Post by reverendroxie22 on Sept 15, 2015 18:53:00 GMT
(Bear with me, folks...I caught that I copied and pasted the WRONG version of this essay...I am aware of the whole "Mister/Doctor" thing...here is the actual correct version...as well, copied and pasted...yeesh ! RKC)
Professor Lane Meets Doctor Spock
(By Roxanne K. Cottell, PHIL - 8, 9/15/15)
It was a typical morning in The Enterprise, save the fact that Captain Kirk chose to leave his crew for bigger horizons with The Dark Side. In his place was a man who no one thought for a moment would be willing to leave his place here on Earth, where it was nice and lovely, for the 1-percent-chance-it-will-work experimental soujourn around the outer Universe with Dr. Spock, the temporary “in command” guy left, for the moment until Lane showed up, in charge of Starship Enterprise. “Dammit Kirk,” said Spock, to no one, “why would you choose to take on such a mission at this critical time in our research?” he asked, almost longingly. You left us right when I went from 'Mister' to 'Doctor.' "
There came a knock first, then the door slid open, and in walked someone whose purpose on this mission was to be the missing link, the missing thought process for not only the crew of the Enterprise, but, as it seemed, at least and in his own mind, for the Universe. Professor Lane really had no idea why it was that he was called up to this mission. What he did know was that he would finally be able to share his own ideas and his own thoughts about everything in existence into words that would become the hard science of life. All he really wanted to do, when it came right down to it all, was to be able to hang out with Dr. Spock. Lane offered his handshake. “Hello, my name's Dave,” he said to the tall, almost ominous Vulcan. Dr. Spock looked at this human being standing before him, a bit perplexed, but it was only because this stranger would become, as he knew it and always knew it, the person who would help him to discover what makes human beings so deliriously foolish from time to time.
Lane had another purpose, at least in his own mind. Because he knew that he was captaining this starship and leading this fleet of hybrids into the next thoughts about human consciousness, he felt that it was important that he let Spock in on the thing that he had been studying, the thing that he had written for this mission. “Doctor Spock, I want to share something with you that no one but a very few people “get.” I think you might understand what I have been trying to tell people, for a long set of years.” Lane took out a tattered old notebook. On the outside of it there were notes written. The professor did not want any of his ideas to vanish into the nothingness of thoughts and muddled thinking. He wanted Spock to get started on many things. Lane handed his notes to the Vulcan. “Dr. Spock, please take a look at my notes. I have compiled these things over many, many years. My wife and I have decided that upon my return to Earth, that we would like to have these things all made into hard, actual science. I need your specific help.” The Vulcan looked at the professor and smiled. “Well, Captain...I mean, Professor, I am sure that you have come to the right place. The Universe does not make mistakes. You are here because She, the Universe, chose you specifically.”
Dr. Spock looked through Professor Lane's notes. His eyes widened and brows furrowed interchangeably. He did not say it out loud, but Dr. Spock was very interested in the Professor's manner of explaining how it was that science has made an art of reducing things down to a minimum. He really liked the way that Professor Lane gave a very down to earth teaching of his own understanding of Reductionism was thought out. “Professor Lane, could you please tell me a little more about this...pretext...text...context...thing, that you have written about?” The professor was not shocked by this hybrid being's curiosity. Because the professor had always only been able to share his Wisdom with others who were being taught at the human level, teaching this being of a different, absolutely higher intelligence than most human beings was going to be a wonderful experience.
“Basically, Doctor, when we think about it, and we can think in terms of what each of the 'hard' sciences gives to us, what we are not given in terms of understanding it all is a good explanation. I like thinking of myself as an interpreter of some concepts that not a lot of carbon based life forms understand. Because I am one said such carbon life form, with what it is that I know and have researched, there is much that I am able to impart to them. But, because the majority of them are not really aware of certain things, because they have not been taught properly, I chose to study this stuff. I wrote a few books about it all, but this one seems to be the one that people can wrap their heads around best.” Professor Lane looked at the Vulcan, not thinking about a thing other than that he hoped the vulcan doctor would understand what he'd written in the manner that Lane wanted humanity to “get it.”
