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FISHERMAN’S GUIDE TO THE COSMIC ORDER
New edition of Fisherman’s Guide: A Systems Approach to Creativity and Organization
(Shambhala, Boston, 1985) For the general reader
New Edition
New edition of Fisherman’s Guide: A Systems Approach to Creativity and Organization
(Shambhala, Boston, 1985) For the general reader
- Shambhala ISBN 0-87773-265-5
- Random House ISBN 0-394-72334-1
New Edition
- 6.5”x 9” book format, full color covers
- Permanent stapled binding with coping
- Quality laser print, 338 pages, fifty illustrations
- Approximate cost US $15
- Approximate airmail to US and UK from Thailand US $15
| Book Summary: |
Fishing in the Canadian wilderness provides the setting for this intuitive fishing trip into the cosmic order,
embracing the natural history of the biosphere and the stars beyond. Through a fantasy dialogue Sherlock
Holmes investigates the whole of science, while the divine scheme of the cosmos is introduced, as revealed in
a cosmic experience. The big screen—not the big bang—hosts the cosmic movie, where galaxies are theaters
eternally recycling their stellar populations so that sentient beings may emerge on the stage with a cosmic
role. Profound yet practical spiritual insights, into the organization of all experience, provide a valuable new
synthesis on how we develop our ideas and endeavors. The reader friendly approach focuses on physics,
cosmology, biology, evolution of the nervous system, our social dilemma and business. Fishing takes on a
global flair with Western left brain technology brought to terms with Asian right brain intuition, both anchored
firmly to our ancient heart in Africa—three dimensions to the integration of human experience. The eternal
plan guiding our human evolution in the biosphere emerges into a new paradigm as we search for direction on
the threshold of the new millennium.
embracing the natural history of the biosphere and the stars beyond. Through a fantasy dialogue Sherlock
Holmes investigates the whole of science, while the divine scheme of the cosmos is introduced, as revealed in
a cosmic experience. The big screen—not the big bang—hosts the cosmic movie, where galaxies are theaters
eternally recycling their stellar populations so that sentient beings may emerge on the stage with a cosmic
role. Profound yet practical spiritual insights, into the organization of all experience, provide a valuable new
synthesis on how we develop our ideas and endeavors. The reader friendly approach focuses on physics,
cosmology, biology, evolution of the nervous system, our social dilemma and business. Fishing takes on a
global flair with Western left brain technology brought to terms with Asian right brain intuition, both anchored
firmly to our ancient heart in Africa—three dimensions to the integration of human experience. The eternal
plan guiding our human evolution in the biosphere emerges into a new paradigm as we search for direction on
the threshold of the new millennium.
CONTENTS
Preface iii
Overture iv
Prologue vii
PART I - THE ROAD TO THE SYSTEM
1 Night Fishing
The deficiency of science introduced
2 White Men and Indians
Frameworks of understanding and the cosmic order
3 Circles and Squares
Ancient systems and the cosmic order
4 Clouds
Conflict in business and a spiritual experience
5 Laundering Experience
Three polar dimensions in a business organization
6 More Laundering
Hierarchies in the biosphere and business are the same
7 Three Mergansers
The cosmic order as yang and yin and the basis of the system
8 Skywalk
Evolutionary tiers in nature’s energy refinery
PART II - THE SYSTEM
9 Voices in the Wilderness
System 1 and System 2
10 Smudgy
System 3 and the projection of the cosmic movie
11 Dance Halls and Spaceships
Sherlock Holmes investigates the mystery of the living cell
12 An Onion Dance
Watson has his own ideas on the structure of the planet Earth
13 An Indian Dance
Watson sees solar system hierarchies in Sherlock’s evidence
14 Black Bandits
Universal hierarchies of System 4 while Sherlock looks at the stars
15 Ghosts and Ghouls
System 4, the creative process, while Sherlock reviews cosmology
16 Graveyard Chess
Three disciplines, transcending death, and the higher systems
17 Harmony
The poetry of evolution
APPENDICES
1 Further Discussion of System 4
2 The Human Nervous System
Preface iii
Overture iv
Prologue vii
PART I - THE ROAD TO THE SYSTEM
1 Night Fishing
The deficiency of science introduced
2 White Men and Indians
Frameworks of understanding and the cosmic order
3 Circles and Squares
Ancient systems and the cosmic order
4 Clouds
Conflict in business and a spiritual experience
5 Laundering Experience
Three polar dimensions in a business organization
6 More Laundering
Hierarchies in the biosphere and business are the same
7 Three Mergansers
The cosmic order as yang and yin and the basis of the system
8 Skywalk
Evolutionary tiers in nature’s energy refinery
PART II - THE SYSTEM
9 Voices in the Wilderness
System 1 and System 2
10 Smudgy
System 3 and the projection of the cosmic movie
11 Dance Halls and Spaceships
Sherlock Holmes investigates the mystery of the living cell
12 An Onion Dance
Watson has his own ideas on the structure of the planet Earth
13 An Indian Dance
Watson sees solar system hierarchies in Sherlock’s evidence
14 Black Bandits
Universal hierarchies of System 4 while Sherlock looks at the stars
15 Ghosts and Ghouls
System 4, the creative process, while Sherlock reviews cosmology
16 Graveyard Chess
Three disciplines, transcending death, and the higher systems
17 Harmony
The poetry of evolution
APPENDICES
1 Further Discussion of System 4
2 The Human Nervous System
- The Limbic Cortex
- The Hypothalamus and the Cerebellum
- Business and Nervous System Organization
- Neuromuscular Spindles
- Spinal Proprioception
| Samples |
...
It is already mid-morning. A couple of hours of unsuccessful trolling has brought the boat into a long, sheltered
bay that is especially peaceful, squeezed as it is between two bulky hills that are both heavily wooded. There is
an abundance of life here, much more than can be seen. Most impressive is the preponderance of plant life.
The air is steeped in its vitality. Everywhere majestic limbs reach out to cloak the earth and embrace the sun,
transforming energies into a storehouse of life. Plants dress the stage, and generate the atmosphere, to
sustain all the other players in evolution’s drama. From tiny origins their numbers exploded in the sea, then on
land, to dominate the early acts of the play, assisted by lower life forms working behind the scenes. Even now,
plant life re-mains in many ways aloof unto itself, with only certain treasured concessions to such intimate
friends as pollinating insects. But what a lavish gift it makes for every higher form of life. A miracle of
transformation has turned a naked landscape and pungent atmosphere into a setting fit for a festival of
animation.
Plants stock the shelves to overflowing in a large section of nature’s marketplace, for all the rest of us to shop.
They offer the nutrition and shelter of their form, but in the process something more is done. They assimilate
and exact a balance to energies that provide a basis for all higher forms of sensitivity. Stalks strain skyward,
from roots searching blindly into earth, to bring together—from darkness and from light—energies from soil and
sun. Heaven and earth stand reconciled in plants through the eternal patterns of vitality they project. Each
species lends its flavor to a polar balance until all varieties have been explored and need for more has been
exhausted. The graceful pine, the hardy spruce, the gentle fern, each has a vital character, a spirit of its own.
From mushrooms and moss to mountain flowers, the dilemma of creation is continually resolved in plants with
vital spirits.
These early acts in the drama began as gloomy affairs, but gradually a vast fund of vital energies enveloped
the globe and saturated the seas. As the bank balance accumulated, and when the timing was right, this fund of
profit from experience was drawn upon to make new investments into certain lines of diversification. New
creatures came on the scene, confined to the sea at first, with specialized yet simple organs for ingestion,
digestion and respiration. The early versions were mostly slow moving, sluggish things with plant-like traits, but
as their variety increased, so did their complexity. Vital energies became ingested and transformed into new
levels of sensitivity, with a capacity for response. Worms and jellyfish came, then shellfish, and great varieties of
arthropods, with insects infesting and exploring to the limits of experience. All manner of invertebrates explored
techniques of metamorphosis, metabolism, reproduction, locomotion, and sensitive response. Nature’s
marketplace was thriving, but in this classic drama the trading is in the energies of life. Another vast fund of
patterned energies accumulates, this one much more complex in its organization. These spirits are of sensitive,
responsive creatures that have learned both pain and pleasure. The profit in the fund is boiling over. ...
* * * *
...
Nature’s theater is a planetary extravaganza, an exotic tapestry of variegated stages, spontaneously
transmuting in lighting, atmosphere and mood. Abounding in phantasmagorical display, a multitude of scenes is
synchronized into a symphonic orchestration, each performance reaching balance in blending with the whole.
