Philosophy has been done all wrong and you
are doing it all wrong!!!
What? What did you say? Wrong… nonsense, I am doing
philosophy as it has been done since day one…
and it is wrong!!!
look out the window and spot something, say a tree…
look at that tree… tell me what you see…
I see a tree… about 20 feet tall… with branches, no leaves
because it is winter…and in winter… a tree loses it’s leafs…
what have you described? a tree… yes, but you missed the basic,
essential aspect of the tree…you missed what makes a tree a tree…
what in god’s name are you babbling about? I did describe that tree and
I got all its essential parts…no, you didn’t…
what did you miss?
you looked at the tree as if it was a static, unchanging object…
but that tree is not just an static, unchanging object…
it is one step along a process… that tree is everchanging…
it was born, as trees are born and it has grown and someday, someday,
it will die…we look at that tree at some point during its process and declare
it to be static and unchanging but it isn’t… even as we look at it, it is changing…
slowly, imperceptible, but it is changing… in the midst of process…
the tree has been programmed by its DNA into changes, into a process of
birth, life and then finally death…
just as all matter is changing… we might not be able to see the change but it is
there… all matter is process… going from one point in time to another and another
and at each point in time, changing…I am not the same person I was a minute ago…
I’ve changed… on some level, in the last minute, I have changed… and I will continue
that process until I die… like that tree, from birth to death… my life is not static,
unchanging, but everchanging, every second is a moment of change…
when you look into the mirror… what do you see? do you see an static,
unchanging person? or do you see the processes that brought you here?
we are made up of changing moments, of a process that will go on from birth
to death and then beyond… when we die, we change again… our bodies,
loses cohesion… we begin to the process of decomposition…
in the everlasting battle between order and disorder, we begin the process to
disorder… if we are no longer alive, our bodies begin to disorder…
our bodies, our system, no longer has any energy to maintain its order…
we are a system to the end of our lives and beyond…
when you look at another person, what do you see?
do you see that static moment in time or do you see the
ever changing process is that is life and matter?
I Kropotkin, exists at this moment in time… and I exists, not
as a static unchanging being, but as matter that has changed
and evolved over time… for evolution is simply another word
for process…now the very word “process” and the very word, “evolve”
carry very different connotations… and yet, they mean the exact same thing…
the word, process, just doesn’t have the same emotional context as the word
“evolve”…
I am not the same person I was at birth and that I was at age, 5 or 10 or 20
or 30 or 40 or even 50… I am almost 59 and I have changed, the process that
has gone on in my life, the evolution of Kropotkin has gone on…
I think of myself as static and unchanging but that is simply wrong…
even if I don’t intellectually or emotionally changed (which I do every day)
but physically, at every moment, I am changing…I am continuing
the process of aging…with every passing moment, I age…and I will continue
to age until death…
when you think of life, when you think of matter… it is the process that
matters, not that momentary second that you contemplate life or that matter,
but the process is what matters…
so we are to engage with matter as a process and the next step
is to wonder how that everchanging matter engages with us…
so we are two everchanging processes…the object that we are engage
with and our everchanging matter that is us…
we are two moving processes that are engage with each other…
no wonder we have a hard time understanding the universe…
no wonder we have a hard time understanding matter and life…
for we are everchanging process and matter and life and the universe
is everychanging…two moving objects in the universe…
this is why Plato is wrong… there is not such thing as an eternal matter like
his eternal forms… because if it is matter, it is changing and if it is life, it is
changing…and we as perceiving matter, are every changing …
you might disagree and say, that refrigerator I see, it isn’t changing!!!
but it is changing… you just can’t see it…it is changing position because
it exists on planet earth and planet earth is rotating and moving through space…
it is changing position if nothing else…and that is the next change, we move
through space…we are ever in motion even if we don’t feel it…
for we are on matter that moves through space… the planet is matter
moving through space… and not only moving, but rotating and moving
around the sun… so we have three different types of motion…
one is the earth rotating, two is the earth revolving around the sun and
three is the entire solar system moving through space…
what seems solid melts into air when we actually think about it…
so what is solid, unchanging? is there anything we can use that
we know is unchanging and unchanging?
no, but this is the cause of our belief in god…
as a fixed, unchanging, unmoving object…
but even god changes… read the new testament
and read the old testament and they are two different
and separate gods… if you belief, actually believe that
that jesus is the son of god and understand that jesus proclaims a new message,
a new gospel… one that is different from the old testament…
there is a distinct and different message from the old testament to the new
testament…
and that change is a change in god…
so there is nothing in life that is not process and change…
we can build upon that as the new message going forward…
change and process is who we are…
so the question becomes simply this, are we going to blindly
go with the change or are we going to be the engine that drives change…
we can decide what change we want to engage with and become…
and that is the message… we change… but we can decide what change
we want and we can act upon that decision…the only solid in the universe
is change… and what direction is the change that will come, take…
that is our only purpose in life… making a choice about the change that will come…
change is here… whether you want it or not…so the question becomes…
what change do you want? how will you direct the process you can control?
Kropotkin