“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(The first quotes I’ve put together, then, are from the 44th session for April 15, 1964. In that session Seth gave us his interpretations of some of the basic laws or attributes of the inner universe, but it will be quickly seen that he was really discussing space and time,² as those qualities are perceived in his reality and in ours. In our world, of course, space and time form the environment in which conventional ideas of evolution exist. For that matter, all of the material in this appendix shows the interrelationship between our ideas of serial time and Seth’s simultaneous time. Connected here also is the philosophical concept known as “naïve realism,” which will be discussed briefly later.

I have also said that basically the universe has no more to do with space in your terms than does the dream world.

Your idea of space is some completely erroneous conception of an emptiness to be filled. Things — planets, stars, nebulae — come into being in this physical [camouflage] universe of yours, according to your latest theories, and this universe expands — pushed so that its sides bulge, so to speak the outer galaxies literally bursting into nowhere. True inner space is to the contrary vital energy, itself alive, possessing abilities of transformation, forming all existences, even the camouflage reality with which you are familiar, and which you attempt to probe so ineffectively.

This basic universe of which I speak expands constantly in terms of intensity and quality and value, in a way that has nothing to do with your idea of space. The basic universe beneath all camouflage does not have an existence in space at all, as you envision it. Space is a camouflage … This tinge of time is an attribute of the physical camouflage form only, and even then the relationship between time and ideas, and time and dreams, is a nebulous one … although in some instances parts of the inner universe may be glimpsed from the camouflage perspective of time; only, however, a small portion.

If the dream world, the mind, and the inner universe do exist, but not in space, and if they do not exist basically in time, though they may be glimpsed through time, then your question will be: In what medium or in what manner do they exist, and without time, how can they be said to exist in duration? I am telling you that the basic universe exists behind all camouflage universes in the same manner, and taking up no space, that the mind exists behind the brain. The brain is a camouflage pattern. It takes up space. It exists in time, but the mind takes up no space and does not have its basic existence in time. Your camouflage universe, on the other hand, takes up space and exists in time.

Nevertheless the dream world, the mind, and the basic inner universe do exist … in what we will call the value climate of psychological reality. This is the medium. This takes the place of what you call space. It is a quality which makes all existences and consciousness possible. It is one of the most powerful principles behind or within the vitality that itself composes from itself all other phenomena.³

Growth in your camouflage universe often involves the taking up of more space. Actually, in our inner universe … growth exists in terms of the value or quality expansion of which I have spoken, and does not — I repeat — does not imply any sort of space expansion. Nor does it imply, as growth does in your camouflage universe, a sort of projection into time.

I am giving it [this material] to you in as simple terms as possible. If growth is one of the most necessary laws of your camouflage universe, value fulfillment corresponds to it in the inner-reality universe.⁴

Now, the so-called laws of your camouflage physical universe do not apply to the inner universe. They do not even apply to other camouflage planes. However, the laws of the inner universe apply to all camouflage realities. Some of these basic laws have counterparts known and accepted in various camouflage realities. There are diverse manifestations of them, and names given to them.

These fundamental laws are followed on many levels in your own universe. So far I have given you but one, which is value fulfillment. In your physical universe this rule is followed as physical growth. The entity follows it through the cycle of [simultaneous] reincarnations. The species of mankind, and all other species in your universe on your particular horizontal plane, follow this law [value fulfillment] under the auspices of evolution (my emphasis).⁵ In other camouflage realities, this law is carried through in different manners, but it is never ignored.

The second law of the inner universe is energy transformation.⁶ This occurs constantly. Energy transformation and value fulfillment, both existing within the spacious present [or at once], add up to a durability that is at the same time spontaneous … and simultaneous.

He [Darwin] spent his last years proving it, and yet it has no real validity. It has a validity within very limited perspectives only; for consciousness does, indeed, evolve form. Form does not evolve consciousness. It is according to when you come into the picture, and what you choose to observe … Consciousness did not come from atoms and molecules scattered by chance through the universe….

(Ironically, Charles Darwin’s natural selection, “the survival of the fittest,” [a phrase that Darwin himself did not originate, by the way], allows for all sorts of pain and suffering in the process — the same unhappy facts of life, in Darwin’s view, that finally turned him into an agnostic, away from a God who could allow such things to exist! As I interpret what I’ve read, Darwin didn’t deny the existence of a god of some kind, but he wanted one that would abolish what he saw as the “upward” struggle for existence. According to the geological/fossil record, this conflict had resulted in the deaths of entire species. Darwin came to believe that he asked the impossible of God. Instead, he assigned the pain and suffering in the world to the impersonal workings of natural selection and chance variation [or genetic mutation]. For Darwin and his followers — even those of today, then — nature’s effects gave the appearance of design or plan in the universe without necessitating a belief in a designer or a god; although, as I wrote in Note 7, from the scientific standpoint this belief leaves untouched the question of design in nonliving matter, which is vastly more abundant in the “objective” universe than is living matter, and had to precede that living matter.

