DC Crisis Cosmology: Update — Source & Great Darkness

[Elizio33]

The New Gods run by Ram V introduced relevant information on the relationship between The Source and The Great Darkness.

The Source is a product of a self-referential void. The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another. For total darkness can only be defined as an absence of light or life. The Source is thus pure information. The very first knowledge, untainted and incomprehensible ideas because it is all the meaning of everything at once.

This confirms once again that The Source is The Light, and as some of you may have already understood, this self-referential void is the Great Darkness.The Great Darkness is not just opposed to ideas or life, but to all existence.

This should be added to the Crisis Cosmology.

 

[Elizio33]

@Antvasima @VeryGoofyToddler2

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

The New Gods run by Ram V introduced relevant information on the relationship between The Source and The Great Darkness.

The Source is a product of a self-referential void. The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another. For total darkness can only be defined as an absence of light or life. The Source is thus pure information. The very first knowledge, untainted and incomprehensible ideas because it is all the meaning of everything at once.

This confirms once again that The Source is The Light, and as some of you may have already understood, this self-referential void is the Great Darkness.The Great Darkness is not just opposed to ideas or life, but to all existence.

This should be added to the Crisis Cosmology.

Seems good to me.

 

[NHTkenshin2]

Small correction: Not so sure as to say that the self-referential void here is TGD, since the darkness is specifically differentiated from that void due to being incapable of 'self-referring.'

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

Small correction: Not so sure as to say that the self-referential void here is TGD, since the darkness is specifically differentiated from that void due to being incapable of 'self-referring.'

The next sentence literally compliments that statement. Self-referential is referencing oneself by this the Darkness in contrast to the Light. It also predates the Light as a void of nothingness prior to being “darkness to light.” Self-referential is referring oneself to something else or else it wouldn’t be “referential” if there isn't a reference. This is hard to gauge just read the two sentences as one cohesive statement about the nature of the Darkness prior to and during the Light.

 

[HenshinIntervention]

The update is perfectly fine and consistent!

 

[NHTkenshin2]

Self-referential is referring oneself to something else or else it wouldn’t be “referential” if there isn't a reference.

That's not what self-reference means.

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

To avoid any confusion. I'll just explain it a bit so we don't get any more misunderstanding.

Self-referential void:​

Self-referential just means;

making reference to itself or oneself.

It's an adjective which means it is meant to describe something. To which its describes the Great Darkness. You may have questions regarding the status of the Darkness being that.

Well, Ram V does an amazing job explaining it with the least words possible. To quote #1:

The Source is a product of a self-referential void.

The Source in the same scan is said to be the Light. The OP mentions the scan from Flash that the Source and Light are one.

If we go back to Crisis on Infinite Earths or even the more recent story called Justice League Incarnate. You would notice that “everything and nothing” were one because everything was nothing and it remained that way for a long time.

You may ask “What's your point?” Well, the Darkness himself said the Light was born in defiance of him which compliments the idea the Source came from the Dark which means it can be considered a “product” of the Darkness as a stand-in for self-referential.

This part was easy to understand. So let's move on to the next. In #2 it was said that:

A theoretical antithesis—-uncreation, the absence of ideas. Not in opposition to life, but in opposition to existence.

Earlier, we see that the Source is pure information and untainted idea which the Darkness lacks. This is important because the “opposition” of existence is well….non-existence. When only the term “darkness” was made when the Source itself came from the dark to give it definition.

Void just means lacking material, the Great Darkness not only lacked material but all forms of description that were applied to the Source; life, creation, ideas, etc….so it was by it”self” where the reference of anything was nothing but it.

Also, The Light as we have seen in Justice League Incarnate is the Overvoid. Hence, the Multiversity story reference of “immaculate perfection” and the “whiteness” of the Light/Overvoid.

The Flash series is shown above shows the Light and Source are one.

Morrison always had said the Void was God or the Source. Which he drew the Multiversity Map saying everything outside the Multiverse was only the Source.

Isn't it Overvoid?​

Ignoring all the evidence above. It would also fail given it gave itself meaning and definition to contrast with the Flaw.

That's not what self-reference means.

It does. If you're going to be dense and pretend you don't have reading comprehension then sure. Since the definition of self-reference is to reference oneself. In this case, the Darkness was once by itself as any form of anything can only be referenced as the nothing. Then the Source came and it became “darkness to light.”

 

[Weaver261]

I agree. This is quite a simple concept to understand if you properly followed DC cosmology.

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

I agree. This is quite a simple concept to understand if you properly followed DC cosmology.

A very simple concept that some people like to ignore due to the hard hardness. I can guarantee you, anyone, with comic knowledge knows that sentences are literally interconnected to each other. There's nothing other than the Darkness that can be the “self-referential void.” It was quite clear that they mentioned it being that due to the “Source” being absent for a time when the Darkness was purely a void of nothingness.

