Physics says the world is made up of particles, and that these particles are subject to the force of field vectors. Frank Wilczek fixed John Wheelers
idiom with the following description:
“energy-momentum tells space-time how to curve.
Space-time tells energy-momentum what straight is (in space-time).”
Energy-momentum = particles; Space-time = fields. There the Yin and Yang at the root of the physical world which makes us all up.
Interestingly, when we think about our psychological lives, and in particular, our affective, feeling life-world, there is this tendency to see our
feelings as purely a function of 'biochemistry'. This biochemistry reductionism, however, fails to apply the facts of more fundamental sciences which
tell us that particles are
guided by fields. If my brain and body is a bunch of complex biochemistry, what is the field that this 'particle' is
interacting with? If the biochemistry of my body is Yin, what is the Yang? Answer: Other Humans.
The activating, and animating influence of feelings in our lives derives from others. We overlook this because we like to think that the feelings we
have about ourselves are a function of how "great" we are in some essential sense; but this is dissociative and ridiculous. You're a physical system
embedded in a dynamical environment with analogously structured physical systems. We're built to know one another; to feel one another's
intentionality by how their bodies move, how their faces look, and how their voices sound. Meaning surrounds us long before anyone utters word. In
fact, the most emotionally impactful and meaningful experiences are non-verbal. A hug when I'm feeling sick or depressed means much more to me than
what a person says. Indeed, if I'm feeling bad and someone asks me "do you want something", the impact of the effect has nothing to do with the
question and everything to do with how they said it. If there's kindness and concern in the voice, it penetrates me and adds an energetic oomph that
otherwise wouldn't exist. My very conscious intent to detect the intent behind the tone adds to the experience, but my conscious intent isn't
necessary for my body to register the meaningfulness of the tone in itself.
In the realm of mental illness, many people are overwhelmed by a pharmaceutical industry that more or less farms humans; we're marketed to in
outlandishly manipulative commercials, and offered chemicals that more often than not will make you more sick in the long term than any value they can
offer in the short term. Worse of all, we become prisoners to the logic of the whole gambit: again and again they repeat the meme: "you have a
chemical imbalance", and after hearing after the umpteenth time, its become a deep-seated belief deeply sedimented in the cultural environment around
us. People then think,"how can I feel better unless some chemistry comes inside of me? I need a particle - a pill, to put in my mouth and swallow, in
order to feel good." The logic is faulty, however.
Just as a particle in matter is transformed by the incorporation of a quantum of energy from the field its embedded within, so to is the biochemistry
within our systems transformed by the incorporation of meaning in the intersubjective field we're embedded within. The same principle.
The delusion then is taking a physically separate object as literally isolated, as if it wasn't dynamically contiguous in logical ways with other
like-systems. This analogy is very basic. When I look at a rock, I see matter, which is somewhat analogous to what I am insofar as I am made of
matter. When I see a cell, its a living system which strives in the same way I strive. When I see a frog, I see a face, a tongue, and other analogous
structures to what I have. And so on on up to the human beings who are most like us - who have the same feelings and attitudes that we do. People like
this 'resonate' with one another because their structures are very symmetrical/analogous. These interactions are just as real and just as causative as
biochemistry; and indeed, theres something superior to them vis-à-vis biochemistry.
edit on 3-12-2019 by Astrocyte because: (no reason given)