Physical reality requires no upkeep,
whereas man’s self-made second reality must have constant story-telling to survive.
The natural operations of the physical world are not dependent on man; not the planet’s rotation, not the laws of gravity or thermodynamics, not the process of photosynthesis. They exist completely apart from any story-telling/explanations by man, but the other world and reality in which man simultaneously lives, the second, non-tangible world of culture, has no existence other than his story-telling.
From the passing human view, the physical world is permanent. The planet on which you live –the universe itself – was here when you arrived, and will be here when you depart. Left untouched, the conditions of the physical world outside of man are, relative to him, unchanging (the mountains, oceans, forests), but in his second reality is no permanency. Boulders are stable but story-telling is not. The atmosphere outside of man is steady while that inside him, anything but.
Consciousness = thinking and thinking = story-telling:
Story-telling is fluid and unfixed, and without this characteristic, consciousness would serve no purpose; its ability to think of the otherwise permanent conditions of the physical world in unrestrained, story-telling terms, is what makes possible man’s manipulations thereof to his benefit. No story-telling = no progress; no story-telling = no civilization to begin with.
If thought did not consist entirely of story-telling about man’s environment, as opposed to totally programmed physical reactions to the environment, man would be living a life not substantially different from other animals, simply taking the conditions of life as they come. But by having the inner talent of story-telling, man’s brain is able to imagine natural conditions in unnatural poses, and pass the pictures to his muscles who can turn dreams into reality.
J,