Actual Freedom – A Request from Konrad Swart

November 11 1998:

KONRAD: An individual ethical ‘I’ has as its source some form of understanding, or logic itself. Or, better, this identity IS the identity that is really the master. And there is a ‘self’, that is ‘social’ of character. It consists of a social principle, and, as such, it is an identity. These two identities are the two things that are ‘in control’ of the body, one of action, the other of speaking. They are both identities, operating in our mind.

RICHARD: Before you build a case about me ... remember that this is your understanding and not mine.

KONRAD: I disagree, however from you analysis of where they come from. Their origin is our culture, and they are therefore not innate.

RICHARD: And therein lies the rub. All sentient beings are born with the survival instincts. This creates a rudimentary animal ‘self’. Being an identity is because the only way into this world of people, things and events is via the human spermatozoa fertilising the human ova ... thus every human being is endowed, by blind nature, with the basic instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire. These passions are the very energy source of the rudimentary animal self ... the base consciousness of ‘self’ and ‘other’ that all sentient beings have. The human animal – with its unique ability to think and reflect upon its own death – transforms this ‘reptilian brain’ rudimentary ‘self’ into being a feeling ‘me’ (as soul in the heart) and from this core of ‘being’ the ‘feeler’ then infiltrates into thought to become the ‘thinker’ ... a thinking ‘I’ (as ego in the head). No other animal can do this. This process is aided and abetted by the human beings who were already on this planet when one was born ... which conditioning and programming is part and parcel of the socialising process. Konrad, if you can tell me something that I do not already know then I am only too willing to learn. It does have to make sense, however and be based in fact and actuality. As your basic premise is ‘Tabula Rasa’ ... then whatever you write is based upon a false premise and will be fatally flawed no matter how convincing your argument appears to be in your own eyes.

KONRAD: Well, let us look at whether you really mean this. Ever heard of the experiment of Friedrich der Grosse?

RICHARD: Yes ... I watched a documentary about it on television some time last year. An hour long programme called ‘Compass’ in Australia.

KONRAD: He wanted to investigate the so-called ‘primary inborn language’. So he ordered that during a year every baby born in his kingdom should be delivered to him. And so it happened. These babies were fed, and taken enough care of so that they did not die because of lack of warmth etc.

RICHARD: This may or may not be correct – my memory is not too precise – but as far as I recall from the television documentary, there were only two children involved. How ever many more than two there were, surely it could not be every baby born in the country for a whole year? The logistics of caring for maybe tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of squalling infants is simply inconceivable. The accommodation; the food supplies; the medical care; the staff to attend to them; the heating arrangements; fuel supply ... how much detail have you on this subject? Was it really every baby of the entire country for a whole year?

KONRAD: So these babies were taken care of, but only at the barest minimum. But ONE thing was prohibited. Namely human contact. For these babies should be left alone so that the natural inborn language should emerge. However, something totally different happened. What? They all died!

RICHARD: The documentary that I watched did say that the two children wasted away, yes, and the reason given was that they had no reason to live. Being cooped up in a room with nothing to do or be involved in for all those years amounts to putting someone in solitary confinement. A totally different result would have emerged had they had access and free range in the environment at large ... mountains and valleys and streams and sky and clouds and rain and sunshine and forests and birds and animals and insects and breezes and so on and so on. There is more to being alive that just human love and language, Konrad. It was therefore an unrealistic and uncontrolled and unscientific experiment that I easily dismiss as being spurious ... and the television documentary indicated that it has been rejected by clear-thinking anthropologists and sociologists and biologists and the like.

KONRAD: Why? Because, in the words of Freud, ‘they were not taught to live’. This experiment was the basis of Freud’s later renunciation of sex as the primary instinct. From the moment he began to think about the implications of that experiment, Freud said, that every human being had a, what he called ‘desire to die’, and that the only thing that prevented that was the instalment of a desire to live by the loving care of the mother.

RICHARD: Hmm ... I guess that you might be trying to impress me by dragging in Mr. Sigmund Freud to substantiate your position. I am not all that dazzled by his understanding of life, the universe and what it is to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. He was not free of sorrow and malice ... therefore all his prognostications were built upon a faulty premise. Some of his observations I have found interesting ... but this is not one of them.

KONRAD: But it is even more simple than that. Man has neither a desire to live nor a desire to die. By birth he has NO desires. For desires are the result of intentionalities, which are particular forms of thought.

RICHARD: Well, this is your theory, Konrad, nevertheless all carbon-based life-forms – both flora and fauna – have an innate drive to come to be born, grow, propagate and then die. We do not have to call that drive ‘desire’ if that sounds better for you.

KONRAD: Now, Richard, you are definitely wrong on this account. If it is as you say, that human beings are born with a survival instinct, why, then, did these babies die?

RICHARD: As I recall from the television documentary they died somewhere around nine or ten or eleven years of age ... so they were hardly babies when they died. There was a case a couple of years ago in the USA where welfare officers found a thirteen year old child in the attic of a house owned by a rather strange couple who had accidentally become pregnant and – not believing in abortion – gave birth but kept the baby hidden all its life. She was fed, clothed and housed but not interacted with apart from the bare essentials of water, food, clothing shelter and so on. When discovered she could not speak – or read or write or any of those things – and sat quiet, impassive and dull. However, the point is that she was thirteen and alive and – as far as I know – still alive today.

KONRAD: Why did not their survival instincts took over, and was the food, etc, to be sufficient to stay alive? On the contrary, this brutal experiment of Friedrich proves that there is NO innate survival instinct whatsoever.

RICHARD: Not so ... you want it to prove that.

KONRAD: That is why these babies, although fed properly, and taken care of enough so that they had no physical reasons to die just died in spite of it. This would not have happened if there was an innate survival instinct present.

RICHARD: In the absence of any carefully-controlled scientific study being done – which will not happen on humans – then this bizarre event that you pin so much faith on to demonstrate your ‘Tabula Rasa’ theory on does not constitute evidence. However, such controlled studies have been done on animals – monkeys in particular – and they survived. They were even able to give birth when mature and nurture their young, although not as ‘lovingly’ as babies raised by mothers. All this I saw with my own eyes.

KONRAD: My vision is based on fact, Richard.

RICHARD: Are you so sure, now?

KONRAD: Yours is based on the false premise of an innate survival instinct that does not exist.

RICHARD: I do not have a vision, Konrad ... I am living what I talk of. My words are a description of what is actually happening.

