INTRODUCTION

Pure objective reality, if such were possible, would consist of an imposed and differentiated arrangement of contiguous parts or components, set in a framework of abstracted relationship, rendering meaning and import. These thought-patterns would yet maintain their respective separate existences and identities.

Pure subjective reality, if this also were a distinct possibility, would permit us to believe that all we perceive is one with us and with itself, having no meaning or significance except as being fully integrated and activated from 'within' by our split consciousness. Definitions would therefore be arbitrarily framed.

A belief in the primacy of an objective reality casts us, as living beings, in the dubious position of 'thing,' thing amongst other externalized things. This state of mind generates ego as abstract concept and center of consciousness, The complementary immersion in a bounded subjective-only reality limits us to create artificial partitions and divisions over and against considerations that could defuse their power base. Myopic narcissism would rule the day.

Do we grant existence to so-called 'external things' for the sake of convenience and utility, a workable artifice; or do we form our sense of self as a reflection of the 'facts' we extricate from an autonomous universe forever indifferent? Are we accidents of evolution, a side experiment whose intrinsic worth is gauged by the lowliest of creatures? Have the peculiarities of language's duality created a problem where none was intended to exist? Do the very assumptions on which 'existence' itself is based need clarification and revamping to avoid erroneous judgments about Reality?

These are old philosophical questions. Rehashing the logic of them will not likely open any new vistas. They are beyond logic at any rate. The solution to these and similar conundrums are not to be found in an identity of opposites as though both persisted independently. The notion of 'dimension' itself is a purely subjective construct and can only serve to help us classify our experience. No, the answer lies elsewhere. And, it has to be a very simple one, I believe.

What I see and what you see cannot help but be different. That is a given in the present post-relativity era. And it is more than a mere difference in labels and measurements. Your entire subjective apparatus not only filters what is perceived at any particular instant of time, but controls, through damping and accentuation, just what is seen, the connections and relationships as well as associations and unique predilections. This is true even on the sensory level. So the argument stands for a purely subjective reality. It needs a disclaimer. That is easy. The proof can be quite abrupt in fact. If we try to force a peculiar subjective view onto our immediate surroundings which does not fill-in the necessary parameters of action, the observables, we could very well find ourselves in serious trouble. So, the objective reality demands and insists on being taken at face value.

Which then is more malleable to manipulation as far as immanent affect on the current state of our individual consciousness is concerned? The more distant a specific world-view is from its external referents, the more necessary it is to transform that objective realm to fit our prejudices; the other choice is to stay away.

There is a third choice somewhat nearer to a solution of our original problem: drop and suspend all pretense, all conceptual and abstract overlays onto what is only 'perceived' anyway. Nothing new, creative or inspiring will unfold before us while locked and blocked psychologically by firm beliefs in the order of things dogmatically couched. What is needed is direct contact, not a return to or glorification of atavism or some vague oceanic feeling supposedly confirming innocence and sincerity. The consternation and confusion resulting from the dialectic surrounding determination of reality parameters is a sickness of the mind. There is a consciousness here over and above subjective-objective considerations.

Consider: The theory of evolution a la Darwin et al tries to infer, in great measure, that each species, in particular the human one, is what it is and how it is today due to competition and adaption to circumstance, on a contingency basis, diversity filling niches of conformity opportunistically. We, in other words, as a species, are only accidentally the way we are. One homeomorphic possibility spread against the background of faded promise and uninspired assertiveness. We could have been some other way, some different version of Mankind but would we still have come out as the dominant animal?

I submit a different story. The bottom line of my assertion is this: In a world of all possibles, given the parameters and forces at work in the universe, Mankind could not have grown and transformed through the eons into any other possible form and nature. Stephen Jay Gould postulates that if we were to run the tape back to the beginning, to the Cambrian Explosion, 530 million years ago, when all the phyla presently existent came into being, there would be practically no chance that 'human kind' would resemble what it is today.

From a mathematical point of view, considering the deep nonlinearity involved, he is probably correct. I am not emphasizing external form and nature, but rather, the drive to consciousness, to self-awareness and the capacity to reflect and know that we are alive.

The objective world's coercive influence and sum of directives shaped subjective drives and growth patterns intentially. If the capacity to develop to our present stature, and I use this term to convey signature and that's all, were not part and parcel of a pre-conscious state of primordial reality then the ultimate design imperative would have never gotten off the ground.

Assuming this to be the case, one can speculate further that Mankind is not yet finished His long journey towards what no one can safely imagine. We are in a condition of transition, always and, perhaps, forever.

