Philosophical Dialogues XXXV
EXISTENCE AND TRANSCENDENCE V
By Franz J. T. Lee
12th July 2000
Prof. Coseino:
We have advanced from the Level,
Cosmos, to the Degree,
Cosmos a n d Einai, now we are dealing
with a Mension, Cosmos a n d
Einai
AND Nothing. In other words, we
are looking at Existence AND Transcendence.
Students, how does Cosmos exist differently, how does it transcend?
Of which attributes should we especially take note? Please, remember, Simplicity
is the Mother of Beauty!
Patricia: Where should we begin? Anywhere, Anyhow, Anytime, Anywhither?
Coseino: Let us begin, looking at the "mysteries" of Cosmos, discovered by Labour, by the Patria, and which in Cosmogony, Cosmology and Astrology were interpreted mainly in spatial-temporal parameters. Who remembers some "curiosities" of Cosmos?
Well, the oysters, the uncloned, genetically
not engineered potatoes, and even tomatoes, "know" the Patrian "time" of
the day, month and even the year. But, what do they know that
we do not know, still do not know as yet?
Mahatma: Without my watch, I am lost. Thinking about it, strangely enough, the most famous Patrian philosophers, scientists, doctors, even athletes, were born when Mars was in the ascendant.
Patricia: My dear Mahatma, I did not know that you have become an astrologer in the meantime.
Mahatma: No, I have become a modern physicist. "Intuitively", at the dawn of "civilization", of Labour, Man knew that all living things on Earth are rhythmically attuned to the magnetic, electrostatic and electromagnetic fields of the solar system. Of course, they expressed these "Bezüge", these relations, in "primitive" ways.
Indira: You are right, Mahatma. Last time, here in Venezuela, when the Sun went into total eclipse, the birds, animals, the insects, became restless, very anxious; our birds ceased to sing, the hens jumped up the tree, searching for their safe resting places, everything kept silent, waiting, awaiting something strange.
Jeanette: Not only could Thales predict a total eclipse of the sun in 585 B.C., but long before, during the "Bronze Age", around 1800 B.C., at the Stonehenge Observatory, ancient priests had announced the coming of the seasons, and eclipses of the sun and moon. When the "brains" still function, you don't need NASA to know all these things.
Karl: That is true. "Red Indians" hold their newly-born out to the sun. Saluting the rising sun, receiving its cosmic rhythm, had been a practice on a world scale; the Chinese, the Japanese, the Hindus, even some Greek thinkers, Socrates and Dion, followed this natural exercise.
Frantz: Karl, I did not know that you have such experience in baby-sitting. Anyhow, I agree with you. In adoration of the sun, even an ancient Pharaoh called himself Ikhnaton, "ray of the sun's face".
Coseino: Well, brilliant "ladies", what about the behaviour of the moon, about Luna, about Selena?
Winnie: She is even more strange than Apollo.
Mary: In a certain respect, the 28-day lunar cycle is apparently equal to the menstrual period of the majority of women; this fascinated everybody across the millennia.
Martina: Excellent, Mary. Across the earth, long ago, the cosmic relations of the moon had already been "globalized", related to rain, plants, tides, moods and fertility. In the Congo, the pygmies celebrate their festival of the new moon just before the tropical rainy season begins. For them, the moon, Pe, is the principle of generating and regenerating life, is the mother of creativity and fertility.
Jeffrey: Yes, Mary, you should know it. In Papua New Guinea, the Moon is like a sort of "Holy Ghost". When a girl assumes menstruation, it is her first husband. The Hittites called the moon "Arma", the big, pregnant one. In Cambodia, full moon implies that good luck comes your way.
Mary: You have "good luck" that you are not sitting next to me, else you would have had donkey ears by now. Anyhow, as far as I know, even constellations of stars were associated with fertility and fate. In China, the Great Bear or Wain (Dümkt) had been adored especially by women who desired to have kids.
Albert: The seven stars of the Pleiades, the seven daughters of Atlas, who committed suicide, were adored throughout the Ancient World.
