil. The Earth will wage war on him, using every thorn and thistle. The thing he was created from will now entomb him: “From dust you came, and to dust, ye shall return.” The interface between humanity and the cosmos boots up.

God’s parting gift is to knit tunics out of “mortal skin” for the couple. Origen observed that “heir being clothed with tunics of skins, contain a certain secret and mystical doctrine far transcending that of Plato of the souls losing its wings, and being borne downwards to the earth until it can lay hold of some stable resting-place.” The interface is sealed with mortality, and the world as we experience it is now here for good.

The Bible blossoms when stripped of materialistic presuppositions, and the Augustinian project of reconciling the Book of Nature with the Book of Scripture takes on new life. But we must abandon the idea that Reality is ontologically a physical place. As new chapters in the Book of Nature are written, we should footnote religious texts to catalog the ultimate Oneness of Truth. Only then can we synthesize and harmonize truth between science and religion.

 

Bibliography

1. St. Augustine, Confessions Book II, Chapter 3 (8). Available at: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/110102.htm#:~:text=Behold%20with%20what%20companions%20I,me%2C%20I%20being%20easily%20seduced. Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
2. St. Augustine, Confessions Book VIII, Chapter 12. Available at: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf101.vi.VIII.XII.html Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
3. Male Jewel Beetles. Available at: https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/06/19/193493225/the-love-that-dared-not-speak-its-name-of-a-beetle-for-a-beer-bottle Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
4. Hoffman D, The Interface Theory of Perception: Natural Selection Drives Truth Perception to Swift Extinction. Available at: https://sites.socsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/interface.pdf Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
5. Kant’s Transcendental Idealism. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-transcendental-idealism/#Bib Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
6. Sacks, O. The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
7. Hallson, P. (2016). ‘Ghosts and Apparitions in Psi Research (Overview)’. Psi Encyclopedia. London: The Society for Psychical Research. <https://psi-encyclopedia.spr.ac.uk/articles/ghosts-and-apparitions-psi-research-overview>. Retrieved 15 January 2024.
8. All quotes from the Bible are from NKJV, available at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+1&version=NKJV  Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
9. Origen Homilies on Genesis 1.2.
10. Paulsen, David L. “Early Christian Belief in a Corporeal Deity: Origen and Augustine as Reluctant Witnesses.” The Harvard Theological Review, vol. 83, no. 2, 1990, pp. 105–16. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1509938. Accessed 15 Jan. 2024.
11. Blue Letter Bible, Strong’s Reference: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h1598/kjv/wlc/0-1/
12. McGrew, W.C. Snakes as hazards: modelling risk by chasing chimpanzees. Primates 56, 107–111 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-015-0456-4
13. Contra Celsus Chapter 40. Available at: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/04164.htm

Metabolism is what the ‘unconscious’ mind looks like

Reading | Philosophy

Dr. Ludwig Sachs | 2024-02-04

From the idealist point of view—which entails a psychic or spiritual foundation of being—a fascinating puzzle arises: how do the myriad aspects of our world, from human consciousness and matter to time, space, and life, originate from this foundation?

In a previous article¹, I already discussed the three orders of structural psychoanalysis (the Imaginary, Symbolic, and Real), a development of Freud’s conception of the psychic apparatus by the French psychiatrist Jacques Lacan². I further discussed how the dissociation or splitting of the subject leads to a lack of being, as well as how the subject repeatedly tries in vain to find itself. In the language of systems theory, these repeated attempts to ‘return to oneself’ are self-referential processes. I already pointed out the phenomena of complex systems that arise through self-referentiality in connection with the language-like structures of the Symbolic, as well as its iterative referential structure: fractal geometries characterized by self-similar patterns that we can find everywhere in nature.

The concept of self-similarity could potentially be a key to understanding deeper connections in our reality. When we apply this principle to mental and physical processes, an exciting question arises: is there a self-similar relationship between the unconscious processes that govern our mental life and the genetic mechanisms that regulate our bodily functions? This consideration leads us to a deeper examination of structural psychoanalysis and biological processes.

Before we proceed, it is extremely important to emphasize that the ‘subject’ discussed here is not understood as a human individual in the everyday sense. As I outlined in the previous article, our everyday consciousness is predominantly under an Imaginary perspective, entailing that the world presents itself to us from the dissociated perspective of an imaginary ‘I.’ However, we overlook the linkage with the Symbolic and Real orders as a split subject.

Therefore, when I speak of the subject in the present essay, it is in the sense of an archetypal Anthropos, Schelling’s ‘World Spirit,’ which unfolds in time and space and manifests itself in the diversity of all living things—not only as a human. The considerations refer to the topological structures of this subject in the Real, Symbolic, and Imaginary orders.

 

The chain of signifiers

In the context of structural psychoanalysis, the concept of the ‘chain of signifiers’ is central to understanding the Symbolic and the language-like structures of the unconscious. This chain is best visualized by considering everyday signifiers that we regularly and consciously deal with: sounds, words, sentences. These elements of language are connected in a temporal sequence, known as diachronic chaining.

The meaning of a statement—the signified—emerges from the linking of these signifiers in their specific order. A change in this order can considerably alter the meaning, as illustrated by the statement ‘Idealism is better than Materialism,’ when compared to ‘Materialism is better than Idealism.’

However, the chain of signifiers is not limited to a horizontal, diachronic (temporal) chaining. At each point in this chain, one can imagine a vertical, synchronic chain or ‘plane’ that adds further levels of meaning. This vertical linking of signifiers is understood in structural psychoanalysis as metaphor, as opposed to horizontal metonymy. Here, it is emphasized that meanings always refer to other meanings and never directly to ‘the thing itself.’ The combination of signifiers creates a kind of barrier that prevents direct access to the signified, or the meaning. An analogy for this is the experience of looking up the meaning of a word in a dictionary: one is often led from one term to the next, never reaching a final clarification.

Therefore, the generation of meaning in a chain of signifiers is a dynamic process in which the signified changes with every added element—the signified ‘slides under the signifiers,’ so to speak. In structural psychoanalysis, the meaning (the signified) of a sentence is determined not solely by the individual signifiers (words), but significantly by their overall sequence. An important phenomenon in this context is the retroactive determination of the signified of a chain of signifiers, highlighting how the meaning of a sentence is fixed by the end of the chain.

Consider this example: the sentence ‘I love you’ conveys a very different meaning than ‘I do not love you.’ This illustrates how each added signifier changes the overall meaning of a sentence. Also, ‘I do not love you’ suggests a different context than ‘I do not love you anymore.’ And this, in turn, changes once again if ‘as much as her’ is added, to form ‘I do not love you as much as her anymore.’ In this case, the words ‘as her’ retroactively influence and fix the meaning of the entire sentence.

