Theos-Talk Archives (August 1995 Message tl00144)

>According to LIESEL@delphi.com: > Dear Brenda,

>> I don't agree with you that the consciousness of animals is
unrecognizably different from ours. I base my view mainly on my
having now lived for 12 years in close proximity to a cat. She
works on a more primitive plane, but it must be similar to mine,
because I've learned to recognize the signals. Coming for a
little pat means" I love you" (which is rather synonymous with
"I'm hungry". Rubbing noses like an Eskimo is just plain "I love
you".When she nips, it means "I'm scared". When she shakes her
front paw it means "I don't like that". When she sits by the
front door gazing at me solefully, it means "I want to go for a
little walk".

>Dear Liesel--

>I endorse your view 100%, and based on recent acquaintance with
critters supposedly "lower" in consciousness than cats:
cockatiels and guinea pigs.

I'm glad you two have so much fun with your animals. Who said an
animal's consciousness is so different? I said I had reached a
state of consciousness in which the idea of being at one time an
animal seemed ridiculous. If it is true that I (as everyone
does) exist in all of these inner realms of which I have no
direct way of knowing or communicating my knowledge to others,
isn't it possible that a human being is complex enough to permit
its several (take three for example) parts to behave differently?
One part of me - the mind and senses (or Logos) is definitely
involved in a progressive development. Isn't it possible to stop
identifying yourself with your material existence? Aren't we made
up of principles, such as atma-buddhi which is for the first time
responsively involved in our material world existence? If being
human is experiencing life under a ray of atma, then why is it so
foolish to associate myself with this and not with everything
that has happened before somewhere? Where was this atma before?
Locked within the Monad. Once it had been drawn forth and then
appeared in a new position (as a bead on a string), my identity
lied and continues to lie there. Atma was not similarly in
existence with animals.

Logos can go its own way, I'm not concerned. What I perceive as
myself is not totally divorceable from Logos, only partly. I
mean if I am three-fold, couldn't those parts work separately? My
body is blessed by the association of the Logos. My soul is new
and temporary and something that will perish. My spirit has
changed its nature in a way that will never allow it to change
back again. Once something has changed irreversibly, is it
necessary to extend its existence back to its former state? This
is a new entity, changed so drastically as to have no connection
to its former existence.