The "Introduction" and "Key Points" for this chapter were summarized by an AI editor based on the main text below; they are not things Mike said during the lecture. The main text comes from Mike's commentary, and the block quotes are Seth's original words (the parts Mike read aloud).
Introduction
This chapter centers on the idea that "reason alone eventually becomes irrational; imagination alone gradually becomes less imaginative," explaining that imagination and reason must be combined. Seth points out that units of consciousness are not neutral, that consciousness has nothing to do with size, and that physical life is the result of spontaneous order. He also uses examples such as letters from schizophrenics and the stockpiling of nuclear weapons to discuss how different proportions of these two abilities form different civilizations and personal experiences, emphasizing psychological diversity and the integrity of the personality.
Key Points of This Chapter
- Reason alone will eventually become irrational, and imagination alone will gradually become less imaginative; imagination and reason must be combined.
- Units of consciousness are not neutral, mathematical, or mechanical; every unit of consciousness has consciousness; consciousness has nothing to do with size.
- Our experience of the world is largely determined by imagination and reasoning ability; different combinations and proportions of the two form different civilizations and personal realities.
- Stockpiling nuclear weapons to maintain peace is a rational madness caused by overemphasizing reasoning ability, while people with different proportions of imagination are often simply judged as mentally abnormal.
- Human psychological behavior is diverse; a rigid posture of consciousness will prevent both imagination and reason from moving forward.
Main Text
Today I am introducing Session 917 of Volume 2 of Dreams, "Evolution," and Value Fulfillment. This session began on Wednesday evening, May 21, 1980, at 8:49 p.m.
Rob said that at noon today Jane received another letter that made her very angry. Interestingly, this evening Seth discussed that letter, as well as two thoughts Jane had received from Seth last Monday. These two thoughts are very important:
Reason alone eventually becomes irrational; imagination alone eventually becomes less and less imaginative.
These two statements are actually the core idea of this session. The two abilities we humans often use are, one, rational logical reasoning, and the other, imagination. Imagination deals more with inner thoughts in the mind and ideas in the head; reasoning ability makes more use of logical rational analysis. These two abilities need to be integrated well.
Does reason contain imagination? It does. There is no rational analysis that contains no imagination at all. If you have systematically studied science and engineering, you know that much of science and engineering is built on certain premises, that is, on a foundation of imagination. Even now, many theories in physics are imagined: they are mathematical concepts, or are even arrived at without any mathematical concept, relying only on some scientists' imagination, and then following that direction to search for relevant evidence.
And imagination is the same: there is certainly logic within imagination. If imagination has no logic, then it is unbridled rambling fantasy—if there is no logical coherence at all within imagination, if nothing has any inner connection or logical relation to anything else, then such imagination has no practical value or meaning. So these two points are important: we cannot emphasize pure reason, nor can we emphasize pure, inner imagination; these two must be effectively integrated.
Units of Consciousness Are Not Neutral
Seth said, very humorously:
Now remember, these units of consciousness that I have been emphasizing are not neutral, mathematical, or mechanical.
Seth took the angle of the invisible particles from the previous session, compared the invisible particles with units of consciousness, and made a fusion and extension of their inner meanings. What he emphasized is this: do not think that units of consciousness are like the atoms and molecules we imagine, without character, without subjectivity, neutral, purely mathematical, and completely mechanical in their movement. No. Every unit of consciousness is conscious, has its own thoughts, ideas, and intentions, just as each of you has your own independent consciousness. This is its characteristic. A unit of consciousness is the smallest little package of consciousness you can imagine -- the word "package" is used because this consciousness can be distinguished from other consciousness. He used the word "package," but put it in quotation marks, because consciousness itself cannot be packaged; it is only for the convenience of discussion that he gave the name "unit of consciousness" to the smallest consciousness that cannot be further divided.
And not -- and regardless of any ideas to the contrary -- basically, consciousness has nothing to do with size.
