Agentito Ergo Sum
I am an agent, therefore I am. Existential meditation on what it means to be human in a post-deconstructed world.
Deconstruction
The world is changing so quickly. What it means to be human is an ever more difficult concept to materialize in a meaningful way
Scientific breakthroughs introduce barbarians at the gate of meaning. A siege of meaning storms the gates of the historical structures of Christianity and Capitalism, approximations of truth in this life and in the next.
Christian and capitalist memes define reality heuristics. Define the boundaries of cognitive space. Boundaries on predicting reality, finding what is meaningful, and in service of ensuring one’s survival into tomorrow. They are constructions of prior minds. Not my own. They serve ends that possess a proportion of truth. But, they are not Truth in its absolute sense. Therefore, they should be held suspect.
Other economic systems came before capitalism. It had a beginning and this would seem to imply it has an end. There are religions that existed prior to Christianity and co-exist with it today. Framing the bedrock philosophies of capitalism and Christanity this way introduces a sense of arbitrariness.
I must start from my own principles. My own anthropology. My own metaphysics.
Finding Bedrock
I am not a static creature. As my body regenerates from a wound, it shows this material I am made of is dynamic. It is alive.
It maintains form.
From the atomic level, the atoms seek balance. The molecular structures seek balance. The organs seek balance. My physiology seeks balance. If there were to be no balance, the body would prompt motivation to my consciousness of its desire for balance using a sensation we call pain.
Maintaining form seems to be a goal.
In the incident of a laceration, the body begins in a damaged state. An open wound of oozing blood. Deep within the organic wisdom of this body, there seems to be a routine, a protocol, a blueprint for repairing the damage. The body knows “where it is” – damage – and it knows “where it wants to be” – repaired.
The many protein structures of the body spring into action. Little worker bees in the hive. Agents of order in service of the kingdom of the body. They know what to do. Though the path may be uncertain, they will continue their mission until they believe it is complete.
The construction of the body seems to be a series of patterns. Of stitchings of flesh like the stitches of a quilt. Weaved together in an optimized pattern formed through eons of evolutionary computation.
Evolution gifted, to my body, organic wisdom — the blueprint to heal the laceration. It merely follows the protocol. A set of instructions. Strategies. If-then statements. Tools for achieving its goal. Intelligence.
Through eons of evolution throwing darts at a wall and seeing what sticks, the body encoded meaningful processes that any living creature can assume will be successful. I do not fret when I cut myself. I know it will be repaired in time.
It seems if this goal-oriented intelligence structure is inherent in my material body, it is true of my mind. My spirit. My soul — the electrical current coursing through my veins, animating my existence.
I am my body and it is me.
What does this say of me then? Am I a being of goal orientation? Do I require an aim? If I do, what does this imply of me?
It would seem my mind is “designed” in the lockstep with my organic body. There are goals and there are means to achieve those goals. Intelligence.
Am I an creature who sets his spirit on an aim and focuses itself to its achievement? Where achievement is a defined thing, a formed substance made of my spirit? The giving of myself into the achievement so it may take its form?
A dynamic goal-seeking entity in service of form?
An agent?
Reconstruction
If I am an agent, it would seem my purpose is to achieve goals. Unlike the body itself, it seems I am both the agent and the client. The executor and the executive.
A goal-achieving entity that creates its own goals.
As the organic agents of the body dynamically facilitate structural integrity, the maintenance of form, that would seem to be the purpose of my function as an executive.
It seems my purpose is to maintain form.
I am function in service of form.
I am an agent of form.
To live a good life would be to choose a form to be in service to.
Construct my own forms and/or participate in the maintenance of existing forms.
To live is to form.