BEINGS:

RUDIMENTARY EXPERIENCES AND DRIVES

I, for one, have long considered the physical and the metaphysical realms or aspects of experience to be two faces of the same phenomenon. Phenomenologically, both realms are comprised of sensation(s). They are better thought of "as" physical experiences and metaphysical experiences - or physical phenomena and metaphysical phenomena. Then one can understand their similarity, in fact, their sameness "as" experience which is always SENSATIONAL.

Experience is both phenomenal and sensational, literally speaking! It is only intellect, in its attempt to interpret, translate and understand the world (of experience) through the process of realization, that divides experience into these two realms, the physical and the non-physical. This distinction is easy, simple and understandable for, by virtue of our very natures, our inherent basic construction, we are designed to make this distinction. I suppose that this is so because all acute threats to survival and all acute requirements for survival are found in the physical realm of experience. So we seem designed to be more acutely concerned about physical and tangible phenomena and to make clearer judgments about physical experiences.

Sense phenomena are all intuitive, that is, they are judgments made by Analogos. Yet the intellectual distinction between physical phenomena and non-physical phenomena, generating concepts "of" physical and nonphysical, seems almost an intuitive process itself - or perhaps logical and simple - to intellect. Frankly, the distinction between "physical" and "nonphysical" seems the most basic, common and simple distinction made by mankind.

These judgments made by Analogos and Logos are, of course, being made for the purposes of survival and animal well-being. This entails actions mandated on part of the organism, in this case, the human being. We realize - since Bretano's realization - that awareness and consciousness are related to mobility. An immobile although living creature such as a plant or tree has limited need for awareness-consciousness since it has no ability to act upon any judgments. It is dependent upon the environment being friendly and consistent with its survival. It is totally dependent upon the nature of its "external" world. It is mobile beings who change their environments who have need to constantly assess and adapt to the ever-new situations. This requires awareness and even consciousness!

By virtue of the above considerations, we conclude that Brain-Mind is a judgmental system making judgments on behalf of the organism and for its survival. These judgments must necessarily provoke, stimulate and generate actions which the organism must carry out in order to defend itself, to procure essentials for survival, to perpetuate itself in the form of offspring, and to make or find an environment compatible with its survival.

The following list of fundamental judgments, beginning with the primary judgment of "be-ing" itself, and all the subsequent judgments superimposed on being (which are the mental phenomena of daily life), are those which must necessarily generate the fundamental drives or instincts.

After wallowing around in the reptilian brain-mind and delving into these rudimentary judgments and experiences, I propose the following interpretations of them as they relate to "meaning". In short, what drives or instincts do they create? What actions do they urge? What behavior to they instigate?

I offer the following list:

The Sensation of Being --- yields--- the drive or instinct for experience.

The Sensation of Continuous Being ---yields--- the drive or instinct for survival - air, food, water. respiration, hunger, thirst.

The Sensation of Perpetual Being ---yields--- the drive for reproduction or the sexual urge, nurture.

The Sensation of Well Being ---yields--- the drives for comfort, for safety, for body temperature, for normal physiological state, for health.

These "sensations" of Being, Continuous Being, of Perpetual Being and of Well Being can be summarized phenomenologically as the awareness of ongoing being, the desire for this sensation to continue on and on ad infinitum, and to feel well while doing so. This is simply a summation of the most simple inherent sense and desire of any living organism. These sensations, although labelled with different words, are not distinct from one another, but are names that indicate dynamic gradations, extensions, smooth variations, colorizations, alterations and natural permutations of the original, simple and basic Sensation of Being.

These higher judgments regarding "being" such as well-being, upright being, seeing being, hearing being, hungry or satiated being, thirsty or sated being, are all necessarily superimposed upon the fundamental judgment of "being" itself. After all, one has to "be" before one can be well, upright, hungry, thirsty, lustful, greedy etc. The Sensation of Being represents the most fundamental and primary judgment made by Brain-Mind. After being, life begins (note the letters of the word ‘begin’ are derived from the same letters of the term ‘being’ Being is the beginning for animal man. Logos was the new beginning for intellectual man, the beginning of personhood, individuation, separation, alienation and isolation. In the beginning was the word. In fact, the instrument of the word - Logos, Intellect or Sin!

A. Iosue