 

[Elizio33]

Small correction: Not so sure as to say that the self-referential void here is TGD, since the darkness is specifically differentiated from that void due to being incapable of 'self-referring.'

Following the narrative, The Source is a product of a self-referential void and right after, it says that The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another. The author makes this even clearer and mentions that total darkness can only be defined as an absence of light.

This corresponds to Alan Moore's Swamp Thing in which the Great Darkness stated that before the Light, it was endless and nameless and did not need a name. Then the Light came and the Great Darkness had its first knowledge of self. Sounds familiar ?

 

[Elizio33]

This might be off-topic but i wanted to share my thoughts on relationships between The Source and The Presence.

In the beginning, before the before, there was The Presence, also known as "The Creator" or "God", and with his voice he brought forth The Light from The Great Darkness which until then was a nameless void of darkness having no need of a name. He uttered the words: "let there be light!" and there was light which made the Great Darkness suffering its first knowledge of self.

Although the Presence has no real form since he is one with The Void beyond mortals, demigods, gods, the war between light and darkness, all obstacles according to Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, he does have emanations through which he speaks and acts. The most common emanation of The Presence is The Voice, also defined as "The Word", which resides in Heaven and empowers beings like the Angels, the Spectre, Radiant, and Phantom Stranger.

The Source has been referred to interchangeably with The Presence in Death Metal. While this suggests that the two entities are the same, it does not necessarily rule out the possibility that The Source may be the same with an emanation of The Presence. There are examples that support this such as The Source being a manifestation of The Creator's power, The Source being The Word in the New 52 era, and past stories have mentioned The Source as being the one behind the gates of Heaven, the Godwave which is highly related to The Source being referred to as the power of The Presence, and more recent stories have associated The Source with The Light. This does not mean that the Source is limited to Heaven or anything, for it encompasses and transcends all of Creation.

My personal view is that The Source is a manifestation of The Presence's power that brought light from the darkness and that The Word, The Source, The Light are the same entity that is part of a truer God. After all, it was a manifestation of the hand of God, representing The Light, that came down from Heaven to unite with the Great Darkness and The Voice/Word, the most common emanation of The Presence residing in Heaven and commanding the Angels and the Spectre that was called The Source.

 

[Swanyee9t76]

This might be off-topic but i wanted to share my thoughts on relationships between The Source and The Presence.

In the beginning, before the before, there was The Presence, also known as "The Creator" or "God", and with his voice he brought forth The Light from The Great Darkness which until then was a nameless void of darkness having no need of a name. He uttered the words: "let there be light!" and there was light which made the Great Darkness suffering its first knowledge of self.

Although the Presence has no real form since he is one with The Void beyond mortals, demigods, gods, the war between light and darkness, all obstacles according to Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, he does have emanations through which he speaks and acts. The most common emanation of The Presence is The Voice, also defined as "The Word", which resides in Heaven and empowers beings like the Angels, the Spectre, Radiant, and Phantom Stranger.

The Source has been referred to interchangeably with The Presence in Death Metal. While this suggests that the two entities are the same, it does not necessarily rule out the possibility that The Source may be the same with an emanation of The Presence. There are examples that support this such as The Source being a manifestation of The Creator's power, The Source being The Word in the New 52 era, and past stories have mentioned The Source as being the one behind the gates of Heaven, the Godwave which is highly related to The Source being referred to as the power of The Presence, and more recent stories have associated The Source with The Light. This does not mean that the Source is limited to Heaven or anything, for it encompasses and transcends all of Creation.

My personal view is that The Source is a manifestation of The Presence's power that brought light from the darkness and that The Word, The Source, The Light are the same entity that is part of a truer God. After all, it was a manifestation of the hand of God, representing The Light, that came down from Heaven to unite with the Great Darkness and The Voice/Word, the most common emanation of The Presence residing in Heaven and commanding the Angels and the Spectre that was called The Source.

Okay so, where's the Presence? You said " the relatinship between Presence and Source " and provided relationship between God and Source? + you said " Presence aka God or Creator " but didn't provided specific evidence of it getting mentioned as?

 

[Swanyee9t76]

Following the narrative, The Source is a product of a self-referential void and right after, it says that The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another. The author makes this even clearer and mentions that total darkness can only be defined as an absence of light.

This corresponds to Alan Moore's Swamp Thing in which the Great Darkness stated that before the Light, it was endless and nameless and did not need a name. Then the Light came and the Great Darkness had its first knowledge of self. Sounds familiar ?

Okay but Didn't Ram V stated " A total Darkness can be defined as absense of light " ?. Yes Great Darkness can be only defined as absense of light because it's darkness.