 

The quilting point

This dynamic of meaning formation can be topologically represented by the concept of the ‘point de capiton,’ or quilting point, a concept derived from Ferdinand de Saussure’s Course in General Linguistics. Saussure’s model assumes that the signifier and signified correspond point by point and together form a ‘sign,’ an assumption critiqued by structural psychoanalysis. It emphasizes that the signified of a sentence is its overall meaning, which does not simply result from the addition of the meanings of individual words but is retroactively fixed by the end of the chain. The quilting point in this context represents the function of specific signifiers (so-called ‘master signifiers’), which intervene in the chaotic signified, fixing and simultaneously altering it.

 

The signified: The desire modified by the signifier

In the context of structural psychoanalysis, the signified is viewed as a form of human want that is influenced and transformed by the signifier. This transformation of need by the signifier is referred to as ‘desire.’ However, desire is not to be understood solely in biological or physiological terms: it is structured by the signifier and thus acquires a special dynamic.

The desires are not only transformed by the signifier, but their transformation is also associated with a loss—structurally speaking, a lack. The entirety of the effects of the signified produced by the signifier is this lack. Thus, the imprinting of the signifier into the subject leads to the emergence of the signified, which can also be understood as a lack and is associated with the dissociation/splitting of the subject, as I discussed in my previous article.

Therefore, the signified in its entirety is not only the result of the effect of the signifier, but also an expression of the lack and the dissociation/splitting of the subject that arises from this effect.

 

The graph of desire

In structural psychoanalysis, the ‘graph of desire’³ (see below) is used to illustrate the concept of the quilting point and the relationships between signifiers and signifieds. This graphical representation includes two main lines forming an arc, each representing different aspects of language. The line running from S (linguistic sign) to S’ (linguistic meaning) symbolizes the chain of signifiers—i.e., the sequence of words and sentences we use in everyday life on a conscious, Imaginary level. This is called the ‘signifying chain.’ The other line, from Δ (the pre-linguistic subject) to $ (the barred subject) and forming a horseshoe shape, represents the chain of signifieds—i.e., what is generated in terms of meaning and sense by the signifiers. This second line is called the ‘vector of desire.’

In different words, the vector of desire represents subjective intentions arising from needs, the deliberate pursuit of the fulfillment of these needs. The signifying chain, in turn, represents sentences such as ‘Give me something to eat!’ Need and speech are linked by the two intersection points, symbolizing the interaction between signifiers and signifieds.

The first intersection point on the right is labeled ‘A’ for the French ‘Autre’ (‘Other’). It stands for the language code and vocabulary used by the subject. The capitalization indicates that it pertains to the Symbolic order. The interaction at this point shows how the vocabulary imprints itself in the subject and alters its intentions, influencing its need structures. Desire is thus heavily dependent on the relationship to the Other. ‘Desire is the desire of the Other’ is the formula of structural psychoanalysis for this entanglement. It primarily refers not to being desired by the Other, but desiring as the Other. What we think of as our own desires often consist of the wishes and messages of parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc., most of which are unconscious.

Therefore, to be satisfied, the need must pass through the grid of language. It must be expressed in claims or symbolically articulated demands. To be understood, these claims must be expressed in a predetermined code.

The left intersection point is labeled ‘M’ for ‘message’: communication, message, news. Like the chains of signifiers on the conscious level, those of the unconscious also have a message, a meaning, a signified. The aim of psychoanalytic practice is to bring to light the messages of the unconscious: the meaning of dreams, symptoms, parapraxes, etc.

The graph represents how need is captured by language and how this, in turn, is connected to the formation of the ‘I.’ This ‘I’ ideal is not only made up of signifiers, but is also a modification of the drive structure, since it acts back on the need. The symbol $—a crossed-out S—stands for the subject shaped by language and therefore excluded from the unconscious, the seat of desire.

This is to remind us that needs have always already passed through these stations and been shaped by language; that the assumption of a whole, unsplit subject as the bearer of a pre-linguistic need is thus a mythical construction based on the desire for imaginary wholeness. As discussed in the previous article, the split is constitutive for the subject. It is what makes the subject possible.

 

The master signifier

The I(-ideal) must be seen in connection with what structural psychoanalysis refers to as the ‘master signifier’: a signifier that seems to have an absolute meaning, but in an illusory way. For instance, the ‘I’—with which the speaker refers to themselves—is a master signifier. It forms the basis of the myth of the ideal I. In this myth, the I appears as an entity that is identical to itself. Self-identity—the absoluteness of meaning—is thus illusory because signifiers only function differentially. The master signifier, therefore, relies on an illusory blocking of the differential nature of the signifier. And since meaning is based on the difference of signifiers, the master signifier is without meaning.

Master signifiers are about identification; more precisely, a certain form of identification: the one whose result is called the I-ideal. When one seeks to clarify the meaning of a signifier, one is referred from signifier to signifier, and thus the meaning shifts anew. So how can it be that spoken words are still understandable? This is the function of the aforementioned master signifiers. They have no meaning themselves and are limited to the function of bringing the movement of referring from meaning to meaning to a halt. In this way, they sort of sew the signifiers with the signifieds. Signifiers that realize this stop function are the master signifiers or quilting points (as above) of structural psychoanalysis: they prevent the signified from constantly slipping under the signifier.

If one focuses on the functioning of sentences, the meaning—which shifts with every added word—is stabilized by the end of the sentence; the signifier in quilting-point function is, in a sense, the period.

 

The phantasm

Another important aspect in this context is the concept of the phantasm, already described in the previous article. The phantasm allows the subject to locate itself in the context of its desires. In the phantasm, the split subject ($) relates to an object in which it projects what it has lost by entering the world of language. The subject, attempting to grasp itself in its desire, can initially only grasp itself in what it desires. And here, again, the I or I-ideal at the end of the vector of desire plays a central role, as it causes the split subject to locate itself as an object and to fix itself in an illusory manner.

 

Self-similarity in biology and psychoanalysis: Discoveries at the intersection of protein biosynthesis and the unconscious

Protein biosynthesis—a central biological process in which proteins are synthesized from amino acids according to the template of genetic information in DNA and RNA—is surprisingly analogous the concepts of the unconscious in structural psychoanalysis.

At the heart of protein biosynthesis is messenger RNA (mRNA), which acts as a messenger transporting genetic information from the DNA code in the cell nucleus to the ribosomes, the sites of protein production. There, the sequence of the mRNA is translated into a specific amino acid chain that folds into a functional protein. This process involves several steps: transcription, translation, and folding. The mRNA plays a key role by translating the ‘language’ of DNA into a form that can be ‘read’ by the ribosomes and translated into proteins via tRNA.

