Travels with Duncan

Book 1 – Duncan in the Forest

Chapter 7. On structure and reality

They come across a spider who warns of danger ahead - danger to the spirit. She offers
them a potion to better see reality, which they try but unsuccessfully - it merely brings on
anxiety after a brief moment of bliss. They arrive at the cliffs and see a passage going up
into the mountains.

Duncan and Pico had been traveling up the canyon for some time - it turned out to be a much
longer one than they had expected - when they came across a big boulder that had fallen somehow
in the middle and on which was perched a big spider, sunning itself with glee.

The spider cried out to them to come over. It wanted to talk to them.

- Take care, my friends. There is danger ahead.

- What do you mean? asked Duncan.
- There aren’t too many who come through here on their way to the mountain. It is a path
traveled by only a few - those who have seen that there is a deep mystery to being here and who
want to enquire further.
- That is us - we are among them!
- But of those who come back, some appear very peaceful while others seem quite rattled.
- Rattled?
- In the mind. There is danger to the spirit. Approaching reality can be daunting to the uninitiated.
It can be downright dangerous to those who take it lightly. I’ve seen some very befuddled ones
come back from the mountains, not quite knowing where they were headed.
- But how can ideas be harmful? Cried out Pico. They are just ideas.
- Ha, said the spider, you are truly quite young. It is ideas that create the injustices in the world.
The world itself has its own natural law, but it is ideas that do battle with that law.
- Yes, that is quite true, said Duncan.
- Here, come over here, said the spider as she scrambled over to the far edge of the boulder and
showed them a small indentation in the rock where a small pool of blue water had formed.
- What is it? Asked Duncan.
- It’s a potion I make. One that fortifies the spirit and gives you a glimpse of what reality is truly
like. You are free to have some. Just take a lick of it and you will start seeing things differently.
- A way to see reality? Asked Pico. From a potion? I suppose so. What do you think, Duncan?

Duncan was rather more hesitant about this potion, skeptical about the possibility of artificially
gaining insight, although he knew that potions of various kinds were used since time immemorial
to lighten the spirit and see the world differently. He decided to go ahead and try it.

- Ok, let’s have some’, he said, and turning to the spider, he asked ‘You sure this is fine, now?
- Oh yes, my friends, I take it every day.

And so, Pico and Duncan both took a lick of the potion an sat back, waiting for it to take effect.
It wasn’t long in coming. A surge of well-being flowed through Duncan and he gazed up the
canyon in astonishment, seeing it flicker in different colors and merge gradually with the forms it
contained, all in a tempo that seemed to flow now more calmly and without any fuss at all. He just
lost track of all around him, focusing as he was on the ever-transforming canyon before him.

He didn’t know how long this effect lasted, but he gradually came slowly to his senses and
realized that Pico was there beside him and the spider saying something up on his rock. It began
to click back in place and he could now understand the spider, who was rattling on about various
travelers who had come by in times past.

Pico came out of his trance too, but both of them remained very quiet. A headache of sorts was
developing and Duncan just felt rather depressed. He told the spider goodbye, indicated to Pico to
jump up and took off up the canyon, happy to get away from this place.

It was as if a cloud hung over his mind. He had certainly enjoyed the sights of the canyon in its
various transformations and that sensation of tranquility that had accompanied them, but he was
now here, trudging up a hot canyon floor, a slight headache gripping his skull and a morosity
engulfing his spirit as never before. He knew he just had to keep going, to get over it.

And indeed, that came about. As the sun started setting and the canyon began to cool off, they
came to the head of the canyon and emerged on a shallow plateau fronted by a cliff. But they
could see where a path had formed along the cliff and it led to the top. Beyond were the
mountains. They were pretty close, he knew for sure.

It would soon be getting dark, though, so they stopped for the night and settled at the base of the
cliff. With their spirits back in order, it wasn’t long before they started chatting in a lively manner
again.