KONRAD: Your whole actualism is built on this belief, that there is such an instinct, and that it should be eliminated.

RICHARD: Not so ... actualism is ‘built’ upon what is happening with this flesh and blood body. There is no affective faculty in this body. That means no feelings ... no emotions, no passions, no calentures. None of what I am living is applied theory ... there is this which is actually happening and I put together an explanation of it – after the event – to explain it to others.

KONRAD: If you admit this mistake, then you must also admit that at least 95% of all the things you have said about the human condition are flatly false, for they are all based on it.

RICHARD: Not so ... all of the things are based upon what I live as an on-going experiencing.

KONRAD: You wrote: ‘if I am wrong about something then I am able to acknowledge that freely’. Well, do that now.

RICHARD: Indeed ... if anything I say does not accord with the fact of what I experience twenty four hours a day – and someone can point that out to me – I will freely acknowledge that I am wrong.

KONRAD: Do not just use those words because they sound so good.

RICHARD: Well, I do not use any words ‘just because they sound good’ . I write for a purpose ... people are suffering and I am sharing my experience for them to do with what they will. If they choose to keep on suffering then that is their business.

KONRAD: Your vision is based on the belief, that human beings have an innate survival instinct. Since they don’t, please acknowledge it.

RICHARD: Konrad, you can plead all you like but I am not going to adopt your Tabula Rasa belief when my on-going experience tells me other-wise. This is the difference between theorising or philosophising ... and a living experiencing. The proof of the pudding comes out of the eating.

KONRAD: Recently I have been thinking hard about consciousness, and what it exactly is. Now, let me explain what I have found. First of all, you talk about 2 identities, namely the ‘I’, and the ‘Self’. The first identity, the acting ‘I’, is the thought that controls the body.

RICHARD: Konrad, I have never said that ... it is you who says that the acting ‘I’ is the thought that controls the body ... not me. You tried to tell Vineeto in one of your posts to her that I did say so – and I asked you again and again to produce the evidence that I did until you told me that I was a ‘whining little boy’ – and here you are saying the same thing again. Do you see what I mean about ‘a lie told often enough becomes the truth’?

KONRAD: No, you have not.

RICHARD: Ahh ... finally you acknowledge your deceit. Could you not have done that right from the beginning?

KONRAD: Your vision on how the body can act, behave purposefully, is vague, contradictory, and mystical.

RICHARD: My explanation – not my ‘vision’ – is precise, consistent and practical.

KONRAD: Why do I say this?

RICHARD: Because you do not read much of what I write ... and what you do read cannot get past cognitive dissonance.

KONRAD: Because on the one hand you have once admitted, that ‘a thought jumps at its place, whenever needed’.

RICHARD: Not so ... that is your phrase. Try reading what I write.

KONRAD: A sentence you have explicitly used, to deny that you have NOT said that no thought is needed to make the body act, behave purposefully.

RICHARD: And where have I ‘explicitly’ used it? Is this request going to take seven E-Mails and accusations of ‘whining little boy’ before you demonstrate where I have said: ‘a thought jumps at its place whenever needed’?

KONRAD: But, on the other hand, when I call you out on that, and say, that by DEFINITION this thought IS then an ‘I’, you seem to say that thoughts are not necessary for the body to act, to behave purposefully.

RICHARD: I do not ‘seem to say’ anything of the kind ... read back through my writing and find out for yourself. Also, when you ‘called me out on it’ I presented your ‘by definition’ theory back to you several times without response. Shall I do so again? Viz.:

• [Konrad]: ‘Now the rest is just definition. This thought is, by DEFINITION an ‘I’. Why? BECAUSE it controls the body’.
• [Richard]: ‘Just what do you mean with this throwaway line ‘now the rest is just definition’? Can you stop and muse about this for a moment before rushing on to your ‘proof’? Is there not something more to be done other than define a problem away cerebrally? What about these instinctual passions? No matter what intellectualisation you may come up with ... they remain firmly in situ, do they not? So, with that sobering thought held firmly in mind, we can proceed onto your second sentence: ‘this thought is, by definition, an ‘I’’ ... and you then ask why this is so? As there is a thought that is needed to act purposefully, you conclude that this thought is an ‘I’ that is controlling the body. Do you see the circular argument operating here? That is, the initial surmise is ‘proved’ by relying upon the initial surmise being a fact in order to do this sleight of hand ... or should I say: sleight of mind? Maybe you can see this if I arrange all of your sentences sequentially? Viz.:

Initial Surmise: ‘An ‘I’ is a controlling thought’.
1. ‘[Because] a thought is needed [for a body] to act’.
2. ‘This thought is, by definition, an ‘I’’.
3. ‘Because it [this thought] controls the body’.
Conclusion: ‘[Therefore] an ‘I’ is necessary to control a body’.

Now, I do not profess to be a logician ... but even with my limited training I find this to be a spurious deduction. If you wish to convince me with the logic of your argument you are going to have to insert one or more sentences between Nos. (2) and (3) ... because there is an implausible leap happening there where an other-wise identity-free thought mysteriously becomes an ‘I’-thought’. It is perhaps somewhat like that infamous theorem ‘I think, therefore I am’: it being predicated upon the initial surmise – ‘I think’ – being a fact in order to produce the conclusion ... ‘I am’. The initial surmise is faulty ... it should read only the fact that ‘there is thinking happening’. Thus the rewritten axiom now looks like this: ‘There is thinking happening, therefore I am’ ... which is – like your deduction above – nothing but twaddle dressed up as sagacity.

And you have never responded ... oh well, c’est la vie, I guess.

*

KONRAD: You are talking about another fantasy of you. Some ‘natural intelligence’ that has the capacity to miraculously being able to make the body respond directly to sensual data.

RICHARD: You see? I say ‘native intelligence’ and you say that I say ‘natural intelligence’ ... and there is a vast difference betwixt the two phrases.

KONRAD: So, on the one hand you once have not explicitly denied that a thought is necessary, but on the other hand, by this ‘natural intelligence’ hypothesis, you implicitly deny that such a thought is necessary.

RICHARD: Why all this searching around for what I ‘imply’ ? Why not look at what I clearly state instead? It is much simpler that way ... of course it would involve you actually reading what I write.

KONRAD: Although, this is even not clear, for if I bring that forward, you deny that you imply that.

