1

Everything All of the Time

A new work by
Alexandre Fauque

Using my experience in Liberal Arts as a microcosm for Western thought, I’ve come to realize that the
West has been engaged in a Hegelian style dialectic between the camps of reason and passion since the time of
ancient Greece. As the West has been a male dominated society, reason has ruled supreme throughout the ages.
Ironically, science, the flagship of reason, has begun to undermine our very notions of an ordered and objective
universe as quantum theory and relativity attune us to what many cultures have known intuitively for quite
some time. As the industrial age grinds to a halt, it will prove essential for Western culture to integrate new
ideas as we shift from a fundamentally dualist outlook to a more holistic approach. My chief concern when
faced with the issue of dualism is that when one operates in binaries, one side is always devalued as we tacitly
express a desire for “this, and not that.” The West has been a culture of men so we have come to place chief
importance on our ability to reason and suppressed our powers of intuition and ability to nurture, much to the
detriment of women, the environment, plant and animal life, other nations and our selves. As we look to the
future, dispelling the boundaries between self and other, men and women, mind and body, reason and
passion/intuition, objectivity and subjectivity and so forth, will be crucial to not only our mental health, but our
very survival as we face an age that will require co-operation on an unprecedented scale. In an effort to avoid
confusion, I will refer to the Apollonian side of the binary (objectivity, self, order, consistency, hierarchy,
mind, soul, reductionism, quantitative, intelligible, action, knowledge, state, etc) as male and the Dionysian
side (subjectivity, other, chaos, fluidity, equality, body, the void, synthesis, qualitative, unknown, passivity,
intuition, church respectively) as female.

I will begin by briefly chronicling Western philosophy and literature in order to demonstrate how they
boil down to the same fundamental tensions mentioned above, with the underlying understanding that reason is
superior. A summary of the effects of this outlook will follow. For this section I will use Edward O. Wilson’s
“Consilience” to epitomize the Enlightenment world-view we must begin to move away from. Next will follow
a synopsis of the Western mind from a Jungian perspective. This will lead into a discussion of Taoism in
relation to the new physics. Lastly, the Mayan conception of time will garner some attention in an effort to
advance new, and from our point of view quite radical, ways of thinking we may consider integrating.

Western thought takes its origins in the philosophy and culture of ancient Greece. So much so that it has
been proposed that all philosophy is but a footnote to Plato. In many ways, this holds true in that Plato was the
first to thoroughly articulate the breed of dualism that plagues the Western mind. For Plato, the soul originated
in the perfect world of the forms whereby it proceeded to fall and become trapped in a body1. From there, the
soul must recall the forgotten perfections as it pursues a life of the mind. In this basic schema is contained the
seeds of the Christian tradition in that the body and soul are distinctly separate and conflicting entities. The
Platonic worldview suggests that the physical universe is riddled with deception and so we must employ
abstractions in order to grasp reality. It is through knowledge of the forms that we escape the limits of the
temporal body. We can see in Plato the clear devaluation of the physical in favor of the intangible. As his ladder
of loves suggests, the love of a body is lowest and the love of the idea of beauty highest2. This hierarchical
outlook is inherent to dualist thinking; there always exists the understanding that there is an ultimate and
unattainable reality and we, as imperfect beings, can experience only the various degrees of perfection.

Placing Plato in a Hegelian context is simple as the anti-thesis appears in the form of his pupil Aristotle.
However, Aristotle is far from expressing the polar opposite of his master as he too values reason above all else.
The difference is that Aristotle, as a biologist, placed much more emphasis on the day-to-day world. He does not
invoke a separate reality to account for this one and he remains very much concerned with questions of ethics,
1
Plato, Phaedo; Translated by Benjamin Jowett , http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedo.html.
2
Plato, Symposium; translated by Benjamin Jowett (Tudor Publishing Company, New York, 1993), 31.
 2
3
politics and science. Aristotelian ethics is a question of habit . There is no external transcendental truth that must
come to be known through reason because ethics is something undertaken as a community with the
understanding that trial and error is a viable way to ascertain what works. Most importantly, he established the
idea of causation that would come to dominate until the time of Einstein. In this linear model, all phenomena
have traceable causes and operate in isolation and while we do not hold to his theory of the four causes4, we
think of events as results of their efficient causes only. Hence, we can apply reason to the natural world to
elucidate an understanding of its fundamental principles based on sense data.

