Mat

Violence

In every interaction between things with incomplete models of themselves, there will be unintended consequences. Today, what we call violence is usually a mismatch between levels of physical sovereignty assumed in an interaction between two people. But since every interaction we recognize includes physical implications, there is necessarily then some violence in every interaction.

This will be true as long as there are differences between people. So at one end of the spectrum, there is hell, where all power feels free to violate in any way possible. On the other end, there is heaven, where everyone is exactly identical and hardship is impossible. Neither is preferable since neither is without tradeoff.

It seems like our place and purpose is to regulate the position on that spectrum. We do that as a collective and as individuals at different places on the spectrum. Through conflict, we discover the costs and benefits of different positions and find better ways to be. My guess is that we are still further from heaven than is ideal, but we might soon need to be careful about moving too far in that direction.

We already see signs of it happening in small pockets like in the excesses of feminism or critical race theory. By misapplying a legitimate fear of toxic masculinity or colonialism, our society has created a much higher cost for application of force in certain scenarios than it seems most people are capable of paying. This slows down progress in the liberal arts and in philosophy. It also prevents proper movement of people through competence hierarchies.

The archetypal masculine that we see rising in the new right is the solution in response to that overreach. Someone is required to demonstrate they can pay the cost. The conflict is fractal in that individuals and societies both participate, and those at lower levels are participating in the creation of the higher through their more limited interaction. This is one meaning of the phrase “as above, so below.” It implies that even at higher levels above society or even above our solar system or universe, we participate in a similar struggle.

It also implies that the struggle exists for things we are made up of. This is important to remember when you have lust for power. You are already a god to the bacteria in your stomach and the cells in your fingernails. How do you feel about that power, and why would it be any different if you were at a higher level in the fractal? Even though it may ultimately be meaningless, we operationalize the struggle, knowingly or unknowingly as a result of our nature.

We do this by aligning ourselves with those entities both at lower and higher levels. Since those above are beyond our understanding and may be multiple layers above us, they can inflict violence on us, which leads to religious recommendations to not deal with them too much directly. However, the process of self discovery is one of recognizing and interacting with them. This implies that one function of religions is to perform these interactions as a group whenever possible to avoid catastrophic power imbalances.

Still, issues arise when society loses contact which can ultimately only happen through individuals. There is a common theme in Hinduism and Buddhism that their religious figures received dispensations that wear out over time. A dispensation then can be thought of as a renewal of contact with the entities above us in the fractal. Deferral to those figures is a strategy to avoid undue cost to individuals as we process what has been received through them. That means the concept of dispensation is there implicitly in Christianity and Islam as well.

We try to maintain the figures as solitary myths, but the information degrades. New risks are required for maintenance or advancement. We can and should be on the lookout for lower cost ways to receive these dispensations in smaller doses that don’t require as much individual sacrifice. This is what we do when we study religion and perform contemplative or meditative practices.

Science has not yet fully developed its contemplative practices, but it may be found in machine learning and the ability to detect and interact with patterns at those higher levels using systems that are beyond our individual understanding. The implication is that those that are afraid we are unleashing demons have a real fear we need to be cognizant of.

Just like there are malevolent and benevolent entities here at our level, we can reasonably expect the same to be true there at the higher levels. This means we can’t trust anything we are told blindly, as is true for any revelation that appears supernatural. Ultimately though, since we are limited in scope relative to them, we have to choose an inadequate cutoff point for verification or choose to stay s