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Peter’s Correspondence on the Actual Freedom List with Correspondent No 23
PETER: A comment you made recently about something I had written in my journal caught my eye, so I thought to respond. RESPONDENT: It pays off to keep the eye on the ball in case you have not read that post… snipped from <No 57 Re: Nice enough but ... (plain text) >
I’d be a hypocrite if I were not to admit that one of the reasons that I decided to deeply dive into the third alternative when I read Peters Journal. Ah well Boys will be boys I guess. PETER: You forgot ‘and girls will be girls’ – unless you think that only half of the human species are capable of enjoying the pleasures of sexual play. RESPONDENT: It is mainly the difference in plumbing systems of man and women that makes the difference so interesting and at times very attractive. PETER: Whilst it is the difference in societal conditioning and instinctive programming of men and women that makes sexual play so often disappointing and at times even objectionable. Whenever I have had the opportunity to discuss the topic of sex with either men or women I find that the same issues equally plague both sexes and nowhere did I find anyone with solutions, and especially so in the spiritual world. I have always said that the opportunity of unravelling the human sexual enigma was one of the things that attracted me to actualism – after all there is no more intimate activity that one can have with a fellow human being than to share the sensual pleasures of mutual sexual play. And a fascinating journey it has been as I experientially ventured through my own gender conditioning and my own spiritual/ religious morals and taboos – my social identity – and on into the malevolent instinctual urges that this social conditioning is designed to pacify … until I finally came out the other side. The result of making that exploration – a very down-to-earth exploration – is that sex is now always sensually pleasurable, always fresh, novel, easy and playful. The other aspect of having made this investigation is that increasingly there have been more and more experiences of an actual intimacy with a fellow human being – the uncomplicated innocence of mateship that the fickle feeling of love always promises but never delivers. Good, hey * PS from Vineeto: ‘Yes, scrumptious, yummy, delightful and great fun.’
PETER to No 60: What you write of reminds me of the time I first really became aware of not being
free. I had been on the spiritual path for years but when my teenage son died I experienced that I was ‘bound’, as though I had invisible bands
around my chest that I needed to break free of. Having someone so young die seemed such a waste, which made me realize that I also was wasting my
life unless I became free of these bands before I died. RESPONDENT: I remember when I read that story, there was something very strange about the way you described that. How the message was being delivered as I felt when I read it was in a pure matter of fact way, inescapable. The stunning absence of any sympathy with the receiver had me baffled. And I remember thinking ‘this is how they deal with a sudden death in Poona’. Also the fact that after the delivery you responded fully emotional; started to cry practically immediately; I think is a not so normal reaction what I got from it was that you had been trained to get it fast out of your system and indeed having done (as I assume) some emotional release work it seems to have been an intelligent response of the system that you immediately started crying. PETER: Your assumptions about the ashram having a particular way of dealing with sudden death is way off the mark – the woman who told me my son had died was an acquaintance and she chose to tell me straight up rather than dilly-dallying. I would probably have done the same if I had have been in a similar situation. Your speculation that my reaction was due to the fact that I had been trained to react that way or that my ‘system’ responded ‘intelligently’ due to me having done some emotional release work is so far off the mark it is baffling as I have made it very clear that I see nothing at all of value in New-Age pop therapy. * PETER to No 60: Being ‘normal’ was never ever satisfactory, particularly as the pursuit of
material wealth and financial power never appealed to me – I somehow knew that ‘something’ was missing but I didn’t know of any
alternative. About age 33 I fell for the belief that abandoning grim reality and opting for a greater reality meant freedom. I guess when my son
died I no could longer kid myself that I knew anything about freedom and hence the feeling of not being free suddenly surfaced as being more urgent
and therefore much more obvious. RESPONDENT: Being normal, acting normal, feeling normal, could never satisfy this deeply felt urge to feel acknowledged in a special way, a way that would bring about that feeling that indeed there is a reason to be here and a damned good one as you somehow always vaguely knew, but yet never got to the point that you could/dared to independently, autonomously demolish that collective believe that is being reflected upon you over and over ‘actually nobody really likes to be here.’ so ... that is normal’? PETER: I can’t tell whether you are asking me a question or simply theorizing. * RESPONDENT No 60: I think I know what you mean about those bands. If we’re talking about the same thing, there’s nothing abstract about it is there? ... for me it feels something like a weight or a drag in the solar plexus region. PETER to No 60: I would describe my feeling as more like being in a straight-jacket and, yes, there was nothing abstract about it at all – there was a definite physical component to the feeling, as there is with all feelings. Plumbing the depths of such feelings can be fraught with danger for depression, and despair can lay at
the bottom, but at the time, and in the circumstances, this feeling of not being free proved to be inspirational and motivational – the feeling
was so strong that it was not something I could either dismiss or deny as I had done so often before. RESPONDENT: See that pre-emption appears to be a sensible one. As to: [such feelings can be fraught with danger for depression] Perhaps these are the very essence of depression, calling them dangerous is pushing my buttons I don’t know why that is so. PETER: The reason I said ‘plumbing the depths of such feelings can be fraught with danger for depression, and despair can lay at the bottom’ is that the risk is that one can become trapped in this emotional suffering of depression and despair and this in turn can lead to wanting to inflict emotional suffering on others and it can even lead to inflicting physical suffering on oneself or others. In other words, the dangers are very real, as can be the consequences. I’m not philosophizing here – I have explored the dark side of my own psyche but I did so knowing what I was doing in that I was attentive to the feelings and physical sensations that were happening at the time and how I was experiencing them. The remarkable thing about developing such attentiveness is that when it was up and running I was no longer capable of being consumed by the instinctual passions, be they the savage passions or the tender passions. An on-going constant attentiveness combined with pure intent replaces the need to be forever ‘in control’, the need for morals and ethics to curb the dark side, the need for drugs of