Building a Bridge

Recently, I wrote the following lyrics for Sasa to turn into a Kodagain song:

Going Down Again

Going down again
Just the same as before
It’s never going to end
Going down again
And going down once more
As if it’s entertainment.

I have to face the possibility that maybe
Not even Kant or Heidegger can save me
There is always this dimension of existence
That demands I try and take it seriously.

Going down again
I’ve been through this before
Apart from this, there’s just the end.
Going down again
When I told myself no more,
As if it’s entertainment.

I have to contemplate the fact that maybe
Not even Henri Bergson can save me
There is always this dimension to reality
That destabilises when I want stability.

You can hear the song – very tuneful – for a limited period, at the Kodagain MySpace page.

I am, in fact, contemplating taking strange pills again, but they've never done any good before, so I probably won't.

It was suggested to me recently that it's strange for me to be so anxious about the allegedly imminent end of the world, considering the fact that I am supposedly a non-materialist (well never mind what I supposedly am), and also because of the implication that I absolutely believe in the doom that has been forecast. This is actually a good point. No one really knows what's going to happen, but doom of one kind or another has been enough of a reality in my life for years to have a paralysing effect. I have to admit, then, that in a sense it may not be about Lovelock's specific doom-mongering, though even the possibility of five billion humans starving to death – it seems to me – is not to be sniffed at.

I remember this from my childhood:

Though Odin would fight long and bravely with Fenris-Wolf, in the end that mighty monster would be too strong for him, and the wolf with his gaping jaws would devour the father of the gods, and then perish at the hands of Vidar the silent.

Then fire from Muspelheim would sweep over all, and thus would everything be destroyed; and it would indeed be the end of all things.

In the words of Kate Bush: "You and me on the bobbing knee/Didn't we cry at that old mythology?"

Strange how the end of all things is encompassed in story.

But yes, Ragnarok appalled me and moved me in ways I could never explain as a child, and I suppose still can't.

As Thomas Ligotti says in this interview, "all apocalyptic phenomena take place on a personal level. It just seems scarier when it’s on a larger scale."

Perhaps Lovelock's pronouncements only amplify my personal apocalypse.

I'm now going to write something that I was intending to write in my private notebook and nowhere else. I have been preoccupied recently by the idea of ripples. Each action, word and even thought is said to have ripples (don't ask me who says this, maybe it's just me?), and this is often presented as what gives life meaning. One lives on in the lives of others through ripples of influence. But what ultimately happens to those ripples? If one imagines them in a vast lake called 'the Universe', then do they simply come to the edge and that's it? If so, how is having ripples any different to not having ripples? Ripples suggests extension, but in the end it's only a relatively more expansive isolation. The so-called 'end of the world' seems to me like the wall against which the ripples finally stop. But ripples, even in an enclosed area, don't really stop like that, do they? They reach the edge and rebound, presumably coming back to the object or event that first caused them. What are the implications of this, I wonder? I associate such rebounding ripples with the idea of eternal return. Imagine the lines of ripples returning to you and everything you do from the edges of time and space, reiterating your outline. It's an image that seems to emphasise 'this moment', 'this act', 'this body' and so on.

I remember reading one of those Buddhist anecdotes with which we are all by now very familiar. I think it was Tibetan, but I can't be sure now. Anyway, there was a master and he was dying. He lay abed waiting for the end. In the meantime, his disciples decided to do something for him as a kind of farewell, or an expression of gratitude. There was a pond in the garden that the master loved, and they built a bridge across it so that, in his last days, he could enjoy the pond more fully. It was a lot of hard work, but finally the bridge was completed. The disciples took the master from his bed to show him his surprise. He saw it and cried out in rage, "Why have you wasted your time building this bridge when you know I'll soon be dead!"

This, of course, is supposed to make us nod our heads thoughtfully in recognition of unanswerable wisdom. I have to say, however, that when I first read this, my reaction was, "Is it just me or is that really stupid? What else were the disciples going to do with their time that was so much better than building a bridge, anyway?" And that, in fact, is still my reaction. It's the so-called master who made the bridge 'a waste of time' by being unable to see any worth in it. If he had thanked his disciples, as they deserved, and walked gratefully upon the bridge, it would, in fact, have been time well spent.

You can imagine what it would have been like if the master had got his way, the disciples sitting around the death-bed just watching him die.

"O Master, how about a game of Monopoly?"

"Don't be ridiculous, there's no time for such frivolities."

"Or you could deliver a sermon."

"Sermons be damned! I'm dying, you dunderhead!"

"Okay, well, maybe we could sing to you."

"No. I told you, there's no time."

"So what are we meant to do?"

"Just sit there."

"Just sit here?"

"Yes. And be quiet."

"Right… I see."

(Looks around at the other disciples, raises eyebrows and sighs.)

O Master, you have truly attained to the level of adolescent nihilism. Etc.

I mean, I do understand such feelings. I find it hard to resist them myself. I just don't see how they are supposed to be wise, noble, mature, etc.

Actually, as far as I understand it, there are threads aplenty in what might be called Eastern spirituality that present a quite different view to this – the idea of doing work for its own sake, without attachment to result. I believe, in fact, that this is the message of the Bagavad Gita, to enter into the battle, which is life, unafraid of what the outcome will be.

Krishna counsels Arjuna on the greater idea of dharma, or universal harmony and duty. He begins with the tenet that the soul (Atman) is eternal and immortal.[32] Any 'death' on the battlefield would involve only the shedding of the body, whereas the soul is permanent. Arjuna's hesitation stems from a lack of accurate understanding of the 'nature of things,' the privileging of the unreal over the real. His fear and hesitance become impediments to the proper balancing of the universal dharmic order. Essentially, Arjuna wishes to abandon the battle, to abstain from action; Krishna warns, however, that without action, the cosmos would fall out of order and truth would be obscured.

I see the same philosophy in much of traditional Japanese culture. The suffix '-do', meaning 'way', is attached to many different words such as 'sado' (the way of tea), 'kendo' (the way of the sword), 'kyudo' (the way of archery) and so on. Almost anything can be a 'way', that is, work that one can do to develop as a human. The work must be done for it's own sake. I also see this sentiment expressed in a short story called 'The Garden' by Akutagawa Ryuunosuke – a story that has affected me recently.

Someone recently posted a link to the following clip in the comments of a blog entry on this blog:

When I come upon evidence of intelligent life in the world, I generally find it quite moving. This clip is very strong evidence of intelligent life. And as the clip says, "Don't piss it away."

I had a dream recently that I had been entrusted with the welfare of a small child. It seems to me that that is what the human soul is – a small child. Children are not to be despised. It is tempting, for all kinds of reasons, to leap upon and rejoice at announcements of the end of the world, but I tend to wonder if this is not a cynical act of playing tough. "We didn't want it anyway. Humans are rubbish anyway." That kind of thing. Maybe, just maybe, there's more to life than that. Or maybe I'm wrong, as usual. No doubt you will decide.