Consciousness has nothing to do with scale. You cannot say that this consciousness is very large and must occupy a great deal of space, while that consciousness occupies very little space; or that this consciousness is very complex, while that one is large or small in some measure -- there is no such concept. If one were to suppose that consciousness were related to scale, then a sphere as large as the world would be needed to contain the consciousness of a single cell alone.
It has been said countless times: if the consciousness of a single cell were imagined as the kind of storage that you humans can understand -- using the hard drives or memory that you humans now have, using this kind of storage method to store the consciousness of one cell -- how large would its capacity be? Suppose it were stored on hard drives: it would be as large as the Earth. A hard drive the size of the Earth, entirely hard drives, would still not be enough to store the consciousness of one cell. So it is not measured by way of scale.
Since that is the case:
Your physical life is the result of a most remarkable spontaneous order.
The consciousness of each of our cells is this complex, and our life has countless cells -- the human body is made up of 50 trillion cells1 -- so how much consciousness does it have? Would it not have the storage capacity of 50 trillion Earth-sized hard drives? So you can understand that the complexity of the human body is not something our current scientific thinking can comprehend or probe, because it is not on the same scale. In terms of the amount of information, that is the result. From this angle, your physical life, its being alive, is the bodily order spontaneously formed by units of consciousness. Remember, spontaneity is one of the basic rules of the universe; among the eleven fundamental laws of the universe, spontaneity is one of them. How was it formed? It was not formed in any particular way; it formed spontaneously.
The Combination of Imagination and Reason
Your experience of the world is largely determined by your imagination and your reasoning abilities.
Here he uses "largely," not entirely, because there is still a small part that does not depend on your imagination and reasoning abilities, but that is not the topic for discussion this time. But most of it is determined by imagination and reasoning abilities.
These abilities do not evolve over time in the way that conventional evolutionary beliefs assume.
Your imagination and reasoning abilities are your capacities to cognize and perceive this world. And these capacities do not continuously evolve and grow stronger over time; they are not like what we imagine, starting out very weak and then becoming stronger and stronger. They are a combination. In a certain historical period of humanity, you may use imagination a bit more; in other periods, you use reason a bit more. From the very beginning, imagination and reason have been basic attributes of humanity; these two have always been there. It is just that throughout what you consider history, humanity has utilized these traits in different ways. "Different ways" means the manner of employing imagination and reasoning abilities is not the same, and there is a great deal of room here — so much room that it exceeds the scope of what you can imagine. There are different imaginations, and there are also different rational capacities, and there are also different combinations, and there are also different extremes.
Therefore the two can be combined in many, many alternate ways.
In the development of your human societies and civilizations, different periods have had different combinations, and these combinations are not the only ones. In parallel worlds and parallel universes, there are still other combinations, all manner of varied ways of combining. Each particular combination gives you your own unique picture of reality, and also determines your experience in the world.
This difference in proportion is a difference in formula. For example, in a certain period, we use 43% imagination and 57% reason; that is just one combination. The experience presented by this combination is completely different from the feeling and experience of the world produced by another combination of 33% and 67%.
Historically speaking, you have had many civilizations — not civilizations of parallel universes, but the civilizations of various different periods in your human history: ancient times, the Renaissance, the Middle Ages, modern industrial society, the contemporary information society. Each civilization has its own sphere of activity, its own science, religion, politics, art. All of these represent the many different ways in which imagination and reason form a framework. Each era has its own religion, science, politics, art, culture, and humanities. How much reason is used, how much imagination is used — when the proportions differ, the framework differs, and the characteristics presented by the era also differ.
Although the experiences differ and the feelings differ, behind the reality perceived through these different proportions, there is faintly a unified or inner reality that is consistent. No matter what method you use, what angle you take, what experience you have, what you ultimately perceive is close to the same. That essential reality does not change.
