This is a science joke:
A student riding on a train asks professor Einstein: What is the next station that stops for this train?
When I was 10 years old the family took a long car trip to California. At one point my totally bored and wandering mind wondered: Is the car moving or is the world moving and the car is standing still? Suddenly there was a paradigm shift and I really perceived that the car was standing still and the road was rushing by!
Immediately it was a fascinating perception but just as quickly it became disorienting. I did not want to look at the road side rushing by. It was almost dizzying. I closed my eyes and got back to the normal way of looking at things.
Later however I slipped back into viewing the road as rushing by again, the car standing still. In school there was a time when we were all giving each other the cross-eyed look. Some could do it easier than others. I practiced in front of a mirror but others could do it better and easier than me. One day some kid said he heard that a kid was doing the cross-eyed look and his eyes got stuck there. I didn't even try to do the look after that.
I tried the perception shift while driving when I was older. It was still disconcerting, especially when driving. I try not to even think about it for fear that I could not get back from the perception unless I stopped the car. That was never necessary because I have not had that perception shift for 50 years but I could at any time that I willed it.
What if I had a perception shift while driving that I could not shift back to normal even after stopping the car. Scary thought. Like wanting to jump off a cliff. I don't go to the edge. Might my new glass floor have some greater meaning? Hmmmm…..! I can remain fixed in space….although the perception is that nothing holds me. Like the water trick referenced toward the end of this comment?
Its relative. The relation of the moving thing to the fixed thing. Which one is moving, which one is fixed? Conceptually we can exchange the roles of constant and variable to make a thing either one or the other. Fixed or moving in relationship to another thing.
I believe that somehow, by nature or nurture, people acquire a frame of reference that assigns relative degrees of conceptual relationships between two things in terms of which one may move and the related one that may not. In a situation where the fixed concept is rigidly static and by self belief (perception or deception) does not, will not, cannot and never will move, other concepts related to it are all in motion. In motion around it, related to it. I think and feel that all things are relative depending on how we look at it. Some ways are better than others depending on the things involved and the circumstances. Choose the best way, the best thoughts, because thoughts become things. For others, relative morality is not morality.
Extending my thoughts another step based on this idea: Some people tend to focus more on what is conceptually the "moving" (the verb) or movement between two objects (subject noun and object noun in a conceptual phrase that are joined together by the action invoked by the verb) . In this way of looking at things the two objects are secondarily perceived as being involved in the movement which is the main focus of attention. The movement of the players on the field. What if the field of play moved and the players stood still?
Other people tend to focus on the nouns in a conceptual phrase structure with the verb invoking action simply doing yeoman work in joining the two nouns together. The verb doing something that another verb might also do as well or better. The specific verb used in any situation is transient in connecting any two conceptual or physical object things. The two things are the persistent objects left after the verb does its work of joining them somehow by indicating an action between them. The players that are still on the field after a play is made. We like the action but cling to things that last. Actions are functions of time.
Sound like grammar structure?
No, I am talking about thinking structure. It might take a mental shift for you to see that. If you have an agile mind, if you ever saw the world coming at you while the car stood still you can do it. Like crossing eyes, some are better than others. If the world shifts however and you can't get back to your original normal view have you created a new norm or are you stranded? Hmmmm….it all depends on how you look at it? Looking back or looking forward maybe? Stranded only if there is not a next step going forward when there is no step going back. Stuck in place, a bad place if there is no way ahead or back. On the other hand a good place to rest and enjoy? I can rest for awhile but I always look to the next best thing, place and journey to get there.
The world shifted for me when I looked at money as a thing that stands still and does not move. There are only two things: Money and the account that it is in. The way that 99% look at money is that it moves from account to account. Just like it used to move from hand to hand. We do not do "hand to hand" movement of money much anymore. It is all account to account. In either case money moves. It comes and goes. Slips through our fingers. The language is rich in idioms, metaphors, jokes about money moving. Easy come, easy go. That is the way we look at money just like we look at the passing scenery.
I can shift my mind to make money stand still in relation to an account full of money. Most people perceive an account as the conceptual bucket (safe?) holding the money flowing in and out. My perception is that the buckets money is in are changing. The money did not move. Same money same place only the bucket changed.
Water trick here. Since I am talking about buckets of money like a glass full of water. Rather amazing one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmi9TAYlLgc
Amazing! Water is not supposed to do that. We never looked at water that way! What exactly was amazing? The container/water relationship changed. It was reversed from our normal perception and became one where the water was the constant fixed thing and the container was variable (variable to the extent of being present or non present). We never looked at water that way. That is why it is so amazing. Water cannot stand on its own......It is a dependent object, it depends on its container. Breaking that dependency means that it flows. Well, flowing is a verb concept and there is a different verb concept at play when the water does not flow, it remained fixed if the container is taken away. Actually it is in a new container called thin air. The container changed.
Beautiful! Elegant! Almost spiritual in nature! The idea of water having variable containers and the containers changing not the water is so novel. Why did we not look at it that way before. Thin air is just another variable container related to a fixed unit of water. New concept? No just a different way of looking at water. Have you ever looked at a raindrop that way while walking in the rain? Maybe poets do naturally. Most others focus on what it does when it hits our head. The verb action in the equation relationship.
Possession ownership of money by changing the name of a current owner (account) on a single fixed unit of money, a digital serialized one dollar, in one fixed place is what changes in a money transaction. A new way of looking at things. The old way remains: Money transactions move money in total amounts from fixed accounts to new fixed accounts. Both can work together. The advantage? It is a system relationship that can be controlled to make money serve us better in organizing our economics, our society and our world. A balance that does not exist today that would enable us to progress to the next step. Otherwise we are stuck.
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