(from Zodiac)
Tying together preceding themes without forming a Gordian knot is fairly tricky, so keeping it somewhat short..
The Dionysian urge in modernity is distinctly absent, so we have the false Apollo, or the illusion of moving forward into the future (a perpetual vanishing-point of technique.)
The psyche is joined to the proportionate rhythms of the body by a sense of the primitive. The origin of things is primitive, and so one looks to the past rather than the future.
Primitive origins, or the egg, have a certain childish simplicity. Now, as a hypothesis, everything from the point of view of Earth is to do with opposites. Everything going away from Earth is approaching the vanishing-point (or an illusion.)
Earth is found (formed) at a focal-point of opposites (sun/moon). Not exactly original thinking, but the other point is that words lose their meaning when used capriciously in the pursuit of an illusion. It's a dark psychology of compulsive distortion of natural rhythms (by the ego.)
The non-capricious use of words is to accept that luck - Fortune - exists and to just go with it. If there is a psychic reality, it affects the free-form motion of the body in active pursuits (games, hunting.)
Fortune frees the mind and body from distortions of natural rhythm. The muscles operate in antagonist pairs; the action is graceful, not logical.
Pulp futures go into the past more often than not, as is the case with Dumarest's medieval-style houses and feuds.
.. These internal conflicts echo his impact on the people around him. He's attractive to women (because rugged bad boy) but they know they can't keep him and their family disapprove. He's a potential ally in local conflict.. but - since he has no local network - politically and socially weak when he takes sides. (Page, Blackgate.)
In some ways Tubb is a Darwinian writer of survival, but if the body is itself primitive (by origin), this changes the way one sees it. Instead of forever going into the future, survival has to balance with the traditions of the past - and it is pretty savage.
On a similar tack, I had another tooth problem, this time on the other side of the face. The pain was bad but I held on and it took over a week to subside. In other words, the body if left to its own devices can be strong enough to protect you.
This argument comes into Dumarest. One shouldn't carry it to absurd conclusions, but to experience pain is an acceptance of bodily strength. One has to take the rough with the smooth.
EVERY TIME I CRYYoutu.be/CFMz9DOhaJ8
To be rough and tough is to also be calm and joyful (full of spirit). The hypothesis is that modernity is heading in exactly the opposite direction: into a future that is not balanced or antagonistic.
This future is an illusion of the ego. It doesn't exist, hence the present confusion. Without the psyche, all that we have is personality. Putin is falling into the same trap as America in Afghanistan: the idea that technological might is everything.
It's an illusion without the psychic dimension of rebellion, antagonism, the ancient cities and beliefs. Rebellion is strong and conveys a type of rough harmony. Tyranny is ok if one can rebel.
With technology one has to believe, so it's worse than any religion, a type of ultimate tyranny of the mind. One can't have non-believers, and this probably harks back to the invention of the transistor or first semiconductor post war.
This instigated the cybernetic era, and therefore we are in variable time (GPS). One is then bound to believe in an electric-green future which is always tending to electricity (cybernetics or variable time.)
This is the future of the Amazon House (see Babcock Ranch TofF2). But without the antagonism of rough living (Shanghai pig manure) there can be no revival. The physical situation of revival from decay imbues a psychic strength.
If Earth is the focal-point of opposites, then this is the reason it's no illusion. We see infinity around us: to approach it would be illusory (variable time.) It's a concept (Dr Strange).
The pseudo-future we see has no physical antagonism; no roughness, harshness, pain, and therefore no revival and no psychic strength.