emergent systems and oscillations toward equilibrium(s)

[temporaryreality]

 

"The things that affect a living organism's functioning, and the responses it makes, cover a very broad range....Physicist Friedeman Kaiser notes, 'The type of the external stimulus is irrelevant...It is the information contained in the signal that is significant.'

Thus it is the information, the meaning encoded, within the perturbation, that is important, not the form in which it is delivered. The form is merely one possible language of communication out of myriad possibilities. In the end it is the meaning inside the behavior that is significant, not the behavior itself. It is not the chemical released, nor the movement of the body, nor the electromagnetic field that is important, but the information, the meaning, that it carries.

And for too long scientists have assumed there is no meaning in Nature. As a result, they have spent their time studying static, dead forms, when the communications of meaning themselves are the essential thing."

--Stephen Harrod Buhner, The Secret Teachings of Plants: The Intelligence of the Heart in the Direct Perception of Nature, pp. 43-44.

 

 

I've been commenting here and there about my recent experience with Covid - and how I could tell there was some meaning involved, being expressed between the virus and my body. On a conscious level I've made a few guesses, but honestly I have no idea what the meaning is - I can only sense that it's there.

So, I'd like to keep in the front of my mind the fact that my mind is not necessarily always an important player in the meaning-making. There's much going on on cellular and chemical and energetic levels (and more).* When this is looked at from a Big Timeline perspective (not exactly deep time, but the timeframe of Earth's livingness and on a planetary scale), the meaning will be expressing itself over centuries and across populations. I am but a singular biological cell in a larger living pattern. I shall keep from being surprised that I don't know the meaning of this particular perturbation.

____
* Here's a theory - as @sdi pointed out in a private message, there's been observation of a state of acedia accompanying covid infection. Perhaps the meaningness that'll be played out will be a species-wide decrease in busy-body-ness, and in the kind of viral-mindset we call productivity. I admit that in a lot of ways this culture already looks listless, diffused, and wasted, but what if the viral changes modify our equally-present social compunction to manipulate the world and tally marks on spreadsheets as evidence of "doing something"? In the long run, natural systems might breathe a little sigh of relief if we can't "be bothered" to reignite the drive toward economic growth (not to mention the difficulty of doing that post resource draw-down). Anyway, this is pure speculation, don't trust it too far - it just points to some of the ways this two-plus-year experiment in viral spread and social upheaval might play out. 

Comments

[sdi]

Yes!

Great quote from Buhner: it's yet another reminder why the height of Greek thought considered consciousness as primary over matter. Indeed, I think our own civilization is getting there, too, as we develop Information Theory, Quantum Mechanics, and on and on—the assumption that matter is dead and static really starts to fall apart when you look closely enough!

You know, your meditation reminded me of how I fell back down into the spirituality rabbit-hole a decade or so ago: Alan Watts' TV special "A Conversation With Myself." (Have you seen it? If you'll forgive a link to YouTube: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) It speaks to the exact same deep meaning of this fantastically complex body we are all tiny parts of... listening to it again, I think your theory and his agree precisely.

[temporaryreality]

Here's another good one from the Buhner book - this time from Buckminster Fuller:

"Virologists have been too busy, for instance, with their DNA-RNA genetic code isolatings, to find time to see the synergetic significance to society of the fact that they have found that no physical threshold does in fact exist between animate and inanimate."

That can be parsed out in so many interesting directions.

Thanks for the Watts links. I'll take a look at them - my dull brain might just be capable of viewing videos :)

[temporaryreality]

Oh good grief - whether or not Buhner knew it, he totally channeled Alan Watts. The first 5 minutes of Part 1 is the gist of Buhner's point. I wouldn't doubt Watts was influential, given Buhner's of that generation.

This is fascinating to watch - the Zen student and the vegetelista coming to similar conclusions it seems.

[sdi]

I'm afraid I don't know! It seems plausible to me that the very air in those days was as pregnant with meaning as today's is: some picked up on it and tried to communicate their gnosis through whatever language they had to hand—Zen, herbalism, etc.—while others happily continued marching over the cliff.

In any case, the parallel is funny to me, since I'm more-or-less a cloistered meditant, while my wife is well on her way to becoming a first-rate herbalist herself. :)

[boccaderlupo]

I have always been a fan of Watts, so thanks for the links.

temporaryreality, still offering some prayers for your ongoing recovery, and that you uncover more of the meaning you're searching for...

[temporaryreality]

Thank you so much, I appreciate it.