Y or why, short story

"Y"

In my sleep, I dreamed, but I knew I was dreaming. I knew I was dreaming and yet I felt that what was happening was real. Outrageous, but real. I was lifted out of my bed by an invisible force, flat on my back as though I was being raised up on a rescue stretcher. My body turned slowly as I moved upward toward a light in the night sky. I did not feel the outdoor air, though it would not have been cold because it was summer. In that moment, the dream stopped. At least my memory of it stopped. But my memory of the complete dream cameback to me many years later. They spoke to me. They said they were telling me the Mystery of Life in the Universe. I felt excited, pleased that my prayer would be answered. And it was.

"Y" is the Golden Secret. "Y" is pronounced as "why." I know who they are and why they are here. The secret was revealed to me because I asked for it. Remember they said "Ask and you shall receive." I was thirteen years old lying in bed and I prayed that I would understand, understand the universe and how it worked, understand the truth. That request was born of innocence, ignorance. The Golden Truth is dangerous, discouraging, exhilarating, both sad and dramatically joyous all at the same time. The Golden Truth is for adults, but has nothing to do with sexuality, a lot to do with genetics. The effect of the Golden Secret is that we would like to be able to create happiness, but we cannot. The Golden Truth teaches us that happiness and sadness are generated by Nature. We are not consulted.

The Golden Secret, the Mystery of Life in the Universe, is like a giant capital letter "Y." It begins at the bottom, and moves upward until it reaches a point where it makes a change, naturally, and turns either to the left or the right. This is us, developing as a Technological Animal, and then taking the turn either left or right. This is what they are studying. They are studying our progress on the letter Y because that is the most perplexing question about all of life in the universe. They understand just about everything, except they do not understand why we have the Y, why every Technological Animal comes to the point where it turns either right or left. It cannot be explained scientifically, and they search diligently for the explanation. That is what they are studying about us. They are looking for evidence. They do this all the time for many types of Technological Animals all over the universe, hundreds of thousands. They all have the Y.

Here is the scientific description of the Y. Not the explanation. Not the Solution to the Golden Question, but the description of what happens. All Technological Animals follow the path of the Y and turn either right (good) or left (bad). It's simple. It's logical. And it is out of our control.

The Y. At the bottom is the birth of the Technological Animal (TA). This is the point at which an animal organism has developed the equivalent of our hands and feet, and senses to detect the surrounding life-supporting environment. But that is not the birth of a Technological Animal yet. The explosive evolutionary path begins only after two qualifying factors. One, the animal possesses the ability to learn from experience; two, the animal loses the fear of fire. Fire is the key to all technology. Friendly fire generates usable heat in a cold environment. Friendly fire cooks food and prepares soil for agriculture. Fire is the tool for making clay pottery. Fire is the weapon that repels deadly carnivorous predators. Fire is the original tool that makes other tools. Fire heals wounds. Fire makes medicines. Fire enables control over metals. All animals fear fire, which is a survival trait for all animals. But the Technological Animal who has lost their fear of fire becomes an agent of technology. Makes things. The loss of the fear of fire is the discovery of power. Fire is energy. All of technology begins with fire. A candle is fire. A nuclear bomb is a fire. All engines of transportation are fire with the exception of wind. Wind is caused by a fire, the Sun. Early humans did not hunt mastodons with spears and clubs. They used a cliff or dug a hole and they drove the mastodon on a path to death with torches. The development of a Technological Animal that fears fire and runs from it cannot be imagined. List all that cannot be done without fire.

Half way up the trunk of the Y tree is the point at which the Technological Animal has become fully aware of their profound difference from the other animals on their planet, the capacity to make things, to exercise control over soil, plants and animals, and over the elements that suggests God-like possibilities, a destiny to create life as well as kill life. The gifted species then continues upward with a higher level of consciousness and wonders who they are. Ponders what they perceive, feel, think, and the perplexing things that they do. War. Love. Art. Stories. Where will it all lead? Are we intelligent beings? Not sure? Seems like it. But is war intelligent? Is destruction of the life-supporting environment with manufactured chemicals intelligent? What about poisons, moral issues, crime, theft, lies, dishonesty, cynicism, anger? The Technological Animal forms tribes, organizes armies, develops the industrial production of weapons, complex weapons that kill more than the military target. The cleansers, the poisons, the waste, the chemicals of technological life become a problem. The TA sees the potential for self-destruction, senses something wrong with the path they seem to be on, a path to species suicide, to destruction of the life-supporting environment and destruction of themselves. They see the possibility, even the likelihood of the self-destruction of human civilization. There are signs, many signs, signs that humans are making changes that are like an illness from which Nature could not recover. This is the point that for many Technological Animals is the discovery that is often called "disclosure." This is the point where the TA is ready, or the secret can no longer be hidden. This is where the vertical path of the Y splits into two possibilities that are like a letter "V" or Vee." This is the point where the Technological Animal realizes what the future holds.