Two Extremes of an Era
At times, people have emphasized the power of the imagination. In certain specific historical periods, people stressed the imagination, relying on it for everything, and external events were illuminated through the tone of the inner imagination -- that is, they were all "colored" by it. You looked at a flower and it was not a flower, but a flower deity; you looked at a tree and it was not a tree, but a tree spirit -- everything had an inner spirituality within it. In such a historical period, everything happening around people received an imaginative explanation: natural phenomena were not natural phenomena either, but became the heavens now raging, now weeping, changing like a child's face at a moment's notice. When the heavens raged, there were floods and earthquakes. External events became a trigger point for the dramatic power of the imagination.
The emphasis on inner events exceeded that on outer events. For example, praying for rain -- the Dragon King of the Eastern Sea controlled the distribution of rain throughout the land, and as long as one prayed to the Dragon King for rain, the Dragon King would send rain. All of this was entirely a matter of inner belief at work. Thus the things of the world became important not only because of what they were in themselves, but also because of their place within the world of inner meaning. A stone, in a rational world, is a stone; in a world rich in imagination, it can become a fairy stone, a precious stone, a stone with spiritual energy. Look at Jia Baoyu in Journey to the West -- he is a stone2, a heavenly fairy stone that comes to the human world and becomes a person. But in modern society, whether it is jadeite or jade, it is just a stone, and it will not be connected to any person.
In such extreme examples, people viewed the objective world only through the imagination, through the inner perspective, and when this was carried to the extreme, natural events almost seemed to disappear under the weight of their symbolic connotations -- people felt that natural events were no longer important, that they were all the result of the inner imagination.
The trend in recent years has been just the opposite. In today's society, we no longer trust the things of the imagination, and the ability to imagine is considered highly suspect. If you tell someone that this stone has spiritual energy, that a tree spirit dwells in this tree, that this flower is a flower fairy, that can only be talk at the level of children -- no one in mainstream society would think that way. At the same time, the external world is considered the only face of reality, and only the things of the external material world are real.
As a result, what you have is a world of either true or false, with no middle ground -- either something truly exists, or it is false and nonexistent. In such a world, it seems as though the deepest questions of life could be answered fairly correctly by some kind of multiple-choice test. This is Seth mocking the naivete of humanity in science: the most core questions of life, the meaning of life -- these deep-level questions -- scientists want to answer them through so-called scientific experiments that can be repeated again and again, precisely replicated -- only when the result is the same every time does science acknowledge it. Using scientific experiments to answer the fundamental core questions of human life -- how could that possibly work?
Thus the human imagination seems to have become linked with error. Only reasoning that has a theoretical basis and evidence is real. There is only one exception: unless the products of your imagination can be used to benefit our materialistic existence -- for example, you imagine a generator, and then you invent it and build it, and he considers this kind of imagination meaningful and important, because in the end you produced something practical. If your imagination cannot produce this kind of practical thing, then he considers it to have no real practical significance. This is humanity's very utilitarian view of the imagination in a materially oriented world. That kind of unfettered imagination, imagination without practical results -- he does not like it, does not promote it, and even treats it with a touch of criticism, calling it "daydreaming."
The imagination is tolerated only because it sometimes provides new technological inventions, and only then is it allowed to exist within human society. Scientific rational logical reasoning cannot completely strangle the imagination, because if the imagination is strangled, science and logical reasoning have no way to develop either -- technology and logical reasoning also need the imagination. But he only limits the imagination to the angle of what benefits scientific development, and all other imagination is cleared away.
Different Ratios and Civilizations
Seth said, of the many ways in which the power of the imagination and the power of reasoning ability can be utilized, I have given only two opposite examples, two extremes. But actual real societies and human civilizations are not like this, not purely imaginative, nor purely rational, but a combination of the two.
To varying degrees, subjectively as well as genetically, each is possible.