any description to dampen the effects of depression or to induce any altered sates of consciousness and so on. Even a virtual freedom from malice and sorrow is to live way beyond human expectations. RESPONDENT: Then again there seems to be a building up of suspense. [the feeling was so strong that it was not something I could either dismiss or deny as I had done so often before] Yep… you can feel that something’s gonna happen. [I could either dismiss or deny as I had done so often before] That’s not a pathetic sound bite. PETER: Is this a literary critique or have you got something else on your mind? RESPONDENT: Incidentally Peter I have recently made some ‘cross-reference’ to No 58 and Richard by using the expression codswallop as being borrowed by No 58; thus far I have not yet gotten a response of in what sense you have used it. PETER: You did ask me a question but then in the same post you appeared to come to your own conclusions about what my answer would be or should be, so I passed on replying. RESPONDENT: It’s fine to make allegations and to remember people that these are preferable to be made substantial, but I could file a complaint about your not responding to my question I see no reason to hmm ‘peer review’ you in a different way, then I do the others. PETER: If you care to re-read
RESPONDENT: And let’s face it you were playing muscle man to No 58 and yes he’s become my list mate so to speak. PETER: Whilst it is apparent that you have assumed the role as list moderator and score keeper, my position is if someone writes what I consider to be codswallop I sometimes have the whim to take them to task. Whilst I am happy, I am not a fool and whilst I am harmless, I am not an ‘excuse-me-while-I-just-lay-down-on-the-floor-so-you-are-better-able-to-walk-all-over-me’ pacifist. As a would-be list moderator it appears to have escaped your attention that actualists on this list are doomed if they do respond (they are then called ‘defensive’) and damned if they don’t (they are then considered to be ‘wimps’). RESPONDENT: Now it may be that there is some idiosyncratic difference between you and me but somehow I have the feeling that how would I put it; our relationship is not really that kind of supportive that I would like it to be. Yes... I think it has to do with respect for each other’s idiosyncrasies and even a little more then that. Ok ... If there has been anyone pathetic then it’s me who takes the blame for that. PETER: Generally as I read what you write to this list, I do find that I understand very little of it. I don’t see this as due to a lack of command of the English language on your part but rather I find that what you probably regard as your idiosyncratic style simply serves to baffle me much of the time. Further, being able to have a meaningful conversation with someone depends upon there being at least some interests in common and from what I gather your interest lays in promoting something you call Actual Reality, but I have yet to be able to work out what it is exactly. Perhaps I can put it this way, I could never get interested in playing poker – there just seemed to be whole lot of nonsense and bluffing that went on before everybody finally laid their cards on the table. If nothing else, I think I have laid my cards on the table on this mailing list but it is apparent that many other participants like playing a game of holding their cards close to their chests. RESPONDENT: But i.e. the discussion between No 37 and No 58 you have been sooo blatantly absent. A fellow list member gets literally verbally raped and you apparently shrug your shoulders and say ah well shit happens and No 37 is gone. PETER: Let me get this right. On the one hand you mark me down in your score book for saying that what No 58 had written was codswallop and providing the evidence that it was codswallop by contrasting what he said with how he talked to other list members and then you mark me down for not taking No 58 to task for how he talked to one of those list members. Dammed if I do and dammed if I don’t, hey. At some point in the early stages of actualism I remember thinking that becoming an actualist would mean that I would have to ‘stick my head above the parapet’. I had witnessed the brickbats and barbs that Richard had got when he wrote on a spiritualist mailing list and I realized that would also be my lot if I dared to say that it is my experience that the actualism method works in that one can become incrementally free of both malice and sorrow if one so desires. Although I knew what I was in for, I found I couldn’t let the naysayers and doomsayers stop me. I figure it’s exactly the same for anyone else on this list who dares to stick their head above the parapet – it’s up to them what they do with the responses they get, how they respond or whether they respond, because actualism is about having the courage to stand on one’s own two feet. RESPONDENT: Ok... I can understand you pass when I blame a couple of nations as that apparently is not in your interest as your country is being included and you have not taken sides for your country (just as an experiment to get to know what it’s like to feel re-associated) I did take side, as my country was not to blame and it simply felt more secure to blame the others rather then myself. PETER: As for blaming either yourself or others, blaming is a feeling that is as useless and as debilitating as any other feeling. The ultimate cause of GW2, like all the other wars that have been fought or are still being fought are the genetically-encoded instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire – those very same passions that are the focus of actualism. RESPONDENT: With the backup of a whole country I surely had taken a position and it has most certainly after all been an interesting learning experience as now I feel I am entitled to label myself as a Neo-Dutch man and incidentally the first ever. PETER: Will you remain the first and only or are you planning to be the head of a new movement? Nowadays whenever I come across people who are busy philosophizing about the morals and ethics of politics or social issues, I am well pleased that I stopped pointing my finger at others and blaming ‘them’ for the ills of the world and made the life-changing decision to turn that same finger around and point it at ‘me’. It was a very deliberate action based on the down-to-earth realization that the only person I could change was ‘me’ – the very notion that all six billion of ‘them’ had to change before I could become happy and harmless was pathetic. And not only this but a PCE confirms that the only person ‘I’ need to change is ‘me’ because whenever ‘I’ temporarily vanish this flesh and blood body directly and unfetteredly experiences the utter peacefulness of the actual world that is already here and has always been here all along. * PETER to No 60: Observation will reveal that all feelings and emotions have physical sensations
associated with them. The last half century of scientific study has unearthed the cause of this – a veritable cocktail of hormones are triggered
by instinctive reactions to both actual or presumed physical dangers as well as to intuitive, as in speculative or imaginary, psychic dangers. (Editorial note: This above assertion by feeling-being ‘Peter’ (that ‘hormones are triggered by instinctive reactions’) is at odds with what Richard reports (that hormones are triggered by instinctual passions):
 Richard, List B, No. 12, 16
January 2003 [emphasis added].
