Is there anything (or anyone) other than us?

No, I'm not questioning God's existence at all. I merely want to make an observation or two about something I'm not so sure I believe myself, even as wonderful a subject it is to think about.

C.S. Lewis says in Mere Christianity:

"There is one thing, and only one, in the whole universe which we know more about than we could learn from external observation. That one thing is Man. We do not merely observe men, we ARE men."

He continues later: "Anyone studying man from the outside as we study electricity or cabbages, not knowing our language and consequently not able to get any inside knowledge from us, but merely observing what we did, would never get the slightest evidence that we had [this] Moral Law."

This quote is in a context that has nothing to do with my subject today, but as I read this passage today for school (which I should be doing now) I couldn't help but to think about some possibilities Lewis' notion opens up.

There is only one thing we can know about other than through observation, and that is ourselves. For instance, we don't know what it is like to be, say, a tree, any more than a tree knows what it is like to be a human. All we know about trees is through external observation, not through personal experience as trees. Rather than scooting around the issue, I will simply put forth my thought directly and then consider the angles.

My thought is this: How can we, as humans, know absolutely if any given tree is not inhabited by a spirit, or an essence, since we have no personal experience knowledge of anything except ourselves?

We can observe a tree, we can study a tree, we can make educated guesses about the tree, but we can never ourselves BE TREES. From the Christian standpoint, what if God decided to give to trees - and I hope you understand that I am using "tree" as an example, not the exception - some sort of living being or essence, and He decided in His best judgement not to disclose that particular information to us humans?

One argument against this is that if it is true for the trees, then how can we say it is not true for anything, for instance the laptop I am typing on now? In answer to that, I say that this laptop was assembled in a manufacturing plant by a worker who presses buttons and flips switches. It, being man-made, is stuck within the realm of human possibility. When was the last time you saw a man create a tree, and I mean an actual living tree that has roots and a trunk and branches that draw water and grow? With God all things are possible, correct?

But still, if what I say is true for a tree, could it not be true for a boulder, or a diamond, or natural gas? Yes, of course it could. Since, I propose, we cannot know any being but ourselves, we cannot really be sure of any organism's essence other than our own.

I don't want to become a radical environmentalist who tries to stop the cutting down of a single tree, I'm merely making an observation based on the quote from Lewis that I read. And that opens up the door for so many possibilities. How much on this Earth has God chosen to hide from us? Every day we make advances in knowing our planet more, but what if there is something here that is more than physical?

I am referring specifically to faeries, though I would hope that your mind doesn't immediately think of Tinkerbell from the story of Peter Pan. If there really are such things as faeries on this Earth, then it is certainly a much more serious subject than a child's games. Though, admittedly, it is often the imagination of a child that conjours up such notions. But that is a completely different matter. I find that many lessons can be learned from children, such as their honesty and openness, as well as their willingness to accept some simple facts that adults cannot come to grips with. But I digress.

Suppose for a moment that there are such things as faeries; spirits that are invisible to the naked human eye. Why should God allow us to know about them, or experience what they are like from an observational viewpoint? We have made it thusfar in history without recognizing them. Is it so hard to believe that not everything that exists can be seen or heard or felt? It had better not be, from a Christian standpoint, because we say that God exists without physically seeing or hearing or feeling Him.

I am making to strong a case for something I said I do not necessarily believe in myself, so here is where I draw to a close. This post, like all my posts to come, is as the title of my blog suggests, "Just Some Thoughts."

Drew