{"id":72580,"date":"2026-05-22T14:25:46","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T12:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/?p=72580"},"modified":"2026-05-22T14:25:51","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T12:25:51","slug":"inside-a-rose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/inside-a-rose\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside a Rose"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Media that attempts to convey a specific message increasingly distances us from immediate experience and reconstructs predictable relationships. But there are gaps that allow consciousness to shine through.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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How can a person enter the innermost essence of a rose? They can do so by observing its color and form, perceiving its fragrance, and following the rose\u2019s whole life cycle as the seasons change\u2014its blooming and its fading. In itself, the rose is a unity. But through the various activities of our senses, this unity is, as it were, broken apart into different spheres of perception: into a world of colors, forms, scents, and more. By bringing these different sensory worlds back together in our consciousness, we can grasp the essence of the rose as a whole. Our senses build the first \u201cmedium,\u201d a primal medium, that connects the Being of the human with the Being of the rose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A second level of media emerges when humans create something representational. We can draw a rose or preserve its scent in perfume. In this kind of media, something of the vitality inherent in the direct encounter with the real rose is preserved for the eye or for the sense of smell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A third level consists of technically produced, analog media, such as film or vinyl records. Here, light or sound waves are continuously recorded in material reality through physical processes and can be reproduced at a later time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the fourth level is that of digital media. In digitization the continuity of the physical world is broken up into discrete signals which are then converted into a sequence of binary code. These numbers are then reconstructed through algorithmic processes and technical equipment so that they appear in the digital medium as manipulable images or auditory perceptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gaps for Consciousness<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

With each subsequent stage of media, the direct connection with the human body decreases. Media become more independent and, at the same time, more virtual. The senses of sight, hearing, and thought in the human organism are concentrated primarily in the head. Thus, in dealing with digital media, humans increasingly become people of the head, people of the nervous system. Our torso and limbs\u2014that is, the areas where the life of feeling and will are especially active\u2014are increasingly pushed into the background and are easily completely forgotten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can imagine that the development of the human senses and human intelligence has also passed through these four stages, but inwardly and, in a sense, invisibly. The transitions between stages are relatively continuous in the members of the human constitution\u2014the physical, etheric, astral, and \u2018I\u2019. In the course of human evolution, the human \u2018I\u2019 gradually takes hold of and shapes each member of the human constitution in such a way that its function and meaning is reflected in its structure. In reality, these interwoven members of our being cannot be separated from one another\u2014the consecutive stages that merge into one another through a metamorphosis cannot be sharply distinguished. Reality is continuous; it can only be differentiated, assessed, or determined through our cognition. External, separate phenomena such as these four levels of media offer an opportunity to build up our inner consciousness. When these four levels of media are projected in physical reality, the individual levels appear more distinctly separated from one another. This creates, three \u201cgaps\u201d where consciousness can be born. Externally, a gap denotes a clear change from one medium to the next; inwardly, it denotes a moment or state when something qualitatively new occurs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the first level, sensation\u2014that is, the soul substance\u2014is still directly intertwined with perception of the here and now. On the second level, as in painting, for instance, sensation hovers outside the canvas and pigments and the soul incarnates in these material substances that support the image created. On the third level\u2014as in film photography, for example\u2014the soul withdraws almost entirely; what remains is primarily the result of physical light processes. Lastly, in the digital world only the mathematical relationships of these physical light processes are recorded, stored, and then reconstructed. Through these steps, we can surmise that the eye too has undergone a development in four stages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Spiritual Rose<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The real question is how human beings can know and overcome the three gaps in between the stages\u2014from the fourth medium back to the first\u2014so that the digital medium is once again spiritualized and the digital rose in digital space awakens the spiritual rose in the realm of consciousness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How can an eye that has already been desouled and digitized find its way back to its original state and reunite with the soul substance that has been separated off? The ancient Greeks were still able to perceive the concept that lives within things with their eyes. If we examine the four levels of media more closely, it becomes clear that they give rise to different qualities of space: from soul to hybrid and on to physical and digital space. One could say that the main essence of a medium first creates a particular kind of space within which the medium\u2019s content can then emerge. So, it\u2019s time to develop a new sense of space! How does real space\u2014that is, the space of consciousness\u2014differ from digital space? Can we bring these three spaces into a dynamic development so that they merge together while maintaining a field of tension between them? Is there a larger space wherein all three can operate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Translation <\/strong>Joshua Kelberman
Photo <\/strong>Xue Li<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Media that attempts to convey a specific message increasingly distances us from immediate experience and reconstructs predictable relationships. But there are gaps that allow consciousness to shine through. How can a person enter the innermost essence of a rose? They can do so by observing its color and form, perceiving its fragrance, and following the rose\u2019s whole life cycle as the seasons change\u2014its blooming and its fading. In itself, the rose is a unity. But through the various activities of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12175,"featured_media":72274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8788,8839,8809],"tags":[11797,11798,8814],"class_list":["post-72580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-essay-en","category-nature-experience","category-digital-world","tag-ausgabe-19-2026-en","tag-english-issue-21-2026","tag-musings"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12175"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72580"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72607,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72580\/revisions\/72607"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}