RICHARD: I do not ... I have clearly stated over and over and over again what part thought plays. I stopped copying and pasting it after seven or eight times because by persisting I was making you look sillier than normal.

KONRAD: In other words, you deny nothing, but you also admit nothing.

RICHARD: If you say so, Konrad, then it is so ... for you. Some other people reading what I write do not have this confusion you have. I wonder why?

KONRAD: Therefore, on the question about how the body is able to act, to behave purposefully, you therefore have exactly nothing to say.

RICHARD: I have plenty to say ... you do not read it.

KONRAD: Therefore, since you have no real vision on how the body is able to act, behave purposefully, I deduce that your ‘actualism’ state is not able to provide you with an answer.

RICHARD: You can – and do – deduce what you like ... it has very little to do with what is actually happening, however.

KONRAD: Besides, this whole line of reasoning is a Sophist trick, Richard, attacking clarity, but remaining yourself in the fog.

RICHARD: I am simply explaining how I live my life, therefore it is not ‘sophistry’ , it is actual. I do not attack ‘clarity’ and ‘stay in a fog’ ... I am relentless in my exposé of the ‘Tried and True’.

It is the ‘Tried and Failed’.

KONRAD: This is no honest dialogue.

RICHARD: May I suggest? Try reading what is written.

KONRAD: And then, to use, on top of this trick, words like: [Richard]: ‘Someone infamous in western history said that a lie told once remains a lie, but a lie told often enough becomes the truth. Keep it up, Konrad, and you will start to believe that what you are saying is true ... if you are not doing so already’. What was that entity, you said you have eliminated in yourself? That soul? That cunning entity? It still seems, that it has taken over completely.

RICHARD: Not so ... you are telling a lie – that I am a Guru with followers – again and again and are starting to believe it. Is this not so?

KONRAD: And another thing: [Richard]: ‘Oh? But you were so convinced about that ... even to the point of insisting that I did not know what I was talking about ... I did not ‘understand understanding’, you said. So ... this new thing that you have discovered: am I going to get a lecture about how I should understand this one too? Until you change your mind again, that is?’ [Richard]: ‘And, although you later backed away from this model, with your propensity for changing your mind who knows when ‘the BEING’ will be back on deck, eh? After all, the Enlightened Masters consistently talk about the Ultimate State as being a ‘State of Being’. (This is where love ceases to be an emotion experienced by an ‘I’ and they identify with Love as Pure Being). And you do look to The Masters for validation of your position’. I defend potentiality, Richard.

RICHARD: I know you do, Konrad ... and so all the wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide will go on ad infinitum.

KONRAD: This means, that I continue to grow in understanding and insight. This makes the old things I have learnt to appear in a completely new light.

RICHARD: Yes ... I am not criticising the fact that you are learning. It is that I am suggesting that you stop giving me a lecture because I do not understand your latest understanding which you will discard shortly and move on to another understanding. You see, I would have to keep in constant E-Mail contact just to get the latest up-date on what to understand today ... and to know when to discard the old model.

KONRAD: What you attack here, and misrepresent by an essential emotional argumentation, (are you really without emotions, Richard?) What you attack is a consequence of the fact that potentiality is integrated in my vision.

RICHARD: Indeed ... it is possible to get to a condition wherein learning ends and living begins. Other than technological learning – acquisition of skills and so on – learning how to live ceases (one’s potential becomes actual).

KONRAD: At every moment there is change going on inside of me, because there is continuous movement from potentiality to actuality. And this causes reality to show ever new perspectives. From this position there is only one thing to do, and that is at any moment to be as honest as I can.

RICHARD: Aye ... whereas I have arrived. Therefore I can be totally honest ... not just ‘as honest as I can’ .

KONRAD: If you can say, from your ethics.

RICHARD: I do not have any need for ethics.

KONRAD: [If you can say] with justification that changing my mind is a bad thing, and use these kinds of emotional argumentation.

RICHARD: Can you demonstrate where it is ‘emotional’ ?

KONRAD: Then I can, with equal justification say, that your claim that you consist only of actuality is an act of murder of your own potentiality.

RICHARD: A sort of ‘Tit for Tat’ thing you mean? A bit childish, non?

KONRAD: And that is an act of dehumanisation.

RICHARD: Aye, I have ceased being ‘human’.

KONRAD: Well, I have still my humanity intact.

RICHARD: And so all the wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide foe ever and a day.

KONRAD: Therefore I can still realize, that others might be able to see what I see. And even being able, oh, how blasphemous in your eyes, as a totally actual being, to LEARN from others. I am not the one who puts himself above the totality of humanity, Richard. You are.

RICHARD: Indeed ... I find this actual freedom to be eminently superior to anything anyone else has ever lived before.

KONRAD: And another thing. You constantly use the sentence: ‘You may have noticed that I once or twice referred to the fact that 160,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century alone? One cannot be happy unless one is first harmless and one cannot be harmless unless one is first happy’. When are you going to correct the figure? I have once pointed this mistake out to you before. Doing too much copying and pasting, eh?

RICHARD: I am waiting for you, Konrad, before responding. Did you not read that bit? Shall I copy and paste? Viz.:

• [Konrad]: ‘Reality can NOT be observed directly. If you believe that, you make such, sorry to say, stupid mistakes as you are making here If THAT is what Actualism does with the mind, then it is very, very dangerou s’.
• [Richard]: ‘Oh? And in what way is it dangerous? 160,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century alone ... with these normal minds steering the ship. Scientists – with their highly developed abstract thinking and ‘heavy mathematics’ – invented the atomic and nuclear bombs ... are these not dangerous? What on earth are you talking about?’
• [Konrad]: ‘Let me respond to this with a little ‘tease’. Are you not meaning to say: 1.600,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century alone ... and not: 160,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century alone? Haven’t you pushed your ability to be blind to abstract thinking too far? For you consistently make the mistake to be off with a factor of 10. I know, it is just a minor mistake. Not one to draw too big conclusions from. So I will not. However, it proves one point. Your ability to observe reality directly, without thought intervening is less infallible than you pretend it to be’ .
• [Richard]: ‘Do you see how you neatly side-step answering the actual question that I asked? Another smoke-screen to avoid answering a very valid point. You said that actualism is very, very dangerous because of what you perceive it does to the mind ... and I ask you about both the normal mind’s dangerousness and the abstract mind’s dangerousness. You are making unsubstantiated allegations about actualism’s effect on people’s minds ... and totally fail to address yourself to the real problem. Namely: humanity’s inhumanity to humankind. If you cannot see this very important fact, then this correspondence is just a complete waste of time for you. If you can successfully answer my original question ... then I will successfully answer your ‘little tease’ .

