The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick
Page 72
Then the mind that fused with mind was the macrocosm entering me.
So external world becomes sentient and familiar. Blood, neural linkings and relinkings—in other words the structure of your own brain. This is very beautiful, but it is that which has been introjected that counts.
This certainly is what being "Adam Kadmon" is all about—sure; you —your mind—would spread out throughout the entire universe!
This is the reason why all at once you would experience vast spaces; your mind has spread out into the universe.
So this puzzling matter is solved. Your mind has penetrated the space —not of the microcosm—but, all at once, of the macrocosm.
Then I am on the right track! Your micro-mind is now macro.
And conversely you now contain the not-you, epitomized by the holy AI voice which emanates from within your head (mind); that which is not you is, paradoxically, in you, as if you had given mental birth.
This transform could not occur unless the inner (micro) and outer (macro) were isomorphic in the first place. It's the mirror phenomenon. Your mind picks up the image of the cosmos and the cosmos reflects your mind back at you, so a back-and-forth push-pull interaction occurs.
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[49:1052] I just now read over the outline for VR and experienced moksa, due to the final note about monotheism and what monotheism really means. Illusion and evil are the same. Reality and God are the same. Thus to truly see would be to see (this follows logically) what I saw: Valis and the plasmate—i.e., God, since he could not have a merely contingent relationship to reality. (I had really done my homework: Spinoza and Buber and Heidegger and the OT.) It is not that he does not have a merely contingent relationship to the universe; no—he could not. When illusion (dokos) departs evil departs and YHWH remains; or, when evil departs, YHWH-as-reality remains. And this is what I saw. YHWH did not break into reality (it was not a theophany in that sense); reality reverted to its actual form for me: that of the one God—there is no other. To say, "Evil holds the power centers" is to say, "Illusion holds the power centers." But YHWH is here, not remotely there (far off: transcendent). It is like in Ubik, the ads. For the first time I see that if monotheism is the case, it would have to be so.➊ By understanding monotheism I find that I understand Valis—how Valis must be the case. What is not Valis (YHWH) is dokos.
[...]
My acosmism (shown in my books) was the illness besetting all of us to some degree; viz: cut off from the one true reality: YHWH. I had the illness so severely that the only cure was the radical necessity of waking up and experiencing God—as I did in 3-74: as I had been formerly more sick than others I wound up cured: but they linger on half-sick.
I had to read the VR outline many times before the inexorable significance linking Valis—my experience of Valis—and monotheism came to me.
Since (inasmuch) as I saw Valis principally in/as causality, the total web of causality, sentient and volitional, then I am at this moment absolutely convinced that I was seeing God (YHWH), because I know, due to my understanding of Spinoza, Heidegger, Buber and the OT, that this is precisely when and how I would see God if I did see him (in contrast to, e.g., an anthropomorphic figure in the world).
As to Christianity, as Spinoza remarked, I don't know what to make of it at all. It sheds no light on my experience one way or another, for or against.
[...]
Further, the living divine Torah is the case. I saw it. Paul is wrong: the Torah can save us, and the doctrine of original sin is blasphemy and a deliberate misreading of Wisdom 2:24–3:1.54 The rabbis are correct about man.
But also there is a "messenger" who feeds the blank sheet into the retribution machine in place of the bill of particulars, as was done in my case, so a mechanical system is rendered sentient and based on judging not reflex; perhaps this is what Christ does.
Eureka. Built into the system is a correction circuit, which we know as Christ in God's grace; this is what I experienced (2-3-74), to keep the system from becoming sterile and reflexive. It isn't feedback but course-correction; it is an override, but to keep reality on the original course—i.e., heading correctly toward the original goal, not another goal. Minute adjustments, such as space flights involve.
This reveals the system (reality) as alive, not mechanical. The mystery religions sought to bring on this course-correction: pronoia to them, based on charis. Otherwise the system would run down.
