Alan Watts searchable speech

Subtitles

by 00:00:35

various Kinds of electrical vibrations light Waves Cosmic Rays Etc 00:00:36

but since the Michelson Morley experiment 00:00:43

Which seemed to prove conclusively that there wasn't any such thing as ether some kind of? 00:00:47

attenuated fluid through which [light] was propagated 00:00:53

space is just 00:00:58

Isn't there it's [the] way we have in other words of talking about 00:01:01

distances between bodies 00:01:07

In other words when we say the distance between them increased 00:01:10

As if the distance were a substantive that does something like the man walked the distance increased 00:01:16

But I suppose what we are actually saying 00:01:24

Is that the two bodies we are talking about? 00:01:27

increased 00:01:30

The distance between themselves, they did it 00:01:32

But then you suddenly find that you've got distance as an object 00:01:35

They increase the distance the distance now being the object of the verb whereas before it was the substance 00:01:39

this is the subject and 00:01:45

so 00:01:48

At once one begins to see there's something fishy about space 00:01:49

and 00:01:54

After all it is the background 00:01:57

against which we see everything and 00:02:03

even a blind person 00:02:06

Has a sense of space? 00:02:09

in that which does not obstruct motion 00:02:12

And yet funny thing about space is [that] in a way, it doesn't end 00:02:19

We're a solid begins 00:02:27

you could shift a solid around in space without apparently altering it in any way and 00:02:32

After all there is space between the two sides shall we say or ends of the solid 00:02:39

We can think of that in terms of space and measure it in terms of space 00:02:46

But it is against space 00:02:52

that we experience everything that we experience and 00:02:55

By the way also we experience everything not only in the dimension of space, but also the dimension of time 00:02:59

now the fascination about space and time is 00:03:08

That while they [are] basic to all possible experiences that we have 00:03:13

You just can't put your finger on 00:03:20

Space seems to be completely immaterial 00:03:24

And when [Saint] augustine was asked what [is] time? He said I know what it is, but when you ask me, I don't 00:03:29

So these two basic dimensions of our physical world 00:03:41

are 00:03:47

uncommonly elusive 00:03:48

We could perhaps say 00:03:53

That they are pure abstractions 00:03:57

There is no such thing as space, and there is no such thing as time 00:04:00

they are merely our way of 00:04:06

measuring and 00:04:09

thinking about 00:04:11

the behavior of the Physical Universe as 00:04:13

a pattern a system of patterns 00:04:16

energy Patterns and 00:04:19

if you measure the movement of these patterns 00:04:22

[the] line along which you measure motion is called the time line 00:04:26

if you measure their positions the line along which you measure their positions you would call the space line and 00:04:31

these two lines would [be] as abstract as 00:04:39

the 00:04:42

the equator in relation to longitude zero 00:04:44

These things don't exist on the physical face of the of the world 00:04:50

They are Imaginary lines and are only to be found on maps 00:04:55

Is it could you also say that the same thing was [true] of time and space? 00:05:01

We think for example that there are three coordinates of space and one of time? 00:05:10

the three coordinates of space being 00:05:18

length Breadth and depth and 00:05:22

Through that runs one of time 00:05:27

But come to think of it 00:05:31

It's rather artificial 00:05:32

it is making us [think] of space as having a sort of grain to it as if it were a crystalline substance and 00:05:34

however transparent the Crystal it does have a grain and 00:05:42

space has the grain of [uppercross] and through 00:05:45

those are the three ways [in] which we think of space and 00:05:50

We can't think of any more 00:05:55

not 00:05:58

with our senses we can um 00:05:59

mathematically conceive 00:06:05

spaces with infinitely many dimensions 00:06:08

That is to say you can write it down as [if] it were so 00:06:11

But you can't conceive it in your imagination you 00:06:16

[can] draw 00:06:21

It's great fun to draw a four dimensional Cube 00:06:22

Having four spatial dimensions. It's called a tesseract [and] 00:06:27

It's a tesseract is a good word to apply to a person who is ultimately square 00:06:31

[four-Dimensional] Square 00:06:39

but 00:06:42

the tesseract 00:06:49

You see the minute you draw it 00:06:52

that obviously you can't have more than 00:06:55

the three right angular dimensions of space or the coordinates 00:07:02

In any kind of solid figure that you know 00:07:10

And so you can think about it 00:07:16

in terms of mathematics 00:07:18

But you can't conceive more than these three coordinates 00:07:21

since sensuously 00:07:25

And so we begin it's it's basic common sense to us that space has this structure 00:07:29

but of course 00:07:37

the 00:07:38

Question is is this a structure of space? 00:07:39

Or is it a structure of the human nervous system the human brain and human thought? 00:07:43