And you never did answer, Konrad.

KONRAD: It is 1,600,000,000 people. You constantly forget one zero. This figure of yours is not impressive. It is just 3 to 4 % of the people living now, not a major crisis in humanity. But the actual figure is a staggering 1/3 of the population living now. What is wrong with your apperception?

RICHARD: There is nothing wrong with the apperception that is happening in this body ... but there is plenty wrong with your understanding. Apperception is the awareness of being conscious whereas reading and writing and counting is thought in action ... which is perception.

Whoops!

*

KONRAD: There is a still deeper layer. This deeper layer is the ontological, or existential level. It is a level, that gives meaning to the word ‘Is’, ‘Being’. It also has a deepest principle, namely that of Parmenides, that was recently rediscovered by Ayn Rand. The Parmenidean formulation is: ‘That what is, is’. Rand formulates it as: ‘Existence exists’. This basic principle is responsible for our ability to become aware of our environment. Since consciousness itself is the activity of a response of a principle to observations, when this principle responds, the response is the experience of reality in the form of ‘IS’, of ‘BEING’. What does this mean? If this principle responds, reality is experienced in terms of ‘BEING’, of ‘IS’. Usually, the distinction between observation and understanding is exactly this distinction. The ontological principle gives us the experience of identity. It tells us, that something IS, something EXISTS. At this level there is no understanding of WHAT it is, but only awareness of the fact THAT it is. It makes, that the awareness of existence reveals itself in the form of ‘BEING’, of forms of ‘IS’. So this is not a form of intellectual understanding, in the sense of classifying and subclassing, but a form of existential awareness in terms of things and events, i.e., facts. This awareness of ‘BEING’ is therefore that what you call ‘observing facts’. This existential awareness includes our own body. We experience, not on an intellectual, but on an existential level, ‘facts’. This includes the fact of our own understanding. And if this principle only is present, the world can be seen ‘as it is’. This is what you call ‘apperception’.

RICHARD: It is not apperception, Konrad, because there is still ‘being’.

KONRAD: Exactly my point. Have I not understood you wrongly, when you said that the only thing required is moving beyond I and Soul? Am I counting correctly? 1: ‘I’. 2: ‘Soul’. Where is 3: ‘Being’?

RICHARD: As I said in my previous mail: ‘may I suggest that you look through my writing and see how many times the word ‘being’ or ‘Being’ (in small quotes) appears ... you are still stuck in understanding the altered state of consciousness known as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’.

KONRAD: There are THREE steps to enlightenment, not two. Since you have not talked about this third step, it is still present.

RICHARD: But I have talked about it for years now ... and with you too, starting about six or seven months ago. Shall I copy and paste? (Does all this copying and pasting make you feel silly?). Viz.:

• [Richard to Konrad]: ‘Where you start to talk about ‘being’, I prick up my ears. This is because all Enlightened Masters talk about their ‘Being’ ... that they have realised their ‘True Being’ and so on. So this is an area that I would like to discuss with you, as it is germane to what I am vitally interested in. Which is: In order to usher in the ultimate condition that a human being can aspire to, one needs to dissolve not only their ego (what you call I), but their soul (what you call SELF) as well. You will be well aware by now that I consider enlightenment to be merely going halfway: the elimination of the ego (the psychological self) is not sufficient to bring peace-on-earth. The soul (the psychic self), must be put under the microscope, as it were, to see what part it plays in providing a continuity of ‘being’ for all eternity. This ‘being’ is that experience of ‘presence’ ... the very identity that is the bane of humankind. Personally speaking, ‘I’ and ‘my’ world-view have become irrelevant and there is no longer a feeling of ‘being’. Everything is simply here as-it-is, no longer needing the support of any ‘presence’. It is only when one thinks and feels that ‘I’ exist that the troubles begin. To locate this entity, one has only to tune into the feeling of ‘being’. In ‘being’ there is an intuitive sense of ‘presence’, a feeling of being present. The Spiritual people tell everyone, peremptorily, that humans are all ‘One’. They endlessly praise ‘Unity’ and revere ‘Oneness’. If one has done what they advise to do, one will have come across a ‘Presence’ which goes by many names. Clearly this ‘Presence’ is a psychic projection of ‘my’ own presence. They describe this ‘Presence’ as being the ‘Timeless One’ that creates and sustains all of Existence. They maintain that by believing in this ‘Timeless One’, one will have absolute security, by which they mean Eternal Life. It is the fear of death’s oblivion that has set this entire system of belief into motion: ‘I’ dread extinction. To be extinct is, of course, not to ‘be’. ‘Being’ is the root-cause of the perceived tragedy of life’.

Did you read that last bit about ‘being’ being the root cause? The full text – and context – can be accessed by typing < I prick up my ears > in the search function of your computer on my Web Page entitled ‘A Dialogue with Konrad’.

KONRAD: Therefore, apperception implies a being as an entity.

RICHARD: Would you care to re-think this statement?

KONRAD: I myself am aware of 3 steps. First I discovered the ‘thought nature’ of ‘I’ after a thorough course in logic. Then there was a ‘transformation’ that was so drastic, that it influenced even my sight. For it made me see everything around me in a clarity never experienced before. Especially the sensual data were experienced as direct experiences of the world. In fact, the world was changed so drastically, that I made endless tours on my bike to look at everything all over again. For even the most familiar of everything around me looked different. And then there was the third breakthrough. The emergence of ‘the process’. Three very clear revolutions. The first made me completely idealistic. The second made me become intensely aware of everything around me. And only the third was that painful emergence of this ‘process’ that took me years to adapt to. There is more proof of this. You have still not shown any sign that you have understood my time definition. Only from pure process, when there is no entity present whatsoever, can there be understanding of exactly what the word ‘time’ refers to.

RICHARD: Indeed, the eternal character of time only becomes apparent when ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul become extinct. That is, ‘being’ itself prevents the direct experiencing of the actuality of time’s eternity here and now.

KONRAD: Now what I want to tell you, is that you can even move beyond ‘Is’.

RICHARD: Oh, good ... now we are getting somewhere in these dialogues. An actual freedom lies beyond enlightenment.