Dr. Spock grinned. He was reading the way that the Professor wrote about reductionism. He chuckled at the genius nature of explaining it in words about words.
“Captain...Professor...Please, tell me more about this manner which you have written this. To liken the answer to the question “What is Life?” to things such as pretext, text and context, even in its sheer simplicity, it is brilliant.”
Professor Lane smiled. He knew that his words were understandable to those on Earth, but to have this being who gentleness was equal to his genius make all these statements about Lane's writing and understanding of this open-ended question which had no answer that was wrong or right was awesome. It was written according to his own understanding, and that is why it made so much sense, not just to him, neither to this Vulcan, but to humanity and beyond. “Thank you, Doctor Spock,” replied the professor. “I tried to make it clear that, if we can think of a way to tell those within our reach about how it is that we can come up with our own way of answering that question, and we can understand that there is no right or wrong answer and that everyone's answer will be different, we can also begin to know what is the madness of other people. On Earth it seems as though no one has a clue about why they do the things that they do. And most people think they know it all. The truth is that it is impossible to know it all. The other truth is that the only person who we can ever truly know and understand is our very selves. No one else can totally understand our thoughts, even when we convey them clearly. There will not ever be two of the same exact thoughts by two different people. When we understand what it is that we call our own purpose, we also understand what is our own mission. The way that we understand things is symbolically.”
The professor continued. “If we took things apart, so to speak, and looked at them the way that we look at a sentence, regardless of how it is put together, we find that pretext is the primal thought, brought about by the Soul as created by the need for understanding by others. We put letters together, called text, or words, and then we build meaning, for whatever purpose we have, for those words, by stringing them together into meaningful thoughts. To liken answering the question, or at least the questioning of both the question and the answer, to the building of a sentence seemed to just make sense to me. What made more sense was that everyone I showed this theory to also totally understood it. If more people on Earth would bother to try to understand what someone else is verbalizing but not necessarily thinking or feeling for real, it will be in the context - the way that the sentence is built and ultimately delivered - that the truth of the person and their thoughts will be delivered.”
“If we cannot think of another way of making people understand that it is really in the manner that your message is delivered, rather than only in the words, that people have an understanding of a whole lot. When it comes to how we understand one another, and we look at the science of things, we can see there that, when we break it down into something symbolic, and we understand not only what those symbols are about, but also about how they are used to convey our message, no matter what the message is, we find that thing called 'greater understanding.' Unfortunately on Earth, we have those beings who are very pompous in their ways. They tend to think that there is only one way of doing, seeing and saying things, and that their specific way is the only right way of doing a thing. If we can break things down to those who cannot see anything outside of their own awareness about things, and we can tell them that we have come up with a way to 'get it,' we might actually be able to ensure that future generations of Human Beings on Earth also 'get it' in terms of having a clue about other people.”
“Because I am a writer, and a teacher, I have another way of making things make sense. You see, on Earth, our higher education comes from within us. We only go to college to make it grow. We understand the pretext of college as being the letters, so to speak, of the sentence of words which make up 'I go to college for the betterment of my life, which in turn will also make other peoples' lives better in some manner,' as being a statement of Truth for many people. Some people believe it, while others simply go and find out that they cannot continue because they have a different sort of higher intelligence. When we think in the manner that is a sentence, and we begin to string together the letters which make the text which ultimately create the context, we can also think outside of what we have been taught is the right manner in which to think. I know that might not make too much sense to a guy like you. I also know that it makes loads of sense to others on Earth who really need to get and keep a clue about each of our own singular experience in Life as a human being.”
“It's intriguing, Professor. I am very impressed by its simplicity. Lots of beings don't understand a lot of things because they are not taught in this manner. Its brilliance comes from its simplicity.” The vulcan flipped through the professor's research notes. “I think, Professor Lane, that what you have here is probably one of the best ways of expalining this whole...Life...thing...” The Doctor and the Professor continued that morning exchanging thoughts. At the end of the day, they sat in their chairs at the control panel of the starship. Professor Lane sat back, a beer in one hand, and a bag of Doritos between him and Spock's chair. He offered the Vulcan a snack and a beer. Spock looked at him, a confused look on his face. Spock took a chip, and a beer. He reclined in his chair just as the professor was doing. Professor Lane directed Spock to look at the monitor in front of them. Lane pushed a few buttons on his cell phone.