- Pico, there is a thought I am grappling with that has me quite baffled right now.
- Oh, yeah? What might that be?
- Well, it is something like this... If I take a process view of the world and consider it as one
massive mutating organism - we’re on the level of the Cosmos here - then the status of things
takes second place. The identity of individual things merges into the greater process that is
unfolding, and in so doing, appears to merge away!
- You mean things dissolve into thin air?
- Yes, that is what is baffling. Now, I don’t mean that they physically dissolve, as happens when
lightning starts a forest fire and trees actually do dissipate into thin air...
- Although the air is not so thin, then, is it? With the smoke and all.
- Ah, you little rascal! Pay attention now.
- Yes, yes, go on.
- The core issue is this, it seems. As I suppress individuality by focusing on the larger-scale unity
of the cosmos, what happens to those individual elements? They disappear from my view, they do
not exist anymore, for me.
- For you?
- For me! Not for others, but for me, yes. Now, this is different from just looking away from
something. See that big bush over there with the red flowers on it? Well, when you look away
from it, it remains there, it does not vanish, right? We know that, because others can continue
seeing it even when you don’t, and they will tell you so.
- Right. The world does have a permanent structure. Things do exist beyond my perception of
them. That is for sure! And I don’t worry about whether we can prove it or not. I just know it.
- Indeed. Things remain, despite our leaving them and coming back to them. We agree on that.
- But that is not what baffles you.
- No, indeed not. What is troubling is the merging of things into large-scale processes. Let me see
if I can find an example... Well, actually, Pico, you can be my example.
- Me?
- Yes, why not? I actually came to these troubling thoughts while reflecting on my own
impermanence and my own lack of identity.
- Ho, ho, now you are going to play the mystery dog, aren’t you? But I know who you are!
- Well, let’s focus on you. You are a little mouse, I agree. But before you were born, what were
you? Nothing.
- Well no, I didn’t even exist! I started existing when I was born.
- Or when you were conceived, actually, because you did exist when you were in your mama-
mouse’s belly, now didn’t you?
- Sure.
- But when exactly did you come into being? Was it when papa-mouse’s semen joined mama-
mouse’s egg, or when?
- Gee, I don’t know. But I see what the problem is - I can’t actually define a start here, right?
- Yes, just like the issue of when an acorn stops existing and a tree starts existing. But something
bigger than definitions is at issue here. When we look at processes, particularly on long time
scales, the things involved merge and dissolve. Not perceptually, but conceptually.
- Yikes, that means they no longer exist, right?
- That is the baffling part. This way of thinking conditions everything to my conceptualizations. As
I alter my manner of conceptualizing the world, things come and go out of existence - not on their
own, but because of the way I conceptualize them. So, it would seem, I create my world!
- You mean you dream it up? As if it did not exist and you imagine it all?
- No, no, not like that. It’s not that I dream it. It is there all right, but I interpret it in a certain
way, in a certain light, in the light of my conceptual structures. So what I create is an
interpretation of the world, that is what I dream up, what we all dream up.
- Well, of course. We all interpret the world, we all see the world in our own individual way,
depending on how we feel on a given day. That is nothing strange, my old pal!
- No, that we interpret the world is nothing strange. We are each an artist in that sense. But still...
that tree over there, is it real? Does it exist on its own, independently of us conceptualizing it? If I
re-conceptualize the world in terms of processes, rather than things, does it disappear?
- Well...?
- Well, it’s baffling me. And mind you Pico, that is just the tree! Let’s adventure further up. The
issue applies to all things... and to processes too... all processes... it applies to everything. To the
Cosmos!
- Including you and me?
- I guess so. But we know we are real, right? Each of us individually.
- Yes, but you make me wonder... let’s see. So what is over there is a tree. But it only exists in a
certain conceptual view... and in another view, it does not exist at all. Then, reality is contingent.
So, what then is reality? What does it mean to be real, to exist? My gosh, it doesn’t really matter
much anymore whether things exist in the world or only in my imagination - that is of little
concern now. What really matters is ‘what does it mean to exist?’. Yikes!
- Yes, Pico, you see how baffling this can get!
- Indeed, indeed!
- Let’s adventure further yet... If we start to doubt the existence of trees and such - not that
something is not there, but how to define it? - then, that puts into question the whole notion of
structure, now, doesn’t it?
- You mean, the rules of how the world works and so on?
- Yes, Pico. Not only what it is made up of, but how it all fits together too. Our great Universal
Unfolding itself is seemingly at risk!
- Oh no! But Duncan, what else can we rely on?! What’s left?
- I don’t know just yet, Pico. That’s why I’m baffled. Because structure explains a lot in a very
tight fashion. And it appears so real! It feels so! Whatever I question, I cannot question the
questioner, now can I? I am very real, and I didn’t just pop out of the blue, right? I came about
within the Universal Unfolding - that seems to explain it, but then explanation is just
interpretation, isn’t it? Structure is just an appearance, despite its massive regularities and elegant
coherence.
- So where does that leave us then, Duncan?
- ... I just don’t know, Pico. We probably need to explore further the notion of regularity, but I’m
getting too sleepy now. Let’s leave it for another time.

