edgar-mitchell

98
The Way of the Explorer
Perhaps the most crucial aspect of our own evolution is the degree to
which we can be self-reflective. And this, too, has its own brief history.
One of the most significant developments in recorded time occurred in
approximately the sixth century BC, with the lives of three extraordinary
human beings who lived almost contemporaneously, yet without knowledge
of the others’ existence. Each independently and brilliantly contemplated
the mystery of being.
Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism; Zoroaster, the founder
of the Persian mystery school; and Lao Tse, who codified the Chinese wisdom
of earlier periods and put them together to form the Tao Te Ching,
apparently worked in relative isolation from one another, but produced
the first recorded instances of critical, self-reflective, analytical thought
about the nature of mind and being.
What I found so interesting in my reading, as many other scholars have
as well, is that until then there hadn’t been vigorous self-contemplation.
The Neanderthal cave artifacts of ritual burials indicate the earliest documented
concern with afterlife processes. The Neanderthal were a people
who could not have engaged in meaningful introspective discourse 100,000
years ago, as their language wasn’t sophisticated enough. But suddenly,
beginning about 600 BC, there was this common phenomenon occurring
worldwide. Four different cultures—the Chinese, the Indian, the Persian,
and the Greek—all engaged in similar intellectual discourse about human
nature and the role of mind, though reaching different conclusions and
emphasizing different aspects of human mental attributes. It was as though
human consciousness the world over had suddenly evolved to a new threshold
of curiosity and understanding.
It wasn’t until 399 BC that Socrates was offered the choice of exile
from Athens or a death sentence for essentially asking too many unpleasant
questions. In the end he chose the death sentence, to become a martyr
for the right to free inquiry, which is exactly what he became. Socrates
was widely believed to have brought philosophy down from the heavens,
and the city elders feared he might inflict his questions upon the gods
themselves. The Athenian government probably understood that once you
start asking questions it is rather difficult to stop. But the genie was already
out of the bottle. For the next 2,400 years, man would critically
analyze his every aspect and his context within this strange world in which
he found himself.
The development of language—spoken, written, and in the artificial
languages of machines—parallels the growth of our technologies and our
conscious awareness. The written word gave us an extended memory for
use by our visual senses. Today we can read the ancient works of Homer,
the ancient story of the Flood as it is recorded in the book of Genesis, and
The Epic of Gilgamesh, and we can create revolutionary documents such as