The attentive reader will have already noticed the similarity here. The processes of the unconscious are conveyed to us (as a dissociated ‘part’ of the split subject) in a parable-like manner in the form of protein biosynthesis. Put in different words, the processes of the unconscious appear to us as protein biosynthesis from a dissociated (imaginary spatiotemporal) perspective.

The words and sentences in the signifying chain (S to S’ in the graph of desire above) can be easily identified with the molecular chain in messenger RNA, the element that transmits the genetic message. Thus, from a topological perspective, mRNA may correspond to a chain of signifiers in the unconscious. If this is the case, one would expect that the synthesized protein emerges from the vector of desire; that the signified corresponds to the protein.

The embodiment of the subject—the biological organism—is shaped by proteins. From the perspective of structural psychoanalysis, the subject is split, dissociated, or excluded, which is represented by $ in the graph of desire. The crossing out of the S symbolizes that the subject is marked by the signifiers. This marking results in the subject being excluded from a part of itself, a part that constitutes it and is referred to as the unconscious.

Such a split is also reflected in our body, which is ‘marked’—among other things—by the language of DNA: processes within our body that are not directly accessible to us. As such, we are also physically ‘split’ between the part to which we have access (our Imaginary body surface) and the inner part from which we are both psychologically and physically excluded because we are ‘barred outside.’

 

The ribosomal quilting point

As discussed, in the graph of desire two intersection points arise between the signifying chain and the vector of desire, which we labeled as ‘A’ for Other and ‘M’ for Message. This means that the satisfaction of need is subjected to a code in language (A) and tied to the formation of a message (M). Let’s compare this with the processes at the ribosome.

At the so-called A-site of the ribosome, the tRNA loaded with an amino acid binds—through its anticodon—to the corresponding codon of the mRNA. What does this so-called codon recognition represent? Or, in J. W. v. Goethe’s words, how does it present itself to the “contemplative power of judgment”? For the process of protein biosynthesis to make sense, it must submit to the rules of a code. This submission takes place at the A-site of the ribosome, which we can therefore topologically align with the intersection point A of the graph of desire.

At the intersection point ‘M’ of the graph of desire, the signified is formed. Where can we locate this in the ribosome? As already discussed, the signified corresponds to the synthesized protein. The site of this synthesis, where the elongating protein emerges, is the P-site. Thus, we find the two topological intersection points in a self-similar manner at the corresponding positions in the ribosome.

Another connection is equally clear: we mentioned the so-called master signifiers, which are necessary to finalize the stitching of the chain of signifiers (in this case, the mRNA) with the signified (the protein biosynthesis) in the form of a quilting point. These master signifiers have no meaning themselves. They are limited to the function of bringing the movement of referring from meaning to meaning to a halt. Now, what brings the translation—the reference movements of the ribosome from which the protein (the meaning, the signified) emerges—to a halt? The so-called stop codon! And for this stop codon—also called ‘non-sense (!) codon’—there is no corresponding tRNA, so it remains empty; it has no meaning itself, just as the master signifier itself has no meaning.

From the perspective of the quilting point, the role of the tRNAs, which represent adaptors in the sense of code biology⁴—i.e., those molecules that establish a relationship between two different types of molecules—also becomes clear: the adaptors (the tRNAs) execute the quilting point by sewing the signifiers with the signified. It’s probably no coincidence that the structure of this ‘quilting point tRNA’ is referred to as a hairpin structure: the needle with which the quilting point is executed.

 

The Levinthal Paradox

In connection with the quilting point, there is another remarkable analogy: the so-called Levinthal Paradox. The molecular biologist Cyrus Levinthal came upon this paradox while elucidating the process by which a chain of amino acids quickly achieves its folded state as a protein. The paradox is that the combinatorial multitude of possible foldings increases exponentially with the length of the amino acid chain and should require immense time. Yet, protein folding happens rather quickly in the body.

Can we better understand this paradox with the help of the self-similar structures of the unconscious? We have already discussed the retroactive determination of the signified of a chain of signifiers by the end of the chain: the signifier also intervenes in the signified on the diachronic level—i.e., in the temporal succession of the chain of signifiers. Here, the last element of a chain—somewhat like the period in a sentence—retroactively determines the meaning of the entire sentence. There is a feedback loop from the last element of the chain to the signified of the entire chain.

Protein biosynthesis similarly involves the creation of a signified, which is precisely brought into its overall desired form—i.e., folded configuration—by the last element of the chain of signifiers, just as the meaning of a sentence is retroactively determined by its end.

 

Hidden messages: the unconscious as the discourse of the Other in psychoanalysis and biology

In structural psychoanalysis, the unconscious is understood as the ‘discourse of the Other.’ This means that the unconscious is more than just a collection of signifiers; it is an ongoing discourse, a form of communication consisting of prohibitions, instructions, and rules. The author of these messages is not the subject itself, but the ‘Other’ in its symbolic function. This ‘Other’ represents the Symbolic order that sets limits for the subject.

The subject must persistently repeat the misunderstood part of the discourse of the Other, which is inherently fraught with lack, manifesting in symptoms and transferences. The unconscious manifests itself in this repetition, in the symptoms and transferences.

Similarly, our bodies, our cells, speak within us persistently, without our consciousness. In constant repetition, organisms emerge from their ancestors and their genetic messages, to reproduce and carry forward the messages. These consist of misunderstood codes, of rulebooks, of prohibitions and commands. And these messages act within us, whether we want them to or not. They speak incessantly and are exchanged in a network of organisms.

We do not understand this language, these messages; they are not conscious to us. And because we do not understand them, we are forced to repeat them constantly. In doing so, we produce symptoms. One of these ‘symptoms’ is our body, which also speaks without our understanding the messages.

Therefore, embodied organisms themselves can be understood as quilting points, as repeated attempts of the subject to sew itself together, to find itself as a self, and finally come to a halt. In this process, new signifieds, meanings, proteins, organisms continually emerge, seen from an Imaginary perspective as an evolutionary process in time and space, from plants to animals and up to the human ‘I.’

 

References

1. https://www.essentiafoundation.org/the-subject-beyond-the-i-on-structural-psychoanalysis/reading/
2. https://www.lacanonline.com/ or https://lacan-entziffern.de/ (German)
3. https://www.lacanonline.com/2020/04/a-tour-of-the-graph-of-desire/
4. Barbieri M. What is code biology? Biosystems. 2018 Feb;164:1-10. doi: 10.1016/j.biosystems.2017.10.005. Epub 2017 Oct 6. PMID: 28993248.

