Philosophy

The Evolution of the Body and Soul

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You might be excused for being confused. Why is there so much diversity in nature? How have humans evolved? Who invented pussy cats?

These are questions that have fascinated me for decades, simply because science offers no clear answers. Charles Darwin springs immediately to mind as being one of the first to study nature and how species adopt new characteristics and shed old ones, over time. He also noticed how ‘unnatural selection’ – that is breeding artificially – can evolve a species.

After you have finished studying barnacles in the finest detail over long periods of time (as Darwin did) you have to pause and take several hundred steps back. There is an overview and to me, the speculation it offers is fascinating.

I start with the mystery of pussy cats. I use this term to distinguish our door mat variety of lion from lions. The puzzling piece in the jig saw picture of all domesticated animals is, who created them? Domesticated cats appear in the hieroglyphs of Ancient Egypt, so indisputably they were around in pre-history.

The usual story around how wolves became dogs, for instance, is that wolves hung around early species of the genus Homo smelling meat dripping over camp fires. A piece of meat was flung to a salivating wolf and a bond was created. The wolf became half tame and a symbiotic relationship maintained that bond through generations of wolves. What morphed a wolf into a Dachshund has always bothered me. Was early man involved in choosing small wolves from the pack and breeding them to make miniature wolves, that became more like…well, dogs?

And if the wolf / dog domestication is hard to picture, consider how the mighty Aurochs (bos primigenius) ceased to be large wild cattle and became mild mannered, spotty cows. Who was in control of that transition, arguably over hundreds of generations?

When we list the present domesticated animals, there is a longer list of wild animals that were never domesticated. Why are there no miniature giraffe’s for instance, keeping the bushes in our gardens trim?

Most scary of all is the question that no one dare ask. Are we some thing’s pets? That is, the story of human evolution is partial at best. There have been several genus of ape-like creatures before Homo and it’s variations. Were the Neanderthals sweet natured creatures that laid flowers on graves and Sapiens Sapiens the bad guys who wiped them out? In which case why would you want to prefer a violent species?

There is a suggestion that modern men were created by a race of being from another star system. They needed slaves to work the gold and precious metals from the earth. Manipulating DNA to create a new species was something they did in their spare time. We are probably all aware that our genome is just a few genes different from our ape cousins. There is no ‘missing link’ because there is no missing link. Homo Sapiens Sapiens were created in a laboratory. In other words we are the product of unatural selection.

That is an interesting theory but it is the only one based on the present evidence and the Bible stories of interbreeding between angels and men. When we have indisputable evidence of ‘angels’ or beings from other stellar systems, our origin may become clear.

Until then, we are left with the conundrum of Us. For we have an enormous distinction from other life forms. We have a soul. This soul is common to every human and is described in multiple ways in our myths, legends, religions and mystical traditions. Mystics have declared a personal unity with the Almighty, for which some have been ritually murdered. Beings sent to convince man to be loving and compassionate such as Jesus the Christ, Buddha, Krishna were only partially successful. How many generations will it take for us to evolve into compassionate beings?

If you wonder whether animals have a divine potential then the answer is, in my view, no. They are locked into the evolution of not only their physical bodies but their souls. And their souls do not have the same quality as humans to become Divine. They are further down the evolutionary ladder and being reborn as animals is their precursor to being born as human. As animals they live mainly in their instincts and emotions and intelligence. At the intuitive (or soul level) then they act as a collective. Birds swoop in a flock and change direction as if they were one. Fish do the same as do most animals with the herd instinct.

The animals have souls that are evolving, just as they evolve physically. The cat that adorns your fire side mat, or the dog that trots along in front of you on your walks, is in training mode for becoming human in a next life. As humans we evolve domestic animals physically, socially and spiritually. We remove them from their herd instinct and place them in safe shelter, where, through interaction with us, they become individual, with a name.

This individuality is the last step on the process of animal evolution. Perhaps the Ancient Egyptians knew this, which is why they mummified their domestic cats.

