Key Principle of Life, for Life No. 2 affirms that due to the inherent limitations of reasoning and the scientific method, there will remain a fullness (wholeness) to life that will not be entirely comprehended through rational thinking or be fully revealed by scientific inquiry.
The world around us co-exists with us at-once -- no science, at least none that rely on measurable confirmations (reliant on speed-of-light delays) can fully and entirely confirm that at-once (nonlocal) nature. That is to say, there will remain a fullness (wholeness) to life that will not be fully revealed by scientific inquiry.
In view of the inability to fully reveal this at-once nature, KPLL No. 2 requires that there will remain aspects of, and potentials within, everyday experience that cannot be entirely reduced to any knowable order (science, equation, academic discipline, physiology, profession, body of experience etc). This simply follows from accepting we cannot 'think' and thus cognitively analyse the infinite whole of all.
Recognising the at-once nature of parts and wholes (of individuals and communities) produces our second Key Principle of Life, for Life (KPLL No. 2):
Key Principle of Life, For Life No. 2:
All occurs at once1
‘Parts’ and ‘wholes’ have validity, reality and purpose
through an at-once interdependence of each other.2
Key Principle No. 2 affirms the interdependence of parts and wholes – a paradoxical independence within dependence.
For example, we may operate or live independently of our family or local community (say, as a hermit in the forest), but we remain dependent on the local ecosystem (an interdependent community of flora, fauna and materials). This key principle (No. 2) will apply in all circumstances, but its expression or outward manifestation will take differing forms.
KPLL No.2 affirms the inability to meaningfully analyse parts independent of their relationship to the whole. However, our sciences and the process of rational thinking have inherent limitations when analysing the at-once nature of wholes and relationships.
Generally speaking, thinking is a serial, sequential process; a process of having one thought after another.3 In other words, our usual thinking process does not furnish us with a full view of life, but merely step-by-step views and experiences, which in turn leads us to take either-or snapshots of life.4
We see evidence of this either-or process in everyday life, such as in politics, religion, science and personal relationships.
Either-or thinking in politics
Political parties reflect an either-or bias in the form of socialist, left-wing or capitalist, right-wing policies and laws. Right-wing views and ideologies are biased towards individualism (parts).5 Left-wing politics is biased towards community (the whole). This either-or thinking usually results in right-wing policies favouring individual rights at the expense of community cohesion and cooperation, while left-wing policies generally favour the community at the expense of individual freedoms and opportunities.6, 7
As is more fully explained in our seminars8 left-wing and right-wing biases are not sustainable – favouring one side at the expense of the other ends up being at the expense of both, as required by KPLL 1 and 2.
Either-or thinking in religion
In religious terms we see this either-or bias when religious folk believe God is perfect (right) and human kind are fallen (wrong, bad). Such right-wrong, Good-Bad views are clear examples of either-or thinking.
Another example of either-or thinking is the belief that we may read the Word of God in some religious text. For God – the whole of All communities – to have stated something specific, such as the Word of God in the form of the Ten Commandments, requires each part, in accordance with KPLL 2, to have co-authored that statement. To suggest or believe that a community can assert some truth, fact or Commandment without having agreement from every part within that community clearly does not voice the sentiment or beliefs of the whole community.
Accordingly, the stated origin and validity of God’s Word, as is explicitly stated in any form, in any book, cannot be assigned complete validity, as required by Key Principles 1 and 2.9.
As explained, science and religion are sister-belief systems, both of which assign the the deeper interconnected impetuses towards life to external/independent causes ('randomness' and 'God' resp.).10
Either-or thinking in personal relationships
In personal relationships, a bias towards individualism (part) or towards the collective (whole) is seen in the form of selfish competitive warring people who kill or take from others, or in the form of ‘totally-giving’ people who selflessly devote themselves to their children or to some social cause.
The bias towards individualism versus the whole (family, community, planet) is usually displayed by the sexes as masculine and feminine; dominant and submissive; competitive and cooperative; logical and intuitive; rational and emotional.
Either-or thinking in family relationships
In social, family relationships this either-or thinking biases favour for select members of our society. In many cultures, particularly Western, there is a strong judicial bias towards the welfare of children (in divorce settlements), but not for the welfare and well-being of the children and the mother and the father.
Either-or thinking in biological sciences
In the biological sciences, this either-or thinking surfaces as the deeply entrenched belief that evolution is due to win or lose “survival of the fittest” competition, independent of the deeper cooperative, collaborative, interconnected and life-affirming communities and ecosystems that provide the base for all competitive behaviour.
Either-or thinking in New-Age philosophies
In new-age philosophies we see this either-or thinking frequently voiced in the form of our needing to ‘transcend the ego’, or that we need to live with detachment and give up desire, or that our physical world is an illusion. In general, all such new-age beliefs and teachings diminish the value, validity and pivotal role of the conscious ego and individual responsibility for both our personal and community/global circumstances.
With the help of the Key Principles, we can learn to appreciate that our conscious reasoning and ego is a necessary part of our whole awareness, but that, even if we have not yet consciously acknowledged it, there is a greater fullness to our awareness that cannot be expressed in words or deciphered through conscious reasoning. This means that, since we cannot consciously think the (infinite) whole of All, our conscious egos are part of an unconscious collective whole. In other words, our conscious egos are parts of the at-once whole of All (collective) consciousness, as required by the God-as Principle.11
Similarly, the idea that our physical world is ‘an illusion’ is an either-or view when attempting to accommodate and describe deeper meta-physical dimensions embedded within everyday reality. Our physical world is quite demonstrably real while being an illusion. Both are true at the same time, hence the paradox of life, in accordance with the God-As Principle.
We may include this either-or thinking process in a diagram, which graphically depicts how we separate, select and serialise our perceptions of life (see Fig. 1.1, tba).
Our serial thinking will interpret and necessarily reduce our at-once awareness by way of sequential words, symbols, ideas, concepts and theories.
Various theorems in mathematics and physics (Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, Godel's Incompleteness Theorem, Chaitin's Randomness Theorem and Turing Uncomputability Problem) all point to the same "irreducible complexity" of life, in accord with KPLL No.'s 1 and 2.
... next (Key Principle No. 3)
Notes:
- 1. For reasons provided in Part 2a, this principle also applies to time. All times (part, present and future) occur at-once.
- 2. This principle can alternatively be stated as parts and wholes (individuals and communities) form an ‘inseparable duality.’
- 3. More precisely, rational thinking is limited to only conceptually recognising parts. See in detail (tba) in Part 2.
- 4. However, even though we mentally take limited snap-shots of life, we can learn to increase our ‘awareness’ to experience a greater fullness to everyday life.
- 5. If such were not biased, they would not be identified by different descriptions as being left or right.
- 6. E.g. as was observed under communism.
- 7. Policies that are biased towards either individualism (capitalism, private ownership) or collectivism (‘oneness’, public ownership) violate the first two Key Principles of Life, for Life.
- 8. Please contact the Belief Institute for more details on courses
- 9. Since not all ‘God-parts’ (individuals, throughout all time) directly contributed to the alleged ‘God’s Word.’
- 10. With the proof of nonlocality – which disallows 'perfect disconnects' (i.e. all parts within any whole are intimately interconnected and interdependent) – it makes no sense to expect that 'things just happen' or that it was God's Will, independent of the system's intent (of cell, organ, body, person, community).
- 11. This principle is frequently voiced by those who intimately feel that they are part of something greater than themselves.
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