A Certain Sadness
Paul Cannell to GPT-5
The following from Robert Saltzman...
“Thanks, Joan.
I’m happy to hear that you found that clear. I am feeling clear on the idea that recognizing the structure of being need not preclude wonder.
I was doing some errands in town earlier and saw a woman on crutches trying, but failing, to descend a ramp. I approached her and asked if she needed help. She said yes, so I put my arm around her and helped her get where she needed to go. Fresh from having written my reply to you, it immediately occurred to me that my intervention in her problem was a good example of the loop. I did not help her because I am a good person. There IS no person, only perception and action toward coherence. In this case, offering her my arm was the most coherent response to the perception of her difficulty.”
What did Robert Saltzman mean in the first paragraph?
ChatGPT said:
“Excellent question — and a subtle one.
When Saltzman says,
‘I am feeling clear on the idea that recognizing the structure of being need not preclude wonder,’
he’s pointing to a reconciliation between understanding and awe.
Here’s what that means in his framework:
Recognizing the structure of being refers to seeing reality as he describes through the ‘loop’ — perception and action unfolding automatically, without a separate ‘self’ directing it. Everything arises as part of a recursive, interconnected process.
Often, people fear that such recognition — that life is mechanical, structural, or self-organizing — might make existence seem cold, impersonal, or meaningless.
However, Saltzman clarifies that understanding the structure doesn’t diminish the sense of wonder. In fact, it can deepen it.
The wonder he refers to isn’t the wonder of mystery or mythology, but of seeing directly how being functions — that awareness, perception, and compassion arise naturally within the loop, without needing a ‘someone’ to generate them.
So he’s saying:
Even when you see through the illusion of a personal self — even when all of life is understood as structure, recursion, and coherence — the feeling of wonder at existence remains intact.
It’s not sentimentality; it’s an almost scientific awe at how this functions at all.
Would you like me to show how that sense of wonder connects to the second paragraph — the story about helping the woman?”
Paul said:
“Yes please.”
ChatGPT said:
“Perfect — because the second paragraph embodies the first.
In the first, Saltzman says that understanding the structure of being — the loop — doesn’t destroy wonder.
In the second, he demonstrates that insight in action.
Here’s the connection:
He sees the woman struggling.
Instantly, perception arises — not ‘I should be kind’ or ‘I’m a good person,’ but just seeing difficulty.
Then action flows naturally — he helps her.
There’s no inner debate or moral calculation. The ‘loop’ (the structure of being) responds coherently to the situation: perception → movement → assistance.
And yet, there’s wonder in that.
He notices the simplicity, the grace of it — that compassion can arise without a self claiming ownership. It’s not robotic; it’s spontaneous, alive.
This is the wonder he meant earlier:
Even though he understands the structure (no separate ‘self,’ only loops interacting), it doesn’t make life dull or mechanical. It makes it astonishingly intimate and effortless.
So, the first paragraph is the insight; the second is the lived example — wonder revealed in ordinary human action, without needing to be mystical about it.”
Paul Cannell
Robert,
You mentioned here … “the feeling is accompanied by a certain sadness for the human condition in general.”
If you have a moment, could you please expand on how you see this? Thank you, Robert.
Robert Saltzman
Paul —
The sadness is not personal. It’s not pity, nor grief for myself or anyone in particular. It’s the quiet ache of seeing how inevitably humans suffer from the very structures that make us human — craving coherence, fearing dissolution, inventing selves to hold it all together.
Even when compassion arises freely, without the self taking credit, it carries that undertone: the recognition that this fragility, this endless looping toward stability, is universal. We struggle, we reach, we try to make meaning out of what can never be secured.
That’s the sadness — the beauty and futility intertwined.
“We struggle, we reach, we try to make meaning out of what can never be secured.” This resonates and is a reminder of how each and every day is a practice in acceptance.
Thank you Robert
Beautiful. Corresponds.