PORCELAINia
Dialogue with HYPATIA
Hypatia: Ancient One, how did the Universe come into being?
Ancient One: Hypatia, old friend. Yours is a question that has been asked for as long as there have been questions. Your question implies a beginning and a beginning implies an end. If you add together the time to "begin" and the time to "end" and compare this sum to the time between, the comparison might tell you that "beginnings" and "endings" are clever inventions of humans. They are not part of the fabric of Existence. The Universe knows only "Continuance." The Universe has always been and will always be. The "now" is that moment without duration where Becoming occurs, where the future becomes the past. We can predict what the Universe is becoming and know what It was and hope for what It will be. Questions that should be asked are, "What is the Universe becoming?" and "What has the Universe been?" and "What do you want the Universe to be?" All the answers will differ and number as many as there are those who ask.
Hypatia: Ancient One, what is the greatest gift that one can leave on this Earth in such a short life as a humble human being?
Ancient One: Hypatia, I regrete that you did not respond to my answer to your first question. Perhaps it was because it was not fully yours. Hypatia, I know that your life has been difficult, laden with much frustration. I saw that the time we spent together in the Museum at Alexandria. The fact that you exist is in itself your greatest gift. There are many lesser ones that time will test assigning relative value long after you have finished this stage in your "Continuance." Whatever you do motivated by wanting to "gift" the Earth, it must have as its source your particular color of light and not be placed there by the many hues and tints that lie outside you but to which you must listen. You must always be true to your inner voice in this and all that you do. Within a few days you will receive information from another source pointing to one of the many "things" you could address that should you follow to its conclusion, will mark your name for all time on the hearts of your fellow humans, if this is what you truly want. Remember the five stages that must be followed to effectively participate in the Becoming of your gift, the first two of which have already occurred. They are (First)Your WILL, because IT (2nd)DESIRES a thing, (3rd)SAYS to it, (4th)BE, and it (Finally)IS.
Hypatia: Ancient One, throughout the ages in both Eastern and Western intellectual and theologicalhistory, the sphere has been invoked as the closest image of perfection,spirit and God. This can be found in the history of Science andMathematics, Alchemy, Theology and Spirituality, from Pythagoras,Archimedes, Euclid to Nicolo Cusano, Kepler, Ficini and Pacioli to even thenewest generation of astrophysicists. But with the understanding ofprecession, dynamic symmetry, the ellipse (conics) and the realization thatperfect symmetry is something that resides in the mind, scientists invokechaos, complexity, duality, multiplicity, quasi-periodicity to understandthe true nature of the unfolding universe in the micro and macro-scale.With this obviously timebound conundrum, what sayest thou to humanity's everdiscovering the elusive but true nature of the physical and metaphysicaluniverse? Is it out of every generation's reach?
Ancient One: Hypatia, as for the "truth" of the nature of the physical and metaphysical universe, either one or the other of the following might you consider. Either "truth" is not static, not fixed, and not absolute or "truth" never changes, is fixed, is static, and is absolute. In the former case, the "truth" of a changing entity exists only for an instant, its essence existing only during that instant and differing in the next. This kind of elusive changing "truth" cannot be known. In the later case with an absolute "truth," we can know only that which changes; therefore, a truth that is fixed cannot be known. In either case in our present evolving human configuration, we approach the "truth" of Existence, but never reach it in this or in any other age. Hypatia, dearest one, be grateful in your great capacity to know that which is changing and be not foolish for want to know that which cannot be known.
Hypatia: Ancient One, how does one move with efficiency and fortitude when one can only take two steps forward and one step back with every effort?
Ancient One: Hypatia, take steps backward when in the solitude of reflection and synthesis found there you prepare yourself for steps forward which will be longer than they would have otherwise been. The overall effect will be that you are further along in your journey for having taken three short steps backward and two long ones forward, thus, movement that is efficient and with fortitude having been strenghtened by the process.
Hypatia: Oh Ancient One, where do the concave and convex meet? How do angles become curvature and what is the nature of negative space? How does this complex mirror image of dynamic reflection tell us more of our symmetrical unity with the unknowable?