“Hey...Spock...ever seen this show? It's called 'Ancient Aliens.' It's one of my favorite shows.” The two men sat staring at the monitor. At the end of the show, Spock looked at Lane and said “You know, Professor, that ...Georgio person...he could help me. Lots of my own family is on your planet. I have not been able to communicate with them for many lifetimes.”
The Professor leaned back further in his chair, took another beer from the cooler between them where the panel controls once were. He grinned widely.
“Hey Spock...I think I have another 'thing' I want to research...you know, for science and posterity's sake. Alien life on planet Earth...it's going to be HUGE!”
The vulcan smirked. “Professor Lane, I will help you with that research, but, you must know now that, for many, many lifetimes, we have been back and forth to Earth, studying human life. I must state now that, for the life of you all, yourself not included so much as the majority of the rest of them, we have been doing this for a very long time. In fact, what do you think you are doing with us, right now, on the Enterprise?”
Professor Lane smiled. He raised his beer to the doctor in a toast. “Cheers, Doctor Spock.” The doctor looked at his new human friend and colleague. He began to take a sip of beer when on the monitor in front of him popped up a very strange human, one who spoke the words “Nanu, Nanu” as a greeting. Spock laughed out loud. “Professor, on your planet you all have it in your heads that my cousin, Mork...you guys call him 'Robin'... has passed into the next lifetime.”
The professor's eyes widened as the Vulcan continued to speak. “The actuality is that, in using your example of pretext, text, context, it is not that Mork is gone from that consciousness, but simply that humans do not understand that we are not a body with a soul, but instead a soul with a body. Your 'Robin'...my 'Mork'...simply just went home to the stars. I saw him the other day...he sends his regards.”
With that, Professor Lane gulped down what was left in his can and quickly reached for another one which he, as quickly, gulped down.
Professor Lane Meets Doctor Spock
(By Roxanne K. Cottell, PHIL - 8, 9/15/15)
It was a typical morning in The Enterprise, save the fact that Captain Kirk chose to leave his crew for bigger horizons with The Dark Side. In his place was a man who no one thought for a moment would be willing to leave his place here on Earth, where it was nice and lovely, for the 1-percent-chance-it-will-work experimental soujourn around the outer Universe with Dr. Spock, the temporary “in command” guy left, for the moment until Lane showed up, in charge of Starship Enterprise. “Dammit Kirk,” said Spock, to no one, “why would you choose to take on such a mission at this critical time in our research?” he asked, almost longingly. You left us right when I went from 'Mister' to 'Doctor.' "
There came a knock first, then the door slid open, and in walked someone whose purpose on this mission was to be the missing link, the missing thought process for not only the crew of the Enterprise, but, as it seemed, at least and in his own mind, for the Universe. Professor Lane really had no idea why it was that he was called up to this mission. What he did know was that he would finally be able to share his own ideas and his own thoughts about everything in existence into words that would become the hard science of life. All he really wanted to do, when it came right down to it all, was to be able to hang out with Dr. Spock. Lane offered his handshake. “Hello, my name's Dave,” he said to the tall, almost ominous Vulcan. Dr. Spock looked at this human being standing before him, a bit perplexed, but it was only because this stranger would become, as he knew it and always knew it, the person who would help him to discover what makes human beings so deliriously foolish from time to time.