The drama is tastefully arranged across the master stage, in a broad, mellifluous band around its planetary
girth. Even in the frigid wastelands of polar settings, fascinating epics unfold through months’ long days and
nights, with fluctuating twilights in between. Each of the continental stages is graced with a prodigious
assortment of prairies, jungles, deserts, peaks, with many ingenious added touches to the sets. Sometimes the
stages run independent scenes, others share the same cast of characters, while the performance in the oceans
has a topography of its own, regulated by tides and major currents. This colossus of a theater is called the
Biosphere, the totality of planetary life, and the name of nature’s energy refinery.
Given the complex structure of a theater that has gone through so many renovations since the beginning of
the show, the performers belong to an equally complex theatrical guild, many of them displaying temperamental
preferences as to where they will perform. Most categories of invertebrates prefer a script written for the sea,
the great exception being many millions of species of insects that infest the land. The mammals and reptiles are
predisposed to play parts on land, yet some of the largest creatures ever, the whales, shares their dominion of
the seas with a supporting cast of cousins, the porpoises and dolphins. Few other mammals like the ocean
setting—the only reptiles that have been persuaded to take extended parts are the turtle, snake and crocodile.
Birds are the most versatile performers. Some migrate from one polar region to the other, supporting
themselves by playing bit parts in local scenes along the way. Other birds, who can’t be bothered with the
exertion of such active roles, have given up on flight—the Oscar for the most bizarre going to the penguin.
Although many birds can swim and dive, this one does little else, choosing the most inhospitable stage on
earth. As for man, he started out humbly enough, but now, with his machines, no stage is free of him. He
dominates the drama, even changes the sets and tries to rewrite the script, without knowing what the plot is all
about.
Just a brief theatrical tour impresses any visitor with the variety of the performance from one location to
another. There is such a range of diversity from the lavish mob scenes in the teeming jungle of Brazil, to the
shoestring budget productions in the desolation of the Sahara. The feedstock to the energy refinery fluctuates
drastically in its constituents. The tiers are populated to the brim in places, while other barren sets are
abandoned to a few derelict performers.
Whatever the constituents, the refinement of energies seeks harmonic balance up and down the levels of the
hierarchy. Reflux becomes regulated through experience. The players on each level of the hierarchy belong to
different instrumental sections in the orchestration of the whole, only certain notes being sounded by certain
instruments within each section. Percussion, brass, strings, and woodwinds may all be richly represented in
grand symphonic movements, while across the way, a few faltering notes from flute and cello strive to sustain a
single resonating chord. All these renditions meld into a resonating topology to the refinement of energies in
the biosphere, modulated by the pace of celestial movements from night to day and from season to season.
The enclosed active interface of the planet resonates in patterns that seek a biospheric balance.
The daily and seasonal regularity to the modulation of the music has a tendency to induce both complementary
patterns and compensating balances in opposite hemispheres of the biosphere. This is implicit in the polar
nature of the energies involved, the enclosed character of the biosphere, and the modulated regularity to the
resonating whole. Thus we find many examples of converging evolution in different parts of the world from very
different ancestral stock, together with the complementary divergence that this implies. The South American
rhea, the cassowary and emu of Australia, and the African ostrich are all very similar yet come from different
parentage. The fenec fox of the Sahara is smaller than the kit fox of America but with essentially identical traits,
yet the two are unrelated. The sea cow of the tropical coast in America is thought to share a common ancestry
with the elephant, yet the sea cow has adopted the characteristics of the unrelated sea lion, seal and walrus.
Another relative of the elephant, the rock hyrax of Africa and the Near East, has all the characteristics of a
rodent, living in burrows and rock crevices. The evolutionary marketplace is full of such examples of copying
wherever biospheric resonance requires. It is one way in which the music gets filled out to achieve a better
balance.
Sometimes these complementary patterns are coupled with geographic isolation that prevents interference
from parallel evolving streams. For instance, a number of species of hoofed ungulates evolved independently in
South America before becoming extinct when the Isthmus of Panama appeared about a million years ago.
These had a strong tendency to resemble hoofed ungulates in other parts of the world. There are a few
modern descendants; the llama and alpaca, for example are counterparts of the camel.
The continent of Australia has been isolated since the demise of the dinosaurs, providing a haven for the
independent evolution of the marsupials. In these mammals, the young fetus is not nourished inside the mother
with the aid of a placenta. Instead the tiny, undeveloped fetus is required to crawl from the vagina into the
mother’s external pouch, where it attaches itself to a nipple for the remainder of its development. The
marsupials have evolved from an ancestral branch independent from that of the placental mammals, yet a
distinguishing feature has been the evolution of species that correspond closely to placental species. There are
pouched marsupial counterparts to the dog, cat, mouse, mole, badger, anteater, squirrel, monkey, bear, and
others.
Of further interest, the marsupials do not have a corpus callosum, the main nerve bundle that in the placentals
interconnects the two hemispheres of the new brain. Their two hemispheres must function independently, both
linked to a common limbic brain, just as in split brain patients. A basis of comparison is thus provided in similar
species between two modes of cerebral function. This is of special interest because of its relationship to
language and the bilateral polarization of brain function in man, leading to the full development of three polar
dimensions to the integration of experience.
* * * *
...
To the northeast of the camp the shoreline juts out into a couple of points as it turns northward on its contorted
journey up the east side of the lake. Each point is graced with genuflecting pines. The boat is drifting slowly
near one point, a good spot for jigging, although pickerel usually feed here later in the day. A lone white pine is
standing some distance apart from a couple of others, its branches licking at the sky, like frozen green flames.
A slight breeze betrays the pantomime with gently flowing movements, just as slightly moving lips sometimes
betray the voice behind the ventriloquist’s dummy. On windy days the mimicry of motion is all but forgotten in
order to accentuate the wind, with dancing limbs tugging at their trunks to join the rhythm.
There is another unseen dance going on within the tree, part of a master choreography well concealed behind
the scenes. Like a brilliant Sherlock Holmes, science has done a great deal of diligent detective work,
identifying many of the characters in the cast, but still has not glimpsed the surreptitious plot. The motive and
the modus operandi remain a lurking mystery, concealed by the collusion of the dancers. The detective work
proceeds in the belief that the universe is nothing more than a gigantic thermodynamic bake shop.
The Sherlock Holmes of science sees a pine tree as a recipe for a cake. The masterful detective is very
earnest in this belief, going to great lengths to convey the opinion to a trusting public. In this ongoing dialogue
the public is Watson, the long-standing assistant and faithful companion to detective Holmes.
“You see, it is all very elementary, my dear Watson. Certain chemicals are being drawn up with moisture from
the soil and circulated through the vascular system of the tree, which runs in a complex maze—like arteries and
veins—to carry the lifeblood of sap to every portion of the tree. The foliage of the tree contains special cells
with green structures within them called chloroplasts. These give the foliage its green appearance, but they are
also the main kitchen for the tree, where the prime ingredients for a carbohydrate cake are baked. As the sap is
circulated through these special cells in needles, water from the soil is combined with carbon dioxide absorbed
from the air to produce the carbohydrate sugar. This cooking process requires energy, just as any kitchen
stove requires energy. In the kitchen of a tree, the energy comes from sunlight. Because the process of
cooking or synthesizing sugar from water and carbon dioxide requires sunlight, we call it photosynthesis,”
proclaims the brilliant Sherlock, confident that the central culprit in the recipe has been apprehended.
“You see it is all quite elementary, my dear Watson. Light energy from the sun is essential for the chemical
bonding of water with carbon dioxide, to produce sugar. In this way, light energy becomes stored in the
chemical bonds of sugar, and it is carried in the sap to various parts of the tree. Some of this energy is then
released and used by the tree to build the more complex substances needed for its trunk, roots, limbs needles
cones and seeds.”
“But how do the various cells know how to do this?” pries the inquiring Watson.
“This was rather puzzling for quite some time. But now you may rest assured that it all has to do with a secret
code.”
“It sounds frightfully diabolical,” says Watson.