Which is projected onto the external world as a tool for measuring it? 00:07:49

This is one way of approaching the problem 00:07:54

But there's another way altogether 00:07:59

which is to consider space as 00:08:03

Anything but nothing 00:08:06

if space is basic to [all] that we experience as 00:08:10

Time is 00:08:15

You might say then that space 00:08:18

Is as near as we can imagine? 00:08:22

To being the ground of the world or what some people have called God? 00:08:27

the 00:08:36

texts of the 00:08:37

hindus buddhists and daoists are full of 00:08:39

Ways in which the symbol of space is used 00:08:43

to mean the ultimate reality 00:08:47

Space is used in Indian Basic Indian Philosophy in Vedanta. It is called Akasha and 00:08:52

Akasha is for them the fundamental element there are five elements Earth water air and fire and akash and 00:09:03

So space contains all the other elements 00:09:11

In Buddhist Philosophy where the ultimate reality is called Shunyata the void 00:09:15

The Chinese will care it will translate the Sanskrit Shunyata 00:09:22

With their character that means sky or space 00:09:27

and 00:09:30

The daoists would say quoting loud sir 00:09:35

the usefulness of a window 00:09:40

is not so much in the frame as 00:09:43

in the empty space through which something can be seen 00:09:46

The usefulness of a vase is not so much in the sides made of clay as in the hollow inside 00:09:50

into which something can [be] put 00:09:57

and 00:10:01

Of course that is a startling 00:10:02

metaphor 00:10:06

for a westerner because 00:10:07

We think 00:10:09

the other way round you see as I started out to say we really think [common] sense [eclis] that space is nothing at all and 00:10:10

We are much more sympathetic to the idea that it's pure abstraction 00:10:18

Then to the oriental idea that space has [some] kind of basic reality 00:10:24

It bothers us too when astronomers 00:10:31

Talk about curved space 00:10:36

how can nothing be curved or 00:10:39

Properties of space or expanding space, how can you do that and? 00:10:44

then when architects begin to talk about the functions of spaces 00:10:51

The common sensical Westerner things why don't they talk about the functions of Walls? 00:10:57

[across] the walls [enclosed] spaces, but the spaces of themselves have no function. They are bothered about this 00:11:04

painters also are very aware of space because especially if you paint in oils 00:11:15

you have to paint your background and 00:11:24

Therefore in filling it in you begin to realize that it has its own shape 00:11:30

it is the obverse of the foreground and 00:11:36

When you play with photographic negatives or anything that switches? 00:11:42

Foreground background foreground to background you begin to become aware of space as having a shape 00:11:48

the interval between all Sorts of objects becomes via something significant 00:11:55

Even though it's constantly flowing and changing as indeed are [the] objects within the space 00:12:01

so it is a kind of a bit of a shock to 00:12:10

Our common sense which in most cases has not caught [up] with 20th century physics or astronomy 00:12:13

To hear space considered as something effective 00:12:20

As something definitely there so that you could say it has properties 00:12:26

To take another case of space, which is rather startling? 00:12:35

There is there are different kinds of space 00:12:41

Space is basically isn't it an interval? 00:12:45

There is an interval between each one of us sitting here 00:12:50

if we didn't have that 00:12:54

We would suffocate bucaille being packed together like sardines 00:12:57

We need space in order to function as a human being we need a kind of area in which to 00:13:01

Gesture and move and walk about and in breathe and Express ourselves 00:13:07

Now you can have intervals not only in space, but [in] time 00:13:14

Pauses [are] intervals 00:13:23

You can also have intervals in sound the intervals between tones or notes 00:13:26

in the interesting thing about the intervals between tones 00:13:36

Is that they are that upon which the hearing of melody Depends? 00:13:40

Melody is here to hear melody is to hear intervals 00:13:47

Now if you will simply visualize melody in terms of something graphic 00:13:54

Supposing are you? 00:14:02

represent a simple say introduction of a few 00:14:05

DDDddd or whatever you know you can see that in terms of a dancing line or a series of points at different 00:14:14

levels representing [light] musical notation the high ones and the low ones and 00:14:23