This kind of combination, whether biologically, genetically, or in terms of subjective consciousness, is possible. In certain historical periods, humanity makes greater use of the imagination, not only because science had not yet sprouted, nor because civilization development follows some process from lower to higher levels, but partly because of subjective choice -- we humans in that period chose to explore in this way. Another possibility is that because of the genetic choices of that period, people's inner senses were stronger, and they were more sensitive to inner feelings, sensibility, and imaginative things, which was biologically determined.
It is not as you think, that more imagination means a lower civilization. The superstitions, sacrifices, and primitive religions of primitive societies seem very superstitious, while modern society has more rationality, as if that represents the development of civilization -- it is not like that. There are countless alternative possibilities for this combination ratio. In other words, there could be a highly advanced civilization achieved entirely through the imagination; there could also be a very low-level civilization generated entirely by technology. Technology is not the only indicator of civilizational development, so do not be misled. But do not go to the opposite extreme either, toward anti-intellectualism -- so-called anti-intellectualism means opposing all wisdom, opposing all science, opposing all theoretical rational reasoning. It is not about being anti-intellectual, but simply about not one-sidedly emphasizing purely rational things while labeling everything else as false and excluding it to one side.
Let me give an example so you understand. Suppose our human civilization continues to develop in its current direction, and technology becomes extremely advanced, with artificial intelligence, brain-computer interfaces, AI, and robots appearing. At that point, all human social labor is done by machines, including mental work done by artificial intelligence. Humans no longer have any need to work, and basically would be kept like livestock, fitted with brain-computer interfaces, and enter a metaverse-style virtual reality world. In the real three-dimensional world, everyone lies in a device similar to a hibernation pod, receiving nutrition through intravenous fluids, sleeping without waking in the virtual world. Then at that point, would you say our scientific development has brought civilizational progress or regression? It is very hard to define. Humans are reproduced generation after generation like pupae or larvae in a beehive, without even needing to fall in love or marry, formed simply through single-cell cloning and replication. In such a civilizational society, technology is highly advanced, but has human civilization advanced? Has it progressed or regressed?
But it is also not the case that, conversely, the more primitive and backward something is, the more it represents civilizational development. Do not go astray. There is now another trend, which is to return to primitive society, return to the agricultural period, not using any modern tools, appliances, the internet, or computers, but living only with one's hands, feeling that this is a higher realm of civilization -- it is not like that. If something is wrong, its opposite is not necessarily right. The world is not black and white; the opposite of error is not correctness, and the opposite of correctness is not error. This point must be understood here; this question is too excellent -- no, to say that would be too naive.
This point involves the future direction and orientation of human social development, and it is extremely critical. As people who study spirituality, we are all core seeds for the future development of human civilization. If we ourselves cannot maintain a balanced and centered attitude, it will be very dangerous.
A Letter from a Schizophrenic
Ruburt received a letter today from a man who would obviously be regarded as schizophrenic. Ruburt felt very sad, not only because of that person's situation, but also because of its philosophical implications. Ruburt thought: My God, why would someone form such a reality?
Rob's note says that both of them, especially Jane, were shocked by the letter writer's unique and original wording, which reflected the reality he had chosen—it was too bizarre. That mentally ill person must have described to them the reality he was in, the reality he believed in, depicting his world from his own angle. In his world, the sun might not be the sun, food might not be food, people might not be human beings—it was a completely bizarre and grotesque world. Most schizophrenic patients will have such experiences to a greater or lesser degree, whether mild or severe. It is normal that you cannot understand him, but by no means should you stand in your own position and try to straighten him out, to persuade him, saying that your views are all wrong and mine are the correct ones.
It is simply that the proportion of imagination and reason he uses is different. You cannot say that any one proportion is absolutely correct, cannot say that a 50-50 ratio is the most correct, while 70% imagination and 30% logical reasoning is wrong. There is no right or wrong here—it is only a difference in proportion, representing the difference in what you experience. Mentally ill patients often use imagination as the majority; when it exceeds a certain proportion, they appear out of step with social reality. But by no means should we judge them with our traditional views, thinking they are a different kind, not like us, that they are sick—no. He simply holds a different proportion from the one held in our era. If he were placed in some era of ancient times, perhaps someone like him would be normal, and people like us would be the mentally ill.