The science of consciousness after death

Reading | Metaphysics

Laleh K. Quinn, PhD | 2024-01-21

Gödel’s Incompleteness and the Realm of Wildlife

Reading | Philosophy

Yaakov Lichter | 2023-12-24

In the spirit of Newton’s call to build more bridges rather than erect more walls, here an analogy is suggested between the stratagem of Gödel’s proof of his Incompleteness Theorems and the modes of behavior that enable animals in the wild to effectively be one with nature while still spreading their intentions and signaling their status. I suggest that Gödel’s most fundamental intellectual insight—which resides in the world of human thought—parallels what animals possess naturally.

The language in what follows is intended to be accessible to non-mathematicians and provide a preliminary introduction to Gödel’s revolutionary and profound work.

 

Direct sensations and language

Simone de Beauvoir proclaimed that “humans are the talking animals.” We do not know of any other animal that uses abstract symbols—such as written letters and spoken syllables—as a means of communication, which members of the species have deliberately pre-agreed on. It would be far-fetched for us to think that any other living creature uses abstract words such as mind, consciousness, justice, happiness, sorrow, and so on. In that respect, humans are a unique species. Dr. Doolittle, who allegedly conversed with animals using human concepts, existed only in Hugh Lofting’s fictional books. Being talking and thinking creatures ourselves, when we read Lofting’s books Dr. Dolittle’s talking animals become a sort of reality for us, but a reality in our mind.

Abstract symbols combine in linguistic formulations—such as words, sentences, formulas, etc.—to eventually create for us, humans, stories of various types, ranging from tag lists and simple accounts to legends, narratives, novels, and theories. These abstract symbols—whether written or spoken—do not mean anything to any other living creature.

A human baby is born devoid of language. However, the potential to understand language and use it is inborn in it. Babies start internalizing language the moment they first hear it. This rather cryptic, even mystifying, process is profoundly influential; it creates our framework of thinking. Humans are very self-reflective: they think about themselves, about their experiences and about their very existence. Language causes us to process all of this in a consistent way, thus creating one of the two sources of our knowledge.

Indeed, two essentially different human experiences feed, increase and sustain human knowing. One is our inborn, unmediated, direct natural sensory experiences that are naturally ‘engraved’ in our consciousness, very much like any other animal. This source is not conditioned by knowing any language or the products of language, such as tales, narratives, or theories. The other source emanates from our linguistic experience of becoming acquainted with an ever-increasing number of words, names, statements, etc.

Søren Kierkegaard spoke of the outstanding change that takes place in one’s mind when, for the first time, the fact that everything in their life depends on the way they think invades their consciousness, where they understand that the absoluteness of thought—which stems from the absolute definitiveness of language—takes the place of alleged reality.

Two essentially different realities—one stemming from our direct sensory experiences, and the other from our language-thought experiences—meet and interact in our consciousness in a very complicated, intricate and, in fact, mysteriously entangled way. This interplay yields tremendous human capabilities, with qualities that are unmatched by any other living creature. These unmatched creative capabilities span from profound artistic, literary, and scientific works to horrendous acts of killing and destruction.

One of the most brilliant human achievements of all times is Kurt Gödel’s analyses of the foundations and structure of mathematics as a formal language, as well as its properties. Gödel published his revolutionary work in 1931, thus changing forever not only widespread popular beliefs about mathematics, but also shattering for good what world-leading mathematicians and logicians thought about it.

Gödel’s outstanding logical genius is discussed in a plethora of books, papers, essays, lectures, movies, and video clips. However, perhaps something unique has been overlooked in at least most of them. When comparing Gödel’s most fundamental stratagem—without which the very body of his work would not have been possible—to the way animals get along and ‘communicate’ in nature, an interesting and rather instructive parallel may be drawn.

 

Metatheories

When Aristotle wrote his teachings about nature—which he called “phusika” (φυσική, in Greek)—he realized that it was impossible for him to explicate nature’s concrete causes and effects, as discerned by the senses, without inventing abstract concepts indicating entities and properties that cannot be directly sensed by us. In order to formulate his philosophical teachings about nature, he had to incorporate these abstractions as an integral part of his text. His disciples decided to gather the definitions and explanations of these abstract terms in a separate section or volume, and then place it right after his physics teaching. The word ‘after’ in Greek is μετά (pronounced ‘meta’), and thus the word ‘metaphysics’ was created. As such, the metaphysics of a certain physical theory is concerned with the investigation, analysis, and description of the theory itself.

This is not exclusive to physics and metaphysics. Each theory can have a metatheory, which investigates, analyzes, and critically describes the concepts, symbols, and inference rules of the theory itself. A particular case of a metatheory is metamathematics.

Understanding that any theory is eventually a story made of language, Rudolf Carnap suggested the following definition for a metatheory: “if we investigate, analyze, and describe a language L₁ [and call this study L₂] … the sum total of what can be known about L₁ and said in L₂ may be called the metatheory of L₁.”

For a variety of considerations, which are out of the scope of this essay, we will refer to mathematics not as a theory of quantities, but as a theory of abstract symbols free of any interpretation, practical agenda, or empirical experience.

We are now setting out on a journey that takes place solely in the world of human language and thought. Later we will contemplate this abstract world from a standpoint located in the concrete world of direct sensory experiences. Both these worlds constitute the contents of human consciousness.

 

Formality, consistency and completeness

Historically, the development of mathematical thought has always been accompanied by the emergence of  paradoxes. The intensity of this process surged during the 19^th century, to the point of becoming a fundamental problem in mathematics and related sciences. David Hilbert, a leader in the community of mathematicians and logicians, called on them to prove that mathematics can be simultaneously a formal, consistent, and complete theory.

The adjectives ‘formal,’ ‘consistent,’ and ‘complete’ are not what mathematics—either as a theory of quantities or a theory of symbols—is about. They are, instead, metamathematical.

What do we mean when we say, ‘formal theory’? The Collins English Dictionary states that it is “a system of uninterpreted symbols and combinations thereof, whose syntax is precisely defined, and on which a relation of deducibility is defined in purely syntactic terms.” That is to say, the truth or validity of one such a theory stems solely from rules and laws related to symbol manipulations, which the theory considers legitimate. A famous example of a formal theory is the basic geometry of the plane, formulated by Euclid thousands of years ago without reference to drawings or plausible experiences. Euclid’s theory is taught in high schools to this day.

It is much simpler and seemingly more intuitive to define ‘consistency’: a theory is consistent when we believe that its text is free of contradictions (it will be understood later why we use the words ‘intuitive,’ ‘believe’ and ‘seem’ in this supposedly simple definition).