➊ That God is as (and where) I saw him: reality collapsing back into its own urgrund—not God behind reality but God as reality—if monotheism is the case. And my encounter with Valis indicates that yes, it is the case. I understand that Valis must be the case. I have never, in the years since 3-74, comprehended this! The inexorability of Valis being as I saw it doing what I saw it doing where I saw it.
[49:1057] If identity (self) can be dissolved, along with personal history (antecedents), and time and place, then what exists actually? The difference between YHWH and Brahman is that the former speaks (this includes writing): he has personal identity despite his Brahman-like ubiquity. This self-disclosure in verbal form permits a dialog between him (the macrocosm) and differentiated micro-cosmos. This brings into existence the "tongue" of God: the wisdom-word hypostasis (i.e., information, which permeates the macrosoma, and which can be retrieved at any place and any time). (And within any given mind.)
Sankara believed there were not plural selves but just the one self which could be identified with Brahman. This fits in with my line of thinking supra.
Also, YHWH differs from Brahman in that he is involved in history—human history, what is involved is the evolution of human freedom. And the universe is real: seeing it we are seeing the field (web) in which YHWH operates. Not (as Sankara believes) mere maya. Human history represents successive levels of self-disclosure by YHWH—meaning self-awareness. Human history is the deity waking up. The opponent to YHWH at any moment is his antecedent self: he is dynamic (in process), not static. He must eternally surpass himself. Thus he perpetually selects pieces from the antecedent universe to fit into his evolving soma. (Is this an entelechy?) But the phenomenal world is not illusory; YHWH is its guarantor. He is involved in it or is it (v. Spinoza). Camouflaged in it or as it. He is interwoven in it, not separate from it.
[49:1069] I've got it. Valis is not an entity which thinks—e.g., a discorporate pure mind; or a mind incorporated, as our human minds are. No. It is a mind which uses all reality by which to think; so it is neither discorporate nor does it have a body as such. This is what I saw that I initially thought of as camouflage—Valis camouflaged into our reality. Either all reality is its normal brain from the start, or it has entered our reality and is making use of it; so any picture, stick, music, book, any arrangement of motion, any linking, any sequence of motion, is used to store, process, convey, create information (thoughts). I even know that it is a 0-1 dialectic binary system. I know that Valis does not move along spatial axes. I know that it is not dependent on the natural causal events of reality for its information, but initiates and/or directs causal trains of events. I know this from seeing what I called Valis in/as reality external to me. But also I know it from its mind joining mine and my experiencing reality the way it does. E.g., its self-assembly from the stockpile around it—so there is a not-it. And my great original, i.e., initial insight was that it (1) has invaded our reality and plunders it and transmutates it and (2) camouflages itself➊; if it = reality it wouldn't have to camouflage itself. Invasion and camouflage go together. And the self-assembly causes it to continually grow as it sublimates more and more of reality, invisibly to us.
Also, what if "my" anamnesis are its memories? They go back to Mycenia and then to the stars.
It uses reality as a notation system, the way a computer chip uses, e.g., bubbles for 0-1. Once having agreed upon an arbitrary notation system, Valis must control reality if Valis is to control the information.
Now, the objection to the idea that this is God is, why would God
need our physical reality in order to think? Because if he cannot think without this physical "brain" then he cannot have preceded creation, nor can he exist independent of it; this makes God an organism somewhat like ourselves. A psychosomatic macro-entity. Creation is as essential to God as God is to creation. And God is not the creator but the psyche of reality (this fits certain pre-Socratic ideas of God). But there is still the set-ground element—visible if you have the grid: feature extraction. I think Valis is camouflaged into reality and does not = reality but is assimilating reality. Well, then it will = reality!
It also may very well occlude our percept systems, so that we can't discriminate it.
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There's another aspect to it invading: it's informing me that all the centers of power have fallen to the evil power, and Valis must utilize "people on the periphery."
➊ If Valis = reality, then what meaning has the "set-ground discrimination" that plays such a role in my thinking?
