Cosmos and Psyche

	Book review on Metaphysics and the Cosmic Order by Milne, Joseph (2008) Reviewed by David Lorimer, 2008
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With a foreword by HRH the Prince of Wales and an introduction by the late John O'Donohue, these lectures given to the Temenos Academy form a seminal contribution to the philosophical debate of our times. As Philip Sherrard pointed out in his book 'Human Image, World Image' our view of the cosmos is reflected in our view of ourselves. As Joseph Milne puts it, 'the manner in which a civilisation conceives the cosmos fundamentally informs every other aspect of its life and culture.' Hence, 'the real problem lies in the circumscribed view of reality that prevails in our age...the narrow mechanistic view runs contrary to the felt mystery of things.' This is the underpinning metaphysical diagnosis which applies to many of our problems. Significantly, in the light of recent news, Milne comments that technology is neither a problem or solution to a problem - this is like 'blaming a knife for committing a murder.' Legislating against knife culture addresses the symptom rather than the underlying cause.

The key hypothesis running through the book is that there are three distinct categories or modes of thinking: religious or mystical, philosophical and empirical. They are discrete levels of apprehension and understanding, organised in a hierarchical order. Much of the philosophical confusion of our time arises from failing to make these distinctions. By the religious he means 'the revelatory, sacred Presence in all things, the disclosure of the creative realm as an act within the mind of God.' The philosophical level is about the metaphysical understanding or contemplation of the essence of reality, including epistemology and ontology as well as teleology. The empirical is the realm of observational and inferential deduction of the laws and nature of visible reality. These are distinctive moods of orientation towards reality or engagement with the cosmos.

A key distinction lost in much modern scientific right is that between philosophy and empiricism. It is philosophy that reflects upon knowledge and meaning: 'science cannot investigate the meaning of science or the nature of knowing.' Scientism singularly fails to make this distinction, assuming the truth of a materialistic outlook without calling it into question. All writing about science contains a philosophical element, which should be made explicit. Such insights go back at least as far as the pioneering work of E.A Burtt in the 1920s on the metaphysical foundations of modern science.

Milne puts forward four propositions: that mind or consciousness is already connected with everything, that all things are in communion with all other things, that all things disclose their nature as an act of being, and that man is called to bear witness to the truth of things. These propositions link in with the emerging science of conscious interconnectedness referred to in my review of the Fenwicks' book elsewhere in this issue. The sharp distinction between mind and matter, man and nature, subjective and objective has cut off our sense of participation in the larger scheme of things. It has created a schism 'between things known and the mind that knows', which also had the interesting consequence of shifting human orientation (and concepts of God) away from being and towards the mastery of the will over things. Hence, Milne argues, 'the will to power, utilitarianism, pluralism, relativism and so on are all bound up with the alienated, self-imposed human subject', who is disconnected from the subject', who is disconnected from the cosmos. However, we are in the

with the new sense of belonging. This will shift our orientation from mastery towards harmony and bring in a new philosophy of nature more resonant with the kosmos of ancient Greece than Christian narrative of fall and redemption.

The mystical mode corresponds to Bonaventure's eye of contemplation, where the philosophical eye represents reason, and the eye of sense empiricism. Here the category of being is central since 'it is at once known and yet unfolding itself to human knowledge.' Milne's formulations reflect those of Meister Eckhart where there is not only no distinction between the object known and the subject knowing but 'the knowing agent is God himself in the soul, not the soul knowing God. It is God's own knowledge of himself that is communicated to the soul. This is an inside-out statement at the empirical level but one which is well attested by mystics throughout the ages. When these insights are translated down from mysticism to philosophy they become propositional belief systems to be assessed by reason alone, thus creating the modern dichotomy between empirical science and religious belief.

The last lecture is concerned with the loss and recovery of metaphysics, and contains an important moral insight based on the way in which 'nature has ordained all things in such a way that each human being has a unique part to play in the natural flowering of society.' The consequence of this is of inestimable importance: that 'the good of the whole and the good of the individual reinforce and sustain one another.' This is no mere invisible hand, but rather an understanding of how the individual forms part of the whole and the many are related to the One. A new philosophy of an interconnected cosmos can provide a social framework of participation and belonging. Milne goes even further by arguing that 'there is a correlation between the depth of communal understanding and the flowering of civilisation.' Government ministers are unlikely to address knife crime by calling for a new understanding of metaphysics, but this enormously important book highlights the connection and invites us to address the crisis of our civilisation by considering the consequences of its cosmic outlook.

 

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