THE COSMIC MIRROR

THE 'TRUE' STORY OF THE SPOON

My dear perceptive readers, (I presume, of course, that there are more than one of you) it is indeed a pleasure to see you again. Ere we commence our session for the day, I wish to tender a anticipatory apology for those among you acquainted with the Wachowski Brothers, for some of what I wish to say would perhaps seem to you to be repetitive and familiar, perhaps painfully so. I can only humbly implore you to bear with me, I’ve done my best so as to not sound like a defective parrot, and put my own twist on things. Also, if indeed the Wachowski Brothers are not unfamiliar to you, you perchance would be able to guess the identity of the ‘Spoon’ mentioned in the subtitle.

On more than one prior occasion, I have touched upon the blurred boundary between perception and reality. Today, I have attempted to clear all remaining doubt on my view of the matter, if indeed the preceding statement makes any sense at all. (All in due time, my dear (reader), all in due time.) This goes beyond merely the subtle yet profound difference between a half-full and half-empty glass. That a mans life is by and large shaped by his perception of it, I doubt any amongst you would disagree. After all, millions of Reader’s Digest articles on the benefits of a positive, optimistic approach have got to, by sheer power of overwhelming statistics, make some sense.

But what if I go a step further? What if I say all life is perception? What if I go as far as to claim that your life is what you perceive? I can already dimly hear the outraged shrieks of the humanists and the sanctimonious chants of the cyberpunks. At the risk of sounding repetitive, I ask once again of you a question I have asked you numerous times… What indeed is reality? It is but your perception of it. What influences your perception, I shall not get into here and now, for that would, in my current mood, possess numerous Jungian elements. Do you, my dear reader, perceptive as you are, see what this implies? Six billion people, six billion realities, six billion worlds. Which among these is the world? Why, all and none, of course. (Disclaimer: I’m only fond of paradoxes as long as I am the one to perpetrate them) And each of these worlds is flexible, supple, yielding to the will of its creator.

Where then, is the absolute? Do I mean to imply that like the One, we can possess the ability to fly, if only we believe? Of course not!! Then, are the laws of physics absolute? Yes, indeed they are. I can no more fly by merely wishing it than survive in a supernova. Then, are people absolute? Or, in accordance with a disturbingly convincing argument presented by Douglas Adams, are living beings merely a figment of the collective deranged imagination? (Don’t even get me started on where ‘imagination’ came into being, let alone ‘collective’) Again, it is a ludicrous proposition. Of course people exist. If you aren’t convinced, punch the next ‘figment of a deranged imagination’ you run across, his/her/its reaction should convince you that he/she/it very much exists.

Well, now that we’ve established, on an empirical basis at least, my existence and yours, and the fact that you are reading this tripe courtesy a very strange alignment of electric and magnetic fields (which, incidentally, I haven’t completely grasped. Help, anybody?), where does the perception part of it enter what we shall for sake of argument, albeit a very flimsy one, I grant you, call the picture? Everything hereon with is merely a construct, and ‘tis within this construct that perception enters what we have (hopefully) agreed to call the picture. It is here that the definite article (note that I use it to define itself, a paradox of another sort, one for linguists to sort out, no doubt) loses much of its meaning (though not all). It is here that objectivity takes a hike and gets lost in the woods (it may also have gotten sucked into a quicksand bog, its fate is yet to be reliably ascertained. In any case, we can be sure it isn’t going to be returning anytime soon.).

Within this construct we all seem to be inordinately proud of, society, everything is perception. Again, I must iterate, this is not merely a half-empty, half-full debate. This is so much more than that. This is the uncomfortable and very, almost frighteningly so, poorly fitting overlay of six billion worlds, of six billion truths. Nothing just is, everything exists in a massive relational field, at places thin, at places thicker than the tension filled air at a eighth grade make-out party.. (Hmm… interesting simile, courtesy Kevin Arnold, The Wonder Years, I guess.) The ramifications, if one chooses to consider them, are truly frightening. I so choose, but find that one cannot, and here I’m guilty of a horrible generalization, move for too long a period of time outside ones construct, ones ‘reality’, and escape sinking into an intellectual mire of nihilistic pessimism. (More on this later).

Do you realize, my dear reader, by virtue of the perception which I take the liberty of assuming you posses, that this removes the concept of an absolute right and wrong? What may be right in one of the six billion constructs may be abhorrent in another. You see the havoc this principle would wreck upon what semblance remains of a judicial system? A construct perhaps, but a useful one nonetheless, is society, and it must be protected. Of this there can be no debate. What then, was the point of this inordinately long piece of text, with its many tangents? Perhaps Isaac Asimov sums up the problem best in his discussions of the Zeroth Law of Robotics, “It is easy to point to, to define a human, to see what will or will not harm him. But what is humanity? It is an abstract concept, at best? How can we know what will harm or benefit humanity?” On a different note, is it sufficient, if indeed possible, to merely define a blanket right and a wrong? I think it’s absurd. You, of course, may differ.

Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth.
What truth?
There is no spoon... Then you'll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.

The purpose is not to exhort you to bend the spoon, only to recognize that the spoon has no existence independent of you. (And by this, I don’t mean the metal spoon, just to clear up any possible misunderstanding) It is but a reflection of your self in the cosmic mirror, and thus it can change, as you change. You can, if you so wish bend the spoon. Do not do so recklessly, but also do not insist on its maintaining a rigid shape. With that, my dear, perceptive reader, I shall descend down into my reality, my world, and leave you with your thoughts, and of course, the spoon.