The evolution that Charles Darwin studied so closely in lower life species, is parallel with another evolutionary process on this planet. A soul moves through countless human and non-human life times, each time correcting weaknesses. When we are reborn we have a new set of lessons and corrections to make; a process which follows a natural and unatural evolution. Humans evolve through new knowledge and experience, which can only be obtained in the 4% of the universe which is physical matter. Eventually, the perfect lifestyle that the body adopts will create a perfect human body, as revered by the Ancient Greeks. The noble lifestyle that the soul longs to  adopt, will eventually create a perfect human soul. At this point in it’s evolution the soul leaves the ‘Wheel of Karma’ and  is restored to it’s natural place in Heaven.

How to Lose the Lottery

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I remember times in the UK when there was no National Lottery. When I went to Australia I considered it quirky that there was a ‘Loto’ which concentrated the attention of the masses once a week. Profits went to social causes, one assumes, like taxes do, one assumes.

Not surprising then, that some regarded Lotteries as a form of voluntary tax. The logic of the possibility of owning more money than you can dream of for the expenditure of just one dollar, is too much. It is logical to enter a lottery, yes, because without a ticket you do not have a chance of winning.

What the Lottery advertising does not suggest is that the chance of winning can be questioned. The question is obviously, how likely am I to win the lottery? For the simple mind without any grasp of statistics or even arithmetic, this question is difficult. Surely, this would spoil the fun and why not, just take a chance?

Even when told that the chances of winning the National Lottery in the UK presently are fourteen million to one, precious pounds are handed over for an empty promise every week by many not really able to afford it. Their dreams have the better of them. Selfish desires are strong motivators.

I expect if they climbed aboard my ‘Reality Bus’ they might see the light. This bus, you see, will drive you passed a football stadium in which have been invited fifty thousand people. They sit in silent expectation, each reviewing their plans for what to do with the millions they hope to win. The guide on the Reality Bus asks how many of those in the stadium might win the lottery. Sun hats are removed as heads are scratched and partners quiz each other.

Is it a trick question?

Well, of course it is because at this moment the bus revs into life. After a few minutes it stops at the entrance to another identical stadium. Inside the stadium can be heard the discourse of another fifty thousand hopefuls. The same question is asked? Some on the bus begin to wonder how many more of these football stadiums there are. And they are correct to do so. All through the morning and afternoon, the bus drives up to another one hundred football stadiums each bristling with like minded people to those on the bus. The bus passengers are beginning to think about dinner. They are let off at the one hundred and first stadium to use the facilities. Some grab a quick pie and a beer on their way back onto the bus. The driver is keen to move on. He has done this journey many times and knows that they are going to be going through the night visiting another hundred identical stadiums.

Come breakfast time the passengers are looking tired and bewildered. How could there possibly be so many football stadiums full of people who are ALL expecting to win the same lottery?

The driver insists they have to drive on and by mid afternoon the bus stops at the two hundred and eightieth stadium. The guide stands up and holds the microphone to address the weary passengers.

‘So far we have passed by fourteen million people all expecting to win with a similar ticket or tickets that you purchased. I have to ask you now, how lucky do you feel?’

This is the point of the whole journey and the moment when the bus passengers finally understand the waste of money and time they have devoted to the purchase of a lottery ticket.

A voluminous hand of fate hangs over the audiences seated in the 280 football stadiums one by one. A clever inflatable ‘hand’ suspended from a helicopter provides this metaphor. As it leaves each stadium having conducted no positive selection, the crowds get up and leave in a dismal mood. ‘It’s not even as interesting as a nil nil footy match’ one hopeful contestant is heard to say.

At the 79th stadium, one lucky contestant is selected amongst whoops of joy from the winner – and moans of envy from the other 49,999 in the stadium.

The Reality Bus completes it’s journey with a visit to Mr. Mind Guru. This is an man from India who sits on a huge golden cushion in a small marquee. The bus passengers are seated on carpets and served tea and biscuits which they gulp hungrily. The guru explains that the secret of a happy life is not to be different to others by being ‘filthy rich’ – he almost spat out the words. The secret of eternal happiness is to cherish the things and people with whom and which one is surrounded. ‘Isn’t it?’

Despite the convoluted English, the audience confer and sort of understanding, as well as they are able following their sleep deprivation.

The audience are invited to burn their lottery tickets and pledge to give materially and with their time to as many worthy causes as they wish in some other way. This will bring them the greatest happiness – so they are told.