KONRAD: And even to recognize this ontological ‘Is’ identificator. Beyond this ‘It is what it is’ sayer, this ‘existence exist’ principle, which is a itself a form of ‘IS’, albeit its most general form. And when your consciousness is able to become aware of the fact, that this ‘fact admitter’ itself is an identity, that what I call ‘the process’ becomes visible. What then happens, is that the fourth domain, that of consciousness, takes complete control. For consciousness itself has then become conscious, and it reacts to itself.

RICHARD: May I ask? Where you say ‘consciousness itself has then become conscious’ do you mean the brain being aware of itself being conscious? That is, not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious ... but awareness of itself? A pure awareness?

In other words: apperception?

KONRAD: I was responding while reading. You ask a real question now. Okay, almost right, Richard, at last! Communication! Not the brain aware of itself being conscious, for this can still be confused with a picture of a brain that imagines itself being conscious of itself.

RICHARD: Not so ... if there is a picture then it is ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious.

KONRAD: No, it is even more fundamental. It is consciousness that is conscious of itself, as a direct sensation.

RICHARD: Hmm ... quibbling the point, methinks? Consciousness is the brain in action ... therefore where you say ‘consciousness that is conscious of itself’ is just another way of saying the brain being conscious of itself.

KONRAD: It means, that the existence of consciousness is not indirectly derived, as others do, but is actually conscious of its own operation at this very moment, as the process William James as the first asserted it had to be. The difficulty I had is the recognition of consciousness as consciousness. When ‘the process’ started, I had not yet made the identification that this ‘process’ was consciousness itself. This was always the confusion in me. Whenever ‘I’, tried to ‘make sense’ of this ‘sensual observable process’, no identification seemed to be possible. Only gradually it became clear, that this act of attempting to identify is always done by an entity that is itself less than that what it tried to identify. This became clear, because although every attempt to identify the nature of this process failed, it did not fail to show the identity that tried to make the identification. So the identity of the identificator always became clear, but this made the identificator to disappear, so that ‘the process’ was the only thing left. Only gradually it became clear, that ‘the process’ was consciousness itself. At first the clues that made me understand this were unclear. Only gradually I noticed more and more, that whenever there was more clarity, ‘the process’ was, as a sensual awareness, also more prominent. So the more intense this sensual awareness of this ‘process’, the larger the clarity, until, when consciousness turned itself totally on itself, the intensity was so great, that the only thing left was this ‘process’, with only clarity, and total elimination of all forms of disturbances.

RICHARD: Precisely! Why do you object to what I write so much? This is what I am saying: when the identity – in its totality – ceases there is only apperception.

As for ‘clarity’ ... I have written to you in previous E-Mails: ‘apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that is arrived at by contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking ... and thinking takes place of its own accord. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity’.

KONRAD: When consciousness itself responds to itself, it no longer responds neither from an identity, a being, nor from an identificator, an ‘I’, nor from a social ‘Self’. No, there is only ‘total awareness’, ‘total, effortless awareness’, for it sustains itself. In other words, you can move beyond ‘IS’, beyond ‘apperception’, beyond ‘identity’. And if this happens, no identity is left any more, and the potentiality itself of us, human beings, becomes conscious. For what happens then is that consciousness itself becomes conscious. THAT is what ‘enlightenment’, ‘IS’ (forgive me the use of the word).

RICHARD: Sure ... look, I could not help but notice the throwaway line ‘beyond apperception’ in there. Are you sure that you do not mean ‘beyond perception’ (which requires a ‘perceiver’)?

When the ‘perceiver’ is not ... there is apperception.

KONRAD: Yes, I mean: ‘beyond perception’, for, if I really look at what I am saying, I do not see any distinction between my use of the word ‘apperception’ and my use of the word ‘perception’, while you imply that you DO see a difference.

RICHARD: This is because there is a difference. With perception there is a ‘perceiver’. Whereas apperception is not possible whilst a ‘perceiver’ is busily ‘being’.

KONRAD: When there is no ‘perceiver’, which I have defined as ‘being’, there is only consciousness. Consciousness, that is aware of itself, now, at this very moment.

RICHARD: Yes ... I agree. This is ‘beyond perception’ into apperception. There is no such thing as ‘beyond apperception’ . Otherwise you go into infinite becoming ... into fantasy.

KONRAD: And then there is only potentiality, no causality, and therefore the concept of ‘time’ loses its meaning, too.

RICHARD: If you were to allow the ‘process’ to finish its job and extinguish what you call the three identities of ‘I, SELF and BEING’ – so that they never came back – then potentiality would be actuality ... as cause and effect happen simultaneously and cancel each other out. Then time ceases being a concept and is experienced in all its breath-taking actuality.

KONRAD: You probably will not believe me, for you believe that you already have achieved everything that is humanly possible. Still, consider this mail very carefully. For you will probably be aware of the fact, that my description of the ‘actual’ domain indeed does conform to your description, and even of your experience. And this was clearly not the case in the past. I also apologize if I have insulted you in any way. I simply did not understand your position. But this is something, you already knew, of course. Thanks for your efforts to make me see what you see, for you can see that I really have learnt from you. The above formulations would not have been possible, if I had not have such a very intensive dialogue with you. Since you did not respond to this mail before, I have decided to send it both to you and your (ex) followers, so that at least THEY can see, that your vision has some merit, but your claim that you really understand my position is wrong.

RICHARD: Konrad, I do not ‘claim’ to understand your position ... I can only go on what you write. And what you write changes daily ... sometimes even within the same E-Mail. I doubt that anyone can understand your position ... you do not have one!

KONRAD: I did not understand you, but now I do.

RICHARD: Let us wait and see about that, eh? After all, you have said before that you do understand me. But ... there is some chance of progress here.

KONRAD: Agreed, only that progress part is again an arrogant, condescending remark.

RICHARD: Well then ... stop being so stubbornly inferior.

KONRAD: You, however, clearly do not understand me. Are you able to do that now? Or, at least, to admit that there is something that escaped you up till now?

RICHARD: And what exactly is it ... this ‘something’ that has ‘escaped’ me, eh? This third identity that you call ‘BEING’? May I suggest that you look through my writing and see how many times the word ‘being’ (in small quotes) appears. You are still stuck in understanding the altered state of consciousness known as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’.

KONRAD: If that is so, you might go through a totally new transformation that enables you to see, that your act of excluding the potential is a violation of Man.

