And why it fails (or, don’t worry, be happy (and sad))
Whenever human beings put a name or number to some experience we have, or object we find within our environment, it essentially defines an absolute characteristic or quality of that environment. The more defined these names become the closer we get to this absolute.
The better we are able to arrange these names in sequence the better we understand the environment and the better we are at manipulating it, being as it is not the really real but a collection of names arranged in sequence.
We are special in the universe because only we perform the activity of naming. The goal is to name everything and record all possible sequences of names so that we may master the universe. Once this is achieved there will be no more pain for we will simply eradicate all such sequences from the story we have thus far uncovered.
Imagine a well-managed train station. Materials have been taken from the environment and changed into tracks, rolling stock, a platform, waiting room and ticket booth. Humans have been trained for the various roles of conductor, manager, driver, cleaner, engineer etc.
Once people use the station they become customers. They may form a union to protect their interests, much as the drivers and conductors may do. The special roles and status gained by these people may define them over and above their simple existence as humans (which of course they all secretly still share).
The station will take on special meaning itself as the source from which rules and regulations (laws) are generated. Its very existence may variably be worshipped, protected, feared or honoured.
Whenever human beings put a name or number to some experience we have, or object we find within our environment, it essentially defines an absolute characteristic or quality of that environment. The more defined these names become the closer we get to this absolute.
The better we are able to arrange these names in sequence the better we understand the environment and the better we are at manipulating it, being as it is not the really real but a collection of names arranged in sequence.
We are special in the universe because only we perform the activity of naming. The goal is to name everything and record all possible sequences of names so that we may master the universe. Once this is achieved there will be no more pain for we will simply eradicate all such sequences from the story we have thus far uncovered.
Imagine a well-managed train station. Materials have been taken from the environment and changed into tracks, rolling stock, a platform, waiting room and ticket booth. Humans have been trained for the various roles of conductor, manager, driver, cleaner, engineer etc.
Once people use the station they become customers. They may form a union to protect their interests, much as the drivers and conductors may do. The special roles and status gained by these people may define them over and above their simple existence as humans (which of course they all secretly still share).
The station will take on special meaning itself as the source from which rules and regulations (laws) are generated. Its very existence may variably be worshipped, protected, feared or honoured.
It will begin to take the shape of a reality for those who now depend on it yet underwriting it all is the same basic environment which must be now be managed as just another resource required by the station: the station is still a product of the natural environment and not a self-reproducing environment in-its-self.
The station grows and requires more of the basic reality. What must be denied is difference or any other form of reality that can challenge the stations existence. Change must be halted and all matter given over to the stations perpetuation. This can be accomplished through language – through the naming of things: a tree becomes a resource for coffee stirrers. Humans become customers and managers and the two differentiate themselves by these titles over and above what they share in common.
The question is: at the point at which the station accomplishes its goal and no evil can challenge its benevolence in providing all these people with meaning and purpose in their lives; with nothing to measure the station against but faded memories, how can we tell, any longer, whether it is good?
The station (language) becomes the reality, all is aligned to its needs and anything that is ‘other’ disappears. The universe crystallises into a substrate of inert data. The story is complete.
There is no possibility of argument against it. It is justified and western civilisation cheers! Unfortunately it ends in inertia by denying the very possibility that brought it about: it ceases to function.
The universe is not a complete sentence but an open dialogue.
Simon Leake
