The impulse towards transcendence.

[Guest guest]

Hi Jim,

> I posted some poorly worded questions about the evolution of

>consciousness and the minds of bees a some other nonsense in search

>of an answer for a question I couldn't quite formulate. Like

>always, an answer did eventually turn up and I wanted to share it

>with everyone, even though I still can't tell you what the question

>was.

>

>Sri Aurobindo said:

>

> We speak of the evolution of life in

>Matter, the evolution of Mind in

>Matter, but evolution is a word which

>merely states the phenomenon without

>explaining it. For there seems to be no

>reason why life should evolve out of

>material elements or Mind out of living

 

I think you might enjoy reading _The Phenomenon of Man_ by Pere Pierre

Teilhard de Chardin. He was a Jesuit and a geologist and paleontologist on

the team that discovered Peking man. The Church would not allow the

publication of this book, only his strictly scientific work. This book was

published after his death. Someone has called him the most synthetic mind

since Aquinas.

 

He says that matter is dual, that every atom carries its own life energy or

consciousness. As atoms and molecules come together, more complexity

results in larger aggregations of this consciousness, until you get to man,

the most complex form. His view of history is teleological, in that God in

all his completeness is seen as the Omega Point at the end of history, and

we are drawn toward that Omega Point.

 

He says we are in the middle of a leap in evolution right now... and in

fact at the turning point of history. That we have been evolving by

expanding, branching out as in the tree of evolution, but now we have

reached the point at which the movement is reversing, and we begin to come

together again on the way to the Omega Point.

 

His book isn't easy to read... he had to coin so many new words for what

he wanted to say. I read the first chapter and got all his words down

pat... and then started over again. But it's well worth the time!

 

Love,

Dharma