The sharing of wonder
Jan. 1st, 2008 01:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve_primeI’ve been getting caught up on my stack of reading papers, which included a bunch of essays by Simon Blackburn. Has this ever happened to you?
But how about this? One clear, crisp morning, many years ago, R. and I went for a hike on the Stream Trail in Oakland’s Redwood Park, our first visit there. A fun outing, but abruptly I was struck. The trees! Their height! Their stillness! The shafts of light piercing the cool shadows! Solemnity! Whoa!
R’s light and cheerful mood, which I normally shared on our outings, was suddenly a source of dismay, jarring. If he’d been able to get inside my head right then, I’m sure he would have found my feelings about his “irreverence” pretty sanctimonious. I quickly realized that to get what I wanted and needed from this forest, I would have to return alone (which I did, and often).
But to clarify, I should note that R. has, in fact, a very finely honed sense of wonder. His, though, focuses on appreciating the very small, the hidden, the subtle and ephemeral: wildflowers, mushrooms, tiny critters, interesting stones. Not so much the awe, the grandeur, the overwhelmed spectator of the stunning vista. R’s sense of wonder is participatory, engaged and, as it happens, fully compatible with playfulness and with sharing with others. And as a source of ethical inspiration, his fascination with the delicate and vulnerable may well be the superior form of wonder.
In philosophical writings, Kant and others write about encounters with the sublime, which by definition is larger than human scale - mountains, thunderstorms, the mighty sea, the vastness of space. These places and events surpass our imagination. What, though, is the place in philosophy for our encounters with the worlds that are smaller than human scale? And what is the appropriate reaction for those times when one person is struck by awe and the other, though by no means insensitive, simply is not?
_______
1 Simon Blackburn, Religion and Respect.
”If we go to the Grand Canyon, and my experience of awe and terror and elevation are only met by your indifference and wish for an ice-cream, the rift between us is serious. Of course, you may excuse yourself—you were tired, out of sorts, preoccupied, angry at something, had seen it often before—but unless you at least feel the need to excuse yourself, we are on the road to alienation and potential hostility. If you only see the Grand Canyon as an opportunity for starting franchises and tourist camps, then I would be disappointed in you. We might have to split up.”I remember this very well. It was 1980. I’d taken my best friend and proposed life partner, “Dave,” on a hike to the top of Spencer Butte, sharing the view from the top and especially the silence and majesty of the fern-filled grove of douglas-firs on the southern trail. He then made the shattering comment that it would be great to be able to bring his motorcycle up there. No. No, it most definitely would not. Time to end our mutual delusion that we had everything in common, and we were too young, I guess, to value our differences.1
But how about this? One clear, crisp morning, many years ago, R. and I went for a hike on the Stream Trail in Oakland’s Redwood Park, our first visit there. A fun outing, but abruptly I was struck. The trees! Their height! Their stillness! The shafts of light piercing the cool shadows! Solemnity! Whoa!
R’s light and cheerful mood, which I normally shared on our outings, was suddenly a source of dismay, jarring. If he’d been able to get inside my head right then, I’m sure he would have found my feelings about his “irreverence” pretty sanctimonious. I quickly realized that to get what I wanted and needed from this forest, I would have to return alone (which I did, and often).
But to clarify, I should note that R. has, in fact, a very finely honed sense of wonder. His, though, focuses on appreciating the very small, the hidden, the subtle and ephemeral: wildflowers, mushrooms, tiny critters, interesting stones. Not so much the awe, the grandeur, the overwhelmed spectator of the stunning vista. R’s sense of wonder is participatory, engaged and, as it happens, fully compatible with playfulness and with sharing with others. And as a source of ethical inspiration, his fascination with the delicate and vulnerable may well be the superior form of wonder.
In philosophical writings, Kant and others write about encounters with the sublime, which by definition is larger than human scale - mountains, thunderstorms, the mighty sea, the vastness of space. These places and events surpass our imagination. What, though, is the place in philosophy for our encounters with the worlds that are smaller than human scale? And what is the appropriate reaction for those times when one person is struck by awe and the other, though by no means insensitive, simply is not?
_______