You will recognize a pattern 00:14:29

But you see at once that the pattern depends on the way the critical dots in it are spaced 00:14:32

And it doesn't matter much whether the space is a big space, or whether it's a little one 00:14:43

Because it will always be relative to the size of the dots 00:14:50

[you] can magnify it or minify it 00:14:55

But you will see it is the way they are spaced that makes the difference and here once again. We are [using] spaced as a 00:14:57

Transitive verb now 00:15:05

We've talked about 00:15:07

spaces Or distances increasing or 00:15:09

people increasing a distance 00:15:13

And now we can talk about space as a verb to space to be spaced 00:15:16

and 00:15:24

So once again the language is either 00:15:25

Playing tricks on us or else expressing a profound intuition 00:15:31

Language does both and you have to watch out for which it is of course it may be both. That is a possibility 00:15:38

But here at once you see especially in that illustration of music of it 00:15:50

Being necessary to hear intervals in order to hear melody 00:15:55

You see that the way things are spaced is really another way of talking about the way [things] are related 00:16:00

So you begin [to] [realize] that space is relationship? 00:16:14

Go further now 00:16:25

There is another idea about space which is connected with both the with all the oriental uses of space 00:16:27

it is quite fundamental to 00:16:36

Indian and a great deal of Chinese thinking 00:16:40

that space equals consciousness 00:16:45

in other words 00:16:51

What actually we are experiencing as the all-inclusive? 00:16:56

Space in which things happen is your mind 00:17:02

and 00:17:07

Your mind of course is not something inside your head that is a great mistake to make your head is something in your mind 00:17:13

We can define a person's mind in many ways 00:17:23

[but] beginning with something rather simple mind is occupied [with] thinking 00:17:29

most people think in words and 00:17:36

You didn't get words out of your head [you] [got] them from the community in which you live [and] were brought up 00:17:40

So when you think in a language which your community gave you? 00:17:49

You are not really thinking [your] own thoughts 00:17:55

It is very difficult indeed to have private thoughts 00:18:00

because 00:18:06

the 00:18:07

when the very 00:18:08

materials with which you think our public property it shows what a vast influence the public has on you in your 00:18:10

the deepest recesses of your mind 00:18:18

It's therefore very difficult also to think freely 00:18:22

Independently because we are pushed around with the symbolic systems of words, or of numbers in which we think 00:18:26

but since 00:18:36

You see the functioning of the mind in the process of thinking 00:18:37

Depends upon an outside community 00:18:42

you begin to see that your mind is a network a 00:18:46

network of relationships you 00:18:53

think only 00:18:56

in the context of an environment of people and 00:18:58

of natural processes 00:19:03

so that you could say that your mind is at the very least a 00:19:07

very most complex network of 00:19:13

present and 00:19:19

past 00:19:21

relationships 00:19:23

stretching out to 00:19:24

the very limits of the universe and 00:19:26

this as I've often said 00:19:30

explains 00:19:32

Such truth as there may be in astrology 00:19:33

That when you want to draw a map of a person's soul 00:19:39

You draw a map of the universe as it was when he was born 00:19:44

We say that is your chart that expresses you in a special way 00:19:52

Now the astrologers maps are very crude. They are based on a rather primitive view of the universe 00:19:59

But the truth of it. [is] there you see 00:20:07

That who you really are 00:20:10

Your soul your mind 00:20:12

is 00:20:15

the Total universe as 00:20:17

Focused upon you 00:20:19

And this connects with what in mahayana buddhism is called the doctrine of mutual interpenetration 00:20:23

Namely that every thing event in the world 00:20:31

anything in other words supposing the whole world is a 00:20:35

in Pattern and 00:20:39

Then you want to identify the wiggles in the pattern 00:20:43

very difficult to to 00:20:46

determine how much of a wiggle makes one wiggle 00:20:49

But by a sort of calculus [imagery] [true] the thing up 00:20:54

We say all this wiggly world consists of so many wiggles and each individual wiggle is a thing event 00:20:57

What is called in Japanese? 00:21:05

[JI] means a thing event and 00:21:08

So the idea of new doctrine of mutual interpenetration is that everything event in the universe 00:21:12

Implies all the others 00:21:21

It goes with it 00:21:24

Doesn't matter how long it lasts or how short it lasts the fact that it is or the fact that it was 00:21:26

Implies the existence of everything else, so 00:21:36

[to] put it in [another] way 00:21:40

The fact that that is a moth flying around me. It's very small and it will soon run into a candle and extinguish itself 00:21:42