The Integrity of the Personality and Mental Abnormality
Seth says that emphasizing the integrity of the individual is very important, rather than the generalized definitions usually given to any set of symptoms.
The integrity of a person is always greater than what you call a human standard. Whether in psychology or psychoanalysis, many of us like to set standards; this is a characteristic of human beings. In the last session we talked about how we humans like to use concepts, standards, and categories to consider problems, so you draw up a human standard, and as long as someone does not conform to that standard, you consider them neurotic, a weirdo, mentally abnormal. Seth emphasizes again that there is no such thing as mental abnormality. The integrity of each person's personality is above everything else. This person experiences the world in this way, and that is their right. You cannot say that because their experience is different from yours, they are abnormal and you are normal. The number of people like you is greater than the number of people like them, so you feel you are normal and they are abnormal -- this concept absolutely must not be held. You must respect their individual differences, respect their integrity as a personality, respect their right to use the way they like -- in the words of this session, to use the proportion they like, what percentage to use imagination and what percentage to use objective rational reasoning ability to cognize this world. This is their right, and also their choice, and it should be respected, not suppressed, treated, or corrected.
All scientists have a higher proportion of rational reasoning ability than what we generally call normal people. So from their perspective, people like us all seem like fools, because you are not rational, not reasonable. If this develops to an extreme, some people who study medicine only firmly believe in what they have learned, and when it reaches a certain extreme, we ordinary people look at them and instead find them strange. Let me give an example. Some medical students stay with cadavers every day, and they bring human joint and organ specimens to the office, even to the dormitory, to study them. For many people, doing research with corpses or human organs is too amazing, too strange. But for them, what is the big deal? This is the scientific spirit. If you think this is a little strange, then you are too ignorant -- what ghosts, what gods, what uncleanness, too ignorant.
I give this example only to tell you that with different proportions, in the proportion of imagination and rationality, our angles of viewing the world are completely different. It is just that we ordinary people and these scientists can reach a certain consensus; the proportion of rationality and imagination in them has not yet exceeded a certain range, and we basically still consider them normal, and they basically still consider us normal, so they have not reached that boundary. And those whom we consider mentally abnormal, mentally anomalous, are people who have exceeded that boundary.
In many such cases, however, the individual combines the proportions of imagination and reasoning ability in a way that is not consistent with his or her historical era.
Generally speaking, what we consider mental abnormality is simply being inconsistent with the proportion adopted by mainstream society and this era. In this society rationality occupies the majority, and you happen to let imagination occupy the majority, so in this society you are considered mentally abnormal. Conversely, in a society dominated by imagination -- for example, there are still some primitive tribes today, some tribes in South America, primitive African tribes, still dominated by imagination -- if you happen to live in that world with a so-called scientific spirit, in their eyes, you are mentally abnormal.
Nuclear Weapons and the Madness of Reason
Seth added, with a touch of sarcasm:
To promote as sane the idea that stockpiling vast numbers of atomic bombs is the way to maintain world peace is madness.
Nowadays, humanity promotes the development of nuclear weapons as a way to keep world peace. Is that not what our society is doing now? Everyone is frantically developing nuclear weapons -- some do not want others to develop them, while those without them desperately want to develop them, all trying to squeeze into the nuclear weapons field. Although the world's two largest nuclear powers -- the former Soviet Union, now called Russia, and the United States -- reached a strategic agreement to reduce nuclear weapons as early as 20 years ago, and for a few years the results were fairly good, with both sides destroying nuclear weapons and reducing their numbers according to plan and with clear targets. But later things went poorly again, and Russia went back on its word. As for reducing ballistic missiles, some countries do not participate and are still developing them.