Alfred: I remember a Danish fairy tale that explained why the Pleiades are invisible during a certain period of the earth year. Here is my artistic version of it.
"Once upon a time, there was a girl who was permanently violated by some male sex beasts; she had seven illegitimate children. One day, a nasty macho met her, and asked her: 'How are your seven bastards?' To punish him, Mother Nature changed him into a cuckoo. The kids were transformed into little stars, and placed in the heavens. Of course, in the summer when the cuckoo calls, the Pleiades are invisible."
Patricia: What a lovely innovation of "Birds", Alfred! The Aztecs of Central America had used the appearance of the Pleiades for horrible human sacrifice rituals. But, Mahatma, what did your Hindu ancestors think about astrology?
Coseino: Yes, how did Indian Theosophy relate the Cosmos to terrestrial doings and thoughts?
Mahatma: It believed that astral movements are directly related to earthly phenomena. In fact, Ancient Hindu Theosophy believed, that they influence farming, health, husbandry, even the "social order". The Vedas set the dates for sacrifice at the new or full moon. Brahma was identified as the "ruling breath of the Cosmos".
Coseino: Karl, what about Chinese Philosophy? Do you have an idea?
Karl: Yes, similarly, cosmic movements and relations revealed harmony, permanence, order and fertility. In fact, like in Greek hylozoism, the Cosmos was seen simply as a living and real organism. The "Tao" was elevated to the "vital energy" of the whole universe, including man. With this we can again connect to Reich and Tesla later.
Coseino: D'accord, Karl. Of significance to us, all these astrological, theosophical, cosmogonic, cosmological views were simply superstructural reflections of the emerging labour process; they simply wanted to harmonize Man in his relation with Nature, with the Cosmos, with Space and Time. Put another way, they aimed towards Labour Order, were focused at the progressive harmonization of unilateral economic exploitation of Nature by Man, by Society.
Nelson: In Ancient "Iraq", then called Chaldea, Astrology, the first Science of Cosmos, was developed. From Saddam Hussein's ancient forefathers we have inherited the "Heavenly Signs", the Zodiac.
Winnie: Your sign was directed towards earthly presidency.
Coseino: Excellent! In those days, astrological maxims were developed, and some "predictions" of Sargon the Old (2470-2430 BC) are still preserved.
Patricia: I know that you have an excellent memory. Please, quote some for us.
Coseino: I will try, dear Patricia. Here are some: "If the moon can be seen on the first night of the month, then the country will rejoice and be peaceful".
Another one states: " If the moon is surrounded by a halo, the king would rule supreme."
Furthermore, "If the setting sun is double its normal size, and three of its rays are bluish, well, then it is apocalypse now."
Joseph: This must have been the case in the night before "Desert Storm".
Adam: I remember another maxim, too. It could have been the following: "If Mars is visible in the month of Tammuz, the warrior's bed will stay cold (there will be war)."
Coseino: Brilliant, Adam. You are getting more and more like me.
Indira: At present, for Venezuela, the following prediction would make 85% of its inhabitants, who live in extreme poverty, very happy: "If Jupiter seems to enter within the moon, prices will go down."
Frantz: In the Congo, this kind of prediction became true a while ago: "If Mars comes close to Gemini, a king will die, and there will be rivalry."
Patricia: When Coseino was born, the following happened: "If a child is born when the Moon has come forth, then his life will be bright, excellent and long."
Coseino: Holy Cow! I have a bunch of astrologers as students! By Jove, you are experts! You did your home-work remarkably well!
Patricia: Professor, you have forgotten, we are your students. To understand our teacher is to surpass him, is to excel him. After all, this is what this class is all about, what Existence AND Transcendence is all about.
Coseino: I agree. In those days, at least, people, like the Pythagoreans, still spoke about various Spheres, about the Harmony (the Relation or Bezug) of the Spheres. Of course, "harmony" is not "peace", does not denote cosmic "peace" or "rest"; on the contrary, it is a "contradiction", a "contrapostulate".
Mahatma: Homer called Venus "The Herald of The Dawn"; also "Vespertine".
