the human dilemma is consciousness in contingency
the essential intuition of consciousness is freedom
- it's freedom
and yet always the knowing that this freedom is
contained
the containment is the world - is contingency
consciousness is in the world - it has no context
without the world - i.e. outside the
world
'outside the world' is a concept consciousness
cannot formulate - except in an imaginative
negative way
the point is that consciousness knows itself as
within -
it is the 'being in the world' - this knowing -
which is the foundation of the assertion 'I'
that is consciousness - that is self -
it is 'being in' that defines consciousness -
gives its universality - a particularity
the primal intuition of freedom - is consciousness
knowing itself - knowing itself as universal
without the constraint of particularity -
of contingent instantiation
this knowing though is essential
(it never leaves consciousness)
consciousness operating in the world - is the real
as distinct from essential knowing of consciousness
consciousness aware - not of itself - but of -
the world -
and so two realities for consciousness
consciousness as essence - the essence is - freedom
consciousness as reality - the reality - is contingent
the dilemma of consciousness is the reconciliation
of itself
understanding the paradox of essence and reality
freedom and contingency
there is no movement here
no movement above and beyond
sorry George
the dilemma is fixed -
any imaginative movement to a higher reality -
a reality of resolution
is wishful - is flight
p.s.
consciousness is always aware of its essence -
its freedom
in any moment in reality - in contingency
finding the place of freedom
is an art
and the art is to find that contingency which gives
peace from the struggle
and by the by
art is consciousness' assertion -
and assertion in the face of the unknown
the expression of freedom as freedom
whatever its form
its language -
its shape and colour
it is finally 'the assertion of'
the being of consciousness
as free -
art is in this assertion too
an invader
it invades the characterless world of pure being
and asserts a reality
it recognizes the unknown
but is never accepting of it
it creates in the unknown
gives it form and content
however
the unknown is not thus diminished
it is just characterized
these creations of consciousness
are ephemeral
they hold only - really for the moment
of their creation
it is only human vanity
the need for permanence
that leads to the idea of art
as something above and beyond
time and place
we think a physical form
a physical expression lasts
and even that the idea of it might
survive corruption
this again is more to do with desire
than reality
at the end nothing penetrates
every creation
a hit that misses