The third terms is ‘complete.’ We say that a theory is ‘complete’ if all of its propositions (or formulas) can be proven to be either true or false based on the theory’s axioms and inference rules.

We want to relate the above to mathematical theories. The root of mathematics is arithmetic, so we can widen our field of interest to any theory that includes arithmetic in it. Including arithmetic in a theory simply means that the list of symbols (alphabet) of this theory should include the symbols for the natural numbers (), plus the multiplication, addition, and equality symbols ().

For the sake of brevity, in what follows let the acronym FCAIT denote a Formal, Consistent, Arithmetic-Including Theory.

 

The fundamental stratagem behind Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems

In response to Hilbert’s challenge, Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead published their monumental three-volume book, Principia Mathematica, about the foundations of mathematics. Their book included their new “Theory of Types,” which emanated from their insight that paradoxes exist only in the world of language and thought, their source being self-reference, which language allows. In the context of language, a self-referential statement is one that entails a reference to itself. The ancient symbol of the Ouroboros—a dragon that eats itself—denotes self-reference and illustrates the paradox of something defeating itself.

Russell and Whitehead’s Theory of Types seemed like a complete solution free of self-referential propositions, thus avoiding the paradoxes that arise from them.

When Russell and Whitehead published their book, Kurt Gödel was a child. After having read their book not many years later, he felt—with his extraordinary intellect and mathematical intuition—that it must be impossible to get rid of self-reference in mathematics and, apparently, in any FCAIT.

Gödel’s brilliant intellect led him to a profound stratagem, which enabled the proofs of his revolutionary Incompleteness Theorems. He decided to adopt Plato’s philosophical view that natural numbers should be regarded as a special type of reality in themselves. Though they do not belong to kind of direct sensory experience that we intuitively accept as reality, we should still consider them ‘real’ in our world of language and thought, which ceaselessly interferes with our sensory experiences.

Thus, Gödel devised a code that converts any alphabetical statement or formal proposition into one unique natural number, and vice versa, in a one-to-one mapping. The code he suggested is very simple indeed, and based on the rules of arithmetic. For reasons of brevity, I will not go into its details here (in any case, there are many different methods to create such a code, so the details are less important). The profound point is Gödel’s understanding that such a code is a necessary condition for proving his theorems. It is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient one. He came up with additional ingenious ruses, which are not mentioned here so we can focus our attention on the code only.

By converting formal statements into natural numbers in a bijective way [Editor’s note: i.e., in a way that ensures that each and every formal statement corresponds to one and only one natural number, and vice-versa], it becomes technically, or symbolically, possible for us to replace (a) the verbal concepts and statements with numbers and (b) the inference rules with arithmetic operations. That gets us from the world of regular verbal language, such as English, into the formal language of arithmetic.

This is a change of a medium; will it create a new message? Apparently, it did. It allowed Gödel to prove revolutionary theorems.

 

Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems

The first of Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems claims that FCAITs are necessarily incomplete; i.e., an FCAIT always has statements that can be neither proven nor disproven, which are therefore called ‘undecidables.’ FCAITs necessarily include undecidables.

The second theorem, which is easily proven from the first, says that there is no consistent FCAIT that can prove its own consistency. This is the final fatal blow to Hilbert’s hope—as expressed in the challenge he posed to the global mathematics/logic community—to preserve the image of mathematics as both consistent and complete.

In even simpler language, what we can say with mathematical certainty, based on Gödel Incompleteness Theorems, about the concepts of completeness, consistency, and decidability for any given arbitrary FCAIT is as follows.

Completeness: does every statement that must be true in a theory have a proof in the theory? No.

Consistency: is a theory certainly consistent? Can we be sure that it is free of contradictions? We cannot know the answer to these questions from the theory itself; the property of consistency cannot be proven or refuted within the theory.

Decidability: is there a finite algorithm that can always determine whether a statement follows from the axioms of a theory? No.

 

Gödel’s realm and wildlife

Gödel’s code is a transformation between two human forms of description, both belonging to the human world of language and thoughts; both using abstract symbols. One form is our regular language, such as these sentences, which we ordinarily use to describe the world and think about it. The other entails the concepts of natural numbers and arithmetical operations.

Animals, as we understand them, do not have a world of conceptual language and abstract symbols. They cannot describe or communicate to other members of their own species, or to other animals, in this fashion.

Originally, I had titled this section “How natural living creatures communicate.” On a second thought, I chose a different title, as you can see above. In my book, Life & Theories: Encounters of the Third Kind, I went even further, referring to animal interactions as messages of nature itself.

The reason I tried to avoid using the word ‘communicate’ is because communication ordinarily implies some form of human-like language—i.e., an ordered combination of abstract symbols like spoken syllables, written letters, mathematical formulas, formal logical statements, etc. Too many people think that we can interpret the way animals conduct themselves as analogous to human language, but animals in nature do not possess such capability. What they do, instead, is to use the objects of nature itself, such as bodily gestures, touches, sounds, tastes, odors, even bodily secretions, which can all be naturally discerned by the senses of living creatures.

For example, we are all familiar with the yawn reflex, which exposes the teeth of the tired animal, thus discouraging any predator that could otherwise take advantage of its fatigue. We see how the fur of a cat bristles and its back becomes curved when a dog attacks it, so the cat looks bigger than it is. Another interesting example is a procession of ants walking along a trail, coordinated by the secretion of various substances (like pheromones). Ants also exercise involuntary physical contact, which excite certain reflexive responses such as opening their mouth to let other ants sense what it carries. They sense the subtle but penetrative sounds of legs strumming the creases on the side of an ant’s stomach. And there are also tastes and smells that ants pass to one another. All these are concrete components of direct sensory reality; all are concrete—none is abstract.

 

Conclusion

In summary, the means that animals employ to effectively be one with nature, and yet spread their intentions and signal their status, are made of the very entities that nature is made of and do not entail indirection via pre-agreed abstractions. Is the resourcefulness and ability of animals to survive and reproduce in nature, as well as live in sustainable balance with it, a result of their being an integral part of nature?

It is clear that Gödel’s profound stratagem of using solely the very elements of the ‘reality’ of mathematics—natural numbers and arithmetic operations—to relate it to metamathematics itself served as a fundamental key to unlocking the unexpected results of his theorems. A parallel between Gödel’s stratagem and the behavior of animals in nature then seems to emerge: the use of elements of a given reality to relate it to its metareality. This may avoid the barriers caused by a language whose concepts are foreign and irrelevant to the reality it tries to describe. Can it be a clue to deeper insights?

Newton said, “We build too many walls and not enough bridges.” Can the above be the beginning of a bridge that will enable better theories?

