Asymmetrical Orientation and the Symmetrical Universe

 

Our modern picture of the universe is founded on the evolution of a living awareness that knows the world by way of dimensionality.  All life operates within the context of temporal asymmetry, living and replicating in the forward direction of time using its continual left-right orientation to connect to the physical environment, as shown in Figure 1 above.  From its “seat” at the living coordinate, awareness operates within its ideal sphere, extending out into the symmetrical universe of pure space, creating an aware-compatible world that is known through patterns derived from spatial (left-right) orientation and – as we will see in this chapter – polar (positive / negative, plus / minus) direction and chiral molecules.

Selective recognition is what separates living awareness from matter. Chiral molecules, distinct from one another only by left or right position in three dimensions, selectively recognize and bind to other same-handed molecules from the morass of molecules moving into, through and out of the cell.  Left-right is the primary qualitative choice that recognizes shape in the successive 2D planes of quantitative, symmetrical 3D space.  Chiral selectivity is the choosing primitive – the grasping hand of cellular awareness.

In previous chapters, we described the way in which awareness perceives the objects it encounters in the physical universe using a few commonsense concepts of geometry as they apply to the dimensionality of 3D objects.  We showed how the world of “things” is constructed from a series of actual and projected angular views of 2D sides in the ongoing present “now” moment and discussed how these successive views of “informational shapes” are organized, integrated and stored in memory for later use in shape recognition at the molecular level and object recognition at the organism level.  We also saw how awareness projects interiority – an “inside” to physical objects that doesn’t exist as a feature of 3D objects themselves.  And, we showed how the combination of object recognition and projected interiority allows the organism to recognize a continual incoming and outgoing flow of physical surfaces, and thus establish a stable relationship between objects within and outside of its body in a way that maintains its own enduring physical form from one moment to the next.

In this chapter, we will explore two other features of the physical universe – mass and force (electromagnetism) – and explain how those concepts likewise correspond to the in-out function of awareness.  In doing so, we’ll again rely on one of our foundational premises, namely, that our modern scientific understanding of the world is built on the same principles of awareness that operate at all levels of life, from the single-celled organism to human consciousness and rational scientific thought.

To begin this discussion, we note that in addition to dimensionality and interiority, living awareness also experiences objects as substantive or solid – they have weight.  From a scientific perspective, this characteristic is referred to as “mass”. Isaac Newton understood mass as “the quantity of matter in a substance.” In his first law of motion, he noted a relationship between mass and force: “A body at rest remains at rest, or, if in motion, remains in motion at a constant velocity unless acted on by a net external force.”  To Newton, then, “mass” is that quality of an object (or “body”) that resists a change in its state of motion, thus requiring the application of an external force to alter its current position or motion.

Since Einstein published his Special Theory of Relativity, scientists have also noted a relationship between mass and energy.  In the context of our discussion, energy may be thought of as something that passes between and through solid objects with the capacity to cause structural change. ¹  Relating these concepts to life, we will see that the effort to maintain form through a change in matter parts – that is, the energy expended in the effort to continue to live – is this sense of force as it is experienced by living organisms.  We can imagine it as effort passed between and through solid objects moving within and through the living body. ²

For the purposes of this discussion, we’ll focus on a specific type of physical force – that supplied by an electric field.  An electric field arises in the space that surrounds electrically-charged particles. ³  This field exerts a force that affects other nearby particles, either attracting them (in the case of opposite-charged particles) or repelling them (in the case of same-charged particles). Turning again to physics as a basis for showing how awareness and a compatible universe give rise to the concepts of “inside” and “outside”, we find that physicists refer to “inward” and “outward” direction in describing the energy of a charged particle.  The energy of particles with a “positive” charge is said to curve (or radiate) outward in every direction; the energy of a particle with a “negative” charge is said to radiate inward in every direction.  When the two charged particles are in proximity to one another, the electric field of each particle responds to that of the other as depicted in Figure 2. 

We’ve observed that the same forward / backward, in-out function of awareness that grasps conceptual hierarchies of smaller parts within larger wholes (discussed in Chapter 1) is the same function that “shapes” dimensional objects from smallest points to 2D informational shapes to 3D objects with an “other side” (discussed in Chapter 5).  Now, we see this same “in-out” principle serving as a pattern to describe the inward / outward movement of energy between objects in the physical universe.   As we examine the interaction of awareness with mass and energy in this chapter, we’ll describe in greater detail the communication that takes place through the matching of shapes.  We’ll also see that both awareness and energy are relational in nature, and how life selects objects in the world for use in maintaining form through a change in matter – doing so by turning energy around as information that in effect, allows it to recognize something “known” from the past as arriving from the future in the present “now” moment.

As we move forward, keep in mind that nothing being discussed here is intended to dispute science. We are attempting to understand the universe from the perspective of living awareness.  The physical world of 3D molecules described by modern science is both compatible with aware organisms and is organized, explained (and built, we contend) by aware organisms. To understand life “on its own terms”, we will once again make use of a few basic commonsense concepts from science, however this is not – nor is it intended to be – a scientific discussion as such.  Instead, it might be thought of as a metaphysical examination in that “meta” means “self-reference”.  As the “self-reference of physics”, the processes of awareness being described in these pages are studies in metaphysics.

¹ In his Special Theory of Relativity, Albert Einstein described the relationship between energy and matter as follows:  Energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared, or  E = mc².  Unlike weight, mass does not change with specific location.

² It is our contention that “effort” is the fundamental feeling of being alive in our body.  We’ll discuss this in later chapters.

³ Although we will refer to “charged particles” throughout this discussion, it should be noted that these are not actual objects as such.  A charged particle is a static range of possibilities that becomes “actual” only upon interaction with other such particles within the shared physical space of an electric field.  The “charge” of a particle refers to its energy potential, which may be described as positive (outward) or negative (inward). See https://van.physics.illinois.edu/qa/listing.php?id=414.