 

[Swanyee9t76]

To avoid any confusion. I'll just explain it a bit so we don't get any more misunderstanding.

Self-referential void:​

Self-referential just means;

It's an adjective which means it is meant to describe something. To which its describes the Great Darkness. You may have questions regarding the status of the Darkness being that.

Well, Ram V does an amazing job explaining it with the least words possible. To quote #1:

The Source in the same scan is said to be the Light. The OP mentions the scan from Flash that the Source and Light are one.

If we go back to Crisis on Infinite Earths or even the more recent story called Justice League Incarnate. You would notice that “everything and nothing” were one because everything was nothing and it remained that way for a long time.

Okay and everything and nothing was seperated as Light and Darkness, GL comic stated that Overvoid contains both Darkness supervoids and Light by standing as omni-awareness. So, by saying that, Overvoid was once everything and nothing at same time but no longer One ( cuz an idea of Light as everything and Darkness as nothing was emerged ) but still describable as Omni-awareness. I think it's clear, that's why Ram V said ' Total Darkness can be only defined as absense of light " because absense of light is TGD.

You may ask “What's your point?” Well, the Darkness himself said the Light was born in defiance of him which compliments the idea the Source came from the Dark which means it can be considered a “product” of the Darkness as a stand-in for self-referential.

Just because it wrote metaphorically as how Light was appeared on Darkness and we all know light was created by God. so, God's basically self-referential void.

Earlier, we see that the Source is pure information and untainted idea which the Darkness lacks. This is important because the “opposition” of existence is well….non-existence. When only the term “darkness” was made when the Source itself came from the dark to give it definition.

Void just means lacking material, the Great Darkness not only lacked material but all forms of description that were applied to the Source; life, creation, ideas, etc….so it was by it”self” where the reference of anything was nothing but it.

Also, The Light as we have seen in Justice League Incarnate is the Overvoid. Hence, the Multiversity story reference of “immaculate perfection” and the “whiteness” of the Light/Overvoid.

The Flash series is shown above shows the Light and Source are one.

Morrison always had said the Void was God or the Source. Which he drew the Multiversity Map saying everything outside the Multiverse was only the Source.

Existence is Source what's hard to claim? true but It's still darkness

but directly stated " Total Darkness "? hmm.... that's why it also stated " uncreation " which exactly is referring to the Source.

It only stated perfection and never said perfection of Overvoid, JLI#4 just make it clear that was appeared on the Light and Light is part of Overvoid.

Okay.

because Source is white page and sort of God ( but not God itself ) and Overvoid is transparent page which is God itself which Morrison already stated.

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

Okay so, where's the Presence? You said " the relatinship between Presence and Source " and provided relationship between God and Source? + you said " Presence aka God or Creator " but didn't provided specific evidence of it getting mentioned as?

You've already admitted that the Source was the Light in the other thread. That JSA scan predates Final Crisis which was years apart. The only other candidate of creating the Light was the Presence. Swamp Thing stories mentioned several times the Voice brought and commanded the Light, and the Voice is an aspect of God aka the Presence.

Okay but Didn't Ram V stated " A total Darkness can be defined as absense of light " ?. Yes Great Darkness can be only defined as absense of light because it's darkness.

Yeah, and that means the Light really doesn't exist in total darkness thus that's not a dual relation.

Okay and everything and nothing was seperated as Light and Darkness, GL comic stated that Overvoid contains both Darkness supervoids and Light by standing as omni-awareness. So, by saying that, Overvoid was once everything and nothing at same time but no longer One ( cuz an idea of Light as everything and Darkness as nothing was emerged ) but still describable as Omni-awareness. I think it's clear, that's why Ram V said ' Total Darkness can be only defined as absense of light " because absense of light is TGD.

Is the concept that hard to gauge? Darkness was everything when everything was nothing, which the Light hadn't even been born yet. The Light is literally called Immaculate Perfection which was a name for the Overvoid during Final Crisis and Multiversity. Let's not strawman anything here.

Just because it wrote metaphorically as how Light was appeared on Darkness and we all know light was created by God. so, God's basically self-referential void.

God would be the Presence, sure. However, the statement is referring to the Darkness, being a “product” of something doesn't mean you created it. The statement is telling us “from where” the Light was created, not whom created it.

Existence is Source what's hard to claim? true but It's still darkness

but directly stated " Total Darkness "? hmm.... that's why it also stated " uncreation " which exactly is referring to the Source.

Uncreation was referring to the Darkness, not on scale of the life and creation but in total opposition to everything. So, more or less, the Darkness is purely a void that's lack anything including the distinction between dualities.

