154 A Programmer’s Guide to the Mind
Natural conscience, like any form of conscience, contains the three
basic elements of a pleasant Mercy „bait,‟ an undesirable Mercy „hook‟ and
a solid Perceiver connection binding these two Mercy elements together.
Suppose, for instance, that I decide to jump off a cliff. As I have
already suggested, the initial Mercy pleasure of “I‟m flying, I‟m flying,”
will lead inexorably to a Mercy conclusion along the lines of “Call an
ambulance, I think I broke my leg.”
If gravity operated only on people, then it would be difficult for this
sequence of events to program conscience. Fortunately, gravity has a way
of punishing all objects thrown off of cliffs with equal severity. Push a
stone over the edge and it will bounce on the rocks below. Drop a
watermelon overboard—a good substitute for the human skull, and it too
will smash to bits when it hits, splattering the ground with red juice—a
reasonable facsimile of human blood.
It is this repetition which makes it possible to learn from natural law.
After seeing the 87th object drop from the cliff, Perceiver strategy will
eventually decide to believe that there is a solid connection between the
Mercy experience of „jumping off the cliff‟ and the Mercy conclusion of
„going splat on the rocks below.‟
Before we go on with our analysis of natural conscience, notice that we
are touching on another methodA by which labels of „right‟ and „wrong‟ are
suggested to Perceiver mode: Every connection which the mind encounters
is remembered as a possible fact by automatic Perceiver thought. Links
which are repeated become more reasonable. A fact which automatic
Perceiver strategy finds reasonable will be suggested as a belief to the
internal world of Perceiver thought.
We ask again: Why can‟t Perceiver strategy build its initial set of
absolutes upon Perceiver reasonableness? Because reasonableness takes
too long to develop. It requires repetition, and that, by definition, takes
time. This is why Perceiver strategy is mesmerized initially by Mercy
feelings into 'believing' its first set of absolutes. Can Perceiver
reasonableness help, at some point, in the formation of Perceiver
absolutes? Yes, in two ways. First, Perceiver absolutes will be determined
by reasonableness if emotions are low and connections are repeated
enough times. This is the source of common sense. Second, I suggest that
Perceiver reasonableness can be used to help build a second set of
Perceiver absolutes. In other words, while reasonableness is too slow to
assist with mental programming, it can help with mental reprogramming.
Later on, we will examine the details of this process.
Let us return to our analysis of natural conscience. Suppose that my
Mercy thought toys with the idea of identifying with the experience of
„jumping off the cliff‟: I imagine myself walking to the edge of the
A The first method which we discussed was mesmerism by strong emotion.