That little incident would not be possible at all 00:21:51

except in the context of 00:21:56

all these galaxies 00:21:59

Because they their existence goes with the possibility of there being such a minut little life fluttering around 00:22:06

What is them not so easy to see is the picture in the opposite direction that? 00:22:16

in the same measure all these galaxies 00:22:23

Depend upon and go with this little moth 00:22:29

As the Poet su, so Henry, su, so once said that 00:22:36

Wasn't Su, though 00:22:43

if someone like it lived about the same time I 00:22:45

Think of it in a minute anyway. He said I know that without me. God could not live for one moment 00:22:49

and 00:22:59

This is the other aspect of it 00:23:01

and this is the difficult one to understand and 00:23:06

We shall be able to approach this in the course of the seminar in 00:23:09

Fact if you realize that then you've really got it you've got the point of your own existence 00:23:14

But to get the reverse picture 00:23:22

You have first of all to get clearly 00:23:25

Its opposite one namely that the existence of any one my new little thing is 00:23:28

intimately related to everything 00:23:35

And then you can you what happens when you clearly understand that and you've really [got] that 00:23:41

Your mind does a flip [boom] like that. It's like when you squeeze the air into a 00:23:47

sausage balloon 00:23:53

and you get all the air squeezed up you think into one end of the balloon and something goes bloop and 00:23:54

It comes off the other end you see well. It's sort of like that 00:23:59

And you have to be very careful at that point not to go crazy 00:24:04

But we're cause you see when you find out 00:24:09

That all this universe depends on you 00:24:13

some people get frightened others get cocky and 00:24:20

from both things disasters can follow 00:24:26

You have to discover that and then be natural 00:24:31

excessive nothing up 00:24:37

so then this 00:24:45

buddhist idea of Mahayana Buddhist idea of Mutual interpenetration 00:24:49

is Expressed by 00:24:53

the great simile of the net of Jewels 00:24:55

in which 00:25:00

you have a multi-dimensional spider's web in the morning, [Dew'] and 00:25:04

on inspecting one dewdrop you see the reflections of all the others and 00:25:09

in each reflection in turn 00:25:14

reflections of all the others and again and again again 00:25:16

And so of course one discovers this to be no mere 00:25:22

Philosophical Fancy no mere metaphor 00:25:28

when you start working with laser beams and 00:25:30

Finding out that you can 00:25:34

reconstruct a whole photograph 00:25:36

from a tiny snip out of the negative 00:25:39

because 00:25:46

the Crystalline structure of the whole 00:25:47

photographic field 00:25:53

the chemical spread over the 00:25:54

acetate or whatever 00:25:57

[when] it's exposed to light all those crystals change in harmony with each other 00:26:00

see especially we all touch each other and 00:26:06

Then somebody says boo 00:26:10

[we'll] all jump a little bit together and 00:26:13

if you examine [anyone] jump carefully enough any one individual jumping 00:26:17

You will see if you couldn't find out enough about it that the way he did it was 00:26:22

in response to the ones next to him and they did it in response the ones next to them and [they] jumped so far because 00:26:26

they couldn't push any further and 00:26:32

Some were a little bit pulled in their jump and so on and by seeing exactly what one of them 00:26:34

Did you could reconstruct what all of them are doing? 00:26:39

Only usually we don't bother to think about things like that because it takes too long 00:26:44

and 00:26:50

This is one of our great difficulties as human beings 00:26:52

That the mode of thinking upon which we largely rely for our practical calculations is unbelievably clumsy 00:26:55

Because it can only deal with one [thing] at a time 00:27:04

and 00:27:08

That doesn't get you anywhere. That's in a way. Why a great deal of scientific work is apt to be trivial 00:27:10

They all very well if I had all that time to think it out 00:27:19

but I don't I have to make practical decisions in a hurry and 00:27:24

no time 00:27:31

But on the other hand 00:27:36

Here is nature here is your body 00:27:39

Not merely your body it by itself as something bounded by the skin 00:27:44

but your body in relationship to a whole community of people and animals and bugs and 00:27:48

vegetables 00:27:55

functioning in this astonishing way 00:27:57

Doing myriads of things all together everywhere at once [and] not thinking [about] [it] at all 00:28:00

