Perceiving complexity (part 2)
Part of the series Perceiving complexity
⟵ Perceiving complexity (part 1)
In the previous part I wrote a sketch about how I see the classical human mindset. Officially, the people have a geocentric mindset, in which the raw reality does not exist (the world of simplifying structures and patters in their minds gives a wholesome sensation of reality through the belief in the personal power and the use of the human type of language). In practical life, they have to relate to the raw reality, but it is as if they are not on Earth, but they see it from the Moon perspective, and when they don’t like the discrepancies between the raw reality and the world of structures developed in their minds, they go to the other side of the Moon to think about the Earth while not facing directly aspects of the raw reality they cannot integrate somehow in their already existing mental spider web.
Historically, the classical use of the human language geared towards simplistic patternization was way out of possibilities to open a direct way to understand a huge part of the raw reality. Sure, this is a “tree”, that is a “stone”, up there it’s a “cloud”. Everything appears so intelligible, it is so meaningful through this feeling of being in control of the situation with the power to patternize the perception of the world. When the people further use this patternization to organize their lives in the raw reality, they inevitably notice all kind of ramifications, but the tendency is to follow the spirit of the “meaningful world”, they tend to be trapped in its “intelligibility” and not really pay attention to the raw reality.
Some of these ramifications are essential for the livelihood, like which patterns determine clouds to appear from nowhere and release drops of rain? Others are just determined by the fact that the immersion in the “meaningful world” from the human mind makes you see the raw reality in a simplistic patternized manner. Thus you are the center of the Universe bestowing meaning to whatever you notice and this makes you pay attention to organizational patterns that you already use in your mind, instead of really paying attention to the raw reality. Like when you notice an intriguing pattern in the raw reality, for example, three similar cliffs close to each other in a mountainous area, why is that pattern there? According to the way the simplistic “meaningful world” in the human mind is shaped, it should be a meaning there if it looks like a pattern. The “meaningful world” starts as practical and useful classification and patternization of the world, but, because it relies on personal power, it ends up too much as a world in itself, too much disconnected from the raw reality and too eager to spread its own meanings over the raw reality.
In such situations of noticing further ramifications, the classical reaction was to continue to live in the “meaningful world” of words, to imagine in words all kind of stories about the raw reality. Those three cliffs? This is a case in which you can still continue to feel in control of the situation to some extent, you are not really paying attention to those cliffs as though they really exist independent of you, the only thing that matters to you is to get that satisfying and reassuring feeling of a “meaningful world” where you feel in control of the situation. You can relate them to patterns that you already know and develop a story about, let’s say, three brothers who did this and that and as a result they were transformed in those cliffs. This is not only about ancient times, it still survives to this day and the current impression of scientific approach to life can even be more misleading to make your mind slide into seeing such patterns that are irrelevant in real life (for example, see the BBC article The simple maths error that can lead to bankruptcy).
With issues like that of the clouds and the rain, which also happen to have an important role the people’s lives and make people dependent on what really happens in the raw reality, it was obvious in the pre-scientific human history that many aspects of the raw reality escape the classical human comprehension. Sure, there is no lack of ideas and imagery to come into your mind from your daily human experience to develop a “meaningful” explanation, like some being living in the skies who drops the water at times only their inscrutable reason knows. Unlike the example of the three cliffs, the part of the nature that is patternized in the case of the raining clouds is manifesting itself in ways that still escape this simple patternization. What reasons has that being to drop the water at certain specific moments? Very important to know, since this aspect is essential to the livelihood of the people in that area. It was obvious that in many cases the personal power to really patternize the entire world was useless, these were things that were escaping the meaningful world of simple and straightforward patternization through the human type of language. And even though they were escaping, they still existed and manifested by themselves.
The way to include them in the “meaningful world” of words was through the concept of sacrality. There is a sacral world beyond the “meaningful world” developed through human classical patternization. And it was made “meaningful” too by imagining in words what kind of patterns were unfolding there, each human culture with its worlds of divine beings doing all kind of things affecting the humans. Worlds that were reflecting rather the psyche of those populations than the raw reality, thus open to manipulations by people who go to the “other side of the Moon”. And then, a few centuries ago, it appeared the Western concept of science with some awareness that you need to pay attention to the raw reality.
The just mentioned psyche of the populations introduces a third element, along with the aforementioned raw reality and the official spider web of structures and patterns. Much of it goes under the radar, as it is not easy to understand and put in words in order to include it in the spider web. People experienced many times along many generations the practical aspects of the imperfections in specific interactions between the “meaningful world” and the raw reality. If a context has been experienced many times, there is accumulated wisdom about it, which is passed (much of it unconsciously, under the radar) from generation to generation along with the official structured and patternized worldview.
This fluid wisdom that is acknowledging the existence of some sort of a raw reality, with some unknown logic of its own, beyond the straightforward patterns of the human mind, is the inspiration of psychological applications in human societies, like religion, mythology, literature, music, visual arts etc. Specifically about religion and sacrality, I don’t perceive it entirely as babble of the people facing the unknown of the raw reality, since it reflects this deep accumulated fluid wisdom. It still depends how well is reflecting it, there is good quality religiosity as there is good quality literature (to compare it to something most modern people can identify with). As there is also poor quality religiosity and literature, where people are rather focused on quick reinforcements of the feeling that they are living in a “meaningful world” and less on the deep fluid wisdom that takes the raw reality in consideration to some extent. The contemporary trend of conspiracy theories are applying this mindset into the modern concept of scientific quest. What in the past were filler stories like in the example with the three cliffs, nowadays are conspiracy theories.