(Naïve realism, the philosophical concept that’s been mentioned a few times in this appendix, enters in here. It could, however, be considered at just about any time, since its proponents believe that it’s unconsciously involved in practically all of our daily activities. Simply put, naïve realism teaches that our visual and bodily senses reveal to us an external world as it really is — that we “see” actual physical objects, for instance. Disbelievers say that neurological evidence contradicts this theory; that from the neurological standpoint the events in our lives and within our bodies depend upon interpretation by the brain, that we can know nothing directly, but only experience transmitted through — and so “colored” by — the central nervous system. The perceptual time lag, caused by the limited speed of light, is also involved in objections to naïve realism. I merely want to remind the reader that in ordinary terms naïve realism, or some mind-brain idea very much like it, is habitually used whether we’re considering evolution within a time-oriented camouflage universe, painting a picture, or running a household. And after many centuries, the debate over the relationship between mind and brain continues, if first the existence of the mind is even agreed upon!

Because I say that you actually create the typical camouflage patterns of your own physical universe yourselves, by use of the inner vitality of the universe in the same manner that you form a pattern with your breath on a glass pane, I do not necessarily mean that you are the creators of the universe. I am merely saying that you are the creators of the physical world as you know it — and herein, my beloved friends, lies a vast tale.

(But, I asked Jane recently, why do our sciences and religions take it all so seriously? I wasn’t really too earnest. If we truly owe our physical existence to the chance conglomeration of certain atoms and molecules in the thickening scum of a primordial pond or ocean [to discuss only mankind here], then certainly we’ll never come this way again in the universe; and moreover, our emotional and intellectual attributes must rest upon the same dubious beginning. Aside from the lack of evidence to back up such “scientific” speculations, what thinking or feeling values, I wonder, can make such a belief system so attractive? Surely very limited ones in linear terms, fated to never get beyond those incessant questions about what came before the beginning. To paraphrase some other material Jane wrote not long ago: “But the earth and all upon it are given. To imagine that such an entire environment is an accident is intellectually outrageous and emotionally sterile.”

You do not survive through cooperation, according to that theory, and nature is not given a kind or creative intent, but a murderous one. And if you see yourselves as the end result of such a species, then how can you expect goodness or merit or creativity from yourselves, or from others? How can you believe that you live in a safe universe when each species exists because it survives through claw, if it must hunt and kill out of murderous intent, as implied in the theories of evolution and of reality itself?

(However, collectively we do share an agreed-upon reality, even if one subject to many stresses. The next two excerpts to be presented from Seth came through in a couple of sessions delivered some time after he’d finished “Unknown” Reality. I’ve put them together for easy reading. Their inspiration was my work here and the discussions on evolution that Jane and I led in ESP class. As noted with the quotations given in Note 13, eventually this material will be published in its entirety as part of a Seth book; perhaps then it can be used as a guide for the sort of investigation just mentioned. In the meantime, the thoughts below can at least help orient some fresh thinking about the beginning of our planet, of all the species upon it, and indeed of the universe itself. Seth began:)

If we must speak in terms of continuity, which I regret, then in those terms you could say that life in the physical universe, on your planet, “began” spontaneously in a given number of species at the same time. Words do nearly forsake me, the semantic differences are so vast. In those terms there was a point where consciousness, through intent, impressed itself into matter. That “breakthrough” cannot be logically explained, but only compared to, say, an illumination — that is, a light occurring everywhere at once, that became a medium for life as you define it. It had nothing to do with the propensity of certain kinds of cells to reproduce — [all cells are] imbued with the “drive” for value fulfillment — but with an overall illumination that set the conditions in which life was possible as you think of it; and at that imaginary, hypothetical point, all species became latent. The inner pulsations of the invisible universe reached certain intensities that “impregnated” the entire physical system simultaneously. That illumination was everywhere then at every point aware of itself, and of the conditions formed by its presence.

At the same time, EE units (see Note 3) became manifest. I have said, for example, that the universe expands as an idea does, and so the visible universe sprang into being in the same manner. The same energy that gave birth to the universe is, in those terms, still being created. The EE units contain within themselves the latent knowledge of all of the various species that can emerge under those conditions. It is according to your relative position. You can say that it took untold centuries for the EE units to “initially” combine, forming classifications of matter and various species, or you can say that this process happened at once. In your terms, each species is aware of the condition of each other species, and of the entire environment. In those terms the environment forms the species and the species form the environment. There were fully developed men — that is, of full intellect, emotion, and will — living at the same time, in your terms, as those creatures supposed to be man’s evolutionary ancestors.