“Not at all, my dear fellow,” reassures the famous detective, with his usual air of confidence. “It sounds a little
complicated, but really it is just a simple matter of elementary chemistry. You see, the code is locked up in a
safety deposit vault, the nucleus of every cell, and it is really nothing more than chemical bonds between four
rather simple chemicals. These four chemicals join hands in pairs to form the rungs of a very long ladder-
shaped molecule, called DNA, that gets twisted into a helical shape revolving every nine or ten rungs, like a
winding staircase. The genetic code is transferred through the rungs. The sides of the ladder sometimes come
apart like a zipper, each side of the zipper retaining half of each rung. Each side then acts like a template to
build a new identical zipper. In this way the secret code can be transferred into a new cell when the cell divides.”
“Amazing!” says Watson. “The energy for cooking the recipe is collected from the sun and stored in chemical
bonds, while the recipe for mixing the ingredients of the cake in a proper sequence and in proper proportions is
stored in chemical bonds as well. That is amazing! If the rungs of the ladder contain the secret genetic code,
then the language of the code must be written in the sequence in which each of the different kinds of rungs
occur. The DNA molecules are like the chief cook, then.”
“Very observant , my dear Watson,” says the sleuth masterfully. “That is basically it. The code is written in
three-letter words, or groups of three rungs in the ladder. Although more than sixty words are possible, a third
of them are sufficient to designate the amino acids in the proper order for assembling unlimited varieties of
protein. The code has already been cracked in this regard, although related questions remain.”
“How about all the other complicated processes going on in the cell, outside the nucleus, in the cytoplasm that
surrounds it?” asks the curious Watson. “If the chief cook is in the nucleus, how do his instructions get passed
along?”
“I thought you would ask that, Watson. The chief cook has transfer agents and messengers, called RNA, that
are copied from the pattern of DNA. They are like sections from one side of the zipper. These shorter templates
go into the cytoplasm, collecting ingredients and giving piecemeal instructions to assembly machines that make
the protein constituents of the cake. The whole thing is run like a bakery. There are other workers as well,
enzymes and so on, but the secret is in the code.”
“Fascinating,” replies Watson, “but how do all these messengers know where or when to go with their
instructions, or whom to give them to? How is it that they can move through the batter of the cake to the right
place, at the right time? How about cell division? How about the code itself? Where did it come from?”
“One question at a time, my dear Watson. It is all very elementary. There are electromagnetic energies at work
in many ways within a cell, and no doubt work in some way to explain the migrations through the batter. There is
even evidence of molecular motors and microtubules to guide them. We don’t have all of the evidence as yet,
but no doubt some satisfactory explanation can be worked out, given a little more time. As for the code itself, it
is just a fortuitous accident.”
“An accident!” exclaims Watson, showing some surprise. “You mean a pine tree is an accident? That is
remarkable!”
“Precisely, my dear Watson, although it is really a series of accidents, occurring over hundreds of millions of
years, that have produced pine trees, and you and I as well, for that matter.”
“You mean I’m an accident too?!” blurts out Watson, horrified. ...
* * * *
. . .
Thus, although the musical score may be written in genetic code, the code is neither the music nor the
musicians. It is a referent to the music—like notes written on a printed page—a discretionary guide for the
universal centers to select the appropriate patterned energies from the sensorium of experience. Each
sprouting seedling interprets the musical score according to its own environment.
Cells read the code with their own hierarchy of activity synchronous with that for the tree. Each cell thus
interprets the code in the context of the tree, while the tree has no access to the code except through cells. The
lineage must be transmitted through a seed. Nevertheless, the structured energies of each new tree emerge
under the tutelage of its parentage, spanning generations of space and time through the dance.
Don’t be misled by the apparent simplicity of the action. Visualize the complexity if you can. Atomic dancers
jostle in a molecular Mardi Gras through the maze of avenues circulating within the tree. The streets and
alleyways are lined with myriads of cells, like dance halls of various designs, complete with ionized facades.
Certain performers are enticed to enter certain halls, while others are ejected by bouncers at the doors. Inside,
what a show! Dancers far more populous than people are induced by enzymes to join hands in complicated
patterns, while others are broken up, to form again renewed. Exotic energies are wafting everywhere, sifting
through the dancers as they two-step to and fro into eternity, waving as they come and go. The hall is rocking
with the beat, the organelles sustaining rhythms of routines. Observe especially the mighty mitochondria. These
energy sustainers for the show are separately delegated their own DNA, at the supervisory level of the
eukaryotic cell.
The maze of streets and alleyways lead on to limbs and twigs, reaching out to halls in needles with special
energy-fixing organelles—the chloroplasts, too, have DNA. It is here atomic triplets enact their star performance
to a caroling chorus of chlorophyll. Triplets beckoned from the moisture of the soil are joined in wedlock with
triplets coaxed in from the breeze. The parson comes from ninety million miles away. The nuptial festivities are
sanctified with sunlight. The six member ring of glucose resonates a wedding march. Sweetness and light
prevail. Space and time are bridged by light. The energies of lifetimes are bestowed. The whole tree strains for
this event. The bride of light, its life is light. ...
* * * *
...
“Then plants and the invertebrates have participated directly in the building of continents. Is that correct,
Holmes?”
“In a manner of speaking, I suppose so, Watson, but other factors—crustal movements, erosion, ocean levels,
and so on, come into play. For instance, carbon dioxide levels can affect the average temperature—only a few
degrees change can alter the size of polar caps substantially, which can change ocean levels dramatically, thus
altering the pressure distribution on the earth’s crust, which affects plate movements.”
“But aren’t carbon dioxide levels regulated by organic life?”
“Yes, but also by volcanic activity, although organic life has gained the upper hand. For example, man’s
enormous use of fossil fuels is increasing carbon dioxide levels.”
“Then are you answering my question in the affirmative?” persists Watson.
“Well, I suppose so, in a manner of speaking, but there are other things—for instance patterns of thermal
convection in the mantle influence crustal movements.”
“But aren’t these in turn influenced by the magnetosphere, which is influenced by the ionosphere, which is the
result of changes in the chemistry of the atmosphere brought about mainly by plants?”
“In a manner of speaking, I suppose so, but solar radiation is involved as well,” replies Holmes with a forced air
of confidence, while puffing much more quickly on his pipe.
“But hasn’t organic life been an essential instrument behind the regulation of solar radiation as well?” insists
Watson, excitement mounting in his voice.
“In a manner of speaking, yes. But so what? You are going in circles and beginning to make me feel like a prime
suspect in the case,” retorts Holmes, with his annoyance beginning to show again.
“Perhaps we are all prime suspects in the case,” replies Watson, with a wild and fiendish glint in his eyes as the
words begin to spill out rapidly. “At every turn since its first appearance on the planet, organic life has been
busy working out a balance between cosmic energies and the behavior of the planet. ...”
Watson is fired up and about to continue, but Holmes cuts him off.
“I know what you’re thinking, but don’t say it!” he bellows.
The two men stand looking at each other sullenly for what seems an eternity. A new perspective to the case has
gripped Watson’s mind. He wants desperately to explore it. At the same time, he has a great respect for his
longtime companion and is repulsed by the thought of jeopardizing their friendship. Finally, discretion prevails;
he perks up with a cheerful suggestion.
“Would you fancy a pint of bitter at the local pub, Holmes?”
Holmes is a bit startled by the sudden change of mood, but after a moments reflection, he is taken by the
idea.
“Yes, I believe I would, Watson. That sounds like a brilliant proposal.”
The two men agree on a familiar haunt. As they walk down the street, the conversation changes to the dismal
weather.
* * * *
...
The sky is almost cloudless. The spendthrift sun is squandering its energy, with indifference for its reserves.
Light leaps in all directions into boundless sky, toying here and there with distant relatives of form, spanning
space and time. Our lumbering planet scavenges through the radiating wealth discarded like small change by
an eccentric billionaire. It circles and filters through the emanating streams, transforming some, selecting some,
rejecting some, according to its needs. An electromagnetic apparatus has been fashioned to exercise
discretion. Huge haloed layers of energy enshroud the earth in a meditating womb, reflecting a maternal
vigilance for a biospheric fetus. Deep within her bowels, our Mother Earth is churning with concern. Turbulent
fluid spirits are disciplined by a brain of interacting ions gyrating through the sky. Seething, restless currents
are shaping her behavior to ensure a place and opportunity for her child. ...
Shifting breasts have heaved and spread to nurture a suckling infant that has been weaned in stages toward
maturity. Vital, sensitive, conscious, and creative spirits are entertained in a resonating biospheric song. Each
intermingling elemental mind refluxes energies, dancing through the void to seek harmonic balance with the
whole. Discordances are introduced as the drama of exploring experience in tiers unfolds, but gradually they
are singled out and tailored to the master orchestration. Gradually, the maturing adolescent learns its part and
place. The lessons come through resonating regulations ringing through a planetary bosom.
