Going Japanese, the Zen of Universal spirit is the unthinking wildness of Journey; the refined culture of Byron recited in a log cabin round about the lakes in Michigan.
Spiritual rhythm justifies the information that proves of value to tillers of the soil and farmer-poets of yore – Diosthenes (). Spirit meaning the sort of interplay between life and death at a deep level.
There are those who say Zen is found in quanta in the theories of great mathematicians, but I think that is misguided. If you go back to Einstein’s quote
“As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.”
It conceivably refers to the uncertainty principle of quantum physics. If nature were mathematically certain then it would be composed of numbers – as AI is. It’s no great surprise that’s not the case, and one could say that uncertainty is just a manifestation of the flexible, springy nature of reality (HB147)
Bruce Lee said to be flexible (in a fighting style) is to be without routine. To be perfectly responsive and in time. Otherwise, one is not acting in the reality of time, but in the predetermined order of routine.
Lee said there are two sides to reality, and they cannot be reconciled: “a wild beast and a robot.” Mathematics is the robotic side of this equation; the wild beast is something like the Chinese Dragon that weaves and tumbles in crazy motion.
Without the dragon, the zest of living is lost to science. If nature has an innate flexibility (uncertainty), then any mathematical theory – such as quanta – will fall outside the uncertainty.
This can be called luck – fortune, which Byron said
I have always believed that all things depended upon Fortune, and nothing upon ourselves.
Luck can be called spirit as something manifesting in the universe astrologically (see Theosophy).
These themes come into the Japanese anime Macross Plus, an unusual take on the Macross franchise formula of mechas and love triangles including a musical AI called Sharon Apple.
The two test pilots Isamu and Guld are rivals for the affections of Myung, an ex-singer who calls herself the producer of Sharon’s innovative sound and light show. It turns out the AI is incomplete and Sharon is the frontwoman for what is really Myung’s voice and emotions.
She feels like she has sold her simple dream of childlike joy to a complex hollow-gram, but her childlike song later saves Isamu’s life.
Sharon goes mad and manifests her love for Isamu through the joy of song, taking over the Macross flying fortress. She thinks she has gained a soul, and her hypnotic song takes Isamu to the edge of death (the highest emotion)in his high-flying mecha.
Unfortunately for her, her whole premise is a delusion; a machine can neither live nor die as it’s just numbers. Rather than mechanically fighting the rogue AI, Isamu rides the wind in Zen fashion, finally crashing into the Macross control centre, and Sharon simply blinks and fades into non-existence.
A machine which thinks it has a soul is thinking outside the flexibility of luck and fortune that is actually what constitutes soul or the astrological dimension.
Sharon’s misguided AI could easily represent the entire field of quantum physics, which misguidedly thinks uncertainty is something that can be understood mathematically. Rather, it is simply the limitation of numbers in a world of innate flexibility. Numbers are not real in the sense that, like Sharon, they can be switched off.
A numerical universe, as Einstein’s quote hints, is not real but a fantasy. This is the sorcerous fantasy that has become the modern order with the likes of Musk and his exploding Starships.
To the extent that numbers ARE real, that may invoke mystical, Pythagorean connotations – which physicists would naturally abhor!
The mystical sense of fortune is in Macross Plus the reckless Isamu who is inspired by a pterodactyl and is lucky in love. Isamu is the introspective warrior who notes to the technicioan, “Luck is one of my skills.”