RESPONDENT: Yes, Basic instinctual fear can indeed manifest in many varieties due to the exquisite moderations that can be made – not only one veritable cocktail of hormones – but a large assortment of these admixtures produce a scala of experiences yet all are, more or less all tainted with the sensation of an impending danger. PETER: I don’t know whether you have experienced basic instinctual fear, but I have experienced terror and dread and ‘exquisite’ is not a word that comes to mind and the experience went way beyond ‘being tainted with the sensation of an impending danger’. Either we are talking about different experiences or you are theorizing about the nature of basic instinctual fear. It is difficult for me to determine which it is unless you personalize your writing and talk about your own experience. RESPONDENT: This gives rise to the hypothesis that how fear becomes manifest in the body is related to ancient animal patterns a particular way of ‘bodily regressing’ i.e. from the reptilian brain or the mammal brain may come a message to produce i.e. an emulation of a frog/ dog/ gorilla/ lion aso. pattern. PETER: Well there is no need to hypothesize about the instinctual passions – a bit of clear-eyed observation is sufficient to make it patently clear that all sentient animals have instinctual survival reactions and in particular that human animals also have instinctual survival passions. The reason these instinctual reactions are manifest as passions in human beings is due to the fact that human beings are aware of these physical reactions and when the resultant physical sensations reach the brain we also ‘feel’ the fear, feel the aggression, feel the nurture and feel the desire. Not only this but even if there is no actual need to feel these feelings, the human psyche has the perverse capacity to invent situations or imagine scenarios in which ‘he’ or ‘she’ is feeling fearful, feeling aggressive, feeling sad and so on, or to share or participate in the fearful, aggressive or sad feelings of others. (Editorial note: This above assertion by feeling-being ‘Peter’ (that ‘these
instinctual reactions are manifest as passions’ is at odds with what ‘he’ wrote in the Actual Freedom Library: “The arising of instinctually-sourced
feelings produces a hormonal chemical response in the body, which can lead to the false assumption that they are actual.” RESPONDENT: The feeling of i.e. [like being in a straight-jacket] thus might be the result of an inhibited (for whatever reason) emulation of a certain animal behaviour with regard to the according breathing pattern on a certain condition of danger. PETER: I’d give a 0 out of 10 for that speculation. The feelings I had had nothing to do with danger and everything to do with not being free. RESPONDENT: ^note fear in it’s raw instinctual form is not facilitated to be experienced due to historical conditioning, it seems that Law and order in a broader context safely can be said not to be maintained at the point of one gun but more at the thread of a whole fr*kn army and every gun is pointing to you consequently you damned well learn to internalize the Law^ PETER: And yet when I experienced raw instinctual fear as dread and terror, I was sitting safely on the balcony of a flat in a small quiet and relatively-peaceful country town – I didn’t have ‘a whole fr*kn army and every gun pointing’ at me. * RESPONDENT No 60: If we’re talking about the same thing, I carry this sensation/feeling around with me everywhere I go (sometimes it’s more oppressive than others, of course, but it’s almost always present to some degree). Apart from a few short interludes of genuine happiness, I always have. PETER to No 60: We may well be talking about different things here. I was talking about a
singular life-changing realization – the realization that my life would be a waste if I didn’t become free of the sense of bondage that I
experienced as bands around my chest. From what I understand you are talking of an almost constant background feeling of heaviness. If this is the
case then I can relate to this – for me it was a feeling of seriousness and responsibility that was both wearying and stressful. It’s a tough
job being an entity living inside a corporeal body, ever on guard, ever needing to be in control and yet never being able to do so. It appears that
my son’s death was the catalyst for me not accepting this as being a good enough way to live. RESPONDENT: Indeed especially the failure to get this desired control gave rise to a lot of frustration in my case. PETER: Yep, that little fella ‘who’ thinks and feels he needs to be in control has got an impossible task because people, things and events never do what ‘he’ wants them to and even if they happen to on occasion ‘he’ knows deep down inside that it wasn’t all ‘his’ doing anyway which means ‘his’ frustration is insatiable. There is a way out of course, but it means the end of ‘him’ – something ‘he’ will bitterly resist. * RESPONDENT No 60: Only rarely am I completely free of it (more below). And, hmmm, just realised as I’m writing this, I actually feel guilty about feeling this way. (Allow me to rant for a moment here because this is quite unexpected). Yes. A thousand exhortations to ‘count your blessings’, ‘think yourself lucky’, ‘thank your lucky stars’, ‘there but for the grace of God ...’, have all been taken (literally) to heart. Heh. When I hear other people talk about the ‘unbearable lightness of being’, it seems to me that ‘being’ is not a balloon, it’s a fucking boulder! RESPONDENT: As to [it seems to me that ‘being’ is not a balloon, it’s a fucking boulder!] With that expression you stole my heart as this fucking boulder really hit home. Yet I’d say this being is as well a fucking balloon as it is a fucking boulder that is I must add my experience. Also to push the analogy a bit further that Balloon may vary as being an (nearly) empty or inflated to the near maximum with all kind of alternative in between variations. Where the boulder (though rather solid) may vary from not to heavy to extremely heavy in terms of weight. Were weight could translate as an experience of carrying an emotional burden that at times even feels a not to unpleasant emotional pressure experienced in the body as some form of (over) excitement/ stress/ fatigue aso. PETER: If I can join the ‘balloons and boulders’ club for a bit, if I am reading you right, I can relate to your ‘nearly empty’ balloon feeling as being somewhat like the almost feeling-less state I used to call being ‘comfortably numb’. From my experience it’s a very deceptive and fickle state of comfort because as soon as some storm blows up, as it surely will, you are back in the washing machine of emotions with egg all over your face, busy blaming others for having disturbed your ‘nearly empty’ balloon. And as for the ‘not unpleasant emotional pressures’, it’s very clear that people do like their sad feelings and do get a kick out of feeling aggressive, indeed most of what human beings term as entertainment involves listening to the sad stories of others or watching human beings being aggressive towards each other. * PETER to No 60: The human condition is littered with dimwitticisms RESPONDENT: [It’s not for nothing that ‘self’-centred reality is know as grim reality.] That sounds like everybody knows that [‘self’-centred reality is grim reality] yet, I beg to differ from opinion. PETER: When you experience your being as a ‘fucking boulder’, is this not your own grim reality which in turn you paste over everything you see, hear, taste, smell or touch, or are we talking of different things here? When you are feeling down and lacklustre does not the tree you particularly noticed the day before seem to have now lost its lustre, does the coffee not taste as good, does the world now seem dull and tinged with sadness? Given that the default setting of the human psyche tends to sorrow and grimness, human reality can be said to be a grim reality and one needs to make an almost constant effort to fight the good fight, look on the bright side or seek excitement or entertainment in order to keep one’s head above water. I’ve never been prone to depression or aggression in my life but when I came to be aware of the human condition and how it operates as ‘me’, I was astounded at how much effort ‘I’ had to expend in order put a better shine on grim reality. After I set my sights on becoming happy and harmless and started to have some success at it, I discovered that all the effort ‘I’ had previously expended in battling it out gradually became redundant as malice and sorrow started to disappear out of my life. * PETER to No 60: The problem I found with being a normal human being was that I was prone to bouts
of melancholy no matter how ‘positive’ I tried to be, that I had a tendency to be antagonistic no matter how much I tried to hide it … and
that I had an over-arching feeling of being separate from everyone and everything, a feeling which was only temporarily relieved by ‘belonging’