The same tension arises in the literature of ancient Greece. In an effort to keep the discussion focused, I
will only make reference to Euripides’ Bacchae as I feel it is the best example of the Apollo/Dionysian tension.
The conflict arises when Dionysus arrives in Thebes and drives all the women into a frenzy of dance and
orgiastic rituals. When Pentheus, king of Thebes, arrives on the scene he immediately starts imprisoning the
ecstatic women, claiming that Dionysus is an upstart god. Eventually, he captures Dionysus who tricks him into
dressing in women’s clothes and brings him to the grove where the dancers have congregated. There, in a wild
fury, Pentheus’ mother Agave rips him to shreds and carries his head back to Thebes. Upon realizing what she
has done she is immensely grieved and must leave the city in exile.5 While Aristotle remained within the
confines of a reason-oriented worldview, Dionysus fully expresses the unconscious and insatiable nature of the
female side of the binary. Pentheus, on the other hand, is clearly the proponent of reason as he values control,
the conservation of the norm and order. As a result, he is torn to pieces by the awesome power of the frenzied
rituals. The play illustrates how either extreme is dangerous in that Agave, in her passion, brings about her own
destruction just as Pentheus’ need to control the power of the unconscious literally destroys him. The truly wise
character in the play is the blind seer Tiresias in that he accepts the rituals but is not carried so far as to lose his
head. The play then is a call for balance as both parties are ruined by their devotion to one side of the binary.

St-Augustine and St-Thomas Aquinas will keep Plato and Aristotle at the fore of the philosophical
enterprise through to the seventeenth century. It is at this time that the tension reincarnates in the form of the
rationalist and empiricist schools as founded by Rene Descartes and John Locke respectively. Where Descartes
posited the existence of innate ideas of the mind6, Locke countered with the notion that all knowledge was
derived from sense data and that we were in essence a blank slate to be written on from birth7. The rationalists
maintained that reason alone could lead us to truth as we must disregard sense data on the basis that it is
fluctuating and therefore subject to deception. They would also posit that objective certainty was the ultimate
aim and available only to those who employed reason untainted by the sensory world. This led Descartes to
conclude that animals were essentially objects8, God was responsible for placing the ideas of perfection within
him9 and that the “external” world’s existence was ultimately up for grabs as all knowledge is derived from the
innate ideas of the mind10. As with Plato, fellow mathematician Descartes split the world in two and chose to
retreat into the shelter of his solipsistic intellectual world. The empiricist schools represents an attempt to voice
the opposite side of the binary though it remains on the male side in that reason is still esteemed as the greatest
virtue. However, with the advent of Thomas Hobbes, for example, an echo of the Aristotelian relative ethical
quest can be heard in that he believed that citizens should cede their wills to the sovereign in an effort to create a

3
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics; Translated by W.D. Ross, http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.1.i.html, ch1, pt 7.
4
Aristotle, Physics; Translated by R. P. Hardie and R. K. Gaye, http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/physics.2.ii.html, ch 3, pt 2.
5
Euripides; translated, with an introduction and notes, by Paul Woodruff, Bacchae (Indianapolis, Ind.: Hackett Pub. Co.,
c1998)
6
Rene Descartes, Discourse on Method, Transl. and ed. By Laurence J. Lafleur (Indianapolis and New York: Bobbs-Merrill,
1956), 22.
7
John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Vol I (New York: Dover, 1959), 121-122.
8
Descartes, 37.
9
Ibid, 22.
10
Ibid, 24.
 3
11
common and subjective good for the polity . David Hume will also offer an alternative, positing that absolute
certainty is impossible; the closest we can come to objective knowledge is a high degree of probability12. Here
we have a philosopher who wholly embraces the idea that the world is changing and does create an external
reality but instead attempts to create a system within the flux. The issue of freedom versus determinism becomes
central to the rationalist and empiricist debate and neither side can come to agree on a solution. I attribute this to
each philosopher’s inability to bring together objective and subjective elements in one philosophy.

