May 12, 2003                                                                         © 2003: JAN COX
 
 
 
 

As well as any characteristic:
man-making-stuff  distinguishes him from all other life forms,
and there are two histories thereof: technical and cultural;
his invention of things useful, and his creation of things entertaining.
Man’s technical history is his invention of everything you see physically around you that was not present on this planet prior to man:
it consists of the many machines that make man’s life more sustainable,
and comfortable;
man’s cultural history is his creation of everything that men talk about which you cannot see and which would not exist did not men talk about them:
it consists of the many metaphysicals that make men
think more comfortably about dying and  that entertain them while they live.
Simply yet adequately presented: these are the twin worlds of: science and art; science and the social sciences; the practical and the abstract; the material and the mythical; the mundane and the mystical  --  technology and culture (which is):
things as they are  --   and: things as thought can imagine them to be.
 

Both worlds begin with thought,
but the technical one comes into physical being only with the participation of hands;
man’s cultural world not only commences with thought,
but never goes there beyond;
no amount of muscular exertion will ever bring this realm into material existence  --  not that such is intended, but neither is man meant to give notice thereof.
 

When a man’s mind conceives of a better way to grow crops,
or of a machine to better treat illness,
he will be driven to put his ideas into a practical form;
but as men’s minds continually conceive of scenarios wherein their lives would be
less uncertain and mortal, but with no idea of how such could be accomplished,
they are driven to ignore their lack of knowledge thereabout,
and the goals’ impossibilities.
If a man’s mind can dream of a machine that would cure Groover’s Syndrome,
no one will imagine that it exists until it is constructed and actually does,
but all men’s minds can dream of magic machines that will cure their
unadorned awareness of what life is, and will imagine that such exists  --
and that they are availing themselves thereof regardless of the fact that
they do not and can not ever be built
(elementarily put): the distinction between medical technology that extends life,
and religious culture that dreams of an eternal version thereof,
(men of a particularly crude wiring schematic neurally perceive it simply as
a conflict between external forces and internal ones:
the classic struggle ‘twix the material and spiritual realms).
 

In the overall life of humanity, clearly: one of these is not right, and the other un right, though common are factions driven to profess such,
holding that science at the expense of religion is wrong (if not somehow evil)
with counterparts proclaiming the opposite;
but thus is a two legged man in a three dimension reality able to walk;
a binary wired brain in a 3-D realm able to think –
civilization in toto, capable of sustainable existence:
it is the relentless, mechanical push-pull going on inside an
internal combustion engine that causes the vehicle to move,
the basic fact here being however that man would not be what he is today
without both his history of technology and culture;
one of them alone would provide no locomotion  --  indeed,
the latter without the former is the operational definition of the inadequately civilized.
 

Thus does an anomalous man born with an unusually clear head,
and unencumbered neural wiring perceive no problem with this arrangement,
nor any conflict between the two worlds,
what he does see is that humanity’s natural inability to also see the situation thus
is the “source” of all verbal/mental uncertainty suffered by men
(keeping in mind that routine people are not supposed to see it like this,
and that it is only applicable to that certain minority man).
 

The manner in which a normal, sane and intelligent man is wired and programmed makes his nervous system (as manifested in its most advanced operation: thought)
feel  that there is a ceaseless and quite real and significant struggle going on,
far beyond his control, between forces in the physical world outside of him,
and powers in the intangible world inside of him,
and that they endlessly fight for supremacy;
at base level: between external pathogens and his internal immune system;
at ostensibly a more refined one: between corrupt spritual forces outside of man,
and virtuous, proper ones housed within him,
and from an infinite number of possible verbal perspectives,
facts everywhere support such a view;
everything about it feels right, plus: it instantly explains all that is inexplicable:
man is simply caught in the middle of a never ending struggle between
evil forces out side of him, and benevolent ones inside of him,
but remember the focus of this story: the twin histories of man’s technology,
and his culture  --
the material constructs that flow from his thoughts,
and the immaterial ones which ne’er have a physical reality,
both serving their own specific purpose:
one to be useful   --   the other to be entertaining.
 

Who would like it if man’s technology extended physical life indefinitely,
but he had nothing to pleasantly fill the new available time in his mind?
Once a man has become fully civilized (lives a life centered around thought)
it is possible that he would prefer death over a life of endless mental boredom;
technology makes life more survivable --  cultural makes it more bearable:
end of discussion.
 

The certain unconventionally conceived man,
born with an irrepressible hunger to understand what is going on,
is satisfied with neither just living longer, nor with being mentally distracted by
man’s routine cultural knick knacks;
what he needs cannot be found in science nor in metaphysics;
that which he seeks resides neither in the external forces, nor the internal ones  --
not as those forces are conceived of by humanity collectively;
such a man with such a hunger must look elsewhere  --  “But where else IS there?!”  you ask: “There are only the worlds outside of man, and the one inside of him!”
which from any normal human perspective is so,
but there is a something-else-view,
one available only to a man born with the uncommonly wired nervous system:
an inner platform on which he can stand and see not simply the struggle between the external and internal forces as they are naturally perceived by the rest of humanity  --  no, what he alone can see is the essence of the perceived struggle  --
a recognition of not merely the apparent participants,
but an understanding of the ostensible conflict itself.