RICHARD: I make no secret that I have ceased being ‘human’ ... if that is what you mean by ‘Man’ . And given that ‘being human’ means being driven to kill one’s fellow human being ... then I am well-pleased to be no longer ‘human’. Being free from malice and sorrow means that I am automatically happy and harmless.

KONRAD: Well, I do not see any harmlessness in these strange twisting of my words, as you did above.

RICHARD: And just what ‘strange twisting’ are you referring to?

KONRAD: That [your act of excluding the potential] is inherently evil, because it goes against that what makes us a creative force in the universe.

RICHARD: This ‘creative force’ is killing people, Konrad ... 160,000,000 in ‘creative force’ wars this century alone.

KONRAD: It is a form of evil, not because the things you say are wrong. But because they are only partial right. They are evil, because you deny that there is even something beyond that what you have found. Partial truths are often more destructive than total lies. Especially when they are not recognized as partial truths, but are mistaken for total truths.

RICHARD: But I am only ever interested in facts and actuality ... not truths. Truths – and especially ‘The Truth’ – is but beliefs masquerading as facts.

KONRAD: I know. The position you are now in, wherein you believe to have found something marvellous that beats anything others have found is very comfortable.

RICHARD: Very comfortable indeed, Konrad ... if I were to become more relaxed I would be but a smear of grease upon the floor.

KONRAD: I know from experience that the adoration of your followers is something you can really become a prisoner of.

RICHARD: And what adoration would that be? And what followers?

KONRAD: Richard, that is what Osho Rajneesh also said. He said: ‘I am not your Master, but you ARE my Sannyasins.

RICHARD: Good grief ... I have never said that. I say ‘we are fellow human beings’. Stop this deceit, it does not become you.

KONRAD: [Osho Rajneesh said] the Master is the inevitable picture you form of me, because you are in the domain of thought and thinking. But if you surrender completely to me, you will discover that there was no Master to begin with, but only the illusion of a Master your mind has made itself.

RICHARD: Once again this is not me ... I am in print as saying never ever surrender. Viz.:

• [Richard]: ‘To become ‘Me’, the Divine ‘Being’, one must surrender; be it to a God, a Supreme, an Absolute or Whatever. This surrender is epitomised in the scriptural injunction ‘Not my will but Thy Will’. One surrenders one’s will and permits Divinity, in whatever form, to take responsibility for one’s life. Nobody seems to realise that this is a second surrender, because one is currently already in a state of surrender ... it is called being ‘normal’, being ‘human’. One has to take one’s will back from the decrees of the real world, to which one has already surrendered, not surrender it yet again! The guiding principle to bear in mind is never, ever surrender. Not to anyone or anything at any time or anywhere. The ego and soul can disappear, never to reappear again, but this is not achieved through surrender. It is achieved through seeing just exactly what I am and just who ‘I’ is. Then will, no longer ego-driven or soul-ridden, can operate freely. The operation of will, freed of the encumbrance of identity, is called intelligence. To be me as-I-am is to be intelligent. It is not necessary to have a high I.Q. to be intelligent ... simply be me as this flesh and blood body’.

Did you see ‘never, ever surrender’ in there?

KONRAD: So if you surrender to that picture, this picture can no longer uphold itself, with the result that you discover that you have surrendered to yourself. And then you are completely free.

RICHARD: You are not completely free through surrender at all ... you will find that you have kow-towed to the unmanifest power that lies hidden behind the throne.

KONRAD: Still, he had many blind followers. And you have at least one. For you have Vineeto, who once attacked me in a typical way that betrays that she is a blind follower of you.

RICHARD: Oh, stop this nonsense, Konrad ... we have spoken of this before. This is the lie you are repeating until it becomes a truth for you ... why?

KONRAD: Of course, this does not have to be a mistake from your part, but the fact remains that in her eyes you ARE her master. You should at least be aware of this fact.

RICHARD: This is just silly trying to talk to you.

KONRAD: Remember, NO Sannyasin really believed that they were followers of Bhagwan.

RICHARD: What planet are you on? I have met many, many dedicated sannyasins ... full-on followers.

KONRAD: Their orange robes just symbolized their individuality in their eyes. If I remember correctly, Osho Rajneesh demanded them to wear orange, not because they had to give up their individuality, but because of the exact opposite. They had to wear orange because only in THAT way they showed, that they dared to make their choices openly, and to show this to the world, in the same way as a marriage shows to the world, that the two people are no longer free to begin relationships with others, because they have clearly chosen THIS partner, and no other.

RICHARD: Hmm ... you were strongly influenced by Mr. Mohan ‘Rajneesh’ Jain yourself, once, were you not?

*

RICHARD: I am no leader, no charismatic master. I am a fellow human being who – by actually doing something about his life – is living in the actual world of sensate delight. Mostly it is insecurity that necessitates one being a leader with adoring followers ... and insecurity is an outcome of fear.

KONRAD: I do not agree, Richard. In the case of Osho Rajneesh this was clearly not the case. It was a con game, yes. But the con game was not from fear, but probably from something as simple as laziness.

RICHARD: You say ‘probably’ ... is this speculation? Try reading some of the many books about him ... there is one that springs to mind by a Mr. Hugh Milne.

KONRAD: Osho Rajneesh had a clear awareness, that in the West matters pertaining to consciousness were a complete terra incognito, in the sense that nobody could see the difference between correct and false statements. In general, a Guru, any Guru, consists of two components. He points out some area wherein we are ignorant. And then he points to problems that can be the result of this ignorance. Mostly these are problems, that are unsolved by humanity. And, since we are ignorant, but now have become aware of an area that poses a potential threat to us, we listen to this person. For is he not the one who has made us aware of these problems? Doesn’t he therefore show clearly, that he had the courage to look at these problems, while we did not see it because of lack of courage? Maybe he has solutions, too. For, obviously, since he has made us aware of things we were not aware of before, he must be a great man. (Everybody believes in his heart that he himself is the best in at least one area. So if there is somebody who surpasses us, this alone proves that he must be a very great man.) Now the trick is this: Because the area the Guru points at is indeed an area we have never considered before, because we were not aware of it, we are unable to see that the solutions he puts forward might be just fantasies, based on nothing at all. For because we were not aware of it, we obviously have no counter arguments. And something even more important is lacking. Namely a clear principle that enables us to make a distinction between a correct and a false statement in this new area the Guru has made us conscious of. Since the Guru is also and always able to make us aware of the fact, that total ignorance of this new area can bring us into trouble, he has convinced us that we MUST have answers to this new source of troubles. Since this man also provides us with answers, HIS fantasies, we become dependent on him. And this is something the Guru uses to obtain the means of those that follow him. Therefore I do not agree with your statement. No, it is just a ‘lazy bastard’, who exploits us on our own ignorance, so that he can obtain means without giving merits in exchange.