 

This essay reiterates some of the ideas in the author’s book, Life & Theories: Encounters of the Third Kind, 2023.

Reconciling the dancing polarities

Reading | Philosophy

Fred Matser | 2023-12-17

Self-cultivation, individuation, and the mind-body problem

Reading | Philosophy

Mark F. Rossbach, MA | 2023-12-03

Could practices such as meditation and martial arts offer us a glimpse into a more fundamental layer of reality?

According to our modern, Western, materialist worldview, this cannot be the case. But if we look in other directions and other modes of thinking, we can find different answers. Eastern philosophies, for example, developed in radically different ways. One of the main differences lies in the understanding of mind and body as being ultimately one, the opposite perspective of our modern materialist worldview.

By regarding mind and body as ultimately one, Eastern philosophies understood that reality was not something outside, separate from ourselves, but something closer and more fundamental. This led to the understanding that reality could never be comprehended solely by thinking, but had instead to be lived through direct experience. In this worldview, thought was not divorced from lived experience, and philosophy developed with strong practical components to it.

The Japanese notion of Shugyo is a perfect expression of the way practice is understood as a means of achieving a lived experience of more fundamental layers of reality. At first, the concept was used to refer only to religious Buddhist ascetic practices, but with time it spread more widely thru Japanese culture, as religious thought itself permeated different layers of society.

Yuasa Yasuo was a Japanese philosopher who translated Shugyo as ‘Self-cultivation.’ He analyzed the concept through different perspectives and associated it with paranormal phenomena and Eastern metaphysics. In Carl Gustav Jung’s Analytical Psychology, Yasuo found a way to bridge this concept with the West, for Jung had developed a theory of psychological functioning that not only allowed a psychological interpretation of Eastern practices, but also understood that psychotherapy should offer a way for Western individuals to develop a symbolic understanding of life, recovering something that in essence is proposed by all religious thinking: a lived, individual experience of totality. This meaningful understanding of life is closely relatable to Eastern philosophies, as is pointed out by Yasuo, especially if we take the idea of Self-cultivation as a starting point.

But what does it mean to cultivate the Self?

According to Yasuo, Self-cultivation is a way of training the mind through the body, in meditative practices such as martial arts and crafts. The idea implied is that, alongside technical development, the practitioner should seek spiritual development throughout his practice. This spiritual development signifies a deep transformation of one’s personality, as well as the lived experience of deeper aspects of reality.

In contrast, in the West bodily practice has been regarded as having merely recreational or health value. Either way, bodily practice has not been considered a means to achieve profound spiritual transformation.

The reason for this contrast may be found in the mind-body problem, since our main Western religious traditions contributed to a dualist and dichotomous paradigm initiated in the Enlightenment period through Cartesian thinking. Such dichotomous understanding of reality considers mind and body two different substances. From this our current materialistic worldview was born, wherein objective reality (body) has higher value and importance than subjective, experiential reality (mind), as the former is thought to come first. The famous hard problem of consciousness is a direct consequence of such dualist thinking.

Eastern traditional philosophies have not been heavily influenced by Cartesian dualism. And neither have they divorced mind and body through a similar socio-political movement as the Enlightenment—at least not until the last century. In contrast, Eastern philosophies developed a nondual worldview, investigating the inner, experiential part of life by taking mind-body oneness as the starting point.

In notions such as Shugyo, mind-body oneness is an experiential state achieved through continuous practice. It leads to the experience of Satori, which is the individual enlightenment lived by Buddhas. Nonetheless, it is important to emphasize that Satori is not a specific experience, but rather a broad term to refer to different experiential states achieved through the cultivation the Self. We could also say that Satori refers to different lived experiences of altered states of consciousness.

To claim that the experience of mind-body oneness is achievable through practice means that, although mind and body may be perceived as two different substances, both are in fact the same; there is but one substance perceived by us in two different ways. And the experience of this one substance can only be achieved through practice. As such, according to Shugyo, the seeming dualism of reality is not fundamental.

Yasuo maintains that mind-body practices show the difference between Western and Eastern metaphysics, the former being occupied with what lies behind the experience of nature (physis), whilst the latter is engaged with what lies behind our inner nature—that is, what lies behind the human ‘soul’ (psyche), as Yasuo puts it, which in turn is investigated on the basis of mind-body inseparability as the starting point.

Yasuo found in Analytical Psychology (developed by Carl Gustav Jung) a bridge to compare the aims and the psychological mechanisms entailed both in meditation practices and psychotherapy (as understood in Analytical Psychology). According to Yasuo, psychotherapy aims at restoring an individual afflicted with an abnormal state back to his normal state of behavior, by restoring the link between consciousness and the unconscious.

On the other hand, meditation aims at ‘transcendental’ states of consciousness, many times regarded as altered states, in which an integration of consciousness with the contents of the unconscious takes place, thus enabling one to learn how to control one’s emotional states.

According to Yasuo, while psychotherapy aims at helping someone deal with abnormal states of consciousness that cause suffering and meditation (Shugyo) at achieving higher states of consciousness, the underlying psychological mechanisms are the same. In this light, Shugyo can be understood as the way of seeking the experience of mind-body oneness through practice.

This transformation of the personality, according to Buddhist traditions, is accompanied or fomented by experiences of losing sight of oneself, of leaving the body, as well as hallucinatory experiences similar to psychedelics, near-death experiences, etc. What happens here is that the ego, which is closely related to the body, loses its place as the center of the personality, and the whole world starts to be comprehended as also being part of one’s psyche; inner and outer experiences start to merge in these ‘hallucinatory’ states, forcing the ego to surrender.

Jung also understood that the goal of life is to transform one’s personality, shifting the center of the personality from the ego to what he called the Self (Selbst). The concept of the Self simultaneously refers to the unique and most individual parts of oneself, as well as the whole of the collective unconscious. The latter, according to Jung’s cosmology, encompasses everything in nature. In Analytical Psychology, this process of integration between consciousness and the unconscious is called individuation.

According to Jung, individuation is a process that occurs naturally and is the telos (goal, purpose) of individual life. The problem is that, when our personality’s center is the ego, our lives become focused solely on strengthening consciousness, unilaterally, thus causing a split between it and the unconscious. The goal of Analytical Psychology is to help the individual to understand how to deal with the confrontation between consciousness and the unconscious, supporting the process of individuation, which results in a deep transformation of one’s personality.

But how is the idea of Shugyo related to Jung’s individuation process?

Shugyo means understanding practice as a way of achieving enlightenment through the lived experience of altered states of consciousness—through a continuous cultivation of the Self. It entails a deep understanding of the fundamental layer of reality, resulting—just as in individuation—in a profound transformation of one’s personality.