It only stated perfection and never said perfection of Overvoid, JLI#4 just make it clear that was appeared on the Light and Light is part of Overvoid.

Okay.

because Source is white page and sort of God ( but not God itself ) and Overvoid is transparent page which is God itself which Morrison already stated.

No, it called the Overvoid by the name it was given during Final Crisis and Multiversity. Morrison literally said Source and God as well as the Overvoid were all the same thing.

 

[Weaver261]

GL comic stated that Overvoid contains both Darkness supervoids and Light by standing as omni-awareness

DC has a lot of inconsistencies and rectons. This scan of overvoid is already outdated and it didn't even mention the great darkness at all. But I digress on that part. The main point is your way of proving things by bringing up old scans won't work since DC has inconsistencies. Accept the latest as the most canon and move on with your life. It would just be a wasted of time to debate.

 

[NHTkenshin2]

I mean no lol, to both of you.

'Self-reference', as the definition you picked out showed, is the process of referring to yourself, by yourself. Replacing the variable here with the void, the Source would be the product of that void referring to itself, which if you need to look up what 'product' also means, this would mean that the Source is what emerges out of said void out of contemplation of oneself. Something that the Great Darkness, explicitly cannot do: "The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another."

To use earlier stories in support that 'interpretation', as that this is referring to COIE, the Great Darkness likewise upon encountering the Light, understood the very concept of 'otherness' something that couldn't really happen since it was the only inhabitant of reality. Or to paraphrase, could refer to itself and as such, couldn't differentiate itself (A) from anything that's not itself (~A).

That's not what self-reference is, because referring to yourself is contained wholly contained within the things reference to itself and does not depend on any other object.

And as such, New Gods is referring to something else entirely here, something that can refer to itself and seemingly potentializes the Source, which in turn gives the sense of a self to the Darkness. Both the Source and the Darkness here don't undergo this process by themselves but by the Presence of another, while the Void did refer to itself by itself.

 

[NHTkenshin2]

The Source has been referred to interchangeably with The Presence in Death Metal. While this suggests that the two entities are the same, it does not necessarily rule out the possibility that The Source may be the same with an emanation of The Presence.

Matter of fact, it's quite possible to now syncretize both of them through that self-reference scan; insofar as that now, the Source could be viewed as the product of Gods infinite simplicity producing a multiplicity of divine exemplars of everything through referring to himself in the Source, which in turn encompasses all meaning, something that the Presence as you imply, is void of.

Edit: to be more specific, since the self-reference (the Source) and the self-referent (the Presence) here are nominally the same thing, but are quite different in essence.

 

[VeryGoofyToddler2]

I mean no lol, to both of you.

'Self-reference', as the definition you picked out showed, is the process of referring to yourself, by yourself. Replacing the variable here with the void, the Source would be the product of that void referring to itself, which if you need to look up what 'product' also means, this would mean that the Source is what emerges out of said void out of contemplation of oneself. Something that the Great Darkness, explicitly cannot do: "The Great Darkness could only refer to itself through the presence of another."

You say the Source emerged from the void out of contemplation of oneself in which the story mentions it came from the Dark. Yet, counterintuitively you mention that it can't be the Darkness which can only refer to itself in the presence of another. So which is it?

Regardless, the Darkness was by itself as nothing hence why it was by itself and can reference itself as nothing. The Source is a product of the self-referential void which implies the Source predates it and comes from it, both descriptions matched the Darkness. The “presence of another” is only the case when the Source presence or genesis is finally there which doesn't deter to the Darkness prior to Light as the self-referential void.

To use earlier stories in support that 'interpretation', as that this is referring to COIE, the Great Darkness likewise upon encountering the Light, understood the very concept of 'otherness' something that couldn't really happen since it was the only inhabitant of reality. Or to paraphrase, could refer to itself and as such, couldn't differentiate itself (A) from anything that's not itself (~A).

Encountering the Light literally meant it wasn't the only inhabitant of reality. It didn't even need to differentiate itself from the Light, it was naturally opposed of it without any sort of reference.

That's not what self-reference is, because referring to yourself is contained wholly contained within the things reference to itself and does not depend on any other object.

Yeah, the statement never said it relied on the Light. That's literally it to this claim of yours.

And as such, New Gods is referring to something else entirely here, something that can refer to itself and seemingly potentializes the Source, which in turn gives the sense of a self to the Darkness. Both the Source and the Darkness here don't undergo this process by themselves but by the Presence of another, while the Void did refer to itself by itself.

If the “presence of another” disregards self-referential. Then you miss the whole point of the Darkness being there by itself for very long prior to Light which in its totality completely lacks. It's saying the Darkness can be defined through the Light yet can exist without it as just a self-referential void.

By your logic, you're indirectly claiming the Darkness and the Source are the same age.