In your world, why do you produce nuclear weapons and stockpile excessive numbers of them, while at the same time saying you want to maintain world peace? You have produced the most dangerous weapon, kept stockpiling it, and still tell me the purpose of the stockpile is to maintain world peace.
While this is somewhat of an exaggerated statement, it is not entirely untrue.
Seth said, calling them madmen may seem a bit exaggerated, but it is not without reason. This amounts to calling the governments of the United States, Russia, and all the other nuclear-armed countries -- even their leaders and elite decision-makers -- mentally abnormal people. He said this statement may be somewhat exaggerated, but it is not without reason.
In your society, such activity is somehow labeled as humanitarianism in a way that completely baffles me.
He cannot understand how this kind of thing has actually gained acceptance from mainstream society, and is even touted as humanitarianism for maintaining world peace. He may be referring to the two atomic bombs the United States dropped on Japan back then, which were instead touted as acts of justice. Setting aside the question of the war itself, from Seth's perspective this is utterly baffling -- the first time humanity used atomic weapons against each other, and so far the only time3.
Such plans are not considered particularly insane. You do not think they are madmen, you do not think they are insane; yet you define those who merely use their imagination, without actually doing anything harmful to human development, as madmen, as mentally ill. But these so-called scientists, who win this prize or that prize, who gain worldwide recognition, who are treated like heroes in their countries -- you do not think they are madmen.
In the deepest meaning of that word, they indeed are.
From a certain angle, these people really are madmen. Building nuclear weapons on one hand, while saying on the other that they are maintaining world peace. There are many reasons for this kind of behavior, but compared to what you consider the imaginative faculties, the overemphasis on the reasoning faculties is at least partly responsible.
Why are those who produce atomic bombs to keep world peace held in such high esteem? Because you have overused your reasoning faculties. Through logical reasoning you say: since we all have atomic bombs, no one dares attack anyone else; if you attack me, you may also be destroyed, and in this way a balance is achieved, so world peace is maintained. This theory sounds very reasonable, and we humans have always believed it is reasonable.
Then let me give a similar, real-world example, and you will see how insane it is. Two people hold different views and ideas, and neither can persuade the other. To avoid being persuaded by you, I strap myself all over with explosive packs; if you try to force me, I will press the switch -- I hold the remote detonator in my hand, and when I explode, I will also set off the explosive packs on your body, because my power is so great that you will absolutely be covered within the blast radius. Both sides hold this view. To avoid conflict, we have to strap ourselves all over with explosive packs? Do you think this kind of behavior is the behavior of madmen? You would say, these are absolutely madmen. But when it is two countries, why do we not say they are madmen? Are their atomic bombs not the same as the explosive packs strapped to each person?
Why does this kind of result come about? It is because we used our reasoning faculties, and emphasized the reasoning faculties. After a round of elite analysis, they said the only way to stop war is to possess more and more nuclear weapons. To ensure that no more wars occur on Earth, fill every corner of the Earth with explosives, so that no one dares make a reckless move, because one move would trigger a chain reaction. We are all sitting in a pile of firecrackers; if anyone makes a rash move, then we all blow up together. Do you not think this is a kind of madman's behavior?
Back to That Letter
In the case of the person who wrote the letter to Ruburt, certain traits were mixed together, in which inner events — events of the imagination — cast too strong a light upon concrete events, in terms of the socially accepted colorations.
That person used inner events, used imaginative things, to cast too strong a light upon outer events, overshadowing the way outer events originally were, making everything centered on inner imagination. Seth says, I am not saying that all cases of mental abnormality are like this; I am only using this person as an example.
I do want to emphasize, however, that your true psychological standards as a species mean that great leeway must also be allowed in the use of imagination and intellect. Otherwise, you could become locked into a rigid conscious stance, in which neither imagination nor reason could advance any further.
