"[Wonder] seems to exist in the object, independent of us. In wonder, the world feels saturated with meaning." This is radically refreshing - as opposed to the common invitation for humans to make our own meaning.
C.S. Lewis talks about "just sentiments", by which he means feelings that are aligned (just) to the way the world really is. Wonder is a "just sentiment" because the world is—truly, in fact—wonderful, full of meaning.
As I read this, the development of the nuclear bomb came to mind. Many of those scientists describe feeling wonderstruck at the immense power that had been contained, something previously behind imagining. I guess the difference is they were ‘wonderstruck’ by their own wielding of power over nature.
Indeed! But I wonder how much control they felt they actually had? What's interesting is the, almost, moral intuition that there is something fundamentally wrong with humans taking for themselves such 'God-like' power.
"[Wonder] seems to exist in the object, independent of us. In wonder, the world feels saturated with meaning." This is radically refreshing - as opposed to the common invitation for humans to make our own meaning.
C.S. Lewis talks about "just sentiments", by which he means feelings that are aligned (just) to the way the world really is. Wonder is a "just sentiment" because the world is—truly, in fact—wonderful, full of meaning.
As I read this, the development of the nuclear bomb came to mind. Many of those scientists describe feeling wonderstruck at the immense power that had been contained, something previously behind imagining. I guess the difference is they were ‘wonderstruck’ by their own wielding of power over nature.
Indeed! But I wonder how much control they felt they actually had? What's interesting is the, almost, moral intuition that there is something fundamentally wrong with humans taking for themselves such 'God-like' power.