source file: mills2.txt Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 16:13:05 -0800 Subject: Re: Haverstick and truth From: David Malkin Great conversation. There is a danger I feel in looking for immutable laws (i.e. security). It is the Borg (a beautiful analogy that is used in the most recent Star Trek movie). The Borg I feel represents the Western trend to define reality objectively but it goes to such an extreme that the Borg is unaware of how ugly it truly has become. The American phenomenon is the best example of this I can think of . Here in America, many feel it is their duty to spread the American lifestyle to rest of the world "for the rest of world's own good." This is because many feel that our time saving, free and just democratic society that cures diseases and allows people the ability to become vapid consumers is good for the rest o' the world. This is the possible danger when the search for truth/God, etc. becomes a quest for perfection and then, once perfection is found, it becomes domination for "other less intelligent people's own good." Another possible extreme of truth seeking is the actionless doubter who is stranded in rational thought (this is what is I see here on the list at times). The doubter believes that to question knowledege is one of the highest virtues. He (or she) constructs philosophical/mathematical houses of cards and blows them over every once in a while. Eventually despair sets in since it seems there is no point in anything since anything created will eventually be destroyed. (I have seen this abyss one too many times in my life). This abyss is probably skirted by those who search for the "ultimate math" or the "ultimate musical scale(s)." I feel that this is the danger of extreme mentalism where all reality is filtered through reason and then eventually discared for one reason or another. I feel that it is because of these tendencies to go the extremes of rationalism (i.e. the scientific method) that modernity has lost it's connection to the spirituality of life itself. We have traded the influx of beauty and meaning inherent in nature for a cheap intellectual model. A model that is very useful (but as with anything) dangerous when it is used to the extreme of describing everything else in its own image. Currently, I believe that truth is all around us. Always has been, always will be. The problem I constantly face is trying to turn off my own mental static so that I can let spirituality flow in (especially when composing). (The first part of this essay was more about mental static and insecurity than about the search for truth. I feel the most important first step is to ask "Why am I searching for Truth in the first place.")The 12TET is the current Borg of Western music and I have no desire to create new ones. I see scales as a tool to express myself. The more freedom to choose, the better the expression. Another eastern idea that helps me is to see us all as part of each other's dream. Most will say that if I open a fortune cookie in a dream, the fortune has significance and is rooted somewhere in my psyche, but if I open a fortune cookie in waking reality, many would feel that the fortune has no significance and is random. To me the fortune cookie in waking reality has just as much significance as the fortune cookie in the dream. To many mystics of earlier epochs in human history, the dividing line between dream and waking "reality" was not so much of a brick wall. Perhaps the true scale of music is sung birds right outside our windows. Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Thu, 20 Feb 1997 03:38 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA12101; Thu, 20 Feb 1997 03:38:29 +0100 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA12087 Received: from by ella.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) id SAA18857; Wed, 19 Feb 1997 18:36:48 -0800 Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 18:36:48 -0800 Message-Id: Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@ella.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@ella.mills.edu