The literature of the 18th century also centers on this fundamental conflict. The Enlightenment and
Romantic movements each embody a side of the binary. Voltaire, for example, had a profound respect for
Newton and advocated deism. William Blake, on the other hand, abhorred Newton and felt that all
systematization of the world must come to an end as it limits the influx of human experience and thereby
reduces our ability to flourish as spirited and powerful beings. While their views appear to be opposed, a
synthesis can be established if we consider the biographical information we have on both men. In “Candide,”
Voltaire mocks those who have prejudged all to be good or bad and laments how they have incapacitated
themselves through incessant philosophical intellectualization of life13. He deems it of prime importance that we
remain politically active and work to understand our environment in a reasoned and ordered way. Advocating
secularism, Voltaire sought to eliminate the forces that held us back from knowledge and activism. Blake was
also politically radical and above all sought to experience as much as possible. In that sense, both figures were
reformists who were heavily critical of the various oppressive forces in the world. The conflict between the two
is in fact a cultural construct as Romanticism is the essential and complimentary force to the Enlightenment
program. As in the Baccae, the ideas must be employed in concert if we are to lead any sort of meaningful
existence. Literature seems to be more ready to express this need whereas philosophers have remained too hung
up on proving themselves right to really attain a significant level of synthesis. Kahlil Gibran sums up this need
in his book “The Prophet” so I will leave it to him to conclude my synopsis of the dualist Western mind. He
writes: “Your reason and your passion are the rudder and sails of your seafaring vessel.”14

The modern age is an awkward by-product of a male driven society that has resisted the integration of its
female side for too long; the Enlightenment project continues to serve as our model for how the world ought to
be.. No contemporary author expresses the inability to become fluid better than Edward O. Wilson. While the
goal of his book “Consilience” is a noble one, I do not understand how he can purport to be unifying when he is
in fact merely reinterpreting everything from a scientific materialist perspective. I have no intention of point-by-
point arguing with Wilson; when it comes to the minute details, he cannot be surpassed. What he lacks is any
sort of awareness of the greater dialogue that is unfolding as he remains fixated on the Enlightenment project of
reductionism of data. This program is fundamentally linear and views the world as an infinite multitude of
separate entities that can be understood through the laws of cause and effect as relayed by sense data.
Essentially, Wilson is unable to delve into the female side of the binary. He remains firmly planted in the male-
centered worldview that describes the world as a perceived set of objective phenomena. What he is failing to
account for is the subjective element. He states that post-modernism and the Enlightenment are polar opposites15
and indeed, no argument there. The issue arises when he says things like: “Let us begin by simply walking away
from Foucault,”16 because this is his very problem, he cannot integrate. I do not wish to say that post-modernism
is right, far from it. Instead, I would advise Wilson to find a middle ground between hard rooted objectivism and
the radical subjectivity of the post-modernists. Science itself has told us that there is more to post-modernist

11
Thomas Hobbes, The Leviathan, http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-
c.html#THESECONDPART, ch. 17.
12
David Hume, “Abstract of A Treatise of Human Nature”, in D. Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1978), 652
13
Voltaire, Candide, or Optimism; translated by Burton Raffel (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005)
14
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet; with an introduction by Robin Waterfield (London: Penguin, 2002), 30.
15
Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, (New York: Vintage Books, 1999) 44.
16
Ibid, 47.
 4
philosophy than Wilson attributes to it as we discover the role of the observer through quantum theory and the
interconnectedness of spacetime as per the theory of relativity. These are aspects of science that Wilson avoids
precisely because they uproot his notion of an objective, atomized and perceived universe. Wilson also goes
through great lengths to show how neuroscience can describe all emotions and responses as neurons firing, that
is to say as entirely physical procedures17. That is well and good, but as Nietsche puts it: “It is perhaps only
dawning on five or six minds that physics too is only an interpretation and arrangement of the world and not an
explanation of the world,”18 and
“Cause and effect, such a duality probably never occurs – in reality there stands before us a continuum
of which we isolate a few pieces… An intellect which saw cause and effect as a continuum and not, as we do, as
a capricious division and fragmentation, which saw the flux of events - - would reject the concept of cause and
effect and deny all conditionality.”19