And so, Duncan cuddled up in the clump of moss at the foot of the tree and of course, Pico made
a bed out of the fur in the crotch of his front upper leg. Off they went to dreams of appearing and
disappearing trees in wildly moving landscapes of the imagination.

The next morning, Duncan still had these matters on his mind.

- Now, about regularity, Pico, there seem to be two aspects to it. One is the perceptual, whereby
regularities focus our attention and hence in that manner, define our world. The other is the
arbitrary aspect, whereby elements get transformed at a certain temperature and not at another,
like water boiling for instance. Although that aspect may simply be due to our poor knowledge of
the universe.
- Let’s see about that perceptual aspect, Duncan. Didn’t you say yesterday that our perceptual
relativism was of no great import?
- Oh, my, my, Pico! What profound words you are using! But, yes, you are right. Perceptual
relativism pales in importance next to conceptual relativism in providing a stable structure for the
world. But our conceptual categories come from perceptual regularities - they arise out of the
regularities we perceive in the world.
- Uh huh...
- Your notion of ‘tree’ for instance, comes out of the similarity you see in all the trees around you.
That is the process of abstraction, isn’t it?
- Right, the trees all have a trunk, and branches, and leaves - at least in the summertime, they do.
They are regular in having all that, and so I consider them as trees. Concepts, then, are based on
the regularities we find in our perceived world, ok... But what about more complex concepts, like
say, ‘process’ or ‘evolution’ - where is the regularity in those?
- I see your point - they are very abstract, aren’t they? And indeed, they are not perceptual in
nature, rather they are derived through thought. But then, Pico, thought nevertheless derives them
from regularities. ‘Evolution’, for instance, is a conceptual view that we derive through
observations on nature. And even something as abstract as ‘process’ is derived from what we find
common to all individual processes we encounter. That commonality defines a regularity.
- I guess so. Everything can be seen as involving some kind of regularity.
- Yes, and it is that regularity which defines a structure for the universe, even if it is a relative
structure, as we were saying yesterday.
- And so, Duncan, all laws of nature involve regularities, right? That seems fairly straightforward.
Things re-occur in predictable ways, in regular ways. And I suppose you are going to tell me that
those that do not, those that are unpredictable, are like that just because we don’t yet see the
regularity involved, isn’t that so?
- Oh you little rascal, you are quite right! The Great Unfolding of the Universe unfolds in a fully
lawful manner. It has done so since the beginning, long before any sentient beings could figure
anything out, and it continues doing so, despite the increasing complexity which sentience brings
about. The coherence of the cosmos lies in that very regularity. Everything fits in tightly together,
working as it should - in fact, working the only way it can.
- Yes, a very complex mechanism with its own established laws.
- Ah, but then, Pico, why the arbitrariness of water boiling at a certain temperature and not at
another? Why is gold yellow and not green? What makes nature the way it is?
- Oh boy, that sounds like too profound a question. Isn’t it just the way it is because that’s the
way it is? Must there be a reason behind it? Behind everything?
- Well yes. That is the whole point. Things don’t just happen. They follow a certain course
because of the way nature is structured, they follow the laws of nature. But those laws themselves
didn’t just come out of the blue either. They followed from other laws of nature, higher-level laws.
Remember, Pico, the universe evolved from the Big Bang. All the elements, and all the laws
governing those elements, appeared over time. They literally came into being.
- Yes, that’s awesome, isn’t it?
- Right, it is. And that coming into being must have followed some laws of nature, too! Nothing is
arbitrary. Just as biological evolution can be fully mapped out as the action of certain laws of
