Journey of the Universe by Brian Thomas Swimme & Mary Evelyn Tucker

Author:Brian Thomas Swimme & Mary Evelyn Tucker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 2011-05-14T16:00:00+00:00

SYMBOLIC CONSCIOUSNESS

Our behavioral freedom and our curiosity led to an entirely new level of consciousness. Consider a moment from early human evolution, say a hundred thousand years ago. Some gazelles and some humans are confronted by the towering flames of a forest fire. They feel almost identical sensations and emotions—the heat, the light, the roaring sound, a fear that freezes the skin, a thrill that rises up from the stomach. But there would be a difference in their response, for the gazelles will know what to do to survive, which is to flee. The gazelles will, in that sense, experience more than the humans. The gazelles will experience not only the heat and light and roar but also an irresistible urge to dash away, a strategy deeply layered into their genes and now fully activated by the forest fire.

There will be feelings of fear in the humans as well. Yet with destruction all around, with the other animals frantically fleeing, the human might instead stand transfixed in wonder. Instead of fleeing from the flames the human might even be drawn irresistibly toward them. It was this relative freedom from instinctual behavior, it has been argued, that enabled us to become profoundly captivated by so many things—by fire, sunrise, ocean waves, erotic intensities, the death of a friend, the birth of a child.

All of these events must have stunned the early humans, drawing them ever further into their experiences. They viewed life through new eyes. Instead of simply responding, they also reflected. They tasted the very essence of what it meant to be alive. With the emergence of the human, the universe created a space where depths of feelings could be concentrated and wondered over.

Humanity’s greatest invention, called symbolic language, enabled humans to share this superabundant consciousness. The universe had reached a new fever pitch in the human, and this boiled over as words. It is as if the early humans were unable to contain such intensities so they constructed mental forms that would carry off some of this white-hot awareness.

Now, even years after an event, humans gathered in the twilight and made rasping sounds, and suddenly in their midst there lived again the roaring fire and the stampeding animals. These early humans huddled together as if the flames were now singeing their hair, and once again they were petrified with fear and captivated with the thrill of existence.

With the invention of the symbol, humans released their blazing imaginations into the world. Nothing would ever be the same again. With the creation of language humans entered into symbolic consciousness. Now humans could remember—could celebrate the great events of their journey. Story was born.

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