Our whirling lady is a living being dancing round a living solar cell. She has a brain, a body, and a spirit that
have mutually evolved, yet she had a primal spirit before the biosphere was born. In her youth she was a wild
unruly wench, lost in constant stormy moods. Lacking a refinement of discretion, she was given to volcanic
eruptions of behavior and flashing lightning thoughts, as if she knew it all. Impetuous and impressionable, she
was easily influenced by the tide, reveling with her dancing partners, a satellite and sun. Rhythm was her
regularity. Maternal instincts came with pregnant seas, then life took root on land while her atmosphere and
moods were tamed, steadily transforming into a womanly concern. Our gracious lady has blossomed into
beauty. She still dances to a tidal rhythm, but she has learned to sing a melody of life.
She dances through a solar wind, part of her magnetic mental apparatus blowing out like skirts into the breeze.
The outer layers of petticoats perceptually transpose on every revolution, opening to trail off into the wonders
of the planetary disc. She relates to her environment to keep from getting dizzy. Her twirling tilted head and her
magnetic personality maintain an equilibrium. Her axis wobbles through the epochs to modulate her moods and
the currents in her core, while magnetic polar transpositions occasionally record the ages of developments. Her
whole molecular bulk is itself a syncopated clock pulsating with the galaxy as it tiptoes to and fro into eternal
emptiness.
The timing of the complex melding of music into mind spans vast extremes. Our seasoned space ship earth has
memories with referents recorded in her crust, reaching back four billion years. Within the grasp of recall she
has wandered with her beaming escort around the galaxy twenty times or so, yet spanning space and time on
such a scale is not the greatest of her achievements. ...
* * * * *
... Most recently, however, she has reared a problem child with a strange perceptual handicap: the ability to
speak. His name is man. Two halves of man’s brain have been delegated special functions. The half that
organizes speech is naturally concerned with social endeavors; through cultural developments, man has
learned to provide quite well for his material needs. The other half, concerned with intuitive comprehension,
sometimes catches glimpses of his cosmic spiritual nature, and his vagrant cosmic father. As if two sides to his
brain were not enough, man’s autonomic nervous system, which refluxes emotional energies into
consciousness, is anchored to his evolutionary origins in the biosphere. Mother Earth had great hopes that
man would one day help her manage her affairs, but through the use of words, man has learned to reflect on
experience in abstraction. He sees in his death the transience of life; at the same time he is taunted by a
timeless cosmic intuition. The creative gift of language has thus presented man with a spiritual dilemma,
bringing much consternation and disruption to the drama.
* * * * *
“…Mars is larger than Mercury but much smaller than Venus. It has two tiny moons, roughly twelve and twenty-
two kilometers in diameter. As with Venus, the solar wind interacts directly with the ionosphere, producing a
weak shock front that trails off down wind. A Martian day is similar to an Earth day, but the year is nearly twice
as long. It is a strange land with magnetic iron soil, peach-colored skies, and purple sunsets.”
“It sounds like an exotic place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there. Our Earth is certainly the most fortunate
of the lot,” proclaims Watson like a typical tourist. Then he ponders, assuming a very professional tone of voice
as he begins to comment on Holmes’s brief account. “The terrestrial planets exhibit definite relationships that
seem to be of fundamental significance to the ordered behavior of them all. Mercury, for instance, exposes
opposite faces to the sun on each revolution, which provides a precise datum for the relationship of night to
day. Of related significance is the retrograde rotation of Venus. Every time it is directly between Earth and the
sun, it exposes the same face toward Earth, even though exactly five Venus days have elapsed between such
conjunctions. The length of a Venus day coincides with two axial rotations of Mercury. A Mercury day, however,
is two complete orbital revolutions of the sun, which is three axial rotations of Mercury. Meanwhile the axial
rotation period of Venus is two-thirds of an Earth year. The same ratio of two-thirds keeps recurring between
rotation periods and revolution periods. There is a triadic character to the behavior of the terrestrial planets
that is reminiscent of the triadic relationships of particle physics.”
You are stretching the point more than a little, Watson. Where does Mars fit into your tidy scheme?”
“Just give me a moment to recapitulate.” Watson pulls out his pocket calculator, scanning a tabulation of data
on the solar system and scratching his head. “The rotation period of Mercury (58.65 days) is two thirds
(0.6667) of its revolution period (87.97 days). One Venus day (117 days) is two thirds (0.665) of a Mercury day
(175.94 days). The rotation period of Venus (243.17 days) is two thirds (0.666) of an Earth year (365.25 days).
Now a Mars solar day is 24.6587 hours. That means that there are 666.8 Mars days in a Mars year. The ratio of
a Mars day to a Mars year is therefore also two-thirds, except that there is a factor of one thousand involved.”
“Then how about the rotation period of Earth? An Earth day is about forty minutes shorter than a Mars day
and doesn’t exhibit any special ratio to revolution periods.”
“But an Earth day is nevertheless close to a Mars day. Both Earth and Mars have seasons distinct from days,
whereas Mercury and Venus do not,” retorts Watson. “Perhaps Earth is allowed some flexibility due to the
influence of organic life. Earth is also the only terrestrial planet to have a major moon—tidal influences have
played an important role in the evolution of the biosphere and tides advance about 40 minutes a day. Is it just
an accident that the rotation period of the moon is the same as the average rotation period of the sun? With the
single exception of the Earth’s rotational period, all terrestrial rotational and orbital periods display a resonance
that cannot be explained by laws of mechanics. Only Earth displays some degree of freedom in its rotational
period.”
Now it is Holmes turn to scratch his head as he takes off his hat and walks slowly in a circle. Then he stops,
replaces his hat, looks up at the dreary sky, and says in a condescending tone, “What are you suggesting,
Watson? Are you implying that the laws of mechanics aren’t valid? Are you saying that gravity and momentum
don’t work according to the time-tested laws of physics?”
“Not exactly, Holmes. I am merely pointing out some remarkable coincidences that indicate a more
comprehensive system of order to things. Since electromagnetic energies are involved as well, perhaps our
understanding of physical laws is incomplete on a cosmic scale. It could be that nature doesn’t work in exactly
the way that we think it does. The formulation of so-called physical laws is built on empirical observations close
to home. There is no proof for them, especially if we attempt to extrapolate them to cosmic proportions.”
“Nonsense, Watson! All this talk sounds more like astrology than science. You mustn’t try to make so much of
a few coincidences. ..."
* * * *
. . .
All day the haze has muted shades of color, softened edges, and blended highlights into shadows. With the
advancing night, the haze has concentrated near the water and in the bays, to hide the shoreline in the
distance. Horizons have merged into the sky. The stars are twinkling in the water. The canoe has been
transported into boundless space, floating in a sphere of stars. An island across the lake, and another to the
north, intrude boldly through the haze in two big blobs, hovering like a pair of oblong asteroids growing trees
from top and bottom.
Holmes has worked hard devising sophisticated instruments and theories in his effort to crack the ultimate
mystery of the cosmos. Now his faithful companion, Watson, has dragged him back to the planetarium with
many questions. Holmes is explaining how powerful telescopes reveal that there are distant galaxies more
numerous than the stars in our own Milky Way. Dispersed in all directions, they are woven in a great skein
throughout the firmament.
* * * *
Watson undoes the top button of his shirt and loosens his tie. “You certainly don’t offer much hope,” he pants.
“Either the universe is going to be crushed again into an unthinkable singularity smaller than nothing, or it is
headed for a frigid oblivion of eternal night. Either possibility, however distant, leaves me wrenched of a sense
of humanity.”
“Nonsense, Watson! There is no room for anthropomorphic feelings in science. It is all a big bakeshop, I tell
you, and the evidence strongly suggests a big bang beginning. The bakeshop started at infinite temperature
and density, cooling very rapidly as it expanded. After the first one-hundredth of a second, the temperature had
cooled to 100 billion degrees Kelvin; after the first second, to ten billion degrees; and after three minutes, to
one billion degrees, though it was still seventy times hotter than the center of the sun.”
Beads of sweat are standing out on Watson’s forehead. He feels entrapped by a web of evidence. Holmes
seems to take morbid delight in his friend’s discomfort. It is the old triumphant feeling that comes with closing in
to wrap up a case. He continues. . . .