RICHARD: This is rather simplistic ... what about the unmanifest power that the Guru has surrendered to? That god’s greatness depends upon many, many follower’s psychic energies to build a power base. Without followers, gods die. Hence my statement that it is fear, mostly. Other factors do come into it, I agree.

KONRAD: This is also, why I find Gurus interesting. For whenever a Guru begins to have a lot of followers, it means that he has seen an area wherein we are ignorant. So it can also be an area wherein I myself can be ignorant. Therefore I test the things he says, to see whether I can find my own answers, without adopting his.

RICHARD: Why does a guru have to have lots of followers before you sit up and take notice?

KONRAD: This is why I find your actualism interesting. For it points at the potential destructive role emotions can have. Your answer is too simple, ‘weg met die hap’, ‘down with all of the emotions’, but the problem you raise is a real one.

RICHARD: The problem I raise? I raise the dissolution of the cause of the problem. Namely: the extinction of ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul at the core of ‘being’. And ‘being’ is the affective faculty all sentient beings are born with. If you wish to paraphrase that as ‘down with all emotions’ then I can guess that you do find that ‘too simple’.

KONRAD: In fact, it has also been raised by J. Krishnamurti, and Osho Rajneesh.

RICHARD: Emotionalism yes ... but passion, no. They praise passion.

KONRAD: Only J. Krishnamurti pointed at the potential destructive role of thinking as generators of emotions.

RICHARD: Well, so do you ... your principles – that you say are the cause of emotions – are thought constructs, Konrad.

KONRAD: And Osho Rajneesh pointed at the potential destructive role of our human nature.

RICHARD: One hardly has to be a genius to state the obvious. However, it is not ‘potentially’ destructive ... it is actually destructive. 160,000,000 people killed in wars this century alone.

KONRAD: J. Krishnamurti suggested, that we had to move to total awareness to end it.

RICHARD: Not really ... his solution was to ‘drink the water’ he was offering and see that you were god. Only he said that he preferred to use the word ‘Life’ instead of ‘God’.

KONRAD: Osho Rajneesh suggested, that we had to search for a state of being beyond that of the ordinary, so that we moved to a trans-human level.

RICHARD: Not really ... his solution was to ‘surrender totally’ to him and see that you too were god. Only he often preferred to use the word ‘Existence’ instead of ‘God’.

KONRAD: Now that I think of it, your vision is a combination of those two.

RICHARD: Oh? Do you get that from things that I write like ‘I am a thorough-going atheist through and through’?

KONRAD: You say, that we must move to a transhuman level beyond emotions, which you call ‘actuality’.

RICHARD: I have never, ever used the word ‘transhuman’. I say that I have ceased being ‘human’ (in the meaning of ‘human’ that is conveyed in that stock-standard excuse: ‘I am not perfect – nobody is perfect – I am only human’).

KONRAD: You have with J. Krishnamurti in common, that emotions are problematic.

RICHARD: Goodness me ... I say cease ‘being’. That is, all of the feelings ... emotions, passions and calentures. The entire affective faculty. Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti praised passion, lived calenturally, and told people to stop ‘becoming’ and start ‘being’. How can you compare me with his pathetic position?

KONRAD: And you have the ‘transhuman’ part in common with Osho Rajneesh.

RICHARD: This is just silly.

*

RICHARD: It is fear that prevents one from actually being here now ... what I did was face the fact of my mortality. ‘Life’ and ‘Death’ are not opposites ... there is only birth and death. Life is what happens in between. Before I was born, I was not. Now that I am alive, I am here ... now. After death I will not be ... just like before birth. Where is the problem? The problem was in the brain-stem, of course. It is the instinct to survive at any cost that was the problem ... backed up by the full gamut of the emotions born out of the four basic instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire. The rudimentary self, transformed into an identity, must be extinguished in order for one to be here, in this actual world of the senses, bereft of this pernicious entity.

KONRAD: In other words, live totally in the here/now.

RICHARD: I do not use that phrase: ‘live in the here/now’ because it has been flogged to death ... and refers to a mystical here/now, anyway (‘timeless’ and ‘spaceless’and ‘formless’). I say that I am this universe’s experience of itself as a sensate human being at this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space. I am always here and it is already now.

KONRAD: And then you implicitly live in eternity/everywhere. For, by your own words, we are always here, and it is always now.

RICHARD: Precisely. It sure beats living in an imaginary world where conceptual time starts just prior to a mathematical ‘Big Bang’.

KONRAD: This is a variation of one of Osho Rajneesh’s messages. (Yawn ...)

RICHARD: Your reactionary cynicism betrays your dearth of understanding here ... you were, after all, strongly influenced by Mr. Mohan ‘Rajneesh’ Jain for a period in your life.

KONRAD: There is one problem with this vision. To begin with, it is based on: [Richard]: ‘All sentient beings are born with the survival instincts. This creates a rudimentary animal ‘self’’. And this hypothesis is false, as the Friedrich experiment clearly shows.

RICHARD: You are starting to repeat yourself, here.

KONRAD: And when it is false, my ‘Tabula Rasa’ point of view, which, by the way, has recently received a lot of support from Gerald M. Edelman and other brain experts, is essentially correct.

RICHARD: Hmm ... just keep on ignoring all the evidence of biology and you will be able to maintain your philosophical position.

KONRAD: But then emotions are a far more complex phenomenon than you say they are. They are not ‘just there’, but they must, in some way or another, be the result of our human conditioning.

RICHARD: There is a simple way to check the credibility of this theory: If what you say were to be correct, then who conditioned malice and sorrow into the first sentient being to emerge on this planet? It is obvious that all sentient beings are born with fear and aggression and nurture and desire ... which gives rise to malice and sorrow. All the predecessors refined and reinforced them into the multitudinous emotions and passions we have to this present day. That is, conditioning is the refining, reinforcing and perpetuation of all those emotions and passions that arise out of the basic instinctual passions.

A baby is not the ‘Tabula Rasa’ (or the ‘Little Buddha’) that more than a few people would like to believe.

