I.
One is an entity.
One becomes two
… and we call this an entity.
Two becomes four
… and we call this an entity.
Four becomes eight
… and we call this an entity.
Eight becomes sixteen
… and we call this an entity.
Sixteen becomes thirty-two
… and we call this an entity.
Thirty-two becomes 64
… and we call this an entity.
64 becomes many.
Many begets one.
One subsumes one
… and we call this a new entity.
But how is it a new entity?
Commentary
As I’ve turned 50, I’ve been doing a lot of self-reflection, and reading or re-reading some works of Eastern philosophy which have resonated with me through the years. Ursula K. Le Guin’s translation of Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching, Thomas Cleary’s The Taoist I Ching (which I’ve made a practice of reading for over 20 years now), and a new entry: Nāgārjuna’s The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way — which has influenced what I’ve written above.
While there is a very specific and literal interpretation of what I’ve written in this meditation, what I find beautiful about some of the classics in Eastern thought is that the reader can bring some level of subjectivity to the reading, and therefore it becomes timeless.
I’ve been thinking a lot about bridging science and philosophy (a division that didn’t exist when it was simply ‘natural philosophy’). I think about creating a self-consistent thread of logic and reason, without appealing the the metaphysical — that is, to say: this can never be known, and must therefore be put in a black box entitled ‘Faith’.