nature, so too cosmological evolution could be... in principle, of course.
- Of course, as you say.
- Now, no need for smart remarks, Pico. Do you see what I am getting at here?
- Well, that everything is regulated by laws of nature, absolutely everything.
- Yes, that is it. And so there must be a reason why gold is yellow, even though we don’t know
why.
- So, in principle, perfect knowledge is possible. I mean, presumably, one day, we might discover
why gold is yellow. We might discover those higher-level laws that made gold what it is, with just
that particular composition that reflects yellow rather than green.
- I suppose so, in principle. But irrespective of what we know, Pico, the basic fact is that the
universe is structured. It is not arbitrary, it follows its own laws.
- Sounds good to me! I don’t mean to be snide, Duncan, but isn’t that kind of natural? Sort of
what we would expect, I mean, commonsensical?
- Sure, but there is a problem now, isn’t there? The universe is structured in a coherent manner,
although one based on our own way of conceptualizing it. That is a very circular process. As we
were saying yesterday, the existence of trees - and, indeed, of all structure - rests on how we
conceptualize the world around us. But our perceptions of the world, and the conceptualizations
based on them, derive from the regularities of that structure.
- Yeah, that does indeed seem circular. So what do we do about it?
- I’m not sure, yet. The interesting question is ‘What does the world look like when no sentient
beings are looking at it?’ How does it operate outside of the sentient realm? After all, it did
operate long before sentience appeared, long before life emerged.
- Sure, it operated from the Big Bang onward. Life came about much, much later.
- Yes. So does a world before sentience still have trees in it? Is it constituted pretty much the same
way we see it today?
- Oh oh...
- Yes, indeed. Why would it be so constituted? Our own point of view is just our own. There is
nothing special about it. Certainly nothing necessarily right about it!
- It’s just a coherent point of view.
- And not fully coherent either, since there are many mysteries yet unsolved.
- Are you saying, then, that the universe is unknowable? That Reality with a big R is just a ghost?
Something that is reflected in our own world, but essentially unattainable?
- No, Pico. It is more radical yet, I fear. It is not that true reality is hidden and that we can only
deal with appearances of it. There is no hidden reality to be uncovered if only we could, reality is
quite simply what we construe it to be. What we conceptualize, that is reality! All of it.
- But, Duncan... That would mean the world does not exist but in our mind, that it is all a dream.
- Not quite, Pico. The world is derived from our mind, yes. It is created there. But it does get
created - it comes into being, it takes shape, it gets substantial, it becomes real. That boulder over
there is real and it is hard. I can’t just walk through it as I could in a dream. And if I bump into it,
it will hurt.
- Sure. So we create the world, but then the world takes on an existence of its own and we
henceforth interact with it according to the rules of nature. Is that it?
- Roughly, yes.
- Amazing. It just sounds so unreal, Duncan.
- Yes, but let’s explore the process a little further. How do we create this world? We don’t just
individually dream it up in a vacuum. We create it slowly in interaction with...
- With...?
-Well, I was going to say in interaction with the world. But then, what world?
- Indeed, since it is not yet created, right?
- Yep. Pico, this is getting too complicated. Let’s go get some food.
- Always food or something... just when it’s getting exciting, too. Oh well...

And so off they go, down along the creek, seeking something to eat. Duncan knew that his little
friend sometimes got impatient at these sudden departures from thinking something through, but
heck, sometimes, it was just better to let things lie for a while and get back to them later. You just
never knew what would come up next.

Later on, they got back to some serious questioning of reality.

