Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Eternal soul and how to rethink the being

Some Thoughts on Naturalism by larval subjects
Our niche consists of a culture that precedes us, the homes and infrastructure we've constructed, the media and technology that surround us, the practices we've developed, but also the ways in which we have chemically and organically modified our environment. Intellectual Ecologies and Populations by larval subjects
Every shift in an intellectual ecology requires revisions of what came before, sublations of what came before, and also abandonment of certain features of what came before… The question is one of how we relate to the tradition or thought that has come before.  Do we stick our heads in the sand, continuing to draw on that tradition as if modern physics, chemistry, biology, neurology, mathematics, and contemporary social transformations wrought by technology haven’t occurred and make no demands on us to rethink the being or being, or do we relate to that tradition in terms of these transformations and seek to determine how we might creatively rethink that tradition in light of these transformations?

A Future Without a Past? by sri aurobindo studies
The idea of an eternal future without a past is a logical inconsistency… Once we accept the idea of an eternal soul, it is essentially incumbent on us to recognize its past as well as its future. It is one thing to believe that life has no ultimate significance or future, and that the single birth is purely a chance of material creation, or an event in the All-Soul’s development, thus making the life ephemeral and transitory. It is quite another to start from a creation out of material forces at the time of birth, and then build onto it an eternity of future result.
Essentially, if there is a recognition of a future, there must be concurrently a recognition of a past, and this brings in a process and a mechanism which provides the underpinning for the theory of rebirth and karma.