* * * *
. . .
In nature’s theater, the whole of space and time is bubbling full of history. Ghost images are streaking through
the cosmos at the speed of light, metering out the scenes in the celestial drama with memories of the way things
were. Events of yesterday are shaping up the scenery for today.
A ghostly mist is settling in the bays again. Dank, wan spirits, converging for a sceance, are reticent at first then
progressively encouraged by their swelling numbers. The sphere of stars has been severed by a ring of spooks
with forebodings of some sorcery to come. Their spell infiltrates slowly into the haze to dim and daze the
asteroids. A caterpillar of ghoulish green light begins to creep across the northern sky. Vertical shafts of the
aurora shunt in undulating bunches through a phosphorescent crest that wavers unsteadily above one of the
asteroids. A trough, reflected underneath, provides the mate to a pair of terribly trembling hands that fear to
fully grasp the spiny boulder stranded in the firmament. Suddenly the hands jump away, then spread in forks
like crooked scissors clipping at the sky. The ghosts that gird the ragged heavens absorb and then exude the
fiendish flickering neon glow of green.
Gradually the shears exchange their shape for sabers, that slice the night in iridescent slivers, rising almost to
the zenith. The slivers fade to greenish yellow, as complex shifting patterns begin to wind in switchbacks, like
mountain trails weaving up a trelliswork. Caravans of angels are ascending and descending a zigzag Jacob’s
ladder into paradise. Their mission of forewarning has cast a horoscope across the sky with mesmerizing
omens of redress. Slowly the trails begin to slip and slide as colors deepen into a nest of squirming serpents.
Greens and yellows change to hues of red, as firespewing dragons wage incendiary war. The northern sky has
ignited into flame. Ghoulish ghosts, encircling the waters of a fiery pit, transform to vampire shades, injected full
with bursts of blood. The canoe is suspended in a holocaust. Purgation comes as hell fires fade to greens and
yellows, rising into another trelliswork. Processions of angels have revived to bridge the heavens with
redeeming grace.
The stars have been relegated a backseat to the display, but some peer on from overhead and from the south,
with reassuring twinkles that the galaxy goes on eternally. The experience indicated that the universe is
eternally sustained, through the polar balance of partitioned energies. All order in the universe is dependent on
the most intricate balance between particular and universal hemispheres that define the social mystery of each
and all. The experience demonstrated a responsible human relationship to this dilemma of a cosmic mind.
The Cosmic Being went on to show how memories work, how energies are refluxed through the nervous system
into the creation of ideas. Memories went streaming out through the eyes into ideas. Visibly organized with
active interfaces of energy, they transformed rapidly through a sequence before they vanished in the void.
They were animated with images of light in living colors. Their pattern of organization was projected in three
dimensions, similar in essence to the diagrams that have been used to depict the system
It is already mid-morning. A couple of hours of unsuccessful trolling has brought the boat into a long, sheltered
bay that is especially peaceful, squeezed as it is between two bulky hills that are both heavily wooded. There is
an abundance of life here, much more than can be seen. Most impressive is the preponderance of plant life.
The air is steeped in its vitality. Everywhere majestic limbs reach out to cloak the earth and embrace the sun,
transforming energies into a storehouse of life. Plants dress the stage, and generate the atmosphere, to
sustain all the other players in evolution’s drama. From tiny origins their numbers exploded in the sea, then on
land, to dominate the early acts of the play, assisted by lower life forms working behind the scenes. Even now,
plant life re-mains in many ways aloof unto itself, with only certain treasured concessions to such intimate
friends as pollinating insects. But what a lavish gift it makes for every higher form of life. A miracle of
transformation has turned a naked landscape and pungent atmosphere into a setting fit for a festival of
animation.
Plants stock the shelves to overflowing in a large section of nature’s marketplace, for all the rest of us to shop.
They offer the nutrition and shelter of their form, but in the process something more is done. They assimilate
and exact a balance to energies that provide a basis for all higher forms of sensitivity. Stalks strain skyward,
from roots searching blindly into earth, to bring together—from darkness and from light—energies from soil and
sun. Heaven and earth stand reconciled in plants through the eternal patterns of vitality they project. Each
species lends its flavor to a polar balance until all varieties have been explored and need for more has been
exhausted. The graceful pine, the hardy spruce, the gentle fern, each has a vital character, a spirit of its own.
From mushrooms and moss to mountain flowers, the dilemma of creation is continually resolved in plants with
vital spirits.
These early acts in the drama began as gloomy affairs, but gradually a vast fund of vital energies enveloped
the globe and saturated the seas. As the bank balance accumulated, and when the timing was right, this fund of
profit from experience was drawn upon to make new investments into certain lines of diversification. New
creatures came on the scene, confined to the sea at first, with specialized yet simple organs for ingestion,
digestion and respiration. The early versions were mostly slow moving, sluggish things with plant-like traits, but
as their variety increased, so did their complexity. Vital energies became ingested and transformed into new
levels of sensitivity, with a capacity for response. Worms and jellyfish came, then shellfish, and great varieties of
arthropods, with insects infesting and exploring to the limits of experience. All manner of invertebrates explored
techniques of metamorphosis, metabolism, reproduction, locomotion, and sensitive response. Nature’s
marketplace was thriving, but in this classic drama the trading is in the energies of life. Another vast fund of
patterned energies accumulates, this one much more complex in its organization. These spirits are of sensitive,
responsive creatures that have learned both pain and pleasure. The profit in the fund is boiling over. ...
* * * *
...
Nature’s theater is a planetary extravaganza, an exotic tapestry of variegated stages, spontaneously
transmuting in lighting, atmosphere and mood. Abounding in phantasmagorical display, a multitude of scenes is
synchronized into a symphonic orchestration, each performance reaching balance in blending with the whole.
The drama is tastefully arranged across the master stage, in a broad, mellifluous band around its planetary
girth. Even in the frigid wastelands of polar settings, fascinating epics unfold through months’ long days and
nights, with fluctuating twilights in between. Each of the continental stages is graced with a prodigious
assortment of prairies, jungles, deserts, peaks, with many ingenious added touches to the sets. Sometimes the
stages run independent scenes, others share the same cast of characters, while the performance in the oceans
has a topography of its own, regulated by tides and major currents. This colossus of a theater is called the
Biosphere, the totality of planetary life, and the name of nature’s energy refinery.
Given the complex structure of a theater that has gone through so many renovations since the beginning of
the show, the performers belong to an equally complex theatrical guild, many of them displaying temperamental
preferences as to where they will perform. Most categories of invertebrates prefer a script written for the sea,
the great exception being many millions of species of insects that infest the land. The mammals and reptiles are
predisposed to play parts on land, yet some of the largest creatures ever, the whales, shares their dominion of
the seas with a supporting cast of cousins, the porpoises and dolphins. Few other mammals like the ocean
setting—the only reptiles that have been persuaded to take extended parts are the turtle, snake and crocodile.
Birds are the most versatile performers. Some migrate from one polar region to the other, supporting
themselves by playing bit parts in local scenes along the way. Other birds, who can’t be bothered with the
exertion of such active roles, have given up on flight—the Oscar for the most bizarre going to the penguin.
Although many birds can swim and dive, this one does little else, choosing the most inhospitable stage on
earth. As for man, he started out humbly enough, but now, with his machines, no stage is free of him. He
dominates the drama, even changes the sets and tries to rewrite the script, without knowing what the plot is all
about.
Just a brief theatrical tour impresses any visitor with the variety of the performance from one location to
another. There is such a range of diversity from the lavish mob scenes in the teeming jungle of Brazil, to the
shoestring budget productions in the desolation of the Sahara. The feedstock to the energy refinery fluctuates
drastically in its constituents. The tiers are populated to the brim in places, while other barren sets are
abandoned to a few derelict performers.
Whatever the constituents, the refinement of energies seeks harmonic balance up and down the levels of the
hierarchy. Reflux becomes regulated through experience. The players on each level of the hierarchy belong to
different instrumental sections in the orchestration of the whole, only certain notes being sounded by certain
instruments within each section. Percussion, brass, strings, and woodwinds may all be richly represented in
grand symphonic movements, while across the way, a few faltering notes from flute and cello strive to sustain a
single resonating chord. All these renditions meld into a resonating topology to the refinement of energies in
the biosphere, modulated by the pace of celestial movements from night to day and from season to season.
The enclosed active interface of the planet resonates in patterns that seek a biospheric balance.
