Changes in our idea of matter
A building has life in it to the extent that it awakens this connection to the personal. Or, in other language, we may say that a building has life in it, to the extent it awakens the connection to the eternal vastness which existed before me, and around me, and after me.
This is perhaps a stretch, but as I was thinking of how that might possibly translate to software, my brain jumped to computer games. Not any computer game, but a few of those I played that left me with a feeling of awe about the vastness of the world they created. Spontaneously, I remember _Frontier — First Encounters_ (a successor to _Elite_), _Civilization_, _Master of Orion II_, _Spore_, and — more recently — _The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild_. I suspect my fondness for strategy, simulations, rogue-likes, and open-world RPGs — is also connected to that, as these are games with non-linear stories (or no story at all), or games which rely on procedural generation. They all are in a way generative and each time you play them a (slightly) different story unfolds.
I believe it is in the nature of matter, that it is soaked through with self of “I”. The essence of the argument which I am putting before you throughout Book 4 is that the thing we call “the self”, which lies at the core of our experience, is a real thing, existing in all matter, beyond ourselves, and that in the end we must understand it, in order to make living structure in buildings. But it is also my argument that this is the nature of matter. It is not only necessary to understand it when we wish to make living structure in buildings. It is also necessary if we wish to grasp our place in the universe, our relationship to nature.
Footnote about the structure of book 4
It would perhaps be helpful for the reader to consider this book as anchored at three points: chapter 1, Our Present Picture of the Universe, chapter 6, The Blazing One, and the conclusion, A Modified Picture of the Universe. These three chapters provide the anchors of the argument, and describe the modified picture of reality which I propose. The other chapters provide details from the spheres of architecture and art.
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