Lane had another purpose, at least in his own mind. Because he knew that he was captaining this starship and leading this fleet of hybrids into the next thoughts about human consciousness, he felt that it was important that he let Spock in on the thing that he had been studying, the thing that he had written for this mission. “Doctor Spock, I want to share something with you that no one but a very few people “get.” I think you might understand what I have been trying to tell people, for a long set of years.” Lane took out a tattered old notebook. On the outside of it there were notes written. The professor did not want any of his ideas to vanish into the nothingness of thoughts and muddled thinking. He wanted Spock to get started on many things. Lane handed his notes to the Vulcan. “Dr. Spock, please take a look at my notes. I have compiled these things over many, many years. My wife and I have decided that upon my return to Earth, that we would like to have these things all made into hard, actual science. I need your specific help.” The Vulcan looked at the professor and smiled. “Well, Captain...I mean, Professor, I am sure that you have come to the right place. The Universe does not make mistakes. You are here because She, the Universe, chose you specifically.”
Dr. Spock looked through Professor Lane's notes. His eyes widened and brows furrowed interchangeably. He did not say it out loud, but Dr. Spock was very interested in the Professor's manner of explaining how it was that science has made an art of reducing things down to a minimum. He really liked the way that Professor Lane gave a very down to earth teaching of his own understanding of Reductionism was thought out. “Professor Lane, could you please tell me a little more about this...pretext...text...context...thing, that you have written about?” The professor was not shocked by this hybrid being's curiosity. Because the professor had always only been able to share his Wisdom with others who were being taught at the human level, teaching this being of a different, absolutely higher intelligence than most human beings was going to be a wonderful experience.
“Basically, Doctor, when we think about it, and we can think in terms of what each of the 'hard' sciences gives to us, what we are not given in terms of understanding it all is a good explanation. I like thinking of myself as an interpreter of some concepts that not a lot of carbon based life forms understand. Because I am one said such carbon life form, with what it is that I know and have researched, there is much that I am able to impart to them. But, because the majority of them are not really aware of certain things, because they have not been taught properly, I chose to study this stuff. I wrote a few books about it all, but this one seems to be the one that people can wrap their heads around best.” Professor Lane looked at the Vulcan, not thinking about a thing other than that he hoped the vulcan doctor would understand what he'd written in the manner that Lane wanted humanity to “get it.”
Dr. Spock grinned. He was reading the way that the Professor wrote about reductionism. He chuckled at the genius nature of explaining it in words about words.
“Captain...Professor...Please, tell me more about this manner which you have written this. To liken the answer to the question “What is Life?” to things such as pretext, text and context, even in its sheer simplicity, it is brilliant.”
Professor Lane smiled. He knew that his words were understandable to those on Earth, but to have this being who gentleness was equal to his genius make all these statements about Lane's writing and understanding of this open-ended question which had no answer that was wrong or right was awesome. It was written according to his own understanding, and that is why it made so much sense, not just to him, neither to this Vulcan, but to humanity and beyond. “Thank you, Doctor Spock,” replied the professor. “I tried to make it clear that, if we can think of a way to tell those within our reach about how it is that we can come up with our own way of answering that question, and we can understand that there is no right or wrong answer and that everyone's answer will be different, we can also begin to know what is the madness of other people. On Earth it seems as though no one has a clue about why they do the things that they do. And most people think they know it all. The truth is that it is impossible to know it all. The other truth is that the only person who we can ever truly know and understand is our very selves. No one else can totally understand our thoughts, even when we convey them clearly. There will not ever be two of the same exact thoughts by two different people. When we understand what it is that we call our own purpose, we also understand what is our own mission. The way that we understand things is symbolically.”
The professor continued. “If we took things apart, so to speak, and looked at them the way that we look at a sentence, regardless of how it is put together, we find that pretext is the primal thought, brought about by the Soul as created by the need for understanding by others. We put letters together, called text, or words, and then we build meaning, for whatever purpose we have, for those words, by stringing them together into meaningful thoughts. To liken answering the question, or at least the questioning of both the question and the answer, to the building of a sentence seemed to just make sense to me. What made more sense was that everyone I showed this theory to also totally understood it. If more people on Earth would bother to try to understand what someone else is verbalizing but not necessarily thinking or feeling for real, it will be in the context - the way that the sentence is built and ultimately delivered - that the truth of the person and their thoughts will be delivered.”