But although this transformation is something present both in Jung’s individuation process and Yasuo’s depiction of Shugyo, for Yasuo a key difference between Eastern Self-cultivation practices and psychotherapy is the idea of normal and abnormal states of being. Yasuo states that psychotherapy tries to restore the individual’s normal state of being, which corresponds to what is culturally expected—i.e., ‘normal behavior.’ On the other hand, Self-cultivation practices actively seek a transcendent mode of being, which usually corresponds to deep religious experiences such as observed in Buddhism, yoga, and even traditional martial arts.

The differences between Shugyo and Jung’s individuation might not only entail the specifics of the states they aim to achieve, but also the moment when their goals can be fulfilled. For according to Jung, the process of individuation can only be fully achieved in death, the completion of life.

Nonetheless, both Yasuo and Jung agree that there is a fundamental layer of reality that encompasses both mind and body. Both agree that the goal of psychological development is the integration of opposites—mind and body, psyche and matter—such integration being the lived experience of totality. According to both Yasuo’s understanding of Shugyo and Jung’s cosmology, the ego should not be the center of the personality, but instead play a merely mediating role. After all, the ego may be central to human meta-cognitive life, but not the center of life itself.

Shugyo offers a way to understand life as something containing meaning, and so does Jung’s Analytical Psychology. According to both Shugyo and Jungian practice, the fundamental layer of reality is experiential, and we are here to express or live it in its totality. Practice becomes not only a way of seeking leisure and health, but a means to transform our personality and express meaning through spiritual growth.

This worldview is radically different than the one provided by our post-Enlightenment paradigms, which deprive life of meaning. According to it, reality is fundamentally experiential and there is meaning to be found, expressed, and experienced during life.

Any practice can be Shugyo, as long as the goal of the practice is to develop oneself, thus achieving the experience of mind-body oneness. The fundamental layer of reality, and thus of ourselves, can only be understood in and through practice. Jungian psychology entails similar ideas, and a similar openness to different practices. In both perspectives, theoretical confabulations have limits, the totality of reality—with its paradoxes—being accessible only through direct experience.

 

Bibliography

1. Yuasa, Yasuo (1987). The Body: Toward an Eastern Mind-Body Theory.
2. Yuasa, Yasuo (1993). The Body, Self-Cultivation, and Ki-Energy. Suny Press.
3. Jung, C. G. (1960). Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 8/2: On the Nature of the Psyche. Princeton University Press.
4. Jung, C. G. (1969). Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 11/5: Psychology and Religion: West and East. Princeton University Press.
5. Jung, C. G. (1968). Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 12: Psychology and Alchemy. Princeton University Press.
6. Jung, C. G. (1970). Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 14/2: Mysterium Coniuntionis. Princeton University Press.

Light or Darkness? Suhrawardī’s philosophy of illumination

Reading | Philosophy

Natalia Vorontsova, MA | 2023-11-26

Perhaps no other metaphor in the history of philosophy and religion—not to mention our language and culture—is as widespread as that of light and darkness. People who like to say to each other: “Don’t turn to the dark side! May the Force be with you!” must have a special appreciation for this metaphor [1,2].

Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that.’ (Mahatma Gandhi)

In the midst of darkness, light persists.’ (Martin Luther King)

The metaphor is often associated with two polar opposites: good and evil, right and wrong. But if we turn to the Master of Illumination, Suhrawardī—a Persian philosopher and theologian who founded a new tradition in Islamic thought, that of Ishrāq (‘Illuminationism’)—then only Light is a fundamental reality.

According to Suhrawardī, all reality is Light, which no concept or proposition can adequately describe or convey. Only the experiencing of the reality of Light itself can reveal it. Whoever encounters it knows it immediately and directly, by presence and not by concepts, for it is axiomatic and self-evident.

Anything in existence that requires no definition or explanation is evident. Since there is nothing more evident than light, there is nothing less in need of definition [4].

What then is darkness? In the philosophical doctrine of Suhrawardī, it is the absence of Light: everything that is neither illuminated nor Light itself. Hence it is Light that is a basic reality, and everything must be defined in terms of it, expressed in varying degrees of intensity, ranging from pure immaterial light to darkness and shadow. In essence, the doctrine is a hierarchical and emanatory scheme based on two principles: light (independent ) and darkness (dependent). And every emanative act is an overflow from the Light above it as an act of luminescence whose reflective nature gives rise to another. Furthermore, no causal relation exists between emanative acts; there is no material or temporal precession. Here is a high-level outline of key emanations in Suhrawardī’s cosmology:

1. Incorporeal (pure) Light: axiomatic, independent in and of itself.
   • Light of Lights: the Necessary Being, the Source of Light, God.
   • Immaterial Lights: Forms, Souls, Angels, Archangels and Platonic Archetypes.
2. Accidental Light: Light inhering in another, such as the light of stars.
3. Suspended Images: A special emanation that mediates between incorporeal and corporeal emanations, also known as Mundus Imaginalis. Autonomous images of the medium through which the incorporeal world of lights communicates and interacts with the corporeal world of shadow and darkness.
4. Corporeal (pure) Darkness & Shadow: things whose nature is darkness in itself, an absence of Light, such as physical bodies (barriers, ‘dusky substances’).
5. Accidental Darkness: depends on something other than itself, such as the shapes of physical objects. In also includes aspects of incorporeal lights that give rise to a corporeal

Similar to Avicenna’s concept of the incorporeal intelligences, the incorporeal lights are aware of their essence and their dependence on the emanating principle, namely the light above them in ontological rank. This establishes the relationship of dominion and love between all members of the hierarchy. Those of higher ontological rank exercise dominion over the lower members, while the lower members desire and love the lights above them. Thus, all existence unfolds in accordance with the underlying principles of love and dominion. In addition to this vertical hierarchy, the immaterial lights, through complex interactions, form a ‘horizontal’ layer to govern the multitude of emanations below them. These are the ‘masters of species,’ of minerals, plants and animals, but also of water, fire, earth and air [6].

For Suhrawardī, philosophy and mystical experience were inseparable. Thus, for him, the “pillars of wisdom” were Plato, Empedocles and Pythagoras, along with Zoroaster and the Prophet Mohammed [3,4,11]. His Philosophy of Illumination is thus deeply rooted in the metaphysical hierarchies of Neoplatonism, set in the context of Zoroastrianism and Shi’a Islam [5].

It is also important to bear in mind that Suhrawardī received his philosophical and theological insights as visions and revelations. In order to articulate them in a given language, pre-existing mental constructs are often used, even if they originally meant something different from what is being articulated. In Zoroastrianism, for example, the struggle of light against darkness is central and directly related to the forces of good and evil. In Islam, too, Allah is Light (nūr) and appears as light in the heavens and on earth [7].