This is where the Technological Animal sees that they cannot control the outcome of their journey. They wonder, infused with a conflict of confidence and shame. We can do it. We can become an intelligent species. We can make the transition from destructive technology to intelligent being that becomes a super caretaker, a god-like species that joins in the care of life in the universe, Guardians of the Galaxies or Watchers of the Heavens. This lower point of the top half of the Y is where the civilization turns either left or right. This is the point of clear and certain disclosure. That turn is not understood. No Intelligent Being in the entire universe understands what causes the turn left to complete self-destruction, or to the right to an Intelligent Civilization that is a caretaker, only constructive and protective, no wars, just peace and the pursuit of harmony. The Golden Secret that explains why and how some turn left and others turn right has not been discovered by the scientific method. Guardians of the Galaxies study thousands of Technological Animals in every corner of the universe and none have ever discovered a satisfactory theory that describes WHY some Technological Animals become Intelligent Beings and others do not. This perplexing Golden Question seems to be a permanent element of life. It is like the Holy Spirit or an invisible spark. There is something, something not seen, something not understandable and possibly not capable of being captured by understanding. It can be credibly argued that understanding is not an infinite process. There is a boundary, a question that cannot be answered by any mind. For some reason, not understood, some turn left and some turn right. Often a Technological Animal becomes aware of this Golden Question while their fate seems to be undetermined so far, as though their will be some kind of choice. An event or a plan that will give our civilization, our version of the Technological Animal, a conscious choice.

But that conscious choice will not be. Revelation of the Golden Secret has not occurred and there is no scientifically certain path to it. Just because the universe has given birth to minds that hunger for truth does not mean there shall be a mind that encloses all that there is to be known. It is like we are invited to attend a lecture where a professor will explain the infinity of the universe, and the Golden Secret, everything. The lecture is scheduled be begin at 10:00 am tomorrow and will not end. This is the essence of disclosure, the realization that we do not know, and no one knows, why we will turn left or why we will turn right. This is the Golden Question that thousands of Intelligent Beings seek to answer. They are studying us for this. And they cannot tell us what to do to avoid self-destruction and to continue indefinitely on the path of an Intelligent Being. This is why the truth is kept secret. Who wants to tell a child that the outcome of his life will not be subject to their conscious choices. This is when we are ready to hear that existentialism is wrong. We do not create ourselves. We are created by Nature and how that is accomplished is beyond our capacity to understand.

One might wonder why there is prolonged secrecy, why the fairytale stories about Santa Claus and angels and the bad angel talking into our left ear and the good angel talking into our right ear. Why couldn't they just tell us the truth? The reason is kind of obvious, isn't it. When our five-year old child asks us "What is sex?" we don't deliver a long dissertation on human anatomy and a detailed description of adult sexual intercourse. They are children. They need words and ideas that simplify, or even just represent the fact of human sexual experience. We might just say that people feel happy when they hug, and sex means adults feel good when they hug. When a child gets a little older we might say that when people are married they have children. It is even harder to explain the Golden Secret, the Y. A very sophisticated concept for a child to grasp. So, we say, instead of the fate of a species being determined by a turn in the path of evolution, we say that there is a bad angel on the left and a good angel on the right. Metaphorical, but otherwise accurate. If we are good, make the transition from Technological Animal to Intelligent Being, our reward is that our species survives in the universe indefinitely. We are qualified to join in the work and joy of the Guardians of the Galaxy or the Watchers of the Heavens. So we just attempt to convey a very serious concept to a child in a child's language. It is not intended to be a deception, just setting the stage for more real and more scientific language later, for those who can hear. If you should come across some new information, some evidence that appears to be part of the explanation of why some TAs make the transition to IBs, please search for me. Find me. Get your information to me, please. I would like to finish my dream.