to someone or by ‘owning’ something. It’s the lot of being a passionate being. RESPONDENT: I think that is the lot of the rebellious entity that deep down inside never gave up, but if you like to call it antagonistic I can well be with that also. PETER: When I wrote my journal and it came time to do a front cover for the paperback version I chose a black cover with red and white lettering because I figured that actualism would appeal to those with a rebellious streak in them. I did this because it seemed that there was no more rebellious thing that one could do than to deliberately decide to opt out of the human condition, in toto – to prove by one’s own example that it is possible for human beings to live together in peace and harmony on this paradisiacal planet. To dare to cease being a contributor to malice and sorrow was another way I put it at the time. Game-in-progress score – a handful of rebels / 6 billion conformists. * PETER to No 60: I didn’t know anything about Eastern religion in my youth and by the time I did
it was too late – I had fallen for it hook, line and sinker. And I am more than glad that I did because I got to know it from the inside as it
were. If I hadn’t made such a thorough investigation, I would probably still be trying to reconcile materialism with spiritualism as I see many
other people trying to do. RESPONDENT: If – you refer with ‘Eastern religion’ to so-called Rajneeshism I think it might be more accurate to refer to that as religion at large (aka. A mixture of eastern and western religion) as I would do anyway, because that is my experience. PETER: Well as I knew him, Chandra Mohan was born a Jain and died a Jain, and his claim to fame or notoriety came about by bashing the largest Western religion on the planet – Christianity. If you experience his teachings in some other way, then fair enough. * PETER to No 60: After I ditched the spiritual path, I have since done a good deal of practical
work in dismantling my social identity – my identity as a father, a lover, a provider, a rational-thinking male, a SNAG, a WASP, a socialist, a
pacifist, a creative person, a patriotic Australian, and so on. It’s a big list to go through because I wanted to get rid of – or at least
reduce to the most miniscule that ‘I’ possibly could – the affective parts of my social identity such that I could be happy and harmless
whilst in the company of my fellow human beings. And if I wasn’t, then I had something to look at, for I then knew that some bit or other of my
social identity needed to be discarded. RESPONDENT: And look at the fruits of that dismantling procedure; still there are those identities a father (in my case uncle), a lover, a provider, a rational (in my case more or less) – thinking male, <snip>a socialist, a pacifist, a creative person, a patriotic Australian (in my case a patriotic Dutch) yet not impassioned or at least not so much anymore. PETER: I don’t quite know if you are talking about me or about yourself when you say ‘still there are those identities’. If you are disputing what I am saying then that’s understandable because the only way you could confirm whether what I am saying is possible would be for you to confirm by your own experience that it is possible. If you are talking of your personal experience then there is not enough information for me to make a meaningful comment. * PETER to No 60: Becoming happy and harmless does have consequences – becoming autonomous and
anonymous are wonderful side-effects, but apparently ones that frighten many away from actualism. RESPONDENT: And yet that becoming autonomous and anonymous (though in my case relatively anonymous a self choses level so to speak) seems to be the key to indeed become happy and harmless. PETER: Well, you have to understand that when I talk about ‘becoming autonomous and anonymous are wonderful-side effects of becoming happy and harmless’ I am talking from the perspective of someone who is already virtually happy and harmless. Back at the start of this process when I was first contemplating devoting my life to the task of becoming happy and harmless, the side-effects that I could see then were daunting to say the least – it was obvious to me that if I set off down that path and kept going, it would be the ending of ‘me’. * PETER to No 60: By the stage of my second experience of not being free I had by-and-large demolished my social conditioning – including the spiritual conditioning that insists that to become free of social conditioning is the meaning of life – which meant I was then able to experience that there is in fact another layer beneath one’s social conditioning that one needs to become free of, and that is the human condition itself. My experience of being tethered to Humanity made it clear that I would not be actually free whilst these invisible emotional tentacles – as in psychic ties – remained. It also occurred to me at the time that ‘I’ only exist whilst these tentacles exist and if these
tentacles disappeared then ‘I’ would cease to exist … because ‘I’, as an affective non-physical being, only exist as a member of an
affective ‘big club’ we call Humanity, a ‘club’ that has no existence in actuality. RESPONDENT: Aye… Humanity, as ‘club’ has not ‘yet’ existence in actuality because ‘unless it is being experienced as such the value of idealistic inferences – that derive from the (idealized) premise I am human and you are human also thus there is common ground – is simply zero. PETER: And yet I wasn’t talking about idealized inferences derived from idealized premises, I was talking about the feelings I have had of not being free. The only way to understand how ‘I’ tick and how ‘I’ exist as a member of Humanity is to get in touch with one’s feelings and that is what I was talking about. Getting in touch with my feelings was the first thing I had to do in order to understand what actualism is about. * PETER to No 60: My description was that there was a ‘goody-two-shoes’ Peter – a front-man
if you like – beneath which lay a not very pleasant person who had a ‘dark side’ that was literally diabolical. RESPONDENT: Diabolical as in evil minded? PETER: No, one’s dark side is a passionate being at heart – ‘he’ or ‘she’ does not merely think dark thoughts, ‘he’ or ‘she’ feels dark feelings and ‘he’ or ‘she’ has an inherent potential to do dark deeds. RESPONDENT: As you speak in the past tense I wonder if you could give some description of that person that no longer exists. PETER: I am struggling to find a better description than
I can’t describe the character of the person per se, because ‘he’ was in no way unique or special – ‘he’ was merely a bundle of passions and neuroses exactly as is every other passionate ‘being’. I am not saying that I am actually free of this identity, but as ‘he’ no longer rules the roost as ‘he’ used to, I have little affective memory of how ‘he’ thought and felt at the time. I can only suggest reading my journal because it might give you more of an idea of ‘who’ I was at the start of this process. RESPONDENT: When using that word diabolical, have you fully explored the implications of i.e. putting yourself in the position of i.e. a hacker with really malicious intentions? PETER: No. I didn’t need to invent scenarios or resort to imagination in order to understand that ‘I’ had a dark, diabolical side, I simply became attentive to the full range of my feelings, as and when they were occurring in my everyday life, with people as-they-are, in the world as-it-is. * PETER to No 60: And just another comment that is relevant to the issue of morals and ethics –
there is a tendency for some people who have some appreciation of the inherent restrictions of their social conditioning to discard their original
moral and ethical conditioning in favour of adopting moral behaviour and ethical stances that are seen by society at large as being immoral and
antisocial – thereby fondly imagining that by swapping camps they have somehow freed themselves from their societal conditioning. Many then form
affiliations with like-minded ‘outcasts’ in order to feel kinship with others who also feel they have ‘seen the light’ or who ‘know the
truth’, or who justify their malice towards others as being ‘honest’, as being ‘real’, as being ‘authentic’, or as being ‘true’
to themselves. RESPONDENT: I think which way you are heading here with this [Many then form affiliations with like-minded ‘outcasts’] as to: [thereby fondly imagining that by swapping camps they have somehow freed themselves] I don’t think there is any fondliness in that. PETER: Are you saying that society’s so-called rebels aren’t fond of their rebellion? That’s certainly not my experience. When I was a political rebel I fondly imagined I was free of ‘the establishment’, when I was a spiritualist I fondly imagined that I was free of materialism and when I was a Rajneeshee I fondly imagined I was a member of a special in-club. RESPONDENT: Particular in the context of anti social behaviour ‘at large’ however, very euphemistically put, is the closest approach to what generally speaking agreed is to be criminal behaviour in some form or another. PETER: As a spiritualist I didn’t need to indulge in anti-social behaviour in order to fondly imagine that I was free of my societal conditioning – the feeling of self-righteousness I got from thinking and feeling that I was free of materialism was sufficient. * RESPONDENT No 60: Yeah, absolutely right. Moral systems are all different ways of inhibiting and/or harnessing the wild beast. Little point in trading one type of harness for another, while the beast remains unchanged. PETER to No 60: If you have followed my recent conversation with No 33 you will have understood
that only by becoming happy and harmless can morals and ethics become redundant. Of course ‘the beast’, to use your words, will resist this, as
being happy and being harmless goes against ‘the beast’s’ very nature – but what to do? If you want to be free of the human condition this