It is astonishing. You know how we overlook that 00:28:11

because of course this is [a] faculty which everybody possesses and 00:28:17

Therefore, we say well that sort of cleverness is a dime a dozen 00:28:27

What we like to distinguish is special cleverness people who can do strange tricks? 00:28:31

like great feats of thinking and talking and 00:28:37

intellectual and cerebral performance 00:28:43

But we mustn't forget that there are also people who do absolutely? 00:28:46

astonishing things without thinking at all 00:28:49

There are jugglers 00:28:53

there are 00:28:56

very beautiful people that's a pretty astonishing when you pick out someone a saying gee isn't [she] gorgeous [and] 00:28:57

That's done without thinking 00:29:05

And it embarrasses many women to be told that they're beautiful 00:29:07

Because they want to be admired for their intellectual achievements 00:29:13

Rather than for the bodies which their parents provided for them 00:29:17

and so [we're] [a] little bit on the defensive about the things that we achieve without our egos of 00:29:22

being in charge 00:29:29

But we do the most beautiful things that we do 00:29:32

really by that means because 00:29:36

All that thought and intellectuality can do is it can embellish your natural talents? 00:29:38

Lot of people who are incredibly good at thinking never do anything creative because they are 00:29:47

Have no talent available 00:29:55

They may have it but they don't know they [don't] trust it. They don't know how to make use of it and therefore their intellect 00:29:57

works 00:30:05

to little purpose 00:30:06

because the in function of the intellect 00:30:12

is to be the servant of 00:30:16

the organic intelligence 00:30:20

You see only what we're doing is we are trying to make the intellect the master 00:30:25

The intellect is a wonderful servant just so long as it knows its place 00:30:32

But once it becomes 00:30:38

saying to nature 00:30:40

Look you you you submit. I know how you ought to be run 00:30:43

Now I'm going to take charge that is the moment of Hybris 00:30:48

where 00:30:52

Adam eats the fruit of the tree of knowledge 00:30:54

that is to say of technical knowledge, and 00:30:58

Tries to be God to [the] world 00:31:02

And God says okay, baby you try 00:31:06

The [then] you see you've got to work. That's why the curse of eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge was work 00:31:14

everything became work 00:31:23

Cats you know dogs and birds. They don't do any work 00:31:28

They true they scurry around getting food, but that's that that's what there is to do 00:31:33

That's fun. [that's] that's lie. That's living it's not work 00:31:40

Besides you don't have to think about it 00:31:44

you have 00:31:47

Your your brain tells you 00:31:48

Where to look for it your nose tells you where to [find] it 00:31:51

you 00:31:56

Do what comes naturally and there it is? 00:31:58

If God, so clothe the grass of the field which today is and tomorrow is cast into the [oven] 00:32:05

And how much more will he tell you faithless ones? 00:32:11

But I never met a minister 00:32:15

never 00:32:21

Who would not comment upon that that that is a very impractical passage which we can't live up to 00:32:22

about to get back to space all I was showing in this sort of digression was 00:32:33

That our mind 00:32:44

our self 00:32:46

is not 00:32:49

Inside our heads 00:32:52

but extends and 00:32:54

so you see 00:32:58

you you have as the great vehicle of this extension of the universe you have space and 00:33:00

You see immediately that you cannot pin space down 00:33:10

You cannot really conceive space at all look at the wonder a child has 00:33:16

When it asks questions and begins, what's up there? What's beyond? What's after that? What's after that? 00:33:21

The Child is 00:33:29

Absolutely fascinated by thinking about that. Do you know all children are [fascinated] with infinity? 00:33:31

Don't you remember seeing um say a child's book? 00:33:37

And on the cover of this [book] is a little girl sitting reading the same book 00:33:42

With the same little girl on the cover 00:33:47

and so naturally there's not a little girl on the cover of the book she's looking at in the picture and 00:33:49

so the child begins to wonder how small can it get how far can it go or 00:33:55

they get in opposing mirrors and look and 00:34:02

See that's wonderful 00:34:06

Why can't you line them up so [that] it doesn't just disappear around the corner always couldn't you get in straight on this seems? 00:34:07

so difficult 00:34:14

Mommy, what did God do before he started the world? 00:34:17

You think back. What would it be like to be in heaven and live forever and ever and ever and ever and 00:34:21

immediately the Sun house stretches the skull and 00:34:28

Children love doing this because children are always trying out experiments on themselves 00:34:31

