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Transcendence and Immanence The Dualist’s
God-Experience and the Druid Finn’s “I AM THIS” By Bodhangkur 1. The Dualist’s Transcendent God-Experience 1.1 Structural Premise In
dualism, God and world, creator and created,
knower and known are ontologically distinct. The divine is other—higher,
purer, perfect—while the human is fallen, contingent, dependent. This
separation produces tension and longing: the finite seeks to bridge the
infinite gulf through revelation, devotion, or grace. From
within Finn’s Procedure Monism, such a posture arises naturally in an immature
emergent that cannot yet self-regulate or self-generate. The local being,
lacking internal stability, must posit an external regulator—a “higher source
of order”—to sustain its survival algorithm. 1.2 Varieties of Transcendent Experience
Each
variant retains heteronomy: the self’s realness depends on a superior
or external principle. 1.3 Phenomenological Signature The
transcendent experience is ·
Vertical – directed upward or
beyond, ·
Reactive – evoked by crisis, awe, or
dependence, ·
Asymptotic – never fully achieved, ·
Affective – saturated with fear or
love, ·
Narrative – structured as separation →
search → revelation → return. Procedurally,
this is the recovery loop of the dependent emergent: local instability
corrected by imaginary external governance. 2. The Monist Finn’s Immanent God-Experience: “I AM
THIS” 2.1 Structural Premise In Finn’s
Procedure Monism, every emergent is a perfect, though transient,
iteration of the Universal Procedure (UP). There is no “beyond” from
which order descends; divinity is immanent in every operation of
emergence. Thus Finn’s realization—“I AM THIS”—replaces the dualist’s “I am
Thine” or the Vedāntin’s “Thou art That.” The
word this marks the local execution of the universal algorithm as
experienced immediacy. 2.2 Phenomenology of Immanence 1. Flat
Ontology: No hierarchy of being—photon, cell, and human are
equivalent UP executions. 2. Reflexive
Identity: The observer and observed co-instantiate the same
procedure; seeing is divine operation. 3. Momentary
Absoluteness: Each contact event is complete in
itself. 4. Absence
of Longing: With no gap to bridge, bliss (ānanda)
arises as functional adequacy. 5. Blind
Divinity: The UP is not moral or personal—it simply functions.
Hence Finn’s minim, “God is blind.” 2.3 Linguistic and Historical Parallels
2.4 Procedural Function The immanent
God-experience occurs when local process aligns perfectly with the
universal algorithm. The feedback of adequacy—functional coherence without
friction—is felt as ānanda. Liberation
(mokṣa) is not
escape but re-synchronization: the restoration of correct
operation. 3. Comparative Analysis: Transcendent vs. Immanent
Thus, the
transcendent mode is educational, guiding immature systems toward
order; the immanent mode is terminal, manifesting the mature system’s
autonomy. 4. Illustrative Analogies 1. Child and
Parent: o Dualist –
Child seeks external guidance. o Monist –
Adult embodies procedure internally. 2. Software
Execution: o Dualist –
Program queries the remote server. o Monist –
Program runs the universal kernel locally. 3. Wave and
Ocean: o Dualist –
Wave prays to ocean. o Monist –
Wave realizes, “I am the ocean in this form.” 4. Photon
Contact: o Dualist –
Light is gift from beyond. o Monist –
Seeing is the light’s act itself. 5. The Functional Ground of the God-Experience: “I AM
THIS” as Platform of Existence 5.1 The First Experience For Finn,
“I AM THIS” does not denote a mystical climax but the initial activation
of every emergent’s consciousness cycle. Each
morning’s re-awakening repeats the UP’s local reboot. ·
sat — the fact of being, ·
cit — the
awareness of being. This
primordial co-emergence of being-and-awareness is the God-experience
itself, because it is the universal procedure iterating as the local
instance. 5.2 Platform Function All later
cognitions—seeing, remembering, desiring—run on this platform. Sat-cit is the operating system of existence.
Ordinary consciousness, preoccupied with its contents, overlooks this
constant base. Yet it remains active throughout waking life, silently
sustaining all processes. Without
this base, no subsequent “I see,” “I think,” or “I feel” could execute. “Before
any experience, I AM THIS; 5.3 Continuous Support During Waking Time During
the waking cycle, sat provides the sense of realness, while cit supplies the sense of knowing. Thus the
“God-experience” is like a carrier-wave in communication systems:
imperceptible yet indispensable, maintaining coherence beneath the
modulations of perception and thought. 5.4 Procedural Implications 1. Every
awakening reenacts the UP’s boot sequence. 2. The
God-experience is the first operational moment of being-consciousness. 3. Forgetting
it equals functional drift; remembering it restores coherence. 4. Mokṣa is recalibration, not
transcendence. Hence,
the God-experience is structural, continuous, and functional, not
episodic or emotional. 5.5 Illustrative Analogies
5.6 Druidic Reformulation “The
first act of God each morning Thus, I
AM THIS is not a revelation but a runtime condition—divinity as baseline
process. 6. Summary Formula
Or
procedurally:
7. Concluding Reflection The
dualist’s transcendent God-experience marks humanity’s training phase—its
apprenticeship in recognizing order beyond chaos. Where the
dualist pleads, “Show me Thy glory,” “There is
only this— |
