Euclid teaches us that a point along either a straight or curved line on a graph possesses location, but has no dimension. A point by definition, is dimensionless. Unless it is a 'hypothetical' point on a plane, in space, multidimensional space, or space time, a point must have an exact location.
A point may therefor exist in topologies of more than three dimensions. A speck of dust at the bottom of a teacup may exist at a single instant, but the moment its life extends longer than an instant, its space-time is not a point. It is a creature of four dimensions, a point of three, living along a line in a fourth.
I leap from this, as crazed as a man attempting to trace the origins of gossip - consciousness must have dimension!
Just as the shadow of a knitting needle upon a tabletop defines its flat space, or an apple floats in a barrel of water, so consciousness rests against the broad back of space-time, aware that its own dimension bulges, a tumescence growing from a limitless universe of dimension entirely unseen by us, unmeasured, unclaimed, and unconquered. We nibble at the fringes of a vast medium, from which we draw sustenance.
So, if like bergs floating in an Arctic sea we are part below the surface, part above, what medium does our consciousness float within?
As a worker (of a previous age) who pauses and leans his back against a giant oak at midday, looking out upon fields upon which he has labored, consciousness focuses its perceptions upon the realm of the senses, through which it receives knowledge and information about the world. The front of our consciousness so to speak, is the world that we perceive.
And what is the broad trunk of the oak upon which we rest our backs? Is it akin to the part of the iceberg that plunges deep into the water unseen by anyone? Is it the same as the spine of the needle stuck into something that protrudes above its own narrow shadow?
The rear unseen edge of consciousness must be super-consciousness, a part of something greater to which we all belong. All conscious being float in the same universe, and while our senses provide different sets of facts about different parts of that universe, the part to which our conscious clod clings, is a whole-earth of awareness, a multi-dimensional super-volume of space-time-that may not be characterized by our senses at all, and consults instead with us through our dreams.
We act upon the world. Our dreams act upon us.
Why our dreams?
Because just as we receive news of the immediate universe through the senses (the apple senses the water that it floats within), so the back of our awareness must interact with the super conscious body of which it is an outgrowth. We are but mycellia, our existence really is more of our dreams than of our senses. More of the earth than of the air where the fruited body pokes its head. And the language of our eternal darkness is lit brighter than midday by the power of dreams, and myth.
For purposes of this model there is a 'conscious' dimension, just as there is a height to the knitting needle above the table, or, just as there is a fractal dimension for all topological forms.
Pursuing this argument for the sake of play only, if the conscious dimension of the universe that we perceive with our senses is 4, then the conscious dimension of our own consciousness is at least 5, and the conscious dimension of that which our consciousness backs against, i.e. super-consciousness is greater than 6.
Therefor our conscious 'body' has a perimeter, and that 'edge' may be described in part by all numbers greater than 5 but less than 6.
Edge effect, where birds and deer come out of the forest to feed. Why is it that sunlit places in nature are always the most dangerous for small creatures . . . . and forest is safety?
The fierceness of a prairie storm. Cormack McCarthy's pilgrims, whirled like dervishes into tornadoes which dropped like angry fingers of God, and cast them across the mountains, dashed to bits along with their words.
There is always some vortex or leak, connecting separate topologies. Each universe has the means of supplying material to another.
While it may seem frivolous to pursue such a rigid topology to something we cannot apply measurement to, bear with me while I list the advantages of such an exercise.
a) Once we admit to a perimeter to a conscious set, we can allow that consciousness has no limit in dimensional size, so long as the perimeter 'recognizes' itself. That defines consciousness AS a recognition of a border, between itself and something 'else' of another dimension. Consciousness if you like is the edge of where four dimensions meet five. It's where forest and prairie meet.
b) Self-recognition is a feature of consciousness. That we know. Reducing it to mathematics makes it easy to discuss just as the numbers 1 and 2 will be forever different. Is death therefor simply a relinquishing of one's grip upon all dimensions of four or less, and returning the contents of fivefold dimensionality to the subconsciousness of six or more?
c) Though we may not measure consciousness as easily as we may measure a piece of plywood, measurements of space and time may only be performed by beings of a higher dimensionality.
So alas we come to the perimeter of this exercise. The teacup we live within is paper thin.
It broadens to the sky. It contains hot liquid. The forces of nature clench its contents tightly within its boundaries, but it may be upended at any time. . . . and though the contents will be lost, the teacup remains . . . a shell . . . a memory.
And when the teacup breaks, its shards will scatter. But some being will perceive them as whole.
And when the shards return their atoms into the realm of lost teacups?
The fish looses itself within the body of another. The tea you spilled yesterday joins the tea of all time. And I breath Thomas Jefferson's air as do you.