I remember an incident of revelation when, many years ago, I was traveling through the back country of Colorado. It was nightfall high in the mountains without a trace of manmade lights anywhere to interfere and obscure vision. The sky was crystal clear and filled to overflowing with stars. I had not imagined, having grown to adulthood in a large everbright city-scape, that there were indeed that many stars actually seeable. I knew they existed but, naively, had not reckoned with the true grandeur of it all.

Just as, I had the thought of peering into space, countless billions of stars and galaxies, I knew not. Suddenly, perhaps because of my location on a hillock overlooking a deep and expansive valley, I realized and understood for the first time something which is embarrassingly obvious to anyone astute enough to ponder the facts of cosmology: "outer space" is not out there anymore than it is right here. We, in all actuality, are living on a planet that is itself very much located in "outer space."

I felt movement of the Earth, momentum, an exhilaration and, most excruciatingly poignant,an overwhelming sense of belonging to a realm the scope and depth of which was beyond comprehension. My own personal earth-bound identity, localized in conventional terms, sloughed away, being too puny a resevoir to contain reason. We are large indeed; to conjure a story of evolution, restricted as it is to earth-only, as though all else was of little or no consequence, is an attempt to confine Life within the parameters of an all too self-centered and thereby self-limiting appraisal of the nature of just who, or what, we truly represent. Neither subjective nor objective definitions currently in vogue seem to encompass the enormous range and textured detail of that initial urge to humankind, inspired at the infinitesimal expansion 'outward' of the germ that was to become universe.

The experience of "I-ness" by us, and all other living embodiments of the spirit of that inexplicable singularity, is repeated and echoed throughout the universe on every other planet on which this unfathomable miracle of life has taken root. Personally I believe the universe to be positively brimming and jammed to outrageous proportions with life-forms of all manner and persuasions.

Subjective or objective? When did this split arise? And why? Is it similar on other life-giving planets? Is consciousness the same everywhere; would it be impossible to communicate using symbols based on raw epistemological suppositions without analogue?

We can bridge no social barriers without recourse to a willingness to shelve and perhaps completely abandon identity-restrictive definitions. The universe is not impersonal: Life incarnates.

Social psychologists would have us believe that we, as individuals, have no identity or meaning except as members of a society, regardless of scale, or across scales. I propose this to be insufficient and pertinent only to our social identity. It is an affront working to undermine our belief in our intrinsic worth through regulation of status points based on something so plastic and ephemeral as the ongoing economic climate. One might argue that various social roles are more important than others because of influence, power and range of privilege. This is obviously true as long as the particular social order in question remains stable and predictive. As we have been seeing especially of late, this is not a fool-proof predicament of the same character and constancy as, say, a law of physics or chemistry.

Simplistically put: if the basis of personal identity, and its associated value, is not of a natural order, then it is, by necessity, contingent on make-believe issues, pertinent to and supportive of whatever systems of commercial, political, religious and social interchange is prevalent in the local time-space.

I choose not to build my house on shifting sands; it is a game of deception played for very high stakes indeed. We do not even, as yet, appreciate the full impact and import of our fleeting existences. Gambling destiny on the turn of cards, stacked and dealt by the niche-distributors and programmers of self-images, without simultaneously keeping an eye on our true source of freedom and survival, is to invite anguish and disaster. Self-delusion is the greatest crime of all, causing the greatest harm; that and lack of imagination.

Where has all the magic gone?

Where are the wizards and warlocks of old? Has the corporate world usurped and traded the dreams of Life's children for sub-standard housing, a job to wear down spirit, baubles and sparklies and a promise to come? And has despair, hopelessness and alienation, joined with hate and vengeance, conspired to turn life against itself?

I wish only to own my self, for better or worse, without the nagging uncertainty that comes with a self-image dependent on the whims of social order.

There is a common denominator dispelling all illusions of differences; it is responsible for our survival as a species and is our only hope for the future, any future. It is born and has its being at the interface where subject-object interplays and authentic 'social' identity intertwine, displaying their innermost substantiality and root connection.

The life-blood of the universe courses through our veins for all time. This common denominator binds us, one to the other, bringing with it enormous responsibility both to others and to ourselves. The community of human beings, entertaining thoughts, dreams, and visions of subjective/objective realities, is in serious danger of capitulating its advantage and relinquishing its hold on now quite tenuous ties to the earth.

There are enclaves and oases of sanity here and there about in the world. Whatever transpires in the next several years will be beneficial only if: there is a general collapse of the empty and futile edifices of separate universes inverted in time, and a realization of our commonality, our singularity, of purpose and meaning.

Our collective purpose needs discovering, else Life may renege.

Table of Contents

Part I