- Well, Pico, I think the question must be ‘to what extent do we create or interpret this world of
ours?’
- Aha. So you do agree the world is there, pre-existing us and that what we create in our minds is
an interpretation of it? One that may be more or less faithful to reality, but so what? As long as the
world is there in one piece, I’m quite happy.
- I’m not sure, Pico. It brings up the issue of how we define reality - what it is we call real, and
we’ll have to come back to that at some point. But for now, let’s stick to this interpretation
business.
- Ok.
- We might consider three levels of interpretation. At the weakest level, our perception of the
world gets filtered through our conceptual apparatus and the specific way it is set up, resulting in
a representation of the world that is particular, but nevertheless in accord with it and reflective of
it.
- Yes, that seems just right.
- Now, at a second level, the conceptual filtering is much stronger, much more pro-active. Instead
of just interpreting the world we perceive, we direct its very shaping in our minds... we in effect
create our perceived world, with the result that it is not just particular, but unique.
- Do I get this right? Then, instead of interacting with the big world out there, I would be
interacting with the world in here, in my mind?
- Yes, with some combination of the outside and inside world.
- But what about the objectivity of the outside world? The fact that you and I can talk about it?
- Yet another side issue - we’ll see about that later.
- Ok, ok.... now, let’s see about that third level of yours.
- Yes, the strangest one, I agree. At this level, the conceptual filtering that goes on is secondary to
a much more pro-active process of conceptual creation. It is the view we discussed earlier. That
the hard outside world originates in our minds, without pre-existing in some form or another.
- Yes, very strange indeed. But I just can’t believe that. It goes so much against my practical
everyday experience, you know.
- Oh yes, I know. In everyday life, we tend to ‘bump into’ the world at every bend, don’t we. It
seems so thrust upon us - and it is. But, you see, we must not confuse perception with control.
- What do you mean there?
- Well, you might think that since you create the world, then you should be able to control it too.
But that does not follow. Just as in our dreams, things happen, so too in the world. What is
created when we create the world is a whole system of interrelations that, once created, follows
its own unfolding. We don’t create the world instant by instant - that might give us some sense of
control over it - but rather, we create the world collectively and as a coherently working system -
one with a logic of its own, and hence its own unfolding.
- Like we might create a monster that then turns on us.
- Well... I suppose. But the world doesn’t necessarily turn on us. It just follows its own organized
path. When we are surprised by the world, it is just that we did not know what was going to
happen. If we knew everything about the world - absolutely everything - why, there would be no
surprises, nothing new, really.
- So we don’t control the world we create?
- No, it’s as if we created an acorn, say, and then let it develop. We wouldn’t know exactly what
shape the oak would take, now, would we?
- Ah yes, I see.
- Keep in mind too, Pico, that we don’t just pop into this world and create it as we are born. Your
mama had a lot to do not only with bringing you into this world, but also with helping you create
your world as you grew up.
- She raised me well, she did!
- Oh undoubtedly! So you see, she created you and then helped you create her - in your own
world, of course.
- Oy yoy yoy, Duncan, this is getting rather convoluted, isn’t it?
- I’m afraid so, Pico. It gets somewhat complicated because we have to deal with history, with
certain events happening before others and even causing them. For instance, you know, don’t you,
that we evolved from non-sentient organisms, which themselves evolved from non-living matter.
So there was a time before mind itself, before there was anything capable of creating a world.
- A world before the possibility of a world? You can’t be serious.
- But remember our discussion of time, Pico - how ephemeral time is. And how all there is, is
now!
- Oh yeah, we only operate in the here and now, with the past and the future being constructions
of the mind - hey, just like our creating the world, right?
- Yes, that’s right.
- But then, Duncan, what is real and not real? What is reality in the end?
- Ah, that’s the crux of it. We tend to ascribe to reality qualities of permanence, of solidity, of true
state of affairs, and we contrast that with appearances, phenomena, and viewpoints, of which we
think of as transient, unsubstantial, and changeable. Reality is ‘the real thing’, right? - whereas,
phenomena are reflections of it, approximations, more or less accurate.
- Yes, I guess that is how we view it, generally speaking.
- Ok. But what if there is no reality with a big R?
- Hey, hold on Duncan, you’re getting carried away...
- No, no. In such a case, then the phenomenal world is in effect reality! We don’t have to assume
that we live in a correspondence framework, in which there is a Reality and some kind of
corresponding reflection of it that we can perceive. That is just one framework, my boy! How
about a framework in which there is just the reflection part? - although, it would not be a
reflection, then - rather, it would be what we have been talking about, our created world.
- Hum... yes, I suppose so. Interesting, this idea of frameworks, eh?
- Yes, but that will be for another day. Let’s hit the road, Pico.
- Righto!