[However, as] you begin to question the nature of time itself, then the “when” of the universe is beside the point. The motion and energy of the universe still comes from within. I certainly realize that this is hardly a scientific statement — yet the moment that All That Is conceived of a physical system it was invisibly created, endowed with creativity, and bound to emerge [into physical reality].

(My position after writing this appendix is that in scientific and religious terms we know little about our world [and universe], its origins, and its amazing variety of forms, both “living” and “nonliving.” Our own limitations may have something to do with our attitudes here, yet Jane and I have become very careful about believing science or religion when either one tells us it can explain our world, for each of those disciplines ignores too much. No matter what the source of this camouflage reality may be, our conscious lack of knowledge and understanding as we manipulate within it, through naïve realism or any other system of belief or perception, ought to make us humble indeed; all arrogance should be transcended as we become more and more aware of the limitless beauty, complexity, and mystery that surrounds us, and of which we are part. Jane and I just don’t think it all came about through chance! The mind can ask too many questions to be satisfied with mechanistic explanations, and nurturing that characteristic of dissatisfaction alone may be one of the most valuable contributions the Seth material can make.

You are well acquainted with the exterior method, that involves studying the objective universe and collecting facts upon which certain deductions are made. In this book [Volume 2], therefore, we will be stressing interior ways of attaining, not necessarily facts, but knowledge and wisdom. Now facts may or may not give you wisdom. They can, if they are slavishly followed, lead you away from true knowledge. Wisdom shows you the insides of facts, so to speak, and the realities from which facts emerge.

A close analogy to this material can be found in remarks Seth made in the 682nd session for that first volume: “The idea of one universe alone is basically nonsensical. Your reality must be seen in its relationship to others. Otherwise you are always caught in questions like ‘How did the universe begin?’ or ‘When will it end?’ All systems are constantly being created.”

6. Ever since Seth came through with the material in this (44th) session 10 years ago, I’ve been interested in comparing his second law of the inner universe with the second law of thermodynamics of our “camouflage” physical sciences. Both deal with energy, yet to me they’re opposites. At the same time I see them as linked through our distorted perception of that inner reality, thus pointing up Seth’s statement just given, that “the so-called laws of your camouflage universe do not apply to the inner universe.” (When this session was held Jane knew nothing of the three laws of thermodynamics, or how they define energy/heat relationships in our universe. Nor is she concerned with them now, per se; they’re simply outside of her interests.)

Seth has always maintained that there are no closed systems, that energy is constantly exchanged between them, regardless of whether such transfers can be detected. (In Volume 1, see Session 688, plus Note 2 for the same session.) The second law of thermodynamics, on the other hand, tell us that our universe is a closed system — and that it’s fated to eventually run down because the amount of energy available for useful work is always decreasing, even though the supply of that energy is constant. A measure of this unavailable energy is called entropy.

It’s often been claimed that Darwin’s natural selection, while ruling out any question of design or a planner — God, say — behind living matter, leaves unexplained the same question relative to the structure of nonliving matter, which in those terms obviously preceded life. I’d rather approach that argument through another statement Seth made in Chapter 20 of Seth Speaks (in the 582nd session): “You are biologically connected, chemically connected with the Earth that you know….” How is it that as living creatures we’re made up of ingredients — atoms of iron, molecules of water, for instance — from a supposedly dead world? In the scientific view we’re utterly dependent upon that contradictory situation. No one denies the amazing structure or design of our physical universe, from the scale of subatomic particles on “up” (regardless of what cosmological theory is used to explain the universe’s beginning). The study of design as one of the links between “living” and “nonliving” systems would certainly be a difficult challenge — but a most rewarding one, I think — for science. I have little idea of how the work would be carried out. Evidently it would lead from biology through microbiology to physics with, ultimately, a search that at least approached Seth’s electromagnetic energy (EE) units and units of consciousness (CU’s). Yet according to Seth, both classes of “particles” are in actuality nonphysical; as best words can note, they have their realities on scales so minute that we cannot hope to detect them through our present technology….

8. Very briefly, for those who are interested: It’s often been shown mathematically that contrary to Darwinistic belief, enormous time spans (in the millions of years, say) will not aid in the chance formation of even the chemical precursors to life — the protein or nucleic acid molecules — but will instead make their creation even less likely. For with time, the even distribution or equilibrium of matter increases, moving it away from the ordered sequences necessary to support life. Scientifically, in the closed system of our universe, the second law of thermodynamics and entropy eventually conquer all. (See Note 6.)