[MD] Case's Answer to Marsha: Part 2

[Case]

Part Two
or
Shit happens. How do we deal with it?

My brother is an earthy kind of guy. But intellectual pretentiousness seems
to run in our family. He used to work on a loading dock and he would be
spouting off to his co-workers about politics and this and that and
generally making himself annoying. Finally one day one of his business
associates interrupted one of his tirades and said, "Look man, don't take
this wrong but if it ain't got to do with fishin' or fuckin' I really don't
give a damn."

Imagine you are a hunter gatherer 15,000 years ago. About all your social
group can offer you is knowledge about fishin' and fuckin'. Nothing else
really matters. 

Eat this. 
Don't eat that. 
Make yourself useful.
If you need to do something smelly, go outside the camp.
Pretty basic stuff.

The game migrates and you either follow it or wait depending on where you
live. The seasons change. Flowers blooms, nuts fall from the trees, the
berries sprout from the thorn bushes. It is said that the oldest profession
in the free market economy is prostitution as in "I trade you some of this
for some of those purple berries." But I tend to think that the second and
third and fourth professions were Pharmacy, Engineering and Astronomy.

Modern pharmacy grows from the herbalist traditions that run as far back as
anyone can remember. Herbal lore accumulates over time and generations. It
is essential and must be passed on from generation to generation because
there is just too much to for one person to figure out on their own in a
life time. These leaves can stop that itching. If you suck this root your
head will stop hurting. If you eat this mushroom the world will melt around
you. 

Engineering begins with banging rocks together and lo and behold they crack
and the shape changes. Hey, I'll bet we could use a shape like that to dig a
deeper hole. You got another one? Wow, that's sharp! What if we tie it to a
stick? Can you show me how you made that?

But Astronomy? Today most of us ignore or can't see the lights in the sky
but for most of our ancestors they were an ongoing mystery, bright and
unmistakable in the heavens. Almost all prehistoric peoples that we have met
in historic times, that is the native and aboriginal peoples, can mark the
change of seasons by the passage of heavenly bodies. This is essential the
farther from the equator you live. This perception of regular cycles is
critical to knowing when the game is going to pack up and leave or when it
is time to start breaking out the blankets. 

While the oldest profession can be learned and mastered in a single life
time these other three require transmission across time. They require the
recognitions of patterns in nature and the ability to see connections
between things that are disconnected. 

The position and phase of the moon as it relates to room temperature. 

The shape and height of a berry bush and color of its fruit in relation to
whether it tastes good or will make you sick. 

The textures and shape of a stone in relationship what kind of arrowhead you
can make from it.

What separated our ancestors from the rest of nature was their ability to
see patterns in nature. They were able to perceive coincidence and to derive
meaning from it. This idea of meaningful coincidence is the beginning of
wisdom. Jung dubbed it Synchronicity. He saw it as meaning derived from
causally unrelated events. For example, you have a dream about an old friend
and the next day to drop in for a visit.

But I think Jung was wrong. Synchronicity is not about deriving meaning from
acausality. Causality is derived from synchronicity. In other words a cause
and effect relationship is one from which meaning can be derived every time.

Individually and collectively what sets us apart from the rest of the
natural word is our ability to perceive patterns and give them meaning. Most
patterns do not have meaning. They are asynchronous. They are just shit
happening. But when we can see a pattern of meaning; when we can see a
persistent relationship, ah ha, now that is some Good Shit. Even if the
pattern tells us that something bad is going to happen, it is good to know.

Good Shit Happens, too: That is Static Quality.

End of Part Two