‘More happiness than all the tea in India – more happiness than in a selfish thought or a comparison of oneself with another.’

The audience trickle out of the marquee. Time has not been wasted. It has been a very truthful lesson.

The bus heads back to the first football stadium where another fifty hopefuls take their seats, for what they are told will be ‘the ride of your life’. Just49,950 hopefuls to be enlightened, from this stadium before the bus moves onto the next. 

Pleasure Palaces

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Pleasure and happiness are not the same thing in my view. Pleasures are sensory stimuli through the senses. Animals are motivated to seek compulsively a combination of pleasures.

Humans are naturally motivated by pleasure seeking as much as the animals. The animal nature of the body is something that should never be denied – as in aesthetic practices. Abstention from pleasure for controlled periods of time for a specific psycho / physiological purpose may be directed by a teacher, dietician or medical practitioner. For instance, seven days of a water fast puts the body into a state where stem cells are released into the damaged parts of the bodies, replacing cells that the body is beginning to consume as a source of protein. In this way organs can be rejuvenated and the life of the body enhanced and even extended.

In general though, most people living in a western culture or aspiring to western style culture, are orientated principally towards pleasure. The body craves satiation of it’s desires and a state of comfort and rest results. I can observe this simply in my cats. They crave their food. When it appears and they consume it – they will retreat to a favourite place to wash and then sleep.

At this level humans are no different. The technology of the western cultures has enabled food to available in supermarkets continually. Hunger is something to be avoided. The same process is mirrored in the other sensual pleasures.

Sexual gratification is deemed a right – even in a war zone where children are not going to have a good life. The pervasion of pornography and places for dignified and undignified sexual gratification are available – if not openely condoned. Humans are animals and the gratification of the desire to have sex is no different to the lusts felt by a stallion of a mare in a field. The indoctrination of philosophies such as Puritanism and social remnants from societies such as the Victorians in England – have left a hypocritical attitude to sex and other pleasures.

Swinging the other way in the ‘swinging sixties’ has left present societies with a liberalism moving ever towards citizens demanding unrelenting pleasure. Social media and it’s content reflect this starkly. Even the gratification of committing suicide is instructed and awarded a status of ‘do-able’.

All of these pleasures and desires put humans on a ‘one track’ direction that is hard to leave. Prince Sidhartha in Indian legend, became disenchanted with his life of luxury and left his family, his palace and social status to search for a reality that was not transient – as is desire for pleasure.

After practising extreme aestheticism he moved into what is now called ‘a middle way’ where ‘just enough’ is enough. For whilst the desire for pleasure and it’s satiation produces problems if totally ignored, too much pleasure also blinds the soul to an inner life with qualities that are not transient – a true ‘heaven’.

From pleasures come a state known as ‘contentment’. This state is also temporary and dependent on the outside world for it’s perpetuation – so contentment is not a destination for seekers of Heaven! Immortality has to be earned.

In my view pleasure palaces contain only the first steps on a long ladder reaching into the heavens. We can remain on the lower steps if we wish. Animals find it hard to climb ladders but humans do not. We have the potential to move vertically through our desire for pleasure and contentment, not negating them, but not seeking them either. They will always come along one way or another. As Jesus the Christ says in Matthew 6

31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

To the modern western mind this sounds like a recipe for disaster – for planning and preparation, is a key to the pursuit of perpetual pleasure.

In the Taoist philosophy we find exactly the same aim as Christianity;

It is more important

to see the simplicity

To realise one’s true nature

To cast off selfishness

And temper desire

(chapter 19 of the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tsu)

Note that desire is only tempered not destroyed. When desire becomes a small part of life, it can no longer dominate a person’s being and purpose. The void that is left will be filled by the Divine – in it’s own time.

In the words of the Sufi poet and seer – Sabistari

Go sweep out the chamber of your heart.
Make it ready to be the dwelling place of the Beloved.
When you depart out,
He will enter it.
In you,
void of yourself,
will He display His beauties.

The tavern-haunter wanders alone in a desolate place,
seeing the whole world as a mirage.

The tavern-haunter is a seeker of Unity,
a soul freed from the shackles of himself.