KONRAD: And when you realize this, a completely new branch of science opens up to us. The science of emotions. Then questions like: ‘If emotions are the result of our human conditioning, what, exactly ARE emotions?’

RICHARD: Maybe they are the cause of all the wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide?

KONRAD: Questions like: ‘In what way do they arise from our conditioning?’.

RICHARD: I will leave that to you to sort out ... after all, it is your theory.

KONRAD: Questions like: ‘Why are emotions there in the first place, do they have some purpose?’.

RICHARD: They are there because of blind nature and their purpose is the perpetuation of the species ... and any species will do as far as blind nature is concerned. Blind nature does not care two-hoots about you or me or humankind ... but I do.

KONRAD: Questions like: ‘And if so, might it be so, that there are ways to have an effect on our conditioning, so that we can make USE of our emotions, in such a way that the problems they cause now do no longer emerge, instead of just eliminating them?’

RICHARD: Yea verily ... I have been asking you repeatedly to list the beneficial things that the affective faculty brings but you steadfastly decline to reply. I guess it is because you just do not know of any, eh?

*

RICHARD: ‘My’ extinction was the ending of not only fear, but of all of the affective faculties. As this flesh and blood body only, I am living in the paradisiacal garden that this planet earth is. We are all simply floating in the infinitude of this perfect and pure universe ... coming from nowhere and having nowhere to go to we find ourselves here ... now.

KONRAD: In other words, you have put an end to intentionality. Indeed, I know that this is correct. If you put an end to intentionality, and ‘float along with the river of existence’, as Osho Rajneesh has already said before you, fear, and indeed all of the affective faculties end.

RICHARD: Except that I have never said ‘float along with the river of existence’ . Would it not be a lot easier if you read what I write? Then I would not have to waste three-quarters of each E-Mail correcting you.

KONRAD: Because both fear and all of the affections are the result of intentionality.

RICHARD: Not so.

KONRAD: But it is exactly the fact that we are free to program our own intentionality, that is so total that the programming you choose is also possible, namely the program not to program, wherein we become existents that are creative in the sense of existence-expanding. If we put a specific intentionality in us by making decisions, the domain of time becomes important, because we NEED time to transform certain aspects of existence. And then it might very well be, that the time we require is longer than the estimated time we can uphold ourselves in existence.

RICHARD: If you think it important that I understand this could you write it in a way that makes sense? It looks like a variation on what I would call a ‘I do not dare to be happy while alive because death will take it away and I will be unhappy’ theme.

KONRAD: And that makes that the very intentionality we have committed ourselves to, becomes a source of fear of death.

RICHARD: It is not the fear of death per se that is the problem ... it is the fear of not ‘being’ that is so dreadful to the identity.

KONRAD: Are you afraid of fear, Richard?

RICHARD: No. There is no fear here in this actual world.

*

RICHARD: Extinction releases one into actuality ... and this actual world is ambrosial, to say the least. Because there is no good or evil in the actual world of sensual delight one then lives freely in the magical paradise, which this verdant earth actually is.

KONRAD: Here you betray to be a Guru, Richard.

RICHARD: Not so ... a Guru has transcended duality and lives in a ‘goodness that evil is always trying to enter’ ... to quote Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti. I have eliminated both good and evil.

*

RICHARD: Being here at this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space is to be living in a fairy-tale-like ambience that is never-ending.

KONRAD: In other words, if you eliminate intentionality, you are completely in the here/now. And then all emotions disappear. This is indeed true. You have in common with Osho Rajneesh that this is a good thing to do. But here I disagree with the both of you.

RICHARD: You do not seem to be able to stop comparing me to other people, can you?

*

RICHARD: Peace-on-earth is possible only when there is freedom from the Human Condition. Freedom from the Human Condition is the ending of identity in its totality. The elimination of the ‘identity’ is simultaneously the demise of both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ within oneself.

KONRAD: Yes, both bad AND good. So there is nothing left to live for any more.

RICHARD: Are you for real? You would keep ‘bad’ going so that there is ‘something to live for’ ? So you condone the killing of 160,000,000 people in wars this century alone? You condone ‘The Holocaust’?

KONRAD: Intentionality creates the distinction between good and evil, and also between good and bad. But intentionality is the villain in your vision. This is a movement to death, Richard, not to life.

RICHARD: Yet – if you can be bothered looking at what I write – you will have seen that I praise intent like all get-out. Only I stress ‘pure intent’. How can you gather that I consider intent ‘the villain’ ? Is this another example of you constructing a metaphysics which you call ‘Richard’s metaphysics of Actualism’ ... and then criticising your own creation!

*

RICHARD: Then ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ vanish forever along with the dissolution of the psyche itself ... which is the only place they can live in. Because there is no good or evil in the actual world of sensual delight – where I live as this flesh and blood body – one lives freely in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are.

KONRAD: Dream on, Richard. As long as there is life, there is a distinction between good and evil ACTUALLY existing in the world.

RICHARD: So ... you are saying that there will never, ever be peace on earth, eh? That is, give up now ... there is no point in trying because ‘good and evil’ will always exist?

Everybody tells me that you cannot change human nature.

*

RICHARD: No cooperation is required whatsoever. Now, a chain-letter effect may or may not occur in the fullness of time ... if it does, a global peace-on-earth would be possible. If it does not, then apart from the salubrity of living as perfection personified for the remainder of one’s life, one is no longer preventing the ingress of a global peace-on-earth by one’s very ‘being’. This is the adventure of a life-time!

KONRAD: No, Richard. This is the end of every adventure, because every human being will be dead if this vision is applied on a large scale.

RICHARD: This insight of yours overlooks one pertinent fact ... I am still alive and breathing.

KONRAD: You are selling death, and call this life.

RICHARD: The psychological and psychic death of ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul, yes. Then one is actually living ... for the first time in one’s life.

KONRAD: I hope, that you can break free from this self-created, pardon, I should say, being-created prison, and that you have the guts to do that. Are you able to do that?

RICHARD: As you might be becoming aware by now ... I did back in October/November 1992. You will find a description in ‘A Brief Personal History’ ... which I sent to you at the beginning of our correspondence. However, as you are on record as saying that you do not read much of what I write – if anything at all – this information has probably passed you by. And yes ... to go through the existential angst of discovering that you are indeed nothing but a contingent ‘being’ requires courage like you have never known before.

Yet it is possible.