You know they prob themselves pull themselves 00:34:36

They love to spin in circles and make themselves feel dizzy because that's a great thing you know that 00:34:39

the guppy like this 00:34:46

They're always fascinated with the limits of experience 00:34:48

So what's out Beyond that? 00:34:52

Because now [when] [otis] oficer de strana tries to tell you that space is finite 00:34:56

the we still 00:35:05

represent this 00:35:09

And say all right space is finite, but what's outside it? 00:35:12

Well this autonomous is you see you [can] only talk about an outside inside space 00:35:15

Outside space there is no outside 00:35:21

You see the mind won't take it 00:35:27

The sense this is infinity 00:35:32

so our 00:35:40

this space 00:35:47

fascinates us 00:35:51

Going on forever 00:35:56

Expanding it seems to be actually going on forever see if the universe is a huge explosion 00:35:59

But you can see can't you [I] think this 00:36:10

Space although, you cannot pin it down 00:36:16

and as the quality of infinity 00:36:19

There's no wave of talking about space as it has no color 00:36:23

It has no weight 00:36:29

you can't cut it you can't possibly chop it into pieces and 00:36:32

Yet 00:36:44

at the same time you cannot differentiate it from 00:36:46

solids 00:36:52

We come to another important point here. You see that solid and space 00:36:54

are in a secret conspiracy with each other 00:37:01

Actually [there's] very little solid in the world 00:37:06

Most of what appears to be solid appears so by virtue of the speed at which. It's jiggling 00:37:11

it's 00:37:19

like an electric fan 00:37:22

which when put in rotation 00:37:24

[the] blades appear to form a solid disk and 00:37:27

This chair is solid on rather for rather the same reasons you can't put your finger through it. It's moving too fast 00:37:30

but actually 00:37:41

Whatever it is. That's dancing in space is increasingly difficult to define the more you think about energy? 00:37:44

You see and you can make a calculus of energy like you make a calculus of wiggles in the well 00:37:51

And you can say there are various waves or wavicles or particles of air 00:37:58

Which we give all sorts of different names to but the more we pursue it the more it all seems to disappear 00:38:03

You like space the more you try to think what it is 00:38:11

the more difficult it is 00:38:16

So let in the same way the more you try to say now come on. Let's sit down. What is this here? 00:38:19

It's [alright] if you stop at a certain point then you say well now 00:38:28

We know that's practical listen this let's not ask any more questions 00:38:32

some of the shop 00:38:35

see 00:38:38

If you keep on asking questions 00:38:41

Everything falls apart [you] notice this in the scholarly world 00:38:45

Scholars spend far more time debunking than they do creating 00:38:50

Cuzz everything that has ever happened has been debunked practically 00:38:56

you can 00:39:02

Show that there is no evidence. You know that Julius Caesar existed not really certainly 00:39:03

There's no evidence that jesus existed that socrates existed. It was a great deal of doubt about plato 00:39:08

Probably the emperor Ashoka was a myth, and so on you know you can go on [in] that indefinitely 00:39:14

Finding out that there really is no evidence. [I] 00:39:21

Don't know that probably the same sort of thing is happening with the warren commission. I don't know 00:39:25

In [other] [did] [something] that it didn't happen anyway 00:39:32

Because that is the work of the analytical intellect you see 00:39:38

When you finally try to be God, that's to say 00:39:43

Define it exactly now. Just where is it and let's get perfectly clear, so where it's fixed see 00:39:48

In it all becomes slippery 00:39:56

Because in order to handle the world you see you have to touch [it] rather gently 00:40:00

You mustn't try to pin things downs they say in zen you do not try to drive a nail into the sky 00:40:06

because 00:40:19

That's the beauty of space you see it has no there's nothing in it to hang on 00:40:20

It hasn't a hook to put your hat on you know somewhere in space 00:40:26

and 00:40:30

Yet, it hasn't got a floor to fall [onto] 00:40:32

So your space had a concrete floor on the bottom it would be pretty dangerous stuff 00:40:36

But it doesn't 00:40:41

There's nowhere in space to Collide 00:40:44

With space you can run into somebody or something else. Yes 00:40:47

but not with space 00:40:52

Figure then on this work on this hypothesis you see throw your hypothesis at the moment nothing more 00:41:00

That space is you 00:41:07

Because you are equally inaccessible to inspection 00:41:12

When you look to find out who you are? 00:41:20

somebody like a zen master will interrupt you and say excuse me, but who is it that wants to know and 00:41:23