[49:1072] Inner-outer transform (reversal).
Reality used as vehicle—medium—by which to process information.
Observer-participant universe.
Valis only controls (is?) reality in a local situation where a sentient mind—i.e., a human—perceives it.
Shekhina sporadic.
Bimodel: Valis controls all reality/Valis invades and is on the periphery.
In experiencing Valis it entered my own brain, which became a universe, the missing part of the external universe: we have half the info (message, reality, signal) in us. And the other half is outside us. There is no message until the two are superimposed, then reality—which is a fusion of outer and inner—can be read as coherent information.➊
So I am Valis/I am not Valis.
But then how can Valis be said to be ubiquitous? This is an aspect which baffles normal reasoning.
Valis is an interaction between a human mind and reality-as-a-field, a new, higher field created by the superimposition of the two. The self is everywhere, rather than being in the human (cf. Sankara!). But also it no longer exists. It is omnipresent and abolished (hence a sense of vast spaces).
It can't move along the 3 spatial axes any longer; but time replaces space as an axis for/of movement. The self is in the outer world, but unfamiliar (e.g., I became Thomas: not-I).
"The self is everywhere." This is pure Eckhart/Sankara. "Valis only comes into existence when my mind is externalized and superimposed onto outer reality; only then does the message (i.e., Valis) come into existence." And: "It is an equation between my mind and the external world." And: "We are each parts." And: "It is a kind of vortex."
Valis—where is it? It is not in the human mind that sees it.
It is not in the world.
It is in both—superimposed as one. It is in neither (alone).
It is an event, when the human mind—the self—superimposes itself in union (syzygy) with the world.
Which is to say, when Atman and Brahman become another universe higher than either. (Either alone.)
Brahman alone is everywhere and underlies all objects and change (which causes the illusion of time): it is the cause of every thing and every event.
But it is not conscious. The self is conscious but it is limited to one place and causes nothing: it is caused, not causing. It is subject to fate.
Together they form Valis: everywhere, causing everything, and conscious.➋ The self now wills change, and Brahman has personality. Out of this comes the void of love, mutual love between the two (Brahman and Atman) of reunion.
➊ Message = Valis. Message (coherent info) only comes into existence when inner and outer are superimposed. ∴ Valis only comes into existence when the contents of my mind—my brain print—is superimposed on outer reality. ∴ I am one half of Valis; for Valis to exist, this equation must occur: an event in which the contents of my total mind are a necessary half. My mind alone is not Valis. External reality alone is not Valis. If I am observer to reality, Valis doesn't exist; the superimposition must occur: together, these two halves form a higher universe than the (two) parts—the principle of emergence. This higher universe which is compounded of the total contents of my mind (brain) and outer reality is Valis. It is like a vortex or krasis. It is a phenomenon that is temporary and localized.
➋ And free of determinism (fate).
[49:1080]
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[49:1081]
The interaction of the two information sources (i.e., the dialectic) takes place in our (as our?) universe, where the sources combine and recombine in greater and greater evolutionary complexity, but still as information. However this information forms the basis of a new world.
[49:1082] Aspects of Spinoza's substantia:
1)Matter
2)Mind
3)Energy
What I saw in 3-74 was either a fourth aspect (material-energetic-information) or all of the above three combined. Physical thoughts—this would seem to confirm Spinoza's view of substantia and natura as God. ("Deus sive substantia sive natura.")
Look: a perception of the two aspects matter and mind is not mind and it is not matter; it is one third thing. There is thought involved as information, but the matter is simply not what we call matter—the whole thing resembles—well, it's physical. But—
But what is obvious is that what we call "matter" is a partial view, and pure mind would be partial (we can't see it). We see mind, and matter is information-rich. Neither aspect is more fundamental than the other.
It is not thinking matter and it is not material thought: it is what it is.
If I could see my brain as I think I'd see linking and relinking: a physical event for each thought.
What I saw was God; and his mind was in fusion with mine.
