Man or Matter: Introduction to a Spiritual Understanding of Nature on the Basis of Goethe's Method of Training Observation and ThoughtLehrs, Ernst
Religion
Man or Matter: Introduction to a Spiritual Understanding of Nature on the Basis of Goethe's Method of Training Observation and Thought
Lehrs, Ernst
Anthroposophy; Cosmology; Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 1749-1832
As the gravity-field decreases in strength with increasing distance
from the centre of the field, that is, in the outward direction, so
does the levity-field decrease in strength with increasing distance
from its periphery, or in the inward direction. In both fields the
direction of movement is from regions of lower to those of higher
intensity. This is why things 'fall' under the influence of gravity and
'rise' under the influence of levity.4
*
How does thermal expansion read as a letter in nature's script when
seen in the light of the two contrasting field-concepts?
Let us, for simplicity's sake, imagine a spherically shaped metallic
body, say, a ball of copper, which we expose to the influence of heat.
As we have seen, it is the centrically orientated gravity-field which
gives the ball its permanency of shape. Consequently, the dynamic
orientation of the material constituting its body is directed towards
the interior of the body itself.
Now, the moment we bring heat to bear on the body we find its surface
moving in the outward direction. The whole mass is clearly under the
influence of some suction which is directed on to the body from
outside. Just as the plants grow in the anti-gravitational direction as
a result of the suctional effect of levity (other factors which account
for its growing into a particular shape, etc., being left out of
consideration), so our copper ball grows in volume by being sucked away
from its centre of gravity. It is the action of heat which has changed
the ratio between gravity and levity at this spot in such a way as to
allow levity to produce this effect.5
What we have thus found to be the true nature of the event perceived as
a body's growth in volume under the influence of heat has a definite
effect on our conception of spatially extended matter as such. For a
physical body is always in some thermal state which may be regarded as
higher than another, and it may therefore be regarded as being at all
times thermally expanded to some extent. Hence, it is all the time
under the sway of both gravitational pressure and anti-gravitational
suction. In fact, we may say ideally that, if there were no field
working inwards from the cosmic periphery, the entire material content
of the earthly realm would be reduced by gravitation to a spaceless
point; just as under the sole influence of the peripheral field of
levity it would dissipate into the universe.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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