Ancient One: Hypatia, your question warmed the worn edges of my thoughs and has given cause for another deep and long search. Finally, there is some information to report. It was necesary to carry your question up two "levels" before some progress was made on it. First, however, it will be necessary to briefly mention some basics concerning: (1) duality, (2)convergence/divergence, (3)some relevant astronomy, and (4)approaching but never reaching a limit. After a brief review of these four, an insight on Symmetrical Unity should emerge. (1) Duality - the yin/yang, positive/negative, matter/antimatter, 0/1, action/reaction, particle/wave, entropy/enthalpy, presence/absence, zero/infinity, linear/cyclic, expansion/contraction, male/female, north/south, left/right, double helix, concave/convex - to name a few. It seems that most things of "importance" have an opposite. But what of space and gravity? Later. (2) Convergence/divergence - from the outer convex surface of a sphere whose reflectance is perfect, light is reflected in all directions (diverged) to infinity and from the inner concave surface of a sphere whose reflectance is perfect, light is reflected to a point (converged). (3) Some astronomy - there was the Big Bang (divergence) and there will be the Big Crunch (convergence). Copernicus had the right idea when he equated the five known planets with the five Platonic Solids. During the first instance after the Big Bang, existence had the shape of a tetrahedron, then the cuboctahedron, then the octahedron, then the docdecahedron, then the icosahedron, then the truncatd tetrahedron, then the truncated cuboctahedron, and on through the remaining 11 Archimedean Solids, and further still with truncations continuing to this very day as the Universe continues its expansion and with each successive truncation approaching perfect sphericity as a limit (4) approaches but never reaches the perfect sphere, a shape of near perfect covexity at its outer surface and near perfect concavity at its inner sphere. The boundry between what lies without and that which lies within the Sphere is the "complex mirror image of dynamic reflection" of which you wrote in your question. As the Universe Sphere diverges into unknowable "negative space" with its antigravity, the Universe we know is created in its wake and this is your "symmetrical unity." By the way, "the convex and the concave" meet at the boundry of divergence and convergence actualized in its greatest sense at the expanding boundry where the virtual non existence of anti space becomes the reality of our known Universe.
Hypatia: Oh Ancient One, in all of your wanderings, what is the single sweetest discovery you have made about life?
Ancient One (10/22/2000): Hypatia, dear one, there have been many revelations, but the "sweetest" is knowing that the simple act of THINKING is communication with the undefined and unknowable that most call god and with whom limited communication occurs through what is called "prayer." Meditation is akin to communication with It as well and is also limited. When one seeks the answer to a problem, its solution comes through THINKING when dialogue is established with It. Think of the mind as a highly advanced transmitter/receiver tuned to the omnipresent It. The extent to which one effectively communicates with It is determined by several factors, mainly genetic and experiential. Since all humans are connected by THOUGHT to It, then through It, we are connected to one another, no small matter. THINKING is the most sacred of human acts and is the well-spring from which all our realities are made manifest, to name a few: Beethoven's 9th Symphony, the cure for polio, the computer, a ballet, the bicycle, Photoshop, universities, etc. If these are to some "positive," then there is also the "negative" which to others is their "positive": rap music, germ warfare, prisons, atomic bombs, etc., all made manifest through thought. Hypatia, the notion that we communicate with the Unknown may raise other questions for you, but you have not asked these. I merely reveal to you the mechanism through which I am becoming more at One with Existence and it is by THINKING and it is so sweet.
Hypatia (10/22/2000): Dear Ancient One, two sweet understandings have embraced my thoughts from through your answer, I understand that tools like Photoshop have a sacred purpose -- they are, in the using, the links from thought to form -- and deeper links to the unknowable through what one can create -- not a mundane thing. I will never look at our tools the same way. I have always thought of thinking as a dialogue with the unknowable. Epiphanies and Eureka moments sprinkle down upon us beyond our thinking moments. But like seeds from which new life is sprung, these moments are nutured like soil and water by thought. And all great thought breeds and spawns new souls to carry itself forward. Yes, how sweet it is, dear friend! Your response has ignited a new question. Born of my love for Socratic verba scriptoris I so lovingly blended with the scientific treatises in the hexagonal scroll tabula in Bibliotheca Alexandrina Grandis, I ask you, what is the true, sacred purpose and nature of dialogue -- both in Kairos and Chronos time -- linking together dialogia of contemporary minds as well as the great minds through and beyond time? And where can one find the library of all thought - is it in the deepest reaches of our soul or is there a place beyond?
Ancient One (10/29/2000): Hypatia, dear one, the sacred purpose of dialogue between humans is to make each at one with the other, and the sacred purpose of dialogue with The One is to make each at One with The One. The One is Existence. The nature of dialogue in its most sacred form is thought. When seeking knowledge, one drinks from the eternal pool of thought - in your words: "the library of all thought" - and with creative thought, pours into it. Even though your library at Alexandria was burned, the truth of all its content remains forever contained in this omnipresent pool of all thought, much having been rediscovered and the remainder yet to be. Knowledge expressed in the real world is but a mere shadow of that which is contained in the "Library of All Thought." Truth in its purest form is thought, and thought is dialogue with the One. You ask for a place to find the "Library of All Thought." There is no place where It is not and no time when It was not. "The Library of All Thought" is in everyplace in all time and our access to it is simply by thinking.
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