Coseino:
Yes, Mahatma. The Ancient Greeks did not realize
that both were one and the same planet. Similar things happen in everyday
life; we distinguish formal-logically between two things, when, in reality,
it is not even two sides of the same thing, but
de facto the one and the very same thing;
for example, Labour and Alienation.
Jeanette: If I remember correctly, Mercury was called the "Twinkle Star".
Coseino: Surely, and later the British kids sang: "Twinkle, twinkle, little star. How I wonder what you are!"
Bill: And Mars is the "Fiery Star", Jupiter the "Luminous Star", and Saturn the "Brilliant Star". Soon they will all be colonized by using Tesla Technology.
Coseino: Not quite so soon, Bill. Jupiter and Saturn would cause some serious colonization problems. However, let us advance to Astrology and Cosmology in our own "times", in the 20th century.
Benefiting from the powerful international communications media, Astrology experienced a renaissance between the two "World Wars"; it spread again from the USA, to Canada, to England, and then to Continental Europe. It appeared as a new Esperanto, as a kind of Orwellian Newspeak. Horror horoscopes appeared in every possible newspaper or magazine. By the 1960's, the USA had over 5,000 working astrologers, serving over 10 000 000 customers.
Mahatma: In India, the whole back page of all newspapers were dedicated to horoscopes.
Karl: In the Mideast, no VIP marriage could take place, without astrological advice.
Jeanette: In 1960, in Japan, 8 million copies of koyomi, of horoscopes, were sold.
Steve: In the USA, Canada and England, university students could even acquire academic certificates and diplomas like "D. F. Astrol. S.",
Coseino: During the Second World War, a real astrological hit became the "Centuries" of Nostradamus (1503-66). The Nazis had developed a monstrous Herrenvolk Newspeak, based in Astrology and Nostradamus. Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda, had employed an army of astrologers whose job it was to publish a pro-German edition of the "prophecies". The Allies published their version of Nostradamus' prophecies, hence "astrology" made its hey-day.
Indira: Could you give us an example of real, true cosmic relations which explode the "normal' spatial-temporal parameters of Labour?
Coseino: Of course, I will give you a simple temporal illustration, which you yourself are experiencing. The scientist, F. A. Brown Jr., made us aware of an interesting cosmic relation, which challenged the usual earthly labour time. Changing their "normal" habitat, he placed healthy, uncloned, natural potatoes, carrots and salamanders in containers and measured their metabolic reactions, as revealed by the quantity of oxygen released. Using a sophisticated scientific method, which he had developed, he discovered that the curve of their displayed oxygen consumption corresponded to the curve of barometric pressure outside the laboratory reported two days after each experimental measurement.
Not only were the "biological clocks" of the "guinea-pigs" changed, these modifications were even affected by "future" events, which were not yet reality at the time of the experiment, and which would only come into being two days later.
In fact, according to Brown, after three years of laboratory work, of scientific observation, he noticed that any living organism, from sea-weed to carrots, from crabs to oysters, to rats, could "predict very safely beyond chances the barometric pressure change usually two days in advance."
In reality, we do not need an expensive laboratory; just by living on Pandemonium Farm, in a region where on the average it rains only 12 times annually, just by observing Nature, the ants, the trees, the plants, you, Indira, could predict any heavy rainfall within the next 48 hours in advance. What sense does "time", the "future", have, when I know it "now" already? To know it, is to live it, here and now, all of it.
What happened to the majority of the cosmic "senses" of homo sapiens sapiens? Did labour devour them all? What can the "mind" still "see" beyond labour "reality", about the spheres? Have all the Salvation Armies of Gods, Devils and Angels already totally destroyed the emancipatory cosmic-ontic-transcendental relation? Are only the formal-logical Heaven, Hell or Purgatory awaiting us in the "hereafter"? Is working, labouring man totally alienated? Is he already totally off his "senses", off his "mind"? These topics we will deal with in our next philosophy class on "Existence AND Transcendence". Good-bye, students, see you all next time!
