“In the language of Islamic thought [..] the first part of this journey of all beings from the Source is called the ‘arc of descent’ and the second part back to the Source the ‘arc of ascent.’ Within this vast cosmic wayfaring we find ourselves here and now on earth as human beings… The answer of materialists and nihilists is [to] reduce our existence to simply the physical and terrestrial level and believe that we are merely animals (themselves considered as complicated machines) who have ascended from below, not spiritual beings who have descended from above. But if we are honest with ourselves, we realize that even the concept of matter or corporeality is contained in our consciousness and that therefore when we ask ourselves who we are, we are acting as conscious beings and have to begin with our consciousness. If we are intellectually awake, we realize that we cannot reduce consciousness to that which is itself contained in our consciousness.”
This was also what was troubling me as a student of physics. We find structures in experience, we think of them as constituting the objective world, and then we try to explain how experience emerges from these structures. It can't be done.
On the other hand: "a play of self-concealing and self-finding is one of the most strenuous joys that conscious being can give to itself, a play of extreme attractiveness. There is no greater pleasure for man himself than a victory which is in its very principle a conquest over difficulties, a victory in knowledge, a victory in power, a victory in creation over the impossibilities of creation…. There is an attraction in ignorance itself because it provides us with the joy of discovery, the surprise of new and unforeseen creation…. If delight of existence be the secret of creation, this too is one delight of existence; it can be regarded as the reason or at least one reason of this apparently paradoxical and contrary Lila." [LD 426-27]
Thanks for this as always.
“In the language of Islamic thought [..] the first part of this journey of all beings from the Source is called the ‘arc of descent’ and the second part back to the Source the ‘arc of ascent.’ Within this vast cosmic wayfaring we find ourselves here and now on earth as human beings… The answer of materialists and nihilists is [to] reduce our existence to simply the physical and terrestrial level and believe that we are merely animals (themselves considered as complicated machines) who have ascended from below, not spiritual beings who have descended from above. But if we are honest with ourselves, we realize that even the concept of matter or corporeality is contained in our consciousness and that therefore when we ask ourselves who we are, we are acting as conscious beings and have to begin with our consciousness. If we are intellectually awake, we realize that we cannot reduce consciousness to that which is itself contained in our consciousness.”
Seyyed Hossein Nasr (TGT, p.7)
This was also what was troubling me as a student of physics. We find structures in experience, we think of them as constituting the objective world, and then we try to explain how experience emerges from these structures. It can't be done.
On the other hand: "a play of self-concealing and self-finding is one of the most strenuous joys that conscious being can give to itself, a play of extreme attractiveness. There is no greater pleasure for man himself than a victory which is in its very principle a conquest over difficulties, a victory in knowledge, a victory in power, a victory in creation over the impossibilities of creation…. There is an attraction in ignorance itself because it provides us with the joy of discovery, the surprise of new and unforeseen creation…. If delight of existence be the secret of creation, this too is one delight of existence; it can be regarded as the reason or at least one reason of this apparently paradoxical and contrary Lila." [LD 426-27]