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Being alive through centering?


Being neither Dead nor Alive (Part #11)

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Geometrical metaphors: The exploration can be taken further through geometrical and topological metaphors -- extending their use with respect to "following a line" and "end of the line" (as noted above). If a degree of identification is intuitively associated with some sense of geometry, one approach is to assume that "feeling alive" is somehow associated with "being centered". This metaphor is frequently used in disciplines of personal development. It would then contrast with forms of dispersion readily understandable as associated with death, whether or not it is associated with "feeling dead".

Patterns of convergence: The suggestion would then be that personal "world lines" (as discussed above) are somehow configured into a pattern of convergence then to be associated with the intuition that "feeling alive" implies "getting one's act together". The simplest geometrical representation of this would be a circle -- widely considered as indicative of a form of integration. However, given the kind of closure implied by "world-making" (as mentioned above), a more integrative geometrical representation would be a sphere -- offering a degree of resonance with the form of the globe. Both of these offer a particular sense of a centre with which identity might be associated.

How might the sense of "feeling alive" be associated with that centre, whether as a somewhat explicit point of convergence of world lines or as a virtual centre of a more implicit nature -- perhaps an "empty centre", consistent with the quest of some spiritual disciplines? Does "feeling alive" imply some kind of dynamic between the centre and the circumference through the pattern of world lines?

Insights of mathematicians? It might be expected that this relatively simple geometry would have been speculatively explored by mathematicians, especially when faced with imminent death or the declining competence associated with progressive dementia. This does not appear to be the case -- as argued separately (Mathematical Cosmology and Death, 2013). Mathematicans and cosmologists are seemingly cognitively disassociated from their own demise -- despite possessing considerable skills with which to reflect on ends, centres, lines, and the beginnings and endings of the universe -- to say nothing of the worlds they have made for themselves within it. It might be said that they collapse unknowingly into the nothingness from which they believe the universe to have emerged. This belief is provocatively challenged by the arguments from a cognitive psychological perspective of George Lakoff and Rafael Nuñez (Where Mathematics Comes From: how the embodied mind brings mathematics into being, 2001).

Forms beyond the sphere: Taking the argument further, it could then be asked whether there are more complex forms than the circle and sphere with which identity could be associated -- as topological "templates" through which "feeling alive" can be sustained. The question also frames the issue of whether such forms are enabling templates or constraining containers -- framing the challenge of "breaking out" of more restrictive containers into those of higher dimensionality. Are there then higher orders of "feeling alive"? The corollary is of course whether "feeling dead" is to be associated with geometry of lower dimensionality than has been experienced -- even to the point of final demise. Mathematician Ronald Atkin frames the question as: Multidimensional Man: can man live in three dimensions? (1981) -- separately discussed as Social organization determined by incommunicability of insights.

Meta-patterning: This framing suggests that "feeling alive" is associated with patterns of ever greater complexity -- with meta-patterns, as argued by Gregory Bateson in affirming:

The pattern which connects is a meta-pattern. It is a pattern of patterns. It is that meta-pattern which defines the vast generalization that, indeed, it is patterns which connect. (Mind and Nature: a necessary unity, 1979)

And it is from this perspective that he warns: Break the pattern which connects the items of learning and you necessarily destroy all quality (1979, pp. 8-11). This echoes Christopher Alexander's sense that: in our time the languages have broken down (The Timeless Way of Building, 1979).

Comprehension: From the perspective of mathematics and (astro)physics, there is no lack of more complex forms which might serve as fruitful templates or indicators of "being alive". The difficulty is there relative incomprehensibility to most and the lack of attention to the manner of engaging with them cognitively -- rather than formalistically (Dynamics of Symmetry Group Theorizing: comprehension of psycho-social implication, 2008).

The issues of relevance might be clustered as follows, with indication of separate discussions:

The complexity and its incomprehensibility call for radical innovation in the use of mnemonic aids. The case for fruitful possibilities is made separately:

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