The Witness and The Observer

If you aren't interested in the ontology of the observer you can skip this post. It is somewhat philosophical and will only be of interest to a few of you, I suspect.

Last week I was reflecting on the notion that you can only observe that which you have language for in light of experiences I frequently have that I don't have language for.

An insight ... there is a distinction between witnessing and observing even though we usually consider these as synonyms in our everyday usage of the words.

Indeed you can only observe what you have language (distinctions) for. As a result, observations can be shared with others. What you can observe determines what exists for you - not what is real - just what exists for you. What can be observed is determined by our structure of interpretation. The observer is an interpreter.

From observations we get narratives and, perhaps most importantly, self-narratives. That is our notion of ourselves - who we are to ourselves - comes from observations.

As an illustration of this refer to Helen Keller's account of learning her first word "water" and how that brought into existence for her the meaning of meaning, temporal narrative (past, present, and future) and her sense of being a self.  Yes, all of that requires the distinction of language itself.

The witness can experience experiences for which there is no language. That is, the witness can witness what can't be observed.

Of course, the obvious question is what is being witnessed? Is it reality? All I can say is that what is witnessed cannot be described by any distinction and, in particular, cannot be described as existing or not existing.

This calls to mind Lao Tzu's claim that "The Tao that can be spoken is not the true Tao." And just to cut off a road commonly taken he goes on to say you can't say the Tao is Nothingness or Beingness for those are distinctions too.

Of course, all I'm doing here is merely observing the witness. What of witnessing the witness?

This points to the answer to so many Zen koans ... "What is your original face?" for example ...

-Steve

Comments

[Mattox Beckman]

Interesting distinction. One of the things that makes wine tasting so difficult is exactly that. I can enjoy the wine well enough, "witnessing" it; but to describe it so that another person can anticipate what it would taste like is a skill that takes much effort to develop.

[Steve]

Mattox,

Great example.

Come to think of it, I found a reverse example yesterday. About 6 months ago I bought a bottle of black truffle oil. I haven't been using it because it was expensive. About a month ago I thought that was silly and I started using it. But it just tasted like olive oil to me. Then about two days ago I suddenly smelled and tasted something that I hadn't before. It was the truffle!

So I had the language - to me it was truffle oil but I didn't have the experience.

-Steve