We humans should allow the existence of such ideas that do not conform to mainstream values. They are not mentally abnormal; rather, they provide great leeway for the development of our human imaginative and reasoning abilities — letting you know what it is like if imagination is taken to its extreme, what it is like if reason is taken to its extreme, giving you many different insights. Only in this way can your two abilities of reason and imagination develop at the same time.
If you become rigid and say, let us set an optimal ratio, suppose 50% reason and 50% imagination, and fix it in place — is that good? No. Would you not say that is a rather balanced attitude? No. The result of what you call fixed and rigidified would be to make our human consciousness rigidify within a particular pattern, with no new progress or development. This is not the best and most optimal result that everyone imagines. Humans always want to find an optimal solution, the best thing, and when you tell him not to think about problems from this angle, his life suddenly becomes lost, and meaning suddenly cannot be found. He does not think that diversity and experiencing all possibilities are things that should be explored; he thinks the purpose of exploring all possibilities is to find the optimal solution from among them. He says the purpose of my experiencing is to find the best, the most optimal ratio of imagination and reason — this is a pitfall we easily fall into. Do not think about problems this way. When neither of these two can advance, human civilization comes to a standstill.
It is very important that you understand that there is a magnificent psychological diversity within your psychological behavior.
Diversity is normal. Your psychological structure is not a standard paradigm or a fixed pattern; it is diverse. Diversity is the most important characteristic of psychological structure. All those variations in psychological experience are necessary — some people think about problems this way, some people think about problems that way, and all of it is necessary. You should allow people to think like that; do not try to make everything uniform and turn it into one single thing. They give you important psychological feedback — this diversity, these different ideas, these different ways of looking at the world, give you different feedback, letting you know that there are still people in the world who look at problems this way, who perceive the world this way.
And in overall terms, exercise the range of your abilities' extension in extremely beneficial ways.
This kind of psychological development pattern that does not follow the usual套路 can give our psychological growth great extensibility. If you cut away all these so-called mentally abnormal people, and turn the whole society into one that thinks according to a single mode of thought and develops according to a single psychological pattern, then the civilization of human society will come to a standstill. It is precisely these strange and unusual ideas that actually enrich you.
Flaws in the Subjective World
The person who wrote that letter probably lives mostly in his own world. He doesn't hurt anyone, and most of the time he can support himself, holding down a simple job to earn a living. From most points of view, his view of reality is skewed. But the key point is:
He adds a flavor to the world that would not otherwise be there.
His skewed way of seeing the world actually provides a new taste, a new perspective, a new experience to the world's diversity. If it weren't for him, you couldn't imagine that someone would see the world this way, and you wouldn't imagine that someone lives in his own world -- and that his own world actually looks like that.
And through his eccentricity, to some extent, he lets others see that their rigid views of reality indeed have flaws everywhere.
He sees the world so extremely, developed to the utmost, that it makes other people -- makes us so-called normal people -- reflect: are we, in viewing the world so rigidly, in understanding the world from the angle we think is correct, just like him?
Every schizophrenic firmly believes that the world is exactly what he thinks it is, with absolute conviction. Whoever tells him it's not like that, that the world is actually like this, he absolutely won't listen. You think he's strange, you think he's ill. But what Seth wants to say is, through his extreme behavior, can you sense that our own cognition may also be off? Are we also as rigid as he is, as unreasonable? He thinks the world is that way, you think the world is this way, and you disagree with each other.
Then Seth shifts: he thinks his subjective world is that way, and you think this physical world is this way. But is our physical world this way? Having studied this spiritual knowledge, we find that it isn't this way either -- it has an inner invisible framework, something 99% of people don't know about, something many people don't understand. We live in a subjective world, not an objective world, and this too is something many people don't understand. So is it that these mentally abnormal people living in their own subjective worlds are correct, or is it that the objective world we believe really exists is correct? Seth's point is that by reflecting on his strange behavior, you can discover the limitations of your own cognition -- there are flaws everywhere. If you think the world is this way, then from another angle, there are also flaws everywhere.
