Crystal Cave of the Giants, Chihuahua, Mexico.
All of my science-speak has only one problem: it sounds bad. People do not like the word "Science", since it sounds too much like a religion, and that without smells and bells. "Atheism" sounds harsh and loveless. None of these words suffices to explain who I am.
I want something that derives from data locuta causa finita, but appeals to the finer senses. I want a word that implies logos, but includes mythos as well. I want to operate blessedly free of the gods, devoted to scientific inquiry, but open to spirituality.
Now by spirituality, I mean the "sense of the sacred". Example: "Crystals are so spiritual, aren't they?" (New Age store attendant, Brookline, MA, ca. 1987). How can a rock be spiritual? It is a feeling of sacredness, of a pattern, a meaning in the apparent chaos of life.
What we call spirituality is a sense that there is a pattern to things, that life has meaning. This explains the persistence of religion in a scientific age: religion offers a pattern, order out of chaos, eternal meaning in our tiny, shaky life.
We hate chaos and seek pattern because we want consistency, predictability, permanence: survival. We are willing to believe all sorts of things in order to survive.
What word adores science but does not despise mystery, beauty, and spirituality? What characterizes the mental processes of my lifetime? Free thought. I'm a freethinker.
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