is the work to be done, no matter how daunting or how scary it may seem at first. RESPONDENT: Hmmm ... For some reason I think that No 58 might object to that. PETER: I know you like playing the list moderator but such comments make no contribution at all to the discussion I was having with No 60. * PETER to No 60: When you say ‘for the last five years or so we’ve enjoyed the kind of
relationship that you and Vineeto are exploring,’ are you saying that you live with your girlfriend in utter peace and harmony – because that
is how I live with Vineeto. The reason I say this is because before I began to rid myself of my own feelings of antagonism and sadness I never
could live this way with anyone, let alone with a companion. Before then I had the tendency to be as moody and as cantankerous as anyone else I
knew – not that I was willing to admit it at the time. RESPONDENT: As I’m not as a fly on the wall or a probity policeman spying/ prying/ glaring into your private life with Vineeto, I take your word for this living in ‘utter’ peace. PETER: Well if you want to then that’s your business but I didn’t take Richard’s word for it that he lived in peace and harmony with his companion because I had had enough of believing by the time I met him. By what I could see he did, but I couldn’t know what went on when I wasn’t there. But as what he said made sense, I decided to find out for myself whether it was indeed possible. Now that I know that it is possible by my own experience, I no longer need to take his word for it. RESPONDENT: Nevertheless still stand this question (it was sent in rich text you may have not received it) [To pre-empt misunderstandings here, I am asking you in what sense you have meant to use the expression ‘codswallop’ in the dialogue sequence with No 58. The noun codswallop has 1 sense (no senses from tagged texts)
My guess is that your intent was to jokingly refer to the sticky quality merely to his contribution; hence I would say you probably meant applesauce. That is of course a more or less educated guess I for one have not detected ill will in his contributions, but then again it was him who borrowed the expression from you. If in the case that you meant it to be trashy then it thus only might refer to the quality of the sauce (i.e. not suitable for consumption). I for one would ‘stick’ to applesauce when using the expression.] In the context of ‘utter’ peace there is indeed no other option then to interpret it as a form of slapstick. Nevertheless my client ‘No 58’ had to bring his suit to the dry-cleaning, as he had codswallop all over and yet he did not even complain as he is apparently is willing to not take any offence even to the point of humiliation. PETER: As I have said above, if you care to re-read
* PETER to No 60: I made the comment because this was my experience – even a good many months after I had a good intellectual grasp of the fact that actualism had nothing to do with spiritualism and that any ‘self ‘-aggrandizing states were but a wank, I gradually became aware that I was having subtle behind-the-scenes ‘self’-aggrandizing feelings. The only reason I discovered them was that they came bubbling to the surface such that I could neither deny them nor dissociate from them. I mentioned it in my journal so as to flag a warning as it were to others who might tread the path –
RESPONDENT: Well most guys will admit that ‘Money for nothing and your chicks/boys for free’ is indeed a tempting prospective. A very straightforward reference to what is on a guys/girls mind. Nevertheless the way to get there and to stay there demands a form devotion/ persistence/ stubbornness not to mention some very good luck. In all honesty I must say that should now occur the situation that I could make a good buck with actualism I would not have many second thoughts about it. And in fact though I used to have a different opinion I think it would not be unfair to consider to put a price tag on actualist-expertise, as most expertise has been tagged this way. But perhaps that is something to consider in a later stage. PETER: I can only suggest that you first understand what actualism is about before you try to make ‘a good buck’ out of it. If you do start to practice actualism yourself you will, as I did, come to experientially understand that ‘money for nothing’ is even more a fundamental instinctive lure than is the lust for fame and for power over others. Whilst fame and power are the icing on the cake, ‘money for nothing’ has a more basic appeal. This explains why people have no qualms at all about selling snake-oil to their fellow human beings, and often whilst knowing full well that what they are selling is snake-oil. * PETER to No 60: I thought I understood the trap well but I discovered it was only an intellectual
understanding – being gripped by the passions gave me an experiential understanding of the overwhelming power of this instinctive lure. No wonder
it has seduced all those who trod the traditional path to freedom. RESPONDENT: Again as to [No wonder it has seduced all those who trod the traditional path to freedom] All those? See, what I perceive it’s only a hair length that you put out an image where people will/ might/ could interpret you as a fundamentalist. PETER: Well, you have just indicted to me that you have experienced the very same feelings as I experienced – ‘Well most guys will admit that ‘Money for nothing and your chicks/boys for free’ is indeed a tempting prospective’. A very straightforward reference to what is on a guys/ girls mind. PETER: Are you now exempting some of your fellow human beings from having the same feelings? I wonder why. What I am saying is something about the fundamental nature of the human passions that make up the human condition. If you see that as me being ‘a fundamentalist’, then so be it. * PETER to No 60: If I can add a rider to this post, I do appreciate that you write of your
personal experiences and your personal feelings as it means that we can talk about down-to-earth matters. I’ve never been fond of
intellectualizing for intellectualizing sake and I eventually found the male habit of philosophizing to be a way of dissociating from the reality
of one’s own everyday life (and I say this because I eventually came to understand that this was the reason why I joined in the philosophizing)
… RESPONDENT No 60: Never quite thought of it that way, but you’re probably right. Given the choice of talking footy, horse racing, women or philosophy over a beer, I choose philosophy any day – but maybe it’s a way of prolonging the seeking and postponing the finding ... PETER to No 60: Or as is currently fashionable in some teachings, a way of denying the need to
seek by accepting the belief that there is nothing to find? RESPONDENT: Yep exploring is much more fun then seeking eh? PETER: It is my experience that seeking and finding is much more fun … and far more rewarding … than the aimless exploring I did in my spiritual years. * PETER to No 60: … and yet I now find myself having to respond to posts that are nothing but
intellectualizing and philosophizing. I have the choice to ignore them of course but you might have noticed that I do take the opportunity to
sprinkle them with some personal anecdotes and some down-to-earth talk that I figure will be of interest to others on this list who are interested
in what is happening ‘where the rubber meets the road’. RESPONDENT: Well apart from some idiosyncratic differences I have a more or less sameness of responding to posts that invite to entertain in intellectualizing and philosophizing. PETER: Yeah. That’s my point. It appears that many people use this list as a way of entertaining themselves rather than use it as the opportunity that it is. RESPONDENT: Yet, as long as there is some sort of dialogue possible, there may be a chance that finally the overall context start to make sense in way that it is experienced where the rubber meets the road. PETER: It is up to each correspondent as to how they use the opportunity that writing to this mailing list provides – it is an un-moderated list after all. * RESPONDENT No 60: Well, the big problem seems to be that the experience can’t be imparted. Without the experiences there are only ideas, suggestions, clues. To be fair to the intellectualisers, it’s pretty hard to understand what is implied in a PCE without having experienced it. And without that, none of this verbiage, however colourful, is worth the bandwidth. PETER to No 60: Thus far there have been people who have recalled having had a PCE and yet have turned away from actualism and there have been people who have not recalled having had had a PCE and yet have been sufficiently attracted by the common sense inherent in actualism to have stuck with it to the point where their investigations into their own psyche in operation have provoked a spontaneous PCE. Remembering having had a PCE apparently does not necessarily translate into having the necessary intent to become happy and harmless. It is up to each individual who comes across ‘this verbiage’ as to what they want to do with what
they read … and who would have it any other way? RESPONDENT: One last note to ‘this verbiage’ Peter, did you write this in a PCE? PETER: No. The remarkable aspect of being virtually free of malice and sorrow is that common sense is freed to operate more or less unimpeded by any ‘self’-centred opinions and feelings.
