SPACE OF KNOWLEDGE

In this sense, presence is the passage from not knowing to knowing. So knowledge is being created, at every moment. In every interaction. Through activity.

There can be found a lot of different notions and concepts of “time”; this term is used in many ways — not necessarily always in connection with clocks.

Very often it is associated with terms like “past”, “presence”, and “future”. These may apply to a certain point at the time scale defined by clocks. But the underlying concept they refer to does not generally imply exact measuring; it is not about distinct periods of time.

Sometimes past and future are just kind of directions, seen from a certain spot, the time being, the presence, now. But in general, there is meant to exist an essential distinction, the two terms referring to completely different qualities.

There is an intimate relation to knowledge: the past is principally known (or at least knowable), while the future is generally (still) unknown.

If everything changes continually between to be and not to be, between on and off, then the idea of completely different (“parallel”, so to speak) times is anything but absurd.

The gap is not, it does not exist, it just becomes effective as a transition from one state to another. (Existence itself, the flow of time, therefore cannot be but continuous.) Observed from another time continuum that pulses in a totally different rhythm, however, a lot of time may have passed between those different states. Or several periods are wholly skipped.

The same pulsation that appears as the constant ticking of clocks defining the time in one continuum may perform in another time continuum a complex rhythmic pattern. If ever; perhaps it will never be recognizable as anything regular; maybe there is absolutely nothing.

A thing does not appear but in its interactions. These determine its existence, its extent, its space. And its time: every interaction, every appearance of a thing, is a new moment in time.

Time is determined by the pulsation of the things, their waxing and waning. All things come into being every moment anew. They appear, they interact with other things. Without that they would never exist.

In order to be, things must renew themselves continually, they must arise again and again. Their potential wakes up, they become active, they appear. But then they vanish again. They give up themselves — for the sake of becoming, for the sake of being.

Space is a structured space of knowledge, knowledge expresses itself as activity, it bears things — and vanishes into space anew.

All that is perceivable and recognizable appears as a thing. Things gather and distribute. They are center and source of power and activity. Their pulsation keeps the world going. And together.

Every sign is the invitation to grasp its sense, to turn the key and enter the secret chamber. It intends to lead us to do the right things, to realize its message.

Every being bears such a secret.

Every thing is the door to a new world.

Mathematics is learned by learning the correct use of the mathematical terms. In this sense, these are and have always been coded instructions, programs.

In the natural sciences we are used to structure the spaces of knowledge mathematically. We search for mathematical formulas showing us how things belong together.

This practice has developed in the course of time. Mathematics was reckoned to be the optimum way to express absolutely reliable knowledge. It is made of simple graphical symbols. Combined into rows, drawn on a flat surface, these are in line with the standard lay-out of texts, which are probably the most widespread means to store and convey knowledge.

Mathematics lines up there, even though it often blocks the normal text flow. In general, mathematical terms are separated from verbal expressions, if possible, and gathered into their own systems of equations and the like. Their meaning is grasped, with few additional words, if ever, by insiders, who have learned to handle those formulas the right way.

Physical formulas and models represent spaces of knowledge. These are structured in a way that allows them to link the relevant data closely together. The distances between the data thus become very short and are done almost automatically. That way, corresponding events can be predicted fast and easily, while in reality, they procede crucially slower, taking much more effort.

Knowledge comprises different things, it comprehends the similarities between them, the common pattern, makes it fixed, makes something of it, a thing.

For that, the different parts are pushed together. This may, at first, be a laborious action, yet, eventually, it becomes a matter of course, an automatism, a spontaneous coincidence. So that, in the end, the different elements come to lie directly side by side.

Still, for all others, not engaged in this process and thus not gaining this knowledge, nothing changes with the original constellation.

So different spaces (of knowledge) coexist. Without bordering each other.

The human reality is determined by social habits and joint activities. It is carried and formed by the language and many other media, which are made, in the main, for human interactivity. Language, knowledge, and, last but not least, reality, are social phenomena.

Whether or not we want to — we are forced to look even at the non-human reality through the eyes that we have got, eyes that are focussed on human relations and interactions.

And, in fact, we can see ourselves reaching much further than expected. The scope of our kinship is much larger than initially realized.

Indentifying ourselves with humanity rather than with more limited concepts like nations or so may already be a step forward; however, in the end it is just as artificial and limited.

Differentiation is characteristic of knowledge as we know it, definitely. But much more of the essence is that what the distinct things have in common. To consolidate this, sometimes differentiation is appropriate — though still remaining just a secondary function, a product, not the very base of knowledge.

Knowing relies on conventions of doing. We learn to apply our knowledge rightly: then we have really got it.

Verbal as well as visual expressions of knowledge serve as anchor points that make it easier for us to recapitulate the right actions. Yet, they may become an end in themselves, in case that our business is almost totally about such symbols. In this way complex constructions get built, self-contained artificial worlds.

These virtual realities gather our activity and transmit the resulting energy to everyone functioning as part of them. This makes those artificial realities become real. They provide us with all we need and give us access to all the other levels of reality.

Looking for knowledge mostly means to look for a suitable model of the real world that offers suggestions about the best course of actions to us, according to our needs and the given circumstances.

Such a model can be communicated and jointly developed, thus enabling us to gather our forces and act as a whole — albeit with a certain delay and usually with frictional losses.

That’s the way explicit knowledge works.

Every image of the world is actively created. Even the seemingly passive sensory perception is actually active. As well as every scientific measurement. So that all that we know about the world is basically a construction.

All reality is constructed. We make it real.