cyclical & linear; life & death Re: pynchon-l-digest V2 #2256

[Doug Millison]

"From the beginning of human consciousness, the ever-renewing seasonal
sequence, with its death and rebirth cycles, has impinged powerfully upon
human thought. This orientation in consciousness has characterized every
previous human culture up to our own. During the modern period, and
especially in the twentieth century, we have moved from that dominant
spatial mode of consciousness, where time is experienced in ever-renewing
seasonal cycles, to a dominant time-developmental mode of consciousness,
where time is experienced as an evolutionary sequence of irreversible
transformations. Within this time-developmental consciousness we begin to
understand the story of the universe in its comprehensive dimensions and in
the full richness of its meaning. This is especially true as regards the
planet Earth, a mysterious planet surely, as we observe how much more
brilliant it is when compared with the other planets of our solar system,
in he diversity of its manifestations and in the complexity of its
development. Earth seems to be a reality that is developing with the smple
aim of celebrating the joy of existence. This can be seen in the coloration
of the various plants and animals, in the circling flightsof the swallows
as well as the blossoming of the springtime flowers; each of these events
required immense creativity over billions of years in oder to come forth as
Earth. [...] But by now the human has taken over such extensive control of
the life systems of the Earth that the future will be dependent on human
decision to an extent never dreamed of in previous times. We are deciding
what species will live or perish, we are determining the chemical structure
of the soil and the air and the water, we are mapping out the areas of
wilderness that will be allowed to function in their own natural
modalities.  [...] Every living being of Earth is cousin to every other
living being. Even beyond the realm of the living we have a common origin
in the primordial Flaring Forth of the energies from which the universe in
all its aspects is derived."
--from _The Universe Story_, by Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry

"This is the World just before men. Too violently pitched alive in constant
flow ever to be seen by men directly. They are meant only to look at it
dead, in still strata, transputrefied to oil or coal. Alive, it was a
threat:  it was Titans, was an overpeaking of life so clangorous and mad,
such a green corona about Earth's body that some spoiler _had_ to be
brought in before it blew Creation apart. So we, the crippled keepers, were
sent out to multiply, to have dominion. God's spoilers. Us.
Counter-revolutionaries. _It is our mission to promote death._ "
--GR, 720

"The real movement is not from death to any rebirth. It is from death to
death-transfigured. [...] The persistence, then, of structures favoring
death. Death converted into more death."
--GR 166-167