Neither the concept "thinking matter" nor "material thought" is quite correct. The first suggests that we are dealing with something matter is capable of doing; it is a property of matter. The second is misleading because it suggests a vehicle for thought as ink and paper are a vehicle for language—a way to write it down—make it physical. But in point of fact I saw matter cease to be matter; it became something else that we have no name for—but I swear, it was no longer matter. Conversely, it was not just a physical medium for thoughts because for one thing (to repeat) it was no longer matter, no longer physical in the usual sense. So matter ceased to be matter. Okay. Did mind cease to be mind? Yes. It turned into—
All I can think of is Pythagoras' special use of the term kosmos. "The harmonious fitting together of the beautiful." But nonetheless glyphs—still information. (Of this, Pythagoras does not speak.)
I can only think of the final canto in The Commedia about the Book. It was a three-dimensional structure that was (at the same time) a book. Or like a musical score. It was a way of encoding information in a structure or as a structure. Time consisted of accretional layers and there was no locus (lens-system) viewpoint. It constantly changed (became more complex, which is to say, more information-rich). Information as reality—yes. Matter turned into one vast intricate structure. That was information and by being "played" yielded up everything, viewed from every subjective viewpoint, that had ever been or ever would be. It was played by being perceived. (Open wide.) Yes; playback came through anamnesis of it.
Just seeing matter—there is no life to it, hence no sentient movement—which is the activity which is information. We are seeing only the carrier! As in frequency. The info is missing. And mind alone has not the beauty of the geometric forms! That is, the attribute mind: only when the two attributes mens and natura are perceived together does the beauty appear: form, proportion, color, ratio, harmony, motion, shape. The thoughts must be seen for their true value (which is beauty) to be discerned.
Consider the information (word) cat and an actual cat. How beautiful is an LP of the Beethoven 9th compared to hearing the 9th?
No wonder I thought of my experience as postmortem. While alive I "saw the God whom we see when we die," as the Friends newspaper wr
ote.55
Could this be indeed the kingdom of God that Jesus spoke of? Finding a way to see the other attribute of substantia? The information (mind thinking) for which matter is the carrier (medium/system)?
How did I do it? Did I do it? Or is it done to/for you?
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[49:1089] So there is a secret within a secret. The Empire is a secret (its existence and its power, that it rules) and secondly the secret illegal Christians pitted against it. So the discovery of the secret illegal Christian instantly causes one to grasp that, if they exist illegally, something evil that is stronger is in power, right here!
Thus to know part B of the secret situation—the illegal Christians—is to instantly know by inference—relentless inference—part A. Whereas if you knew part A, you could not (conversely) deduce part B. So part B tells you part A, but part A does not disclose part B. So part B is the greater secret. By knowing part B you know the whole situation.
[49:1092]
[49:1096] 4:30 A.M. hypnagogic: "I have bought my redemption (by the price I paid in terms of suffering)." I.e., the tax matter. Not by the act but by the suffering later.
[49:1099] Previous hypnagogic revelation: "I bought my redemption through suffering." This would be a mythic identification with Christ: the way of the cross; only Christ through his suffering can buy our redemption. The dream I just now had of the tortured and dying sheep led to a wall where its brutalized body leaves a 2-D "painting" like of the Cro-Magnon men of animals, of supernatural beauty. I am told how every detail of the gestalt of the painting came to be, derived from the suffering sheep. And I say in anguish and awareness of the sheep's anguish, "I hope they (the torturers of the sheep) burn in hell for doing this." Obviously the sheep is Christ; the painting is a Roman fresco—mosaic. But this is done not once but repeatedly; there are innumerable sheep "paintings" (as if branded by a branding iron). This fits in with an earlier hypnagogic revelation: a scene in which the shroud of Christ is burned onto a wall by intense heat as a "painting"—i.e., for all eternity. And the more they torture the sheep the better a picture they got—it was dreadful but the picture was indescribably beautiful.