56 Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path
Why are we compelled continually to correct our ob-
servations?
A simple reflection provides the answer to this ques-
tion. If I stand at the end of an avenue, the trees at the oth-
er end appear to me smaller and closer together than those
where I am standing. My perceptual picture changes as I
change the place from which I make my observations.
Thus the form in which the perceptual image confronts
me depends on conditions determined not by the object
but by me, the perceiver. The avenue does not care where
I stand. But the image that I have of the avenue is funda-
mentally dependent on where I stand. In the same way, it
makes no difference to the sun and the solar system that
human beings regard them just from the earth. But the
perceptual image of the heavens that presents itself to hu-
man beings is determined by their living on the earth.
This dependence of the perceptual image on our place of
observation is the easiest kind of dependence to under-
stand. The issue becomes more difficult when we realize
the dependence of our perceptual world on our bodily and
spiritual organization. The physicist shows that vibra-
tions of the air are present in the space where we hear a
sound, and that even the body in which we seek the
source of the sound displays a vibrating movement in its
parts. But we become aware of this movement as sound
only if we have a normally constructed ear. Without this,
the whole world would be forever silent for us. Physiolo-
gy teaches us that there are some people who perceive
nothing of the magnificent splendor of color surrounding
us. Their perceptual picture shows only nuances of dark
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