Absolute (noun, often with capital A): “That which exists without relation to or dependency on any other being; that which is capable of being thought or conceived of by itself alone.”
You mention Annie Dillard too as writing about the Absolute. I didn’t quite understand you, but I just finished her book The Writing Life, and discover that she closes it with this quotation from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin:
“The world is filled, and filled with the Absolute. To see this is to be made free.” Which is a good enough signal that whatever it is, she has fixed her sights on this elusive entity.
Not only that, but the publisher’s synopsis on Amazon of her book Holy the Firm includes this:
“Dillard bears witness to the violent incursions of the Absolute into the wreck of space and her vision of the power play of holy fire.”
The Absolute is not a word I would normally use, because I prefer to write about things I know directly, via senses or inner revelation. But I’ve been revisiting the website I put together some years ago, before I stumbled on Blogger as a medium of expression more suited to my needs. It seems to me that the Ian of those years had a more circumscribed life and vision than the Vincent of today. I recognize the Ian of the website, but as Vincent my awareness is different. Was the Absolute there in the website too? Browse for yourself.
It’s replete with different ways to navigate to its various out-of-the-way corners. Click on any screenshot for a start-point and you should be able to get to anywhere else from it. Turn your speakers on, for there are midi files you can play, plus two pages with background sound, intentionally very quiet. (Firefox, at least on my computer, shortens or ignores some of the longer midi files, so I recommend you use a different browser to hear them at their best.)
19 comments:
That's some site.
So is your name Ian, Vincent, or some other yet to be disclosed name? I'm quite confused.
If one of them is a pen name, I've thought of doing that before. "Bryan White" isn't exactly...
Well, Ian is my first name and Vincent is my middle name. I have nowhere to hide now!
My middle name is Matthew. I like that better than Bryan, actually.
My initials, of course, are BMW. I'm still waiting for my free monogrammed car.
May your wait not last much longer, dear Matthew.
I’ve just been fixing some broken links, and discovered that some pages weren’t accessible at all, such as this one about Sir Gawain and the Holy Grail
Vincent,
As your circumscribed mind broke out its circle, would you say you have become more intellectual? As you filled your mind with more stuff over the years, would you say it made more space, or became cluttered?
In general, would you say your mind has grown sharper or dulled?
Answers to your three questions:
a) both more and less intellectual, possibly
b) both more and less cluttered
c) both sharper and more dulled.
Lest this sound like a riddle, let me make all plain. There are many minutes in 24 hours and many modes of consciousness and unconsciousness.
The human brain is at its least reliable, I fancy, when occupied in the analysis of its content and the summarization of its essential nature.
mm .. it all sounds a bit like 'fuzzy logic' to me .. something that 'computer' programmers - and 'social engineers' have been trying to understand, and manipulate, for millenia.
Cheers and best wishes; whoever you might think you are, or where you be. ... heh.
OK, I can't stand the curiosity any more. What does mm mean?
Vincent,
All this stuff goes over my head.
Is absolute the same as God?
Ashok, I sympathize with your puzzlement. If two men look suspiciously similar, and you have never seen them in the same room together, you begin to wonder if one of them is in disguise, and they are the same man.
That appears to be a somewhat cryptic answer Vincent.
Well you would never find someone saying "I believe in God and also the Absolute," would you?
But less cryptically, the Absolute is pretty much by definition unknowable, and the same goes for God. Except mystically---whatever that means.
@JM .. I have the - probably unfortunate - habit of almost writing as I speak. "mm" is the sound made with lips together signifying a precursor to thought, as distinct from "um". Just be thankful that i do try to type words with some sort of common literacy and don't go into full "Aussie accent".
Yd probly get toettly lost n unstend a lot less.
.. and Vincent .. Well you would never find someone saying "I believe in God and also the Absolute," would you?
Cardinal Pell of Sydney Australia might be a good candidate for that one .. heh.
.. aand, on a lateral note - the plot of "Gawain" sounds remarkably like the one in
Gates of Fire
Davo,
When I read your words I hear my version of your Aussie voice. MM kept throwing me off. It was a like a scream in the middle of pop song. Now,
You crack me up.
Excellent.
"Personally, I try to have faith in as little as possible, and let reason be the laboratory technician, not the chief executive. I worship at the altar of revelation."
The more I think about it the more I like it. You outdid yourself with that one.
If you are not Vincent, Vincent said that.
It should be its own post.
Personally, I have little that my ability to reason is vast enough to understand the vast universe and believe that there is much going on that is beyond it.
Post a Comment