 Through the chamber of the heart is small,
it’s large enough for the Lord of both worlds
to gladly make His home there.

Note the reference to ‘both worlds’ – for Sufism does not deny our presence as a soul in a material body. Both the physical world and it’s pleasures and the non-physical worlds are the abode of the Beloved. The task of the human is merely to become lost in the love of the Beloved and everything else, will follow – including happiness and pleasure.

Is Happiness Wrong?

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Blaise Pascal was not only a scientist and mathematician but philosopher. He is known for his book entitled Pensees in which he stated;

‘All human problems stem from the inability to sit in a room alone.’

With the benefit of hindsight since the 1600’s when this was written, I would suggest an amendment to;

‘Some human problems stem from the inability to sit in a room alone.’

It remains certain though, that inaction of body and mind is a problem for a lot of people in the West. There remains in Western thought an imperative to voyage and discover new things, places, people. The myth of seeding the planets and stars with human beings is a modern manifestation of this, but at a contemporary everyday level, it manifests as exploring social media compulsively.

Inactivity is seen as something to be avoided and children are instructed to keep themselves busy. There is a notional link here between being engaged in something and being happy. If happiness could be measured on a scale of one to ten, then we might expect to be somewhere around five most of the time. At times of misfortune this would go down to one or zero and at times of fortune nine or ten. Being ‘unhappy’ would then become an impossible state of mind, as there was only a surfeit or depletion of happiness. As emotional beings connected to the world through our senses we could become addicted to happiness through sensual pleasure. However the power or thought has given mankind the ability to disconnect into the abstract worlds of mathematics, language, pattern and imagination. Here also we find happiness. The absence of these activities does not reduce a state of contentment if we abandon contentment as our goal.

A later philosopher to Pascal was Jeremy Bentham from the 18th and 19th Centuries. His famous ‘hand me down’ thought to humanity was his ‘fundamental axiom’ for a fulfilled life;

‘It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.’

The ‘pursuit of happiness’ found it’s way into the the American Constitution in 1776 as a noble aim for our endeavours. As a piece of legalised diplomacy though, it let’s the snake into the garden, as happiness means different things to different people.

Persons engaged in any or all of the ‘deadly sins’ of the Old Testament for instance (if slavery is ‘theft of freedom’) might also be condoned under this right of the constitution. It had to be so, for many Americans from the south were not totally convinced slavery was a bad thing.

When Nazi Germany mobilised it’s military might – with it’s people in general support, they appear in the contemporary movies as being at least eight or nine on the happiness scale. Yet with hindsight we can see that the second world war was wrong and should never have happened, any more than should the first. We have to conclude that we have here an example that one can be very wrong and very happy.

Returning to Pascal’s point about being able to ‘live with oneself’; it is sobering to ponder if the Nazi’s would have been better to have learnt to do this. Instead of finding ‘wrong’ in their society and supposed causes of ‘wrong’ their first endeavours would have been better directed within. Outward exploration of one’s ideals and opinions inevitably mean trampling over someone else’s, in this case Belgium and Poland and most of Europe. This is a manifestation of the inability to sit quietly. Faults that we find intolerable in others are usually those holding most power over our selves. This truth is known from ancient times and is recorded as ‘known thyself’.

When a child is bored, it is because the child has an idea that a change of mental or physical environment is necessary. For whatever reason, this function is not available to the child inwardly.

My English teacher ‘Windy Gale’ was fond of aphorisms and he posted examples around the classroom. One was;

‘There are no dull subjects, only dull minds.’ He was no doubt tired or reading dull essays from dull minds.

While quiet can at first be regarded as in some way lacking, once accepted it can become a ploughed field upon which crops grow and from these comes nourishment.

There was a television series on the world religions several decades ago, presented and written by the theatre producer, Ronald Eyre who died in 1992. In his conclusion he said poignantly that if he were able to bring all the world’s religious leaders into one room, he would expect there would be a pervasive silence. He meant that far from being arguments about dogma and doctrine, origin and authenticity; because these beings had advanced sufficiently into themselves they would not be ‘throwing stones’ at others.