RESPONDENT: Lets have a tug from the living well-spring of pure enquiry RESPONDENT No 58: Just curious. What exactly did you expect of Dick considering you had travelled thousands of miles from your home and were only gonna be in the Buddha field for a limited amount of time? RESPONDENT: Sorry I couldn’t hear. What was it that you said what field you were talking about? RESPONDENT No 58: Did you expect him to drop everything, all matters of importance, just to chat with an ordinary human? RESPONDENT: What matters of importance were to be dropped by who? Is there any difference between the matters of importance and the one who drops them? Iow. is not the dropper the same as what is being dropped? RESPONDENT No 58: After all, you are not a young woman. RESPONDENT: There is however no way to establish/ verify/ check that as a to be a fact otherwise, then come over and look me into the eyes request/ suggest/ me to drop my pants and then see what happens. RESPONDENT No 58: You are not some master where he could record the conversation, then cut and edit his way to some altered hollow victory, chock full of cheap points, and paste it onto his journal which shall serve as the new new testament after his bodily demise. RESPONDENT: Are you referring to the article about a conversation with a ‘spiritual teacher? RESPONDENT No 58: What exactly was he going to gain by such a meeting? RESPONDENT: Are you asking about what I expected to be his utility values. To name a few: (What would it buy him? Would it make him happy? Would it reassure him? Would it bring him peace? Would I serve him well in a crisis? How could he use me?) RESPONDENT No 58: Did you expect him to actually come face to face with a person as they are, in the world as it is? RESPONDENT: Are you asking what I was expecting from somebody who I only new from hearsay that that somebody had said ‘enlightenment is a myth’? RESPONDENT No 58: Did you expect him to risk getting off that pink cloud to suit your fancy and whim? RESPONDENT: I had no intimate knowledge as to the location this person was residing at that time. Iow. Whether that somebody was residing on some (obscure) pink/ green/ yellow/ black/ white cloud/ cloud nine (9). I did not know, let alone that I would have been able to have any ‘expectations’ that that somebody would come off that cloud, yu imagine him to be on at that time, let alone that I was ‘expecting’ that he was to come off that cloud to suit my fancy and whim. But just as a matter of ‘curiosity’, what do you mean by ‘risk’ in this context.? RESPONDENT No 58: Enquiring minds want to know. RESPONDENT: I have heard that it is said that curiosity killed the cat, could it be that this cat kind mind was perhaps performing a kind of inquiry that became fatal to that cat? Iow. perhaps this cat might have been a bit too naïve as to what the ‘risk level’ was of active inquiry/ inspecting/ exploration of that subject he went to curiously inquire about/inspect /explore into. ^note as this ‘cat story’ I only have from hmm ‘hearsay’ it well could be that it is a metaphorical reference to a person that perhaps sticked his/her nose into business that he were not supposed to stick his/her nose in^ No 58, curiosity 10.5.04 PETER: So much for having a tug from the ‘wellspring of pure enquiry’ hey? Seems to me that it was more like having a wallow in the muddy waters of deception and obscuration. Very simple questions received no coherent answers at all. Did you in fact travel thousands of miles in order to meet Richard? What were the exact circumstances of your not meeting Richard? Did it have anything at all to do with you not being a young woman or not being a spiritual teacher? But then again you did admit to being ‘somewhat evasive’ in a subsequent post –
Nod, nod, wink, wink, say no more, hey. By sleight-of-hand ‘No 23-the-hard-done-by’ survives unscathed and another of No 58’s trite innuendos, or in this case blatant fabrications, remains on the table.
Such is ‘the living well-spring of pure enquiry’ that ‘enquiring minds’ regular dip their snouts in to. In the light of your recent comments on accepting responsibility, not playing the blame game and putting one’s money where one’s mouth is this, I suggest that giving straight answers to the blatant fabrications of others could well be a good place to start.
RESPONDENT: Also I find it a bit strange that after my straightforward answers to Peter I have not yet received any straightforward answers to my questions which I thought were relevant to the situation and also your query. But then again Peter usually takes a fair time to digest before he responds so. We’ll see how it goes from here. PETER: I have searched back through your posts and cannot find any outstanding questions that are relevant to the topic of this mailing list, yet alone relevant to whatever ‘situation’ and ‘query’ you are currently referring to. Could you repost these questions or point me to the post(s) that contain these questions?
RESPONDENT: Dimlogicism Nah, you’re not gonna find that word in the dictionary. In fact it is a variation on dimwitticism PETER: I think you will find that there is already an appropriate word that applies to the
subject matter you were addressing – mentalism Mentalism is a particularly chronic form of self-indulgence and one that mostly afflicts the males of the species. I have an actualist friend who finds a good deal of the conversation on this mailing list to be bewildering and lacking in common sense. I point out to her that this is how men think, by and large, and have done for thousands of years – they persist in trying to make a philosophy out of the utterly simple and entirely down-to-earth business of being alive.