While I have no doubt that physics can account for every phenomenon that has ever occurred, this is only a
description. The fact remains that what is of value are the experiences, not the post-fact explanations thereof;
that is to say that we ought to get back to having experiences as opposed to analyzing them. Wilson is also a
conservationist20, a fact that further illustrates his inability to integrate the notion of change. The environment is
currently undergoing drastic changes, not as a result of human action, but as a reflection of the collective
mindset/actions of our species at large acting in accordance with global and universal currents. If we are to
evolve, we must ride the waves of change. At this stage, the earth cannot revert to its original state, to end
climate change, we would need to change immediately and we know that won’t happen21. Might I propose that
we let that which must end do so? The industrial age is basically crumbling around itself; perhaps we might
consider that the planet is heating to facilitate a move to a way of life based on proper agricultural techniques
and life within the natural world. What we must do is adapt to a new way of life and a new mentality that
embraces change, subjectivity and the values associated with the female side of the binary. In clinging to the
ideals of the Enlightenment despite the new physics and in seeking to preserve the earth in a state that is most
convenient for the maintaining of our current living arrangements, Wilson establishes himself as incapable of
developing a relationship with the unknown . The result is pseudo-unity whereby the values of science are made
to be universally applicable even though they are fundamentally limited in scope as they can serve only a
descriptive role. The view of the universe as prescribed by the Enlightenment has withered for a reason. The
challenge will be not to return to these ideals, but to integrate our understanding of the world with the new
developments in physics and the various teachings of non-Western cultures that clearly indicate that the
subjective world has been dormant for too long.

In the quest for new systems of thought, we need not deviate from the Western world immediately. Carl
Jung wrote at a time when psychology was still a fledgling discipline. In order to ensure that his findings were
taken seriously, he approached the unconscious from an empiricist stance, which makes for thorough and
relevant writings on topics that would otherwise be rather daunting. This is reflected in his correspondences
with physicist Wolfgang Pauli. Together they discussed the nature of the acausal connecting principle termed
synchronicity to which Pauli contributed the idea of a relation between atoms and the self in that both operate
within the web of inter-subjectivity that comprises the universe.22 The principle depends on the relativity of
space and time as well as the role of the observer as per quantum theory. In classical physics, all occurrences are
quantifiable and reproducible. What relativity tells us is that time is relative to the densities of the objects

17
Ibid, 105-135.
18
Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Translated by R.J. Hollingdale (Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 1973), 14
19
Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Translated by Walter Kaufmanm (Random House, New York, 1974), 112.
20
Wilson, 291-326.
21
IPCC, 2007: Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the fourth
Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing team, Pachauri, R.K and Reisinger, A.
(eds.)] (IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, 2007), 43-48.
22
David Lindorff, Pauli and Jung: the meeting of two great minds (Wheaton, Ill.: Quest Books, 2004), 97-111.
 5
involved and because density is equitable with energy, it becomes a question of the energy levels inherent to a
scenario. Quantum theory tells us that the observer is as much a part of the phenomena as that which is being
observed. Hence the psychic state and the “external” event are intrinsically linked; they do not affect one
another, they are one another. Jung writes: “A content perceived by an observer can, at the same time, be
represented by an outside event, without any causal connection.”23 Expanding on this idea, Jung, like
contemporaries Richard Rorty and John Searle, suggests that we would need an entirely new language to
conceive of these new developments.24 25 26 The idea here is to illustrate how the mind/matter problem is
dissolving. In viewing them as separate, we not only devalue one but tacitly imply that we are isolated and
operating in an objective universe with fixed laws. In reality, the world is as we perceive and manifest it to be;
we are the current of life. This is not to say that it cannot be described accurately through empirical methods,
quite to contrary, my point is simply that this description is not the be all and end all of existence and that while
reason is a means to a representation, we cannot substitute precision for the experience itself.

Our society is dominated by a patriarchal worldview that has hitherto been unable to adequately care for
our planet, humanity and all living species. If Jung were to psychoanalyze the Western mind, I believe that he
would posit the problem in our inability to incorporate our female side. Jung describes the anima as the female
personification of the unconscious; the integration of which is essential to the mature and functional psyche. The
traits attributed to one whose anima assumes a negative role include: nihilism, lack of self worth, fear of disease,
impotence or accidents and the tendency to render life devoid of spontaneity and feeling as a result of excessive
intellectualization.27 Remarkable how well this characterizes the contemporary industrial age: meaningless,
fearful and wrapped the protective layers of a pre-fabricated ideology. When properly integrated, the anima
serves primarily as an intermediary between the logical mind and the collective unconscious when the former
falls short.28 This process would thereby hone our intuition and ability to experience sympathy and compassion
as well as dissimulate the boundary between the self and the other. Expressed in Jungian terms, this is the means
to our transformation as a species whereby the focus is placed on our own fluidity as we incorporate the
neglected side of the binary.