The daily and seasonal regularity to the modulation of the music has a tendency to induce both complementary
patterns and compensating balances in opposite hemispheres of the biosphere. This is implicit in the polar
nature of the energies involved, the enclosed character of the biosphere, and the modulated regularity to the
resonating whole. Thus we find many examples of converging evolution in different parts of the world from very
different ancestral stock, together with the complementary divergence that this implies. The South American
rhea, the cassowary and emu of Australia, and the African ostrich are all very similar yet come from different
parentage. The fenec fox of the Sahara is smaller than the kit fox of America but with essentially identical traits,
yet the two are unrelated. The sea cow of the tropical coast in America is thought to share a common ancestry
with the elephant, yet the sea cow has adopted the characteristics of the unrelated sea lion, seal and walrus.
Another relative of the elephant, the rock hyrax of Africa and the Near East, has all the characteristics of a
rodent, living in burrows and rock crevices. The evolutionary marketplace is full of such examples of copying
wherever biospheric resonance requires. It is one way in which the music gets filled out to achieve a better
balance.
Sometimes these complementary patterns are coupled with geographic isolation that prevents interference
from parallel evolving streams. For instance, a number of species of hoofed ungulates evolved independently in
South America before becoming extinct when the Isthmus of Panama appeared about a million years ago.
These had a strong tendency to resemble hoofed ungulates in other parts of the world. There are a few
modern descendants; the llama and alpaca, for example are counterparts of the camel.
The continent of Australia has been isolated since the demise of the dinosaurs, providing a haven for the
independent evolution of the marsupials. In these mammals, the young fetus is not nourished inside the mother
with the aid of a placenta. Instead the tiny, undeveloped fetus is required to crawl from the vagina into the
mother’s external pouch, where it attaches itself to a nipple for the remainder of its development. The
marsupials have evolved from an ancestral branch independent from that of the placental mammals, yet a
distinguishing feature has been the evolution of species that correspond closely to placental species. There are
pouched marsupial counterparts to the dog, cat, mouse, mole, badger, anteater, squirrel, monkey, bear, and
others.
Of further interest, the marsupials do not have a corpus callosum, the main nerve bundle that in the placentals
interconnects the two hemispheres of the new brain. Their two hemispheres must function independently, both
linked to a common limbic brain, just as in split brain patients. A basis of comparison is thus provided in similar
species between two modes of cerebral function. This is of special interest because of its relationship to
language and the bilateral polarization of brain function in man, leading to the full development of three polar
dimensions to the integration of experience.
* * * *
...
To the northeast of the camp the shoreline juts out into a couple of points as it turns northward on its contorted
journey up the east side of the lake. Each point is graced with genuflecting pines. The boat is drifting slowly
near one point, a good spot for jigging, although pickerel usually feed here later in the day. A lone white pine is
standing some distance apart from a couple of others, its branches licking at the sky, like frozen green flames.
A slight breeze betrays the pantomime with gently flowing movements, just as slightly moving lips sometimes
betray the voice behind the ventriloquist’s dummy. On windy days the mimicry of motion is all but forgotten in
order to accentuate the wind, with dancing limbs tugging at their trunks to join the rhythm.
There is another unseen dance going on within the tree, part of a master choreography well concealed behind
the scenes. Like a brilliant Sherlock Holmes, science has done a great deal of diligent detective work,
identifying many of the characters in the cast, but still has not glimpsed the surreptitious plot. The motive and
the modus operandi remain a lurking mystery, concealed by the collusion of the dancers. The detective work
proceeds in the belief that the universe is nothing more than a gigantic thermodynamic bake shop.
The Sherlock Holmes of science sees a pine tree as a recipe for a cake. The masterful detective is very
earnest in this belief, going to great lengths to convey the opinion to a trusting public. In this ongoing dialogue
the public is Watson, the long-standing assistant and faithful companion to detective Holmes.
“You see, it is all very elementary, my dear Watson. Certain chemicals are being drawn up with moisture from
the soil and circulated through the vascular system of the tree, which runs in a complex maze—like arteries and
veins—to carry the lifeblood of sap to every portion of the tree. The foliage of the tree contains special cells
with green structures within them called chloroplasts. These give the foliage its green appearance, but they are
also the main kitchen for the tree, where the prime ingredients for a carbohydrate cake are baked. As the sap is
circulated through these special cells in needles, water from the soil is combined with carbon dioxide absorbed
from the air to produce the carbohydrate sugar. This cooking process requires energy, just as any kitchen
stove requires energy. In the kitchen of a tree, the energy comes from sunlight. Because the process of
cooking or synthesizing sugar from water and carbon dioxide requires sunlight, we call it photosynthesis,”
proclaims the brilliant Sherlock, confident that the central culprit in the recipe has been apprehended.
“You see it is all quite elementary, my dear Watson. Light energy from the sun is essential for the chemical
bonding of water with carbon dioxide, to produce sugar. In this way, light energy becomes stored in the
chemical bonds of sugar, and it is carried in the sap to various parts of the tree. Some of this energy is then
released and used by the tree to build the more complex substances needed for its trunk, roots, limbs needles
cones and seeds.”
“But how do the various cells know how to do this?” pries the inquiring Watson.
“This was rather puzzling for quite some time. But now you may rest assured that it all has to do with a secret
code.”
“It sounds frightfully diabolical,” says Watson.
“Not at all, my dear fellow,” reassures the famous detective, with his usual air of confidence. “It sounds a little
complicated, but really it is just a simple matter of elementary chemistry. You see, the code is locked up in a
safety deposit vault, the nucleus of every cell, and it is really nothing more than chemical bonds between four
rather simple chemicals. These four chemicals join hands in pairs to form the rungs of a very long ladder-
shaped molecule, called DNA, that gets twisted into a helical shape revolving every nine or ten rungs, like a
winding staircase. The genetic code is transferred through the rungs. The sides of the ladder sometimes come
apart like a zipper, each side of the zipper retaining half of each rung. Each side then acts like a template to
build a new identical zipper. In this way the secret code can be transferred into a new cell when the cell divides.”
“Amazing!” says Watson. “The energy for cooking the recipe is collected from the sun and stored in chemical
bonds, while the recipe for mixing the ingredients of the cake in a proper sequence and in proper proportions is
stored in chemical bonds as well. That is amazing! If the rungs of the ladder contain the secret genetic code,
then the language of the code must be written in the sequence in which each of the different kinds of rungs
occur. The DNA molecules are like the chief cook, then.”
“Very observant , my dear Watson,” says the sleuth masterfully. “That is basically it. The code is written in
three-letter words, or groups of three rungs in the ladder. Although more than sixty words are possible, a third
of them are sufficient to designate the amino acids in the proper order for assembling unlimited varieties of
protein. The code has already been cracked in this regard, although related questions remain.”
“How about all the other complicated processes going on in the cell, outside the nucleus, in the cytoplasm that
surrounds it?” asks the curious Watson. “If the chief cook is in the nucleus, how do his instructions get passed
along?”
“I thought you would ask that, Watson. The chief cook has transfer agents and messengers, called RNA, that
are copied from the pattern of DNA. They are like sections from one side of the zipper. These shorter templates
go into the cytoplasm, collecting ingredients and giving piecemeal instructions to assembly machines that make
the protein constituents of the cake. The whole thing is run like a bakery. There are other workers as well,
enzymes and so on, but the secret is in the code.”
“Fascinating,” replies Watson, “but how do all these messengers know where or when to go with their
instructions, or whom to give them to? How is it that they can move through the batter of the cake to the right
place, at the right time? How about cell division? How about the code itself? Where did it come from?”
“One question at a time, my dear Watson. It is all very elementary. There are electromagnetic energies at work
in many ways within a cell, and no doubt work in some way to explain the migrations through the batter. There is
even evidence of molecular motors and microtubules to guide them. We don’t have all of the evidence as yet,
but no doubt some satisfactory explanation can be worked out, given a little more time. As for the code itself, it
is just a fortuitous accident.”
“An accident!” exclaims Watson, showing some surprise. “You mean a pine tree is an accident? That is
remarkable!”
“Precisely, my dear Watson, although it is really a series of accidents, occurring over hundreds of millions of
years, that have produced pine trees, and you and I as well, for that matter.”
“You mean I’m an accident too?!” blurts out Watson, horrified. ...
* * * *
. . .