I am not trying to idealize him or his kind.
He's not saying they're wonderful and we should all be like him. He's only pointing out that you can use your imagination and intellect in other ways -- some people do use them that way, like the person who wrote the letter. This possibility exists.
In fact, these methods are not only genetically possible -- a topic I will discuss later in this book.
Some people are born this way. Genetically possible means biologically -- these people are born different from others. You don't necessarily have to ask why or find a reason. Some of it is genetic, and you could also call it hereditary. Scientists have also discovered that some mental illnesses can be inherited, with a strong genetic likelihood of appearing -- if parents have symptoms of schizophrenia, their children have a higher probability of developing schizophrenia, though not inevitably.
Imagination, of course, deals with the implied universe -- those vast areas of reality that are not specifically actualized. Reason, meanwhile, usually deals with the evidence of the world, in quotes, before him.
When you use your imagination, you're dealing with your inner universe, that implied invisible universe -- those things that haven't been manifested. And reason deals with the so-called "evidence" that exists in the outer world -- it isn't real evidence, just evidence of reality.
That statement is generally true. But, of course, specifically speaking, any imaginative content involves reasoning, and any rational act involves imagination.
From a macro perspective this view is correct, but any rationality involves imagination, and any imagination involves rational reasoning -- there is no absolute distinction between the two. So this final passage is consistent with the two points Jane received from Seth: if a person uses only imagination and no rational reasoning at all, then he has no imagination; if a person uses only rational logical reasoning, looking only at objective facts and evidence without a trace of imagination, then he has lost even his capacity for rationality and logical reasoning. Pure rationality ultimately becomes irrationality, and pure imagination ultimately becomes the inability to imagine. This is the dialectical relationship between the two that Seth wants to emphasize.
At 9:57, the session ended.
Summary
There is nothing too difficult about this part of the content, but it has profoundly influenced the possible future direction and course of the development of our human civilization. He has repeatedly emphasized this knowledge in many chapters, and he emphasized it most in the book The Magical Approach. Although the way of expressing it is different, the meaning he wanted to convey is the same. If such a viewpoint could gradually become the consensus of human society in our era, then the development of our human society and the development of our civilization would enter a new stage and rise to a new level. If not, and we continue as we do now to overemphasize rationality and treat rational logical reasoning and science as the only direction of development, then our civilization will not be elevated.
It is still the same thing I said earlier: the development of science and technology does not represent the progress and development of civilization. The development of civilization must come from the combination of rationality and imagination in order to bring about true development. This is what the development of human civilization should look like. Leaning toward either side is not right: pure imagination is not right, and pure rational reasoning is not right either.
注释与核实
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According to Mike's original words, it was "50 trillion cells"; upon verification, it should be "the total number of cells in the human body is approximately 37 trillion (3.72×10^13), not 50 trillion; another revised estimate gives about 30 trillion human cells." (Source: Bianconi et al., "An estimation of the number of cells in the human body," Annals of Human Biology, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23829164/) ↩
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According to Mike's original words, it was "Jia Baoyu in Journey to the West is a stone"; upon verification, it should be "Jia Baoyu is a character in Dream of the Red Chamber; the Spiritual Jade of Understanding in the book was originally a five-colored stone left over from Nüwa's mending of the sky." (Source: National Ethnic Affairs Commission, "Dream of the Red Chamber: The 'Stone That Mends the Sky' Standing Alone Through the Ages (Part 2)," 2023, https://www.neac.gov.cn/seac/c103391/202302/1160674.shtml) ↩
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According to Mike's original words, it was "the first time humanity used atomic weapons against each other, and so far the only time"; upon verification, it should be "nuclear weapons have been used twice in human warfare: the United States bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, 1945, respectively; they have not been used again in war to date." (Source: United Nations, "Next Steps to Universal Nuclear Disarmament," https://www.un.org/en/chronicle/article/next-steps-universal-nuclear-disarmament) ↩