Spiritual concepts
Competition
Competition is an essential part of the Strategy of the Great Work. We can see this from observation. All of life on earth competes – competes for space and for resources. Why is competition needed, what does it achieve?:
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Promotes co-operation and agglomeration - At first sight competition and co-operation appear to be opposites and thus mutually incompatible as part of a strategy. But competition acts as a driver towards greater co-operation and agglomeration. There is no incentive for any creature to agglomerate unless there is an environmental or competitive driver. It is competition that drives the process of function improvement and increase via agglomeration.
- Preserves diversity - competition helps to maintain a balance in the species and the number of individuals of those species. In effect, no one species becomes dominant, thus inhibiting the development of all the species as a whole and their overall functionality
- Tests function - How do you test function? Form is created which expresses that function and this is the means by which function can be tested 'in the field' as it were. But this then leaves the question open, how do you test the form and what is the test for success of a form? One way is to limit resources. And the next way is to ensure there is competition for those resources. Competition is the means by which function is tested to be 'proven'
How long does a form need to have survived before it is deemed to be a tested function? I don't know. I could find no philosophical or mystic argument that explained this point at all. Most mystics tend to want to concentrate on the idea of co-operation as a strategy and ignore the realities of life that competition exists and appears to be there for a purpose. Philosophers are no better at coming up with answers. As this is an anthology of other people's ideas, a synthesis of the best as it were, when no solution is offered I have to leave it at that. And this is one time when it will have to be left at that.
How have organisms responded to competition for the resources it needs to survive? In other words let us now leave the realm of the strategy to promote more functionality and look at what likely effects competition is likely to have on the organism themselves. It may develop two main approaches:
- First it may defend itself or those resources, or attack the competition in an attempt to halt or destroy it.
- Second, it may form loose or tight agglomerations with other species or the same species.
Or the two may be combined.
If the organism uses the defence and attack approach, from the point of view of the Objectives of the Great Work , this approach adds function as new and novel functional approaches of defence and attack can be added to the organism's overall functional set.
It does have one disadvantage from this point of view, that it runs the risk that one species may remove another species, by either attacking it to extinction, or defending its position but annihilating the attacker in the process. The risk is extremely small if the species is successful, but if the number of a species is tiny the risk increases.
But and it is a big but, maybe this is a test for the proven nature of the form. If its numbers are tiny, it has formed no defensive strategies of its own or partnerships that will help it survive and it can be quickly and easily exterminated, then perhaps it cannot be deemed to be a success.
But now we get onto some interesting territory, because by saying this we have already assumed that the responsibility for further development of function and form is not that of the one who set the strategy, but is the responsibility of each species or sub-species. In effect we have already started to assume the existence of Co-creation and co-creation by everything.
Observations
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