Dust (His Dark Materials)
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Dust in Philip Pullman's trilogy of novels His Dark Materials is a mysterious particle that is integral to the plot. In The Golden Compass, Lord Asriel says, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." (Genesis 3:19)
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[edit] Description
Pullman's Dust is a fictional form of dark matter, an elementary particle that is of fundamental importance. It is invisible to the human eye and cannot be seen without the use of special instruments, such as the amber spyglass or a special film. While humans cannot see Dust without the use of outside devices, creatures such as the mulefa are able to see dust with their own eyes.
Unlike ordinary particles, Dust is conscious. It falls from the sky, is attracted to people, and wears off onto objects made by people. This makes it of great interest to the Church, which believes that it may be the physical manifestation of Original Sin. It is later learned that Dust actually confers consciousness, knowledge, and wisdom, and that Dust is formed when matter becomes conscious. This allows creatures who have the ability to see Dust to identify other sentient and intelligent creatures. An example of this is when the mulefa are able to distinguish Mary Malone as an intelligent being (compared to the other animals), because of the Dust surrounding her.
Dust is also the thing that allows all "magic" to be done in the worlds. Those beings that can understand Dust by looking at it can also see the truth in things and are able to change things by getting into a certain state of consciousness. An example would be the panserbørne, who are able to see the truth in all things and therefore cannot be tricked, unless they become like humans. There are also the witches who understand Dust on such a level that they can use it to achieve flight, cast "spells", and make themselves unnoticed—among with other things.
Dust is also the thing that connects humans to their dæmons. This being is the physical manifestation of the soul that can talk and is in the form of an animal. It sends the Dust to the human to allow the human consciousness. Even in worlds whose people lack apparent dæmons, they still exist, though they typically do not take the form of animals. In some worlds, one's dæmon is the silent consciousness in the back of one's head, that other voice that confers intuition. If the bond between a child and their dæmon is severed (as through Intercision), both the child and the dæmon will eventually die. If the separation occurs after Dust has settled on the person (that is, after he or she has reached adolescence), the person simply becomes a lifeless shell.
It is Dust that provides the answers given by the alethiometer, the I Ching system of divination and also the computer that Dr. Mary Malone creates in order to communicate directly with these particles by using one's consciousness.
Dust has various names among the various different worlds within the trilogy. Dust was previously known (in Lyra Belacqua's universe) as Rusakov particles after their discoverer, Boris Mikhailovitch Rusakov. It is known also as Shadows in our world (Pullman relates Dust to dark matter), and the mulefa's word sraf accompanied by a leftward flick of the trunk (or arm for humans).
Angels are formed when Dust condenses. Nevertheless, Angels are not in reality the human-like figures they appear to be. They are the physical manifestation of spirit making something 'be'. Because consciousness is the thing that makes us "sin", it can (in theory) be seen as original sin. This is the point of view seen by the Magisterium, and therefore they seek to destroy it. However, they fail to see what the full repercussions of this would be, as they are ignorant to the true nature of Dust. Eliminating it would mark the end of consciousness, and would most certainly lead to the quick destruction of all worlds with conscious life in the multiverse.
[edit] Inspiration
The mysterious substance "Dust" was likely inspired by religious texts.
In the first book of the Old Testament, Genesis, God creates Adam and Eve from dust. Similarly, the funeral service from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer has the famous line "Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust."
In the Paradiso by Dante Alighieri, pp.11–12 'Dust' is used in reference to the Human Body: "And even as the soul within your dust..." Beatrice tells Dante that just as the soul distributes its power throughout the physical body, where it is differentiated according to the part that receives it, so too is the power of God distributed throughout the Heavenly Spheres and the undifferentiated power of God becomes differentiated when it combines with the qualities associated to the Spheres.
In Buddhism, dust is a commonly used metaphor for the sensation, knowledge, and entanglement with the world that inhibits enlightenment. As a first example, in the Viveka Sutta of the Pali canon, a deva says to a Buddhist monastic who had become distracted:
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- Let me remind you of that which is good —
- For the dust of the regions below is hard to transcend.
- Don't let the dust of the sensual pull you down[1]
In the Mahayana Shurangama Sutra the Buddha gives a detailed metaphor of dust for individual consciousness and is quoted as saying, "It is because living beings are impeded by guest-dust and affliction that they do not realize Bodhi or become arhats" and later affirms that, "considering it this way, what is clear and still is called space, and what moves is called dust. The word 'dust,' then, means 'that which moves.'"[2]. Here, space refers to the Buddha nature and dust refers to the defiling consciousness.
A final example comes from the Sixth Patriarch Platform Sutra, famous in the Chan (aka Zen) school of Buddhism. The Fifth Patriarch Hongren sets up a poetic contest to determine his successor which features two poems that would become integral to the Chinese and Japanese culture, history and thought. The first, composed by Yuquan Shenxiu, states that
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- The body is the bodhi tree
- The mind is like a bright mirror's stand.
- At all times we must strive to polish it
- and not let dust collect.
To which Huineng, the eventual Sixth Patriarch and successor of Hongren, replies
[edit] Similar Works
The significance of relating dark matter to spirit is that it provides a spiritual solution to the quest to combine quantum physics and general relativity, popularly known as the Theory of Everything. Many popular science fiction and self development works, such as What the Bleep Do We Know and the Fritjov Capra's Tao of Physics allude to the possible spiritual implications.
In His Dark Materials, Pullman incorporates scientific explanations of Dark Matter and quantum physics with poetic and theological explanations of the nature of the universe and the role of consciousness in it. This popular endeavor is known as quantum mysticism.
Just as Einstein's Theories of Relativity made a connection between matter and energy that had far reaching implications for our understanding of the universe as a whole, Pullman imagines an intellectual framework that incorporates spirituality and consciousness as the missing piece that connects the observer in quantum mechanics to the experiment. While part of a strong tradition in twentieth century science fiction, Pullman has popularized the notion to an extent not previously achieved, especially by young readers.
[edit] See also
- The Book of Dust, a forthcoming Pullman novel in the same series.
[edit] References
- His Dark Materials: A Look into Pullman's Interpretation of Milton's Paradise Lost, by Karen D. Robinson. Mythlore[1], #92 24.2, 2005.
- ^ "Viveka Sutta". http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn09/sn09.001.than.html. Retrieved on 2009-05-27.
- ^ "Shurangama Sutra". http://online.sfsu.edu/~rone/Buddhism/Shurangama/ps.ss.02.v2.020526.screen.pdf. Retrieved on 2009-05-27.
- ^ McRae, John. Seeing through Zen: Encounter, Transformation, and Genealogy in Chinese Chan Buddhism. University of California Press. ISBN 0 520 23798 6.
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