In an effort to segue from Jung into Taoism, an account of his essay “What we can learn from India” will
be included. Jung felt that Indians had retained a certain amount of “primitiveness” that afforded in turn
afforded them crucial insight. For one, they do not think so much as perceive thought. That is to say that the
process of reasoning is done unconsciously and what is perceived is the completed thought. Jung contrasts this
our notion of a concept whose Latin root means to take by grasping thoroughly.29 This decidedly linear and
imperial approach to ideas results from a split between the conscious and unconscious mind. Jung remarks that:
“It was a liberation from the burden of irrationality and instinctive impulse at the expense of the totality of the
individual… Thus we became highly disciplined, organized and rational on one side, but the other side remained
a suppressed primitive.”30 The term primitive is used to refer to the time before humans experienced the
separation of the conscious and the unconscious, when we existed as nature itself. This state is characterized by
an attunement to natural cycles, the realization that things do not have sharp boundaries, awareness of the
necessity and beauty of change and transformation etc. These themes are recurring in worldviews that have a
place for the anima; Taoists and the Maya are key examples.

23
C.G. Jung, Civilization in transition; translated by R.F.C. Hull (Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, c1970), 531.
24
C.G. Jung, Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, Translated by R.F.C Hull (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1973), 96.
25
Richard Rorty, Philosophy and Social Hope, (New York, N.Y.: Penguin, 1999), xviii.
26
John R. Searle, Mind: A Brief Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 108, 122, 126-132.
27
C.G. Jung, Man and his Symbols (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, c1964), 191.
28
Ibid, 193.
29
C.G. Jung, Civilization in transition; translated by R.F.C. Hull (Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, c1970), 524.
30
Ibid, 527.
 6
Taoism is among the most longstanding philosophical traditions that have succinctly and poetically
iterated a system based on the inherent wholeness of being. As mentioned, the new developments in science are
at last attuning us to what Taoists have intuited for hundreds of years. Classical learning relies on abstractions in
order to systematize and categorize the world. As a result, we have come to take our symbols for reality when
they are in fact only limited representations thereof. Newton’s model was revised upon the discovery of
“invisible” electric and magnetic forces. Likewise, the Tao Te Ching, which is essentially a meditation on the
nature of reality, opens with “The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao.”31 Because language is an
abstraction, there can be no words to describe the fundamental nature of reality. Every word is tacitly
establishing parameters; we use language to designate. Hence the idea that the Tao is beyond any framework we
could conceive of. The focus then is on direct experience and not second hand understanding. This ties in to the
concept of non-action. Far from a call for social apathy, non-action is the practice of letting all things take their
course and acting in accordance with our true selves. To try to shape reality is to have an ideal, an image to
strive for. In doing so we impose our will on reality, become attached to a certain state and garner expectations
that are ultimately detrimental as the fundamental nature of reality is change. If there is to be continuity, it must
come in the form of renewed acceptance of each moment. We posses the notion that the universe is static and
that we must act to shape it to our liking and posses it but as Einstein demonstrated, reality is a dynamic system,
buzzing with energy and necessitating the observer as part of our understanding.32 Thus the idea of non-action
becomes tangible in that we are ever manifesting reality not by building it, but by simply perceiving it. At the
sub-atomic level, particles can only be understood in relation to the whole, including the observing party.
Likewise, “All particles can be transmuted into other particles; they can be created from energy and can vanish
into energy,”33 and as the Tao states: “Each separate being in the universe returns to the common source.
Returning to the source is serenity.”34

The new physics and Taoism also converge on the issue of the dissolution of opposites. Capra writes:
“At the atomic level, matter has a dual aspect: it appears as particles and as waves… We can never say that an
atomic particle exists at a certain place, nor can we say that it does not exist.”35We can only discuss atomic
particles in terms of probabilities and tendencies where acknowledging their complimentary nature becomes the
key to unraveling the uncertainty principle. Laozi writes: “Stay at the center of the circle… What difference
between yes and no?”36 Indeed, the whole text revolves around this idea of centrality and the interplay of
opposites. By allowing all to be that which it is, we attain a measure of freedom unimaginable to those who
would endeavor to hold to only one side of the spectrum. By removing duality, we remove judgments and so
notions like beautiful and ugly, which are fundamentally co-dependant, fade. “The unnamable is the eternally
real. Naming is the origin of all particular things.”37 The hierarchization that arises when we view things as
separate is at the root of all discrimination and intolerance. The Tao basically calls for us to trust our inner
vision and not put constraints on the world. In doing so, we remove the constraints from ourselves and can
experience the wonder of our true nature, which is beyond such abstractions as good and evil.