Suhrawardī’s philosophical doctrine is certainly non-dual at its core, for here darkness has no independent existence and is merely the absence of light. But can his emanation cosmology be interpreted in the context of good versus evil? On the face of it, Suhrawardī is simply using an already conceptually available allegory of light and darkness to outline the creation by emanation from the omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient incorporeal reality that contains all that there is, to that of our corporeal universe, which is finite, ephemeral, limited and constantly changing. Incidentally, one can appreciate Suhrawardī’s intermediate emanations between the level of Light of Lights and that of Pure Darkness. For the gap between these two levels of reality is so great that without all the intermediate layers, such a scheme could be compared to lighting a light bulb directly from the sun.

But can light and darkness, with all the shades in between, be understood simply as colors with which Suhrawardī paints a picture of his illuminationist philosophy? It would seem that by conceptualizing emanation as a gradation of illumination and shadow casting, he is outlining proximity and relationship to the Divine, rather than a scale of good and evil. Nevertheless, the degrees of intensity of light seem to allude to the degrees of perfection: the closer to the Light of Lights or the Divine, the more perfect are the emanations [8]. In the Hermetic tradition in general, we find references, for example, to man’s re-conquest of his Perfect Nature—his soul, the ‘Illuminated Man’ or the ‘Man of Light’ in Zoroastrianism. And Suhrawardī is no exception, for in his view those on the mystical path who succeed in regaining their Perfect Nature become the disciples of Hermes [9].

Suhrawardī’s own visions and intuitive insights undoubtedly influenced his illuminationist doctrine. In his most important work, the “Wisdom of Illumination” (Ḥikmat al-ishrāq), Suhrawardī presents a unique conception of philosophy that combines the intuitive mystical path with rigorous philosophical discourse:

The best student is the student of both intuitive philosophy and discursive philosophy. Next is the student of intuitive philosophy. And then the student of discursive philosophy [4].

Nonetheless, he seems to value intuitive, direct knowledge over mere reasoning and rational speculation, since only direct experience guarantees the acquisition of true knowledge [8].

Theorising and rational arguments are like empty shells and are fruitless without grounding in the intuitive and direct apprehension of reality. [6]

In other words, discursive philosophy should be based on intuitive, direct insights communicated in images and symbols.

…symbols by their very nature are openings onto a mystery that can never be wholly explained and can never be exhausted [10].

For Suhrawardī, a symbol is a way of communicating what cannot be expressed in words. It is a way of bypassing the rational intellect so to arrive at an intuitive insight. Meditation on images and symbols can lead the soul to connect with a higher ontological reality. The soul ‘inhabits’ both the immaterial world of lights and the sensory world of physical forms simultaneously. Thus, the soul incarnates to acquire wisdom, but also remains in the world of the immaterial lights as the perfect nature of the initiate, as a guardian angel. The soul is therefore the microcosmic counterpart of the Mundus Imaginalis or the world of Suspended Images, which mediates between the sensory and intelligible worlds. The Imaginal World is neither corporeal—with a spatiotemporal existence in the sensory world—nor purely incorporeal, but rather comparable to images suspended in a mirror.

The mirror is the locus in which the form in the mirror is made evident. The forms are suspended and are in neither a place nor a locus. The imaginative faculty is the locus in which the forms of the imagination are made evident and are suspended [6].

It is on the plane of the Mundus Imaginalis that visionary events take place, which are more real than those in the sensory world. For they are more ‘illuminated’ or energized by their proximity to the world of the Immaterial Lights. The Mundus Imaginalis is the world that the spiritual pilgrim encounters in his mystical experiences, the “land of visions” and the “land of resurrection”, where it is possible to be reunited with the soul, with Perfect Nature. And man has access to it by means of a special faculty of the soul, namely the active imagination [6,11].

Suhrawardī has gone down in history as the founder of an illuminationist philosophical tradition—an influential philosophy that has been studied extensively both in the Islamic East and later in the West. But it is remarkable how far and wide in human history we can find references to what he outlined in his emanatory cosmology: the Imaginal World (Mundus Imaginalis), Perfect Nature and Active Imagination. Here are just a few examples [8,10,11,12]:

• In the Zoroastrian tradition, Mundus Imaginalis is referred to as the “Land of the Emerald Cities” or the Eighth Region of the World.
• According to a Sufi tradition originating in Yemen, Khezr-Elijah—the name of Perfect Nature, the Angel of Knowledge, man’s most luminous nature—dwells where the celestial and terrestrial oceans touch.
• Paracelsus spoke of the faculty of imaginatio vera, true imagination, which he urged should not be confused with fantasy.
• Martin Ruland, in his Lexicon alchemiae (1612), stated that “Imagination is the star in man, the celestial or supercelestial body.”
• Jacob Boehme spoke of the Imaginal World in the guises of the “Holy Element” or the “Soul of the World,” where Sophia (wisdom) dwells.
• Carl Gustav Jung observed that the Magnum Opus of alchemy was as much a psychological operation, concerned with self-transformation, as the transmutation of metals. For him, true imagination was a fundamental key to understanding the Great Work. The in-between reality of the Imaginal World he called psychic.

And didn’t even Newton write in his alchemical texts that the real truths are embodied in myths, fables and prophecies [11]?

 

References

[1] https://dictionaryblog.cambridge.org/2020/06/17/from-darkness-into-the-light-metaphors-of-darkness-and-light/
[2] https://www.britannica.com/topic/Star-Wars-film-series
[3] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/suhrawardi/
[4] Suhrawardi & The Philosophy of Illumination,  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbD8vfzsEHA&t=861s
[5] Cheetham, T., All the World An Icon: Henry Corbin and the Angelic Function of Beings, North Atlantic Books, 2012.
[6] Suhrawardi’s Science of Mystic Lights, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01qrFgEYhqI&t=190s
[7] Surah An-Nur Ayat 35 (24:35 Quran).
[8] https://plato.stanford.edu/Archives/Spr2013/entries/suhrawardi/
[9] Rebisse, Chr., Rosicrucian History and Mysteries, Athenaeum Press Ltd, 2007, pp. 110-111, 115.
[10] Cheetham, T., All the World An Icon: Henry Corbin and the Angelic Function of Beings, North Atlantic Books, 2012, p.68.
[11] Rebisse, Chr., Rosicrucian History and Mysteries, Athenaeum Press Ltd, 2007.
[12] Harpur, P., The Philosophers’ Secret Fire: a history of the imagination, The Squeeze Press 2009, p.123.