In the twentieth century, the connection between any human being on the planet with another through social media, has expanded this capacity to do ‘wrong’ in the pursuit of ‘happiness’. The forces of ‘radicalisation’ for instance are able to engage the minds of ‘bored’ souls anywhere on the planet. They will break their roots and leave their families to cross borders into broken states to support an aim they perceive as needing salvation from unhappiness. I am of course thinking of the so called ‘Islamic State’ as an example. At this time it’s influence is almost broken but like all political philosophies and doctrines it will always remain as the written word and thought.

Those emerging from the war will have learnt much about being alone and being near one and zero on the happiness scale. They may find that on return to their host countries after trial, they will be placed in a room alone. The question they must face is, can they live with themselves and in doing so become happy? Perhaps then, they will find the happiness they did not find through doing wrong.

The Universe and The Universe and The Universes

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Understanding the Universe has proved difficult for scientists. They have an idea that it started at a single point and expanded, but cannot explain what was there before. This is because their thinking is limited by their logic.

‘If a thing exists then there must have been a time it did not exist.’

This is logical but not true, because logic is limited and changed by the presence of an observer. Quantum physics proves this with such realities as an atom existing in two places at once.

What is the sound of one hand clapping?

To describe the universe we need better words, ideas, concepts than we use to describe a four dimensional world.

Mathematicians describes up to eleven dimensions. Universes that exist apart and in the same space / time, something that is ‘not logical Captain’.

To view other dimensions it is necessary to move the position of the observer. We know this because we understand the difference between two and three and four dimensions. Two dimensions is a world on a single plane. It becomes three when we see the dinner plate as a circular object rather than a straight line. When the dinner plate is dropped and breaks into pieces, the plate has an existence in time – that is the space time we have grown to understand.

There are still people who believe in a flat earth. Even though sailors and pilots and astronauts tell of a spherical earth, the Flat Earth Society members prefer to interpret the facts in their own way.

Would it not be interesting to move to the next level of thought about the universe, just as the jump in thought between the Flat Earther’s and the rest of us? The universe is without a boundary according to our astronomical observations. In fact the galaxies are expanding ever outward at this moment in time. It is more likely, in my view, that there will never be a universal boundary discovered. This is because I believe the universe bends around and comes back on itself, as does a sphere. But in my model of the universe I see it as a Toroid shape, like a Polo mint – the ‘mint with a hole in it.’

Matter and energy appear from the Torus shaped centre of the hole as waves of galaxies, stars, gases and dust. It comes from the collapsed version of itself and is in the state of either expanding or contracting depending on in what stage of its life you view it. Time spins around the surface of the Torus as a snake around a tree coming eventually to its own tail, which it swallows. This is the serpent in the garden of Eden. Time introduces the dimension of ‘self awareness’ or ‘knowledge’ which the Creator thought man would be happier without.

There is not one Toroid though, neither is a there a place outside the Universe where the inhabitants of Heavenly Space live out separate lives. This model is Medieval in origin and was created to fit with the concept of Heaven and Hell as places of destination after death.

To my mind there is no heaven or hell other than that which is created by man, respectively through Divine inspiration or not. And before you ask, Divinity is everywhere, not just in Heaven.

There are an infinite number of Toroids. Each larger Toroid is a product of a smaller one, as we may all watch when we watch a programme producing fractal patterns.

Scale, like time, is after all relative to the observer, nothing else. It does not matter what size a Toroid is. There could be a million million in one finger nail, and a million million curving over the horizon. As observers limited to a human scale our logic and our instruments can only conceive and view up to a certain point. After that, our intuitions have to operate as they do in dreams, stories and our inspirational knowledge contained in native traditions and ancient myths.

Just because time appears to move in a straight line it does not mean it does. A car driven along the equator of the earth appears to move in a straight line when viewed from space. From another view it is describing the curvature of the earth and is travelling at over one thousand miles per hour through space as the earth spirals.

These relative ideas were described by Professor Albert Einstein in the twentieth century and it is telling that the ideas of Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Computing have not begun to be explored by the popular imagination. Many people still live in the tick tock universe conceived by Sir Isaac Newton.

Perhaps intuition and stories will burst our thoughts out of the chains of logic into new worlds. Worlds which expand and contract, which are made of energy and matter, which move through infinite spaces and return every split second to the place they started.

Perhaps.