Taoism and the general theory of relativity also coincide in terms of the power of high energy/density
entities to attract like bodies. This becomes a key notion in terms of non-action in that when we cease
experiencing desire, all we need is granted. “When a country obtains great power, it becomes like the sea: all
streams run downward to it.”38 Likewise, Einstein’s theory forced us to rework our conception of gravity. It
would seem that large bodies like stars and planets don’t exert a gravitational pull per se. Instead, they create a
31
Laozi, Tao Te Ching, Translated by Stephen Mitchell (New York, NY: HarperPerennial, 1992), 1.
32
Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics (London: Flamingo, 1982), 52-81.
33
Ibid, 80.
34
Laozi, 16.
35
Capra, 151.
36
Laozi, 20-21.
37
Ibid, 1.
38
Ibid, 61.
 7
curve in the fabric of space-time that would look something like a bowling ball on a mattress. Gravity is not a
constant external force; it is the very fabric of reality bending around high-density objects that causes bodies to
become enmeshed in their energy fields. As matter is energy, a person or state can have the same effect and so
non-action becomes the process of unconsciously and effortlessly attracting that which is ready to enter our
energy fields. This is a key notion in that we must forget how to do and remember how to be.

The Maya provide a view of reality that is very difficult for the Western mind to grasp as we have come
to view time in such a linear fashion that any other approach strikes us as absurd. What the Maya believe is that
time is not separate from the universe and us. Time, for the Maya, is the unfolding of our evolutionary process.
Each day is a manifestation of our evolution. The Mayan word for day, time and sun are the same. Hence our
experiences, evolution itself and the source of life are one. Before extrapolating further, I will provide an
account of the Mayan calendar. Essentially, this age is divided into 13 periods, known as B’ak’tuns, of 395
years. Beginning August 11th 3114 BCE, each B’ak’tun has certain characteristics that describe the phase of
evolution they correspond to. We are in the final B’ak’tun that began around the time of Galileo and is
characterized by a duality consciousness.39 3114 BCE is around the time of the first writings in Sumer and in
many ways, this was also the beginning of the separation between objectivity and subjectivity in that ideas took
on a life of their own, independent from their proponents. The Mayans also divided the time from the Big Bang
onwards into 9 parts, each of which gets progressively shorter as they build upon each other and we evolve at a
faster rate. The Maya also had a 260-day calendar that was based on two cycles of 20 and 13 signs respectively
known as the Tzolk’in. This count was used to distinguish each particular day as having a certain energy that
was influenced by a number from 1-13 and one of twenty god signs.40 While I do not wish to enter a discussion
of Mayan prophecies and apocalypse theories, time must be devoted to illustrating how the Mayan conception
of time could inform our own. Essentially, the Maya do not view time as a separate ticking clock; time is the
evolution of consciousness itself. They also posited that world events were shaped by our evolutionary currents,
as the planet itself is in fact part of the global ecosystem that includes humans. This view is upheld in the book
“The Conscious Universe” that puts forth the idea that nature is a symbiotic organism that is perpetually
negotiating as opposed to a set of competing parts.41 We have created time and now it controls us because it runs
separately. If time had been understood as growth, we may have ended up with a more holistic outlook that
accepted change as a necessary process that demands celebration. Instead, we view change as an inconvenience
because it causes us to adapt, which is ultimately not cost efficient or as they say: time is money. For the Maya,
each day carried a lesson and represented an opportunity to flourish and attune the self to the rhythm of change.
To us, it is a period whereby a set number of deeds can be accomplished. We view time as a linear model that
ultimately reified our vision where as the Maya saw today as integrally linked to every other day that has ever
been and will be. Again we see how the binary comes into play as the Maya incorporated distinctly female
cycles like those of the moon and Venus42 as opposed to our reliance on the sun, the ultimate symbol of reason.

