Everything I learn and everything I do and everything I read keeps bringing me back to the same truth, an unacknowledged truth, a truth not yet widely accepted by the mainstream. This truth is making inroads, though. And it keeps calling to me over and over.
Just now, after a busy day of lunch with a friend followed by helping Sylvain interview PSWs, I turned on a reading lamp and settled in on the sofa to continue my new English pedagogy book, Teaching Unplugged: Dogme in English Language Teaching. There I was just reading along, highlighting one or two important phrases or concepts per page with my yellow highlighter, when I hit a term that made me drop the book and reach for the laptop. Must Google this NOW: ‘order-for-free.’
Which brought me to this webpage,…
which blew my little mind as I devoured every word and made me go, “Oooooh, of COURSE!”
And led me to the Wikipedia page about Stuart Kauffman,…
Which sent me into more fish-out-of-water type spasms (lots of gasping and opening of the mouth).
Every time I’ve had to listen to (or read about, or whatever) the age-old Darwinism versus Creationism debates, there has been a little voice at the back of my head saying, “There’s got to be more to it than that.”
For the most part, I swallowed the Darwinian model because it was more compatible with my personal world view. But there was always that niggling feeling that something was missing…something really essential. It was always a lot to buy… that everything we see around us, from moths with faces on their wings to the human brain, could be explained purely via natural selection plus oodles and oodles of time. Millions of years. Okay, sure. But still!
Did you ever feel like that? Like story #1 sounded pretty far-fetched and story #2 sounded a lot better, but you were waiting for story #3?
In just half a dozen paragraphs, Stuart Kauffman has completely satisfied all my misgivings and has provided story number three.
Immediately it occurs to me that in a sense, the Creationists were closer to the truth than the Darwinists. Hungrily, I scan the list of Kauffman’s publications to see what I can read next. And there it is:
Reinventing the Sacred: A New View of Science, Reason and Religion.
“What fascinating gray matter you have.”
“The better to think you with, my dear.”
Thank you for this introduction to someone I should have surely, surely known, though as a cartoon I am not a complex process, but only a product of same, though I serve to keep it on the edge of chaos. Yes I do.
Kelly,
I am so sorry for such a late response.
I love the way you write. It’s kept my eyes on your weblog for hours a day lately.
You are the one I really look up to.
Raheleh, Thank you so much for keeping in touch. I deleted your address from the comment because I don’t want it visible to the whole world, but I copied it into my address book and today am putting a little magic in the mail to you. Much love, K
Kelly,
Among all the categories that you have perfectly sorted out, I was lured into the one about Japan.
This is probably a crazy request but can I ask you teach me some Japanese? Whatever you remember and is easy for you, even bits and pieces. And I really like to know more about the chant you talked about, the one you committedly did say at midnight coming back home.
I’m waiting to know what you think.
Thank you for sending me precious things.
Raheleh, I would be happy to share some basic Japanese with you! Japanese is actually quite easy when it comes to the grammar and the phonetics (memorizing all those Chinese characters is another matter). It only has five vowel sounds, the same five that Spanish has and very similar to the vowels of Persian except that the /a/ is not a diphthong. I think that in Persian, the long /a/ is a bit of a diphthong, no? I will try to make a video this weekend. In the meantime, take a look at a hiragana chart such as this one: http://www.tokyowithkids.com/fyi/hiragana_chart.html. This is the starting point … a chart of characters so you know what sounds you have to master. Once you know those, you can pronounce anything pretty much correctly in Japanese. As for the chant, it is just a sutra used by the Nichiren sect of Buddhism; they have a temple in San Jose (on Mona Way) and I’m sure they would be very happy to teach you this chant. The only problem would be getting rid of them if you decided not to continue chanting. They can be very persistent in their zeal to bring their teachings to others. Hugs, Kelly
Kelly jaan,
So sorry for responding so late. And thanks a million for the hiragana chart and the explanation. I’m gonna learn the sounds and I really hope I could learn the symbols too.
Cannot wait to see the video.
Love,
Raheleh
Hi, Raheleh, Me too, I apologize for responding late. Today after work I had to visit my hospice client for my volunteer job. She kept me an extra hour, so I was late getting home. Then I had to do lesson planning because the Level One teacher asked me to supply tomorrow morning. He left me a lesson plan, but I didn’t think it was enough. So, of course, I had to do a bit of work. I am so glad school is open again. I nearly went crazy being off for TWO WEEKS. Sylvain was supposed to come over with his video camera, but he is getting sick. Tomorrow he will try to see a doctor if he can. Maybe we should not wait for him and his camera. Maybe we should just Skype. What do you think? Do you ever Skype? Love, Kelly