Return to Conclusive Ignorance


A new view of the much-discussed subject of conclusive ignorance might be in order.

The postulated condition of mind, 'I want to not know about it', popularly verbalized as 'Ahdo'wan' anoahbowdt', is a theme that permeates a universe at many levels. It is in fact the entire mechanism underlying 'levels' of consciousness, the 'focus' device of being a viewpoint instead of all viewpoints.

This ingredient, if it can be called that, acts something like an opaque fluid which dries as a clear coating on reality sectors, which have been created, but which are being conclusively ignored. Instead of the reality they protect, these layers or coatings cause alteration to spring to view when contacted by live attention.

This coating renders parts of reality invisible to consciousness in normal operation.

Those parts of reality thus rendered invisible to consciousness are still created by consciousness but do not come to view when perception is directed at them. What happens instead?

Sometimes invisibility is all -- a blankness, or blackness of mind, with no substance to it. 'Tell me the last phone number you dialed in Mauritania' produces a blank because one really hasn't

'Tell me exactly what you did on the evening of June 3rd, 1949' produces a blank (if it does) because the creation is layered out of visibility by the creation of conclusive ignorance.

'Tell me exactly what you did with the sweet young brunette who was making eyes at you at the party', as a different example, can produce a blank of view because one is determined not to know, because he intuitively senses that what he knows others may and he certainly doesn't want others to because etc., etc., etc..

In any given template, the filter imposed by the collection of Conclusive Ignorance Layers provides the exact sense of what IS IMPORTANT and what ISN'T IMPORTANT. Thus the impression (often outraged) of people not paying attention to what is truly important is a false impression from the point of view of what they are actually perceiving.

A teenage buck on a tailgate in a baseball stadium parking lot with 12 cans of Miller in his gut is paying exact, precise attention to exactly what is important at that particular moment. But it might be, for example, that his layers of conclusive ignorance have led to the design of a template in which what he lets himself perceive are importances only relative, say, to the desperate task of figuring out how to build an identity acceptable in the hot brouhaha of social opinions with which he believes he is surrounded, primarily from his peer group.

An astronaut running through high-tech circuit test patterns in pre-flight will be paying attention at different levels and degrees to as much as he allows himself to know about his physical comfort, the numbers, states and mechanisms being reported, the immediate future of the flight, the historical context and public image or belief system within which his flight will operate, and so on. If he considers, for example, spiritual states or God in connection with the activity , it would likely be in a fleeting way.

So the kinds and degrees of conclusive ignorance used will define what is important; they will define the scope of intention allowed, ranging from the most internal subjective problem to the broadest consideration of the fate of the Galaxy.

The only known solvent for this hard obscuring coating (something like neutral nail polish) is a similar fluid called responsibility. If there is an opposite to total retreat, it is not total attack but complete benevolent identification without judgment with all forms. This is the willingness to assume Source over that creation, and only that willingness will melt the curious structure of conclusive ignorance.
In the final analysis, as artist and musician Mark Scott suggested, it comes to this small credo:


God as a Verb

Because there are blacks in the universe, I am black.

Because there are whites in the Universe, I am white; because Chinese, I am Chinese.

Because there is truth, and beauty, in the Universe, I am truth and I am beauty.

Because there is hatred and evil in the Universe, I am evil, and I am hatred.

With loving consent and tolerance without condition, without limit,

There is no line between me and Universe. Every part and every condition is a reflection of my part, and my condition.

Thus is the Word defined.

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