The Maya believed that the cycle of B’ak’tuns and the nine-step cycle would come to a close sometime
around what we would call October of 2011 CE.43 Theirs was possibly the only calendar with an end because
they calculated a point whereby an entirely new phase of evolution would take place, one that is had evolved
from the dualist consciousness of the last B’ak’tun. Whether one takes these predictions seriously or not is of no
importance though I nevertheless feel we are on the verge of major changes. In terms of ethics, this will mean
eliminating the distinction between self and other and recognizing that, as a species, we are one with the earth
and all its inhabitants as we share both origins and destination. The new mentality has already begun to pervade
the field of science though there are those who would cling to the old ways who must ultimately become part of

39
Carl Johan Calleman, The Mayan calendar and the transformation of consciousness (Rochester, Vt.: Bear & Co., c2004),
50-57.
40
Jon-Poz Molesky, Contemporary Maya spirituality (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006), 132-153.
41
Kafatos, Menas & Robert Nodeau. The Conscious Universe. (New York: Spring-Verlag, 2000)
42
Prudence Rice, Maya Calendar Origins, (Austin : University of Texas Press, 2007), 192.
43
Calleman, 61.
 8
the evolutionary process as the world is reinterpreted according to holism and not reductionism. In terms of
environmentalism, I feel as though the challenge will not be to preserve our way of life by reducing emissions
but to let the old ways die and use the changes that have been brought about as means to simplify our return to
nature. We may appear as isolated beings, bodies in motion, fragmented and self-interested but the reality is that
we are the voices with which the world spirit sings and whether we work for good or evil is entirely
inconsequential. My only real suggestions are that we learn to embrace transformations, view everything as
fluid and renewed each day and recognize that we are beings of love. Our success in this regard is also of
secondary importance as the planet will regulate itself and we are certainly not powerful enough to resist its
evolution. However, we can begin to retune ourselves to the earth’s needs by embracing our feminine elements
and allowing our intuition to guide us. As the Tao suggests: “See the world as your self. Have faith in the way
things are. Love the world as your self, then you can care for all things.”44

44
Laozi, 13.
 9

Calleman, Carl Johan. The Mayan calendar and the Transformation of Consciousness Rochester, Vt.: Bear &
Co., c2004.

Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics. London: Flamingo, 1982.

Descartes, Rene. Discourse on Method. Translated and edited by Laurence J. Lafleur. Indianapolis and New
York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1956.

Euripides. Bacchae. Translated, with an introduction and notes, by Paul Woodruff. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub.
Co., c1998.

Gibran, Kahlil. The Prophet. London: Penguin, 2002.

Hans, Seigfried. “Autonomy and Quantum Physics: Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Heisenberg,” Philosophy of
Science, Vol. 57, No. 4 (Dec., 1990): pp. 619-630.

Hume, David. “Abstract of A Treatise of Human Nature”, in D. Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature. New York:
Oxford University Press, 1978.

IPCC, 2007: Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the fourth
Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing team, Pachauri,
R.K and Reisinger, A. (eds.)] IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, 2007.

Jung, C.G. Civilization in transition; translated by R.F.C. Hull. Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, c1970.

Jung, C.G. Man and his Symbols. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, c1964.

Jung, C.G. Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, Translated by R.F.C Hull. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1973.

Lao tzu. Tao Te Ching. Translated by Stephen Mitchell. New York, NY: HarperPerennial, 1992.

Lindorff, David. Pauli and Jung: the meeting of two great minds. Wheaton, Ill.: Quest Books, 2004.

Locke, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Vol I. New York: Dover, 1959.

Menas, Kafatos & Robert Nodeau. The Conscious Universe. New York: Spring-Verlag, 2000.

Molesky, Jon-Poz. Contemporary Maya Spirituality. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006.

Nietzsche, Friederich. Beyond Good and Evil, Translated by R.J. Hollingdale. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth,
1973.

Nietzsche, Friederich. The Gay Science, Translated by Walter Kaufmanm. Random House, New York, 1974.

Plato. Symposium. translated by Benjamin Jowett. New York: Tudor Publishing Company, 1993.

Rice, Prudence. Maya Calendar Origins. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2007.

Rorty, Richard. Philosophy and Social Hope. New York, N.Y.: Penguin, 1999.
 10
Searle, John R. Mind: A Brief Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Voltaire. Candide, or Optimism; translated by Burton Raffel. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005.

Wilson, Edward O. Consilience The Unity of Knowledge. New York: Vintage Books, 1999.