D. Ryan Foster: Imagination as a form of Measurement

4/27/08-- Inspired by Wendell Berry and class discussion

Wendell Berry was discussing the difficulties involved in the term Nature Poetry and the class was addressing this section at the behest of Dr. Redick. But as we looked into the concept of encountering nature beyond appreciating or experiencing and immersion and the necessity of imagination, many were lost along the way. In hashing out the details the comparison to science and its objectivity arose and the inherent flaws of science as capable of understanding but not capable of being immersed as it is anathema to objectivity. And at the same time immersion in a subject lends to being unable to comprehend as removing oneself from the constant flow of moments is necessary in order to establish reason and order and to consider and make abstract what is real. So a balance is required to be established. However, we have a serious problem in that the human mind does not experience or encounter without definition. Everything gains its label and descriptions as we fight to establish order to a chaotic series of events. Science has it easy as they simply invent the language of math to describe the objective quantities and define boundaries in the medium of measurements where their mathematic language of symbols and numbers convey meanings. But to the subjective and the ultimately real experience we rely on other functions in order to define as without stepping back and becoming objective there is no way of conveying meaning while encountering the moment. We communicate in the language of ideas but the medium for that is not exact and universal as math, a human invention. Those in the moment not observing it must rely on interpreting those ideas and the necessity to that interpretation is the imagination. In a since as a chemist measures concentrations of minerals in molarities we measure the concentrations of traits and ideas in others by what we imagine them to be based on input from variables just as the chemist determines molarity from the volume and the mass of the compound involved. This idea that I imagine you a certain way and that is not you yourself nor is my imagination of myself going to be the same as your imagination of me and as such it requires continuous input to update our imaginations of each other and interpretation of the world about us. This measurement system that equates to liters and inches is appropriate in its inconsistency and requirement of incongruity as it is most useful to those who operate within the ever changing moments of the world and can be adjusted on the fly so as not demanding the removal of oneself from that streaming flow.

While I don't particularly want to harp upon or hearken back to my former entries about the idea of a pilgrim for the sake of being a pilgrim, but the idea of expanding thought not through measurement of science but through imagination appeals to the pilgrim in that he functions in incongruous space and knowledge and it is only appropriate that he use such a morphic and subjective measurement while in that travel space and outside the flow of moving time.