Nah, not hormonal. The "darkness" quote is open to interpretation.
My interpretation is that new knowledge shines a light to what was once dark. The darkness becomes light. Our consciousness is in the dark, until something awakens it. If our consciousness starts as an infinite amount of dark rooms, then realization lights one or more rooms. This is a multi-level, multi-dimensional state of perception that has a complex set of realization potential. We can get really descriptive and throw in many interpretations, but that could span many threads.
What do you believe this universe is exactly? An infinite universe with finite possibilities, a finite universe with infinite possibilities, a finite universe with finite possibilities, or an infinite universe with infinite possibilities?