Who is it that's looking? 00:41:30

Find out that 00:41:32

So you know you [soon] chasing your own tail like a little dog, and you never catch up with it 00:41:34

There's all this [you] see so space is like you 00:41:43

Only we turned in the ordinary way to think of ourselves. We make the gesture like this me I'm in 00:41:50

We go this way I can feel this I'm inside it. That's me see 00:41:59

But always when you get a certain feeling about things examine the opposite possibility 00:42:04

if you 00:42:12

Are this now we're going to look in due course at the neurology of this, but you do see that 00:42:15

what you see outside you and 00:42:21

Ffel outside you is the way you feel inside your skin 00:42:24

since all the optical images shapes and colors 00:42:31

everything our 00:42:36

neurological states in the Brain 00:42:37

So what appears to you as outside is the most intimate feeling you have of the inside of [your] head 00:42:41

As you know you don't it's difficult to feel the inside of you, and this you have a headache or tumor or something 00:42:47

But in the ordinary way the inside of your head is 00:42:52

Unconscious and the surgeon can open up your skull and put instruments in the brain, and you won't feel them at all 00:42:55

Brain is very uh nested eyes 00:43:03

So in order to feel the brain you have to look out there see and that's how it feels in the brain 00:43:06

so I'm just trying to give an indication of how to get the feeling of 00:43:15

reciprocity Prosity of 00:43:22

You on the one hand it's easy to see as I said you depend on the whole show 00:43:25

Now I want you to see the opposite and equal truth that the whole show depends on you 00:43:29

so that you don't anymore put yourself down as 00:43:35

this wretched little bacterium 00:43:39

living on the 00:43:42

Subscrive Olve Surround A 00:43:46

- star on the outer Fringes of one of the lesser galaxies 00:43:49

This is the great 19th century put-down of man 00:43:54

How nice to be all unimportant? 00:43:59

Watch out for this watch out for the political consequences of everybody is equally inferior 00:44:03

The political consequence is emerging in becoming cleared as day goes by Barbarism as the answer to that 00:44:12

untrammeled violence Police States and 00:44:21

Shocking disregard for human existence because they're only wretched Little Bacteria see 00:44:27

Let's get rid of a whole lot of them get blown them up 00:44:35

And this is not unrelated you see to this feeling of 00:44:40

the individual as someone who 00:44:48

Doesn't matter 00:44:56

at all 00:44:59

Which can [be] the reaction? 00:45:02

Against the philosophy of life in which an individual matter too much in the wrong way 00:45:06

In the Christian tradition we have made the individual matter too much in the wrong way 00:45:15

That is to say 00:45:23

You as an ego [are] infinitely precious 00:45:26

God has made each one of you separately and each one of you as a separate ego will last forever and 00:45:32

Therefore you're all important in the eyes of God 00:45:42

But you better know your place, baby, because your subjects of the king 00:45:46

on the other hand the other way of looking at the individual as an incarnation of the divine as 00:45:52

God him, or it or herself 00:45:59

Coming on it. God everywhere 00:46:06

Did you realize how fascinating that is that if you were God? 00:46:11

Wouldn't be fascinating to see myriads 00:46:21

to know yourself in terms of Myriads of reproductions of yourself all different and 00:46:25

really different 00:46:32

like other people seem to be different from you and 00:46:34

They've got a secret in them. You don't know what they're going to do next 00:46:38

See so they are alive if I push you you just go [blasts] 00:46:40

It's very plastic if you look at jump a little ah that's someone else. I don't know what she's going to do next 00:46:45

[see] that's what I'm looking for that's what we're all [looking] for in personal relationships 00:46:54

And that's you see you can imagine 00:46:59

if you simplified 00:47:04

here is the kind of ball of light which is the divine being but 00:47:07

It's fascinating. It's fascinated with itself and 00:47:16

so in order to 00:47:21

Find out its own possibilities. You see it brutally puts another one out there [and] 00:47:23

they they bounce together and flip that comes another you see they go all over the place and 00:47:29

So you get this idea of ever so many echoes [of] one sound and they're all chattering back, but they're not just playing uniforms 00:47:35

They soon you introduce into this the element of differentiation 00:47:42

So that each one looks as different as [possible] from the other 00:47:48

But it's all one because they can't be 00:47:52

the sense of I am I 00:47:58

Without the sense of further is someone else 00:48:01

something else there is other I 00:48:05

And other imply each other as much as solid Implies space 00:48:09

Well, we'll have an intermission 00:48:19