Perennialism

This is Rusholme in the dark. It's been like that at night for many years, and I have many memories of it, both happy recent ones and from 30 years ago. In so many ways, nothing changes. Perhaps it's a bit more fun now. 

There's been a discussion online about perennial philosophy. Aldous Huxley wrote a book about it in 1947.  Perennialism is about permanence and continuity - about what stays the same. Love stays the same: there's a nice quote by Rumi in Huxley's book: "The astrolabe of the mysteries of God is love."

Scientifically and biologically, what stays the same is the fertilised egg. We phenotypes have to adapt in many different ways to different worlds. When I first knew Rusholme, there was no internet. But life began in the same way, driven by love. Bill Miller says it's driven by "preference". I can agree, but I think preference is really "order" and order is fundamental to perception. Perception is an order-seeking process.

What Ekhardt says here could be said of the zygote:

This identity out of the One into the One and with the One is  the source and fountainhead and breaking forth of glowing love.

What does an organism - you and me - do by way of expressing this? We seek order in our perception, enact preferences. On rare occasions in my life I can't tell if the universe selects my preferences for me.  Epigenetically, the results of our seeking are carried back to the zygote, to the unity. The agency of an individual seems to be coloured by the cosmos. And life goes on by maintaining stability.

We worry about our mortality. But not every part of us dies. The microbiome and necrobiome among other things, may be a vehicle for life after death. What if were to wipe ourselves out in a nuclear conflict?  Something of life is likely to be retained - something perennial survives. Love, as preference, perception and order, survives.