“If we cannot think of another way of making people understand that it is really in the manner that your message is delivered, rather than only in the words, that people have an understanding of a whole lot. When it comes to how we understand one another, and we look at the science of things, we can see there that, when we break it down into something symbolic, and we understand not only what those symbols are about, but also about how they are used to convey our message, no matter what the message is, we find that thing called 'greater understanding.' Unfortunately on Earth, we have those beings who are very pompous in their ways. They tend to think that there is only one way of doing, seeing and saying things, and that their specific way is the only right way of doing a thing. If we can break things down to those who cannot see anything outside of their own awareness about things, and we can tell them that we have come up with a way to 'get it,' we might actually be able to ensure that future generations of Human Beings on Earth also 'get it' in terms of having a clue about other people.”
“Because I am a writer, and a teacher, I have another way of making things make sense. You see, on Earth, our higher education comes from within us. We only go to college to make it grow. We understand the pretext of college as being the letters, so to speak, of the sentence of words which make up 'I go to college for the betterment of my life, which in turn will also make other peoples' lives better in some manner,' as being a statement of Truth for many people. Some people believe it, while others simply go and find out that they cannot continue because they have a different sort of higher intelligence. When we think in the manner that is a sentence, and we begin to string together the letters which make the text which ultimately create the context, we can also think outside of what we have been taught is the right manner in which to think. I know that might not make too much sense to a guy like you. I also know that it makes loads of sense to others on Earth who really need to get and keep a clue about each of our own singular experience in Life as a human being.”
“It's intriguing, Professor. I am very impressed by its simplicity. Lots of beings don't understand a lot of things because they are not taught in this manner. Its brilliance comes from its simplicity.” The vulcan flipped through the professor's research notes. “I think, Professor Lane, that what you have here is probably one of the best ways of expalining this whole...Life...thing...” The Doctor and the Professor continued that morning exchanging thoughts. At the end of the day, they sat in their chairs at the control panel of the starship. Professor Lane sat back, a beer in one hand, and a bag of Doritos between him and Spock's chair. He offered the Vulcan a snack and a beer. Spock looked at him, a confused look on his face. Spock took a chip, and a beer. He reclined in his chair just as the professor was doing. Professor Lane directed Spock to look at the monitor in front of them. Lane pushed a few buttons on his cell phone.
“Hey...Spock...ever seen this show? It's called 'Ancient Aliens.' It's one of my favorite shows.” The two men sat staring at the monitor. At the end of the show, Spock looked at Lane and said “You know, Professor, that ...Georgio person...he could help me. Lots of my own family is on your planet. I have not been able to communicate with them for many lifetimes.”
The Professor leaned back further in his chair, took another beer from the cooler between them where the panel controls once were. He grinned widely.
“Hey Spock...I think I have another 'thing' I want to research...you know, for science and posterity's sake. Alien life on planet Earth...it's going to be HUGE!”
The vulcan smirked. “Professor Lane, I will help you with that research, but, you must know now that, for many, many lifetimes, we have been back and forth to Earth, studying human life. I must state now that, for the life of you all, yourself not included so much as the majority of the rest of them, we have been doing this for a very long time. In fact, what do you think you are doing with us, right now, on the Enterprise?”
Professor Lane smiled. He raised his beer to the doctor in a toast. “Cheers, Doctor Spock.” The doctor looked at his new human friend and colleague. He began to take a sip of beer when on the monitor in front of him popped up a very strange human, one who spoke the words “Nanu, Nanu” as a greeting. Spock laughed out loud. “Professor, on your planet you all have it in your heads that my cousin, Mork...you guys call him 'Robin'... has passed into the next lifetime.”
The professor's eyes widened as the Vulcan continued to speak. “The actuality is that, in using your example of pretext, text, context, it is not that Mork is gone from that consciousness, but simply that humans do not understand that we are not a body with a soul, but instead a soul with a body. Your 'Robin'...my 'Mork'...simply just went home to the stars. I saw him the other day...he sends his regards.”
With that, Professor Lane gulped down what was left in his can and quickly reached for another one which he, as quickly, gulped down.
