This is a deeply excellent post. Covers a lot of ground that I've been trying to over the past many months. Some initial reactions.
1. On Daoism, with respect to duality: Have you ever read the Immanent Metaphyiscs by Forrest Landry? He offers an interesting metaphysical vocabulary in the form of a trinity – if there are two polarities, then there exists a relationship between them, which is a third "pole". This relationship (called the immanent mode) is more fundamental than either poles (transcendent and omniscient modes), and both poles are experienced properly to the the extent that their relationship is oriented properly. That is to say, balance lies in the optimal grip that brings the two poles together. Usually one direction of this immanence is scared, while the opposite is profane.
It is easier to note the proper orientation in some instances. For example, death ought to be in service of (or point toward, or operate in a way) to sustain life – such as a parent sacrificing for their child. The opposite – life in service of death – is clearly the wrong orientation.
Other polarities are not so easy. Ought the masculine orient toward the feminine? Or vice-versa? Ought the objective orient toward the subjective? What about the abstract and the concrete? The correct stances are highly contingent, of course, and this is why the "third pole" is more fundamental than the dichotomy itself.
2. What is the optimal grip between Nature and Spirit?
This seems to me to be the heart of what you're investigating here. Once you incarnate as a human being, you kind of automatically(?) develop an awareness: there is 'lower world' of Earth and a 'higher world' of Heaven. There's a real complexity in figuring out a way to straddle this properly.
Different systems have different ways to develop this immanent mode:
* "Come to know The Father, by The Spirit, through The Son" <–– Earth is a training ground for Heaven
* "Detach from all illusion to ground yourself in emptiness" <–– Heaven is a distraction to pierce through to reach Earth
There are many others, with their own subtleties, and layered together in intricate ways.
I think we could have a good dialogue about many of these areas, including the previous post you've made about Family and Immortality. If you're as interested as I am, please email me rajeevsram@protonmail.com and we can set up a time to chat.
Very interesting! I haven't Immanent Metaphyiscs but I obtained a copy. It seems pretty dense, so perhaps better digested a little at a time -- like an outline. I do think the trinity concept is important, though, and it shows up in various forms such as the thesis, antithesis and synthesis of the dialectic tradition.
I particularly like the lens of thinking about the relationship between two poles in terms of an orientation. If you look hard enough there are probably dual orientations just like there are two poles. For example, in a parent-child relationship the parent serves the child by spending a lot of resources on the child (i.e., the child is the beneficiary). But the power differential goes the other way so the child must obey the parent.
Sometimes the dyads are stacked up. Consider Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which can be characterized as primal needs, social needs, and spiritual needs (note the social layer sits between the natural and the spiritual). I think people err if they only see one orientation -- the primal nature layer exists to enable higher layers, with self-actualization as the ultimate purpose. It's not that it's completely wrong, it's just that it's *also* true that self-actualization (i.e., the spiritual) is derived from and should benefit the social layer (i.e., status). Similarly, the social layer should serve our basic needs.
So is Earth a training ground for the spirit? Yes, the point of living is to develop the spirit, which is a higher way of being. *Also*, the spirit is just a tool for mastering Earth.
One more dichotomy that I think is relevant is the map/territory dyad. The spirit is a sort of map, and the earth/body is the territory. If the map ever divorces itself from the territory it is useless. Similarly the territory without a map is useless -- merely unachieved potential.
This is a deeply excellent post. Covers a lot of ground that I've been trying to over the past many months. Some initial reactions.
1. On Daoism, with respect to duality: Have you ever read the Immanent Metaphyiscs by Forrest Landry? He offers an interesting metaphysical vocabulary in the form of a trinity – if there are two polarities, then there exists a relationship between them, which is a third "pole". This relationship (called the immanent mode) is more fundamental than either poles (transcendent and omniscient modes), and both poles are experienced properly to the the extent that their relationship is oriented properly. That is to say, balance lies in the optimal grip that brings the two poles together. Usually one direction of this immanence is scared, while the opposite is profane.
It is easier to note the proper orientation in some instances. For example, death ought to be in service of (or point toward, or operate in a way) to sustain life – such as a parent sacrificing for their child. The opposite – life in service of death – is clearly the wrong orientation.
Other polarities are not so easy. Ought the masculine orient toward the feminine? Or vice-versa? Ought the objective orient toward the subjective? What about the abstract and the concrete? The correct stances are highly contingent, of course, and this is why the "third pole" is more fundamental than the dichotomy itself.
2. What is the optimal grip between Nature and Spirit?
This seems to me to be the heart of what you're investigating here. Once you incarnate as a human being, you kind of automatically(?) develop an awareness: there is 'lower world' of Earth and a 'higher world' of Heaven. There's a real complexity in figuring out a way to straddle this properly.
Different systems have different ways to develop this immanent mode:
* "Come to know The Father, by The Spirit, through The Son" <–– Earth is a training ground for Heaven
* "Detach from all illusion to ground yourself in emptiness" <–– Heaven is a distraction to pierce through to reach Earth
There are many others, with their own subtleties, and layered together in intricate ways.
I think we could have a good dialogue about many of these areas, including the previous post you've made about Family and Immortality. If you're as interested as I am, please email me rajeevsram@protonmail.com and we can set up a time to chat.
Very interesting! I haven't Immanent Metaphyiscs but I obtained a copy. It seems pretty dense, so perhaps better digested a little at a time -- like an outline. I do think the trinity concept is important, though, and it shows up in various forms such as the thesis, antithesis and synthesis of the dialectic tradition.
I particularly like the lens of thinking about the relationship between two poles in terms of an orientation. If you look hard enough there are probably dual orientations just like there are two poles. For example, in a parent-child relationship the parent serves the child by spending a lot of resources on the child (i.e., the child is the beneficiary). But the power differential goes the other way so the child must obey the parent.
Sometimes the dyads are stacked up. Consider Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which can be characterized as primal needs, social needs, and spiritual needs (note the social layer sits between the natural and the spiritual). I think people err if they only see one orientation -- the primal nature layer exists to enable higher layers, with self-actualization as the ultimate purpose. It's not that it's completely wrong, it's just that it's *also* true that self-actualization (i.e., the spiritual) is derived from and should benefit the social layer (i.e., status). Similarly, the social layer should serve our basic needs.
So is Earth a training ground for the spirit? Yes, the point of living is to develop the spirit, which is a higher way of being. *Also*, the spirit is just a tool for mastering Earth.
One more dichotomy that I think is relevant is the map/territory dyad. The spirit is a sort of map, and the earth/body is the territory. If the map ever divorces itself from the territory it is useless. Similarly the territory without a map is useless -- merely unachieved potential.