Thus, although the musical score may be written in genetic code, the code is neither the music nor the
musicians. It is a referent to the music—like notes written on a printed page—a discretionary guide for the
universal centers to select the appropriate patterned energies from the sensorium of experience. Each
sprouting seedling interprets the musical score according to its own environment.
Cells read the code with their own hierarchy of activity synchronous with that for the tree. Each cell thus
interprets the code in the context of the tree, while the tree has no access to the code except through cells. The
lineage must be transmitted through a seed. Nevertheless, the structured energies of each new tree emerge
under the tutelage of its parentage, spanning generations of space and time through the dance.
Don’t be misled by the apparent simplicity of the action. Visualize the complexity if you can. Atomic dancers
jostle in a molecular Mardi Gras through the maze of avenues circulating within the tree. The streets and
alleyways are lined with myriads of cells, like dance halls of various designs, complete with ionized facades.
Certain performers are enticed to enter certain halls, while others are ejected by bouncers at the doors. Inside,
what a show! Dancers far more populous than people are induced by enzymes to join hands in complicated
patterns, while others are broken up, to form again renewed. Exotic energies are wafting everywhere, sifting
through the dancers as they two-step to and fro into eternity, waving as they come and go. The hall is rocking
with the beat, the organelles sustaining rhythms of routines. Observe especially the mighty mitochondria. These
energy sustainers for the show are separately delegated their own DNA, at the supervisory level of the
eukaryotic cell.
The maze of streets and alleyways lead on to limbs and twigs, reaching out to halls in needles with special
energy-fixing organelles—the chloroplasts, too, have DNA. It is here atomic triplets enact their star performance
to a caroling chorus of chlorophyll. Triplets beckoned from the moisture of the soil are joined in wedlock with
triplets coaxed in from the breeze. The parson comes from ninety million miles away. The nuptial festivities are
sanctified with sunlight. The six member ring of glucose resonates a wedding march. Sweetness and light
prevail. Space and time are bridged by light. The energies of lifetimes are bestowed. The whole tree strains for
this event. The bride of light, its life is light. ...
* * * *
...
“Then plants and the invertebrates have participated directly in the building of continents. Is that correct,
Holmes?”
“In a manner of speaking, I suppose so, Watson, but other factors—crustal movements, erosion, ocean levels,
and so on, come into play. For instance, carbon dioxide levels can affect the average temperature—only a few
degrees change can alter the size of polar caps substantially, which can change ocean levels dramatically, thus
altering the pressure distribution on the earth’s crust, which affects plate movements.”
“But aren’t carbon dioxide levels regulated by organic life?”
“Yes, but also by volcanic activity, although organic life has gained the upper hand. For example, man’s
enormous use of fossil fuels is increasing carbon dioxide levels.”
“Then are you answering my question in the affirmative?” persists Watson.
“Well, I suppose so, in a manner of speaking, but there are other things—for instance patterns of thermal
convection in the mantle influence crustal movements.”
“But aren’t these in turn influenced by the magnetosphere, which is influenced by the ionosphere, which is the
result of changes in the chemistry of the atmosphere brought about mainly by plants?”
“In a manner of speaking, I suppose so, but solar radiation is involved as well,” replies Holmes with a forced air
of confidence, while puffing much more quickly on his pipe.
“But hasn’t organic life been an essential instrument behind the regulation of solar radiation as well?” insists
Watson, excitement mounting in his voice.
“In a manner of speaking, yes. But so what? You are going in circles and beginning to make me feel like a prime
suspect in the case,” retorts Holmes, with his annoyance beginning to show again.
“Perhaps we are all prime suspects in the case,” replies Watson, with a wild and fiendish glint in his eyes as the
words begin to spill out rapidly. “At every turn since its first appearance on the planet, organic life has been
busy working out a balance between cosmic energies and the behavior of the planet. ...”
Watson is fired up and about to continue, but Holmes cuts him off.
“I know what you’re thinking, but don’t say it!” he bellows.
The two men stand looking at each other sullenly for what seems an eternity. A new perspective to the case has
gripped Watson’s mind. He wants desperately to explore it. At the same time, he has a great respect for his
longtime companion and is repulsed by the thought of jeopardizing their friendship. Finally, discretion prevails;
he perks up with a cheerful suggestion.
“Would you fancy a pint of bitter at the local pub, Holmes?”
Holmes is a bit startled by the sudden change of mood, but after a moments reflection, he is taken by the
idea.
“Yes, I believe I would, Watson. That sounds like a brilliant proposal.”
The two men agree on a familiar haunt. As they walk down the street, the conversation changes to the dismal
weather.
* * * *
...
The sky is almost cloudless. The spendthrift sun is squandering its energy, with indifference for its reserves.
Light leaps in all directions into boundless sky, toying here and there with distant relatives of form, spanning
space and time. Our lumbering planet scavenges through the radiating wealth discarded like small change by
an eccentric billionaire. It circles and filters through the emanating streams, transforming some, selecting some,
rejecting some, according to its needs. An electromagnetic apparatus has been fashioned to exercise
discretion. Huge haloed layers of energy enshroud the earth in a meditating womb, reflecting a maternal
vigilance for a biospheric fetus. Deep within her bowels, our Mother Earth is churning with concern. Turbulent
fluid spirits are disciplined by a brain of interacting ions gyrating through the sky. Seething, restless currents
are shaping her behavior to ensure a place and opportunity for her child. ...
Shifting breasts have heaved and spread to nurture a suckling infant that has been weaned in stages toward
maturity. Vital, sensitive, conscious, and creative spirits are entertained in a resonating biospheric song. Each
intermingling elemental mind refluxes energies, dancing through the void to seek harmonic balance with the
whole. Discordances are introduced as the drama of exploring experience in tiers unfolds, but gradually they
are singled out and tailored to the master orchestration. Gradually, the maturing adolescent learns its part and
place. The lessons come through resonating regulations ringing through a planetary bosom.
Our whirling lady is a living being dancing round a living solar cell. She has a brain, a body, and a spirit that
have mutually evolved, yet she had a primal spirit before the biosphere was born. In her youth she was a wild
unruly wench, lost in constant stormy moods. Lacking a refinement of discretion, she was given to volcanic
eruptions of behavior and flashing lightning thoughts, as if she knew it all. Impetuous and impressionable, she
was easily influenced by the tide, reveling with her dancing partners, a satellite and sun. Rhythm was her
regularity. Maternal instincts came with pregnant seas, then life took root on land while her atmosphere and
moods were tamed, steadily transforming into a womanly concern. Our gracious lady has blossomed into
beauty. She still dances to a tidal rhythm, but she has learned to sing a melody of life.
She dances through a solar wind, part of her magnetic mental apparatus blowing out like skirts into the breeze.
The outer layers of petticoats perceptually transpose on every revolution, opening to trail off into the wonders
of the planetary disc. She relates to her environment to keep from getting dizzy. Her twirling tilted head and her
magnetic personality maintain an equilibrium. Her axis wobbles through the epochs to modulate her moods and
the currents in her core, while magnetic polar transpositions occasionally record the ages of developments. Her
whole molecular bulk is itself a syncopated clock pulsating with the galaxy as it tiptoes to and fro into eternal
emptiness.
The timing of the complex melding of music into mind spans vast extremes. Our seasoned space ship earth has
memories with referents recorded in her crust, reaching back four billion years. Within the grasp of recall she
has wandered with her beaming escort around the galaxy twenty times or so, yet spanning space and time on
such a scale is not the greatest of her achievements. ...
* * * * *
... Most recently, however, she has reared a problem child with a strange perceptual handicap: the ability to
speak. His name is man. Two halves of man’s brain have been delegated special functions. The half that
organizes speech is naturally concerned with social endeavors; through cultural developments, man has
learned to provide quite well for his material needs. The other half, concerned with intuitive comprehension,
sometimes catches glimpses of his cosmic spiritual nature, and his vagrant cosmic father. As if two sides to his
brain were not enough, man’s autonomic nervous system, which refluxes emotional energies into
consciousness, is anchored to his evolutionary origins in the biosphere. Mother Earth had great hopes that
man would one day help her manage her affairs, but through the use of words, man has learned to reflect on
experience in abstraction. He sees in his death the transience of life; at the same time he is taunted by a
timeless cosmic intuition. The creative gift of language has thus presented man with a spiritual dilemma,
bringing much consternation and disruption to the drama.