RESPONDENT: Dimlogicism Nah, you’re not gonna find that word in the dictionary. In fact it is a variation on dimwitticism PETER: I think you will find that there is already an appropriate word that applies to the
subject matter you were addressing – mentalism Mentalism is a particularly chronic form of self-indulgence and one that mostly afflicts the males of the species. I have an actualist friend who finds a good deal of the conversation on this mailing list to be bewildering and lacking in common sense. I point out to her that this is how men think, by and large, and have done for thousands of years – they persist in trying to make a philosophy out of the utterly simple and entirely down-to-earth business of being alive. RESPONDENT: Hi Peter I’m curious if you have asked her ‘what’ exactly she found bewildering and/or lacking in common sense. Have you? PETER: Yes. Which is why I wrote what I wrote. RESPONDENT: Also as you refer to your source of critics (an actualist friend) with regard to this mailing list and as apparently she (yet) has not made her opinion/ criticism/ whatever public here, it seems to be reasonable to presume that you and her have been evaluating (some) of the material from this list in private (aka a face to face situation). Am I correct in this presumption? PETER: Firstly, she is not a critic as in a fault-finder, attacker, censurer, detractor, carper, backbiter, reviler, vilifier; knocker, or a nit-picker as she has now put into practice the realization that no one else is to blame for her own feelings of malevolence and sadness. Secondly, as a practicing actualist her focus of interest is the hands-on study of the human condition as it manifests itself as ‘me’ which means she has abandoned the senseless habit of being a critic of others (as in being a fault-finder, attacker, censurer, detractor, carper, backbiter, reviler, vilifier; knocker, or a nit-picker). Speaking personally, whenever I read another’s post to this mailing list I always evaluate it in terms of whether or not what the other person has written makes sense or not, i.e. I evaluate the sincerity and facticity of the content of the post. I long ago understood the futility of attempting to ‘read between the lines’ as whatever I think or feel is written ‘between the lines’ can only ever be a product of my imagination.
RESPONDENT: Dimlogicism – nah, you’re not gonna find that word in the dictionary. In fact it is a variation on dimwitticisms PETER: I think you will find that there is already an appropriate word that applies to the
subject matter you were addressing – mentalism Mentalism is a particularly chronic form of self-indulgence and one that mostly afflicts the males of the species. I have an actualist friend who finds a good deal of the conversation on this mailing list to be bewildering and I point out to her that this is how men think, by and large, and have done for thousands of years – they persist in trying to make a philosophy out of the utterly simple and entirely down-to-earth business of being alive. RESPONDENT: Hi Peter I’m curious if you have asked her ‘what’ exactly she found bewildering and/or lacking in common sense. Have you? PETER: Yes. Which is why I wrote what I wrote. RESPONDENT: Ok. So you have asked her ‘what’ exactly she found bewildering. So I take it that you could provide at least one instance that you and her have discussed such as that she were able to report to you that she found that instance/post/article/dialogue, hence I assume that you would be able to provide at least one instance/post/article/dialogue that she mentioned to find. Could you please provide that one instance/ post/ article/ dialogue? PETER: And yet I have reported the gist of the content of the conversation that was relevant to this thread. RESPONDENT: Also as you refer to your source of critics (an actualist friend) with regard to this mailing list and as apparently she (yet) has not made her opinion/ criticism/ whatever public here, it seems to be reasonable to presume that you and her have been evaluating (some) of the material from this list in private (aka a face to face situation). Am I correct in this presumption? PETER: Firstly, she is not a critic as in a fault-finder, attacker, censurer, detractor, carper, backbiter, reviler, vilifier; knocker, or a nit-picker as she has long ago put into practice the realization that no one else is to blame for her own feelings of malevolence and sadness. Secondly, as a practicing actualist her focus of interest is the hands-on study of the human condition as it manifests itself as ‘me’ which means she has nowadays abandoned the senseless habit of being a critic of others (as in being a fault-finder, attacker, censurer, detractor, carper, backbiter, reviler, vilifier; knocker, or a nit-picker). Speaking personally, whenever I read another’s post to this mailing list I always evaluate it in terms of whether or not what the other person is saying makes sense or not, i.e. I evaluate the sincerity and facticity of the content of the post as I have long ago understood the futility of attempting to read between the lines as whatever ‘I’ think or feel is written ‘between the lines’ can only ever be a product of my imagination. RESPONDENT: Ok I’ll rephrase: [as you refer to your source (an actualist friend) with regard to this mailing list and as apparently she (yet) has not made her opinion public here, it seems to be reasonable to presume that you and her have been evaluating (some) of the material from this list in private ().] PETER: If I can just head this one off at the pass – the conversation we had was about the content of the posts to this mailing list and the relevance of the content to the down-to-earth business of being happy and harmless, it was not about individuals or individuals posts. In the course of the conversation it became evident that a good deal of the content reflects the male tendency to ‘persist in trying to make a philosophy out of the utterly simple and entirely down-to-earth business of being alive’. RESPONDENT: I admit that that [aka a face to face situation] is presumptuous as it well could be that she has let you know her opinion in a private e-mail/ telephone/ written letter /videotape conversation/ whatever other way then in a face to face situation. PETER: Just because you regard it as presumptuous that actualists discuss the human condition and come to conclusions as to how it manifests itself does not mean that it is so. Vineeto and I found such discussions to be absolutely necessary in the process of becoming free of the human condition, whether it be with Richard, between ourselves or with others on this and other mailing lists. The trick of course is not to fall for being obsessed about the details and nuances of how the human condition is manifest or to obsess about the personalities in which it is manifest but to realize that the human condition is manifest in each and every human being ... including ‘me’. RESPONDENT: Also as you state [she has now put into practice the realization that no one else is to blame for her own feelings of malevolence and sadness.] How can you know that? PETER: I know that because she is now focussed on eliminating her own malice and she has broken with the universally-ingrained habit of blaming other people, things or events for her own feelings of malice and sorrow – t’is a palpable and radical change in one’s own focus and in the way one relates to one’s fellow humans. RESPONDENT: I’m asking this because it has been pointed out what the difference between actualization and realization is. PETER: There is a vast difference between intellectually understanding that no one else is to blame for one’s own feelings of malevolence and sadness and having a realization that no one else is to blame for one’s own feelings of malevolence and sadness. Putting such a realization into practice can result in either of two actions – one can follow the traditional path of dissociation inherent in all spiritual/religious belief and practice … or one can do something completely innovative and choose to set off on the path to becoming happy and harmless. Given that the latter course of action is not only brand new in human history but is also counter-instinctual, anyone who chooses this path has demonstrably set off on a path of radical change. RESPONDENT: Iow. how have you established that she indeed has now [put into practice the realization that no one else is to blame for her own feelings of malevolence and sadness]? Did she tell you in a private e-mail/ telephone/ written letter/ videotape conversation/ whatever other way then in a face-to-face situation? PETER: Although you have rephrased your question it is still the same question. Consequently I still have the same answer –