* * * * *
“…Mars is larger than Mercury but much smaller than Venus. It has two tiny moons, roughly twelve and twenty-
two kilometers in diameter. As with Venus, the solar wind interacts directly with the ionosphere, producing a
weak shock front that trails off down wind. A Martian day is similar to an Earth day, but the year is nearly twice
as long. It is a strange land with magnetic iron soil, peach-colored skies, and purple sunsets.”
“It sounds like an exotic place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there. Our Earth is certainly the most fortunate
of the lot,” proclaims Watson like a typical tourist. Then he ponders, assuming a very professional tone of voice
as he begins to comment on Holmes’s brief account. “The terrestrial planets exhibit definite relationships that
seem to be of fundamental significance to the ordered behavior of them all. Mercury, for instance, exposes
opposite faces to the sun on each revolution, which provides a precise datum for the relationship of night to
day. Of related significance is the retrograde rotation of Venus. Every time it is directly between Earth and the
sun, it exposes the same face toward Earth, even though exactly five Venus days have elapsed between such
conjunctions. The length of a Venus day coincides with two axial rotations of Mercury. A Mercury day, however,
is two complete orbital revolutions of the sun, which is three axial rotations of Mercury. Meanwhile the axial
rotation period of Venus is two-thirds of an Earth year. The same ratio of two-thirds keeps recurring between
rotation periods and revolution periods. There is a triadic character to the behavior of the terrestrial planets
that is reminiscent of the triadic relationships of particle physics.”
You are stretching the point more than a little, Watson. Where does Mars fit into your tidy scheme?”
“Just give me a moment to recapitulate.” Watson pulls out his pocket calculator, scanning a tabulation of data
on the solar system and scratching his head. “The rotation period of Mercury (58.65 days) is two thirds
(0.6667) of its revolution period (87.97 days). One Venus day (117 days) is two thirds (0.665) of a Mercury day
(175.94 days). The rotation period of Venus (243.17 days) is two thirds (0.666) of an Earth year (365.25 days).
Now a Mars solar day is 24.6587 hours. That means that there are 666.8 Mars days in a Mars year. The ratio of
a Mars day to a Mars year is therefore also two-thirds, except that there is a factor of one thousand involved.”
“Then how about the rotation period of Earth? An Earth day is about forty minutes shorter than a Mars day
and doesn’t exhibit any special ratio to revolution periods.”
“But an Earth day is nevertheless close to a Mars day. Both Earth and Mars have seasons distinct from days,
whereas Mercury and Venus do not,” retorts Watson. “Perhaps Earth is allowed some flexibility due to the
influence of organic life. Earth is also the only terrestrial planet to have a major moon—tidal influences have
played an important role in the evolution of the biosphere and tides advance about 40 minutes a day. Is it just
an accident that the rotation period of the moon is the same as the average rotation period of the sun? With the
single exception of the Earth’s rotational period, all terrestrial rotational and orbital periods display a resonance
that cannot be explained by laws of mechanics. Only Earth displays some degree of freedom in its rotational
period.”
Now it is Holmes turn to scratch his head as he takes off his hat and walks slowly in a circle. Then he stops,
replaces his hat, looks up at the dreary sky, and says in a condescending tone, “What are you suggesting,
Watson? Are you implying that the laws of mechanics aren’t valid? Are you saying that gravity and momentum
don’t work according to the time-tested laws of physics?”
“Not exactly, Holmes. I am merely pointing out some remarkable coincidences that indicate a more
comprehensive system of order to things. Since electromagnetic energies are involved as well, perhaps our
understanding of physical laws is incomplete on a cosmic scale. It could be that nature doesn’t work in exactly
the way that we think it does. The formulation of so-called physical laws is built on empirical observations close
to home. There is no proof for them, especially if we attempt to extrapolate them to cosmic proportions.”
“Nonsense, Watson! All this talk sounds more like astrology than science. You mustn’t try to make so much of
a few coincidences. ..."
* * * *
. . .
All day the haze has muted shades of color, softened edges, and blended highlights into shadows. With the
advancing night, the haze has concentrated near the water and in the bays, to hide the shoreline in the
distance. Horizons have merged into the sky. The stars are twinkling in the water. The canoe has been
transported into boundless space, floating in a sphere of stars. An island across the lake, and another to the
north, intrude boldly through the haze in two big blobs, hovering like a pair of oblong asteroids growing trees
from top and bottom.
Holmes has worked hard devising sophisticated instruments and theories in his effort to crack the ultimate
mystery of the cosmos. Now his faithful companion, Watson, has dragged him back to the planetarium with
many questions. Holmes is explaining how powerful telescopes reveal that there are distant galaxies more
numerous than the stars in our own Milky Way. Dispersed in all directions, they are woven in a great skein
throughout the firmament.
* * * *
Watson undoes the top button of his shirt and loosens his tie. “You certainly don’t offer much hope,” he pants.
“Either the universe is going to be crushed again into an unthinkable singularity smaller than nothing, or it is
headed for a frigid oblivion of eternal night. Either possibility, however distant, leaves me wrenched of a sense
of humanity.”
“Nonsense, Watson! There is no room for anthropomorphic feelings in science. It is all a big bakeshop, I tell
you, and the evidence strongly suggests a big bang beginning. The bakeshop started at infinite temperature
and density, cooling very rapidly as it expanded. After the first one-hundredth of a second, the temperature had
cooled to 100 billion degrees Kelvin; after the first second, to ten billion degrees; and after three minutes, to
one billion degrees, though it was still seventy times hotter than the center of the sun.”
Beads of sweat are standing out on Watson’s forehead. He feels entrapped by a web of evidence. Holmes
seems to take morbid delight in his friend’s discomfort. It is the old triumphant feeling that comes with closing in
to wrap up a case. He continues. . . .
* * * *
. . .
In nature’s theater, the whole of space and time is bubbling full of history. Ghost images are streaking through
the cosmos at the speed of light, metering out the scenes in the celestial drama with memories of the way things
were. Events of yesterday are shaping up the scenery for today.
A ghostly mist is settling in the bays again. Dank, wan spirits, converging for a sceance, are reticent at first then
progressively encouraged by their swelling numbers. The sphere of stars has been severed by a ring of spooks
with forebodings of some sorcery to come. Their spell infiltrates slowly into the haze to dim and daze the
asteroids. A caterpillar of ghoulish green light begins to creep across the northern sky. Vertical shafts of the
aurora shunt in undulating bunches through a phosphorescent crest that wavers unsteadily above one of the
asteroids. A trough, reflected underneath, provides the mate to a pair of terribly trembling hands that fear to
fully grasp the spiny boulder stranded in the firmament. Suddenly the hands jump away, then spread in forks
like crooked scissors clipping at the sky. The ghosts that gird the ragged heavens absorb and then exude the
fiendish flickering neon glow of green.
Gradually the shears exchange their shape for sabers, that slice the night in iridescent slivers, rising almost to
the zenith. The slivers fade to greenish yellow, as complex shifting patterns begin to wind in switchbacks, like
mountain trails weaving up a trelliswork. Caravans of angels are ascending and descending a zigzag Jacob’s
ladder into paradise. Their mission of forewarning has cast a horoscope across the sky with mesmerizing
omens of redress. Slowly the trails begin to slip and slide as colors deepen into a nest of squirming serpents.
Greens and yellows change to hues of red, as firespewing dragons wage incendiary war. The northern sky has
ignited into flame. Ghoulish ghosts, encircling the waters of a fiery pit, transform to vampire shades, injected full
with bursts of blood. The canoe is suspended in a holocaust. Purgation comes as hell fires fade to greens and
yellows, rising into another trelliswork. Processions of angels have revived to bridge the heavens with
redeeming grace.
The stars have been relegated a backseat to the display, but some peer on from overhead and from the south,
with reassuring twinkles that the galaxy goes on eternally. The experience indicated that the universe is
eternally sustained, through the polar balance of partitioned energies. All order in the universe is dependent on
the most intricate balance between particular and universal hemispheres that define the social mystery of each
and all. The experience demonstrated a responsible human relationship to this dilemma of a cosmic mind.
The Cosmic Being went on to show how memories work, how energies are refluxed through the nervous system
into the creation of ideas. Memories went streaming out through the eyes into ideas. Visibly organized with
active interfaces of energy, they transformed rapidly through a sequence before they vanished in the void.
They were animated with images of light in living colors. Their pattern of organization was projected in three
dimensions, similar in essence to the diagrams that have been used to depict the system
Fisherman's Guide