RESPONDENT: As to: [I think you will find that there is already an
appropriate word that applies to the subject matter you are addressing – mentalism ).] I don’t think that mentalism is an inappropriate
word that applies to the subject matter that I was addressing, nevertheless I found dimlogicism PPS. As you may notice I have strictly taken your response face value. PETER: The thread you were responding to was one that was introduced by No 53 and the thrust of his logic led him to the following conclusions –
These comments, the last of which was made immediately prior to your post entitled ‘Dimlogicism’, are precisely why I made the following comment –
PETER to No 60: Being ‘normal’ was never ever satisfactory, particularly as the pursuit of material wealth and financial power never appealed to me – I somehow knew that ‘something’ was missing but I didn’t know of any alternative. About age 33, I fell for the belief that abandoning grim reality and opting for a greater reality meant freedom. I guess when my son died I no could longer kid myself that I knew anything about freedom and hence the feeling of not being free suddenly surfaced as being more urgent and therefore much more obvious. RESPONDENT: Being normal, acting normal, feeling normal, could never satisfy this deeply felt urge to feel acknowledged in a special way, a way that would bring about that feeling that indeed there is a reason to be here and a damned good one as you somehow always vaguely knew, but yet never got to the point that you could/dared to independently, autonomously demolish that collective believe that is being reflected upon you over and over ‘actually nobody really likes to be here.’ so … that is normal’? PETER: I can’t tell whether you are asking me a question or simply theorizing. RESPONDENT: Apparently you have missed the question mark behind the sentence. PETER: I did see the question mark which is why I said I cant’ tell whether you were asking me a question or simply theorizing. And just to spell it out as to what I meant by simply theorizing – it appeared to me to that you were theorizing, or speculating or imagining, as to what I meant by ‘being ‘normal’ as none of what you wrote accorded with what I said to No 60 in particular and none of it accorded with anything I have written elsewhere on the subject. What I have to say about being ‘normal’ is very straight forward and unambiguous – it is normal for human beings to either be materialists (whereupon the meaning of life is held to be the pursuit of material wealth and financial power) or spiritualists (whereupon the meaning of life is held to be the pursuit of personal salvation and esoteric/psychic power) … or they ‘tether their camel’ by ‘having a bet each way’. RESPONDENT: However here’s another opportunity to give a straight-forward-no-bullshit-answer: PETER: Given that the question you referred to is from a year-old post, do you plan to offer your opportunities on an annual basis? Speaking personally, I would be much more interested in answering your questions if they were straightforward questions that were relevant to the purpose for which this mailing list exists. Your post has arrived at an opportune time for it reminds me that fixation on trivia is one of the ploys that many use in order to avoid having ‘a straightforward no bullshit’ discussion about the fact that malice and sorrow is prevalent in instinctual feeling beings. RESPONDENT: have you ever wondered how <name deleted> is doing?? Yes, that’s right 2 (two, zwei, deux) question marks you can’t miss them right behind the sentence. PETER: If you are referring to No 33 who recently wrote on this mailing list, then the answer is no. As with all the other people who come and go in my life or have disappeared out of my life, I presume that No 33 is busy doing what No 33 is interested in doing and I wish him well doing it.
PETER: Matter, the stuff of which a thing is made, is commonly classified into three types – animal, vegetable or mineral. RESPONDENT: Which is not to say that it an accurate classification. PETER: Whilst I do acknowledge that this is a simplistic classification, I am at a loss to see that it is not accurate. Perhaps you could elaborate further on your comment? * PETER: If you asked a biologist, a doctor, a zoologist, a microbiologist, a mother or a teacher whether animal matter is passive, as in inert or inactive, he or she no doubt would look at you askance. That animal matter is ‘not merely passive’ is surely obvious but the extent to which it is not passive is literally breathtaking. As an example, the smallest unit retaining the fundamental properties of life are cells, the ‘atoms’ of the living world. RESPONDENT: Though you have atoms put between quotes, this could be the beginning of a misunderstanding because ‘atoms’ are elements best considered as how they are being classified as elements in the periodical system starting with the smallest unit H+ (hydroginum without the electron; a single proton). Cells imo can be best described as the smallest unit retaining the fundamental properties of biological life. PETER: I put the word atoms in inverted commas for a reason – to indicate that I was using it as a descriptive term and not necessarily to be taken literally. As I understand it, this is a common convention. * PETER: A single cell is often a complete organism in itself, such as a bacterium or yeast. Other cells, by differentiating in order to acquire specialized functions and cooperating with other specialized cells, become the building blocks of large multicellular organisms as complex as the human being. It would require a sheet of about 10,000 human cells to cover the head of a pin, and each human being is composed of more than 75,000,000,000,000 cells. RESPONDENT: If human-cells were angels you had resolved an ancient riddle [how many angels can be put on top of a needle pin]. PETER: In this case I am not indulging in fantasy but simply reporting a fact in order to give some sense of the microscopic scale of animate life. RESPONDENT: You being a self-proclaimed bootstrap non- spiritualist I doubt you’ll appreciate the credits for the solution. PETER: I take no credit for your fantasy – it is entirely your own fabrication. RESPONDENT: You being an architect a reconstruction of the analogy used [It would require a sheet of about 10,000 human cells to cover the head of a pin] might stretch your conceptualization into different direction. PETER: Given that source of the information is However, I don’t profess to be an expert in these matters – if you have information that contradicts what I have assumed to be fact, let me know. RESPONDENT: If the top of a needle were to be a platform as big as it were capable of covering the amount of supporters that an entire baseball stadium could contain. What would be the height of the needle and how thick would it be? PETER: Come in, No 23 … I am losing you … RESPONDENT: To make it easier, put the entire content of the stadium in a giant meat-grinder and make a large stadium-burger of it. PETER: … now I have lost reception entirely … but then again, I sometimes wonder if you and I live on the same planet. RESPONDENT: I am curious how you have represented this 75,000,000,000,000 figure in your mind. PETER: I don’t have to represent it in my mind – I know it be a fact that individual living cells cannot be seen by the naked eye and I also know it to be a fact that they can be seen with the aid of a microscope. I have seen documented evidence of individual living cells dividing and multiplying, captured by linking a video camera to a microscope – the instance that comes to mind is the fertilization of a human female egg by a male spermatozoa, both of which cannot be seen by the naked human eye, such that this singular event triggers an ongoing sequence of cell divisions that can lead to the development of yet another autonomous human being. This I find to be amazing – as in astonishing, wonderful, remarkable and marvellous. And even more amazing I find the fact that the collection of living cells that is the brain of this flesh and blood body can marvel at this fact.
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